Thirteen Orphans (41 page)
“How do I know you wouldn’t trick me? Give me a false Rat crystal or an incomplete spell?”
“How do I know you wouldn’t trick me?” the Snake countered. Her gaze had fixed on Brenda with such intensity that Brenda felt her head swim. “How do I know if you love your father enough to want him whole again? Perhaps you like him this way more. You and I would need to trust each other.”
“I would need time,” Brenda said. “Pearl keeps Foster’s memory locked up in her keeping. I don’t even know where, except that it’s probably in either her bedroom or her office.”
“Time.” The Snake shrugged one shoulder. “Perhaps you have plenty. Perhaps not. My father is not precisely confiding these days. However, he will not be dissuaded from his goal for long.”
“And that is?”
“He wants a set of twelve memories,” the Snake hissed. “And once he has them, I can use them to find where Flying Claw’s memory is hidden. This Pearl’s memory would be at my disposal. But I would prefer not to wait.”
Because she’s not sure her father will let her rescue Foster,
Brenda thought.
Once Righteous Drum has what he wants, he may just drag her off home.
Brenda thought.
Once Righteous Drum has what he wants, he may just drag her off home.
“I’ll think about it,” Brenda said.
“Don’t think too long,” the Snake said. “When you have the crystal, put something red in your hair when you next walk out with Foster. I will then make arrangements for when and where you should meet me. And don’t think you can trick me. This is between me and you, you and me. I’ll be able to tell if you have the crystal.”
Brenda didn’t know if the other woman was bluffing, but she nodded, trying to look appropriately intimidated. That last wasn’t hard—she
was
intimidated.
was
intimidated.
The Snake had been talking very fast, so the exchange had taken only a few minutes.
“Think about it,” the Snake said, “but like I said, don’t think too long.”
She turned and waved to Foster. “Bye-bye, Flying Claw. I’ll see you again, soon … .”
Foster hurried over, but the Snake was already retreating, her undulating walk slow, but somehow covering a great deal of distance. Brenda suspected magic was involved.
“Wait!” Foster called after the Snake. “Why do you call me that name? Who are you? Do I know you?”
But the Snake neither turned nor looked back.
Brenda saw the hope on Foster’s face fade, his expression changing to one of hurt and frustration.
“Who was she?” he asked no one in particular, but Brenda decided to answer.
“Just a snake in the grass … a real snake in the grass.”
When they got back to Pearl’s house, Brenda asked a few questions, and managed to ascertain without giving anything away that no one knew anything about her encounter with the Snake.
Pearl was at a committee meeting, so she’d been out of the loop, but Des, who had been at the house, seemed unaware that anything had happened. He was wearing the amulet bracelet that should have alerted him, so Brenda was forced to assume that the Snake had been successful in temporarily blocking the snooping spells. It shouldn’t have been too hard. It wasn’t like whoever was on watch sat and stared at a TV screen, watching whatever Brenda and Foster were doing. Their small group was stretched too thin to manage that kind of surveillance, especially when Brenda and Foster’s outings lasted for hours at a time.
Spell jamming made sense in a weird way, but when Brenda found herself thinking how ugly things could have gotten if the Snake had wanted to do more than talk and no backup had shown, she got cold inside. Then again, maybe if the Snake had tried to do anything other than talk, that would have broken through whatever jamming device—might as well think of it that way—the Snake had set up. The lack of backup was worrisome, but not nearly as worrisome as the decisions Brenda needed to make.
On the drive back to Pearl’s house, Brenda had convinced Foster not to mention the Snake to the others. It hadn’t been hard. Foster was smart, and he was all too aware that his freedom to leave Pearl’s house was based on his behaving in a trustworthy fashion.
If the three adults who were at home noticed that both Foster and Brenda were distracted and a bit tense when they came in, and that the pair avoided each other afterward no one commented.
Brenda wondered if they put it down to a lover’s spat. That thought annoyed Brenda almost as much as the Snake had. It was bad enough that her friends thought she and Foster were closer than they were without having to deal with their quiet sniggering.
Damn it!
she thought.
Foster hasn’t even really held my hand, and he certainly hasn’t kissed me. I’m not sure he even likes me as much as I’d hoped. I mean, the way he looked at the Snake …
she thought.
Foster hasn’t even really held my hand, and he certainly hasn’t kissed me. I’m not sure he even likes me as much as I’d hoped. I mean, the way he looked at the Snake …
Brenda shook herself. A man who wouldn’t look at the Snake was probably either dead or neuter, and neither interested her in the least. She’d just need to do her best to prove to Foster that she was worth looking at … .
Looking,
she thought.
Looking isn’t what I want, but how do I know that this man I think I love is really the man I think he is? How do I know that he wouldn’t be happier if I just let him go? And even if I decide to let him go, will the others agree?
she thought.
Looking isn’t what I want, but how do I know that this man I think I love is really the man I think he is? How do I know that he wouldn’t be happier if I just let him go? And even if I decide to let him go, will the others agree?
When the knock came on her office door, Pearl wasn’t at all surprised. According to Des, Brenda had been tense and miserable since her return from the park earlier that afternoon. Now here was Brenda, looking like someone who had made a difficult decision.
“Pearl, can I talk with you, privately?”
“Sit,” Pearl said, coming from around her desk and motioning toward the more comfortable sitting area. “I just brewed tea. May I pour you some?”
“No thanks. I got myself some lemonade before coming in.”
Brenda set the glass on a table next to the chair Pearl had indicated. As they settled themselves, Amala and Bonaventure appeared, each cat claiming a lap.
“They must know we’re going to have a long talk,” Pearl said, encouraging confidences with her tone.
Brenda ran a hand down Amala’s spine. “Pearl, the Snake came to the park today.”
Quickly, and with a conciseness that told Pearl the girl must have been rehearsing what she was going to say for hours, Brenda gave an account of the Snake’s visit.
“Foster’s memory in exchange for Gaheris’s,” Pearl said. “Interesting. Are you willing to try it?”
Brenda looked sad. “I don’t see that I have a choice. My dad is being used. He has been given a sort of lobotomy. And Foster … He was just starting to get used to this weird new life of his, but seeing the Snake tore him up.”
“Did he recognize her?”
“No. But she knew him—or acted like she did. Hell! I know she recognized him, and he knew she did, too. It made him miserable, knowing she knew all those things he wants to know but can’t remember.”
Pearl saw the anguish in Brenda’s eyes and deliberately shifted the discussion to practicalities. “If she trades Gaheris’s memory to you, the Snake would be risking her father’s anger. Or do you think she was only pretending to be working behind his back—that she has her father’s approval after all?”
“I think the Snake’s working on her own,” Brenda said, “just like she assumed I would be doing. She kept saying the deal was between just the two of us. I’m guessing that whatever spell she worked that kept Des from knowing what was going on would also have kept her father from snooping. I’ve tried to work out what the Snake is planning. My guess is that she has some idea that when she has Foster back, she can recapture both the crystal with my dad’s memory and the spell amulet. Then she would have gotten what she wanted without losing anything.”
“Do you think she could pull it off?”
Brenda nodded, showing a lack of conceit that Pearl found endearing.
“Of course she could, Auntie Pearl. I’m a trainee. She’s the Snake. Foster is their Tiger. My guess is that the Snake expects me to act pretty much in the same way she is—to behave like some idiot out of a girls’ adventure novel, swipe the crystal containing Foster’s memory from you, come out in the middle of the night, whatever. We’d rendezvous by midnight or some time where the Snake would have the edge. Once she had broken the spell on Foster, they’d both go for me and I’d need to surrender Dad’s memory again—and maybe more.”
“You sound very certain,” Pearl said mildly.
Brenda tugged at the tip of one of Amala’s ears. The cat twitched her tail in annoyance, and Brenda gave a sheepish grin.
“Maybe I’m so sure because I came pretty close to doing just that. I figured I could learn where you and Des have the crystal, and come up with some clever plan to get it. Then I realized how stupid I was being. If you have wards up against magic being used here without your permission, you must have the crystal protected. And how would I explain afterwards, when Dad’s memory was suddenly intact and Foster was gone?”
“So you came to me instead—even though this was a deal between the two of you.”
“The Snake said that, not me. Pearl, I don’t want to give Foster up, but how could I leave Dad the way he is? He’s like a caricature of himself—and he’s vulnerable to their manipulations as well. We know that. And besides …”
Suddenly Brenda looked much older than her years.
“How can I talk about giving Foster up when I don’t really have him? Nissa’s been trying to get me to face reality, but I haven’t wanted to listen. Today, though, today that Snake called him Flying Claw. She knows his name. She probably knows his mother’s name. His father’s name. If he has brothers and sisters. What his favorite food is. The more I thought about it, all that seemed a lot more intimate than if they’re lovers or engaged or anything. She knows his past. All I know is a really handsome, kind, in-over-his-head guy who might not even think of me any more affectionately than he does Nissa—or Lani!”
Pearl was fairly certain that Foster felt differently about Brenda than he did about the other women in the household, but what good would come from her saying so? Brenda had made the decision to give up her lovely illusion. That was what she needed to do, what Pearl had been hoping she would do. Why then did Pearl feel so sad?
Pearl shook her head as if she could physically clear a thought, then sipped her tea to give herself time to consider.
“Brenda, you arranged a delay with the Snake?”
“I did. I mean, I had to, didn’t I?”
“Then we must think how to use this to our advantage. When he has not been studying or making amulet bracelets, Riprap has been following through on his plan to see if he can find where the Dragon and the Snake are staying. If we could find where they are living, then I think we could use this.”
“Is Riprap having any luck?”
“Only in the negative. We are fairly certain that our enemies do not have access to the type of electronic credit they would need for a major hotel. The current rash of fear regarding identity theft proved extremely useful in testing that. In some cases, where Des or I had a strong contact with one of the vulnerable nine, we simply called and told them to check for unexpected charges—especially coming out of this area. We spun a good yarn about a scam we’d learned about.
“In other cases, Riprap simply called and posed as an independent auditor for major credit holders. He was adamant about not wanting to know any details about any accounts, simply requesting that they review their accounts and let him call them back. Again, he used the story that someone was making the charges in northern California.”
“And it worked?”
“Riprap can sound very convincing, and I helped him with his script. Since he told those he called that he did not want any identifying information, not even the type of card or cards they held, they were inclined to go along with it.”
“I guess I would,” Brenda admitted. “I mean, I’d worry.”
“Exactly.”
“So probably they’re not staying at a major hotel—or even a minor one.”
“That’s right. Most will insist on a credit card in case you use the phone or do something that will run up charges. You can still pay in cash if you want, but they’re going to protect their interests in advance.”
“How are you handling the less fine establishments?” Brenda asked.
“Des and Riprap have done some drive-by snooping. Depending on the place and its tone, they ask questions. Des uses a touch of magic—nothing too powerful, just looking for signs that someone else is or has been using magic in the area. Again, we’ve come up with nothing. Nissa has been tracking down less formal rental options. She represents herself as a student, hoping to rent a room or a suite for a week or two.”
Brenda nodded. “Seems hopeless. Maybe we should give in to the Snake, give her Foster’s memory, and then do our best to learn from Dad—if we get him back—if he knows anything.”
Pearl kept her tone gentle, hearing despair in Brenda’s voice. “He probably wouldn’t. I think the Snake would make sure of that.”
“Yeah.” Brenda rose and carefully set Amala on her chair. The cat curled into a ball, taking advantage of the warm spot. “I think we’d better fill the others in. Should I get them?”
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