Lake Silence

CHAPTER 30

Ilya

Firesday, Juin 16

“I have something to show you,” Natasha said the moment Ilya returned to the lodge. “Aggie Crowgard brought it over after you left to take Miss Vicki to the doctor.”

Ilya took the envelope and studied the former bank manager’s name. “We already suspected him of having one of the tie clips and being involved in the threats to Victoria.”

“Aggie thought it was important because it had shiny gold ink.” Natasha smiled, showing a hint of fang. “She mentioned a couple of times that the police might be interested in a shiny envelope and that they sometimes exchanged one shiny for another.”

“Not a precedent I want to follow, and one Officer Grimshaw may come to regret,” Ilya murmured as he considered the return address. “TCC, with a Hubb NE address. Tie Clip Club?” That would fit in with Grimshaw’s and Farrow’s thinking that the group had a name that would be overlooked by most of the humans attending the schools in Hubbney.

“Would an enemy be that bold to display the location of where they can be found?” Natasha asked.

“Organizations send information to members all the time. Nothing unusual about that. Nothing suspicious. All out in the open. Except the part that is hidden.”

“If these humans have dug in to three locations in the Northeast Region, they could have their claws in many more.”

Ilya nodded. In human-controlled cities, there were Courtyards—a separate place within the city that was the territory of the terra indigene who kept watch over the humans and made sure they honored their agreements. Because Hubb NE was the seat of government for the Northeast Region, the Courtyard there had a strong gathering of Sanguinati. It was possible they already knew about these tie clip humans but had not interfered because the humans had interacted only with other humans. With this gambit against Victoria DeVine, the tie clip humans had crossed a line and were now dealing with the terra indigene whether they knew it or not.

“What are you going to do?” Natasha asked.

Ilya tapped the return address on the envelope and smiled. “I’m going to ask the Sanguinati in Hubbney for any information they might have about these humans.”

He went into the office at the lodge, turned on the computer, and composed the e-mail he would send to the Sanguinati in Hubb NE. Then his hand hovered over the SEND button.

Human-controlled cities were watched by a collective of terra indigene living in a Courtyard. Here the humans had been watched by the residents of Silence Lodge. They had been a shadow that touched Sproing and Crystalton. But despite their fiercely human-centric educations, their training in how to speak and how to dress—even what vehicles to purchase—they had been isolated. And not just from the humans in Sproing who had thought they were mysterious, rich city dwellers slumming in the wild country. Their ability to be urban predators also had kept them apart from the rest of the terra indigene who lived around Lake Silence and the northern half of Crystal Lake. Even the ones who had some interest in human things were wary of the sleek beings who dressed in black and exuded a blended threat of human and Other.

Then things had changed in the Courtyard at Lakeside. Interesting things that had altered passive watching to interacting. And things changed even more because of the war between the Others and humans, followed by the Great Predation. New humans had arrived in Sproing—and a caretaker had arrived to restore The Jumble. Various forms of terra indigene wanted some knowledge of human things without too much human contact. More a Simple Life than city kind of knowledge.

It could happen now. Was happening now. And, he admitted to himself, he was no longer bored with his important assignment of being the leader of Silence Lodge.

Ilya sat back, the message still waiting to be sent. Last year he had envied Vladimir and the rest of the Sanguinati living in the Lakeside Courtyard. They had been at the center of events that had rippled through the whole of Thaisia. Did he want the tie clip club to be a serious threat because he wanted to be at the center of a new event that might create another, if significantly smaller, ripple? Was he already thinking too much like a human, wanting a problem to solve in order to garner attention and praise from the most powerful among the Sanguinati?

Did it matter? Someone was trying to force Victoria to leave The Jumble. Until she was safe and her position was secure again, even an innocuous-sounding organization could be an enemy.

Ilya sent the e-mail to the Sanguinati in Hubb NE. Then he sent an e-mail to the leader of the Sanguinati in Lakeside—a progress report on the status of The Jumble and his interactions with the caretaker.