by Nova Nelson
Only once Bloom heard the news did she realize she’d been expecting as much. “Complete today’s plans, otherwise the volunteers will start spreading rumors around town that we’ve already given him up for dead. But then send word to volunteers in the morning that we’ve gotten another lead and are taking the investigation in another direction. They’ll just be so glad they aren’t expected to go back out first thing, they won’t question it.”
Titterfield nodded. “And do we have another lead?”
“Not yet,” Bloom said. “But I have faith another one will be coming very soon.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because this is usually the point in the investigation when those who know more than they’re letting on get antsy and make a foolish move.”
Titterfield’s grin hardly turned the corner of his lips, but it was there. “Whatever you say, Sheriff.”
He nodded and made to step out of her office, but Bloom called after him. “Morris.” He paused, his eyebrows raising at her use of his first name. “Find a volunteer to lead the rest of the day’s search, and then go home and get some rest.”
“Yes, Sheriff.”
He shut the door behind him and Bloom felt back into thought.
While she knew in her heart that what she’d said about another lead showing up was true, there was always that part of her that doubted it would happen, that this time might be the exception.
That was the way it always was, though. Faith didn’t exist without doubt.
But, good goddess, were they maddening bedfellows.
Chapter Nine
Ruby’s nap had been fitful at best, and non-existent at worst. At one point, she was pretty sure she’d slept, simply because her mind had spun a strange movie that involved Sheriff Bloom riding Taurus through town (fully clothed, thankfully), while Ezra and Zax juggled three kids (the faun variety) between them.
Clifford’s snoring had finally tugged her from that dream or reverie or (goddess forbid) vision and she’d been grateful for it. There was something she was missing in all this, so she’d decided to be a bit more purposeful about summoning her subconscious to her.
She pulled on a robe and stuffed her swollen feet into her slippers. The swelling was a new perk of growing older, brought on by any walk in her boots along the cobblestone streets that lasted longer than twenty minutes, which were most walks through town. She was sure there was a tincture of some kind at the Pixie Mixie that would cure this new condition, but that would require her admitting to herself that it wasn’t just a fluke, that her body really was irreversibly falling apart.
She hadn’t yet been ready to make that concession in any monetary way.
But as she limped down the stairs, she thought she might be ready to make that concession in the morning.
Clifford didn’t bother getting up from his padded bed on her bedroom floor, which was fine. She didn’t need him for what she was about to do.
Once back downstairs in her parlor, she threatened Mirna with banishment until the spirit temporarily faded out of sight and sound, and then she settled herself in the overstuffed chair by the fire. It was the same chair Ezra had imported for her from Avalon years ago because he knew she would like the particular shade of violet and her old reading chair had been an unforgiving wooden rocker. He had been right. She loved her chair.
She forced all thought of that witch from her mind and shut her eyes. Her gift of Insight could be fickle, but she’d grown more in control of it year after year. It’d been a good two years of being in Eastwind before she even stumbled over the concept of it in a book and realized that Insight was the greatest strength of Fifth Winds. Could have saved her a lot of trouble in her early years if she’d known to trust her gut more, but she supposed that could be said for almost anyone. And weren’t one’s twenties for making comically poor decisions with an unholy degree of certainty that one was making the correct choice?
But now she was fairly sure she’d read every book in the library that so much as mentioned the word “Insight,” and she was glad she had. It proved invaluable in times like these.
What had once felt little more than a tickle in the back of her mind and a slight twinge in her core, had blossomed into a wealth of wisdom she could access under the right circumstances. While it felt like magic, she was fairly sure Insight fell more under the heading of logic. She felt it in her gut, sure, but it lived and breathed in her mind.
Because, when it came down to it, her Insight never told her anything she didn’t already know. It just pointed her in the right direction, and made connections between seemingly disparate things she’d forgotten she knew.
She twisted in her seat and pulled the patchwork quilt off the back of her chair, draping it over her legs to help settle her nervous system. And then she shut her eyes and focused on her breathing.
Once she’d found a comfortable rhythm, she asked her question. What am I missing?
It was minutes before the image appeared. But there it was: a figure with the legs of a bear, the torso of a man, and the head of a bull. He stood in a clearing at night with moonlight glowing around him. He stood staring at her, his arms out by his side, his human fingers bent like claws, his chest heaving.
And then he charged.
Ruby yelped when someone pounded at her front door, giving her meditative whiplash.
Clifford stampeded down the stairwell, yelling, “Someone’s here. Who is it? Who is it? Who is it? I’ll take care of it!”
To anyone but Ruby, it would simply sound like deep, hellacious barking, but she hardly noticed that part.
“Calm down,” she said. “I’m sure it’s fine.”
But she wasn’t sure it was fine. Whether that was because the image of Taurus charging had rattled her nerves or because her Insight was still whispering to her, she couldn’t be certain.
So when Clifford stayed glued to her side as she went to answer the door, she didn’t tell him no.
She wasn’t sure who she was expecting to see, but if it’d been Bloom or even Ezra, she wouldn’t have been surprised.
It was neither of them.
Instead, two werebears smiled nervously at her. “Can we come in?” Opal Barker asked.
Ruby’s eyes traveled from her to the man next to her, who looked uncannily like Virgil Pine, though he stood half a foot taller and seemed to have a handful of years on him. “And you are?”
“Cedric Pine.”
“Virgil’s brother.”
He nodded.
“Oh, all right then, come on in.” She stepped aside and let them pass, but didn’t miss Clifford’s close inspection of them via trained sniffer.
Cedric was tall enough that he had to crouch slightly to avoid hitting his head on the assortment of dangling wards Ruby hung from the parlor ceiling. He eyed them suspiciously.
“Don’t mind them. They’re all positive. Well, except that one.” She pointed to a mobile made entirely of petrified bats. “But I hardly ever tap into that one. It’s mostly there for decoration.” Opal and Cedric shared a quick nervous glance, and Ruby added, “Sit, please. I’ll make some tea.”
The offer calmed them as she’d intended it to, and she allowed them a moment to take in the novel space while she put the kettle on and spooned out a mixture of tea leaves that included chamomile, lavender, and a little bit of slippery elm (to loosen their tongues). Thankfully, you could hardly taste or smell the last ingredient over the soothing scent of the others.
When she returned to the table with the tea tray and began serving each of them, she smiled and said, “I assume you know something regarding Swamy’s disappearance that you’d like to share.”
She poured the last cup then folded her hands in her lap, waiting patiently.
Neither of her guests spoke. But she did notice that Opal’s hands were shaking. Ruby nodded at her shaking hands. “The tea will help with that. But I suspect telling me why you’re here will as well.”
“We saw him,�
�� Opal said quickly.
Ruby sat up straighter. “Swamy?”
“No. Not Swamy. Taurus.”
Ruby’s eyes flickered to Cedric as she tried to gauge whether this was a joke. He seemed embarrassed, but not the kind one feels from pulling a lame prank.
For fang’s sake… They seemed to be telling the truth. Or at least what they believed to be truth. She’d read about group hallucinations before. Could it be something like that? Perhaps someone was casting an enchantment over Fluke Mountain.
“You saw Taurus?” she prompted, trying not to sound as judgmental as she felt.
Opal nodded. “Outside the lodge. I saw him through a window in the restaurant’s kitchen. Or at least, I thought I did.”
Cedric took over. “She mentioned it to me and I went outside to look. I saw him, too, but only briefly as he was running away.”
Yes, they seemed serious enough. Ruby looked at the clock on her wall. It was nearly one in the morning. From what she remembered of the restaurant hours posted on a small sign by the host stand, it closed at ten each night. She began doing the math of how long the last diners might stay, added in time to clean and close the kitchen and the walk from Fluke Mountain to her house.
The timeline was feasible, but still a stretch.
“What time did you see Taurus?” she asked.
Cedric opened his mouth, but Opal jumped in. “Just after close.”
“I’m unfamiliar with your hours,” Ruby lied. “What time is close?”
“Nine.”
Oh, so even earlier than she’d thought. “Were there still diners around when you saw it?”
Opal’s eyes fell to her cup of tea, and she cradled it between her palms. “No, I believe the last couple had left a few minutes before.”
“So, no one else to corroborate your story?”
And now Opal looked up from the surface of her drink, and her eyes cut into Ruby. “You don’t believe us?”
“I don’t know what to believe. Trust me, my job would be much easier if everyone told the truth all the time and I never ran into stories about legends coming to life, but alas, that’s not the case. So I must practice skepticism. I hope you’ll forgive me once it gets to the bottom of your boyfriend’s disappearance.”
That did it. The werebear looked properly embarrassed and didn’t respond.
“Now,” Ruby began, addressing Cedric to test for holes in his story, “would you describe what Taurus looked like?”
Cedric nodded and shrugged his hefty shoulders. “Just like you would expect.”
“Begging your forgiveness, but I don’t have any expectations of his appearance at all. Could you be more specific?”
He took a deep breath, leaned back in his chair, and stared vaguely toward the baubles on the ceiling. “Bull’s head, with big horns, like a minotaur. Bare chest like a man’s. From just below, oh, maybe the belly button down, he looked like a werebear. Big, thick legs with brown fur.”
“And you were able to see the color of his fur in the darkness?”
Cedric nodded nonchalantly, like that was obvious.
“Were you in your bear form?”
“No.”
“Was he in moonlight?”
“No, it was mostly shadows.” He sat up straighter, and his voice deepened. “But I know what I saw.”
She smiled softly. “No need to get worked up, just trying to get the facts.” But now it was clear that he didn’t know what he’d seen. If he wasn’t in his bear form, then his eyes were limited like hers. She’d once read in an obscure book on were anatomy that the number of rods and cones in a were’s eyes shifted along with his or her form. That meant that werebears had just as poor night vision as she did when they weren’t full-on hairy.
But more importantly, it also meant that they couldn’t see colors at night.
It was a strange phenomenon and one she hadn’t considered herself until the library book had brought it up. But while someone with her optical anatomy could make out shapes and movement in the darkness, thanks to the rods in one’s eyes, the cones, which detect color, were all but useless in such conditions. Which meant that whatever color one might “see” in the nighttime was only a mental projection based upon past data. One can’t tell a tree is green at night, but the brain assures you that it always has been and therefore still is, so your mind colors it in.
It all amounted to the fact that Cedric wasn’t an especially reliable witness. He couldn’t have seen the brown fur. He could have seen fur, but his assumption that it was brown came from somewhere else. Perhaps the myths circulating around the werebear sleuth had mentioned that fact. Or maybe his brother had dropped the detail into his story of the attack. Either way, Cedric didn’t seem keen on a simple “I don’t know” to her questions, and was happy to fill in the details as needed without questioning where the information had originated. He was a tainted witness, in other words.
She addressed her next question to him. “Do you believe Taurus has anything to do with Swamy’s disappearance?”
He nodded adamantly. “Absolutely. The timing is too coincidental.”
“But we don’t have a body, as far as I know.” She hadn’t spoken to Bloom since the search party was due to wrap up, but she assumed she would have heard an owl pecking at her bedroom window with an urgent message from the sheriff, if anything had turned up.
“Doesn’t mean anything,” Cedric replied. “He could have been mauled and dragged off somewhere.”
Ruby checked on Opal’s expression, and it seemed vague and faraway.
“Was Taurus so large as to manage such a feat? From the pictures I’ve seen of Swamy, he’s not a small bear. It would take quite a creature to overpower him and drag him off.”
Cedric nodded his understanding. “Taurus was huge. Easily a foot taller than Swamy. And his arms were thick as ancient oaks.”
Opal nodded emphatically now, despite the obvious exaggeration, then took a long sip of her tea and seemed to relax.
“Ah yes,” said Ruby. “Drink up. It will help settle the nerves.”
They both did, and Ruby simply brought hers up to her nose and inhaled deeply. The scent alone helped to still the many swirling half-formed thoughts in her mind.
“For what it’s worth,” she said. “I believe you’re telling me the truth.” She refrained from mentioning that she thought their truth could be completely false.
Both werebears appeared greatly relieved, which was exactly how she’d wanted them to feel before asking the next question. “Why did you come to me about this instead of, say, the sheriff?”
“We didn’t want to bother her,” Cedric said quickly.
Then Opal added, “We didn’t think she would believe us.”
“No,” Ruby said, “she certainly would not have believed you. But I’m glad you came here. I’ll keep my third eye out for any signs of Swamy, but in the meantime,”—she addressed Opal directly then—“I believe you should proceed as if he’s still alive.” The woman’s reaction was about what Ruby had suspected it would be. A certain flash of guilt lit up her eyes before it was gone as quickly as it had appeared.
She allowed them a few more sips of their tea before she stood and strongly hinted that it was time for them to be going. Thankfully, they took the hint.
“Do be safe,” she said as they stepped out onto her porch. “Cedric, it would be best if you walked Opal all the way to her home.”
“Of course.”
As soon as she shut the door behind them, she turned to face Clifford where he’d been pretending to sleep by the fire. “There’s much more to that story,” she said.
“I couldn’t agree more.” He stood up and stretched his front legs, performing an elegant downward-facing hellhound. “Are we following them, then?”
Ruby grabbed her sweater from the hook by the door and slung it over her shoulders. “Of course we are.”
Her familiar trotted over to her side. “I love a good late-night prowl.”
/> Chapter Ten
Bloom checked the clock in her office. Ten fifteen in the morning. Ruby had asked to meet at ten o’clock, but she still wasn’t there. It wasn’t like her to be late. Over her thousands of years in existence, Bloom had noticed a peculiar phenomenon where people with very little to do in their daily lives managed to be late to everything. Perhaps time was simply less consequential to them, so why bother keeping track? But Ruby wasn’t like that. She was the opposite. Perhaps it was her constant awareness of death that made the Fifth Wind more conscientious of the time.
“Should we be worried?” asked Zax Banderfield from where he sat in a solid oak chair across the desk from the sheriff.
“I’m honestly not sure,” Bloom replied. “It’s unusual behavior for her, but she can take care of herself. And she’s smart enough to bring the hellhound with her when she does something extra foolish, so I usually don’t worry about her.”
But maybe she should start.
Zax shifted restlessly in his chair. “Maybe she forgot?”
“I don’t see how she would. She only sent the message for us to meet last night.”
“This morning, technically,” he corrected. “I heard the owl bell ring outside my door at two fifteen this morning.”
“Right, right.”
Ruby’s message hadn’t been especially detailed. At least hers hadn’t. (She couldn’t speak to the one Zax had received.) It simply said, Lead fell into my lap. Meet at your office at ten a.m. to discuss. RT.
While it was always nice to receive confirmation that her hunch of a new lead surfacing was yet again proven accurate, Bloom would have been much happier if she knew Ruby was okay.
Because all too often, when a lead fell into one’s lap, it wasn’t a lead but rather a dangling carrot that led straight into a trap.
At twenty after the hour, Zax cleared his throat, causing Bloom to look up from the paperwork she was distractedly filling out.
