Page 42 of Brimstone and Broomsticks
He thought on that a moment. “Probably. Dad didn’t get killed, but he did get tossed out.”
“With half the business,” I countered.
He grinned. “Yes, with half the business—the half no one else knew how to or wanted to run. But demons get killed in hell. I don’t think I’d be spared because of whose loins I sprang from.”
“Same here. I don’t think Dallas would kill Clinton outright, but if the guy didn’t accept a defeat, or kept challenging over and over again, then I think Dallas would do it.”
“But why would he hide it?”
“He wouldn’t. I don’t think Dallas has anything to do with Clinton’s disappearance.” I sighed. “I’m beginning to think that Dallas is right. Clinton will show up eventually.”
“So where are we going now?”
“There’s a second mystery here. If I can’t solve the first, then maybe we can solve the second.”
“Which is…?”
“Which is how your coin got on the other side of that deadfall, right where the break in the wards occurred.”
It didn’t take us long to reach the spot on Beaverton Road where Bronwyn and I had parked just last night. It all looked benign in the sunshine, a bunch of fallen trees and brambles at the end of a dirt road. Lucien and I got out of the car and walked over, standing in front of the mess.
“So, walk me through the fight again. That’s when you lost the coin?”
“I’m assuming so. I had it earlier when we were in the bar drinking, because I was joking that it wouldn’t buy me much in the way of beer. I showed it to Alberta and John, and they bought my beer. I had the fight with Clinton right after that. So I’m thinking it fell out of my pocket.”
There was an odd expression on his face, as if he didn’t quite believe that. “It fell out of your pocket. Is that even possible?”
“I didn’t think it was, but here in this town all sorts of impossible things happen,” he joked. “I’ve got practically no powers here. The coin doesn’t even seem to be working. I guess it could have fallen out. Outside of Accident, I would have figured nothing outside of magic would get that coin out of my possession.”
“So someone picked it up. Clinton, John, Alberta, Shelby, or any random patron who happened to walk through the parking lot and see a brass coin in the gravel.”
He nodded. “Picked it up. Evidently came here. Dropped it.”
I eyed the deadfall. “Dropped it on the other side of that mess of downed trees and brambles. This is where the break in the wards was, and where we found your coin.”
“And this has nothing to do with Clinton’s disappearance, aside from the intersecting timelines?” Lucien asked.
“I’m not sure.” Was the break in the wards and the coin related to Clinton’s disappearance and possible exsanguination? As it stood, all I had were some rather suspicious coincidences.
“Clearly Clinton wasn’t stabbed, or whatever, here or you and Brownwyn would have seen blood,” Lucien conjectured. “I lost my coin, or someone picked my pocket, while I was fighting with Clinton. Coincidence? Or not?”
“A lost coin, a missing werewolf, and a broken ward. I’ve got no idea,” I confessed. “Wards don’t usually break, and it’s just weird that your coin would be here.”
“Think someone planted it here?” he asked. “Like the blood in my hotel room? They knew you’d come to investigate a break, and figured they’d pin this on me as well?”
I shrugged. “The blood in the hotel room wasn’t done by someone used to manufacturing a crime scene according to Ophelia. If this was intentional, then it strikes me as a bit amateur as well. I mean, why drop the coin on the other side of the deadfall and the wards, making it look as if you’d escaped, when whoever did this clearly wanted it to appear that you murdered Clinton in your hotel room?”
“Maybe they were going for me killing Clinton in my hotel room, then dragging him all the way across town and throwing him over the deadfall to break the wards, then climbing through, dropping my coin, and dragging Clinton’s body off into the woods.”
“That’s ridiculous.” I gestured to the deadfall. “Besides, a bloody werewolf body isn’t going to break the wards. Werewolves as well as any of the supernatural residents of the town, are able to come and go through the wards without any hinderance. They suffer a slight degradation in power within the city limits, but that’s it. And being dead or covered in blood doesn’t change that.”
“So whatwouldbreak the wards like this?” Lucien asked.
“Bronwyn and I figured it was a fae. Pixies. Elves. That sort of thing. They can come and go without problem, but their magic can really screw stuff up. The easiest explanation is that a fairy or some type of fae was doing magic, or carrying an enchanted object across the wards, and basically it was like blowing a fuse.”
Lucien looked down at his ankle monitor. “An enchanted object like this?”
“With fae, who knows? Maybe. That device was made by Bronwyn, so the magic is compatible with the wards. The wards trigger the anklet and keep you from leaving or passing through them. Fae magic and their enchanted objects are different and not compatible with what we witches do. Sparks fly when our magic gets together, and not in a good way.”
