Downside Rain: Downside book one (20 page)

On
the bed, knees drawn up to my chest, arms about them, I rock. My eyes sting.

River
is gone; I heard his footfalls go down the stairs. I thought making him leave
would be harder. I thought we would fight and call each other names and part in
anger.

He
understands leaving is for his own good and mine. He must understand, or he
wouldn’t have gone, would he?

I
stand, and the walls close in around me. I’ll suffocate if I stay here.

I
quit the apartment, trudge down the stairs and out to the street, and head for
Housing to put my name on the list for an apartment.

Filling
out paperwork took half an hour. I don’t want to go back to the apartment yet. I
walk several blocks hoping Castle will join me, and end up at his grave. “It’s
a mess. I’m a mess,” I tell it. “Where the hell are you, anyway?”

Castle
materializes straddling the black dirt in front of me. “Right here, sweet pea.
I think you summoned me.”

I
step back. “If I did, it was unintentional.”

“There
I was, minding my own business when
oof,
here I am.” He kicks at the
rich soil as though he can actually dislodge it. “Does my resting place have
some kinda power over me, you come, call, and I’m brought here?”

“You
didn’t when I came here for your burial.”

“Maybe
the compulsion hadn’t kicked in.”

“Were
you shocked to return here?”

“I.
. . .” He squinches one eye. “Not shocked, disorientated, but only for a
second, like when you land heavily and need to regain your balance. I knew what
happened to me, and I was back. It felt . . . natural.”

“What
about before?” Feeling my skin pebble, I rub my arm. “In between?”

“Wasn’t
an in between. One minute I’m in my house, life draining away, the next I’m
here.”

“And
you can go anywhere. Except when I come here and speak to you, you have to
return?”

“I’m
not sure. We should experiment.”

“We
can, but later. I’ve been looking all over. Where have you been?”

His
shoulders hunch. “Wandering around Gettaholt, listening to chat.”

“Chat?”

“Folk
talking about places I never saw. What do you think of traveling when this is
over?”

When
this is over
. The bitterness is so strong, I taste
it in my throat. “When this is over? Whoever killed you is after me now. Four
attempts on my life and I know nothing.”

Castle
ticks off numbers on his fingers. “
Technically,
one on
ours
and
three on yours because you have to be special. Not to mention my murder, which
went a teensy bit farther than
attempt
.”

“Can’t
you recall
anything
about that night,” I butt in before his rattling gets
out of control.

“Nothing
more than I told you.”

I
look at the almost-solid man facing me and grief unexpectedly rises in my chest
again.

His
voice is gentle. “What’s up, honeybun?”

“It’s
not . . . fair.” I drop my gaze. “It must be awful for you, Castle, worse than
being Upside.”

Silence
stretches, making me look up to find his back to me. He doesn’t want me to see
his expression and his serious tone is not one I’m accustomed to from my
irrepressible friend. “It was good at first, seeing you here, knowing I still
had
some
kind of presence. But you’re right. This is worse than Upside.
This is my stomping ground, I know people, but I can’t interact.”

“Except
with me,” I sniffle. “I’m
so
sorry.”

“You’d
better not be crying over me.” His voice is firm now. “You make the difference.
I’d lose my mind if not for you.”

He
twirls on his heels to face me and says fiercely, “Don’t be thinking I’ll
always be hanging over your shoulder, though. I’m here when you need me, and
sometimes when I need you, but don’t worry I’ll stick my nose in where you
don’t want it.”

“Castle,
I want you with me!” I interrupt indignantly.

“Yeah?
So there’ll never come a time when you’ll prefer a little privacy,” he leers.

I’m
relieved to see the old bawdily suggestive Castle back. “Um.” My gaze drifts
past him. I can come up with a number of situations where I’ll want to be alone.

“I
registered for a new apartment today, not only because of what Angie did to
River; I don’t feel safe at home.”

“You
should get out now.”

“Yeah.
I could go to Alain.”
Where did
that
come from?
I’m aghast and
want to clap my hands over my mouth. Castle will have a ball with the
suggestion.

“No
way!”

But
it’s not the worst idea I’ve ever had. “Just till I figure this out. I suppose
a demon can appear in Alain’s house as easily as my place, but pitting Alain’s
vampires against a demon bothers me not at all.”

“There
is that,” he reluctantly concedes. “Just watch yourself.”

“Can
you lay low for a while?”

“Lay
low? How low?” He eyes his grave. “If you think I’m going down there with the
worms and gods know what. . . .”

Exasperated,
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “No, Castle dear, I mean don’t come to me while
I’m at the Peralta enclave. I’ll forget myself and speak to you, and you know
how good vampire hearing is.”

He
eyes me impishly. “Is that the only reason?”

“Yes,
the only reason.”

“You’re
sure
you and vamp man aren’t. . . ?” and he makes an explicit sign with
the fingers of one hand as his eyebrows wiggle up and down.

I’m
going to say I’d know whether Alain and I are doing what Castle alludes to.
Instead, I give him a cock-eyed look and leave it at that.

I
crouch to pluck the rose from his grave. The dry withered petals and stem fall
apart in my hand like confetti.

My
heart thuds in my chest, beating faster as a memory crashes into my skull. In
my mind’s eye, a waterfall of dirt and yellow flowers; a casket teeters on the
hole’s edge and plummets down.

And
in the depths of sorrow flowers bloom.

Damn.

I
toss aside the dead rose. “Come on, partner. Let’s take a walk.”

“Where
are we off to now?”

“I
spoke with the angel. As usual, I didn’t understand a word. I
thought
he
commiserated with me over your death. But I think
he tried to tell me
something
about
your death. We’re going to Bermstead.”

“It
said,
‘In the depths of sorrow flowers bloom.’
I thought it was a
metaphor for . . . I don’t know . . . life isn’t all doom and gloom. Or maybe
it tried to tell me you’re still here. But, Castle, when the coffin came down,
there were
flowers
on it. Tulips, still in bloom.”

“That’s
kind of . . . thin,” he says from behind me.

“There’s
more, but let’s look at the crypt first.” Finding the casket still in the
ghoul’s dining room is probably too much to ask, but we should check it out, in
case.

The
mausoleum isn’t far. I ignore the path and walk across the cemetery, weaving
between gravestones and another mausoleum. The grass in this stretch is thick and
mossy, making my feet sink fractionally. Castle comes silently behind me. The
dead make no noise when they move, not a footfall, nor the whisper of canvas
shifting on denim. I look back twice to make sure he still follows.

The
mausoleum is locked. Nothing stirs in the expanse of grass, paths and markers. No
witnesses, so I drop flesh and pass through the wall into the tomb.

Sturdily
made and dry inside, the mausoleum was built to last. Three long niches contain
two ancient marble sarcophagi and old wood coffins adorned with brass and copper.
The stone slab where the fallen casket had rested balances on the edge of the
jagged hole in the floor. Two heavy wood beams span the hole on an angle, ends
wedged against the side of the slab and the far wall to stop the slab falling
in.

The
smell of old bitter earth comes from below. The casket is no longer down there.
They removed it along with the dead ghouls; it’s been taken elsewhere.

I
slide through the wall, quickly dress and head north. Flush against the bluff
which frames the cemetery’s north side, the mortuary and crematorium is a building
of textured cement with four wings surrounding a central courtyard. An old gray
faun with curling corrugated horns answers my rap on the office door.

I
smile. “Hi. We didn’t meet at the time. My partner and I dealt with your ghoul
problem.”

With
head nearly touching one hunched shoulder, he fingers sparse gray chin hair as
he regards me. “And did a bit of damage, didn’t you, hm?”

“Sorry
about that. It was unavoidable.” I try to dazzle him with my smile. “In a way,
I’m here because of the damage.” I work two fifty drach notes from my hip
pocket. “I want to look at the casket which fell in the tunnel, and the body in
it.”

He
eyes the notes but keeps worrying at his chin. “Not only irregular, I can’t let
just anyone in to look at the dearly departed. You’re not related, are you? No,
of course not.”

“Not
related, but interested.” I tug another note from my pocket.

His
arthritic old fingers shoot out and grab the notes. They disappear into a
pocket in his checkered wool vest.

A
brass plaque says Chumleigh Yarrow died eight years ago. In the casket, the
body rests on what looks like a layer of tar from when the organs and soft
tissue inside putrefied into goo and seeped out. Embalming fluid can slow down
the decay, not stop it. But all in all he doesn’t look bad, probably owing to
the solid crypt and top-quality casket. His skin is gray, cracked like old
leather stretched over the bones of his face. His nose is gone, leaving gaping
nasal cavities and an earlobe resembles a small piece of shriveled leather.

His
head lies on one side, arms are straight down. Aren’t the dead buried face up
with hands folded on their waists? Did the shift in position happen when the casket
fell in the hole?

“He
looks kind of squashed,” Castle notes.

Chumleigh’s
cheek is crushed and his chest concave beneath a disintegrating suit jacket. Something
catches my eye. A small piece of red silk twists around a cuff button. I
carefully unwind it.

 And
it all clicks into place.

A
silent grave. Does something of you linger here, beloved? Do your bones tie you
to the earth?

“I
think someone put a fresh body in an already occupied casket.”

“That
would account for him being a mite crunched up,” Castle agrees.

Deep
in thought, I brush off his comment with a flick of my hand. “And they hid
another someplace. They were in a hurry, wanted the bodies concealed fast.”

“How
did you come up with that?”

“I
know who they were.” I close my eyes to better picture Ethan Hyde and his wife
Derille. Derille, who always wore her signature red scarf with the long fringe.
“Hyde and his wife didn’t go Upside,” I breathe. “They were murdered. Derille
was dumped on top of old Chumleigh.”

“Derille
Hyde?”

I
hold up the red thread with thumb and forefinger.

Castle
gets it. “Her scarf?”

“She
never went out in public without it.”

“I
know, but I wouldn’t call it hard evidence.”

I
give him a brittle smile. “Come outside. I saved the best for last.”

I
reposition the casket lid and head out to where Castle already waits for me. I
angle right to look up at Calla Blayne’s house, perched on the edge of the
bluff against a red sky streaked purple and mustard-yellow, and murmur,
“What
you in your ivory tower, deceit and death and gloom?”

“The
angel said that?”

“Yep.
Who took over Hyde’s position when he left?”

He
walks away from me, nearer the cemetery’s perimeter, and gazes at the house, a three
story home of ivory stone with towers on the south and north wings. “Well I’ll
be damned.”

Calla
made the public announcement of Hyde’s resignation from the Triad and the
reason for his retirement. What did he do, or discover, to earn death? Is the
other remaining Triad member involved? I know little about Solange Jughon,
except she tends to stay in the background.

Newshounds
did their job. They tracked down Hyde’s personal physician who confirmed Derille
suffered from a disease which could not be successfully treated Downside. They
spoke to the Station Master, who confirmed Hyde and Derille left through The
Station.

How
much did Calla pay them, what promises did she make, to commit what amounts to
treason? And another reason for the Station Master to haul ass.