C.E. Murphy - Truthseeker

Lara got up to root through the freezer and came out with a bag of corn. “You make tartar sauce, I’ll cook the corn. Vegetables will be accomplished. Did you talk to him?”

“Corn is technically a grain.” Kelly laughed as Lara gave her an exasperated look. “You have no idea how much fun that was. All these years of you saying things like that, and now I get to get my own back. I did, yeah.” She took the fish out of the oven and slid the sticks onto the plates. “I said what you suggested, that he was probably right but it seemed safer to let you work through it on your own for a while. He was kind of tense, but then we had great makeup sex so I guess it’s okay.”

“I did not need to know that.”

“Oh, but I think you did. Is that enough corn for two people?”

“It’ll have to be. It’s all you’ve got.” Lara put the pot on to boil and went back to her papers. “I also have this idea that because the weapon was used to drown Annwn it might have an affinity for water. So I think if Brendan brought it here, it would be hidden near a river or lake or something.”

“Look at you, Ms. Extrapolatey. Here, let’s try something.” Kelly came over to pick up the top sheet of paper, then cleared her throat dramatically. “The worldbreaking weapon is hidden at—you actually had to photocopy pages about Niagara Falls? You couldn’t have remembered that one?”

“I was being thorough.” Lara lost her scowl as Kelly laughed.

“Okay, okay. Ahem. The worldbreaking weapon is hidden at Niagara Falls in upstate New York,” she said decisively, then looked hopefully at Lara, who gazed up at her in astonishment.

“That’s one of the strangest things I’ve ever heard. There’s no music with it. It’s completely neutral, like you don’t have any idea of the truth of what you’re saying.”

“Well, I don’t. But damn, I hoped maybe there’d be some kind of inherent truthiness you’d pick up on.” Kelly went back to the fridge, taking mayonnaise and pickles out to make tartar sauce.

Lara shook her head. “I guess the power’s not that well developed yet. It was a good thought, though. It’s okay. I’ll just read all of these carefully and see if anything strikes a chord.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“I don’t know. Maybe that just means this is the wrong way to go about it. I’ll keep trying to think of other approaches, too.”

“Are you really sure it was only a day, Lara?”

“Of course. Why?” Lara looked up with a frown to see Kelly studying her with an odd expression.

“Because you’ve always been quiet and shy. The only thing I’ve ever seen you strongly opinionated and decisive about is clothing. And here you are acting like”—Kelly shrugged a shoulder and smiled—“a superhero.”

Lara glanced down again, half wanting to hide herself in the paperwork. “Yeah, I know. It’s partly that I was so scared in the Barrow-lands just in those first few minutes, Kel. I had to pretend I was brave so I wouldn’t completely fall apart. And then dealing with Emyr, I kept having to stand my ground, and it keeps getting easier.”

“Well, that’s good. I think that’s good. You’re going to need all the confidence you can get your hands on when we go to court. In the meantime …” Kelly drained the corn and plonked spoonsful onto the plates, then slopped tartar sauce down beside the fishsticks. “In the meantime, a delicious repast prepared by yours truly, and you can spend the next week or two honing your truthseeking skills by finding the worldbreaking weapon.”

More accurately, it seemed, she could spend the next week or two giving herself headaches trying to find the worldbreaking weapon. It seemed extraordinary that being called into court could be a welcome relief, but Marjorie Oritz’s call that Dafydd had been granted a hearing was the first time since she’d come home that Lara felt a surge of real hope.

For a woman who couldn’t get taken on for jury duty, she had spent a surprising amount of time in courtrooms recently. One, true enough, had been Emyr’s palace court, but if he were to be considered the judge there, he was a far less forgiving one than the woman who presided over Dafydd’s reentry hearing. She, at least, had a glint of humor behind her expression of distaste for the array of petitioners gathered in her courtroom.

Lara knew she made a good impression: her boxy-shouldered, short-sleeved dress was of a classic style, popular for its elegance and its practicality in the summer heat. It lent her slight form a degree of determination, making a statement that she wasn’t a victim. The judge would very likely see it as just that, but Lara had thought it an important effort to make, regardless.

Dozens of other people were gathered as well. Lara’s mother was there, watching Dafydd with an open curiosity that Lara doubted had been present any other time they’d been in each other’s company. Kelly was at Gretchen Jansen’s side, and Dickon Collins was at Kelly’s. Worry niggled at Lara when she glanced Dickon’s way: he had tread very lightly around Lara the time or two she’d seen him over the past two weeks. It would take Dafydd to prove herself to Dickon, and whether Dafydd would be willing to do that remained unknown.

Cynthia and Steven Taylor were there as well. Cynthia looked astonishingly adult in tailored gray, while Steve maintained an expression of reassuring calm. Beside them, on the courtroom aisle, sat Detective Reginald Washington, whose off-the-rack suit looked uncomfortably hot and ill-fitted compared to the tailors at his side.

Unexpectedly, parole officer Rich Cooper was also there—though after his comment about being turned inside-out by questioners after her disappearance, Lara supposed she ought to have expected his attendence. She might, after all, let slip some detail of where she’d been, instead of the mysterious refusal to discuss it that she’d left him with.

Dafydd himself looked better than he had in prison. He still had nothing of the vitality Lara was accustomed to seeing in him, but he seemed stronger. His suit had been purchased for him hastily, rather than taken out of storage. Lara breathed a promise to herself that he would soon enough be free, healthy, and returned to the gorgeous clothes of his home court.

Lawyers, security, and a court stenographer were there, but un-alarming. It was the reporters gathered in the room who made Lara’s heart palpitate with nervousness, and she was grateful there were no cameras allowed within the courtroom itself. The bailiff called for order and the judge leaned forward, elbows on her desk as she brought her forefingers together to point accusingly at Lara.

“I’m given to understand that you’re here to petition David Kirwen’s return to polite society, young lady.”

“Yes, your honor.” The title came much more easily to Lara’s lips than “your majesty” had, and she schooled her expression, certain that laughter wouldn’t stand her well just then. “He didn’t kidnap me, and he certainly didn’t kill me. There’s no reason for him to be incarcerated.”

“Yes, so I understand. And yet you’ve given no one any explanation as to where you were for the past …” The judge made a show of tipping her wrist and examining her watch, as if it had a calendar of all the days Lara had been missing. “Seventeen months, three weeks, four days, I believe?”

“Seventeen months, one week, and four days, your honor,” Lara said with a touch of asperity. “I’ve been back two weeks now, after all.”

“Don’t get hoity with me, young woman. You’ve cost the state a remarkable amount of money in terms of manhunt hours, nevermind the cost of incarcerating a man you claim has done you no harm. One more remark like that and I’ll present you with a bill for our time.”