Iron Kissed (Mercy Thompson #3)(42)
Author: Patricia Briggs

I don’t know how sensitive Tony is to magic, but he was quick and his fingers lingered on the Celtic designs on the silver.

I met his eyes and gave him a brief nod. Otherwise he’d pick at it until even the blind fae noticed he’d seen more than he ought.

"You’d think so," I said ruefully. "But here it is."

He smiled thoughtfully. "If Dr. Altman is through, we’ll just get out of your way," he said. "I’m sorry Zee is unhappy with the way you chose to defend him. But I’ll see to it he doesn’t get railroaded."

Or killed.

"Take care," I told him seriously. Don’t do anything stupid.

He raised an eyebrow. "I’m as careful as you are."

I smiled at him and went back to work. No matter what I’d told its owner, this car wasn’t going to be done until tomorrow. I buttoned it up, then cleaned up and checked my phone. I’d actually missed two calls. The second one was from Tony, before he’d brought the department’s fae consultant. The first one was a number I didn’t know with a long-distance area code.

When I dialed it, Zee’s son, Tad, answered the phone.

Tad had been my first tool rustler, but then he’d gone on to college and deserted me – just as Gabriel would do in a year or two. He’d actually been the one to hire me. He’d been working alone when I’d come needing a belt for my Rabbit (having just blown an interview at Pasco High; they wanted a coach and I thought they should be more concerned that their history teachers could teach history) and I’d helped him out with a customer. I think he’d been nine years old. His mother had just passed away and Zee wasn’t dealing well with it. Tad had had to rehire me three more times in the next month before Zee resigned himself to me – a woman and, he thought at first, a human.

"Mercy, where have you been? I’ve been trying to get you since Saturday morning." He didn’t give me a chance to answer. "Uncle Mike told me that Dad had been arrested for murder. All I could get out of him was that it was related to the deaths on the reservation and that I was, under the Gray Lords’ edict, to stay where I am."

Tad and I share a certain disregard and distaste for authority. He probably had a plane ticket in his hand.

"Don’t come," I said after a moment’s fierce thought. The Gray Lords wanted someone guilty and they didn’t care who it was. They wanted a quick end to this mess and anyone who stood between them and what they wanted would be in danger.

"What the hell happened? I can’t find out anything." I heard in his voice the frustration I was feeling, too.

I told him as much as I knew, from when Zee asked me to sniff out the murderer to the blind woman who had just come with Tony – including Zee’s unhappiness with me because I had told the police and his lawyer too much. My gaze fell on the walking stick, so I added it into the mix.

"It was a human killing the fae? Wait a minute. Wait a minute. The guard who was killed, this O’Donnell, was he a swarthy man, about five-ten or thereabouts? His first name was Thomas?"

"That’s what he looked like. I don’t know what his first name was."

"I told her that she was playing with fire," Tad said. "Damn it. She thought it was funny because he thought he was doing her such a favor and she was just stringing him along. He amused her."

"She who?" I asked.

"Connora…the reservation’s librarian. She didn’t like humans much, and O’Donnell was a real turkey. She liked playing with them."

"He killed her because she was playing games?" I asked. "Why’d he kill the others?"

"That’s why they quit looking at him as the killer. He had no connection to the second guy murdered. Besides, Connora didn’t have much magic. A human could have killed her. But Hendrick – "

"Hendrick?"

"The guy with the forest in his backyard. He was one of the Hunters. His death pretty much eliminated all the human suspects. He was pretty tough." There was a crashing sound. "Sorry. Stupid corded phone – I pulled it off the table. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. A walking stick, huh? It just keeps showing up?"

"That’s right."

"Can you describe it to me?"

"It’s about four feet long, made of some sort of twisty wood with a gray finish. It’s got a ring of silver on the bottom and a silver cap with Celtic designs on the top. I can’t think why someone would keep bringing it back to me."

"I don’t think anyone is bringing it to you. I think it is following you around on its own."

"What?"

"Some of the older things develop a few quirks. Power begets power and all that. Some of the things made when our power was more than it is now, they can become a little unpredictable. Do things they weren’t meant to."

"Like follow me around. Do you think it followed O’Donnell to his house?"

"No. Oh, no. I don’t think it did that at all. The walking stick was created to be of use to humans who help the fae. It’s probably following you around because you are trying to help Dad when everyone else has their fingers up their noses."

"So O’Donnell stole it."

"Mercy…" There was a choking sound. "Damn it. Mercy, I can’t tell you. I am forbidden. A geas, Uncle Mike said, for the protection of the fae, of me, and of you."

"It has something to do with your father’s situation?" I thought. "With the walking stick? Were other things stolen? Is there anyone who can talk to me? Someone you could call and ask?"

"Look," he said slowly, as if he was waiting for the geas to stop him again, "there’s an antiquarian bookstore in the Uptown Mall in Richland. You might go talk to the man who runs it. He might be able to help you find out more about that stick. Make sure you tell him that I sent you to him – but wait until he’s alone in the store."

"Thank you."

"No, Mercy, thank you." He paused, and then for a moment sounding a bit like the nine-year-old I’d first met, he said, "I’m scared, Mercy. They mean to let him take the fall, don’t they?"

"They were," I said. "But I think it might be too late. The police are not accepting his guilt at face value and we found Zee a terrific lawyer. I’m doing a little nosing about in O’Donnell’s other doings."

"Mercy," he said quietly. "Jeez, Mercy, are you setting yourself up against the Gray Lords? You know that’s what the blind woman is, right? Sent to make sure they get the outcome they want."

"The fae don’t care who did it," I told him. "Once it’s been established that it was a fae who killed O’Donnell, they don’t care if they get the murderer. They need someone to take the fall quickly and then they can hunt down the real culprit out of sight of the world."