by Nova Nelson
At hearing his name, the deputy also leaned over the desk to see what I was pointing at.
If you guessed “nothing,” you’re correct. But they both fell for it.
As the two men squinted to figure out what I was talking about, I scanned the area behind them until I spotted what I was looking for.
“Grim. I need you to cause a distraction.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Anything. Just cause a little bit of chaos. Can you do that?”
He trotted to the opposite side of the desk from Manchester and lifted his leg. “You kidding? I was born for this.”
Grim’s forceful pee stream splashed loudly on the wooden desk.
“Wha— Ohhh come on!” shouted Jingo in a gravelly voice.
When Deputy Manchester leaned to the side to look, I saw my window. “Pace yourself. I need a couple minutes.”
“No need. I was born to leave my mark on the world. I’ve got a bottomless tank.”
I hustled to the door with the wood engraving that read Sheriff Gabrielle Bloom and pushed it open without knocking.
As soon as I oriented myself, I realized I’d committed a gross oversight.
I had no idea what kind of creature the sheriff was. What if she hated witches? What if she was a sphinx and started asking me riddles and if I couldn’t answer one she ate me? I was terrible at riddles.
The U-shaped desk was piled so high with papers that I almost didn’t see the top of her head as she stooped over in her chair.
When she looked up at me, I felt a mixture of calm and guilt wash over me.
And for some reason, a memory of stealing a cookie from my aunt and blaming it on the kids next door surfaced in my mind. Weird.
“May I help you?” she asked.
Her face was lean, blonde hair in a pixie cut.
Did that mean she was a pixie?
No, probably not.
The dang leprechauns had sent me into a downward spiral of stereotyping.
I shut the door behind me so Stu wouldn’t see where I was once the initial shock of Grim’s powerful bladder wore off.
I stepped forward cautiously. “I need to talk to you about Bruce Saxon’s murder.”
She narrowed her eyes at me for a moment, then relaxed. “You must be Nora Ashcroft.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And you just burst into my office because?”
“Tanner is innocent.”
She sighed heavily. “Come, have a seat.”
I looked at the papers stacked on every surface. “Where?”
She stood, and when she did, I glimpsed the wings.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d guess Sheriff Bloom was an angel. And before I could think better of it, I blurted, “Are you an angel?”
As she moved a stack of papers from the chair in front of her desk to the ground, she chuckled. “What gave it away? Was it the giant, white wings?”
Okay, yeah. That one was on me.
“Sorry,” she said quickly. “You’re new. I’ve met plenty of new people in my time, so I know there’s an adjustment period.” She motioned to the empty chair. “There, now you can have a seat.”
After clearing off a small gap in the wall of paperwork so that I could see her over her desk, she placed clasped hands in her lap and said, “I know Tanner is innocent.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“It’s part of being an angel. I can tell who’s innocent and whose soul is tainted by lies. Makes me quite good at interrogations. Unfortunately, it’s never that simple. When I sense dishonesty, I may know on a core level that it’s because the person committed the crime of which they’re being accused, but my ability to sense those things doesn’t hold up in a court of law.”
“So you talked to Tanner and think he’s innocent?”
Her posture softened and her wings slumped. “There are few people in this town more innocent than Tanner Culpepper. I know that. But the High Council has been on me about closing this case, and all the evidence points to him. I had to make an arrest.”
“But you know it’s not him! That means the person who did it is still out there. They could kill again.”
She shook her head, disheartened. “I know. But look around you, Nora. Look at this paperwork I have to sort through. It’s unrealistic. I can never be as thorough as I’d like to. I have to close cases wherever I can.”
“What if I told you I knew who actually killed Bruce?”
She tilted her head to the side. “I’d ask you what proof you have?”
“Um, yes, I don’t have that yet. But I think, with your help, I can get it.”
She frowned. “In a way that wouldn’t necessitate entrapment? The Council isn’t huge on that.”
“That makes sense. I don’t know how I’ll get the evidence, but I’m determined to do it. Correct me if I’m wrong, but neither of us wants to see Tanner in prison for a crime he didn’t do.”
Her gaze roamed the piles of parchment, and she sighed. “It’s not like the paperwork is going to run off if I take a couple hours off to exonerate an innocent man.” Her wings stretched out behind her, knocking over a precariously balanced stack and causing a domino effect as papers cascaded to the floor. She didn’t seem to care. “For heaven’s sake! Let’s do this. Who do you suspect?”
I tried not to get overexcited, but it seemed like this might actually happen.
I opened my mouth to explain when I heard Stu’s irate voice outside the door. “Don’t tell me Ms. Ashcroft went in there!”
The door burst open, and Deputy Manchester stood on the threshold, red-faced. “Ms. Ashcroft! I—”
I gasped as the door slammed shut in his face.
Sheriff Bloom lowered her arm, which was extended toward the door, and returned her attention to me. “You were saying?”
O-kay … Angels could move things with a flick of their wrist. Noted.
“Um, I don’t know what I was … Oh right! The murderer. It was Tandy.”
“Tandy Erixon? Who works down at Echo’s Salon?”
“Yes. She was dating Bruce.”
“I know. Pretty sure everyone in Eastwind knows, considering the display those two put on.” She pressed her lips together and shook her head disapprovingly. “Go on.”
“Bruce was also dating Fiona Sheehan.”
Bloom leaned back in her chair. “Ah.”
We exchanged a knowing glance, and the matter was settled. No further explanation needed. And I couldn’t help but feel relieved that this town had a female sheriff.
Two thin lines appeared at the bridge of her nose, and she chewed her bottom lip before asking, “What kind of creature is Tandy? I can’t recall.”
“A xana.”
A small twitch of her head. “A what?”
“A xana. Wait, are you telling me you don’t know what that is?”
“Not afraid to admit what I don’t know. Plus,” she added airily, “God Herself couldn’t keep up with all the different types of beings in Eastwind. And all of them think their breed is superior.” She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, no, I’m not sure what a xana is, but if we’re going to act on this suspicion of yours, which seems as solid a hunch as any, we need to know what we’re up against.”
Searching the office for anything that might resemble a computer, I came up empty-handed. “And where do we find that?”
“The library,” she said, grabbing a coat on her way to the office door.
She slipped it on and a moment later her wings emerged from two tailored slits down the back.
I had to hustle to keep up with her pace as she crossed the station, breezing by a stunned Deputy Manchester and passed the front desk.
“Grim,” I said, spotting him still in hiked position. “Let’s go.”
“I can’t just cut it off midstream,” he protested.
I stopped in my tracks. “You’re not done yet?”
“I told you! Th
is was the role I was born to play.”
I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, careful to avoid any splashes from his continuing trickle, and dragged him behind me and out of the sheriff’s office.
“If they didn’t allow dogs before,” I told him as we descended the stairs out front, “they definitely won’t allow them now.”
Chapter Thirteen
The Eastwind Library was a hulking structure only a few blocks away from the sheriff’s office. Imposing arches and stone gargoyles loomed over approaching visitors, making me wonder, of course, if there were actual gargoyles in Eastwind.
Growing up, I’d always loved bookstores, but for some reason, libraries had given me the creeps. As soon as Sheriff Bloom and I set foot on the marble floors of the Eastwind library, Grim a few steps behind, I formulated a theory as to why I’d never felt comfortable in libraries.
The place was teeming with ghosts. Ruby had a theory that I’d always been able to sense ghosts, but my mind and body weren’t fully open to them until I crossed into Eastwind. If that were the case and Texas libraries were anything like this, it made sense why I’d avoided them whenever possible.
The spirits floated this way and that from one aisle to the next. Ghosts filled the empty chairs on either side of long wooden tables that were lit by floating lamps every yard or so down the center and stretched the length of the colossal first floor. Like Bruce, the ghosts hovered slightly above the chairs, sitting out of habit, I assumed, rather than any actual need.
It took a minute before I noticed something especially strange going on. Whereas Bruce hadn’t been able to touch the teacup Ruby set out for him, these ghosts were not only able to turn the pages of the books that sat open before them, they were also able to take the books off the shelves and move them. I tried to imagine what it would look like to someone who couldn’t see spirits. The books would appear to float through thin air. That would be weird.
Although, not as weird as seeing a bunch of ghosts.
“Is it always this packed?” I asked Grim.
“Your guess is as good as mine. I’ve never bothered coming in here. I can’t read. Because I’m a dog.”
“Excuses, excuses,” I said, already tuning him out again.
Sheriff Bloom dodged the floating books but didn’t seem too worried about the accompanying ghosts carrying them from place to place. As she cut across the chamber, she passed through one spirit after another without flinching.
“You can’t see them, I assume?” I asked.
“The books, yes. The restless spirits, no. But I can feel them, sometimes pure, sometimes … not so pure.”
And I thought I could be a little on the judgmental side.
The sheriff knew her way around the place. She must come here a lot. It made sense. If I had that much paperwork to fill out and worked in the same building as someone like Stu Manchester, I’d probably come somewhere deserted (except for the ghosts, obviously) to knock out my work without the possibility of unnecessary distraction.
We paused between two long rows of shelves, and Bloom leaned forward toward a waist-high shelf. “Let’s see … Were-elk, werewolf, will-o’-the-wisp”—she dragged her finger along the spines of books as she read them off—“wolpertinger, wraith, wyrm—ah! Here we go. Xana.”
She pulled a thick leather book from the dusty shelf with ancestry scrawled in it, and turned to the table of contents before flipping through. Her eyes scanned from top to bottom so rapidly that I assumed she was just scanning. But then she flipped the page, did the same over and over again, then shut the book. “Well, this is interesting.”
“Did you actually read all that?”
“Yes. When you have as many documents to look over as I do and thousands of years to hone your skills, you learn how to speed read.”
Thousands of years? I’d have to ask about that later.
“So what’d you find?”
“You met Tandy in person, right?”
“Yes.”
“And when you spoke with her, did you hear anything out of the ordinary?”
“Um, no. Not that I…” Then it came back to me. “Actually, I remember music. The harp. Is that what—“
“And how did it sound to you?”
“I don’t know. Like a harp? You probably know more about the harp than I do.”
“Why do you say that?” She appeared genuinely stumped.
“Because you’re an— Never mind. Why are we talking about the music?”
“Did you enjoy it or did it irritate you in any way?”
“I enjoyed it. It was actually one of the most beautiful pieces I’ve ever heard.”
Sheriff Bloom beamed. “Yes, that’s what I thought you’d say, but I had to be sure. Hmm …” She opened the book again, staring down at it as she worried her bottom lip.
“Are you going to explain?”
She cleared her head with a shake and shut the book again. “Oh right. Xana, as the book explains, can produce a song. They can direct it at a specific target. If the target is pure of heart, the music sounds beautiful. In your case, you heard a harp and you found it enjoyable. That bodes well for you.”
“But?”
“But if the person is impure or lying or hiding something, the song can slowly drive them insane, causing paranoia and even hallucinations.”
Well, then. I was glad I passed the test. I’d once eaten an old mushroom pizza that gave me hallucinations. I didn’t want to relive that experience, especially in a town that already felt a little like one extended drug trip.
Besides, it was hard enough to be the new girl in town. The last thing I needed was to be stumbling around town all twitchy and talking to people who weren’t there.
A tiny memory knocked on the inside of my skull. “Hold up,” I said, retrieving it. “Tanner said something about— Yes! That’s it! Tanner said Bruce was acting strange in the week leading up to the murder. Talking to people who weren’t there and being paranoid. Do you think …?”
Bloom chuckled dryly. “Oh yeah. I definitely think.”
“But how do we know?”
Bloom replaced the book on the shelf. “That’s the catch. We can arrest her, but without evidence, the charges won’t stick. If she confesses, then we might have something, but she doesn’t strike me as the type to confess. If we did somehow manage to make the charges stick and she went to trial, that wouldn’t turn out the way we want it, either; put someone who looks like her in front of a jury, and you’re going to get a verdict of innocent every single time.”
Sounded like the justice system in Eastwind wasn’t a far cry from the one back home.
“So we trick her?” I asked.
“Nooo …” she said firmly. “That could easily be misconstrued by a jury. At least if I do it. However, if you were to find evidence or have her confess when an officer of the law just happened to be around to witness it …” She let the words hang, which was fine. She didn’t need to say more.
“So the question becomes, how do you convince a psycho like that to show her true colors?” I said.
“That’s the million-gold-piece question, right there.”
Having gotten the answers we came for (other than a specific how-to of tricking Tandy, which I didn’t suspect even a library this massive would contain), we passed through one freezing-cold ghost after another and made for the front steps of the library.
“I have to get back to the paperwork,” she said, “but I’ll postpone moving forward with Tanner as long as I can. And I’ll make sure he’s treated well while in our custody. You just send an owl to let me know where you need Deputy Manchester to be and when, and I’ll send him along.”
“You trust him?”
“Manchester?” she said, caught off guard. “Of course I do.” Then her temporary shock diminished, and she amended with, “Sure, he can be a little full of himself and unintentionally patronizing, but trust me when I say he has a good heart. Sensing that is sort of my thing.”
&nbs
p; “Okay. If you trust him, I trust him.”
“He’s a good cop. Reliable, honest. He may be a pain in the hide sometimes, but he comes through in the clutch. And that’s what matters. We’re a small department. Not including Jingo, who isn’t worth his weight in sage when it comes to customer service, it’s just Manchester and me in charge of all law and order in this town. I’d trust him with my life. That is, if I were mortal.” She shrugged before leaning over to Grim. “Don’t let her get into trouble. And also, be sure to hydrate thoroughly after that stunt you pulled on Jingo’s desk.”
She patted him on the head then headed back to the station.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said. “You ready for that lasagna?”
“Am I!” As he padded down the steps and I recapped the information I’d just learned about xana, a question formed in my mind. “Hey Grim, out of curiosity, did you hear Tandy’s song at all when we were at Echo’s Salon?”
“No, but if I did, I’m sure it would’ve sounded worse than a banshee’s nails on a pewter cauldron.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah. You have such a dark past. Give me one example of something terrible you’ve done.”
“Nuh-uh. Not happening. What happens in the Deadwoods never sees the light of day.”
Oh boy. “I really lucked out when I got you as my familiar,” I said sarcastically.
“I was just thinking the same about you. Keep in mind, though, that not all luck is good luck.”
“Oh, I am, Grim. I am.”
Chapter Fourteen
Franco’s Pizza was much busier in the late afternoon, and the familiar clank of metal and glass, and the excited and friendly chatter felt like a small slice of home. I didn’t so much miss the pressure of running Chez Coeur, but I did miss this.
When you live most of your life alone, or at least feeling alone and going unnoticed and unappreciated, any proof that you exist and are a part of something larger, that this world is real and alive and you’re a piece of it, is like wrapping yourself in a thick comforter on a chilly November night.
Grim wanted to stay outside, and I didn’t fight him on it. The host stand was now occupied by a sweet willowy girl, perhaps in her late teens, with dark mocha skin and dazzling green eyes. “Welcome,” she said. “Table for one?”