“Pretty much. Bear gave me some fake business cards and a cell phone. We’ll look around the office. Talk to the store owners and maybe some of the tenants in the apartment building. Basically see if anything interesting is said.”
“Bear knew you were going to investigate. Why didn’t I?” Vanessa gave me a sideways stare.
We had had this argument previously when I hid my investigation from her. “I didn’t plan on investigating, at least not yet. I probably would have told you sometime today, but there was no rush. I wanted to wait until after Colleen’s visit, but it didn’t work out that way.”
“Makes you wonder if Bear didn’t make some arrangements with Colleen to pressure you into this. What’s she like? I mean, super intimidating is obvious.”
I slowed down for another light. “That’s what I noticed too. She is so in control and strong and I think really powerful. And can you believe how good she looks?”
“Do you think she would mind if I asked for beauty tips?”
I snorted at the idea of Colleen and Vanessa trading skincare routines. Surely Colleen had more important things to do.
I pulled into the parking lot, which was about as empty as it had been the previous evening. Most of the store fronts were still dark. Checking the clock, I realized that it was only a little after eight, and most of them probably didn’t open until later in the morning. “I guess we’ll just see who is here and catch the rest later.”
Only three stores had their lights on. The martial arts studio at one end, a liquor store roughly in the middle, and a florist in the penultimate position to the other end, where the property manager’s office was located.
“Oh, let’s go to the liquor store first.” Vanessa threw off her seat belt and jumped out of the car.
“Wait! My car’s a mess. We can’t leave it like this.” The front seat was covered in the debris from the breakfast burrito battle. The back seat was even worse since Patagonia had completely shredded the aluminum foil that the burrito was wrapped in and the tortilla hadn’t fared much better.
“Your cat, your car, your problem.” She laughed a little at her own joke. “Crack the windows so the smell doesn’t get trapped inside, and we’ll stop at a car wash later and use their vacuum.”
“Leave my windows down?” I looked around the slightly depressed neighborhood. Seemed like leaving the windows down was an invitation for trouble.
Vanessa rolled her eyes. “If only there were some way to make humans ignore your car.”
After all this time, I still didn’t immediately think of magic as the answer to my problems. I scrunched up my face in thought. I didn’t have any spells memorized for this exact situation, but I should be able to modify a spell. Modifications were advanced magic and one of the things we had been focusing on the past few months.
“The invisibility spell is way too magic intensive, but I’m not sure I could pull off the modifications without an incantation or potion.” Spells cast without any help were the most flexible but took a lot of skill, talent, and effort.
Incantations helped to direct the spell, like a road map to the final destination, and were necessary for many of my most complex spells. Potions helped to relieve some of the magical workload of a spell. Whenever I had a bit of magical energy leftover at bedtime, I would invest it in a potion for later use.
I had only a few potions in my bag but didn’t want to waste them. I hadn’t expected to have an investigation so soon. I needed to be better about stockpiling potions and not wasting them in training.
“I agree. Invisibility isn’t the way to go. So what is?” Vanessa leaned back against the car, enjoying her role as the one who already had the answers.
More and more in training I was faster, stronger, and knew the answers better. It had been a swap from when we started training, but since I was older by half a dozen years and she had always been a lazy student, she hadn’t been as bothered by the shift as she could have been.
Patagonia meowed and circled the car, sniffing at errant cigarette butts and a crushed potion vial.
“I’ll use the ignore spell, then they just won’t pay attention to my car. So I need to shift it from me to something outside myself and from a living creature to an object.” I did the calculations and cast the spell with a heavy grunt.
Patagonia gave a full-body shake as the spell snapped into reality. The aura of my own magic surrounded me, like crisp melons and cucumbers.
I tipped my head to the left and right to crack my neck after the exertion. “Did it work?”
Vanessa squinted at the car and looked away then back. “I think so? It’s hard for me to tell ’cause I already know it’s here, but… yeah, I think it worked. Besides, we should be able to see it from the stores, and if anyone gets too close, you can come yell at them.”
I grabbed my purse from the car and locked the doors out of habit. “That’s a good point. Why didn’t you mention that before I worked all that magic?”
“You’re the one always complaining about lazy mages. I’m just helping you to put that magical theory we learned into practice.”
We headed out, but instead of going to the liquor store like she had suggested, I veered off to the martial arts studio. Patagonia ran ahead of me as if she knew where we were going. “I met the guy that works there last night. He was pretty tight-lipped, and I wonder if he might know something.”
“Everyone might know something. That’s the whole point of this investigation.”
“Not so loud,” I whispered. “Remember you are here to help me.” I passed her a pen and notebook.
“Oh, cool. I’ll pretend to write.”
I rolled my eyes at her. “No, you’ll really write. Come on. Use your brain. Write down names, numbers, and anything that you think might be useful. We probably won’t recognize the importance of anything until later on.”
“Got it.” But she grumbled under her breath.
I pulled open the door to the martial arts studio for us to enter, then the door slammed behind us when the autumn breeze turned into a strong gust.
The slamming door had about a dozen heads swiveling around to look at us. I hadn’t noticed them as we approached because they were on the floor, below the sight of the windows. On the thick black mats covering the floor were some of the most beautiful and sweaty women I had ever seen.
Their bodies were contorted like pretzels. Elbows and knees were twisted at unnatural angles, and every one of the women shook with the effort of holding their positions. After realizing that we weren’t doing anything interesting, the women turned their faces away, unable to hold their positions with their attention on us.
Patagonia gave a meow and raced through the lobby, bobbing and weaving around the studio. She seemed excited, and after a few moments, I guessed why. The room was full of sensations. The emotions in the room were heavy with determination and an inner strength. The smell was a mix of chemicals from the mats and the acrid and sweet aroma of sweat, both new and old. It wasn’t unpleasant though it should have sent me running from the room. It was tempered by a subtle spell that was being woven.
The magic had a light and crisp smell with hints of lemongrass and ginger. It was gentle and soft and seemed to caress my muscles. I felt the urge to strip my clothing down to my undergarments and flop myself onto a mat and stretch.
The source of the magic was a small, quiet woman at the front of the room. She had been watching me since we first entered but hadn’t said anything. Patagonia did a few more laps around the room then stopped in front of the woman, who ran a hand under Patagonia’s chin to scratch.
“And release. Why don’t you take child’s pose and do some deep cleansing breaths while I talk with our guests? Focus on breathing in all the good in the world, the love and positive energy. And then breathe out all the bad in you: your resentment, your anger, your pettiness.”
Without using her hands, she smoothly went from sitting cross-legged to standing. She was shorter than I expected,
and her thick black hair reached well past her waist in a chunky braid. She gestured for us to follow as she entered a window-lined office in one corner of the studio.
The spell shifted slightly, and I fought the urge to stay and ditch some of my negative emotions with the rest of the class.
The woman sat behind her desk, and Patagonia jumped onto the cluttered surface to rub her face on the woman’s neck.
I reached out for Patagonia and put her in my lap as Vanessa closed the door behind us. “I’m so sorry. She normally doesn’t do that.”
“It’s okay. Familiars like me. I’m Mary Anno, owner of the studio. How can I help you?”
“I’m Ella, and this is Vanessa. I met Dave Anno last night?” I lifted my voice in a question, hoping she would volunteer how they were related.
If Mary and Dave had been human, I would have guessed them both to be in their thirties and would have assumed they were married or siblings. But since they were both mages, they could be virtually any age, and I didn’t want to embarrass myself with a ridiculous guess.
She nodded. “My husband. You must have been one of the people who came after Ned’s death.”
“Yes, I came with my boss.” I pulled out a card and handed it to her. “I’ll be taking care of things here while they hire someone new. I wanted to introduce myself. I’m sure I’ll be here awhile. The office was a mess.”
She grimaced. “I should not speak ill of the dead, but…” She shifted uncomfortably. “Hold on.” She stood and went to the door of the office and leaned out. “Stacey, will you take over for a few minutes? Why not run through some warrior poses?” She retook her seat. “It’ll be good for Stacey. She needs to build her confidence.” Mary’s magic was in the air.
I twisted around in my seat to watch the class. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a healthy group of women in one place. Must be one heck of a class you run.” I turned to face her.
Though she tried to hide it, she radiated pride. “It’s all their doing. How can I help you?”
While I really wanted to know about why someone might want to kill Ned, I wanted to hide my primary purpose. “I’m trying to sort out the business here, but it looks… complicated.” I let the implications land heavy on the last word, so she would hear it in whatever way she wanted.
She nodded. “We’ve been here for eleven years and have a long-standing contract with the property owners, which really annoyed Ned. He wanted us out, though I never understood why. We always paid on time, never caused trouble, and in the nine years he was here, we never complained or asked for repairs once.”
“What did the other tenants think of him?”
She paused for so long that I thought she wasn’t going to answer. When she did, she carefully measured out each word. “We’ve never had an issue with any of our neighbors. I mean sometimes they didn’t put all their trash in the dumpster and the birds got into it, or they let their stores get a bit dingy, but nothing serious.”
She paused again. She was apprehensive, and my guess was that she was debating how much to share. “But there was something weird going on. Nothing I could put a finger on or prove, but… please be careful, Monza Ella. If they know you are looking into his murder, they will go after you too.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
In my elegant way, I replied, “What? No… I mean… huh?”
She looked between Vanessa and me. “Oh, did your assistant not know?”
“No… I mean, yes, she knows everything, but…” Literally five minutes into the investigation and already our cover was blown.
Mary’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, I’m not supposed to know, am I?”
I exchanged a look with Vanessa, but she seemed as confused as me. “No, you aren’t supposed to know.”
She laughed. “I need to explain. I was a seer until a few years ago, then I was in an accident. Or rather, that is what the marshal wrote it off as. I believe it was an attack, but I’m not sure. I survived, but my brain and magic no longer work the same way. That’s when I started teaching here full-time. I used to freelance for mages who couldn’t afford a full-time seer, which is most of them. I still have the gift, but now it’s all mixed up, so I don’t know what is a prophecy and what is yesterday’s news.”
“Wow,” Vanessa said. “I know you. I was in Europe, but I heard about the attack. You were found wandering around at night, right? But I heard that you had a spell go wrong.”
She waved a hand in the air as though she could dispel the rumor with the simple motion. “That was the marshal’s official finding, but I know it isn’t what happened. But I don’t know what did happen, so I can’t contest the ruling. I have things to tell you but not right now.”
She stood and went to the office door. “I need to return to my class. Stacey is going to have a rough day, especially with her toddler, who is sick, but Stacey won’t know that until tomorrow. I don’t want her all tired out from running my class. I have one class after this, then I will be able to meet with you.”
We left the studio. The brisk autumn air felt great after the heat inside. At least until a newspaper slapped me in the face.
My car was still there, and no hoodlums were loitering nearby, so we walked halfway down the sidewalk and entered the liquor store, Rambler’s Refreshments. I was no expert, but it seemed like a pretty standard layout for that type of store.
There were glass-front refrigerator units all along the walls of the store with aisles that ran back and forth. Above the aisles were curly-fonted signs marking where the whiskeys, ciders, vodkas, gins, and other libation varieties were located. In the center of the store, located right near the checkout counter, at eye level for optimal viewing, was a glass display case with what I assumed were the high-ticket items.
Maybe they were meant to be impulse items, though I couldn’t imagine who would pick up a three-thousand-dollar bottle of wine on a whim.
No one was behind the counter, so I looked around the store. Vanessa, on the other hand, grabbed a mini shopping chart and started wheeling it around the store, grabbing bottles and six packs.
“What are you doing?” I hollered to her.
She stood on her tiptoes to see over the schnapps and waggled a bottle at me. “Shopping, obvs. I’m sure that Tiffany has some crazy stuff planned, and I want to have plenty of alcohol on hand. I think I saw a bakery a few doors down. We should stop there too.”
“Good idea. Grab me some hard ciders. The crazier the flavors the better.”
She nodded and rolled off.
“Good morning, ladies. Can I help you find anything?”
A man on the tail end of middle age waddled behind the checkout counter. His face was swollen up like he had been stung by only slightly effective bees. His face was flushed, but the red reached its peak at his nose, which glowed like Rudolph’s.
I stepped over and handed him a card. From that distance, I was sure the cause of his ills were of the liquid variety. I resisted the urge to gag at the overwhelming smell of tequila. I had never been able to stomach the smell.
“Hi, I’m Ella, and that’s Vanessa, my assistant. I assume you heard about the property manager, Ned’s, untimely death?”
He grabbed the card and gave it a good once-over before using it to pick at a piece of pepper lodged in his teeth. “Yar.”
I took that be an affirmative and pressed on. “I’ll be handling things until they hire—”
“Great. There’s something wrong with the crapper in the back. Maybe you can go take a look at it.”
“Uh. I’ll pass that on to management. I’m mostly here to deal with rent.”
“I’m all paid up on that. Hey, if you’re interested in buying those, I’ll give you a real deal.”
I stared at him, confused at the sudden change in topic until I realized he was looking past me. Turning around, I saw Vanessa was standing in front of the glass case.
She pointed at a bottle. “How much?”
“Three thousand, but I’ll let
you have all three of them for six thousand. That’s buy two, get one free.”
“Can you open this up? I’d like to see them.”
I mouthed at her, “What are you doing?”
She shook off my question and raised an eyebrow at the man.
He reached under the counter and seemed to not find what he was looking for. “The key is in back. I’ll get it, but no funny business. I have cameras everywhere.”
He moved slowly, like an arthritic penguin, until I finally heard the door slam in the back corner.
“Vanessa, you are not paying six thousand dollars for liquor.”
“You don’t understand. Look at this.”
I stepped over to see what I was missing. It was a large bottle. I think champagne makers called it a magnum. It was nearly black though I could still see the liquid inside. On the outside wasn’t a label but rather a hand-drawn image of a dragon in gold. The neck of the dragon coiled around the bottle’s neck, and the flames shooting out of its mouth seemed to shimmer. No other information was present, just a dragon.
And slowly, I could sense the magic. I normally couldn’t sense magic contained in a potion, which was what paranormal alcohols were. At least not until they were activated, but I could sense this magic. Either my senses were developing, or more likely, the magic inside the bottle was much stronger than anything I had encountered.
The magic was deep and fruity. It fittingly reminded me of a wine, with its raspberry notes and heady flavor. “What is that?”
She peered around, making sure we were still alone before whispering her reply. “Dragon-heart wine. It looks just like how I’ve heard it described. Look. The dragon’s breath moves.”
It was subtle, but if I really stared, I could see the flames dance. It was gorgeous, and I was sure the wine inside would be amazing. “But you don’t need three.”
“You don’t understand. I have never even seen this before. It’s like a legend. You might know someone whose roommate’s brother’s ex-girlfriend’s dad had a bottle at his hundredth birthday, but no one I know has ever actually drunk it. We have to buy it. I just don’t understand why it’s here. Everything else in here is human. I think he’s human. How did he end up with three bottles?”
Nice Day for a Mage Wedding: Casino Witch Mysteries 4 Page 6