by Beth Lyons
“But Fara is the one that we know was magicked by a cleric. Remember: gentle repose.” I felt like I’d scored a point on Boleian, although I couldn’t see how the cases were related.
“True.” Boleian sat forward. “So maybe, possibly Farrell is the killer for one murder. Farrell might have killed Fara, but nothing says he killed Helena.”
Even had been watching this exchange intently. “Who would hire an assassin to kill an orphan girl?” She threw up her hands. “We’re traveling a circle.”
“Maybe not.” My mind began to race. “We don’t know Charles’ financial circumstance – if that’s even his real name, which I doubt. Maybe Fara was pregnant, and he had to get rid of her.”
“Who’s Charles?” asked Boleian.
“Pregnant? Pregnant!” Even hopped to her feet.
The room fell quiet, and Even held up her hand. “Sorry,” she whispered loudly to the others in the room, and then leaned in to me. “Explain yourself, Vox Swift!”
As I started to tell them about my conversation with Tez Fuller, I realized my mistake. “No, wait – which girl was a virgin? One of them was and one wasn’t. Tez says—” I looked at Even. “Teresa Ann Fuller, Fara’s friend at the orphanage? She said Fara was a virgin, but Del said that Helena’s the virgin and Fara isn’t. But Helena ran off with that boy back in Pildee, and Fara? She’s just an orphan girl….” I came up for air. “So seriously, which is which?”
My question met with silence.
Finally Boleian said, “I think I’m beginning to understand.” He nodded to himself. “Everything points toward a certain businessman we know.”
“Myy...” I dragged out the name in case I was wrong.
“Miles Edjrest no longer manages any of his business holdings. Farley Edjrest, he’s the man.” Boleian clapped his hands and stood. “You need to give our friend Miles an update, Vox. He shouldn’t be left in the dark.”
I remained seated. “What about me? I’m left in the dark.”
Boleian didn’t answer me. He turned toward Even, but before he could speak I said, “What about me, Boleian?”
“You have to ask yourself, Vox, why murder?” Boleian sat down. “That’s always the question. It was the question with Cirdore Forlone; it’s the question with Helena Grimwell and Fara Fram. Killing someone is an extreme reaction, wouldn’t you say?” He went on without waiting for a response. “What did Helena have that anyone would want? Half an apartment, a bunch of dresses.” Boleian looked at me from under those bushy eyebrows.
“The adoption,” I whispered. “Farley killed her? Farley?”
“He sent Beltine Byrd off east. Means and motive. Who else had something to kill for?”
“But what about—”
“No time, Vox! You need to go see Miles Edjrest.” Boleian stood again. “And Even, I could use a hand, if you can spare it?”
Even stood and said, “Yes, but I still don’t understand what’s going on.”
“Is this really necessary?” I asked. “You can update Edjrest. I have plans tonight.” My date with Jesskah, well dinner anyway. I might just have time to update the old man and then get to her place near Central, but I should change clothes – she’d seen me in this shirt this morning.
“All will become clear. Vox,” Boleian shooed me away with his hands. “Go see Miles Edjrest, but don’t tell him about Farley. I’ll join you, soon.”
I nodded. Fine, I wouldn’t change clothes.
Boleian went on. “Oh but do tell him about Beltine Byrd. You can hint that Farley abused his authority in transferring Byrd.”
“But—”
“Stay with him until I arrive. He may be in danger, too.”
“But—”
The two of them left me standing on the sidewalk, my protests unanswered. Just then I heard the bells of Saint Morrow toll four o’clock.
No good choices here, Vox. You can go to Central and see if Jesskah can come with you to the Edjrest estate. Mmm, Jesskah with Miles, not a good option given the broken engagement. I could send a message via Swift to tell Jesskah I’d be late, but that felt presumptuous – she said she was going to make dinner, and I didn’t want to spoil it.
If not one of those options, what was left? Hoping that Boleian would arrive so I could extract myself from Miles Edjrest before six? And what if Farley were there? If he really killed Helena – but how could he when she was on stage for everyone to see? But Boleian seemed awfully sure of himself. And so if Farley was at the house, I couldn’t let him out of my sight.
Could I get Jess to join me if I emphatically told her we’d catch a killer before the evening ended? Maybe I just wouldn’t mention his name.
###
As I hurried to Central I rolled over Boleian’s words. What did Boleian think I could do to help Miles Edjrest? The old man had an army of servants and men like Vance to protect him. Money can buy a lot of muscle.
Can it buy loyalty, though? If you pay a bodyguard, what’s to stop someone else from paying him more? Was that what worried Boleian? But if someone bought off Edjrest’s guards what did he think that one lone elf was going to do to thwart them?
I needed to ask Underwood about other bard spells. Nothing fancy – dancing lights or ghost sounds would be fine. Something to buy me time in a fight.
Time for what, though? Time to cast another spell? Time to run away? What I needed was a better strategy.
“How about any sort of strategy,” I muttered as I approached Central.
The lobby of Thornbury’s central police station was crowded. People of all races waited for loved ones to be released, while others stood two-deep at the sergeant’s desk clamoring for justice, information, or a sympathetic ear.
Passing by I heard a woman say, “She’s always been jealous of me.”
Jealousy didn’t seem to be our motive. If Boleian was right and Farley Edjrest had killed Helena, it was greed that drove him. He couldn’t stand to see her share in his inheritance.
But how did he do it? Farley would need powerful magic to convince people they were seeing Helena Grimwell singing at the Lamplighter when she had been dead at least 30 minutes.
I needed a look at Jesskah’s report on the Grimwell crime scene. Was it still on her desk? Or had that dwarf—
“Did you need something?”
Tundra Stonesten sat at her desk. I felt that I’d conjured her since I had just been thinking that the odds were good she’d locked away Jesskah’s notes.
I gave her my best smile. “Vox Swift – from this morning? I need to see Paladin Morningstar. And no, she’s not expecting me.”
“Sit there and don’t move.” The dwarf pointed to the chair by the door and then carefully closed a file before rising from her desk.
Seeing Tundra put me in mind of something. Had she said something about the case? No, it wasn’t her, but another dwarf— What was it? The answer sat at the edge of my mind. If I could—
“Vox? What are you doing here? I thought—”
“Do you have time to come with me? Boleian’s all but solved the case – the Grimwell case. Well, I helped him. Gave him the pivotal pieces. Anyway, I need to go see Miles Edjrest now. Before dinner. Before I can talk about Fara Fram. Before I can help you find Fara’s killer, I need to get Helena’s.” I paused for a breath. Jesskah hadn’t moved. I took her hand. “You were there at the start. Help me see it to the end.”
Chapter 23 Two Birds
With a yank Jesskah freed her hand. “Slow down! Start at the beginning, or I’m not going anywhere with you. My shift isn’t even over yet.”
I pulled her into the hall and leaned in. “Farley Edjrest,” I said softly, “killed Helena Grimwell. And I need to get to his house and make sure that he doesn’t try to kill his father next.” I was embellishing on Boleian’s directive, but so what?
“Farley?” Jesskah shook her head. “He’s a bit stuffy and self-centered, but he’s no murderer.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
“Proof. Yes, perfect. With your zone of—”
“I’m not a tool that you use when you need it.” Jesskah turned away.
“No, you’re a police officer. And that means you have to uphold the law. A girl is dead, Jesskah.” I stepped toward her. “Helena Grimwell’s life ended, and the man who did it thinks he got away with it.” I looked into her eyes. “Help me give her justice.”
After a long moment she said, “Let me get my coat.”
I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. The truth is that I was beginning to really like Jesskah Morningstar and paladin or no, I needed to know who she really was. Any woman who’d walk away from the chance to catch the bad guy – well, I didn’t need her in my life.
Jesskah came through the inner door, coat in hand. “I left word for Finn that you’d had a breakthrough in the case.” She hurried past me and down the stairs. “Keep up, Vox!”
The streets were crowded with workers heading home. Jesskah and I didn’t speak as we navigated the crowds. For my part, talking would have broken the illusion of the bubble of solitude that rush hour gives me. Surrounded by people yet utterly alone, I can let my thoughts wander.
Plus I rather enjoy silence, and I had to wonder if Jesskah felt the same way, but you can’t very well break the silence to ask someone if they enjoy it.
At the turn onto Sidel Alley, Jesskah stopped short. “Where are you going?”
“This is a shortcut. Trust me; I’ve been running around this city for almost two years.”
“And I’ve lived here my whole life. Hightower’s that way.” She pointed over her shoulder.
I started to laugh, and then realized she was right. “But I turned because....”
“Sometimes a path chooses us, Vox Swift.”
That wasn’t Jesskah’s voice, but I knew it all the same. “Wisdom.” I turned to see a hooded figure in the mouth of the alley. “Did you make me turn?”
“I can’t make you do anything, try as I might.” She stepped closer and pulled back her hood. The lined, creased face of Even Weymoor looked out at me. Gray hair swept back from her forehead.
Jesskah looked from the older woman to me. I said, “Wisdom, Jesskah. Jesskah, Wisdom. She’s Even Weymoor’s… relative. There’s this curse,” I sighed. “It’s a long story.”
“I told you not to seek vengeance.” Wisdom’s voice sounded loud in the alley. “And yet you search for it every night. You seek her with blackness in your heart. And the malice that surrounds Marilye, it will use that against you.”
“It’s just a scry spell. I haven’t been successful yet.” To Jesskah I said, “I’m still really new at this magic thing. Late bloomer.”
“You’re scrying? That’s really complex with the whole,” Jesskah waved her hand in front of her, “holy water basin and everything.”
“It’s a mirror. About so big.” I stretched out my arms to approximate the size when Widsom spoke again. “Two birds,” she said. “Two little birds without a nest. Help one and you help the other.”
“Are you talking about me and Jesskah?” Wisdom suddenly had my full attention. “Because we’re not—” I glanced at Jesskah and stepped closer to Wisdom. “We’re not together—”
“Words rarely mean only one thing.” Wisdom flipped her hood over her face, and her eyes glittered in the shadow. “Remember that.” She moved past me.
“Wait! You can’t just walk away. If you know something….”
“Here’s what I know, Vox Swift. I’ve been fearful far too long. That ends today; that ends right now.” With that she glided past me.
What in the world did that mean?
“Vox,” Jesskah put her hand on my arm. “If you really think that Farley killed Helena— I can’t quite believe that, but if he did, maybe he also killed Fara Fram. Is that possible?”
“No! Why in the world would he—” I stopped short as an image flashed in my head: the dwarf paladin Del Totely tracing a thick line of makeup along Helena’s jaw as her body lay crumpled in the Morningstar library. He said she didn’t know how to put on makeup, but that’s not true. Helena, veteran of the stage, knew how to put on makeup. But an orphan girl? Who’s gonna teach her to put on makeup, a nun?
The world went still as the idea crystallized in my mind: Fara is Helena and Helena is Fara. Could that be true? I’d gotten them confused more than once, and what if that was by design?
“I don’t understand it all yet,” I told Jesskah. “But I think you’re right.” The facts of the Grimwell case flashed through my mind – what she was wearing, when she was last seen alive. And I thought of what Fara’s friend Tez had told me about the events leading to Fara’s disappearance – the clothes, makeup, even the apartment on Treefall.
I said, “He knew about the adoption. Farley. Of course his father would tell him before he told Helena. Which gave Farley time to plan it out – the perfect murder. So many pieces, so many moving parts, but Farley at the center like a big, fat spider attuned to his web.”
“Miles Edjrest was going to adopt Helena?” Jesskah shook her head. “Why would he do that?”
“You can ask him yourself,” I said and took off at a jog toward the ritzy neighborhood of Hightower.
As we rounded the corner onto Gainly I stopped and put my hands on my thighs, trying to catch my breath before approaching Miles Edjrest’s front door.
“Thanks for going easy on me.” Jesskah wasn’t nearly as winded as me, but a glance at her face told me she was sincere.
“That was for me,” I said. “Being a detective,” pause for breath; “has ruined my conditioning.”
“I ran track in school. I liked the quiet.” Jesskah had taken off her coat sometime around Yarnel, and she now donned it again. She ran her fingers through her hair fluffing it out. “Ready?”
With a nod I started down the street. In the distance I could see a man sitting on the steps leading to Edjrest’s front door. Security? Did Miles know that he was in danger?
As we got closer the man stood and turned toward us, a large piece of paper propped against his chest. Scrawled across it the words “Morality + Tradition = Stability.” He bounced the sign up and down a few times chanting “Boycott Edjrest Industries!”
“Sure,” I replied. “We’re just gonna...” I trailed off as I started to move past him up the stairs.
The man checked my movement without interrupting his sign bouncing. “My wife left me because of him. How does he sleep at night knowing he did that?”
“Your wife left you for Miles Edjrest?” I couldn’t keep the puzzlement from my voice. The wheeled chair-bound old man didn’t seem the type. “When was this?”
“I lost my job, and she left me.” He turned to Jesskah, perhaps he thought she’d be more sympathetic.
“How long did you work for Edjrest?” Jesskah asked.
“I wouldn’t work for that monster! Who knows what he could have done to me if I’d worked at one of his companies.”
“But—” I began, but the man cut me off. “I didn’t understand until I read Table for One. Then it all made sense. That dwarf – it was like he was speaking to me. Explaining how the rich get richer on our backs.” He glanced at the mansion behind him. “Edjrest is the ringleader, so I vowed to come here every day and show people what kind of man he is.”
I smiled wondering what the man would say if I showed him the mansion just on the other side of this one – the house of the dwarf who wrote Table for One.
“Good work.” I patted the man’s shoulder. “Admirable work.” I moved past him up the stairs. “But that ‘monster’ needs our help.”
“We all deserve equal protection under the law,” Jesskah said to him. “I believe that, and right now I need to stop a murderer.”
“Murder?” the man’s question came out as a whisper. “He’s killed someone?”
I shook my head. “Sometimes bad things happen to good pe
ople, and sometimes bad things happen to bad people. But you know, ‘good’, ‘bad’ I don’t know what they mean anymore. You got a bum deal. I get that. You got kids?”
The man nodded.
“Are they trying to kill you? No? Then you’re in better shape than the man in that house.” With that I turned and hurried up the steps.
The man was silent for a moment and then called out, “Screw you, elf!”
A small laugh escaped Jesskah’s mouth. “Ever think about living somewhere else, Vox? Someplace a little kinder?”
I knocked on the front door. “You’ve never been to the Olden. This is nothing.”
A tall woman opened the door, and I said, “Vox Swift with Boleian Investigations and this is Detective Morningstar with Central Division. Is Miles Edjrest available?”
“Detective?” Jesskah murmured as the woman went to relay our presence.
With a shrug I said, “Plays better. Gives you more um, what’s the word? Gravitas.”
“One day soon we’re going to have to talk about your passing acquaintance with the truth, Vox Swift.”
“Is that so? ‘One day soon’.” I smiled and she smiled back, and then I ruined the moment by blurting out, “Your eyes turn this deep green when you’re lost in thought.”
The butler’s arrival kept Jesskah from having to answer. He said, “Mr. Edjrest will see you.”
“Thank you, Sutton,” said Jesskah. “How’s your wife?”
“Doing well, Miss Morningstar. Thank you for asking.”
“Farley’s not here, is he? I—”
“No, Miss. We haven’t seen him all day.” Sutton gave Jesskah a smile and leaned toward her. “Do you want to see him or not?”
Jesskah’s face flushed, and before she could answer I said, “How is the old man? Mr. Edjrest, I mean. Been a good day?”
My question was met with a stare.
“Detective Finn Hobrook might be joining us, Sutton,” Jesskah told the butler.
He nodded at Jesskah’s words, and I thought to add, “Boleian of Vedasa too! He might….” I sounded like an excitable girl, especially compared to Jesskah’s cool grace. “We’ve had a breakthrough in the Grimwell case.”