Magitek (The Rift Chronicles Book 1)

by BR Kingsolver

  I took a deep breath, relishing the clean air outside the house. “What my boss is afraid of is this might be the beginning of a gang war.”

  We stood there and drank our coffee in silence, watching cops, forensics experts, and the ME’s staff scurry around. Half an hour later, Novak came out of the house, looked around, and spotted us. He came over, nodding to the sergeant, but not meeting his eyes.

  Reading off his notepad, Novak said, “Got the inventory. Two hundred thirty-four vials of what is probably astropene, a kilo of white powder—probably rasheen—a half kilo of what appears to be cocaine, a half kilo of weed. I couldn’t find any bottles like the ones that large quantities of astropene are usually shipped in, so they probably received it already cut. A quarter of the rasheen was broken down into single bags, and the same with some of the coke.”

  Astropene and rasheen were imported across the Rift and were highly illegal, as was the cocaine. Rasheen was a soporific with effects similar to heroin or morphine, more lethal but less addictive. The weed was legal.

  “Street value, off the top of your head?” I asked.

  “Quarter of a million dollars, give or take twenty thousand.”

  “Not big time. They were supplying the street dealers.”

  Novak nodded.

  “So,” I said, looking back and forth between the two sergeants, “either this is about a street-level turf war and we’re looking for their direct competitors, or a major dealer is pissed about new competition, and the torture was aimed at finding out who their supplier was.”

  I waited, and both slowly nodded their heads.

  “Second one makes more sense,” the uniform said, “because of the torture.”

  Novak chimed in, “If it was street-level, they would have taken the drugs. The fact they didn’t makes me think the quantity was too little to bother with.”

  I nodded.

  “That’s a helluva lotta drugs to walk away from,” O’Reilly said.

  Turning to Novak, I said, “Talk to your old buddies and find out if there’s a new face in town at the upper levels.”

  “Right.” He moved away, taking his phone from his pocket.

  “He’s not a dummy,” the uniform said.

  “No, but he’s got a lot to learn,” I replied. I just hoped he learned it before he got himself or me killed.

  I waited around another couple of hours until Kevin’s magik sniffer finished scanning the property. Kevin and the woman came looking for me.

  “I found a place in the attic that had heavy residuals,” she said. “But the spell was broken, and anything it might have hidden is gone.”

  “Thanks. Well, it was worth a chance.”

  “If it’s any help,” the woman said, “whatever that ward was guarding was magikal in itself. Cross-Rift magik. And the safe was warded but with a much weaker ward than the one cast in the attic.” Her face twisted into a crooked smile. “If I was guessing, I’d say the safe was meant to be a decoy, but they found the real treasure anyway.”

  Now, that was interesting. Money wouldn’t have left that kind of signature. What might have come across the Rift that was more valuable than money or drugs?

  On our way back to headquarters, I told Novak, “If you don’t want to work with me, let Whittaker know, and I’ll back your transfer. But if you ever disrespect me in public like that again, I’ll cripple you, and that’s not a threat, it’s a promise.”

  He flushed. “I’m sorry. I was trying to be funny, and I realized immediately that it wasn’t. It won’t happen again.”

  “You sure you don’t want out?”

  “No. I’ll stay if you’ll have me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you don’t treat me like I’m a porcelain doll. You don’t care about my name.”

  I snorted out a laugh. That was the first time anyone from the Hundred praised me for disrespect of their name. “Okay. Case closed. Now, think about what we’re going to tell Whittaker. He’s going to ask if we have a plan.”

  He shifted in his seat. “Most people walk on eggshells around me, but I really do care about being a good cop.”

  I nodded, a little uncomfortable with his admission.

  All I could think of while I drove, parked the car, and rode up the elevator was that someone or something had murdered a major demon as casually as I would swat a fly. We had a real problem on our hands.

  “Well?” DC Whittaker asked when we walked into his office.

  “Looks like a gang war to me,” I said. “And someone is strong enough to take on a major demon.”

  We gave him our report, including our theories, then waited while he leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling.

  When he finally did say something, it was a question. “Drugs and human women?”

  “Girls, really,” I said. “They were killed, but they weren’t brutalized or shot.”

  “Check with Dolin over in Vice. See what they’ve put together since you busted Fredo. Then check with Collins over there about the drugs. See if you turn up any names in common. Those idiots in Vice wander around in their silos and don’t talk to each other.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Novak blush. “Demons working with vamps and humans is a little unusual, wouldn’t you say?”

  “A little,” I responded, “but the end users are humans, right?”

  To my surprise, Novak spoke up. “Not entirely. For astropene, yes, but vamps will feed rasheen and cocaine to their blood slaves. Not the same slave, but two different ones. Rasheen changes once a human has metabolized it. The vamp feeds off a human high on cocaine, then feeds off a human high on rasheen. The vamp can’t overdose, and the combination of the two drugs’ metabolites gets the vamps safely high.”

  “How in the hell do people figure that kind of thing out?” Whittaker asked.

  “Why are almost all races determined to alter their state of mental being?” Novak asked in return. “Only thing I could ever figure out is that their reality is either incredibly boring or so terrible they feel the need to escape.”

  I chuckled. “Out of curiosity, what’s your drug of choice?”

  “Weed, but I rarely use it,” he answered. “Usually only when I have to deal with my family.”

  Whittaker snorted. “Knowing your father, I can understand that. Well, any questions? No? Get out of here.”

  “Yeah, I have one,” I said. “How many demon lords are there in the Mid-Atlantic region?”

  “One,” Whittaker answered. “Only one on the entire east coast. They don’t get along with each other. There are only three in all of North America, as far as I know.”

  Chapter 20

  Lieutenant Joseph Dolin looked like someone’s favorite uncle. Good-looking, always with a conspiratorial grin on his face, and a bag of candied nuts that he offered to everyone he met. We wandered into his office, the walls covered with pictures of women and children who had either been rescued or killed. I introduced him and Novak.

  “I don’t know if you heard about the massacre up in the Pimlico area this morning,” I said, “but there were two girls there who I’m sure were trafficked.”

  Dolin nodded. “I heard about it. Lots of drugs and Rifters.”

  I sat on the corner of his desk. “Thought I’d come by and see what you’ve come up with from Fredo.”

  He pursed his mouth, then leaned forward, and typed on his computer. A screen on the wall lit up, showing a picture with a lot of little boxes and lines between them. The box in the center was labeled ‘Fredo.’ A few of the boxes had a red X over them.

  “This is a small part of a chart I’ve been working on for seven years,” Dolin said. “If you want a list of all the names, I can send it to you, but it would be easier if you gave me your names and I searched for connections. There are thousands of people of all races implicated in this thing. Many victims don’t even fit the stereotypical image of people who are trafficked. A lot of domestic workers and other types of slaves.”

  “That
’s fine,” I replied. “I’ll send you the names as soon as I have them. The demons weren’t carrying identification for some reason.”

  Dolin laughed.

  I was intrigued by what he had said, though. Seven years of painstakingly putting the connections together. “Joe, your pretty pictures wouldn’t happen to have a section that includes people in the Families, would it?”

  His eyes widened even as he glanced toward my partner.

  To his credit, Mychel said, “I’m a cop. Unless any of the connections touch on Novak or Cappellino, I’m good. If they do, then I should probably step out of the room.”

  I knew that his mother was a member of the Cappellino family. To my relief, Dolin shook his head.

  “Nope, as far as I know, your family is clean. You use magiteked robots for servants, don’t you?”

  Novak’s face turned red. I assumed because such robots were expensive as hell and Dolin was correct about the Novaks using them.

  “Mostly. The human servants have been with us for generations.”

  Dolin typed on his keyboard, and a similar chart appeared on the screen. I stepped closer and looked it over. Martin Johansson’s name appeared in one of the boxes, but the two lines leading to it were dotted, not solid.

  “What do the dotted lines mean?”

  “Unconfirmed connections. We may have heard a rumor, or someone snitched, but we don’t have any evidence that the person is involved in anything illegal. Sometimes it might simply be a john who was caught with a girl who was trafficked.”

  “Thanks. Yeah, if I could get this one in addition to the one with Fredo’s connections, that would be great. And as soon as I have IDs on the victims from this morning, I’ll send them on over. Second question, do you know anything about a private play space called Dorothy’s Dungeon?”

  Dolin nodded. “It’s come up in conversation a few times. Want the section of the map with it at the center?” I smiled, and he said, “I’ll send that, too.”

  We left Dolin’s office and wandered down the hall to Detective Sergeant Jeff Collins’s office. Novak told me he knew Collins well, and I had seen them chatting at the crime scene that morning.

  “You know him, you take it,” I said to Novak as I knocked on the closed office door. How did a sergeant rate his own office? I didn’t even get a cubicle, just a desk in an open office with six other detectives.

  “Who is it?” a voice came from inside. Novak didn’t even bother to answer, just turned the knob and walked in.

  “It’s the tooth fairy,” Novak said. “Stop watching porn and give us a few minutes of your precious time.”

  “Sure,” Collins said. “I’d much rather watch her.” He sat up straight in his chair, giving me his full attention. I smiled and batted my eyes at him. I couldn’t believe there was a cop in Arcane who didn’t know who I was.

  Novak choked back a laugh, and I remembered that he hadn’t known who I was, either. It appeared the drug section of Vice wasn’t paying much attention to what was going on around them.

  “We’ve got a couple of murders, and astropene has cropped up at both scenes,” Novak said, settling into one of the side chairs. “In addition, that one this morning also had a fairly large quantity of rasheen on hand. What we’re wondering is, if there are any new players moving large quantities of those drugs.”

  I didn’t sit but moved to lean on the wall behind Novak. Collins’s eyes followed me. He was dressed in jeans, a t-shirt, and work boots. He appeared to be a little older than Novak and me, shaggy light-brown hair that needed trimming, not at all bad-looking. The t-shirt showed off a ripped physique, and his lascivious grin was rather attractive. Nothing about him or his office gave me a clue as to what kind of magik he wielded.

  “I haven’t heard anything about new players,” Collins said, “but there are rumors that one or more of the big players are moving to consolidate. I’m sure Frosty got caught up in that.”

  “Frosty?” I asked.

  “The frost demon this morning. Lavessinel is his name, but on the street he’s known as Frosty, for obvious reasons. He’s been around for about five years and started expanding his business during the past year or so. Arrogant prick. Looks like someone gave him a dose of his own medicine.”

  “Any idea who his supplier was?” I asked.

  Collins tossed off three names. “Those are my best guesses. Now, answer me a question. You’re both mages, right? Who killed him? I mean, could a human mage do that, or would it have to be another demon?”

  I kind of shrugged my shoulders and was about to say his guess was as good as mine, but my partner surprised me.

  “There are mages strong enough to take down even a demon lord,” Novak said. “That kind of power isn’t common, though.”

  “Are you saying it could be someone from one of the Families?” I asked.

  “Could be, but it could also be a street urchin,” Novak responded. “Talent is inherited, but you never know where or how magikal talent manifests.”

  Collins laughed. “And you never know where someone from one of the Families has been dipping his pen.”

  After we left Collins’s office, I asked my partner, “What kind of talent does he have?”

  Novak laughed. “No talent, not in the way you mean it. He’s a cat shifter. Fast as lightning, smooth as silk. We were partners for two years, and I trust him. Good cop, honest cop.”

  Chapter 21

  By the time I finished sorting through everything I received from Dolin and Collins, I had a set of boxes drawn on a piece of paper with lines connecting them. Not as fancy as Dolin’s computer map, but good enough for me to visualize things a little better.

  Three of my boxes had Xs through them. Lavessinel and the devil dealer at Middle River were dead, and Fredo was out of action in a cell up in Gettysburg.

  Martin Johansson, Sarah Benning, and Dorothy’s Dungeon formed a triangle. Johansson and Ashvial had a link.

  On the drug side, I could link one of Lavessinel’s potential suppliers to Fredo, according to Collins.

  While I was trying to make sense of what I was looking at, Kelly Quinn, the new medical examiner, called and gave me the results from her investigations.

  “You were right about the girls,” Kelly said. “Evidence of restraints on their wrists and ankles. Signs of sexual abuse. I estimate one was about fifteen, the other a year or so older. Cause of death was broken necks, quick and effortless. A very strong man or a Rifter.”

  “Do we have any identification on them?” I asked.

  “Not yet. Preliminary DNA places one girl’s origins in Mexico, the other one in southern Europe. I have an ID on the woman, though. Alecia Valdez, from here in Baltimore.”

  And suddenly I knew where I had seen her before. In the book of potential play partners at Dorothy’s Dungeon.

  “As to the frost demon,” Quinn continued, “definitely killed by magik. His internal organs looked like they’d been cooked. Quite a trick, considering they were still inside his body. The goop leaking out his ears has the same chemical composition as demon brain tissue, but it’s been reduced to a chemical sludge with no intact biological cells. And before you ask, no, I’ve never seen anything like it, and I can’t find anything in any of the databases.”

  “Lavessinel,” I said. “I was told that was the demon’s name. Sergeant Jeff Collins in Arcane Vice identified him. Can you tell if melting his brain killed him, or did it happen afterward?”

  “Considering the cooked internal organs, I can’t give you an official answer,” she said. “But my bet would be that the brain is the COD. Demons are damned hard to kill, and I’m not sure the other damage would have done it.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I had another murder a couple of days ago, a devil killed with a fire lance out in Middle River. You wouldn’t happen to know who conducted that post-mortem, would you?”

  I heard her chuckle. “Yeah, that was me. What do you want to know?”

  “Did you get an ID?” />
  “Sure. Hang on and let me look it up.”

  I waited for a couple of minutes, then she came back on the line. “I got a hit on his DNA with a record in the system. His name was Megistifal, standard devil. File number zero-zero-five-eight-seven-four-six.”

  “Thanks, Doctor Quinn.”

  I called up the devil’s file and saw that our first record of him was twenty years old. He had been captured during a Rifter raid on a hospital in Georgia. His latest bust was for selling drugs five years before he died. Devils were minor demons, just the type of being a major demon, such as Lavessinel, would use as a distributor.

  A note in Collins’s file on the massacre caught my attention. He said that ‘someone’ needed to go through the ‘office’ on the second floor and catalog the paper found there. He said that some of it looked like business records. Someone. He hadn’t looked terribly busy or overworked when we visited him. I gave him a call.

  “Sergeant Collins? Lieutenant James in Major Crimes.”

  “Well, hello! Calling for a date? I knew my animal magnetism would make an impression.”

  The God’s-gift-to-women attitude I could hear in his voice set my teeth on edge.

  “It did,” I answered. “I have a couple of burning questions. First, do you keep a litter box in your office or in the men’s restroom? And second, do you know if anyone ever went through all that paper in Lavessinel’s office?”

  Silence, but I could hear breathing on the other end of the phone. I waited. Eventually, he said, “As far as I know, the office is still untouched. No one from Vice has searched it.”

  “Since the recently deceased was a drug dealer, don’t you think someone in your office should do that? Or are you hoping someone else will do your job for you?”

  His reply had a bit of heat to it. “It’s a Major Crimes case, Lieutenant. I’d hate to overstep.”

  “Oh, you want supervision? Not a problem. I’ll tell you what. Meet me there in an hour, and we’ll go through it all together. Cover both our asses.”

  I hung up, not giving him a chance to say no or give me an excuse. I handed everything I’d been looking at to Novak, including my hand-drawn chart.