Four and Twenty Blackbirds

by Mercedes Lackey

  "We won't be able to prevent him," she said bitterly, her voice steady and calm. "We both know that. And I can't think of any way that we could even catch him in the act, except by accident."

  It was unpalatable—but it was truth. He winced, and nodded.

  "So we continue to react as quickly as possible, and we pray that he makes a mistake somewhere, sometime."

  He nodded again. "I can't think of anything else to do," he replied helplessly. "And he's proven twice that he can act right in the middle of a crowded street at the height of the day and still get away. He doesn't have to wait for the cover of darkness anymore. He has us at a complete disadvantage, because he'll always wear a different face. Witnesses do us no good. I can't think of anything that will help except to instruct the constables to keep an eye on female entertainers."

  "Unfortunately, neither can I." She bit her lip; it was getting a distinctly chewed-on appearance. "I'll—think on this for some time. Perhaps something will occur to me."

  Think? She meant that she was going to pray about it. He knew exactly what she was going to do, she was going to spend half the night on her knees, hoping for some divine advice. Maybe she'd get it, but he wasn't going to hold his breath.

  Her eyes were focused on something other than him, and he tried to be as quiet as possible to keep from disturbing her. Abruptly, she shook her head and looked at him again.

  "You might as well go," she told him. "You go do whatever it is that lets you think; perhaps you can evolve some plan. If anything happens, or if they find the body, I shall have someone fetch you."

  He stood up, gave a brief, stiff nod of a salute, and took his leave.

  His own form of meditation was to sit and focus his eyes on something inconsequential while his mind worked. When he got back to his room, that was precisely what he did, leaving the door open so that if Kayne came for him, she would know he was waiting for the summons. He sat down on his bed with his back to the wall, and stared at a chipped place on the opposite wall.

  This case was precisely like all the rest, with nothing left to tie the murderer to an actual person. Tal had been studying case-histories in the files of the Justiciars with Kayne's help over the last week, and he had found one other murderer like this one—a man who'd been compelled by some demon inside him to kill, over and over again. "Demon" was the word the Church clerk had used, but Tal and Ardis had both been a bit less melodramatic. "I would say, need, rather than 'demon,' " she had commented when he showed her the case. "As you yourself pointed out; domination, manipulation, and control. This man was driven by his own need, not by some other creature's, he was the only director of his actions."

  That particular man had taken mementos from each of his victims, some personal trinket from each of them, and once the Justiciar-Mages realized what he was doing it was through those mementos that he was caught. They had done something that allowed them to follow those objects to the place where they were lying—which happened to be the man's apartment, hidden behind a false wall in a closet.

  It was obvious to Tal that the missing knife or knives served the same purpose here, but a mage would know better than to leave such a knife uncleansed after the murders, so there was no hope that a trace of the victim's blood would provide the link they needed to find him. Tal was certain—and so was Ardis—that the person they sought was male. The fact that all the people taken over had been male was the telling clue, rather than the fact that all the known victims were female. A woman who hated other women usually felt that way for some other reason than confusion about her gender—in fact, other than women who were of the cutthroat variety of thief, females who murdered other females usually did so out of jealousy or rivalry and considered themselves intensely female. It was Ardis's opinion that in order to control the secondary victims, the murderer would have to identify intensely with them, and it was Tal's opinion that most females, even one with severe mental and emotional warping, would find that distasteful.

  They could both be wrong, of course, but again, women who murdered women almost always killed people they knew, and it would simply not have been possible for the murderer to get to know all of the widely disparate victims in the short period of time between murders.

  Men kill strangers; women don't, except by accident, or as part of another crime. That was the pattern that had emerged from Tal's study of the records.

  As to where their killer got his knowledge of magic—the most logical place to look was the Church itself. This troubled Ardis, and although she faced it unflinchingly, Tal avoided bringing the topic up. But that made it yet more likely that the killer was male, for Ardis knew all of the female Justiciar-Mages in all Twenty Kingdoms personally; none of them had gone missing, was subject to strange or inexplicable trances lately, or indeed ever had been in all of the cities, towns, and villages in question. "I don't think it's possible to do this remotely," Ardis had told him. "I think the killer has to be there, nearby, somewhere. There are just too many things that can go wrong if he can't actually see what's happening."

  Which meant their killer was hidden somewhere in plain view of the scene. It would have to be somewhere above the level of the street, too, in order for him to have a decent view.

  Tal wished that there was some way to conscript that bird-man. If anyone had the ability to spot someone watching the murders, it would be him! And no one in the entire city of Kingsford had a better chance of stopping another murder in the act than this Visyr. At least, he would if the murder took place in daylight, in the open street. After this last incident, the murderer was quite likely to go back to murders at night, or even indoors.

  We still don't know how he's taking control of his secondary victims. How hard would it be to take a room in a big inn, stand up on the balcony, and take over one of the patrons? Tal thought glumly. Then, when the constables come to question everyone, the murderer can either be gone completely out the window, or protest that, like everyone else, he was tucked up in his virtuous bed.

  Frustrating.

  But if Visyr would just volunteer his services. . . .

  Ah, but why should he? He wasn't human, he had no interests here except for his paid position in the Duke's household, he probably hadn't the least notion what a Free Bard was. He was a predator; how would he feel about murder?

  Well, obviously he felt strongly enough about it to try to kill the presumed murderer. There was that. Tal just wished he could have read the bird-man a little better; obvious things like feather-trembling and eye-pinning were one thing, but what had it meant when the creature went completely still? What had some of those head, wing, arm, and talon movements meant?

  You can't coerce a flying creature, and I don't know what to say or do that would tempt him or awake whatever sense of justice lives in him. I fear the answer is that there is no answer for this one, unless the Duke lends us his services. That meant that the Duke would have to do without whatever the bird-man was doing for him, and he didn't know just how willing the Duke would be to sacrifice anything he personally wanted to this man-hunt. Especially when there was no guarantee that there would be any concrete result from the sacrifice.

  Well, he'd mention it to Ardis; she had more channels to the Duke than anyone else he knew of.

  If only Visyr had managed to snatch the knife! But once again, it was missing. Visyr definitely recalled that the man had had it in his hand when he bolted from the murder scene, and had not had it when he ran out onto the ice. It was a point of pride with the bird-man, how accurate Haspur memory was, and Tal was not inclined to doubt him. So, once again, the telltale knife had vanished into the crowd. Which meant it probably had been dropped, deliberately, in a place where the real murderer could find it. The knives were probably serving the same "memento" purpose—or, more accurately, perhaps, serving as trophies—as the small, personal objects had served for that other killer.

  One other thing they had learned that they had not known before. It was not the same knife, although the
blade was the same shape. This one, unlike the one that Tal had seen the knife-grinder use, had boasted a gaudy, jeweled hilt—precisely the kind of toy that a young, well-dressed man might wear as an ornament. So it was reasonable to assume that the murderer had several knives of the same type, each suited to a particular "tool" for murder. For the jeweler it might have been this very piece. For the blacksmith, the plainer blade that Tal had seen, or even a rough, half-finished blade. So the "curse" notion, at least, could be discarded. It wasn't at all likely that there were two or more knives of the same type carrying so powerful a curse!

  Well, that's one small spot of progress, anyway. Then again, it could be the same blade, with a different handle.

  Movement at his open door caught his eye, and he nodded in greeting to Kayne. "They've brought the body in; Ardis is with it," she said shortly. He nodded again and rose to follow her.

  Ardis, assisted by another Justiciar, was already in the process of examining the body with a detachment that Tal found remarkable in someone who was not used to seeing the victims of violence on a regular basis—and certainly someone who was not used to seeing nude young men on a regular basis, either!

  The other Justiciar was a much older man; thin, bald, with an oddly proportioned face, very long, as if someone had taken an ordinary man's face and stretched it. His eyes were a colorless gray or faded blue; his hands and fingers as long and nimble as any musician's.

  "Well, there's no trace of magic, which is what we expected, but it's more than merely frustrating," she was saying to her assistant as Tal and Kayne entered. Kayne went white, then red at the sight of the nude body, then excused herself. Ardis didn't even notice.

  Tal took his place on the other side of the table. The body hadn't been in the water long enough for any real damage to have occurred, but Tal did notice one thing. "He doesn't look drowned," he pointed out. "Look at the expression; he doesn't look as if the last thing he was doing was struggling for air." In fact, the expression on the corpse's face was one of profound relief; if Tal hadn't known better, he would have thought that the man had died in his sleep. It was most unsettling to see that expression on this body.

  "True." Ardis frowned. "Of course, that could be simply because the cold rendered him unconscious first. His lungs are full of water, at any rate, so drowning is definitely what killed him."

  But Tal had already moved on to the next thing he was looking for. Again, the fact that the fellow had drowned in very cold water, and soon after committing the murder, had kept the formation of those strange bruises to a minimum—but the bruises were there. Ardis and the other Justiciar bent over them to study them at close range when Tal pointed them out.

  "You say you've seen these on the other killers?" Ardis asked, delicately turning the man's arm to avoid further damage as she looked at the bruising on the inside of the upper arm.

  "All the ones I was able to examine," Tal replied. "They don't look like the bruises that would come from falling, or from being struck."

  "No, they don't," the other Justiciar replied. "There's no central impact point on them; it's more as if the limb was shoved or struck by something large and soft, but shoved or impacted hard enough to leave a bruise." He looked up at Tal from across the table, and nodded. "You must be the Special Inquisitor; I'm Father Nord Hathon, the Infirmarian."

  That accounted for his presence here: his medical knowledge. Ardis was calling in anyone she thought might give her a clue. Tal had no doubt of the Priest's competence, for no one who worked closely with Ardis had ever proved less than competent. I just hope that the same can be said about me.

  "Look on the legs for the bruises, too," Tal told him. "You'll probably find them on the backs of the thighs and the calves."

  "Fascinating," Father Hathon murmured, following Tal's suggestion. "I can't account for this; kicks would have been directed towards the shins or the knee, blows to the head or torso, and attempts to seize the hands probably wouldn't have left these bruises on the wrists and hands. Those are particularly odd; they don't look like ligature marks, but they don't look like blows, either. Falls would have left bruises on the outside of the arms, not the inside, and on the shins again. This isn't quite the damage one would see from crushing, but it isn't far off from it."

  Tal shook his head. "I don't understand it, either," he confessed. "All I know is, they look just like the ones I saw on the other bodies."

  "Fascinating," Father Hathon said again. Ardis straightened up from her own examination and wiped her hands on a towel placed nearby.

  "I don't think we'll learn anything more here." She sighed. "There's nothing magical in the clothing, no traces on the body. We might as well turn his corpse over to his relations. We're questioning the relatives, but I'm virtually certain that they're going to say precisely what all the friends and relatives of other secondary victims have said."

  "This is a most curious case, Ardis," Father Hathon said, still examining the body. "I fear the only way that you will apprehend this perpetrator is when he makes a mistake."

  "So you agree with me?" she asked, turning to look at him. "The man didn't simply go mad and murder a stranger, like the fellow at the Cathedral?"

  Father Hathon looked up, and nodded.

  "Absolutely," he replied. "This is not behavior that can be rationalized even by a very disturbed soul, and despite what the laity might believe, people do not suddenly run mad and begin killing strangers without giving very powerful signs that all is not right with them long beforehand."

  "People don't suddenly run mad and murder strangers at all," Tal interjected. "It might look as if they have, but either a person they really wanted to kill was one of the job-lot, or else the people they kill bear some strong connection or similarity to someone they do want to kill but don't dare."

  When both Ardis and Father Hathon turned to look at him in surprise, he flushed. "I—handled a case like that," he murmured apologetically. "We caught the murderer and I got a chance to question him. Fellow ran mad in the marketplace and killed three older women. Turned out he really wanted to murder his mother. I got curious and looked up other cases of supposed stranger-killings, and indeed they were like his."

  Ardis and Hathon exchanged a look; hers was rather proud and proprietary, his was an acknowledgement. Hathon continued, this time including Tal. "I shall question these relatives myself to assure myself about signs of a disturbed mind, but I believe, with you, that I shall find no such signs, for I find no accompanying signs of physical neglect or abuse on this body, and no signs in the belongings that he planned this crime." He shrugged. "I cannot account for these bruises, and they trouble me. I concur with your analysis. If I did not know better, I would argue for demonic possession."

  Tal couldn't resist the obvious question. "What do you mean, Father Hathon, that you 'know better'?"

  He smiled, thinly—more a stretching of his lips than a real smile. "I have seen nothing in all my years to make me believe in demonic possession. There are spirits, certainly, even ones we humans might term 'evil.' There may even be demons. But I do not believe that such a creature can infest a human soul and make it do its bidding. That a human could invite one to infest, I do truly believe, but that is voluntary hosting, and not involuntary possession, and the creature that is hosted is no greater in evil than the one doing the hosting." He lost what was left of that faint smile. "Believe me, Special Inquisitor, the human heart is as capable of evils as any supernatural creature of legend. It is capable of things more terrible than any poor, homeless spirit could engender on its own. In my time, I have seen the worst that man can wreak, and I would prefer to face the worst that a spirit could do than fall into the hands of one of my fellow humans who harbors such a damaged soul."

  Ardis drew a sheet over the body, shrouding it from view. "Father Hathon, if you would see to dealing with the relatives, I would be grateful. You can tell them that the Church believes their son was a victim himself, and that he can be buried in hallowed ground
with all the appropriate rites."

  "And I shall be suitably vague when they ask me what I believe he was a victim of." He nodded briskly. "You can trust my discretion."

  "I never had any doubts," Ardis replied and, gesturing to Tal to follow her, left the room that evidently served the Justiciars as a morgue.

  Once again, they retreated to the haven of Ardis's private office. Once they were in their accustomed seats, Ardis leaned back and watched him under half-closed eyelids. "You surprised me back there," she said slowly. "Pleasantly, I might add. I knew that you were intelligent, but I did not know that you were inclined to supplement that intelligence with research. What other oddities have you studied in the case-books, Tal Rufen? Perhaps we might find some similarities with this case."

  Kayne came in at that moment bearing a tray with the dinner they had both missed, which was just as well, since Tal's stomach was beginning to tell him that it didn't matter what turmoil his head was in, his body needed food. She set mugs of hot tea and plates of bread, cheese, and pickles in front of both of them.

  "Rank hath its privileges, including raiding the kitchen-stores, and I borrowed your rank and your keys on your behalf," Kayne said crisply. "You two need to eat, or you'll collapse and nothing will get done. May I stay? If you can't find anything for me to do as a secretary, I can take a toasting-fork and make you toasted-bread-and-cheese."

  Ardis seemed more amused than annoyed; Tal was simply grateful for the food. "Certainly," Ardis replied, picking up the mug and taking a sip. "At this point, you should be part of our investigation. You may be in my position one day, and have to conduct another like it."

  Kayne made the sign of the flame with her two hands against her chest. "God forbid!" she exclaimed. "I don't want to see any such thing happen!"

  Ardis only arched a brow and waited for Tal to begin. She knows that once a crime has been committed, sooner or later someone will emulate it. He grimaced.

  "Well, the first thing that comes to mind probably doesn't have anything to do with this one," he replied, seeing the page before his mind's eye as vividly as if he had a Haspur's memory. "That's the one I call the 'would-be hero.' He's a fellow that does something deliberately to put people's lives in danger so that he can be the first on the scene to rescue them. The fellow in the archives set fires, then rushed in and rescued those who were in peril, but I suppose it would be possible to make holes in boats, set up situations where things could fall on people, lure a boat onto a hidden obstruction—"