to take a closer look to be certain, but it’s probable. Kid’s gonna have it tough for a while,” I said. “It’s like emotional trauma. Someone dying, that kind of thing. It tears people up the same way. They don’t get over it fast.”
“I’ve seen it too,” Forthill said. “I haven’t brought this up yet, but I thought you should know that Nelson came to me earlier this evening.”
I nodded at the cot that had been occupied when we came in. “That him?”
“Yes.”
“How’d he strike you?” I asked.
Forthill pursed his lips. “If I didn’t know you sent him, I would have thought he was having a bad reaction to drugs. He was almost incoherent. Very agitated. Terrified, in point of fact, though he would not or could not explain why. I managed to get him calmed down and he all but fainted.”
I frowned, running the fingers of my right hand back through my hair. “Did you have the sense that anyone was following him?”
“Not at all. Though I might have missed something.” He essayed a tired smile. “It’s late. And I’m not as spry as I used to be, after ten o’clock or so.”
“Thank you for helping him,” I said.
“Of course. Who is he?”
“Molly’s boyfriend,” I said. I glanced across the room, at the mother holding her son. “Maybe Charity doesn’t need to know that part, either.”
He blinked and then sighed, “Oh, dear.”
“Heh. Yeah,” I said.
“May I ask you a question?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“These creatures, these phages. If they are what you say, beings of the spirit world, then how did they manage to cross the house’s threshold?”
“Traditional way,” I said. “They got an invitation.”
“From whom?”
“Probably Molly,” I said.
He frowned. “I have difficulty believing that she would do such a thing.”
I felt my mouth tighten. “She probably didn’t know they were monsters. They’re shapeshifters. They probably appeared to her as someone she knew, and would invite in.”
Forthill said, “Ah. I see. Someone such as you, perhaps.”
“Perhaps,” I said quietly. “Makes it the second time someone has used my face to get a shot at Michael’s family.”
Forthill said nothing for a moment. Then he said, “It occurs to me that these creatures killed without compunction in your previous encounters. Why would they carry Molly away instead of simply murdering her?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “I don’t know how my spell managed to bring them to Molly. I don’t know precisely what these things are, or where they hail from. Which means I can’t figure out why they’ve been showing up, or where they might have taken the girl.” I waved a hand in a frustrated gesture. “It’s driving me insane. I’ve got tons of facts and none of them are lining up.”
“You’re tired,” Forthill said. “Perhaps some rest—”
I shook my head. “No, Padre. The things that took her won’t rest. The longer she’s in their hands, the less likely it is we’ll ever see her again.” I rubbed at my eyes. “I need to rethink it.”
Forthill nodded at me and rose. On the other side of the room, Charity was covering her exhausted son with a blanket. Even Alicia had surrendered to fatigue, and now only the adults were awake. “I’ll leave you to it then. Have you eaten recently?”
“Sometime in the Mesozoic Era,” I said.
“Sandwich?”
My stomach made a gurgling noise. “Only if you insist.”
“I’ll see to it,” Forthill said. “Excuse me.” He went over to Charity and took her arm, leading her out as he spoke quietly to her. Now that her children had been cared for, she looked like she might come apart at the seams. They left the room together, leaving me in the dimness with Mouse and a lot of sleeping kids.
I thought. I thought some more. I picked up all the facts I knew, turning them every which way, trying to figure out something, anything, that would let me put a stop to this insanity.
The phages. The answer was in the phages. Once I knew their identity, I could begin to work out who might be using them, and what I might do to learn more about them. There had to be a commonality to them, somewhere; something that linked them together, some fact that could provide me a context in which to judge their motivations and intentions.
But what the hell could they have in common, other than being monsters who fed on fear? They’d shown up randomly in a bathroom, a kitchen, a parking lot, a conference room. Their victims had been disparate, seemingly random.