Amazon Queen (33 page)

“Where is Thea?” I asked Areto.

She didn’t look at me, didn’t look at any of us.

“Thea lied to us,” Areto said. “I followed her because I believed her lies.” She twisted her head then and looked me in the eyes. “I don’t any longer.”

I inclined my head, but only slightly. The warrior had told me that Cleo had been hidden in the barn. That bought her a small amount of respect, but not trust, not yet.

And respect didn’t mean I wouldn’t kill her.

But she knew that.

“Tell me,” I said.

She didn’t ask to be released, to have her bonds loosened, or even to have Bern lower her blade, she just talked. My respect grew a bit more.

“She worships in the day. Makes us worship then too . . . when warriors should be practicing, hearth-keepers working, and artisans creating. It isn’t natural.”

I didn’t interrupt her or enlighten her as to why that was.

“She brings humans into the camp.”

“The cable men,” I replied, to encourage her.

“And the women.”

I paused. “The birders,” I murmured.

“The birders.” She shifted her attention to Bern for a second. There was an apology in her eyes.

The dark-skinned warrior didn’t acknowledge it, but I saw her blade waver.

Areto swallowed. She whispered the next words, so soft at first I thought I’d heard them wrong . . . believed I had to have heard them wrong. “They worship with us.”

My shock must have shown.

She pulled her elbows in toward her body, as if she wanted to pull back inside herself, contract with . . . shame . . . or anger? I wasn’t sure which. I knew I would have felt both. Shame that I’d let the priestess lead me so far away from my values, anger that she’d violated my trust.

“What about the three who were killed? Do you know about that?”

She shook her head, but she looked to the side, telling me she knew or suspected something, something she didn’t want to say out loud. “The one . . . that was before any of this . . . while you . . . ” She stopped. “The others, yes. A little . . . ”

I didn’t like her answer, didn’t believe her. “What about Kale? Do you know what happened to her?”

She looked up, her face earnest. “I don’t know the name.”

“The dark-haired warrior who was with me at the camp.”

She licked her lips. “I never saw her before then. There was another one, though.”

“Another one?” I prepared for a shock; I could feel one coming.

“There was another Amazon. She was angry. Thea had already gone to the woods with the two women. Taken them to the obelisk.”

Her eyes shone with outrage; I shared it, but I didn’t acknowledge hers or mine, didn’t give her an out to stop.

Her jaw tensed, and she continued, “This Amazon was looking for someone, a priestess, but not Thea.”

“Padia,” I offered, then to myself, “and she found her.”

“I don’t know, but she told me she was on the high council and ordered me to tell her where Padia was. I told her I’d never heard the name and she said, ‘The priestess, tell me where the priestess is.’ So I sent her into the woods.”

Kale waited to see my reaction. I didn’t give one. She had betrayed Thea to this mystery Amazon. Did I care? Not a whit.

“After maybe an hour, Thea came back. She had me go with her into the woods. She carried a body back with her.”

A body, and not the birder’s.

“It was the Amazon.”

“Where is she?” I asked.

“The barn, under the hay. I think it’s what made Thea think to put Cleo there.”

I didn’t know how to respond, didn’t know what to think. There was a dead Amazon hidden in the barn. Who was she? Fariba or Valasca was my guess—one of the high-council members Kale had named who had supported Padia. They had probably found out she had deserted Artemis and were as outraged as I was.

I wanted to know who this dead Amazon might be, but I wasn’t done with my questions either.

“What about the sheriff. Who called them?” I asked, putting the body to the side for now.

Her chin rose. “I did. Thea thought I was arranging the hay bales, but I went into the woods and saw them. I knew Thea had killed them and the council member too.”

“But you didn’t see Kale?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No, but I didn’t stay long. I knew I had to get back to the barn before Thea discovered I was missing. I returned to the house and called, told the police we had trespassers.”

“You didn’t mention Thea.”

Another shake, this one slow, ashamed. “I couldn’t.”

A chance at shedding her sheep’s wool and Areto had balked. Of course, only a sheep would call humans to do what an Amazon should take care of herself.

“And when they arrived, Thea talked to them,” I prompted.

“She did. I think she was worried they’d go in the barn. Hay was still everywhere. She directed them to the obelisk, but I could tell she was angry.”

“Did she suspect you?”

“She trusted me enough to get my help in hiding the Amazon. It would never have occurred to her I’d call about two dead humans. She also didn’t know I’d seen them.”

The muscles in Areto’s neck were tense and her eyes were hard, but the emotion wasn’t directed at me, it was turned inward.

I gave her a moment, realizing I’d misjudged Thea in at least one respect. She hadn’t brought the human authorities to our property. Of course, that was a small issue compared to everything else she had done . . . or was trying to do.

“So where is Thea?” I was still curious about the Amazon in the barn, but Thea was my focus right now. I had to find her.

“I don’t know. She has hardly slept at the safe camp since you left. She told me to take your room.”

“She said you could have my room?”

“No, she
told
me to take it, and she had another warrior sleep in hers.”

So even when she did stay at the camp, it wasn’t in either of the rooms I might have guessed.

Mel was right; Thea was a follower of Athena, a plotter. But if she wasn’t sleeping at the camp, where was she sleeping?

I looked at Mel. “I think we need to find out who these birders are. Find them, and we will probably find Thea.”

I gestured for Bern to pull Areto to her feet. I wasn’t sure what to do with her. A lot depended on what happened next, if I discovered what she had told me so far was true or not.

I glanced at her. “Do you see Thea come and go? Does she drive herself, or do birders come with her?”

“She leaves at dusk on foot and comes back at dawn.”

So wherever she was staying was close. But our woods covered fifty acres, and a number of houses were within jogging distance, cross-country. She could be in any of them, or she could be staying in a tent pitched on our property or an adjoining property . . . there was no way to know.

“There’s more.”

Bern held Areto by the arm. The captured warrior didn’t struggle. She lifted her face and met my gaze.

“There’s something planned in two days. I don’t know what, but we were told to stay at the camp, that we would all be expected to participate.”

“Night or day?”

“Day, little before noon.”

I nodded, then moved to walk past them.

“Zery?” Areto pulled in a breath. Her chest expanded. “I accept my fate, whatever you decide, but I want you to know . . . Bern too . . . I’m sorry.”

I walked past her then. She was sorry; I was sorry. But regret wasn’t going to get us out of whatever Thea had planned . . . action was.

While Mel revisited the computer, looking for anything that might tie the date Areto had mentioned to Athena and give us some clue as to what Thea had planned, I sought out Jack and Mateo.

In a strangely normal tableau, they were sitting in the kitchen, drinking beers and eating peanuts. There were two empties in front of each of them and the floor was littered with peanut debris. As I entered, Mateo crushed a shell under the heel of his boot, then shifted his foot to smash another.

I filled them in on what Areto had said.

The bird son didn’t look up until I’d finished.

Like me, they were more interested in where Thea might be now than in who might be lying dead in the Amazon’s barn.

“I didn’t see any sign of a tent,” he replied. His face was drawn and his eyes tired. I didn’t think it was the beer causing either. It was easy to forget he was Andres’s father. That he had as big, in some ways bigger, stake in what happened than I did.

“But you weren’t looking for one either,” I said. I kept my tone pure business. There was no room for pity, and certainly no time. “And if there is one, I don’t think it would be obvious.”

Looking at Jack, I asked, “How are wolverines at tracking?”

He scissored his fingers around the beer bottle’s neck, then swung it back and forth. “Better than humans.”

“Better than Amazons?”

He looked up. His eyes were filled with challenge.

“See if you can pick up her scent,” I replied. Then, at Mateo, “And see if you can find a tent, or anything else that she could be staying in overnight.”

He brushed a pile of peanut shells onto the floor and started to rise.

I paused, for some reason feeling propelled to say more. “He’s alive, Mateo, at least for now. I don’t know what she has planned, but I’m sure whatever it is, it involves Andres . . . which means we have until . . . ” I hesitated, calculating. Areto had said two days, but it was morning now—had she meant from yesterday? Realizing she probably had, I finished, “Wednesday, noon. We have until then.”

Then I left. A day and a half. That was it. It wasn’t much; I prayed it was enough.

By five I was still wide awake, as was Mel.

She was at the computer, a cup of coffee at her elbow. The beer sounded better to me, and since neither would have much effect on my Amazon metabolism, I walked back to the kitchen to get one. Mateo and Jack had left. Kale was missing too. She seemed to like to be alone; considering what she’d been through, I could understand that.

Crunching peanut shells under my shoes, I returned to the office with a longneck.

As I twisted off the lid, Mel leaned back in her chair and watched me.

“So, there’s another Amazon involved.”

I lifted my head in the affirmative. “From the high council.”

She slid her fingers through the coffee cup’s handle and tapped them against the ceramic. “Any idea who she is or why she came here?”

I lowered the bottle I’d just pressed to my lips. “Kale mentioned two other council members who were on Padia’s side. I figure one of them found out about her worshipping Athena and weren’t happy with being duped.”

Mel seemed to accept my explanation. “Makes sense. Too bad she didn’t find us instead. It would have simplified things a lot.”

“Or Kale. Thea . . . ” I was having a hard time deciding what to call the priestess, Padia or Thea. For now I had settled on Thea. I’d thought of her that way for too long. “Thea must have already done whatever she did to her before the council member Areto saw showed up, otherwise the pair of them might have been able to stop her.”

“But she only killed the second arrival. I wonder why?”

I shook my bottle, checking how much I had drunk. “She needed a patsy? She’d already killed the birders too and wanted someone to take the blame?” Maybe if Areto hadn’t called the sheriff’s office, Thea would have.

“Maybe.” Mel didn’t seem to buy it. “And you said Thea didn’t seem to know Kale.”

“She was obviously acting.” I shrugged; I was past understanding why Thea did anything. To be honest, I didn’t want to understand her; I just wanted to stop her.

Mel picked up her cup and took a sip. “Do you think Andres’s still alive?

“According to Areto, there’s a big event coming up. So, yeah, I think he is.”

Mel pulled her fingers free from the cup. “Well, that’s what confuses me. This event . . . it’s huge.” She tilted her head toward the computer monitor. “Panathenaea. Athena’s birthday.”

On the screen was an image of Athens, people thronging the streets. They were gathered around a statue I now recognized as Athena. “What are they doing?” I asked.

“Giving gifts.” Mel’s face was grim.

“What kind of gifts?” I asked, but I already knew.

“Sacrifices. During Panathenaea, they made sacrifices.”

“And what better sacrifice than the blood of your enemy mixed with the blood of those you betray,” I murmured, repeating Bubbe’s words.

Mel nodded. “None, but the thing is, Panathenaea didn’t just pop up. If Padia wanted to kill Andres for Panathenaea, and it makes sense she would—any sacrifice made then is going to have one hundred times the power of one made any other day—why would she have tried to kill him earlier? That doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe she hadn’t thought about Panathenaea being so close, but by the time she stole Andres back, she realized she was missing an opportunity.”

“An Athena worshipper forget her birthday?” Mel scoffed. “Athena’s about planning, remember? What kind of plan is that?”

She was right. Like many things about Thea, it didn’t make sense. Panathenaea had only been a week away when we stole Andres. What was a week? Nothing. Not if it meant increasing your power by one hundredfold.

The beer seemed to be giving me a headache, or maybe it was trying to figure out the indecipherable priestess.

I set the bottle down. “I don’t know. I just know we have to stop her.”