Unquiet Dreams (16 page)

I leaned against the door. “Not you. Me. I should have asked before I gave you her number.”

Janey arched an eyebrow. “Ah. Yes. I can see how that might annoy someone.”

The lab Janey occupied was deeper underground than her space at the OCME, but looked brighter and more professional. Her wooden worktable held several standard microscopes as well as odd stone-and-glass contraptions designed to work with essence. The funny part is the common equipment was contained in warding fields. In a fey lab, metals screw up the work because it causes warping of essence. The more sophisticated tools require essence to make them work and a delicate touch to keep that essence from interfering with whatever is being studied. “So, has this helped?” I asked.

Janey smiled broadly. “Definitely. I haven’t had tools like this since college. I felt rusty coming in here, but I’ve found some interesting things for you.”

Leaning across the table, she pulled a stone object closer. It looked much like an old-fashioned celestrial globe, only with several lenses attached and a small tray in the middle. On the tray, I recognized one of the drug stamps Dennis Farnsworth had been carrying. Janey maneuvered some levers, then stepped back for me. As I leaned in to look, the damned little thing on the tray gave me a sharp pain just like the other one had at the OCME. I looked through a series of stacked lenses and was greeted by what I expected, a lot of cells jammed together. “I don’t really know what I’m looking at.”

“Live cells,” Janey said.

“Okay, I can see some movement if that’s what you mean,” I said.

“For one thing, I would think the cells should be dead by now. There’s an essence on the stamps keeping them alive.”

I pulled myself away from the lens. “Why would someone go to that much trouble?”

She pursed her lips. “Potency, I would guess. I managed to pull the essence protection off and examine the cell essence directly. I have to say, it makes me uncomfortable. The cells have no cell wall, like animal cells, but contain chloroplasts and a large vacuole—sort of a water sac that plant cells have. I don’t think these cells should exist. I think this is from some kind of animal/plant hybrid.”

Other than the creep factor, the ramifications were not going anywhere fast for me. “Well, from the strong essence, the plant part is oak. Can you tell what kind of animal?”

She shook her head. “I’m baffled. There’s an essence catalog next door that I tried cross-referencing with, but nothing comes up. I think you’re looking at a rare solitary fairy or elf species. It’s related to the oak family, but I don’t know how. For want of a better word, Connor, I’d almost say we’re looking at blood cells of some kind.”

“Well, that’s gross and different,” I said.

“It’s also where the compulsion is coming from. There seems to be yet a third essence mixed in it via spell transfer. Whenever I try to separate it out, the cell structure collapses and fades. As an educated guess, I’d say the spell enhances the compulsion ability inherent in the cells. I’m trying to conserve a sample. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I sighed and leaned against the table. “Well, I guess this confirms that the kid was involved in drug running, which is what Murdock suspected all along. If you can afford the time, I’d appreciate it if you could keep working on it.”

She retrieved the sample and put it in a glass warding box. “Oh, sure. I’m a little slow on my end of things at the lab, so I can slip a few hours in here and there.” She lifted the ward box and peered at the stamp. “What do you think the ‘F’ stands for?”

“It’s a ‘D.’ It’s ogham for oak,” I said.

She wrinkled her nose. “No, it’s not. It’s the futhark.”

Without getting any closer than necessary, I could see my mistake. The ogham for oak is a line with two short strokes coming off it. Given the essence, I just assumed it was a “D” for “dair,” the Celtic word for oak. Looking again, though, Janey was right. The two short strokes were slanted, not straight. It was an “F” rune, not ogham, the first letter of the futhark, the Germanic lettering system.

Realization struck me. “You’re right. It stands for ‘Float.’ It’s new. You’ll probably be seeing more of it.”

She considered it for a moment. “It’s always something new. Does this help your case?”

“Yes and no, to be honest. It connects a few dots but makes the picture more tangled,” I said.

She nodded. “I’m intrigued by the binding spell on it. There’s something elven about it, but I can’t place it.”

I pushed myself away from the table. “You’ll let me know if you come up with anything?”

“Of course. And thanks again,” she said.

“Please, please, please, thank Meryl. And don’t tell her I asked you to,” I said.

She gave me a knowing smile. “Ah, that’s the way of it.”

“What?”

She shook her head. “Nothing. I’ll tell her.”

Despite the bright sun, a cool breeze caught at me when I left the building. October in Boston can be balmy or freezing. I bunched my hands in my jacket as I walked back to the Weird.

Dennis Farnsworth had been running drugs. I rolled the words around in my head, letting myself get comfortable with them. It’s not the way I hoped he went, but there it was. Fair enough. I could live with that. Lots of kids think it’s a way to make a little cash and get out of a rough neighborhood. They don’t get that it just sucks them in deeper. It’s not the best idea, but I’ve been living down in the Weird long enough to understand that the bad ideas are sometimes the only ones.

I could walk away from the case, let Murdock close the file, and move on. No one would question us. Just another dumb kid in a string of dead kids. People don’t expect gang hits to get solved. The only people who care are the families and the gangs. The only time it gets bigger than that, when some politician or preacher or chanter starts up on gangs, is when someone squeaky-clean dies by accident. The scholar on his way home from Boston Latin High who gets caught in the cross fire of a drive-by or some office worker on a subway platform who accidentally gets bumped in front of a train during a brawl. Then it’s news, and justice gets talked about. But Dennis Farnsworth died near the worst part of the worst neighborhood in Boston. And now the weather.

But I had loose ends. Dennis Farnsworth had been wearing the colors of a gang led by Moke. Moke had a turf rival in C-Note. C-Note was running a new drug called Float. Why would Dennis have been wearing one gang’s colors and running another gang’s drugs?

I pulled out my cell and called a number I didn’t call that often. To my surprise, it still worked.

“Hey, little bro,” Callin said.

“Hey. How’d you make out last night?”

“Not bad. Yggy’s is neutral again. I appreciate the brotherly concern.”

I ignored the sarcasm. “Listen, I was wondering if you can tell me where to find the gentleman responsible for that.” Given that someone had been right on my heels when I found the Nike, I decided to be cautious with what I said.

“Maybe. I know a place he shows up sometimes.”

“Where can I meet you?”

“Can’t. I’m in the middle of something. I’ll send Joe when I know something.”

I felt oddly let down. “Okay. Great. And, um, Cal?”

“Yeah?”

“I am glad you’re okay.”

There was a short silence. “Thanks, man.” He disconnected. I tried not to dwell on Callin. Most times, I can put him out of my mind. I didn’t even know where he lived at the moment, but he obviously spent a lot of time down in the Weird. I could try and take comfort in the fact that the Clure still hung around with him. The Cluries weren’t so bad, more amoral than anything else. Fun as hell. Small comfort, but a comfort nonetheless.

I was still playing the connections around in my head a few hours later as I stood outside the Rowes Wharf Hotel. MacGoren’s comment earlier to Keeva about a gala prompted the memory of having seen Seacorp’s promotional schedule on their Web site. The latest dog and pony show for their waterfront project was scheduled at the hotel tonight. Given that Keeva was going to attend, I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone and try to get an update from her on the Kruge investigation as well as see what else I could learn about macGoren’s business.

With a mixture of envy and annoyance, I watched many of the city’s high-powered fey—the beautiful ones that the press called flitterati—entering the lobby. At one time, I mingled with these people, drank with them, ate with them, and slept with more than a few. Now, on the rare occasions I run into them, they get that faraway look in their eyes as though they cannot place where they know me from. The price of falling from on high is the angels tend to look busy when you drop by to say hello.

I slipped past security with laughable ease. Tricking myself out in a long leather coat and lots of black just sealed the deal. Picking the right entry point, in my case a city employee, strutting like a privileged fey, and I was sipping mediocre champagne before my presence even registered with anyone.

Since the Seacorp project involved hard-core real estate, major property owners circled around each other. MacGoren, of course, several high-ranking Consortium elves, and more dwarves than I had seen together in a long time. If memory served me correctly, and as a druid it usually did, dwarves didn’t own much land near the Tangle, but they had to be concerned about their own nearby investments.

Seeing all these dwarves made me think of Moke. Murdock had left me a message that he had some information and would fill me in later. Later was starting to look pretty late. I probably should have asked Cal about Moke, too, but that would have been pushing my luck with him. It didn’t take much for us to trigger silence between us, and me looking like I was just hanging around him for information would probably piss him off again.

Waiters circulated with drinks and hors d’oeuvres, paying particular attention to the various city officials. If macGoren wanted the project to move forward, he had to make the mayor and local reps happy.

I mingled with a crowd perusing placards off the lobby. Maps and projections of potential development ranked down a long hallway that led to a banquet room. I did not see anything that I had not already researched, although the fact that all the land under consideration had not been secured seemed to be conspicuously absent.

As I studied a color-coded map of the piers on the south end of the Weird, I felt an essence coalesce behind me like a spear.

“Interested in investing?” Keeva asked.

I turned and smiled. She was in full impress mode, a lovely deep blue wool skirt, leaf-patterned blouse, and ivory-colored brocade vest setting off her flowing red hair. The small necklace she wore cast a glamour that made her seem to move in a haze of soft light. “You could say I’ve invested in the Weird for some time.”

She rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. “Ah, yes. The Weird. Of course you’d go there.”

“That’s what the point of all this is, isn’t? Getting rid of the Weird?”

She shrugged. “Yes, Connor, that is the point. Does the city, any city for that matter, really need a neighborhood called the Weird?”

I pursed my lips. “I would think the people who live there think so.”

She gave me an exaggerated bored look. “Why are you here, Connor? Can I have at least a little time off from aggravations?”

“Old friends, you might say. Why are you here? Playing hostess?”

She shook her head. “Not really. I’ve been so busy, this is the first night in a week Ryan and I have been able to see each other.”

“And you love a big party,” I said.

She toasted the air with her glass. “And I love a big party.”

“So, you two an item?”

“You could say that.” She smiled smugly, the kind of smile that dared me to think their relationship was anything less than pure attraction. I’m sure that was there. I’m also sure that each had a private little pros and cons sheet on the other.

“How’s the Kruge investigation?”

She checked our surroundings before responding. Even when she did, she pitched her voice for my ears only. “Still haven’t found the troll Croda. She’s the only connection to Kruge we have that we haven’t been able to clear. Why, do you know something?”

I shook my head. Keeva had a habit of not asking for help. She had to be coming up really dry to ask me outright if I had heard anything.

I gestured with my glass. “And here’s the man of the hour.”

MacGoren moved in behind Keeva, wrapping his arm around her waist. Even to my doubting eye, the smile she gave him looked genuine. He tapped my glass, showing a wide smile. “Hello, Grey. Are you intercepting Briallen’s social invitations, too?”

I did my best to smile at his joke that I was sure was an unspoken dig. “Something like that. Nice turnout.”

He glanced around him, assessing the gathering. “We’ll see later in the evening. I’m gauging interest.”

I looked at the map. “Looks like you’re pretty interested. Don’t you own most of this land?”

He nodded several times, his eyes roaming the maps as though he were confirming that all his properties had been noted. “You know your neighborhood well. There are some major pieces that need to be picked up to move forward, but, yes, a lot is mine.”

I already knew that. An interesting bit of coincidence was that Dennis Farnsworth had been found on macGoren property. “A murder victim was found on some of that land.”

MacGoren turned his smile into a pensive look. “Yes, I heard. It’s sad when young people get caught up with drugs.”

I kept my face and voice nonchalant. Janey Likesmith would file her research with the Farnsworth file, but it was too early for Keeva to have received it, never mind mention it to macGoren. “Who said anything about drugs?”

The smile quirked back on his face. “I just assumed. You know that neighborhood.”

“Yes. I live there.” Running down macGoren’s holdings the previous night, I found two large parcels that were divided by a sliver of land he did not own. I brushed my fingers on the map. “Isn’t this area where Alvud Kruge had his office?”

The smile hadn’t left his face. “Alvud was interested in the project, if that’s what you’re asking.”