CHAPTER FOUR
STICKS AND STONES
FOR THE BAREST part of a second, I had the inane thought of “So that’s how it works” run through my mind and then I plunged to a halt. The Eye of Nimora had been alerted to something about us. On Goldie? What the . . . and then I had it.
I turned on my heel, but before I could say anything, the elder in question, in a rippling blue-and-green–plaid shirt and dark blue cotton pants with a sharply defined crease, pointed again and repeated, “Lies!” Just in case we hadn’t all heard him the first time, I suppose.
A niggling suspicion went up my spine, and I swung around to look at my friend.
I raised my voice a little. “No kidding. Goldie, I thought you were serious when you told me your armor came from dragon hide and unicorn oil!”
A groan rolled through the assembled crowd. Goldie gave a light laugh as I looked over my shoulder at them. “How was I to know? I’m new at this. No dragons? No unicorns?”
“Not in this century, lass,” a tenor voice answered me. I looked into the crowd and saw one of Hiram’s construction crew grinning back at me.
I waved both hands in the air in frustration. Goldie stepped down to join me, Hiram’s hand on her elbow as if he might buffer her from any further challenges from the crowd, and everything seemed fine until a woman pushed her way through.
Not only was she not bearded, she wasn’t short and stout either. This one was as tall as any of the men around her, and slim as well as curvaceous. No longer young but no telling how old she might be, as dwarves wore their years like trees grew rings, quietly if steadily. I could, however, tell she held some power within the group because they gave way to let her through.
“Not so fast,” she said. “Goldie Germanigold has not been an honored guest here for a number of years. Have we all forgotten why that came about? And one lie may hide another.”
But the shining ray from the Eye of Nimora had gone out, and it looked as though the falsehood matter had been settled. Goldie nodded toward it before she turned to face the other.
“And shall we have a duel of words, Ludcrita, to see which one of us alerts the gem? I daresay you might be cautious in that regard because there is a traitor amongst you.”
Hiram made a tiny noise at the back of his throat as if he wished Goldie had not brought up that little accusation, but she continued speaking, as headstrong as the harpy warrior I knew her to be. “Perhaps it might be said that falsehoods amongst the tribes are not as important as lies outside them.”
“You are a guest here,” Ludcrita answered, her eyes holding a gleam deep within them. I had a moment to wonder if the two had, at one time, been rivals for the widower Mortimer’s favor. Likely there was another reason for the dwarf’s animosity, but I stood in fascination, mouth half-open, to watch and listen.
Goldie threw her head back a little. “While it is true,” she declared, “that my own nest sisters betrayed the place where I kept the Eye safe, it is equally true that they had no inkling whatsoever of the bridal gift Mortimer had given me, not until told of it by a dwarf. Their treason began here. Without that knowledge, they could not have planned a theft. So which one of you—or your sons and daughters—betrayed me? I left no stone unturned until I was given names and one of them, Ludcrita, belongs to your son Milardi.”
A gasp ran through the crowd, and the comely Ludcrita’s face paled into a color close to ashes. Her head swiveled to the Eye of Nimora, but it did not reveal a lie. She put a hand to her face and stepped back, disappearing into the crowd, words choked to silence.
“I pray you find out differently,” Goldie called after the woman as she ran from the gathering, her skirts knotted in her hands.
“It is well you leave, Germanigold, before you harm us further.” The elder wearing the gem beetled his brows at her in a hard stare.
“I concur.” She swept past Hiram to the SUV and stopped one last time. “I have given the names of three others to Hiram, and if you’re brave enough to investigate, ask him what he knows.”
I think I heard him mutter “shit” as he opened the car door and hustled her inside, dresses, armor, jewel pouch and all, before shutting her away from further provocation. I hopped in alertly, thinking he might well leave me behind if I didn’t hurry.
We bounced onto the gravel road when well away from the manor houses and Hiram paused only long enough to throw our hoods at us.
Goldie batted hers away serenely. “Not needed.”
I grabbed for mine and pulled it on. I had looked forward to seeing Hiram’s home, with Morty’s touch everywhere within it, but the afternoon felt soured now. I really hadn’t expected Goldie to lob verbal grenades as she left. I’d no idea of the grudge she’d carried.
Hiram said little to me and nothing to Goldie as he dropped us off. The screech of tire rubber on the road as he drove off, however, spoke volumes. Goldie looked after his vehicle and gave a little shake of her head. “So young he is. And, as Mortimer might say, opinionated.” She smoothed the heavy bundle she carried over her forearm. “If you have any questions about the journal, you know how to reach me. I hope it holds some of the answers you need.”
Indeed, I did know how to reach her, although talking to an owl and asking for her seemed on the odd side, but nothing like what I’ve been through the last year or so. The corner of her mouth quirked as though she could read my thoughts. “He didn’t write in code, I believe, but he might refer to names and events as though you should know what they are, with little explanation. The past influences the present more than you might guess.”
“How old was Morty, anyway?”
“Nearly four hundred years when he died in battle.”
“Four—wow.” I revised my opinion of Hiram’s probable age. “Seriously?”
“Very.” Goldie tilted her head. “I was a child bride, barely more than two hundred years myself.”
I tried to smother down my reaction and ended up hiccoughing. She pounded my back with her free hand. She laughed when I finally lifted my head to meet her expression. “Tessa, all of us . . . all the ones of us you might call magical . . . we live in a niche outside of your time. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t exist today.”
“Truth?”
“What do you think?”
Before I could answer, she wrestled her car phone out of a heretofore unseen pocket in her dress skirt.
“Can I drive you anywhere?”
“No, I’m going to call for a car. It should be here soon.” She shifted her booty in her arms. If I’d thought she was out of ammo, I found myself greatly mistaken when she began to speak again.
“Your house is being watched,” she told me. “I wish I could say it was Brandard, looking the situation over before he comes home, but it doesn’t appear to be. You and your mother need to be very careful.”
“Watched? How would you know?”
“My little friends about the neighborhood have sharp eyes and ears and noses. They know.”
“I’ve got Carter. And Scout. And Simon.”
She tilted her head dubiously. “I’m not certain any one of those could help you in time. So promise me. You will take care?”
“I will, if you’ll promise me that you’ll let me know anything else you find out.”
“Done.”
Before she finished, a car swept up to the curb, a limo, and its trunk bounced open. It must have been waiting around the corner. Goldie leaned over, brushing her lips across my forehead.
“Be safe, Tessa.” She said it like a benediction, sending shivers down my back as she walked to the car, stowed her things, and got in. She did not look back as the car drove away.
For a brief moment, I wondered if I’d see her again.