by Rik Hunik
I shook my head. "No, it's a rather complicated spell that I've never attempted before and I think I'd rather be alone."
"Is it dangerous? Are you sure you want to be alone?"
"The biggest danger to me is that I might fall asleep. I'd rather be alone because, well, when I concentrate too hard I tend to drool."
She laughed and chucked me under the chin. "Now I want to stay more than ever, because that would just make you cuter, and I could sit by you and wipe your chin."
Now we were both laughing. "Thanks for the offer, but I'll get by on my own. Besides, I want to get something to eat first. You run along home now. That's an order."
"Yes sir," she said with a smile, saluting me.
I saw her out the door, locked it, turned the sign to display "Closed” and went upstairs for a quick bite to eat. Then I had no more excuses left so I quit stalling, went downstairs and sat down in front of the apparatus.
I got all the items from the missing women and laid them out where I could easily grab each of them, then I sighed, referred to my notes and started the spell that charged the apparatus. When it was done I picked up the first item, a ring, set it in the brass tray, put my thumbs on the copper coins on the sides and tried to get an impression.
The dark coldness of death ran thick fingers up my spine, making me shudder so bad I broke the connection. I put a twenty-talent gold coin under the tray and tried again. The cold, damp, darkness was amplified by the gold coin but this time I was ready for it, and while it still made me shudder, I managed to remain focused on the small glass sphere in the center of the apparatus. If my target was dead the sphere would turn black, if she was alive the sphere was supposed to shine, but I concentrated and stared at that sphere for over a minute and it didn't do either, though I detected the faintest glow of red in the center.
I sat back, wiped the drool off my chin and shivered. If this spell was being blocked as strongly as my talent, that meant the faint red glow, as opposed to a tiny black spot, indicated that she was still alive. I made a note, then picked up the next item; only eight more to go.
By the time I finished with the last item my head was pounding and I was shivering, whether from the rain or because the spell lowered the temperature, but either way, I was ready for bed. I felt drained, but happy because I had confirmed that all of the women I'd been hired to find still lived. I didn't know where to find them, but at least I had something positive to tell the parents. And if Zena complained about having nothing to do tomorrow I could get her to carry some messages.
Chapter 36
When Zena arrived the following morning she asked me right away how the death-checker had worked.
"I strained it to the limit, giving myself a serious headache, and I only got a dim red glow instead of a bright light, so I could be wrong, but I think all the women I'm looking for are still alive."
"That's wonderful news." She sat at her table, laid her hands on it and looked at them. "But what am I supposed to do while you deliver the good news to your clients?"
I have a small business and it's still new so, despite her complaints about the condition of my accounts, there wasn't a great deal of work involved in straightening them out and keeping them up to date, and everything else had been rearranged and cleaned, except upstairs in my apartment, which remained my own responsibility.
"Anything you want to, as long as you stay here, in case one of my clients decides to drop by for an update. Do you read much? You could bring a book, or take a look at one of mine. I have a few upstairs."
Before we could continue that discussion the office door opened and a priestess walked in. I recognized the shimmery, pale gray dress from my dealings with the Temple of Hermia, and I knew the priestess too, though her face had a lot more color.
"Hello, Adeela."
She gave me a sly smile and closed the door, nodding casually to Zena as she sauntered up to me. "Hello Berk."
"I never thought I would ever see you here."
Her smile got bigger. "The High Priestess Theola sent me here to get you. It's my first time out alone in public since..." She put a hand to her mouth to cut herself off. "Well, you know; I'm not supposed to mention it." She looked down at nothing in particular on the floor.
I knew, but I couldn't tell by looking, and I didn't want to talk about it either. Over her shoulder I saw Zena's eyes go wide and her mouth drop as she put the last pieces together and figured out that it was her old boss who was standing in front of me. She quickly composed her face while I pulled up a chair for Adeela, then got behind my desk and turned the conversation to business. "Why does your High Priestess need me?"
"One of our priestesses went missing last night. The High Priestess wants to hire you because you get faster results than the police."
"Sometimes. We help each other and we both benefit."
"We've heard that you've already been hired to find several women who have disappeared from Old City in the past month. Too many women have been disappearing and we think a lot of the cases are related. That's why we want to hire you, not only to find our missing priestess, but to find out what has been happening to the other young women who have disappeared, because The Temple Of Hermia cares for all women."
"Is that your slogan?"
She shook her head but she smiled and said, "Not officially, but they do say it a lot."
"Like a snake is their logo."
She giggled. "Oh, you found your tattoo, did you? It's our little joke. Did it cause you any trouble?"
I shook my head. Behind Adeela, I saw Zena stifle a laugh with her hand.
Adeela's smile had an edge to it. "I liked you, and despite the drug you were still considerate. Some guys get too rough and they're not so lucky, they get big tattoos in more prominent places, which married men especially have trouble explaining. I heard about one guy who got a full-color, detailed picture of a snake tattooed right on his penis, so it looked just like a snake's head. Once it heals some guys actually like their tattoo, but you're the first in a lot of years to figure out where you got it."
"I'm glad I made the grade." My little tattoo had pained me for a few days and itched a lot longer, but now that I knew what it was it didn't bother me much anymore, though I was acutely aware of it now. I didn't want to imagine what those less fortunate guys had gone through. "But why that whole drug and sex thing anyway?"
"Why?" She smiled like she was about to reveal a secret. "It was my final initiation, that's why, and the drug was to keep it secret. The High Priestess said to me, 'Adeela, when you can fuck a man silly you'll know you're really a woman.'" She flicked hair back from her face in a quintessentially feminine gesture. "So, will you take the job?"
"I'll go with you and talk to the High Priestess, but I won't promise anything." As we left I said to Zena, "See, you're working now."
She stuck her tongue out at me.
# # #
At The Temple of Hermia Adeela took me up into the left wing, to the outer office of the High Priestess Theola, then went about her own business while I stated mine to a receptionist. I only waited about five minutes before the receptionist ushered me in.
The office was smaller than mine, but it had nicer furniture, and a view down into the back garden behind her, wet from a shower that had started after I entered the temple. I recognized the woman behind the desk from Aldwin's meeting in Gray's Road House. She waved me to a chair and I sat.
"Adeela said you wanted to hire me."
Theola nodded. "That's right. A priestess of ours didn't come in last night. She was last seen when she was leaving the home of a private citizen to return to the temple, but we couldn't find her and neither can the police. Our magic tells us she's still alive but it doesn't tell us where she is."
I nodded at the familiar story and got a few more details out of her. "I'll do what I can, but I can't promise much." I gave her my rates and she accepted them.
"I also want you to check into the disappearances of some other women
in our congregation who have gone missing in the past month or two. A few of them lived in other quarters but apparently all of them were in Old City when they disappeared, so I think they could be related to our missing priestess."
"It's possible, even likely, but there are plenty of other reasons for women to vanish. I know the police had a special task force that recently rounded up several killers, and not all of their victims have been found or identified."
"You're right, and there's always more scum ready to float to the surface to take their place, but certain information has some into our hands that makes us believe we are victims of a cult that has set itself up in Agrippina to kidnap dozens of our women for some unknown purpose."
My mind flashed onto something Jayna had said the night she encountered those goons in the alley. I slid my chair closer and leaned one elbow on her desk. "I think I've come into contact with members of that cult on more than one occasion. One girl I rescued said one of the goons referred to her as a sacrifice, which she thought was odd since she was definitely not a virgin."
"Virgins do make the best sacrifices, but any lives will work, especially if you have lots of them."
"Yeah, and it's all dark magic, and it does more harm than good, but knowing they're all going to be sacrificed doesn't help us find any of them, and some of those women have been missing for weeks." I stood. "I better get started. I'll need to see the missing priestess's room, and I'd like to get a list of the other missing women you want me to investigate. I want to know where they lived, where they were coming from, where they were going, and where they vanished."
"I'll get Adeela to show you the room, and the list will be ready before you leave, along with your retainer." She got up and walked around her desk and lowered her voice. "But before you go there is one other matter I'd like to discuss with you. I read about the skinless girl you found in the maze and the two others that showed up soon after."
"Their killer, Renzo, was arrested but he was insane and the police never got a coherent story out of him. He died mysteriously in prison, from poison or dark magic. I don't know the details."
She sighed. "I'm not surprised, and I guess it doesn't matter now, but I have something that might explain his motive and I wanted to share it. While researching an unrelated matter I found a reference to the Thirteen Moons Spell, a magic spell so dark and dangerous that few dare to even look in that direction. My source mentioned it because it is a foul perversion of our rejuvenation spell, stolen hundreds of years ago by a rebellious priestess. It involves multiple kills and donning the living skin of the victims."
I grimaced. "That sounds like Renzo alright."
"The only purpose of the spell is to turn a man into a woman."
"Why would Renzo want to do that?" Last month I would have wondered why any man would want to do that, but then I'd met Adeela, lately Aldwin, and learned there could be reasons.
Theola shrugged. "He's dead now so I guess we'll never know. Apparently the spell didn't take for Renzo and he was caught before he could kill enough to make the change permanent."
"Or he lost control and it drove him crazy. You should tell all this to the police."
"I suppose you're right, but it's too late to make any difference and I don't like talking to the police because they're already suspicious of us."
"I can't imagine why."
She almost smiled as she went back behind her desk.
The missing priestess's cubicle, as sparsely furnished as Adeela's, was cold and lifeless, almost devoid of personal belongings, but I found a comb with a few brown hairs stuck in it. When I touched it I got a picture of a small woman with plain features but no indication as to her direction or location. Just as I expected.
On my way out I picked up my retainer and a list with five other women and all the addresses I'd requested.
I started with the priestess, retracing her known route through the streets. I sensed the place where she had been snatched but it was just another alley that led to another street.
I spent several hours finding the homes of the other women, gathering personal items, and questioning acquaintances about their disappearances, but my talent revealed nothing and all of the trails were cold. The gray sky matched my gloomy mood and getting caught in an occasional shower further dampened my spirits.
At times my travels took me near a client's home and I was able to deliver the good news to a mother that I was fairly sure her daughter was alive. Each time I saw hope rekindled in her eyes and she thanked me profusely, but I still felt like I had failed them all. There was no way of knowing how long they would stay alive.
Chapter 37
By mid afternoon I was ready to quit for the day but a man in his forties approached me and told me about a woman a couple of blocks away who had some information I might find useful.
Following his directions to her address took me onto a narrow, winding street with almost no traffic, so I couldn't help but notice the pretty woman in a tight dress walking about thirty feet ahead of me. The way she moved she would have caught the eyes of any man, but she looked out of place here, too glamorous to be hanging out in such a squalid part of Old City.
When she reached an alley a man popped out right in front of her and grabbed her arms. "Let me go," she cried out. Another pair of arms reached out and helped pull her out of sight.
Here we go again, in broad daylight yet, I thought, drawing my cudgel on the run and running wide around the corner. Two men held the woman by the arms, dragging her away while she struggled weakly, repeating her demands to be released, but with less urgency.
"Why don't you big meanies pick on someone who fights back?"
They looked at me but didn't stop. I advanced several steps into the alley, slapping my cudgel into my other hand. They let the woman go and all three turned around, but she didn't try to get away, she just stood there laughing at me, her breasts shaking in her dress, a dress that looked inadequate for such a cool day. She was sucker bait and I had just been played.
I wished for her to catch a really bad cold.
Several other men emerged from concealment behind the trio. I recognized the man whose arm I'd stabbed with the splintered crate when I saved Jayna, and looking over my shoulder I saw half a dozen more men blocking the mouth of the alley. Even with my cudgel and brass knocker I couldn't fight that many, so the only reason I wasn't already beaten to a pulp was because they thought they had me cornered and wanted to watch me squirm. I wasn't ready to oblige them on the squirming part but there didn't seem to be much I could do to avoid the beaten to a pulp stage. Only my eyes moved as I checked out the alley.
"You've interfered with our business a few times now," said the man with the scarred arm. "We discussed it among ourselves and we all think it's time for you to stop." A murmur of agreement rose from the mob.
Several doors let into the alley. If I could find one that wasn't locked I would have a way out, but I would only have time to try one. "Well, consider me stopped. As far as I'm concerned, the case is closed, you don't even have to pay me anything, I'll just back right off and let you guys do your thing, whatever it is, I don't even care." While I babbled I put myself into a receptive state for a second so I could get a quick impression of the nearby doors, trying to find a way out of this mess.
"That's not good enough," Scarred Arm said, "We're going to make sure you never mess with us again." To emphasize his point he pulled a slender blade from somewhere behind his back. Several of his cronies drew knives of their own and edged closer.
I feigned a panic that was only slightly more than what I was actually feeling. "I can pay." I reached into my pocket and grabbed all the loose coins in the bottom. "Here, take my money." I tossed the coins high and while every eye watched the glittering silver arc upwards I ran straight at Scarred Arm, swinging my cudgel at his head. In the last instant he raised his arm in a clumsy block, crying out in pain as I pushed past him without slowing down.
By the time anybody else c
lued in to what had just happened I was already at the door I chose, which was unlocked. The hinges were stiff but my momentum pushed the door open far enough for me to slip through, then I put my shoulder to it and slammed it shut behind me. Urine and cabbage predominated, but a hundred other smells contributed to the thick air I breathed in the tenement as I dashed the length of the corridor. I let myself out the front door and kept running.
When I reached the end of the block I glanced back and saw only three of the gang pursuing me. I stepped around the corner and leaned against the wall, trying to catch my breath and be silent at the same time.
As the first guy rounded the corner I rammed the end of my cudgel into his solar plexus and shoved him out of the way. The second guy took a stab at me but I bounced back a step and smashed his wrist with my cudgel, and this time I heard bones break. He screamed like a girl and dropped the knife. The third guy, a punk teenager without a knife, discovered he wasn't so tough without backup. He didn't want to get close to me.
"Come on," I said. "Give me one good reason I shouldn't spill your brains on the side of the road."
Apparently the three of them couldn't come up with a single reason between them because, without a word, they ran away faster than they had chased me.
I wondered how big their organization was, and how much money they had, because they seemed to have trouble finding people to beat me up or kill me. Not that I was complaining about the ineptitude of those people. Still, I must be getting close to something to stir them up like this, even if I didn't know what it was myself.
They wanted lots of women for some kind of sacrifice, which struck me as a terrible waste. I had been hired to find several missing women but my lack of progress in all of those cases couldn't be considered interference, could it?
I finished tracking down the lead that brought me here but, just as I thought, it was part of the setup and came to nothing. I kept my eyes out for more goons but they either stayed far away or kept themselves well hidden.