Forensics

Alfarinn snorted quietly at the choice of names.

"Yes, and when we go somewhere in disguise I can be Aron Brown and you can Thad Black. No one would ever suspect. "

Considering Thaddeus's thoughts on Lykaios's motives for a hiding place, he had to agree that they were sound.

"Well then since it is not right here in the open for him to gloat over then we must conclude that he took great pains to hide it. Got any possible ideas?"

Alfarinn leaned against the wall and looked around the room for possible locations. It could be anywhere in the house really. Thaddeus had checked the vents, most of the floor had been gone over... He stood up and walked over to the bed with a shrug.

"Let's just move it further aside so that we can feel the floor underneath it and then move it back."

Difficult to recover as possible..difficult to... Thaddeus was quite likely right there.

"Well ripping up the floor boards would be difficult. I think we're probably on the right kind of thought track but it is a bit cliche...then again so is John Wolfe. "

He shoved the bed aside with Thaddeus and bent down to inspect the newly exposed portion of the floor.

"I certainly hope he didn't bury it out back, though I don't think that would feel safe enough, or put it under the foundation or something insane like that. I'd hate to have to get a permit to tear down the building and to relocate all these people to find something that could be worthless to us."

It seemed unlikely that it would be worthless, not if Lykaios went through so much trouble to hide it away and keep it safe but he'd still rather not have to cause so much of a disruption in people's lives for the information on what a killer deemed worthy of hiding.

Thaddeus smirked at Alfarinn’s suggestions for pseudonyms, though he did raise one eyebrow at his companion, feigning a hurt expression.

“So Thaddeus Grey III isn’t a good alias then? And we don’t get to have the same last name?”

Shaking his head, he lifted his end of the bed and helped move it to the side, considering the question.

“Too many ideas, unfortunately. Though I think you’re right about the floorboards, the walls, the vents…places like that are what we’re looking for. In any case, I think we’re likely going to need to tear the place apart anyway, but yes, hopefully not in the literal sense.”

He shook his head at the idea of placing it under the foundation, still thinking as he knelt down beside Alfarinn.

“Judging by what you learned from the closet, Lykaios wasn’t the original owner of the house. I can see him putting the box under the foundation, or perhaps inside of it, while it was being built, but after the fact something like that would draw attention.”

He bit down on his lower lip, considering, then realized he wasn’t being particularly helpful in checking the floor. He ran his hand over the surface, his head lowered.

There were feelings of both fear and security here, and he closed his eyes, focused on discovering more. He nearly started when the darkness was abruptly interrupted by a flash of light and the image of a wolf, warm yellow eyes seeming to glow in the shadows under the bed. Then realization struck, and he turned to his companion.

“I think one of the wolves didn’t care for thunderstorms. He must have felt safe here.”

It was odd to think that any living creature could find it safe under The Wolf’s bed, but there it was. Shaking his head, he sat back on his heels, considering.

Someone had lived here before…

“There’s just the one bedroom. But a family lived here before Lykaios.”

He bit down on his lower lip again, looking around the room.

“I don’t know why, but something about this seems odd to me. I mean, beyond the fact that there aren’t enough bedrooms for a family; I suppose that can be explained away...or he changed the interior.”

He rubbed at his chin, realizing belatedly that he had managed to smudge dirt along his jawline.

“God, this place just naturally invokes the need for a shower. In any case…it just brings to mind all sorts of questions. Why this house? Why a corner unit instead of an end unit, or a single home altogether? What was the difference to him? Why did it matter?”

He resisted the temptation to rub his chin again, thinking at the same time that was rather like closing the barn door when the wolf was already inside.

He reminded himself that puns were the lowest form of humor.

“I just don’t think he would buy a house without having a reason. What was he looking for?” He ticked off possibilities on his fingers. “He needed a place where he would be left alone. The neighborhood makes sense for that reason, I suppose, and its sewer accessibility. He needed a big enough place to keep the wolves…I suppose that’s why he didn’t choose an apartment. And he needed a place to hide this…box.

But what makes this house better than another? The only difference I saw from the outside was the bay windows and I rather doubt he would care much about those.”

He frowned, shaking his head.

“There are, I suppose, any number of things we don’t understand about him. When we…met him…there was something so primitive there, but then we find out that he’s comfortable with technology. In spite of the dust, the house is fairly neat; no clutter, things are put away, organized. But then there’s that awful chair downstairs…I suppose I expected things like the chair, but all of his…hostility…seems to have been reserved for that piece of furniture. The desk doesn’t have a scratch on it. It speaks to a certain meticulous compartmentalization.”

He turned to Alfairnn and smiled ruefully.

“I’m doing it again. We could likely have this place torn down and every fiber sensed and accounted for before I really felt like I understood that twisted mind. I’m just…trying to glean some basic insight, thinking it might help.”

Alfarinn smiled at Thaddeus a moment, touched that he'd want them to have the same name for an alias. It might have been silly of him considering the whole thing was hypothetical anyway and certainly they would give their aliases, if they ever had need of them, more thought than that but he was still pleased with the idea of the same last name.

"Oh, well I was going on the sound of Björn for Brown and the fact that your name is already a colour so I suppose we could both be Brown that would catch us both up into the silliness with an economy of names. I just wouldn't want you to think you'd have to take -my- ..alias..."

Alfarinn stopped and shook his head.

"This is really a rather crazy conversation isn't it?"

He wondered if there was any thought of name changing when they decided to have a ceremony of some sort. It would not be difficult to do in both cases as there was no true valid birth records for either of them. Soon enough he would have to have someone else play an older Arin Björn for a while and he would have to pretend to be a cousin or simply a good look alike or distant relation for a while and then he could go back to being the son of the owner again. Perhaps if Thaddeus wished, this time when he ceased publicly being Arin Björn he could be Alfarinn Grey instead.

Alfarinn smiled at the pleasant sidetrack his thoughts had taken, but realized he was still standing there doing nothing.

He listened to Thaddeus's thoughts as they moved the bed and he knelt to feel around on the floor.

"I agree. If he were around from the beginning watching the place for whatever reason he did not move in immediately but I think it would be a better assumption to say that he likely didn't live here when the place was first built. Its most likely in the rent records and paperwork if we wanted to convince the landlord to talk to us but I suppose that would only be necessary if we can't find it."

He wondered if Skodde had been the wolf under the bed and bent down to see if he could get an image of which canine it had been. Sure enough, when he touched the floor there was an image of Skodde hiding under the bed looking about as pitiful as any scared puppy could look. He gradually grew younger in his image until he was just a young pup and Alfarinn could tell that the wolf had been hiding under there for quite some time.

Looking at Thaddeus thoughtfully at the idea that Lykaios had changed the interior somehow Alfarinn finished his inspection and stood back up.

"Perhaps he knocked out a wall or something? There might have been two bedrooms but now there was one larger one?"

He was about to go touch his hand to the plaster in order inspect the walls in an effort to test that theory but paused as he watched his companion rubbing soot onto his chin. Placing his sleeve over his thumb, Alfarinn reached his other arm around Thaddeus's waist while using the sleeve to wipe away the dirt. He held his companion a moment more as he listened to Thaddeus continue to puzzle things out about the place. The position of the house was indeed interesting and certainly it would make sense that Lykaios chose the place after a considerable amount of thought.

"Maybe so that there were less outside walls with neighbors against them? He liked to play loud music? Who knew the Wolf was a metal fan?"

It was a weak thought at best and he certainly wasn't serious about Lykaios liking to play harsh music really loudly at odd hours of the night but the position of the house was not sparking any other inspired thoughts for him.

"The computer is a necessary item though I am not certain what purpose the violence to the chair serves, if any. I suppose we could always sit in it to find out..."

It certainly wasn't the most pleasant thought he'd had today but it did need to be done at some point. They still had this room to continue searching through.

"We can flip a coin for the honors later or you can sit in my lap... and tell me what a good boy you've been."

The first portion of the thought was him being practical; they could both sit in the chair that way and then touch the arms without falling over from disorientation. The later was his sense of humor rising up at an inappropriate moment.

"I'm sorry, sometimes my mouth doesn't filter the things my brain instructs it to say. We'll save that discussion for some nice chair at home."

He was blushing the colour of a fire engine and quickly found something else in the room to inspect, in this case one of the walls that he had originally thought of earlier.

Thaddeus felt just a little childish when his companion stepped in to help with the dust problem, though he cooperated meekly enough, holding still while Alfarinn wiped away the grime.

[I have a feeling this isn’t going to be one of my more dignified days.]

He somehow doubted that Lycaios would care one way or another if he disturbed his neighbors with loud music, and didn’t think it would make much of a difference in this neighborhood.

“I don’t have any better ideas; I didn’t see a stereo anywhere though. I can see him not wanting to be bothered by neighbors…which is why living in a townhome at all doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

He couldn’t help but smile wryly at Alfarinn’s offhanded mention of the computer being a ‘necessary item.’ He’d managed without for quite some time, but now that he had his laptop it was strange to think of being without that wonderful tool, even if he was certain he didn’t understand half its uses.

Walking over to the wall, he continued to listen as Alfarinn suggested approaches to solving the chair mystery, though he paused mid movement at his companion’s addendum.

Now –that- was a mental image; straddling Alfarinn’s lap, hands buried in silky hair while he whispered all sorts of ‘good’ things in his companion’s ear. His mind helpfully commented that he ought to get a hold of himself but his baser instincts immediately took that remark to a place it really didn’t need to go. What on earth had gotten into the two of them? Besides each other, that is…

Shaking his head to clear it of further thoughts in that vein, he joined his companion in examining the wall, finding he was quite unable to resist slipping his arm around Alfarinn’s waist as he looked.

“I’ll have to hold you to that.” He reached up to trace the wall with his fingers, more for the sake of finding something to distract his mind from ways that comment could be a double entendre than anything else. His palm flat on the wall, he closed his eyes, leaning lightly against his companion as he felt along. His forehead crinkled into a frown as distant senses came to him, and after a moment he opened his eyes again.

Looking up at Alfarinn, he pointed to the place in the center of the wall where he had felt a flicker of shock go through his hand, along with an oddly calm satisfaction.

“I felt something there…do you see anything?”

Alfarinn had been staring intently at the wall but had yet to do more than touch his fingertips to one portion of it. Thaddeus's arms around his waist were a comfort and so were his companion's distinctly distracted emotions. Whatever Thaddeus was thinking about, from the feelings he received from his lover, they were thinking along the same lines. This, he found, only served to cause his cheeks to flush even more, though for an entirely different reason.

His companion's statement caused him to raise his eyebrows in surprise but he grinned at the thought that his mind conjured.

"Oh...Well you won't hear me complain...unless of course you wanted to. I suppose I could even put a mock struggle if you like."

Biting the inside of his cheek to keep from breaking into a wider grin, Alfarinn turned back to the wall with something of a studious expression, the corners of his mouth trembling with the effort to hold it in place.

Thaddeus's alerting him to a portion of the wall brought him out of his levity and truly back to the situation at hand.

"Here?"

He swept his left hand slowly across the wall and then leaned into it as his mind filled with images.

There was a hole here, he could see the torn edges of the sheet rock, and this piece was new, newer than the rest, made to replace the opening that seemed to have been deliberately made.

Alfarinn came back to himself in the room, holding both hands flat against the wall with his forehead touching it. He had almost expected to find himself falling through the gap that he could still see vividly in his mind.

"There was a hole here. It was made after the building was erected. This piece of sheet rock is newer than the rest. What did you feel?"

Thaddeus instinctively moved closer and put his other hand on Alfarinn’s shoulder when his lover began to sense the wall, any lingering thoughts of playing at a struggle completely gone from his mind now. He stayed tense and ready, his arm twitching when Alfarinn leaned forward as though trying to walk right through the wall.

Alfarinn seemed to recover fairly quickly, though, and he loosened his hold when it became clear they were back to business.

“There was some sort of impact, and…an odd sensation.” He shook his head, smirking a little. “Sandpaper, maybe. That would make sense with what you saw. In any case, there wasn’t anything overpowering as far as emotions go; mostly calm, satisfied.” He raised one eyebrow at his own statement. “Which would indicate he quite deliberately put a hole in the wall and repaired it again. I –think- I would have felt more had this happened in a fit of rage or even if it were an accident.”

He looked around the room for a moment, contemplating their next move.

“Furthermore, I think we’ve found our hiding place. Or at the very least, we’ve found something…curious.”

He didn’t see anything in the immediate vicinity that would help them tear up a wall, save of course a host of blunt weapons that he would just as soon not handle at the moment, but he hadn’t really expected to.

“Perhaps The Wolf kept a hammer or something in the desk.”

With that, he walked over to the roll top desk and lifted the cover. Unsurprisingly, a black laptop rested on top of a stack of oversized papers, and he picked it up with his gloved hand to put on the bed with the rest of the items they had decided warranted more study. He looked to Alfarinn with a little half shrug before returning to search the desk.

“I suppose it can’t hurt to look.”

Alfarinn turned, reaching for the hand that had so recently held him in concern; sliding sideways away from the portion that had once been knocked away, he then leaned against the wall and got his sense of balance again as he listened to Thaddeus explain his feelings on what happened.

"Hmm that's true. I wonder also how often or likely a fit or rage would have been. Everything here suggests a controlled person for the most part and it seems unlikely that he would have channeled his anger so carelessly where it would have done him no good. Lykaios was a psychotic murderer to be sure but he was an economical one when it came to his time and materials...at least from the evidence we've collected."

The place may have been drab but it was orderly, the weapons on the wall suggested someone with a precise sense of order and even Lykaios's fighting style had suggested one who wasted little when it came down to a challenge, when all the toying was set aside. Though, Alfarinn shuddered as he remembered the hideous words that were the man's last.

''As The Heir will join The Bitch in the blackest hell? A Wolf will live without his companion; will you live without yours?'

He held Thaddeus's hand to his chest, feeling its warmth and life and allowing the sense of his love to drive away the lingering fears those words brought about, heightened as they were by this house where everything touched brought images of Lykaios to his mind as if the man walked amongst them once more.

Alfarinn nodded in agreement at the astute assessment concerning the wall and watched Thaddeus move towards the desk before pushing himself off the wall and moving over to join his companion.

He eyed the computer with momentary curiosity before turning back to the task at hand.

"Its possible."

A quick search of the drawers found that there was indeed a small tool kit containing a hammer, hardly something sizeable like one would normally use for such a task but considering Alfarinn could easily push his fist through the sheet rock, even a small hammer combined with vampiric strength made for sufficient force to do the job.

"Me or you?"

It was going to be messy in the room no matter which one of them did the honours and it would likely cover most of the room in white dust. Luckily they had come prepared to get dirty but he was not so certain they wanted everything else covered.

"Do you think we should get some sheets to cover a few things up first?"

As Alfarinn was inspecting the drawers, Thaddeus lifted up the papers to check if there was anything underneath them. Seeing nothing of use, just a desk calendar and a few pencils, he rested the stack back down and made to join his companion’s search of the drawers, but it seemed Alfarinn had found the hammer fairly quickly.

He looked down at the desk for a moment, considering their next move, and the papers again caught his eye. Not one to miss reading something when it was right in front of him, his forehead creased as he scanned the paper. It was a light weight vellum and so many were stacked on top of each other that the print was difficult to discern, but it appeared to be a stack of schematics or floor plans. He wondered if there might be a plan for the house that would reveal more hidden places and picked up the first sheet, resting it on a cleared area of the desk.

He blinked.

“Sheets would be good…Alfarinn?” He pointed toward the drafted map. “Is this what I think it is?”

The map was an intricate work and incredibly detailed, showing everything from the layout of the building to marks indicating guards outside doors, furniture, air vents.

“Because it looks to me like the House of Pain.”

He picked up the next sheet and placed it over top of the first. Now more areas were clearly defined. The crease in his forehead grew deeper before he shook his head and stepped away.

“I’m letting myself get distracted. I think we’ll want to look at those again, though.” He turned to Alfarinn with a slight smile. “I don’t mind tearing into the wall a bit. I think there’s a linen closet out by the bathroom, though; I’ll go get us some sheets.”

That said, he stepped out the door and into the hallway, heading straight for the closet. He opened the door with his gloved hand and looked inside, giving the several cans of shaving cream an odd look before pulling out two off white sheets and returning to the bedroom.

Alfarinn continued rummaging through the drawers on the off chance that there might be two kits or something else useful. He stopped and stood up when Thaddeus picked up the sheets of velum and seemed to find them interesting.

"Well, now that's a bit disturbing. I wonder if he was just tracking...someone...through the house of pain or actually planned on making a move there. Surely he wasn't that crazy. Perhaps he had a target who frequented the place."

Or perhaps he had seen Thaddeus before they saw him. It was a frightening thought to consider that Lykaios could have made his move far sooner than he did instead of them coming to him when they were ready. With a final glance at the thin sheets, he turned back to the desk; though further searching proved it was a fruitless effort and only one hammer was to be found.

Helping Thaddeus place the sheets over the bed and nearby furniture, Alfarinn then headed to the wall.

"Probably better if you did the hammering anyway. I don't think I could help myself from singing a bad rendition of "Sixteen Tons". If you want to make several holes ups towards the top I can then pull some of the sheet rock away while you continue to work on it."

They were definitely going to need a bath after all this and he could just imagine the faces of the people at Meridian if they walked in through the nice clean lobby covered in plaster and dust from head to toe or worse walking into the Manor. Alfarinn somehow thought that whatever good will Rupert might have had for him would be lost if he were to come into the place covered in dirt. The apartment had a nice feeling of home about it right about now and he realized that there were advantages to living without a whole clan of people in the same building and not making a spectacle of yourself would be one of them.

He figured they could strip down and dump clothes off straight into the washer so as not to spread the dust to everything else, shower,order some food to be delivered and perhaps watch a movie or two like normal people when they finally managed to get home.

Thaddeus watched the pale sheets float over the bed and settle over the various items before turning to close the roll top desk and join Alfarinn at the wall. There was something childishly satisfying in knowing they were about to rip apart something that belonged to The Wolf; a violation beyond merely rummaging through his things. Furthermore, they were about to find something that The Wolf did not want found and he would be lying to himself if he didn’t admit to finding that pleasing.

With such thoughts in mind he wrapped his hand tightly around the handle and gave a respectable swing, pushing through the plaster and drywall. Per Alfarinn’s request, he made a straight line of holes across the top, then began using the hammer to punch holes down one side so as not to get in his companion’s way.

The task lost its charm fairly quickly; it was too noisy to talk through and he had to keep stopping to blink the dust and chips of paint out of his eyes. Dirt and noise were not his favorite things under any circumstances and while being eager for information got him over the worse of his annoyance it was still bothersome.

He walked around to the other side of Alfarinn to punch another vertical column of holes, then took the claw end of the hammer and pulled hard through the line. He walked around and did the same to the other side, then started along the bottom. Deciding he had done as much with the hammer as he could do without stepping on his companion’s toes, he started in on the holes with his hands, pulling out generous pieces of sheet rock and setting the larger chunks carefully on the floor while the smaller bits fell where they would.

Finally they were left with the studs and pink foamy insulation. This Thaddeus began to pull out with his gloved hand, as even a vampire’s skin could become irritated by such things.

“I’m going to feel a little silly if after all that we don’t find anything…”

His somewhat fixed expression broke into a smirk as his hand struck something solid. He looked to Alfarinn, aware that he must look absolutely ridiculous at the moment, and shook his head.

“…alright, I feel a little silly in any case but it looks like we were right.”

That said, he went back to pulling away insulation until a large metal box was completely exposed.

Alfarinn was amused by his companion's mild sense of excitement at the idea of breaking down the wall. There was something freeing about being allowed to do something destructive, for it to have a purpose and with no harm in it other than some mild property damage. Something he supposed they should fix; though he guessed the owner of the building could take it out of Lykaios's security deposit, Alfarinn figured that sense they were the ones making the hole they should repair it.

He began working on pulling away plaster where Thaddeus made a line of holes for him, doing his best to work on the other side from Thaddeus in order not to shower his companion with more dust than he was getting from his own efforts. Looking down at the normally impecably dressed Anantya covered in a fine white powder, Alfarinn couldn't help but laugh.

'Its the ghost of Christmas past or perhaps he was past and Thaddeus was Christmas present.'

It was an easy guess that the back side of him was mostly dust free but a glance down at his clothes proved that he was just as white as Thaddeus on the front side and his hair held a good helping of plaster, given time and he could have some natural knotted dreds in the making. Alfarinn dismissed this look as something that would drive him insane when he tried to run his fingers through his hair.

"Well you do not yet look silly."

Alfarinn smiled and swiped a clean stripe down Thaddeus's nose.

"-Now-, you look silly."

Kneeling down next to Thaddeus, he looked in at the box and smiled.

"Well at least we don't look silly for nothing then."

Thaddeus pulled back, crinkling his nose and giving his head a shake, when Alfarinn decided to add to the absurdity. Doing his best to straighten his posture while on his knees in front of the wall, he fixed his companion with an imperious expression and spoke gravely.

“This is a very serious matter.”

The corner of his mouth twitched a little and he quickly turned to pull the box out of the wall and onto the floor before he could give himself away, though he realized well enough that Alfarinn would know he was amused. Then he went over to the bed and carefully lifted the sheet up, ducking under it to retrieve the green box and then replacing the sheet as it was.

Normally he would have asked Alfarinn if he would like to do the honors but combined with his anticipation was a concern that the key wouldn’t work and he felt it best to alleviate that as soon as possible. He braced himself for the disappointment when the key did not fit on the first try, though he wrote that off as nerves when it slid home on the second attempt. Even so, it took a bit of wiggling to convince the key to turn.

“Changes in temperature I suppose, but I think this is the right key.”

Being careful not to apply too much force, he pulled the key back just a hair and turned again, feeling the mechanism release at last, and opened the metal panel to peer inside. A sense of serenity filled him at the sight, and a slight, absent sort of smile crossed his features. He had hardly expected to find buried treasure in The Wolf’s dwelling, but it seemed that was exactly what they had uncovered.

Inside was a thick tome, its cover a faded green with gold leaf accenting. He looked up to Alfarinn, pleased, and reached up to take the ungloved hand.

“Together, then.”

With that, he reached in to take the book out with his gloved hand.

Alfarinn smiled but nodded trying to return the serious expression that his partner was giving him.

"Oh absolutely."

Watching Thaddeus try to remain solemn was enough to make him grin despite his best efforts to do otherwise. He waited as his companion retrieved the key and struggled with the box before getting it open. It was something like watching a kid on Christmas morning and there was nothing so pleasant as seeing Thaddeus's excitement at getting the container unlocked and being able to peer inside.

In fact, he'd been so wrapped up in watching his companion that it took him a moment to look down into the box himself. Seeing what had caused the rush of excitement and curiosity from Thaddeus allowed him to fully understand it and began to feel the same.

Knowledge was a treasure far more priceless than anything else and this.. but this was lost. Alfarinn scratched absently at his temple a moment, piecing together the past. A wry grin formed on his face and he said.

"She tricked me after all. It did exist. "

That made him wonder did Lykaios kill Emma for the book or simply revenge? It seemed likely that he took it from her when he attacked her. Normally he would have thought someone hired the hitman to wait until she found the book and then kill her and take it but in this case that does not make sense because Lykaios kept the book. It would seem reasonable that, even with a deal potentially gone sour, that he would have tried to find another buyer for the book if it meant nothing to him. For some reason it did mean something, perhaps it only meant that Emma did not have it any longer, nothing more. It was truly hard to tell.

"I'm ready."

Despite that announcement his hand nearly shook with anticipation and nervousness and he was glad Thaddeus held on to it.

Thaddeus had the distinct feeling he had missed something at Alfarinn’s reaction to the book, and hesitated before taking it out of the box.

“This is what you two were looking for?”

He realized that his companion must be anxious to examine the book he had sought for so long and hoped Alfarinn wouldn’t be too terribly frustrated with his questions. He looked up, tilting his head and frowning.

“She beat you to the ruins and told you she hadn’t found anything. You parted ways…but she stayed behind…and somehow the book ended up in Lykaios’s hands.”

They knew little more than that for certain and those puzzle pieces could, at the moment, fit together in a number of different ways.

“As likely as it may be that Emma pulled the wool over your eyes…” The corner of his mouth turned up a little, thinking there was a fair chance she had decided to have a bit of fun with Alfarinn before coming clean. “…that isn’t the only possibility.”

Even now, though, he hesitated to sense and find out what they could, wanting to take his thoughts to their conclusion before adding more data to the mix. “Why would she stay in Bulgaria, after all, if she had already found what she was looking for? Had it been as simple as that, she would have returned home and never would have…” Trailing off, he let the obvious conclusion go unspoken as he suddenly found himself quite interested in their two hands.

Realizing he had ended things somewhat awkwardly, he shook his head and looked back to the book. “At any rate. Perhaps we should find out what happened, not to mention discovering what was…so important.”

Alfarinn looked up at his companion when Thaddeus paused and smiled.

"Yes, it was."

He hooked a leg around the other side of Thaddeus and moved himself in behind his love. Wrapping his free hand around Thaddeus's waist, he leaned his chin on his companion's shoulder and looked down at the book nestled so innocently in the box before them. It held such secrets with its simple being that it was almost unimaginable what kinds of mysteries might be solved by reading its pages. Alfarinn held Thaddeus tighter and looked away, leaning into Thaddeus's neck and closing his eyes.

An explanation was in order and he collected his thoughts on where to begin.

"I believe I mentioned in our first meeting that Emma and I were racing towards the same goal. "

He smiled as the image of Thaddeus standing so seriously in front of the museum cases came back to his mind. Great storms announced themselves with the slightest breeze or in this case a small neatly penned letter; neither of them had any idea how much that meeting would change their lives... was still changing there lives.

" There were records in Anantya that would lead to the mention of the books and we each had hoped, I believe, that they would hold some answers to questions about our origins though there was no particular reason to assume that they would except for their age. Emma had those records and in Evenhet there was an old vampire who once belonged to another group of people that had banded together, this vampire had told me of the books and the rough location of their where abouts. So we each set off for seperate locations but each of us had reason to believe in the veracity of the other location as well. It was not clear whether there was simply one book with two writers or two books, my clan mate was vague."

Alfarinn remembered going to as many ancients as he could in the early days of Evenhet in the hopes of preserving their knowledge and building the clan archives. He had gone to those inside his own clan first and then spoke with as many as would agree to talk to him from outside the clan as well. This ancient was a wise and watchful woman, she always seemed to have so many secrets hidden behind her eyes that when she came to him again after he had spoken to her about her own knowledge, Alfarinn had been more than willing to listen to anything she had to say. It was then that she had told him about the books. It was a story that needed to be told and she said that over the course of their speaking she felt she could trust him to tell it properly. He wondered now just what she had meant by that. Did she know that he and Emma continued to speak and would share knowledge that would benefit both clans so long as it did not harm either in the telling?

"I always felt like a child in her presence so I spoke as little as possible in order not to distract her from her story or try her patience with me for fear that she would decide I was not worthy of hearing it after all."

He blushed somewhat and rubbed his cheek on Thaddeus's collar as if he could push it away.

"So we knew that we were looking for books we just did not know exactly what we would find. "

Looking up finally, he said.

"I believe Emma found something in Bulgaria worth staying for...and I do not mean the book."

Alfarinn kissed Thaddeus tenderly on the cheek before looking down into the box.

"Perhaps we will never know the reason she stayed but I would agree that the reasons could be many and probably were. "

Thaddeus leaned back into Alfarinn’s chest, listening to the accounting and trying to tie it together in some way to his own memories. He smiled a little at the thought of Alfarinn feeling like a child and reached up behind his shoulder to brush his fingers over his companion’s cheek. He realized too late that his gesture probably had the effect of making streaks in the dust similar to the one on his nose and hoped Alfarinn didn’t mind.

“I knew so little about why she was there; she had her cover stories of course…hmm.”

He frowned for a moment, gathering his thoughts, then shook his head.

“I’m going off topic again…I was just wondering if you both had an interest in the families that lived in that area or if that was just something Emma was investigating. She was, coincidentally, looking for another book.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Long story, that, but I swear she didn’t pass up a library at any home she visited.”

He smiled slightly. “Not particularly odd behavior in and of itself, just the talk of books made me think of it.”

He honestly wasn’t certain of how much of Emma’s curiosity regarding the family histories was feigned for the sake of having easily explainable business in Bulgaria, and if he were being honest it was perfectly possible that she was simply taking an interest in something Thaddeus enjoyed talking about.

“In any case, I suppose we should have a look.”

With that he dusted off his hands as best he could on his pants and picked up the heavy volume with his gloved hand, holding it up for both of them to sense. Grinning slightly, he twisted his neck around to look at his companion.

“Do you swear to tell the…alright, that’s not funny, let’s do this.”

That said, he rested his free hand on top of the book, being careful to leave enough room for Alfarinn’s as well, and closed his eyes.

There was a feeling of age beyond reckoning as he held the book in his hand, and he felt and saw little beyond that for a long moment. This was, however, followed by a succession of senses and images that Thaddeus needed his full concentration in order to remember.

…the oddly bright blue eyes of The Wolf as he tucked the book into a satchel, gleaming with malice...a long stretch of darkness in which the feelings of wrath intensified…The Wolf, holding the book in a circular room, rough fingertips brushing the leather cover, a moment of satisfaction cutting through the anger…darkness again…Emma, touching the book, then pulling her fingers away as though burned when The Wolf’s hand crossed over hers, a mix of fear and bitterness and loathing blurring the image into black…

Thaddeus kept his eyes closed, continuing to sense, though he wasn’t certain there would be anything beyond that. There were little flickers of emotion, disturbance, but they felt so distant and he was sure he was losing the thread of his senses. Even so, there was enough to hold on to, enough to tell him there was something here.

Whatever it was, Thaddeus got only a sudden flash of deep sorrow and the feeling of tears streaming over the cover of the book before, it seemed, his senses gave out on him.

Alfarinn leaned into the hand that stroked his cheek heedless of the further mess they were making of each other with the gestures of affection. Thaddeus was warm and real leaning against him and he found it a comfort while dredging up the cold distant memories of the past.

He looked puzzled at Thaddeus, momentarily raising his head from his companion's shoulder before settling down again with a thoughtful frown.

"Hmm genetics and lineage are always of interest but I can't say that I looked into the families in that area specifically. Perhaps she had reason to believe one of the writers of the book had children before being turned and that they might have known... well, no, the book is here and presumably she found it so there was no need to search for it. I cannot see Lykaios having an interest in archaeology; he must have taken it from her."

Alfarinn hugged Thaddeus tighter at that, thought the grisly image of Emma and the Wolf in confrontation coming easily to his mind even though he had not been there. It came to him then that Thaddeus actually -had- been witness to that horrible scene, which no doubt was far worse in reality than his creative mind could conjure, and so, with an up welling of sympathy, he pulled closer still to his love despite being unable to protect him from the past.

"She was looking for another book there?"

He spoke in part to distract himself from his thoughts but also in curiosity. It had taken some time but he had gone back to China to look for the other book and found the resting place empty. There had seemed some recent disturbance to the site but the book was none the less not there. Was it possible that both books had been brought together in Bulgaria and that was why Emma had stayed?

"What was this other book, did she tell you?"

He nodded almost absently at the prospect of sensing the book, wholly absorbed for the moment in this new mystery but with a shake of his head, he cleared his thoughts of the questions and returned to the task at hand.

Just in time for Thaddeus to be humorous. He held his hand poised over the book and looked apprehensive for a moment.

"I don't know, Thaddeus, that depends on what you plan on asking me. "

Laughing a little, He grinned at his companion before returning to the object in front of them. Closing his eyes and placing his ungloved hand on the book next to Thaddeus's, he felt the aged leather for the briefest of moments before the images came and all else faded away.

He saw Lykaios packing away the book in the metal box looking like a pirate with a treasure; both proud and satisfied with it but at the same time worried that someone would come along to take it away.

It was on a table with various knives in scabbards so close as to be bumping against it. One plain but well kept, the other gold gilded with intricate scroll work. A well manicured hand casually covered the ornate weapon but there was a hidden tenseness to it that seemed to be directed towards the book which was firmly within Lykaios's calloused grasp.

There was a gazebo and the killer was holding the book out as if showing it to someone, his hands on it, clasping tight and possessive. He saw a slender delicate hand reach out and caress its surface lovingly despite the menacing presence of Lykaios.

The book was pulled from some crumbling stonework which seemed to be part of a wall. Large hands held it tightly a moment and then rested it on a large leg as the person leaned over to replace the bricks that had concealed it.

A longer pause in the images indicated to him a large span of time before hands placed the considerably less worn book safely inside its hiding place. The wall glowed the rich warm amber of firelight and the shadows of many objects danced along the stones.

Alfarinn blinked a few times as the last of the images faded and slowly took his hand away, resting it around Thaddeus again until the brief disorientation subsided.

After a long moment to assure himself he would sense nothing else, Thaddeus pulled his hand away from the book and let the arm supporting it fall to his lap. Twining his fingers in Alfarinn’s, he kept still and quiet for a long moment, trying to sort through what they had sensed together.

“She was so close.” He shook his head. “He never let it go, though.”

Biting down on his lower lip, he grimaced at the taste of plaster and absently switched to trailing his fingers lightly up and down Alfarinn’s leg. Then he pulled the pen and paper out of his pocket and began to lightly sketch out the two scabbards.

“I don’t recognize the scroll work but I want to know it if I see it again.” He continued in drawing out the lines, though it was really more to help him remember than anything else; he was content to believe his talents rested elsewhere. “To answer your earlier question, though,” he continued, speaking somewhat distantly, “Emma showed some interest in the Grey lineage, but she wanted the obscure books. Personal things, one aunt’s poetry, an uncle’s diary, rather than the more direct records. My father suspected she was looking to unearth something unsavory about the Greys, I think.”

He smiled lightly, remembering his father’s reservations and his annoyed reaction when Lady Grey explained Emma’s search to Thaddeus.

“In any case, she did eventually get to see two of the books she was looking for, but the third presented a problem.” He did his best to keep the corner of his mouth from twitching up and spoke with as much solemnity as he could muster. “It seems my family’s odd sense of humor has once again come back to haunt me…” at this the grin broke, though he still did his best to look innocent. “The Greys, you see, took to claiming that the family rules we have a tendency to quote were actually written down ages and ages ago in what we called The Book of Grey. It became something of a myth, a mysterious family secret that none but a Grey was permitted to see.”

He had the grace to look slightly embarrassed as he continued. “It was, I confess, something of a hoax; the book does not exist and is in fact a rather elaborate inside joke. Emma was less than pleased when I told her.”

Finishing up the rather rough sketch, he flipped the paper to make more notes on a clean sheet before he forgot what they had seen. There was something of a dream like quality to sensing and he worried at times that it would slip away, particularly the images.

“In any case…I suppose I thought it an interesting coincidence that Emma was searching for not one, but two books of questionable existence. I don’t know that there’s any connection there, though; I’m not even certain of what she hoped the books would reveal, other than some truly awful poetry and some interesting insight into my uncle’s second wife.”

He sighed softly as he finished up his notes, knowing that there would be a great deal of thinking ahead. He flipped the page again, this time turning the notebook horizontal and making a timeline on which he tried to place the events they had sensed in order. He frowned a little as he went along, not quite sure of how his own senses and Alfarinn’s fit together, and soon the page was looking quite cluttered in spite of his neat writing.

“She was so close.”

Putting his notepad down on top of the bed, he rested his head lightly on his lover’s shoulder, the amusement from his accounting of the book fading into sadness. He had, until that moment, quite forgotten the little details of her search for the book; a great deal seemed to have happened in a short time that summer and the little things had faded away to some extent. Of course, when he tried he found he could recall more than he expected and his journals could fill in the gaps, but he still felt guilty for forgetting…or forgetting to remember.

“There really is more I should tell you, but if you don’t mind too terribly much, I’d rather not do so here.”

Sighing, he sat up straight, moving the book to rest on one thigh and pulling the other to his chest so he could rest his chin on his knee. After a moment he realized that this probably made him look about five years old and he rolled his eyes inwardly at his own morose mood. It was making him less than productive.

“Do you think the hand we saw was the same one we sensed from the ring?”

Hearing his companion's quiet words, Alfarinn held him closer.

"Yes, she was."

His words were solemn as he continued to review the images in his head as well as watch Thaddeus make his own notes. Thinking about the scrollwork they saw in the imagery, Alfarinn frowned.

"It was familiar but the design is something that has been copied through the ages so there is no telling which it belonged in. It could have been a current item or something older but it appeared in good shape so it was either well cared for, not often used, or reasonably new."

Which did not narrow things down really at all.

Smiling at Emma's choice of interests, he shrugged slightly.

"Perhaps she found the family irresistibly interesting? Though it does sound like she was looking for something specific in your family's history. Perhaps mention of the ruins or the book? Maybe she thought the journal or the poetry might have a less factual account that might include something like a rumor or a legend that would be of use. How long had your family lived in the area?"

The idea that the esteemed elder of the night had been duped into looking for a fictional book to the point of asking about it made him smile. No doubt Emma did not like the set back in her thinking that this might have caused but he was certain she would have still been able to find the humor in it.

Thaddeus's small note pad was becoming a bit muddled and it seemed that they would need to eventually work out the details on a larger surface but for remembering key points, the notes in the small book would be perfect.

Thaddeus spoke again, sounding sad and lost, perhaps in memory as his words suggested. Alfarinn wrapped his arms around him and gently stroked his back, speaking quietly.

"She may not have been able to solve the mystery of this book but it led her to you and that was a far greater treasure. "

He hugged Thaddeus tightly a moment but loosened his hold when Thaddeus leaned forward.

"Thank you. You were with her and she was happy and hopeful. I can't imagine her being otherwise with you in her life and that is something that she had likely not felt in a long time. I think by comparison that made not having the book a minor issue. "

Leaning his cheek against his companion's back, Alfarinn closed his eyes and called up the images to mind but nothing specific in them gave him any definite answers.

"I would think so. We can't be certain, I suppose but I would like to think we only have one other person involved in all this and not the possibility of two. What do you think?"

Alfarinn leaned back but kept one hand on Thaddeus's thigh, not willing to totally let him go just yet.

Thaddeus nodded slightly in agreement with Alfarinn’s assessment of just what the dagger cases were probably worth as far as evidence went.

“Yes, I suppose it’s a long shot; honestly I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks the work looks familiar, I thought I was seeing things. In any case it can’t hurt to make a note of it.”

He chuckled a little at the suggestion that Emma simply found the Greys fascinating, though that was certainly a possibility. Thaddeus had never really grasped that some things were only interesting to the people involved in the story, at least when it came to his own family history.

He was, however, intrigued by the possibility that his own family texts might have some sort of insight into the mystery of the book; he thought that would just figure, to have had answers to a centuries long puzzle in his grasp all this time without realizing it.

“Well honestly nothing comes to mind with regard to the books, but then again I’ve never really looked at them in that light. The Greys started work on the home in the fifteenth century along with three other prominent families, so I suppose there might be a hint of something in one of their records.”

He smiled softly. “I don’t know why that never occurred to me…I suppose I was just too close to the matter. That’s a good idea, though.”

Closing his eyes for a moment while Alfarinn stroked his back, he quietly listened to his companion’s perspective on the matter. Emma hadn’t always been happy; the summer had been fraught with worry, dramatics, secrecy, misunderstandings. There were regrets. He knew that at times he had frustrated her and had even been the cause of some of some sadness.

He had also made her laugh. And he had loved her with everything he had.

Pulling away from his musings, though, he considered Alfarinn’s question.

“I think until we see otherwise we should pursue this with the idea that we were looking at the same hand. I’m not totally positive, though.” He sighed and leaned back into Alfarinn’s chest, letting his hand cover the one on his thigh. “So it was someone else with an interest in the book...I suppose that was the motive…” He frowned and shook his head. “No, that’s not right. This was being planned before the book was discovered. I suppose depending on how confident you and Emma were about finding something there, the accomplice might have been willing to make a gamble, but honestly it seems to me the killers wanted Emma dead whether the book was found or not.”

He continued to consider the possibilities, tilting his head up to look at the ceiling.

“So how did the book factor in, then? How much did they know? There seemed to be a confrontation about it and we already know that the accomplice had the ring, which The Wolf wanted. Perhaps the accomplice wanted the book but for some reason those two items never got into the right hands. They didn’t appear to be on good terms.”