fifty-four

“Is she all right?” I asked. “What happened?”

“You were right about the ergot poisoning,” Max said. “It looks like she’s been breathing in bad fumes from the moldy old books she was using as inspiration. She’s not in good shape, but it’s too soon to tell what’ll happen.”

“Ergot is extremely toxic,” I said. “And hallucinogenic.”

So Isabella had been accidentally poisoning herself. I tried to think about what herbal remedies might help ergot poisoning. Modern medicine was best to treat it in its acute state, and I would bring something to help her recuperate. If she made it.

“So I hear,” Max said. “That’s probably what got her talking. She admitted she was the artist behind Logan Magnus’s success. He made his own paint and did the final technical execution of the pieces, but she gave him the subjects and composition, and set up the lighting with shadows that gave the work its unique qualities. She’s our forger, Zoe. She—”

“That’s collaboration, not forgery.”

“I know that.” Max’s voice was harsh. “I wasn’t finished. That’s not why she’s going to be arrested. She’s going to be arrested because the team found forgeries hidden in her secret art studio.”

They had? What was going on? And it wasn’t only Max’s words. Snapping at me wasn’t like him. Not the Max I knew. Neither was the fact that he was telling me so much about an active case.

“Why are you confiding in me now?” I asked. It wasn’t even his case, after all.

“Because Detective Vega is officially missing now. Something isn’t right. It’s all hands on deck.”

“I wish I could do more to help.”

“Your friends … or step-parents, whoever they are … Mina told me they’re all right. I’m glad.”

“Me too.”

“Someone needs to interview Perenelle. She said Ward poisoned her, and he’s still missing.”

“She doesn’t have any information.” I could only imagine what the police would think of Perenelle if she shared the information she actually had. I expected I’d only ever see her again in a room with padded walls.

“We’ll be the judge of that.”

“She’s not well enough to talk.”

“You and Mina have both confirmed she’s okay. She can talk.”

My hand gripped the phone. That was why Max had told me so much. Because he needed something from me. “Is this an interrogation?”

“Of course not,” he snapped. “But we need to find Luciana.”

“So you’re going to bust down my door?”

For a few moments I heard only the faint sound of Max’s breathing. The time stretched on until I wondered if I’d lost the signal or if he’d hung up on me. I also wondered if he had indeed sent someone to the house. Dorian could escape through the attic skylight, but Nicolas and Perenelle …

“This is serious,” he said finally.

“I was serious about what I told you in my lab too.”

“I can’t have this conversation right now, Zoe.”

“We’re talking about the same thing. I can swear to you that Perenelle is telling the truth, that it’s Ward who did this to them—and I know with equal certainty that whoever questions Perenelle won’t believe her story.”

“Because she entertains the same delusion as you do, that she’s hundreds of years old?”

I clenched my jaw shut and resisted the temptation to scream at him. “Questioning Perenelle won’t tell you where Ward is. Max? Are you there?”

The phone was dead.

I rushed downstairs. “Change of plans. Nicolas and Perenelle are sleeping in the trailer.”

“What’s going on?” Tobias asked.

“Detectives are going to be showing up to question Perenelle.”

She gasped. “Inquisitors?”

“They won’t hurt you,” Tobias said, squeezing her hand. “But you don’t want to talk to them.”

“I suppose alchemists are no more welcome in this century, eh?” Nicolas asked as he struggled to stand up. His body faltered and he gripped the side of his head. “Merde.”

Perenelle and Tobias rushed to his side and helped him.

I scanned the room. “Where’s Dorian?”

“Cleaning up in the kitchen,” Tobias said. “He’s slower than usual with only one good shoulder, but he wouldn’t let us help.”

“So thoughtful,” Perenelle said. She didn’t know it was more likely due to selfishness. Dorian didn’t like anyone to disturb his kitchen.

I tossed my keys to Tobias. “Get them comfortable in the trailer. I’ll meet you in the truck in a minute.”

I found Dorian scrubbing the counters and told him it was time for him to hide in the attic. “You’ll be my eyes and ears,” I said. “You can let me know if the police show up.”

He frowned. “Where will you be?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“What if Edward Kelley finds you?”

“I don’t think he’s after us.”

Dorian clicked his gray tongue. “He searched for the Flamels for years, mon amie. He is a dangerous man.”

“And there are four of us against one of him.”

Dorian’s scowl deepened. “Yet Ward is the only one of you who possesses evil in his heart. He is only one person, but he will not pause before striking.”

I grabbed Ashwagandha tinctures that might come in handy for energy on the run, then met the others outside.

“Where to?” Tobias asked as I hopped into the truck.

“We do what we’ve always done,” I said. “Hide in plain sight.” I directed him to a trailer park along the Columbia River.

“We can’t hide out forever,” he said.

“I know. And I wish we could ask for more help from the police, but if even Max won’t believe me about this … ”

“He’ll come around.”

I studied Tobias’s profile as he drove north on Highway 5. His broad hands rested on the large steering wheel, and he hadn’t glanced my way when he spoke.

“You don’t believe that,” I said.

He shrugged. “I’d like to believe it.”

The sun was at its zenith when we reached an RV park where we could rent space. We were all exhausted and no good to anyone in our current fatigued state. I cleared space in the trailer for the three of them to nap. But in the middle of the day, with a sun I hadn’t seen in days high overhead, there was no way I’d be able to sleep. As Nicolas began to snore, I slipped out of the trailer and went for a walk.

I walked past towering oak and Douglas fir trees that lined the river. A few yellow and brown leaves were beginning to appear on the oaks as autumn approached. A blue heron swooped through the sky overhead. With its elegant long neck, it reminded me of a phoenix.

I walked for what felt like both minutes and hours. Leaves gave a satisfying crunch under my feet, energizing me with every step.

When I got back to the spot where we’d parked, I didn’t see the Airstream or my Chevy. I rubbed my eyes. I was suffering from exhaustion. I must have misremembered where we’d parked.

But I hadn’t. Imprinted in the dirt were tire tracks from the truck and trailer. They were gone. And they’d left in a hurry.