“Maritza said to gather the particles and store them in the little bag she left.” Tanner loaded everything back onto the tray. I stood on my own, shuffled side to side and declared my feet fine, and held the opened bag in both hands. Tanner steadied me with a light touch to my hip.
“How’re we supposed to gather all this up?” I asked. There were more particles on the ground than could possibly fit into the bag dangling from my hand.
“A rake.” Tanner went to the shed and returned with the one with finer teeth. He stepped inside the circle and ushered the particles into the center. I tossed him the bag and he managed to collect every bit.
Drawing the strings tight, I weighed the contents in my hands. “Kind of feels like there’s some heavy magic in here.”
“Blood magic always feels that way, Calli.” Tanner flopped onto the grass and patted the ground beside his hip. “C’mere.”
“I’m exhausted,” I said, stretching out next to him and resting the pouch on my belly. He found my hand and interlaced our fingers. “And I suppose it’s time to move on to the breaking-and-entering segment of our day.”
“You’re going to need more than cookies and lemonade after your adventure with the dress.”
I grunted. My druid smiled in understanding and continued, “You shower. I’ll make dinner. Then we’ll go to your office.”
Tanner drove us into town. The parking lots and roadside spots were filled to capacity, typical for a Friday night, necessitating he maneuver his truck into a tight spot. “Come out the driver’s side. I parked a little too close to the brambles.” He pressed the pedal to engage the parking brake and reached for the handle of his laptop bag. “You ready?”
“Yes.” I could have asked the brambles to make a path for us, which might have called attention to the next part of our night. Instead, I scooted across to the driver’s seat. My dress rolled up and over my hips and I flashed Tanner a view of my underwear.
It was time for a new wardrobe and better accessories.
On the off chance that Kerry happened to turn the corner before Tanner and I were inside the building, I asked if he could grab a couple of leaves and do his cloaking thing.
“Good idea.” Tanner plucked two massive volunteers from a bigleaf maple and chanted over them while we stayed close to the truck. By the time we mounted the stairs to the entrance, leaves floating above our heads and keys in hand, he assured me no one could see us.
Opening the vestibule door and then the one to my old office, I took issue with the changes made by my temporary replacement. My whiteboard was missing and there was no discernible order to the papers tacked to my beloved corkboard. All the work I’d done earlier in the summer to track the farms and orchards we knew, or suspected, had Magicals on staff or housed tunnels and portals, was wasted.
Unless he had taken research that was supposed to help the locals and was now using my research against them.
Ugh.
At least I had a few photos of my project walls on my cell phone. I shut the door on the man’s chaos and my guilt, went to Kerry’s desktop, and started up her computer. We knew each other’s passwords. I had a search engine up in no time.
“Did you bring a thumb drive?” I asked Tanner.
He pulled a new one from his bag and set it beside Kerry’s keyboard.
“Thanks. I know how the paper filing system’s set up. I’ll start pulling everything related to the properties that have been operating the longest.” Kerry had already collated that information into a list, which she’d expanded to include every property that had more than five live, producing apple trees.
Tanner adjusted the desk chair and hovered his fingers over the keyboard. “Send me the list of orchard and farm employees, too. I want to focus on the apple growers. There’s got to be some connection we’re missing, between the dead hidden folk, Adelaide’s bid on the orchard near Brooks Family Farm, and the Pearmain orchard.
“We know that Cliff’s family has had a relationship with the hidden folk going back generations,” he continued. “There’s a tunnel system in place though we still don’t know the full story behind who uses it and how.
“Then there’s the big portal tree, and the trees transported here from Europe, the ones Cliff said they were hoping to make healthy again, and…”
A network of possible connections blossomed in front of my eyes, including the property where the Mother Tree grew. I still had no idea where that piece of land was situated. Maybe if I just—
“Tanner, give me that notepad,” I said, waving my hand in his face. “The blank one—quick, before I forget.”
I roughed out a map of the island, drawing circles in the approximate locations of the orchards I remembered off the top of my head. I added my property for good measure, and because of the Old One and its as-yet-unverified four separate portals. “Clifford trained to become a druid. And he wanted Abigail to train, too, but she couldn’t handle the physical rigor, right?”
Tanner nodded. “But Ni’eve and Idunn treated her and you’ll see, Calli, the change in her is remarkable. I think she’ll be around for many more years.”
I looked up from my scribbling. “When did you say they’re due back here?”
“Monday.”
“This coming Monday?” I glanced at him for affirmation the elderly couple would be home in three days. “And their property has all the potential and most of the infrastructure it needs to be a magical hub. Is that how you worded it?”
He nodded again.
“So who else would want to create a hub like that—or an even larger one?”
“The Fae,” we answered as one.
“Odilon is Fae. All of the Flechettes are Fae, as far as
