Between Frames (The City Between Book 4) Read online

  “So then how did our murderer get in and out without the concierge’s knowledge?”

  “Exactly what I would like to know. And then there’s the unique distribution of bodies—three high level fae, one human, and then another fae. So very interesting! The detective seems to think—Ah, Pet! I see you’re with us at last.”

  “Flaming heck,” I said in annoyance. I’d twitched when he mentioned a human victim; hadn’t been able to stop myself.

  “Ashipda,” murmured JinYeong, and there was still a touch of Between to the words when he said, “Not. Clever. Enough. Petteu.”

  I stuck my tongue out at him, which made one of his eyebrows lift briefly.

  “Pal oddae?” he asked; a smooth threat.

  “The arm’s fine,” I answered. “You threatening me?”

  “Tangyeonhaji,” JinYeong said mockingly.

  Flaming rude, that.

  “Anyway,” I said, making the best of things, “what’s all this about a murder victim at a club in Salamanca?”

  “I have no idea to what you’re alluding,” said Athelas. “For the very good reason that Zero forbade us discussing the matter with you.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “And I have not,” he added, “discussed the matter with you.”

  “Okay, that’s true. So why don’t you just keep discussing it with each other?”

  “Hae bolkka?” said JinYeong, with a sparkling look at me, then Athelas.

  “Certainly not,” Athelas said, to both of us. “JinYeong, do not encourage the pet!”

  “That’s rich!” I said. “You’re the one always telling me stuff!”

  “As I said!” JinYeong said triumphantly, crystal clear. “Good Pet. I will have coffee. I deserve biscuits.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” I said. “You’re not telling me stuff, so you don’t deserve biscuits.”

  “Biscuits!” said JinYeong, and left his guard to wander into the kitchen.

  I would have gone after him, because I could hear him rummaging in the drawers for biscuits, but Zero arrived home just as I was about to go, so I dropped down on the arm of the nearest lounge chair and grinned at him.

  “Busy visiting crime scenes again? You should get Detective Tuatu to do that for you. Thought you lot were working together sometimes these days.”

  For a minute, I thought I might have gone a bit far and given myself away, but there was a soft laugh from Athelas, and Zero’s eyes softened a touch.

  “I was not visiting a crime scene.”

  “Yeah? Bet that’s nice for a change. Where’d you go?”

  I didn’t actually expect him to answer, so it was a surprise when he said, “I revisited the former human quarters of Upper Management. I was curious to see if it was still there.”

  “Was it?” I asked, though I was pretty sure if he was talking about it in front of me, it didn’t have anything to do with what he was working on. Talking was still talking, when it came to Zero.

  “Technically, I suppose it was still there. There’s still a seventh floor to the police station, but it’s no longer…occupied. No doubt the normal humans will become aware of it again once the enchantments on the stairwell and elevator dissolve.”

  “Curious, but not entirely unexpected,” said Athelas. “It was merely a branch, after all. After my…rescue, it would be foolish for them to come back. We did leave rather a mess.”

  “How’d you get captured, anyway?” I’d been wondering that for a little while now. Athelas wasn’t careless, and he definitely wasn’t stupid. “I mean, they were all humans.”

  “That is a question to which I would also like to know the answer,” said Zero, but there was an edge to his voice that suggested he already knew the answer to the question, and didn’t like it much.

  “Think of it as forcing their hand,” Athelas said, smiling faintly.

  “I thought as much,” muttered Zero, his mouth grim.

  I said, “You got yourself captured on purpose?”

  “It is sometimes necessary to sacrifice a pawn in order to take a knight.”

  “Yeah, but you’re not a pawn!”

  “Thank you so much, Pet!” said Athelas. “I had no idea you thought so well of me! I’m gratified.”

  “Yeah? I reckon you’re being sarcastic again, but whatever. So you really weren’t kidding when you told me that time that you were exactly where you wanted to be?”

  “It wasn’t too far from the truth,” agreed Athelas. “Though I must admit, if I’d realised how well prepared they were to encounter fae, I might have rethought my decision.”

  “I reckon!” I said, with a shudder of remembrance for the condition in which I’d found him—pierced through with moonlight and helpless. “You ever wonder if you’re too clever for your own good?”

  “I feel like I might just as well turn that question back on you,” Athelas said, and although there was no coldness in his voice, I reckoned it was better to shut my mouth.

  I couldn’t help grinning, though. “Want a cuppa?” I asked him.

  “Not right at this moment, I think,” said Athelas, and I saw the way his eyes very carefully didn’t go to Zero.

  “Tea and coffee, Pet,” said Zero, with that unmistakeable edge of command.

  “Sorry,” I told Athelas. “You’re on your own.”

  This time, I wasn’t the one in trouble. I joined JinYeong in the kitchen just in time to see him waltz out with the last pack of shortbreads, and was too late to say more than “Oi!” at him in passing, which he ignored.

  By the time I got back to the living room, there was still a chill to the air, but Zero had left the house again and Athelas was calmly contemplating the ceiling.

  “There you are, Pet,” he said. “I was just wondering how much longer you would be.”

  “Sorry ’bout that,” I said, pinching Zero’s coffee. His loss, my gain. “Didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”

  “Trouble is an inescapable fact of life,” said Athelas. “Now, what were we discussing before my lord came down?”

  “You were telling me about heirlings,” I said.

  Athelas’ spoon made the smallest chink! as he put it in the saucer. “I really don’t think I was.”

  “Well, maybe not. But if you’re not gunna tell me about the case you’re working on, I wanna know about heirlings and why that sword is called the Heirling Sword, and why JinYeong’s not supposed to touch it.”

  “The fae do not object so much to JinYeong’s touching the sword as the fact that he exists.”

  I was about to say that I didn’t love the fact of JinYeong’s existence much, either, when it occurred to me, mouth open, that he was saying it wasn’t JinYeong’s personality that offended the golden fae so much as JinYeong’s kind.

  “You lot are pretty flaming xenophobic, you know that?”

  “I’d prefer not to be lumped in with the fae who were here earlier, thank you, Pet,” said Athelas mildly. For all the mildness of it, I felt the chill of his displeasure. “I object to JinYeong upon the grounds of his personality and his general inconvenience, not his birth.”

  “Oh,” I said. I felt much the same, so it wasn’t like I could object. “Hang on, though,” I said. “You’re still pretty flaming toffy-nosed when it comes to humans!”

  “Humans,” said Athelas, and there was a ghostly gentleness to his voice that made me blink and sit back, “are such soft, delicate creatures. So very likely to die. So full of weaknesses and exploitability. Inferior in nearly every way.”

  “Oh, just nearly every way?” I asked crabbily. “Flamin’ broad-minded of you!”

  I should have put a laxative in his tea.

  “Pet,” said Athelas, and there were crinkles beside his eyes again. “I really advise against interfering with my tea.”

  “We were talking about heirlings,” I said, trying not to clear my throat. “You said a while ago that they’re some kind of humans.”

  Athelas sipped his tea, and althoug
h his lips didn’t smile, his eyes glowed with amusement. “Not necessarily.”

  “Well, that they’re part human, anyway.”

  This time, Athelas nodded. “Indeed. It is a peculiarity of the requirements that any heirling must have human blood in some part.”

  I might have snorted a bit.

  “Yes, I thought that would amuse you. The irony of it is not lost on me, I assure you.”

  “Hang on,” I said. “I thought Zero said that heirlings are fae, or a mix of fae and another race who have the right fae blood. Doesn’t that mean someone without human blood can be an heirling?”

  “Fae don’t like to admit to mixed blood,” said Athelas. “But I do assure you that even the purest of the royal lines have had a drop of human blood.”

  I grinned. “Bet that flaming rankles!”

  “A little. Ah, Pet, as enlivening as this conversation is, I have a job for you.”

  “Really? What is it?”

  “This,” he said, bringing out a tiny flash drive from his pocket.

  I took it from him gingerly. “What is it?”

  “Video surveillance. I’d like you to watch it through.”

  “Yeah? You bring that home from the cop shop? Thought I wasn’t supposed to know what you’re working on.”

  “There are some things we will not discuss. Others are more flexible.”

  “Right.” It must not be anything important, then. I waved the flash drive at him and asked, “How am I supposed to watch this? I can’t do it on my phone.”

  “Perhaps you noticed that JinYeong brought home friends last night,” suggested Athelas.

  “Kidnapped a couple of people, you mean? Yeah. What about them?”

  “My lord seems to have decided that certain accoutrements are necessary if we’re to stay here any longer.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked suspiciously, but Athelas only flicked his eyes toward the staircase and sipped his tea.

  I took my coffee upstairs into the living room there, and found a computer set up, bright, shiny black screen and silver accessories and everything. I didn’t even have to turn it on: JinYeong’s kidnapped techs had set it up and left it on, just waiting to be used. I plugged the flash drive into the back of the computer and it opened automatically, a drive with five folders. I double-clicked on the first, which seamlessly brought up a media player, and smiled a satisfied smile at the setup. I even had wifi now! The techs must have been here all night setting up the stuff. No more searching things on my mobile phone—or sneaking to the library.

  Mind you, when Zero and Athelas learned how to search browser history, I’d have to start being a lot more clever about hiding the sort of things I searched for.

  But for now—now it was pretty close to perfect.

  I was still smiling happily when a coloured room interior showed up on the media player. Pink and gold, it was obviously an expensive room in an expensive house, and I was pretty sure I was watching security footage. High class security footage, but definitely security footage.

  The room was open and wide, with a couple of desks around it and a lot of bookshelves—maybe a library of some sort. Long windows opened out onto what must have been a balcony, judging by the bit of pot and foliage I could see poking in. A man worked at one of the desks, his polo shirt as blue as the room was pink, and his hair gelled neatly in place; probably a business man who made more in a month than most people made in a year. Was it the club they’d been talking about? I remembered the pink and gold that had brought Athelas home the other night, and decided that yes, it must be.

  As I watched, the lights flickered a couple of times, and died. It must have been daylight, because I could still see pretty well, but it was harder to see the bloke’s face, and the colour faded around the room. The man stood up from his desk, head twitching around, and went for the door. I saw him test the handle once, twice—then three times. When it didn’t open, he pounded on it a couple of times, too. Then he started back across the room, the light from the windows showing up his face.

  He was halfway across the room before another figure came through the long windows from the balcony, his face obscured by the lack of light in the room and a dark cap. The first man stopped, then started forward again, and I squinted at the screen. What, he recognised the other bloke? What was happening now? I couldn’t see a weapon, and if this was about what I’d heard the other night, someone should be losing a heart at some—

  Window bloke shoved a fist at polo shirt bloke—like he was punching him, but straight out, at his chest. I expected the dude to stagger back, or move away, or something.

  And I mean, yeah, he staggered all right, because window bloke’s fist went right through his chest.

  Blood blotted light material in the shadowed room, and polo shirt bloke swayed, transfixed by a human looking arm and fist that shouldn’t have been able to punch right through his chest. The window bloke moved his shoulder a bit, like he was, I dunno, feeling around for something. Then he wrenched his fist back out, slimy and dark and glistening, and something big and wet pulsated between his fingers, dripping blood.

  “Athelas!” I howled.

  “Yes, Pet?” said Athelas’ voice mildly, right by my ear. What the heck? How did he get there so quickly?

  I didn’t ask either of those questions. Instead, I wailed, “He pulled out the other bloke’s heart! He shoved his hand in there and pulled it out! You could have warned me!”

  “I was curious to know what you would see,” he said, leaning against the computer desk with one hand.

  “I saw a bloke pulling out another bloke’s heart! What the flaming heck else would I have seen? It’s a surveillance camera—it doesn’t change!”

  “Humans are often mistaken about that. What else did you see?”

  “I didn’t finish it, if that’s what you mean. Got kinda distracted by the bloke who was reefing out someone’s heart!”

  “I see,” said Athelas. “I thought it was rather neatly done, myself. I do apologise. If you can bring yourself to look again, perhaps you would be good enough to tell me what else you see?”

  “Blood,” I muttered, wincing and looking back at the screen. Window bloke was still where I’d seen him last, though polo shirt had dropped onto the floor, and the heart was still where it had been, too, though it wasn’t dripping as much as I would have expected. “And how come it’s not blue?”

  “Should it be blue?”

  “You tell me,” I said. “If they’re fae, yeah. Zero’s blood is blue, and so’s yours.”

  “I don’t believe I said the victim was fae.”

  “Yeah you did,” I told him. I would have grinned if I wasn’t still feeling a bit sick. “You said fae were having their hearts torn out.”

  “You heard rather a lot, didn’t you, Pet?”

  “So why isn’t it blue?”

  “Those fae who are based in the human world and do most of their work here have built in safety protocols to keep the humans from discovering them. Blood is one of those things that is taken care of.”

  “What, so if someone tears out their hearts, the police won’t be freaked out?”

  “It’s a little less sensational than that,” Athelas demurred. “But if a fae should happen to die unexpectedly, we prefer that they not inform unwary humanity of our existence.”

  “Tearing hearts out is pretty sensational,” I pointed out. “Pretty flamin’ bloody, too.”

  “And yet, for the injury, there is remarkably little blood, would it not seem?”

  “Maybe his hand is really hot,” I said.

  “Cauterisation? I think not. There were no such marks on the body, and there’s too much blood for that method. There’s little enough of it, but not that little.”

  “Doesn’t look like he’s drinking it, either.” It wasn’t too bad now that I wasn’t surprised. Athelas was right—there wasn’t much blood, and the slightly unreal surveillance footage made the floppiness of the body not quite a
s horrible as it might have been if I’d been seeing it in real life. It also gave the murder itself a more surreal feel, which was kinda nice if you can call anything about a murder nice.

  And whatever Athelas or Zero said, I knew that this was the case they were working on. I’d heard enough of what the fae were talking about the other night to know that much. So this bloke had been a high level fae?

  On impulse, I asked, “Where is this, anyway?”

  “That is not important,” he said.

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said, but I wasn’t really cranky because I was still pretty sure I knew exactly where it was. “Not important to know where it is, or if it’s the case you’re working on, or if the bloke’s human.”

  “You surprise me, Pet!” said Athelas, with a feathering of amusement to his voice. “Following our conversation earlier, I really didn’t think you would discriminate against a person based on his lineage!”

  I grinned. “You shouldn’t stick your tongue out at the pet,” I said. “It’s beneath you.”

  “How many of the files have you watched?”

  “Just the one,” I said, feeling a bit grumpy again. “I s’pose the others are just as gory?”

  “This camera had the best angle,” said Athelas. “Alas, the others are nothing like as clear.”

  “Yeah, I’m devastated. Is this the only camera in the room? We can’t see his face like this.”

  “It was the only one. People in that place have an…expectation of privacy.”

  “Woulda thought they had an expectation not to be killed, too,” I said. “Oi. How come he turned off the lights first?”

  “To make it more difficult to see his face, one assumes,” said Athelas.

  “Yeah, but the other bloke already recognised him. He walked toward him, and he wasn’t scared or anything. And we can’t see his face from this angle, anyway, plus he has a cap on.”

  “It is not unknown for a murderer to want to take more care than necessary, Pet.”

  “Yeah.” I mean, Athelas was the expert, after all. I was just the pet.