“What are you going to do?” Kitsune asked.
“Fix this,” Oliver said, laughing a bit wildly, feeling hysteria overcome him. “I’m going to fix all of this shit.”
He said nothing of his father’s murder or of his missing sister. Now was not the time. Later there would be an opportunity. At the moment, all that mattered was getting out of London without further trouble.
They had reached the bridge and started to walk over it. From behind, there erupted a braying police siren. Oliver spun and saw a police car stopped at the corner where he had called Julianna, where the Borderkind had appeared in front of Battersea Park and likely shaken the faith those people had in the world around them.
“They’re coming. Any minute.” Desperate, he looked to Blue Jay. “You’ve got to get out of here with him.”
The trickster smiled. “We’ll see you at Trafalgar Square.”
Then Blue Jay dumped Gong Gong over the bridge. Oliver shouted but could not stop him. As he fell, the dragon seemed to awaken, twisting his body around, trying to spread his wings. He hit the water like an anchor and sank.
“What the hell—”
Kitsune grabbed Oliver’s hand. “He will be all right. He is the Black Dragon of Storms. He needed to sleep to heal. He saved our lives. Now he will wake.”
Upon those words there was a crash of thunder across the sky so loud that Oliver scanned the storm clouds for some sign of catastrophe. It sounded like the whole world was cracking open. Lightning played up in the clouds but did not reach its fingers down toward earth. The snow sped up, falling more heavily now. It had been a clear day not long before and now it was growing steadily into a blizzard.
Oliver looked down over the bridge to where Gong Gong had hit the water and saw a ripple on the surface of the river and a shape moving beneath, an enormous thing that seemed to make the water heave upward. Then it was gone.
“Until we meet again,” Blue Jay said.
It was not the blink of an eye, but a fraction of that. Blue Jay vanished, and where he had been was a small bird with the same cerulean feathers that had been tied in his hair. The bird flapped its wings and darted out over the Thames, weaving through the snowstorm as though at play.
Kitsune twined her fingers with his.
“We will be all right now,” she said.
The braying siren— so different in its grating wail from those in America— moved closer. Oliver glanced over and saw that the traffic had started to move, stubborn gawkers reluctantly giving way to the police car.
He shook his head. “No, Kitsune.”
“We’ll walk hand in hand,” she said, wincing slightly as she touched her abdomen again, then smiling weakly. “They will think us lovers.”
He stared at her. “You don’t understand, you’re unmistakable. A beautiful Asian woman in a fox-fur cloak. It might not matter, but if they ask you for identification and you don’t have any, they might want to question you about whatever those people back there saw, and we can’t afford that. If you’re being held, and the Hunters come for you—”
She held up a hand to cut him off. “I’m not thinking clearly. I shall see you at midday at Admiral Nelson’s feet.”
Oliver would never watch her transformation without holding his breath in astonishment. The cloak flowed around her. He watched those jade eyes as her face became the narrow, cunning face of the fox and copper fur enveloped her. The woman was gone. At Oliver’s feet was the small, lithe fox.
The police siren warbled.
Kitsune darted away across the bridge, northward through the falling snow, a small limp to her walk.
Oliver started to walk after her, taking his time, wanting attention to remain on him as she disappeared into the storm. A passing motorist shouted something at him. Then the voice was drowned out by the police siren and he heard the squeak of brakes in need of fixing as the car rolled to a stop beside him, engine rumbling. A door opened.
The siren cut out.
Back along the way Oliver had come, just at the beginning of the bridge, electrician Keith watched warily, keeping well back as though afraid a battle might break out.
“Oh, thank God!” Oliver said as the officers got out of their car and came toward him. He gave them no opportunity to ask questions. “You know, in the States we have a saying, there’s never a cop around when you need one. I’m so glad to see you guys.”
“That right?” said the larger and older of the two, his cap pulled down snugly over his thinning silver hair. “Got the impression you’d rather avoid us, sir. We’ve got a few questions for you.”
Oliver blinked in feigned confusion, remembering the exhilaration he had felt the first time he had ever stepped onstage as an actor. The freedom in it. There was freedom in this as well, for it was just another sort of performance.
“Okay.” He shrugged, mystified, brushing some snow out of his eyes. “Whatever you say. But, look, I really need some help. I was walking in the park and stopped to make a call. When I came out of the phone booth I had my organizer out— the one with my British money and my passport— and this guy, this fucking guy, he bumps me and then takes off running. Looked like an Indian, that’s the weirdest thing. Native American, I mean. Feathers in his hair and everything.”
The older cop crossed his arms and stared doubtfully through the snow.
“Right, I’m sorry, you’re saying this Indian nicked your billfold?”
They both tensed as Oliver reached into his back pocket for his wallet, pushing the tail of the peacoat up to get to it. “Well, no, I mean, I’ve got my regular wallet, but that’s just credit cards and a little American money. My organizer’s like my travel wallet. All the stuff I needed for my visit here. American Express Travelers Cheques, that kind of thing. I was just hoping you could take me to an American Express office. I can’t even take a cab ’cause I have no British money. I think there’s one by Buckingham Palace, right?”
He frowned as though he was thinking hard on the question and actually scratched at the several days’ stubble on his chin. With his rustic shirt and his peacoat and how badly he needed a shave, they probably figured him for homeless at first. What he wanted was for them to realize he was just another crazy American.
Oliver grinned and spread his arms, wallet clutched in one hand. “I’m kind of screwed here, boys. Help me out?”
The older cop rolled his eyes and gave a small sneer that spoke volumes on his opinion of Americans. The younger shook his head. He had a stoved-in nose like a prizefighter and wide-set eyes that made him look sad and sleepy. Snowflakes had begun to whiten the shoulders of their uniforms and the tops of their hats.
“Sir, we really need to ask you a few questions,” the prizefighter said. “Starting with your name.”
He gave them his shallowest American lawyer smile. “Oliver Bascombe, Kitteridge, Maine. U.S.A., obviously.”
“Obviously,” the older cop said drily.
Oliver gave them a sheepish look. “You can ask me anything you want, guys, but could we do it in the car? I’ve got a lunch date I’d really rather not miss. Met a girl here in London. Came for a few days and now I don’t know when I’ll go home. And I really need to get this thing sorted out. There wasn’t a lot of cash, but the Travelers Cheques . . . Anyway, can you ask me whatever you’ve got to ask me on the way? It would be a huge help.”
The prizefighter looked at his partner. The older man rolled his eyes again and stepped over to open the rear door of the police car, bowing like a chauffeur.
“By all means, sir. Hop in and we’ll have us a chat. We’ll help you get sorted.”
Oliver smiled broadly, stuffing his wallet back into his pocket. “Really? Thank you so much. Is this a great country or what?”
The whole situation was surreal. Oliver’s father had been murdered and mutilated, and his sister was missing. His own life was in peril and back home the police were no doubt wondering what had become of him as well. But on the outside, he was all smiles.
Happy and cooperative, he climbed into the car, brushing snow from his peacoat. The car rolled across the bridge, wipers clearing snow, the world beyond the windows beautifully white now. And the questions began. Oliver remained mystified. He didn’t know what the hell those people back at Battersea Park were talking about, he told them. The guy with the feathers in his hair, yeah. He’d seen that guy . . . fellow stole his organizer, after all. He even thought he recalled seeing the Asian woman they described, though he didn’t think she’d been bleeding. But a man made of ice?
That was just crazy talk. Weird, the things people imagined. And speaking of weird, wasn’t it strange how the weather had changed so suddenly?
Sort of nice, though, at Christmastime.
CHAPTER 17
The snowstorm in South London that morning had not been predicted by a single meteorologist, but it was over too quickly for any of them to have to apologize for the oversight. By ten minutes till noon, at which time Oliver was exiting Charing Cross tube station and emerging into Trafalgar Square, the day had turned a typical London gray and the temperature was falling. The wind across the square had a December bite that made pedestrians turn up their collars and vanquished any thoughts of lunch in the square or a pleasant stroll. The only people in Trafalgar Square that noontime were determined tourists and Londoners on their way from one place to another.
It had been a long time since Oliver had been to London, but Trafalgar Square appeared largely unchanged. The roads around the square seemed somehow narrower than he remembered, but that might have been a fault of his memory. Once upon a time it had been the King’s Mews, but in the mid-nineteenth century it was transformed into a broad city square of marble and granite to commemorate the Battle of Trafalgar, perhaps the most significant British naval triumph during the Napoleonic Wars. Oliver had a great fondness for the place because it was the tangible memorial to a part of history that fascinated him. There were other statues, other monuments in Trafalgar Square, but Nelson’s Column was always the most impressive. It towered imposingly over the rest of the square, and the statue of Lord Admiral Horatio Nelson looked out over the city from its peak. Nelson had led a fascinating life with a single-mindedness of purpose that Oliver had always found both intimidating and inspiring.
It was the first place that had come to mind when he had been forced to come up with a rendezvous under pressure. Given time to think, he might not have chosen it. Midday at the base of Nelson’s Column could not have been considered an inconspicuous meeting place. And yet he was pleased just the same.
Now he strode across the square toward a pair of older women wielding cameras who were bustling about the base of the column. No sign of his companions. Oliver let his gaze drift, surveying the whole square, almost faltering when he craned his neck round to see the National Gallery and the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. His favorite view was to the west, where Canada House stood proudly. Though it was hardly the grandest structure in London, there was something stolid and official about it that he had always admired.
Oliver had no watch, but the clock down in the tube station had been ticking toward noon. He hoped that the others would arrive momentarily, because otherwise he would have to entertain the idea that something had detained them, and the thought was deeply troubling.
When he reached Nelson’s Column he craned his neck to gaze up at the great admiral outlined against the sky, and he remained that way until the old women moved on to photograph some other monument. He leaned against the column and crossed his arms as though waiting for a train. There was little else he could do at the moment but watch cars going by at the outskirts of the square and the anonymous people passing through. There were beautiful fountains arranged around Nelson’s Column— perhaps a dozen feet from the base— but with the temperature they were not functioning, the statuary not spouting water today. The two he could see from his post by the column were filled with ice.
It was from there that the whisper came.
“Oliver.”
He looked up, eyes drawn immediately to the frozen fountain to his right. A smile came unbidden to his lips and a small, relieved chuckle followed after. During the tension at Battersea Park, Frost’s departure had been rushed, and though the winter man was likely the one amongst them most able to extricate himself from harm, still Oliver had worried for him.
A pair of dapperly dressed English businessmen strode by, both smoking cigarettes, trailing furling smoke trails behind them in the breeze. One muttered something to the other, eliciting a derisive grunt, but they did not so much as glance at Oliver. He glanced around and saw that the only other people nearby were a small cluster of young tourists, perhaps American exchange students, and a startlingly obese man who might have been their teacher or guide. But they were headed for the National Gallery.
There was still no sign of the others, but Oliver crossed to the fountain. The ice that was frozen there was sculpted into familiar jagged ridges that formed the face of the winter man.
“You’ve done well,” Frost said, with the snap of cracking ice. His blue-white eyes gazed up from the fountain.
Oliver grinned. “You were watching me?”
The fountain’s ice popped and shifted as Frost frowned. “I hadn’t anywhere else to go. When I am on this side of the Veil, I travel alone. It is difficult to be bound by the limits of flesh and bone.”
“Well, sorry to hold you up. I wouldn’t mind having the wind just carry me away when trouble starts.”
The winter man’s eyes grew dark. “You do not wish to trade lives with me. Despite the chaos you are experiencing now, there is still a place that you call home. I have never had a home.”
Oliver felt the urge to snap at him, to tell Frost that his father had been murdered and his sister stolen away, that his home had been torn apart by violence and grief that would never have intruded upon his life had he never met the winter man. But he knew that Frost was also in mourning, for the death of Yuki-Onna, and so he kept his bitterness to himself and the two of them shared a reflective moment in silence.
