Charms and Death and Explosions

by Honor Raconteur

  “Edwards actually volunteered to take it,” Gregson’s smile was not nice, “as it overlaps with her area of expertise. Go away, Woods. You’re only embarrassing yourself.”

  An inhuman whine exploded from his throat as Woods wheeled about, slamming his way back out of the station. I watched him go and nodded to myself. Yeah, he’d be the reason why Third Precinct was so terrible. A leader more interested in covering his backside had no time to actually do his job correctly.

  Gregson caught my eye and asked, “What are you doing here?”

  “Stealing Henri’s chocolate before I go find Gerring to get an update,” I answered truthfully.

  “Then go.”

  I went.

  My wonderful minion (you have no idea how sad I am that I can’t make minion jokes either) had in fact been a busy little beaver while we had been quarantined. I found him in the back conference room, the one that no one liked to use because it was cramped, windowless, and a little musty smelling. He had the door propped open to offset some of that, the table buried under reports, and the blackboard covered in writing. With his ebony skin, the chalk dust all over him made it look as if he’d gotten into a fight with a flour mill. And lost.

  Gerring looked up at my entrance with visible relief. “You’re back?”

  “I am,” I answered, slinging myself into the nearest chair. “Sorry you had to muddle through on your own. We needed at least one person to continue working the case while we all got trapped inside. I’ll treat you to dinner, okay?”

  “Okay,” he agreed happily. (I’m pleased everyone’s picking up that word so quickly.) “You and Dr. Davenforth know the best places to eat anyway.”

  I snickered. “Yeah, well, I’m actually stealing his knowledge. Want a chocolate?”

  Gerring happily accepted one, popped it into his mouth, and moaned appreciation. “Is this from his stash?”

  “Of course. I only get the best. Hit me, kid. What have you found?”

  “A lot, actually.” Gerring gestured to the piles of reports and the blackboard. “I heard Captain Woods yelling earlier, and I know why he was, as he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. I reported to Captain Gregson that there were thirty-six complaints, but actually there’s more. Some of them were misfiled or maybe deliberately mislabeled so that they were ‘lost’ in circulation. Third Precinct has creative ways to get around actually working.”

  “Oh, lovely,” I groaned. That called for another chocolate. “So how many do you think there actually are?”

  “I’ve still got two piles to go, but there are at least seventy-two,” he answered sourly, jerking his chin to indicate the two piles in question. When I started swearing, he grunted, mouth curling up in a snarl. “That’s exactly how I feel about it. A lot of damage was done that could have been avoided, if they’d just responded to the first complaints. I mean, I know that I’m new, but if we had a complaint like this come in? I know for a fact that if I took it to Dr. Davenforth, and asked him to take a look for me, he’d do it.”

  “That’s what makes him an exceptional Magical Examiner,” I acknowledged. “As well as a good man. Alright, so we have lots of proof to get those idiots in trouble. Good. Glad to hear it. There has to be a silver lining, as this is too dark of a cloud. What else have you found?”

  “All of the civil suits were dropped. The business filed a Chapter Twelve—they revoked their own business license and promised to close up shop in a week as the settlement. I think they begged for leniency, as they wouldn’t have been able to pay the fine for damages and wrongful death against that many plaintiffs. Over a hundred families joined forces to put a case against them.” Gerring tapped the binder in question, and while I couldn’t read it upside down easily, I made out the court’s number and logo without a problem. So he’d gotten his hands on the court transcripts, had he? Clever boy. I owed him more than one dinner, it appeared.

  “Alright, that’s an amazing amount of legwork,” I praised, heartily meaning every word. “Have you had the chance to run down any of these families, talk to them?”

  “Not personally, no. I do have a list to work from.” Gerring scooted his chair back in a scrape to stand, gesturing to the columns of names on the board. “This first list is every person who lost a child and has the right skills. They’re either a powder monkey or a mechanic. Star next to their name is for the powder monkeys.”

  “Only six of those,” I noted, counting quickly. Fourteen suspects. SO much better than a fifth of the city. “The other list?”

  “People who lost a loved one due to the charms—that I could actually prove, at least. I think there’s more. It would just take a Magical Examiner to verify my suspicions.” He pointed to several underlined names. “These are the people who were part of the lawsuit.”

  I added them up quickly, estimating. “Gerring, that’s a good hundred people to run down.”

  “Hundred and thirteen,” he confirmed wryly. “I vote we split up the list.”

  “Motion carried,” I agreed faintly. I was so not running down a hundred and thirteen people all by my lonesome. “Let’s reach out to the Kingsmen, give them a portion of the list to work on. You and I will take the powder monkeys today, as I know where to go with them. And if we’re very, very lucky, we’ll catch people.”

  The day with Gerring had not turned up any obvious suspects, but it removed several people off our list, which I took as progress in the right direction. Many people had an alibi for the night and day in question, which made life easier on me.

  Day two of being back on the job, I spent a few hours in the morning following up on the demolition companies that hadn’t gotten back to me before the epidemic hit. I half-hoped they might have a suspect for me, but no one else had any dynamite missing. Only the one company, and they weren’t entirely sure it wasn’t just a misprint of sorts. I hardly wanted another cold lead handed to me.

  Frustrated, I abandoned the search and trooped back into the station. I’d need to gather up Gerring again, see if we couldn’t connect with the three men we’d failed to interview the day before. He’d come in late this morning, a doctor’s appointment, but surely he was back to work by now.

  My desk had a few reports on it, one scribbled message, and that made me smile. I was going on year two of being on this world and could finally read the simpler sentences. A lot of vocab was still missing, and slang went right over my head, but I was making steady progress. Give me another year, I might be able to pass muster.

  Shifting my briefcase aside, I picked up the note first, as notes were rare. Most people just talked to me directly about anything case related. It didn’t used to be that way pre-Henri, but post-Henri my relationship with my colleagues had improved by leaps and bounds. Henri openly teasing me had eased fears. I still unnerved some people—Berghetta, for instance—but I think that was less about me killing a rogue witch and more about my willingness to wear pants and shoot guns.

  I couldn’t just scan the note, the loopy style of the handwriting made it a little hard to decipher, and I had to puzzle through more than one word. Then the overall meaning of the note hit and a thrill raced through me. Holy crap, was this right?! Spinning about, I lurched around the desks and hightailed it for Henri’s lab.

  Not even knocking, I burst through the door but stayed behind Henri’s line. I was not stupid enough to cross that, as he’d been in here hours already and had likely pulled out something dangerously magical.

  He had a clear table, nothing more than a report and a sealed evidence case on it, so he must have just finished with something. He jerked around sharply at my entrance. Alarm spread over his face, eyes wide behind his glasses. “What?”

  “I have a note that someone claiming to have killed Garner turned himself in this morning,” I quickly relayed, words tumbling out and into each other. “He’s waiting in the jail cell.”

  Henri looked as flabbergasted as I felt. “Criminals don’t normally turn themselves in, do they?”

  �
��More often than you’d think, but not as often as fiction inclines you to believe. Get us an interrogation room, grab Penny if you see her, but I’m hauling this man in to see if he’s really the culprit.” Sometimes people weren’t. Sometimes the fame of the act drew the loonies in, and they wanted their fifteen minutes in the newspapers. Those were the dangerous ones. I’d have to be careful how much information I gave this man and test him to see if he was the genuine article.

  I swear, being a cop some days was like playing cards with a gambler. Where was a truth serum when you needed one?

  As Henri hustled one direction, I went the other, toward the back of the building where the internal jail cells were. We didn’t have a lot of holding room back there, maybe enough to keep thirty people, and only two men on duty to manage the lot. At the moment, we had a largely empty house, with a drunk sleeping it off and another man who looked resigned, slouched on a wooden bed chained to the wall. I stopped at the desk just inside the door and leaned in. “Hey, Finch.”

  “Edwards,” Finch returned with a nod. A portly man, Finch had a wife who was a good cook, three kids, and twenty solid years on the force. He was the steady sort that can be depended on to keep things from getting ugly. He inclined his head toward the resigned man on the bed. “That’s yours.”

  I leaned in further, keeping my voice low. “Who took him in?”

  “I did, actually. Poor Hurst didn’t know what to do with him when he showed up. She called me, and I brought him back. He hasn’t said a peep, except for he’s the one who blew Garner to pieces.”

  Right. This might get strange. Although I hoped we actually had the right man, as that would further matters along nicely. “Alright, bring him out.”

  “You got a room?”

  “Henri’s arranging it.”

  Amiable, Finch got up in a clatter of keys and walked to the cell, slotted in a key, and waved the man out. “Detective Jamie Edwards is here to talk to you. Let’s go.”

  He shuffled out and I got a better look at the man. Small, that was my general impression. Small and depressed. Short enough to hit my chin, thin in body and in frame, dark hair lank against his head, as if he hadn’t washed it in days. This might be my murderer, but I’d wager he regretted his decision every second.

  Stepping out of the cell, he looked up at me and his expression shifted from resigned to vaguely curious. I didn’t see a lot of life in those eyes, and that was a bad sign. This wasn’t a man anxious to live. Just what had he done to himself? Was the weight of another man’s soul crushing his spirit? I understood that weight, all too well, but I had never acted out of vengeance, only self-preservation. Some might see it as a fine line but that distinction was soul-saving.

  “I’m Detective Edwards,” I introduced myself, my voice gentle, as I sensed this man needed gentleness right now instead of abrasion.

  “Parkins,” he rasped back, wetted his dry lips, and tried again. “Jake Parkins.”

  “Mr. Parkins, won’t you come with me? My partner and I have many questions for you.”

  He nodded, a vague assent, and fell into step with me, his cuffed hands held loosely in front of him. I kept an eye on him, of course I did, as underestimating people got you quickly dead. Still, I sensed no danger from this man.

  Henri stood waiting outside of the interrogation room, his dark eyes flitting over the man in a quick, intense study. He caught my eye, his own eyebrows arched in question, and I shrugged. I had no idea if this was really our man or not. At least, not yet.

  We stepped inside the small interrogation room and I was relieved to see that Penny already stood in the corner of the room, her shoulders braced against the wall. I wanted her here for various reasons, but mostly for experience. She handled a lot of the low-key interrogations for domestic issues, or for witness statements, but this would be very different than anything else in her experience.

  Parkins took a seat on one side, Henri and I on the other. Henri had his notebook out, a pencil lying on the blank pages, and I trusted him to take notes while I did the talking. We’d discovered that system worked best for us. I was trained in interrogation. Henri wasn’t. We chose to play to our strengths, although I’d teach Henri the nuances of this eventually.

  “Mr. Parkins, this is my partner, Dr. Henri Davenforth. He’s a Magical Examiner.” I casually folded my hands on top of the table, pitching my voice to be friendly, my body language inviting. “That’s Officer Penny McSparrin. She’s also working this case with us. Can you give us your full name, address, and occupation for the record?”

  “Jacob Parkins, powder monkey with North Storey,” then an address I vaguely recognized as being near the east side docks. He locked eyes with me, like a puppet upon its master, waiting for the next order. The guy seriously needed therapy.

  I could tell the other two had picked up on it, too, but I ignored them for the moment and focused on Parkins. “I understand you confessed to killing Garner. Is that right?”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  Nothing, huh. I tried again. “Can you tell us the story? Why did you do it? How?”

  Curiosity flickered in those deep grey eyes. “You want my story?”

  “I sure do. It’s this thing with cops, we like to know motives.”

  A bitter laugh snorted through his nose. “They sure didn’t.”

  “Who?” I prodded. Ha! Real emotion. Now we were getting somewhere.

  “Cops at Third Precinct,” he answered, rage tightening his fists until the knuckles shown white. “I reported the charms, we all reported the charms, but they said charms didn’t do that. They didn’t make people sick. They either worked, or didn’t work. And that my—” he choked, faltered, eyes burning bright with unshed tears.

  “They’re quite wrong,” Henri put in gently. “Bad charms can, in fact, cause the very thing they’re supposed to prevent. And I promise you, after this, everyone will be very thoroughly educated on this point. RM Seaton is on the warpath about this very subject and our good queen is equally upset. Revisions will be made so that bad charms will have a hard time getting on the market after this. We’ve also written up Third Precinct’s captain for this shameful conduct. An investigation into the station is now in the works.”

  That lifted Parkin’s head again and he stared at Henri in wonder. “All of that, really?”

  “The epidemic that broke out recently,” Henri continued, tone lilting in question. “You’ve heard of it? Yes? That was mostly caused by Garner’s bad charms. Because of it, I was able to report it to RM Seaton, and he in turn reported it to the queen. I assure you, no one is happy about the matter, and it’s shoved the problem into the light. I believe we’ll finally see regulation where charm making is concerned.”

  A shudder of relief went through Parkins, but it was a bitter sort of relief, leaving him brittle and angry. “So it takes more than once for that sort of change, does it? It wasn’t enough we suffered under his hands?”

  “Who did you lose, Mr. Parkins?” I asked, trying to not only get info out of him, but bring him back on point.

  “My daughter,” he whispered, face rippling with repressed emotion. “My little girl. Her lungs were weak, we bought a charm to keep the colds at bay. She was dead from pneumonia a month later. I knew it was the charm, she was fine before that, and for once no one else in the neighborhood was sick. There was no one to catch it from. And we got to talking, all of us, and it was always the same charm that set it off. We knew it was the charm. But we couldn’t get anyone to listen, not at first. Then there were too many complaints, and Garner was gone. But he wasn’t really gone. We didn’t know that at first, we thought he was out of business entirely, and were glad for it. I might have left it alone if he’d learned his lesson. But I got a job over here on west side, to demo some of the old shacks and clear out land for a new neighborhood. And I saw him, coming out of that fancy building of his, climbing into that fancy car. And the sign on the window, that made it clear enough. He hadn’t stopped. He�
�d just pulled up stakes, moved to another section of town, changed names, and was right back at it.

  “I went home, told people what I’d seen, and they were livid. Like me. And we had to stop him, didn’t we? Because we’d reported it once and got ignored, we couldn’t just trust the police to do it.” Here, he looked at Henri in apology. “I thought it at the time. But I heard what you did, Dr. Davenforth. I heard what you and your parents are doing, how you’re pulling strings to get those charms destroyed. If I’d known you were here, that you’d help, I…well, things might be different, is all.”

  I felt my heart break for him. I’d seen grief and rage break good men, and when they felt like their backs were against a wall, they lashed out, because they didn’t see any other option. Indeed, if he had known about Henri, he might not have made the same choice. But that bridge was well burned and cold ashes by now. There was no undoing it.

  “It was the car that made me mad,” he continued, eyes blind as he stared at the wall between us. “Silly, now that I think about it. But it was the car that really made me mad. My daughter’s life helped pay for that car. And he drove it around, always with a different woman in it, playing at being a successful charm maker. I wanted to kill him for it. I said that for a week, and the more I said it, the truer it was. I wanted him dead for it, and I wanted that car to be what killed him.”

  He faltered there and I nudged him, just a little. I believed his grief was real, it was too raw and unapologetic, but was he really the culprit? Or was he covering for someone else? “Did you know how?”

  Shaking his head, he denied, “Don’t know nothing about cars. Had a buddy tell me how the engine worked. Once he explained the spark plug, I knew that was the ticket. That spark of electricity, to fire things up, that’s all it would take to get a stick of dynamite going. I figured it wouldn’t take more than one. I had a false start on it, day before, I didn’t wire it right. I redid it, and the next morning, it blew everything apart first try.”