by Joshua Bader
“Do this in remembrance of me?” I added.
“Something like that. I know many of your kind regard guest right as important. It’s not…kosher to harm someone you’ve shared a meal with.”
I nodded. “Many Arab tribes believe it makes men family until the next sunrise. Refusing to eat is almost an act of war.” I accepted the bread and took a nibble. “I hope you don’t mind if I order my own plate for the rest.”
He smiled, but said nothing until after our waitress came and left. I ordered a coffee, a tall stack of pancakes, fried eggs, and hash browns. I was on his tab, I assumed, and I was never one to skimp on a free meal. It’s like the twelfth law of wizarding, I think.
“Colin Fisher.” He rolled my name around on his tongue. “Do you know who I am?”
“Lucien Valente?” I ventured.
He nodded.
“Never heard of you before…though I must say I’m impressed so far.”
“Are you familiar with Valente International?”
I racked my brain for a moment. “Big multinational conglomerate. Owns that coffee chain and the dollar discount stores.”
“Among other things. I like to keep my interests diversified. I also don’t care for advertising my success. Bill Gates, I’m not.”
I let out a low whistle. I had friends in environmental movements who liked to go on long rants about the evils of multinationals. The more I thought about it, the more I recalled Valente International been spoken of in a tone of voice generally reserved for topics such as Nazis or terrorists. “That Lucien Valente, huh?”
“Yes, Mr. Fisher.” He paused for a sip of his coffee. I noticed he drank it black, a trait I associated with strong character and honesty, probably because it matched my own preference. “Miss Deluce seems to think I should hire you on as my personal wizard. Was that her idea or yours?”
“Hers. I didn’t know who her boss was. And Duchess didn’t strike me as someone whose opinion could be pushed around or manipulated. If she says she thought of it, she must have.”
“No,” he conceded. “She is an exceptionally stubborn secretary.” I must have cocked an eyebrow in surprise, because he responded to my body language. “Yes, secretary, executive assistant, whatever the in-fashion term is. She provides external order to my life and activities, and acts in my stead when I am otherwise engaged. I believe the archaic term suits her better: she is my seneschal.”
We sat in silence after that. My breakfast arrived and I began to eat. I could tell Lucien was waiting for something, but I didn’t have a clue what. So I attended to what I did understand: blueberry syrup atop hot golden pancakes.
I was four or five bites in when Lucien started to laugh. “I give up, Mr. Fisher. I’ve had twelve other personal wizards before you. Most were con artists or one-trick ponies. Near worthless. But I think I like you.”
I had enough etiquette to swallow before replying. “Why’s that?”
“You’re not trying to impress me. No dire prophecies of doom or demonstrations of power. You don’t need to. That’s the sign of real power, isn’t it? When you don’t feel the need to show it off, it means you really have it.”
“I know a little,” I confessed. “Enough to know that I’m not the biggest fish in the sea. But my luck and love spells pack a mean punch.” My last luck spell, in fact, had accidentally killed its recipient. He won a quarter million dollars on the roulette wheel before karma straightened itself out in the form of a speeding bus. After that, I was very careful to limit my scope when I tinkered with probability. None of that seemed particularly interview-relevant, however. Scratch that. It probably was interview-relevant, but I suddenly wanted to get this job and thought that anecdote might sour the deal.
“Ooh, ooh, tell him about the couple on their honeymoon you put in the nuthouse. I love that story.”
“Hmm.” He proceeded. “What about curses? Do you know how to break them?”
“Depends on how it got there in the first place. It can be as simple as getting the person who placed it to unspeak the curse or as complex as paying reparations.” All of which I understood in theory. I was well read in virtually every field of magic. In practice, however, I had never seen a real curse in action. From what I had studied, that was part of how curses operated: they blended into the background, subtly tilting reality toward their destination.
“This one is not simple, but perhaps some form of reparations could be made. I’m afraid I don’t know who placed it on me.”
“I see.” I chewed it over, along with a mouthful of egg. “I’d have to study it, then. How do you know you’ve been cursed?”
He held up a hand. “We’ll get to that, if I hire you. Breaking it will be your first professional duty. Could you do it?”
I should have insisted on more details or revealed my inexperience in the curse-breaking arena. But the truth was I was enjoying eating in restaurants, sleeping in hotels, and not worrying about how to pay for it. I was a good vagabond, but I knew I couldn’t live that life forever. So I lied. “Of course I can.”
“Sure, you’ll lie to a murderous, powerful lord of capitalism, but not to the FBI about a little thing like murder.”
His steely blue eyes dug into me. After a minute, he leaned back in his seat. “I think you can. I really do.”
“Is this the part of the interview where I ask what your company does and what my responsibilities will be?”
“Valente International maintains form and balance in a world determined to plunge into chaos. It makes me money in the process, but I assure you it also serves humanitarian interests, the greater good. I’m what you might call the Devil You Know. I may be evil, but I keep much worse things at bay. I make sure there’s a food store and coffee shop every other block. I don’t like it when people disappear or families get slaughtered in their homes, because the dead and the abducted can’t spend money or work jobs. I want you to know that up front, Colin Fisher. I am evil, but I’m your evil. I uphold society and, in turn, society upholds me.”
“Your honesty is refreshing.” I tried not to shudder. “Drugs? The meth they found on the clerk, he was selling that for you?”
“A subsidiary of a subsidiary of a subsidiary, I assure you. In a perfect world, I would only peddle pot. Ice makes people dangerous, unpredictable. But he was an employee, regardless, and I take his murder as a personal insult.”
“So you’re like the mob?”
His smile was predatory. “No, I’m a businessman. But legalities don’t define the limits of my enterprise. Again, I’m the Devil You Know. If I didn’t handle it, others, less pleasant than me, would. Have you seen the news coming out of Juarez or Tijuana?”
“Point well taken,” I said. “But I’ve already got the FBI interested in me. I’m not sure crime would be the best career move for me.”
“I’m aware of the bureau’s interest in you. Your job tasks need not delve into the more illicit activities connected to me. My personal wizard answers only to me and handles three responsibilities. First, I need you to advise me regarding the supernatural. Second, I have agreements with the fae courts, a truce of sorts. You will act as my emissary in any such matters. Third, you will protect me from the magic of my enemies. There are plenty of people out there who think they can do the job better than I can, and I’m certain the serious contenders have personal wizards as well. In exchange for performing these services, you will have access to my Inner Circle, the resources of my various enterprises, and …” He slid an envelope across the table. “A healthy paycheck.”
I pulled out the cashier’s check and tried to keep a straight face. “This is my annual salary?” I hoped I sounded nonchalant about it, but doubted it.
“Annual? No, Mr. Fisher, that should cover the first week.”
I whistled at that.
“Besides…of my last dozen wizards, only one lasted longer than a month.”
8
I should have politely, very politely, asked permission to leave,
gotten in Dorothy, and driven until her tank was empty. But the check in my hand was a heavy anchor holding me in place. Ultimately, I blame what happened on my ego. I had too high of an opinion of myself to really believe that I could fail him. And so I stayed in my seat, contemplating the six digits printed on the check. Let me be clear: six digits, decimal point, two zeroes.
“Two conditions,” I added, once I thought I could trust my voice. “If you ask me to do anything I find morally repugnant or illegal, I can say no.”
“You would turn down my offer over ethics?”
I took a deep breath. “Yes, I would.”
He nodded. “The condition is acceptable. I dislike getting my hands dirty as well. I will not force you to do anything you deem immoral. Your second condition?”
He caught me off guard. I had expected that one to be a deal breaker. “Two…I want your help with a personal issue. I want you to use your resources to find a girl. Sarai, she’s...”
“I’m familiar with the strange case of Miss Claremore. I rarely step into anything blind, Mr. Fisher. I take it, then, you didn’t kill her.”
“No, I didn’t.” My personal uncertainties and dark doubts didn’t need to be aired out in front of Valente.
“My resources are yours in the matter, though I would ask that you concentrate on the curse first.” He paused for emphasis. “The job is yours, Mr. Fisher. Will you accept it?”
“Let me help out here. Y-E-S.”
I really disliked it when my shadow and I agreed on something. It was usually a sure sign I was about to make a humongous mistake. “I’m your wizard.” Pause. “Might I ask why? What makes you want to hire me?”
“I could give you a number of reasons. First, I think you could say no to me. Yes-men are cheap and readily available; character is not. Second, you impressed Miss Deluce and she is not easily taken in. However, the most decisive factor is that there is something about you I do not wholly understand, a numinous element, if you will. I have survived a long time in a perilous business by using people who can do what I cannot. Be it fae-blood, gypsy-blessed, or demon-spawn, I employ the supernatural when I see it. If it won’t work for me, I make peace with it…or I kill it.”
I gulped. I doubted his backup plan for me included peace talks. “What don’t you understand about me?”
“You managed to shut out Miss Deluce. According to her, you are the only human ever to catch her in the act and force her out. That alone is remarkable; even my own discipline is not flawless against her and I have the advantage of knowing what she is capable of. You also managed to survive the curse once, which is what initially caught my attention. I thought perhaps you were a part of the curse at first.”
Curse? I really hoped he wasn’t saying what I thought he was. “The attack at the gas station?”
“Yes.”
“But curses are subtle. They bend probability. That was...”
“A nightmare, yes. But I assure you, it is a curse. I received a letter in the mail six months ago. The letter never should have been able to make its way to my hand, but it did.” Lucien produced a manila envelope and handed it me. “The postmark was from Oklahoma City.”
The top page inside was a photocopy of the letter. I scanned it over, feeling the hairs on the back of my neck rise as I read. It was written in a feminine, cursive script. The occasional tremor suggested the writer was either very old or very emotional. The word “curse” was used ten times. I suspected that was important. Repeated words and number patterns generally mean things in magic. The writer didn’t specify why she was cursing Lucien Valente beyond the most general accusations (“You take, you take, you consume until nothing is left”).
The last line made me shudder as I recalled the store room of the gas station: “I curse you with the Winter, heartless Winter, a hunger greater than your own.”
“That sounds vaguely familiar.”
“You think she is doing this?” I hesitated, then added, “How many have died?”
“Six. The pace is quickening. Three months passed between the first two attacks. There was less than a day between the last two.”
“Winter is coming,” I commented, mostly to myself. “Whatever she did, it’s only going to get stronger, more vicious, as we get closer to true winter.” I wanted to add, “If the curse is magic and not a demented psychopath,” but in that moment I knew. No serial killer could quick-freeze a person like that. There might be chemicals that could do it, but they would be easily traceable, the sort of work modern police detectives are best at. The detectives hadn’t yet arrested the villain; ergo, it wasn’t within their domain. It was magic – a heartless Winter curse. Worse, I had already volunteered to fight it.
“I suspect as much, but magic is not my forte. You survived it, so you are the expert.”
“The clerk died while I was in the store? I felt a presence, but...”
“So it would seem,” Lucien said. “The temperature change has given the coroner fits, but on the surveillance video, the employee went into the back mere seconds before you entered the store.”
I thought back to how cold the fridge handle had been, and my snap decision to go with coffee rather than soda. Had the curse been waiting behind the door, waiting to pounce? I muttered, “It’s not mature yet.”
“Yes, you already said as much.”
“No, I said it was getting stronger. This…this curse isn’t full grown yet. It needed the cold of the coolers to make it powerful enough to kill. It was scared to come out into room temperature.”
“Not even through the crime scene reports and already you see the common thread.” Lucien smiled. “There was a source of ice at each crime scene.”
I flipped past the letter and saw the rest of what he had given me in the envelope. Every report, every crime scene photo, even hand-scribbled detective notes were in my hands. “How did you get this?”
He shrugged. “Not everyone is as moral as you.”
I glanced over it all, moving quickly past the photographs. “It didn’t like it when I cast my shield spell. I think it was waiting for me behind the door until then. The air was so cold. But it felt the energy moving, my magic, and decided to run.” My mind returned to the first call afterward. “It growled, tried to run me off, to mark its territory. It’s getting stronger, but it still doesn’t like the idea of a straight up fight. Were there elements of an ambush at each scene? The victim had just turned a corner or opened a door, something like that?”
He nodded, though his face was puzzled. “Growled?”
I told him about the thing panting over the phone and the ancient language I couldn’t quite place. For reasons involving straitjackets and psychotropic medications, I had left that part out of my police interviews.
Lucien Valente sat pensively, slowly working away at his coffee. After a lengthy pause, he said, “Tell me what it all means.”
I had been mulling it over in my own mind in the silence. I had an idea, but was I on the right track?
“It’s plausible. But...”
“But what?”
“If that is what’s going on, then it’s not immature or getting stronger. It’s waking up. And that’s bad news. The last time one came out of hibernation was 1846 and that was just long enough to wipe out eighty percent of a wagon train.”
“The Donner party?”
Yeah. But that was just a midnight snack. For all intents and purposes, it rolled over and went back to sleep once its belly was full.
“But this one is awake.” I flipped back to the letter. “Somebody went poking at it with a stick until it was up and moving.”
“And it’s not going back to sleep until it’s destroyed Valente International…if even then.”
“Why wouldn’t it once the curse was fulfilled?”
“Colin, there’s a reason the spirit speakers didn’t call on them when the white man started stealing their land. Their people had to go to war to force them into slumber. If it gets fully awake, nothing short o
f a war is going to knock it back out. As soon as it gets done with the curse, my guess is it will go after the people that woke it up, followed by anybody around with enough magical juice to be a threat to it.”
“How did you learn so much about this stuff? I don’t remember ever reading about an ancient Native American spirit war.”
“Just because you want to believe I’m part of your subconscious don’t make it so, kemosabe.”
“Mr. Fisher?” There was no sound of impatience in Lucien Valente’s voice, but I suspected I had been talking to myself for far longer than I had intended to.
“Wendigo. In Native American lore, it’s a cannibal spirit of the frozen north. It gained power by counting coup…umm, eating a part of those it defeats. It’s usually pictured as either a dire wolf or a winter storm. There are two possibilities. Either the woman sending the curse woke up a real wendigo or she’s drawing power on the wendigo myth to enhance a lesser spirit or thought form.”
He held up a hand. “I don’t need the technical details, Mr. Fisher. I am convinced you know what you are talking about.” The waitress came back and Lucien paid the check before he spoke again. “You’re proving more enlightening than my last wizard already. He wouldn’t even admit that it was definitely supernatural.”
“Speaking of which, what happened to him?”
“Miss Deluce didn’t tell you?” Valente shook his head as if this neglect amused him. “You owe your freedom to the man, incompetent though he was. While you were being questioned by the police, the wendigo ate him.”
Second Interlude
Special Agent Andrea Devereaux of the Behavioral Sciences Investigative Division didn’t dare to pull her head away from the sink long enough to investigate anything. The coughing was subsiding, but she still felt like she had been gargling pond water all morning long. When she was confident she didn’t have anything left to spit out, she poured a shot of Listerine and swished it around with a sense of determined desperation.