I would have thought getting the rusalka back to Puget Sound would be a considerable undertaking, but it’s pretty amazing what can be accomplished when money isn’t an issue. Lurine footed the bill for the whole thing. A day later, I was there to watch as the Shedd staffers lifted her out of the tank in a stretcher they used for transporting dolphins and transferred her into a specialized water-filled shipping container in the back of the cargo truck that would carry her to O’Hare airport.

“When we had to move our dolphins and belugas during the renovation, we had someone they know and trust ride along with them every step of the way,” one of the staffers said to Lurine, looking starstruck and vaguely perplexed by Lurine Hollister’s involvement in the entire thing. He was probably dying to tell someone about it. “I don’t know how you feel about it, but the, ah, rusalka seems to trust you. . . .”

“Sure.” She stepped out of her high-heeled pumps and handed them to him. “Put these somewhere safe, will you? They’re Louboutins.”

“Okay.” Holding her shoes, he stared as Lurine hopped up to perch on the container’s ledge, her legs dangling in the water. “Don’t you, um, want a wet suit?”

“I’ll be fine.” She looked amused. “Are you sure you don’t want to come along, Daisy? My treat. No sense letting space on a chartered flight go unused.”

“Yeah,” I said reluctantly. “I’d love to, but I really need to be here for this conference with the families.”

“Okay, cupcake.” She smiled at me. “Try to stay out of trouble while I’m gone, will you?”

“I’ll try.” I leaned over the container.

The rusalka surfaced. Already her skin—if that was what you called it—looked healthier, more greenish than gray. Her nictitating eyelids opened, her lucent emerald gaze meeting mine. “Thank you.”

I clasped her hand for the last time, feeling the cool, rubbery webbing against my own warm fingers. “Be safe.”

The conference took place two days later at the county sheriff’s headquarters. Jim and Sue Vanderhei were there, along with Mike Huizenga, Kyle Middleton, and their parents, me, Cody, Chief Bryant, Detective Wilkes, and Sheriff Barnard. I have to admit, it was pretty much the last place on earth I wanted to be. Seattle would have been a lot nicer. The sense of anguished loss and devastating guilt hanging over the room was palpable, so much so that I found myself wishing Stefan were there to siphon off a measure of it, like he’d done at Thad’s funeral.

And no, I hadn’t seen Stefan or spoken with him since the night it all went down. As he’d said, he could wait.

Silence weighed heavy on the room. Sheriff Barnard and Chief Bryant exchanged a glance. They were cut from the same cloth: big men in positions of power who knew how to use their imposing presence well.

“Anything you boys want to tell us about the night Thad Vanderhei died?” the sheriff asked gently.

Mike Huizenga shook his head violently. Kyle Middleton wrapped his arms around himself and shivered.

“All right, then.” Sheriff Barnard nodded at Detective Wilkes, who opened a file and slid a handful of photographs of the rusalka in her tank across the table. “Let us tell you. Chief Bryant?”

The chief cleared his throat. Leaning forward to prop his elbows on the table and fold his meaty hands over each other, he laid out the whole sordid story from beginning to end, periodically consulting with Cody or me to confirm a detail.

At first, the parents were in utter denial. I couldn’t blame them. It really was unthinkable, and all the more so because the young men involved were raised in devout Christian households and taught to revile the very existence of the eldritch community. But then, I suppose that made the temptation posed by forbidden fruit all the stronger.

At any rate, it wasn’t long before the boys’ reactions made it impossible to deny the truth. Kyle simply shut down, going into a state of glaze-eyed catatonia and refusing to respond to his parents’ insistent questions. Mike Huizenga broke silently, tears streaming down his broad face, his linebacker’s shoulders shaking.

The room got very quiet.

“So it’s true,” Jim Vanderhei said after a long moment. No one answered him. “Whose idea was it to put Thad in the river?”

Chief Bryant glanced at me. “That’s one detail we don’t know,” I admitted.

“It was that crazy woman’s.” Mike’s voice was thick with tears, but audible. “The lady ghoul. Then the other one, Ray, he said he’d hot-wire a motorboat once the bars closed and no one would ever have to know. So Kyle and I just grabbed a bottle from the bar and started drinking.” Turning his head, he wiped his nose on the sleeve of his T-shirt. I rose to fetch a box of tissues and handed it to him. “Thanks.”

“And these . . . ghouls?” Jim Vanderhei pronounced the word with profound distaste. “They’re to be charged with my son’s death?”

“No,” I said. The chief hadn’t gotten to that part in his narrative. “They were both killed in the course of the raid.”

Thad’s father eyed me with disbelief. “That’s awfully convenient. You’re protecting them, aren’t you?”

“For what they did to the rusalka?” My temper stirred. “No, sir. Never. Not in a thousand years. I assure you, they’re dead.”

“But I thought that was impossible,” Sue Vanderhei said in a faint voice, surprising me. “I thought they were condemned to eternally prey on the sufferings of others.”

Everyone looked at me. “Nothing is impossible,” I said. “There are weapons that can kill even a ghoul.”

“I give you my word, ma’am,” Cody added. “I saw it with my own eyes. They’re dead and gone, and they’re never coming back.”

“So what happens now?” Kyle’s father demanded. “What happens to our boys? Are they being charged?”

“They could be,” Sheriff Barnard said bluntly. “Concealment of an accidental death is a punishable offense. But given the fact that they were subject to unnatural influences at the time, I’m not inclined to bring charges against them.” He glanced at Jim and Sue Vanderhei. “Unless the victim’s parents insist on it.”

Jim Vanderhei hesitated.

“No!” his wife said vehemently. “I won’t have it, Jim! I won’t have Thad’s name dragged through the mud.” She pointed at Mike and Kyle, her hand trembling. “These boys didn’t make Thad climb in that awful tank with that unspeakable thing, and they’ll have to live with the memory of what happened for the rest of their lives. Don’t you think that’s punishment enough?”

Reluctantly, he nodded.

“Then I think we’re done here,” the sheriff said. “Thank you for your time, Mr. and Mrs. Vanderhei; again, I’m sorry for your loss.”

Unfortunately, Sue Vanderhei wasn’t finished. She stabbed a manicured finger in the chief’s direction. “None of this would have happened if he didn’t tolerate a demonic element in Pemkowet’s midst! Chief Bryant should be dismissed and that unholy underworld razed to the ground!”

“Amen,” Mr. and Mrs. Huizenga murmured in unison.

My tail thrashed, and I could feel the air tightening around me, the scent of ozone rising. I fought to keep a lid on my temper.

The chief glanced at me with his sleepy-lidded Robert Mitchum eyes. “Go ahead, Daisy.”

“I’m sorry,” I said to the parents. “But none of this would have happened if your sons hadn’t thought it was a great joke to spend their time browsing Schtupernatural-dot-com, if they hadn’t decided that sexually abusing an eldritch being—a sentient, feeling being held captive against her will—would make them Masters of the Universe. The ghouls preyed on the rusalka’s emotions, yes. But they relied on ordinary human men like your sons to make her suffer.”

There was another silence.

It was Kyle Middleton who broke it, emerging from his catatonic state. “We didn’t know,” he whispered. “We didn’t know what we were getting into. The ad didn’t say anything about her being held captive. And Matt, Matt Mollenkamp . . . Matt and Ron said . . . Matt and Ron, they said . . .” His voice cracked. “We didn’t know!”

“I believe you,” I said. “But you went through with it anyway when you found out, didn’t you?”

“We tried to, yeah.” His haunted gaze met mine. “Or at least, we would have. Thad went first.”

I couldn’t help it; I felt sorry for him. Sue Vanderhei might be high-strung and intolerant, but she was right about one thing.

It was a lot to live with for the rest of their lives.

Forty-two

Bit by bit, things returned to normal in Pemkowet.

I went back to being a part-time file clerk at the police department, albeit one with a magic dagger on her hip and the Oak King’s token strung on a chain of dwarf-mined silver around her neck. Cody went back to working patrol on the night shift, and we saw less of each other. I found myself missing him: the real Cody, the Cody I’d come to know, not just the object of my long-standing crush. Even if I’d wanted more, I’d liked having a partner.

I continued to avoid Stefan.

Stefan continued to be patient. I had a feeling his patience could wear down mountains. Whether or not it could wear down me, we’d have to wait and see. It was going to take me a while to forget the sight of him impaling himself on his own sword, and I still wasn’t thrilled about the fact that he was attuned to my emotions.

Lurine returned from Seattle with a satisfyingly stirring tale of seeing the rusalka turned loose in Puget Sound, returning to the wild, and heading unerringly toward her home somewhere in the Bering Sea, free and unfettered.

I wished I could have been there to see it.

After spending a week at home, Jen’s sister, Bethany, put on a much-needed ten pounds, copped a healthier attitude toward her bloodsucker beau . . . and promptly caved when Geoffrey the insufferable prat begged her to return to the House of Shadows, vowing for the umpteenth time to make good on his promise to change her.