Omens (35 page)

I don’t believe Marlotte had known that Christian had the hots for his sister, but he did suspect their relationship was a little too close. As the years went by, I think he’d understood more, looked back, and wondered if, subconsciously, he’d known exactly what was going on and had joined Christian in manipulating Jan because it benefited him. Now he knew that deception may have played a role in her death and the death of Peter Evans. Heavy stuff.

To redeem himself, Marlotte was willing to share every vaguely sinister detail he knew about his former best friend’s life. I didn’t even need to prompt him with the “potential serial killer” checklist Evans had provided. The guy already knew the early signs from a college psychology project. Coincidence? Maybe not.

From sleepovers, Marlotte knew that Christian had been a bed-wetter until he seemed to overcome the issue around twelve. He’d never been known to kill small animals, but Marlotte did have a cat go missing once, and he seemed to recall that it happened shortly after the animal scratched Christian’s eye, a minor but extremely painful injury. While he couldn’t recall Christian committing arson, he’d been very keen on camping bonfires and always insisted on tending them. Though he’d only attended community college, he had an above-normal IQ—he just couldn’t seem to achieve the grades to match. As for his family, there were none of the obvious markers—no absent father, no domineering mother, no alcoholic parent, no unstable family life, much less time spent in institutions. His father obviously had a few loose wires, though.

All this meant Christian hit some markers on the checklist. Or grazed them. I suspect many people would. As for occult connections, Marlotte remembered that Christian enjoyed Halloween. He’d liked horror novels as a teen. He’d owned a necklace with a pentacle, bought at a rock concert and never worn because it might upset his mother. In other words, he’d been about as interested in the occult as the average person.

When I left, I hadn’t achieved any amazing breakthroughs, but I hadn’t learned anything that discounted the Christian-killed-his-sister-in-a-jealous-rage theory, either. A decent start.

I got home in time to make a choice. I could have dinner and read Evans’s case files. Or I could go try a karate class. I wasn’t hungry, I wasn’t ready to read those files, and my body screamed for exercise. So I opted for number two.

As I walked into the community center, I was mentally running through the Marlotte interview as if some new lead would magically leap out. I dimly heard the slam of car doors as children spilled out and shrieked past me.

In my half daze, I walked into the gym and saw a dozen figures dressed in white robes. Small figures.

They were all children.

Before I could retreat, a voice called “Liv?” and there was Gordon Webster, the hardware store owner, in a white robe with a black belt. He walked over, grinning.

“Hey,” he said. “Are you joining us?”

I looked around. “I was going to, but I think I’m a little old.”

“No, no. It’s all ages. We do have one adult— And here she is now.”

I turned to see Rose striding down the hall, kids zooming out of her path. Spotting me, she nodded and smiled.

“Olivia,” she said. “I didn’t know you were taking karate.”

“Actually, I was just leaving.”

She took off her jacket, showing her uniform underneath, complete with a brown belt. “Stay. I would love an opponent over four feet tall.”

Gordon pressed, too, and there wasn’t a graceful way to refuse. So I got my lesson. More than my money’s worth, given the time Gordon devoted to me, which had a few of the watching parents grumbling.

Afterward, Rose caught up and walked beside me.

“I’m glad to see you taking my advice on self-defense,” she said. “Particularly now that you’re working alone.”

“I know what it might look like, me showing up at your karate lesson, but I’m not trying to get you to play go-between with Gabriel.”

“I know.”

“You knew what he’d done,” I said as we began our walk to Rowan Street. “That’s why you told me to make him cookies. You thought it might make him feel guilty.”

“It was worth a try. My nephew is a manipulative, scheming, unscrupulous son of a bitch. And those are his good qualities.”

I snorted.

“Oh, I’m quite serious,” she said. “What Gabriel has accomplished in his life is phenomenal, given the circumstances. The problem is that he knows it. Arrogance is blinding, particularly in the young. When he does make a mistake, he’s slow to see it. But he made one with you. He knows that now.”

“Good. Maybe he’ll think twice before setting up paid interviews with other clients.”

Her laugh was so sharp it made me jump.

“Oh, no,” she said. “He won’t. He shouldn’t. He accepts payment for ensuring his clients get a fair shake from the media. There’s nothing wrong with that. His mistake was that you are not a normal client. The balance of power in your relationship skews in your favor. You didn’t want the interview. He should have retreated or, at the very least, apologized.”

“Maybe, but if you expect me to change my mind—”

“I don’t. I’m just offering some friendly advice. If you do decide you want to work with him, don’t wait until you need him.”

“Or he’ll know I’m desperate and the power shifts.”

“Exactly. He wants this case. Badly. He’ll try again and when he does, consider whether you truly mean for this rift to be permanent.” She waved for me to cross Main Street. “Now the subject of Gabriel ends. Come over for tea.”

“I’d rather not—”

“Did you know that my Internet provider recommends changing my wireless access password every month?”

I glowered at her.

“You’ll have tea,” she said.

V
eronica watched Rose Walsh walking with the Larsen girl. That was good to see. The tighter the girl was woven into the fabric of Cainsville, the more likely she was to stay.

It was also comforting to see the old families of Cainsville supporting each other. The bonds used to be so much stronger, in the early days, when families found a pleasant hometown and stayed for generations.

When the elders founded Cainsville, they had actively sought to weave
themselves
into its fabric. That was the goal, of course. A lofty one, founded on the very principles of America itself. The great melting pot. Of course,
they
were not quite the sort of old-world immigrants the founding fathers had envisioned, but the principle still held. They would make a new life here, and they would eschew the old tradition of separating themselves from the
boinne-fala
. They would live together in harmony … or at least symbiosis.

Part of weaving themselves into that fabric was quite literal. Within the oldest families—the Walshes, the Bowens, and a few others—the old blood was strong enough to produce true powers, as with Rose Walsh and, it seemed, the Larsen girl. Yet it had also had the adverse effect of bringing these gifted individuals to the attention of … others.

On thinking that, Veronica instinctively glanced up, but there was no sign of the ravens. They’d retreated. For now. The trick would be keeping them away, convincing the outsiders that the Larsen girl was not her parents—not vulnerable, not unprotected, not weak.

The Walshes would help with that—Rose and Gabriel both—even if they had no idea what exactly they were doing. It came naturally, this recognition of similitude—the instinct to spread wings of protection around one another. And the girl, Veronica feared, would need it.

W
hen we turned onto Rowan, the moon slid from behind the clouds and illuminated a strangely perfect circle of glowing white mushrooms.

Rose quoted, “And I serve the fairy queen, to dew her orbs upon the green.”

“
Midsummer Night’s Dream
again?”

“Of course.” She walked over to the mushrooms. “If it’s fairies, it must be Shakespeare. And that”—she pointed—“is a fairy circle.”

“Ah.” I followed, dew dampening my sneakers.

“You have no idea what a fairy circle is, do you?” She sighed. “Which is shocking for a changeling child.”

“What?”

She laughed as she bent beside the mushrooms. “You know what
that
is, then.”

“Sure. It’s a fairy child left in place of a human one. I stumbled across the Bridget Cleary story in a high school law class.”

Rose recited,
“Are you a witch, or are you a fairy, or are you the wife of Michael Cleary?”

“Her husband burned her to death and was found guilty of manslaughter, not murder, because he claimed she was a changeling.”

“And you cannot murder a nonhuman.” Rose smiled. “The much-underutilized fairy defense. One that would impress even my nephew.”

“So now you’re saying that I’m a changeling?”

“Metaphorically speaking, of course. A child stolen from her parents and snuck off to others, who raise her unaware of her true heritage.”

Tricked by malicious fairy folk. I wondered what my mother—Lena—would think of that. Was it how she felt?

“Olivia?”

“Sorry.” I snapped out of it and nodded at the mushrooms. “What’s the story with these?”

“They’re considered the dancing place of the fair folk. If you see them, you must hurry on. Do them any harm and you are doomed to misfortune and early death. Dance with them and you’ll dance forever, trapped in their circle.”

I crouched to look more closely. “There must be a natural explanation for the growth formations.”

“Don’t be dull, Olivia. There is no graver sin.” She began walking again. “Now come. We’re having tea, and you’re going to tell me what you found in your room.”

I looked up sharply.

“Did I mention I have the second sight?” she said.

“No, Grace told you I thought someone broke into my place.”

“Perhaps, but how would that explain knowing that something was left in your room?”

“Inference. Or firsthand knowledge.”

“You mean I put it there?” Rose laughed. “That would be a trick indeed, considering Grace won’t let me set foot on her property. The old bat hates me.”

She resumed walking, long strides consuming the sidewalk.

I caught up. “I thought you were friends. I know you gossip.”

“No. We trade points of information. When dealing with a bogart, one must be careful.”

“Bogart … Right. That’s a type of brownie.”

“You remember. Excellent. Yes, it’s a particularly nasty subspecies.”

“I don’t think she’d appreciate the comparison.”

“Didn’t I mention that I keep a sprig of hawthorn in my attic to ward off bogarts? Grace hasn’t darkened my doorstep in years. If that’s not proof, I don’t know what is. Of course, it could be the fact that the last time she came over, I threatened to pluck out a hair and fashion a poppet. But I prefer to believe it’s the hawthorn.”

I laughed.

Rose continued, “She’s useful to me, I’m useful to her. As long as that continues, Rowan Street is safe from an old-lady smack down of epic proportions.” She turned up her walk. “Come inside, get tea, and tell me what you found.”

As it turned out, Rose didn’t know that something had been left in my apartment. Grace had told her I suspected a break-in, Rose had guessed that something was left behind and my reaction had confirmed it.

“A con artist mustn’t be afraid of being wrong,” she said as she set out a plate of ginger snaps. “We must be willing to make guesses, act as if we fully believe them to be true and promptly dismiss them when they aren’t.”

“I thought you really had the sight.”

“I do.” She disappeared into the kitchen and returned with the teapot, picking up the conversation as if she’d never left. “But it isn’t like a light switch. I can’t simply flick it on when I need it. Think of it as…”

She walked to a group of vintage photographs, removed one, and brought it over to the table. “Recognize this?”

The photo showed a dumpy old woman in mourning black, with a very recognizable “ghost” behind her. “Abraham Lincoln?”

Rose nodded. “William Mumler’s photo of Mary Todd and her dead husband. And this one?” She picked up a second and brought it to me.

“Again, it looks like Lincoln and…” I sputtered a laugh. “P. T. Barnum?”

“Correct. Barnum hired someone to create that photo, which he then gave as evidence in Mumler’s fraud trial, proving how easily it could be done. Barnum may have believed there was a sucker born every minute, but apparently he didn’t think it was fair if the ‘sucker’ was a grieving relative.”

Rose sat across from me. “The second sight is like the ability to see the dead. One cannot simply conjure real ghosts for a photo session.”

“Like real fairies?” I said, reaching for a ginger snap.

She waved a finger at me. “You mock, yet you want to know more. Feigning disinterest is fine for teenagers, but you should be beyond that.”

Rose poured the tea. “Let me give another analogy, then. My power is like the ability to notice and interpret omens.”

My fingers tightened, almost snapping my cookie. She continued without glancing up. “If one could interpret omens and portents, one would presumably have to wait for them to arrive. Like ghosts or the sight. One could not simply conjure them out of the ether.” She lifted her gaze to mine. “Can you?”

“W-what?”

“Is the analogy correct? Does the omen need to exist where everyone can see it? Or can one appear to you and only you?”

“I don’t know—”

“—what I’m talking about?” Rose sighed deeply and added milk to her tea. “All right. We’ll continue this game a little longer. Now, tell me what you found in your apartment.”

I showed her the photos of the symbol under my mattress. When I said I had a sample of the powder, she made me retrieve it.

“There was something like it sprinkled outside my door a few days before,” I said after I got back, as she opened the paper to reveal the grayish powder within. “I thought I detected a symbol there, too, but I was probably imagining things. Hell, I’m probably imagining the powder, too. It might have just been cigarette ash, and I—”

She lifted a hand. “Don’t do that.”