Page 43 of Secrets of the Forgotten Heir

‘Can you tell us what you were doing yesterday at about eleven o’clock?’ Yanni asked.

‘I went for a walk – I always go for a walk, just around the seafront. I like to feed the birds when I’m in my human form.’ She hesitated. ‘I may have plucked off one or two – you know, when I’ve transformed – but I always feel a bit guilty about it so I take some homemade seed balls for them. As an apology.’

I couldn’t imagine Mrs D in anyform plucking off living creatures. Yanni had been right: I didn’t know everything about my old teacher, no matter how much I wanted to believe that I did.

‘Did anybody see you?’ Dove asked.

‘I don’t think so. I try to go at quiet times in case my instincts get the better of me and I fancy a snack. That’s not something I’d want any of my students – past or present – to see me do.’ She looked flustered.

‘So you have no witnesses. And you have a motive,’ Dove said.

Mrs D nodded. Tears started to trickle down her cheeks. ‘I know.’

‘I’m afraid this doesn’t look good,’ Yanni said. ‘I think it’s best that we keep you in for further questioning.’

‘Keep me in?’ Mrs D looked horrified. ‘Does that mean I’m officially a suspect?’

My stomach twisted. That was it – I was done listening to this! I swivelled around, ready to march out of the door and into the interview room, only for Eva to block my path. ‘I need to go in there,’ I said.

She tipped her head to the side then made a quiet noise that was something between a bark and a squeak. I thought I knew what she was trying to tell me: this was an official police investigation and I had no business sticking my nose in.After all, if Mrs D was innocent as I was sure she was, the evidence would point to that, wouldn’t it?

But I wasn’t so sure. How many crime dramas had I watched in the non-magical world where false evidence was planted to bring an innocent person down?

Yanni walked out of the interview room and came through to me.

‘You have to be joking!’ I snapped. ‘You said it was questioning!’

‘Itwasquestioning,’ she replied evenly. ‘And the questioning leads us to believe that she could’ve done it. She had a motive, priors and no alibi.’

‘But it’s Mrs D!’

‘I understand that you’re mad.’ Yanni’s voice was calm but firm. ‘But I’ve got the council on my back – and not just the shifters. Everybody is freaked out by what’s happened. This is the first murder we’ve had in Witchlight since … since—’

‘Since my grandmother came in and killed everyone,’ I finished for her. And I had shouldered a lot of ill-feeling about it because my grandmother had come here forme.

‘You must understand why everyone’s on edge. You might not remember, but it started with a murder back then, too.’

‘I remember.’ My voice was sharp. ‘My parents wereamong the dead.’

Yanni shook her head. ‘No, before their deaths, Bea. Your grandmother killed a shifter and took his power so she could get through the ward.’

‘What?’ I shook my head, struggling to take in her words. ‘She could take a shifter’s power?’

‘She could take whatever power she wanted. After she’d tracked you and your father down, she needed to get past the wards that were intended to keep people out. She waited. When a fox shifter went too far one night and travelled beyond the barrier, she killed him and transformed into his body to disguise herself. That’s how she got through.’

I sank into a chair. ‘I … I didn’t know any of that. Why didn’t anyone tell me?’

‘Because we were trying to protect you.’

None of it made sense. I thought I knew everything about my grandmother and what she’d done but apparently Istilldidn’t.

‘But this isn’t the same,’ I said. I couldn’t change what my grandmother had done but I wouldn’t let Mrs D go down as a scapegoat for a scared community. ‘Magic didn’t kill Warren. It was a gunshot.’

‘Iknow, but we need people to see that we’re taking action, that we’re keeping them safe.’

‘And you’re doing that by arresting a little old woman?’ I snorted.

‘We’re doing that by arresting the person that the evidence points to. Mrs D knows that. If you can find someone else, please do because I don’t want this any more than you do. But right now, it’s the right thing to do.’

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