N. Wilson - The Dragon's Tooth

The blackened carcass of the Archer loomed in front of them.

Cyrus stared at it, his throat tightening, his already-singed tongue drying. This was bad. Where would they go? They didn’t have any insurance. Antigone grabbed his hand. She was covering her mouth. Greasy, soot-clumped strands of hair were clinging to her forehead, and tears were piling up in her eyes. He couldn’t do that. No crying. Not again. He’d been ten when they lost the California house. He could do better this time.

“Dan!” Antigone yelled. “Dan, where are you?”

CYRUS PEERED INTO the charred remains of his old room. Behind him, Antigone was still yelling for Dan. They had both lapped the motel and had looked inside the Red Baron and in every burnt and unburnt room that they could get into. Without the walkway, a lot of the second story wasn’t an option.

Cyrus was dizzy with heat and hunger and nervousness. Dan wouldn’t just go away. He could be with the police. It was possible. But he would have left a note.

Memories from the night before were jumbled, but clear enough when it came to Dan. He’d been there. Alive. Angry. And sorry. He’d even apologized for giving Cyrus’s room to Skelton.

The image of a burnt body tucked beneath a slumping wall slid into Cyrus’s mind, and he quickly forced it away. He shook his head. They wouldn’t find a body because Dan wasn’t dead. He hadn’t been in the fire.

Cyrus stepped back from his doorway. Throwing up was a very real possibility, but stomach acid and ash were all he had inside him. Breathing slowly, trying to calm his gut, he turned around.

Horace was leaning against the yellow truck, checking his watch. “He’s not here,” the lawyer said. “I told you already. I made a thorough search before waking you. As he was your legal guardian, I had hoped to speak with him.”

“Not was,” Antigone said. “Is. He is our legal guardian.” She was angry, flushed beneath the soot, which meant that she was worried. Cyrus watched his sister tuck back her hair and cross her arms. “We have to eat, Cy. He’s probably talking to the police. Let’s leave him a note and go.”

Chewing his lip, Cyrus scanned the ruin. Unless they wanted to eat waffle batter and drink from puddles, they needed to go somewhere. The waffle batter wouldn’t even be an option soon.

He turned back to the lawyer, pieces of the previous night shuffling in his head. “Did you know this was going to happen?”

Horace raised his brows. “No. I knew something was going to happen. I knew Skelton’s old brotherhood was on his trail, and I knew that he intended to die. That is what I knew. I did not know that there would be a fire or such damage done to your property. As for what I know now, I know that Skelton has given you an object that some very dangerous gentlemen would like to possess for themselves, that we three are desperately hungry, and that there are legal matters that will require my — and your — attention immediately. Time, as I have already said, is short.”

Cyrus spat a gray glop into the rubble.

Horace checked his watch again and tucked it back into his pocket. “And after speaking with police and hospital administrators early this morning, I know that there were three fatalities in addition to William Skelton, and none of them was your brother. I know what the thugs were after, but not how many of them there were or which ones were in attendance.”

“I only saw four,” Antigone said. “One was called Pug.”

“Ah, yes,” said Horace. “Pug. Thanks to his own terrible life choices, he has passed on. I wish I could pity him.”

Cyrus looked at his sister. He could hear the first explosion and see the tongues of fire, the evaporating glass, the slender man who’d trapped them beside Skelton’s body. “They talked about a doctor. And there was one called Maxi.”

“Maxi?” Horace blinked slowly, looking from Cyrus to Antigone. “How much did Daniel know?”

Antigone shrugged. “What do you mean?”

“Did you tell him what Skelton had done? Did he know what you’d been given?”

Cyrus reached for his pocket. “You mean the keys? No. I don’t think so.”

Horace sighed. “Well, his ignorance may be some little protection.”

Antigone looked at her brother, cocked her head, and turned back to Horace. “This is about keys? They burned down the motel and killed Skelton for a key ring?”

“Yes,” Horace said. “They did. And for what is on that ring. Although I’m sure an overarching mean-spiritedness played into their motivation as well. And forgive me if I point out the terribly obvious, but as they didn’t actually get the keys, we can expect them to make further efforts.”

“Keys!” Antigone yelled. She walked toward her brother. “Cy! I told you to give them back. What were you thinking?”

Cyrus stepped backward, raising both hands. He didn’t want his sister angry. Especially not now. “Hold on! I tried, Tigs. I did!”

Antigone stopped in front of him and raised a pair of vicious eyebrows.

“He didn’t want them,” Cyrus said. “He made me keep them.”

Horace snorted loudly. “Mr. Cyrus, I may be a lawyer, but I was a witness to the event, and I know the truth.” Again pulling out his watch, he flipped open its face and pressed down a small knob. “Mr. Skelton offered you the keys. He did not force them on you.” The watch went back into his pocket. “And the gift was, if I recall — and I do — accompanied by a string of rather morbid admonitions and dark metaphysical threats.” He glanced back at the road.

“Why didn’t you take the keys?” Antigone asked the lawyer. “You knew they were dangerous, and you let a kid take them?”

Horace nodded. “Yes. Another reason why I am grateful to your brother for his rashness. I prefer this circumstance to that one.”

He looked at Cyrus and smiled grimly.

“Now, I’ve called my car, and it’s just around the corner. I have stretched and torn the boundaries of professional courtesy in this rather unusual situation, but I cannot remain in this place any longer than I have already. As Skelton’s lawyer, I am an obvious target at this point, as I am bound to have information about the location of the keys. I must move to safer territory. You come with me to a brief explanatory breakfast, or you do not.” Turning, he looked back at the road. “If you come, I can explain more to you about the nature of what you have been given, and who will be coming to collect it. If you do not, it is unlikely that we will ever see each other again, and I will consider your inheritance null and void.”

A very low and extremely wide black sedan swooped around the corner and bounced into the parking lot.

Horace hurried toward it. “Leave a note if you like,” he called. “But come now.”

Antigone glared at Cyrus. “I’m leaving a note. Don’t get in that car until I’m back. Got me?” She poked him in the chest and began jogging toward the courtyard.

Cyrus watched his sister leave. He watched a tall, lean driver in a black suit open the rear door for Horace and the stout little lawyer slide himself in. And he waited, leaning against the old wooden camper on the back of the yellow truck.

The camper.

Cyrus’s heart skipped, and he straightened. The wooden planks ran horizontally above the truck’s bed. Some sort of earwax-colored sealant was flaking off around the seams and above every knot in the wood. He’d seen the same stuff on old sailboats. There were no windows. Dragging his fingers down the side, Cyrus moved to the rear of the truck and stopped in front of a narrow door. A small T-shaped knob with a center keyhole had been snapped down and was dangling from a crushed spring.