Between Frames (The City Between Book 4)

by W. R. Gingell

  Zero, sharply, asked, “It’s not him? Again?”

  I could have laughed my relief if it wasn’t for the fact that someone actually was still dead—if it wasn’t for the fact that I was still in trouble. “Did someone do a glamour again?”

  Zero stooped for a closer look at something I couldn’t see, his eyes running over the corpse from head to toe.

  “It’s really not him,” he said. “It’s a glamour again. This one is fae, I think.”

  “It can’t be a fae glamour,” said Athelas, rather grimly. “I would have noticed it this time.”

  “It’s not fae magic,” Zero said. “It’s human. The corpse is fae, but the magic is human.”

  “Hang on, humans can have magic?”

  None of them answered me. JinYeong laughed again, his eyes bright and malicious, and said something I couldn’t follow.

  “Indeed,” agreed Athelas. “Perhaps our murderer would have better luck picking someone at random this time. He doesn’t seem to be able to keep up with who is his intended victim and who is not.”

  “He’s broken his pattern again, too,” remarked Zero. “Perhaps that will be useful to us.”

  “Or he knew the bloke was fae again,” I said. All three of them looked at me, and I added defensively, “Well, you said there would be one human murder and four Behindkind ones. Maybe he knew this fae was pretending to be human. Maybe he didn’t care about what games they were playing. It could be the start of one of his rampages, again. If it is, there should be two more Behindkind murders and a dead human somewhere, right?”

  “Perhaps,” said Zero, but there was a worried line between his eyes. “But I find myself doubting it. I’ve never seen him do something like this before. We’ve found the fae bodies before the human bodies at times, but that was merely a matter of us coming across them at the wrong times. What’s made him change his pattern now? Why this fae—or human, if he thought it was a human? And most importantly, why did the Enforcers think this is an heirling?”

  Athelas laughed suddenly, a bright, amused sound that was more than his usual soft, chuckle. “Ah, this really is a puzzle! My lord, has it occurred to you that this human who seems to keep being murdered could be a harbinger?”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Trouble,” said Zero briefly.

  “For the Family and the crown, certainly,” said Athelas. “Not something that need trouble us, however.”

  JinYeong only grinned, but he’s mostly trouble in a suit himself, so it was probably just fellow-feeling.

  “So the old mad bloke is a harbinger?” If the old mad bloke was a harbinger, what did that mean?

  “It seems likely,” Zero said, surprising me by answering. “Your neighbour across the road has been surrounded by trouble, attracts danger, and has escaped death multiple times. Not unusual when you deal with Behind, but to survive it all and still be drawing trouble would suggest special status.”

  “So it’s what, a special position Behind?”

  “Something like that. But it’s a born position, not a given one.”

  “What’s a harbinger do?”

  “Sow discord, bring rebellion, attract danger—and heirlings,” added Athelas. “How very interesting, my lord! If a harbinger has indeed shown up, it would seem that you have less time than you hoped.”

  “You got any idea what they’re talking about?” I asked JinYeong.

  He shrugged and said in Korean, “I’m too young. There is one ruler Behind since my turning.”

  “What use are you, then?” I demanded in disgust, and went back to listening to Athelas and Zero. Even if they talked in circles, at least they knew something.

  JinYeong made a sniffy little laugh and crouched beside the corpse again.

  “Do you mean we’re gunna have heirlings appearing all around Hobart?” I asked Zero. “Is this the Behind apocalypse or something?”

  “The apoc—well.” Zero stopped, and I saw him glance at Athelas, who was still looking distinctly amused. “It’s a fairly accurate summary, if it comes to that. When the full cycle of a ruler’s reign comes about in Behind, the world itself works together to shake off the old for the new. heirlings begin to be born, and a harbinger works his way through the cracks to draw heirlings to himself.”

  “So heirlings are potential Behind leaders, and the harbinger is like the guardian of them all?”

  “The harbinger is perhaps closer to being a catalyst,” Athelas said. “I find it interesting, my lord, that our contacts told us about this death in particular. Do you think they knew the significance of it?”

  “They might have thought he was a harbinger,” Zero said, nodding once. “If so, they’re probably the ones who tried to kill him.”

  “Hide a body in a graveyard,” said JinYeong, still clear to understand, shrugging one shoulder. “It is sensible.”

  Good grief, no wonder the old mad bloke was as mad as he was. I’d already thought it must have taken a toll on him, always being surrounded by weird stuff happening everywhere, but if he was a harbinger, it had probably been weird since he was a kid.

  I asked, “What if he doesn’t want to be a harbinger?”

  “He has very little choice in the matter. Even were he to give up the position, it would be difficult to convince anyone that he’d done so.”

  “But he can give it up?”

  “Indeed. One assumes he does not wish to do so.”

  “Reckon I would, by now.”

  “Perhaps he’s of your mind, Pet,” suggested Athelas, with a gentle humour. “Perhaps he feels that heirlings as well as other humans ought to be protected. Perhaps he sees it as his duty to them.”

  “That one should stay away from our pet, then,” said JinYeong, startlingly understandable. “Our pet is protected.”

  “And not an heirling,” Athelas said, with slightly more pointed gentleness.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I don’t want it!”

  “Being an heirling isn’t something a person can give up,” Zero said. There was a heaviness of experience in his voice. “You can run away from the expectation of it, but it follows in one way or another.”

  “Indeed,” murmured Athelas, and I thought he laughed, though it could have been sorrow I saw in his eyes, too.

  “I will take the blood,” said JinYeong. “What else, hyeong? Nan Petteuleul daerigoyo?”

  “I don’t want to go with you,” I told him indignantly. “I’ll go with Zero.”

  JinYeong made a pft sound that managed to be disparaging and sulky at the same time and disappeared through a writhing of vines on the wall beside him.

  “Should I see what there is to be seen at the police station?” enquired Athelas.

  Zero said, “That will likely be troublesome for the detective.”

  “No worries,” said Tuatu, approaching us. “They’ve already connected me with you. It won’t be any worse if he comes with me.”

  “You gunna be all right?” I asked Athelas.

  “Certainly. This time I shall not permit myself to be captured.”

  “Not being captured is a good choice,” I said, even though it wasn’t exactly what I’d meant. To Detective Tuatu, I said, “You better make him a nice cuppa. And give him some of the bikkies you keep in your desk drawer.”

  “How do you know what I keep in my desk drawer?” demanded the detective, startled, but Athelas, pinching the sleeve of his shirt, drew him into Between through a slight ripple between the gate before I could answer him.

  I heard the faintest echo of his voice saying to the detective, “We have some matters to discuss, I think,” and that was worrying enough to make me gaze after them for quite some time.

  “Athelas will manage,” said Zero’s voice. “There’s no need to worry. Follow me; I’m going to see how far I can track the murdered fae Between before I lose the trail. If he’s fae, he came from somewhere Between. We might be able to identify him while the glamour wears off.”

  “Okay,” I said
. “But if dinner is late tonight, it’s your fault.”

  I don’t know whether Zero was sniffing him out or following a trail that only he could see, but it took us inside the house we’d found the body outside. We paused briefly at the stairs, and didn’t go Between until we were in the kitchen, where there was still a cup of tea sitting with the milk making a scum along the top.

  “Who lived here?” I asked. “The fae? Did a human glamor him, or did the murderer?”

  “If the murderer glamoured him, the murderer is a human,” said Zero. “And considering most humans don’t even know about Between and Behind, I very much doubt that. I’ve also seen his work Behind, and I’m certain a human couldn’t manage that.”

  “Yeah, but it’s not like it’s particularly reasonable that a human is going around putting glamours on people, either. Hang on, though: what if the human knew he was going to be murdered and didn’t want to die?”

  “You think your old neighbour glamoured the fae.”

  “Don’t tell me you didn’t think the same thing,” I said. “So this human”—the old mad bloke, but somehow I didn’t want to think about that—“this human didn’t want to die, and he knew there was a fae here, so he glamoured them and ran away before the murderer got here.”

  “The interesting thing,” Zero said, opening the pantry door, “is that if it’s so, this human has to be a harbinger. We were told the body was an heirling, but I’d give a lot to know whether the Family knew it was false when they told us.”

  He stepped into the pantry as he said it, and I followed, tripping over a huge bag of flour and leaving a few white footprints behind as I staggered Between.

  “How do you lot know who are heirlings and harbingers, anyway?”

  “By the way they interact with the world around them. And occasionally, the amount of dead bodies around them.”

  “So you look at the old mad bloke and see all the deaths and the magic that someone’s doing, and you say, yep, that one’s a harbinger!”

  “Something like that,” Zero said, as the shelves turned to a ladder by his shoulder. “Up we go, Pet. Follow me closely.”

  I did so. I didn’t like the way the darkness above us swallowed up the ladder, not to mention Zero’s shoulders. We went rung over rung until we reached a ledge, but the ladder began again after that, a bit wider. It wasn’t the easiest climb I’ve had, but we’d only seen one person—creature?—going down while we were going up. Most of the things I met Between were actively trying to kill or imprison me, so I was pretty pleased with that.

  I was a bit slower this time in following Zero, which was lucky, because just as his boot came level with my face, a little trapdoor opened between the rungs, and a goblin head popped out.

  It grinned at me with murder in its eyes, and put a single, knobbly finger up to its lips. Then it raised its hand and stabbed its needle through Zero’s boot.

  “Don’t do that!” I said, and punched it in the face.

  It squeaked and dropped its needle setup, and fell onto the ledge. I heard it a moment later, wailing at the top of its lungs as it ran for cover, and saw a last flash of wide, rolling eyes as it disappeared into the shadows. I might have felt sorry for it if I hadn’t seen the gleeful murder in its eyes as it stabbed Zero’s foot.

  “Those won’t kill me,” Zero said, dropping back down to the ledge.

  “I know,” I said. “You told me ages ago. They’re for knocking people out.”

  “Bring them,” he said, and stood up again. He turned on his heel and went on along the ledge instead of up again without waiting for me. I scrambled for the needles and hurried after him, stuffing the tiny apparatuses into my front pockets.

  “Hang on, I know they’re not gunna kill you, but are they going to do anything to you?”

  “Yes,” said Zero, even more briefly. “We need to be home before that happens.”

  “Okay,” I panted, “but don’t forget that your legs are a lot flamin’ longer than mine!”

  I don’t think he actually remembered, because it didn’t slow him down much. He didn’t ever let me drop out of sight, but he didn’t give me any chance to breathe, either; he forged a path through Between at a lope, his leather jacket a patch of darkness to follow in the changing world around me.

  Sometimes I can sense we’re about to get home just before we do, when it comes to Between. Sometimes. This time, I don’t think we were even halfway there when Zero stopped suddenly, causing me to walk into his back, and turned sharply to the left.

  That took us into a walk-in freezer that must have been in someone’s restaurant in the human world. Here, it was neither freezer nor something else, just cold and weird and slightly slimy.

  “Oi,” I said, startled. “What are we doing?”

  “Shut the door,” he said, swaying.

  I shut it, pulling back on the emergency open to do so, and there was a cavernous sort of boom as it sealed. There must be a heck of a lot more to this place Behind than there was in the human world. Fortunately, there wasn’t as much cold here Between, and the walls were solid enough when I looked around it.

  Zero pushed me gently to the side and ran his hand around the inside seal of the door. Straight away, things got a decent bit cooler, though still not as cold as they would have been if we were right in the freezer, and the outline of the freezer walls got clearer.

  Still swaying in a way that worried me, he walked along one of the walls with his hand trailing through the frost until he reached the far end, and sat on the floor with his knees bent and his forearms resting on them.

  “Hang on, what are you doing?”

  “Sitting down,” he said.

  I followed him. “Yeah, I can see that, but why?”

  “I’m about to be slightly drunk,” he said.

  “Behindkind can get drunk?”

  “Anyone can get drunk, if you’ve got the right kind of stimulant. Those needles don’t knock me out, but they do…make havoc in my body.”

  “What, you don’t want people to see you stagger?”

  “Call Athelas. Tell him he needs to come and get you.”

  “What, you’re a nasty drunk? Rubbish!” I knew a few things about people who got drunk, and the most important thing I’d learned was that the drink didn’t change them; it just took away their inhibitions against doing whatever they wanted to do. People who were nasty deep down got nasty. People who weren’t, got happy.

  “I’m not—in this state, I can’t keep you safe, and the Sandman is still lurking. Sit still and call Athelas.”

  “We’re in a freezer,” I said, wiggling my phone at him. “There’s no signal.”

  There was silence for a few moments before Zero gave a huge sigh that gusted around us. “Of course there is not,” he said.

  “Oi,” I said, sitting down next to him. “You sounded like a human then.”

  “I am part human.”

  “Yeah, but you don’t usually sound like it.”

  “Are you trying to irritate me, Pet?”

  “Athelas says that it’s being part human that makes you able to be an heirling.”

  “Ah, you are trying to irritate me.”

  I grinned. “I would never.”

  Zero might have given the smallest grin, but he tilted his head back to rest against the wall so that I couldn’t see it, and when he next spoke, it was to say, “You didn’t call for me.”

  “Knew you were coming,” I said, but that wasn’t quite true. I’d also known JinYeong was coming. Was it the fact that I hadn’t been as much frightened this time? Or maybe just the fact that I hadn’t been acting in mindless fear?

  “I see,” he said. “Next time, call anyway. Pet, how long have you known the harbinger was following you?”

  “Since I was a kid,” I said, my grin fading away. This was the bit…this was the part where he would kick me out of my house.

  But he didn’t sound angry, just tired. “How long have you known he was still following you after w
e thought he was dead the second time?”

  This time, my voice was only a mutter. “The whole time. After we found the bits and pieces of his body, and the ash, I saw him alive. He wanted me to see him.”

  “You need to talk more.”

  I meant to say sorry, but I said, “That’s flamin’ rich,” before I could stop myself, instead.

  A soft, deep disturbance of sound shook Zero’s shoulders for a moment, and it took me far too long to realise that he was laughing. By the time I realised it, he was serious again.

  “There’s no necessity for me to talk,” he said.

  I wanted to protest that, but I’d already been cheeky instead of apologising, so I said, “Sorry.”

  “I can’t protect you if I don’t know what’s happening around you. Next time…just tell me.”

  “I know. I was afraid you lot might kill him.”

  “We would have discussed it,” Zero said. “But I doubt we would have decided to kill him. Perhaps we would wipe his memories to be safe.”

  “You gotta catch him first.”

  “Indeed,” said Zero, and there was a thoughtfulness to his voice. “He is…oddly difficult to catch, for a human.”

  “Maybe Athelas is right, and he’s a harbinger.”

  “I hope not, though it does seem likely.”

  “Anyway,” I said, “I’ll tell you next time I see him.”

  I said that because I couldn’t tell him that I wouldn’t hide something like that from him again; not when I was still not planning on telling him about Morgana. There had to be something that this Behind-tainted life of mine didn’t touch, and it was far too late for the old mad bloke. If there was one thing I was going to keep safe from Behind and Between, it was Morgana. It was bad enough that she’d already seen JinYeong—and that she was currently sharing her house with a lycanthrope.

  “Oh yeah,” I said, and I couldn’t help the stray thought that fluttered through my head—the one that said if I told him this, he would trust me more, suspect anything else less. “Full disclosure, though; I’m researching what it is that could be after Mr. Preston.”

  “I know,” he said; and though he was short, I was pretty sure he was pleased that I’d told him.

  Was it Athelas in my head, so approving while I felt guilty? Or was I changing in ways that I hadn’t expected? Changing like the old mad bloke, maybe.