A Stroke Of Midnight

This was the first time I had spoken to him since I’d resurfaced. “A little worse for wear, but I’m fine.”

“I thought they’d killed you, too, three years ago. Why didn’t you call?”

“Because if you’d spoken my real name near a darkened window the Queen of Air and Darkness would have known. The sound of our conversation would have traveled back to her. It would have endangered you. It would have endangered anyone.”

He sighed over the phone. “And now you’re ‘princess’ again, and looking for a husband. But you didn’t call up just to chat, did you?”

“Have you heard something?”

“A rumor that the reporters left the faerie mound, but are now all gathered in the parking lot. The press conference is over, so why are that many national and international media types hanging around in the middle of a cornfield in Illinois?”

I told him the broad outline of the problem.

“I can be there with a team in less than…”

“No, no team. I’ve already got a few police coming with a forensic unit. You can come, but you can’t bring dozens of agents with you. This happened inside the sithen, not on federal land this time.”

“We could help you.”

“Maybe, or maybe there would just be more humans to get injured. We’ve got a dead reporter, that’s bad enough. We can’t afford to have an FBI agent get killed by one of us.”

“We’ve talked about this for years, Merry. Don’t cut me out now.”

“My father’s murder is sixteen years old; it is secondary here, Raymond. The priority is the new deaths. Hearing your voice now, I’m not sure that would be the case for you.”

“You don’t trust me.” He sounded hurt.

“I’m in line to the throne now, Raymond. The good of the court outweighs personal vengeance.”

“And what would your father say to hear that from you, his daughter?”

“He’d say that I had grown wise. He’d agree with me.” I was wishing I hadn’t called him. I realized that Special Agent Raymond Gillett was part of a child’s wish. I couldn’t afford that kind of wishing, not anymore.

I was suddenly tired, and my arm ached from shoulder to wrist. I turned and leaned against the desk, half sitting on it. It forced Galen farther away from me, and that was fine. He kept his hand playing lightly on the edge of my thigh, moving the skirt back and forth as he petted me. It was comforting, and I needed the comfort.

Doyle was looking at me, and something in his eyes softened his face. I had to look away from the kindness I saw there. I wasn’t sure why such a look from him made my throat grow tight.

“Don’t come, Gillett. I’m sorry I called.”

“Merry, don’t do this, not after almost twenty years.”

“When we’ve solved this one, if I’m still alive and still have the carte blanche in this area, I’ll call you, and we can talk about you coming down. But only if it’s about my father’s death.”

“You don’t think the FBI might be helpful on a double homicide?”

“I don’t know what we’ve got here, Gillett. If we need something fancier than the local lab can handle, I’ll let you know.”

“And maybe I’ll answer the phone, and maybe I won’t.”

“As you like,” I said, and I struggled not to let my voice show how tight my throat felt, how hot my eyes were. “But think on this, Gillett. Did you start all this with a seventeen-year-old child because you felt sorry for me, or because you were angry that the queen cut you out of the investigation? Was it pity that moved you, a desire for justice, or simply anger? You’d show her. You’d solve the case without the queen’s help. You’d use Essus’s daughter to help you.”

“It wasn’t like that.”

“Then why are you angry with me now? I shouldn’t have called you, but I gave you a promise. A child’s promise to call you if ever a similar murder happened. It isn’t similar in detail, but whoever did it has similar magic at their call. If we solve this, it may get us closer to finding my father’s murderer. I thought you’d like to know.”

“Merry, I’m sorry, it’s…”

“That the murder has been eating at you all these years?” I said.

“Yes,” he said.

“I’ll call you if anything pertinent comes up.”

“Call me if you need better forensics than the locals can give you. I can get you DNA results that they can only dream of.”

I had to smile. “I’ll be sure to let Major Walters know that the FBI has such confidence in the locals.”

He gave a dry little laugh. “I’m sorry if I made this harder for you. I tend to get a little obsessed.”

“Good-bye, Gillett.”

“Bye, Merry.”

I hung up and leaned heavier on the desk. Galen held me against him, careful of my hurt arm. “Why didn’t you let Gillett come down?”

I raised my face and looked at him. I searched that open face for some hint that he understood what had just happened. His eyes were green and wide and i

I wanted to cry, needed to cry. I’d called Gillett because the murders had raised ghosts for me. Not real ones, but those emotional pains that you think are gone for good until they just rise again to haunt you, no matter how deep you bury them.

Doyle came to me. “I watch you grow more worthy of being queen every day, Meredith, every minute.” He touched my good arm lightly, as if not sure I wanted to be touched at that moment.

My breath came out in a sharp cry, and I threw myself against his body. He held me, his arms fierce and almost painful. He held me while I cried because he understood some of what it had cost me to let go of childish things.

Barinthus came up to us and put his arms around us both, hugging us to him. I glanced up, and found tears ru

Galen hugged us from the other side, so that we were warm and close. But I realized in that moment that Galen, like Gillett, was a child’s wish. They held me, and I wept. Crying didn’t cover it. I wept the last of my childhood away. I was thirty-three years old; it seemed a little late to be letting go of childish things, but some wounds cut us so deep that they stop us. Stop us from letting go, from growing up, from seeing the truth.

I let them all hold me while I cried, through Barinthus cried, too. I let them hold me, but part of me knew that Galen, and only Galen, didn’t understand what was happening. He’d been my closest confidant among the guards. My friend, my first crush, but he’d asked, why didn’t I let Gillett come?

I cried and let them hold me, but it wasn’t just my father’s loss I was mourning.

CHAPTER 7

I CLEANED OFF THE REMNANTS OF THE MAKEUP THAT I HADN’T cried away. Got the lipstick that still looked like clown makeup off, and even gave Frost a makeup cleansing cloth so he could do his own face. We were clean and neat and presentable when we started back to the crime scene. I felt hollow inside, as if a piece of me were missing. But it didn’t matter. Walters would be here soon with the CSU team. We needed to have finished the questioning of the witnesses before then in case they said something that we didn’t want the human police to know. I wanted justice, but I also didn’t want to make the bad publicity worse by sharing some dark secret with the human world.

Doyle stopped so abruptly that I ran into him. He pushed me farther back into Galen and Usna’s suddenly waiting arms, as if he’d given some signal that I had not seen. With Doyle and Adair in front and Galen and Usna suddenly very close on either side of me, I could not see what had frightened everyone. Barinthus, Hawthorne, and Frost were bringing up the rear. They had turned to face back down the hall as if they were worried about someone sneaking up behind us. What was happening? What now? I couldn’t even manage a drop of fear. I’m not sure it was bravery so much as exhaustion. I was simply too tired emotionally and physically to waste the adrenaline on fear. In that second, if we’d been attacked, I’m not sure I would have cared.