Strike at Midnight(13)
He hesitated, and I decided to save him. “Because they’re gentlemen, and they won’t be as willing to go to the lengths that I would?”
A light pink dusted over his cheeks, and I smiled.
“It’s fine, Sir Raymond. I chose this career, and with it come certain requirements. I’m a big girl. I can handle it.”
“I have no doubts. Thank you, my dear.”
“You’re welcome,” I said. Then I went back to annihilating the rest of my pie.
*
I left the Inn of Briar Rose, and Sir Raymond with another goblet of red wine.
It would be easier to hire a horse to go to the private detective’s office, as she lived way out in the sticks, so I walked around to the back of the inn where the stables were situated.
It didn’t take me long to use some of Sir Raymond’s coin to hire a beautiful brown mare called Dainty. She didn’t look very dainty, but as long as she got me where I needed to go, I was happy.
We trotted along the lane that led to the West Wind Forest, just north of the Kingdom of Carena. It was on the outskirts of the city borders, and I had to say it was a very scenic place to live.
These forests were still part of Carena lands, so it was unlikely that one of the banished magical creatures would jump out on me. The woods beyond the borders of Carena were another story, though. Since the banishment, it had turned into an open game of territory wars and clan standoffs, with no carriage paths or protected borders. It was species against species out there, and it was every elf, giant, fairy, or troll out for themselves.
It was a prejudice that had been debated and quietly protested against for years, but to no avail. The majority of people were concerned how they—as normal people—could live alongside such uncertainty from the magic of other beings. But I thought that was because they were just scared and ignorant assholes—two things that have torn many a kingdom up before now.
The part of the forest I was riding through could still be dangerous, though, and it was prone to bandits or witches who either wanted coin or blood—depending on the attacker—but the threat decreased during the day. I supposed everyone has to sleep sometime.
The trees hummed in welcome as the odd noise of a bird chorused with its friends, and part of me could understand the need for living in such an isolated place.
I personally preferred the hustle and bustle of the city. It made me feel a part of something bigger after living in the dark for so long. The sound of late-night drinkers and the early morning call of the markets gave me the comfort I needed to remind me I was no longer in the shitty cellar where I had been left to rot. By sleeping with my curtains open, it gave me the sanctuary I needed from the nightmares that had once plagued my dreams. That bitch and her two daughters couldn’t get anywhere near me anymore, and no one had bothered taking the time to try and hunt me down for his death. If indeed he had died.
The rhythmic pace of the journey forced me back to the present, and the trees became denser to highlight the border of the forest. Dainty pushed forward off track, and in the next moment we were swallowed up by the greenery.
This was where the journey started to get a bit trickier, as the lane was made only by the travelers who had come before me. There were no defined roads or flattened walkways, just the natural trail of where the soil had been previously downtrodden.
Dainty was pretty good at navigating her way through it, and I only had to guide her through a few awkward moments. We took the last bit at a trot as the land leveled out, and when the foliage broke ahead of me, I pulled Dainty to a slow stop.
The grass was flat in this area of the forest, and the flower gardens surrounding it were well maintained. It wasn’t a large section of level ground, and in the center of it stood a large tower that dominated the landscape.
It looked like it had broken apart from a grand castle, as the cylindrical structure had been finished with a tiled red turret on the top. The cream stone of the tower itself didn’t look like it had been made by a man’s hand because it was as smooth as silk, with only ivy and small arched windows breaking its flow. It looked naturally in tune with its habitat as if it had merely decided to sprout out of the ground one day.
This was the base of my kind-of friend, Rapunzel—a private detective who worked from her home office behind the name Ever After Findings. It wasn’t an ideal location for a business, but she didn’t really have a choice.
A curse that had been cast upon her at a young age wouldn’t allow her to leave the tower during the night. The magic of it always blinked her back to the tower after sunset every evening and locked the tower doors behind her. It must have been a killer for her social life.
There was a narrow tree that I noticed would be perfect for me to tie Dainty’s reins around while I met with Rapunzel. The mare would have plenty of grass to nibble on, and she settled easily enough when I left her to her healthy snack.
The wooden door at the base of the tower creaked when I pushed my way in, and I let my eyes adjust in the darkened entryway. The stairs were an absolute bitch, but there was no way I was going into the cage contraption thingy she tried to pull me up on last time. It was a death trap.
The Cage of Death was now looking at me from the right of the stairs, and it was something Rapunzel had cleverly designed and made herself. It worked on some form of pulley mechanism by using a few cogs and a rope, and the only thing that protected a person from falling to a possible death was the wood and metal that had been framed for a person to stand on.