Crowbones

CHAPTER 78

Grimshaw

Moonsday, Novembros 5

Brainwashing,” Grimshaw said, thinking things through while Julian drove to Sproing.

“What if Civil and Serious Crowgard were playing mind games with Clara Crowgard, claiming that they wanted to recruit her for their cause but needed to be sure of her loyalty before they told her anything of significance?” Julian said in turn. “Based on what Aggie, Jozi, and Eddie told us, Civil and Serious were isolating Clara from her friends, making it sound like working for Vicki was a bad thing while they were, in fact, working with a human—or at least having conversations with one or more humans. Except things started to go wrong, and either Civil or Serious was killed on Trickster Night, and the Crow’s feet ended up tied to Adam Fewks’s rib cage, connecting those two deaths.”

“And then the Others barricaded the roads, and we’ve been assuming that whoever is behind all this is trapped in the area.”

“Safe assumption.” Julian seemed to be debating with himself. “I’ve been wondering if the Others would have reacted as fast if Adam Fewks had knocked on the door of Xavier’s boardinghouse instead of showing up at The Jumble. Did someone miscalculate the degree of interest that terra indigene like the Elders and Elementals have for Vicki and expect to be dealing with just Crows and Sanguinati because those are the terra indigene most in sight these days?”

“Ian Stern is a psychologist—and an Intuit.” Grimshaw let the statement hang.

Julian’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “You’re thinking he knows how to brainwash people? That he would use his extra sense of people to find their pressure points and make them susceptible to being controlled? Convincing them to murder other humans for some cause or for some fucking science project?”

“Humans murder other humans for all kinds of reasons—including a warped ideology. The Humans First and Last movement proved that much.” Grimshaw paused. “You’re friends with Ian. You may not see him clearly. Not all Intuits are good people, Julian.”

“I would trust Ian Stern with my life. Michael too,” Julian snapped.

“Would you trust them with Vicki’s life?”

Julian swung into a parking space and braked so hard, Grimshaw was glad to be stopped by the seat belt and not by having his face meet the windshield.

Julian shut off the car and stared at Grimshaw. “I hadn’t seen Michael or Ian for several years, but there is nothing about the feel of them that is different, that makes me uneasy being around them.”

“Your strength and gift is feeling a place, not individual people,” Grimshaw said quietly. “I’m asking you to keep an open mind.”

“I suggest you do the same.” Julian started the car. “If you don’t mind, I need to open my store.”

Grimshaw got out. Julian pulled out of the parking space and drove to the small lot behind Lettuce Reed.

Maybe he was too focused on a university degree that implied knowledge about how to control a person. The gods knew there were plenty of people who could manipulate and exploit people without having a degree in psychology. Look at Ellen Wilson. She was a walking vessel of ill will and soured everyone around her to the point that some merchants gave in to her demands just to get her to leave their other customers in peace.

Come to think of it, he didn’t know if Mrs. Wilson had a degree of some kind. Something else to check.

“Open mind,” he muttered as he walked into the station. Then he stopped just inside the door when he heard the whining pleas coming from the direction of the cell.

Crap! With the explosion and everything else yesterday, he’d forgotten the day had started with him bringing Rodney Roash in to assist the police with their inquiry. Had Osgood stayed at the station, or had they left Roash here alone?

“Help! Is anyone there? Tell her to go away!”

Her?

This morning he couldn’t ignore that he’d been on the edge of an explosion yesterday and his knee was a mess, but he moved as quickly as he could to reach the station’s single cell.

The cell door was open. Was that Osgood’s decision or that of the female who turned her head and smiled at him before fixing her gaze on Roash again.

Not Air. Had he seen this one at The Jumble the other day?

“Ma’am,” he said. “You are . . . ?”

“Water.”

That’s what he thought.

Grimshaw took a step closer in order to look inside the cell. “Professor Roash? Do you need to use the facilities?”

“Do you promise she’ll stay right there?” Roash whimpered.

Water laughed.

“Yes, she’ll stay here.” Which didn’t mean a thing if any of the Elemental’s kin were in the building.

Roash eased out of the cell and scampered to the station’s bathroom.

Grimshaw took another step closer to the cell, wondering if Osgood was going to have to swab it out. He forgot all about that possibility when he saw the shoes encased in ice.

“Officer Osgood had to respond to a call,” Water said. “Winter and I came in to keep watch. The little human was not . . . respectful . . . of females until we provided incentive for him to be polite and stop making noise.”

“You formed a block of ice around his shoes.”

“This time we gave him the opportunity to take his feet out of the shoes before the ice hardened. The next time we will not—and the ice will cover more than his feet. We explained this to him.” Water smiled.

“I appreciate the help, but I can take over now if there’s someplace else you need to be,” Grimshaw said, but he thought, Winter and Water, working together. Gods above and below. He was not going to think about Constance Dane. When her husband and his pals tried to take The Jumble away from Vicki, the woman had been choked by a hand made of ice coming out of a bathroom sink.

No, he wasn’t going to think about Constance Dane. But he would, if he had to, tell Rodney Roash just how close the man had come to wearing an ice shroud.

“Officer Osgood is bringing food from the diner on his way back from his task,” Water said. “He’ll return soon.”

“Ma’am.” Grimshaw stepped out of the way.

The bathroom door opened. Roash stuck his head out, spotted Water, then ducked back inside.

Not the best choice of rooms to hide in if Water was annoyed with you.

Grimshaw didn’t actually see her leave. As she moved past him, she just wasn’t there anymore.

He hoped that was true.

He coaxed Roash out of the bathroom, located a couple of ratty towels he and Osgood used to wipe their shoes if they’d been out in the wet or in mud, and gave them to Roash to put under the shoes so his socks wouldn’t get wet when the shoes started to thaw.

Osgood returned, looking like a man who had slept at his desk. He took a travel mug of coffee and one of Helen Hearse’s breakfast specials to Roash, then divided the rest of the food he dug out of the delivery box.

“Do you need to go back to the boardinghouse for a couple of hours and get some sleep?” Grimshaw asked.

“No, sir. I’m all right.”

What else would a rookie say? Then again, Osgood was young enough that it might be true.

“Is Viktor coming in?” Osgood asked after they’d been eating in silence for a couple of minutes.

“Don’t know. Yesterday was hard on him, losing a friend that way,” Grimshaw replied. “Harder still because he didn’t respond to the bait and Karol did.” The timing of that was still something he needed to piece together.

Osgood looked up. “Someone tried for both of them?”

He nodded. “And used a recording of Kira calling for help to lure them into the building.”

“Huh. If someone was aiming for Viktor, they used the wrong lure.”

Grimshaw swallowed his coffee and kept his tone casual. “Viktor doesn’t get along with Kira?”

“Oh, they get along fine, but . . .” Osgood took a bite of toast and chewed slowly. “It’s like . . . if someone called and said Pops Davies was trapped in a building, I wouldn’t forget procedure, wouldn’t stop thinking like a cop. Not the way I might if someone told me Paige was trapped in a building. Karol seemed more keen to show his devotion to Kira, and Viktor wasn’t interested. That’s all.” The rookie shrugged and went back to the serious business of eating.

Interesting, Grimshaw thought.

When they’d all finished the meal, Osgood collected the dishes and took them and the delivery box back to Come and Get It.

Accepting that his knee required at least another day to heal before he could pretend it was back to normal, Grimshaw settled in to answer phones and read through the information the mayor’s office had provided about Sproing’s new residents.

It didn’t surprise him that a number of newcomers had lived in other towns in the Finger Lakes area. He made note of anyone who had come to Sproing from any of the places that had killings similar to the ones here.

Then he came across one name. He looked at it for a long time.

Ellen C. Wilson. He hadn’t known what the C stood for—until now. And until now, he hadn’t had any reason to think she had some connection with the academics who had come to Sproing to observe Trickster Night.

Observe? Or do something more?

He looked at the list of Ellen Wilson’s previous residences and considered how they tallied with some of the killings in other towns. Nothing in the information compiled by the mayor’s office to indicate if she’d ever taken courses at a college, but that didn’t mean anything. People were self-taught in any number of subjects, and it would be easy enough to do if a relative actually was enrolled at a college and taking courses that could become the twisted foundation for experimenting with other people’s minds.

Was all the whining and complaining and the particular way she pitched her voice simply the woman? Or was it all calculated to achieve a specific result?

Maybe she was behind some of what was happening in and around Sproing, but not all of it. He didn’t think she was the one who had persuaded Adam Fewks to put on a costume and pretend to be the Crowgard bogeyman.

But she might have a partner. Or a competitor?

Were all these deaths being tallied on some kind of scorecard?

Grimshaw carefully closed the folder and made sure all the papers inside were aligned so that no one would realize he’d found a possible connection between Ellen C. Wilson and at least one of the academics who had come to Lake Silence for Trickster Night.

Then he went back to the cell and said, “Professor Roash? Tell me again how you ended up coming to The Jumble for Trickster Night.”