Chapter Twenty-Seven
Hanlon and Maktel were waiting, pale but alive. The surprise on Maktel’s face when I walked in irritated me. Had he thought I was going to ditch them despite my promise?
‘Took your time,’ Hanlon said gruffly, which, given the blood on his chest, was heroic cheek.
Maktel looked at the keys in my hands and the blood on them, then at my face, reading more than I liked. He said nothing.
‘Let’s get you two down,’ I said briskly, business as usual.
The ring held half a dozen keys, each etched with various runes. I found the one that hummed when it kissed the chain’s lock and turned it. The wards unwove and the lock clicked open. Maktel dropped to his feet in a controlled fall, landing with a grunt of pain.
We went through the same dance with Hanlon. He staggered as he fell, and I reached out to catch him, trying to hide the slice of pain from my protesting ribs. Hanlon tried to pretend he hadn’t nearly face-planted, stepping away from my steadying hand. I pretended not to notice.
‘Our captors?’ Maktel asked, voice neutral.
‘They’re done,’ I said evenly. ‘All of them.’
They both gave me one of those long looks, no judgement on either of their features.
We moved upwards and outwards.
The smell of smoke thickened in the corridor.
Tired and in pain, I gathered my intention and hissed a small ‘draught’ that coaxed the flames back into the side room, pulling air away from them and starving them through the crack under the door.
It wouldn’t hold the fire for long, only long enough for us to get out, and that’s all I cared about.
Coughing on the smoke, we reached the exit without encountering anyone else. Angie had known about the plans, had been in on the discussion, but of the five of them, she was the only survivor. The only one who hadn’t got her hands dirty in some way or another.
Outside, the night air slapped me sharply. I needed it as the smoke and pain were making my thoughts thick and slow like molasses.
Stars pricked the sky over the industrial estate, indifferent to the trauma we’d endured. A fox skittered in the shadows, stopped, blinked at us, then trotted on, unfazed by our presence.
Maktel slipped something into my hand as we crossed the cracked tarmac: a cloth handkerchief, old-fashioned and clean.
When I looked at him, he tipped his chin to the blood smears on my fingers.
Blood from Hunter or blood from Beeks. Either way I wiped it away.
The cloth came away sickeningly red, but I still didn’t regret my actions.
Maktel took the dirty cloth back without flinching and folded it into his pocket.
‘Inspector,’ Maktel said after a moment, ‘who were our captors?’
‘Beeks, Hunter and Kerr. Anti-Crea assholes. One of my cases spilled over. Sorry it got you both involved. Got you both hurt,’ I corrected.
Hanlon shrugged, then winced. ‘If they were Anti-Crea, then they were no friends of ours anyway. They were prepared to hold ogres,’ he pointed out.
‘You can’t get seer-imbued chains at the drop of a hat.
They were planning to capture and hold other ogres.
I’d rather it was us. Besides, we were supposed to guard you, keep you safe.
His Excellence won’t be thrilled with the turn of events. ’
‘His Excellence will get over it. I keep myself safe. This was my work, not yours. Our captors were killers who knew I was closing in on them.’ I shrugged. ‘I finished the job.’
Hanlon nodded. ‘Justice.’
‘The permanent kind,’ I agreed – apparently that was my line now.
And wasn’t Faraday going to love that? I’d gone against his explicit orders, but I’d spin it.
It had been Kerr’s life or mine. ‘Anyone got a working phone?’ I asked.
I didn’t want to use Beeks’s phone. If I turned it on, the Domini could use it to track me, and there was no point risking that when I might not be able to get the contents off it right now. That would need Ji-ho’s skills.
Both ogres shook their heads.
‘Smashed or taken.’ Hanlon shrugged as if it didn’t matter which.
‘We don’t need it anyway,’ Maktel said. ‘Look.’ He pointed to the moon, which was obscured by flickers of black wings as a murder of crows headed our way. We watched in silence as they flew closer, changing from specks to larger fully-formed birds.
They settled around us, eerily silent. One let out a single caw. The hair on my neck stood up.
Maktel was looking towards the road and rightly so. Moments later ten or more black Land Rovers rolled up, brimming with ogres. Before the front car had even stopped, the door opened and Robbie was out, storming towards me, a sad-looking Loki cradled in his hand.
‘Pigdog,’ Loki greeted me, relief in his tone.
‘Hey Bird. How are you?’
‘Broke wing,’ he admitted.
‘We’ll fix you up,’ I promised. After all, I had the Crone all but on speed dial at this point, and she’d be very interested to know about Beeks’s tattoo. We could do a little quid pro quo.
Robbie drew me into his arms, saying nothing as he cradled me gently.
‘Fractured ribs,’ I warned.
His hold on me softened further, but he didn’t let go. He pressed his nose to my hair, inhaling my – probably disgusting – scent.
‘I’m okay,’ I promised.
He nodded against me but made no move to withdraw. Then he let out a long shuddering breath and, with visible effort, stepped away from me.
‘Kaerasta,’ Robbie belatedly greeted me, his words calm even though his eyes were wild. ‘You had an adventure.’ His lips tightened with concern as he looked at my scrapes and bruises and the blood covering me.
‘Just a small one.’ I shrugged, then winced at the movement through my sore ribs. ‘I know you won’t love this, but we need to call the Connection. This is my current case, albeit it’s blown up in my face. You can’t cover this up.’
He sighed. ‘Little Miss By-the-Book. Fine. We’ll call your colleagues.’
Good. Because I had questions. Like why the hell had Elvira and Bland not been on Beeks and Hunter?
The answer to that, it transpired, was Faraday.
Kerr Senior had been stamping his foot loudly, talking about the disrespect to his associates, and in the end, when Elvira and Bland had ended their shifts, Faraday had cancelled their replacements.
His judgement call had enabled Beeks and Hunter to kidnap me, and that set my teeth on edge.
Bloody politics. I took no small amount of satisfaction in calling in a report, and as anticipated, it wasn’t long before Faraday arrived on scene.
‘This is a mess,’ the vampyr snapped, eyeing the burning building.
‘We’ve requested fire elemental backup on SPEL. Estimated time of arrival is ten minutes out.’
He grimaced but nodded. ‘Talk me through the events.’
‘I was travelling home, accompanied by two ogres, Maktel and Hanlon, when we were jack-knifed by a truck. Our car rolled, and we all sustained injuries and lost consciousness. When we awoke, both ogres were shackled in seer-spelled manacles, and I was in magic-cancelling cuffs with my feet secured by rope. I got myself out and drew the daggers that had been on my person but our captors had wholly missed.’
‘Clumsy,’ Faraday grunted.
‘Indeed. I utilised said daggers on Hunter, killing him instantly. I searched him for the keys to the spelled shackles but found none. I proceeded through the building until I found a room with occupants. Both Beeks and Kerr Junior were discussing the murders of Marlow and Drummond. Beeks complained that Kerr and Hunter’s presence at Drummond’s murder had disrupted things, because Hunter had kicked the door down whereas Beeks could have simply finessed the lock with his skills.
It was clear from the tone of their discussion that Kerr was the one calling the shots. ’
I wasn’t going to mention the Domini to Faraday until I knew far more about the shadowy organisation and had dug into the vampyr’s background and beliefs. The Domini collected powerful members like stamps, and Faraday was certainly powerful. I’d have to tread carefully here.
‘Kerr referenced his father’s political aspirations and that his platform would benefit from an increase in Anti-Creature sentiment. They were deliberately trying to engineer the same.’
‘Any suggestion Kerr Senior knew about the events?’
‘No sir,’ I confirmed. I should have dug into that in Kerr Junior’s mind, but I’d been too focused on surviving.
An annoying omission on my part. Still, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree, and I’d felt Junior’s excitement at his plan to rape and kill the female satyr.
I was going to keep a close eye on Kerr Senior.
I expected that he was going to do the same to me.
‘I gave a verbal warning, as dictated by protocol, and then an altercation ensued, which ended with the deaths of Beeks and Kerr.’
Faraday’s lips pressed together. ‘I told you the kill order was rescinded on Kerr.’
‘You did, sir, but he was trying to strangle me to death,’ I said flatly. ‘His death was in self-defence.’
He studied me before slowly nodding. ‘Kerr Senior will no doubt want a sub-wizard to view your memories to verify that the events occurred as you said. Any issues in that?’
A cold sweat broke out, but I shrugged nonchalantly. ‘None of us enjoys having a sub-wizard crawl through our minds, but I’ll submit to examination if it is so ordered.’
I had been subjected to a sub-wizard assessment precisely once: on entry to the Connection.
Mum and I had argued extensively about it, before I found a heavy tome on sub-wizard powers dumped on my bed one day.
I never asked how or where she’d got the book, but I’d followed its instructions carefully on how to keep a fellow sub-wizard from discovering certain aspects of my memories.
I’d practised for weeks before my testing, only to have the sub-wizard take the barest glimpse into my thoughts and give me the all-clear. Turned out he was a friend of Dad’s. Corruption and nepotism were everywhere, though I’d be a fraud if I said I wasn’t grateful for it on this one occasion.
‘For obvious reasons,’ the vampyr said, ‘I’ll pass the death message. You steer clear of the family.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Faraday continued his questioning. ‘You killed both offenders and then what?’
‘I located a ring of keys in Kerr’s bag and took them back downstairs to unlock the seer-imbued manacles, freeing the ogres. We all exited the building and waited for backup.’
‘Which came in the form of sixty virtually nude ogres,’ Faraday said drolly.
I refrained from snapping back that help wasn’t coming from the Connection since he’d pulled my backup. Instead I said, ‘As you’re aware, I am dating Robert Krieg, High King of the Ogres. He became aware that an incident had occurred and came to our location.’
‘How did he find you?’
His question was valid. The truth was, he had used Loki. The moment I regained my magic, our bond had snapped into place, and Robbie had used Loki like a tracking device to home in on my location.
‘Tracking app,’ I lied blandly.
He questioned me further for several minutes before releasing me to seek medical assistance. He would remain and sort this mess out. For once, I was more than glad to walk away.