“Yes,” she sighed, and thumbed the call open. “Hello?”
Detective Oseki’s voice was crisp and professional, every syllable too precise for this hour. “Ms. Flynn. Just a few follow-up questions. If you and your companion could come to the precinct? The sooner the better.”
Goldie blinked. “As in, right now?”
“If you can,” Oseki said, which in police-speak meant,don’t make me send a cruiser.
Goldie closed her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Sure. Of course. Because sleep is a social construct anyway.”
“Thank you, Ms. Flynn.” The line went dead.
Goldie dropped the phone onto her chest and stared at the ceiling. “We’re being summoned.”
A short time later,they stepped into the sterile, buzzing lobby of the Bellwether Civic Precinct. The air smelled of stale coffee and flopsweat, an aroma Goldie now firmly associated with the worst days of her life.
She clutched the paper cup in her hand a little tighter. The caffeine wasn’t a miracle, but it helped. And the walk over in the thin morning sunlight had done something for Splice; he still looked rumpled and hollow-eyed, but there was a faint, new brightness in him, like the warmth had coaxed him a little further into his own skin.
A tremor of anxiety ran through her anyway. Her hand instinctively found Splice’s arm, fingers curling tightly around his bicep. He didn’t flinch or pull away. Instead, he straightened, becoming a solid, living anchor against the fluorescent glare and muted murmur of the precinct.
They waited in the entry area, perched awkwardly on a bench that had definitely seen better days. Goldie sipped her coffee; Splice watched everything with alert, quiet wariness, like the building itself might decide to interrogate them.
A glass door squeaked open, and Detective Oseki strode out, sleek and composed as ever, her black hair perfectly in place and her dark eyes sharp and cutting. Detective McCutchen trailed behind her, clinging to a cup of coffee like it was holding him together, his gray eyes shadowed with fatigue and a rough stubble marking his jaw.
Oseki gave them both a brisk once-over, cataloguing their rumpled clothes, Goldie’s coffee, Splice’s unblinking focus, and then gestured sharply, a silent command to follow.
“Let’s get you settled,” she said, already turning on her heel.
Goldie and Splice rose together and followed her deeper into the precinct.
“How is she this awake?” she asked Splice, sotto voice.
Without turning, Oseki replied, “Clean living and a complete lack of hobbies.”
McCutchen snorted into his coffee.
Detective Oseki didn’t lead them to one of the glass-walled interrogation rooms, but instead to a small, functional office. A single, healthy-looking fern sat on the corner of the desk, its fronds an almost aggressive shade of green against the municipal beige.
Oseki gestured for them to sit in the two chairs opposite her desk, which they did, a silent, unified movement.
The detective sat, pulling a slim tablet from a drawer. She didn’t power it on immediately, instead folding her hands on top of it and regarding them with a calm, unreadable expression.
“I’ll get straight to it,” she said, her voice even. “There’s a lot to unravel from the other night, but the preliminary findings are consistent with your statements.”
She paused, and Goldie felt Splice tense beside her.
“The energy signature from the event that killed Tamsin Donover and Jonah Pell was enormous, and originated from the Grove Core itself. Our forensic readings tracked the pulses and concluded it was a defensive reaction. A violent, but targeted, expulsion.”
Oseki tapped the screen of her tablet, and a faint web of light projected into the air between them.
“They didn’t catch everything, but they caught enough. There’s no trace of offensive spellcraft from either of you. You were caught in the blast radius, not causing it. From a legal standpoint, it’s clear you didn’t do anything wrong.”
The knot of tension in Goldie’s chest loosened just enough for her to breathe. “That’s good,” she said, the words coming out as a weary exhale.
Oseki gave a slight, acknowledging nod before swiping the projection away. “It is. It simplifies one aspect of this. But it complicates another.” Her focus shifted, landing squarely on Splice. “We did some digging into the Green Holdings Land Trust.”
Goldie’s grip on Splice’s arm tightened instinctively.
“It was founded thirty-three years ago by Marlow Truckenham and six other private partners,” Oseki explained. “A magical charter binding them to the land, and to each other. With Truckenham’s death, and the subsequent events, we checked in on the other founding members.”
