“That is for the mayor to deal with,” Yuen said. “We deal with the details. Tell me what happened, from the beginning.”

* * *

• • •

We walked him through the events at Grant Park, giving him every detail we could remember, while Petra made notes on a smaller screen paired to the larger one, so her words appeared in tidy rows behind us.

“I don’t understand how they could simply appear and reappear,” Yuen said.

“They must have learned a new skill,” Theo said. “That wouldn’t surprise me, given Ruadan seems to be pushing them in a new direction.”

“But what direction?” I asked. “Shifters are blamed for Tomas’s death. The peace talks fall apart, and fairies are trying to make big magic in Grant Park. How do those things connect?”

“Fairies,” Petra said. “They’re the common thread.”

“And Ruadan specifically,” I said. “He was at the sessions, the party, the castle, Grant Park.”

“And without Claudia for the latter events,” Yuen said. “You said her room was disheveled, and she’s apparently missing. Why?”

“Ruadan likes violence,” I said, thinking of his expressions at the castle and Grant Park. “He wants trouble. Maybe he wanted a real fight at the peace talks, and was angry when Claudia agreed to a seat at the table.”

“What about the pin?” Theo asked.

“Forensic tests haven’t been completed yet,” Yuen said. “Surveillance video of the party is still being reviewed at Cadogan.”

“How’s Riley doing?” I asked, feeling a stab of guilt since I hadn’t visited him again.

Yuen’s eyes went dark, concern etched in his face. “For now, he’s handling it. For now.”

“Has his memory improved?”

Yuen shook his head. “We’ve tried meds, meditation, and magic. Nothing has helped. He still has pain when he tries to remember.”

“What about the knife?” I asked. “I know his fingerprints were on it, but do we know where it came from?”

“We don’t,” Theo said. “At least, not specifically. It was a mass-produced hunting-style knife.”

“Hard to trace,” I said.

“Exactly. The blood on Riley’s shirt was Tomas’s. But the quantity wasn’t nearly as much as should have been there given the nature of the wound.”

I had to kick away the memory of Tomas’s disconnected head.

“So the actual perp was probably covered in blood,” Theo said. “There’d have been soiled clothes.”

“The CPD’s going through the castle?” I asked.

“They are,” Yuen said. “They haven’t reported anything yet, but if there’s anything to find, they’ll let us know.”

“We have to figure out where the fairies are,” I said. “Aren’t there security cameras all over the place these days?”

“There are more cameras than there used to be,” was all Yuen would confirm. “Petra?”

“I’m on it,” she said, pulling off her gloves and working the main screen again, logging into some kind of a city portal. She pulled up a map, then zoomed in on the river’s south fork, where the castle was located. The area was covered in dots.

“Those aren’t all cameras,” I said.

“Oh, they are,” she said. “Welcome to the Internet of Things. Traffic-light cameras, speeding cameras, security cameras, laptop cams, body cams. Always wear your good underwear, because someone is probably filming you.”

“Sound advice,” Yuen said with a smile.

There were four traffic cameras near the castle. It took only a few moments to find video of the castle’s gatehouse and front drive, and only a few minutes longer to speed through the window of time between our first and second visits to the castle.

Unfortunately, not a single fairy showed up. The only visible change in the time period was darkness; the torches hadn’t been lit the second evening, so the castle stayed dark as the sun fell.

“Either they’ve got a secret way out of the castle,” Theo said, “or they left by magic. And there’s no way to tell that from the video.”

“There might have been magical vibrations,” I said. “But the castle grounds are enormous, so the ripples might not have spread any farther than that.”

“So we assume they left by magic, as a group,” Yuen said, studying the video. “And they took Claudia with them?”

“Maybe,” I said. “But Claudia wasn’t with Ruadan the night Lulu and I visited. It’s possible she was already gone by then.” And given the condition of her room, that they’d dragged her out in a much more conspicuous style.

“Go farther back,” I said. “Find the period between the Cadogan party and our visit.” If we couldn’t find the fairies leaving, maybe we could find Claudia.

* * *

• • •

We searched video of the castle for nearly an hour. And still didn’t have what we were looking for.

“Maybe we don’t have the right angle on the castle,” Theo said.

“There are more cameras in the sector,” Petra said. “But unless we can narrow down a place or a window, it would take days to go through all the video.”

“Zoom out on the map,” Theo said. “Let’s check our options.”

On the screen, the square of green that held the castle became one block in the larger quilt of the city.

And there was an unusual bundle of cameras just up the street from the castle.

“What’s on that corner?” I asked, pointing.

“Gas station,” Petra said after a pause. “Lots of security cameras, including on the pumps themselves.”

“Fairies have vehicles,” Yuen said. “Good thought, Elisa. Pull it up.”

The gas station was busy. Autos and driven vehicles pulling in for gas, people pulling in for snacks or necessities. They all looked human, or humanlike, at least until a large black SUV pulled up to a pump. The passenger’s side opened and a fairy stepped out, looked around cagily, and moved to the pump.

While he waited for the tank to fill, he pulled open the back door. There in the backseat, hands tied in front of her and a vacant expression on her face, was Claudia. She was visible for only a second before the door was closed again.

“Well, well, well,” Yuen said quietly.

The SUV drove off again, giving us a clear view of the license plate.

“I’m pulling the license,” Petra said, logging into another information portal. “And . . . it’s licensed to Claudia, no last name given, and the address is the castle, so no help there. Permission to track?”

“Track it,” Yuen said.

Petra pressed a hand to her screen for some kind of security clearance, then did more swiping and typing. The overhead monitor flashed, and a map of the city replaced the camera footage.

“There’s now a tag on the vehicle,” Yuen explained. “If it’s spotted by a person or camera, we’ll get an alert, and we can track its movements.”

“That’s handy and terrifying,” I said.

“It is,” Yuen agreed. “In equal measure.”

Petra looked back at us. “Now that we’ve got that underway, do you want to talk about the ley lines?”

“The what?” I asked.

Petra glanced at me. “Rivers of magical power that run through the earth’s outer crust. Possibly remnants from changes in the earth’s magnetic field.”

“Theoretically,” Theo said. “There’s no evidence they actually exist.”

“Spoken like a tool of the Deep State. Bet you don’t believe in aliens, either. Hot tip,” she said in a whisper, “they’re real.”

“Let’s just stick to planetary subjects for the time being,” Yuen said with a smile.

“Fine by me,” she said, but slid me a glance. “Ley lines are completely legitimate, but the government doesn’t want you to know they exist.”

“And why not?” I asked.

“Big Petroleum. Oil companies go out of business if humans figure out how to utilize the ley lines to run our vehicles, heat our homes, energize our tech. So they keep the knowledge very carefully guarded. But some of us know better.”