by Judy Teel
"You sound like you have a plan."
"I think a friend of mine can analyze it. He has some resources that you might not have here."
"White stuff. Is that a technical term?" he asked, neatly avoiding asking if my friend used less than legal methods.
"You could say that." I was glad that we were getting along again. I was especially happy that he wasn't nagging me about being a Were. The idea was as ridiculous as expecting Wizard to sprout wings and go after pigeons. Maybe he'd thought about it overnight and realized it was a dead end.
"I'd like a sample of the powder, if you can swing it," I said.
Cooper gave me a piercing look, and I could almost see the wheels turning as he weighed just how willing he was to participate in a likely shady method to get some answers. His chest expanded as he pulled in a long breath, then he unclipped his iC from his belt. "Drop by forensics on your way out," he said, keying in a message.
I controlled my triumph and drank the rest of my soda. "Any idea what the symbol I shot meant?" I asked when he finished sending the request.
"God and...." He thumbed through his notes. "Revenge. Our profiler described the killer as highly intelligent, narcissistic and well on their way to a God complex."
"The generic MO of serial killers everywhere," I commented, unmoved by the FBI shrink's analogy. I had some experience with psychologists and had yet to be impressed by one.
"If you ask me, Marla should be at the top of the suspect list," I said. "She had a lot of reasons to want the vampire out of her life."
"Her alibi checks out. I have no justification for digging further." Cooper accessed another file on his iC. "But that conference speaker Laiyla told you about? Got an ID on him: Gregory Frost, 29. Registered as human. Not married, briefly in therapy after going postal on a coworker for taking credit for some company-wide recycling idea, quit to attend a second-rate magic school in Raleigh, and then landed a fill-in speaking gig when the owner of the school recommended him. Deceased."
"Let's make him a suspect. You did mention ghosts as a possibility."
Cooper gave me a level look, a gratifying mixture of exasperation and amusement skating over his features. "We're a full load short of leads in this case. This afternoon we're going to go to Raleigh and talk to the guy who recommended Frost."
"Aye, aye, chief. Thanks for the soda." I stacked folders as I stood up. "And the sample. If I turn up anything, I'll let you know."
"Take this. It'll help." He slid an FBI-issue iC across the table. I slapped my palm down on it reflexively, only to snatch my hand back from the cool, smooth touch of high-tech temptation.
The feeling that we were finally getting along jumped out the window, took a nose dive and splatted on the pavement. "I told you—"
"Easy tiger." He held up his hands, palms out. "Before you throw it back in my face, look at it. Note the word 'temporary' emblazoned in red across your ID badge on the home screen? It's an agency rental, Addison. Just until we finish the case."
I eyed the device suspiciously and then picked it up. The slim weight of the latest iC resting against my palm felt nice, like I was finally making headway in my career. Only I hadn't done it. Cooper had. No, not even him. The FBI. Big brother. Institution with a capital I.
"Temporary has a sneaky way of turning into permanent," I grumbled.
"It's just a tool, not a commitment."
His tone was casual, lazy even, but my heart still stopped for a breath before leaping forward like a sprinter. Knowing Cooper, he wasn't actually talking about technology.
"Tools can be addicting," I countered, clenching my hand around the iC.
White teeth flashed at me, and he wiggled his eyebrows. "Only if they're the right ones."
I clamped my lips together to keep a renegade laugh from escaping, but after a moment gave it up. He was too ridiculous to hold a grudge against. And he also had a point. The latest technology could only help me do my job better. I would be stupid to turn it down. I pocketed the unit and a look of relief flashed through his eyes. Geez, invested much?
After telling him where to pick me up for the trip to our fair capital, I headed out. I tried not to feel desperate about our lack of anything useful to solve this case and hoped that Falcon came through for me with something spectacular.
CHAPTER SIX
Magical Gadgets and Bits had staked its claim about three years ago in one of the shops in Plaza Midwood. The area around Thomas Avenue was one of the few places that wasn't damaged in the initial attack or the skirmishes that followed, though like everywhere else in the world, it had still endured plenty of changes. The shop Falcon's uncle owned was a perfect example.
The glass front was now covered with an elaborate grate composed of various metals bent into magically enhanced symbols guaranteed to fry the unsuspecting evil-doer. A sign warned patrons not to stare at the barrier too long unless they wanted a blistering headache for their trouble. Inside, vintage women's wear had been replaced with a hodgepodge of shelves, barrels, trunks and tables full of all things magical, magically enhanced or just plain gadgetry.
A lanky kid of seventeen slouched on a stool behind the counter operating on a hand-sized metallic box with a few pieces of metal guts sprinkled around it. He had thick hair that stood up all over his head and was the rusty, tan color of a deer's hide, eyes like buffed pewter, wire-rimmed glasses, a re-purposed tool belt around his narrow waist, and a brain that would have outclassed Einstein's if it hadn't been saturated with hormones. He was also one of the few people I considered a friend.
He looked up and grinned. "Addie K, what up?" Falcon said, reflecting his love of all things early twenty-first century.
"Official business. Got a paying job."
"Awesome. Gotta keep little Wiz in the tuna."
I braced my forearms on the counter and peered at his latest project while he carefully placed a thin square of what looked like aluminum foil into the center. "Which electronic creature died and left you its organs?"
He leaned back, beaming at me like a new father. "Ever wish your scanner could see stuff like a practitioner does? You know," he splayed out the fingers of his empty hand and wiggled them dramatically, "like beyond the physical?"
"Not really."
"Well, this one can. Or will. When I get the reverse quantum matrix figured out." He tapped the small, delicate pliers against the counter and stared at the scattered components.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, but I know it'll be brilliant when you're done."
"Thanks," he said, genuine pleasure wiping away the frown he'd shot at the ruined scanner. "If I can get it working, I'll make a fortune off of it. So what brings you into the land of mystery? The Browning jamming again?"
The weight of my gun against my thigh surfaced into my awareness. "Hasn't bugged up since you fixed it." I pulled the small packet of white powder out of my front jean's pocket and laid it on the counter. "I'm hoping you can tell me what this is."
He picked up the packet and held it up to the light coming through the windows behind me. "Looks like powdered sugar. Where'd you get it?"
"A murder scene."
His hand jumped, but his interest sharpened. "No kidding?"
"There was a thin circle of this stuff near the bodies. Currently classified as 'unknown substance'."
Falcon let out a low whistle and glanced at me. "Plural murders with unknown substances are the worst." Excitement sparkled in his gray eyes. "I love it!"
"Can I look at the books in the back while you check that out?"
"Sure," he said, already refocusing his attention onto the puzzle of the white powder.
I left him to his fun and headed to the back room where his uncle stored the moldiest of the myth and magic books. Assuming the symbol I'd shot meant "God" and "revenge" might satisfy the FBI, but I wanted more. I figured old was probably the best place to start for my answers.
Plowing through rows of boxes, I wound my way to the last stack at the b
ack. I remembered seeing it when I helped Falcon bring the boxes in from an estate sale his uncle had gone to in Virginia. The carton labeled "Very Ancient Gods" was still there, right where I'd left it. At the time, Falcon and I had joked and laughed about the label the eccentric collector had used, but now the musty cardboard seemed more ominous than silly.
I chastised myself for mistaking mildew for voodoo and knelt down to have at it. A half hour and a dozen disintegrating books later, I found what I needed. Entitled The Hidden Culture of Dead Languages, the slim book was covered in benign, stained green leather with patchy gold lettering, its pages made of thick, high-quality paper that had also taken some water damage.
The author was some Hungarian professor whose name I couldn't pronounce, and on page one hundred and two, I found my mysterious symbol. The only difference was the professor had recorded each character separately, not overlapping like the one I'd seen. He stated that he did this in deference to his translator who'd freaked out about the death curse the symbol supposedly called down. Made me glad I'd shot the blasted thing.
The main part of the store was empty when I wandered back out and the neon red Closed sign was flickering above the door. I heard a muttered curse from the doorway next to the counter and headed in that direction.
Laying the book next to the disemboweled scanner as I passed, I sauntered to the entrance to Falcon's laboratory. "Find anything?" I asked, hanging in the doorway where I felt relatively safe.
To say the room looked like a mutant high school chem class didn't do it justice. Smells of sulfur, fermentation and latex burned my nose while the incomprehensible muddle of piled junk and wires assailed my eyes. What he needed with a bicycle tire, crash helmet and a tank that might contain oxygen and might not was something I wasn't sure I wanted to know. Geniuses. Wow.
Falcon wore lab goggles and stood hunched over a chipped dinner plate with a petri dish on it. A single drop of black liquid from the dropper he held hit what was in the dish.
I braced myself for anything—explosions, smoke, screeching banshees...nothing happened.
He sat back and blew out a frustrated breath. "I was hoping for purple smoke."
"Seriously?"
"Whatever this is, it gave off a faint magical signature in another test," he said, all retro-speak fun forgotten in the face of a scientific challenge. "Not enough to prove anything, so I decided to go for the big guns." He looked over his shoulder at me, his gray eyes freakishly large behind the prescription goggles. "That new iC on your belt says FBI. They in on this?"
"I sense a big bill approaching. That stuff expensive?" I nodded at the dropper.
He shrugged. "Prehistoric shaman bones, royal Egyptian mummy dust, a pinch of Dead Sea salt. You know, the usual rare stuff that's nearly impossible to get your hands on. For you I'd have a discount. Anyone else..."
"Use the FBI account number on file," I said with a certain amount of satisfaction. I had to admit, it was nice not to foot my own bills for a change. "So purple smoke means practitioner?"
"In this case, time-space bending residue. I based it off a formula that was used when the first batch of the old ITZ scanners came out." He pulled off his goggles, tossed them onto a tangled pile of red and green wires, and then put on his glasses. "Before the company-who-will-not-be-named bought the patent."
Grabbing the packet of white powder, he headed out of the room. "Traitor," he said, nodding at my new iC as he ambled past.
I self-consciously covered the unit with my hand and followed him. Being a fan of underdogs everywhere, on principle Falcon disliked the giant conglomeration that made the iC. The company had barely missed a beat after the world virtually turned upside down, and now they dominated the high-tech scene. I secretly admired their resourcefulness, but I'd never tell him that. I didn't want to hear the thirty minute lecture that would follow that kind of confession.
"Maybe you can help me with this," I said, moving to the other side of the counter and picking up the book. I flipped to the page I needed. "When I saw it, this symbol," I pointed at the one that looked a bit like a cursive Z, "was overlaying this one."
He leaned closer and sneezed.
I jerked the old volume back. "Nice, Falcon." Pulling up the corner of my tank top, I wiped his spit off the pages.
"I'm allergic to mold," he said, sniffing loudly, his face turning bright red as he looked everywhere but my bare stomach. "Um, that could be Sumerian for God."
Taking pity on him, I tugged my shirt back into place. "The author claims it dates five-thousand years before that."
Falcon's interest sharpened and his embarrassment faded. "What about the other one?"
"Around the same time. Means revenge. All of which even the FBI figured out. This is the part they didn't." I pointed to the footnote at the bottom of the page.
"Local myth associated with referenced tablet fragment," Falcon read out loud, "speaks of a king compelling his holy man on pain of death to call forth a mighty warrior from beyond the air. The warrior stepped forth and brother turned against brother until the streets ran with blood and the city was destroyed. To this day in local culture, writing or speaking this name is forbidden."
Sniffing, he leaned in to peer at the symbol. "And you saw this?"
"It was part of what looked like an incantation circle."
"Revenge...God. You think it's that simple? Or it could mean revenge of God. Or God's revenge." He took the book from me and flipped back a few pages, his gaze moving quickly over the text, his eyes watering with the effort not to sneeze.
"Call me when you figure it out," I said, heading for the front door. Until then, Cooper and I had a professor to interrogate. I had a feeling he might have some answers for us.
* * *
The city of Raleigh and its outlying neighborhoods hadn't seen as much fighting as Charlotte. The enemy paranormals had been too smart to waste their resources on soccer fields and human suburbia. When your goal is to destroy a civilization so you can own it, you hit where it hurts—commerce, power sources, defense.
Unfortunately for the industrial complex known as Research Triangle Park, the commerce category was a perfect match. Like the banking district in Charlotte, RTP had been flattened. Only a few buildings remained, and the rest were rubble, steadily being consumed by Mother Nature's voracious appetite.
The pitted concrete of one of those remaining buildings had been painted purple with silver moons and stars scattered around the double glass doors in an arch. A large sign above this celestial horror boldly declared Professor Tasson's International School of Magic.
"Holy cats," I muttered as Cooper and I walked up and took turns standing in front of the scanner mounted beside the doors. "Shouldn't there be carnival music?"
"I feel a headache starting," he said, eyeing the silver crescent moons with distaste. Weres tended to be sensitive about people taking the symbol of their deity, the goddess Diana, in vain.
After a moment of staring at the solidly locked doors, Cooper flashed his iC badge at the security camera. "Paranormal FBI, Agent Daine," he said. "Let's keep this friendly."
I imagined the surprise and alarm radiating from whoever was on the other side of the doors. After a moment, locks clattered as they disengaged, and we pushed through into an open lobby that looked like the twentieth century New Age movement had thrown up on it.
Amateur-level murals of Egyptian gods and goddess cavorted across the walls in dazzlingly shades of turquoise, yellow, red and the ever-present purple. Mystical symbols of all kinds decorated the high ceiling, slapped on using metallic gold and silver paint. Wherever there was some extra space on the walls and ceiling, inspirational posters declared worthless nonsense like: Yes, you can! and Think it and you can do it!
A spindly, thirty-something woman stood waiting for us in the middle of the impressive tackiness, her hands winding around each other like they had something sticky on them that she couldn't quite rub off. Her light auburn hair hung around her thin face in
fine wisps, and her wide, brown eyes regarded us with nervous uncertainty.
"W-welcome to the international..."
Cooper gave her his most charming smile. The receptionist's face turned red, and I thought she might faint. "We'd like to speak with Mr. Tasson," he said.
"S-school of...what?" she ended with a squeak. "He...I...is he in trouble?"
"We just have to ask him some questions."
"He...doesn't interact with the public. The...uh, energy disrupts his chi."
"He can talk with us in the comfort of his office, or he can come with us to the station. His choice," Cooper responded, his tone firm though not unkind. That was one of the things I'd always liked about him. He was perfectly capable of some serious intimidation, but he knew where to draw the line. Going tough on someone like this poor soul would be nothing short of bullying.
"He'll be...very displeased," the woman said, her voice wavering into a whisper.
But sometimes a little pushing helped speed things up.
"Get a lot of unhappy people looking for him?" I guessed. Based on the décor alone, the guy had to be a con. Real practitioners never flaunted it. They were too focused on trying to blend in with the rest of humanity.
The mousy receptionist turned pale and tore her stunned gaze from Cooper's pretty face to focus on me. Personally, I'd never worried too much about blending in. If you were willing to kick some ass, advertise it, and then the person getting kicked had only themselves to blame. Thus, my limited wardrobe of black or navy tanks and Ts, worn jeans and custom-made boots.
"Um, well, oh dear," Mousy stuttered. "He hates t-to be interrupted when he's working." The warmth of pride touched her expression. "He's writing a book."
"He'll get over it," Cooper said. "How about you let him know we're here."
"Oh, I couldn't."
"We can search the school, upsetting the students and generally causing mayhem," I said, giving her a benevolent smile. "Or you can do what my partner suggests." Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cooper give a start and glance at me.