by Anne Bishop
Henry said.
Oh, yeah. If it occurred to her that Skippy had found the mouse in the office, Nathan would have to do a mouse check every morning, regardless of his actual assignment.
But right now, Simon was surrounded by leaders who had come to discuss the trouble and deaths that had been happening in Thaisia. He understood the confusion he saw in their eyes. They had been prepared to meet a dangerous predator, an adversary equal to themselves, not a short female with weird hair and a fear of mice.
“Simon?” Charlie finally said. “It was just a mouse.”
“I know,” he replied.
“A small mouse.”
He sighed. “I know.”
“So,” Alan said after a long pause. “That’s Namid’s terrible creation?”
“Yeah. That’s Meg.”
Another long pause. Then Bobbie said, “Why is her fur that strange color?”
“It was a disguise.”
Bobbie made a sound that was half laugh, half disbelief. “What was she pretending to be? One of those traffic cones humans put on the street when they’re making repairs?”
Simon growled softly, offended on Meg’s behalf. Then he noticed how they were all looking at one another, and he had an idea. “Why don’t you ask some of the Courtyard residents about Meg?”
“She’s known to more than the Business Association?” Jackson Wolfgard asked, sounding startled.
Vlad laughed. “I think everyone in the Lakeside Courtyard can tell you a story about Meg.”
“We’ll meet back in the library in a couple of hours?” Alan said, looking at everyone.
“Might as well leave the clothing there,” Bobbie Beargard said. “Any chance of something to eat when we get back?”
Simon nodded. “Tess said she’ll have coffee and breakfast foods available, and Meat-n-Greens is serving a variety of food throughout the day.”
“Will we have a chance to observe the Courtyard’s other human employees?” Bobbie asked.
“Yes.”
All the guests ambled back to the library to discard their clothes and shift, leaving Simon and Vlad standing behind the Liaison’s Office.
“You have enough to think about,” Vlad said. “You should let Blair explain the ‘no live toys’ rule to Skippy.”
“Let’s hope he didn’t find that toy in the office,” Simon grumbled.
“It could have been worse.”
Simon snorted. “How?”
Vlad grinned. “Skippy could have found a rat.”
The guests returned to the library a couple of hours later. Most gave Simon and Vlad wary looks. Alan looked intrigued, and Charlie was clearly amused, especially when Joe and Jackson returned with their fur encrusted with snow and chunks of ice clinging to their tails.
The Elementals or the ponies must have heard those two expressing an unfavorable opinion about Meg, Simon thought.
“We all have a lot to think about,” Cheryl Hawkgard said. She hesitated. “These blood prophets. They can’t all be like your Meg.”
“No, they can’t,” he replied. “But I don’t think we should blame them for being a weapon when no one is giving them a choice.”
CHAPTER 22
On Watersday, Meg took the broom and dustpan out of the storage area while Merri Lee began cleaning the kitchen area in the office’s back room.
“It was kind of strange this morning,” Merri Lee said. “All these terra indigene leaders filling up the tables at A Little Bite, with Ruth, Theral, Lawrence, and Michael sitting at one table playing the part of human customers. And Lorne coming in to buy coffee and pastry to take back to the Three Ps. And Jenni Crowgard and her sisters sitting at a table, all flustered and giggling.”
Meg stopped sweeping. “Why would Jenni be flustered? She has a high standing with the Crowgard here. Doesn’t she?”
Merri Lee grinned. “I got the impression that Charlie Crowgard is a celebrity among the Crows. I think Jenni … Well, it would be like me sitting near a human film star I had a crush on.”
Meg nodded. She didn’t understand the feeling, but she turned the words into a kind of image that she could recall later.
“Anyway, a couple of things struck me. This was the terra indigene elite who deal with humans, and I don’t think most of them had ever been in a coffee shop or had a meal in a restaurant like Meat-n-Greens.”
Meg frowned but continued sweeping. Merri Lee’s words had layers. She wanted to stop and concentrate, but she had the impression Merri was talking in order to understand, and Meg didn’t want anything to shut off the words.
“For instance, they were all going to take a spoonful of honey and eat it off the spoon instead of drizzling it on the warm scones Tess provided.” Merri Lee went into the bathroom to rinse off the cleaning cloth.
“Would just eating the honey be bad?” Meg asked, raising her voice to be heard over the running water. She felt a tingle in her left arm. Why would mentioning jars of honey start the pins-and-needles feeling?
Merri Lee returned to the back room. “Not bad in itself.” She opened the wave cooker and wiped out the inside. “But it would be something snobs would point to as proof the Others weren’t really equal to humans. After all, they don’t even know how to properly eat honey.” Her voice took on a condescending tone. Then she stopped working and looked at Meg. “I thought it was kind of strange that Mr. Wolfgard was hiring Ruth to teach terra indigene how to do human things—simple things like placing an order in a restaurant or when to use a fork and when to use a spoon. But we learn those things at home, don’t we? And if you don’t know those things, other people think less of you.”
Do they? Meg wondered. Do you think less of me because of all the things I don’t know? She didn’t think that was true of the girls who worked in the Courtyard, but it revealed how vulnerable she would have been outside the compound if she had landed anywhere but here.
“It made me realize how progressive this Courtyard is compared to the other ones that keep watch over human cities.” Merri Lee pushed her hair back, then picked up the electric teakettle. “And it made me wonder how many times a human said, ‘This is how it’s done,’ and misled the terra indigene so they would look foolish in their dealings with other humans. I began to understand how things could have gone wrong in Talulah Falls and other towns. If the Others can’t trust us to be honest about something simple like when to use a fork or a spoon, why would they trust what we say about anything important?” She turned and stared at Meg. “Why are you rubbing your arm? What’s wrong? Should I call Tess?”
“What?” Meg looked down and watched her right hand rub her left forearm, trying to ease the prickling. “No. Don’t call Tess.”
“Meg?” Merri Lee sounded alarmed.
She stared back at her friend. Merri Lee was holding a teakettle. She was holding a broom.
“Teakettle and broom,” she whispered. She had seen a broom and teakettle in the prophecy about sharks and poison.
“Oh, gods,” Merri Lee said. “The last two images we couldn’t place.”
“I don’t want Skippy in the front room by himself.” The prickling under Meg’s skin increased. She set the broom aside and went to the front room.
Skippy was tossing a ball and chasing after it. Since the ball left a wet mark every time it bounced, Meg figured he’d been at it long enough that she wouldn’t want to pick up something with that much slobber on it.
“Skippy, come into the sorting room.” Meg pulled back the slide bolt on the go-through’s wide top, allowing him to come behind the counter and enter the sorting room through the Private door.
Skippy looked at her for a moment before tossing the ball again.
She didn’t know if he was deliberately ignoring her or if this was one of those times when his brain skipped and what she’d said was forgotten so fast it left no impressi
on.
“Want a cookie?”
That made an impression. She stepped out of the way to avoid being knocked down by his rush to find the cookie.
With Skippy safely in the sorting room, Meg closed the go-through, sliding the top bolt into place. Then, gritting her teeth as the prickling in her arm increased, she slid the two hidden bolts into place.
Returning to the back room with Skippy dancing beside her, she opened the container that held the cookies she’d set aside for him. It was tempting to give him a piece of the chamomile, but just reaching for it made her hands buzz. So she gave him a cow cookie and watched him settle on the floor near the small table and chairs.
She didn’t protest when Merri Lee took her arm and led her back into the sorting room.
“What’s going on?” Merri Lee said. “The broom and teakettle were clues. What does that mean?”
“Pins and needles,” Meg replied.
“That’s bad, right? Shouldn’t we call someone?”
Meg tried to steady her breathing. “It’s fading. That feeling usually means something bad is going to happen, but when it fades then the bad thing won’t happen.”
The pins-and-needles feeling returned with such ferocity, Meg stifled a cry. When Merri Lee turned toward the phone on the counter, Meg grabbed her arm and whispered, “No. Stay near the Private door, but stay out of sight.”
“Meg, you’re scaring me.”
“Me too.” But she stepped into the front room and stood behind the counter just as a small, dapper man pulled the door open.
Not a deliveryman. For one thing, he wasn’t dressed like a deliveryman. For another, he wasn’t carrying any packages.
Every scar on Meg’s body began to burn as the man walked toward her. Every scar except the ones she’d acquired since coming to the Courtyard.
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“Oh, my dear,” he replied in a voice ripe with kindness. “I’m here to help you.”
Trust me.
She didn’t hear the words, but she would have sworn he said them. “I don’t need help.”
His smile was sweet, but the eyes behind the glasses were oddly blank of any emotion. “You do need help. I can see it, feel it. You’re overwhelmed by the outside world, and it will chew you up. But I can take you to a safe place, a good place where you’ll be looked after. Wouldn’t you like that?”
Of course she would like that. Who wouldn’t like to feel safe? And if the scars weren’t filling her with so much burning pain, she would put her hand in the one he was holding out and follow that soft, compelling voice to …
A soft hiss from Merri Lee, barely heard. But it was enough to conjure the training image of a snake rising out of a basket and a man playing some kind of instrument. Snake charmer.
“What’s your name?” she asked, struggling to ignore his voice. She took a step back to avoid being within reach of his hand.
“I’m Phineas Jones. I’m here to help you.” He walked around the counter to the go-through and slid the top bolt open. But the go-through, still secured by the hidden bolts, didn’t budge.
Phineas Jones, Meg thought as she heard Merri Lee whispering, “Shark, shark, shark.” No biting.
Thank the gods Nathan wasn’t the watch Wolf this morning. Skippy was too involved with the cookie to notice a stranger in the office, but Nathan wouldn’t have hesitated to bite the hand that had reached for her, regardless of any warning she gave.
She backed up until she stood in the Private doorway. “The office is closing in a couple of minutes for the midday break. If you need assistance, you should call at the consulate to make an appointment.”
He stared at her with those blank eyes. “You need to come with me. I can help you. I can make the hurting go away.”
She still wanted to believe him, couldn’t stop herself from believing him.
Then Merri Lee, hiding on the side of the doorway where she couldn’t be seen, grabbed the back of Meg’s sweater, a reminder that she already had help from people she could trust.
“You have to leave now,” Meg said, trying to sound firm and professional but hearing the quiver in her voice. “We’re closed.”
He pushed at the go-through again, then reached down, feeling for the hidden bolts.
If he got in, she wouldn’t be the only one in danger. “We’re closed!” she shouted as she stumbled back into the sorting room. She locked the Private door, then hurried to the receiving doors to make sure those were locked too.
“Meg?” Merri Lee whispered. “I think he was trying to hypnotize you. Do you know what that is?”
“Snake charmer,” she replied as she hurried to the back room. She didn’t lock that outside door. The Others used it to pick up the mail for the Market Square, HGR, and A Little Bite—and there was the unspoken worry now that she might cut herself and they wouldn’t be able to reach her in time if all the doors were locked.
Skippy was on his feet, watching them come into the room. Meg wasn’t sure if he finally sensed something was wrong or if he’d finished the cookie and was hoping to get another one.
Whatever the reason, the Wolf stood between her and the back door when Phineas Jones walked in.
“Get out!” Merri Lee yelled. “I’m calling the police!”
She would never know if it was the tone of Merri Lee’s voice or the words or a spike of fear that Skippy picked up, but something made the youngster turn on Jones, who scrambled out the door.
“No biting!” Meg yelled as Skippy rushed after Jones.
She grabbed the broom and went after the Wolf.
It was like a movie with gaps, only she was the person in the pictures. Inside the office, grabbing the broom … skip … outside, screaming as Phineas Jones raised an arm in a protective gesture and Skippy prepared to leap on the intruder and bite … skip … swinging the broom and whacking Skippy so hard she bowled him over … skip … Crows cawing, Wolves howling … skip … screaming as she whacked Phineas Jones with the broom … skip … more screaming as Merri Lee beat on Jones with the teakettle … skip … suddenly surrounded by heads and bodies that were and weren’t human … skip … Simon grabbing her, dragging her away and shouting something at Charlie Crowgard and …
They were in the back room. Merri Lee looked as sick and dizzy as Meg felt. And there was Charlie standing between them and the door, changing his position and raising his arms to prevent Merri Lee from going to the window that would give her a view of whatever was happening behind the office.
Shouts. Roars. Howls. Caws. Screams.
Silence.
Then Charlie, looking grim, said, “Simon wants you to call the police. He said you would know which one.”
With their arms linked, Meg and Merri staggered into the sorting room to reach the telephone on the counter. Meg’s hands shook so much she could barely lift the receiver.
“I can’t remember the number,” Meg said. “Lieutenant Montgomery.”
“We’ll call Michael. He’ll reach everyone else.” Merri Lee punched in the numbers while Meg held the receiver.
Just as Michael Debany answered the phone, Charlie stepped into the doorway and said, “Tell the police to bring humans who can handle dangerous things.”
Having delivered the message and given Michael a shaky reassurance that she and Merri weren’t hurt, the two women returned to the back room.
“I can make some tea,” Merri Lee said, turning toward the counter. “It’s gone. The electric teakettle is …” She swallowed convulsively a couple of times, then ran into the bathroom and threw up.
“Meg?” A gentle voice. Kind in a way that wasn’t at all like Phineas Jones’s voice. A voice she really could trust.
She focused on Charlie, who was crouched beside her on the floor.
“You have feathers in your eyebrows,” she said.
He looked embarrassed. “I’m having some trouble holding the human shape.”
They were all having trouble holding on to the hu
man shape. People teeth weren’t as useful as beaks and fangs, and … She grabbed Charlie’s arm. “No biting. Poison frog. Tell Simon no biting!”
“He knows,” Charlie said, patting her hand. “You told him, told all of us. Don’t you remember?”
She’d been too scared to remember. Suddenly exhausted, she lay flat on the floor, releasing her grip on Charlie’s arm.
“Just tired,” she said when he made some inarticulate sound of distress. “Just tired. Tell Simon all the pins and needles are gone.”
She heard Merri Lee return and ask a question, but she slid into sleep before she heard Charlie’s reply.
Monty tried not to think about what they would find in the Courtyard. For now, it was enough that Simon Wolfgard had placed the call. Well, not Wolfgard personally, but he’d sanctioned the call.
And Wolfgard had asked for police who could handle dangerous things. Not knowing what to expect, Monty had called Louis Gresh, the bomb squad commander, figuring Louis had been seen before by Simon and Vlad, and a familiar face was a better choice no matter what they were up against.
Gods above and below, please don’t let this be someone trying to assassinate the terra indigene who came for this meeting, Monty thought. He didn’t want to consider what would happen to Lakeside if anyone started that kind of trouble.
Lights flashed and sirens screamed as every available police officer from the Chestnut Street station descended on the Courtyard—including Captain Douglas Burke, who was driving so close to their bumper, Monty hoped Kowalski wouldn’t need to make a sudden stop.
Debany and MacDonald were already there, their patrol car poking out of the access way.
“Park …” Monty began, then didn’t bother to finish when Kowalski pulled up in front of the street entrance, effectively blocking the delivery area.
Louis wasn’t going to be pleased with being shut out. Then again, maybe he’d be relieved that he had an excuse not to bring his vehicles onto land where human law didn’t apply.
But they asked for us, Monty thought as he got out of the car and hurried toward MacDonald.
“Where’s Officer Debany?” Monty asked.
