Page 126 of Dead Beat

Had the priests sent them to spy on her? To frighten her?

“I don’t suppose we have a magic spell for avoiding owl attacks?” she asked.

“Even if we did, I’m not sure those are ordinary owls.”

She wanted to take Darlington’s hand. She wanted to kiss him goodbye. Instead, she backed down the front walk, keeping an eye on the roof. “Leave me alone, you creepy moon-faced weirdos.”

Alex supposed if they were going to dive-bomb her, they were missing the perfect chance.

“Let’s go,” she said when they reached the sidewalk. “But you’re not going to see anything. Not unless you drink Hiram’s elixir.”

“You can just drink a potion and see ghosts?” Turner asked.

“Side effects may include kidney failure,” Dawes said.

Turner pulled up his collar. “I’ll pass.”

Alex buried her hands in her coat pockets as they turned down Temple. She had never gotten used to the cold. Maybe it was too many years in the California sun, the hard-baked heat of Van Nuys blacktop, and the steady burn of Valley sage. New England would probably always feel wrong to her.

Turner made a disgusted noise when they passed beneath the towering Egyptian gates that read, THE DEAD SHALL BE RAISED.

“Uncorrupted,” he complained, finishing the proper read of the line. “The dead shall be raised uncorrupted. What is wrong with you people?”

“They’re here,” she said as she caught sight of the Bridegroom and Hector waiting by Arthur Twining Hadley’s tomb with its soaring Celtic cross. The font, Darlington had once pointed out. That curving bridge between Deco and Nouveau. Deeply romantic. She was glad to have his voice in her head, and it did look like something that had been dragged over from Avalon.

Alex knew Hadley had been a member of Skull and Bones and later president of Yale. He had died in Japan, and there was a story that he’d been buried in full samurai regalia, complete with sword. He had been alive to see Harkness built, and the quadrangle. Had he known what some of the alumni from his society were planning? Had he helped to shepherd the projects himself?

“I don’t like this,” said Dawes.

“You could have stayed home.”

“No, I could not.”

“What do they look like?” asked Turner.

“The Bridegroom looks like Morrissey,” she said. “But bloodier. Hector is wearing a suit.”

She left it at that. Grays appeared as they had in death and the soldier’s suit was soaked, its pockets bulging with stones. There was a sweetness to his face, a childishness that was at odds with the burly shoulders and thick neck.

“Hi, Hec,” she said. “You don’t know it, but we’ve met before.”

“We have?”

“Sort of.”

“This is so weird,” whispered Turner.

“I can hear you and so can he.”

“It’s hard to get used to,” Dawes said.

Turner clamped his lips shut. He was trying.

“I need to know what you know,” she said to Hec.

“About what?”

“All of it,” she said. “The Gauntlet. The armor.”