The spectral mist, musically composed into a body, shifted and burst apart, coming together again by the force of Emery’s will. My grandfather’s stricken ghost wailed the final verse of his song.
“You must find the one who poisoned Shearwater, and discover the truth behind the wraith.” His voice warped, inhuman and shrill. “The true face of the one who killed me!”
The magic keeping him there collapsed like a miniature dying star. The vacuum of its waning power tugged on my insides. The rain poured like it grieved my grandfather’s last words as much as I did.
It poured, but I wasn’t as soaked as I should be.
I looked up at the umbrella over my head, then over my shoulder at the man holding it.
Kessian opened his mouth to speak, but no words came. Silently, he touched my arm, a question and comfort in the gesture. It confirmed for me what I couldn’t quite grasp, even after hearing it from my grandfather’s own mouth.
He’d been murdered.
Chapter 16
It was not the sort of revelation I could come to terms with in the rain or without something to drink.
We all crammed into Lunaris’s narrow cabin. She brewed us tea while Emery and I cast enchantments to dry everyone’s clothes, and Kessian tapped on his phone to order us a Chinese takeaway. It was all quietly done, with nothing but the sound of rain on the roof and teaspoons chiming as we stirred our cups. Lunaris had conjured two generic ones for Emery and Ambrose. The starry one she’d made Kessian had never vanished from the cabinet.
Into the silence, Emery said, “I’m sorry. I imagine that was the last thing you expected to hear.”
Not the last, but far from the first. Not much surprised me anymore in Shearwater. I didn’t know how to parse my feelings. I supposed sadness was amongst them, but something far more familiar cloaked it. Guilt. A sense of responsibility. I’d stayed out of Shearwater to keep my family safe from the wraith, but Grandad had fallen prey to a different sort of danger anyway. Beside me, Kessian hunched in the booth, holding his cup like it was the only thing keeping him warm. I wasn’t the only one so affected.
“I don’t know how I’m going to tell my family,” I said. “Or if I should.”
“Have you considered whether to involve the police?” Emery said.
Practically speaking, we’d need to if we wanted to order an autopsy report, but if my grandfather’s death hadn’t aroused any suspicion, themurder weapon had most likely been magic or medicinal, something to mimic natural causes that left no visible trace behind. In a small town like Shearwater, news of a recently buried local getting dug up for an autopsy would spread easily and make it back to the killer, giving him time to cover his tracks.
It would also make it back to my family, and I didn’t want to think of how it might darken Fae’s wedding day, or how Mum might twist it all to be my fault.
“Let’s keep it between us for now. I may have to involve someone if we need to examine the body.” Once out of my mouth, I realized how clinical that sounded. “Sorry.”
“It’s a strange situation you find yourselves in,” Emery said.
“Is there anyone you might suspect?” Ambrose asked.
I’d played over the question on our walk back to Lunaris, the cold rain reminding me of a broad hand passing me a lily for Grandpa’s grave. Silently, I rose and went to my bedroom, coming out with the trousers I’d worn to the funeral retrieved from my laundry hamper. I turned the pockets out and a card fluttered to the floor. I picked it up and set it on the table between us all.
Kessian leaned over and tilted it so the light flashed across the glossy name. Something sharp flashed through his eyes, too. “Westley Warwick?”
“He approached me at the wake to give me this. Asked if I’d be staying in Shearwater long, invited me to come by and chat. He called Grandad his business partner, but at the reading of the will, my sibling told me he bought the spa outright. Maybe he’s involved. Or maybe he knows something.”
Emery hummed. “It doesn’t present him with much motive. What reason would he have to kill his partner if the business was his regardless?”
I recalled what Fae had told me. “The spa was failing at the time Warwick bought it. The magic had gone. Not long after my grandad signed it over, the strid called me and two dozen others to our deaths, and the magic returned. Very convenient for Warwick. If he had something to do with it, and Grandad found out …” I sighed. I didn’t have any evidence Warwick was involved in all those people who drowned, let alone Grandad’s death. “Now I say it out loud, it sounds like a long shot.”
“No,” Kessian said, surprisingly firm. “It’s a shot, but not a long one.”
“Why do you say that?”
“He’s my landlord. The garden-variety greedy sort, raising rent each year while dragging his heels on basic repairs. I didn’t have a working shower for six months. Not saying that makes him a murderer, but he lacks enough empathy that I wouldn’t put it past him.”
He looked at the card rather than meeting our eyes, and I got the sense—as I often did with Kessian—that he was only giving me part of the story.
The conversation made me recall the dream I’d had. Or shared? It had been Kessian’s memory, and Warwick had indeed been the landlord to hand over the keys to his park home. Kessian didn’t share much of himself easily. He’d only divulged as much because the dream had revealed it, only told me about his recovery from Bowen’s Wane because Briar’s actions had prompted him to. I didn’t suspect him of involvement in all this dark business, but I wondered what else he hid and why.
“That reminds me of something else,” I said, trying to choose my words carefully so they didn’t come across accusatory. “The dream I had. Orwehad?”
