Chapter 47: Chapter 44: Behind the curtain

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> “Treaty negotiations are going smoothly. There should be an agreement within a fortnight. Or so I hear. It will take some time, however, for the news to reach anyone other than me.”

“Y-you!” I stammered before Beatrice nudged me in the ribs.

“Shhh,” she said as she set the box down on the table and waited for Dalia de Wyck to respond.

“Hmm,” said Dalia, who was holding a crystal tumbler with some sort of brown liquid at the bottom. “Why are there only two of you?”

“I’m sorry,” said Beatrice. “Are we in the right place?”

Dalia took a sip from the glass before taking a seat in the head chair.

“Can’t hear you so well. This table is ridiculously large. I’m not sure why I ever bought it. Can you come up here and take a seat?”

I looked at Beatrice for her lead, but she just shrugged her shoulders slightly and picked up the box. The far side of the room sported a large flatscreen television mounted on the wall, an old-fashioned bar cart, and two more doors, which would complicate any escape route that way, and I doubted that the elevator the floor above us would answer our call.

So we walked the length of the table slowly and my thoughts raced in 40 different directions, none of them helpful, until we reached the second and third chairs away from Dalia and sat.

“Much better,” she said. Her black hair streaked with strands of silver and brown, which fell down past her shoulders. She was wearing a bright red dress that had the same intricate embroidery as the dress from the Met lecture. Up close, I could see that it depicted a magnificent tree.

“Now, before we go any further, you,” she turned her eyes at me, “seem to have an idea of who I am, but I think some formal introductions are in order. I am Dalia de Wyck, creative director of Thera DeWitt, but more importantly for our purposes, the 13th chairman of the Guild.”

“Wait, you’re the head of the Guild?” I said, incredulously.

Dalia smiled.

“You were expecting a wrinkled old geezer with a monocle? Or a maybe a slightly younger but taller man who dyes his hair gray to look more distinguished?”

“Well, no,” I replied, “but-”

“You must be the famed Beatrice Taylor née Stallard,” said Dalia, turning her attention away from me. “I’ve heard a lot about you. Mostly good. Although it’s my understanding that you were the one responsible for the demise of Winston.”

“That’s because you sent him to kill me,” she said calmly. “And I didn’t mean to kill him.”

Dalia raised an eyebrow.

“Oh? Well, in any event, you’re mistaken. I didn’t send him after you. That was all Gilbert’s doing. I only heard about it afterward. We generally stay out of the murder business, whereas you seem quite drawn to it.”

Another jab landed and I wondered when the dam would break and Beatrice would unleash her fury. But instead, Dalia shifted her focus back to me.

“And you, well, I’m afraid I don’t really know who you are, other than Ms. Taylor’s latest trainee.”

“I’m Jade Peters,” I said, gripping the leather armrests with my fingernails. “And I’m no trainee.”

“If you say so,” said Dalia. “But that leaves one person missing. Where is Francesca?”

“She’s somewhere safe,” said Beatrice.

“I see,” said Dalia. “But where are my manners? Would you ladies care for a drink?” She gestured to the bar cart in the corner, which held crystal decanters of various shapes.

“No th-” I began before Beatrice cut me off.

“Thank you. We’ll have whatever you’re drinking.”

“A fine choice,” said Dalia, finishing her glass off. “Although I can assure you that the other bottles are not poisoned either.”

She stood up from the table and returned with a decanter full of the same brown liquid that had been in her glass moments ago, along with two tumblers. Those Dalia filled, along with her own with what I assumed was whiskey and we each grabbed one with trepidation.

“To a fruitful discussion,” said Dalia, raising her glass, which I now saw had a small bird etched into one of its facets. I pantomimed her gesture, as did Beatrice, and then took a sip of the liquor. It felt smooth, yet also hot against my throat, it tasted smoky but somehow also sweet, and it smelled like a thousand different memories that had come bursting out of my brain.

“What is this?” I asked, taking another sip.

“Something from the Guild’s private collection,” said Dalia. “At this point, we’ve lost track of the year it was made, but if I had to guess, it probably dates back to the early 1800s.”

“And you just have it lying around here, like a bottle of supermarket whiskey?” Beatrice said incredulously.

“Of course not. I had it brought over from the Guild Hall specifically for the occasion. But let’s get back to business, shall we? You were saying that Ms. Lewis is somewhere safe. When were you planning on releasing her to our custody?”

“First things first,” said Beatrice. “Call off your dogs. Gilbert, the tracker, whoever else you have stalking us.”

“I can assure you I don’t know what you’re talk-”

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“And then you’ll explain why you attacked us in the cave and again in the park.”

Dalia stared at us as if her gaze could pierce into our minds, and my heart skipped a beat at the thought that she had acquired the apples from the old man at Hunt’s Point. But after a few moments, she shook her head and let out a big sigh.

“I’m afraid you are sadly mistaken on all fronts,” she said. “No one from the Guild attacked you, either in a cave or a park, and we certainly aren’t ’tracking’ you.”

“Then why don’t you tell us wh-”

Dalia held up her hand and Beatrice stopped.

“Let’s just start from the beginning. You two took on a Raid last month to uncover information from a tattoo on Frankie’s back, correct?”

“Yes,” we said in unison.

“But what you didn’t know was that you were working on behalf of our adversary, who has been trying for years to locate our Keeper.”

“Frankie?” I asked.

Dalia nodded.

“And a Keeper is . . . ” Beatrice chimed in.

“A protector of Guild secrets. The responsibility is passed down from parent to child, much like our Guild seats.”

“So you’re saying that whoever posted the Raid was trying to steal something from the Guild . . .” I said, the pieces slowly falling into place.

“Exactly. And they got you two to do their dirty work. We of course intercepted the first set of coordinates you turned in. But we didn’t know if you had figured out the rest.”

“So that’s why Gilbert was at the Met that night,” said Beatrice.

“What?” said Dalia, a tiny note of worry in her voice. “No, he wasn’t. He was staking out the door in Long Island City.”

“I saw him there. After we stole, err, took the door knobs,” said Beatrice.

“I can assure you that wasn’t him,” said Dalia. “You two have a long history, perhaps you were just imagining things.”

“Maybe,” said Beatrice. “Or maybe you’re just full of sh-”

“So,” I interjected. “If Gilbert was watching the door, then he saw us enter it?”

“Yes,” said Dalia. “He tried to follow but couldn’t open it.”

“That’s because we removed the knob from the other side,” said Beatrice.

“Ah,” said Dalia. “That explains that mystery.”

“But that doesn’t explain who attacked us,” I said. “If Gilbert couldn’t get through the door, then how did someone attack us in the cave?”

“The lighthouse has four doors,” said Beatrice. “Well, had four doors before someone burned it to the ground. They must have come through that door that still had a knob.”

“So someone else has access to the waypoint,” said Dalia, who finished her drink with a gulp.

“Is that what it was?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Dalia. “Our Keeper is responsible for guarding the location of the waypoint and its keys. But apparently somewhere along the way, one of them strayed in their mission. Continue.”

“We unlocked one of the doors with one of the knobs from the museum, passed through another portal, and ended up in a cave. Where we found this…”

I reached into the box, retrieved Rita’s diary from inside, and slid it across the table. Dalia eyed it silently for a few seconds before cracking open the cover and flipping through the pages slowly.

“This diary, it has been missing for a long time.”

She set it down in front of me and I picked it back up and flipped to the first page.

“Who was Rita van Asch?” I asked.

“She was the sixth chairman of the Guild. It was a particularly taxing time for the company. The Guild had splintered during the War for Independence and this,” she patted the cover of the diary, “recounts some of Rita’s efforts to rebuild our ranks in the war’s aftermath.”

“I see. Was this also hers?”

I put down the diary and pulled out the wooden box from the swamp, my eyes never leaving Dalia’s. Her features strained to hold back the excitement in her eyes and she rose from her chair to walk to the box.

“And thank you for returning this. We’ve-”

“It’s not what you think it is,” I said.

“What do you mean?” said Dalia, as she opened the box and pulled out one page of parchment with a small paragraph of writing. “This is-”

“The only page that was in the box,” said Beatrice. “Written in Rita’s handwriting. We were hoping you could help us make sense of it.”

Dalia poured over the front and back of the page as if the rest of the Compendium would magically unfold itself from within the paper.

“Where did you get this?” she said slowly.

“We think you well know where we got it,” said Beatrice. “Seeing as how one of your thugs tried to attack us immediately after we found it.”

“Again, I don’t know what you’re talking about. There’s no one from the Guild following you or tracking you or whatever you may think is happening. You’re attaching a level of importance to yourself, Ms. Taylor, that is not in tune with reality. So now that we’ve established that, why don’t you tell me what the beak of an extinct bird has to do with our present situation.”

“It’s Frankie,” I said slowly.

“What about her?”

“She’s . . . I . . . I turned her to stone.”

Dalia’s hands suddenly strained against the table and I was afraid that she was somehow going to crack through the wood. But after a few moments, she eased back and sat down.

“You turned her to stone,” said Dalia, repeating my words back to me as if I was a child telling an obvious lie about why the cookie jar was empty. “Explain.”

I nodded and recounted the rest of our misadventure in the cave. Dalia’s eyes perked up at the mention of the missing box but she let me continued uninterrupted and I described how we had been rendered unconscious and had woken up to find a bound Frankie lying on the cave floor, the box gone. I clamped down my emotions as I narrated our escape, neglecting to mention Beatrice’s ring, and my decision in the fire to stab Frankie with the Medoblad, rather than let her burn to death. The ordeal finished, I picked up my glass and relieved it of the rest of its contents.

“A fine tale, to be sure,” said Dalia. “But not the truth.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, wondering if she had picked up on my strategic omissions.

“You expect me to believe that hoi polloi like you have one of the legendary Relics.”

“We don’t need you to believe anything,” said Beatrice. “Because, yes, I am the Keeper of the Medoblad.”

“The Keeper of the Medoblad?” Dalia let out a chuckle and I sensed this meeting was taking a course from which we would not be able to correct. “Did you happen to bring that Relic with you today?”

“Why would I do that?” asked Beatrice. “So you can just take it from me?”

“How convenient,” said Dalia. “But yes, I would have. Regardless, if you actually possessed the Blad, like you claim, we wouldn’t be in this mess to begin with.”

“What do you me-”

“This audience has gone on long enough. You two have 24 hours to return Frankie to me, in whatever state she’s currently in, along with the Medoblad. We’ll settle your debt to the Guild then.”

“You can have the girl,” said Beatrice. “But you’re daft if you think I’m giving you the Medoblad.”

“I see,” said Dalia. “So be it. But before you go, let me leave you with a history lesson. Have you heard of Curtana, the Sword of Mercy?”

“Can’t say that I have,” said Beatrice.

“The blade itself dates back to the time of Tristan. Yes, that Tristan. It’s also one of the swords used in the coronation of a new British monarch. Well, it was, until it went missing in the early 1600s and had to be remade by the London Worshipful Company of Cutlers. I’ll leave you to ponder who took it and whether you think you’re capable of succeeding where the British royal family failed.”

We stood up and Beatrice began putting the book and wooden box away when Dalia started shaking her head.

“What are you doing?”

“We’re leaving,” Beatrice replied curtly. “What does it lo-”

“No, I meant with those,” Dalia said, pointing to the trove we had brought. “Those are Guild property. So you’ll be leaving them here, if you don’t mind.”

Beatrice clutched the diary against her chest and I looked back and forth between the two of them, wanting more than anything to duck under the table. The battle of wills continued for another minute before Beatrice finally relented and put the book back down on the table.

“Fine,” she said, stacking the diary on top of the wooden box.

“Ahem,” said Dalia. “I believe you’re forgetting something.”

“What is that?” asked Beatrice.

“That ring, below your wedding band, it’s ours too.”

Beatrice opened her mouth to say something but thought better of it and silently removed her wedding band and then the last memory ring, which she plunked down on the table.

“Anything else?” said Beatrice, the anger in her voice rising. “Would you like my fir-”

I grabbed her hand and she stopped.

“Let’s just get out of here,” I whispered.

“It’s been a pleasure, ladies,” said Dalia. “We’ll be in touch about tomorrow. You can see yourselves out.”

Next: Desperate times call for desperate measures.