A Cold Case Froze (Ice Witch Mysteries Book 2) Read online

  “I was able to find a cup from Helio’s death party and traced it to one of the sick fairies.” He turned the bag around and I saw the name Hemlock L. scribbled on it in black marker. “Hemlock L., as in Hemlock Lark, one of the fairies in the sleep coma.”

  “Hold the phone, did you just say death party? Really, Ash?”

  He shrugged. “He may not have intended the death part, but it happened, nonetheless. Is that what you took away from what I just said?”

  “No, no, I heard you. So you went dumpster diving and found Hemlock’s cup. Did you—”

  “Already done,” he said, gesturing to the tray. “I’ve tested the inside of the cup and it contains many compounds that are known to induce sleeping, including some that I hadn’t heard of. We’re talking concentrated amounts that are potentially lethal.”

  My jaw dropped. “What? Someone must have been trying to drug people—and did way too good a job of it. God… it’s a good thing only the fairies fell ill like that.”

  Then it hit me. Only the fairies… But there had been other people there besides fairies. Lionel was proof of that, not to mention some of the other names the chief had spoken to.

  Ash nodded along. “Exactly. Someone was targeting fairies specifically. Did you and Goldie determine any kind of link between the ones in the hospital, aside from them being fairies who had been drinking?”

  I shook my head. “No, and that was something I’d already been wondering about, but I didn’t put two and two together.”

  “What’s odd is that everyone knows fairies are impervious to our magic.”

  He was right, but something stuck out about what he said. “Right… they’re impervious to our magic. And natural materials. But they’re sensitive to some man-made chemicals, specifically in beer. Quicksilver even told me so! That might have something to do with it. Maybe the sleeping drug mixed with the beer and had some weird chemical reaction.”

  “Then the next question is why? What was their intention? Either the person who slipped the drug in their drinks intended that to happen or they didn’t.” His frown was back.

  I eyeballed the cup, a familiar wariness setting into my shoulders. “I don’t know but it doesn’t sound good either way,” I said, not really wanting to think about the why behind someone drugging someone else’s drink. I was in college at one point too, and it was well-known that you had to be careful about leaving open drinks anywhere.

  “Do you think this was just someone mixing things together, or was there actual sleep magic involved?” I knew Fatima had knowledge of magic that most witches and wizards didn’t use but I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure if she could do anything like that.

  “Sleep magic is much more complicated, believe me. Sleep magic is time magic and no witch or wizard—or fairy for that matter—has access to that. Neither of them have the ability to wield it. It could be a magical mixture, but whoever did this didn’t imbue it with sleep magic.”

  It was something I always wondered about, and maybe it was because I was tired of taking such little steps to get anywhere with these cases, but I knew there was no other way to broach the issue as I finally asked him the question.

  He saw it in my eyes before it even came out.

  “Are you going to tell me or not?”

  To anyone else it would’ve seemed completely out of context, but he knew exactly what I was talking about. Hanging his head, he went silent.

  I held my breath.

  “I’m not a wizard,” he said softly.

  “I know. And you’re obviously not a fairy or a vampire…” The only thing I could think of was a shifter, but something told me it was more than that. I pushed the tray to the side and stood up. “I’m your friend, Ash. I’m not going to think any differently of you. Heck, you’re the one who took me in without knowing a thing about me. I know I can be insufferable, but you can trust me.”

  Part of me wanted to reach out to him, but the sweatpants hanging low on his hips and the way his black t-shirt clung to him left me feeling flushed, and I thought better of it.

  “I know I can, Indie. I know.” He ran his hand through his dark mop of hair. I could tell he was wrestling with something inwardly, and when a spark of determination flitted across his face I knew he’d decided.

  “I’m a reaper.”

  History has been foggy on the mysterious and rare creatures of death; reapers. The historical accounts of coming into contact with these beings are few and far between, not giving the magical community an understanding of what their powers or capabilities are. Some scholars believe this is intentional.

  The paragraph about reapers in my A Comprehensive History of Magic book was sparse at best. No one knew anything about them, as far as I could tell. And yet… somehow the title fit him, just like all of the other quirks.

  I swallowed hard, doing my best not to stare at him as intensely as he was looking at me. “So you’re a reaper. Okay. What exactly does that entail?”

  He slowly sat down in the chair and I mirrored him. “My powers are limited inside this magic barrier, unfortunately. You’ve seen my teleporting. I have… instincts that most don’t. Almost all magic has no effect on me. And the time magic thing, well… I know about it because I live it. It’s part of me. There’s a reason why I don’t need to sleep.”

  He was waiting for me to say something, but there was no way I could say anything that didn’t sound absolutely ridiculous. It was too much to compute all at once, and I was still trying in earnest to stop looking at his dark golden hazel eyes. I waited him out and eventually he continued.

  “Reapers are all related. We’re brothers and sisters, though we can look like any normal person.”

  I’d hardly say Ash was normal. He had that look that said ‘other’, but I never thought it was something like this.

  “We’ve been around for a very long time. Our parents, if you can even call them that, created us after the first of mankind…” he trailed off, and the sharp cut of his cheekbones flushed.

  Parents. Created after mankind… it dawned on me. I gasped, my eyes wide. “Mother Nature and Father Time? They’re your parents?”

  He nodded. “So you can imagine how family dinners went. No, I’m just being facetious,” he added before I could ask. “But that’s why I didn’t say anything until now.”

  “If you’re their kid, then what the heck happened with this curse? I imagine you couldn’t intervene, but why in the world would they trap their own kid here?” A certain type of anger that I usually kept hidden deep inside was rushing to the surface. I knew a thing or two about crappy parents, and the idea of someone treating Ash that way made me feel stabby.

  He heaved a sigh that sounded like generations of parental neglect. “Mother Nature is relentless. She cast the spell on a whim because Father Time was spending too much time here in her eyes. He liked to go visit some of the magical anchor towns like this one. Sometimes he would stay too long, and she’d get jealous. I’m sure we’re not the only town she’s cursed. Do you know what happened when he told her he was going to retire to a beautiful island on his own?”

  I shook my head.

  There was a twisted misery in his sneer. “I’m sure you’re familiar with the tale of Atlantis.”

  I brought my hand to my mouth. “Oh my god.”

  “Precisely. And the problem with that is their magic is equally balanced. Neither of them can undo the other’s magic. Nature is under the mercy of time, and time is facilitated by nature. You can’t have one without the other. He couldn’t affect the weather or touch any part of the curse.”

  Something was being left out though. “The time freeze spell. Those eleven years… how?”

  He looked away.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “What happened?”

  “It was miserable. Things were going badly—people were turning on one another. And my instinct told me it would get much worse if winter didn’t wear off soon. My father was finally leaving, and I begged for his help t
o get rid of the curse. Of course, he couldn’t. But he offered me another solution…”

  “You. You asked him to put everyone to sleep.”

  The nod of his head was almost undetectable, but I didn’t need to see it. I knew it to be true somehow. “You wanted to stall and since you’re a reaper, you’re immune to the magic. And you what, you can’t get old? You don’t age?” I guessed. That sounded both terrifying and exhilarating.

  “I exist as long as I need to. That is, as long as there are souls around to help guide on, I’m here. Oh… yes, I do that when I this magical barrier isn’t surrounding the town. It’s hampered my abilities to the point where I can’t do my main job. Yes, it’s frustrating, and no I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

  “I can understand that. So, you asked him to put a time spell across the town. And… then what?”

  He looked at me expectantly. “You happened. Something my father said stuck with me. He mentioned a beacon when we talked about trying to break Gilded Lake’s ice. The sea people are still trapped under the lake, though we believe they are still awake. That was one of my main concerns with the curse. No one expected the lake to do that, and it effectively cut a part of the town out of the equation,” he said, gritting his teeth. “I thought I could try and reach out to them somehow to let them know that we were working on trying to free them. But I’m not sure it worked.

  “And that’s where you come in, Indie. I believe you showed up when you did for a reason. You were close enough to feel something, and that’s why you’re here now. I’ve been trying to repurpose the beacon for over a decade, but it took you being physically close to town—maybe because of the mountain—for it to break through.” He leaned in, as if to prove his point. “I know it’s a lot to take in and you’re in the middle of your investigation, but you were right and I—”

  “Hey, hey. You don’t need to worry about that. I’m just glad you told me. I’m not a fan of secrets, in case you weren’t aware,” I said, giving him a knowing look. “But I get it. I don’t know that I’m necessarily the reason why everyone woke up, because admitting that sounds like taking on an awful lot of responsibility that I’m just not willing to accept right now… but yeah, I get it.”

  The easy smile on his face was sudden, catching me off guard like the rest of this conversation. It made me mad that he didn’t do it more often.

  “So you don’t think I’m some crazy LARPer?”

  “It’s still up for debate,” I said casually. “But I do think you did the best with what you had to work with, and I probably would’ve made the same decision.” I placed my hand on his and squeezed. “Thanks for trusting me enough to tell me the truth.”

  His gaze dropped to my hand. “You deserve the truth. You could’ve sat back and done nothing but worry about yourself and getting out of here, but you didn’t. You showed up more than just about anyone else here, trying to right the wrong. In that way I think you and I are alike. No one sees it, but we do it anyway.”

  I nodded. “Someone’s gotta do the work.”

  Ash had a valid point. We were more alike than I'd thought. I put my head on his shoulder, though I wasn't sure why, and he did the same.

  “I’m still trying to leave, though. I think you should know that.”

  “I know. I’m still trying to help you.”

  “I know.”

  He moved his head away and stood up. “I’ll see what I can find on the triathlon.”

  And as usual, he got the last word.

  14

  Grasping At Straws

  It wasn’t a New York Times’ Bestseller, but flipping through the Sunday paper after I spent hours and hours working on it felt pretty freaking good.

  I caught Ash looking at me over top of the paper and I stuck my tongue out. “Are you making fun of my scrutinizing?”

  “I was trying to decide whether you’re scrunching your face up like that because you can’t make sense of what you’re reading, or whether you just need glasses.”

  “Ha-ha.”

  He too, had his own copy of the paper—the first edition completely edited by yours truly. The previous edition was mainly set up by Drusilla while I helped, but this week was all me.

  Goldie was still out on behalf of the Special Council, working on something for them and the police department apparently, and she wasn’t sure when she’d be finished. With Fatima busy with her latest batch of soothing oatmeal skin balm, that left the two of us to pontificate over what Goldie and I had learned from Cosmo.

  I finished reading the paper, satisfied with how it turned out, and folded it neatly in front of me. “I mean, Lionel and Breeze corroborated his story. And I double-checked last night and he was telling the truth about Moira Rumpleroot living close to the clock-tower.”

  “Have you spoken to her yet?”

  I shook my head. “She’s been hard to get ahold of, actually. I know we need to talk to her. Not only would she be able to help back up Cosmo’s story if he is indeed telling the truth, but she might have some info about Helio that no one else would.”

  I’d been doing the thing I told myself I wouldn’t do—thinking non-stop about the cases. As soon as I went back to the camper after girl’s night it all came back to me. Then I topped it off with the visit with Cosmo… it was hard to give myself space from it all.

  Which was part of the reason why I was really pushing to puzzle it together.

  “What about Amortencia?”

  “That’s one of the reasons Goldie’s gone. She took a letter to her for me early this morning. She had to go meet with the Special Council, so she hopefully dropped it off to her. I just let her know what we’ve found out so far.”

  Ash put his paper down and took a sip of his gross plain black coffee. “Until you speak to Helio’s sister, have you thought about the obvious?”

  I raised a brow at him. “The obvious?”

  Ash sighed, his lips pursing together in that way they did when he thought I was being particularly obtuse. I hated when he gave me that look.

  “There has to be some kind of connection between Helio’s death and the fairies in the comas. Possibly even a bigger connection than you realize.”

  “It’s been noted. But I feel like they are two different things. One has to do with someone drugging a group of fairies with no real connection to one another, and the other is a dead fairy who most likely did something to make someone mad enough to want him dead. At least going off of what we’ve learned so far.”

  If they were related, then why was Amortencia asking me to treat them like two different things?

  But Ash didn’t look convinced. That left me wondering if I was missing something.

  I had to think out loud to gather up my thoughts if I was going to make any sense to him. “Think of the scene. Helio throws this rush party, and from all accounts he's getting pretty trashed himself. There were people around witnessing this, and with nearly everyone who was important enough for us to speak to being fairies, it’s safe to assume there were plenty of fairies there. Ridge said Helio was mad at him about something stupid he said, and he leaves the party with the Pines twins to talk about their bet or whatever. At some point Helio passes by close enough to Cosmo and spills his drink on him accidentally, though Cosmo thinks it was on purpose. They must have been shooting pool or something, because then Cosmo takes Helio’s pool cue and breaks it in half. They start arguing, and someone pulls Helio away. No one really sees him leave, but we know Lionel saw Cosmo stalk off in the direction of Moira’s house, who was not at the party—”

  “Did you talk to Quicksilver? Was he at the party?”

  That was a good point. Embarrassed that I hadn’t made that connection myself, I chose my words carefully. “I guess I didn’t want to bring the whole thing back up with him. He was pretty upset about it when I brought up Helio the first time. I’ll talk with him tomorrow. Something tells me partying isn’t really his thing, though.”

  “Even still. If he was
close with Helio then it makes sense to talk to him about it. He’s a smart guy, right? And he already knows his aunt contacted you about the cases?”

  I nodded.

  “Then he’s likely figured out you’re actively investigating them. It wouldn’t hurt to just ask him point blank about this. He’ll want to help you find out who or what happened to his friend, so at least that’s one extra source you can utilize.”

  Which brought me back to the original reason why I hurried to drop the subject with Quicksilver in the first place—he was my employee, not just some source. I would hate for him to think otherwise.

  Sighing, I got up to wash the dishes. Ash was the opposite of a slob when it came to the state of the library, but I hated dirty dishes something fierce.

  Luckily for me, the dishes were not the same boring chore they used to be. Squeezing some soap on a sponge, I smiled to myself. The sponge floated in mid-air, and as I turned on the water, I directed the trickle of water from the faucet to the sponge and got to work. Anything could be an excuse to use magic if you had a good imagination.

  “Talk to Moira. Talk to Quicksilver. Wait to hear back from Amortencia. I’ll just add all of that to the growing list of things to do.”

  “Careful over there. Don’t flood my kitchen, please,” Ash said mildly.

  “A simple thank you will suffice. Shoot!” I said, realizing as I turned to face him I had inadvertently soaked half my t-shirt. “Fantastic. This soap better not break out my skin.”

  I made to grab the sponge and just clean the breakfast dishes by hand when it hit me like a snowball to the face.

  “Ash! I might need your assistance.”

  He looked at me funny. “I suppose you can use one of the t-shirts in the guest room.”

  “No, no. I mean I need your transportation assistance.”

  With dry clothes and a new piece of the puzzle buzzing around my head, I walked with purpose up to the frat house’s front door for what felt like the millionth time.