Irregulars: Stories by Nicole Kimberling, Josh Lanyon, Ginn Hale and Astrid Amara (17 page)

Archer followed without comment. Just before he closed the door behind them, he threw a look back at Baker and Roya. They hastily returned to their cataloging.

As the lock clicked into place, Barry stopped huffing and puffing. “How did it go?” He took his seat behind the enormous desk positioned beneath the gilt-framed portrait of Carl Peoples, the museum founder.

“It could have gone better,” Archer admitted, taking the velvet-upholstered chair on the other side of the desk.

“They released you.”

Archer nodded.

“But?”

“They know about my involvement in the SRRIM.”

“Of course they know.” Barry shrugged, unperturbed. “Knowing and proving that you are still an active member are two different things.”

“Not necessarily. Not given the broad spectrum of powers the current administration has given law enforcement agencies like the Irregulars.”

“There are no law enforcement agencies like the Irregulars,” Barry said gloomily.

“True.”

Barry grimaced. “Still. Given your position, I’m sure they’ll—”

Archer laughed. “I shouldn’t bet on it. I don’t think my position is going to protect me this time.”

Barry nodded. “What exactly did Commander Rake say when he brought you in for questioning?”

“He believes I’m involved in the effort to return the Stone of Fal to the sidhe.”

Barry made a disgusted sound. “That’s nothing more than species profiling.”

“Well…”

Barry threw him a quick look from beneath his silver brow. “A boy’s enthusiasms—”

“They’re not merely the enthusiasms of a boy. You know where my sympathies lie.”

“Of course. That doesn’t change the fact that you’re not involved.” Barry did not go so far as to ask why Archer had been in that warehouse allegedly meeting a notorious fence, but his gaze was inquiring.

“No. True.” Briefly, Archer considered telling Barry the whole story, but this was personal. Truthfully, Barry was better off not knowing.

And Archer didn’t want to hear what Barry would have to say.

Barry sighed. “I can see this Commander Rake is going to be a thorn in our side.”

“Not necessarily. His interest seems focused on me. That could work to everyone’s advantage.” Barring his own.

“He plans to nail you to the wall. You’re right about that.” Barry sighed. “I think he’s one of these fellows that takes it all very personally.”

“Unlike us.”

“I don’t know.” Barry seemed thoughtful. “Do we take it personally? I don’t think I take it personally. This is beyond personalities.”

“We’re fanatics, according to Commander Rake. He’s probably right.” Archer smothered a yawn. It had been a long night and a busy morning. “The bottom line is we’re out of time. I certainly am in any case.”

“This isn’t like you.”

Wasn’t it? Archer liked to think his idealism was tempered by pragmatism. It was one reason he’d managed to fly under the radar this long. “They were waiting for me last night.”

“You think it was a setup?”

“Yes.” Honesty compelled Archer to add, “I’m not positive, but yes.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know. It’s not as though I pose a threat to anyone.”

“A threat? No. Although I suppose the Commander Rakes of the world will always see people like us as threats.”

Barry was polite enough to say
us
, but he meant
you
. Archer knew he was right. “I suppose I should think about moving on now that I’ve been targeted by the authorities.” The thought gave him a pang. He had been happy in Vancouver.

Still, it wasn’t the first time. He would survive.

Barry was shaking his head. “No, no. Nothing of the kind. Remember how gung ho Brennan was at first? We’ll wear this one down too.”

Archer thought of Rake, of that big, powerful body clothed in the Savile Row suit. The buffed fingernails and expensive haircut. Beneath that civilized veneer was something not remotely civilized. Oddly, the thought of that unknown excited him. “I don’t think so. He’s a different breed.”

“Speaking of different breeds,” Barry said. “I got confirmation this morning that the naga skin will be delivered tomorrow afternoon.”

The snakeskin, shed by an Indian demon some eight thousand years earlier, had been under study by the R&D department of NIAD in DC for the past three years. It was be returned to the museum to be cataloged and reshelved and ultimately forgotten.

“No worries there.”

“Er…no.”

Archer glanced up. “Is there a problem?”

Barry grimaced.

“There can’t be. The bloody thing’s been exorcised.”

“You know the way rumors get started.”

Archer’s brows drew together. “What rumors?”

“That the skin is…”

“Is what?”

“Showing signs of life.”

In the resounding silence, Archer said, “It’s just a skin. How much life could it show?”

Barry shook his head. “You know how these rumors get started.”

Oh yes. Every legend began life as a tiny, persistent rumor. Sometimes as nothing more than idle gossip.

Barry added, “Nothing that need worry us, I’m sure.”

Because they had bigger things to worry about?

***

The rest of the day passed without incident. At five, Archer slipped his jacket on, grabbed his briefcase, and left the mus-eum. He caught a streetcar and then a SkyTrain to Library Square where he spent the next hour or so browsing book stacks and services.

When he was sure he’d lost the tail that Rake had planted on him, he headed toward Kerrisdale. He crossed the Burrard Street Bridge and turned right onto Cornwall Street. That put him in the Kitsilano neighborhood,were Ezra lived.

“Kits” was an arty-crafty enclave of artisan bakeries, art studios, organic markets, trendy cafes, and Vancouver’s Greektown. It was mainly populated by college students and yuppies and yoga teachers. Pretty much the last place one would expect to find a goblin lowlife like Ezra, which was why it was such a perfect place for him to hole up.

As Archer walked he could smell the salty scent of the nearby sea. It reminded him of Romney Marsh. Of home. Home and long ago. He was impatient with himself, but perhaps the sense of nostalgia wasn’t surprising given his mission.

Ezra lived in an old apartment building on Vine Street. The scent of lamb moussaka filled the downstairs hallway and tagged along with Archer up to the second floor. Beatles music played from a few doors down.

 Archer tapped on Ezra’s door. After a few seconds, he knocked again.

The door swung open just as Ezra’s goblin face was morphing into more socially acceptable features; the lipless piranha smile transformed into something equally toothy but cheesy and human.

That smile too faded as Ezra took note of his caller.

“Green.” His voice came out in a croak.

“I was in the neighborhood,” Archer said.

“Oh. Hello. I di—” Ezra staggered back as Archer applied the heel of his hand and the toe of his boot to the door and shoved. “Wh-what are you doing?”

“I thought we might have a little chat.”

Ezra took another few steps back and looked around as though seeking an escape way that had suddenly disappeared. “Chat? About what?”

Archer slipped inside and closed the door, leaning casually back against the painted plywood. “Guess.”

Ezra shook his head.

“You set me up.”

Ezra’s human face wavered as his masking spell dissolved and reformed itself in goblin lines. He bit his nearly nonexistent lips, and though he was considerably taller than Archer, he seemed to shrink into himself.

“I heard there was trouble.” Ezra gulped. “But it wasn’t anything to do with me. How could I know the badges were watching the Moth Man?”

“That’s your story? That the Irregulars were following the Moth Man?”

“Of course. You can’t think
I’d
work against you.”

Archer smiled. “Can’t I?”

Ezra shook his head. “I’m no friend of the badges.”

“That doesn’t mean you wouldn’t sell me out to save your own skin. Hell, you’d sell your own mother out if you thought there was something in it for you.”

Ezra looked hurt. As hurt as a goblin could look. “That’s not true. I’ve got scruples. Not many, I admit, but I’ve got’em. Same as you.”

Archer considered Ezra’s sweaty, misshapen face. He could have been telling the truth, of course. It wasn’t impossible. Unlikely, but not impossible. The relationship between fae and goblin had always been…unpredictable. And with the mounting instability among the Irish fae in the Tuatha Dé Dannan Islands and the large goblin mercenary forces there, they were likely to become more so.

Ezra unwisely launched into further protests, finishing, “We all know what you’re doing. You and your friends. We’re all beh-ind you.”

Ezra’s intel was out of date—Archer’s radical youth was well in the past now—but perhaps that shouldn’t have come as a surprise. Archer said gently, “If I were to discover that you
had
tried to double-cross—”

“I didn’t! I wouldn’t!”

“I have a
very
long memory.”

“I know that. You don’t have to do the glowing eyes thing. I know! I’m not a collaborator.”

He was lying. The more he denied it, the more certain Archer was, but what course would best serve his purpose? Knowing Ezra couldn’t be trusted made him a useful conduit for feeding incorrect information to the Irregulars. While it was true Archer was no longer involved in radical activities, his sympathies were largely unchanged and he was privy to the plans and schemes of many whose aims did not align with those of the NATO Irregular Affairs Division.

Besides, Archer wanted something more than he wanted revenge. All day long the thought of the green glass beads had haunted him. If there was a chance they still existed…

“If it wasn’t you, then it was the Moth Man.”

“Yes.” Ezra leaped at this explanation. “That’s what I told you. It had to be that freak.”

“Where does he live?”

“Somewhere in Downtown Eastside.”

“Where?”

“Hastings Street.” Ezra babbled out the address.

“All right. I’ll pay a call on him. See what he has to say for himself.” Archer watched Ezra’s fluctuating features.

Ezra’s gaze shifted. “You can’t trust anything he says.”

“Now, now. People say the same thing about you, Ezra.” Archer smiled maliciously before slipping out the door.

***

Downtown Eastside wasn’t the hellhole it had been a few years earlier, but it was still no place to be after dark if you didn’t need to be. Archer had his favorite places in the DTES. Carnegie Center with its century-old stained glass windows. The Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden with its mirror-like ponds and exotic flowers scenting the smoggy night. Hypodermic needles no longer littered the pavement, but the ratio of drug addicts, prostitutes, and the homeless compared to regular citizens was still too high for most people’s comfort. The streets always smelled of blood and urine to Archer, but his olfactory sense was more highly developed than that of a pure-blooded human.

He walked briskly, and though a couple of revenants followed him for a few streets, only the still-living variety hassled him with offers of drugs for sale. At five foot nine and slightly built, Archer looked like easy prey from a distance. Up close, his faerie heritage was apparent, and while the semblance of birth defects was rarely a deterrent, possible—or at least sober—predators veered off.

Archer found the Moth Man’s place without trouble. It was an old brick building, a former hotel from the 1920s, converted into a number of single-occupant residences. A musical clash of cultures was being waged in the dingy halls, and somewhere a baby wailed unconsoled. People sat in open doorways, smoking pot and talking loudly. Red-rimmed eyes watched Archer pass, but no one spoke to him.

He knocked on the door next to a tarnished nameplate stating R. Mann.

A double look at the peephole revealed a pale, protuberant eye peering through at him. Archer waited.

There came a sound of sliding bolts, several of them, and then a chain, and at last the door swung open.

“Good evening,” Archer said.

Without speaking, the Moth Man nodded for Archer to enter.

Archer stepped out of the hall into a gloomy room full of boxes. The boxes were stacked all the way to the ceiling and marked with the brand names of televisions and stereos and fans. The fans were a little puzzling, but whatever. A chair and table were positioned a few inches from a television set. The television was on, but it was muted. Teenagers danced and sang, silently energetic on a large stage.

“I thought you would come.” The Moth Man pulled his chair out. “If you got away from the drearies.”