This Eternity of Masks and Shadows

by Karsten Knight

  “I’m serious!” Emile’s face lit up. “You could be my research assistant. I know rock samples aren’t the most riveting topic, but with college deferred a year, it might be nice to have something academic to fill the gap in your résumé. And you could spend some time with your grandparents while you’re up there.”

  Part of her felt drawn to the idea. Leave all of this behind—Delphine, Themis, Nook, the investigation. She only made it up to her mother’s hometown once every few years, but she always felt recharged after a week in the brisk air, listening to the cold surf lap at the rocky shore.

  However, she had started down an uncertain road, and now more than ever after reading her mother’s journal, she needed to see it through.

  “I really want to say yes, dad, but there are some things around here I have to wrap up first. I sort of took an internship recently.” Cairn figured this was at least an approximation of the truth. “A criminal justice shadowing program.”

  “Criminal justice? I guess I’ve been more out of the loop than I thought. ‘Detective Delacroix’ has a nice ring to it, though.” Emile rubbed the back of his head and glanced sheepishly at the door to the wine cellar. “When I get back, I promise to make healthier choices … and be more present in your life.”

  Squall hopped onto the couch to investigate the food, and Cairn scooted the crab rangoons away as he extended a big paw toward the open container. “I think we both could benefit from a fresh start,” she said.

  As her father spooned more fried rice onto his plate, he said nonchalantly, “Maybe it’s just because I’ve been at the office a lot, but I haven’t seen Delphine around here recently.”

  Cairn had always thought of her father as oblivious, more attuned to the fine details of a geode than those of the people around him. Now she wondered whether he’d intuited how her relationship with Delphine had evolved—and dissolved.

  The truth was that her feelings for Delphine had been written on her face for years.

  “She’s not currently my biggest fan,” Cairn replied. “I haven’t exactly been my best self these last few months, and I don’t think ‘sorry’ is going to fix it this time.”

  Her father pursed his lips. “If there’s one thing I learned from almost twenty years of marriage, it’s that ‘sorries’ come in different sizes. Maybe you just need a bigger one.”

  On a whim, Cairn asked, “Do you ever wonder about mom’s other lives? Her previous ones, I mean?”

  Her father’s eyes widened. Since the memorial service in September, they’d taken no strolls down memory lane together. Speaking Ahna’s name was hard enough. Either of her names. “How do you mean?” he asked.

  While Cairn had eventually accepted her mother’s mythological origins, she had never quite wrapped her head around the fact that she was reincarnated every hundred years. “Did it ever bother you that she probably had dozens of husbands and children in the centuries before us? That she’ll have many more in her future lives?” Cairn had often wondered just how many “cousins” she had running around out in the world—the descendants of Sedna’s children from former incarnations. There could be thousands of them by now.

  Emile shrugged. “Sure, it bothered me in the beginning. Here I am, this mortal dude who only gets one shot at an earthly life, and I’m just the latest in a long line of husbands to a woman who has been coming back to earth like a boomerang since the dawn of humanity. It was an even harder pill to swallow knowing that one day, I will die, while she gets to be reborn, starting a new life that doesn’t involve either of us.” He glanced at a family photo on the fireplace mantle, a shot of the three of them standing on one of Nantucket’s sandy bluffs. “But the truth is the Sedna who comes back is different each time. Eventually, I concluded that I was fortunate to get to spend my life with this specific one—my Ahna. She can be reborn a million times until the sun dies and the earth will never see another one like her. You and I won the lottery in that way.”

  Even now, it was impossible to fathom that her mother would have a whole different persona in her next incarnation, especially when Cairn still felt like she knew so little about this one. “Tell me about the day you met her.” She’d heard the story many times before, but in the wake of reading the journal, she desperately needed to cling to the version of Ahna she remembered.

  Emile swallowed. “I was twenty-two. It was my first field excursion in Canada as a grad student. I was staying at a tiny research station outside Coral Harbour, on this remote island in the northern part of Hudson Bay. Growing up in Quebec, I thought I had experienced cold, but that far north, the chill settles into your bones. I was really excited to drill core samples of this Pre-Cambrian greenstone belt that—” He stopped himself and smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, I’ll spare you the nerd details.”

  As he went on, his eyes glazed over with a wistful sheen. Cairn could tell that he was no longer in the room with her, but traveling along the frigid shores of that vast Arctic sea. “I had just finished examining a garden of fossilized coral. I thought they were the most beautiful specimens I’d ever seen—and then I saw your mother.”

  Even though her eyes welled with tears, Cairn found herself smiling. “Bet she wasn’t wearing a coat.”

  Emile chuckled. “Nope. Cold enough to freeze your spit before it hit the ground, and there she was, standing knee-deep in the bay in just jeans and a cable-knit sweater. She was trying to soothe a young beluga that had gotten separated from its pod. I started to call out to her that she was going to get frostbite—I didn’t realize at the time she wasn’t mortal, of course—but then I stopped. She leaned down and pressed her nose to the whale’s bulbous head and spoke to it in a series of high-pitched chirps and trills.”

  Her father drew in a deep breath and attempted to replicate the whale song. Cairn laughed and covered her ears. “Please never do that again.”

  “After that, the whale just jetted off toward the open water, spouted out its blowhole, and it was gone. Even then, I knew I’d witnessed magic and I thought to myself: if I don’t ask this woman out for hot chocolate, I will always look back and wonder what if.”

  Cairn cupped her green tea and watched the steam rise. She wanted so badly to share her growing certainty that her mother’s death might have been more than an ironclad case of suicide, but she also couldn’t bear to get either of their hopes up if the investigation didn’t pan out.

  Cairn chose her words carefully. “Mom obviously had another life, a place she never let either of us into. But I promise you”—her voice broke, so she repeated—“I promise you, I’m going to find out what really happened that day.”

  “I won’t tell you not to go searching through your mother’s past.” Emile nodded at the family photo of the three of them on the living room wall. “Just don’t let it taint the good memories you have of her. Those moments are no less real no matter what you find.”

  Through the gloom, Cairn suddenly pictured Delphine, both the bad—that look of finality on her face before she walked away at the Coconut Grove—but also the good. Their first kiss atop the lighthouse. All the little things that had made up the last thirteen years of their friendship.

  She had an idea.

  “I need a rock from your collection,” Cairn said. “I can’t tell you what it’s for and you probably won’t get it back.”

  He had always been so protective of his specimens, she half-expected him to reject the idea outright. Instead, he laughed and patted her hand. “Take whatever you want. They’re only rocks.”

  The first snow of the season descended unexpectedly on Boston that night, a brief preview of the cold, temperamental months to come.

  The taxi dropped Cairn off in Boston’s Fort Point neighborhood, a network of historic brick buildings that that once served as sugar, molasses, and spice warehouses. At the turn of the twenty-first century, many of the structures had been transformed into apartment complexes and restaurants.

  According to Delphine’s father, the songstress had
apparently moved there a month earlier. She was glad when he volunteered the address without her having to grovel.

  Cairn attempted to dial Delphine’s apartment number into the intercom, only to discover an “out-of-order” note on the keypad. She peered through the glass, searching for someone to let her in, but after ten minutes, not a soul emerged from the elevators. She threw up her hands as a snowplow cruised by. Its wheels hit a puddle, showering her with a geyser of slush.

  Drenched and freezing, Cairn prepared to drag her defeated ass home. But as she passed the alleyway, she noticed the fire escape, a network of rusty ladders ascending the side of the building. It probably hadn’t been replaced since before the Great Depression.

  If she climbed this, she knew ending up in jail for trespassing would probably be the least of her troubles. But she had come too far to give up, and if courting death was what it took to deliver an apology to Delphine, then so be it. At least a morgue drawer would be drier if she fell.

  “Screw it,” she muttered.

  Cairn climbed the nearest Dumpster and sprung upward, grabbing for the slippery bottom rung of the fire escape ladder. After some flailing, she hoisted herself up onto the landing above.

  Cairn felt like a cat burglar as she carefully climbed the ten flights of stairs, scurrying past any lit windows that showed signs of life. It dawned on her that this horribly improvised plan would firmly secure her stalker status. She found herself praying that Delphine wasn’t home after all. Then she could leave, regroup, and return a less creepy way at a later time.

  But just as she decided to abort, she passed a fluttering curtain and saw Delphine. The songbird lay on a tattered sofa in a sparsely furnished room, lounging in a silk pajama set. She absently twirled one of her frizzy brown curls around her finger, bathed in the flickering glow of the television.

  I should definitely go, Cairn decided.

  Too late. Delphine’s sleepy gaze flicked from the TV to the window. After a double-take, she let out a scream and bolted upright.

  Shit, shit, shit, Cairn thought. She fumbled with her phone and turned on the flashlight app, illuminating her face to show that she wasn’t an intruder. Her mouth froze somewhere between a sheepish smile and a mortified grimace.

  Delphine’s expression hardened from fear into rage. She crossed the room in several quick strides and threw open the window.

  “Did you know that your doorbell is broken?” Cairn asked in a conversational tone. “You should really submit a maintenance request.”

  Delphine pinched the bridge of her nose. Her nightgown billowed around her as the chilly air rushed inside. “First my workplace. Now my home. Is there any sanctum of my existence you don’t plan to violate?”

  “I haven’t joined your yoga studio yet,” Cairn replied.

  Delphine went to close the window.

  “Five minutes!” Cairn pleaded. “Give me five minutes and I promise I’ll never bother you again.”

  Delphine’s hands remained poised on the lip of the window. Then she pulled out her phone. After a few quick taps, the sound system inside started to play Dinah Washington’s Baby, Get Lost. “This song is three minutes and eleven seconds. You have until the applause.” She stepped out onto the fire escape with Cairn, making it clear there would be no invitation to join her inside the warm apartment.

  For a moment, Cairn couldn’t find the words she’d rehearsed in her head. The image of the snow falling around Delphine and collecting in the coils of her hair had arrested Cairn.

  This was what she stood to lose if she failed tonight.

  Finally, she fished around in her pocket until she found what she was looking for—a stone, mottled gray and brown. To the untrained eye, it was wholly unremarkable and looked like any number of rocks one might dig out of their backyard. She handed it to Delphine.

  Delphine reluctantly cradled it in her hand. “And I thought diamonds were the universal ‘sorry I cheated on you’ stone, but this really puts me in a forgiving mood.”

  “It’s Acasta Gneiss,” Cairn rushed on, “this chunk of rock up in the middle of the Northern Canadian wilderness, near Great Bear Lake. Geologists like my dad estimate it to be more than four billion years old, which makes it the oldest exposed fragment of the earth’s crust, formed way back when the planet was just starting to solidify.”

  Delphine nodded to the jukebox playing inside. “That’s verse two.”

  But Cairn knew she’d captured her attention. She swallowed. “You are my Acasta Gneiss. It’s hard to remember a time before you. And while I can be a fractured, selfish, molten mess just as the earth once was, your companionship, your laughter, your soul are the solid bedrock that runs through me. Without you, I’d just be a … gas giant like Jupiter.”

  A laugh burst out of Delphine, but she quickly stifled it with her hand.

  “So you don’t have to be my girlfriend and you don’t even have to forgive me for being a thoughtless prick.” Cairn’s lip quivered. “But I categorically reject your application to terminate our friendship.”

  Inside, the song finished as Dinah Washington’s last sultry note tapered off and the recorded audience erupted in applause. Delphine stared down at the stone cupped in her hand, her expression inscrutable.

  Finally, she straightened up. “Take me to dinner. An early one on Friday, before my set at the Grove. Pick me up at the front door like a normal person, please.” Without a hug goodbye, she ducked back into the apartment. “Oh, and I’m keeping the weird rock.” The window slid shut.

  As the blinds closed, Cairn gazed off over the channel to Boston’s skyline, which glittered behind the curtain of falling snow. She felt a swell of hope.

  Maybe, just maybe, she’d found a “sorry” that was big enough.

  The Scarab Heist

  By the time Nook arrived at the Museum of Fine Arts, news vans already clogged the semicircular drive. He parked the Challenger in the middle of Huntington Avenue and barreled onto the scene. Camera crews had infiltrated as far as the front steps, leaning over the blue police barricades as they filmed the SWAT team gearing up for a firefight.

  “Everybody back!” Nook bellowed as he muscled his way through the scrum and pushed a camera out of his face. “Thirty paces or I will have you all arrested for obstruction.” Whoever set up this perimeter was going to get an earful tomorrow.

  “Detective Bedard.” A young female officer, who looked barely out of the academy, approached him. The blue cruiser lights strobed over her grim expression. “I’m Special Agent Montoya.”

  Now he recognized the name—HQ’s newest hostage and crisis negotiator. So there were civilians inside. “What do I need to know?”

  “The museum is hosting a special exhibit on Jewelry of the Ancient World,” she said as she led him up the steps to the towering columns that framed the museum’s entrance. “The centerpiece was a scarab carved from a 98-carat sapphire. Value estimated at seven million dollars.”

  Nook slipped one of the bulletproof vests over his head. “That’s an expensive fucking bug.”

  “No kidding.” Montoya tried not to stare as the detective’s metal hand fumbled with his vest clasps. “A three-man crew with assault rifles rolled in just as they were closing. We believe the leader is Raijin—the Shinto god of lightning.”

  “I’m familiar,” Nook said. Raijin was a notoriously slippery cat burglar who had learned to use his power over electricity to his monetary advantage. Bypassing alarm systems, deploying well-timed power outages, cracking safes with electric locks. He had a penchant for shiny, expensive things and stealing from the wealthy.

  He was also a criminal informant who had been relaying information to Nook about other outlaw gods for the last year.

  “Something went awry. Night guard turned the corner at the wrong time. Poor guy got 50,000 volts for his troubles.” Montoya shook her head. “After things went south, Raijin took hostages: three curators and four board members on an after-hours tour. He completely blew open the roof o
f the Old Masters Gallery, and now there’s a single storm cloud hovering over it, pouring rain into the room—and obscuring any shot our snipers would have at taking from above. Long story short, we now have seven hostages kneeling in a giant puddle with a lightning god, who’s threatening to fry them if we breach the premises.”

  That story didn’t sit well with Nook. The guy might be a thief, but he was a good one, methodical and precise. He always flew solo.

  This was a sloppy job, no finesse and all blunt force. Hostages, casualties, armed accomplices, wanton destruction of the museum—none of it matched his M.O.

  “I tried to communicate with him, but he said he would only talk to you,” Montoya said.

  Nook opened his mouth to respond, but a familiar voice behind him boomed, “Bedard!”

  Captain Isaacs, his superior, ascended the stairs two at a time and leveled a finger at Nook. “When you convinced me to cultivate Raijin as a source, you promised me that he wasn’t a threat. Now we have a dead vic and possibly seven more on the way, all while this goddamn media circus munches on popcorn and spectates.” He waved a hand at the line of cameramen snapping away with their telephoto lenses.

  Nook held his tongue. Until five minutes ago, he had no reason to believe that the lightning god was capable of murder. “Give me a chance to go in there and talk him down before you send in SWAT.”

  For a moment, as the vein pulsed at the captain’s temple, Nook thought for sure his request would be denied. But then Isaacs sighed. “Don’t take any chances with those hostages. You get so much as a whiff that he’s about to play human spark plug, empty a whole magazine into his head.” He spun a dial on his watch. “Ten minutes and we breach.”

  Nook gave a single nod, and with no time to waste, he rushed past Montoya and through the entrance.

  The moment Nook stepped into the museum, he realized he wouldn’t need a map of the floor plan to find the right gallery. Water cascaded down the central staircase. He drew his gun as he followed the flooding up the marble steps. The splashes of his footfalls forfeited any chance at stealth, but the last thing he wanted to do was surprise a storm god, anyway.