* * *
* * *
An hour later, after a meal of ginger ale and crackers—and not answering questions lobbed at me by Julian, Grimshaw, and Ilya because Michael Stern had called Julian and blabbed about seeing me run to the powder room, obviously ill, and each male had called to find out why—I returned to my office.
Hoping that I was alone, I took the prophecy message out of my pocket and stared at the words, trying to make sense of them.
A no sign over pity. What did that mean? The only sign I could think of that meant “no” was a circle with a diagonal line through the center. On the pad of paper, I wrote the word “pity,” then around it drew a circle with a diagonal line through it.
Oh. No pity.
I was sure that Meg from Lakeside had done more than read a few cards in order to tell me these things, so I couldn’t dismiss a single word even if I didn’t understand most of what she’d said. Maybe I just needed to remember so that I would understand at the right time.
I read the last line. rubbings. pencil on paper, revealing secrets. Then I studied my desk and the pad of paper.
Nothing looked like it had been touched. But someone had been in my office, because the piece of paper that had the slight impression of my shopping list on the front and the mark on the back was gone.
CHAPTER 77
Julian
Moonsday, Novembros 5
With Grimshaw in the passenger seat and both of them in need of coffee and breakfast, Julian drove away from the Mill Creek Cabins and Richard Cardosa, the remaining academic, who looked more like a sheep penned for slaughter than an educated man.
Considering everything that had happened lately, it wasn’t a harsh comparison.
When he reached the intersection that would take him to The Jumble if he turned right or Sproing if he kept going straight, Julian pulled onto the shoulder of the road and put the car in park.
“You forget something?” Grimshaw asked.
“No.”
“You want to check on Vicki before driving me to the station?”
He did, but he wasn’t sure it would do any good. After Michael’s call to tell him something had produced a reaction in Vicki that was violent enough to make her ill, he’d called and tried to talk to her, but all she’d given him were evasions and nonsense. He’d thought they were getting closer. Now he wasn’t sure.
The back door opened. Ilya slid in, closed the door, and looked at both of them. “Victoria was not forthcoming about the cause of her distress.”
“Yeah, we got put off too,” Grimshaw said.
“However, she called Natasha, asking her to tell me to call the Lakeside Courtyard.”
Julian twisted in his seat in order to see Ilya better. So did Grimshaw.
“I spoke to Vlad,” Ilya continued. “Apparently, Meg Corbyn called Victoria just before the blood prophet made a cut. Only Victoria knows the words of prophecy that were spoken.”
“And whatever was said is the reason Vicki wouldn’t say anything to any of us?” Grimshaw asked. “Because there was something in the prophecy about us?”
Ilya ignored the question. “Apparently Simon Wolfgard’s reaction to finding Meg is the reason for Victoria’s panic attack.”
“I can imagine how he’d react,” Julian said softly. He could easily imagine how Vicki had reacted to that male anger and distress if any of it was directed at her, even over the phone.
Ilya hesitated, then seemed to gather himself. “Nicolai Sanguinati is here.”
Grimshaw frowned. “You have a friend staying at Silence Lodge?”
“Not exactly. Nicolai was living in Bennett, a town near the Elder Hills, and was supposed to go to Lakeside. He ended up here. There is some speculation that he was directed here by a vision drawing.”
“Crap.”
Meg Corbyn was using cards for prophecy, at least most of the time. That meant . . . “Another blood prophet aimed this Nicolai toward Lake Silence?” Julian asked.
“Yes,” Ilya said. “A girl whose visions are quite accurate, regardless of how she reveals them.”
“Gods above and below,” Grimshaw muttered. “What is going on?”
“I don’t know.” Ilya opened the back door and stepped out. “But we need some answers soon.”
Yeah, they did need that.
When Julian and Grimshaw were once more heading for Sproing, Grimshaw said, “Did you notice how our Sanguinati friend didn’t confirm or deny that we were mentioned in that prophecy?”
“I noticed.” For him the real question was this: Was Vicki’s evasion about the prophecy because she was afraid of the men she had called friends a day ago, or was she afraid for them?
CHAPTER 78
Grimshaw
Moonsday, Novembros 5
Brainwashing,” Grimshaw said, thinking things through while Julian drove to Sproing.
“What if Civil and Serious Crowgard were playing mind games with Clara Crowgard, claiming that they wanted to recruit her for their cause but needed to be sure of her loyalty before they told her anything of significance?” Julian said in turn. “Based on what Aggie, Jozi, and Eddie told us, Civil and Serious were isolating Clara from her friends, making it sound like working for Vicki was a bad thing while they were, in fact, working with a human—or at least having conversations with one or more humans. Except things started to go wrong, and either Civil or Serious was killed on Trickster Night, and the Crow’s feet ended up tied to Adam Fewks’s rib cage, connecting those two deaths.”
“And then the Others barricaded the roads, and we’ve been assuming that whoever is behind all this is trapped in the area.”
“Safe assumption.” Julian seemed to be debating with himself. “I’ve been wondering if the Others would have reacted as fast if Adam Fewks had knocked on the door of Xavier’s boardinghouse instead of showing up at The Jumble. Did someone miscalculate the degree of interest that terra indigene like the Elders and Elementals have for Vicki and expect to be dealing with just Crows and Sanguinati because those are the terra indigene most in sight these days?”
“Ian Stern is a psychologist—and an Intuit.” Grimshaw let the statement hang.
Julian’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “You’re thinking he knows how to brainwash people? That he would use his extra sense of people to find their pressure points and make them susceptible to being controlled? Convincing them to murder other humans for some cause or for some fucking science project?”