A Perjury of Owls

by Michael Angel

  “Well, I have my fingers crossed. It’s getting easier, thanks to you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That case you came up to see Esteban about? You called it down the line. The guy we found in the park had overdosed at a club up on Solano. We got confessions on tape, everything. So with your help, I’ve officially ‘made my bones’ in Homicide.”

  I nodded. “You’d have cracked it even without my help. Especially the way you knew those tattoos.”

  She shrugged. “I had to know them. This side of L.A. is my neighborhood.”

  “You grew up here?”

  “Here?” Isabel rolled her eyes and nodded towards the exit. “Come on, that’s enough time spent powdering our noses in here.”

  “Agreed.” I followed Vega as she pushed through the door and crossed the hall.

  “My parents emigrated from the Dominican Republic when I was six,” she said, as she pushed the door open to the conference room I’d seen her in at first. Esteban looked up from his work and smiled at me. “I didn’t even see Los Angeles until I got into college. I grew up in San Clemente and spent half the time serving food on the beach from my Dad’s taqueria.”

  “That’s why she was assigned to a lot of robberies up on the Avenues when she joined the LAPD,” Esteban said, joining the conversation. “She understood what was going on with the neighborhood, why we had problems getting the evidence we needed.”

  That made me genuinely curious. “I’m listening.”

  “Turned out that the work ethic got in the way.” Vega said. “Many families up on those streets, they’re from the D.R. like my parents. A lot of them run bodegas – little grocery stores – and they have to keep the place running all the time to scrape by. Local street gangs used stop in and rob them so regularly, it was like pulling money from an ATM.”

  “The gangs’ saving grace was that they didn’t kill anyone,” Esteban put in. “All they did was scare the store owners a bit, then duct tape them to the counter or something before they left.”

  “So how did the work ethic play in?” I asked.

  “Whenever the thugs left, it was back to work for the family,” Vega explained. “They’d just peel themselves free and get back to work, obliterating all the fingerprints. I got them to at least stop wiping down the glass countertops, and we started making arrests.”

  “See?” Esteban said, jabbing a thumb at Isabel, “I told you she was good at her job, Dayna. Even without you around to lecture her, Vega knows how to protect a crime scene.”

  That finally pried a laugh out of me. I needed it.

  I needed it more than ever now.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  There were owls in the rafters.

  They remained nothing more than shadows perched high in the rafters of the throne room, but every now and then, something metallic gleamed in the dim light up there. Freshly polished battle talons, I was willing to bet. Their gaze on the back of my neck was as palpable as heat radiating from a cast iron stove.

  I firmly thrust that image from my mind. If I focused on that, I’d never get anything done today.

  Morning sun gleamed through the narrow, slitted windows along the alcoves, as well as the rosette-shaped expanse of stained glass that let the light in from above and behind the throne. Whoever designed that bit of architecture had known their stage lighting. Depending on the time of day, the King would either be wreathed in an otherworldly brilliance, or cast dramatically in shadow.

  Fitzwilliam hadn’t arrived yet for this morning’s session of verbal pugilism. In fact, several of the higher-ranking lords were still filing in. Between the news about Thea, looking for Shelly, and the demands of my job in L.A., I hadn’t had time to request that repairs be done to my chair, so I had to take matters into my own hands as best as I was able to.

  Since yesterday, someone had kicked my chair back into its original spot in the corner. That made me grit my teeth, but it gave me some room to work. While the King was skittish about my importing technology into his kingdom, I figured that so long as I kept things unobtrusive, he wouldn’t complain.

  Ignoring the rude looks and the occasional ‘harrumph’ directed my way, I moved to kneel next to the left side of my assigned chair, turning my back to the room so I could keep my hands out of sight. Then I pulled a tube of instant adhesive glue from my inner jacket pocket.

  Squeezing out a couple of drops on the surfaces I needed bonding I pressed them together. In a few more seconds I had tucked the glue away and tested the chair’s arm. It felt solid. The chair still looked decrepit, but at least it wasn’t going to come apart on me.

  The sound of many people’s feet tromping across the stone floor made me look up. The remaining lords entered the hall, followed by the King and his usual swarm of pages. Commander Yervan, as always an impressive figure in his gold-trimmed plate, preceded the group and came over to join me.

  “Dame Chrissie,” he said, giving me a little bow, which I returned. “His Majesty is pleased to see that you have arrived as requested.”

  I stood and gave him a wry smile. “I wouldn’t ignore my liege’s first requests of me, Commander.”

  He nodded his approval, then cleared his throat as if he were embarrassed. “His Majesty has also made it clear to all concerned that you will remain sitting to the right of the throne today. The court you attended the day before last never came to order, due to the news of the Albess’ death. So it did not ‘count’ as your first attendance.”

  It really didn’t matter to me, given the fact that Behnaz and Ivor equally loathed my presence at court. I simply nodded and moved to grab the back of the chair. Maybe this time I could get it to make its scraping sound in a whole new key.

  “And it was decided unanimously during yesterday’s court that you shall always receive assistance in your seating arrangements,” he quickly added. “Allow me, please.”

  Yervan picked up the heavy chair like it weighed nothing. I followed in his wake as he placed the chair between Fitzwilliam and Behnaz. One of the pages set up a little folding table before the King’s throne. A second group of servants wearing aprons entered and began setting out crocks of butter and baskets of baguette-style loaves at strategic intervals around the table. Others set out drinks and a quartet of azure-colored bowls. Each bowl contained a gleaming pile of lumpy, off-white crystals.

  The King, of course, got his own set of crock, loaf, cup, and bowl.

  “This is another custom of our court, Dame Chrissie,” Yervan explained, as he drew back to his position behind the throne. “Every third meeting, all the nobility present break bread and share salt together. It gives ballast to the stomach before taking on weightier matters.”

  I nodded and moved to take my own seat. Before I did, I pulled another item from my world out of a handy pocket. It wasn’t anything more than a thick triangle of plastic, so I doubted that Fitzwilliam would object. I took the little wedge I’d been using in my office as a doorstop and jammed it under my chair’s short leg to use as a shim. Then I settled into my seat, wobble-free for the first time.

  My effort didn’t go unnoticed.

  The King nodded in my direction. “You seem to have landed on your feet a little better today, Dame Chrissie.”

  “At least a little more evenly, Sire,” I agreed. One of the baskets of loaves finally made it down to my end of the table. Lord Behnaz performed the same actions as the other lords further down the way, grabbing a loaf from the basket, he tore off roughly a third, and then swiped the torn end across the butter.

  I darted forward as soon as the man’s hands had cleared the basket. There was no way I wanted to share bread with the man, so I tore the end off an untouched loaf and brushed it across the open crock. Behnaz scowled as I did so but didn’t say anything, which was fine by me.

  The bread had been baked so recently that it was still warm in its fluffy white core. And while the butter looked pale enough to use for spackle, it had a fresh flavor that put anything
I’d had out of a box or plastic tub to shame. I chewed happily, decided against drinking anything, and watched the curious movement of the last ingredient on the table.

  The bowls of salt were shifted from individual to individual. Most every person reached into the container, grabbed a pinch, and sprinkled it on the buttered end of their bread. I noticed, however, that the bowls only went about halfway down towards the far end. I craned my neck and for the first time saw that, while knights and lords were somewhat intermingled along the table’s length, lords predominated the closer you got to the king.

  So that’s what it means to be ‘above the salt’, I realized. It’s an Andeluvian colloquialism for achieving a certain social status. Pity about the neighbors you get up here, though.

  A salt bowl had finally worked its way up towards my end. I reached out for it, only to have it nudged just out of reach by Lord Behnaz. I scowled at the man, but he ignored me and simply chewed more loudly on his bread.

  For a moment I contemplated drop-kicking the man’s shin, but sanity intervened. Instead I got out of my seat, inviting a couple of sniggers from the assembled lords, and snagged a small pinch of salt. I sat back, ground the crystals up in my fingers over the butter and munched on it defiantly.

  “Let us bring this session of the royal court to order,” Fitzwilliam announced, as he sat down the remains of a neatly buttered and salted slice on his plate. “Today we begin with matters of trade that have been relegated to the back bench for too long.”

  Things went better from there. I wouldn’t say that it was exactly interesting, but it was a relief from being the center of attention – or at least nasty gossip. The details involved everything from the movement of iron ore to wagonloads of cabbages. And it turned out to be a strange combination of homeowner’s association meeting, rowdy kindergarten class, and bar brawl.

  “…promised that carts would go the left-way-round the northern pike…”

  “…wouldn’t go a quarter-furlong on the metal in those horseshoes…”

  “…and a fist for your damned cabbages!” (This one was followed by a scuffle.)

  “…as if my wife would take a ‘royal share’ of the route!”

  “…your wife takes my ‘royal share’ and she likes it!” (This one was also followed by a scuffle, which Commander Yervan had to break up with his plate-armored fists.)

  My chair didn’t list as badly as a sinking ship anymore, but the lumpy cushion made me want to shift around like a restless ten year old. To make matters worse, Lord Behnaz had apparently learned that I hated the cologne worn by his now-deceased Air Cavalry commander. Every few minutes he would spritz himself with the stuff, sending up a noxious cloud of cloying fragrance that smelled like bergamot mixed with rancid sweat. I gritted my teeth and forced myself to look thoughtful and composed.

  My salvation came after about an hour or so of slow torture. In the middle of a mind-numbing discussion about the grading of leather and whose commoners produced the best in the land, a page with a Dutch-boy haircut stepped forth and broke into the discussion.

  “Pardons all, my Lords,” he announced. “A griffin wishes to enter and request a boon from His Majesty.”

  Fitzwilliam, whose eyes had already glazed over long ago, looked happy for a break in the tedium. He nodded, and the page returned with Grimshaw in tow. Shaw looked winded, his feathers disarrayed by a recent blustery flight, but he still projected his usual bluff hardiness.

  “Your Majesty,” Shaw intoned, as he spread his wings in a full bow. “News hath come that I must share with thy court’s newest addition. I must ask thee a boon: release Dame Chrissie so that I may convey it within her demesne.”

  Fitzwilliam sighed, obviously hoping for a longer distraction from business as usual. “Granted,” he said, and he nodded in my direction.

  Once again, all eyes were on me as I got out of my chair, knelt down to retrieve my shim, and then followed Grimshaw out the main entrance. As we walked, I caught his eye and casually flicked my finger in the direction of the ceiling. He nodded, and kept silent until we had reached the turret room and had shut the heavy wooden door behind us.

  “My thanks,” he said, “For reminding me that owls yet shadow us in this place.”

  I gave his neck a scratch, which he gladly accepted. “And you have my own thanks for getting me out of a rather boring meeting.”

  “I bring news, but I am unsure whether it shall help thee.”

  “Let’s have it.”

  Shaw moved to lie down on one of the big black and red rugs that carpeted the room’s floor. “The High Elder says that it has been over a year since she spoke with Albess Thea. Rather, she spoke within the last fortnight with Raisah of the Noctua. The ‘Anointed’, as she styles herself, asked about wyverns.”

  That got my attention. “Go on.”

  “Raisah hadst heard rumor of a great battle near the aerie. She wished to know if the areas to the north and west of Fitzwilliam’s capital were safe for her people.”

  “Which is right in the area where Thea was killed.” I mulled that one over for a bit, but had to throw cold water on it. “Too much of a stretch. I certainly recall the battle that Raisah asked about. As for the areas north and west of here…according to Liam, that’s just part of the owls’ normal hunting grounds. It makes Raisah’s query a prudent one, if anything.”

  There came a knock on the door. Before I could answer, Galen shouldered his way in. The centaur had a neatly folded bundle of cloth in his arms.

  “A most exceptional morning to you both, Dayna, Grimshaw,” the wizard said, as he trotted over to the table and began to lay out his package. “I was returning from dropping off the borrowed footwear and cloak with Lady Behnaz when I ran into our very own Lord of the Pursuivant. He asked me to convey these garments to you.”

  Galen took a step back so that I could come up and see what he’d laid out. The first item I picked up was a long-sleeved silver garment that reminded me of a rather ritzy sweater. The knitted fabric was dense and well put together, and the sleeves ended in fur-trimmed cuffs. I next looked at the padded vest or doublet that Herald had sent me. It had a pleasing violet shade and, as Andeluvian fashion trended away from buttons, could be done up with a series of silver buckles. To top it off, I’d received a charcoal gray cloak with yet more fur-trimmings around the hood.

  I held each piece up to the light and turned it back and forth before shucking my jacket and everyday top. I took a deep breath, as if I were diving into cold water, and shrugged my way into the sweater.

  It fit beautifully. So did the other two items of clothing. Galen produced a large hand mirror from one if his myriad pockets and held it up for me, allowing me to get a decent look at myself. Yes, this was no time to be playing fashionista, even for a tiny bit. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the new clothes looked pretty darn good. I was ready to step onto the stage of whatever medieval or fantasy epic was filming down on the Hollywood lots, by my estimation. At least, if they shot me from the waist up. The jeans and modern day hiking boots would probably have broken the illusion.

  “Thou looks properly Andeluvian for the first time,” Shaw observed, with a leonine chortle.

  “It does look pretty keen,” I admitted. “But the important thing is: it’ll keep me warm.”

  “That is good, for today is the best time to fly to Sir Talish’s estate,” Galen said. “While I have no new information from the court, I just received a message from Protector Liam that he is ready to meet you there.”

  “And we know the owls will be watching for us,” I said grimly. “Let’s go, Shaw. I want to see exactly how the Albess met her end.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Grimshaw circled a large clearing that was equal parts blue, green, and brown. The blue came from the reflection of the sky in a little pond, the green from the pines that made up the bulk of the forest eaves, and the brown from the skeletal stalks of long-dead rows of sunflowers. The griffin selected a spot close
to the edge of the pond and came in for a feather-soft landing.

  I slipped off Shaw’s back gracefully, now that I’d had a decent amount of practice from my time with his people. I did a couple of deep knee bends to restore circulation in my legs, but that was due more to the long flight than the cold. Though my lips felt a little chapped, the clothing that Herald had tailor-made for me did its job and kept me comfortably warm.

  Two cervine figures appeared silently at the forest’s edge. I recognized Liam’s mismatched brown and green eyes immediately. The other, a huskier stag with a chest full of rust-red fur, followed in his wake.

  Liam and his companion made a bow in that uniquely deer like, adorable way that only the Fayleene could pull off. The huskier stag looked unsure and awkward about our presence, but Liam was confident and aglow with excitement.

  “Ardan,” Liam began proudly. “Allow me to introduce you to Dame Dayna Chrissie, and Grimshaw of the Reykajar aerie. They normally go by ‘Dayna’, and ‘Shaw’. Dayna, Shaw, allow me to introduce Ardan, the very first of my Rangers.”

  “I am honored to meet you,” Ardan said, in a similarly Gaelic-tinged voice. “I do not know either of you personally, but I witnessed how you both helped escort my people to their new home in the Grove of the Willows.”

  Shaw returned the bow in his gruff manner. I shook my head in wonderment as I said, “And the honor is ours, Ardan. But I’ve never heard of a Fayleene ‘ranger’ before!”

  “That’s because none have existed before,” Liam informed me. “Thanks to you, Galen, and Shaw, I’ve gotten to see realms far different than the Fayleene woods, and I realized my people’s ways could use some updating.”

  Shaw looked puzzled. “What dost thou mean?”

  “Consider the disaster that took place at the aerie only recently. Many of the griffin’s rulers were killed or wounded. But did their leadership come to an end?” Shaw shook his head, and Liam went on. “We Fayleene have always relied upon one mystical figure – the Protector – and that’s our vulnerable point.”