Who the heck were the Palmers? North had said they were human, but—
Hang on. Had she, though?
She’d said that Sarah was human. She hadn’t specified that the Palmer parents were human. Was it possible that they were something else? But if they were something else, I couldn’t see North fighting to keep Sarah with them when she was fighting so hard to keep her away from Upper Management.
I stored that thought away to chew over later and wandered over to Sarah’s dressing table. It was a mess of fake flower, hair things, cute plastic toys, and one hidden lipstick tucked away behind an artful flourish of the fake flowers. Underneath the lipstick was a single photo, but there was nothing contraband about it.
It was a photo of Sarah Palmer, grinning as her parents embraced her on some sort of sports field, her knees grubby and her school uniform running shorts dangling a hem. One fist was up in the air, a clear sign of victory. It must have been a favourite day for her, but maybe it wasn’t so favourite for her parents, with the picture hidden away like that.
Had something happened on that day that her parents didn’t want to remember?
I would have to add that to the list of questions I needed to ask North next time I was able to get in contact with her.
I took a photo of the lipstick and the photo, just in case, and had just started toward the hall that led to the front door when I heard a car pull up outside. Heck! The Palmers were back already? It was barely nine o’clock.
I could have made a run for it back upstairs and taken the same way out that I’d come in, but I had a suspicion that Zero would have followed them all the way home to be sure they were safe. He probably already knew about their precautions against fae, so it was likely he wouldn’t hang around for long after he saw them get safely inside. It was much safer for me to stay in the house for another half hour or so until he left.
I made myself comfortable behind a big potted plant in the hallway, putting up my hood and feeling the shiver of Between seep into me and flatten me until I was more of a shadow than a person. It was a weird feeling. I was still there, still myself, but somehow I was in a different space where there was…more space. Maybe I was sitting in a little patch of Between, while just my shadow came out in the human world.
I didn’t know, but whatever it was, the Palmers didn’t see me when they came in, and they were pretty cautious. All the lights went on first thing, and if I hadn’t had my bit of Between to sit in, I would have been easy prey. Mr. Palmer came in first, looking around swiftly, with Sarah close behind him, one hand curled in a fist full of his woolly jumper. After them both came Mrs. Palmer, glancing toward the rear until she could close the door safely on them.
Oh, they were jumpy. I mean, I’d probably be jumpy too, if someone was trying to pinch my kid, but they were knowledgeable about how they moved, and that was interesting. Maybe that was because there was a feeling of familiarity to it.
Mr. Palmer went upstairs briefly, and I saw the flood of light down the stairs as he turned on every light upstairs, too. When he came back down he said, “All clear,” quietly to his wife and daughter.
I could understand North’s urge to protect them. I could feel it myself. They were trying so hard, and they were obviously so tired.
I just couldn’t understand why North had that urge. It wasn’t something I was used to seeing in Behindkind. I had the feeling that if I could just understand that, I might be within a hairsbreadth of understanding how I could break the Palmer’s contract with Upper Management. Right now, I had nothing to grasp that could potentially turn into leverage, and that was a dangerous position when I was dealing with Behindkind.
I waited until they went to bed, and then for another half hour after that, watching shadows that shouldn’t be there moving in the hallway. I heard noises, too, that weren’t the Palmers moving around to settle down for the night.
That made me look a bit more closely at the wall that separated the Palmers’ side of the house from the other side as I crept toward the front door. There was definitely a bit of Between there. I would have liked to know if the Palmers knew that, and if so, how. The iron filings curved around the exact section of wall that seemed most contaminated. To me, it looked like most of the action must be taking place in the semi-detached place next door, and since the main entrances were reversed for the two dwellings, that would make this section the spare room in the other house. Would there have been enough noise to worry Sarah’s parents without them being able to actually see the slow seep of Between down the wall? It was one thing knowing about fae and potentially Behindkind as well—it was entirely another thing to be able to see them. I’d always been pretty sure that I wasn’t the only one who could see stuff like Between and Behind, even though Zero and Athelas disagreed, but I could only see it being trouble if the Palmers could see it, too.
No wonder they were being harassed by Upper Management, if so! The Palmer kid had escaped Behind, after all, and I found myself wondering once again if the interest in Sarah was less to do with North’s connection to the kid and more about the kid herself. Still, that didn’t help me with how to break her contract with Upper Management, either.
I puffed out a silent breath, discouraged to find myself with as little useful knowledge going out as I had had going in, and very carefully, very quietly, slid through the front door. After crouching for so long behind a potted plant, that wasn’t the easiest, but I didn’t dare try to massage some feeling into my legs until after I was out and shaking off filaments of Between from my shoulders.
Earlier, there had been a painful warmth somewhere near my pockets where the USBs were digging into my skin. The sudden absence of that warmth made me pat my pockets in a start of remembrance, fearful that I had somehow lost them as I was crouching and exploring inside the house, but they were still there.
I let out a relieved breath, and trotted toward the front gate, careful to scoot around the soft beam of light that now lay on the lawn from the hallway window. It was well beyond time to be going home. I had learned a lot of things that seemed utterly disconnected and useless, and I wanted to sit down quietly and chunter about them to myself for a while. Preferably with coffee. If I was lucky, there would still be a pot of coffee on the percolator, and we could each percolate for a while: the coffee, and me with my thoughts.
With happy designs on that imaginary pot, I stepped out onto the street, smiling at the dark.
And stopped dead in my tracks.
Across the road opposite me was Zero, a deep cleft between his straight brows. Ghostly in the moonlight with his white hair and far-too-pale skin, those pale blue eyes stared straight at me.
Ah heck.
“Pet, what are you doing here?”
Could I get away if I needed to? Where could I run? He’d catch me along the road in no time, and there’s no way I’d beat him if I dodged into the tempting patch of mossy Between that existed in the stormwater drain just a short drop away.
I began, “I’m actually not your pet right now, so—”
“Don’t play with me.”
I bit my tongue before I could tell him that playing was what pets were meant to do, and said instead, “I’m investigating. I’ve got a job.”
“What did you take from the house?”
Ah man. I hadn’t taken anything, but there was no way he was going to believe me. I wouldn’t believe me; I’d even patted my pockets as I left the house to make sure the USBs were still there, and he’d obviously seen that with his stupid super fae sight or whatever. I could have kicked myself for that.
“I didn’t take anything,” I said, sighing. “What was there to take? There were some photos and a few knick-knacks. Maybe some goblins, but I think they’re next door and I wouldn’t take one of those with me anyway.”
“If I have to go through your pockets, I will,” said Zero icily. “I won’t have you interfering in my investigation.”
“You’ve got no right to go poking your nose into my b
usiness,” I protested. “You didn’t want me in the house investigating, and now I’m out of the house! I don’t answer to you!”
“This is a Behindkind matter.”
“It’s not, it’s a human matter. Someone’s trying to steal a little girl away from her parents.”
“You’re interfering with a changeling contract.”
I managed to hide my surprise at the sudden influx of information that the single word changeling had prompted by tumbling into speech. “Yeah? Well, I remember you interfering with quite a few changelings yourself, not long ago.”
My anger was growing, but it wasn’t just because of how unreasonable Zero was: it was because I knew that if Zero really did search my pockets, he’d find both USBs. Why had I brought them out tonight? Why hadn’t I taken the time to leave them back at the house before I came out?
“That’s completely beside the point,” said Zero. “What did you take from the house?”
“I didn’t take anything!” I said exasperatedly. I didn’t even know what there was I could have taken from the house that would do any good to either Sarah or my investigation.
Zero took a step down into the road, his jaw setting, and I skipped back an equal step back onto the footpath, fishing the USB Detective Tuatu had given me out of my pocket.
I held it up. “Oh, you mean this?”
Maybe I really had gone mad. But just like the situation with his father, it was the only way I could think to make sure he found the thing that I could most afford to lose. I mean, I was gunna try not to lose this USB either, but he didn’t need to know that.
It stopped him in his tracks.
“How come you and your dad both want this?” I asked him. “Has it got something to do with my parents or your mum? Is that why North was hiding it? To give to you?”
I already knew the answer to the last two questions, but he didn’t know that. I was beginning to think that Athelas had taught me a lot better than Zero knew. Maybe better than I’d realised, too.
Zero held out one hand commandingly. “Give it to me, Pet,” he said.
“I’m not your pet, and you can’t have it,” I said. I mean, it wasn’t like I could stop him, but beggar me if I wasn’t going to fight all the way.
And when I say fight, I mean run away.
I shifted my weight back just slightly to turn and run, but as I did so, there was movement at my right shoulder, and the familiar scent of cologne.
Ah heck. JinYeong. Now I couldn’t even try to run away.
Zero must have thought the same thing. He said, “Bring me the USB, JinYeong.”
“Do your own dirty work!” I shot at him, hunching my shoulder against the warmth beside me that was JinYeong. It wasn’t possible to watch both of them, but I couldn’t help flicking a look up at JinYeong anyway, angry and defensive. He shouldn’t have followed me to Morgana’s house if he was just going to show up when Zero was around and force me to give up stuff to him.
JinYeong’s eyes met mine for a brief moment before his head twitched sideways. He grinned lazily at Zero, his eyes all liquid darkness, and said, “Shilloh.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Maybe I’d forgotten exactly how icy Zero could be, or maybe it was just that I’d never seen him this absolutely cold.
“I do not wish,” said JinYeong, with great clarity, “to do as I am told.”
Zero’s sword came out, nothing like the umbrella it usually was in the human world, and it seemed to me that it was bluer than I remembered it being. Bluer—colder?
“Oi,” I said, in more of a whisper than anything, “what have you done to the sword? It’s gone all blue.”
“It was always blue,” said Zero. “You’re the one who made it yellow. Give me the USB, Pet. I won’t ask you again.”
I looked away from him and up at JinYeong. “You okay?” I asked shakily.
“I knew today would be fun,” he said, his eyes dark and bloody. “Get ready to run. We will meet afterward.”
“Yeah,” I said. “We’ll get some good coffee.”
His eyes met mine, one brow momentarily rising. He nodded.
Zero crossed the road in a single leap, with a slashing sweep that JinYeong darted beneath and emerged from again with two blades.
I’d only ever seen him with weapons while we practised: I’d never seen him really fight with weapons, just his teeth. And he was beautiful. Quicker than Zero, though not more savage, he slashed and swirled and parried, always just a little too fast for the heavier Zero. But I saw the strokes that landed on JinYeong, and I knew with a jolt of sudden fear that Zero was stronger, even in my shock at the deadly beauty of them both.
I scrambled back to get out of the way of a scurry of strokes and parries that brought them too close for comfort and kicked up loose bitumen on my jeans, completely woken from my daze.
“You,” said JinYeong over his shoulder. “Run away now. You are in my way.”
It took his attention away for the briefest moment, and Zero struck mercilessly with the hilt of his sword.
I couldn’t help the breath that hissed in through my teeth at the weight behind it. JinYeong stumbled back into my arms and I caught him, but we fell heavily despite that. I had barely a moment to slip both of the USBs into his pocket before Zero’s huge white hand seized me by the neck and plucked me away from JinYeong’s prone body.
He went methodically through my pockets, then dropped me back to the ground with a definite jolt, and I caught myself up on a sob of anger, or fear.
“Pet,” he said, through his teeth. “Where. Is. The. USB?”
“Swallowed it,” I said, looking up the length of that blue blade. “You’re gunna have to cut me open to get it.”
Man, I have got to start thinking more before I open my mouth.
Zero stared at me for a cold moment, the tip of his sword slightly dropping.
Maybe it was the sweat trickling over his brow and into the corner of his eye that made him flinch. Maybe that was all that saved me from being sliced open in the brief moment before JinYeong collided with Zero in a snarling, bloody tumble that sent them both rolling down the alley.
I scrambled to my feet and ran for it.
I didn’t stop running until every breath hurt and there was wetness all down my cheeks and below my nose. Then I stopped between someone’s wheelie bins and sniffed and panted and tried not to cry properly. When everything was dry again but more swollen than before, I got back up and kept walking, trying to ignore the tight heat that was gravel rash through a torn patch in my jeans. I had to make sure I was ready to meet JinYeong again when he got away. He was still out there fighting like a streak of breathtaking lightning, too quick for Zero to land a significant hit if I wasn’t there to get in the way. And Zero—Zero hadn’t really been about to gut me, had he?
I moved up my pace a bit, sniffing defiantly. Athelas had told me clearly, but I’d still wanted to believe, even now, that even if Zero had been so lacking in concern for humans in general, that he cared enough to keep at least me safe.
I had been very wrong. Anything, everything that I had interpreted as genuine concern for me had been nothing more than his determination to keep me safe so long as he was contractually bound to keep me safe.
Well, so what? I thought, ducking up the street before Palfreyman’s Arcade to approach from behind. I didn’t need Zero—I was perfectly fine without him. And as soon as JinYeong got away, I’d be perfectly fine and have my USBs again, too.
I came across the parking lot less casually than I’d meant to, drawing a few looks from the blokes who were smoking out at the back of the steakhouse, and made myself slow down. I flicked my hood up, too, slouching my shoulders a bit, and they looked away again, cigarettes glowing bright as they sucked in a breath.
I tucked myself just inside the arcade at the back, from where I’d be sure to see JinYeong passing on his way to our meeting spot. I was sure he would understand exactly which coffee shop we were to meet at. No
w that I was out of sight, the fight wouldn’t last too long, would it? Zero was only interested in getting what he needed from me, not fighting with JinYeong. I’d never seen him even close to really fighting JinYeong before, despite JinYeong’s very pointed provocations in the past, so I didn’t think it would be too much longer.
It felt like a long time, though, and when I checked my phone for the time, it was already ten. I bounced on my toes, cold and hot and nervous. What was taking JinYeong so long? Zero wouldn’t really kill him. I mean, JinYeong wouldn’t kill Zero, either—would he? Not really? I’d seen them prowling around each other with death in their eyes and danger in their movements, but I didn’t think I’d ever thought they’d really try to kill each other. I’d always thought that one of them would be sane enough when it came right down to it, even if the other went mad.
Too long. It was half past ten now, and too long—JinYeong should have gone past by now.
I tried to make myself wait there longer, but every moment stretched out and scratched at me unbearably, like the coil of wild graffiti that wrapped spikily around the ankle closest to the wall. I shook off the graffiti and strode through the arcade toward the street.
I came out of the arcade and headed back up the street the way I’d come, my heart beating just a bit too quickly. I stepped down between two cars to cross the road and saw something across the road, in the shadows of the gutter.
It was dark and crumpled and looked like roadkill: really big roadkill. Before knowing my psychos, the most I would have done was stay on the other side of the street to avoid the smell. That thought made me realise there was no smell to this roadkill, just the idea that there ought to be a smell. At the same time, I saw the faintest flutter of Between to the blood-matted bundle of flesh and cloth, and as I nipped between sporadic traffic and got closer, the wafting scent of JinYeong tickled my nostrils.
Oh heck.
Chapter Nine
I dropped to my knees beside the body, normal sight clashing with Between-aided sight that told me that even if the damage wasn’t as bad as it looked to a passer-by, it was bad enough.
Between Homes (The City Between Book 5) Page 14