The Golden Bell

by Autumn Dawn

  Rain frowned, her suspicions now knee deep. The girl was social climbing, and while the Rain didn’t consider herself of any importance, she did resent friendship offered under false premises. When the girl started to trail off, her face showing uncertainty in the wake of Rain’s cool expression, Rain said slowly, “You have something green in your teeth.”

  Horror widened the girl’s eyes. She slammed a hand over her mouth and sent a chagrined glance at her husband, who’d been startled into peering at her.

  The unfortunate lady’s hand dropped, then flashed back up to her mouth. “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t realize… Come on, Gari! We have to fix it.”

  Rain did feel a tiny stab of guilt as the girl rushed off.

  Fallon looked at her with reproach, but there was laughter lurking in his eyes.

  She shrugged irritably and said in her defense, “She was…well, I’d swear she was brown nosing for some reason.”

  He shrugged. “Get used to it. That one isn’t all that bad once you get past the gushing, though.” He lowered his voice and murmured in her ear, “The thing about a sword, love, is you have to know when to use it. You possess an especially powerful one. Try not to annihilate too many defenseless young things.”

  She sighed, feeling too old for this kind of torture. “I’m getting the impression you’re somewhat admired here.” These people surely weren’t sucking up to them to get closer to her.

  Fallon laughed.

  The laughter attracted his mother. Rain wasn’t sure if that was bad or good, because while she at least knew that Portae liked her for her good sense in marrying her son, she also proceeded to introduce her to everyone in sight, dragging her around the room with dizzying speed. Her traitor husband quickly found a group of friends to hide behind, chatting with them while his mother showed her off, occasionally gesturing to Fallon for emphasis.

  To Rain’s relief, she got to sit down at a table reserved for Portae, herself and Fallon while those being honored, including Fallon, took turns making speeches at the head of the room. Grateful to be in the shadows, Rain sat back and studied the two elders who were also retiring.

  Elder Azion took his turn at the pulpit, looking more like Sean Connery than ever. Uncertain of his guilt, she sat there torn between hating him and giving him the benefit of the doubt.

  Elder Rite was easier to hate, though she could prove nothing yet. Middle aged like her father would have been, a fact that made her bitterly resent him, his hair was still black and his eyes still a piercing blue. He wasn’t handsome, but he was big, even bigger than Fallon, and built like a concrete pylon. That black hair gave her pause. There’d been no black Haunt the night her father was killed, or she didn’t think there’d been; it had been a confusing night.

  She was going to have to speak to them. Her guts clenched at the thought, emotion riding high.

  Her chance came later, as people were starting to clear out. She’d told Fallon that she wanted to speak to the men, then whiled away the time as best she could with a group of Portae’s friends.

  “…so then I made his house glow in the dark,” she related to the amused group of matrons. The story was a about a bully who’d teased her about being a geek when she was a kid. The boy had made her life miserable on the bus, and she’d repaid him by making the neighborhood think his house was haunted. “I also made howling noises start up when anyone walked up the drive. He never bothered me again.” She smiled with satisfaction as the ladies laughed.

  “I’ll have to mind my manners around you then, young lady,” a gruff voice boomed from behind her. “Obviously you make a dangerous enemy.”

  Rain turned and smiled coolly at Elder Rite. Heart pounding, she offered him the barest of nods in respect to his status. “You wouldn’t do that, would you, Elder?”

  His heavy brows rose. “Still taunting a bear with a stick, young Rain? I see marriage hasn’t taken care of your recklessness.”

  “I learned when to take chances after my father died.” Her heart was in her throat, waiting to see a glimmer of guilt, something that would convict him once and for all.

  Instead his face softened. “I am sorry for your loss. Your father was a good man. There should have been something we could have done to find justice for you.”

  To her horror, she felt tears prick her eyes. He was making her feel young again, and she hated it. She never wanted to be a child again. “I survived.”

  He sighed. “You did well to marry Fallon, child. He’ll make you happy.” With a nod of farewell, he was gone.

  Well, that sucked. Disgusted with her emotions and the pitying looks she was getting, she turned her face away while she regained control. Happily, the ladies took pity on her and took up their conversation again.

  She’d been aware of Fallon nearby, and no doubt he’d caught their conversation. By the carefully neutral expression on his face as he came up to them with Elder Azion, she’d swear he had.

  Azion didn’t seem affected by the somber mood. “Lady Rain! I’m happy you seem to have settled so well into your new home. What a pleasure to see that the Dark Lands held something for you after all.”

  Pompous, she thought. Certain he was right. “So it seems.” Remembering her purpose, she bared her teeth at him in imitation of a smile. “Fallon is even helping me to set up a new lab. I plan to jump into my work right where I left off. The first thing I plan to do is build a new Bell.”

  Azion’s eyes gleamed. She would have missed it if she hadn’t been looking.

  “Really? I hadn’t known you were into musical instruments.”

  She smiled like a wolf. “It also plays music.” Almost daring him, she reached up and stroked the Bell pendant at her neck. His eyes followed it, glued themselves to the golden sphere.

  Almost strangled, he said, “What a lovely piece of jewelry, my dear. Did you make it?”

  She just smiled, that cold, hard smile that said, I’ve got you, you murdering bastard. She could feel that subtle change in her eyes, the one that meant they were glinting gold. For once, she didn’t care. She wanted Azion to know she hated him.

  Fallon stepped into the silence, taking her arm. “My wife has many talents. If you’ll excuse us, Elder, ladies.” He steered Rain out of the room at a slow, deliberate pace.

  “That was stupid, Rain. Azion is a powerful man,” he said once they were alone in the hall. Though his voice was quiet, the anger carried clearly.

  “He murdered my father,” she hissed, though softly. “It’s no accident he’s ‘retired’ now. That bastard followed me to the Dark Lands, and he wants to finish what he started. Keeping my mouth shut won’t make me safe.”

  “You don’t know for certain it’s not Rite. Just because someone is nice to you, doesn’t make him innocent.”

  “Don’t I know it. But tell me, how many Elders who could have been involved just coincidently arrive here within days of me?”

  He was silent for a moment. “We’re going to raise the security around you. It’s going to be close and visible.”

  “Telling him you know there’s danger? I say we let him try to come after me and pick him off. I’ve outwitted him before.”

  “No.”

  “Reconsider. This is a good opportunity.”

  He looked at her, and this time his eyes were gleaming gold. “I said no.” Slow, deliberate, his words held the weight of finality.

  A muscle ticked in her jaw. She was going to have to get creative.

  CHAPTER 7

  Fallon wasn’t going to give her the chance to do something stupid. The minute they entered his rooms, he summoned Rykarr. Rain listened with interest as Fallon brought his captain up to speed.

  Rykarr heard Fallon out and started issuing orders over his com unit.

  Rain slouched in her chair and walked a coin through her fingers.

  Fallon felt a burst of anger as he watched her. She was willing to put herself at risk for the sake of revenge. Justice, she called it. Maybe it was, and overdue at th
at, but she didn’t need to get herself killed to obtain it. They had plenty of time, and he was patient. They could see this thing resolved easily enough.

  “Who’s the head honcho around here, Fallon? The guy in charge of justice?”

  Surprised out of his plans, Fallon focused on her. “Jayems, Lord of the Haunt.”

  She considered. “You have an in with him? Seeing as how you were an ambassador for him?”

  “He’s my cousin,” he said cautiously, wondering where she was going with this.

  “I’d like to talk to him.” She sat up, closed her fingers around the coin. She looked at him expectantly.

  The men looked back at her.

  “Okay, but why?”

  “I want to tell him what’s going on…and a few more details you don’t know about all this.”

  Fallon frowned, feeling an unwelcome twinge of jealousy. “You can’t tell me first?”

  She shrugged. “Two birds, one stone, you know? Introduce me to him and I’ll let you in.”

  Let him in. Interesting phrasing. “Rykarr should be there, too.”

  “Okay.”

  Fallon looked at her a moment more. “All right. I’ll see if he’s available.”

  Rain was a lot more nervous than she let on. Fallon didn’t say much as they walked toward Lord Jayems’s suite, an escort of Haunt before and behind. Unfortunately, the combination was making her eyes water with the urge to sneeze. The medicine must be wearing off. The only good thing about it was that it was hard to be fearful in the middle of a sneezing attack.

  Fallon looked at her as they approached a set of double doors guarded by still more Haunt. “You didn’t take your last dose of medicine, did you?”

  She held her finger on her upper lip, trying to fight off another sneeze. Just as the doors opened, she sneezed powerfully, then three more times in succession.

  Rykarr chuckled and moved slightly left, out of the line of fire.

  Muttering something, Fallon led her to a chair and sat her down. Sniffing, determined not to lose it again, Rain looked up…and sneezed again.

  “Excuse me,” she said to the dark haired man standing in front of her. “I’m allergic to dog fur.”

  His stern mouth twitched. “I see. How uncomfortable for you.”

  “You’ve no idea,” she muttered.

  Fallon sighed and introduced them. “Rain, this is my cousin, Lord Jayems, though you’ll call him Jayems. All in the family, you know. You probably saw him at the ceremony, though I didn’t get a chance to introduce you.”

  “My apologies,” Jayems said gravely. “I was only there a brief time. Our daughter is ill, and I wanted to check on her and my wife.”

  “Nothing serious, I hope,” Rain said politely.

  “Just the usual childhood malaise, but she is very uncomfortable,” Jayems said. He waved Fallon and Rykarr to seats and took the one behind the massive carved desk. “I was told you had something of interest to tell me?”

  Rain took a deep breath. Whatever the man said, his little girl was sick enough to make him cut short his appearance at an important ceremony. He wouldn’t like to spend much time dallying with her. “I think Elder Azion killed my father.” She gave him the cliff notes version of her life before the murder and after. “During the murder I saw a gray Haunt. Fallon tells me that’s rare.”

  Fallon cut a look her way. “You hadn’t told me you’d actually seen the gray Haunt!”

  She met his eyes. “We’ve got a lot of unresolved issues. Listen and you’ll hear what else I didn’t say.” Beyond him, she saw Rykarr wince.

  Fallon straightened and his nostrils widened, but he kept his peace.

  She looked at Jayems, who regarded her with a curious gleam in his eye, and quoted her conversations with Rite and Azion as closely as possible. “Azion murdered my father,” she finished simply.

  Jayems regarded her without expression. “You’ve mentioned that a couple of times. What I don’t know is why? What was his motive?”

  She drew a deep breath and removed her necklace, slipping the Bell from its clasp. “Meet the Bell.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Fallon staring at the thing as she passed it over to Jayems. He had to be burning up about now, either with frustration or curiosity.

  Jayems examined it. “What does it do?”

  She smiled. “I’d heard rumors that you wanted to try to close the gate when all the immigrants crossed over. I’ll tell you now, I doubt all of them will. I wouldn’t have, if I hadn’t been…pushed.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a muscle jump in Fallon’s face. “There’s also the problem of how to close the gate. Your site is remote, unmarked, but accidents happen.”

  “The volti take care of ‘accidents’,” Jayems said coolly, referring to the wolf-things that prowled the woods around the gate.

  She shook her head. “You need a better way. The Bell can lock the gate for you. As a matter of fact, it’s a gate in itself.” She let the silence build.

  Finally Fallon ground out, “Are you saying you could have left at any time?”

  “Two problems with that. No money, for one, which slowed me up the first time. I need time and peace to build that up, and I’ve yet to get either.”

  “I gave you money this morning!” Fallon sounded as if he were chewing gravel.

  “Prismatic silver is not an easy currency to convert, let alone explain,” she said tersely.

  “Just as well, as you were going to use it to leave me!” Fallon’s eyes were glowing gold.

  “Ah…you said there was a second reason?” Jayems said, interrupting a doozy of a brewing quarrel.

  A little abashed, she looked at him. “I haven’t tested it yet.”

  “Ah.” He set the Bell carefully on his desk.

  Fallon picked it up and looked at it. “So this is what I spent so much frustration trying to figure out.”

  Rain shrugged. “If it makes you feel better, it frustrated Azion for years.”

  The look he sent her throbbed with so much fury that she finally shut up. Taunting him was beginning to seem hazardous to her health.

  “So,” Jayems said, drawing out the word to get their attention. “This Bell could be used for escape, theft…even murder.”

  “An assassin’s dream,” Rykarr said, speaking up for the first time.

  “That’s not why I made it,” Rain said with a frown.

  “It’s how it’ll be used,” Rykarr answered. “I’d say it’s best left locked up in Lord Jayems’s safe.”

  She smiled without humor. “Nice thought, but it doesn’t eliminate the central problem. Azion knows I can make another one any time I want. Hundreds, if I liked.”

  Her words met with deafening silence.

  It was almost funny, sharing the irony of her existence with three men who looked as stumped by the problem as she did.

  For a moment, anyway.

  “Azion will have to die,” Fallon said coldly. “I won’t tolerate his continued threat to my family.”

  Surprised by that, she shot a look at him.

  Jayems held up a hand. “Peace. We haven’t proved beyond doubt it was him.”

  “I can’t afford to wait,” Fallon answered.

  Rain let them debate, following her own lines of thought. When she’d traced them somewhere interesting, she voiced them. “What makes an object valuable? It’s rarity. In the case of technology, it’s good only until it becomes obsolete or common. One day a spy is killing for it, the next every guy in America is using it from the comfort of his couch.”

  “You can’t put a Bell in every house,” Fallon argued, looking alarmed at the possibilities.

  “No, not as it stands. I can modify the technology, though. Think about it,” she said, getting excited. “What have you got for transportation here? Shoe leather and pack animals, some boats. Okay, what if I made Bells for emergency or official transport, limiting their use to on world, secure sites? The Bells could be programmed as single use units, or better, single de
stination.”

  Fallon said slowly, “Azion would still know they could function as off-world destination devices.”

  She shook her head. “Not if I published the disappointing results of my off-world attempt, made it very public, stressed the local applications as if I’m trying to save face. Half the appeal of the technology is its secrecy. Once it goes public…” She let them work it out for themselves.

  “All of this still leaves you lacking justice,” Jayems pointed out. “While your sighting of a gray Haunt is incriminating for Azion, I’m told you have no scent memory. Without it, your testimony is still your word against his.”

  She drooped a little, thinking of that. The world sucked sometimes. “Well, Fallon was against plan A. I compromised by solving his problems instead.”

  When he spoke again, Jayems’s voice had gentled. “You still aren’t certain it works.”

  “It’ll work,” she said gloomily. “I always make these things work.”

  Jayems looked at Fallon, who still held the Bell. “Well? Do you want to keep charge of it?”

  Fallon looked at Rain. “Do you need it?”

  She swallowed. She hadn’t used the Bell in days, was afraid of what the withdrawal would be like. On the other hand, maybe Fallon’s…attentions…would mitigate any lingering problems. Making love to him did seem to give the same sort of pleasure, only deeper and fuller.

  She blushed just thinking about it. “No. Better keep it here, just in case.”

  Fallon studied her color and handed the Bell back to his cousin. “Very well. Are you ready to go, Rain?”

  Rykarr stayed behind at Jayems’s request as Fallon escorted Rain back to their suite.

  She hesitated at her own door. “Would you mind? I’d like some time to myself for a while.” She was feeling depressed. She hadn’t meant to sacrifice her interests like that, and the backlash of emotion wasn’t pleasant.