“I do, Praetor.”
“Why have you come to this suspicion?”
Logan, never taking his eyes off the praetors, said, “On the night of the incident, this mage threatened me and my legionnaires. He advised us he had placed several powerful wards in place around the museum building and that he would need to deactivate them if we were to be able to conduct an investigation. There was a period of approximately five minutes where the accused was out of our sight.”
Isaac rolled his eyes.
“Surely this alone cannot be enough to bring such a harsh accusation to bear on this mage. Isaac has been an upstanding citizen of our community. Why would he tamper with evidence if he, as he says, was the victim of an attack by an unknown ethereal entity of substantial supernatural power?”
“Because, Praetor, I believe he has been untruthful in his statement.”
“Isaac Moreau,” said the male praetor, “How do you respond to this accusation?”
Isaac glanced at Logan, and then up at the black platform again. “I deny them entirely.”
An awkward silence hung in the air. When no one spoke, the Tribunes began to grumble amongst themselves. Finally, the praetor said, “Is that it?”
“It is. I offered my statement, I told you what happened, gave you my theories of what exactly had gotten out of the mirror I had restored, and yet you have kept me under arrest for seven days. Who knows how much power this thing has gained? How many lives it has taken? I was also under the assumption that a memory wipe would take place after I left the museum, but since it hasn’t, my job may very well be at risk. This unjust arrest has already put my livelihood at stake, but now to also be presented with an accusation that I have been less than forthcoming in my testimony is disappointing to say the least.”
Of course, Isaac had lied during his testimony; he had been extremely careful to omit any reference to Alice’s involvement, or anyone else’s involvement for that matter. This had all happened to him and him alone, because if it had happened to anyone else, the magistrate would want to bring them in for questioning… and the last thing he wanted, after what he had learned about Alice only a week ago, was to put her in front of this group of predators.
“Legio Logan,” said the female praetor, “Do you have evidence to support your claim that Tribune Moreau tampered with the scene of the engagement before your arrival?”
“I do.”
Isaac didn’t let it show on his face, but a trickle of fear like cold fingers forced its way down his throat and gripped his insides. He could feel a couple of beads of sweat forming on his brow and hoped no one would notice, but Logan noticed. Logan’s strange eyes were—infernal—sharp, his instincts were strong, and he trusted his own judgement. It was the kind of self-confidence one only gets after a couple of years serving as a distinguished police detective.
The double doors opened and one of Logan’s legionnaires—the girl with the purple Mohawk, whose name he knew was Sonia—stepped through with something in her hand—a small, black, and mangled thing. She handed the item to Logan, and then Logan showed the item to Isaac, who recognized it instantly. The black frame was damaged and had clearly smashed into pieces when it had slammed against the wall, but the strip of red against the black was unmistakable.
This was all that remained of Alice’s soul camera, Trapper.
“Do you recognize this?” Logan asked.
Isaac didn’t need to be reminded of where he was standing, who he was standing in front of, and just how many magic spells had to be floating above his head. Until now he hadn’t been brought into this room, into the Throne room, to discuss what had happened that night; all of the questioning had been done in the magically nullified apartment he was being kept in. No mage could use magic in there to tell whether he was being less than truthful.
But in here? He could be sure each of the four praetors had their own spells currently operating silently and invisibly. Standard procedure was to have a minimum of four spells running when court was in session; one to detect whether the witness or the accused was outright lying, another to take note of any sudden changes in their brainwaves, another to note changes in their biology, and another to prevent them from using magic without being detected.
If he lied, they would know. If he used magic, they would know. But he had to protect Alice. He couldn’t let them find out she was there that night.
“I do recognize it,” Isaac said.
“What is it?” Logan asked.
“It looks like an old Polaroid camera. I used to have one as a child.”
“Do you know who this camera belonged to?”
“I believe I saw it around the neck of a woman who was in attendance at the unveiling. If memory serves she was wearing a black dress. A photographer, maybe.”
Isaac was navigating dangerous waters, he knew, but he also knew how these detection spells were crafted. Thanks to the law of the land, praetors were forbidden from invading a person’s mind or being too intrusive with their magic during questioning, so the lies had to be outright and blatant for their spells to catch them. He didn’t think this line of answers had set the spells off.
At least, he hoped it hadn’t.
“And did you—”
“Praetor,” Isaac said, interrupting Logan before he could ask the question he knew would back him into a corner. “I do not understand what this broken thing has to do with my supposed tampering of evidence. I did not go back to the Greek exhibit after I met with the legionnaires and did not touch this object. And while we sit here and play judge, jury, and executioner there is a powerful entity out there, moving unchecked throughout our city. We are wasting time, and have already wasted too much time. This has to move along or else we are all in danger.”
“Legio Logan?” asked the male praetor, siding with Isaac on this.
Logan scowled at Isaac, but nodded. “Of course,” he said, and he turned the piece of broken plastic around so that the inside of the frame was facing up. There, Isaac saw something he hadn’t seen before; something he wasn’t counting on being presented with during this interrogation at Court.
Someone, likely whoever had built the camera, had taken it apart and etched symbols and runes into the inside of the frame—into the plastic itself. The etchings, which looked like they had been cut into the material with a knife before the camera was put back together, bore the unmistakable mark of a mage’s hand. As if that wasn’t surprising enough, the design on the camera looked awfully similar to the one on the back of the closet door in Alice’s apartment; and they bore a striking resemblance to the ones he had seen on the underside of the trapdoor at the Cinema Royale.
“Do you know what these are?” Logan asked.
Lucky for Isaac, lying here wouldn’t be difficult. “I can’t say I know what these runes mean,” he said, maintaining his aura of calm as best as possible.
“Legio Prime,” said the male praetor, “Bring the artifact forward.”
Logan flashed a wolfish grin at Isaac and stepped toward the pews to the right. He handed Trapper’s carcass to the tribunes who each, in turn, gave it a cursory glance before passing it on until it arrived at the hands of the four praetors sitting high above the pit. So high, in fact, it was as if they were floating on clouds up in the sky.
The praetors whispered among themselves, discussing the item, or Isaac, or both. Above them, in the gold domed basilica itself, the painting of the Tempest pulsed with mysterious, violet light.
“Is there a reason, Legio,” asked the male praetor, “Why this item has not been brought to us sooner?”
“We wanted to be sure,” Logan said. “When we discovered it, our immediate concern was the safety of the magistrate. We took the item, analyzed it, and when we decided it was of no threat we presented it to you.”
“Correct me if I am mistaken, Legio,” said the female praetor who was now holding the plastic frame, “But analyzing the intricacies of a magical artifact, especially in order to assess any d
anger it may pose, is a responsibility which falls to the librarian. Was the librarian consulted in this matter?”
Logan’s confident smirk melted away. “No, Praetor. I apologize.”
“The magistrate’s legionnaires are enforcers of the Magus Codice; your responsibility in this case was to surrender the artifact immediately after its discovery. In failing to do so you have potentially endangered this Court, however, as I sense no threat from this object, I see no reason to impart a sanction.”
“Thank you, Praetor,” Logan said, bowing his head. “It will not happen again.”
“As for the artifact itself,” she continued, directing her stern, authoritative voice at Isaac. “Did you have any idea that this woman—this photographer—was using a camera that had been built by a mage?”
“None,” Isaac said, and he wasn’t lying.
“Very well. We shall adjourn for the time being while the librarian is summoned. Legio Logan, if you or your legionnaires have discovered more traces of this camera, you will bring them to us. For now, escort Tribune Moreau back to his quarters.”
“As the praetors wish,” Logan said.
Sonia grabbed Isaac’s arm, turned him around, and ushered him toward the door. Logan followed, silently, and they went through the arch which opened into a dimly lit corridor of dark marble. Delicate golden designs ran along the walls and floor. When the double doors to the courtroom closed, the echoing choir of voices ceased their song, and Logan spoke.
“You think you got away with that.”
“Got away with what?” Isaac asked.
Logan grabbed Isaac by the shoulder, pinned him against a wall with his forearm, and glared from behind a pair of eyes the color of blood. The purple haired girl watched with her arms folded. “You’re a fucking smartass,” Logan said, “I’ll give you that. But you don’t fool me. I know you’re hiding something, and I’m going to find out what it is.”
It took every ounce of Isaac’s composure to keep from responding with anything other than civility and dignity, but he managed to rein himself in. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Logan released him, opened a door immediately to Isaac’s left, and shoved him inside. The door, which was made of simple brown wood and didn’t at all match the dark marble and gold motif of this entire hallway, led to the plain apartment Isaac had been forced to stay in, and when Isaac crossed the threshold he felt the hand of magic transport him from wherever he was, to where he was now. If he had to guess, he put the apartment somewhere on Ashwood’s South Side.
The sounds of the city—police sirens, dogs barking, and rap music—drifted in from the open window opposite the door.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” Logan said, “I’ll be back for you soon,” and he slammed the door shut. The wooden frame seemed to glow faintly blue and the runes carved into the back of the door harmonized with the light as the magic wards surrounding the apartment engaged and asserted themselves.
Isaac breathed a deep breath and exhaled the stress and tension. This has gone well, he thought, when he considered all the things that had been said at Court and the introduction of Trapper’s remains to the praetors. This he hadn’t been expecting, and he wanted to kick himself for not having discovered it himself.
Of course her camera was magic. He knew that. Alice had told him she hadn’t made the camera herself; she had told him it had shown up at her doorstep one morning along with her Chest of Haunts. And if Trapper had been made by a mage, then so had the chest. The question of who and why formed at the forefront of Isaac’s mind, but he couldn’t think about that now. If he thought about Alice too much, or considered the problem too deeply, he may not be able to trick the spells employed against him next time.
In a way, he thought, it was a good thing he hadn’t been the one to discover the camera’s secret. It was also fortunate that Logan hadn’t surrendered it to the librarian. These two things meant that Isaac had just bought a little more time. He checked his watch, sat down at the table in the plain, boring kitchenette, and opened the book he had left there—the Mountains of Madness, by H.P. Lovecraft. With one leg crossed over the other, Isaac picked up where he had left off thinking he could probably kill a few chapters before the inevitable visit, which would likely be soon.
Good thing he and the librarian were friends.
CHAPTER 3
The Lion and the Lich
Alice groped for the hall light, though her fingers had trouble finding it, and flicked it on. Illumination from the single bare bulb in the ceiling was faint, but there was light enough for her to see the face of the man standing in the door and know she didn’t recognize him. He was wearing a leather jacket, had short, sandy brown hair, three-day old stubble growing on his chin and jaw, and a set of severe, narrow eyes the color of murky seawater.
“Who the hell are you?” Alice asked, perhaps more aggressively than she had intended to.
The man put up a hand in a gesture of surrender. The other hand followed. “You must be Alice,” he said, his voice a smooth sip of whiskey in a smoky bar.
“Who I must be is none of your business. How did you find this place?”
“How does anyone find anything? I was given a map.”
“A map?” Alice eyed the threshold of the door and noticed his feet hadn’t yet crossed it. Maybe he couldn’t? There were spells protecting this place, and if he wasn’t supposed to be here he wouldn’t be able to enter. “Who sent you?”
“Isaac sent me,” he said, “My name’s Cameron. Cameron West.”
Alice’s body tightened at the sound of Isaac’s name and then relaxed, like an archer who had thought twice about letting an arrow fly. “You know Isaac?”
Cameron’s hands came back down to rest by his sides. “I do. I’m a friend. He told me you would need my help, said you were a little banged up, so I’m here.”
“I was hurt, but I’m fine now.”
“Let me guess… you drank the infusions?”
“How do you know about those?”
He smiled, and when he smiled his whole face lit up, even his narrow eyes. “I made them.”
She looked at the floor again, at the threshold, and then looked up at Cameron. “Alright,” she said, “Come on in.”
Cameron nodded and stepped through the open arch, moving into the house. A second passed, and then another, and another, and nothing happened. His flesh didn’t fall off. No bolts of lightning raced out of the sky to strike him down. He hadn’t triggered the wards, which was a good thing—the last thing Alice wanted was to deal with the kind of mess she was assured an enemy mage would become if they tried to step through the doors uninvited.
Alice stepped aside.
“Nice place,” he said. When he turned to look at her, he still had that narrow-eyed smile on his face, though in this light she could see his eyes weren’t as dark as she had originally thought; they were misty gray. “Nothing to say?”
Alice sighed. “Don’t take it personally. I’ve been cooped up here for a week and I don’t know what’s going on. Smalltalk isn’t what I need right now; what I need are answers, and to get out of here.”
Cameron’s smile weakened. “I have bad news on that front.”
“What bad news?”
“Do you want to sit down?”
Alice’s heart began to thump hard against the left side of her ribcage. When someone about to deliver bad news asks the other person to sit down, it usually heralded the impending revelation of someone’s death or injury. Isaac wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be.
“I’ll stand. Tell me what’s going on.”
Cameron sighed. “Long and short of it is this; Isaac isn’t getting out anytime soon. He’s still under heavy investigation and the magistrate hasn’t decided what it’s going to do yet. They’ve had some preliminary talks, but Isaac hasn’t been too cooperative with them so they’re holding him until they can gather all the evidence they can. He really does know how to piss them off.”
“Evidence of what?”
“That he broke the law.”
“Do you know what happened to him? Has he told you?”
“He didn’t have time, and in any case he wouldn’t have had to explain anything to me. Isaac and I go way back. He asked for my help, so here I am.”
“Just like that?”
“In a heartbeat. I owe him big.”
Alice took a moment to process everything he had just said. Isaac wasn’t getting out any time soon. How long is that, she thought. A day? A week? A month? “So, you don’t know why he was being investigated?”
“I do. I’ve heard rumors that something happened at the museum; someone attacked him and trashed his exhibit in front of Pleb—humans.”
Alice cocked an eyebrow. “Did he tell you if he managed to find any leads on were his attacker went?”
“He’s been locked away since the night the legionnaires picked him up. I doubt he’s had a chance to do more than read the books he was given. His lockup doesn’t even have a TV, and he isn’t allowed a cell phone or even the paper. Can’t use magic either; the place is warded to keep mages docile.”
“Docile?”
“Unable to use magic. Kinda like the wards around this place. I felt it as soon as I walked in here. I’m about as magic as a ham sandwich right now.”
“That’s good to know.”
“Not really. Not for me, anyway. It doesn’t feel right to not have my magic. Feels like I’m naked.”
Alice caught herself thinking, purely aesthetically, that it wouldn’t be entirely tragic if he were naked.
“Look,” he said, and his voice snapped her back into the moment. “I won’t sugar coat it. Things don’t look great right now. Isaac got word to me on a wing and a prayer—literally—and I don’t know how long he’s going to be stuck with the magistrate, which means I don’t know how long you need to be in here and under my protection.”
“Your protection? The answer is simple,” she said, folding her arms across her chest. “Zero minutes.”
half-lich 02 - void weaver Page 3