She compressed her thin lips into an even thinner smile. “Monitoring everything. That’s all you need to know.”
I shrugged. “Be that way. Just remember what Gillen Yor told you.”
“I can take care of myself, Connor.”
Dylan stuck his head in the doorway. “Can I steal Connor for a minute?”
Keeva shooed me out the door with a flutter of her hands. If anything confirmed why I’d rather jump off a bridge than work for her, that gesture did. I joined Dylan in the corridor.
“Follow me,” he said. He kept his head down as we made our way across the department. When we reached his office, he checked the hallway, then closed the door and leaned against it. “Meryl’s been arrested.”
I pinned him against the door. “What are you pulling, Dylan?”
He tried to push me off, activating his body shield, but I clung to his jacket. I shook him. “What did you do?”
He released his shield and raised his hands to the sides. “We’re not going to get in a fistfight, Connor. I didn’t do anything.”
We stared at each other. I knew him like I knew few people, the way he looked when he lied, when he was afraid, and when he was telling the truth. I dropped my hands. “What the hell is going on?”
He straightened his jacket. “I’m not sure. Remember that knife we found at Belgor’s?”
“The Breton dagger?”
He nodded. “It wasn’t the mate to one here like you thought. It was the one here.”
I frowned. “I don’t understand.”
He held his hand up to silence me as he tilted his head to the door. He waited a moment, then continued. “I asked Meryl to bring me the other dagger you saw in the storeroom. When she released the essence field on it, we discovered it was a counterfeit. The dagger from Belgor’s was the original.”
“So why is Meryl under arrest?”
Guilt crept over his face. “She says someone else switched the daggers. I had the logs checked, but Meryl is the only one who entered that storeroom. When Keeva and I were called down to the Weird because of Carmine’s attack, someone entered my office and took the knife.”
“And what has any of that got to do with Meryl?”
He compressed his lips a moment. “Meryl’s the only person who had high enough clearance for the storeroom and access to the department floor. She was seen on the floor that afternoon. I was debating what to do when Ceridwen caught wind of what was going on. She’s charging Meryl with theft, tampering with evidence, and assaulting Belgor.”
Hot anger gripped my chest. “This is bull, Dylan. Meryl comes up here for work all the time, and you know it. You and Ceridwen want her to answer questions about Forest Hills that she doesn’t know the answers to.”
Dylan shook his head. “Don’t throw me in that pile, Connor. You know this is Ceridwen.”
Frustrated, I spun away to keep from hitting him. It would have been dumb. It would have been striking out at the nearest thing, and he just happened to be it. Besides, Dylan could hold his own against me, even without his shields. “I want to talk to Meryl.”
His worried look was genuine. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. You’re on Ceridwen’s list, too.”
I rubbed my hands across the stubble on my head. “I don’t answer to Ceridwen. I want to talk to Meryl, Dylan, and I want to do it now.”
We didn’t speak as he tried to decide what to do. Finally, he opened the door. “Let’s go.”
We took the elevator to a subbasement deeper than Meryl’s office. I knew the place. It didn’t get used much. Not unless the Guild wanted someone to disappear. The doors opened on a dim hallway, burning torches casting sooty light against walls of granite blocks. It should have had a sign that said: HINT: DUNGEON.
Halfway down in the gloom, two Danann security agents guarded an oaken door with a cast-iron dead bolt. They didn’t move when we reached them. I felt sendings passing between them and Dylan. One of the agents opened the door.
“Make it quick,” said Dylan.
I squinted against the harsh light from the small room. A cot and commode took up opposite corners. A plain wooden table stood in the middle. In the lone chair, Meryl relaxed with her hands behind her head and her feet up on the table. The door closed. I listened for a lock to slide into place, but none did.
Meryl dropped her feet to the floor. “I hope you brought some C-4. I really want to blow something up.”
Just seeing her made my anxiety ease. As I came around the table, she stood, and I wrapped my arms around her. That meant I lifted her off the floor since I have a least a foot in height on her.
“Are you okay?” I said into her ear.
She giggled. “This is so lame, Grey.”
I released her and kissed her on the top of the head. She hates that. I love that she hates that. “Meryl, Ceridwen can ruin you.”
She waved her hand dismissively. “Blah, blah, blah.”
I scanned the room and tapped my ear. “Can we talk?” I mouthed to her.
She pointed to a broken cup on the sink. “Yeah, we’re fine. They left a listening ward. If that’s the level of sophistication I’m dealing with, I’ll be out of here tomorrow.”
“What happened?”
She dropped back in the chair and jabbed her finger at the table. “Winny ap Hwyl happened. When I find that bitch, I’m going to kill her.”
“Who the hell is she?”
“Rhonwen ap Hwyl. An old friend. Former old friend. She used to be chief archivist here. I hadn’t seen her in years. She asked me to lunch and oh-gee-can-I-see-the-old-place. She stole the dagger the day she came to visit three weeks ago. I really am going to kill her,” she said.
“Why didn’t you just tell them that?”
She had the good grace to look embarrassed. “I didn’t sign her in.”
“The receptionists have been warning you about that for years.”
She slumped in her chair. “It wouldn’t matter anyway. I didn’t steal the damned dagger, and I sure as hell didn’t attack Belgor. Ceridwen isn’t going to let a little thing like the truth stop her.”
A thrill of realization went through me. “Your friend attacked Belgor. Anglicize the name Rhonwen ap Hwyl.”
She let out an impressed whistle. “Rhonda Powell. Winny ap Hwyl was Viten’s girlfriend. But how the hell did she survive a bullet to the head?”
“He made her a soul stone.”
“I’ll be damned. I didn’t think those really worked.” She paced behind the table, her face flush with excitement. “Holy crap! That’s why Viten was down here. I never understood why he didn’t just go to the lobby and run out the front door when he escaped his guards. Now I do. He came down to the archives to get his personal effects. He was going after Winny’s soul stone.”
The evidence tag from the Ardman file floated up from my memory. I rummaged in my jacket and found an ATM receipt with a pathetically low balance. I drew the ogham runes from the Viten evidence tag from memory. “This is where Viten’s personal effects were stored. Is it the same room where the Breton dagger was?”
Meryl shook her head. “No, that’s the one next to it. Now that I think of it, Winny asked to see the dagger’s storeroom specifically. Maybe she had the wrong location.”
“Could she have gotten in when you were distracted?”
She shook her head firmly. “The doors are keyed to my essence. Best security I know.”
I tapped the receipt. “How do I get into that storeroom?”
“No problem.” She placed her palm flat on the paper and chanted. Little shots of blue light dripped off her fingertips and faded into the paper. When she handed me the receipt, the paper was infused with her body essence. “Put this flat against the door and push.”
I stood. “I’ll get you out of here, Meryl.”
She glanced at the door and winked. “I mapped this place, Grey. Don’t be surprised if I send you a postcard from the Caribbean.”
CHAPTER 22