‘‘Oy,’’ I said, sliding down the wall to the floor. ‘‘This has ‘doomed from the start’ written all over it. You didn’t think up this plan yourself, did you?’’ I asked suspiciously.
She looked offended. ‘‘No, I didn’t, and you can stop being such a negative Nelly. Gabriel thought up the plan, and Drake and I are helping. I’m the decoy, you see.’’
‘‘Of course you are. What, exactly, is this grandiose escape plan?’’
Her mouth set in a prim manner. ‘‘I can’t tell you.’’
‘‘Why not?’’
‘‘There could be bugs. We don’t want them to know our plans.’’
‘‘If they were listening in, you just told them there’s a plan, so they’ll be expecting something to happen,’’ I pointed out.
‘‘Yes, but they won’t know what,’’ she said, pulling off her jacket. Her shirt followed almost immediately, as did her jeans, shoes, and the sparkly pink socks that she was so prone to wearing despite the fact they would look more at home on a twelve-year-old.
I watched her striptease with confusion for a moment before a thought struck me.
‘‘You don’t mean-’’
‘‘Shhh,’’ she said, waving a vague hand around as she pulled off the scarf she wore to confine her bangs. ‘‘Bugs, remember?’’
I bit back an obvious reply, thought for a moment, then decided that although the plan Gabriel had come up with was too I Love Lucy for words, I didn’t have any alternative. I stripped.
A half hour later the door opened to Tej. ‘‘Cyrene Northcott? You may see the committee now.’’
I turned from where I was pacing back and forth across the small room, ignoring Cyrene dressed in my clothing as she sat in a corner hunched over her knees.
I wasn’t sure that our trick would fool anyone, especially since Cyrene’s hair was a bit longer than mine, but Tej didn’t give me a second glance as I marched out the door. ‘‘It’s about time,’’ I said, adopting Cyrene’s light, fluty voice. ‘‘I’ve been in there forever! You don’t have any right to hold me! I haven’t done anything wrong!’’
Tej said nothing, just opened a door and gestured for me to go in.
My stomach quailed for a moment as I saw that one of the three men who sat at a long table was Dr. Kostich, but I remembered that Cyrene, as a naiad, had no special fear of him. Chin high, I stormed forward in my best impression of her at her most outraged. ‘‘This is an obscene injustice! I demand to be released immediately. If you do not, I will alert the sisterhood to this travesty, and then you’ll all be sorry!’’
The man at the end of the table, a dark-skinned man with lovely brown eyes, grimaced as he glanced at the papers before him. ‘‘I am Monish Lakshmanan, currently acting head of the watch. You are Cyrene Northcott?’’
‘‘I certainly am!’’
‘‘I am pleased to inform you that the charge against you of assault has been dropped due to lack of evidence.’’
‘‘And rightly so, since I never did assault… er… that person.’’ I backed out of the corner from which I found myself with as much aplomb as was possible, which admittedly wasn’t a whole lot.
‘‘The dragon in question,’’ Monish said with a slight emphasis, his eyes watchful, ‘‘refused to make a statement, and in fact, left the building rather hurriedly.’’
‘‘He was a liar,’’ I said, tossing my head in a trademark Cyrene gesture.
‘‘She did not say much to allow us to make an assessment either way,’’ he said.
I forced a light, lilting laugh. ‘‘You fell for that cross-dressing act? I would have thought someone in the watch had more sense. You can take it from me, Mr. Lakshmanan-that dragon was no lady.’’
The moment of silence that followed was pregnant with unspoken words.
Monish cleared his throat and slid a glance toward the mage next to him. ‘‘Indeed. We cannot help but find your presence here somewhat of a coincidence, Miss Northcott. Your sister is arrested and tried for crimes against a number of individuals, and that very same day you are brought in on an assault charge that is mysteriously dropped.’’
I tried to school the surprise I felt at his words from showing on my face, arranging my features to display vague indifference, instead. Sister? Monish had said sister, not twin. The word ‘‘sister’’ was never used to indicate a doppelganger, except occasionally by the originating twin as a form of affection. But everyone else always referred to the two people as twins, not sisters-which could only mean that Monish and the others did not realize the truth of our relationship. Savian knew I was a doppelganger, as did Porter. Why did neither of them tell the committee? I gave a mental head shake-the whys weren’t really important now. What did matter was that the two thief takers and Cyrene had managed to keep my origins quiet, and that, I saw, was the key to Gabriel’s plan for my escape.
‘‘Well, of course it’s not a coincidence,’’ I said, thinking as quickly as I could. I allowed outrage to fill my voice. ‘‘She’s my sister! Do you think I’m going to stand around and let you guys do who knows what with her? This whole thing about poor May being a thief is ridiculous. Ridiculous! She’s as innocent as I am!’’
The second the words left my lips, hindsight pointed out that that claim wasn’t, perhaps, the most judicious to make at the moment.
‘‘Indeed,’’ Dr. Kostich said, speaking up for the first time since I’d marched into the room. He gave me an appraising glance that I had a horrible feeling saw much more than I would have liked. ‘‘I find that statement difficult to believe.’’
I lifted my chin in haughty scorn, allowing a slight sneer to enter my voice. Mages and elemental beings had a long history of disagreement, and I knew that Cyrene was no fonder of him than I was. ‘‘Do you question my word, mage?’’
‘‘It is not your word I question, naiad,’’ he answered smoothly. ‘‘It is, perhaps, your identity that I wonder at.’’
‘‘My identity?’’ I scoffed, throwing as much disbelief as I could into the word. ‘‘You don’t believe that I am a naiad?’’
‘‘You are very much like your sister,’’ Monish said slowly as both men eyed me. ‘‘Are you twins?’’
I couldn’t lie. Both men looked too savvy to not sense an outright untruth when spoken. Subterfuge was one thing-that was natural to a doppelganger. But I seldom spoke lies simply because I didn’t do it well. ‘‘Yes, we’re twins. But there are obvious differences between us!’’ Such as the fact that I was a doppelganger, while Cyrene was an elemental being.
‘‘In that case, I’m sure you wouldn’t mind proving you are who you say you are?’’ Dr. Kostich said with a slight smile.
‘‘Oh, for the love of the twelve gods… you question me? Me, the ninth sister of the house of Hydriades? I am a naiad, a daughter of Tethys, and you have the audacity to question me? I have never been so insulted!’’
‘‘It is not meant as an insult,’’ Kostich said, the belligerent look easing as I slammed my hands down on the table in front of him. ‘‘More as a way to verify-’’
‘‘Fine!’’ I bellowed, my voice echoing off the walls. ‘‘You want to verify I am a naiad? You wish for me to summon water to prove to you, a mage, one who knows nothing of the ways of the elements, my worth? You want me to prove it?’’ I pushed up my sleeves and spread my hands out, palms down. ‘‘Fine! I’ll summon water. I’ll summon enough water to flood this ridiculous room, and you with it! And when your head is pressed up against the ceiling with two inches of air left, then perhaps you’ll believe me!’’
‘‘Wait!’’ Monish interrupted, looking nervously from me to Kostich. ‘‘Er… with all due respect, sir, I believe such an extreme act might have repercussions. This room has not been warded to contain the contents.’’