The Book of Mayhem

by Melissa McShane

  I heard the door bells ring and put the book down. “It’s going to be a long afternoon.”

  Once again, the store stayed mostly empty until two, when the Ambrosites showed up in droves to match their counterparts. Once they were gone, I read from Silas’s diary, sometimes aloud. Silas had worked out through trial and error the smallest volume of books the oracle could contain. Then they’d filled hundreds of packing crates, careful to keep them close together. Moving the crates from the store to the ship was the most dangerous part, as they couldn’t separate the crates too far apart without depriving the oracle of a “roost,” as Silas put it.

  “So he thought the books are the oracle’s body,” I said.

  “Which makes sense, if you think about how a human can lose bits and still be alive,” Judy said. “And isn’t there something about how you replace all of your cells over the course of seven years? We sell books, and we bring books in, but it’s still the oracle.”

  “I wonder if there are any books still in there that came from the Charing Cross store,” I said, jabbing my thumb in the direction of the bookcases. “There are so many things I’d like to know that I can’t find out without damaging or destroying the oracle.”

  “Like which of Hallstrom’s books do we still have?”

  “That would be at the top of my list, yes. I feel uncomfortable knowing we have stolen property on our shelves.”

  Judy shrugged. “If it was really a bad thing, the oracle would do something about it. Like reject anything stolen.”

  “The oracle’s moral principles aren’t like ours. It will accept requests that indirectly would lead to abetting a crime and only rejects the ones that come right out and say they’re going to murder someone, for example.”

  “Because people have free will. There are a lot of auguries you could use to cause harm if you chose, but the oracle gives us the chance to make that decision.”

  I opened Silas’s diary where I’d closed it on my finger, marking my place. “I wish I could say that made me feel better about the ones I know people will use to do evil.”

  Finally, six o’clock arrived, and Judy and I closed up shop and battled rush hour traffic to the Kellers’ home on the west side of the city. Blocky houses that were ultra-modern forty years ago peeked out above the trees that grew heavily on the hills surrounding them. I admired their neighborhood without wanting to live there. It was wealthy enough I felt out of place in my ten-year-old Civic.

  Harry and Harriet, however, welcomed us in with no hint that they thought I should have dressed up. Judy, in a vintage dress I could barely identify as being from the ‘70s, looked chic and well-to-do as usual. “It’s so nice to see you both,” Harriet said. “Come in, sit down. Dinner will be a few more minutes.”

  The Kellers’ living room looked like something out of a contemporary home décor magazine, with the chairs and couches upholstered in soft gray plush and the cabinets of pale blond wood. Bright paintings made the only spots of color in the room. I heard a howl from deeper within the house, and shuddered.

  “Don’t worry about Vitriol, dear, it’s safely locked away. We’ve had to keep it inside for the last several days, so it’s a little more vocal than usual, but perfectly safe.” Harriet patted my hand reassuringly.

  “Damned Ambrosites thinking they’re entitled to destroy someone’s familiar,” Harry grumbled. “I hope Will finds this killer soon. Tensions are too high.”

  “Poor Morena,” Harriet said, and I remembered the shooting from yesterday morning. “As if killing Nicolliens will bring back those dead Ambrosite magi.”

  “Father is working closely with Lucia to solve these crimes,” Judy said. She sat on one of the low sofas, and I took a seat next to her.

  “And it sounds like the two of you are helping as well,” Harry said.

  “After dinner, dear,” Harriet said. “Let’s talk of happier things for now, shall we? How’s your boyfriend, Helena?”

  I’d forgotten Harriet’s mission in life was to marry off all her young, single friends. “Actually, we broke up,” I said. “It was a good thing. He turned out not to be who I thought he was.”

  “I didn’t know you broke up with Jason,” Judy said, eyeing me suspiciously.

  “It was just a couple of days ago.”

  “Well, that’s still too bad, dear,” Harriet said. “I’m sure you’ll find someone else. How about that nice Gary Stewart over at the Gunther Node?”

  “He’s gay,” said Judy.

  “Oh, is he? I’ll have to remember that. Or there’s Manuel Gutierrez, he’s a real rising star at the Board of Neutralities—”

  “Actually, I want to be single for a while,” I said. “But thanks for caring.”

  “Helena’s got a type,” Judy said, smirking. I glared at her.

  “And what type—” The oven timer beeped, saving me from having to answer that question. Harry and Harriet both rose. “Why don’t you all be seated at the table, and I’ll bring in the fried chicken and beans.”

  Harriet was nearly as good a cook as my mom—at least, that’s what I told myself, but the truth was I’d never had a better meal. I ate until I was stuffed and groaning with fried chicken, barbecue baked beans, and green salad. Dessert was homemade ice cream with caramel sauce. By the end of the meal I wasn’t sure I could stand, let alone walk to my car, but I managed to waddle back to their living room and drop like a well-fed stone into a chair.

  “So, Judy says you need to find someone,” Harry said. “A suspect.”

  “I don’t know how safe that is,” Harriet said.

  “We’re not going to confront him, we’re going to tell Lucia so she can capture and interrogate him,” I said.

  Harry and Harriet exchanged glances. “I suppose that’s not so bad,” Harriet said.

  “I’ll get the map,” Harry said, pushing himself heavily to his feet. He’d eaten even more than I had.

  “This works better if you have something that belongs to the person,” Harriet said.

  “We don’t. We had some books he’d stolen, but all I have now is his augury file.”

  “Stolen books wouldn’t work. They’d point to the owner, not the thief. It’s all right. It will still work, just not as easily.”

  Harry returned with a map of Portland he spread out on the glass prism the Kellers used for a coffee table. It was the same map I’d bought, minus the red Sharpie marks. He scattered a handful of glass cubes across the map’s surface. They looked like dice, but with blank faces, and their beveled edges glittered in the light. “Did you want to test, or record?” he asked Harriet.

  “I’ll record.” Harriet went to a low cabinet beneath the picture window and removed a thin notebook from it. Harry handed her a ballpoint pen which she clicked rapidly a few times, in and out, then scribbled a line to test the ink. She settled on the couch across from Harry, and I sat next to her. Judy took a seat in an adjacent chair, where she perched on the very edge of the cushion like a bird of prey, her blue eyes intent on the map.

  Harry gathered up the cubes and began placing them at what seemed to me like random spots on the map. As each touched the table, it let off a whiff of ozone and a white spark like flint striking steel that vanished without leaving a mark. When he’d laid out eleven cubes, he set the others to one side and dusted off his hands, making more sparks. I glanced at Judy, but she was still watching the map, so maybe this was all normal.

  Harry spread his arms wide and placed his hands, palm down and fingers extended, at the west and east sides of the map. “What’s his name?”

  “Mitch Hallstrom.”

  “We’re looking for Mitch Hallstrom,” Harry said, and lines of white lightning speared between the cubes, making an irregular web that crackled over the surface of the map. I sucked in a startled breath and leaned back. Heat rose from the web and played across my face and hands. I released my grip on the arm of the couch and tried to relax.

  Harriet wrote something in her notebook. “Are you su
re about the name?”

  “The oracle was,” I said.

  “Do you see how it’s fighting?” Harriet said to Harry. “If his real name is Mitch Hallstrom, there’s another name he identifies with.”

  “At least one other name. Could be more,” Harry said.

  “Does that mean you can’t find him?” I asked.

  “Unfortunately, that’s what it means.”

  Judy flung herself backward in her seat. “Well, it was a nice idea,” she said.

  “Wait,” I said. “What about an object? You could find that, right?”

  “If it’s something associated with him, sure,” Harry said.

  I shook my head. “No, no, I mean an object he’ll have on him. An augury.”

  “That’s risky. Who knows how many copies of the book there might be in the city,” Judy said.

  “Then we get locations for all of them and let Lucia do the footwork,” I said. “I remember the title of his last augury. It was Sinful Cravings. I remember teasing him about the half-naked man on the cover. He was pretty embarrassed about it.”

  “Wow, what question did he ask?” Judy said.

  “That, I don’t remember.” I turned to look at Harriet, who had set her pen and notebook in her lap. “Please try. This is really important.”

  “I suppose we can try,” Harriet said. Harry swept the glass cubes, now blackened and cracked, off the map and threw them at the fireplace, where they struck the back of it and shattered. He took out another handful of cubes and began placing them randomly across the map. It looked to me like they were in different places than the first set, but I wasn’t sure.

  Harry rested his hands on the map again. “A book called Sinful Cravings,” he said, and lightning once more formed a web between the cubes. This time, it was tinged red and looked like fireworks going off, though it went on and on instead of exhausting itself and vanishing. I heard Harriet scribbling in her notebook, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the display. “Do you have it?” Harry asked.

  “The first round, yes,” Harriet said, and laid down her pen. Harry shifted position, and the lightning vanished. The cubes weren’t blackened, but pulsed with red light. The map didn’t look any different to me, but Harry examined it closely, tapping his finger against his lips in thought. He shifted some of the cubes, sliding them across the map without lifting them as if playing some fiendish multi-dimensional game of chess. “Let me see that list,” he said, and Harriet held it out. “Probably east of here,” he muttered, moving a few more cubes around. “All right. Let’s do it again.”

  The web of lightning sprang up, but this time not all the cubes were connected. Four of them pulsed their red light outside the web. Harriet wrote a few more things down. I wanted to ask about the cubes, but was afraid to talk. I knew so little about magic. I never had any idea what was appropriate for me to do or say when it was happening, or whether I’d disturb the magus or ruin the ritual. So I bottled up my impatience, and my questions, and waited.

  Finally, Harry picked up the lone cubes with one hand, keeping the other flat on the map, and rearranged them so they were once more part of the web. Harriet made another note. Harry removed his hand and the lightning vanished. “That’s better than I expected,” Harriet said, showing the notebook to Harry.

  “Did you find it?” I asked.

  “We found fifty-seven. But eleven of them are at Powell’s downtown, and another nine are at Powell’s in Beaverton, and there are a lot of smaller groupings, probably other bookstores. There are three individual results, here, here, and here.” Harry took the notebook from his wife’s hand and referred to it as he pointed at three locations on the map, all of them with glass cubes on them.

  “East and south of Powell Butte,” Judy said. “Any of those could be Hallstrom.”

  “How close can you narrow each of those locations?” I said.

  “We can give you street addresses,” Harriet said. “Harry, do you have a magnifying glass on you?”

  Harry drew a brass-rimmed magnifier with an ebony handle from inside his cardigan and handed it over. Harriet huffed on its surface, then examined the little red-tinged cubes. “They should have the addresses written…there.” I couldn’t see any writing on the cubes, but Harriet confidently read off three addresses, which Harry wrote down on a fresh sheet of notepaper. He tore it off and handed it to Judy.

  “Thanks,” I said. “We’ll give this to Lucia right away.”

  “You’re welcome,” Harriet said. “And do be careful, dear. This man, whoever he is, is dangerous.”

  “Hard to believe he came into Abernathy’s all those times, maybe even looking for auguries that would find him victims,” Harry said. “He might have killed one of you.”

  I hadn’t thought of it that way, and it chilled me, remembering Mitch Hallstrom’s constant twitchiness and the sense of urgency he carried with him. If we were right, we’d been next to the serial killer without knowing it. “We should probably go,” I said, feeling a little urgency myself.

  “Wait, I’ll pack you up some leftovers,” Harriet said.

  I wasn’t going to say no to that.

  19

  We put the plastic boxes of food in the back seat, filling my car with delicious smells, and I reversed down the Kellers’ drive while Judy called Lucia and left a message about what we’d learned. “You really think Hallstrom is our guy?” she said.

  “I thought you agreed with me.”

  “I do. I was just thinking, what if we’re wrong, and Lucia harasses an innocent man?”

  “Better than ignoring him as a suspect and getting someone killed.”

  “I guess.” Judy’s phone rang, a cheerful rendition of the Funeral March that struck me as typically Judy. “Hello? No, I don’t think we overstepped our bounds…I’m not telling you that…Because it’s irrelevant, that’s why.” Judy covered the receiver with her hand and whispered, “She’s pissed because we didn’t let her track Hallstrom herself. Do you want the addresses or not?”

  There was a longish pause during which Judy drummed her fingers on the armrest. Then she sat up indignantly. “What do you mean, useless?” she exclaimed. “You don’t have one person who can—fine, but I don’t think that’s ever mattered to you before, so why—” There was an even longer pause. I could faintly hear Lucia talking loudly on the other end of the call.

  Finally, Judy said, “You’re making a mistake,” and hung up. She was breathing rapidly and her fingers, which had been tapping the armrest, were curled into a fist.

  “She’s not going to look into it,” she said.

  “What?”

  “She says without more evidence, she can’t investigate Hallstrom. And she doesn’t have anyone to spare to find evidence. We don’t even know what type of magus he is—if he’s not a wood magus, there’s no point, she said.”

  “But she wasn’t certain the killer is a wood magus! And Hallstrom is suspicious.”

  “It’s all circumstantial. Just because he’s a thief, that doesn’t make him a murderer too. He could have moved here from some other city so we wouldn’t have seen him before. And the Powell Butte thing could be coincidence.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  “What I believe doesn’t matter. Lucia’s the one in charge. She’s not investigating.”

  “I can’t believe this.” Someone honked, and I realized the light I’d been sitting at had turned green. I hit the accelerator and drove on, speeding up until I was going faster than the speed limit by a few miles per hour. “She’s making a huge mistake.”

  “We did what we could. Call her again tomorrow and see if things have changed.”

  “By tomorrow someone else might be dead, and Malcolm…” I let my voice trail off. Judy didn’t care what happened to Malcolm.

  “I don’t see what else we can do.”

  I snatched the paper from where it was lying in Judy’s lap. “We can find Hallstrom.”

  “No. We told the Kellers we wouldn�
�t do that.”

  “That was before it turned out we’re the only ones who care about this lead.” I glanced over the addresses. “The second one is only a few miles from here.”

  “You’re out of your mind.”

  “How? Look, it’s simple. We’ll just scope out the area until we see Hallstrom—or don’t see him—and move on. Once we know where he is, I’ll ask Derrick and the team to check it out. We don’t have to get involved any more than that.”

  “Do you think they’ll care?”

  “If it helps prove Malcolm’s innocence, I’m sure they will.”

  Judy sighed. “If we get in trouble, I’m blaming you.”

  “That’s acceptable.”

  Judy looked at the addresses, holding the paper close to her eyes. The sun had nearly set while we were with the Kellers, and the lights of the street lamps flashed past, illuminating then darkening the car. “I think we ought to go to the first one, though. It’s in a more wooded part of town. Wood magi draw strength from the trees and use them in their magic.”

  “But we’re almost at this other place. We’ll go to the woods second. Let’s just cross this one off the list.”

  The neighborhood we drove through was overgrown enough to practically be woods itself. Giant oaks sprang up from every front yard; hedges surrounded every house. Dense leaves swallowed up the moonlight and the lights from the street lamps, making pools of shadow along the sidewalk. A few cars were crouched at the curb, a few more parked in driveways. Most of the houses were lit from within, and I saw the bluer glow of televisions blended with the white-gold of light bulbs. It felt strange, looking through those windows and knowing we were there to spy on one of them.

  I drove past the address on the page. It was one of the few houses where the lights were out, though there was a slight glow from deep within the house. “Now what?” Judy asked.

  “We’ll park down the street and walk back this way, then get into the backyard,” I said.