Friends and Enemies (Gwen Farris Book 5) (13 page)

He should have known better than to do that.

Gwen let her chin come up, and spoke to Ethyl.

"Can you set that up? We should make a point of having him and Agatha Longbranch in as soon as possible. We'll need to clear her, but if she isn't the one trying to take you down, which I doubt very much she would be involved in, then she's exactly the person we need in on the investigation. If anyone knows the polite social circle better than you, it would have to be her." Unless that was wrong.

The truth was, she realized inside her own head, Agatha was just a person that she associated with being nice and polite all the time. She was pretty much the Western Kingdom's Miss Manners, so to her mind that transferred to being invited to all the best parties, but it might not be the case.

Ethyl seemed to agree however. It was in her body posture and facial expression, Gwen thought. That was the kind of thing she'd always had trouble with. For the longest time people only gave her three cues, so she learned those really well. Disgust was the most common, followed by hatred and on occasion, pity. This wasn't any of those. There was a subtle nodding at least, which really did have a positive feeling to it. It
could
have just been her being polite though, not desiring to insult Agatha, or even simply wanting to have her friend around.

Gwen knew she normally felt better when Beth was there with her.

Ethyl gave an answer almost immediately, her voice sounding kind and gentle, if not truly excited about the whole thing.

"I'll invite them over for a late dinner tonight? Agatha will scold me for doing it at the last moment, but this
is
rather an emergency. There must be allowances for such things."

There was a pause, and Gwen realized what it was going to mean to her personal plans. Instead of going, right then, to confront the evil Mr. Clements, and possibly kick him in the groin a few times, or torture him into good behavior, she was going to have to wait. Just sit back and let other people handle things for her.

She
hated
that.

In her life nothing good had ever really come of letting anyone else do things for her. In fact, in the main, no one had ever helped her in any meaningful way at all, other than medically. A few people
had
really done some work for her in that regard, back in the day. If not for them, she wouldn't have lived as long as she finally had.

Still, that was old information, wasn't it? Her friends here just thought that they were going to be the best ones to handle this, and Gwen, as anxious as the whole thing was making her,
was
still recovering from the training she'd just had. It could be making her feel things that she didn't want to. Depression came to mind, for instance. Anxiety was also in there, someplace.

Even if there'd been a good reason for it, and she'd agreed to do it from the start, Gwen had basically been tortured for five days. Chemically speaking her brain
had
to be a mess. You didn't just recover from that kind of thing. That was why she wasn't allowed to be where Mona was anymore. That wasn't a joke, or something that would go away anytime soon.

 It was her turn to seem positive and nod then, so she did it, looking at the rest of the people one by one.

"Let's do that then? We can get James to take the invitations around.
If
you don't mind writing quickly. I'll..." That was the hard part. Gwen had nothing of value to do, it seemed. No one wanted her help.

It felt dark and like she was useless. After all, if she couldn't go and fix things for them, why would they want her around at all? This was her problem anyway, wasn't it?

Except, after she thought about it for a few seconds, she realized that, for once, it simply wasn't the case. Ethyl seemed to be the target this time, and while Gwen was
going
to be there for her, if she could, the whole thing was hinging on
her
for the moment. It had to, if they wanted to get to the real bottom of the thing.

Even if they took this current problem as an isolated thing, Will and Charles being blackmailed like they were, Gwen wasn't truly involved, was she? It just
wasn't
about her. The attack had probably been aimed at Charles, really. Through him someone had planned to get at Robert. To make him look gay, in a place where that was an actual thing to avoid for a businessman.

How she'd gotten to a state of mind where everything was all about little old her, all the time, she didn't know. Thinking about it now left her feeling small and petty. The world back home had never been like that, had it? She'd been almost invisible. When she wasn't it was only when people tried to hurt, or even kill, her. Even then it was never really premeditated. People, normally small groups of them, would play off each other and try to get the person that was too different. That didn't make them right, or good, but they only saw her for a few moments before acting.

The world here wasn't about her petty concerns either. At best she was just average, really. Even that was all borrowed from Katherine. Gwen was drinking from her life, like a vampire. Taking a sip at a time. Day by day, making the other woman into less than she might have been alone.

Thankfully Kate was a horrible person. If she ever reformed herself too much, then Gwen would have to get out of her way. Even if she didn't want to. This simply wasn't her life. It was becoming harder to be a good person and still take from this girl she barely knew. Especially once she considered all the things that Erin had done to her a little over a year back. Katherine Vernor was the one paying for what someone else had done, because no one had a box to keep a mind control victim in, if they did things like body theft and murder under the influence of another. In the past those things probably wouldn't have worked.

Erin must have been so proud of all she accomplished that way. At one point she'd even brainwashed kidnapped people into rifting. Luckily that technology or trick had died with her. If anyone had that, they could build a program to rival the Westmorlands in pretty short order.

Ethyl hurried off, not excusing herself first. No one said goodbye there, since it could be turned into a curse too easily. They just left. At most, people spoke of their return, later. Even that was kind of rare. They just walked away, and everyone was fine with it. The only one that had trouble with it was her, most days.

Beth seemed
far
too pleased with the current plan, and actually moved to fuss over Charles a bit. That was down to the fact that she was a better friend than Gwen was. She should have been doing the same thing.

Instead she listened to her friend, who moved closer to the butler, her face concerned, but not all that worried.

"Is there anything you need, Mr. Winslow? I
do
think that we have a workable plan here. This is unfortunate, but it won't take drastic action. If it becomes too dire, I'll involve my family in it. We
can
fix this, and will, for you."

Gwen got that, thanks to what Kate had told her about it all. She didn't want Charles to kill himself,
or
quit, even. The man wasn't her best friend, perhaps, but he was in the top five that way. Other than Beth, she'd spent more time with the guy than anyone else in this new world.

He'd even seen her naked, having tried to jump her in the shower, five or six times, so that she wouldn't get lazy.

So she had a reason to keep him around, since they were buds now.

"That's true. I can see about ten different ways to fix this, without even really knowing this Mr. Clements at all. I think I met him once, however. Tall older man? Gray mustache?" It had been when she'd stormed in and took over his telesar station once. She hadn't figured him as the boss, but it wouldn't have mattered if she had, at the time. The king had been kidnapped, and evil people were planning to destroy the world. When that happened, you had to be ready for Gwen Farris to take over.

Will Werner gave her a tense smile.

"The very man. He isn't normally this kind of person, but if he doesn't give me the boot, others might claim
he
loves men too, later. If I want him to take that kind of a risk, I have to offer him something worth taking it over."

Gwen shrugged, not caring that no one else got it. Though... She kind of thought that Beth really did now, having been around her for the last year as much as she had. She hadn't bothered to lose the habit, and as cute as it was, a few other people had started.

"I just don't see this as a big problem. So what if a few people think the wrong thing about you? They will anyway. Better they think you like dudes than a
lot
of other things. Like that you're the kind of douche bag that would fire a person over their sex life. No one would want to be accused of that, would they? I guess that's just because I'm from a different reality and can't understand how things are done here. The fact is that no one would care all that much about that kind of thing back home. A few might bring it up, but that would go away in a week or two, if you ignored it."

Will, who wasn't exactly her best friend ever, given that she'd barely met the man before, gave her a look that nearly left her in tears it was so heartfelt.

"Then, Miss Farris, I think I'd like to go to that place, some day. For surely it's a better land than this one."

It wasn't true, over all, but to a person everyone else there agreed, each seeming a bit more sad just then, than the last.

Chapter six

James didn't come in, taking his transportation job
most
seriously. Ethyl sent the invitations to dinner out to him with Peter. The kid was trusted to get things like that done. More to the point, everyone figured that he, unlike Gwen, would come back. She felt a bit put out by that one, since they all, automatically, seemed to be assuming that she was some kind of child. Worse, they sent the kid to do it, trusting him more than they did her.

It was like they didn't remember she could teleport now. Teletransport, which was the same thing. Exactly so, as far as she could tell. It was the act of moving from one place to another, more or less. The only real difference was that they counted telekinetic actions into the same category.

Besides, they had a plan, and while it wasn't the one
she
liked best, Gwen had to agree that she, the woman from another world,
might
not be the best one to fix every single problem ever. Really, when looking at everything that had happened so far, a good percentage of the trouble that the entire Western Kingdom had been put to in the last year had something to do with Gwen Farris, and her impractical ways of doing things. Insisting that everyone bow to her way of being, and bent to her will.

Like what she was trying to do with the Westmorlands.

It wasn't exactly true, since she hadn't caused Erin Debussey and her friends to be morons, but from a certain perspective she
did
look pretty involved. On the good side a lot of people there seemed to feel she was in on it, but on the good side of things. It was probably why they'd decided to leave her alive, and not locked up, for some of the things she'd done.

So she sat back, and did what everyone else wanted. Which for her, was nothing at all. That was her least favorite thing to do, however. Nothing was just so boring. Plus, really common there. These people waited
so
hard, most days. The worst thing was that they hardly seem to notice it happening. She'd seethe, and freak out, feeling breathless and tense because nothing was taking place, while everyone else sat back, sipped tea and discussed the same topic for three days in a row.

It meant that everyone else had things to get done at this moment, except her.

Ethyl bustled off to ready the evening meal, which meant setting things up with the staff. Winslow went with her, since that was
his
job, in a literal sense. Beth moved off to use one of the telestators, in order to give the new plan and what had happened to the detective in charge of the whole thing, Kirk. Pete actually called in to go back to Central, since he had a project to work on, too. Some form of training, or something that they didn't want her to know about. At least no one told her anything, and normally they would have.

It probably meant it had to do with her. Not that she wanted to be paranoid, but she could have her moments that way, when people where plotting against her too obviously. What they really had planned, she couldn't tell, but Gwen actually felt a light sense of an impending something, coming at her. It wasn't that big of a deal, but she could feel that it was correct. At least it was backed by magic. She felt the pressure on the side of her head again over it.

It was definitely the Westmorlands, and involved some kind of an attack, and her. It probably wouldn't be a physical one, since if that was the case the feeling would be more exact and stronger, and she would have understood it better. This had the feeling of complex plotting.

The question was then, why that would be the case.

It made almost no sense from her perspective, given that they were her friends. Except that not all of them always were. Adam couldn't stand her, most days, for instance. It was something to keep in mind.

So not three minutes after Will had managed to escape, healthy and whole again, Gwen was left in the front sitting room. With Heather. They were friendly enough, but not close really. It was a bit strange, actually, since they
had
to have a lot in common.

They were the same person, after a fashion. They should be able to talk about fashion, or weapons maybe. Boys they liked came to mind, but she didn't really want to be the one to bring any of that up.

"Um..." Gwen had never been all that great about small talk. Her life simply hadn't been about that kind of thing. Fighting, and watching television, or perhaps playing computer games, but not communicating with others, one on one.