Yes, although it doesn’t explain why he’s left it so long to try and find us.
Maybe it wasn’t until the Fitzgerald brothers were jailed and blabbed their mouths off that he suspected where we were. We might have changed our names, but I don’t think there’s another green-eyed royal witch who hangs out with a Sarr. It wouldn’t be hard to put two and two together.
It wouldn’t have been hard to do a finder spell using some of your personal items, either, Liz. As I’ve noted before, if they seriously wanted to find us, they would have.
And yet they’ve resorted to a tracer rather than a spell. Perhaps we were better at covering our tracks than we thought.
“Which is why the records were no doubt sealed,” Monty was saying. “I’ve asked my friends to keep me updated on the goss, so hopefully they’ll let me know if and when Clayton suddenly leaves town.”
If Clayton did leave town, I had no doubt it’d be so well concealed no one would be any the wiser. “And the Empusae? Anything new on them?”
“Well, there is one textbook that suggests the best way to get rid of Empusae is to swear at them. Apparently, insults send them screaming away.”
“Somehow, I can’t see the rangers accepting that as a suitable method of dealing with them—especially after Byron’s death.”
He straightened. “What?”
I quickly filled him in on the two murders and on what I’d seen in Jeni’s mind. He swore and thrust a hand through his hair. “Shit, Liz, this is bad.”
“Considering we’ve currently no leads on these bitches and five dead people, that’s something of an understatement.”
“What about the White Lady? She must have some way of locating the Empusae if she’s been dogging their heels for decades.”
“She’s already told us she hasn’t been able to trace them since she bound and drowned the younger.”
“Well, that’s terribly inconvenient.”
“Indeed.” My voice was dry. “In fact, I haven’t seen her since Belle talked to her.”
Which was rather weird. If nothing else, she should have been there last night, because the Empusae had taken two men rather than the one; even if she’d been some distance away, she would have had time to get there. Besides, whether they were watchful or not, she was capable of killing them.
She killed the weakest of the three, Belle commented, and only then because she caught it off guard.
It’s still surprising she wasn’t there last night.
Maybe our chat took as much out of her as it did me—and spirits don’t recover as easily as us.
Maybe. I still think it’s odd, though. To Monty, I added, “Did you get any practical information on killing Empusae?”
“Nothing much more than what Vita has already given us. One book did suggest they can be killed the same way as you’d kill a vampire—stake through the heart, burning, or chopping off their heads.” He paused. “I suggest we avoid burning—vampires can’t regenerate, but these things are shifters and might be able to.”
“After our confrontation with the soucouyant, I don’t even want to think about creatures on fire.”
“A sentiment I can certainly get behind.” He mopped up the last bit of tomato sauce with his burger bun. “I might get one of the rangers to take me up to the crime scene and check it over myself.”
“Why? If they’d left anything in the way of a magical fingerprint, Ashworth would have found it last night.” Anything else, the rangers would have found.
“I know, but I’d still like to investigate the area myself. Then I’ll head over to the coroner’s and ask if I can view the bones of all the victims.”
I frowned. “Why the bones specifically?”
“To see if any trace of magic remains.”
“Why would there be magic on their bones?”
“I don’t know, but I remember a uni professor once mentioning that some supernatural creatures leave traces of magic behind in their DNA. Given you said the Empusae licked the bones clean, it’s possible their saliva left such an imprint. If that is the case, we might be able to use it to work up a tracking spell.”
“That’s a whole lot of ifs.”