“What is that doing?” Francois asked.
“It’s collecting magic. I’m not sure why, but it’s very interesting.” Annie closed her fist around the pin, before handing it back to Francois. He stared at it still confused by her ardent interest in the small pin that everyone wore. He thought for a moment before placing it back on his lapel.
“Is it safe?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah. You’re fine. Mind letting me back in?”
“No problem.” He opened the door and Annie strolled back through the hall toward the sleeping quarters.
Chapter 31
He should have had surgery the night before. Instead, Michael Brite lay heavily sedated and sleeping in the hospital wing of the French Wizard Hall, carefully observed by his Wizard Guard partner and best friend, Sebastian Shiff. While Shiff tossed and turned on a hard metal chair watching the clock, the rest of the American wizard guards raced against time, preparing to return him home.
The heat roared on as the building rolled awake to receive employees. Annie and the team skirted through the cubicles toward the hospital.
While the rest of Wizard Hall was under dim lights, the hallway to the hospital was blinding. Annie, Cham, and Gibbs stopped short of the reception desk; nurses were scarce. Glancing around the corner and ensuring they were alone in the hallway, they entered Brite’s room unseen.
“How’s he doing today?” Annie asked.
Well medicated, Brite slept peacefully. His hand was wrapped in thick gauze. Specks of blood dotted the bandage where it had soaked through.
“He slept… better than I did, I think,” Shiff said with a deep yawn. He stretched his arms above his head and rubbed the rest of the sleep from his bloodshot eyes.
The clock on the wall read 4:35 a.m. “Yeah. You look like hell. Get some sleep once you get him to the hospital.” Annie offered a wan smile.
In turn, Shiff offered her a smirk. “Thanks.”
“You ready? I think it’s time to get moving.” Annie dropped her phone in her pocket.
Shiff glanced quickly at Brite’s bandaged wrist before gently waking his partner. Heavily sedated, he was difficult to rouse from sleep. Shiff shook him a little harder, finally waking him. Brite’s dopey grin grew larger when his eyes fluttered open and he noticed his team waiting for him.
“’s time?” he asked and closed his eyes again.
“Come on, Michael. We need to get moving,” Shiff said as he gently slapped Brite’s chilled cheeks. “I need to get you ready.”
Brite’s eyes fluttered opened once again. Dazed and unfocused he said, “Okay,” and held his breath as Shiff helped him sit.
As his arm was stabilized in the sling, he held his breath, wincing at the pain.
“I’m going to wrap your arm to keep it from moving during teleport,” Shiff announced. The stretchy wrap spread across Brite’s back, his chest, and his forearm, securing his arm to his torso. “Ready?” Shiff asked. Without waiting for an answer, Shiff and Cham helped him from bed.
“Won’t miss it here,” Brite mumbled as he was guided from the hospital wing. Dizzy from the drugs, he stumbled against his partner as they entered the main wizard hall room.
“I’m going to teleport him down the hallway. He’s never gonna make it at this rate,” Shiff said.
“You need help?” Cham glanced through the darkened hall toward the hidden back door where they would make their escape.
“I’m good,” Shiff said as he wrapped long arms around Brite. “Good luck,” he said to Annie. She offered him a weary hug and kiss on the cheek.
“Be safe,” she said and kissed Brite’s cheek. “Get well. I’ll see you when we’re done here.” She watched as Shiff teleported Brite away.
“Text me when you make it back,” Annie said to Cham.
He kissed her goodbye. She in turn put all of her exhaustion, worry, and anxiety into the kiss, searching his mouth with her tongue, letting him wrap his arms around her. Eventually, he reluctantly pulled away from her.
“Be careful,” she whispered.
“You too. Nothing fancy.” His lips grazed her forehead before he teleported away, the unmistakable sound of air rushing into the space he just vacated.
Annie and Gibbs watched into the darkness as the door squeaked open and slammed shut with a vibrating thud.
*
“Are you comfortable completing the spell?” Gibbs followed her through the cubicles, dodging the cameras that blinked and flashed.
“After going through Marielle’s desk and reading the papers from the sea side cottage, I realized you were right. I need to build a case against her, and this will give me time,” she replied and pushed open the door to their sleeping quarters. It swung wildly, banging into the wall.
“They’re off okay?” Lial asked. Sitting on the floor cross-legged, he was wrapping up his supplies and shoving them in his bag.
“On their way home,” Annie said. Her palm rested against the cold, rough cement wall; the spell flew from her palms, enveloping them in a shimmering glow. She plopped down on the empty cot, then jumped when her phone buzzed in her back pocket.
“Hey, Bucky. What’s the word?”
“First of all, the phone number you gave me,” he started.
“A burner phone?” Annie asked.
“You would think so, but no. The number belongs to Marielle Beauchamp.”
Annie smiled.
So why use her own phone to call Amelie?
“I’m grateful she’s an incompetent criminal, but she’s a wizard guard. You’d think she’d know better,” she said.
“Agreed. And that leads me to the other goody I have for you. There are two magicals in French Wizard Council who are related to the Van Alton family. The first a woman named Antoinette Van Alton who’s married to a third cousin.”
“And the other?” Annie’s heart pounded wildly in anticipation.
“You need to be careful because it’s Marielle Beauchamp. She’s a first cousin once removed and does have claim to the remaining money and property.”
Annie’s hand shook. “I thought that might be the case.”
“Girl. You need to walk lightly with this one,” Gibbs warned.
Lial’s eyebrows raised in surprise.
“Yeah,” Annie admitted and shifted on the bed. “Did you get my other texts this morning?” she asked Bucky. Gibbs glanced at her, quizzically.
“I did. I’m in the French Wizard Guard server now. We’re adjusting the tapes directly. You’ve all been scrubbed from the tapes. By the way what were you doing this morning?” he asked.
“Let’s leave it at plausible deniability, Bucky.” Annie chuckled lightly.
“I know nothing. Just be careful, Annie. Marielle is dangerous.”
“I will. Thanks, Bucky,” Annie said and clicked off the phone.
She relayed her story quickly, regaling them with her early morning adventures through Wizard Hall. She finished by saying, “So I’m prepared to erase their memories of our time here and buy us time. When we have enough proof to put her away, we give them back their memories,” She glanced at her phone. “We don’t have much time before Marielle gets here.” She handed Gibbs a crystal.
He ran a palm over the rock, reading the magical trace she had stored in it.
“What is this?”
“I captured the magic in the security guard’s pin.” She summoned the pin and held it in her palm. “This pin, actually. I switched them out when he wasn’t looking. Marielle, Roland, Jory—they’ve admitted to doing this before. And the magic corroborates it.”
Gibbs took the pin, which vibrated against his skin.
“There’s a stash of pins in Marielle’s desk. Hundreds of them. They already contain a grayish white magic. These pins, I think, were designed for this,” she said excitedly.
“You think she’s hiding the vampire killings?” Lial asked.
“I can’t be sure, but it is so weird that there were so many unidentified vampire deaths throughout France
. How does a Wizard Guard unit not search and track that better?” Annie asked. Both Gibbs and Lial let that thought sink in.
“Memory modification seems like overkill,” Lial noted.
“It’s definitely a plan,” Gibbs grumbled.
“I thought from the beginning Amelie was being helped. And now with Bucky confirming Marielle’s related to the Van Altons, it all seems to fit. She’s systematically killing off the remaining family for whatever money or property is left.”
“You need substantial proof to go through with the international wizard tribunal,” Gibbs pointed out. His steel blue eyes were intense and icy; Annie felt them burn through her.
He’s not wrong.
“If she hadn’t been insistent on the memory modification, I might not have pursued it so strongly,” Annie admitted.
Gibbs maneuvered the crystal over Annie, searching for any magic. “I’m not sure if it’s because we’re here or you’ve been using a lot of magic, but there’s residual energy around you.” He glanced at the crystal, grayish, beige and dirty.
“What is it?” She looked at the crystal and couldn’t make out what magical energy was attached to her.
“Not sure. Work this like any other case, girl. Be extra careful. That guard is not to be trusted.”
“I believe that to be true.”
Annie returned the favor, siphoning any magic from Gibbs and Lial. As of now, there were no memory modification spells or other magic attached to them.
And what did she do to me?
“So now what?” Lial asked.
“Wait for Marielle and perform a memory modification spell and hope this will be the last death attributed to Marielle.”
Annie looked at her phone.
It’s time!
“Keep an eye on Marielle,” Gibbs ordered.
Annie nodded, placed one hand on the wall, and removed the muffle spell. The hazy perimeter dispersed immediately, just as Marielle strolled down the hall to their sleeping quarters.
“Good morning,” Marielle said with a wide smile.
It doesn’t fit her mood or her face today!
“Good morning,” Annie replied curtly. She found it difficult to pretend to be friendly with the wizard guard.
Somewhat unnerved by Marielle, Annie let her lead them back to Wizard Hall and remained several feet from her. Gibbs maneuvered himself closer to Annie, glared at Marielle and remained his normal grumpy self. She wouldn’t have known there was any change in his demeanor.
Lial followed behind as they entered the large hall, still blanketed in darkness. Marielle led them to the direct center of the room, just below the brass rod. It hadn’t been there prior; Marielle had set up a four-foot-high, two-foot-wide square altar. The ancient, very well-used piece of furniture held a battered, gold-plated bowl on the flat surface.
I’m sure it’s been used often, Annie thought as she summoned one of the pins from Marielle’s desk. With it between her fingers, she slipped the pin inside the folds of Marielle’s shirt and stuck it there with a basic sticking spell.
“I will watch for other cases to make sure that there is nothing suspicious. Okay?” Marielle asked.
“Yes. We need to make sure no one ever finds the connection between the cases,” Annie said. Knowing what she knew made Annie more restless and eager to return home.
Marielle hummed softly as she tossed ingredients into the bowl.
It only served to make Annie angry.
When the ingredients were emptied from a plastic bag, they filled the entire circumference of the bowl.
“Ready?” Marielle asked and lit the foliage. The combination of herbs smoked as the fire consumed them; smoke billowed out of the bowl. “Say this spell.” Marielle ordered.
Reluctantly, Annie grabbed the spell, which was written neatly in French on a well-used card.
Word flew through her lips; her hand hovered above the bowl. Smoke grew thicker and rose higher, snaking its way toward the rod.
A bright gray light formed at the base of the rod. The magic traveled upwards through the ceiling and up the Eiffel Tower, finally shooting out of the antennae where it searched for the pins scattered across France and, in some cases, across Europe itself. Marielle’s eyes fluttered closed, and she dropped against Annie.
Unable to stop the spell, Lial and Gibbs raced to Marielle, pulling her away as Annie murmured the new reality, one in which the American Wizard Guard hadn’t been to France the last few days, nor had the French Wizard Guard had been cleaning up an exceptionally large amount of vampire deaths.
When Annie finished with the memory modification, they carried the limp guard to her cubicle where they sat her in the chair and rested her head on the desk.
Exhausted after performing two memory modifications so close together, Annie stumbled after them and leaned herself against the flimsy wall. “We have very little time if we’re going to leave without being seen,” Annie whispered.
“You okay, girl?” Gibbs asked.
“Yeah. I’m fine. Let’s just go,” she said as she pushed away his effort to assist her.
“Next stop,” Lial quipped. Gibbs wrapped his arms around Annie, propelling her through space and landing her beside the prison wing door.
The security desk was manned by a sleeping guard who lay with his pin on his cheek. Annie and Gibbs exchanged glances. Lial shrugged as Annie checked the guard’s pulse. It was strong, his breathing even.
“He okay?” Gibbs impatiently asked.
“Yeah.” Annie donned a glove and felt under the desk for the button to let them in.
The door quickly shot inside the thick stone wall. While Lial waited to let them back through, Annie and Gibbs ran down the corridor, felt the pulse of the second security guard slumped across the desk, and pushed the next button. The doors clattered and clanged as they slid through the wall.
For his assistance in the case, Sturtagaard had been granted a small amount of freedom and was no longer tethered to the wall or required to wear the collar around his neck, though Annie could see the flashing of the ankle bracelet he still wore under his blood-soaked black pants.
Sturtagaard glared when they reached his cell. “Everything done?” the vampire inquired. Gibbs ran his palm against the cell lock. It clicked open and slid into the groove that ran into the stone wall. Sturtagaard strolled from the cell; he grimaced as he turned away from Gibbs. The vampire held his hands behind his back as Gibbs tied his hands together with a magical rope, so tight that if Sturtagaard had circulation, it would have stopped.
“So I’m going to the States?” Sturtagaard asked.
“Yeah. You’re going to the States.” Gibbs’s grip on the vampire’s upper arm was tight. Though the vampire cringed, he let himself be dragged down the hall.
“Lial come with me,” Annie ordered. They left Gibbs at the prison entrance, and traversed the staircase up to the minimum security wing. There, the security guard had fallen near his desk, slumped against the wooden side with his head rolled forward. They raced to the fallen man. Lial felt for a pulse, opened an eyelid, and searched for a concussion.
“I think he’s fine. You get Louis.”
Annie ran for the nonmagical’s cell. When she arrived, Louis Van Alton was tossing fitfully in his sleep.
She waved her palm at the door. It rattled as it flew inside the wall.
Louis jerked awake, his eyes wide and scared.
“You’re free to go,” Annie said.
“Just like that?” he yawned.
“We’re making it so the French Wizard Guard won’t remember us or you. Amelie is dust, and we need you out of here for this to work. Mess with vampires again or reveal this secret, and we will deal with you,” Annie warned.
Though I really don’t care what happens to Louis Van Alton.
“We’ll take you out and then you go where you want,” she added as he cautiously pulled himself from the cot.
Annie didn’t wait for him to make a decision; she turned an
d headed out. Louis stumbled after her, trying to match her speed.
“What will I do? Where will I go?” Louis whined.
“It doesn’t matter. Just stay far away from here and you’ll be fine,” Annie responded.
Lial received them at the entrance to the prison wing, where the security guard now lay across his desk. Louis, not privy to the plan, seemed terrified by the sight. He glanced from the security guard to Annie and Lial and back again.
“What did you do?” he asked and backed away.
“They’re alive and fine. I told you we made it so no one will know any of us were here,” Annie assured him.
“Will you do that to me?” he asked cautiously.
“Only if you make problems for us,” Annie responded. They entered the hall.
“I want to verify the security guard in the front is okay. We’ll leave by the elevator,” Annie ordered. They struggled to catch up to her as she ran to the front entrance, opened the door, and peered into the reception area.
Francois was splayed across his desk, saliva dribbling from his open mouth to the desktop.
She slipped inside and checked for a pulse. “He’s good. Let’s go,” Annie said and pulled on Louis’s arm, leading him from the reception area and into the final hallway.
“Everything else okay?” Gibbs asked as he pushed the elevator button.
As it was now 6:30 a.m., the elevator came quickly when summoned. The doors squeaked open and Annie nudged Louis inside. They were followed by Lial, who maintained a tight grip on the vampire.
When they were all inside, Gibbs smacked the button. Annie opened the window beside them just enough to teleport through. She wrapped her arms around Louis Van Alton, and when she saw the light of day, she teleported the nonmagical home.
Chapter 32
When Annie woke, it was with a soft flutter in a semi-darkened room; the sunlight poked around the shades like a halo.
She let herself wake slowly, without the pressure to be somewhere or to track something or be responsible for anything other than herself. She had one day before she had to return to work to wrap up her case, to determine who was responsible for Princess Amelie’s murderous trek through Europe.
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