Mark Del Franco - Unquiet Dreams

“Joe, I said ‘find it’ not ‘take it.’ You’ve just contaminated evidence in a murder case.” For the record, it’s hard to look angry at someone sitting in a running shoe floating in the air.

He pulled a long face. “I’ll put it back then. You could have been clearer.”

“Where was it?”

“On a roof four or five buildings over that way,” he said. As he pointed, he almost lost the shoe. I resisted the urge to grab it.

“Please, put it back exactly where it was and in the same position. I’ll meet you there. Wait for me in front of the right building so I can find it.”

“What if someone sees me?” he said.

“That’s the least of my concerns right now, Joe. No one’s going to see you if you don’t want them to.” Most flits are shy to the point of reclusiveness. They’ve set themselves up for a vicious circle, though. They’re shy because their size often gives them unwanted attention, but because they’re rarely seen, they attract even more attention when they do appear. It wasn’t so bad in the Weird, since fey of different sizes were hardly unusual. Joe’s usually not so sensitive to it, but I could tell I upset him. He’ll get over it because he understands enough about my job to know he screwed up.

He turned the shoe and flew off. Skipping the shortcut through the mud, I made my way around the field to the next street over. More empty buildings, though a few of these looked like they might be inhabited. Rough curtains hung in warehouse windows, and sometimes people even showed their faces through sooty glass. This end of the Avenue was not known for entertainment. It was close to the Tangle, which meant trouble, so only the truly desperate lived here or, ironically, the kind of people that the desperate feared.

At the top of a building stoop, I found Joe standing defiantly in full view of the street. I knew he’d get over it.

“Sorry,” he said as I walked up the steps.

“Yeah, I know. I didn’t mean to yell. Can I get up to the roof from here?”

He nodded. “It’s empty as far as I can tell. Smells bad, too, and not in a good way.”

I pursed my lips, then decided not to ask for a clarification of that last part. We entered the building through a smashed-open door. Joe hovered over my right shoulder as we ascended the stairs. He was right. The place stank, bodily secretions being the main culprit. The sagging staircase rose dimly before me and would have had the same gray, dingy look should sunlight ever penetrate. Spray-painted graffiti was most evident the first two flights, in several languages and three alphabets, but dwindled as we went upward. The smell faded, too, but that was probably due more to open windows allowing wind through than any diminishment of the source.

The stairs topped out at the roof through a small, doorless penthouse enclosure. The sun blinded me briefly after the dark interior of the building. I examined the roof surface before stepping out. In this part of town, rotting roofs come with the package. This one looked more solid than most. Others had been there before, demonstrated by three mismatched lawn chairs, a wooden telephone cable spool set on its side as a table, and enough empty bottles and cans to open a recycling center.

“Where is it?” I asked.

Joe put on a mock-curious face. “What? You mean that strange orange Nike shoe sneaker over there by the washing machine that I’ve never seen before in my life?”

I can’t stay angry at Joe for long. Annoyed yes, but it’s not in his nature to provoke me, and he always feels bad when he does. “That would be the one,” I said.

I walked over to the incongruity that was a washing machine on a roof. Whenever I see something like that, I wonder about the motivation of the people who put it there, why it occurred to them to lug something so heavy to such an odd place. The Nike lay on its side near it. I could only sense Joe’s essence at the spot, so that was a good sign that no else had been there. It helped confirm my suspicion that the kid lost it in the air.

“Well, at least your essence fades quickly. No one will find it if they look.” Flit essence can be elusive. Flits being so small, their essence fades almost instantly under most conditions.

I scanned the nearby buildings. We were about a quarter mile away from the field where the kid had ended up. I couldn’t see any sight lines that might produce witnesses, just other roofs that no one would likely be on in the rain and cold of the previous night. Off to the south, someone floated up into view. Even at this distance, I could see a slight distortion in the air that indicated wings. The sun glinted off something metallic. The chrome helmet of a Guild security guard. He drifted back down.

I brought my attention back to the running shoe. Having been out in the rain, it had no more essence on it than the kid’s other clothing. I squatted down to look more closely. A few dark spots flecked the visible side.

“Joe, after you picked this up, did it touch the ground again or did anything drip on it?”

Stinkwort pulled his head out of the washing machine. “No. I picked it up by the laces and put it back exactly how I found it.”

I leaned as close as I could get my nose to the Nike without falling over. When you work for the Guild, no one blinks an eye at what a druid might do to sense essence. When you’re all alone on a roof with nothing to identify you as an investigator, you look like a guy with a shoe fetish. I hoped no one could see me. I waited for any essence to assert itself. After a long moment, just the slightest hint whispered up to me, so faint I was worried I might be imagining it. Elf essence. Only one thing would retain any indication of essence after that much rain. Blood.

I looked back toward the Tangle, then turned to sight the line to the field. The shoe was almost on a straight line between Kruge’s storefront and the dead kid. Could be a coincidence. Or could be this wasn’t just a gang feud.

“Did anyone see you, Joe?”

His eyes narrowed at me. “Just some dwarves.”

“Black hoodies? Yellow bandanas?”

He nodded. “I don’t want to ask. Why?”

I shrugged. “Just curious. There’s some elf blood on the shoe.”

He gave me an exasperated look. “Just some elf blood, he says. Like one of the most famous elves in the city didn’t just get exploded up the street on the same night. Like, oh, did you happen to see a gang of marauding dwarves, he says. Nothing to worry about, Joe. Nope, nope, nothing at all.”

“You’re letting your imagination run away with you, Joe,” I said. “I’m sure it’s just coincidental.”

“Just because it’s a coincidence, doesn’t mean I can’t get killed because I touched some smelly Ikey.”

“Calm down, Joe. And it’s a Nike. And it doesn’t smell. It’s brand-new.”

“Except for the elf blood,” he said.

I tried to give him a reasonable look. “It’s just a little. Hardly any. I can’t even tell if it’s Alvud Kruge’s.”

He rolled his eyes. “I feel so reassured.”

“Look, Joe, it’s a gang feud, pure and simple. He could have picked up the elf blood anywhere. He had an odd mix of essence on him, so there’s no telling where he got it. Murdock and I are running the gang angle, and once he gets some gang names to contact, this will be all over. No one even knows you were involved.”

He looked at me unconvinced. “You forget the marauding dwarves.”

“They weren’t marauding, and unless dwarves can suddenly fly, there’s no reason for them to connect you to a shoe on a roof they couldn’t even see.”

He nodded. A sly look came over his face. “I bet you want to know about gangs.”

“That’s the plan.”

He smiled knowingly. “I know someone who can help you. Knows all the gangs from here to Southie. Want me to set up a meeting?”