Briar woke before dawn and dressed quickly, gulped terrible coffee from a delicate cup, and set out for the shore where the fisher folk launched their boats. Drizzle soaked him in short order but he wouldn't be dissuaded. He had one more sunset and no time to waste. Quinn had spent all his hours at the sea; if anyone knew to speak of him, it would be the fisher folk by the nets. Sleep still lingered in Briar's eyes when he reached the group sitting on their portable chairs, battered tin cups steaming at their feet. The air smelled like a storm.
Yet, again, not a one would part their lips for Briar.
"He's lived here his whole life," Briar told a man with a creased face and fingers that were all joint. He repaired a net swifter than he might have as a boy. "Quinn Lawrence. He's—" beautiful; deadly; my heart outside my body and I didn't even realise— "short. And fast." Briar sighed, frustrated at himself. "I'm looking for him. It's important."
"To you, perhaps. But what'll you do should you find him, so?" the man asked, squinting up at Briar.
"Nothing. Talk. I need his help."
The man resumed working his net in clear dismissal. Briar stared at the top of his head where his knit cap had been neatly repaired. He'd forgotten they'd always been that way, down at the shore. Smiles for Quinn, but for others? As cold as the north wind in winter.
Briar fingered the curl of paper in his pocket, the soft petal. The old man was only the latest door shut to him. He rubbed his face, trying to rub the blood back from where the wind had bit his cheeks, and began to trudge over the pebbled beach, thighs burning with effort. There were other places yet to search and one remaining day until Noah came in from the city with his guns. Briar would find a clue before then. He must.
Dawn crept slowly across the beach. Where light hit the patches of sand it glittered like broken bottles. A glint caught his eye and Briar changed direction to pick up the green stone of weather-beaten glass. He smiled at it in his palm.
"There's a ghost taken up the lighthouse."
Briar nearly stumbled when he turned quickly on the uneven ground. An old woman glared up at him with her hard eyes, her face as weather-beaten as the prow of a ship. She scarcely reached his chest.
"Pardon me?" Briar didn't know what else to say.
The woman shifted in place. "Ghost been moved in since you were here. Sad thing, so scared of the water." She looked away. "You find him, now. Set him right."
Before Briar could ask a follow-up question, though he scarcely knew what, the woman shuffled toward the line of boats bobbing in the shallows. Her step never faltered over the sand or stones. Briar watched her jump nimbly into a boat and lift the oars, heaving away in swift motions like she'd done, in all likelihood, every day of her life.
Eyes on his back made Briar glance at the last man who'd shut him down. The man pointed toward the old lighthouse like he thought Briar might be confused. Then he returned to his net. No one else looked up from their work.
Briar was confused, but not about the lighthouse or its new ghost. He remembered he and Quinn being fascinated by the ruined old building and daring one another to look; he'd have wound his way there eventually, if only when he exhausted more likely avenues. But he didn't remember Quinn ever being afraid of the sea. The notion made Briar queasy, like seeing an empty net dragged to shore.
Yet Briar was looking for ghosts and the lighthouse held one. He changed direction away from town and headed along the coast. He pocketed the glass beside Quinn's note.
The lighthouse was farther than Briar had thought and the morning had truly set in as he approached. It slumped at the edge of the rocks, its silhouette jagged where the roof had collapsed inward, like someone had taken a bite. Rocks broached the water like cresting whales around the outcrop, where wreckers had once enticed fortunes to shatter their purses open. The great lightbulbs had been smashed before Briar was born, with no light ever shining over Lastings' sea but the moon. Ships no longer came close enough to worry the shore, having navigated their money south generations before.
Briar's spectre waited there. Quinn stood scant inches from the break of the waves. His trousers were rolled to his knees, his ropy calves dusted with hair. When Quinn seemed content to be planted there a good long while, Briar walked closer, enough to see fine tremors shaking Quinn as waves drew ever closer to his naked feet. His webbed toes were nearly buried in the sand.
"We staying out until the tide comes in?" Briar asked, unable to stand a second more.
Slowly, Quinn shook his head, his gaze not leaving the distant horizon. Briar couldn't be certain if Quinn had blinked in all the time they'd been standing there. However long that had been. Briar wasn't sure. Each wave had brought a year back to him, until no time had passed since he'd left Lastings and been the boy who loved Quinn Lawrence.
"Can go in, if you like," Quinn said, not looking at him.
Briar looked away from Quinn and at the lighthouse. "This where you live?"
A sinuous shrug. "Here and other places." Abruptly, Quinn took three long steps from the breaking waves. He met Briar's eyes. "You want to see, Briar Augustin?"
It was Quinn's privilege to live however he pleased, Briar reminded himself. Casting the brooding sky a wary glance, Briar nodded. "I'd be honoured."
Manners, like his mama always said, despite Briar's first instinct to recoil from the notion of anyone living in the ruin. He imagined shattered glass and cobwebs, flotsam and jetsam and the stale scent of places time had forgotten. Carlisle Street but colder.
He was glad to have held his tongue when he saw the home Quinn had made from the lighthouse's corpse. Neatly-mended curtains hung at the windows, their stitches tidy though the thread didn't match, while similarly kindly-mended furnishings were set in the round main room, oriented toward a brazier with smouldering embers.
Morning followed them inside, making Quinn soft with warm colours as he busied himself unpacking a knapsack left by the door. A glint from a long knife made Briar turn his head, and he breathed out on discovering Quinn's enemy was a slice of seeded loaf he slathered with honey. The bread hung from his mouth as he continued to clatter about. Briar forced his attention away. Quinn moved like a dancer and Briar didn't trust himself to know he had only until the performance ended to indulge.
Briar sank into the well-loved couch, which sighed with stale smoke. He sniffed. Quinn continued making kitchen noises. Briar thought of the note in his pocket.
"Are you looking for something?" Briar called.
A cupboard slammed. Water poured. A strange noise, a rustle.
"Quinn?"
Briar's beating heart returned from the kitchen, carrying wild roses in a chipped vase. They used to sell the like at the nightmarket, a certain blue Briar hadn't seen anywhere outside Lastings.
"Pretty, don't you think?" Quinn asked, as he set the vase on the low table by the door, just so. He scrubbed his tufty hair as he turned and dropped to sit tailor-style at Briar's feet.
If not for their ages, they could have been a decade gone. Even the bruises on Quinn's face took Briar back, echoing one beating or another, and Briar again brimming with the helpless rage as had filled him throughout his boyhood. Even love had made Briar angry for how it consumed him, with no one able to understand how vast and terrible a thing it was to love and be loved as he did.
Years had made Briar realise most people felt the same way about their first love: confused and overwhelmed and enormous. With Quinn once more at his feet, Briar wondered if he hadn't been right the first time. Vast and terrible, indeed.
"I got your note. I missed you, too," Briar said, before he could think better of it. His hands shook with how he wanted to hold Quinn. He didn't move. The chasm between them was filled with blood and tears, and no one ever returned to Lastings once they freed themselves. Not for keeps. Not until the sea claimed them.
Quinn held onto his bare feet and rocked a little before stopping himself, abruptly, with a flinch. His jaw firmed. He looked up at Briar.
"Folk say Dupont has money," he said.
Absorbed with Quinn's tics, Briar startled at the reminder of his purpose. Dupont. Money. The job. Guns and Noah, not the ghosts of Lastings' past smelling of brine and honey-bread. Business, not—this.
"Money? I don't know anything about it. I'm with the Rangers." Briar edged forward, meaning to entreat, but stopped when Quinn started looking hunted. He eased back. "I'm here to take Dupont to the city, for my job. That's all."
"What about her money?" Quinn asked, insistent.
Briar hadn't heard anything about cash but it would make sense, Dupont returning to Lastings for a stash she'd hidden at some previous point. Killing the partners from the score to claim a bigger cut for herself. He could see that story unfolding. He'd heard the like before.
But again, why Lastings? And if Quinn knew, then Adrienne must, so why hadn't she mentioned the cash? They'd get a finder's cut for its return, and Adrienne had never stiffed Briar on his share before. There would be no sense in starting now. But, more than all of that, why were the hairs on Briar's neck prickling like they did when someone was lying?
Briar leaned back, casual-like, and stretched out his legs, nudging Quinn's foot with the toe of his boot. Quinn relaxed in turn, though only a fraction; lightning ran through him like a storm on the water. "You know, I can't help you if you don't trust me, Quinn."
It was the wrong thing to say. Quinn's eyes flashed and Briar saw the killer from his daddy's story. Quinn rocked to his knees, lip curled to show the shark's teeth Briar had loved.
"Don't need no help from the city," Quinn snarled.
Despite himself, Briar's heart ached at the roads between them. A beat later he shoved away the hurt, since Quinn spoke truth, and Briar was a grown man and a Ranger besides. He forced himself to remain relaxed. Going for his gun wouldn't help none and Quinn hadn't yet moved beyond posturing.
"You want Dupont, don't you?" Briar asked, voice steady.
After a fraught moment, Quinn subsided and sat back on his heels. He chewed a ragged fingernail between his teeth. Briar saw where the high webbing between Quinn's thumb and forefinger had been torn and crudely stitched to leave a crooked scar.
"There's something of mine she wants. I hid it. She can't be having it." Quinn's gaze slid to Briar. "You neither. You can have her money instead. That weren't a lie."
The notion of Quinn in his lighthouse having anything of enough value to tempt Dupont from the city made Briar raise his eyebrows. He tried to think what might hold that kind of value and yet keep Quinn in his beautiful ruin. Something he couldn't convert to cash? Something he'd stolen, too hot to move? But Quinn couldn't leave Lastings and riches didn't visit. Briar frowned but dismissed his curiosity, albeit temporarily; the nature of the item didn't matter so much as how it would help him find Dupont. Lena had told Briar he needed Quinn. He wanted that to be true.
"Could we set a trap with the—the item?" Briar asked.
Quinn looked unconvinced, or an emotion in that general area. He'd become difficult to read over the years. "She can't be having it," he repeated.
"She won't, but we'll need to be convincing. Could you pretend she might get the—it?" Jewels? Cash? An artefact of some nature? Short notice, but perhaps they could substitute an imitation to fool Dupont.
"Can't fake it," Quinn muttered. He'd been chewing the inside of his lip and blood spotted his pout.
Before Briar could respond, Quinn shoved abruptly to his feet. Only training kept Briar from flinching. His fingers inched toward his gun as Quinn disappeared into the kitchen. Had Quinn gone for the knife? When Quinn returned, he brought a blanket that he dropped unceremoniously onto Briar.
"Stay," he said.
"But it's barely gone ten—"
"Sleep, Briar Augustin."
As much as Briar protested, Quinn refused to say anything but "Later." Then he disappeared up the spiral staircase, moving light as a secret. Briar considered continuing his thus far fruitless search for Dupont, or contacting Adrienne or the Sheriff or Lena, but all roads seemed to lead to the lighthouse and Quinn. Theirs was a conversation scarcely begun.
A nap seemed pleasant enough. His nights had been filled with uneasy dreams of late. At least he'd be well-rested, for whatever came next.