Oath Keeper

by Jefferson Smith

  “It says here that she was probably murdered.”

  “‘Probably’ murdered? Or ‘was’ murdered?”

  “It says ‘probably.’ Written on the last page. It looks like the same handwriting as most of these other notes. Except for yours.”

  “Probably Arun’s then,” DelRoy said. “And he’d be guessing. If he had any evidence, he’d have said so.”

  DelRoy sat back down on the sofa, one hand throbbing and the other wrapped around his wine glass. “Well, you’re going to have to read it all. Try and learn as much as you can from the notes. The more we know, the more likely we’ll be able to connect it to something. Is there a picture?”

  “Of Regina? Yes, a couple. There’s a family photo of her with her kids, and a newspaper photo.”

  “Show me the family photo.”

  Sue held up a sliver of nothing between her fingers. DelRoy sighed. “Figures. Describe her to me, would you? I feel like I’ve been chasing a ghost through my memories, and this isn’t helping.”

  Sue looked at her hand. “Well, she looks like a nice woman. Kind eyes. The kind that seem to smile, even when she’s tired. And she is. Tired, I mean. Fairly thin, and plain looking, but tired. Although who wouldn’t be? The girls in the photo are all young. Not one of them looks older than five. That would be enough to drive any mother to exhaustion.”

  The detective nodded. “So it’s one of those cases then,” he said, setting his wine down on the coffee table.

  Sue wrinkled her brow. “What do you mean?”

  “Oh, you know. The sweet, devoted mother of five who inherits a ton of money, buys a crematorium, kills the kids and disposes of them, then, in her guilt, buys a private high school and an orphanage to make amends. You read about it every day.”

  “Are you seri—?”

  “Sorry,” he said. “Cop humor. What would this case be without another impossibility before supper?”

  DelRoy stretched back on the couch and scrubbed at his hair in exasperation. It had reached the point where this was no longer just a case. No longer just about Sue and her missing daughter. It had become personal. Martin was no longer just a nice-guy cop helping an attractive woman with her problem. Now he was involved. Personally. And he was getting angry.

  “Read it to me,” he said, keeping his eyes closed so he could concentrate. “Read me every single word.”

  So she did.

  * * *

  It was two days later, and DelRoy sat in his car, half a block from the Old Shoe. Sue sat quietly beside him, drinking her coffee in cautious little sips. The gray afternoon sky had already grimed itself into the darkness of night, and a chill wind blew down the empty street around them. The car was running, to keep the heater going, but all the lights were out.

  They were on a stakeout.

  Yesterday, Sue had managed to get some information from the girls about the parties. Apparently, the Goodies held one every Friday night. The kids didn’t know what went on there, and had no idea who attended them, but they were certain that they happened every week, starting promptly at eight. Every Unlovable knew the schedule, because it was the one day when they got a bit of a reprieve from the constant badgering of the nuns, who were always too busy with their guests on party nights to spare any more than a single Sister to watch the entire place. So even though Failing Light came early on Fridays, the girls could lie in their beds and talk as much as they wanted, without fear of being shrieked at, or punished.

  When he had announced that he was going to go watch the party guests arrive, Sue had quickly insisted on coming with him, and now here they were, alone together. Again. And the more often it happened, the more uneasy he grew.

  “If you’d asked me last week,” he said, trying to fill the silence that was anything but comfortable. “I’d have sworn up and down that I’ve never even seen this building before.”

  Sue patted his hand. “Well, when it comes to the Old Shoe, your memory isn’t exactly the most reliable thing going now, is it?”

  DelRoy grimaced, but he couldn’t argue the point. “At least I can see it,” he muttered.

  Sue laughed. “That would have been awkward, huh?” Despite his irritation, he chuckled.

  “It’s almost seven. According to the kids, people should start arriving soon,” he said.

  “So who is it we’re looking for, exactly?” Sue asked.

  He shrugged. “Nobody specific. This is more fact-finding than a witch hunt. Sure, it would be nice to get some hard evidence on whoever it is in my department that’s involved, and it would be even better if we got a sighting of Regina Finch, but we still have no idea what’s actually going on. So the best I’m hoping for is that we’ll get a few leads, based on who shows up.”

  “It’s too bad Ned and I never got an invitation,” Sue said. “If we had, then you and I might be sitting somewhere warmer now, instead of freezing here in the darkness waiting for clues to parade past us.”

  She was making light, DelRoy knew, trying to fill the drab hours of waiting, but how could she not realize that she was sending mixed signals, too? Talking about Ned, and in the same breath talking about himself and her sitting somewhere warmer? More intimate? He sucked angrily at his coffee and felt himself slumping down into somber thought. What could she be thinking?

  “Something wrong, Detective?” Sue asked, after a moment of silence had stretched into three.

  DelRoy jerked his head up. “What? Oh, sorry. No, nothing’s wrong. Just thinking.”

  Yes. There was something wrong, dammit. This was the fourth time they’d ended up in some intimate little situation while discussing the case. And every time, it had been without Ned. Without Mister Nackenfausch. DelRoy had been certain for several days now that Sue and Ned weren’t actually married. Not only because that’s what his instincts told him, but also because he was a detective, and he’d done a little detecting. There was no marriage license on record. No joint taxes filed…

  Granted, none of this was proof, really. Not ironclad. But it was enough for him. So why the charade? He wanted to ask her. Wanted to tell her that he had penetrated her game. Wanted to hear her explanation, and to be reassured that it didn’t have anything at all to do with her missing daughter, or with any of this other craziness they were unearthing now. Only he couldn’t ask. Because he was afraid he’d learn she really was mixed up in it all. Or find that the question drove her away.

  Most people who lie build a shallow story. They don’t plan out all the details. So if you want to catch them at it, all you had to do was ask about a specific detail that they should know about, if their story were true. Sure, Sue probably had an answer ready for where and when the wedding had taken place, and for where they’d been when Ned proposed. But had she prepared other details? Like, where they’d held the wedding rehearsal dinner? Or where she had registered for her china? Probably not. When people get an unexpected question like that about their past, the truthful ones get drawn back into reminiscing, trying to recall the answer. But the liars panicked and got defensive about the question. Not always, of course. Especially not the accomplished liars. But with the garden variety mom or pop who gets caught up in events that are spiraling out of their control? The ones who reached for that lie as a desperate bid to gain back some of their control? Well, they didn’t reminisce. They panicked. And when they did, they often lashed out too.

  So yeah, he was pretty sure that he could get the truth from her, and he needed to. He couldn’t go on pretending not to know. She might not feel it, but it was becoming a barrier between them. A barrier for him, anyway. Which is why he’d agreed to let her come along. To confront her. To shine his trick question lamp in her eyes and watch her squirm in the light. Only now, as he sat there, sipping his coffee and watching its steam fog up the windshield, he realized that he didn’t want to use his professional techniques. Not this time. Not on her. This wasn’t professional interest. This was off the clock. And more importantly, it was getting personal too—in a numb
er of ways—and his usual tricks of the trade suddenly felt cheap.

  “Why are you pretending to be married?” he asked. The question just blurted itself out of him.

  Sue’s answering sigh of relief almost shattered him.

  “Oh, thank God,” she said, setting her own cup back on the dash. “I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you, but I was afraid it would…”

  “Make you look guilty? Of something?”

  Sue nodded and began to fidget with her scarf. “But I’m not!” she added. “We’re not. Or, at least, not what you must think.”

  “Sue,” he said, resting his hand over hers, stilling her sudden nervousness. “Just tell me what’s going on.”

  She looked away, then she nodded tightly. “It’s a bit of a long story,” she said. “And a weird one. And kind of personal too. I’d have told you sooner, only I couldn’t be sure you weren’t part of the conspiracy.”

  DelRoy laughed. “Which is exactly what I told myself about you,” he said. Sue turned back to face him. There was a weak smile on her face, but mostly, she looked nervous. “So spill. Who is Ned, really? Is he making you do this?”

  “What?” Sue’s shock was plain. “No! Of course not!”

  “Then why…? I mean—”

  Sue looked at the confusion that must be painted all over his face, and then she burst out with happy laughter. “Oh, you goof! Ned Nackenfausch is not my husband, and he’s not some manipulative master villain. He’s my brother!”

  The detective’s brain came to a screeching halt.

  “Your brother.”

  Sue nodded.

  The detective shook his head in a tight shudder, as though trying to dislodge some idea that had gotten stuck. “And you needed your brother to pretend to be your husband because… ?”

  “Because the Sisters of Good Salvation do not accept unmarried women as parents,” she said. But before he could press her further, Sue gasped and pointed.

  “Look at that!” she said, reaching for her camera. “There goes the Mayor.”

  And just like that, the case took a different turn.

  Chapter 17

  All that night, Sarqi puzzled over what to do next, and finally, as darkness began to wane, he decided there was only one way to respond to his new-found knowledge that the Gnomes had captured the Wasketchin Queen.

  He would have to tell Angiron everything.

  So, the next morning, when the crop had fully risen and the oppressive humidity had sludged itself up into the air, clutching at him like a fever-drenched blanket, Sarqi called out to his jailer.

  “Ishnee! Get up here, you miserable fly squisher! The Djin Ambassador has an urgent message for the King!”

  “Another one?” The Hordesman’s worn and tired face poked itself up out of the bolt hole next to Sarqi’s embassy, and blinked twice in the light before freezing still—the closest a Gnome ever came to showing spontaneous emotions. The sight before him clearly was unexpected. During the night, and for the early part of the morning, Sarqi had wrestled with his thoughts, trying to plan a way out of his dilemma. And since he always did his best thinking while working with stone, Sarqi had put his hands to the task of improving his accommodations, leaving his brain free to puzzle over his deeper problems.

  Building from the original pair of rock slabs, which had leaned against each other like two exhausted books, the Djin Ambassador now had a serviceable, four-walled structure with a roof of overlapping slats. Lacking the tools to make a proper door, Sarqi had left a gap between the walls at one corner, which he had faced directly away from the river, giving himself a dry and comfortable diamond-shaped building in which to receive any further diplomatic inquiries.

  “Yes, another one,” he said, trying to keep the scorn out of his voice. “Tell your King that I have news that will change his war plans.”

  Maybe it was the tone of his voice, or maybe the jailer was still startled by the transformation that had swept through the rocks above him while he’d slept, but for the first time, Ishnee did not argue. He scrambled up out of his hole and ran off to deliver the message.

  “Tell him to hurry!” Sarqi called out to Ishnee’s scurrying back. Then he turned to consider his new shelter. “I think it needs a balcony.”

  * * *

  It was long into the blackness of that following night, much closer to sunrise than sunfall, when the stars were stretched out in brilliant promenade across the sky, that Sarqi heard a scratching sound from inside the walls of his embassy.

  He’d completed the balcony that now thrust out over the raging water late that afternoon, and he’d been sitting on it ever since. Waiting. Wondering who would come. Would it be Angiron? He hoped not. Qhirmaghen had said that all Sarqi’s requests ended up going to him, so Sarqi had trusted that the king himself was still too busy for the grumbles and complaints of a Djin ambassa-prisoner. But even if his message had been shunted to Qhirmaghen, would he come? Might he send somebody else? Might he ignore it? Sarqi’s message had been carefully worded to entice the man to come himself. “News that will change his war plans.” It sounded important. Surely anyone who heard that would want to judge the news for themselves, wouldn’t they? But he’d been sitting here for most of the night with no sign of a visitor.

  Again a scraping noise reverberated from within the walls of his newly remodeled prison. Sarqi rose up on his long Djin legs and went inside to investigate.

  The small stone that Sarqi had used for his dimlight charm now glowed a steady blue-green from the corner of the single-room structure, oozing a cool bath of light around the floor of the room. In the corner, to the left of the doorway, a head-sized hole now glared its black gaze at him from the floor.

  “Who comes?” Sarqi hissed. He glanced quickly over his shoulder to be sure Ishnee had not taken a sudden interest in the night air.

  “A friend,” came a muffled voice from the hole.

  At night there was no buzzing from the airborne crop or any natter of people coming and going along the path, but the river still cast enough of a din to mask casual conversations. If they were careful. Even so, Sarqi did not want to risk any more than he must, so he kept his voice as low as he could and moved closer to the empty void. “I have no friends here,” he replied.

  There was a pause. “I have come for more of your… flapmeat,” the voice from the hole said. “I was told you have a very fragrant piece to share.”

  Ah. So it was Qhirmaghen. Sarqi felt himself relax a little. “Come up,” he said. “We are alone.” It would be best not to speak his visitor’s name. Ishnee was probably asleep at this time of night, but there was no sense trusting in probably. A moment later, the Gnome’s head pushed up through the hole, followed shortly by the rest of him.

  “You waited a long time,” Sarqi whispered. “I did not think you would come.”

  “I’ve been here since sunfall,” Qhirmaghen replied, “but I had to be sure your message had not reached… its original target.” Sarqi nodded. That made sense. The last thing they wanted would be for the Gnome King to arrive late and find them plotting together. “You took a grave risk, sending the message the way you did,” the Gnome added.

  Sarqi shrugged. “If Angiron had come instead of you, I would have spun him tales enough to worry his war-loving heart.”

  Qhirmaghen nodded briefly. “So tell me, Ambassador. What news reaches a man exiled in a house of stone that does not reach a man in my position?”

  Sarqi paused to consider his answer, and was surprised to feel a tremor of apprehension clutch at his stomach. He believed that Qhirmaghen was earnest in his opposition to Angiron, but still, what if he was wrong? This whole concept of lying and deceit was still so alien. Without the Dragon’s Peace to ensure truthfulness, how was one supposed to know when a man’s words did not align with rightness? So far, they had been speaking in code, making only veiled references, as each felt for strands of trust delicately reaching out from the other. Time was crucial if there was to be any chance
of taking action, but he was also painfully aware that he was gambling with somebody else’s life, and must place his feet with great care on this political scree of oily tongues and slippery agendas.

  “Before I give answer,” Sarqi said, “we must speak plainly, you and I. Once said, my news cannot be unsaid. If I trust unwisely, I will have betrayed all. So first, tell me what you intend to do.”

  Now it was Qhirmaghen’s turn for silent consideration, and Sarqi watched the Gnome administrator wrestle with his own doubts. Would the Gnome rebel feel that he could trust Sarqi? For all Qhirmaghen knew, Sarqi had been placed here by Angiron for this very purpose—to ferret out those who opposed the King’s war. Sarqi didn’t even know what trust would look like on the face of a Gnome. Their stinginess with emotion made them so hard to read. But whatever doubts or fears might be giving the Failed Contender pause, he must have found reason to set them aside.

  “We mean to topple the King, and beg the Wasketchin Crown for peace,” Qhirmaghen said. “This war is wrong, and it can do nothing but ill for the Horde, or for any other peoples of Methilien.”

  Surprised, Sarqi drew a deep breath and let it out. He had not expected Qhirmaghen to speak that plainly. But in a way, it was good that he had. Sarqi could feel an almost child-like sense of release relaxing its way through the muscles of his body. Qhirmaghen’s bluntness had been more than simple expedience. It had been a gesture of trust. Both men had much to lose if they were caught, but it felt so good to let the walls and barriers of suspicion down—to be free of the second guessing, the silent examination of every utterance before allowing it breath.

  It felt good to be trusted.

  And being trusted, so openly and so entirely without reserve, Sarqi realized that the honor of his House would let him do no less. He squared his shoulders and drew himself up to full height.