Jason nodded.

“I sort of got that idea with all the talk about faeries and the work being done in those offices.” Jason had the good sense to keep his voice down but not to draw attention by whispering. Nothing was quite so suspicious as the sound of whispers.

“Yes, but it’s not all just faeries, and not all of what we think of as faeries are the same race. The sidhe alone make up a solid fifty different tribes. Infinite worlds of infinite variation and all that, you know.”

“I…I think so.” Jason nodded. “So, these shade lands?”

“It’s not a realm where anything lives. It’s the place of the restless dead. The hungry dead,” Henry replied quickly. He hunted there, spent years at a time in those murky depths, but he didn’t like to talk about the place all that much. “The shade lands lie just under the skin of all living worlds. When you see a ghost here, its spirit is trapped in the shade lands and usually trying to break back through to the living world because of something unfinished, something it needs or fears or loves that it’s still holding on to, even in death.”

Jason was very quiet for a few moments.

“Are there a lot of ghosts?” he asked at last.

“Fewer than you’d think, if you believe in them,” Henry answered. “A lot more than you’d expect if you don’t.”

“That’s not really an answer.”

“It’s the best I can give.” Henry shrugged. “It’s not like they fill out census forms. And the shade lands aren’t a clear, bright place. They’re murky and filled with currents like the deep sea. They stretch infinitely out as far as death reaches.”

Jason nodded, but he wasn’t looking at Henry. He hardly seemed to be listening to him.

“If someone was murdered…violently, would he end up trapped there? Would he still be suffering?” The anxiety in Jason’s expression was obvious.

“No. Not necessarily.” Henry wondered just who Jason had lost. The father he’d mentioned earlier or the mother that he didn’t mention at all? From the way his face drained of color Henry guessed that it had been someone close to him and the end had been very ugly. “The vast majority of souls pass through the shade lands, no matter how they died. It’s generally when magic is involved that they remain. But most streak through instantly. Like shooting stars.” Sometimes they even made the gray darkness seem beautiful.

“My dad was murdered…” Jason looked away from Henry, down into his coffee cup. For an uncomfortable moment Henry feared that the young man might cry, but to Henry’s relief he pulled himself together. “He was torn apart by monsters—snow goblins. And I just need to know if he could be trapped in those shade lands?”

“How long ago was this?” Henry asked.

“Seventeen years.” Jason’s gaze remained on the dark liquid in his cup. “He suffered…”

It didn’t take a mathematical genius to figure out that Jason would have just been a child when his father had been murdered, and it sounded like he’d witnessed it.

“No. Your dad’s not trapped. See, unless they’re political refugees, snow goblins only come to the earthly realm as mercenaries, not magicians. They can be brutal, but they don’t bind souls or break them with torture,” Henry assured him. “Whatever your old man suffered, it ended with his life. By now he’s been reborn. More than likely he’s kicking up trouble as a surly teen somewhere.”

Jason at last lifted his gaze to meet Henry’s. He was a plain young man, but there was something so hopeful and relieved in his expression that he seemed rather handsome at the moment.

 Henry felt loathe to ruin Jason’s happiness, but the fact that his father had been murdered by snow goblins didn’t bode well for Jason himself. While a few of their clans lived as political refugees, most served the powerful rulers of other unearthly realms. And a man didn’t make an enemy of any of them by accident.

“What did your father do?” Henry asked.

“He was a musician. He could play pretty much anything with strings.” Jason answered this easily and with more than a hint of pride. “My mom too. She played the flute and the mandolin. I still remember the songs she taught me.”

“Yeah?” Henry encouraged Jason to go on. Smiling and animated, the young man took on a charming appeal.

“‘Suite Romantique’, ‘Syrinx’, ‘Carmen Fantasie’, ‘The Stone Of Fal’—”

“Stone of Fal?” Henry knew the name well enough but was surprised that Jason did.

“Yeah, I think it’s Irish or something.”

Sidhe actually, Henry thought but he didn’t say so. “So what’s it about?” Henry inquired.

 “According to the ballad the Stone of Fal must be possessed only by the high king of where-ever-it-is.” Jason cracked a shy smile. “So when a usurper murders the rightful king and rapes the king’s daughter, the princess steals the stone from the usurper’s bedroom before he can claim the throne.”

“Yeah?” Henry asked. “And how does that work out for her?”

“Kind of weird and sad. Most old ballads are like that,” Jason replied, at ease with his subject. “According to the song, the only way that the princess can hide the stone is to swallow it. When she gives birth to the usurper’s child, the stone is in him. But the usurper, fearing the princess’s child will have a legitimate claim to the throne, hurls the child into the sea and thus loses the stone forever…It’s pretty dark, but the tune is really beautiful and the chorus is fun to sing.”

“That’s the case with a lot of those old songs,” Henry commented, but his thoughts were on the ancient magics hidden so often in music. Sidhe in general—and the Tuatha Dé Dannan in particular—favored spells woven through simple melodies. Supposedly one of those songs—a cheery tune that unleashed a merciless slaughter—had stripped them of their humanity and gotten them banished to an underworld by a band of Milesian magicians. “Are you and your mother still in touch?”

“No. She left us when I was seven…” Jason looked a little sad but not as anguished as Henry had expected. “Dad always said that she was a free spirit who couldn’t be kept in one place. She had to go, but at least she left us with each other so we wouldn’t miss her so much. That’s what my dad said anyway. He was sort of a sap, really, but a good guy. I guess my mom’s probably in Timbuktu playing guitar with Tuareg nomads or something by now.”

Henry nodded. He wondered if she might not be even farther away.

Seven years would have been more than enough time to bind a truly immense magic to a child’s bones. That, added to the seventeen years that had passed since, would have placed Jason’s birth right around the time of the revolts against the Tuatha Dé Dannan regent, Greine the Usurper, as many called him. Greine still maintained rule over the Tuatha Dé Dannan Islands, but the theft of the Stone of Fal had prevented him from claiming both the title of high king and the power the stone conferred.

The thief had never been discovered as far as Henry knew.

“Do you recall much about your mother?” Henry tried to make the question sound casual.

“Her first name was Fionn…but I don’t think I ever heard her maiden name. I just called her Mom. She had bright red hair and long hands.” Jason spread his own fingers and smiled a little wryly. “I think I inherited her hands. I’d like to think I inherited some of her musical skill as well. She played beautifully.”

“So you share your parents’ disposition for music?”

“Yep.” Jason smiled. “Both sides of the family. No getting away from it.”

“Are you any good?” Henry asked.

“I think so.” Jason flushed slightly.

“Maybe you can play something for me? What’s your instrument of choice?”

Jason colored a little more, but Henry was certain why.

“I’m pretty good with most any musical instrument. I like woodwinds best. I have a fife that belonged to my mother that I’ve written a few melodies for.”