Tye was smiling, too, as he set the frosty glass down in front of
Pierce. “Maybe that’s why they didn’t find you. The knife was guarding you.
” He picked it up with both hands, reverently. “I’ll just put this back
where it belongs. We’ll need it tomorrow.”
Merle took a sip of his own beer. He looked different, Pierce thought: a
weight off his shoulders, a few centuries out of his eyes. “Carrie and I
slipped out through the fuss in the street,” he said. “Nobody noticed our
shadows. There were reports called in of weird events at Stillwater’s: people
screaming, running out the doors, somebody stabbed, people disguised as
knights looting the place. Lots of disorderly conduct. It didn’t look very
orderly at the police station, either, so we walked on by. Everyone recognized
your father. He and your brother were taken along as witnesses. It will be a
while before all that gets sorted out. I found Carrie’s friend Zed Cluny and
sent Carrie with him to get a decent meal.”
“Good.” Pierce took a sip, felt the cold seep through him, and shivered
suddenly, shaking memories loose in his head. “What was all that? Stillwater?
Those three women? What did they do to him? And what does it all have to do
with this place?”
“It’s a long story.”
“That’s all right. Sounds like I’ll be here for a while.”
He caught up with Leith and Val several hours later, eating pub food at a
brewery around the corner from their motel. Val, whittling down a mountain of
deep-fried seafood and talking on his cell, flashed a grin at him. Leith,
looking weary and relieved, pulled him into a hug, then dragged the nearest
stool closer to his. “Sit down. Have you eaten?”
Pierce nodded. “I’ve been with Merle at the Kingfisher.”
“How did he miss being pulled in with the rest of us? He was running around
in wolf shape one moment, and talking to those three women in the next as if
he had grown up with them.”
“Maybe he did.”
“I could swear—actually, I might have at the station—that the oldest of
them was Lady Morrig Seabrook, the king’s aunt. What she was doing in Chimera
Bay tracking down that malevolent chef absconded from some depraved fairy tale
I cannot begin—” He didn’t try, just rendered himself speechless for a
moment with a slab of steak.
“What happened to the Knights of the Rising God?”
“They got charged with theft, destruction of property, violation of an
ordinance against loud noises within city limits, and a few more things. Then
someone recognized Prince Ingram, and the whole business started all over
again. Neither Merle, nor Merle’s daughter, nor Stillwater’s wife were on
hand to testify that the knights were not stealing those machines, nor did
they wreck the place, and the diners who actually saw what happened to
Stillwater kept contradicting one another.” He chewed another bite, gazing
incredulously back at the endless afternoon. “Where was Merle when we needed
him? And where were you?”
“It took me some time to get that knife out of the table. I wasn’t going to
leave it there. When it finally decided to let me free it, everyone had
vanished.” He caught sight of the expression on Val’s face, one he didn’t
recognize, even after days of close company, dealing together with mysteries,
enchantments, and other assorted crises. “Who is Val talking to?”
“Your mother.”
—
They waited for her in the Kingfisher Inn the next afternoon. Leith, as tense
as Pierce had ever seen him, kept trying to leave.
“She won’t want to see me.”
“She does,” Val insisted. “She said so.”
“She said that to please you. She didn’t mean it.”
“Well, I want you here,” Val said patiently. “I haven’t seen her since I
was a child. Stay to please me.”
They were sitting on one of the sagging velveteen couches in the bar. Luckily,
Pierce thought, most of the old springs were shot, considering the edgy,
restive fidgeting on either side of him. He wondered, studying Leith, if
bravery in the face of impending angry spouses counted in the code of
knighthood, especially when the knight was in the wrong. He wouldn’t have
blamed Leith for justifying his absence as a kindness, to give Val and Heloise
more time to talk. But Val wanted his company and would recognize any excuse
for the abject cowardice that it was. Their father, who could have faced a
living wyvern without flinching, had to force himself to stay put.
A woman walked alone into the bar; their three faces turned at once. But it
was not Heloise. It was no one, Pierce thought at first, no one he knew, just
a young woman with drifting hair, and a thin, tired face. She went to the bar;
Leith and Val went back to fidgeting. Pierce watched her. Something in her
movement, her tall grace, the tilt of her head within her lank, untidy hair,
made him rise abruptly.
He crossed the quiet room. It was nearly empty in the midafternoon, too early
yet for the Friday Nite gathering. She was talking softly to Tye, who said, as
Pierce joined her, “You should talk to Ella. I know she’s been needing more
help, but I don’t know if she’ll admit it yet.”