Spell Maven Mysteries- The Complete Series

by J L Collins

  Despite the noise of the bar, my wavering voice was enough to get his attention, and the minotaur’s great head turned until his dark eyes were focused on me. Then came the grin that many would probably find terrifying, while I found it totally adorable.

  “Gwen!” his trench-deep voice reverberated through the entire room as he made his way over to us. “It’s been a minute!”

  He walked around until he was standing in front of me and scooped me up in an instant, squeezing me lightly even with his huge arms. I buried my head into his chest, laughing.

  “It’s been way too long,” I mumbled as I pulled away.

  Someone cleared their throat and I looked over my shoulder to see Gentry looking both mildly shocked and irritated, his eyes narrowed at the both of us.

  “I take it you two know each other?”

  Arcas gently placed me back on my stool, clapping a hand the size of a ham hock on my shoulder. “Why, you her boyfriend or somethin’?”

  This time I snorted, my cheeks burning as I tried to explain. “No, no, nothing like that at all. We’re working a case. Or, well, I’m looking for my brother and he’s here because my uncle said so. But enough about all that! How have you been?”

  Arcas still looked at Gentry with suspicion in his eyes but shrugged. “Pretty good. Bought this place and fixed it up a while back. I needed to have something to do to occupy my time.”

  I nodded. It made sense that he did that because a minotaur with nothing to do but kill time was a dangerous creature indeed. It didn’t help that Arcas had been abandoned on the front steps of the town hall when he was only a baby. The town didn’t have any orphanage or anything in place since everyone mainly belonged to family somewhere. When the town came together to figure out what to do with the only minotaur Spell Haven had seen in centuries, it was agreed that instead of leaving him in Amaranth Forest to fend for himself, someone would adopt him into their family. Luckily for Arcas, a local Witch family took him in not long after Tristan was born. And since they just so happened to be some of our closest neighbors, Arcas and I had known each other for most of our lives.

  “You don’t know how happy I am to see you,” I said, the reality of why I was here in the first place settling back in. “This whole thing with Tristan . . .”

  “Yeah. I heard about that. Sorry, Gwen,” he rumbled. “The whole situation is messed up.”

  Gentry leaned forward, his hands splayed across his knees. “We have information that says Tristan came to your bar pretty often. Is that true?”

  I could tell Arcas was not about to go into detail with Gentry, so I held up my finger to him and pulled Gentry away from the bar until we were near the first steps of the staircase. “Let me handle this one, okay? Arcas and I go way back. We’ve been friends forever. He doesn’t like strangers, so chances are he won’t say much with you around.”

  Gentry huffed. “I’d say he sounds pretty bull-headed, but that would just be ridiculous. Fine. I’ll go wait outside. Just don’t take too long.”

  “I’ll take however long I need to take, actually.” I flipped my braid back over my shoulder and turned back toward Arcas, slightly irritated. I knew I should be getting used to Gentry and his irritating demeanor, but he had a habit of being just enough of a jerk to really get under my skin, without it being enough for me to complain to Uncle Gardner about. Not that I would ever do that, of course.

  “So. Tristan? Did he come here a lot?” I asked Arcas once I was seated again.

  He’d walked back around to the other side, and was now filling a martini glass with a viscous, dark red liquid, sliding it over to the ghostly pale woman beside me. She smiled and slid him what looked like a piece of paper along with a couple of smaller bills for the drink. I shook my head as he took the paper and balled it up, tossing it over his shoulder and depositing the money into his pocket.

  “I see you’re still knockin’ them dead every which way you turn,” I chuckled. “Some things never change.”

  Arcas folded his massive arms across his chest, looking at me as if it were nothing. “Another day, another dollar. They always come in here looking for the wrong thing from me. I don’t have time to entertain no one like that. I’ve got bills to pay. As much as I’d like it to, the bar can’t run itself.” His gaze turned upward. “And someone has to be here, just in case.”

  I ignored the temptation to ask him about what exactly was going on up there.

  “But to answer you, yeah. Tristan was here a couple of times a week, usually. At least for a while.”

  My heart skipped. We hadn’t had much luck in the way of finding my brother just yet and at this point it felt like any little thing might help. “For a while? When did he stop coming by so much?”

  Arcas let out a loud snort. “He hasn’t been in here since a couple of weeks before Enoch was ganked. And not any bones on him or nothin’, but I’m glad. Tristan by himself is one thing, but with all them other fools running the Dark Market?” He just shook his head.

  I took in a deep breath, nearly choking on the gross stench and feeling of the atmosphere. “So he was hanging around them?” Dropping my head down, I tried to calm my steadily racing heart. I had hopes that maybe our information was wrong—I was holding out for Tristan maybe not being part of a group of gangsters. “He’s changed. It doesn’t sound like he’s the same person I left.”

  The solid ring in his large nose swung back and forth as he snorted. “Nah. Tristan’s a good guy. He’s just a little . . . misguided—yeah, misguided. Gets into trouble from being at the wrong place at the wrong time. He’s probably doing himself a solid by staying out of the picture.”

  Yep. That definitely sounded like my brother.

  “I just wish he knew what he was getting himself into. Heck, I wish I knew what he had gotten himself into. No one seems to know anything about the murder or where Tristan might be. There’s not enough to go off of.”

  “Have you checked in with his girlfriend? The Fairy?”

  Uncle Gardner had mentioned something about an ex. “Not personally, no. But I thought they’d broken up? That’s what someone told the MARC, anyway.”

  It only gave me more to think about, and with Tristan you just never knew. I could totally see him breaking some Fairy’s heart in the process.

  “Maybe. I don’t know. I saw them in here together about a month before the murder. They were pretty much all over each other so . . .”

  I held up my hand. “I get it, thanks. And you don’t get many from his circle over here, by any chance?”

  Arcas flexed his arms, tilting his head to one side and then the other. “You know I wouldn’t let that kind of trash up in my bar. I don’t need the MARC sniffing around here. Or Delaney Drakar’s bunch, for that matter.”

  I bit back the surprise in my voice. This was a bar he was running, not the Welshley-Arms Hotel. And seeing the way his eyes shifted, quickly glancing around the room, I had to wonder if it wasn’t the MARC he was worried about… was it this Delaney Drakar woman?

  “So you’ll keep your ear to the ground? The MARC will probably keep their heads blissfully turned the other way if you gave them any kind of information. If you want, I can give you Gentry’s number, so you can contact him if you need to.” I started to pull out my wand but Arcas carefully placed his hand over mind.

  “Don’t know him, so I don’t trust him,” he said, his huge muscles bulging under his tight black t-shirt as he looked over my shoulder to where I assumed Gentry was probably still waiting. Arcas narrowed his dark eyes at me. “But you? I’ll keep an ear out for you, Gwen, no problem. The girls might pick up something here and there.”

  As brutally honest as Arcas always was, I knew that all I had to do was ask him point-blank about the girls and I’d get an answer. I was just about to open my mouth, when I thought better of it. It really wasn’t my business and I certainly didn’t want to offend him, after all.

  And well, if the MARC hadn’t enacted legislature in opposition of cer
tain business services… who was I to say Arcas couldn’t employ hookers at his tavern?

  19

  The Apartment

  To any outsider, the racket coming from the other room would’ve been enough to startle them, but in the Brady household it was just another Friday morning. So when I walked into Oisín’s room to find him trying to stuff poor Jax into a closet, I just rolled my eyes.

  “Seriously? You don’t always have to be such a jerk to him, you know.”

  I yanked open the closet door and bent down to scratch Jax behind his ears, glaring at Oisín.

  He of course, looked as if he couldn’t care less. “Well, I don’t see how you expect me to rest properly when I have him trying to slobber all over me. No one can live for five-hundred and fifty years and not need a full twelve hours of sleep to look this good.” Oisín patted at his silky black fur around his face as if to prove his point.

  “Oh, I’m sure. Now, the reason I came in here to begin with is because I need you today.”

  Trying to tell Oisín you need him for literally anything else other than to eat his food, was like trying to pull teeth. The sheer amount of effort it took to make him do something he didn’t want to do was enough of a reason to never ask.

  “You need me? And I don’t suppose you’re offering anything in return?”

  I folded my arms across my chest as Jax ran out of the room. “That depends.”

  His whiskers twitched. “On what? Am I to be graded on this special assignment of mine?”

  “It depends,” I said slowly, narrowing my eyes at him, “on your behavior, obviously. Fiona-Leigh and I are leaving for Spell Haven shortly. I want to check out my brother’s apartment without having someone breathing down my neck in the process. You were close with Tristan. At one point, anyway. Maybe if we have someone with a different point of view . . .”

  “. . . someone close to the ground, you mean?” he guessed. With a great sigh, he arched his back then yawned. “Fine. I’ll tag along, I guess.”

  I waited for a moment, knowing that wasn’t going to be the end of it. “And? What, you don’t have any special demands or anything this time? I think I might actually faint.”

  Oisín waved me off with his big paw. “Now, I never said that. I just wish to have time to . . . come up with my desired list.” He finished it off with a toothy smile.

  “Yep. And there we have it,” I said as I left Oisín to his cackling.

  The outside of the Blue Hill Apartment building wasn’t much to look at, especially given the scenic view around it. With the mountains that led to Arcadia on one side in the distance, and the Valley down below that led down to Lachlan’s Lake, Blue Hill Apartments sat on top of the bluish tinged grass like an utter eyesore against the skyline.

  “Wow. This is not at all what I was expecting,” Fiona-Leigh said as we all got out of the carriage. After much begging and pleading with me, she’d finally weaseled her way into being part of the search for Tristan.

  I tucked my wand back into my pocket, assessing the rundown building. I hated to think that my brother lived here but given the circumstances, I guess it made sense. “Come on. I don’t want to be here all day snooping around.”

  We walked up to the second floor where his apartment supposedly was, and despite the good breeze coming in, it still felt swampy and warm.

  “I’ve hacked up hairballs that look better than this place,” Oisín muttered, trailing after us. “You would think working for a mobster would come with better perks.”

  “Your brother works for a mobster?” Fiona-Leigh repeated, her blue eyes wide as we stood outside #6. “There’s like a vampire Mafia?”

  I pulled my wand back out, half wanting to ignore the comment. “Not exactly. It’s a long story, but let’s just say Tristan wasn’t in the best of company.” Unlocking the door, I flicked my wand, turning on all the lights inside.

  Despite the light starting to warm up the room some, the inside of my brother’s apartment still felt dark and abandoned. The walls were in desperate need of a good washing. The worn-down sofa had seen better days, and I wasn’t sure whether the shaggy dark circle on the floor was a rug or a dead animal.

  The door creaked shut behind me as I let them past. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one judging the place.

  “Not trying to be rude or anything, but it sort of smells like a meth lab in here,” Fiona-Leigh said as she coughed, her face scrunched up.

  “And how do you know what a meth lab smells like?” I replied. “It definitely smells . . . stale. This is—ugh, yeah it might be that over there.” I pointed to the several week-old half-eaten sandwich that was sitting on the small table in what I assumed to be Tristan’s dining room space. From this angle I was pretty sure I could see fur growing around it.

  Oisín yowled, scampering backwards from sticking his head up in the air to sniff. “Did anyone else see something moving inside of it?”

  Okay, clearly this was going to get out of hand fast if I didn’t quickly take the lead. “Yes, you two, it’s pretty foul in here, I’ll give you that. But we need to stay focused. Be very careful when you’re looking around, and don’t touch anything that doesn’t look . . .” I scanned the room, wincing. “Okay, maybe don’t touch anything. Just look around first. Try not to breathe very much.”

  We split up, trying our best not to step on or in anything that might be considered a bio-hazard. Here and there, I caught glimpses of the Tristan I remembered. On a rickety side table there was an old photo of my family, taken right after Tristan was born. I picked it up, swallowing hard.

  My mother’s shiny red hair was like a fire cloud on her shoulders, and she stood holding a little bundle in her arms with a huge proud grin on her face. My father had his arm around her, and his other hand on my shoulder as I stood in front of him, looking rather grumpy and missing one of my front teeth. I shook my head, not wanting to get too distracted, before I put the picture back down. As much as I wanted the picture for myself, I didn’t want to take it from Tristan. Deep down I was still holding out for him suddenly popping back into existence, totally oblivious as usual.

  “The state of this place! Maureen would not have approved,” Oisín sniffed, ducking his head under the sofa to look around. When he popped back up, his dark face was covered in dust bunnies.

  “Nope, definitely not,” I said softly, chuckling to myself. I had lost count of the times my mother would get after me for not cleaning up after myself quickly enough. No, Maureen Brady was all about efficiency and accuracy — admirable traits for the town’s apothecary keeper.

  Fiona-Leigh bravely rifled through the kitchen while Oisín and I wandered through the rest of the small, cramped rooms. When he sent himself clear across the room from sneezing so hard, Oisín looked up at me with bloodshot eyes and a scowl.

  “The list is growing ever longer.”

  Nearly half a day was spent going through everything, but nothing we found was much help to us. As far as I could tell, Tristan had packed up what little belongings he had and left the place completely deserted without the intention of ever coming back. My chest tightened when I finally locked the door to the apartment behind myself.

  “What a delightfully boring waste of time,” Oisín casually said, walking down the steps. “So glad I could participate.”

  “That’s enough, Osh,” Fiona-Leigh warned. “It’s not like we came here to be your personal entertainment for the day.” That shut him up. At least until he realized his mistake and pounced into her lap on the way back to the forest, anxious not to have her mad at him. She caved right in, scratching behind his ears and running her hand along his back.

  Tristan had always been good in dealing with Oisín and his cranky temper, too. It only made me miss him even more.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” Fiona-Leigh whispered, nudging my elbow as I stared out the window.

  I let my shoulders drop, heavy from holding up everything so far. “Whenever Tristan was in trouble with my father, h
e’d always go hide in my room like a little baby. I used to tease him about that.” The smile crossing my face was a sad one. “We fought often, but he’d always seek me out when he was scared. I just wish I knew where he was so I could help him now.”

  20

  The Overseer

  It was hard not to feel totally useless as I trudged back into Uncle Gardner’s office, leaving Oisín and Fiona-Leigh to sit on the bench outside of it. Everything in me wanted to give him even the smallest new piece of information, but we hadn’t found a single thing that would help. It didn’t sit well with me.

  Uncle Gardner slowly ran his hand over his dark beard, his eyes unfocused as he sat back down behind his desk.

  His silence was deafening. It was like a physical presence in the room with us. I cleared my throat and leaned against the edge of the desk. “Are you sure there’s nothing more that maybe we’re just overlooking somehow? Maybe we—”

  “No. I have given you absolutely everything I have on the matter. I told you we did a thorough sweep of Tristan’s apartment, so I am not surprised that you found nothing there. But . . . when we first realized he was missing, we did perform a few interviews. One central subject seemed to pop up more than others.”

  “The new Overseer of the Dark Market?” I guessed. “Delaney Drakar?”

  To anyone else that didn’t know him like I did, the casual look on his face meant nothing. But I knew better.

  “That’s it, then, isn’t it? I overheard some people whispering about her while we were leaving Enoch’s shop. What’s the big deal about her? Does she sacrifice little changelings in the moonlight or something?”

  “No,” he replied, sounding thoroughly unamused. “She has a reputation because of her family. They’ve been deep in the Dark Market since it was first cobbled together.”

  “I’ve never heard of the Drakars.” And I had done a fair bit of research on Spell Haven history in my day.