TWENTY-FOUR
Food and a chance to dry
out were welcome. While I was wolfing my meal—unladylike of me, but
true—I kept turning things over in my head. Aside from the late
Jonah Leung, the ley weaver had listed four mages: the nexus, the
puppeteer, the child, and the rogue. Including the freaky, inhuman
thing as well, that was five, not four as I’d expected. I’d been
thinking in terms of four cardinal points and assuming the
spell-flingers who occupied each virtual position were the anchors. But going from Willow’s reaction,
the anchors were physical objects that lay in the lake itself—or
had until one of them had been shifted in 1989, causing the magical
energy of the grid at the bottom of the lake to break loose. So in
a way, maybe I was right in thinking that Costigan’s house and
Jewel’s were now holding down two of the points, but it wasn’t the
way the system was supposed to work. What the hell had happened in
1989 and how had it moved the anchor? Surely an anchor was
something pretty solid or magically resistant to change, something
that probably dated back to whenever the landslide tumbling down
Mount Storm King had dammed up the original valley and formed the
lakes. It wouldn’t be something easily shoved aside. And where was
it, whatever it was? Leung must have had it or had some control
over it if it was the cause of his death, but Steven seemed to be
the only member of the family who didn’t possess an iota of magical
power. But he’d known about it....
I put the gnawed remnants of my meal aside,
frowning and wondering if I was chasing my own tail. It would be
nice to know what sort of object was causing all this carnage,
because then I might be able to discover who had one, but if I just
knew who killed Leung, or Strother, surely I’d be able to find the
anchor among the individual’s effects. It was another
chicken-and-egg problem—find one, find the other, but where to
start looking . . .
The longer a crime goes unsolved, the harder it
becomes to close, and the events of 1989 were now twenty-two years
past. Clues were fading away. But now someone had killed Alan
Strother, not just because I was in town—though that certainly was
the catalyst—but because he was close to something that pointed at
Leung’s murderer. He hadn’t been killed for the license plate,
because no one knew I had it, not even Jin. No one would have
confused Strother for me, either, so it wasn’t an accident of time
and place. On the surface, there was no connection between Alan
Strother and Steven Leung except the investigation of the sunken
Subaru. But there was one link, now expunged from the records:
Willow.
Seventeen years had elapsed between the time the
anchor was moved and Leung disappeared. It wasn’t the wild magic
that had taken him, as it had his son; it was a person who wanted
to stop him from doing something with the anchor. Not Willow; she
hadn’t known the anchor was the cause of the wild magic or her
father’s death until I’d said something. Why had Leung waited so
long to do something about the anchor? Hadn’t he figured it out
sooner? Willow hadn’t, but she’d had other things to look after, as
she’d said. Chasing and taming the yaoguai would be my guess. But
Steven, alone in his house mourning his wife and son and missing
his daughters, must have had a lot of time to think about what had
taken them all away. . . .
And the anchor had sat wherever it was all that
time. Could Leung have had the anchor all along and not known what
it was? If he suddenly came to that information, would he think the
anchor was the key to his problems and try to get rid of it or fix
it? Jewel had indicated as much, and if she wasn’t jerking my
chain, then what had Leung tried to do? And who had known his plans
and tried to stop them? I was still betting on a neighbor; someone
Leung had trusted enough to talk to when he must have been
scared—at least scared enough to try something crazy. What had he
done, who knew about it, and where was the anchor now?
I sat at my table, puzzling over it all for a
few more minutes, getting nowhere. Now that I was actually in
Forks, my cell phone had started working again and it flashed a
light at me to let me know I had messages waiting. I hoped they’d
be more helpful than my current ruminations.
The first was from Soren Faith. The department
had found an electronic file containing the list of resident home
owners around the lake on Strother’s computer. It had half a dozen
names and addresses, going back to 1988. It looked as though
Strother had been out trying to talk to some of them in person when
he’d told Ridenour he wasn’t nearby. I guessed he was buying time
for Willow to leave the greenhouse but hadn’t known I’d take his
place and undo that gift. Faith seemed to think the list wasn’t
that useful, but he told me to call him anyhow.
But there had to be something to it. If Strother
had found something interesting, maybe he’d gone back to follow up
rather than coming to look for me on the mountain. Of course, he
didn’t know Ridenour hadn’t picked me up, so he’d have assumed I’d
be at my hotel once the storm came in after dark. He’d had no way
to know about the zombies or how long it would take me to get back
to Port Angeles. But someone could have followed him down the
mountain and to my hotel.
I let the other messages wait while I called
Faith back and asked for the list.
“Well . . . it is the homicide of a fellow
officer, now, Ms. Blaine. Not sure I should pass it on.”
“You know I’m not the one who killed him and he
only made the list because I suggested it. My client wants some
closure on the death of her father. I promise not to get under your
feet. I just want to see the list.”
Faith sighed. I could hear an ancient desk chair
creak as he leaned back into it. “I wish I was working with a dog
on this. . . .”
“Excuse me?”
“Usually my partner and I spend most of our time
with K-9 units, hunting down missing persons and dead bodies that
float up off the Strait, chasing down marijuana smugglers, and
picking up after idiots who drink and drive on the cliffs. No
offense, but frankly the dog’s a lot easier to work with than you.
I know you’re cooperating, but for God’s sake, lady, you’re kicking
over rocks like you want to get yourself killed next. One freakin’
homicide a year’s more than enough. I’ll give you this damned list
if you can get yourself into my office by four thirty. But after I
do, you tell Mrs. Newman that any more carnage on this account will
not be ignored. She is not going to wave this off with the smell of
money.”
I found myself nodding at the phone.
“Understood, Mr. Faith.”
“Ah, that ‘mister’ stuff makes me think I ought
to wear a tie.” He said it as if he could already feel it
strangling him. “Just ‘Faith.’ And you’re not here by four thirty,
I’m gone.”
I didn’t get a chance to reply before he’d cut
the connection. I checked the time and thought I could listen to
the next message and still make it back across the hill if I
started right away.
The other message was from Quinton.
“Hey, beautiful. Um . . . sorry about the other
day. But I’m done with my project and I thought I’d better come
talk to you so . . . I’m about to get on the ferry to Kingston.
I’ll call again when I get to Port Angeles.” Strange—not only did
he sound odd, but he wasn’t in the habit of checking in on me or
randomly showing up while I was working.
The next call was also Quinton. “Hey. I’m in
Port Angeles, but the clerk says you checked out of your hotel. I’m
just sitting in the lobby for a while, staring at this pay phone. .
. .” He rattled off the number. “I’ll wait here until four. I
brought you something from Ben.”
He sounded worried and I guessed the sheriff’s
department was still hanging around. Given his feelings about
police agencies, I imagined he was nervous, and I wondered what had
prompted his trip—I doubted that whatever Ben had given him was so
compelling that he had to bring it to me immediately. He hadn’t
called very long ago, so I tried the number.
“Hello?” It was definitely Quinton’s voice at
the other end.
“Hey,” I said. “What brings you out this
way?”
“Hey. Um . . .” He cleared his throat but didn’t
say more.
“So . . . someone’s nearby whom you don’t want
listening to this conversation?” I asked.
“That sounds right.”
“All right. I have to stop at the sheriff’s
department. Do you want to meet me there?”
“Not so much. I met most of them already, I
think.”
“OK. Go down to the Canadian ferry dock and I’ll
pick you up there about four forty-five.”
“Will do.” He got off the phone without an
endearment or goodbye, which was standard procedure for Quinton if
he thought anyone might be too interested in what he had to say.
Since having worked for a covert agency, he really distrusted
phones.
I rushed to get back to Port Angeles before
Faith’s deadline. In the steadily increasing rain, it was going to
be tight.
But I made it and found Soren Faith standing
beside a desk in the sheriff’s department, shrugging on his jacket.
He looked up and waved me closer.
He picked up a file from the desk as I
approached and held it out to me. “I don’t think it’s going to be
much help.”
I took the folder anyway. “Why not?” I
asked.
“Well, most of the folks on that list are
already suspects. The rest aren’t around anymore. The 1990s were a
good time for real estate investors, so most of the lake cabins
were bought as vacation homes, not permanent ones. Aside from Elias
Costigan, the Newmans, and a couple of Morganroths and Barnses
whose families have lived here as long as Washington’s been a
state, no one’s a year-round resident who isn’t accounted for.
Alan’s car computer logged all his stops and times, so I marked up
which houses he visited and when on that list. He pretty much
covered everyone. The only thing that’s unusual is that he drove
back and forth a couple of times.”
“Did he drive or did he stop?” I asked.
Faith smiled—a crooked, funny smile—as if I’d
figured out something that pleased him. “That is the interesting
feature, but I haven’t been able to figure out what he was doing
yet.” He reached for the folder I held and I gave it back to him so
he could spread the contents on the desk. He pointed to the car
computer log, item by item. “Down here, he stops by Costigan’s
place. Then he stops a few minutes later at the Newmans’. That’s
not too strange since they lie along the same route. But then he
goes back and stops at the Log Cabin Resort—isn’t that a strange
coincidence—about four hours before you called us from there. Then
he turns it around and drives out to Lake Sutherland and goes
around the back side of it and stops at three different houses,
including Steven Leung’s. All of them are unoccupied. He goes to
Fairholm, around to Camp David Jr. and back, then heads to Lake
Sutherland again. He was out of the car for about thirty minutes at
that point, and he didn’t log what he was doing, so I assumed he
was eating or having a piss, but the car wasn’t near any facility
because all of them are still closed and there’s no one resident at
the small lake who’d have let him.”
“So where’d he go and what did he do?” I asked,
as expected.
“I don’t know. Nothing else on the list or the
log points to anyone specific,” Faith replied, rubbing the scar
under his hair.
I frowned and started to push my hair back,
mirroring his movement until I caught myself. Faith gave me another
of his crooked cat-smiles. “It points to no one,” I said,
disappointed. “I was sure it led to something.”
A wry quirk twisted his mouth. “It does. We just
don’t know what. And that’s why I’m giving it to you. I don’t want
you getting into trouble, but putting the extra brainpower on the
problem won’t hurt. You been up here most of a week, so I figure
you might see something I’m missing.”
I gave him a suspicious glance. “How do you know
how long I’ve been in town?”
“I like to be thorough. I checked with the
hotels and guesthouses,’cause you don’t look like the camping
type.”
I snorted. It wasn’t that I wouldn’t or couldn’t
go camping; I’d just never had much cause or chance to. Though I
suppose surveillance details were kind of like camping, in a
homeless-guy-living-in-his-car kind of way. And thinking about cars
made me ask, “Hey, do you have a list of the items found in Leung’s
car? I’d like to take it to my client and see if anything stands
out.”
Faith glanced down, thinking. “I believe I do.
Hang on a second.” He banged around on the nearest computer
keyboard for a moment and coaxed a page from a cranky laser printer
that made grinding and coughing noises and shook as if the page
were being generated by a hidden Gutenberg press tended by
asthmatic souls of the damned. Faith handed the still-warm paper to
me. “Good luck with that. And if you come up with any ideas, don’t
act on ’em. Call me first.”
I agreed, knowing I was probably lying. “Oh, one
more thing,” I said as he shooed me toward the door.
Faith cocked me a look with raised brows.
“Yeah?”
“What happened at the lake in 1989?”
“’Eighty-nine?” He gave it some thought.
“Nothing. Nothing I know about at least. Ridenour’d be the one to
ask. He would have been pretty new back then, but I imagine if
anything significant happened, he’s the one who would know.”
I plunged back out into the rain in Faith’s wake
and watched him head deeper into the parking lot until the rain hid
him from sight, reflecting light from the sodium vapor lamps into
scrims and rippling swags of liquid gold streaked black in the
fallen night.
The rain was no heavier by the water, but the
wind off the Strait of Juan de Fuca blew it in at a cutting angle
that filled the windshield with blurry white lines. I had to
concentrate on the road just to be sure I was on it, and not
wandering into some ghostly pocket of the Grey, but I found the
Black Ball Ferry Line’s passenger pickup zone without having to
circle around more than once.
There was only one passenger at the dock at that
time of night, since the last boat from Victoria hadn’t arrived
yet. The size and shape were right, but in the downpour it was hard
to tell if it really was Quinton. After what had happened to
Strother, I was a touch more paranoid than usual and moved my
pistol into the center console. I kept my hand on it as I unlocked
the doors.
He bounded into the front seat and shut the
door, sweeping off his hat and dropping it onto his boots along
with his backpack. Then he pushed back the hood of the sweatshirt
he had on underneath the coat, and as the light fell on his face I
almost shot him.
“Whoa!” he shouted, putting up his hands as he
saw my hand on the gun. “Next time I’ll say something first.”
I let my breath out in a relieved puff at the
familiar sound of his voice and drew my hand away from the pistol.
I peered at him for a second, just in case it wasn’t really Quinton
but some kind of Grey trick. “What the hell happened to your hair?”
I asked as I started to pull the truck back onto the road.
He made an embarrassed chuckling sound and ran
one hand over his head. His long ponytail was gone and his hair was
clipped into a neat, short style that probably looked boringly
corporate when it wasn’t damp and mussed. He’d shaved off his beard
as well, and his face seemed too large and a little too hard around
the jaw without it. He looked more like the old ID photo I’d seen
of him when the NSA had come calling a couple of years earlier than
like my beloved, shaggy anarchist. I recognized him from other
details as well, but it took some restraint not to stare at his
broad cheekbones and naked chin.
“Well . . . um . . . I had a need to change my
look.”
“Are you running from someone? Is that why
you’ve been so jumpy? Is that why you’re here?”
“Not as such.”
“How ’bout you get to that ‘such’ and tell me
what’s going on?”
“Could we go somewhere drier and quieter for
that? And private?” he added, reaching into his pocket for his
pager. Then he popped off the back and removed the batteries,
eyeing me with an unspoken suggestion that I do the same.
I pointed at my phone where it sat in one of the
cup holders. Quinton took it and removed its battery also, putting
the two parts in separate holes in the console. He seemed to
breathe easier once it was done.
“What’s the problem?” I asked.
“It’s a long story. I’d rather tell it all at
once. Where are you staying?”
“I was at a hotel a few blocks away, but I
wasn’t planning on going back there. One of the local cops—”
“Was killed in your previous hotel room. Yeah. I
got that story out of the desk clerk. So you were going to take a
different room tonight?”
“It sounded like a good idea to me.”
“Is there some other place, not a hotel, we
could go? Someplace a bit . . . off the grid?”
I thought about the key Geoff Newman had given
me. The Leung place wasn’t perfectly safe, but it wasn’t likely
anyone would come there by chance. It also was guaranteed to have
no phone or Internet connections, and probably no cable, either, so
if Quinton was being paranoid about electronic surveillance, it was
the best choice we had, short of staying in the Rover. We’d done
that before and I hadn’t cared for it.
“I have a place. . . .”