by Frank Hurt
“I understand I’m the newest member of the staff,” Ember said. She looked at each of the other Investigators. “Has anyone ever wondered why we are even filling out paper case file forms anymore? I mean, it’s Twenty-first Century. We have computers.”
Jackie plucked at the sheaf of paper with long, gel-coated nails painted in a zebra pattern. “Dang it, Wright’s got a point. Why are we writing these out? We still have to enter them into the system anyway.”
Ember pointed at the scarlet-haired woman. “Right! And what do we do? We enter everything into databases so we can search more efficiently. But what’s the point of filling out paper forms in the first place?”
Duncan crossed his meaty arms. “Sure, we enter the forms into the computers, Wright. But computers fail. What if our computers went down? Then what?”
“We’d call up the Department of Information and ask for a backup copy.”
“Okay, then what if there’s a fire in the building, and their servers get destroyed. And their backups too?”
Ember said, “I’m assuming they have off-site backup. If they don’t, Curtis Davies and his staff are doing a pretty poor job.”
Duncan repeatedly clicked the mechanical pencil, advancing its lead. “Computers anywhere are susceptible to hacking, or data corruption.”
She leaned forward, resting her elbows on the edge of the table. “Right, so you’re saying that in a scenario where some amazing disaster strikes—maybe an alien invasion or nuclear war, something existential that can simultaneously take down four layers of backups upon backups, when all electronic files everywhere are wiped from the Earth in a digital rapture, that is when we will all gather around the filing cabinets for redemption?”
Duncan narrowed his gaze. “Yes.”
“Brilliant. I just needed to make sure I understood the procedure. I see now that I do.” Ember pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut. How this man could be considered a peer to Wallace Livingston—The Legend—is beyond my comprehension.
A staccato knock on the open door took the entire department by surprise. A round Malvern man with dark grey, unmanageable hair and a matching full beard leaned into the room. His bright absinthe-green eyes blinked nervously and rarely made contact with anyone else’s gaze. He wore a collared short-sleeve shirt with a mustard stain over his heart. The trait which stood out most for Ember was something nobody else could even see; the shadowy smudge of a Deference Spell encapsulating the man’s aura.
“Oh. Hello. Hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he said.
Duncan rotated his chair to face the guest. “Deputy Viceroy Shadbolt. Good morning, sir.”
Geoff Shadbolt looked self-conscious as he half-turned and pointed down the hall. “There wasn’t anyone at the front desk.”
“No, sir. We’re all here. Morning staff meeting.”
“Oh. A meeting.” Geoff held a tattered, brown briefcase in one hand, which he used to gesture toward the break room. “I have to talk with you when you’re done. I can…oh, I can wait out…there?”
“You’re welcome to sit in on the meeting,” Duncan said.
Geoff squinted at the conference table and blinked repeatedly. “Oh. I…okay. I guess.”
Duncan waved his yellow mechanical pencil like a conductor’s baton at Joy. “Hilliker, give the Deputy Viceroy your agenda.”
Joy slid two stapled pages over to the new arrival. She had drawn an elaborate maze which weaved throughout the paper among the itemized agenda points. Duncan didn’t appear to notice the sketch.
Geoff began humming an unintelligible tune as his interest went to the maze. He set his worn briefcase upright on the table between himself and Duncan. The old leather was stained with a splash of liquid whiteout which could have passed for a Rorschach test. It served as an adequate distraction for the staff as they pretended to listen to their supervisor. A faint scent of Cheetos emanated from the briefcase.
“Alright, where were we,” Duncan murmured. He tapped the yellow mechanical pencil against his cleft chin as he scanned the agenda. “Oh, right. Let’s go over these case file form samples. You should each have five copies of—”
“Oh. I’m s-sorry to interrupt,” the Deputy Viceroy said. He had been tracing the route of the maze with his finger, which remained planted on the paper along with his focus. “How much longer do you expect this meeting to run?”
Duncan peered at the clock. “We’re about halfway done. So…another hour or so?”
“Oh,” Geoff’s finger resumed its course as he talked to the agenda. “Meetings are important, everyone s-says so. I attend them all the time. Meetings with department heads. Meetings with committees. Meetings with subcommittees. Oh, this week I’ll have to chair all the meetings, as Viceroy Roth is visiting England. To Glou-Gloucestershire on business. He s-says that it’s important to remind the mages in Malvern Hills that we colonials still exist.”
Duncan clicked his mechanical pencil, otherwise silent as he watched the mage talk to his paper behind the privacy barrier of his cheddar-scented briefcase. The tempo of the pencil clicks increased proportionate to the length of the Deputy Viceroy’s musings.
“I tell you what, how about we bump your item to the top of the agenda, Deputy Viceroy?” Duncan spoke with a smile, though the muscles in his neck and jaw were clenched.
“Oh no, that’s quite alright. Just pretend I’m not even here.” Geoff resumed humming to the maze.
Duncan was midway through explaining how to properly code Form 125-A (and how important it was that this form didn’t get confused with Form 125-B) when a sharp squeal startled the meeting attendees out of their comas.
“I’ve got it! That chord, it would be such a playful choice. I need to write this down.” Though his shirt had no pockets, Geoff patted his chest. He suddenly stood up as though something had just bitten him on his butt. “No pencil. Gotta go. No time. Bye-bye, Director Heywood. Bye everyone.”
“Uh, you said you had something you needed to discuss?” Duncan asked.
“S-something to—oh! Yep. Yep. Yep. It’s a missing person case. Missing persons. Changelings. Missing people, I suppose. Three of them. Here, it’s…this.” Geoff slapped his briefcase down hard onto the table, clicking the two locks open simultaneously. He produced a large manila file folder, tossing it carelessly onto the surface. A set of papers and photographs burst from the folder, sliding across the table toward Ember. A wave of Cheeto-scented molecules traveled with the papers. He reached for the folder but stopped short, choosing instead to close his briefcase and depart. “Oops. S-sorry. Messy. Yep. Messy. Bye-bye! Gotta go.”
Awkward silence filled the room in the Deputy Viceroy’s absence. Joy slowly raised her hand and waved at the doorway. “Nice chat. Thanks for stopping by.”
Everyone chuckled—everyone except Ember, who sat staring at three photos shuffled on the table. She knew these people. She knew what had become of them, too.
They were dead. Buried in shallow graves. She knew this because she helped kill them.
9
A Dang Hero
“I’m taking this case.”
The words spilled from her mouth involuntarily. Ember didn’t even realize she had spoken until she noticed the other investigators were all watching her. The photos that spilled out onto the table were of people she had only ever seen once before, but she would never forget them.
Duncan retrieved the file folder, his brow furrowing as he glanced over its contents. “What are you even volunteering for? This isn’t even a case—not formally, at least. Three changelings, reported missing by an acquaintance. I’m not even sure why the Deputy Viceroy would have been given this instead of our department. They haven’t even filled out the proper forms yet.” He seemed more bothered by the faulty paperwork than by the missing people.
“I’m taking it anyway,” Ember repeated before quickly adding, “I need to get back in the field.”
“Oh, what, the princess thinks this is another Ch
angeling Hunter?” Roseanne snorted. “One slap on the back from the Viceroy wasn’t enough? You think you’re the only one who can solve crimes in this department now?”
Neal didn’t miss the chance to chime in. “Yeah, maybe it’s a copycat killer, right?”
Ember’s neck burned red. She felt a growl forming in her throat. Before she could respond, Jackie surprised everyone.
“Shame on you two! You weren’t there! Neither was I. But I was there when we discovered the hidden dungeon where that sick psycho kept his own daughter and grandson locked up. I was there for the aftermath, first on the scene after Wright confronted the Changeling Hunter.” Jackie’s face paled and her voice quieted. “It could’ve been me—it could’ve been any of us. I don’t know if I would’ve been fast enough to take the perp out. If it would’ve been me, I might not have lived through it. I might not be here otherwise, hearing you spread bull crap about someone who I think is a dang hero.”
Jackie’s defensive compliment stung almost as badly as Roseanne’s jab. Neither sentiment rang true to Ember, but at least she knew how to react to an unjust insult.
“Alright everyone, let’s all take the drama down a notch.” Duncan grumbled as he fixed his olive drab gaze on the members of the Department of Investigation. “Wright, you’re a Senior Investigator now; your role includes filing reports and assisting me with personnel duties. You can help by filling out the forms to elevate this missing person request to case status. Then, you’ll hand this off to one of our Associate Investigators. They’re all quite capable of handling this. There’s no need for you to run around the field looking for a trio of nobodies.”
“Duncan, I’m taking the case.” She kept her tone cool.
“Excuse me, Wright?” Duncan clenched his cleft chin, his fingers forming a fist around the mechanical pencil as if it were a combat knife. “Did you suddenly forget who’s in charge here? You think you’re the one giving orders now?”
Ember stood up fast, rolling the conference room chair hard against the wall. She faced the Director of Investigations with both hands planted on the table. Her nostrils flared as she challenged him with fire-blue eyes. She said nothing.
The instant silence in the room was enough for Neal’s swallowing reflex to be audible.
The elder mage was incredulous, meeting Ember’s challenging gaze—for a moment. Two seconds into the stare-down, his expression telegraphed doubt. It didn’t take long for his olive drab eyes to look away, to glance back at the file folder in his hand. “If it means that much to you, fine. Whatever.” He shrugged, as though it was all of little consequence to him. As if he hadn’t just been unnerved by the silent exchange with his supposed subordinate.
Ember nodded once and accepted the file folder. The tension in the room broke with Joy’s audible exhale, her furtive eyes darting from face to face as though to confirm what she had just witnessed wasn’t in her imagination.
“But you’re going to have your cheerleader assisting you,” Duncan said. “Jackie knows the locals better than you do. That’s my decision.”
He’s trying to save face. To reassert his dominance over the herd. Ember briefly considered protesting but opted to accept her victory and sit back down. I have no idea how I’m going to deal with this case, but I can’t cover it up if I’m not on it.
Cover it up. She wrestled with that phrase and found it souring. I’m not covering anything up. I’m protecting the Schmitts from evil people. I’m doing this for them as much as for myself.
Throughout the rest of the meeting, she didn’t hear a word that was said. Ember was alone in her thoughts, studying the photos and the minimal information included. Details were sparse, but the essential key was right there, in black-and-white: their names. Their full names.
The accompanying personnel photos were innocuous enough. In the photos, they looked almost harmless. None of them looked like innocent youth, but they didn’t look like the monsters she knew them to be. They didn’t look like would-be rapists and murderers, sent to spy and kidnap her for interrogation by who she suspected was Elton Higginbotham, the corrupt Director of Wellness.
The one they had called “Matty” was Matthew Boxrud. This changeling was one of the two crows who tracked her, spied on her. He was the only one who died while in human form when her containment net knocked him from a picnic table, breaking his neck as he hit the ground.
The other crow changeling was Douglas Demorrett. He was the one who gifted her with a permanent scar upon her cleavage, courtesy of his knife-blade. In the photo she now held, he looked a lot like how she remembered him. His dark eyebrows and greasy black hair unwashed and unkempt, his skin pockmarked. Only his nose was different: in the photo, it vaguely resembled a bird’s beak but when she saw him last it was just a bit shorter and whole lot bloodier. She had shortened his pimpled hook nose by clamping her teeth down hard onto it, biting off the end. She vividly recalled the sound of cartilage breaking, the taste of his putrid, hot blood. It was her own gift to him, and he would get to enjoy it for the final few minutes of his miserable existence. Soon after, he transformed into his crow subform and became a hood ornament on Alarik Schmitt’s pickup.
Last was Josh Stockert, the turkey buzzard. Long hair framed an angular jawline and beady eyes. This was the creep who had described watching her undress in her apartment as he spied on her. He had promised her an eventful, long drive back to Minot. Anna Schmitt took him out, she in golden eagle subform catching the buzzard in mid-air and ripping his featherless throat out as he thrashed helplessly against an asphalt parking lot.
Twelve weeks had passed since they ambushed her at a rest stop outside of Devil’s Lake, North Dakota. All three of them paid for that mistake with their lives.
And now it was her task to somehow explain how they went missing.
“Um, Wright? Are you coming? The staff meeting’s over.” Jackie’s voice was hesitant, even timid.
Ember blinked at the scarlet-maned woman seated across the table. The others had already shuffled out of the conference room. Somehow, an hour passed and Ember wasn’t even aware of it.
Jackie pointed a gel-coated fingernail at the file in front of Ember. “Should we go over this together and enter a formal case file into the database? Contact their next-of-kins and significant others?”
“Yes. Brilliant. You take care of all of that.” Ember tucked the photos into the folder and gave it a tap with her knuckle. “Let me know what you find out, yeah?”
“Yeah. Sure. Sure, I can do that. Whatever you say. You’re the boss.” The Associate Investigator eagerly fetched the folder. “What’re you going to do?”
“Oh me?” Ember’s lips quirked. “I’m going to go dig through some rubbish.”
10
We’re the Cooks You’re Lookin’ For
It was late morning that October Monday when Ember guided her Ford Ranger into the small town of Plaza. She smiled at the yellow house on the edge of town—the one she admired as a charming two-story cottage. The cottage’s elderly owners always made a point of decorating for each holiday. Today, jack-o’-lanterns smiled back at her with toothy grins, as a soft breeze shook leaves loose from the maples in the yard. Attached to the yard’s white picket fence were silhouettes cut from plywood and painted to resemble Halloween tropes: a black cat with its back arched and tail upright, a green witch riding a broom, and a ghost in the shape of a billowing, formless white sheet.
Ember waved at the silhouette as she idled past the house. “If only the ghosts I have to deal with looked as tame as you.”
Alarik’s farmstead was just a half-dozen gravel road miles north of Plaza. As she approached from the main road, the old gambrel-roof barn came into view, peeking through gaps in the mature elm and pine that shielded the farmyard from North Dakota’s winds.
She hadn’t called ahead to let him know that she was coming to visit. Her purpose there wasn’t social, anyway. She wished it was.
Luck would have it that he wasn’t h
ome; the Schmitt Brothers Welding Service truck was gone, and with it Rik and Arnie, off to yet another job site somewhere in the vast oil patch. Her disappointment in missing a chance to see him was overshadowed by the fact that she wouldn’t have to lie to him or evade answering why she was there. It was better that he didn’t know that someone had noticed the absence of three Changelings whose bodies happened to be buried on his property. Better that I deal with this on my own, for his and his family’s own peace of mind.
Leaving the Ranger behind, she zipped up her jacket and walked along a barbed wire fence line out to the pasture. It was July when she last made this trek, when the tall prairie grasses were green and lush. The pasture had been grazed by cattle since then and the grass was shorter, hued tan now as it crunched beneath her feet. The crisp air was cool but the cloudless sky allowed the sun enough exposure to keep her warm. Black crickets skittered within tufts of sod, hopping away from her shadow as she disturbed them from their burrows. A cow bellowed somewhere in the distance in a neighbor’s pasture. The sage scent of ungrazed wormwood filled her nostrils, teasing out a sneeze.
When she was less than a yard away from it, a pheasant hen surprised Ember by jumping out from its hiding place and flying across her path. The mage had just enough time to utter a startled “bloody hell” as she stumbled backward, landing on her butt.
As the pheasant glided away, Ember looked straight at it and closed her eyes. “No human aura. Good. You’re just a bird. An actual bird.”
She retrieved the two cell phones she carried in her pockets, verifying they were intact. “Nothing’s broken,” she declared to herself.
Somehow, even on the dry prairie she managed to find a spot of yellowish-colored mud to land in. She scraped off what she could from her pants using a fistful of desiccated prairie grass. It reminded her of the yellow paint she had splattered on herself on her Testing Day so many years ago. That was two decades ago. Will I be any less clumsy in another twenty years? Probably not.