Joe nodded. "It's been fifteen years. When I came out here that first time and saw his ghost...I said all I had to say about his death."
I didn't want to ask about that. Instead, we crossed the road to make our way to the farm house. As we passed under the cedar, a greenish glow flickered near the base of the tree. Hoping it wasn't the possum ghost digging for ghost crickets, I raised the fairy globe.
A fairy?
I blinked and the glow was gone.
Maybe I was imagining things. Then again, the tree definitely contained magic and fairies were nothing if not magic.
We traveled back the way we had come under the full glossy moon. Even if Troy had come back nightly to retrieve the ring, any scent of such a long-ago death was not detectable as the air rustled across the open field. The smell of dried bales of hay mingled with soil. We passed a two-story barn about three hundred yards from the house. It was old, but not decrepit. The house was much smaller and made of limestone rather than weathered wood. The ranch style had lots of porch; a long white rectangle sitting atop a gentle hill. The only part of the ranch not neatly kept was the ragged fence that pretended to keep the goats in one area.
The inside of Joe's house did not smell of death, but it was a mausoleum with Troy's room the tomb. Troy's spirit was at rest near a magical tree and the body was elsewhere, leaving the house in a kind of twilight; not dead, but not alive either.
Troy's room wasn't locked. "Maggie hasn't had the dusters in here for a while. Not that it matters, I guess." He pointed. "The other two footballs. His team pictures. That one there is of him and the dogs. He had a goat too. He was just a kid."
"Still is," I said, but regretted the remark instantly.
Joe glanced at me, but thankfully his sorrow was too old to be affected by my careless reminder of youth frozen forever. "Do you think he comes here to visit? I can only see him there by the tree."
I breathed deep. The taint was old, like the dust. "No. He may have come here recently, but it isn't somewhere you need to watch for him." I looked down at Joe's hand, the one that held the ring. "He isn't haunting here." Death had many smells. Haunting had a smell too, but it was more a mixture of death and emotion, usually sadness or anger. The scent here smelled more like the tree, like Troy was riding a lifeline of magic back here.
"Nothing else has gone missing? Here or elsewhere in the house?"
"I don't think so." His eyes traveled across the room. "We kept everything here except a picture or two. I kept the ring on my desk. Seemed more real to me than a picture. I guess him taking that was probably easier than taking the transporter, although I would have noticed that showing up by the tree for sure." A hint of a smile crossed his features.
"You still have the transporter? The one he...that hit the tree?"
He nodded. "It was half on my property, half on the county. After the investigation, it sat there for a lot longer than I liked so I finally took the tractor and hauled it to the barn."
"I think I better look at the transporter." There really wasn't anything more I could do. If clues existed in Troy's old room, I didn't know what they were.
On the way out, I looked at Joe's desk. He put the ring back, setting it on top of a flat piece of polished wood. I suspected the wood was from the cedar tree by the road, but I didn't pick it up to smell for magical vibes.
Joe's wife, Maggie, was in the bedroom, probably pretending to sleep. I waited in the living room while Joe retrieved the other two photos from the bedroom. One of them had a touch of magic on it, but while I could smell it, I couldn't tell if it was recent or not. Troy may have left magical residue if he considered the photo before taking the ring, or it could have been the magic of that particular moment caught forever.
"Let's check the transporter," I said.
The air felt cooler after the warmth of the house, and I decided that my first impression of the house being closer to death than life was wrong. There was still life there, it was just muted and stuck in time.
When we reached the barn, Joe said, "I don't come in this way much anymore. After I put the transporter in here, I started using the other door except for the big loads."
He handed me his globe light. I held them both high. The simple hinged, planked boards latched without a lock. There were two wide doors, but Joe only hefted the one side open, holding it up above the ground and then setting it back gently when it was wide enough for us to enter. The reek of magic hit me at the same time as the motes of hay and grain wafted out. There were almost too many smells to sort.
Troy hadn't died in the transporter. Perhaps that was why the smell of death wasn't strong. Or maybe it was the magical smell that overwhelmed it. I took a deep breath. It was almost like...magical death? Not really. I frowned. I wasn't certain what the smell was.
Joe moved inside without hesitation. I didn't. Magic, like death, had different smells. Right now I was wishing I knew more than I did because there was something wrong with the magic. The undercurrent wasn't death, but it reminded me of death for some reason.
"Over there," Joe held his globe high and pointed to one corner. Square bales of hay were stacked from one end of the barn all the way to the other. An old metal barrel in one corner might have contained grain. At the far end, loose hay had drifted into piles against the mangled transporter.
My light was tight against my chest, nearly blinding me as I peered around the side of the door. It was hard to tell what the transporter originally looked like. For one, it was a very old model, and for two, the carbon panels in front had accordioned as they were supposed to do in a crash. One side was sheered off and other pieces had fallen to the ground. Darker metal made a patchwork with the original blue.
I sniffed again, but I already knew the smell came from the transporter. The only other thing I could see in the barn...there was a glimmer near the transporter. Was it just hay motes disturbed from Joe's steps? Or..."Troy?"
Joe started, looking from me to the transporter. He took two steps forward, echoing my own.
My legs hit a cold spot. I knew that feeling. I jumped back, nearly falling. The wisp at my feet was easily identifiable as a ghost, only it wasn't Troy. It was a skunk.
Joe swung his globe around. "Troy must be here," he said. "That skunk is one of his favorites."
I wasn't certain anyone could tell one live skunk from another, never mind a dead one, but I didn't argue. I looked back at the long wisp hanging next to the transporter. The breeze from the open door displaced part of what might have been an arm trying to form.
Joe noticed at the same time I did. He immediately headed for the open door.
I really didn't want to be locked inside the barn with...any of the things I could see or smell. "I don't think you should close the door."
He grinned and closed it anyway. "He wouldn't hurt even a skunk."
"It's not him I'm worried about." I held the light low and searched. The ghosts left no prints, but in hay and hard-packed dirt, neither did anything else.
With the door closed, the air settled. The long wisp, near as I could tell, pointed to the trunk of the transporter. Troy's ghost was not very solid this far from the tree where he had died.
Joe gave a funny sounding snort. "You don't suppose some animal died in there and he wants to make it a ghost."
"No," I said, "I don't think that's it."
He looked at me. "Can't be human. No one comes in here."
I shook my head. "That's not it either." He didn't ask how I knew. I wasn't going to tell him either.
"Well, only one way to find out." He strode over to the transporter.
"I'm not sure that's a good idea!" In fact, I was certain it was a bad one even if I couldn't identify the smell. I took a step forward either to stop him or prove I was just as much a man as he was.
"Troy wants me to look, I'm gonna look." Joe yanked on the end of the vehicle, but the sliding trunk door was latched. Without hurrying, he went to the driver's side, leaned in and pressed a lev
er. The electronics had long since stopped working. It took Joe a few extra seconds to locate the manual release for the lock.
The trunk finally released, but the door did not slide aside as it would have done had the electronics still worked.
I took one step forward, wondering if it was my duty to protect him since he was my client. I was a private detective, not a bodyguard. I didn't even have the one weapon I owned, a simple stun device.
The ghost stayed still, waiting. His features were more blobs than form, but his body was human now.
A side panel from the transporter broke off and clattered onto the dirt floor.
I jumped.
Joe took a step back, not so sanguine either.
Sheepish, we lifted our globes. At the last second Joe leaned over and grabbed a plastic bucket that was almost buried in loose hay. As weapons go, it wouldn't have been my first choice. "Pitchforks are around the other side, where I usually get the hay."
I grunted a non-answer. Joe had closed the only real exit behind us. On the other hand, nothing had come oozing out of the trunk. The smell of death was still quite faint. Was the odor just some strange combination of old dead skunk?
Breathing in again and holding my breath made me dizzy. I stopped trying. It wasn't skunk. But it stank.
Joe stepped forward. I matched the motion.
He had a bucket in one hand and the globe in the other. I had a globe in one hand. That left me with the only free hand. Feeling as though I had lost a game of short-straw, I reluctantly slid the trunk panel back in one motion, my globe ready to smash anything that threatened or moved.
Probably because we both had our lights so high, it took a while to register what we were looking at. I didn't even see the second fairy because the light motes that usually surround them weren't there. The one I did see was smaller than usual, maybe four inches high surrounded by only the dimmest blue glow. She lay on the bottom of the trunk, not moving, her wings tucked tightly around her body.
I thought the fairy was dead because of the strange smell coming from the trunk, but her tiny eyes blinked, and her hand fluttered over her face as though to reduce the glare.
"Hello?" As Joe leaned closer, the light from his globe was blocked by his head. It took the worst of the light away, but not so much that I couldn't see the cage.
"Someone caged a fairy?"
The fairy sat up carefully. Her wings fluttered anxiously, not unfurling, but twitching. "Oh, please good sirs, let us out!"
"Us?" we echoed.
She uncurled a tiny finger and pointed to the other side of the trunk. A smaller cage was there. The fairy inside was not sitting. She really did look dead. I peered closer. The smell in the trunk was...dying magic. The iron surrounding the fairies hit the magic emanating from them, and it burned. Not death exactly, but destruction.
Most species of fairies were between six and eight inches. The one lying down was maybe two inches. She was only a child.
Joe swung the globe around the entire trunk, searching the corners. "Who could do such a thing? There's no food in here!"
"Dew of any flower will help save her! Goat's milk or honey?" The fairy stood, brightening some with hope. Her little hands folded, pleading. "Oh, please help us! We haven't had the right things to eat! They won't let me out until I spin enough straw into gold!"
"They?" And then, "I thought only the dwarfs knew that secret," I said.
Joe gave a muttered exclamation. "The roses are barely budding and there won't be any dew until morning!"
"I take it this cage is made from iron?" If there was a door, I couldn't see it. I turned to demand Joe bring back some cutters, but he was long gone.
"I can spin gold, I can! Just not very fast, but I promise--"
"Shh, I don't want your gold. How does this thing work? Is it spelled to keep you inside?"
She blinked at me. Her wings unfurled the tiniest bit. It was hard to read the expression on her face, but she was either stunned at my stupidity, or she was surprised that I claimed to not want her gold.
"Just lift it up," she said.
Ah, stupidity then. The cage, made of pure iron, was not the least bit of strain for me, unless you counted the brains to figure out lifting it. For the fairy to touch it was instant poison so I balanced it very carefully while removing it. Being close to it was damaging enough for her kind.
With the iron gone, I half expected her to grow into some monster with fangs. I thought the wrath of an entire clan of fairies might fall upon my head, but she merely unfurled her wings and breathed deep.
I quickly removed the other cage from the child. Her mother, and I was fairly certain it was mom, was instantly at the tiny fairy's side, sharing her light.
Joe barreled back into the barn, his wife, Maggie at his heels. Maggie was still in her nightdress, her robe lopsided. Her gray hair was short, but tufts of it stood on end. "Fresh goat's milk and honey!"
"The dew hasn't formed yet," Joe declared. "Maggie has some fresh bread from yesterday morning."
Maggie rushed over and offered the loaf. A large chunk was missing from the center.
"Here. Hop aboard. Let's get you out of there." I gently scooped the girl onto my open palm. She was softer than a rag doll. Her eyelids opened, but she didn't have a smile. All four inches of mom climbed next to her. I deposited the fairies inside the bread.
"They can't eat off of just anything, but I don't remember all the rules," I said.
Maggie set the bread on a bale of hay, and then dabbed some honey into the bread. Ever so carefully she lowered a thimbleful of milk into the loaf. "It's warm. Joe got it just now. Do you need more?"
The goat probably had plenty left because there wasn't much in the porcelain thimble. The fairy quickly dabbed a piece of bread into the milk. Using it as a sponge, she dribbled milk into her daughter's mouth.
"Joe, I think we need more. There's two of them! You didn't tell me there were two!" Maggie said.
"I did."
"She needs dew," Maggie fretted.
Trapping anyone was highly illegal; trapping a fairy even more dangerous and stupid. Ever since the world had moved back to the gold standard, fairies and other magical creatures had happily come out of hiding, more than willing to trade their services for a currency worth something. The fairy globes we had been using all night were lights magically provided by fairy dust. Not paying a fairy for their various talents was unheard of. There wasn't a single clan I knew of that wasn't able to defend its own, either. Of course, until tonight, I didn't know there was a group that could spin gold either. "Why didn't your clan save you?" I asked.
The fairy glanced up. "I will not tell you!"
"Oh." I blinked and leaned away from her fierce frown. "Of course not." It was a stupid question, worse than my one about the cage. If the fairy told us how they had been captured and held without defense, well, we could do it again. Or spread the news.
I shifted my attention to the rest of the barn. Even once freed from the iron, no other fairies had rushed in. They must not be able to detect the two or they couldn't help for some other reason. Fairies had been trapped and rescued from iron before. If the clan couldn't find a way to remove the iron, they could make a kidnapper so desperate, he would use his last breath to release the captives if necessary.
Had the transporter somehow created a problem for the fairies? Or was it the ghosts? Or the magic from the tree?
I didn't know enough about ley lines to make an educated guess but...Charlinda's elf magic hadn't worked well near the tree. Something about either the tree or the death there interfered with magic...Hmm. Perhaps, just perhaps, the tiny fairy and her magic was hidden because of the flow from the tree. The transporter was tied to the magic and the death--even when I smelled it, those things had mingled, causing me a great deal of confusion.
I turned to the ghost. He was nearly completely formed now, sitting atop the transporter. At first I thought his clear appearance was due his superhuman effort, but Joe
was no dummy. He had brought the ring. It rested on the top of the transporter, just below the ghost. "Who did this?" I asked. "Can you tell us?"
The fairy poked her head above the bread opening. "You need not worry. Revenge will be ours!"
Now see, that's what I meant about messing with a fairy. Who could possibly be that dumb, yet smart enough to have figured out how to kidnap one? I turned to Joe. "Who else visits this place?"
"Here?" He shook his head. "I had no idea anyone ever came here."
"Something about this spot--the ghosts, the tree, the triangle between the ring, the transporter and where it all happened--it keeps things from working the way they should. No one should be able to trap a fairy, not for long." I looked at the angry face peering out of the bread. "We can't help you if you don't tell us what to fix."
"You won't fix it!" She darted back inside the bread.
I would have argued, but Troy moved. He drifted up towards the top of the barn where he seemed to take a deep breath. In one motion, he dove headfirst, faster than he had elevated. When he hit the transporter, he almost stopped, but with forward motion only a ghost can know, he sunk into the backseat. He sat upright behind the driver's seat, and then drifted to the other side and back again.
"Albert? Sandy?" Joe asked.
Troy drifted again, side to side. Then, like a cork, he popped out the open front window, and disappeared completely. The ring fell from the top of the transporter, clattering against the side on the way to the ground.
"Looks to me like both of them are guilty," I said.
"It's the tree," Maggie said. "It's why Troy has been able to stay around, and it's why it's so easy for the animals to turn to ghosts. The magic leaks from the tree."
"Is it that same magic that allowed you to somehow be held captive?" I asked the fairy.
The fairy did not answer, and she was probably the only one who knew.
"The leak interfered with Charlinda's ability to talk to Troy." It hadn't interfered with my limited skills, but I didn't actively change magic or death, I just sensed it. It must not have completely stopped the fairy magic, because she still claimed to be able to spin gold, yet the other fairies didn't seem to be able to find their own underneath the stream of magic. "How do we stop the leak?"
Tracking Magic Page 6
