Gaelthide's jewelry shop was located in a run down section of town; a rough and tumble neighborhood that made Catherine glad for the self-defense training she'd taken. She forced herself to be calm; no sense in alarming Vincent, who she knew would sense it if she allowed her nerves to get the better of her.

She had unexpected butterflies, as she approached the store. She had no idea what she would find, but intuition told her it might be important both to the case and to Vincent.

Stomach in a knot, Catherine pushed the door open. Bells on the door jingled, and a man called from the back, "A moment please ..."

His voice was melodic, and lightly accented. After the promised moment he appeared. He was tall, though slender. She couldn't begin to guess an age; clear brown eyes regarded her evenly. His skin was fair and smooth, his hair wavy blond ...

... in Vincent's exact shade and color. He wore his hair back in a pony tail, and it was several inches longer than Vincent's, but she'd know that blond mane anywhere. Catherine's heart skipped a beat, seeing that. What had she stumbled upon, here?

"Aelann Gaelthide?"

"That would be me," he said, with a welcoming smile.

"I'm Cathy Chandler, with the DA's office."

He blinked. Clearly, that had not been what he expected her to say.

She extended a hand across the counter to shake. "I've been assigned an old case to prosecute, and your name has come up."

He brushed her hand with his fingers, then abruptly withdrew, and stared at her. His gaze was clear, piercing. "Well, this is a pleasant surprise. You've been touched by one my people. Nay, more than touched -- you know one of us quite well. With the DA's office, you said? So you live here?"

"I'm not sure what you're talking about when you say 'my people'."

He tilted his head and regarded her with some amusement. "You must be protecting him. It is a him, yes? I can always tell when a young woman bears a mark of protection of one of my people. You could be a handmaiden to one of our ladies, I suppose ... but no. A man, I think. The mark on your soul is one of the purest love and you looked at me with enough appreciation when you entered that I do not think you like women."

"I ..." she had not the foggiest clue what to say.

"Oh, you don't have to tell me his name." Aelann said, holding a hand out, palm up. "I won't ask you to violate your confidences. However, I mention this so that we are on a level playing field -- you know what I am, and I know you know."

"I do not know what you are," she said, finally finding her voice. "Would you care to tell me, since you've brought it up?"

"Why, a creature of faery, of course." He seemed surprised she needed to ask.

"Forgive me if I'm skeptical."

"Forgiven," he said, easily, with a small smile that was so very ... Vincent. "You said you were investigating a case?"

"It's about a woman named Alice Andrews."

He blinked, clearly taken aback. "Alice left me twenty-five years ago last month. I haven't seen her since." His reaction was genuine -- real surprise at the name. Then comprehension dawned, and shock, and he shook his head in swift disbelief, "You mentioned a case. It is safe for me to assume, then, she met with foul play?"

"I'm sorry."

"How ..."

"She was murdered. A couple of blocks from here." Catherine said, softly. "Twenty-five years ago."

"I never ..." he blew a sharp breath out. "I was out of the country for a couple of months. I had family business I couldn't put off ... When I left, she seemed happy ... when I returned, it was to a note that she didn't want to be married to a man who couldn't stay home with her." He hunched his shoulders. "She took my son with her. My son ... do you have any news on my son? He was born while I was gone."

Catherine shook her head. She wondered if she was lying when she said, "I'm sorry, no."

Aelann glanced at the shop's door. "I've always hoped he'd walk through that doorway someday. It's why I've never sold the shop. And her, too. I always hoped she'd return to me. Someday."

"Can you prove where you were when she disappeared?"

Aelann gave her a sideways look. "Faery." With bitterness evident in his words, he said, "Try proving that to a jury. I assume I'm a suspect, then, because I was married to her? They always look at the husband first."

"You surely don't expect me to believe in ... faery ..." Catherine said, skeptically. Her mind was racing ahead, however. There were so many possibilities here -- including the entirely improbable one that he was telling the truth. Your boyfriend is half lion, Cathy, Catherine thought, with some private amusement. Faery being real is not much harder to swallow.

"You know one of us," Aelann pointed out. "You're under his protection. That's not something we extend lightly to mortals."

"Was Alice under your protection?" She didn't answer his questions about being a suspect. Logically, he was. He knew it, she knew it. There was no point in discussing it.

"She was my wife," he said, bleakly. He clenched a fist. "You must understand how upsetting this is to me. I've convinced myself for twenty-five years that she just simply left me. That was easier to believe than that ... well, I thought she would bring the boy back. To meet me. Someday. And she never did. I thought he would have questions only I could answer. And I've wondered these last few years how he was doing -- one of our kind, and even a halfling would be more fey than human, you must understand -- living in the world above? It must be terribly hard for him."

"The world above?" The phrasing gave her a cold chill.

"It's what we call the mortal world. Because faery is found within hollow hills, in legend." He twisted his lips into a smile that held no humor and no joy. She realized she had destroyed any joy in his soul with this news of the death of his estranged wife. "Though the truth in the legends is often small."

"You call her your wife -- were you married?"

He held up his hand, the fingers turned towards her, displaying an elegant silver wedding band. "Yes. Legally, by human law." Again, he made that humorless smile. "There was a justice of the peace involved. And a baby, on the way. I promised her a proper wedding later, in Faery ... eight months later, she left me."

"I'm sorry." His pain, and grief, still fresh after twenty-five years, was too real. In her mind, he wasn't a suspect. Logically, he should be. But her intuition said 'no.' This man, who still wore his wife's ring twenty-five years after she had left him, was not a murderer. Possibly, he was certifiable, but he was no murderer.

He was regarding her evenly. "I'd like to offer my help to find the killer. Surely, you must know what the worth of an offer by one of the daoine sidhe is, in a matter like this. I have ... resources."

"I can't allow that." Catherine shook her head. "I appreciate the offer, but no ..."

"... then you must understand that I shall be looking for the killer on my own." There was a deadly glint to his eyes. "Faery justice is ... clever, and I have more faith in my ability to make the man who killed her pay than any punishment that the mortal world will dispense."

Catherine finally said, in relative exasperation, "I have a friend who isn't normal, Aelann. But I've never heard anyone talk about faery as you are. He certainly has never mentioned it."

Aelann blinked, slowly, and in real surprise. "Oh, my. I assumed you knew. I've never seen anyone with a mark on them that didn't know all about us. Marks on mortals are so very rare ..."

"I didn't know anything."

He frowned.

"What's a mark?"

"Your friend, he has made a link to you. If anything happens to you, or if you are even frightened, he will know. And, if he's a typical sidhe, he'll shred anyone who dares to touch you."

"I'm ..." she stopped. It was all too much. He'd pretty much accurately described Vincent's bond with her. There just might be a grain of truth in his words.

He scratched his jaw. "You must think me a madman, now, if you didn't know about us. I am babbling about faery and sidhes and -- you truly know nothing? I should have words with this protector of yours, who would mark you without you truly knowing what it means."

"That might be quite interesting," Catherine allowed.

He huffed a sigh. "We should begin with proof that I am what I say I am ..."

And suddenly, the man standing before her was no longer mortal. He was something more ... something so much, much more. Ageless beauty, delicate and refined. He was tall, slender, high cheekbones and a narrow jaw. Sharp teeth glinted when he spoke. He was far too beautiful to be mortal; far too ethereal to be real. His hair was the only thing which had not changed. With dark humor, he asked, "Proof enough for you?"

"Umm."

And then his illusion -- his glamour? -- was back in place. "Ask your protector to show you his true form. He should have done so, before claiming you as his."

"I believe I've seen his true form," Catherine said, with perfect honesty. "That ... you must understand, this is all a remarkable shock. My friend doesn't know what he is."

Aelann was silent. Suspicion glinted in his eyes. "I'd like to meet your friend. Could you arrange this?"

"I'll ask him."

"Thank you." Aelann tilted his head, in graceful acknowledgement. "Now, I imagine you want to know about enemies that we may have had ..."

"That would be helpful," Catherine said.

"My ex," Aelann said, promptly. "She would be my first choice. Unfortunately, she's faery, and if she is the killer and not a mortal, then there is nothing mortal justice can do. Punishment will be mine to dispense."

"You have an ex."

"After five hundred and thirty years," he said blackly, "I have lots of exes. Ihlred, however, is the most logical suspect. I intend to pursue that now. The only reason I never investigated her before is that she would make sure that I suffered, for the crime of loving another. Because I never knew their fate I thought I was safe in assuming that she was not involved."

"Suffered?"

He sighed. "My son, most likely ... I had convinced myself that Alice has simply left me, because I could not stomach the thought of what she would do to the boy."

"A punishment?"

"A curse, a mutilation, some sort of dark evil -- to make me hurt, you understand. The worst thing you can do to a parent is to hurt their child. She would have exacted vengeance on me through the child. It is odd, however, that she has not brought Alice's fate, and my son's, to my attention yet."

"I ..." Catherine trailed off. I think you need to meet Vincent, she thought. But didn't say. It wasn't her decision to make. It was Vincent's.

A curse.

Aelann said, quietly, "Curses can be broken; damage can be undone. I only wish I knew where the boy was now. I doubt she would have killed him outright ... she probably expected me to know of Alice's fate right away, not knowing that because Alice had left me, I never knew she ..." his voice lowered. "... she died."