“Oh.” She frowned. “I forgot this is your first time.”
“What? What was the ‘oh’? It’s going to be bad? How bad? Bertie, how bad?”
“It’s going to be lovely,” she lied through her pretty, straight, sharp white teeth, her short white hair puffed up like a halo atop her head. “Just sit here at the end of the table. I’ll gather the other judges and your assistant.”
“I get an assistant? To feed me?”
“Delaney,” she said with one eyebrow raised. Ah. I had finally hit the end of Bertie’s patience. “I’m not dragging you to your grave. You would know.”
“Is it an option?”
“Oh, it could be arranged, dear.” She shoved me down into the chair with a firm finality that made me wish for another explosion, or maybe a friendly class-five hurricane.
“Now, much like death,” Bertie said through her smile, “this will be much more pleasant than you think. Food, drink, and all the men you could desire.”
I angled a glare up at her. “Are you selling me a castle in the sky, Bertie?”
“I am comforting you and promising you glory for your bravery on this battlefield,” she said quietly, and with the tone most people would associate with someone complimenting a six-year-old who had made a gold-star thumbprint turkey painting.
Deities and creatures always showed their true nature, right in front of us all, even if most of us didn’t know to look for it. Still, it had been a while since Bertie had threatened me with my own grave.
“What’s the assistant for? Really?” I asked.
“Didn’t you read the information I sent you today?”
“Some of it?”
“Delaney. You’re an officer of the law. I expect you to take this seriously and pay attention to details.”
“I will. I was just”—staring at Ryder—“distracted by work.”
“Don’t worry. I’ve put you in very good hands.”
And then she was off, swooping down on some other poor, unsuspecting soul in the crowd.
Valkyries made amazing party planners.
Bertie gathered the judges, who all took their places at the table with a lot less complaining than me.
I was surprised to see Fawn Wolfe, one of Jame’s sisters, at the end of the table, but decided maybe it was a bit of brilliance to have a werewolf among the judges. They had amazing sense of taste and smell.
Frigg took the chair next to her and gave me a big wink, while she waved to the audience. Next to her sat our postmaster Chester, a mortal, and his niece Aluvia, the lead chef from the The Kraken, our one high-end restaurant.
The last chair was taken by big, tall, dark-haired, bearded Tomas, who was our local Leshy. A guardian and creature of trees and forest in his native land, here Tomas spent most his time as the second-in-command at the public library.
So we had two creatures, one deity, two mortals, and me. Pretty nice showing. I scanned the crowd, waiting for the starting gun, or whatever would be used to kick off this event. I was also taking note of the nearest trash cans in case I had to barf.
The audience settled into their seats. Mortals I knew, tourists I didn’t, and a smattering of creatures. I even caught sight of Herri in the back, her arm around Chris Lagon, who looked exhausted and sad. It looked like Herri was there to keep Chris on his feet, or maybe had been the one to talk him into attending the judging event.
He wasn’t taking the death of Heim very well, not that there was an easy or correct way to grieve the loss of a friend.
Herri caught my gaze and gave me a small smile and nod. She was there in support of Chris, which was really nice of her.
I looked through the crowd for Margot, Chris’s girlfriend, and didn’t see her. Not that I expected her to be there. She and Chris hadn’t been seeing each other for all that long. I couldn’t blame her if she wasn’t into rhubarb.
Dan Perkin had been sitting and twitching in the front row since I first walked in, his baseball hat shoved down hard on his head, his eyes flicking around the room, and then coming back to focus on me like I was the only light in the place.
I made eye contact, gave him a polite half-smile, and ignored him.
