A Local Habitation

decided to go out the window—before the door swung open to reveal Jan, looking utterly weary, standing on the other side. “Okay. They can come in. Alex, if you could . . . ?”

“Got it,” he said, with a sardonic half-salute. “This is a discussion we peons don’t need to be a part of. Quentin, Toby . . .” He hesitated. “I’m sorry. That’s all. I’ll see you soon.” Not waiting for us to reply, he turned and walked rapidly off down the hall.

I watched him go before turning to Jan, not saying a word. She stepped out of the way, letting us pass.

The office was Elliot’s, according to the nameplate on the desk; like all the offices, it was located in what I was coming to recognize as the knowe’s main building. It was as tidy as I would expect a Bannick’s office to be, with carefully sorted baskets of paper sitting atop the filing cabinets and a small collection of bonsai trees on shelves around the room. There were several blank spots on the walls, showing spaces where frames had recently been removed. Elliot himself was sitting on a folding chair to one side of the desk, shoulders slumped, still looking shell-shocked.

Jan closed the door behind us, starting to pace almost immediately. She was so clearly her uncle’s niece when she moved that way that it was hard to see how I’d ever been able to miss it. “We found the first body last month,” she said, punctuating the words with a sharp gesture of her hand. “We thought—oak and ash, we thought it was Dreamer’s Glass. We thought it was just some kind of screwed-up scare tactic gone wrong.”

“So why didn’t you call the Queen?” I leaned back against a clear patch on the wall, watching her. “If Riordan had somebody killed, even by accident, she broke Oberon’s first law. You could have brought charges against her.”

“No proof.” Jan raked her hair back, frustration briefly beating back anger. “We don’t even know for sure that it was her. Who’s ever heard of the night- haunts leaving a body behind? What the hell was I supposed to do? Go to the Queen’s Court and be all ‘excuse me, Your Majesty, but Duchess Riordan maybe had one of my people kidnapped, or somehow had her killed in a way that doesn’t make sense, and anyway, I don’t know any of this for sure, but can you make her stop?’ It wasn’t going to work.”

“You could have told someone.”

“I tried.” Jan sighed. “Whether you believe me or not, I’ve been leaving messages for Uncle Sylvester since this started. I wanted his advice. But he never called me back.”

Sylvester thought she’d stopped calling; she thought he’d stopped answering. I didn’t know what it meant, but it couldn’t be anything good. “The night-haunts didn’t come for the first victim?”

“They haven’t come for any of the victims,” said Elliot. “All three of them just . . . stayed, exactly like they were before they died.”

“And we’re sure they died.” Jan kept pacing. “There would be demands by now . . . or something. Or someone would have managed to get loose, if they’d been kidnapped and replaced with some sort of mannequins.”

“Kidnap victims don’t always escape on their own,” I said.

“The first victim—Barbara—was a Cait Sidhe Queen of Malvic’s line. The cats have been in mourning ever since.” She fixed me with a steady look. “Don’t you think they’d know if she were still alive?”

I winced. Malvic is one of the Cait Sidhe Firstborn. Most of the Kings and Queens of Cats are his descendants, and he wouldn’t be happy when he heard about this. Neither would Tybalt.

“All right, so we know she’s dead,” I said. “Where did you find her body?”

“In the cafeteria.”

“The cafeteria. The cafeteria where you left us alone?” She nodded. “Right.” They ditched us in a place where somebody died. How sweet. “I assume that means you didn’t close the scene after the body was found?”

“We tried, but . . .” Elliot waved his hands.

“It was upsetting people, and there wasn’t anything to find,” said Jan.

I bit back a groan. Being largely in denial about the existence of death means most purebloods never learn thing one about proper police procedure; when they find evidence of a crime, they’re likely to clean it up just so they won’t have to look at it. They probably destroyed any evidence before the body was even cold, oblivious to the fact that this could be a bad idea.

“Was there anything that stood out about the first victim?” I asked.

Jan laughed bitterly. “How about the part where she was dead? Exactly like Colin. We left her where she was for almost a day to give the night- haunts time, and they never came.”

That wasn’t a good sign. Twice is enough to start looking like a pattern. “How about the second victim?”

“She looked like she was sleeping,” said Elliot. His voice was bleak. “She was just . . . she looked like she was sleeping. But she never woke up.”

“Her name was Yui Hyouden,” Jan said, putting her hand on Elliot’s shoulder and squeezing. He stared down at his feet. “She was a Kitsune. She worked in software testing.”

I looked away from Elliot. “Where was she found?”

“On the lawn outside. She hadn’t come through the reception room; she was still in the mortal world.”

The statement made my skin crawl. Kitsune can be beautiful, but it’s not human beauty. If the night-haunts hadn’t come for Yui’s body . . . “When did you find her?”

“Just after sunrise.”

“Right.” That made it less likely that anyone had seen her, especially since none of the local tabloids had been running the story. It was also no help at all. A body found “just after sunrise” could have been there all night, hidden by an illusion that dissolved at dawn. “She was killed the same way as the others?”

“She was,” Jan agreed. “That’s when people started leaving. They couldn’t handle the idea that they might be next.”

“But you didn’t go because . . . ?”

Her smile was grim. “This is my County. I leave it, I’m probably not getting it back without a lot more lives lost. I’m staying as long as there’s any chance we can save what we’ve been building here.”

“Oberon save me from the idealists,” I muttered. Louder, I said, “I need to know everything. Where the bodies were found, who found them, who might have had access to those areas before the bodies were discovered, everything. Photographs would be good, if you have them.” I’d be surprised if they didn’t have security cameras, given the rest of the knowe.

“Whatever you need,” Jan said. “Of course, you realize that if it somehow turns out you’ve found a way to mimic someone else’s magic and you’re not who you say you are, I’ll have you tried for treason.”

“And I’ll applaud it. Did anyone photograph the bodies? I want to compare the wounds.”

Elliot looked sickened. Jan squeezed his shoulder again, saying, “No—”

“Damn.”

“—but we have the bodies, if you’d like to see them.”

I stared. “What?”

“We have the bodies.” Jan looked at me levelly. “They’re in the basement.”

The cafeteria was an unmarked murder scene and the basement was full of bodies? Cute. On the other hand . . . a firsthand examination might give me something to go on, and I needed it. Colin apparently died of three small punctures, none of which hit a major artery, and some minor blood loss. That wasn’t a good sign.

“Have you taken Colin there?” I straightened, gesturing for Quentin to come. He moved to flank me, silent.

Jan nodded. “Peter and Gordan will have finished moving him by now.”

Those two were toting bodies down the stairs while the full-sized people sat around? Oh, that was a fair division of labor. “Good. Let’s go.”

“Go where?” Elliot asked. It was clear he knew the answer but was hoping to be wrong.

Tough. “The basement. I need to see the bodies.”

“Right.” Jan straightened, taking her hand off Elliot’s shoulder. “Follow me.”

“Can I stay here?” Elliot’s voice sounded shaky. “I don’t want to go down there.” Jan gave me a pleading look, and I nodded. With the way the morning was going, he’d throw up on the bodies. I’m no forensics expert, but even I know that vomit doesn’t usually improve the evidence.

“You can stay here,” I said. When he brightened, I continued, “I want you to get me everything you have on the victims. Personnel files, medical records—anything.”