The Best Paranormal Crime Stories Ever Told

not real. If she existed, she would be.”

“So all we have to do is find-”

“We don’t have to find anything.” Gran stood up. End of conversation.

Question two was never asked.

Maggie’s hands were on her hips. Unfortunately, no children were. This was her battle posture, and I didn’t much like it. “Your grandmother drives me nuts.”

“She has that effect on people.”

“I thought wisdom was supposed to be soothing.”

“Judge for yourself.”

Maggie snorted. “We need to go on a Unicorn Hunt,” she said at last.

Which more or less brings us full circle. “Why?”

“Because.”

More argument, which I’ve already mentioned, followed by grim silence, which I may have failed to add.

“The ring,” she said at last. “I would have held on to that ring forever. And it would have cost me my life. No, I’m not saying it would kill me-but look at me now. Look at me then. I’m alive now. I live in the present.” She walked over to her computer and flipped up the lid. I suppose it won’t come as a surprise to say Gran doesn’t hold with computers much either, so I’m not real familiar with how they work.

“So you want revenge?”

Maggie was silent. For a minute. “I think this is the first time I’ve ever understood why your grandmother calls you stupid,” she said in a flat voice.

“Ouch.”

“Live with it.” Maggie shouted a warning to Shanna, who seemed intent on turning two teetering chairs into a makeshift ladder. “I know the maiden is out there,” she said at last.

“Pardon?”

“I know she’s out there. I think she’s close.”

“How?”

“Because I feel younger than I have in years,” she replied softly. “And I feel-right now-that I can do anything.”

“You’re the mother,” I told her.

“Even the mother has to dream. Maybe especially the mother.” She looked fondly at the head of her younger child. “Look at this.” The computer was now flickering.

“Unicorn hunt.”

“It’s all garbage,” she added. “I’m sure your Gran was right about that.” Big concession. “But there’s got to be a grain of truth in this somewhere. What if,” she added, as her fingers added prints to the screen, directly across the face of a painted woman with a delicate, horned head in her lap, “it’s true?”

“What’s true?”

“Not that Unicorns are drawn to virgins,” she said, “but that they’re drawn to maidens.”

“Which is usually the same thing.”

“In Unicorn speak.”

“Don’t you start that too.”

Maggie didn’t seem to hear me. “If we go out on a Unicorn hunt,” she continued, “we’re bound to find the maiden.”

“Okay. But.”

“But?”

“What the hell does a Unicorn want with the maiden, anyway?”

“My guess? To kill her,” she said softly.

“That’s phallic.”

“Idiot.”

“And all that rot about Unicorn horns and healing?”

“I don’t know. Maybe there’s something in that. We can always find out.” She paused. “But I’m guessing that Unicorns don’t actually look like this either.”

“They’d be pretty damn hard to miss.”

So Maggie and I went over to Gran’s house. Gran was waiting for us on her porch. Which is to say, she was sitting on it, her arms crossed, her expression pure vinegar.

“You know why we’re here,” Maggie said, without preamble.

“I might.”

“We need your help.”

Gran pushed herself out of her chair. “I don’t have a lot of help to offer,” she said at last. “You’re going in search of the maiden.”

“We’re going in search of Unicorns,” Maggie replied firmly. “And we’re not certain that we’ll be able to even see them.”

“You might. She won’t.”

“I think you can see them well enough, if a glint of ring could tell you so much. We need to be able to see them.”

“You won’t like it,” Gran said, as if that would make a difference.

“Doesn’t matter. We’ll live; we all do what we have to.” She paused, and then added, “I’d like it if you kept an eye on the kids while we’re out.”

“That’s your job.”

“Yes. And I’d guess yours would be to find the maiden, which you aren’t doing.”

Gran relented so quickly it was pretty clear she’d already made her decision. “I’ll go to your place,” she said. “They won’t be as safe here.”

The tone of her voice made me wonder if I’d misjudged her reasons for keeping them out of her house in the first place. And I liked the older reasons better.

She gave us glasses. Sort of. Nothing you could wear on your face, though. She gave us some sort of sticky, foul-smelling ointment as well. “You might need it,” she said. “But if you don’t, don’t waste it. Costs a fortune to make.”

“Is that blood?”

Gran shrugged. The last thing she gave us, looped around fine, long strands of something that looked like hair, was Maggie’s old ring.

Maggie looked at it, but she didn’t touch it. “You carry it,” she told me. I was looking at Gran.

“She’s right. You carry it. It’ll point you in the right direction.”

“We can trust it?”

“To find a Unicorn? Yes. You can’t use it against one, though. Don’t even try. And if it talks? Don’t listen.”

“As if.”

“There are a couple of other things I should have probably told you both. Maggie’ll get a clue, once you’ve started. You might have trouble.”

Great. “What?”

“You’ll be walking old roads, if there’s a Unicorn to be found.”

“You’re not talking about old city roads.”

“Good girl.”

“They’re safe?”

“Not bloody likely.”

“What does not safe mean?”

“You’ll find out.” She handed me the last item. It was a long dagger, slender and shiny. And not really legal, on account of the way it disappeared in the hand. “Concealed weapons,” I told her, doubtfully.