Storm's Heart

Page 42

He grew grim as she talked. “What was the part that hurt you the most?”
Her gaze fell.
Everything clenched inside him. Maybe you can’t make this better, she had said. Sometimes things just hurt. A ball of burning lava lodged in his chest. “It was the thought of never having children, wasn’t it?”
She shook her head. “It started there, but you know, mostly I think I’m having a problem with the concepts of ‘forever’ and ‘never.’ I don’t want to think in absolutes. I’m not dying to have children, but I also don’t want to say I’ll never have them, especially just to placate other people. And I am not thrilled with the thought of committing to the Dark Fae throne for the rest of my life, especially today of all days.” She looked up, met his gaze, and the shock of the connection between them was deeper and more profound than ever. She whispered, “There’s only one thing and one person right now I am wholly committed to, and that’s you.”
He made his lungs expand and discovered he could breathe again. He cupped her face in both hands and kissed her, savoring the texture of her soft open lips.
“Only one person,” he whispered. Only one thing.
She put her cheek against his and nuzzled him. “Would you like children some day?”
“I don’t know,” he said. He ran his hands down her shapely back. “Maybe. I like children. I would like your children. I must confess, this is not a subject to which I have given much thought.”
“Me neither,” she sighed. She switched to telepathy. You know, we might decide some day that I should abdicate. I would like to see how we feel about things after we’ve opened the Dark Fae borders and brought the rest of my family’s murderers to justice. I don’t think we need to stress too much over the long term when meeting our short-term goals is enough of a challenge.
That is a good point, he said. One step at a time. Now, about marriage.
She kissed him. What about it?
Do you require this ritual for happiness? We can always marry in secret, if you like. He brushed a lock of her hair out of her beautiful eyes.
She stuck out her lower lip and grumbled, I would like to point out I am actually much more Wyr than anybody has given me credit for thus far. I mean, hello, I moved in with you all when I was seventeen, remember. I know to a lot of you geriatrics that’s not such a long time ago, but it’s quite a significant length of time to me. Tiago, are we mated or not?
We are indeed, he said.
She went nose-to-nose with him. And will you have me and no other?
I will. He touched her delicate skin. And will you have me and no other?
For the rest of my life. She smiled. “So I reckon that’s that.”
“I reckon it is.” He smiled back.
“Here, drink your coffee before it gets any colder.” She leaned sideways to pick up the cup on the floor by his chair and paused. She cocked her head. “What is this package?”
He leaned over and looked at it too. “It’s the next thing on my to-do list after I talk with you.”
“What’s in it?”
“I don’t know. It’s a message from a dead woman.” Niniane looked at him quickly, and he explained how he had acquired it.
“How could you not open it right away?” she exclaimed. She snatched the packet up and thrust it into his hands.
“It has quite a high priority rating,” he said. “But making sure you were okay was the most important thing to me.”
“I think that’s one of the sweetest things you’ve ever said to me.” She slid off his lap to kneel on the ground in front of him. She leaned against his legs and nodded to the package. “Hurry up, open it.”
He turned it over in his hands, considering. It was roughly nine inches by six or seven, and more or less flat, wrapped in leather and bound with a thin length of cord that was firmly knotted. He pulled out a pocketknife and slit the strip. Then he folded back the leather cover. Inside was a manila envelope that had been folded in half. He opened the envelope and pulled out the contents.
The message from the dead woman came in the form of corporation papers, owned by a dead man.
The papers were for Tri-State Financial Services, complete with bank account and checkbook. The company supposedly had been incorporated by Cuelebre Enterprises, but the single shareholder listed was Urien Lorelle.
Son of a bitch.
A little while later, Niniane lay curled in a pile of pillows on the floor near the brazier. Tiago had erupted out of the chair to prowl the confines of the tent when they had discovered the contents of the packet. After the stress of the broken night, her energy had already been at low ebb. He had far more stamina than she ever would. She couldn’t keep up with him and didn’t even try.
He had paused in his furious pacing to drape a soft woolen blanket over her curled form. Then he opened one of the nylon coolers that he had tucked into one corner of the tent the evening before. He piled a variety of foods onto a plate, which included quintessential American fare like fried chicken, potato salad, and cherry and apple turnovers. Then he slapped the laden plate on the floor in front of her and ordered her with a glare to eat, the warlord mother hen at his finest.
So she rested, watched him and nibbled.
Then Aryal’s voice sounded just outside the tent. “So you two clowns are on guard duty now? Good for you. Move or I’ll break your legs.”
Niniane choked on a piece of potato, coughed and swallowed hard. She exclaimed, “Aryal!”
Tiago stopped pacing and turned to the front of the tent.
“What!” Aryal snapped back. The harpy sounded even more bad-tempered than usual. “They’ve been taking the same trip we have. You would think they would know by now they don’t have to guard you from me or Rune.”
Niniane let her head fall back on a pillow and covered her eyes with one hand. She said to Tiago, “Now is not the time for anyone to be working my last nerve.”
“I feel you on that one,” he said between his teeth. His upper lip curled in a snarl.
Then with exquisite politeness, a Dark Fae male said, “Your highness, forgive me for interrupting you at your rest. Wyr sentinels Aryal and Rune request an audience with you.”
Close on the heels of that, Aryal’s sarcastic mutter was clearly audible. “Ding-fucking-dong. Ooh, what a surprise. Someone’s at the door.”
Rune said, “This is why you have so few friends, dipshit.”
Niniane clapped her other hand over her mouth. Don’t laugh. After a moment she managed to say, “Thank you for letting me know. . . .” She lifted her fingers from her eyes to squint at Tiago.
That one is Bruin, Tiago told her.
“Thank you, Bruin. Aryal and Rune may enter.”
“Yes, your highness,” said the soldier.
She muttered, “Although if they don’t start pretending to have some manners I’m going to kick them out again.”
Tiago put his hands on his hips. “You’ll have to get in line, faerie.”
She sat up as the sentinels stepped into the tent. Her exasperation faded as she got a good look at them. They were streaked with mud and dirt, and both looked tired. Aryal’s gaze fell on her plate. The harpy’s expression turned hopeful and she started forward. “There’s food?”
Tiago smacked Aryal in the back of the head. It didn’t look like a gentle blow. “Touch her plate and die.”
“Ow!” Aryal glared at him and rubbed the back of her head.
“There’s still plenty in the cooler,” Niniane told them.
Rune had already gone to investigate. He bit half the meat off a chicken leg in one bite and chewed as he stretched his neck first one way then the other. “We’ve done all we can,” he said around his mouthful. “Durin and one of Kellen’s attendants have treated Arethusa’s body with herbs and wrapped it, so it’s ready to be transported to Adriyel for a proper burial.”
Wyr tended to prefer cremation, so when Rune mentioned a “proper” burial, which was more of a Dark Fae concept, it was clear he was speaking to the two sets of ears on the other side of the tent walls. Tiago shook his head and strode outside. Niniane, Rune and Aryal fell silent. They listened as he told the two guards, “We have too many guards and not enough off-rotation. I’ll send for the next pair when we need them. For now, go get some shut-eye.”
“Yes, sir.”
Tiago reappeared. He scooped up Niniane, blanket and all, and settled in a chair again with her in his lap. Rune carried the cooler to the second chair, and Aryal sprawled on the floor beside him. The two sentinels divided the cooler’s contents between them.
Niniane rested her forehead in the crook of Tiago’s neck and let her eyes drift half closed. Tiago told the other two, “Spill it.”
Aryal licked sugar from a turnover off of her fingers. “Inconclusive. We’re Wyr on Dark Fae land. We can only request others’ cooperation; we can’t command it. We could only take things so far when we questioned people.”
The growl started so low in Tiago’s chest, Niniane was probably the only one who heard it. She put her flattened hand against his heavy pectoral, stroking, and he quieted.
Rune said, “Arethusa’s body has a wound behind one ear, caused by a blow made with some kind of blunt object, but her death looks consistent with drowning. Theoretically she could have slipped, hit her head and drowned, but it’s clear by how everyone is acting that nobody believes her death was an accident. The problem is, there’s simply no proof. Whoever killed her knew just what to do. They watched and waited until most of the encampment was asleep or in their tents. They had to have waded in the water because there’s no definitive scent in the immediate area.”
“Don’t misunderstand, there are plenty of scents and plenty of tracks,” Aryal muttered. “We scoured every inch of the riverbank, and they’re all over the goddamn place. And almost everybody has something wet or damp in their possession. The whole camp has been down to the river at some point, to either wash or haul water.”
Rune opened the container of potato salad. He took the fork Niniane had left on her abandoned plate and began shoveling food into his mouth. He said, “I think the killer did the simplest thing possible and bashed her over the head with a rock, threw the murder weapon into the water and let the river take care of the rest. Maybe it was someone Arethusa trusted, or at least someone she discounted as a threat, or maybe it was someone capable of sneaking up behind her and catching her by surprise. It had to be one or the other. Arethusa wouldn’t have turned her back to just anybody.”
The thought of such quiet, calculating malice made Niniane shudder. Tiago cupped her cheek. His fingers curled around the back of her neck, underneath her hair, and he stroked her face with his thumb. He nodded to the manila envelope on the floor and told Aryal and Rune, “Look at what Arethusa left for me, in care of one of her men.”
Aryal pulled out the checkbook and papers. The harpy held them up so she and Rune could both stare at them. Rune murmured, “That’s motive right there, baby.”
“Here’s how I piece it together,” Tiago said. “Someone works on Geril and gets him to try to kill Niniane. That someone also has access to Urien’s mansion, finds this bogus company in his files and decides to use it. If Geril succeeds, he gets paid. If fallout from Niniane’s death causes an investigation that uncovers the payment, the Wyr get blamed. Only Arethusa talked to us, so she didn’t stop digging when she was supposed to, and she found this file. She kept quiet because she knew one of the Dark Fae had done it, but she wasn’t sure who.”
“She wouldn’t have had the authority to dig through Aubrey’s or Kellen’s belongings, not without creating a big stink,” Niniane said. “We would have heard if that had happened.”
“And we didn’t slink off in disgrace the way we were meant to,” Rune said. He sat forward, his elbows on his knees. “So—what, you think maybe someone discovered this file had gone missing? I wonder where it was when Arethusa found it.”
“Our someone wouldn’t have wanted to keep something so incriminating,” Tiago said. “The file was probably put back where it had been found in case it might be useful again, or better yet, it was hidden somewhere else, in a cubbyhole, or stuffed under towels in a linen closet. That was a big house. It had a lot of hiding places.”
“Our someone likes to hedge bets,” Rune said. “But he made another mistake by not destroying that file.”
Aryal yawned. She had stretched out on the floor, her long legs crossed at the ankle. She said in a drowsy voice, “I could start bitch-slapping people. Sooner or later somebody would squawk.”
Niniane was so tired. It had sunk deeper than her bones and become a cold ache that dragged at her spirits. It was exhaustion that made her eyes leak. It had to be.
She said, “I don’t know why you’re all being so circumspect. It’s not like you to dance around something instead of just saying it.”
Tiago’s arms tightened. He held her with his whole body, but it was Rune who asked, “What do you mean, pip-squeak?”
“Anybody who had been in that mansion could have found that file,” she said. “But the one who probably did was the one responsible for going through Urien’s financial papers, as well as for overseeing all the other Dark Fae financial matters.”
Aryal tilted her head to look at Niniane. The harpy wore a rare expression of sympathy.
Rune said, “You think the killer was Chancellor Aubrey.”
“I don’t want to think that,” she said. Her voice sounded small, and as cold as the rest of her had become. “But suspecting him without proof would have been more than enough reason to keep Arethusa quiet.” She tilted back her head to look up at Tiago. “What do you think?”