Chapter 3
The Eternal Bloom was Nekros City’s only fae bar. The public side was a kitschy tourist trap with a limited but overpriced drink selection and an even more pricey short-order food menu. No one would have given the place a second glance—and certainly not much patronage—except that it was one of the few places humans were guaranteed to see unglamoured fae. The fae employed on the public side of the Bloom were paid to allow humans to gawk at them, and that started with the bouncer in the main entrance.
Today the bouncer was one I hadn’t seen before, and I couldn’t identify what manner of fae he was on sight. He had two rows of small black eyes and a mouth that ended with a pointed beak. He was so tall that, even sitting on the provided stool, he had to hunch down to avoid brushing his head on the ceiling. But while he was long, he was thin, like someone had put him in a taffy puller and stretched him. He reminded me of some sort of stick bug. Not that I’d tell him as much.
His small beady eyes scanned over our group as we stepped through the door. He nodded at us and lifted an arm, pointing to a small lectern in the corner of the room, and beside it, the VIP door. The ledger was one of the most important things in the room, and I headed straight for it as Falin checked his gun with the bouncer. I meticulously signed us all in, writing as clearly as possible, and putting the exact time in the arrival box. While the public portion of the Eternal Bloom might be a tourist trap, the VIP room was a pocket of Faerie. An in-between space that led to the door to the winter court. The bouncer was there in part to prevent humans from wandering into Faerie unknowingly, but more than that, to ensure that everyone who did enter signed the ledger. The door was easy enough to walk through, but time sometimes did funny things if you didn’t document your arrival and departure properly.
It had been a while since I’d visited the Bloom. Since my castle had dug itself out its own little pocket of blended mortal and Faerie reality a couple months ago, there hadn’t been much reason for me to visit the bar and its unpredictable door. Not much had changed in that time. Masterfully carved tables and chairs were scattered through a room larger than should have been able to be contained within the building as it existed in the mortal realm. A motley gathering of fae sat at those tables, some played dice in the corner, and a few had even joined the endless dance in the most distant corner of the room. In the center of the room was the amaranthine tree, its varied ever-blooming flowers giving the bar its name. And above it all, the impossible stretch of Faerie’s sky. Normally the sky had little correlation to the sky in the mortal realm, but today the sun hung at nearly the same spot as when we’d been outside, but this sun looked larger, closer than the one in mortal reality. Also, despite a lack of clouds in the soft blue sky, it was snowing, though that snow never seemed to reach the ground.
A hush fell over the bar as we wove through the tables, the vacuum of noise rushing out in front of us and then filling back in with quiet whispers in our wake. I knew why. The silence stemmed from the fact that Falin was the queen’s knight, her bloody hands. The whispers were likely because we were accompanied by the Shadow Prince. Knowing why the fae reacted so strongly didn’t make it any less unnerving.
While I might not have visited recently, I had gotten more familiar with the place when I had been dining here regularly. I didn’t know most of these fae by name, but I recognized many of the faces that were now tilted toward their neighbors, voices pitched low. A glaistig and a water nymph eating a companionable lunch looked up as the sweeping hush flowed over them. They took one glance our way, dropped their food, and fled to the door of the Bloom without a backward glance.
Falin watched them go, a grim frown etching itself across his face. He didn’t like being the bogeyman of the winter court, but as any cop would tell you, running at the sight of authority was a good way to look guilty. He’d remember those two and likely look into their recent activity.
We reached the base of the tree, which acted as the door to Faerie, and I hesitated. Falin gave me a moment—he was used to my reluctance to cross into the court—but Dugan openly studied me.
“You’re afraid to enter?” The question was curious, not holding a hint of ridicule, and yet I still felt heat rise to my cheeks.
“It’s not the entering that’s the problem. It’s the fear that I won’t be able to leave again.”
Dugan nodded. “A reasonable fear given your . . . uniqueness. I admit, I’m hesitant for much the same reason. Even with the knight’s vow, walking into the winter court is a treacherous proposition.”
“Then why do it? I’ve been summoned and as I like living in Nekros, I kind of have to respond. You could go back to the shadow court and wait for me to let you know what I learn. We have a contract; I’ll keep you updated.”
“While that sounds safer, I have reached the stage of needing to make a calculated gamble. Our court looks like the guilty party. If I leave now, I look as suspicious as those two independents who fled at the sight of the Winter Knight. Mitigating damage and preventing war is my main mission. If I fail, it really doesn’t matter if I am captured now or stand with a desperate cause later in the shadow court.”
Put that way, he was rather between a rock and a hard place. “I guess it’s time to put on our brave faces then,” I said, taking a deep breath.
Dugan gave me one of those looks again, like he was trying to puzzle me out. I shot him a weak smile and walked toward the tree. Falin fell in step beside me. After the barest hesitation, Dugan took up a position on my other side, so that we all circled the tree at the same time.
The world around us blurred, colors smearing as the warm lights and deep wood tones of the bar were washed away. They were replaced by the glimmering whites and icy blues of the frozen halls of the winter court. The amaranthine tree was gone; in its place stood an enormous pillar of ice, carved with intricate scenes of fae in snowy landscapes. The hall around us was solid ice, the walls lined with what appeared to be statues carved from glistening ice but I knew from experience were guards that could awaken and attack at the queen’s whim.
Not that there was a shortage of living guards.
Six stepped out to block our path as soon as the hall solidified around us. I’d never seen more than two guarding the doorway before. The murder clearly had the queen on edge.
“Knight,” the guard in front said, dipping her head.
I guessed at her gender based solely on the pitch of her voice. The blue ice armor she wore was identical to that of her companions and showed little of her shape beneath. The hoods the guards wore covered their faces, so all I could see was the triangle of her jaw and chin; the rest of her features were lost in shadows too deep to be natural. Despite that, I could feel the moment her frigid gaze swept over me, assessing, before moving on and leaving my skin prickled with gooseflesh. When her gaze reached Dugan, her hand fluttered to the sword strapped at her waist.
“Stand down,” Falin said, stepping between the guards and Dugan. “He is here as a guest.”
There was a moment of uncertain shuffling in which the guards kept their hands on their swords, their hoods twitching slightly as if they were catching each other’s eyes from behind those shadows. But Falin was the Winter Knight, and when it came to security in the court, his word was second only to that of the queen. I held my breath, my heartbeat thudding in my ears, but it was only a small hesitation, and then the guards dropped their hands from their weapons. But they didn’t relax.
“Where is the queen?” Falin asked, his posture straight, demanding.
“The library, awaiting word from you,” the same guard who had spoken earlier said. She was clearly the leader of this band of guards.
Falin nodded. “Then we will assess the scene first.”
“As you wish.” She made a hand motion to one of the other guards, who nodded and broke formation, turning to lead us deeper into the court.
Falin followed without another word or backward glance, trusting Dugan and me to keep up. The rest of the guards didn’t move, forcing me to pass so close to one of them that I could feel the chill coming off his armor—which had to be an intentional magical effect. The ice making up the walls and floor didn’t radiate cold, and the temperature in the hallway was pleasant, so the armor likely only chilled those close enough to be in combat with the wearer.
As we followed the guard through the seemingly endless halls of the winter court, I noticed that Dugan had released his glamour. Gone was the suit he’d appeared to wear in my office. In its place was his dark armor, his black cloak flowing behind him like a living shadow. He cut a terrifying figure stalking down the frozen halls, and I hurried to catch up with Falin. Not that Falin looked any less dangerous. He didn’t need creepy armor for the killing grace of his every movement to shine through. Of course, I’d also seen that particular strength and grace aimed at far more enjoyable activities, so I appreciated it in a different way.
The guard finally stopped in front of an icy archway and gestured. I didn’t bother trying to look into the room—whatever I saw wouldn’t be whatever was actually there when we stepped through the passage. Doorways in Faerie were weird. Two other winter guards stood to either side of the archway. They nodded to Falin, but their swords were drawn.
“A shadow trails you, Knight,” the one on the left side of the door said, as if we’d missed the fact that Dugan was behind us this whole time.
“He is here as a guest, currently. He will observe the investigation. You will let him pass.” Falin delivered the commands with authority. The guards didn’t lower their weapons, but the one who had spoken gave a small, tight nod. Falin half turned and glanced from me to Dugan. “Let’s go.” He stepped through the archway and vanished, leaving Dugan and me alone in the hallway with three nervous-looking guards.
I hated doors in Faerie.
I hurried after Falin, and the world lurched as I passed through the archway, the door taking me somewhere else in Faerie. Then the world settled and I stepped into what was obviously a bedroom. Falin had stopped just inside the door, blocking most of my view of the room, but it wasn’t a large area and around his broad shoulders I could see the posts and canopy of a bed carved from pale wood. Gauzy blue curtains hung from the canopy like dangling icicles. A spray of reddish-brown marred the curtains near the head of the bed and I looked away before I saw more than I wanted.
A guard stood to one side of the doorway. He nodded to Falin, but I was too close to see if Falin returned the gesture. He hadn’t traveled more than one large step into the room. Which was going to make it very uncomfortable when Dugan joined us.
As if summoned by the thought, Dugan stepped into the room behind me, crowding the doorway where we lingered. To our side, the guard jolted in shock at the sight of the Shadow Prince. Then he sprang into a flurry of action. An icy blade zipped through the air, leaving a trail of frost in its wake. Just as quickly, Falin was there, his two long daggers crossed, catching the blade before it completed its path toward Dugan’s head. Not that the prince looked caught unawares. His own sword was out, bleeding shadows into the air around it.
“Stand down,” Falin commanded.
The guard drew back but didn’t sheathe his sword. His cloak hid everything but his mouth and chin, which revealed only that his lips were curled back, exposing gritted teeth that were far sharper-looking than a human’s, but he obeyed his knight.
“The Shadow Prince is a guest here to observe,” Falin said, and then glanced over his shoulder, not at me, but at someone beyond me.
I hadn’t noticed the sentry on the left-hand side of the doorway when I’d entered. She was the complete opposite of the hooded and ice-armored guard. She wore a very modern black pantsuit that was fitted to her wasp-thin body. Her short black hair was slicked back on her head, except for two small antennae that hung forward just above her forehead. I couldn’t actually see the dragonfly wings that kept her lifted a foot off the ground—they were only a blur of movement as she had to keep them in continuous movement to hover in one spot the way she was—but I was familiar with them because I recognized her. Agent Nori, one of Falin’s FIB agents.
“Sir,” she said, tilting her head toward her boss and studying him with multifaceted eyes.
I scanned the room, wondering if there was anyone else I’d missed. If one FIB agent was here, preserving the scene, shouldn’t more have been here working it? Or at least waiting for Falin so they could start working the scene? But no one else was present. No one living, at least.
Now that Falin was no longer directly in front of me, I could more or less see the entire room. My gaze skittered over the prone figure on the bed and the copious amounts of blood surrounding it. Another figure lay sprawled on the floor only a few feet ahead of me, as if he’d been running for the door and almost made it. I’d known before walking in that there would be two bodies, but it was slightly unnerving to realize that I’d been standing so close to one and hadn’t sensed it. With no land of the dead in Faerie, grave essence didn’t reach for me. I couldn’t feel bodies. I wasn’t used to that.
As a general rule of thumb, I didn’t like blood. Hell, I didn’t really like dead bodies either, though they were often unavoidable in my line of work. But the small body only feet in front of me didn’t trigger an immediate need to look away, no rising nausea or panic. Perhaps it was because I couldn’t feel him, so my mind could dismiss him as something other than a body. Without contact with the land of the dead, there were no obvious signs of decomposition, so he looked like he could be sleeping—if anyone would sleep facedown on a floor made of ice. There was also remarkably little blood—though the sword sticking out of his back was a pretty clear sign of the violence that had killed him. Or maybe it was easier to look at him because he was so visibly inhuman.
The fae were a diverse people. Some looked nearly human, but many more were wildly different. He was on the humanoid-shaped-but-obviously-not-remotely-human side of the scale. He was the size of a child; I’d guess no more than three feet tall. His skin was green and rough-looking, like an alligator’s. He had no hair, at least none I could see from this distance, not even on his eyebrows. But the most unusual thing was the fact that he had three arms: one on his left side and two on his right. Make that the second most unusual thing. The most unusual was how pristine the floor around him was despite the sword jutting out of his back.
“Do goblins bleed?” I asked, scanning the floor between the small body and the bed. There was a lot of blood close to the bed and I didn’t look at it too hard, but only a smudge or two of blood was near the goblin’s body.
“Yes,” Falin said, his eyes making the same journey mine had. “Their blood is a little darker than a human’s, but it flows as freely as any when they are cut.”
“Then this scene is wrong,” I said.
Falin nodded. “Very.” He turned to Nori. “You’ve checked the goblin?”
“He doesn’t appear to be glamoured or spelled.”
I glanced at where Agent Nori still hovered beside the doorway. She had no forensic kit with her, no bags for evidence, nor a camera. I knew Falin didn’t have anything, as I’d arrived with him.
“Do you have a team coming to process the scene?” I asked.
Falin half turned toward me and opened his mouth like he was going to answer, but then his head snapped back around. While I’d been rather analytically observing the scene, Dugan had sunk to his knees next to the goblin’s body. Dugan had mentioned he’d known the shadow fae since childhood. By the obvious grief on his face, it was clear he’d known him well.
“Don’t touch the body,” Falin said, and the emotion flowed off Dugan’s face as if he’d only just realized we’d been witnessing his moment of grief.
“Kordon,” Dugan said, the word barely a whisper and nearly lost even in such a small room.
“What?”
“The goblin, his name was Kordon.” Dugan stared at the small figure. “You checked to see if he was fake, but did you make any effort to revive him?”
I shot a skeptical glance at the giant sword protruding from the goblin’s back. “I’m fairly certain it is safe to assume he is beyond resuscitation.”
Dugan frowned at me from where he knelt by the body, but it was Falin who whispered, “Death is not always a permanent condition in Faerie.”
I blinked at him in surprise. “Fae can heal mortal injuries?” I mean, I’d seen Falin heal some pretty bad wounds, and quickly at that. But they were more in the category of could prove fatal as opposed to the he was dead this morning type of injury.
Falin lifted one hand and twisted it in a sort of movement. “Some fae can naturally heal anything that doesn’t outright kill them. Goblins are a race that tend to heal nearly anything. But death, true death, cannot be self-healed. That said, if the body remains in Faerie, it is not uncommon for life to be magically restored by a healer.”
“Can they ever leave Faerie after that?” I asked, suspecting I already knew the answer.
Falin shook his head. “Not without great risk. Some pass through the mortal world unscathed. Others drop dead unexpectedly with no apparent cause. A fae may visit the mortal realm multiple times without incident before suddenly falling dead with no warning while there.”
I could guess why. I couldn’t prove it, not without seeing a fae who had been revived, but I would guess once the body died, even if it was later healed, the connection between the soul and body was damaged. Here in Faerie, without a land of the dead, that likely didn’t matter. But in the mortal realm . . . A restored body might not mean a truly living body. Soul collectors would likely take the soul if they saw one walking around.
“Has a healer been summoned?” Dugan asked, still kneeling beside the goblin.
Falin looked to Nori. She nodded. “Stiofan is beyond healing. His heart is missing.”
A frown tugged at the edges of Falin’s lips, but he nodded.
“And Kordon?” Dugan asked. There had been mostly sorrow in his voice before, but now his tone sharpened in anger. Nori turned her large, insectlike eyes on him. A thin membrane passed over her eyes as she regarded him, but she didn’t answer. He scoffed, shaking his head. “Of course, your healer didn’t even check. He wasn’t your court.”
“He’s also our suspect,” Nori said.
Dugan glared at her before returning his attention to the small goblin. He cocked his head to the side, a quizzical expression crossing his face. He reached out for something hidden from my view by the sprawled body.
“I said not to touch anything,” Falin barked as Dugan lifted a dagger from where it had been half hidden under Kordon’s third arm.
The Shadow Prince frowned at Falin, his hand stalling, the dagger only halfway lifted. “You said not to touch the body.”
“You’re really going to argue semantics. This is a crime scene. Don’t touch anything.” I could almost hear Falin’s teeth grinding as he spoke. “Now your prints will be on that dagger.”
Dugan resumed his motion, lifting the dagger and examining it. “It would already have my prints,” he said. “It’s my dagger.”
That stopped whatever Falin was about to say—which I’m sure would have been to kick Dugan out of the scene. He lifted an eyebrow, regarding the prince.
“Yours? How long has it been missing?”
Dugan frowned. “I didn’t realize it was until I saw it here, but it is definitely mine. It’s a handsome blade, commissioned for me as a gift. Unfortunately, its beauty is all it has going for it. It has never held an edge well and it is poorly weighted. I keep it on display.”
“Somewhere public?” Falin asked.
Dugan’s frown deepened. “No.”
Agent Nori’s wings released a shrill keening of alarm as they rubbed together. “So, your fae. Your dagger. And you compromised the scene? The queen could demand your head for less.”
“Nori,” Falin said, her name a warning, but he didn’t look like he disagreed with her. He turned to Dugan. “Put the dagger down, back up, and don’t touch anything else or you’ll be held accountable for interfering with the investigation.” He gave the other fae an appraising look as if he could find guilt physically on his person. “We will discuss the dagger after I finish with the scene.”
Dugan set down the dagger and backed away from Kordon’s body, but while he made a point of lifting his hands as if in surrender, his movements as he rejoined me in the doorway were too casual. He seemed to be making a point of moving slowly, his steps easy as if he were trying to convince everyone present that moving away from the body was his own idea. Falin scowled but didn’t say anything more to him.
After studying the scene from the doorway a moment longer, Falin walked a careful circle around the goblin’s body. He studied the floor, the blade Dugan had replaced, and the sword in Kordon’s back, never touching any of it. Finally he turned to the other body. He couldn’t get too close to the bed and the body on it without tracking through the blood and contaminating the scene, but he walked up to the edge of the blood pool. I didn’t follow, but Nori did.
She hovered a foot off the ground, her wings buzzing as they kept her above the blood pool. “As you can see,” she said, hovering near the head of the bed and gesturing to the body, “the goblin must have been in a rage. I haven’t counted all of the knife wounds, but there are at least two dozen.”
Falin looked away from the body and studied his agent. “And how did this go down? What do you guess were the series of events?”
Nori blinked, an iridescent membrane sliding over her large insectlike eyes, and then she glanced between the dead goblin and the dead Sleagh Maith. Her lips pressed into a thin line as she studied the scene.
From his post beside the door, the guard cleared his throat. “Isn’t it obvious? Stiofan was surprised and overwhelmed, as he must have been asleep when the attack began. The goblin was vicious and rabid, but Stiofan was able to reach his sword. He plunged it into the goblin, driving it away, but he succumbed to his wounds. The cowardly goblin tried to run away, but the blow Stiofan delivered proved fatal.”
“That’s certainly how it is meant to appear,” Falin said.
“But you are not convinced?” Dugan asked.
Falin glanced at him. “What do you see?”
The Shadow Prince grimaced. “It does appear as he said.”
Falin grunted, and then he met my eyes. “What is wrong with this scene?”
“Besides the lack of Kordon’s blood?” I let my gaze drift over the prone figure on the bed. There was no lack of blood there, and the murdered fae definitely didn’t look like he was sleeping. One leg hung unceremoniously off the bed and his face was contorted with pain; both arms were flung over his head as if he’d been trying to ward off blows or maybe like his wrists had been pinned over his head. And blood. There was so much blood. And his torso—I couldn’t even look at the mess that should have been his chest. I let my gaze move on quickly.
I focused on the goblin again—he was much easier to study. I walked the same circle around him Falin had. I didn’t want to look at the sword protruding from his back, but I forced myself to study it, simultaneously trying to trick my brain into accepting that I was looking at something else, something less gruesome.
There was a small amount of shiny dark liquid on the back of Kordon’s tunic where the sword had entered, but not nearly enough. I’d shed more blood from skinned knees before. There was no blood on his hands or arms, not dark goblin blood nor bright Sleagh Maith blood. The blade of the dagger was slick with shiny red blood that looked as if it might have been spilled only a moment beforehand, but there wasn’t a drop on the hilt. The goblin was barefoot, but there was no blood on the soles of his feet. I frowned and glanced back toward the bed without actually looking at the body lying on it.
“There are a few scuffed footprints leading from the bed in this direction, but he has no trace of blood on his feet. Neither his blood nor the noble’s,” I said. “Is the sword pinning him to the ground enchanted? Could it have frozen his blood on contact? Could that be why there is none of his blood around him?”
“Possible, and we will have to test the blade for enchantments, but Stiofan was not known to own any enchanted weapons.” Falin continued to watch me. “What else?”
This felt rather like a test, but it was in my contract that I’d be helping with the investigation, so I scanned the scene again. “If Kordon was vigorously stabbing the winter noble, how did he end up with a sword in his back?”
“He was obviously running away,” the guard insisted.
I let my eyes dart to the figure on the bed once more. “No. Stiofan has a dozen or more wounds and was clearly overpowered. Why would the goblin have suddenly decided to turn and run? Also, the noble’s arms aren’t extended like he’d delivered a blow or fumbled for a weapon—they are up, over his head. Which means driving a sword through the goblin wasn’t the last thing he did.”
“Don’t judge fae based on mortal fragility—many can take much more damage than a human,” Falin said, but despite the correction, he had an odd note of pride in his voice, as if my deductions had impressed him. “But in this case, I have to agree with you. Goblins, while they heal well, aren’t particularly durable, and unless his individual anatomy is unusual, that sword pierced his heart. It would be instantly fatal. He wouldn’t have been able to continue an attack, let alone flee across the room.”
I nodded. “And you said Stiofan couldn’t be healed because his heart is missing?”
“Magic can heal and mend mortal wounds, but it can’t regrow missing body parts,” Dugan said. He was watching me with curiosity.
“That’s not what I’m getting at. Where is the heart?”
“The goblin must have eaten it,” the guard said, sounding sure in his conviction.
I shot him a frown. “So you’re assuming the goblin was in a battle frenzy that resulted in two dozen stab wounds and eating an organ. Then he cleaned his hands and the hilt of his dagger—but not the blade. And then Stiofan rammed a sword through his back, at which point the goblin turned and fled but paused at the edge of the blood pool to wash his feet?”
“Perhaps he was betrayed by an accomplice?” Nori suggested. “Look at the voids in the blood splatter.” She gestured toward the blood on the curtains and then to the bloody sheets on the bed.
Falin leaned closer, but I made no attempt to approach the bed or look for any pattern in the blood. I might be assisting in the investigation, but I had my limits. I’d let them tackle that one.
Falin made a sound and then pulled back, scanning the room again. “It does appear that either something was removed—and I see no evidence of that—or there was at least one other person here at the time of the murder, likely helping to hold Stiofan down.”
I frowned at Kordon’s body. “Then one way or another, we are missing a killer.”