It did.
“You’re awake.” The voice was male and sounded pleased. “How do you feel?”
“Like crap.” The room didn’t spin, and her head didn’t fall off. It might have felt like that, but then it would have stopped hurting, wouldn’t it? Carefully she looked around.
She was in a bedroom. An ordinary enough bedroom with blue drapes at the only window and two chairs at the other end of the room. There was a tall stack of books next to one of the chairs. A bowl of fruit rested atop it. Two doors, both closed. All very ordinary, if impersonal, except that the light didn’t come from something as prosaic as a lamp. It came from those mage lights bobbing up near the ceiling.
Being a bedroom, it had beds. Twin beds. She was sitting on one. The man sitting on the other bed was taller than her. Hard to say how much taller with him sitting all yoga-like with his feet tucked up on his thighs, but maybe five-ten, and built solid. One seventy, maybe. He wore jeans and a plain gray tee. Socks but no shoes. His hair was longish and streaky, with a dozen shades of brown and blond all mixed up. Dark eyes were framed by crow’s-feet; deeper creases bracketed his mouth.
She knew him. Knew who he was, anyway. “Sean Friar.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Right the first time. And you’re Lily. Beth’s sister. Is your head hurting?”
“Yes.” She pushed the blanket back and saw that she was barefoot, too. She wore the clothes she’d had on before, but without shoes. Also without her weapon, shoulder harness, watch, and phone…and the ring with the toltoi charm. They’d taken the toltoi, but not her engagement ring.
The loss of the toltoi infuriated her. Anger made her head pound. “You have some ibuprofen?”
“No, but she left something for you.” He unwound his legs and stood. “I’ll get it.”
“She?”
“Our captor. Alycithin. I’m probably not saying it correctly, but that’s close.” He went to one of the doors and opened it. She saw a sink in an ordinary vanity. He vanished briefly from her line of sight, then emerged with a clear plastic cup in one hand. The cup held about two inches of a dark liquid. “It’s supposed to be a painkiller that works for humans.”
“Do you honestly expect me to drink that?”
He shrugged. “They haven’t poisoned me yet. Haven’t hurt me at all, save for the little detail of taking me prisoner. Harming us would be against the rules, a violation of honor. She’s big on honor.”
“Is Alycithin about my height and covered in fur?”
His eyebrows shot up. “You know who she is?”
“We met briefly. Then someone shot me with a dart.” Lily remembered the feather sticking out of her cheek and reached up and found a small scab.
“She used a sleep spell on me. That wouldn’t work on you, I guess.”
“You know about my Gift.”
“Beth talks about you. Alycithin told me you’d be waking up with a sore head because of whatever they used to knock you out. Want to give this a try?” He held out the cup. “She gave her word it would help with the pain and wouldn’t harm you.”
Lily’s head hurt enough that she was tempted. Tempted, but not stupid. “No, thanks.”
He looked at her a moment, then turned and set the cup on the floor near the wall. “You may be right.”
No tables. That’s what was missing. No bedside table, no table by the two chairs—which were heavy upholstered things, not the sort you could smash to make a club from one of the legs. No chest of drawers. Also no television or radio or anything electronic. “Where is the music coming from?”
“The walls. They seem to be stuck on a classical station.”
Lily looked at the wall next to her bed. It was painted white, like the ceiling. It looked like any other wall. She leaned closer and laid her palm flat on it.
Magic. Lots of it, and it vibrated. She’d never touched magic that vibrated before. She pulled her hand back. “I saw Alycithin, but I didn’t see your brother.”
“He’s not here. He’s the reason I’m here, but I’m a mistake. If you don’t want to drink her whatever-it-is, would you like some water? It’s from the tap, and it hasn’t poisoned me yet.”
“Not yet.” Though she was thirsty. She also needed to use the bathroom, and with an urgency that suggested a fair amount of time had passed. “Do you know how long I was out?”
“Not really. I’m pretty sure it’s morning, and they brought you here sometime last night, so you were out several hours, but I can’t say how many.”
Still, it helped to know it was morning. It oriented her some. Lily swung her legs off the bed and stood. And shut her eyes for a moment at what the motion did to her head.
“Are you okay?” Sean Friar’s voice was closer.
She opened her eyes and stepped back. “It’s just a headache.”
He’d stretched out one hand as if about to steady her. He let it fall to his side. “You don’t trust me. No reason you should, I suppose.”
“I’m a cop. I don’t trust anyone right away.” The door that didn’t lead to the bathroom was the obvious first thing to check out. She headed there. Her head didn’t like the motion, but it was settling into a steady ache. Annoying, but not incapacitating.
“Especially people with the last name Friar.”
He didn’t sound upset. More like resigned with a whiff of wry. “That’s a factor,” she agreed, and touched the door. More magic, but this wasn’t vibrating. It felt slick, slightly oily. She tried the knob and was unsurprised to find that it was locked. Then she pressed her ear to the door. Nothing.
“They’re probably out there,” Sean said. “They did something to soundproof this room. She says that’s for my privacy. Our privacy now, I guess. But clearly it’s also so we can’t listen in on them or get the attention of anyone outside here. Wherever ‘here’ is.”
She straightened. “They, not she?”
“I’ve seen three of them. Alycithin and two others—uh, Dinaron or something like that. I don’t remember the other one’s name. The one whose name starts with a D is male. I’m not sure about the other one.”
“Elves, halfling, or human?” She headed for the window between the twin beds. “The two who aren’t Alycithin, I mean.”
“Elves, I think. At least they look like it. Alycithin is in charge.”
“And she’s a halfling.” Lily pulled back the drapes.
A shiny silver rectangle looked back at her. Not silvery, like a mirror. Silver. And shiny in a literal way. Light leaked through the silvery surface, but no images. She pressed her fingers to it. What should have been a window felt like glass, cool and slick, but it was heavily coated with magic. A slippery sort of magic similar to that on the door. It made her think of cheap lotion, the kind you can rub and rub and it doesn’t soak in.
“Weird, isn’t it? It lets in light in the daytime, goes dark at night,” Sean said. “Which is how I know it’s early morning. The light’s not bright yet. And it doesn’t break. I tried.”
“With what?”
“I’m pretty good with a flying kick. I connected solidly three times. It didn’t break.”
She glanced at his bare feet.
“I still had my boots then,” he said dryly. “After I kicked their window they decided I could get by without footwear. Maybe that means I had a chance of breaking it, or maybe they were annoyed that I tried.”
She ran her fingers along the place where the glass—if that’s what it was—met the frame. The magic coating the frame vibrated like that on the walls…which were now broadcasting something by Mozart. “If they aren’t listening to us in here, how did they know you were kicking their window of weirdness?’
“Window of weirdness. Huh. I like that. It’s the walls. When I kicked the window, the vibration created something like static in the walls’ sound system. They act like a magical intercom.”