O Happy Dagger (Chase, Briony, Red's Story)

[Content warning: this story features heavy discussion of murder, demonic possessions, murder investigations, racial discrimination in a fantasy context, and descriptions of dead bodies. There were also mentions in previous chapters of pregnancy, birth, and sororicide.]

Part I: Amid the Thorns

Part II: Bad Apple

Part III: Honey and Vinegar

Chase had had a shitty childhood, no two shakes about it. But one thing he was grateful for—it had taught him how to swim.

He turned instinctively into the current of the river, cutting easily to the surface with smooth, powerful strokes. He surfaced, took a life-saving breath—and then was pummeled again, the water as furious and thundering as a high mountain flood after a storm. Damn, but that hurt; he felt his body being pelted every which way, bashing into underwater boulders and heavy branches that snagged dangerously at his clothes, but he mastered the urge to flail or panic. He’d been tossed into his fair share of storm-flung waves. He angled, kicked upwards, and broke the surface again. A bright flash of pink swept past him, and his first thought was, Peaches. He could be fairly confident in Red’s abilities—the tall Mage was an experienced lifelong swimmer, or so he claimed—but they couldn’t know if the same was true for Briony. Amnesia could make you forget a thing like that, couldn’t it? But hadn’t she been found in a shipwreck, and how would she have survived all that if she didn’t know how to swim?

All of this flew through his mind as he kicked off powerfully and dove after the former gladiator, snagging her roughly by the back of her uniform and hauling her up to the surface of the tumbling rapids. Briony gasped and spluttered, wet hair blinding her as she panted, “Red?”

“I don’t see him,” Chase answered, shouting to be heard over the roar of the current. The red-haired Mage was nowhere to be seen, and they were being swept downstream at an incredibly rapid pace—where had this unnatural flood come from, and how long could it keep up? Then another swell overtook them—Chase nearly lost his hold on Briony, for she was a surprisingly heavy gal, dense and compact with muscle—dipping them below the surface before Briony popped up again and cried something out in frustration.

Instantly, the breakneck current eased, and it was maybe a minute later before they found themselves in calmer waters. Briony proved herself to be a perfectly capable swimmer once Chase let her go, and they were able to wade out of the now tranquil river, collapsing on the muddy bank and shivering in the tall grass like sodden stray dogs.

It was Chase who sat up first, feeling for his dagger. The water would have made his gun useless for the moment, but he needed to be on-guard. The creator of the flood could still be in the area. He glanced at Briony, who was propped up on her elbows, glaring sightlessly through her limp pink bangs, and said simply, “Ovozin.”

Who else could it have been? There were no other Mages in the area, and they knew Ovozin Typhaine was capable of working great Elemental magic, if he’d been going around healing everybody’s plants. It wasn’t that much of a stretch that he could have raised a flood to catch them off-guard, too. Briony pounded the riverbank with her fist in frustration. “Ovozin,” she repeated through her teeth. “That little ifzin sharmooti. When I get my hands on him, I’ll—”

There was a rustle from the bushes to their left—Chase turned sharply, and Briony grabbed silently for Gonturan—but it was only Red, staggering up to them as if in a daze, mopping hair out of his eyes. At the sight of them, he put out a hand and sagged against a tree trunk in relief. “You’re alive,” he croaked. “Thank the gods. Was it you, Briony, who stopped the flood?”

She nodded grimly. “I couldn’t have if Chase hadn’t given me enough time to breathe,” she said. “I just reversed its flow enough to slow it down—but I felt the magic that was driving it in the first place, and the caster is strong. Almost horrendously so. Whatever we do, we can’t underestimate Ovozin.”

Oh, don’t worry, I won’t make that mistake again, Chase thought, already picturing trussing the criminal Mage up like a wild turkey. Very few people ever caught him by surprise like that—or lived to tell the tale. He glanced at Red and asked, “How did you manage to get out?”

“Translocated,” Red answered weakly, putting his hands against his knees as if winded from a long run. “Would not recommend trying that when you’re getting batted around by a flood. I’m lucky I didn’t scramble up my own particles, or wind up half made out of water.”

“Almost makes me glad you didn’t try to save us that way,” Chase intoned sardonically. Then he sheathed his knife, still scanning the surrounding woods, and said, “Come on. What are the chances that we can still catch the fucker?”

Briony hauled herself up, her eyes sparking, and said fiercely, “He’s probably headed back to his house!”

But when they arrived at the Typhaine homestead, prepared for a fight, they found it empty, as pleasant and sun-drenched as it had been when they left it. Ovozin’s packhorse was gone, and a search of the surrounding fields and even neighboring farms turned up nothing. When they showed up in the center of Theydon-Prum (though dryer and considerably more composed than when they’d straggled back onto Ovozin’s property), one of the Woodsbury sons, as tan and open-faced a farmer as any other, blinked and said, “Typhaine? But he left for Ambryn hours ago.”

“He may have only said that,” Briony began. “We think he may still be in the area—”

“Begging your pardon, miss,” the Woodsbury son interrupted, “but I saw him riding his horse on the road to Ambryn myself; I passed him on my way back from Harveston, an hour west of here.”

The three of them looked at each other; Red said firmly, “When exactly did you see him, and where? This is very important.”

After they’d sent the young man on his way, Red turned to the others and said, “It couldn’t have been him with the flood, then. The timing doesn’t line up. If he was by the river with us, there’s no way he could have gone back to his home, saddled his horse, and made it forty minutes down the road to be seen by Sonny Woodsbury like that.”

“Could it have been an illusion?” Briony offered. “An Enchantment of some kind, to provide him with an alibi? Or could he have translocated?”

Red frowned. “Maybe,” he said, though his voice was doubtful. “But it’s hard to believe he could have planned that far ahead, especially if he didn’t know we would actually run into his one witness before coming after him. And he did tell us he was going to that party tonight in Ambryn, remember? If he really had tried to kill us, why would he then head directly to where he said he’d go, rather than fleeing in any other direction?”

They were all silent for a moment, brooding over that, before Chase kicked at a pebble on the ground and said, “Fine, then. So say he’s not the flood-maker. Who would be, then? Another magic-user in this area?”

But neither Red or Briony had any answers to that, either; they debated fruitlessly over the possibility of another Mage, a rogue Elemental, an Endarkened, a freak accident, as they continued searching the town or the woods surrounding the river for any hint of suspicious activity. But the area was simply too large to canvass efficiently, and nothing seemed amiss; so finally Chase said, a bit impatient with the loose ends: “Well, look: it was either a mystery person, who’s seemingly gotten away for now, or it was Ovozin. Somehow. And we know he was lying to us about a lot of things—about how he’s been using magic to exploit the people here, about whether he had any enemies who would have had cause to hurt his sister. And we know where he’s going to be tonight. Seeing as he’s our only lead, I’d say our best shot is to keep a close eye on him. Maybe tail him and see if he gets up to anything that would crack this case open, or look for other lies to corner him with when the time comes.”

The other two nodded at that. “I agree,” Briony said. “And what’s more: he said that his sister’s body is being kept at a morgue in Ambryn, didn’t he? Seeing how she’s the only murder victim we could possibly examine, short of digging up poor Fawn Woodsbury, I think it’d be prudent to take a look at Ève. Maybe there’s some clue, some hint in the manner that she died, that could bring more clarity to this picture too.”

“Although he never said which morgue she’s being kept at,” Red said musingly. “So—assuming we can’t ask him directly without tipping our hand—we’re going to have a long search ahead of us.”

“And there’s the matter of this party,” Chase said. “Some politician’s fundraiser, isn’t it? Invitation-only. Real glitzy and intimate. If we barged in using our Shepherds’ authority, we’d be noticed for sure; and if we tried to infiltrate secretly, I’d like some details of who’s going to be there, at least, and who might be a good person to impersonate. No good spy worth his salt ever walks into a function like that without some kind of cover.”

To his surprise, Red sighed heavily at that. “I think I know a way for us to get one,” he said.

#

Red’s sister, Chase noted with interest, was nothing much like her younger brother.

She brooked no shit, mostly, whereas Red was so mild-mannered and easygoing that you could get away with a lot in his presence, only earning a sheepish laugh or a half-hearted reprimand as a consequence of your antics. Chase had always half-believed that the only reason there was any order in the Veiled Circle was because people liked their Archmage too much to take advantage of his trust.

Lydda, on the other hand, had a way of staring you down with a flat, headmistress-like stare, as if vaguely incredulous you’d managed to survive all the way up to your current position of annoying her. She ruled through fear and sheer, steel-willed bossiness. And she did not take to nicknames the way Red tolerated them: Chase’s offhand use of “Lyddie” had been met with an unshakeable “I don’t know you. You’ll address me by my full name or not at all.”

Chase decided he liked her, though the sentiment was probably not warmly returned.

Currently, the orange-haired Mage was turning that same thin-nostriled stare on her—much taller—little brother, who was gazing fixedly at some old books on her living room shelf as if they occupied his sole attention. Lydda was quite thin, severe and bird-like in build, with her thin copper-bright hair pulled back into a smart bun and permanent ink stains all over her fingers. A bit plain, Chase supposed, or pretty in a bookish kind of way, depending on one’s tastes; he saw portraits of Red’s other sisters on the wall and saw that they were all about as vivid and good-looking as he was, the youngest radiating an air of rebellious glamor and the second-oldest a particularly stunning beauty—which gave him some insight on Lydda’s air of severity. But she still projected an air of utmost authority, in a way that demanded you focus on her, and she had the tenacity of a bulldog; just being in her presence made one feel as if she would bowl through you on her way to more important things without a second thought. Briony seemed in complete awe of her and had not yet spoken in her presence, merely sitting meekly on her couch and sipping a cup of tea while Lydda eviscerated their teammate.

“That,” Lydda was saying to Red, “might just be the most ridiculous plan you’ve ever proposed.”

They had translocated straight to Lydda’s doorstep from Theydon-Prum, his sister’s home being one of the handful of places Red kept fixed in his mind whenever he hopped to Ambryn. (Although incredibly convenient, Chase could not confess to finding translocation an altogether pleasant experience. It wasn’t like shutting your eyes in one place and then opening them again in another. Normally Red was more elegant about it, whisking them across large distances in a zipping blur, but when he was tired—or half in shock from nearly being drowned—it was more like heaving the group in a particular direction, magic dragging forcefully at them as they lurched towards their destination in short bursts. Like skipping a rock over the surface of a pond. The trip home from Wallmire had been nauseating.) This had left them little time to really hash out anything like a coherent strategy; Red had only said, “Well, we know two things. We’ll have to split up. Someone keeps an eye on Ovozin until we can determine he’s not actually a threat. And someone else finds out where he sent his sister’s body—especially before he has time after the party to retrieve her, or possibly even tamper with the evidence in some way.”

“And the other thing?” Briony had asked.

“We need a way of getting into that party unnoticed,” Red responded. “And, as luck would have it, my sister happens to be one of the head librarians at the Library of Ambryn. I didn’t register it when Ovozin was first talking about it, but she’s been talking about attending this same fundraiser for weeks.”

Talk about serendipity, Chase had thought at the time. But evidently, Lydda did not share their excitement about it.

“So, what, you want me to take the three of you as my unannounced, last-minute escorts to the Trade Minister’s party?” she demanded now. “The party where I was planning to divest rich politicians of their funds so I can build a new wing for the library? The party where I had to work my arse off just to be able to rub shoulders with these damn ‘ristos, and which I’ll surely be kicked out of for having the gall to show up with a stranger without permission?”

“It won’t be the three of us,” Red said reasonably, though with a hint of pleading in his voice. “Just one: Chase.” They had decided that Chase ought to be the one to tail Ovozin. He had more experience blending in to foreign environments, after all, smooth-talking and lying his way through situations and escaping notice while scouting out his target. And his presence as a Norm would carry far less impact than either Briony or Red would, showing up to the Minister’s party uninvited. Even Lydda, an actual invitee, had the benefit of being more low-key: she didn’t have the iladrin in her eyes. “He can pretend to be your colleague, or your assistant or apprentice, or something. That should be easy enough to explain to anyone who questions why you came with one extra person. I’m sure plenty of these guests will be bringing their secretaries, their partners, maybe even a courtesan or two. They won’t bat an eye at his presence so long as he comes in at your side. And then he’ll leave you alone for the rest of the evening, and you can get on with soliciting your politicians.”

“As if I’ll be able to concentrate on that, knowing there’s a Shepherd thief skulking around investigating a serial killer!” Lydda hissed. She turned her sharp brown gaze on Chase. “Do you even know the slightest thing about libraries or books?”

“As a matter of fact, I only just learned how to read this last year,” Chase answered cheerfully. He had calmed down considerably since the incident at the river, and gently prodding Red’s sister towards apoplexy was doing further wonders for his mood. “I can write whole sentences now!”

A muscle ticked in Lydda’s jaw. She said to Red, too calmly: “And what about keeping this Ovozin from realizing he’s there? The man’s seen all of your faces, surely?”

“Chase is good at remaining undetected,” Red assured her. “But just in case, I was thinking we could charge up one of your glamours.”

Lydda tsked. “Typical,” she said in disgust—but Chase knew then that she had already ceded the battle. She acted tough, but it was obvious she would do anything for her brother; and she also knew Red wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. The argument raged on for a while, but ultimately, Lydda ended up doing exactly what Chase had expected her to do the moment she opened the door for them: she agreed to the plan.

Then she gave him a remarkably ugly collar-brooch, which he was not expecting. It looked like an enormous, white-gold beetle with emerald-plated wings. Red explained that it was a readymade “glamour,” some sort of magical device that subtly altered the wearer’s features in a passive way, different from how an Enchanter would have to forcibly maintain an illusion through active willpower and concentration. No explanation for why Lydda had it, and Chase didn’t ask. When he affixed it to his collar, Briony gasped.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, staring at him wide-eyed. “You look… beautiful!”

Chase glanced into the mirror, but he saw only his own familiar features staring back at him, green eyes bemused and thin brown brows quirked in curiosity. “What, more than I already am?”

They tried to explain what he looked like now, but it came out muddled: his eyes had become more almond-shaped, his nose upturned, his features more delicate and pure, almost feminine.

“Ye gods,” Chase said, running a hand through his hair, which Briony said had turned into fluffy blonde locks. “Did it turn me into a pretty boy?”

Briony was giggling, and even Lydda was suppressing a smile as she busied herself with collecting unused teacups. “Well,” Red said ruefully, “at least Ovozin has no chance of recognizing you.”

“It’s a low-level spell,” Lydda warned. “It won’t last past sunup, so we’ll have to make sure you’re well away from the party by then.”

Chase preened a little in the mirror, turning as if a different angle would reveal his glamoured façade. “So no going home with anyone from the party, got it. I’ll try to resist.”

Lydda rolled her eyes and disappeared to go prepare for the party; it was rapidly approaching sundown. Chase turned back to Red and Briony, who were poring over a directory of businesses in Ambryn (again, it was serendipitous that Red had a librarian sister who would have a reference like that on hand) and said, “Any idea where you’ll start looking for Ève?”

Red sighed. “Not exactly. There are at least a dozen mortuaries here that Ovozin could have chosen to have his sister’s body examined. I suppose we’ll just have to pick one at random and work our way down the list.”

“That’s a lot of work for the off-chance that her body will show us something useful,” Chase said, “but I suppose we don’t have much choice. Are you going to, you know…” He waggled his fingers in a casting magicgesture. “Do that thing?”

Recently, Trouble had asked one of the Mages in the Order to help him with a murder investigation, having her use her Divination on the murder victim’s body in order to experience his last moments. Now that there were Mages who could work as law enforcement for the first time in hundreds of years, there was a burgeoning movement to further develop this nascent art—or, as Red said, re-learn it, as he believed Mage police of old might have used it—but traction on the whole thing had been very slow, given that it seemed to take an extreme psychological toll on the Mage in question, and no one had yet figured out a way to avoid the traumatic effects of experiencing being killed. Neither Red nor Briony had tried such a spell, but both always looked a little green whenever the possibility was brought up. Briony said faintly, “I’m not much good at Divination, but if it’s the only way to find this killer, I’ll try it.”

Red shook his head. “I’m no good at it, either,” he said. “But maybe we’ll find a way to combine forces and share the burden. In any case, it’s a call we’ll have to make once we get there, not before.”

Hmmm. It was always interesting to Chase how people could readily face down death every day—especially Shepherds—and show no hint of fear in the face of their own mortality; he’d seen Briony walk off a blow that should have decapitated her, and Red was regularly trying out magical stunts that could leave his entrails strewn across multiple dimensions without batting an eye. But when it came to things like this—or killing people, especially if there was time to “work up to it” rather than being prompted in the heat of battle—there was always that hesitation, that queasiness. He’d often wondered if his lack of concern in those areas indicated that there was something wrong with him, rather than the other way around. He shrugged internally. Probably so. After all, none of them had made a living from murdering people from a young age like he had. Something like that was bound to fuck up your brain’s wiring (or your moral compass? One’s humane sensibilities?). He’d said as much to Blade, who was probably the only one who would understand, and the dark-haired Ket had only grunted lightly, as if in agreement.

In a short while they were splitting up: Briony and Red were starting with a mortuary across town, while he and Lydda took a coach to a venue the Trade Minister had rented out for the party. Botanical gardens or some such. Lydda, stiffly, explained the backstory behind the event while they rode together in the carriage—the Trade Minister was hosting it as a favor to a friend, a much more junior politician hoping to rise in the ranks by currying favor with both the wealthy elite and the common folk who could help spread awareness of his name among the masses—but truthfully most of it only briefly skimmed the surface of Chase’s mind. While he usually loved the opportunity to mingle and flirt with the richies by sneaking into their parties, his focus tonight was on Ovozin. There were a lot of things about him that weren’t adding up, and that made Chase uneasy.

He had instinctively misliked the man, as soon as they’d met him on his farm. Too… polished, too nice, especially for the whole martyred son, tragic hero story he’d presented them. Ohh, my parents died and I take care of my sick, difficult sister and I’ve been left by my community to fend all for my little old self, but I get by! I don’t have grudges with anybody! No way. No way a guy like that—the only Diminished person in an area hostile to Mage types, though probably the hostility had come after he started exploiting them—wasn’t bitter and sore and a little mean about it all, way deep down, if any of it was actually true. It hadn’t surprised Chase in the least to discover that he had, in fact, been happily putting the screws to the community who’d supposedly neglected and wronged him all this time. He’d seen the ambition in the man’s eyes, the concealed cunning and evaluation and constant assessment of how he could get more. No way a man like that was anything like the genial, mild-mannered picture he presented to them. He was a jackal. And worst part was, he’d left their whole interaction with an air of smugness, of satisfaction. Like he’d thought they were dumb enough to actually buy it. He thought himself that much more intelligent than they were.

(Briony had asked him, during the search after the river, how he’d known that Ovozin was a liar just by looking at him. You had to be one to recognize one, Chase had wanted to tell her then. Like called to like. But he’d only slyly insinuated that you had to be good at seeing that kind of thing if you wanted to make it as a thief—which was true—and left it at that.)

The only thing was: yes, Ovozin was a liar, a cheat, and an overall scumbag for the way he’d been bleeding the community. No question there. But was he a murderer? Did he have what it took to slit his own sister’s throat open with a serrated knife—her friend too—plus dozens of animals, and try to drown three Shepherds in broad daylight?

Chase didn’t think he had it in him. He’d been wrong before, yes, but he was fairly good at reading people, and Ovozin seemed a yellow-belly type. The kind that got other people to do his dirty work for him, fancying himself a kind of puppeteer. He probably got off on wielding power over other people, controlling them. He operated from the shadows, in other words, from behind the scenes. But as a brazen, violent killer? The whole thing felt off. But then who could it have been? Were they looking in the wrong place altogether? He didn’t think so, but he couldn’t make the pieces they had fit, either.

Lydda was watching him from the shadows of the carriage’s opposite seat. She was wearing a canary-yellow dress, her hair piled on her head in an artful bun, a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her nose. She said archly, “I think this is the longest you’ve been quiet in my presence so far.”

Chase blinked at her, slowly, his chin on his palm as he rested his elbow against the carriage window. Outside, a crimson sunset shattered magnificently across the sky, splitting it into a dozen fiery shards of pink, mandarin, and blood orange, bathing the red, stolid brick of Ambryn in a rosy light. He’d always liked this city. It was industrial and phlegmatic compared to the complicated, impractical designs of fair Haven, but stately in its own way. “Just wowed by your loveliness, that’s all, duchess.” She did act like an old dowager-duchess, very dignified and haughty.

Lydda regarded him shrewdly. “No, you’re not,” she declared. “You’re thinking about the case.” Then, with sudden realization: “You’re much smarter than you let on, aren’t you?”

He grinned slightly. “I’m flattered you’d even dream of the possibility. But I’m sorry to say it’s a false assumption. At any given moment, I’m either thinking about nothing at all or who I’m going to bed next.”

“Hmm.” She squinted at him some more. “I see. You act like an idiot on purpose. Because it’s easier, or it gives you an advantage when people underestimate you? No, maybe because you don’t want others to start counting on you.” She shook her head. “I was wondering why Red held you in such high regard. He doesn’t willingly spend time with people he doesn’t respect, so I was trying to understand why… Ah, but he must have seen through you by now. I bet Briony has, too. Probably they all have.”

Chase was a little unnerved by this. “Lief holds me in high regard?”

Lydda shrugged. “Well, he talks about all of you, whenever he comes to visit or when we get together with our parents. But your name comes up a lot; I know he views you as a friend, not just a teammate. And he wouldn’t think of you that way if he didn’t like all of you—the part that playacts, and the part underneath. If he didn’t understand you in that way, you’d just be another coworker to him, a flirt and a jester, not worth mentioning.”

She was reading a little too much into it, he thought. “We have to spend a lot of time together out of necessity. It stands to reason that I would come up in conversation.”

Lydda sent him a flat look. “If you say so.”

The carriage rolled to a stop then, and a valet snapped the door open with ruthless efficiency. “The Trade Minister welcomes you,” he said in a blaring, grating tone. “Please enjoy the party.”

Thereafter came a blur of introductions, of handing off their coats to one servant and being hounded with trays of canapès by another. No one batted an eye at Chase’s intrusion—not that they would; servant-types were trained to keep their feelings to themselves, but it was a big enough party that he doubted anyone really cared that Lydda had brought along her “assistant”—and he followed her around for about half an hour, making sure that people saw them together, saw that he was supposed to be there and that he belonged. Ovozin was nowhere to be seen, but there were at least two hundred people here, and the party sprawled across the breadth of the botanical gardens and into its grand exhibition hall, which had been filled with sparkling indoor fountains and displays of hothouse flowers for the occasion. Which was just as well: brooding clouds were swiftly moving in, and it looked like it was going to rain later on in the evening.

He hovered with Lydda for a while, smoothly pretending to be a librarian’s assistant and making up believable nonsense about books—“but you’re so good-looking to be a book-keeper!” one young noblewoman cried, pressing his arm lightly—and charming minor nobles and magistrates into listening to her pitch about funding for the library. She was all Antiqua, Lydda, impassioned and articulate but far too focused on the academia and tedious details to really captivate the minds of her audience, puffed-up old merchants who were now rich enough to delude themselves into thinking they were one of the elite and tittering bored dilettantes who were just looking for a glamorous cause to affiliate themselves with. But his job tonight was not to help her with that—and, he had to face it, his personal approach would have been lying his ass off to make the whole thing appealing enough for people to hand their cheques over, which he doubted she would want—so after a while, he smoothly detached himself from the circle of polite listeners around her and went off to look for Ovozin.

He found the Mage under a gazebo strung all over with colorful paper lanterns, talking at his ease with what looked to be four other successful merchants or businesspeople: they didn’t have the mien of aristocrats or politicians, anyway, but they were richly-clothed enough to indicate they’d done extremely well for themselves, so they weren’t here to ask for money like Lydda and some members of the public sector were. From the way they were crowded around Ovozin, however, he looked to be the most respected or envied among them. He looked sleek and urbane in his shimmering red and gold robes, as if he had been born into money, his dark skin gleaming under the paper lanterns and an expensive ear-drop dangling from one ear.

“—but how can you account for such monumental success?” someone was asking him. “Your profits have skyrocketed year after year, and they show no signs of stopping. What’s your secret?”

Ovozin smiled, his sleepy, heavy-lidded eyes giving him the look of a contented fox at rest. “Hard work and luck,” he replied. “And an excellent community to surround myself with. In Theydon-Prum, we all help each other get through in times of hardship, and then repay those debts twice-over in times of prosperity, until it forms a healthy ecosystem of profit-sharing that feeds into itself. A rising tide lifts all boats, after all.”

Shithead, Chase thought. The party was bustling enough that he was able to position himself within earshot of the group while placing his back to them, leaning innocuously against one of the pillars of the gazebo and sipping blindly at whatever drink he’d plucked off a passing waiter.

“Do you think such a system could be developed in other towns?” someone was asking, perhaps with a hint of skepticism, but they were overridden by another voice saying, “Where’s your sister, anyway? When you brought her to this party two years ago, it seemed as if she couldn’t stand to leave your side.”

Chase’s proverbial ears pricked. But Ovozin said, as smooth and easy as anything: “She moved out of the house and is living on her own now. We both came to the conclusion that our living arrangement was no longer ideal for the both of us. We were too dependent on each other. So now she’s gone her own way.”

What? Chase felt his heart pick up, thrumming with excitement in that old familiar way, the way it did whenever he was about to fasten his teeth in something good—like when he finally spotted something he just had to steal, and knew the chase was ahead of him. Was Ève Typhaine not actually dead? But no, multiple witnesses had seen him fishing her out of the river, hadn’t they? Had he staged it all? Or was he simply lying to save face in front of these business associates: it’d be a bad look to be at a party like this directly after finding your sister murdered, wouldn’t it?

“Oh, that’s good,” the same person was saying. Apparently they were not known for their tact. “She was so quiet, just a little slip of a thing, hardly spoke a word to anyone all night! I kept thinking, ‘What was the point of coming to a party if you don’t want to talk to others?’ But of course, she must have come to support you, Ovozin.”

Just then, the same young lady from before—the one who’d claimed that he was too good-looking to be a bookkeeper—came tottering up to Chase, her eyes glassy and her lips stained red from indulging in too much wine. Something about his glamour had been driving her wild all night, which had been mildly enjoyable, but Chase had thought she’d left—and hopefully with her fiancé, judging by the rock on her gloved finger. But apparently she continued to find him irresistible, because she lit up at the sight of him and cried, “Oh, darling, good news—I’ve decided to donate to your little library after all!”

She said it so loudly and stridently—and with an obvious liquored slur to her tongue—that she instantly drew the attention of Ovozin’s group, however briefly. Chase cursed in his head—damn his animal magnetism!—even as he smiled, cool and polite as anything, and said, “That’s very kind of you, Lady Etsuina. Miss Antiqua will be incredibly pleased. Have you told her this yourself?”

“Oh, but we should do it together!” the excitable young woman cried, evidently delighted by his every word and expression. She laid an elegant hand on his forearm, tugging insistently. “Come, we can deliver the grand news ourselves, and then perhaps—”

“Ah, but I have an appointment to meet another potential donor here,” he said regretfully, acutely aware that Ovozin’s group had stopped talking. Maybe it was better to walk away with her? But then it would be strange if he got caught hanging around them again after supposedly leaving with her… “Perhaps I can catch up with you in just a few minutes?...”

Deftly, he managed to send her on her way without too much pouting, but now he was left with having to pretend he was really meeting somebody, which wasn’t ideal. Instead, he glanced over at Ovozin’s group and found a few of them—Ovozin included—smiling at him knowingly. Chase’s heart jolted, but there was no look of recognition in Ovozin’s eyes. It was more as if they were sharing an inside joke together. And he had the glamour on, besides. So, rolling with the punches, he raised his glass to them in a rueful salute and said apologetically, “The young lady has had a bit too much to drink.”

That earned a chorus of knowing laughs. “Don’t worry,” a thin young man with jagged black hair said, grinning and raising his glass in a similar gesture. “We’ve all been there. Raising capital feels a bit like courting, doesn’t it? Only some people enjoy the dance just a bit too much.”

“Too right,” Chase agreed, tossing back the rest of his glass. An enthusiastic middle-aged woman—the one who had been posing the insensitive questions about Ovozin’s sister—watched him, her eyes glinting, before she said, “Did I hear correctly that you’re raising money for the Ambryn Library? We”—she gestured around at their group—“are all investors in the area. Perhaps you should try your pitch on us.” She giggled. “And we promise not to assume you have other intentions.”

Well, maybe you should, lady, Chase thought, not without a sense of irony. But he had no choice then but to be drawn into their conversation, and soon enough he was standing directly across from Ovozin himself, careful to keep his face neutral as they talked, trying to act as if Ovozin was a perfect stranger, no more remarkable than any of these other investors.

To his chagrin, Ovozin seemed genuinely interested in donating some of his vast wealth to the Library of Ambryn. “I can’t believe I never thought of it,” he declared. “I am a great lover of books; my personal collection at home takes up two whole rooms. The library has always been an incredible resource and comfort to me. After my parents died”—he paused for the requisite sympathetic noises and coos from his audience—“I found myself at the library several days out of the month, poring over as many texts as I could get my hands on. Once I accepted that I had a responsibility to the farm, and that I wouldn’t have as much time to see the world or go to university, as I’d intended… I was at least able to derive some of that experience from reading.”

Is that how you learned how to wield your magic?Chase thought. He probably had a treasure-trove of illegal spellbooks hidden away in that farmstead of his; the thief knew from his friends that doing things like healing plants and curing diseases was a complicated thing. It wasn’t just something that sprang out of nowhere, you had to have a lot of practice and knowledge to do it, not to mention the inborn talent and power. He kept the polite smile plastered on his face as he said, “I’m so glad to hear our institution has been of use to you. But which university were you planning on attending? It’s never too late to bolster your education, if that’s still of interest to you.”

“That’s right, Ovozin,” the middle-aged lady said, turning to him. “Now that your sister is out of the house, and business has been doing so well… there’s nothing stopping you from attending school, is there?”

Ovozin’s expression faltered, just for an instant, before he came up with one of his usual polished excuses, and Chase felt just a small flicker of triumph. That’s right, bastard, you can’t leave because that whole town is relying on you to keep their crops alive. Try and go somewhere that doesn’t have blight and see how successful you’ll be there.

They talked for a while longer before the others tired of the subject and began to drift away in pairs and threes, some turning to greet other guests they knew, others excusing themselves to visit the punch table and refresh their drinks. Chase and Ovozin were left to eye each other in silence for a moment before Chase said gamely, “So, are you planning on heading back to your town tonight, or will you be staying in Ambryn?”

Ovozin raised a brow—it might have read as a come-on, which was probably better than not—before he replied, “I’ll be heading back later tonight. I never sleep quite as well except when I’m in my own bed.”

Interesting. “That’s a long drive to make right after a party. Is there anyone waiting at home for you?” He could pretend he hadn’t heard all the talk about his sister, after all.

Something flickered in Ovozin’s eyes. “In a sense,” he said cryptically. Then he leaned in, and Chase felt a sharp sensation, right in the midpoint between his brows—it was like the headachy feeling he got when standing in the vicinity of someone wearing too much cologne, and indeed, something about Ovozin smelled overly strong and sweet. “What about you?” the Mage asked, lowering his voice almost to a purr. His jade-green eyes were sharp and catlike, and Chase suddenly felt as if he was falling into them. In the same moment, he felt a hot clench of panic and instinct, the same thing that always warned him of danger danger danger— “Where are your friends tonight? Are they waiting for you?”

Chase suddenly felt as if his thoughts were covered in syrup; he felt slow and belated, as if he was registering everything five minutes too late. “Friends?” he said blankly. “You mean the other librarians?”

“I mean Red and Briony,” Ovozin said, perfectly calm. He laid a hand on Chase’s elbow, and Chase could not find the strength to push him away, as if he were arrested in a dream. “You thought a paltry little glamour like that would fool me? No—it’s almost insulting for someone of my caliber. But no matter. I’ll break it, and then no one will realize that we’ve even left together.”

That was all Chase heard before everything went black.

#

Red and Briony dashed into their tenth mortuary of the night, rubbing rainwater out of their eyes. “I still think we should have used a rain-proof spell,” the Battle-Mage grumbled, stamping her feet against the small entry rug to generate some warmth. But of course, it was always better to conserve their magical energy in case they needed it for a fight. Briony technically saw the sense in that—she just didn’t have to be happy about it.

Red was already talking in a practiced fashion to the person who was working the night-shift for this particular morgue, who looked just as startled to see them as the nine previous ones had been. There was much confused gesticulation and waving around of the Shepherds’ medallion. But then Red gave an unusual exclamation and turned to Briony, his face bright with relief and excitement. “She’s here,” he confirmed. “They have Ève Typhaine.”

They followed the assistant undertaker down into the morgue, and Briony had to brace herself for what she would find. Ève had died, what, six days ago now? And she’d fallen into the river, besides. Briony had seen her share of dead bodies, and she knew that this was not going to be a pleasant experience. Still, they’d hinged all their hopes on the belief that this ordeal would at least turn up something useful, so it had to be done.

She was surprised to learn that magic actually had one of its few legal uses in the practice of keeping the dead; even the Autarchy saw that magic couldn’t harm corpses, not really, and so someone had mercifully put several layers of cold-spells, stasis spells, and de-odorizing spells on these bodies, ensuring that they remained almost perfectly frozen in time. They wouldn’t last forever that way, but for the purposes of autopsies, examinations, and burial rites, it was actually an oddly inoffensive experience—at least compared to what Briony was expecting.

She felt her first unpleasant shock when the undertaker drew back the tarp that was covering Ève Typhaine’s body. At first she thought it was because of how defenseless the victim looked, her deep beige skin mottled and swollen, her face bent into an expression of frightened sadness. She looked thin and frail, her hair hanging in limp dark hanks around her starved face. Briony took in a hiss of breath. Ovozin had said she’d be ill, but this… She looked at the girl’s wrist: it was so stick-thin that Briony could have put her thumb and her forefinger around it in a complete circle. She almost looked as if she’d been held captive in a sunless prison somewhere, not merely confined to her bed.

And there was the raw, jagged cut circling her throat, thin and bloodless now—the wound that had ended this poor girl’s life. Red and Briony stared down at her for several long moments, afraid to touch her and disturb her rest—but it seemed crucial to learn more. Briony turned eventually to the undertaker and said, “Was there anything that was discovered in the autopsy that we should know about? Anything that stood out?”

The undertaker was consulting his notes. “Not that I can see,” he said apologetically, flipping through the pages. “I did not perform this examination, but aside from the obvious homicidal nature of her death, there isn’t… Ah, it does say that her right hip was shattered, and mending very painfully. It didn’t seem as if it had ever been seen by a professional, physicker or otherwise.”

Ovozin Typhaine had said as much: his sister had broken her hip in a ditch last year. But why hadn’t he taken her to a Healer? “Any diseases that you could find evidence of? Wasting sicknesses? We were told she was all but bedridden for a year.”

The undertaker shook his head. “I’m not sure, officer. We didn’t find any evidence of the usual suspects—consumption, plague, that sort of thing—if that’s what you mean, but I don’t believe that was the focus of the examination, anyway. They would have been looking at her wounds, not her internal condition.” He glanced at his notes again. “She was very malnourished, though.”

Red was frowning down at the body, his expression distant and remote in the way it was when he was concentrating very hard. Finally he said in a strained voice, “There’s something odd about the body. It’s very subtle, but—feel around with your magic. Do you feel it, too?”

Briony frowned too, but she opened up her senses and did as he said. After a few moments of blind groping, she felt something catch at her mind and gasped. “Oh, there’s a—there’s—it’s so subtle, it’s almost like trying to pinch spider silk without breaking it. Is that an illusion?”

“We have to unravel it,” Red said firmly, flying into what she thought of as his instructor mode. “I’m going to—right, you’ve got that end, I’ll take the other—and then you’re going to delicately break it in half, like snapping a dry twig with your fingers, but with your mind. And—yes, now!”

Together, they peeled the spell off of the body, and Briony felt the unease that had been niggling at her falling away. She gazed stupidly down at what lay on the examination table—the undertaker’s eyes were practically bugging out of his skull—before she said, “It’s a log!”

Someone had Enchanted a piece of driftwood into looking—with perfect authenticity—like Ève Typhaine’s dead body, an imitation so precise that trained undertakers had been able to perform an autopsy on it and find nothing amiss. That spoke of monstrously powerful Enchanting magic, akin to some of the masters in the Order. “Elemental and Enchanting magic on this level?” Briony said incredulously. “He’s good enough to heal the plants in Theydon-Prum and maintain a spell like this from hours away, long enough to have her here for days, and—” She looked up and saw the look of dawning horror on Red’s face. “Oh no. What is it?”

“If this is a log, then where is Ève Typhaine’s body?” Red said, his tone rough as he worked things over in his mind. “We have to assume that she’s likely not dead. And if that’s true, and if we assume that Ovozin lied about her not being a Mage, as he’s lied about every other thing since we got here, then—”

“Then she could have been the one who raised the flood,” Briony breathed. “That’s how Ovozin was able to be away by that time. But if she’s the Elementalist, and Ovozin is the Enchanter…”

“We thought all along he was some kind of plant-Mage,” Red said in quickening tones, his voice rising in urgency as he spoke. “But if he isn’t—do you think an Enchanter of this caliber, strong enough to do something like this, would be fooled by a low-level glamor?”

Briony felt her heart drop into her stomach. “Chase!”