“Good morning, dear,” Heddy said, somewhat distracted. She was still staring up at the roof as they walked by.
“They’ve all moved around,” Inga said when they were a little farther up the hill. “Well, maybe not every single one of them. But enough that people have surely noticed.”
“You’d think all the gargoyles flying around yesterday would have tipped them off,” Luke remarked. Rogue sniffed at a gargoyle statue standing in the middle of the road, frozen in position. There was a cockeyed lei draped loosely around its neck.
“I’m sure plenty of people did see them. For the old-timers, it’ll just confirm what they’ve always suspected.” She whistled to Rogue, who had started to lift a leg on the gargoyle statue. “Everyone else might be tempted to write it off as some kind of prank. People have an amazing ability to fail to notice what they don’t want to see.”
They climbed the hill. Rogue accompanied them for a while, then bounded off to investigate a smell in the bushes and didn’t come back.
“Are you keeping him?” Inga asked. “I imagine having a teleporting dog is going to be tough.”
“I don’t really see that I have any choice. Not that I’d want to rehome him anyway, but if I did, he’d just come back.”Luke decided to keep his private suspicions about the dog to himself for now. If he’d been stuck as a bear, it was not impossible that Rogue hadn’t started out on theanimalside of the research facility. But there was no way to really prove it for sure, especially with Brockton dead and anyone else with in-depth knowledge of their illicit research either dead, arrested, or missing.
Inga grinned and slid her hand into his. “I think that’s the right decision. We’ll just deal with the inconvenience.”
We. He thought he felt his bear preening somehow, which was a very strange feeling.
“Says the woman who adopted a bunch of seagull griffins,” he said.
“They’re wild animals. They just happen to be living near me.”
“I think right now they’re living in your friend Nita’s boat, actually.”
Inga laughed and rolled her eyes. “I should probably move them out of there. Nita’s gonna kill me if they make a mess.”
“I think it’s too late.”
The row of gargoyles on the roof of the stone house on the hill were all back in place, Luke noted. Well, most of them. There were one or two gaps, like broken teeth. Or maybe there had been some missing before? He was suddenly unsure.
Inga opened the garden gate, and they quietly stepped inside.
“Hello?” Luke called.
The garden was forlorn and deserted-feeling in the rain. Bathed in sunshine, it had been easier to notice its beauty. Now, the spring barrenness of most of the branches, other than the evergreens, made it feel empty and sad.
“Hello? Is anyone home?”
On the previous day, they had been called up to the patio, but rather than going that way without an invitation, they wentaround to the imposing edifice of the front door. There was an old-fashioned brass knocker with, naturally, a gargoyle’s head. Inga reached for it cautiously, as if she thought it might bite her (not unreasonable, after what they had seen yesterday) and gave it a tentative tap, then a more brisk knock.
There was a long wait, long enough that they were about to leave, when the door opened and Mace stood there, broad and imposing in a dark red sweater and gray slacks.
“Welcome,” he said, as if the two of them appearing at his door was perfectly normal. “Come on in, there’s a fire. You can leave your wet things in the foyer.”
At this point everything was wet, but they hung up their raincoats and took off their muddy boots. A small box of house slippers was next to the door, and they both slipped on a pair over their damp socks.
“I’m going to guess this isn’t just a casual social visit,” Mace remarked as they went down the hall together. “Although maybe you’re here to chat about the weather.”
“We could chat about the weather,” Inga said. “Is Thea here?”
“Afraid not. She’s in Italy,” Mace said casually, as if Thea hadn’t just been on the patio yesterday.
Okay,Luke thought,they have some ability like Rogue does.Thea had implied the rolls were fresh from France. After everything he’d seen yesterday, none of that was surprising to him now.
They didn’t go to Mace’s private study this time, but rather into a pleasant stone kitchen, with a long table and windows with small old-fashioned panes looking out at a view down the hill to the sea. The room was so warm it was almost stuffy after the chill of outside. Mace had a window cracked, letting in a damp and cool breeze. He gestured them to the table.
“Coffee? I can offer you some light refreshment, nothing fancy. With Thea gone for a few days, I’m living a bachelor’s lifestyle.”
Inga’s stomach rumbled, and Luke’s followed suit. “Sorry,” he said. “I guess we worked up an appetite walking up that hill. You don’t need to feed us.”
