by K. J. Emrick
Picking up her black purse from the floor, she got up from her chair, and went over to the side of the stage.
When no one was looking she slipped through the doorway that led to the back area of the building.
This was where the kids set up for their Christmas pageant every year. It was also where the candidates had been waiting before the debate began. Yes, the police had been all over back here looking for clues, but they didn’t have the ways of looking for things that a Kilorian sister did.
A dimly lit hallway led to three rooms off to the left, and straight ahead was the back door, and then a sharp turn to the right led to the stage. The first room was a utility closet, crammed with brooms and a mop bucket. She briefly considered the cleaning supplies, Clorox and window spray and drain cleaner. All of it was toxic, and poisonous, but unless someone had duped Seth into drinking a glass of furniture polish, then Addie doubted she was looking at the murder weapon on any of these shelves.
The next room was large and empty, except for a few metal folding chairs just like the ones out in the main room. There was a garbage can too, about waist high with a lid operated by a foot pedal, but when Addie looked inside it was empty. The police had already gathered the trash up as potential evidence. She smiled, remembering the odd looks the officers had given Lucian when he directed them to take the trash. He believed her when she said it was poison, and he was acting accordingly. It was one of the things she loved most about the man. Where others would have doubted her, Lucian believed.
So why was he giving her grief all of a sudden? Here she was, helping him with another investigation into another murder, giving him the insights that only a witch could give him, and he was acting like she’d just spit in his coffee, or something. Men. They were harder to understand than the ways of magic.
She brought her focus back to the room in front of her. This was where Seth and Eleanor had waited for the debate to begin. They would have both been back here, just sitting and going over their talking points, until they were called to the stage. Nice and cozy. Had Eleanor noticed any signs of distress from Seth? Surely the police must have asked her that already.
Just to be safe, Addie decided she was going to ask the question herself.
Of course, she was just assuming they had been back here alone together. Someone else might have been back here with them. Or, for that matter, Seth might not have been back here at all. There was that delay at the start of the event that needed to be explained. What had caused them to start late?
Well, well. She had lots of questions to ask Eleanor. Did she notice anything wrong with Seth? Were they the only ones in this room? Did Seth walk in late through the back door?
For that matter, did she see him eat or drink anything? Did Eleanor actually watch Seth poison himself?
Or…
Addie realized she couldn’t rule Eleanor out as a suspect, either. If she was back here alone with Seth that gave her plenty of opportunity to poison him. Maybe that should be her first question. Excuse me, Eleanor. Did you kill Seth Hunter so that you could get his town manager position?
Um. Well. Maybe she’d be a little more subtle about it than that.
There was still one room back here to check. The bathroom door squeaked when she pushed her way through it, and it smacked against the inside wall to reveal a tight space with two closed stalls and two sinks, a hand dryer and a single mirror. The garbage can was empty here as well, and she could only imagine that the officer who had to bag that up hadn’t been very happy about it.
That was it. She was out of places to look. It seemed like she wasn’t going to find any clues back here after all. Just more questions. Maybe she should just call it a night and start fresh tomorrow with the help of her sisters. The deed had already been done. She couldn’t resurrect Seth Hunter from the grave, and giving his killer one more night to walk free wasn’t going to change that. There were some things that not even magic could fix.
Taking out her phone from her purse, she dialed the landline phone up at Stonecrest. The sisters each had a cellphone, of course, but they maintained a landline at the house because Kiera still didn’t trust cellular technology. She was old fashioned, in more ways than one, and she was very certain that one day soon electronic devices would fail humanity entirely and the only things still functional would be the old standards like landline phones, and manual typewriters, and vinyl records. Considering that vinyl was making a comeback, Addie thought maybe she had a point.
A man’s voice answered her call, and at first Addie thought that maybe Kiera’s son had gotten comfortable enough at Stonecrest to answer the phone, but then in the next instant she realized it was just Kyle talking.
“Kilorian residence,” he said, chipper like always.
“Kyle? What are you doing there?”
“Well, hello to you too, Miss Addie.”
Kyle was the handyman the sisters used whenever something needed to be fixed at Stonecrest. From roof work to plumbing, Kyle was a master at just about everything. He was not, however, the person who usually answered the phone.
“I’m serious,” she told him. “Where are my sisters?”
“Er, well, Kiera’s in the living room talking about a mile a minute with that new fellow. Willow’s not here. I don’t think. At least, I haven’t seen her since I’ve been here.”
That wasn’t unusual for her little sister. Ever since Willow had started dating Gary, she’d spent less and less time at home. Which was fine, because Willow was a grown woman, with a life of her own to lead. It just seemed like her personal life was starting to interfere with her responsibilities as a member of the Kilorian sister’s coven.
“I still don’t understand why you’re answering the phone, Kyle.”
“Because it was ringing,” he said, as if that answered everything.
Addie leaned a hip against one of the sinks. Kyle was a nice man, and like she’d said before he was a superb handyman, but he wasn’t exactly the brightest crayon in the box. “How about this. Why are you in our house?”
“Oh, that,” he said, laughing at his own foolishness. “I came over to fix the draft from that one window before winter sets in. Had some time tonight so I hopped right over.”
“Well, that’s very nice of you.” Considering, she thought to herself, that they’d asked him to fix it two weeks ago. “You didn’t want to come and see the town manager debate?”
“Nah. Never much cared for politics. It’s always boring.”
“Not tonight it wasn’t. Can you pass a message to Kiera for me?”
“Sure can. Let me just get a piece of paper and a pen…”
“It’s just a small message. You can remember it.”
“No, no. Let me write it down. That way I’ll be sure to get it right.”
“Really, Kyle. It’s just a short message.”
“Yup, yup, I’m sure. Just hold on a tic. Well, here’s a pen. Can’t seem to find any paper though.”
“There’s a notepad on the sideboard next to the phone.”
“Where?”
“Right next to the phone.”
“I can’t see it.”
Addie hung her head, scrubbing her face with her free hand. At this point she could have sent the message by carrier pigeon and gotten it to her sister quicker.
As she stood there listening to Kyle talk about all the things he was moving around on the sideboard looking for the notepad, she glanced down into the sink she was leaning against.
There was a stain there. A brown stain. It was still a little damp, and when Addie took a deep whiff she could smell the faint bitter aroma of coffee over the usual smells of toilet water and sanitizer.
Coffee. Someone had brought coffee in here, and dumped at least some of it down the sink.
Could it be?
“You know what?” Kyle said into her ear. “I’m just gonna write it on my hand. Go ahead. Shoot.”
“Just tell her I’ll be home later. Something came up and I ca
n’t get away. She’ll understand.”
Kyle repeated the whole thing under his breath. “…something came up, can’t get away, she’ll understand. See, now I’ve got it down and I don’t have to worry about messing it up.”
The sink held her attention, and she was only half listening to him, but she had to wonder how he possibly could have forgotten less than ten words walking from one room to another to tell her sister. Whatever. That part was done. She thanked him and ended the call, sliding the phone back in her purse.
At the same time, she took out a folded bundle of felt.
She went everywhere with this, because a witch never knew when she might be called upon to cast a spell. A lot of things could be done with the right words and the flow of Essence through her body. Others were easier to accomplish with the help of the right powdered herb.
The felt packet was held together with a leather cinch. Putting it on the shelf above the sinks she undid the tie and then rolled it out flat. There was a row of pouches sewn on the inside, each pouch containing a small amount of different herbs. Just the ones she used most often, but a few of them kept changing depending on the time of year. Or her mood that particular week. There was powdered verbascum and dried lavender and diced rue. Then, in one of the middle pouches, was the last of her wormwood.
The sun-dried leaves were grayish-green and turned to fine powder when she crushed them between her fingers. She sprinkled it over the basin, right around the drain where the wet residue stained the porcelain. It soaked in immediately.
Addie waited, fanning her hand over the sink as she did, whispering the words to the spell over and over. It didn’t take long. Soon enough the mixture of the plant, the coffee residue, and the magic, turned the stain a different color.
Green.
There it was. Green was the color of poison. If it had been just coffee, just what it should have been and nothing else, then the spell would have turned it blue. Purple, maybe, if there had been artificial sweetener in it. But green was bad in this case. Green meant the coffee was tainted. Deadly.
Poisoned.
Addie put her things together and went back out to the main room of the town hall. She was looking for Lucian, to tell him what she’d just found.
Instead, she came face to face with Cavallo Raithmore.
“I see you’re still here, Miss Kilorian.”
His voice was deep and rumbling. As the head of the Raithmore family he was a man who was used to being heard, and obeyed. He wasn’t overly tall, but he was all sinew and muscle, stocky and tough. Addie had known him since she was a little girl, and she had disliked him for the same amount of time.
“Yes, I’m here,” she told him, forcing a smile. “There’s bad business going on. Where else would the Kilorian sisters be?”
He snorted through flared nostrils. “At home, making corned beef pie, or whatever it is Irish women do when they aren’t meddling in the affairs of our town.”
She lost track of how many ways he’d insulted her in that one sentence. Addie had never once been embarrassed by her Irish heritage. She certainly wasn’t going to let this man be the first to make her feel smaller for being who she was. Cavallo had a dark past, and a dark secret, and the reason he was acting this hostile towards her was because Addie and her sisters knew that secret.
Cavallo was a shapeshifter.
Not that being a shifter made him a bad person. There were plenty of good shifters in the world. What made Cavallo a bad person was his attitude towards everyone else. No one was worthy to stand in his shadow. He wasn’t a businessman. He was rich in his own right, with no need to work at it, thanks to the inheritance of his great-grandfather. He lived in Shadow Lake, and he owned a lot of the land around the lake itself, but he didn’t have any real investment in the people or the places. He rarely took an interest in anything that went on down here among the little folk, unless it was something that benefited him personally.
So that begged a question.
“What were you doing here tonight, Cavallo?”
He pushed a heavy hand through his dark brown mane of hair. “Perhaps I have an interest in this particular race. Although, it would seem that it’s over now, since one of the candidates is dead.”
“That’s a bit harsh, isn’t it?”
“Not really. I never much cared for Seth Hunter.”
“I’m sure you didn’t,” Addie said wryly. “Seth was a decent man. You and he didn’t exactly run in the same circles, did you?”
“Not even close. He always restricted business in this town far too much, in my opinion.” He snorted again, and stomped his foot. “Perhaps now that we have a different person in charge of the purse strings some progress can come to Shadow Lake.”
“You mean, maybe you can buy up even more land,” Addie argued. “You’re hoping you can bend the ear of the new town manager before she gets to know you properly. That is, if Eleanor Griggs is given the job.”
He shrugged, stuffing his hands deep into his pockets. “As you say, Miss Kilorian. I have a vision for Shadow Lake. A long term plan to bring us to greatness. Now that you’ve taken my two sons away from me I can focus on that vision. Well. I’ve wasted enough time here.”
“Hold on, Cavallo, I didn’t take your sons from you—”
“One is dead, the other in prison, and you and your sisters made that happen. Put whatever spin on it you like. It’s the truth. Now. Good night.”
Addie let him go rather than continue arguing the point. Cavallo lost his sons because they had the same arrogance in their hearts that he did. Only bastards like the Raithmores would ever think that they could get away with murder.
She stared after him now, watching him leave. Get away with murder… Cavallo Raithmore was here, at a town meeting, when he never came to these things. He wanted Seth Hunter out of the picture, so he could advance his vision of owning every scrap of land in this town to use for his own pleasure. Was it too much of a coincidence that Seth was now dead?
Would Raithmore actually stoop that low?
Yes. Yes he would.
She saw Lucian talking to the only two officers left in the town hall. She caught his eye, and motioned for him to come over, away from everyone, where they could talk.
“Where have you been?” he asked right away. “We were just about to wrap up and go. We’ve got a mountain of paperwork and about twenty-five witness interviews to do. I don’t know if maybe one of those is our suspect or if we should be looking somewhere else.”
Which was a fair question, she guessed. The killer didn’t have to be someone who was in this room tonight. It could have been anyone in Shadow Lake.
She frowned at that thought, because either way one of her neighbors was going to be a killer. Again. She wanted to go back to the days where the worst thing she had to face in Shadow Lake was growing up without her parents and the odd troll or rock pixie or drunk leprechaun.
Well, for now, she thought it would be a better use of their time if they concentrated on the people who were actually here when Seth died. If they exhausted those suspects, then they could widen the search to the rest of the town. And the state. And the world, if it came to that.
She took a breath, and brought herself back to this moment right here.
“I found something in the back,” she told Lucian. “Someone threw some coffee down the drain in the bathroom. There was still a little bit left around the drain and it’s definitely poisoned.”
His eyes got wide. “Seriously? Wow, Addie, that’s amazing. Perfect. My guys can take a sample of it and then the lab can analyze it and tell us what kind of poison it is.”
“Oh,” Addie said, in a very small voice. She hadn’t thought of that.
“Oh? What, oh? What’s that mean?”
“Well, um, for me to test a small amount of something like that for poison requires magic…”
“Yes?”
“And for this particular spell, um, I needed to mix powdered wormwood into what was le
ft in the sink.”
His face fell. “You did what?”
“Lucian, this is the way magic works. You use the proper herb or concoction, something which connects to the Earth in a specific way, and then you recite the spell and—”
“Addie, I don’t care about any of that. Do you know how science works?” It was a rhetorical question, and he didn’t even pause long enough to notice Addie’s face was turning red. “In science, we take a substance we want to test to the lab, uncontaminated by any worms or pieces of wood—”
“Wormwood,” she tried to interrupt.
“—and then we test the substance to find out what’s in it. I can’t bring them coffee with this spell powder of yours in it!”
“Wormwood,” she said again, her voice taking on the same angry edge that he had. Thankfully they were both keeping the conversation quiet, but they were still drawing a few looks from people around the room.
He leaned in close, and the look in his eyes said more than his words did. “Addie, you contaminated the sample.”
“I found out it was poisoned,” she said defensively.
“Great! Fantastic!” His voice rose with those two words, but then he closed his eyes, and took a breath, and when he spoke again he was at least trying to stay calm. “I’m glad you think you know what you’re doing, and I understand you and your sisters think of yourselves as the defenders of Shadow Lake or whatever, but I can’t use witchcraft as proof for any arrest I make. Dear God, Addie, you have to think about these things. Now, even if I find out who killed Seth Hunter, a key piece of evidence just got powdered with worm food!”
“Worm. Wood,” she said a final time, pronouncing each syllable as a separate word.
“Whatever,” he said to her. “Just… whatever. I need to go.”
She could feel anger rising within herself now, and could feel the shift in her aura. An angry witch was a dangerous thing. Lucian had never seen her really, truly angry, but from across the room she caught the way a couple of the selectmen eased back a step or two. They might not know for certain what she and her sisters were, but they knew better than to be anywhere near the Kilorian sisters when they got mad.