Night Rune (Prof Croft Book 8) Brad Magnarella (the red fox clan TXT) 📖

underground wasn’t helping. Neither was the incessant ringing of the telephones or the mewling cries of the plant jonesing for my blood.

“Is there somewhere saner we can talk?” I asked.

“Saner?” Claudius glanced around before an idea appeared to strike him. “Yes, follow me.” As he turned to lead the way, I noticed the back of his head was bald, the hair completely sheared off.

“What happened to your hair?” I asked.

He brought a hand to the crown of his head. “What about it?”

“In back.”

His fingers jumped as they encountered the bald skin. He felt around it for another moment, then gave it several pats.

“Oh, yes. That. I was testing possible routes to the Harkless Rift. One realm was made of a living jelly. It gave every indication it would let me pass, but then turned testy when I started wading through it. I’m lucky that’s all it ate off.” He led the way up a spiral staircase that ended at a landing. “After you,” he said, holding a door open.

I hesitated before stepping through a rack of winter coats. Half expecting to emerge into another nightmare realm, I was surprised to find a suburban-looking living room, sunlight glowing through a picture window. Claudius shuffled past me.

“I’ll put on some tea,” he said. “Have a seat.” He waved toward a couch with floral upholstery.

“Where are we?” I called.

“Home sweet home.”

“Right, but where?”

“Oh, ah, outside Annapolis, Maryland,” he said as he disappeared into a kitchen. “Or is it Peoria, Illinois?”

I could hear him considering the question in a mutter beneath the opening and closing of cupboards. The living room, with its matching furniture set, cream carpeting, and generic landscape prints, looked shockingly pedestrian. Compared to the basement, we could have been in an alternate universe.

The doorbell rang. “Claudi-poo!” a woman’s voice called.

From the kitchen, a metal teapot clanged to the floor. “Don’t answer that!” Claudius called.

I craned my neck around. Through the diaphanous curtain, I made out the profile of a squat woman with a coif of frosted pink hair. She was holding a tinfoil-covered plate to her chest. The doorbell rang again.

“I have your favorite treat!” she sang.

The kitchen went very quiet. I caught myself hunkering from her view.

After another round of bell-ringing, the woman said, “Well, fudge!” and clopped off.

Moments later, Claudius peered from the kitchen on hands and knees. “Is she gone?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

He retreated, then emerged upright carrying a platter with a teapot, cups, and cream and sugar. He arranged everything on the coffee table, then shuffled to the door, opened it furtively, and retrieved the plate the woman had left on the stoop. Returning, he removed the tinfoil from a heap of golden cookies.

“She’s in my book group,” Claudius explained, setting the plate beside the tea platter. “Recently widowed. Had me over for dinner last month, and I’m afraid I let things go a little too far. Makes a tasty gingersnap, though.” He popped one into his mouth and poured the steaming tea. “Now,” he said as he settled into a soft chair with his cup and saucer. “What did you want to talk about?”

“So, no luck reaching the Order?”

“I’m afraid not. The senior members accessed the rift through their collective powers. I’m not near that level, and my few attempts at shortcuts didn’t go so well.” He patted the back of his head, producing a slapping sound.

“Any idea how they got trapped?”

Claudius slurped his tea and made a thoughtful face. “I guess I haven’t really considered it. Or if I have, I’ve forgotten.”

“Could a demon have done it?”

“A demon? It’s possible, I suppose.”

Assuming Claudius had also forgotten the story about Arianna visiting my dream and telling me to find Arnaud, I recounted it for him. I also told him about my adventure in the time catch. “So I have Arnaud,” I finished. “And somehow that’s supposed to free Arianna and the other members of the Order. But there’s been no follow-up from her. I’m guessing because she can’t reach me.”

“No, probably not,” Claudius muttered. He was squinting at a note his amour had tucked among the cookies. I caught a couple R-rated words. Claudius flinched before disappearing the note into a jacket pocket.

“What if Arnaud’s master trapped them?” I asked.

“His master?” Claudius frowned as he polished off another cookie.

“Malphas,” I continued. “He’s ambitious, powerful. He was manipulating energy in the time catch, we think to create a portal he could enter by. What if he knew that the biggest threat to his plan was a response from the Order?” I was presenting the questions more to myself than Claudius, who appeared more interested in the refreshments. “What if he was the one who trapped them in the Harkless Rift?”

“I don’t like where this is going.”

I looked up from my tea, surprised to find him regarding me sternly. “Where what’s going?”

“You’re wondering if the solution is to offer Malphas’s servant to him in exchange for the Order’s release.”

I stared at him for another moment. That was exactly what I’d been thinking, because why else would Arianna have directed me to find Arnaud? “It would be bargaining with a demon master, sure…” I began.

“Never a good idea.”

“Well, I happen to agree, but if it leads to the Order’s release…”

“I still don’t like it.”

Neither would Vega, I thought, remembering our talk in her office and the way her protective instincts had flared up. She would never forgive me for releasing Arnaud, no matter what we received in exchange. But I couldn’t stop thinking about how, once freed, the senior members of our Order would be able to enter the time catch and recover the Upholders, not to mention boost our firepower against the demons.

After another moment, I exhaled. “All right,” I said in concession. “I’ll wait for Arianna’s guidance. But in the meantime I have to recover the others from the time catch. That’s non-negotiable.”

“You mean 1776 New York?”

Maybe it was the high volume of ginger he was consuming, but Claudius’s mind seemed to have sharpened in the last