* * *
We rest back at our campsite. We must, considering how far we need to walk. A four-hour nap before we break camp and walk until the sun starts to drop. I want to push on after that, but Dalton says no. We’re less than halfway home, with no chance of making it back without more sleep. Better to find a spot and get our shelter up before it’s fully dark.
We’re in bed by six, asleep 1.5 seconds later. As exhausted as we are, though, we don’t need twelve hours of sleep, so we’re on our way again by three in the morning, our flashlights leading us through the darkness.
It’s nearly noon when we reach Rockton, and I can say with absolute certainty that these were the most physically strenuous three days of my entire life. Dalton’s promise of an entire batch of fresh-baked cookies may be the only thing that gets me through the last ten kilometers. I’m holding him to that, too, and washing them down with multiple mugs of spiked coffee, followed by an afternoon nap that may last until morning.
I reach the town perimeter and topple face-first into the snow. Or I try to, but my feet tangle in the snowshoes and Dalton grabs me before I snap my ankle with my drama-queen gesture. He lifts me over his arms, and I struggle to get out, saying, “I’m fine. Just being a brat.”
“Too late. I’m carrying you.”
I start to settle in. Then he flips me over his shoulder, firefighter style, which is a whole lot less flattering.
“No, no, no,” I say, renewing my struggles. “Just let me—”
“Too late.”
“You can’t—”
“—embarrass you by carrying you over my shoulder through town? Yep, I believe I can.”
Storm starts dancing around us, barking, finding her second wind. I grab the back of Dalton’s parka and yank, and I’m just goofing around, but it’s hard enough to make him stagger, and apparently Storm chooses that moment to cut in front of him, and we all go down in a heap of curses and yelps and giggles.
As we untangle ourselves, a voice says, “First, you disappear for three days. Now you are napping at noon. I understand the holidays are coming, but as a taxpayer, I object.”
I twist to see Mathias standing there. “Since when do you pay taxes?”
“I treat each and every person in this community with marginal respect. It is very taxing.”
We untangle, and Dalton and Storm rise as I snap off my snowshoes. “What are you doing out and about?”
“There is caroling. It began at ten in the morning. After two hours, my choices were to walk in the forest or begin a quiet but relentless slaughter of the offenders. Knowing the latter would force you to work through the holidays, I chose the former. It is my gift to you.”
“Thanks.”
We start for the town.
Mathias falls in beside me. “Also, speaking of relentless, we must discuss this constant flow of visitors you have unleashed on our peaceful village, Casey.”
“Peaceful?” Dalton says. “Where have you been living?”
“In a town where people do not wander in from the forest and make themselves at home. Your detective is the Pied Piper of the Yukon, leading people to our town with her charming manner and sunny disposition.”
I look at Dalton. “You have another detective?”
“Compared to me, you are pretty damned charming. Not sure about sunny, but people definitely find you less intimidating than me, which just means they don’t know you very well.”
Dalton turns to Mathias. “Yeah, we’ve been doing more outreach since Casey’s been here. Building relationships with the community really wasn’t my strength, apparently. If you’re talking about Tyrone—”
“I’d rather not really. Mr. Cypher has chosen his alias well. I do not know what to make of him, and I have decided he is a puzzle I do not care to solve. The problem is that the procession of strays does not end. I discovered only today that you had a hostile in town. A live hostile, which you promised me for study, and you whisked her in and out without a word to me.”
“You requested a hostile,” I say. “I chose to deny that request.”
“Instead, you give me other strays. A wolf and a feral boy.”
“First, you asked for Raoul. Plenty of people wanted him, and you got him, and therefore you owed me a favor, which you repaid by taking Sebastian, who is a resident, not a stray. Also not feral.”
“He spent half his life being raised by narcissists who treated him as a fashion accessory. Then he spent the other half imprisoned for their murders. He may have learned very pretty manners, but Sebastian is as feral as that half-breed dog, and I have spent six months sleeping with one eye open, wondering which will kill me first.”