Deception of the Magician (Waldgrave Book 2) (32 page)

“Yes?”

Lena’s skin was crawling; she wasn’t sure how much time had passed since she had escaped, or if anyone had noticed yet. “Bring a lot of people. And guns. Just in case.”

Lena hung up and went back out to the front. Jenny had produced a cold pack from somewhere, which Lena promptly slapped onto the bruised side of her face.

*****

CHAPTER 18

The pickup went on without a hitch; despite the fact that it was a forty-five minute drive, several cars pulled into the otherwise empty lot within twenty minutes. Howard had jumped out of a car to greet her; he was thinner than she had ever seen him, and shaking. She ran out from behind the counter when she saw him and he pulled her into a hug. Looking over his shoulder, she could see several other Council Representatives standing beside a car just in front of the entrance.

Are you okay?

“Yes. I’ll be fine. We really should get out of here.” She whispered.

They got into the car, and no one spoke on the ride home. Howard told her that no one was allowed to speak or communicate concerning her ordeal until they could set up to officially document it, and she was relieved. The opportunity presented more time to decide what she was going to do about Daray, and possibly the opportunity to speak with him first.

“They were at the motel.” Lena peered out the car window anxiously, but the world was silent with night shadows. “The one on the far side of town, where we went to get suits.”

Howard looked pained. “We know, Lena. We’ve known they were there for days. A gathering of human-borns that large is hard to miss.”

Lena’s attention snapped to Howard. “Rollin didn’t seem to think you knew—“

Howard made a gesture to cut her off. 
No more until we officially have it on record. Human-borns are highly empathetic beings, and they have a lower threshold for the moods they project. I suspect Rollin has underestimated exactly how loud they are to the rest of us.

Her heart pounded the whole way back to Waldgrave, but nothing happened. They pulled into the unpaved drive and right on up to the house like it was any other night; for the first time in a long time, Lena felt like she was going to cry. Like she needed to cry, but she couldn’t. She just got out of the car and walked into the house with everyone else.

Mrs. Ralston was sitting at the table in the kitchen, wearing a floor-length floral pattern nightgown and curlers, a cup of coffee in her hands, when Lena walked in. She put a hand to her mouth and half-ran over when she saw her, and pulled her into a frantic hug. She kept patting her back.

“What happened to your face? Now, now come with me, and we’ll get that fixed up…”

Mrs. Ralston took her hand and started to lead her away, but Master Perry stopped them. “I’m not sure if that’s a good idea…”

Howard turned on him. “Why not?”

“Because—“

“Because she’s human-born? I assure you that Rosaleen has only the best intentions toward her. She’s family, Ansel.” Howard’s expression was tired but determined. An uncomfortable silence filled the room, and it became evident that Master Perry wasn’t the only one hesitant to leave Lena alone with Mrs. Ralston, who had removed her hands from Lena’s shoulders and taken a step back. Lena thought she could actually feel a pang of sadness radiating off of Rosaleen, and though she thought she saw her lower lip quiver slightly, her eyes remained impassive.

Lena was disgusted as she looked at the rest of the suspicious faces around her. “I think I’m old enough to make these decisions for myself.”

She grabbed Mrs. Ralston’s hand and they walked together back up to Lena’s old room, the last door on the left down the hall on the second floor. Still painted green, the shades drawn over the windows, the bed had been made. Exactly as she had left it, like nothing had ever changed; across the hall, Ava’s room was probably in a similar state, but she was never coming home.

Mrs. Ralston took Lena into the bathroom, where she used a washcloth to sponge off the small abrasions; most of the damage was from bruising. Looking in the mirror, Lena saw that the blood pooling under her skin was spreading, and she was starting to develop a little bit of a black eye.

“This just looks terrible…what happened?” Mrs. Ralston was still fretting about, running the cloth under cold water and then holding it on the injury until it got warm again. She forced Lena down to sit on the edge of the tub.

“I don’t think I’m supposed to be talking about it.” Lena looked up at her apologetically.

Mrs. Ralston crouched down in front of her, the curlers in her hair bobbing uncertainly. Her eyes were a little watery, and the bags under them were evident. “You’ve been through a lot. You don’t have to act tough for me. They might frown on your human side, because you were raised in a place much safer than this one, but you can’t just ignore the fact that all of this bothers you. You’re not Griffin.”

But it didn’t bother her anymore. She had been choked, shot at, kidnapped, orphaned, punched, and interrogated. She had nearly drowned, she had witnessed several murders, and here she sat with slashed palms from her earlier escape attempt. And none of it bothered her anymore; she had only felt that way once before, and it had been at her first arrival at Waldgrave after the domino deaths of her father and her grandmother. There wasn’t any way for her to feel, and there were no words. Maybe she would feel something about it someday, but for the time being, everything from her hands to her emotions was just numb.

“Can I get you anything? Food? Aspirin?” Mrs. Ralston’s mood brightened to become a shade more hopeful; it was time to look forward. Lena only shook her head. “Well, you’d better get some sleep, and we’ll deal with it all when you’re ready.”

Mrs. Ralston got up and left, and then brought back in some pajamas for Lena to change into.

“Is Griffin okay?” Lena’s voice was hollow.

Mrs. Ralston sat down next to her. “Well, yes, he’s going to make it. It’s very lucky that we have the doctors here for your grandfather. They say he probably wouldn’t have made it to the hospital, he lost so much blood.” Lena flinched, and Mrs. Ralston softened her tone. “But they’ve done what they can for him, and he’s been in and out since the surgery.”

“Surgery?”

“The bullet hit the bone and did some damage, and they’ve had to keep him decently drugged for the pain. He’s going to make it, though.”

They sat in silence for a moment, and then Mrs. Ralston got back up. “Now, get some sleep. Just give a holler if you need anything, and I’ll bring up breakfast in the morning.”

“Thank you.” Lena whispered.

And she was gone. Lena sat on the edge of the tub for a long while afterward, trying to make sense of what she was feeling, and finally turned the faucet on and let the tub fill with water. She undressed and lowered herself in, but felt sick after only a few minutes and got back out. She put on her nightclothes and tried to go to sleep, but she couldn’t.

Well aware that she still wasn’t supposed to wander up to the upper floors without permission, she found her way back to the library and climbed the stairs. She found her way up to the fourth floor, and made her way to Griffin’s room. Very quietly, she opened the door and slipped inside. She turned around and surveyed the situation.

There were instruments and machines set up everywhere; there must have been a rush to send them over. Griffin was asleep in the bed with an IV in his better arm. The arm that had taken the bullet was wrapped and splinted extensively, and was near four times its usual size due to all the layers.

There was a very old man sitting in a chair next to the bed looking over some paperwork. His hair was completely white, and though he had a considerable bald spot forming on his head, he had almost successfully hidden it using a comb-over technique. Very calmly, he looked up and over at Lena.

“I don’t believe you’re supposed to be here, young woman.” He said with a welcoming smile.

Lena walked over to the opposite side of the bed. They had him on a breathing tube, too. He was ghastly pale, and even though she knew he was sleeping, his lack of responsiveness was disturbing. “I just wanted to be sure he was okay. I mean, I’m the reason…”

The old man put down what he had been working on—Lena saw that it was a Sudoku puzzle—and folded his hands in his lap. “He’ll be fine. One of the worst open humeral fractures I’ve ever seen, but nothing we couldn’t handle—truly a blessing that we don’t have to worry as much about infection. That’s going to save a lot of time and energy in the long run. He won’t need the breathing apparatus much longer, but I figure it’s always best to be safe than sorry. And you must be the granddaughter? Eden is it?”

“Lena Collins.”

“Yes.” He smiled kindly. “Yes, you look exactly like your great-grandmother. A fantastic woman. Beautiful to a fault, but I’m told you act much more like your grandmother, Olesia. She was quite a woman, too, God rest their souls. A fighter. She would be proud of you for making it onto the Council—that never would have happened back in those days.” He picked up a bowl of hard candies that was sitting on the nightstand and held them out to her over Griffin’s sleeping form. “Would you like one?”

Lena sat down on the edge of the bed, bewildered. “No, thank you. I’m sorry, who are you?”

He smiled genially and put the bowl back on the nightstand. “Doctor Lyle Evans. I’ve been tending to your family for generations.”

Lena was taken aback. Lyle Evans—this was the man Warren Astley blamed for the death of his wife and the disappearance of his daughter? This man, with his comb-over and his sparkling white smile? He seemed too nice to be a murderer. Lena gave him a sidelong glance, and he just continued to smile at her.

“Can I ask you something? Something private?” Lena asked dubiously.

He shrugged. “Of course—doctor-patient confidentiality. I’ve kept a lot of secrets over the years, and I knew someday it would be your turn.”

Lena almost felt guilty for what she was about to do. Doctor Evans just didn’t seem the type. “I…well, I heard from somebody who would know…I think somebody told me that a while back you were working with the Astley family on a complicated pregnancy?”

He stared at her for a while, and then jumped back to attention. The skin between his eyes crinkled as he thought back. “Yes, yes. But that was over a decade ago. I did everything I could to save the poor woman, but she bled out. It’s a common risk for human women pregnant with Silenti babies. But how would you know about that?”

Lena swallowed, trying not to let her gaze wander. “What happened to that baby?”

Doctor Evans sat back in his chair and scratched his head, looking at Lena like he wasn’t quite sure what to do with her. For the conversation they were having, though, the mood was awfully calm; Lena was asking him some tough questions, and the man didn’t seem defensive or intimidating at all.

“The baby…”

“I know about your deal with Master Darius Corbett. I just want to know what happened to the baby. I promised someone that I would find out.” Lena whispered.

Doctor Evan’s eyes narrowed. Then he leaned forward, a very serious look on his face. “Between the two of us, I don’t think your grandfather has much longer. A few more years, and this would have died with me, but your family continues to be a wonderfully well-kept box of secrets. I won’t ask who you’ve been talking to, because it would get that person in a lot of trouble, if you promise to keep the secret.”

Lena nodded.

The doctor nodded as well. “As you said, over a decade ago I was asked to help with a difficult pregnancy. An extremely difficult pregnancy. And as far as the Astleys go, I’m sure you’ve noticed that they don’t quite fit in around here. They have a penchant for human religions and decently extreme political views, and while I don’t care about any of that, some people do. All of this,” he gestured to the machines, the IV, and all of the other medical equipment lying around, “Costs money. Research and education cost money. And as such, now and more so as a young doctor, I’m at the will of the person that funds me, and that person is your grandfather. So when he approached me one day and told me to tell the Astleys that their daughter had died in the delivery or shortly after, I didn’t have much of a choice. I asked him what he wanted the child for, and he said he didn’t—only that Darius Corbett would be in contact with me. Well, he was, very shortly, and he told me to either keep her or give her away; he didn’t care, so we kept her on with our other housekeepers.” He gave Lena a saddened look. “I’ve saved a lot of lives over the years with that money, and I saw to it that she had a good upbringing.”

Lena could hardly believe her ears. It had been Pyrallis Daray, and not Corbett, who had paid Doctor Evans off for the deed, and he hadn’t killed Mrs. Astley at all; it must have been a creative embellishment on Master Corbett’s behalf. But if Daray had been in on it, then what about the rest of Astley’s story?

“So, you’ve had her the whole time?” Lena asked.

“Almost.” Doctor Evans raised his eyebrows. “A few years back, Master Daray asked me to have the child sent here—I guess your uncle had volunteered to take a few children, so an explanation was conveniently unnecessary.”

Lena’s brow furrowed. “What? Who?”