“We need to follow,” Julianna said quickly. “Can you help us?”
The Nagas regarded each other once more. After a moment, Ananta slithered over to Shesa, serpentine body scraping over stone and hard-packed dirt. They conferred for a moment quietly, but Halliwell heard enough to realize they were speaking a different language. One he could never have understood.
At length, Ananta turned to face them again, his wings spreading wide.
“Shesa will remain here on guard. I will see you safely to the other side of the Gorge, and there the Nagas who stand sentry to the east will set you on the path you seek. Whether you will overtake them must be left to fate, for the Bascombe has a Borderkind with him, and there is no telling how swiftly they might travel, or if they shall remain in this world.”
Halliwell allowed himself the smallest flicker of hope. If Oliver could go back, that meant he could, too. And that was one more mystery solved. When Oliver had disappeared from his family home on Rose Ridge Lane in the middle of a blizzard, Halliwell had been baffled by the question of how he had gone anywhere in the storm. Then Collette had disappeared. Oliver had shown up in Cottingsley, and then in London, with no clear explanation of how he had traveled there. But it was obvious now. He had traveled here, then back to the real world.
Home, Halliwell thought.
He glanced at Julianna and smiled, and he was sure she was thinking the same thing. The panic that seethed in him at the utter alienness of this world could only be calmed by two things: hope, and concentrating on resolving their predicament.
“All right, all right,” he said quickly, practically mumbling. “That’s fantastic. Thank you so much.”
The Naga guard studied them, surveying their clothes again. “You truly are newcomers, then? Newly Lost?”
“We said as much,” Julianna replied, though not unpleasantly.
Ananta nodded. “Come, then. Before I set you on the path, you must speak with Virginia Tsing. It is rare for the newly or recently Lost to find their way to the Gorge, but it has happened. Miss Tsing sees to them, as she will to you. There are things you will need to know about the Two Kingdoms if you wish to survive here. She will likely feed you as well. Perhaps even sandwiches and coffee, though I have never understood what humans love so much about those beans.”
“They’ve got quite a start on us already,” Halliwell said.
“Do not worry. Miss Tsing will not keep you long. Come.”
Ananta slid across the mountaintop, toward the top of the ridge. Halliwell watched Shesa warily for a moment, but the younger Naga ignored him now, as though humans were beneath him. Halliwell thought that perhaps, in this world, that was precisely what such creatures thought.
Now that they were near the top of the ridge, it was clear that this was indeed the gorge. The edge was in sight. Jutting up from the broad canyon below he could see the tops of some kind of rope and metal rigging, as well as the tips of some kind of ornamental stonework.
“You have no idea how much we appreciate your help. But I wonder…if Oliver and this person he’s traveling with go back through to…where we come from, can you show us how to get through? Is there another door that goes back?”
At the edge of the cliff, Ananta paused and looked back at her. “I am sorry. I thought you understood. You are Lost Ones now. You have crossed the Veil. And once through the Veil, the Lost Ones can never go home.”
Halliwell staggered, swayed on his feet, staring at the Naga as he spread his wings, trying to make sense of the words.
“That’s…that’s impossible. We have to go back.”
Ananta only shrugged. “You will want to speak with Miss Tsing. She can explain better than I.”
He took flight for just a moment, dropping down to a platform just beyond the edge of the cliff. Halliwell walked numbly after him. He glanced at Julianna. Her eyes were hollow.
The guardian had to be wrong. Oliver could travel back and forth. There had to be a way. The thing wasn’t even human, after all. What the hell did he know?
Together, Halliwell and Julianna went to the edge and looked down into the wondrous river gorge. There were awnings and stone bridges, ladders and walkways of wood and rope. The river went through a thriving village. The smell of food cooking down below rose to make Halliwell’s stomach growl. Somewhere down there, children were laughing, and the sweet sound echoed off the walls. He saw a large, colorful florist’s cart on the broad promenade beside the river, amidst all manner of shops.
Below, Ananta waited on the platform. It was connected to a strange latticework of stairs and rope bridges that led down hundreds of feet into the heart of Twillig’s Gorge.
Halliwell took one last, long glance at the eastern side of the gorge, knowing that their path continued there. They had to get after Oliver and this Kitsune. That was the only way they were going to find real answers.
But Ananta began to slide his long serpent body down the stairs, holding the rails, wings tucked behind him, and after a moment’s hesitation, Julianna followed.
Still numb, Halliwell descended behind them, wondering if there was any point in going on.
CHAPTER 7
L ight snow fell on the tarmac at Bangor International Airport, the gentle cascade of white illuminated by the runway lights as the plane touched down. Sara Halliwell stared out the window, her forehead against the glass, and stared at nothing as the pilot taxied toward the terminal.
Everyone stood up before the seatbelt light was off. Sara stayed in her seat. Only when the door was open and people began to file along the aisle did she stand and retrieve her bag from the overhead compartment. It was smaller than a suitcase but larger than an overnight bag, and heavy. With the strap over one shoulder, she listed badly to one side.
She shuffled along the aisle, face slack, tired but all too awake. The flight attendants stood just outside the cockpit and smiled pleasantly as she got off the plane, then Sara was in the throng moving up the gangway into the terminal. People hurried by her. A crewman pushed an elderly black man in a wheelchair. She went around them, but neither of them glanced up.
Once upon a time, an eighteen-year-old Sara had driven into Canada to go skiing with her girlfriends. It was raining lightly, just spattering the windshield, but in the dark she had not realized it was freezing rain, and the highway had become a sheet of ice. Then something about the sound of the rain on the roof of the car troubled her and she frowned and gently tapped the brake.
She had crested the hill. As she did, she saw the brake lights flash on the car in front of her. It started to skid, sliding as if in slow motion down the other side of the hill. Ahead, cars collided, one after the other, first two, then five, and then there were at least nine vehicles careening into one another with a crash of metal, gliding so gently into their collisions.
Sara had not tapped the brake again, nor had she accelerated. Instead, she had steered, carefully, skirting around a slowly spinning car and weaving through the wreckage. Even as she made it through to the other side, a car came over the hill behind her going much too fast, and the resulting crash made a thump like a cannon shot into the air.
Yet Sara had slipped through, as though she had been invisible. Untouchable. She felt that way now. Moving up the gangway and into the airport, anonymous and invisible, she was untouchable.
But fate had already touched her, after all.
Fate had been Jackson Norris on the phone just after ten o’clock last night. Just hearing his voice she had caught her breath. A phone call from Jackson Norris could only mean the worst.
When she left the gate area and walked past security, he was there waiting for her. The man was fortysomething, but the raccoon-dark circles under his eyes made him look ten years older. Haggard and tired, he looked too thin and his hair was much grayer than the last time she had seen him, back in the spring.
Still, he managed a sad smile for her as she went to him.
“Hello, Sheriff.”
He held her
at arm’s length, like a long-lost uncle who hadn’t seen her since childhood. “Sara. You look great, kid.” The sheriff took her bag and slung it over his own shoulder. “And I’ve told you before, you’re long since old enough to call me Jackson.”
“Not sure I’ll ever be old enough for that,” she said, and she kissed his cheek even as they began to walk through the airport.
The sheriff led the way, already fishing out his keys, though it was no short walk to the parking lot.
“How’s life treating you, kid?” he asked. “You still the glamour girl, taking pictures of all those pretty models in their underwear?”
Sara smiled. It was an old conversation. One they repeated over and over. “Still taking pictures,” she confirmed, though for the first time since she could remember, she was traveling without her camera. She felt bereft without it, and yet also weirdly free. “Though I’ll go out on a limb and say it’s not quite as exciting as you make it sound.”
When the sheriff chuckled, she saw the deep wrinkles around his eyes and mouth, and the gray bristle on his chin. He’d skipped shaving today. That wasn’t like Jackson Norris at all.
“Because you’re a girl,” he said. “I don’t know how a man can take photos like that and keep his concentration on the job.”
“Good thing I don’t have that problem,” she said, not bothering to mask the sarcasm he would never understand.
They rode the elevator up to the parking garage in silence, both stewing, contemplating, worrying. Walking to the car-his Wessex County Sheriff’s Department official vehicle-the sheriff moved a little too fast, as though he wasn’t ready for the rest of their conversation. The real part. The unfamiliar, unrehearsed part. He put Sara’s bag in the trunk and went around to unlock her door like a true gentleman. He even held it open for her.
Sara only stood and looked at him. “Where’s my father, Jackson?”
He had been urging her to use his name for years. Now that she did, he flinched. The sheriff glanced away and let out a breath, then lifted his gaze to meet hers as though his head weighed a thousand pounds.
“I honestly don’t know. There isn’t any news, Sara. You know if there was, you’d be the first to know.”
“So this law firm hires him to go look for one of their lawyers in fucking England-a guy who maybe murdered his father-he goes missing, and all you can tell me is that there isn’t any news?”
Hysteria tinged her voice. She knew it, and hated it, but could do nothing about it. Once upon a time, Jackson would have chided her for her language. Tonight, he said not a word. Small town guy he might be, but he wasn’t stupid.
“We know he and Julianna Whitney, who was with him, chartered a boat to take them out to an island off the coast of Scotland. It was in the middle of a snowstorm, apparently. But your father and Ms. Whitney went ashore on the island. When they didn’t come back, the charter captain went looking for them, but there wasn’t a trace. There was a fire on the island. The people who live there won’t say how the fire started. None of them report having seen your father or Ms. Whitney. I’m not sure what else I can say.”
December wind breezed through the garage. Sara shivered and ought to have zipped her jacket, but it was as though someone else was feeling it, someone else was cold.
She leaned against the car and stuffed her hands in her pockets. “Sheriff, what was my dad doing moonlighting for some law firm? I know…I mean, I don’t see him much, but we talk. He never mentioned doing anything like that. Sheriff’s detective pays all right, doesn’t it? So what was he doing this for? Going to England? In his whole career, he’s never done anything like that. He’s a cop in Maine. That’s all he ever was or wanted to be. So here’s what you can do. You can tell me how it happened. How did he end up going there in the first place?”
For a long moment, Jackson Norris stared at her with those raccoon eyes and a twist to his mouth like he’d just eaten something sour. Then he left the door open and walked around to unlock the driver’s-side door. After he opened his door, he paused and stared at her over the roof, past the rack of blue emergency lights that were, for the moment, unlit.
“Politics, Sara.”
Incredulous, she stared at him. “What?”
“I owed the firm a big favor. A lot of favors. Chances are, I wouldn’t be sheriff if it hadn’t been for their support. They wanted to play this investigation a certain way-do it quietly, try to protect their image, all of that-and I played along. Oliver Bascombe is one of theirs. Nobody really thinks the guy killed his father, but chances are he knows who did, or why. So when they wanted help going and fetching the lawyer in London-”
“You loaned them my father,” Sara said quietly, stomach in knots.
“Not quite. They asked if I’d give him some time off, if I’d object to them giving him a freelance investigation job. I paved the way, Sara, but I couldn’t have ordered Ted to take the assignment. It’s not my jurisdiction. Bascombe and Cox offered him work, and he took it. Hell, kid, you know what he’s like when he wants to close a case.”
Sara tasted bitterness in her mouth. “Better than anyone.”
Her father was a good man, but he had never been a good father. Not when it mattered. The job had always come first. And now, here she was, taken away from her life and her work because the idea that something might have happened to him made her frantic. Because, despite the distance that they could somehow never bridge between them, she loved him desperately and had never known what to do about that.
She slid into her seat and closed the door.
Only the crackling of the police radio broke the silence as the sheriff drove them away from the airport. He wasn’t going to be getting many calls down in Bangor, but still he did not shut it off. Habit, Sara supposed.
How she had wished for someone to blame this on. It would be so convenient to be able to hate Jackson Norris for putting her through this, or even her father for making her think maybe they would never be able to solve the problem of the awkwardness between them.
But there was no one to blame. And nothing to do but wait, and ask questions, and hope.
The snow was falling outside, heavy flakes that drifted gently to the ground. The way the snow danced on the darkened highway ahead was mesmerizing. Sara watched it, and let herself be captivated. Taken away.
“What was that?” the sheriff asked.
Sara frowned. “Huh?”
“You said something. I didn’t catch it.”
For a second she did not know what he meant. Then she realized that she had spoken, almost unconsciously.
“He wanted me to come home for Christmas,” she said, watching the snow, looking at the holiday lights gleaming on evergreens and strung from buildings as they drove away from Bangor. Tomorrow night was Christmas Eve.
“Guess he got his wish.”
The wind was blowing from the west, or Kitsune would have caught the soldiers’ scent before it was too late. Later, she would wonder if there was more to that failure than merely the direction of the wind, if the confusing feelings that swirled in her heart had distracted her. But by then, such questions would be meaningless.
It took longer than Kitsune had expected for them to reach the Orient Road. Many years had passed since the last time she had passed this way, and even then it had been from an entirely different angle. In those old times, she had not even been aware that Twillig’s Gorge existed. That had been a hard journey, as she recalled, and it was a dark irony for her to learn now, so long after, that had she only traveled a few hours to the west she might have come upon that sanctuary.
But that was an old story from her life, and she did not want to dwell upon it.
More than three hours after they left the gorge, they had come to a sparse forest of ancient growth trees. Skirting its edge, they had passed a pond upon which sat the ramshackle remnants of a long-abandoned grist mill. A short way further they came upon a small house, a kind of way station from an age gone by.
Th
en, at last, the Orient Road.
Kitsune had journeyed the length of that road more than once. To the southwest, it led toward Perinthia. To the east, all the way into the furthest regions of Euphrasia, into the deepest and oldest parts of the world beyond the Veil. That was where her home lay, the forest where she had been born, far back in the mists of time and the ancestral memory of an entire region.
But Kitsune had not passed through that forest in two hundred years and had no desire to return. All that waited there for her was the bitter, aching memory of a more vivid, more vital time and a life full of passion and playfulness. Another age.
The present was a pale shadow of the past, but it required her attention. When the sorcerers had created the Veil, they had done so to protect the purity of the legendary worlds. Kitsune believed they had failed. It was not a pleasant thought. Indeed, these recent days it had been only the presence of Oliver at her side that lightened her heart. He was a good man, smart and strong and simple. Despite his harsh opinion of himself, there was nobility in him that was becoming more and more difficult to find amongst the legendary.
In the shadow of the tall pines, she glanced at Oliver. She knew that he was devoted to another, but Kitsune desired him. It troubled her, that desire, for she did not understand it. For a human, Oliver was brave enough, and he was charming and full of heart, but he was still ordinary. Kitsune could not make sense of what she felt for him, but that did not lessen its power.
He longed for Julianna, the woman he would have made his wife. But she was a world away, and he might never see her again. In time, his devotion to her would lessen.
Kitsune could wait.
As they passed the dusty way station, whose roof had been staved in by a fallen pine, Kitsune spared a thought for Frost and Blue Jay, and all of her kin. Part of her longed to be with them, to search for answers and vengeance in Yucatazca. But that was not to be.
She cast another glance at Oliver. He sensed her regard and looked over, one eyebrow raised. A ripple of pleasure went through her and she smiled at him. Oliver smiled back, puzzled. If he thought her enigmatic, Kitsune did not mind.
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