I patted Lloergan, and Pamela tentatively did the same, then she said to Ricky, "It's yours?"
"She. Lloergan. One perk to being Arawn is getting my own cwn. Slightly damaged." He ruffled the hound's shredded ear. "A starter cwn."
Lloergan growled and he laughed, scratching behind her ears.
Pamela stepped away from the hound and looked around.
"Had you ever been here?" Ricky asked. "She'd have been your great-grandmother, right?"
"Granny Carew, yes. And yes, I spent...I spent many days here. Days and nights when I was little." She walked into the parlor and looked up. "The magpie frieze."
"One is for sorrow, two is for mirth," I said. "You taught me that."
"As she taught me. We used to--" She stopped, that hitch in her breathing again. She turned toward the window. "May I have a moment, Eden? I'm sure Ricky would appreciate an update, as patient as he's being."
We backed out. Gabriel went to start coffee, and I told Ricky what had happened.
"Holy shit," he whispered when I finished.
"I didn't want to call you in," I said. "After what she did to Gabriel, I couldn't take that chance."
He pulled me into a hug. "I get it. You didn't need to explain. How's Gabriel doing?"
"I can't tell right now. Everything feels like it's spinning a mile a minute, and there's no time to even stop and process what I'm thinking."
"Yeah."
"Felix?" Pamela said.
We startled out of our tete-a-tete and saw her standing at the base of the stairs, one hand on the polished banister, looking up at...
"Hey, TC," I said. "Yeah, that's my cat. TC."
"Short for 'the cat,' " Ricky said. "When Liv names animals, they're either dead simple or..." He waved at Lloergan. "Impossible to pronounce."
I stuck out my tongue at him. Then I noticed Pamela watching us, the way she'd been watching me with Gabriel. Analyzing. Processing. I stepped away, uncomfortable with the scrutiny.
TC chirped as he came down the stairs. He stopped three steps up, on eye level with Pamela. Then he chirped again.
"He looks like..." she began. She shook it off and stroked his head. He leaned into her hand and her fingers absently rubbed over his ear. Then she stopped, looked down, and touched a white spot behind his left ear. "No..."
TC chirped.
"You know him?" I said, walking to her.
"He's...was...Felix. My--" She cleared her throat. "My cat. Which should be impossible, but..."
"It's Cainsville," I said.
"There was a young woman. Hannah. She was friends with--" She glanced at Gabriel as he walked in with a tray of coffees. "Your aunt. Great-aunt."
"Rose," I said.
"Yes. Hannah said Felix was a matagot. I went to the library to look that up. I was concerned."
"That he was fae."
"He's not," she said emphatically. "It's French folklore, not Celtic. The book said he'd grant a gold coin a day. I asked Hannah about that, and she laughed. She said there'd be no gold, but that he was special. That was all. He was special."