Uncertain Allies

22

Later that afternoon, I waited in a small anteroom at the Rowes Wharf Hotel. The strange behavior of Eorla’s people in the Weird concerned me. Some seemed to have crossed the line from not helping to interfering in the community policing Eorla was trying to establish. Keeping fey away from the warehouse fire when they could have helped or hindering investigators from doing their work were not the best ways to create a safer environment. Eorla might have her reasons, but it was getting to the point where her people needed to stay out of the way.

Security had been tightened in the building. I had been asked to show identification even though the person asking me for it addressed me by name. I didn’t take it personally. They were doing their jobs, and the policy wasn’t directed at me. At least, I didn’t think so.

As I watched people stream in and out of Eorla’s office, I realized they were not the usual petitioners and construction people. More security and administrative staff attended to the room. Their stressed and concerned faces brought to mind Briallen’s thoughts about Donor.

Rand appeared at the door. “Her Majesty will see you.”

I gave him a playful poke on the shoulder. “You’re a receptionist now?”

Elves, in general, were aloof with people outside their social group, and elven guards more so. Rand was no exception to the point of appearing not to get that I was joking. “I won’t be serving coffee.”

Yet again, he surprised me. His bowed head hid a small smile as he stepped back to let me pass. Eorla sat behind an enormous desk stacked with files and paper. Unlike the receiving room, this office was her working space. The dwarf Brokke perched on the edge of a couch beneath the windows, skimming some documents. He gave me a cursory glance and went back to his reading.

I hadn’t figured out what Brokke’s motivations were. He claimed to be an advisor to Donor Elfenkonig—and was—yet had informed me about some crucial court gossip in the past. Now he sat with Eorla, a renegade of the Elven Court who had been threatened by the king himself.

Eorla came around the desk to greet me with a kiss on the cheek. “I wondered that we haven’t spoken.”

“I’ve been helping the Boston police with the dwarf murders,” I said.

She gestured toward the seats by the windows with a drab view of the city’s elevated highway. Brokke didn’t acknowledge us as we sat in the chairs to either side of him. “Are you having problems with the police?” Eorla asked.

“No, but the case looks like it’s leading to something they can’t handle. I have reason to believe the murderer is a leanansidhe,” I said.

Eorla raised a considering eyebrow. I had yet to find something that flustered her. “I haven’t encountered one, but I understand they can be debilitating.”

I smirked with affection. “Eorla, they debilitate people to death.”

Annoyed, Brokke shifted in his seat. He didn’t like my lack of deference to royalty, nor Eorla’s indifference to it. Eorla chuckled, then hid her mouth with her hand. “Do not tell anyone I laughed at that.”

I tilted my head. “Promise. How have you been?”

She leaned sideways in the chair and stared out the window. “Cautious. Donor is trying to persuade the human government to allow him to move against me. So far, he has not met with success. I haven’t been able to determine what his true game is.”

I gave Brokke a sharp glance as she spoke. He didn’t impress her, and she often spoke to him in a dismissive tone when she wasn’t ignoring him completely. Her admission in front of him that she knew something of Donor’s movements struck me as strange. “After they let the Guild have free rein down here, I can’t say I blame them. They’re getting enough flak for not moving against you themselves,” I said.

She nodded. “For now, it’s to their benefit to let me lead the fey down here. They know I’m taking care of things the Guild doesn’t, and it eases their burden. I haven’t banned them from the Weird, so they can pretend they still have the territory under control.”

“Except you don’t let them bring anything more than handguns in,” I said.

She waved a dismissive hand. “They know that’s common sense. They saw what happened when their National Guard came in with tanks. I’ve kept the neighborhood calm, and that’s what they want.”

“Is that why your people are keeping the fey away from the police?”

Curious, she cocked her head. “How do you mean?”

“I’ve witnessed your guards either refusing to help the police or keeping other fey from helping them,” I said.

“I gave no such order. In fact, quite the opposite,” she said.

Brokke shuffled through his documents. “In life, I find, Your Royal Highness, not everything—or everyone—is who they appear to be. One must look beneath the surface to understand the depths.”

Eorla pursed her lips as she tapped her foot. “I see. Donor has been secretly moving his men into the city. A few have attempted to infiltrate our operations. Perhaps you have met some?”

“He’s trying to discredit you?” I asked.

She smoothed her long skirt down her leg. “Of course. I know he has been working with the humans. My sources tell me he has been trying to make a side agreement against me with the Guild.”

“I’ve heard that, too. I guess your attempts at getting the Consortium and the Guild to work together are working,” I said.

To Brokke’s annoyance, Eorla laughed. “I suppose this is an example of that phrase ‘be careful what you wish for.’ He’s been exploiting the fears and suspicions among the people in the Weird. Not all of them trust me yet, especially the Dead.”

“The Dead have no interest in anything that doesn’t benefit them, and the living have nothing to offer them,” I said.

“Which might make them perfect mercenaries for Donor,” she said.

“I don’t think you have to worry about the Dead. They played that game for the Guild, and it got them a war,” I said.

“Anything can be bought for the right price,” she said.

I stared at Brokke point-blank. “If only there was someone who had access to the king who might advise you.”

Brokke glowered. “His Royal Majesty knows full well my loyalty and my whereabouts.”

I nodded toward him. “You let him in your office knowing that?” I asked Eorla.

Her mischievous smile revealed the answer. “I feed him misinformation, and he runs to Donor with it like the trained puppy he is.”

Baffled, I stared at both of them. “I do not understand elven politics at all.”

Brokke rustled his papers and went back to reading while Eorla laughed. “It’s an old game—like all court intrigue. We pretend to be fooled by subterfuge while using it to further our own ends. By saying I give my cousin’s dwarf misinformation, I reveal my awareness that he is not to be trusted while making him wonder what is true and what is not.”

Brokke sighed. “And I am no one’s dwarf.”

Eorla observed Brokke with bemusement. “He says that often, and I tend to believe it is the one thing he speaks always true. Brokke may provide counsel, but he keeps his own more often.”

“Maybe he can tell me why one of Donor’s men was after an essence seller down in the Tangle?” I asked.

Brokke dropped his papers on the seat beside him. “Her Royal Highness may entertain herself by speaking about me as if I were not here. You may not.”

I shrugged. “Sorry. I got confused.”

“The Elven King knows Eorla is concerned about the blue essence moving through the Weird. He made the connection to essence sellers before you did,” Brokke said.

“Why does he care?” I asked.

“Answers have advantages when you are the only one who has them,” Brokke said.

“Did he find any answers?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but he will find something. I have seen him in a vision, sure and elated as he moves through this city,” said Brokke.

Brokke’s visions were what made him valuable to the Elven King. His predictions held up, and that made him dangerous as an ally or foe. He saw truth and likelihood where less skilled scryers saw hints and guesses.

“And then what happens?” Eorla asked. Donor had come to Boston to bring Eorla to heel. Anything that made him happy did not bode well for her.

Brokke shrugged. “The vision fails. I see nothing beyond those moments.”

The downside to seeing a future, even for those who were good at it, was that the scryers could not see their own future. Knowing the future changes the future. For scryers, events that included them became difficult to decipher, if not unseeable. When scryers were part of events, thinking about them muddied the vision. “You’re going to be there,” I said.

He narrowed his eyes at me. “Or you are.”

Time and again, scryers had told me that they cannot see me in their visions. The obvious conclusion was the black mass in my head, but how that related to the future—or affected visions of people I had never met—puzzled me. “Is it asking too much to find out what Donor knows?”

Brokke gave me an enigmatic smile. “Not at all. Sharing that answer might be another matter.”