As he walked, he went over the bits that he’d been taught. The basis of it was in holding the idea of a thing. Its essential concept. Not a word, or mental image, just the feeling of the thing. Once he had that, he needed to add a trickle of power. In his case that would be life energy, from his links. Humans could do it without that, producing the stuff for themselves.
Mages practically poured it into reality, though not in a way that meant anything to vampires. They could serve as links, but were about the same as regular people that way.
Focusing, a thing that he had some experience with, he tried to hold the idea of not being hungry. It was a constant in his life, so took some work. Carefully adding power to the idea, just a hint of a buzzing, didn’t do much. Not at first.
By increasing the clarity of the idea that he wasn’t feeling any hunger at all, that ebbed and, just as he got to the door of the station, went away totally.
It was taking work to make happen. Energy as well. Not a lot of it. Eve had been really careful about explaining that to him. If he pushed too hard, his links would suffer. If, on the other hand, he managed to be clear and focused enough, it would take almost nothing to warp reality to his will.
There really wasn’t any difference between doing magic inside himself and at a distance. People thought that things outside of them would be harder, so it was. Troy didn’t have that issue, being a line walker by training. He knew, first hand, that all points were connected at their heart. All time probably was as well. That was, basically, what the void between worlds was. A connection to everything that existed, all at one time.
Trying not to lose his focus for a while, since it was fun, not being starving for a few moments, he headed to his office space and clocked in on the computer. Then he made a copy of the file he’d put together and sent it to Tran. There was, as promised, a message waiting for him from Santos. Pictures.
No nudes, of course. The chickens hadn’t been plucked, except in patches.
He was looking at those when Denise came in, this time having stopped to get a coffee on the way in.
“Hey, kid. Anything new going on?”
He smiled, even if it wasn’t all good.
“Yes. Oh, first, put the coffee down and hold this for a bit. Ten minutes or so. Let me…” He had to work at his neck, then use his intention to turn the thing on before handing it over. His partner trusted him enough to take the thing in her bare hand.
“Oh… That… Ow. What is this?” She didn't throw it down, but clutched at her chest a bit. Then her left hip.
“Healing magic. You need ten minutes with that and it will take care of the heart condition. Probably everything else too. That was what I was told. It won’t work on me. We have to return it to the owner later, so do the healing now.”
She held on, gasping a few times. He sat and watched, since it was kind of amazing. For instance, her eyes cleared after a few moments. They’d been slightly bloodshot. Then they cleared visibly in front of him. The wrinkles stayed, but her breathing cleared up enough that he could hear it. Several things in her lower back cracked, getting her to gasp loudly. Once she called out, in pain. A single cut on her right hand, that looked like a bagel injury to Troy, went away.
It was like something from a movie. The stage makeup was removed bit by bit, over the course of a minute, leaving only smooth flesh. After a bit, she pushed a finger into her mouth and went wide eyed.
“Fuck. I’m growing a tooth back? That’s been gone for thirty years. Where did you get this thing? I know that The Technician said you should make some calls, but I figured it would be, I don’t know, pills or something? That or a crock of shit. This is really working. Should I get excited about it yet, do you think?”
She looked at him, slightly wide eyed.
“After it’s done?”
It was clear that she was doing something still. She was thinning a bit. Not enough to be slender or even really normal, but a good ten pounds seemed to be shifting. Being used up in order to heal everything wrong with her, he didn’t doubt. It could have been less than that. At almost ten minutes exactly, she handed the item back.
“Okay, so… You want my bank card? That was… Incredible. How much did this cost?”
“Some information. I got it from my friend, Zack. Oh… Hey… I’m setting up a thing this weekend. Shooting at the range, with friends. You need to show up, since some of them are contacts. I think Santos and her wife are showing up too. It’s a lot of women, so far. That probably means that I’m secretly planning a ten-way girl orgy.” He shrugged, then sighed, turning the amulet off and putting it around his neck, carefully. The thing was probably worth billions of dollars. Maybe more than that. “Only I’m not. It’s just the way things are working out so far.”
“I don’t have a life, so I can be there. Anything else?”
That got him to wave for her to sit.
“You know, there is. Remember my date last night?”
“Right! How did that go? Did you get lucky? Details. I need to know if you’re going to be Mrs. Heidi whatshername or not.”
He grimaced.
“Not. I was stood up. At the same time, while I was out, someone came and left me a bouquet of chickens in a circle on my doorstep. With a decorative hand print. I called it in and Santos came and took some pretty pictures for us. Just to tie things together, about a quarter of the people that have vanished down in New Mexico have had those about a week before they vanished. Probably dead, rather than kidnapped. Eric Weise had that looked into. A friend of mine, Steve York, knows his daughter. Um… He’s the President of the mages, more or less. So, high level. Weise, not Steve.”
She nodded, taking it all in, then looked at the new pictures.
“Well, holy crap. So, someone is trying to kill my new partner already? I’m pretty sure that’s my job. They done fucked up, you know?”
He did, though he also appreciated the statement.
“Oh, yeah. They really have.”
Chapter nine
That day was the most relaxing at his new office, so far. They did get out of the office for a few hours, which was nice. That was just to head to the school and hassle Clem the former druggy, as well as little Morgan, the shifter boy. Neither of them had much to say, but the conditioning was holding for Clem, which was the real point. He’d given up his drug dealing ways at least.
There was a controversy, since a student had not only drugged and raped the student art teacher, but the first bit of things was there as well. She’d been totally banging about five guys in her classes. Not all of them were of legal age, either. It was making problems.
When they got back to the office, Tran, clearly feeling a lot better than she had for a while, laughed a bit.
“We dodged that one then, didn’t we? The rape guys have to be pulling their hair out on this one. Do they forgive her what she did and go after the creepy kid, or do they go after them both? Bet you can’t guess which is going to happen.”
Except he could. He’d lived in America his whole life, after all.
“They’ll ignore what she did and go after the kid. It’s not only the more serious crime, but she’s attractive, so half the men hearing that she was sleeping with fourteen-year-old boys will be wondering where she was when they were that age. It makes it hard to prosecute at the best of times. You need a female judge, for one thing.” It wasn’t a hundred percent that way, but most days it was about like that.
Women, especially pretty ones, weren’t held to the same standards as other people. Particularly men. Denise Tran was a police Detective, so knew that one first hand.
“No shit. Well, we’re knocking these things down pretty well. I… Should we get with the mage leadership? You said that they had some data on this thing with the birds? From a source. It would be better if we get them in on it. Especially if it’s about their people. We’re screwed if they’re in on it officially. What do you know about this Weise guy?”
Troy had to think for a b
it, but he actually knew a little bit.
“Well, his daughter, Lisa, is the Ambassador for her people at Westfield. She’s been there for years, so we’ve met. Zack, of the healing amulet fame, used to work for her, about… Oh, thirteen years ago? Fourteen? Something like that. She’s nice. Lesbian, which was a bit of an issue with her dad for a while. I guess they talk now? After their last leader was murdered, Eric Weise was voted in. He’s considered hard on crime and terrorism. A real law and order politician type. Not evil that I ever heard. We’ve crossed paths a few times. Nothing close. I doubt that I could just call him up for a date or anything.”
Not that he’d want to. The man wasn’t his type at all. In general, he liked women, so that was a hard one to get past right off the bat. Not that he couldn’t do things with a guy. It had been part of the training to be a vampire, actually. It just wasn’t his first pick that way.
Denise spread her hands.
“We make the calls. He answers or not. It’s out of our jurisdiction, so if he doesn’t have time to spend on us, that’s up to him. How do we do that though. I mean, I couldn’t get the number of our President. Could you?”
That got an eye roll.
“Of course, I could. It would just take more string pulling than could ever be worth it. What I can do though is… Call up Lisa. She may or may not remember me.” It wasn’t like they’d ever been close.
Troy didn’t know if she would or not, to be honest.
Edom got him the right number, which meant making another call in the chain. Then Lisa Weise acted like they were old pals. It was slightly odd.
“Troy! I hear that you’re the one putting up the big community event, there in Arizona. Are the mages in on that yet?” She sounded hopeful, instead of like he might be coming to ask for money.
It was a good sign.
“Not yet, that I know of. I was just going to ask if I could get your father’s number. Not for that, honestly. There have been some complicated blood magic things in New Mexico, followed by dead or missing people. No bodies, yet. We have things here that sound identical. I was hoping to pick his brain. In my official law enforcement capacity. I can chat up the picnic idea, as well. Do you want to make a showing there? We don’t have a local embassy here, so that works for me. You can set up a table and pass out brochures. Everyone loves a good brochure.”
“Heh. Right. I can see about putting something together. I get a few weeks?”
“We haven’t even set a hard date for it yet. We do have a band, possibly two and the food is being paid for by Avery Rome. The Rotted is helping with that. I asked her as a joke. It worked. Go figure? I’m not even paying her for it. The Coalition of Nations is in as well. So, we might even have ten or fifteen whole people showing up.” He didn’t want to oversell, even if it was looking to be a bit larger than that. You had to plan big on things like that. It didn’t mean you got big though.
Most events tended to be around thirty people, in Troy’s experience. That was roughly the number that he knew at any given time that would come to anything he asked them to. Except that, he wasn’t that well connected at the moment.
Lisa seemed interested at least.
“I’ll see if I can set up something? Todd was looking for something to do toward that end anyway. You know him, right? My assistant ambassador here?”
That was new to Troy, but the face behind the name was familiar from the last few years.
“Really. Is that new? Last I heard he was going off to college.”
There was a soft chuckle.
“Yeah. They grow up so fast. Anyway, let me get that number for you. Good luck. Dad can be… Interesting at times.”
On that winning endorsement, he got off the line and tried to call the President of the mages. It was a fascinating thing to experience. After the first ten calls to different secretaries and under-beings of different flavors, Troy realized something.
“My life has been too easy. For half a minute, I kind of expected this to be me putting a few numbers in and having Eric Weise hop-to, as if it were the thing to do. Well. Put me in my place.” It was true enough, but he wasn’t so far up his own behind that he couldn’t get the joke. No one was that important. Not really.
Detective Tran shook her head.
“I know. It’s like we’re, gasp, real people. Go figure, right?”
“Yup. Clearly the mages aren’t paying attention to how important we are. Or, erm… maybe they are paying attention? That might explain it.”
That was meant to be funny, but was probably fair. They were a tiny department on a small force in a city notable only for producing a few famous people and having too many demons around for the health of the population. Only Darla and her friends knew about that last part.
It was interesting, because Troy was all out of things to do for the time being. There was nothing police related at all. Not even the next graffiti case or helping clean up the parking lot. Looking at the clock, Denise finally nodded at him.
“I’m going to lunch. I’m starving for some reason. Do you need anything?” She actually winced a little, as if asking that was rude.
“I’m good. Bored. That’s probably the best I can ask for given the job.”
“Don’t jinx it. If you say things like that, you’re asking for something to happen. I haven’t even had my sandwich from Subway yet.”
“Go. I’ll hold down the fort here. See you in an hour?” They hadn’t been taking any breaks, though they could, by union rules. They were supposed to take them. It just hadn’t come up.
As his partner left, Troy thought about why that was. For his part, it was clearly that vampires didn’t do that, not wanting their elders to kill them. It was all work, all the time. Doing anything else was asking for the maker to toss them into a fire. That or a tiny box for an extended stay.
What Detective Tran was doing that way, he didn’t know. Honestly it was probably about not seeming weak in front of the boss or the new guy. Now that she was fixed that way, she might start asking like a regular detective that way.
No one called or came into the office. It was in short, a lot of sitting. Just as Troy was about to go and start working on the parking lot, even if it didn’t need it, Tran came back. She seemed pretty normal, if happier than she had been the last two days.
Sitting down, she slapped her cheap metal and plastic desk.
“Fine. If this Weise guy can’t be spared, who else do we have. This is a mage side thing, from the look so far. I mean… Can humans do that kind of magic? Who can, if not the magic people, right?”
Troy got the idea.
“Let me… Um, well, greater demons, easily. Some lesser demons… Different groups often have people that can do a little magic. Maybe not at this level? That really does sound like the mages. I mean, I can do a little bit of magic. I had some training in it, but not enough for anything like this.”
Instead of asking him to make things move around, Denise just looked at him funny.
“So, it could be anyone, but it really isn’t going to be, is it? Mages, greater demons… Those are the most likely types?”
Troy thought for a moment.
“That’s it. Probably not the demons. I mean, they could, but they wouldn’t. Unless they wanted to for some reason. If that’s the case, we’re screwed. So, we focus on the mage community? I don’t even have a clue who that would be around here. I mean, mages live all over, but there isn’t a gathering place here, that I know of.”
Even finding that kind of thing was going to be hard. If he were in Vancouver, he would have gone to Candles and More. In Lincoln Arizona, well, that wasn’t going to be as easy to find. They didn’t have a specific church or anything. No shops that were just theirs, except that they did need supplies for their craft work. Crystals, herbs and various metals. Wire and things like that. Silk cloth was a thing too. True, you could get those things in a lot of places.
If there was a place that had them all though, it would probably be a
good place to start looking.
That took an hour of searching online. When he finally found the most likely place, Troy tapped his computer screen. The ad for the place called to him. There was, he thought, something there that he needed to fix.
“I think we have a place to start.” Laying out his rationale, he smiled.
Tran shrugged at him, from her desk.
“It will probably be nothing, but I’m not doing anything right now anyway. Except thinking about all the hot guys I’m going to be doing, now that it probably won’t kill me. This new tooth is bugging the crap out of me, by the way.” Her face, which was a lot more relaxed than it had been, curled up into a big, very real seeming, smile. “Thanks. That was… I know that the demon, The Technician, said you could pull it off, but I didn’t think that was real, you know? I mean, who can do that?”
Troy shrugged then, thinking about it.
“Anyone with the right contacts. Hence you coming to the thing this weekend. Now, are you driving, or shall I?” He could do it, even if he did feel like he was on fire.
The words got a snort.
“I didn’t let you when I could have keeled over at any second. You think I’m gonna start now? Come on, rookie. Let’s go and find out that the shop that probably sells to mages knows nothing about anything at all.”
That was the way of real investigations. Oh, it helped that he knew the basic kinds of things to look out for, but there was almost no way that they were going to get there and find out that it wasn’t just some eccentric woman running a business at loss in her retirement.
After the fifteen-minute drive, well out of the city, he passed the tiny hole in the wall shop they were looking for. Twice in fact, before Tran worked out that it must be the one next to the two empty places in the mini-strip-mall set up. There were two shops, along the highway. The other, on the far end, was a country themed restaurant. The Rest and Rant. He assumed it had a bar, since there were neon signs for Bud and a few other beers all over the windows. They hit the cowboy theme pretty hard, but at least it looked like they might actually open up at night.
Troy Ounce (Lopez Time Book 1) Page 13