Seanan McGuire - A Local Habitation

“They were hired from a lot of different places, for a lot of different reasons,” Jan said, almost apologetically. “Colin . . . well, we needed a Selkie for some of our integration testing. It’s difficult to explain, but race really mattered. Peter was a history teacher with a specialization in folklore—that wasn’t just human folklore.”

“Faerie historian?”

“Genealogist.”

“Why did you need a genealogist?”

“Market research.” Jan shrugged. “You can’t use the same sales pitch with a Daoine Sidhe and a Centaur. It’s not going to work. Yui was our team alchemist. She could make just about anything compatible with anything else, if you gave her time.”

“What about Barbara?”

“Friend of Gordan’s, hired in a nonsecure position. She was from San Jose. That probably explains why . . .” Jan stopped.

“Why she betrayed you? Yes, it probably does.”

“Don’t the bodies tell you anything?”

“Nothing. They died of some internal trauma; I have no idea what it was, but the external wounds can’t have killed them. Maybe I’d know if I were more of a forensics expert, but I don’t, and I’m not.” The fae have never needed forensics training; that’s what the Daoine Sidhe are for. Unfortunately, that means we don’t have many options when the blood fails us.

“Maybe you’re too weak to ride their blood,” Jan said, slowly. “Changelings are weaker a lot of the time, aren’t they?”

“Quentin tried, too. Nothing.”

“We can’t get you a forensics expert. We can’t get the police involved.”

“I know,” I said. “Unfortunately, the dead aren’t talking.”

“But why are they like that?” she asked. “Why didn’t the night-haunts come?”

“I have no idea.” I raked my hair back with both hands, trying to hide my exasperation. “You’d have to ask the night-haunts.”

“Well, can you do that?”

I paused. “Can I . . . ?”

Could I ask the night- haunts? Were they something you could ask ? I’d never seen them, and neither had anyone I knew; they came in the darkness, took the bodies of our dead and were gone. They weren’t something you saw . . . but could I see them? Was there a way to summon them—and more importantly, could they tell me what I needed to know? The Daoine Sidhe know death, but the night-haunts are death. They might have the answer. I owed it to Jan to try.

Jan was watching me. I nodded, saying, “It may be possible; I don’t know. I’ve never heard of it being done. Maybe they can be summoned without a body.” I paused. If there was anyone who would know how to call the night-haunts . . . “I’ll have to get back to you on that.”

“Please.”

“I’m going to head back to the office, go through these files, and try to figure out whether it’s possible. And get coffee. I really need coffee. Will you be okay until Elliot gets back?”

“I’ll be fine.” She pushed her glasses up with one finger. “I’ll lock the door and check in with April every few minutes.”

“Okay.” I inclined my head in the bare outline of a bow, tucked the drawer up under my arm, and walked back out into the hall. I had a lot to think about.

VOICES RAISED IN faint argument were drifting through the door of Colin’s office. I sped up. Quentin’s safety was the one thing I wasn’t willing to risk. That’s why I wanted him to stay in the office in the first place: better paranoid with a locked door between him and the rest of the knowe than following me when I wasn’t sure I could protect him.

“—and I’m telling you that if they focused more on telling a good story, the graphics wouldn’t matter! How many explosions do you need in the first ten minutes of a movie?” That was Quentin. He sounded annoyed, but not like he was being threatened.

“Your argument is specious,” countered the second voice. April, who sounded like, well, herself. Not quite bland enough to be a machine, but close. “You are a teenage male. Teenage males like explosions.”

“Generalize much?”

I relaxed before leaning forward and knocking, noting impassively that my brief terror seemed to have helped my exhaustion. The voices went quiet. Then Quentin called, “What’s the password?”

“Do your homework. Now let me in.”

He unlocked and opened the door, revealing April in my abandoned seat. The Hippocampi were clustered at the end of the tank, apparently as unhappy with the Dryad’s presence as they’d been with mine. I looked between them and raised an eyebrow.

“I tested that ‘pager’ thing,” Quentin said. “I just said her name and she showed up. And then we started talking about movies.”

April disappeared from the chair, reappearing next to Quentin. “His taste in plot and construction is contrary to that of most teenage males and does not make sense.”

“Chalk it up to his archaic upbringing,” I said, not bothering to smother my grin. “You two about finished? I need to update Quentin.”

“I have duties which I can attend to,” April replied. Looking toward Quentin, she said, “We will resume at a later point,” and vanished.

“Looks like someone has an admirer,” I said, and closed the door. “She open up at all?”

“Not really,” he said, sitting down again. “I learned that she likes AC current but DC tickles, she likes rabbits, and she thinks computer games are good exercise programs. Oh, and she doesn’t approve of people dying, because it disrupts the production schedule.”

I put the drawer from Barbara’s desk down next to the tank of Hippocampi. “So she doesn’t know anything?”

“If she does, it’s not anything I can get out of her.”

“Great.” I shook my head. “Not exactly useful, but you tried. Good for you.”

“Did you find anything?”

“Well, Barbara was spying for the Duchess of Dreamer’s Glass; I found her files. Everyone in this County has a death wish and insists on hanging out alone. And I need coffee. Get your things, we’re heading for the cafeteria.”

Quentin stood, nodding. “Do we know when my ride’s going to get here?”

“Ready to leave?”

He grimaced. “Ready to not be sitting in this office anymore.”

“I need to make a call anyway; we’ll call Shadowed Hills afterward, see if we can get a status.” I was assuming Tybalt had actually given Sylvester my message, and that someone would be waiting by the pay phone.

“Who are you calling?”

“Jan’s asked me to try summoning the night-haunts.”

Quentin froze, staring at me. “Can you do that?”

“We’ll never know until we try.” I was glad he hadn’t asked who I was calling. We’d both be happier if he didn’t know that part of things until he had to.

“Will they be able to help?”

“I have no idea.” The night-haunts live on the flesh of Faerie. They might decide I was an ideal midnight snack and rip me into pieces . . . but they might also decide to answer my questions. They had to have a way of knowing when anyone with fae blood died; they arrived too quickly not to. If they were capable of thought, they’d have a reason for their actions. They could share it with me. There was a chance that I’d get myself killed in the process, but that’s always a risk; if it worked, it would be worth it.

He watched my face as we left the office, starting down the hall toward the cafeteria. “Toby?”

“Yeah?”

“Is this a good idea?”

“Absolutely not. But it’s the only one I’ve got just now, so we’re going to run with it.”

“Right,” he said, with a sigh.

We walked the rest of the way to the cafeteria in silence. I opened the door to reveal Elliot sitting at one of the tables, staring into his cup. He looked up and smiled when we entered, trying to look like he wasn’t worried. It wasn’t working. “Hey.”