Curse of Iron

by D. D. Miers

  I lifted my head and stared at the paper. There was nothing I could write to get me out of the mess I was in, and no one to blame since I hadn’t had the fucking sense to pull myself together and examine the body myself before the cops broke down my door.

  The thought made me think again about the series of events leading me to the metal folding chair and table, sitting across from the pretty detective with the serious scowl. “Two things, detective. My name’s Morgan. Morgana was like, my great-great-grandmother. Second,” I paused and thought out my words, “I’d barely found my phone to call for help when your guys busted in my door.”

  She watched me, silently, one dark eyebrow arched in askance. I waited for her to answer, and it turned into a staring contest until she rolled her eyes and sighed. “Are you asking me a question?”

  “Well, if I hadn’t had time to dial your number, and there was no fight or screaming, which obviously, there wasn’t…” I spread my hands on the table, palms down, grateful for the part of me not Fae keeping some of the magic the detective was using from fully affecting me. “Detective Mills, how the hell did you guys know about the dead guy in my apartment before I did?”

  She didn’t answer, but the smirk faded from her face. The flash of hope I had that she believed me disappeared just as quickly as I had the thought. “How about you lead me through your night, okay? What did you do? Where did you go?”

  Her magic pulled at me, but it was her tone, even and understanding, making me want to talk, especially since it kept the magic aimed at me in a low hum. “I mean, I worked yesterday, closed out a couple really profitable skips, and we went for dinner and drinks to celebrate because a real bitch of a case, had everybody and their dog hunting him and we'd finally done it.”

  Detective Mills checked her paperwork. “Right. Because you work in bail bonds.”

  “Yes, Orson, Penelope, Digger, and I closed out a large bounty, um, you probably don’t know it, but he, uh, he killed a couple of gas station attendants, bail was over a million, so…”

  “The bigger the bail, the bigger the bounty.”

  “The boss took us to dinner before Pen and I took Digger out on the town. He’s out of Ohio.”

  She glanced at her notes again. “Do you drink a lot?”

  I sighed and rubbed my face. I couldn’t be sure. It was the stickiest point of the whole ordeal. “No. No, I don’t, and Digger’s a beer and country music kind of guy. I get bloated before I get drunk on beer.”

  The corner of her mouth jerked up again. Not a smile, but a twinge of understanding. Tracy Mills was magic first, then cop. Just like I’d been raised to be magic, priestess, and after that…nothing. In my case, survival had meant not being anything beyond the coven raising me, until even being the model witch hadn’t been enough.

  “You did drink but weren’t drunk. And this Is where you met up with Mr. Masters?”

  “I don’t know, detective. We were in the Tenderloin. Penelope talked me into dressing up more, ah, provocatively than usual, so I had a few guys come on to me. But I don’t remember picking anyone up or how I got home.” I growled my frustration.

  She stiffened.

  I had to relax. “Hell, I don’t hang out with the coalition people at all. I’m not really what you would call popular with any group.”

  “Because you help catch supernaturals who have jumped bail.”

  She was making a statement, so I didn’t bother to correct her. “Sure, okay. You know, the guys we bail out? They don’t hate us, even when they’re caught. We’ve got no beef with the coalition.”

  “I didn’t say you did. But, since you brought it up, how do you know the coalition doesn’t mind you chase supers?”

  “C’mon, you know we’re one of the few parts of the system doing anything for these people, gets them back with their families while they can. The guys who skip, they know the score. They don’t blame us. We’re not monsters.”

  “Not a monster? What kind of person can sleep next to a dead body, let alone one she killed, huh? Are you so dead Inside my magic isn’t enough to make you tell me the truth?”

  I wasn’t about to tell a witch who didn’t know me my magic was stronger than hers, even though it was. Even if I couldn’t use mine in the moment and she could. Bragging was only going to get me hurt. “Look. I flirted with a hot guy who was flying solo. He had dark hair, but he wasn’t big like the alpha. He was lean and…and almost pretty, you know?”

  It occurred to me the man I was describing might have been the one to leave a trophy in my bed. “You didn’t kill the hot guy because you were picking up another hot guy. That’s the best you’ve got for me?”

  I clenched my jaw and tried to control my breathing. The detective’s easy manner had dissolved in the blink of an eye and left me staring at the real Detective Tracy Mills, hard as nails and less than a tenth as friendly as she’d pretended to be.

  “I’m just saying, there’s holes in my memory, but nothing I remember includes the Bay Area alpha.”

  “Right, so now there’s a conspiracy against you, a simple bail bonds book keeper,” she scoffed. “Please, I can’t wait to hear this sales pitch.”

  For the first time since I’d woken with my icky bedmate, I had the good sense to shut the hell up. She glared at me for a couple of minutes, her energy growing until it made it hard to stay in my seat.

  “What the hell do you want me to say?” I finally blurted, well past the hope she’d see the truth. “You want to know why your magic isn’t kicking my ass? It’s because my father is a Fae king and my mother was a witch.” I kicked the table leg and shoved back from it, the chair clattered to the floor. “My own family has tried to kill me one way or another since I hit puberty. I’ve been drowned, beaten, and threatened with sacrifice, and frankly, if you’re such a powerful magician, how the hell don’t you know who I am?”

  I sagged against the wall and tried to catch my breath as she stared. She licked her lips, and started to reply, but pressed her lips together in a thin line and without another word, gathered her papers and folders and walked out. I’d thrown away my one chance at not being overcome by the new magic the police were using against my kind. Detective Mills was a witch. Her loyalty would always be to the covens before the police. A half-breed like me meant nothing to her. If anything, I’d just sealed my own doom.

  I guess I wasn’t completely immune the truth spell. I cursed myself silently and slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor. “Oh, don’t sit there, Ms. Storm.”

  “Silk. I go by Silk. Storm is my father, but I don’t really know him…” I bit my tongue to stop talking again. I could almost see the detective, now safe behind the glass, adapting her spell to fit what I really was. Stupid Is what you are. A dumbass with a big mouth.

  I giggled at my own insults, and the still sane part of me shot a glance at the mirror. “Too much, detective,” I laughed, cringing on the inside but unable to control my mouth. “You should’ve just taken me out for a beer if you wanted to get inside my head. I’m not exactly a, a…” My brain screamed closed book, you Idiot, but all I could do was open and shut my hands mimicking a book as I giggled.

  I thought I could never hate anyone as much as I despised my aunt and her cronies, but Detective Tracy Mills had just hit the top of my "People to Curse if I Ever Go Dark" list. As soon as the thought crossed my mind I felt the words in my mouth, making my tongue ache as I forced it to stay still.

  Oh no, oh no, oh no. I knew the moment those words left my mouth I was done for. No one who was so stupid they’d threatened a cop with magic ever saw the light of day again. At least, not without making good on the threat first. I counted to a hundred in my head, whimpering as the truth curse pressed down on me like the stones of the Salem Witch Trials, practically squeezing the words out of me.

  “Fine, you evil harpy. You win,” I gasped, horrified to hear the sounds coming from my mouth. “I’ll tell you anything you want, just stop, for Christ’s sake.”

/>   Three

  “All right, enough,” a brash man in an expensive suit pushed his way past the cops who were watching me and gave me his hand. The moment his skin touched mine, my head cleared, and my nervous giggling subsided. He huffed at me in annoyance. “Good. I was afraid the incessant twittering was just you.”

  “Uh, no,” I muttered, trying to jerk my hand back. “Not usually much of a giggler.” I continued to pull at my hand until he yanked me right against the silk lapel of his suit and whispered in my ear.

  “Stop fighting me. Legally, I need to maintain contact to protect you.” I froze and waited for him to continue. “All right, folks, from what I understand, you have no cause of death and absolutely nothing indicates there was a homicide, so unless I’m mistaken, my client is free to go.”

  It might have been a question, but he made it a statement, and no one in the room argued with him, despite the enraged looks we got as he escorted me out of the room. “Okay, being interrogated with magic sucked so hard,” I whispered as he opened the door of his little yellow ‘92 MG.

  “I bet.” I watched him unbutton his jacket and buckle himself in. “Safety first.”

  “What?” I stared at him until he pulled at the seatbelt strap across his chest.

  “Buckle it.” I laughed weakly but did as he said. Somehow, his concern with me buckling up for the ride seemed ridiculous after what I’d just been through all day.

  “So, who are you?” I huffed. “I mean, thank you for getting me out of there before I regaled them with stories of my childhood bedwetting, but I didn’t catch your name.”

  “My name is Robert Chapman.”

  Well, shit.

  I knew just where we were headed, too, and it wasn’t back to my apartment. “You…you’re from Heyward and Oakes, right? My boss sent you?” He nodded without looking at me. “Hey, look, I’m still in my PJ’s. Any chance I could go home instead of going to the office looking like this?”

  “That horrible cat thing Is pajamas?” he asked. “I thought it was just an ugly dress.”

  “Well, I sleep alone, so comfort beats sexy any night of the week.”

  “Fine, whatever. What you’re wearing doesn’t really matter. But I’m sorry, your apartment’s a crime scene right now. You can’t go in.”

  I let the thought sink in. I’d worked for Orson Tell for four years. Lots of bounty hunters had come and go, most of them getting in trouble with the law along the way. Orson was the only bondsman in the area for supernatural beings who the police treated with anything approaching respect. Partly because he didn’t let his people get in trouble. Ever.

  “Hey, Mr. Chapman, how did you put a stop to the truth spell?” I asked, trying to distract myself from the fact I was minutes away from getting my ass kicked by Orson, in my koala sleep shirt, and I couldn’t even go home after he fired me.

  “What?” he gave me a quick double take. “Uh, Robert is fine, but, uh…” he glanced at me again, tugging his sleeve up his arm. “I’m a registered warlock, so I can carry one magical item with me to serve my supernatural clients health and wellbeing.”

  I examine the gold bracelet around his pale wrist. Masculine, with wide, serpentine links roomy enough for magical symbols to be etched into them. “That’s intricate magic, and yet so stylish. How very warlock of you.” He chuckled at my quip.

  “Well, the police don’t worry so much about their own ethics in interrogation. The rule is, anything to get an honest confession.”

  “At least they want a real confession and not just any admission of guilt even if it’s not true,” I sigh. “That would’ve been my only saving grace.”

  He scoffed. “Then what were you about to tell them when I walked in?"

  “That I hate their detectives and was thinking of cursing Detective Mills.” I groaned and rubbed my eyes again. “That magic wasn’t made for me, and it almost squeezed the life out of me. Next time, it will be tailored just for my little ‘ol hybrid self, and it still might actually kill me.”

  He pulled into a free space in front of Tell’s Bonds and parked. “There won’t be a next time, because you have representation and they can’t talk to you without me present, okay?” He put his hand on mine to stop me from getting out. “These cops are scared all the time. Shit like dead bodies in a supernatural’s bed makes them think the very worst of all their superstitions and mythology is true.”

  “I’ve never killed anyone in my life, and I had no reason to kill someone I would’ve assumed was more powerful than me.” My head pounded, and bile threatened to gurgle up into my throat again. “I’ve done my fair share of sacrifices, but a dead human is nothing like a dead chicken, or goat, Robert.”

  He nodded and released my hand. “But someone wants them to think you did it, so you better pray they find evidence to make them look somewhere else because cops aren’t trained to think beyond the easiest solution.”

  “Right now, I’m praying he died of a heart attack, so they think I just fucked him to death.”

  He cleared his throat and nodded. “And that’s not even the strangest thing a client has ever said to me.”

  I laughed and agreed. “Yeah, I know, I’m the one who approves bonds for these folks…or at least I used to.”

  His face was sympathetic, but he made no move to walk with me to the office. I took a deep breath before going in, squaring my shoulders. I did my best to ignore the sense of impending doom that had settled over me. It wasn’t premonition, just nerves, but it didn’t make it any easier to disregard.

  The door swung in as I reached for the handle. “Well good afternoon, Ms. Silk, interesting fashion choice.” Orson looked me over and I groaned aloud.

  “Hey, Boss.”

  “Seriously. I can’t talk to you with a giant baby koala staring back at me. You look like shit.”

  “I don’t have a change of clothes here anymore, I loaned them out to a client.”

  He chuckled. “I told you to stop being so damned charitable. Loaned, right.” He sighed and jerked his head inside and held the door as I obeyed. “Penelope picked something up for you, paid with petty cash, so don’t let her con you into paying her back.”

  “Uh, okay," I frowned at him. “I thought there’d be more yelling.”

  He shrugged, running one hand over his lumpy bald head. “Penelope was at your place last night. She said you weren’t in any mood to go out after she left, and you were already in that ridiculous nightie of yours.” The long-sleeved tee had seen better days, but I was beginning to get irritated with the judgements.

  My legs turned to jelly as relief washed over me and I sank into the nearest chair. “Oh then…” I stopped myself just before ‘thank you’ slipped out. “I am so glad to hear that. I’ll bring in coffee for everyone tomorrow.” Orson looked disappointed but simply jerked his head up and down in agreement.

  Shit. The last thing I needed was to give a Fae a reason to demand a favor, even one as enlightened as Orson. Thank a Fae and they’ll demand a good deed returned. Many of the scariest human legends about Fae were simply the disastrous and deadly results of "errands" they were given.

  “And donuts. Coffee and breakfast for everybody.” The corner of his mouth twitched, but he accepted the offer without trying to finagle a deal out of it, praise Dana.

  Before he could change his mind, I escaped to the restroom and changed into the slinky mini dress and boots Penelope had picked out for me. “Very funny, Pen,” I muttered aloud as I tried to make the dress look less like I was about to go clubbing. In the end, I wrapped my nightshirt around my waist, so the cartoon baby koala was hidden and tied the sleeves in front. It was still a little black dress, but at least with my hair combed through and a little mascara, I felt like myself again.

  “Hey Digger, I thought you’d be long gone by now,” I called when I emerged from the ladies room.

  “I was on my way out of town when I heard ya got nabbed, chickee. What the hell happened?”

  I shrugged and sat
at my desk, fidgeting with the mail I’d left the day before. “I dunno, Dig.”

  “It’s those evil cu...” Penelope coughed, clearing her throat. “I mean, you know your aunt was behind it.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know, Pen, this is pretty gruesome for her.” I was finally safe enough to think about the poor alpha who I’d awakened next to. “Shit. I bet he has a family. Or at least had a family.”

  Penelope sucked on her teeth. “Low enough for her, though.” I couldn’t argue it, so I didn’t bother. Not to mention if they couldn’t find a natural cause of death, they’d have to start looking for magical causes, and that would put me right back in hot water unless they had a better suspect by then, and why would they bother looking, when someone had handed me to them on a silver platter?

  My coworkers were already treating the fiasco like it was over, Penelope going through the skips I’d dropped on her desk before we went out, Dig saying one last goodbye to Orson before heading out to his next gig.

  “Go home, Silk,” Orson called out from the doorway to his office. “You still look like shit. Take the rest of the day off and flirt whatever cop is standing guard at your door to let you get your clothes. I’ll get you a room for the night if you need it.”

  Orson had already given me one get out of jail free card. A day off for personal issues was the only other offer he could’ve made that would have shocked me as much as not firing me for getting arrested.

  “Orson, you are a scholar and a gentleman,” I called out, signaling to Penelope to head for the door. “I’m just going to borrow Pen to get me to my car, and I will see you tomorrow.”

  “Yeah, you better be bright-eyed and bushy tailed.”

  I grinned at him wide enough to flash him some fang and tossed my head, flipping my hair behind my shoulder. Being Kitsune as well as witch, I had inherited my predatory canine teeth and sharp, foxlike features from my Fae genealogy.