C.E. Murphy - Truthseeker

Lara inclined her head sheepishly. “Sorry, your honor.”

“As well you should be. Well, Miss Jansen.” The judge waited until Lara raised her eyes again, then spoke acerbically. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to provide some sort of explanation for disappearing so thoroughly and frightening the wits out of your friends and family. I would be delighted if it encompassed the reasons Mr. Kirwen opted not to speak in his own defense at his indictment, if he’s not responsible for your disappearance.”

“I didn’t say he wasn’t. I said he hadn’t kidnapped me.” Lara reached for the confidence she’d developed over the past weeks, pushing away the embarrassment that had briefly overtaken her. She couldn’t afford to be mild, not when she had nothing but unpalatable truth on her side. She had to make them believe, regardless of the cost.

The judge’s eyebrows lifted. She glanced from Lara to Dafydd, then turned a thin-lipped, sharp smile back at Lara. “Do go on. We’re all abated waiting to hear the details.”

“Your honor.” Lara took a breath, then steadied her voice as she met the judge’s eyes. “Your honor, you wouldn’t believe me.”

Truth rang through the words, making them sharp enough to cut. Fanciful phrase, Lara thought, but even it had precision to it: it was as though the truth, forced into being spoken aloud, actually made the air clearer, made it ring and shape the world. She heard it, and so, clearly, did the judge, whose face went lax, a telling show of surprise before the muscles around her eyes and mouth tightened again. “Perhaps you’d be so good as to let me be the judge of that, young woman.”

Lara swallowed and deliberately opened her hands, refusing to make them fists. It took concentration: everything took concentration, even breathing, but it was only with that effort she felt she could invest her words with truth. And she had to be believed; she, who had spent a lifetime hearing the truth, had to make it heard now. Anything else would be insufficient; anything else would lead to Dafydd’s exposure, and that was not a risk she was willing to take.

But she could do it. Her talent had stretched well beyond where she’d once imagined its boundaries lay. She remembered the nightwings, destroyed with a prayer, and drew on the strength of belief and voice she’d had then.

“You wouldn’t believe the details, your honor. They would make you angry. You would think I mocked you. I wouldn’t, and neither would Dafydd if you sent him from this room and heard his side of the story separately, but you would believe we were lying. That we’d practiced it, though you wouldn’t be able to figure out when.”

The words hurt. They scraped at her skin, exposing muscle, and went deeper, digging for marrow. There was none of the music she associated with telling or hearing truth, but rather a harsh uncomfortable strain to everything. Maybe that was what relentless truth was to other people; at its worst it could be that way for her, too. She wished abruptly she had another way: a translation of truth into song, the way she sometimes heard lyrics on the radio. It still cut deep that way, still hurt, but music tempered truth in a way raw forced words couldn’t.

Rustling in the courtroom made her dare a glance over her shoulder. Both policemen wore deep frowns, and the gathered reporters had given up scribbling notes or holding out their recording devices to instead stare uncertainly at Lara. Kelly, sitting beside Lara’s mother, had her arms wrapped around herself, face pinched with unhappiness. Gretchen herself wore an expression of terrible sorrow, her gaze on Lara speaking a desire to somehow save her from herself.

“I’ll tell you.” Lara looked back at the judge, keeping her voice soft. Soft as shark skin, and so razored in its way. “But it will not satisfy you, it will not make you happy, and it will not change the fact that David Kirwen is not a kidnapper, and should be released from jail. I am sorry , your honor, but this is not easy on any of us. Please let it end now.”

The judge’s fingers, once pointed so accusatorily, were now knotted together, less an action of distress than frustrated rage. She wouldn’t be accustomed to such flaunting of her authority, and even if she was, she would never have encountered something like Lara’s talent. She gathered herself, spitting a question that came forth hoarse, despite the attempted strength behind it: “What are you?”

Lara bowed her head and sighed. Not who, but what was she, and there was no satisfactory answer to that. She tried anyway, looking up and speaking as softly as she dared while keeping the truth’s razor edge in her voice. “I’m someone who hears truth and lies when people speak to her. And I can make others hear the truth, too, if I have to. Please, your honor. David Kirwen is guilty of no crime. Let him go.”

She did, after that. Had him taken away, technically, to fill out paperwork, but the intent was clear: he would be released.

It was also clear almost no one understood why. Kelly did; Gretchen Jansen did. Dafydd ap Caerwyn, of course, did, but the others let their gazes skitter off Lara and shifted away from her if she came too near. Even the reporters backed off, retreating from the courtroom with low-key agreements that they would interview her on the steps outside. It didn’t surprise her: Lara felt her own presence and actions like a weight in the courtroom, and was as grateful as they were to escape it.

Kelly was waiting with Gretchen Jansen and Dickon when Lara exited the room. Both women offered hugs, and Lara sighed into her mother’s shoulder before turning to face Dickon, searching for something to say.

Detective Washington strode up to them, a step ahead of Officer Cooper, before Lara found a way to break the silence, and did it for her: “What the hell was that?”

“The truth.” Her answer was so simple it almost made Lara laugh. Instead she passed a hand over her face, and more quietly, said, “It’s what I said in there, Detective. My whole life I’ve known when people were lying to me. Today I had to make you hear the truth. I’m sorry. I really am.”

“You can’t make somebody …” Washington trailed off unhappily as Lara lifted an eyebrow in challenge. “Excuse my French, Miss Jansen, but that’s a load of bullshit.”

“Okay.” Lara shrugged as discomfort raised the hairs on her arms. Small enough recompense for what she’d put the court through. “Then find an interpretation you can live with, Detective. I told you none of this would make you happy.”

“You still haven’t told me what happened to you.”

Lara looked up at him, studying his dark eyes and the deepening lines around his mouth before she shook her head. “The only way you would believe me would be if I did what I just did in there, Detective. If I made you hear the truth. And I think you hate what just happened, am I right? So maybe you should let it go.” She glanced at Cooper, standing silent behind Washington, and sighed. “Both of you. I’m sorry.”

“You say that a lot. Do you mean it?”

Kelly gave a sharp, bitter laugh. “Lara never says anything she doesn’t mean. Reg, you really wouldn’t believe her. Let it go, okay?”

His scowl darkened. “You know where she’s been?”

“Yeah. And believe me when I tell you that you’d think she was lying to you. God,” she added explosively, turning to Lara. “Is this what your life is like all the time?”

Lara, under her breath, said, “It’s not usually this dramatic,” but nodded. “With the truth? Yes. It’s always complicated.”

“I’m sorry for ever giving you shit,” Kelly said fervently.

“You’re forgiven.” Lara caught the hostility on Washington’s face and sighed. She’d spent a lifetime with that kind of emotion directed at her, even without forcing people to acknowledge a truth they didn’t want to hear. Maybe it was strength to be able to stand in hostility’s face, but the idea of its relentless weight never lifting exhausted her.