by R. L. King
The next day was gray and overcast. The memorial service, held at one of the local churches a couple of blocks off Main Street, was well attended: just about everyone in town who could get away had shown up, as well as a small knot of people who looked as out of place among the townsfolk as Stone, Jason, and Verity did. Upon entering the church, Stone immediately headed for this group, and all of them greeted him warmly. They gathered in the back of the sanctuary before the service started, all of them looking sober and sad at the loss of one of their own.
There were seven in all, ranging in age from mid-twenties up to a couple of women in their sixties. They all responded politely when Stone introduced Jason, but seemed much more interested in meeting Verity. “So this is your new apprentice,” one of the sixtyish women asked, looking her up and down. Stone had introduced her as the friend who had phoned him about Eleanor Pearsall’s death.
One of the men, about the same age as Stone, smiled at Verity. “I never thought I’d see you take another apprentice, Alastair. Too antisocial, you always said.”
Stone shrugged. “Neither did I, but you never know how these things work out sometimes.”
The service was short, simple, and heartfelt. The minister spoke for a few minutes, followed by several of Eleanor’s local friends getting up to celebrate her kindness, her charming eccentricity, and her famous store displays. Nobody said anything about her magical activities, but that wasn’t surprising. It likewise wasn’t surprising that there was no casket. Jason wondered if they’d even released the body yet, but decided this wouldn’t be a good time to ask.
Afterward, there was a short reception in the church’s meeting area. Stone and the other mages didn’t attend, instead opting to head with Jason and Verity out into the parking lot. All of them looked downcast as they tried to remember the good things about Eleanor, rather than the gruesome way she had died.
“Heading back soon?” one of the women asked Stone.
He nodded. “We’ll be taking the portal down in Lowell, so we’ve got a bit of a drive ahead of us. You’re at the Alpine Chalet, right?”
Several of the mages nodded. “It’s the only one in town, as far as I know,” one said.
Jason, feeling out of place among all those mages, walked to a pay phone near the church to call the motel desk and see if Stan had left a message. It was early in California, and he didn’t really expect to hear anything, so he was surprised when the clerk, a young woman this time, said, “Oh, yes, Mr. Thayer. There’s a message here for you from a Mr. Lopez.”
“There is? What did he say?”
There was a pause. “He says to call a Lieutenant Whitcombe at Helmford PD after 10 a.m. There’s a phone number.”
Jason dug out a pencil stub and a notebook and wrote down the number. He thanked the clerk and hung up. It was just now ten, so he shoved another coin into the phone’s slot and dialed the number she’d given him, shooting a thumbs-up at Stone when the mage glanced over to see what he was doing.
When he came back to join the group, he looked satisfied, but tried not to show it, given the gravity of the occasion. “Get something?” Stone asked.
“Yeah, believe it or not. We can talk to the guy for fifteen minutes if we can get over there in less than an hour. They’re moving him to a different facility later today. Only thing is,” he added, looking troubled, “They said they can only let two people in. I tried to get him to budge but he wouldn’t, especially after he found out V’s underage. She’s not gonna be happy about that.”
Verity, meanwhile, chatted animatedly a short distance away with a blonde female mage in her early twenties. “Let me handle this,” Stone said, motioning for Jason to stay put. He moved over to where the two women were talking, and said something first to Verity, then to the other woman. Verity’s face clouded with annoyance for a couple of seconds, but then she nodded. The other woman patted her arm, and the two of them continued their conversation.
When Stone returned, Jason asked him, “How did you manage that?”
“Well, she is my apprentice, which means theoretically she’s supposed to listen to me,” Stone said. “But really, she’s getting on quite well with Sharra there, so I suggested the two of them get some lunch so Verity can talk magic with someone who isn’t me for a while. I think she thought it was quite a good suggestion, even though she wasn’t too pleased about being left behind.”
CHAPTER FIVE
It took Jason and Stone about fifteen minutes to say their goodbyes, get back to the car, and drive the five miles to Helmford. Jason was nervous about leaving his sister alone with strangers, but Stone assured him that Sharra was a talented young mage and could deal with any trouble that might come up.
The county sheriff’s office was a sprawling, wooden single-story building on the outskirts of the town. Stone and Jason went inside and after a few moments of waiting they were ushered into the tiny, cluttered office of Lt. Morris Whitcombe. He was a balding black man with a goatee, the beginnings of a beer gut, and sharp dark eyes. He looked both of them over. “So,” he said. “I hear you two want to talk to our prisoner, but what I don’t understand is why.”
Jason took a deep breath. This would be the hard part. They couldn’t exactly spill the beans about magic and the Evil and what they suspected had happened to the security guard the night Eleanor had been murdered. Much as he would like to—and the compulsion to do just that sometimes got very strong with him lately—he knew it would cause more problems than it solved, and likely end up with him and Stone being held for observation alongside Dwight. He indicated Stone with a head gesture. “Dr. Stone and I are from California—we’re consulting on a similar case out there, and we thought we might be able to get some insight talking to this guy.” He forced his voice to remain calm and dry. Just the facts—sort of. They were from California, and they were sort of working on a similar case, so it wasn’t technically a lie. Sure, he’d left out quite a few details, but that was okay.
Whitcombe’s dark eyes shifted between the two of them. “I’m not sure how this is gonna help, but Wakowski down in Boston seems to think you know what you’re doing, Mr. Thayer,” he said, sounding troubled. “The thing is, this is the weirdest crime that’s happened around this area in years.” He leaned forward. “If you do anything to fuck up my investigation—”
Stone shook his head. “We have no intention of upsetting your investigation, Lieutenant. But the situation in California has similarities to this case: a senseless and extremely brutal murder and evisceration with no apparent motive. We just want to talk to your suspect to see if we can determine if the two have anything else in common.”
Jason remained silent. Stone was fabricating like crazy, but he had to admit the guy was a good liar. If it worked, it worked. If not, he’d have to see what else he could come up with.
“Well,” Whitcombe said at last, “I’ll tell you up front that I think it’s a bad idea. But there isn’t any regulation against it. Technically he is allowed visitors under controlled circumstances—we’re just trying to limit it to family only, aside from attorneys and other professional personnel.”
Jason nodded. “Trying to keep the media out mostly, I’d imagine.”
Whitcombe looked surprised. “Yes,” he conceded. “Media and—the curious.” He sighed. “Like I said, Wakowski speaks highly of you, Mr. Thayer, so against my better judgment, I’m going to allow this. You’ll have fifteen minutes, no more.” He stood. “Follow me, please.”
Jason and Stone followed the lieutenant out of the office and down a hall through the main lobby of the building. “Guess Stan came through with his friend in Boston,” Jason whispered to Stone.
Whitcombe took them through the lobby and out the other side. At the end of a long hallway he opened the door to a room with a table, three chairs, and a tiny reinforced window set into the door. “Wait here,” he told them. “You understand an officer will need to be present, and you are not permitted any physical contact with the prisoner.
”
“Of course,” Stone said. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”
It was about ten minutes before the door to the room opened again. Whitcombe came in first, followed by a chubby young man in an orange jail-issue coverall. His hands were cuffed in front of him, his ankles chained together so his walk was more of a shuffle. He stared at the floor, so they couldn’t get a good look at his face. Behind him waited a uniformed officer, who guided him to the single chair on one side of the table and motioned for him to sit down. He did so without looking up.
“Fifteen minutes,” Whitcombe said again, and left the room. The uniformed officer stationed himself in front of the door.
Stone immediately leaned forward from the other side of the table. “Dwight,” he said gently. “You don’t know us, but we’re trying to determine what happened the night Eleanor Pearsall died. My name is Alastair Stone, and this is Jason Thayer.”
The young man did not look up.
“We’d like to ask you a few questions, if we may. We don’t have long to talk with you, so I hope you don’t mind that we’ll get right to it.”
“I’m sorry...I’m so sorry...” Dwight whispered. “I—”
“You said you didn’t mean to do it,” Stone said. “What do you mean by that, Dwight?” Stone’s voice was even, soft, almost hypnotic.
The young man did look up then. His eyes behind thin-framed glasses were watery, his entire face a mask of misery and despair. “I—I keep trying to tell them—it wasn’t me.”
“You say you didn’t do it?” Jason asked.
Dwight looked conflicted, stricken. “Yes—no. I mean—my body did it. I know that. But—my brain—didn’t.” He started to cry. “You aren’t gonna believe me. Nobody believes me. I guess I don’t blame them...”
“We believe you,” Stone said in the same soft, hypnotic tone. “Tell us, Dwight. Tell us what happened that night.”
Dwight took a deep breath. He pulled his manacled hands up out of his lap and put them on the table, wringing his fingers with obvious unease. “Why—why would they let you guys come to talk to me? Is this some kind of messed-up joke?”
“We’re just trying to understand,” Jason said. “That’s all. Please tell us, okay?”
Dwight shrugged. “It doesn’t matter...” he whispered. “I’ll tell you what I told them, and you won’t believe me either, and nothing will change.” He looked up, meeting first Jason’s eyes and then Stone’s. “We—we’d just finished our rounds. We—Kurt and me—we’d drive around to check on things and then go back to the Alpine Chalet to watch TV. There—there’s never really anything to find, no crime or anything.”
“Were you smoking that night?” Jason asked.
There was a long pause, and Dwight didn’t meet his eyes. “Yeah, a little. Kurt too.”
“Just pot? You sure it wasn’t anything harder?”
That time he did look at Jason. He shook his head. “No, man. Never. Never anything harder. Just a little weed, is all.”
“What happened then?”
Dwight swallowed. “We got a call, on the radio. From—Ms. Pearsall.”
“Was she in trouble?”
“She said she heard something inside the store. She—sounded scared. Wanted us to come check it out for her.”
“And you did that?” Stone asked.
“I—” He looked down at his hands.
“Dwight?”
“This is the part you’re not gonna believe,” he said, his voice bleak.
“Like we said, try us,” Jason said. He glanced down at his watch—not much time left.
“When we—when we got to the back door to Hillerman’s, I felt something. It was weird—like some kind of—really bad lightheadedness. And then after that—” His breath picked up and his hands began to shake. Beads of sweat broke out on his wide forehead. He looked up at the two of them. “It was like—I was a passenger in my own body. Like—something else was in there with me, and it was driving.”
“Driving?” Stone asked. “You mean—you felt as if you weren’t in control of your body?”
“Yeah,” Dwight whispered. “Like I was moving, but something else was making me move. But—it was like whatever it was, it was using me. Using my brain. Picking through it.” Tears formed in his eyes. “I watched myself—talking to Ms. Pearsall—going around the store, looking for whatever noise she’d heard—but somehow I knew there wasn’t a noise. Because—”
“Because what?” Jason asked quietly.
“Because—whatever it was she’d heard—they made it happen. So she’d call us.” Now he began sobbing in earnest, but he kept talking as if he felt he had to get this out. “I know, you won’t believe me. I hate myself so much. I want to die. I want to kill myself, like Kurt did, but I was too chickenshit to do it then and now I can’t.”
Stone leaned forward. “So you’re telling us that—whatever you claim took you over, it made the noises inside Hillerman’s to cause Ms. Pearsall to call you over there?”
Dwight nodded. “While I was going up and down the aisles—pretending to look for the sound—I grabbed a knife from the kitchen department. Or—it made me grab one. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to...” He lowered his head again, sobbing.
Jason tapped his watch and looked meaningfully at Stone. Not much time left, he mouthed.
Stone nodded. “Did you know it meant for you to kill her?”
“I—I think I did. I tried to fight it, but...I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.”
“Whatever this is—do you know if it did the same thing to Kurt?”
“It did... He had another one...like the one inside me. He never even tried to stop me when I stabbed her. I wish he had. I wish he had...Maybe he’d have killed me, and Ms. Pearsall wouldn’t have had to die.”
Stone leaned forward a little more. “Dwight...you’ve been very helpful. Thank you for talking with us. There’s no need for you to relive what happened to Ms. Pearsall. But I would like you to answer one more question for us, if you can. It’s very important.” When Dwight didn’t answer, he went on, “This thing you claim was inside you, forcing you to do these things—do you have any idea why it wanted you to kill Ms. Pearsall? Did it give you any impression of that? Anything at all?”
There was a knock at the door. The uniformed officer opened it to admit Lt. Whitcombe. “That’s time, guys,” he said.
“Just one moment, please, Lieutenant,” Stone said without taking his eyes off Dwight. “Dwight? Can you answer that?”
Dwight thought about that for several seconds, squeezing his eyes shut. He shook his head. “No...no...Nothing. I’m sorry. I don’t—” He shook his head violently back and forth.
“That’s enough, gentlemen,” Whitcombe said more insistently. “Let’s go.” The uniformed officer moved over to stand behind Dwight, intending to help him up.
Reluctantly, Stone and Jason rose. “All right. Thank you, Dwight, for your time,” the mage said.
The two of them turned to follow Whitcombe out of the room when suddenly Dwight spoke again, more loudly. He seemed to be in the grip of an interior struggle.
“Wait! I remembered something. It wasn’t me, it was Kurt—but—right before it made us kill her, he said something like—now aren’t you sorry you didn’t join us?”
CHAPTER SIX
Jason and Stone got out of there as fast as they could after that, and were soon heading back toward Woodwich. They’d managed to act casual enough to convince Lt. Whitcombe that they were disappointed with what Dwight had told them, that clearly the man was insane and all of this stuff about something else driving his brain were the ravings of a sick man. The cop told them that the ‘aren’t you sorry you didn’t join us?’ part was new—they hadn’t heard that before. But he didn’t seem to place must emphasis on it; it was merely more evidence that something had snapped in Dwight’s mind.
“We’re still waiting on tox screens,” he told them. “I’ll be very surprised if we don’t find out there was
something other than pot in what they were smoking.” They made noncommittal noises suggesting agreement, thanked him, and left.
“I don’t get it,” Jason said when they were back in the car. “Why kill mages who don’t even know they exist? I guess they might see you guys as a threat if you started getting organized, but so far they haven’t seen any sign of that because it isn’t happening. Right?”
“Not that I know of,” Stone confirmed. “As far as I’m aware, aside from who knows how many Forgotten, we and Verity are the only people who know of the Evil’s existence. And even we don’t know bloody much when it comes right down to it.” The last sounded bitter and resigned.
Jason sighed. “We’re gonna have to tell somebody, Al. You know that, right?”
Stone nodded. “I know. But the trick is figuring out who, and how. You know as well as I do that if we let this out to the wrong people, it could be disastrous.”
“Shouldn’t you at least tell the other mages to watch out?” he asked. “If somebody’s going around trying to kill them, they should probably be on their guard, right?”
“And I should tell them what, exactly?” Stone said with a frown. “‘Pardon me, but you’d best watch your back because some evil invisible extradimensional bodysnatcher is trying to kill you’?”
“They might believe you.” Jason shrugged. “They’d have a better chance than the general public, right? And anyway, you wouldn’t have to tell them about the Evil. But just suggesting they watch out for themselves is a good start, right? I mean, can’t most of them take care of themselves if they’re expecting trouble?”
“Good point,” Stone said. “That can’t do any harm, and at least it might prevent any more deaths.”
Ten minutes later they rolled back into Woodwich.
They found Verity and Sharra bonding over pepperoni and onions at the downtown pizzeria. They were almost done, but Stone and Jason sat with them and split another pizza, forcing themselves to talk about safe topics following a meaningful glance at Verity to inform her that they’d fill her in later. Verity proved helpful with this: she spent the remainder of the time telling Stone about new spells Sharra had suggested that she wanted to learn, causing him to roll his eyes indulgently and sigh.