Deceptions (Cainsville 3)

"We've been led up and down these streets. Now our target has vanished into a dark alley. I don't believe it takes an omen to signal we're being led into a trap."

"So we retreat?"

"No, we proceed with extreme caution."

The dark alley was actually a narrow road between buildings. It wasn't all that dark, either, only dim from the shadow of one building stretching across to the other. It was still midday, and we could hear the shouts of men at a construction site a block over. The last dangerous place I'd ventured had been an abandoned psychiatric hospital at 2 A.M. This was nothing.

There was no sign

of Ransom. When we got halfway down the lane, Gabriel pointed to the mouth of an adjoining alley. Which meant that Ransom could have gone that way . . . or be lying in wait there to pounce on us.

"I'm going to check," Gabriel said. "Wait here and stand watch, please."

When he reached the intersection, he peered around it. At a noise behind me, I glanced around to see a plastic bag tumbling my way. I turned back and . . .

No Gabriel.

I was almost ashamed of the sudden impulse to run and see where he'd gone. Um, down the side alley obviously. I waited a minute. Then I walked to the intersection and looked around the corner to see . . .

A dead end.

The alley was only about ten feet long and stopped at a chain-link fence. I couldn't imagine Gabriel hopping that fence. He's too big to be agile, and his dignity stops him from doing anything that could look, well, undignified.

I walked to the fence and peered through. No sign of Gabriel. That's when my heart started pounding in earnest. And when I started cursing us both out for not retrieving our cell phones from the car before we set off to follow a Huntsman.

I returned to the lane and walked along it. When a dark shadow loomed over me, I turned with a greeting on my lips. No one was there. The shadow stayed, though, and I craned my neck to see an owl perched on the roof above.

Owl in daytime. Always a bad sign.

I rubbed the back of my neck.

Across the road at the end of the lane was a block of housing. An old woman stood in a rear yard scrubbing clothing in a basin with a washboard. I crossed the road, pulled by the archaic sight. She had her head down, scrubbing diligently while crooning to herself. I walked right up to the fence and peered over. I could see her long, snarled hair and her reed-thin, wizened arms. When she raised her head, I knew what I'd see. Those blackened, jagged teeth. That long nose and sunken eyes--one black and one gray.

"Y mae mor salw a Gwrach y Rhibyn," I whispered.

Her mouth opened. "Fy mhlentyn, fy mhlentyn bach," she shrieked. "Fy mhlentyn, fy mhlentyn bach."

My child. My little child.

The bean nighe warns of death.

As she wailed, I stared at the white shirt in her hand. Gabriel's shirt.

I turned, tripping and stumbling down the road. Then there was no road. I was in a field. I took two staggering steps and felt the soft earth beneath my feet and the long grass whispering against my legs. The field flickered, like a broken recording, and I was on the street again, feeling the pavement and hearing the whine of distant machinery. Two more steps and I was back in the field, a butterfly tickling past, the smell of wildflowers on the breeze.

I stopped and pressed my palms to my eyes.

I have to stay in the real world. Gabriel's there.

I heard the shouts of construction workers and smelled the stink of fresh asphalt, and when I opened my eyes, I was on the street. I searched for a sign.

Nothing. Even the owl was gone. I spun back to Gwrach y Rhibyn, but in her place was an ordinary woman hanging out her laundry.

I raced across the road, ignoring the honk of a passing truck driver. I was almost back to the lane when I heard a psst, like a child trying to get my attention. It was indeed a child. A little blond girl, one I'd seen before and one who was as out of place in this world as Gwrach y Rhibyn. Unlike the crone, she looked as if she belonged--a girl in a pale green sundress and neon-green jelly sandals. In one hand she carried a stuffed animal, so old I couldn't even tell what it was. Her other fist was clenched, but I knew what it held: black and white stones.

I'd seen her before, in my dreams. I'd been her in an earlier vision of Gwrach y Rhibyn. Seeing her here, though, made the ground seem to shift under my feet.

"I have a story," she said. "Do you want to hear it?"