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At first I thought to ask him about Chase, but then I stopped myself. No use putting the detective in danger, in case Herne’s bad mood extended to him as well. I quickly restructured my question.
“Have you heard of the Bog Eater? Do you know if he’s near?” Might as well ask something that could help us.
Herne choked. “Now I understand why I don’t trust you. Yes, that piece of filth is near. Anyone who cozies up with the likes of Stollen Kom Lightly deserves what she gets.”
“I’m not—” I started to say, then stopped as Herne and Tra vanished in a swirl of frost-covered leaves. Both confused and relieved—we’d gotten off lightly—I turned to Delilah.
She broke into a nervous smirk. “You know the old proverb: Foolish are those who summon the gods, for the gods might just answer.”
“I didn’t summon him. And Tra gives me the creeps. I hope he behaves and leaves us alone.” Still shaking, I forced myself to calm down. “At least we know the Bog Eater is near.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any better.” Delilah let out a long sigh and shook her head. “I smell Chase.” She pointed through a patch of waist-high ferns. “I think he’s that way.”
We plunged through the fronds, limp from winter’s chill, and the rattle of dried leaves echoed with our passing. The overgrowth was dry from the winter, and leaves shattered with our touch, breaking into shards as we pushed our way through the tangle.
“Why would Chase have come this way? Maybe he ran off the path?” Delilah asked, but I could tell she already knew the answer.
“Easy one. Either he was carried, or he was running away from something and looking for a place to hide.” I shook my head, gazing around in the unending sea of foliage. “How are we going to find him? I’m beginning to think we’re nuts for coming in here on our own. We should have at least brought Smoky with us.”
Delilah paused, then pointed ahead. “Look!”
I followed her gaze and there, in the tangle of a briar bush that bordered a glen, saw a jacket. It had to be Chase’s.
We shoved our way through the last of the bushes over to the brambles, and I gingerly removed the jacket from the branch. It stuck on the thorns and I tugged, then tugged harder, and it ripped into my hands. I held it up to Delilah’s nose, but even from here I could smell Chase on it. He’d come this way.
“He must have been in a big hurry if he had to leave this.” I peeked through the pockets and took out his wallet, badge, checkbook, and anything else that looked like it might be important. As I did so, a card fell out. It was the business card of a local psychic—one I knew was legit and fairly accurate. I said nothing, but put it back into the wallet.
Delilah leaned over, and when she stood up again, she was holding a gun in her gloved fingers. “Chase’s gun. And it’s been fired. This is not a good sign.” She looked around, her eyes brimming, but she didn’t cry. She merely slid the gun’s safety on and placed it into the bag containing the iron cuffs she carried.
“Should we continue?” I glanced around the glen. Ringed by tall oak and cedar, the glen was shaded and the ground dusted with a thick layer of white. Something caught my attention. At second look, I could see where something—or someone—had been dragged through the hoarfrost. “Look—there.”
Delilah knelt by the tracks. She sniffed, holding the breath deep inside for a moment before slowly exhaling. “Chase. Chase was here. Something caught him and he fired at it, dropping his gun. Whatever it was, I think it overpowered him.”
I followed the tracks with my eyes. “That looks like someone dragging dead weight—I don’t see footprints indicating he was on his feet.” If he’d been running after them, or resisting, it would have looked more like a scuffle.
“Come on.” Delilah headed across the glen and I followed her, not wanting to go farther without additional help. But Chase had been captured, and who knew what had hold of him?
I fell in beside her and we followed the trail of trampled grass. When we came to the other side of the glen, there was a short path through a ring of cedar and oak, and we cautiously navigated through it, with Delilah’s nose checking the air while I kept glancing over my shoulder to watch our backs.
And then, as we pushed through the trees, we found ourselves on the edge of a bog—long and wide—that stretched almost beyond eyesight. I caught the silhouette of land on the other side, but the marsh was covered with wisps of mist that lingered above the ground and it was hard to see much through the vapor. The smell of peat was strong, and the acrid scent of decaying vegetation rang sour through the air.
I gazed at the wide expanse of wetlands. Fens were treacherous. If we tried to work our way through there without the proper equipment, chances were we could get bogged down, no pun intended. There was no easy way to tell where the path was—the frost covered everything as it had back in the glen, but with the tangled foliage, it was impossible to follow any trail that Chase might have made.
Overhead, a mournful call echoed as a team of ducks came winging by.
Delilah turned to me, her face pale. “Want to make a bet the Bog Eater is out there, waiting? Do you think he has Chase?”
“If he does, then Chase might as well be dead.” The words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them. At her pained look, I bit my lip and then lightly laid my hand on her arm. “I hope not. Aeval didn’t think so. Do you think he was dragged away into this strip of forest rather than the bog? Do you want to look?”
She gave a hopeless shrug. “Do you think we’ll find anything? Or do you really think he’s out there . . . dead?”
For the first time, even through all of the crap we’d been through, I saw defeat on her face as she held her breath, waiting for my answer. And that tore up my heart. Of all three of us, she was the eternal optimist, and though I was glad she’d grown up—she had desperately needed a dose of realism in order to be able to face what we were up against—the realization that my younger sister was no longer the happy-go-lucky kitten pained me.
I steeled myself and did something I rarely did. I lied.
“I don’t think he’s dead. No. If the Bog Eater had caught him, he would have eaten him up right there and we’d have found bloody remains. I think something else caught hold of him. Now, whether he’s out in the bog or not, I’m not sure. We can’t check on that without more help. But let’s walk along the edge of the fen here, there’s room enough—just be cautious for quicksand—and see if we can find any sign that whatever dragged him away took him into the forest instead.”
Delilah began to breathe again. She flashed me a grateful look and leaned down to kiss my cheek. “Bless you. You’ve always known just the right thing to say. I know it’s been hard, over the years—you’ve kept the family going and now, with what Father pulled on you—but . . . Menolly and I both owe you so much.”
