Ngalthr—a priest, but also often a mediator of R’lyeh’s millennia-spanning political squabbles and compromises—nodded somberly. “We might be able to suggest a few possibilities.”
Later, he pulled me aside, and spoke softly so that the men of the air couldn’t hear. “Do you trust her promises?”
I hadn’t yet slept, though fatigue was beginning to creep into my bones. I had been talking to Audrey and Jesse, listening to their stories about Sally and wishing I had a notebook. It took me a moment to realize that he was talking about Mary. “I don’t know her well enough to judge. I wouldn’t try binding her to it magically, though; her team would take it badly.”
“One day, your family will learn that other people are not blind.”
“I’m sorry, Archpriest. It’s been a long night. I truly don’t know—I think she’s honorable, but I don’t think she worries about following set rules and promises so much as what she thinks is right. And her judgment hasn’t always agreed with mine.”
“Well. We’ll try this. We will watch and wait, and if need be we’ll move the spawning grounds yet again. Innsmouth will do for now, though. We’ll retrieve gold from our stores; it should be sufficient for you to buy back some of what’s rightfully yours.”
Even tired, I could imagine the advantages of a small fortune. Miskatonic might not sell us our books, but the construction companies working on the outskirts of town were likely motivated by more straightforward greed.
“Archpriest. There’s something you should know.” A glance told me that Spector and Mary and Dawson remained elsewhere. The plash of waves would cover our words. “I found Ephraim Waite’s journals at Hall. One of his cultists was exiled Russian nobility. And not pleased with his exile.”
Ngalthr hissed softly. “You haven’t told them.”
“I was trying to decide whether I should.” I hesitated. Speaking would make the choice real. “There are things they’d be able to do to protect themselves, however small, that would work better if they knew where the threat originated. But I think even Spector would feel he had to tell his masters. They’ve tried to blame us already, even without the details. With them, the paranoia would become even worse than it is now—and probably more destructive than any number of saboteurs and spies.”
“The dangers of paranoia are much of why that art is so strongly forbidden. Yes, your judgment is good. Keep silent for now, and let me know if you learn of a reason to speak.”
Hiding Ephraim’s secret would be far from a perfect protection. Barlow hardly seemed to need evidence to suspect us, and we still didn’t know who had visited Upton scant months before. The answer to that, when it came, might well spark its own paranoia. But for now, this was what I could do.
Spector’s trust in me, ultimately, couldn’t weigh more heavily than the unknown lives saved or lost by my decision.
Dawn, scarce stronger than moonlight, whispered behind the overcast as we drove back to Miskatonic. Mary drove Jesse home, bearing Sally’s body. She would tell Barlow what had happened, or most of it, but the public story would be that Sally, distraught by her boyfriend’s hospitalization, had wandered out into the blizzard and frozen to death. She deserved better, but it was a tale people would accept all too willingly. I didn’t ask Mary for details about how they’d have her found, or how they’d explain the sigils still scarring her arm.
I supposed some secretarial duties were more pleasant than others.
Audrey and I had spoken more with Jesse. He was exhausted—as we all were—but had agreed to cooperate with the story. I hoped his unbound promise would hold. At least Audrey seemed to have persuaded him that she kept company with me by her own will.
*
There was one more person who must hear the truth. Trepidatious and feeling out of place, I followed Audrey and Jesse into Leroy’s hospital room.
He was awake and sitting up, though his skin still looked waxen. As soon as he saw us, he asked, “What’s wrong?” And then, “Where’s Sally?”
“Sally’s gone,” said Jesse, his voice thin.
“How?” He looked at me. “Why are you here?”
“I was there,” I said softly.
“Aphra tried to save her,” said Audrey. I bowed my head, not brave enough to protest the claim.
“Like you did me,” he said reluctantly. “Did your family…?” He trailed off, eyes flicking to Jesse.
“He knows about them,” I said. “He was there too. And no, not my family this time. Not … not for the most part. Jesse, perhaps you ought to explain the first bit, since Audrey and I weren’t there.”
“Um.” Jesse took the single wooden chair, and sat, gingerly, beside Leroy. “After Sally told me to talk to Aphra about what happened to you, we decided we needed to know more. We were obviously getting into the kind of thing we’ve always talked about, and we needed some sort of power to protect ourselves, and to be able to stand up to whatever happened. So we snuck into the library.”
“Without me?” Leroy’s enthusiasm was immediate and automatic. He flinched even as he spoke, but didn’t try to deny his reaction.
“We found some restricted books that looked good. We thought we were doing all right, until the alarm went off…” He continued through their encounter with Barlow’s people, the federal team’s willingness to provide cover for their own ends, their offer of mentorship in exchange for shared texts.
Aside from the need for a precipitating burglary, it was much how Charlie and I had started working together. At that time, I could hardly have claimed more experience than Mary—only a better awareness of my own limits.
Up through the start of the inventory ritual, it seemed clear that Leroy would have happily gone along with every bit of their plan. At that point, however, Jesse was forced to admit amnesia and hand the narrative over to me.
I summoned once again the half-lie we’d told Barlow: that we’d noticed the odd ritual in progress and been caught up in it when we came to investigate. “Then something else answered the summons. We’ve been calling it an outsider—one of the things that doesn’t belong in our universe, but waits for someone to make a crack in the world. It was … cold. And hungry. Professor Trumbull managed to banish it before it could spread, but it left a bit of itself in Audrey and Sally. And in me, through the connection that my grandfather made.”
It hurt to tell the story, and yet it was also strangely relieving. I could speak of it, could explain things that at the time had felt beyond words, could turn them into something human. Leroy listened intently, but glared when I told him, not trying to gloss it over, what my grandfather had done and why he had done it. Glared harder when Audrey insisted that it had probably been too late to save Sally anyway.
“We don’t know,” I said. “We can’t know.”