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I’d have loved him in that other world, where such things were possible, but in this one, love would get us both killed. If he challenged Adair, he’d fail. And I’d lose him again. Whatever power he might have to change things, it wasn’t worth the risk. “Do as you were brought here to do, and go back to your life, far away from this place.” I picked up my book. “Far away from me.”
The bell tinkled, and when I looked again, he’d gone.
If he did as he was here to do, Adair might let him go. He’d leave, and we’d both continue on, him in Massalia, living a real life, in a real city, with real people. And me, here—I skimmed my gaze across the riot of colorful toys, listened to the clocks tick and the trains chug—trapped in a world of make-believe, a puppet on Adair’s string.
ChapterTwenty-Four
Valentine
If Devere would continue to be stubborn, I’d find my own answers, as I’d been attempting to do since the very beginning. The Lost Penny Inn was the same as before. I found my key conveniently in my pocket, and inside the room, my belongings were exactly where they’d been before I’d decided to leave.
When I opened the bureau drawer, bottles of laudanum clattered together. I had no desire to touch them, not with my head already full of illusion. But they were there, which meant events were taking place long before Devere had poured their contents away.
These were my first few days back in Minerva after fifteen years away, and for some inexplicable reason, I was living them for a second time.
I needed time to think and a moment tobreathe.
I ordered dinner in the bar lounge, and while eating, I went over everything I thought I knew and the great holes missing from that knowledge.
This inn was real. The fireplace, the other patrons, the tables and chairs. Real. I was real. The wine in my glass and on my lips was real. These were facts. But the events whirling around all of this seemed changeable. Like dreams. Dreams seemed real when we dreamed them and only appeared to be fantasy on waking. Dreams had no end and no beginning; they existed outside of time. Was I trapped in a dream? How would I know if I were?
While seemingly real, dreams did not follow logic. Whereas everything around me now appeared logical. Nobody was flying. There were no purple cats or unexplained happenings—besides those I’d lived. Day followed night, followed day. Time plodded on. This wasn’t a dream.
So what was it, then?
Devere knew and wouldn’t tell me. There were more layers at work here than those I could see. Still, among it all, I felt as though I did not belong. The outsider. The investigator from the city, returning to his hometown to solve the toymaker’s murder. I was part of this world, but also separate from it. Was there more to this detached feeling inside? If I embraced it instead of denying it, perhaps I’d learn something.
I’d already learned one thing: I wasn’t leaving. It wasn’t just because of Devere, although he’d become a large part of it. I had to know the reasons for all of this, and until I did, I couldn’t walk away. It also appeared as though the forces at work would not allow me to go.
Devere had previously mentioned monsters, alluding to the unknown. He’d talked about howtheycontrolled things. And now he’d mentioned one person, a man whom he feared beyond all others.
Devere would not, or could not, say more. But there were clues. Tiny hints in the fabric of the deception, frayed threads I’d find and follow.
Things, people, events that did not fit in the quaint backward town of Minerva… such as the gentlemen’s club.
I’d hurried through its back-room corridors and sensed how there had been more to the building and its people than I’d first seen. Its unassuming façade hid a darker underbelly.
“There is no truth, only that of his making.”
Devere had revealed more in that one sentence than anything else he’d said.
Someone was hurting him and hurting me. Someone powerful.
If I blundered around, unprepared, asking questions, Devere believed events would reset, and he’d forget again. We both might forget.
Who had such power?
Not who.
What.
“There are no gods in Minerva, only nightmares. Or did you forget that too?”
He’d been trying to tell me all along. I hadn’t taken him literally because nightmares weren’t real.
Unless they were.
I was close. I could feel it like electricity buzzing beneath my skin.
