Page 7 of His Human Believer

“Well, she does this for a living,” Dagr says.

“This human hosts an entertainment program.”

“She solves cold cases.” Dagr still hasn’t looked up. “The program is about the cases.”

“Thank you, Dagr,” I say and turn back to Vidar. “But I’m retired from the IBB and it’s true that I’m on vacation. I should be here to help with Halloween and make sure none of the kids get sick from eating too much Halloween candy. I do not plan to work on your investigation.”

“Good,” Dr. Coalstone says. Satisfied. Matter closed.

And that lands wrong somewhere under my ribs, which is ridiculous, because I am on vacation, and because it turns out I’d rather have been asked and turned down than not asked at all.

Then he adds, “You should understand that this is a credentialed evaluation, Ms. Reyes. My findings will be submitted to the Royal Academy and to the peacekeepers. They must be defensible. Unimpeachable.”

“I know what an evaluation is.”

“Then you understand why I cannot have an unaffiliated investigator with a public audience working adjacent to my fieldwork. Anything you published would compromise the objectivity of the record.”

“And for my part,” I snort, “I don’t work under anybody’s credentials. Ever. That’s the whole methodology. The second I’m attached to somebody else’s findings, I’m not independent, and if I’m not independent, I’ve got nothing.”

“Then we agree.”

“Yes, we will stay out of each other’s way.”

“That would be best.” Vidar stands and collects a hard-shell case from beside the couch.

I turn to Avery, because I’ve been sitting on this for twenty minutes and she has been watching me learn all my information from a stranger. “You should have told me.”

She puts her palms up. “I told you.”

I point at Vidar. “You did not tell me the Royal Academy sent a Senior Fellow to run instrumentation off your back wall.”

“Well, that part’s new.”

“Avery.”

She sighs. And then she says it straight out, in front of everyone, including Vidar. “If I’d told you, you’d have come here to work.”

“I came to see Mitry.”

“Mar,” she says gently. “You’d have come to work, and I was hoping to keep this a fun visitation and not let it turn into something more.” She waves her hand. “Let him focus on the case, that’s what he’s here for. You and I can still have fun setting up the very first human Halloween on Tarvos.”

I don’t have an answer for that, because there isn’t one.

“She is correct,” Hannibal says into his drink.

“Nobody asked you, Hellstone.”

Vidar shoulders the case. He inclines his head to Avery, then to Hannibal. Then, last, to me. “Ms. Reyes.”

I look up.

“For the record,” he says, “I was not told you were coming either.”

Then he’s out the side door and gone.

“He didn’t fully answer your question about the golden eyes,” Dagr comments. He still hasn’t looked up from his tablet.

“I know,” I say.