A shot rang out, and this time I jumped at its nearness, the distinct sound of a ricochet off metal close by, then something heavy falling to the ground. I pressed back against the wall, scanning the length of the alley. Row upon row of dark, shattered windows stared back at me. A blaze of essence-fire sliced above the roofline from one side of the alley to the next. Another shot went off farther away, followed by more essence-fire. Whoever was shooting was moving off, the fey pursuer not far behind.
I slipped into the welcome darkness of the next pedestrian alley, a low anger coiling in my chest. I could have been killed in a random shooting all because of a desire that would not go away. I needed to find my focus again, find a purpose for myself other than drifting from one favor to the next.
I wasn’t going to find that in the bottom of a stone bowl.
9
After leaving Belgor, I did what I do whenever I’m conflicted. I ran. I changed into shorts and a sweatshirt, and jogged the neighborhood. The good thing about hiding out in an essence-saturated neighborhood like the Tangle was that I didn’t have to run very far to go very far. I ran the same loop five times to put some mileage in, but each time the streets shifted, not always in a dramatic fashion, but enough to notice that something had changed—different building façade here, new pavement there, even the way the sunlight filtered down. It was the same route each time, only the visual cues had changed.
The dark mass in my mind yearned for essence and caused me pain without it. When I had found the stone bowl, I found a way to feed that yearning and lessen the pain. I didn’t like it any better. The desire itself became consuming. Instead of dealing with pain, I had to deal with compulsion. The more I gave in to that compulsion, the less I cared about how I satisfied it.
That road led to death. I had almost killed Keeva macNeve, my old partner. I was tapping her essence to feed, but I let my mind deny it. My conscience couldn’t, though, and I stopped. Because of me, she had to go to Tara to heal.
I didn’t need a shot of essence to stem the pain, at least not anymore. Having an unexplained dark mass in my head was bad enough, but now I had a heart-shaped stone nestled against it. The stone and the darkness seemed in their own battle, a stalemate for control of my pain.
Meryl called them metaphors, symbols for things we could not explain. The dark mass, to her thinking, was a manifestation for something we couldn’t describe. The faith stone was a manifestation of power that was sometimes tangible—a stone—and sometimes not—a spot of glowing light. The darkness and the stone had found each other or been attracted to each other and ended up having a happy dance in the neighborhood of my hypothalamus.
Even though I had not given in to the urge to take a hit of essence like a junkie, the fact that I almost did made me angry. It made me angry with my situation. With everything else going on in the world, I needed to find an answer to what had happened to me and how to fix it. Time and again, I found myself doing a favor when I thought someone else’s situation needed more attention than mine, only to have my life take a backseat to the world. So I ran in circles to work off the stress and frustration, another metaphor for my life.
Since moving into the Tangle, I was amazed at how fast rumors flew. Even given the fey’s ability to do sendings, which was a way of sending thoughts wrapped in essence to people, news traveled fast. The Tangle was a cluster of intrigue and danger, the worst the Weird had to offer. People who lived there relied on information to survive, and the network of communication was larger than I had ever suspected.
When a dead body showed up at the edge of the neighborhood, random sendings flew through the air. I caught a general broadcast, meant to be heard by anyone nearby. I had the news about the body before the first emergency vehicle had been dispatched.
I hiked over to the scene, the corner of Summer and Elkins, where the city power plant was located. A dead body meant Murdock would be involved, and I hadn’t seen or heard from him since the day I had been at his house.
Police vehicles gathered at the intersection. The power plant looming above bore signs of damage. Soot marks from a fire a few months earlier still streaked down the blank six-story wall, which was painted a strange pink—to mimic brick, I supposed.
The fire had been a false alarm. Bergin Vize had been hiding in the power plant, protected by solitary fey who thought they were helping one of their own. In truth, the solitaries were being used by the Consortium in a proxy war against the Guild. The Guild, in turn, manipulated the Dead of TirNaNog into flushing Vize out of the complex by setting it on fire.
The scheme set off a night of rioting and other fires like nothing Boston had ever seen. The solitaries—always the scapegoats for fey transgressions—fought back against the combined forces of the Guild and the National Guard. The Dead were in it for the bloodbath. Since they were already dead, dying didn’t mean much to them. They resurrected with the next day’s dawn.
The riots produced profound changes. Eorla brought the solitaries under control and started her own court. Ceridwen, a murdered Danann underQueen, ruled over the Dead in disguise as the King of the Dead. The Guild and Consortium backed down, but not before I lost control of the darkness in my head and almost killed everyone. It was not fun. The entire Weird had become a crime scene that night, so another dead body at the power plant was no more than a coincidence, but an interesting one.
The power plant was a vital component of the local utility grid, and any major crime in the area prompted precautionary measures. Even though there was no fire this time, an alarm had gone out, and a ladder truck idled on standby as a precaution.
As luck would have it, the truck was from Kevin Murdock’s station. He sat on one of the running boards, talking and laughing with his coworkers. As Briallen predicted, he was none the worse for wear from his deep sleep, probably better. His body signature glowed a deep bronze among the humans. He stopped laughing when he saw me. His face became a suspicious mask as he tracked my approach to the temporary police barrier.
Kevin, along with his brother Gerry, had decided I was the cause of the tragedies that had struck the Murdock family. I was present when their father—the former police commissioner—was killed. It didn’t matter to them that he was a dirty cop who had brought about his own downfall.
They blamed me. They also blamed me for destroying their family by having an affair with their mother. It had happened years ago, when I was young and green, hormone-filled and stupid. I didn’t even know the Murdocks then. Leo, who was the oldest, was still in high school then if I had my math right. I had no idea of the trouble the affair caused until years later. But they blamed me for that, too, despite the fact that their mother lied to her husband and initiated the affair. No one wanted to believe their parents were flawed human beings. Scott Murdock and Moira Cashel were as flawed as they come. I survived both of them, so somehow I was the villain.
I ignored Kevin’s stare as I waited for a police officer to let me through. Gone were the days when I sauntered past checkpoints, secure in the knowledge I had the authority if not the connections. Too much bad blood existed between me and the Boston P.D. these days. I hadn’t killed Scott Murdock, but that didn’t stop his son Gerry from encouraging the lie on the force. He wasn’t respected like Leo was, but that was what made him a problem. Gerry appealed to the rough edges of the blue, the cops who chafed at the rules. They saw criminality everywhere they looked and acted on it. I didn’t want to give them any more reason to pull out a Taser.
Leo waved me over to where the body lay. Not many other people stood near. The few people who were nearby kept their distance. Jumpers never made for pretty death scenes. The higher they fall from, the less pretty. The dead guy was a Danann fairy, so that mitigated the damage. Dananns have more resilient bodies than humans. He was still dead, though, his wings a tangled and torn mess, a leg bent at an angle legs weren’t meant to bend.
“We’re going to lose this one fast.” Wearing gloves, Murdock held open a small billf
old that showed a Guild ID. The Guild might not take cases in the Weird any longer, but it protected its own. The last thing macGoren wanted was his allies on the police force investigating a murder that might expose Guild secrets.
I recognized the name and face of the victim. “He was a low-level administrator.”
I crouched by the bloody body. The strong whiff of alcohol wafted upward. Dananns had a propensity for whiskey. Back in Faerie, it wasn’t available in quantity, so drunkenness was more an accepted reprieve from the high life than a question of alcoholism. Not so in the post-Convergence world. Whiskey was everywhere, cheap and easy to acquire. More than a few Dananns ended up in the Weird because they had fallen to the bottom of a bottle.
“We’re trying to get clearance to check out the power-plant roof,” Murdock said.
I glanced up at the wall. The building was high enough to kill a Danann. “He smells pretty drunk. He might’ve passed out when flying overhead and dropped. You might have an accidental death.”
“Yeah, that happens to Guild agents all the time,” Murdock said.
Nothing with the Guild was ever simple. “Honestly, I’d call the Guild, Leo. They’re going to take over anyway.”
Murdock jerked his chin up toward something behind me. “Looks like someone decided to save us the minutes.”
Up the block, two dark figures appeared in the sky, telltale silhouettes of Danann security agents. They circled once overhead before landing on the sidewalk. I was surprised to see Keeva macNeve. She strode over and examined the body with a neutral expression.
“Hi, Keev. Nice of you to drop in,” I said.
She ignored me as she went through the dead guy’s pockets, tossing inconsequential items on the sidewalk—matches, coins, and receipts. Looking at Murdock, she remained crouched, her forearms on her thighs, hands dangling between her knees. “Where is it?”
Without argument, Murdock handed over the billfold.
“You got here awfully fast,” I said.
Keeva fanned out some business cards, then tucked them back in the billfold. “You’re not the only one with friends on the force, Grey. Mine happen to follow procedure and inform interested legal entities instead of their gym buddies.”
“Connor hasn’t been to the gym in weeks,” Murdock said.
Keeva stood. “You know the drill, Detective. Move along and thank your boys for me.”
“I remember this guy, Keeva. He was a Consortium mole. We used him a couple of times for disinformation,” I said.
She scanned the surrounding area. “Any other classified information you want to broadcast within earshot of uncleared staff?”
“You get a lot of moles in the Guild?” Murdock asked.
Keeva’s glance flashed with dismissiveness. “Why no, Detective. I’m shocked to hear it. How old did you say you were, by the way? I can’t tell if you’re wearing diapers under those pants.”
Murdock narrowed his eyes at me. “Did she imply she’s looking at my ass?”
“What’s with all the antagonism, Keeva? I mean, more than usual?” I asked.
The corners of her mouth turned down as she stared at the victim. “We’ve lost a lot of people, Connor. This guy may have been low-level stupid, but he was helping with disaster recovery. Every person lost is more work for everyone.”
“Well, maybe the Guild….” I began.
Keeva held her hand up. “Connor, I don’t want to hear one of your anti-Guild rants. Not today. People who were my friends are dead. People you knew are dead, so give it a break.”
I wasn’t going to go off on the Guild, but that Keeva thought that would be my first reaction under the circumstances was embarrassing. I guessed I had become a one-note ranter in her mind. “I was going to say maybe the Guild should beef up security. Donor Elfenkonig destroyed the Guildhouse, and now someone you need to manage the crisis is dead. That’s all I was going to say, to be careful.”
She nodded, peering down the street. “Good advice, considering you were there, too, when the Guildhouse came down. Leave, Connor. Now, before I do something we both regret.”
I took a deep breath. “How is Ryan?”
I tried to warn macGoren that Vize was up to something. I tried to stop what happened. MacGoren didn’t listen. He was arrogant, ambitious, and an ass. He had survived the destruction of the Guildhouse. He had also been injured—seriously, I had been told—but no one would give me any details.
Keeva fired up her hands with essence. “Alive, no thanks to you. Detective Murdock, explain to your friend that if he does not get out of here, I will incinerate him where he stands, and there is not a damned thing you and your badge can do about it.”
The police and firefighters nearby were listening. More than a few had smiles on their faces. Murdock tugged at my sleeve. “Come on, Connor. This isn’t going anywhere.”
I let him pull me away. I was more hurt than angry. Keeva and I had been partners. We might not have been the best of friends, but we got along, at least until she met macGoren. MacGoren’s injuries were his own damned fault, no matter what she had been told.
I slumped in the passenger seat of Murdock’s car. “That sucked.”
He started the engine and pulled away from the scene. “I think she was serious about incinerating you.”
“Nah. That’s Keeva’s way of saying she cares,” I said.
Murdock circled around the block and brought us back to Old Northern Avenue. “A lot of people seem to show their affection for you that way.”
That was an understatement. After a career as a Guild investigator, I had more than my share of enemies. The funny part was, all those old enemies left me alone now. I wasn’t a player anymore, so I didn’t factor into their plans. Instead, I seem to be making a career of turning friends against me. Keeva and I had always been competitive, but things had changed since she met Ryan macGoren. I used to think she was being a social climber, that she couldn’t possibly see anything in him. I wasn’t so sure anymore. She seemed genuinely attached to him and genuinely upset that he had almost died.
When people I considered friends started siding with people who wanted me dead, I had little hope things would get better.
10
After Murdock dropped me off, I returned to my room in the Tangle. I had a bed, a couple of armchairs, a bathroom, and a corner that pretended it was a kitchenette. What it lacked in amenities, it made up for in seclusion and security. I had been offered better accommodations from Ceridwen but turned them down. Accepting a nice, comfortable apartment in the Tangle would have been accepting that I lived in the Tangle. I wanted to pretend it was temporary, like my apartment in the Weird had been temporary, if three years and counting could be considered temporary.
After the fall of the Guildhouse, Ceridwen rescued me and provided me with a safe haven. She didn’t have anything to lose by associating with me. For one thing, no one knew she was in the city. For another, she was Dead, murdered by Bergin Vize and barred from TirNaNog when I had destroyed the gate to the fey afterlife. I might have destroyed the whole realm, but no one knew for sure, like no one knew if Faerie still existed.
After taking a quick shower, I joined Ceridwen for what had become a regular meeting for conversation. Her private rooms were as extravagant as one would expect of a fairy queen. Fine, sleek furniture filled the living room, lush draperies in orange florals hung from the windows, and hand-woven rugs in muted shades of green and blue covered the floors. Everything about them spoke of glamour and money except the view. We sat at a table beneath a brick arch, the top of the frame of a warehouse Palladian window. The Tangle spread below, ramshackle rooftops of water towers and chimneys, odd plumes of essence rising and falling in dark colors. It wasn’t beautiful, but it was fascinating to watch.
Ceridwen didn’t wear her red leather Hunter getup in her private quarters, but more casual, feminine outfits. Today she wore a light, sleeveless blouse and orange shorts. She tucked her shoeless feet up on the seat as she stud
ied the chessboard between us. If it weren’t for her diaphanous wings moving with a languid ripple in the air-conditioning, she could have been mistaken for a young woman passing the time on a hot day. She moved a pawn across the board.
“Your move,” she said.
We had taken to playing chess, a game we both loved but rarely played because no one would play us. We were pleasantly surprised to find we were evenly matched. I moved a bishop into position. “I’ve heard the police aren’t coming into the Tangle at all anymore.”
Ceridwen’s eyes shifted back and forth as she surveyed the board. She took the bishop out with a knight. “Your move.”
I pursed my lips. I didn’t think she’d expose the knight, but I wasn’t going to let it slide. I moved my rook and took the knight off the board. “It’s funny, ’cause violent crime has actually gone down.”
Without pausing, she moved her bishop to protect her king. “Your move,” she said
The board was getting tight, but I saw a scenario that would gain me an advantage. I shifted a pawn one square. “Your move, Your Majesty.”
She captured the pawn with one of her own. She had something going, but I couldn’t see it. I took out the pawn. “Your move.”
She slid her queen along the side of the board, just shy of my men. Something was forming on the board, the lines of conflict crisscrossing.
I saw the opening I wanted and slipped another pawn off the board. “Your move.”
She leaned back in her chair. “I don’t need the police. Given enough latitude, people fall into acceptable behaviors. I need you to go to Ireland,” she said.
“Why me?” I asked.
“I trust you. I’m ready to move my people there, but I need someone on the ground for logistics,” she said.
“My passport’s probably flagged. I doubt I’d set one foot on the plane,” I said.
“Drive to Canada and fly from there. I’d prefer that. I don’t want anyone knowing you’re there except my contacts. They’ll get you what you need,” she said.
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