She looked back down at the blueprints. The private chambers, which Ianto had barred them from, consisted of two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Perfectly typical. All of it was perfectly typical.
Slightly demoralized but unwilling to admit defeat, she flipped over to the cross sections again.
There was the gabled roof with a very slight pitch, not large enough for an attic, or even a crawl space, as Preston had previously suggested. But along the eastern-facing wall of the house, just near Ianto’s bedroom, there was a narrow strip of white space, something the architect had forgotten to fill in.
Only no architect worth their salt forgot to finish their cross sections （just Effy, and that was mostly apathy, not incompetence）， so she leaned over the desk and squinted, trying to measure the size of the empty space against her thumb.
“What is it?” Preston urged. “Do you see something?”
“Yes.” Effy pointed. “It’s not in the floor plan, which is odd, but if you look closely at the cross section, you can see this little bit of white space. Judging by the relative scale of the drawing, it’s just the size of a narrow closet and it’s off Ianto’s bedroom. I’d say it was a mistake on the architect’s part, but I already know you don’t believe in coincidences.”
Though Preston looked affronted, he didn’t argue. “Well, I can believe Ianto is hiding something of his father’s in there. He’s certainly cagey enough.”
“But we can’t go there now.” It was already late; Ianto had retreated to his chambers, and the thought of confronting him again made Effy feel queasy. Whenever her mind was not otherwise occupied, it was immediately filled with the image of the Fairy King, one hand on the steering wheel and the other reaching toward her. She shook her head, trying to dispel the memory.
“No, of course not,” said Preston. “But tomorrow morning Ianto will go out—he always goes down to church on Sundays; it takes about an hour. We can seize the opportunity while he’s gone.”
An hour. That was roughly as long as they had spent in the pub, and Ianto had been in such a vicious hurry to get back. Effy considered bringing it up, but what did it suggest, really? Nothing useful. Just her brain trying to make meaning out of the baseless terror that haunted her like a ghost.
Instead she said, “What about the irrelevant Mrs. Myrddin? You said she never leaves her chamber. She’ll be there, even if Ianto won’t.”
Preston glanced askance at the door, as though he expected someone to come bursting through. “We’ll just have to be quiet so that we don’t disturb her.”
“But what if we do disturb her?” Effy ventured.
“Then I suppose we’ll have to lie,” said Preston. He shifted a little as he said it, shoulders rising. “Just tell her Ianto sent us.”
“That’s not a very good lie.”
“Well, you come up with something, then.” He was very faintly flushed. “We’ll meet back here tomorrow morning. Ianto will be gone by sunrise.”
It still seemed like an extraordinarily bad idea. But Effy couldn’t think of any alternatives. “All right,” she agreed. “Meet here at dawn.”
Preston nodded. As Effy turned toward the door—slowly, so as not to aggravate her gouged knees any further—she felt his gaze on her still. She looked back over her shoulder and saw Preston look down hurriedly, shuffling through some papers on the desk, embarrassed to have been caught watching her.
His flush had deepened. Effy found herself thinking about how lightly he had touched her, and how the pads of his fingers were still stained with her blood.
“Preston?” she said. Her voice sounded strange: small, wondering. Almost hopeful.
He glanced up. “Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For caring whether or not I die of sepsis,” she said.
“Oh,” he said. “Well, you can never be too cautious. People have died in much more banal ways.”
“Thank you for giving me the chance to die of something interesting, then.”
“As long as you don’t throw yourself out of any more moving cars.” There was a slight quiver on the left side of his mouth, as if he were trying not to smile. Behind his glasses, his eyes were solemn. “There are far more interesting deaths out there.”
Effy stepped out of the study and stood in the flickering glow of the naked bulbs that lined the hallway. The moment the door shut behind her, she felt suddenly cold and rooted to the ground, as if something invisible were holding her there. Her breath misted out from her mouth in pale wisps.