Pendant of Fortune (22 page)

“
I imagine so,” Lady Dewanne sniffed. “It’s very odd to find such a uniform place.”

“
Many smaller communities are this uniform,” Captain Nero said, walking up behind her. “Is that not so, Cantor?”

“
True. But in those cases they usually share a common church with several other communities. Ikling is exceptional.”

“
In many ways.” Nero looked around thoughtfully, and his eyes rested on Volle.

“
We’re integrating, slowly.” Lord Dewanne sounded and looked a bit defensive. His ears were back very slightly. His wife, too, had moved to his side, slowly, but purposefully.

“
Integration is a wonderful thing. It allows us to understand our brothers, no?”

“
Quite.” Dewanne’s ears came back up, and he appeared to relax.

“
Speaking of which,” Ilyana said, “Where is Streak?”

She was looking at Volle, but he looked at Nero, and it was the wolf who answered. “He wasn’t feeling well. He asked to remain back at the castle.”

“
Helfer prefers to call it a mansion,” Volle said quickly.

Nero looked annoyed, but Volle couldn’t tell if it was at him or at himself. “Indeed.” None of the others had noticed his mistake, but his tail kept lashing. He surveyed the crowd for a moment and then said,

“
Lord Vinton, I wonder if you might accompany me back to the
castle
. I think your presence there could prove useful.”

“
I was going to invite Lord Vinton to spend the remainder of the day at this lovely resort we’ve found. We’re not going back to the castle.” Lord Dewanne gazed at his wife, and Volle reflected that there were times when it was convenient to be married to a self-proclaimed invalid.

“
Will you be there tomorrow?” Volle asked.

“
Yes, of course.”

“
I’ll join you then, if I might defer the invitation.” He wanted to go, but Nero looked insistent and the reminder of Streak tugged at his guilty heart. Perhaps Nero had discovered a way for Volle to get in to see him.

“
Certainly. It’s the Burning Waters. I’m sure anyone local can guide you there.” Lord Dewanne made as if to leave, but Volle stopped him.

“
Maybe Ilyana and Volyan could spend the day there with you?” He knew that their accommodations in Ikling were less than luxurious.

Ilyana gave him a grateful look, while Volyan, who had been staring at Nero with large eyes, turned to Volle and said, “I wanna go with you!”

“
Voly, dear, be polite.” Ilyana rested a paw on his shoulder, but he kept staring at Volle.

“
Why are you going away again?”

Volle knelt and tousled the fur between the cub’s ears. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Volyan. Okay? Be a strong fox and take care of your mother until then.”

The cub bit his lip and then nodded. “Okay.”

“
Good boy. I promise I’ll see you tomorrow.” Volyan’s tail wagged, and Volle smiled. “That’s a good fox. Listen to your mother now.”

“
All right, Volyan.” Ilyana put a paw down, and he clasped it, standing obediently by her side. She looked up at Volle. “Why do they need you at the castle? I thought your hearing wasn’t until next Ursiday.”

“
It’s not.” He glanced at Nero. “But I’ve been assisting Captain Nero here with some of his casework, at his request, and I did promise to make myself available to him.”

She raised her eyes for a moment. “All right. We’ll be happy to accept your invitation, Lord Dewanne.”

“
My pleasure.” He bowed to her.

Lady Dewanne coughed. “Do excuse my not curtseying, but after all that kneeling in church my rheumatism is bothering me terribly.”

“
I quite understand,” Ilyana said. “We’ll see you tomorrow, then, Volle.”

“
Bye, Daddy!” Volyan waved enthusiastically.

Volle waved back as they walked across the plaza. Being called “Daddy” still felt odd to him. He wished now that he’d made more time to spend with the cub while he was growing up. Intellectually, he knew he couldn’t have, but if there’d only been some way…

Nero seemed to read his thoughts, once he’d said goodbye to Helfer and joined the wolf in the carriage. “You haven’t seen your son in a year.”

“
More than that.” Volle stared across the plaza, where the bright red of their fur was still visible. “Three years? Four years? I saw him when she had him baptized in Divalia, and on each of my visits to Vinton.”

“
Three times total, then. Was he baptized in the Cathedral?”

Volle flicked an ear, a little disturbed—though not surprised—that Nero knew how many times he’d visited Vinton. “No. We asked, but I’m not important enough. He was baptized in the small church her parents attend, and they did a lovely job.” As an afterthought, he added, “The Cantor there is a fox anyway. The one at the Cathedral is a coyote.”

“
All canids. Does it make a difference? I would have thought you of all people would not hold to such differences.”

“
No, it doesn’t make a difference. To me. But…” He paused for a moment, then realized that Nero knew he’d been raised in Ferrenis. “The Reformed Church separates each race. They don’t have Families. Or rather, they do, but each Family is just one race. Fox, Wolf, Coyote.”

“
I am familiar with the tenets of the Reformation,” Nero said stiffly.

“
But in Ferrenis, I see…I mean, I didn’t grow up with as much of an attitude about integration. The farm I grew up on was in a village that was primarily foxes, but we didn’t ostracize the others.”

“
What others were there?”

Volle thought quickly. “Bobcat and hare,” he said, naming the races of two of his childhood friends from the streets of Caril.

“
I see.”

“
But here, there seems to be tension within Families and sometimes between Families.”

“
There will always be tension between the predator Families and the others.”

“
Well, yes. I don’t mean that. But when was the last time there was a…a prey incident?” He was hesitant to say the word, and his ears folded back as he did.

Nero stretched out. “King Barris had been on the throne for four years. A wolf killed two mice and a hare.”

“
And you caught him?”

“
Her.”

“
Oh.” Volle let it drop, and Nero didn’t seem anxious to discuss it any more. “So what would you like my help with?”

“
I would like to visit the crime scene again. There are a few scent marks that we found puzzling, and a few items…” He trailed off, looking out the window at the mountain scenery. “As you’re close to the suspect, we’d like you to take a nose around and see if you can identify his property.”

“
I’m sure I can. But please, while speaking to me, could you call him ‘Streak’ rather than ‘the suspect’?”

“
Of course. And I would like you to speak to Lord Fardew. Find out if there’s any way he will let you talk to the sus—Streak.” Volle sighed. “I am aware, at least partially, of your history. He is now my superior, though his appointment is so recent that this is the first time we have been working this closely together. I have heard his thoughts on you, but absent any actual crime, I have been left to form my own opinion.”

“
And that is?” Volle thought there was a slight emphasis on the word actual, but he wasn’t sure. Was that a reference to the document he’d stolen?

The wolf smiled at him and shrugged. “When I have formed it, if the occasion warrants it, perhaps I shall share it.”

Volle thought for a moment, then charged ahead. “You do know that I’m going on trial for an actual crime.”

“
As I understand it, if you are what you claim to be, then the removal of the documents is not a crime so much as a minor breach of protocol, for which you will no doubt be reprimanded. And if you are not what you claim, well then, the actual crime falls outside my purview.”

“
Then I will await my vindication, and hopefully that will help you form your opinion.”

“
I’m certain it will play a part.”

Volle grinned. The large wolf’s circumspect manner reminded him of Tish. “What do you do when you’re not tracking down robbers and murderers?”

“
I study the history of robbers and murderers. And I cultivate a small flower garden in a hothouse.” He shifted his weight and stretched out again.

“
History, eh?”

“
I find it invaluable. Even though our city is larger than it has ever been, it is exceedingly rare that an individual finds a unique way of committing a crime that has never been seen before. The past repeats itself—not always identically, but often with the same patterns.”

The image of Xiller came to Volle’s mind unbidden, and he tried to shut it away. That history would not repeat itself this time, not if he could help it. He had to save Streak if he could. “And what does history teach you about this case?”

Nero looked shrewdly at him. “That I should keep my opinions to myself until I have reached a definite conclusion.”

“
Fair enough.” But the thought of history repeating itself continued to disturb Volle, and he made no more effort at conversation until they reached the castle.

“
So, should I face Dereath first?” He straightened his shirt and doublet.

“
Yes, why not? I’ll locate Archie and meet you in Lord Fardew’s parlor, since the crime scene is there anyway.”

As he wandered away, Volle heard the wolf order a servant to go find Archie for him, and he chuckled. So that’s what ‘locate’ meant.

The castle seemed much more sparsely inhabited; probably much of the nobility had chosen to remain in warmer Ikling. He wandered the corridors and only saw two or three other nobles. In fact, he had to go out of his way to find a servant on the second floor from whom he could get directions, once he’d realized that he didn’t know where he was going. “Should’ve asked while Nero was around,” he muttered to himself. “Then he’d know I didn’t know where the chambers were. But he’d probably have thought I was just pretending for his benefit.”

He tsked at himself. Seir had often told him,
Don’t overthink things
, and he thought that lesson applied now.

Dereath’s quarters were locked, and nobody responded when Volle knocked. He sighed and looked around, but nobody was in sight. He didn’t particularly want Dereath or Nero to come back and find him sitting like a servant outside the door, so he wandered along the maze of narrow passages in that area, sniffing now and then, but mostly just thinking.

He tried to stay near Dereath’s quarters whenever he had a choice of passages to take, and at one point that led him to venture down a narrow side corridor when the main one would have taken him further away. Halfway down the passage, he stopped, nose held high. A scent was intruding on the air of the corridor, and though it was stale, it set his fur prickling. He must be near the crime scene, but how was he getting the scent of blood? Surely they had already moved the body, and he’d thought the crime took place in Dereath’s quarters.

Further along, he found his answer. A large hole at about knee level was where the scent was strongest, and as he put his eye to it, he caught a glimpse of the room beyond before another scent made him jerk his head back.

Unmistakably, his nostrils told him, Streak had been at or near this hole in the recent past.

He knelt to the hole again. Inside, he could see a variety of simple furnishings. The bed had been neatly made, while the plain dresser stood with one drawer open. The floor was uncarpeted, covered only with a few grooming tools and several dark stains that Volle’s nose told him the nature of. Sitting back on his heels, he contemplated the hole. It was too small for Streak to fit through; it was too small for him to fit through, in fact. Helfer might have been able to manage it, though he’d have lost some fur in the process.

What would Streak have been doing here? And more importantly, why had this hole been left uncovered? Unlike the hole he and Streak had slipped through, all the interior holes he’d seen at the castle had been covered with boards or sheets.

He heard noises in the corridor outside, and hurriedly stood. The noises resolved into the voices of Nero and Archie, but he managed to get back to Dereath’s door before they came into view.

“
Lord Vinton,” Nero said by way of greeting. “It seems Lord Fardew is on his way back from Ikling, and is expected soon. We procured a key from the Steward, which Archie will have to return once it has served its purpose.”