The Woodward Academy, Year 7

Chapter 5: October

"Come on, David.  We've got another case," Joe said.

David looked up from the file he was working on.  "I'm kind of in the middle of all this stuff Chloe turned up..."

"And that will be there when we get back.  This takes precedence."

"What have we got?' David asked, standing up and grabbing his coat.

"Murder."

"Shit.  Where?"

"Burton."

"Where's that?"

"A fair ways away.  The other side of Treacle about a hundred miles."

"Joy."

"Nice glide...uh... truck," Joe said as they stepped out of the office onto the street.  "New?"

"Had the car reworked," David replied.  He waved his hand and the vehicle changed from its dark metallic green to a black vehicle with Rimohr logos on the sides.

"Nice," Joe said.  After a second of thought, he went back inside and came out with Chloe in tow.  "Figured she could use some investigative field experience, since we've got the room in the car."

"Truck."

"Whatever.  Still as fast as it was?"

"I saw no reason to make them change that," David said with a grin.

"Let's go, then."

 "This is what I call the middle of nowhere," Chloe said.

Joe replied, "Yeah, well, apparently our murderer wanted some privacy.  David, what are you doing?"

"Wishing for once that I'd brought Jailla with me on a case."  David kept his head turning, his senses alert for anything untoward.

"Why?"

"Joe, the Vrudenan border is less than fifty miles that way," David said waving.  "Given how touchy things are getting with the negotiations, I don't really want to be this close to the bastards."

"I'm sure we'll be fine," Joe said.

"Maybe.  I'd just like my lookout with me."

"Why didn't you bring him?" Chloe asked.

"I don't usually bring him to the office with me.  He finds it dull.  And since I can't really take the time to go get him for each job..."  David shrugged.

"Right."

"Looks like the clearing we're looking for up ahead," Joe said.

The three Rimohrs stepped into the clearing, a small meadow less than a hundred feet across.  In the middle of it sat a large rock, flat on its top.  The rock was clearly stained by blood.

On top of the rock sat what appeared to be a body, but it was heavily distorted and deformed.

As the three approached, before she even got within twenty feet, Chloe put her hand to her mouth and said, "Oh, god, I think I'm gonna..."

David turned quickly, snapping his fingers.  A small canvas sack appeared in his hand.  "Here, use this," he said.

Chloe took it and got it to her mouth just in time.  She vomited until long after her stomach was empty.  Once she had finished, she held the sack by its top and looked at David with distress.  David took it and opened it, then vaporized the contents.  In another second, the bag was back in his Conjuring Room.

"I'm sorry, I've just never..."

David put his hand on her shoulder.  "I puked my first couple times, too.  I think everybody does.  You'll get over it eventually."

Chloe nodded, taking a few deep breaths.

"Breathe through your mouth," David advised.  "You okay to continue?"

Chloe swallowed once, took a deep breath, and nodded.

David nodded encouragingly to her, then turned back to the body.

"What've we got?" he asked Joe.

"You think I've looked?  This shit still makes me queasy."

David shook his head, then walked up to the body.  The skin of the body was the sickly gray of the dead.  The blood of the body had obviously run down over the rock, but how the victim had died wasn't immediately obvious.

"Chloe?  What do you see?" David asked, trying to do for her what Joe and Vivian had done for him.

"Well," she said, swallowing frequently, "It was apparently a woman, based on the fact that the body is wearing a dress.  She was a brunette, unless the magic that was used on her changed that for some reason.  Just as a guess, she bled to death, given all the staining on this rock."

"Not all of that's from her," David told her.

"What?" Joe asked, right before Chloe could.

"Look here," David said, pointing to a spot on the rock.  "This here is a fresh blood stain, from our victim.  This, however, is clearly an older stain.  It's been weathered off in a couple spots, here, and here.  This rock has been used to kill more than once."

"Aw, fuck.  Another serial killer."

"Not the usual type, though, if I'm not misinterpreting this," David said.

"How do you mean?"

"Well, this older stain has to be years old to be weathered this way."

"So it might not even be the same killer, just a convenient place to do it?" Chloe asked.

"Or some kind of ritual location," David agreed.

"Let's keep looking for clues," Joe urged.

A brief look around, and Chloe said, "We've got some footprints over here."

"You sure they're not ours?" Joe asked.

"None of us has walked over here yet," she reminded him.

Joe nodded, and then he and David went to look.

David bent down to look.  "Would appear to be a woman's foot."

"Could it be the victim?" Joe asked.

David conjured up a ruler, and measured the footprint.  He then went over and measured the victim's foot.

"Not unless her shoe has shrunk by about an inch and a half," David said.

"So our killer was a woman... or at least wearing shoes that give the impression of a woman," Chloe said.

"You're learning," David said with a grin.  "In this damned place, nothing can be taken at face value."

"So how do you use any clue, when they could all be misdirections?" Chloe asked.

"You start out assuming they're true, until you can prove they're not.  That is, unless you have some reason to think they're not true to begin with."

"But isn't 'to hide their identity' already a reason to think all clues are fake?"

David shrugged.  "Most criminals just don't put that much thought into things."

"Let's see if we can figure where these tracks go," Joe prompted.

The trio carefully followed the footprints back into the forest.  They were able to track them for several hundred yards, but after that, they faded out in a rocky part of the forest, and they weren't able to pick the trail back up.

"Could this be a werewolf?" Chloe asked as they returned to the body.

"While anything's possible," Joe started, "werewolves generally do not get ritualistic about their kills.  They just rip you apart."

"I guess we need to ID the victim now," David said.

Joe nodded.  "Go ahead.  You need the practice."

David cast the spell, and his wand collected the victim's trace.

"Okay, now what do I do with it?  I've never actually seen this spell used successfully."

Joe chuckled.  "Just do this with your wand," he said, motioning with his hand.  "You'll be able to call it back up later at the office, and we can match it there.  For now, let's keep looking to see if there are more clues."

A few moments later, and they found a bag of herbs, along with the stubs of two candles.  David ushered these into some evidence bags.

"Maybe we'll get fingerprints off the candles," Chloe hoped.

"I don't think so.  I think they've melted down over any fingerprints that would have been on them.  Still, these look like specialty candles.  We might be able to figure out where they came from, maybe even who bought them."

Nothing further was located, so they levitated the victim's body back to the truck, and returned to the office.

"David, Chloe, head on over to the examiner's office," Joe said.  "She's got some results for you."

As David and Chloe walked next door, David said, "Why do I get the feeling you've become my new supervisory officer?"

Chloe replied, "I think we're each others' supervisory officers."

David snorted.  "You don't need supervision, you just need a little more confidence.  You did so well with DIRT, why does this intimidate you so much?"

"More responsibility, I guess.  The consequences here are a lot higher for the people I'm dealing with.  It makes it more important that I don't make mistakes."

"Everyone makes mistakes.  The best way to not make mistakes is to not focus on not making mistakes, and just focus on doing the task at hand."

Chloe nodded.

"And don't worry too much about doing it exactly by the book, either.  The truth is that the regs rarely work if you follow them to a T.  Be guided by the spirit of the regulations."

"But if I screw up, and that lets a guilty man go free..."

"That doesn't happen much here," David said.  "If you flub the regs that bad, you get punished.  The justice system here does not, however, reward the guilty for your mistake.  Keep in mind that any convicted person in Dugerra can demand a truth potion to prove their innocence, so you can't really put an innocent man in prison for any length of time."

"So why don't we just automatically call people guilty, and then let the innocent ones take truth potions?"

David snorted.  "Because that would simplify things too much."  After a few steps, he continued, "It comes down to a matter of privacy and integrity.  We are sworn to make the attempt to not harm the innocent.  Putting an innocent person through a truth potion is an invasion of privacy - they will have to reveal things they do not want to reveal, in order to prove the potion is working - and a breach of our integrity, since we didn't try to prove his guilt or innocence before trial."

"I suppose.  Makes life a pain for us, though."

"If all you had to do was go arrest someone, this job would get very boring, very fast."

"That's true."

The two entered the examiner's office at that point, and found her standing over the body.

"Examiner Cavanaugh," David said properly.

"Hello," the woman said.

"Officer Chloe Kirkland, Officer Intern David Stroud."

She shook both their hands and said, "Call me Jordan."

They responded in kind, and then David asked, "So, what can you tell us about Miss Edwards?" the spell David had cast on the body revealed her to be Linda Edwards, age twenty-two, having just become a citizen and working at a small bakery.

Jordan said, "The woman was hexed, which is what caused the bleeding, but it turns out this was merely a distraction."

"Distraction?" Chloe asked.

"To keep the victim busy trying to heal herself.  The real damage done was that the body had its life energy forcibly removed."

"By what method?" David asked.

"Some kind of very advanced hex or curse.  I would suspect hex, since this sort of thing doesn't require a lasting effect."

"But you don't know the spell involved?" David asked.

"No, there's not really a way for me to determine that."

"Did the hex make her look like that?" Chloe asked.

"Yes.  When your life energy is removed, it's not the same as just dying.  Oh, it kills you, all right, but in the process, instead of the energy just leaking away naturally, it is ripped violently away from you.  Since it resides within your flesh, your flesh is severely damaged in the process.  Her internal organs, muscles, and even her bones, to some extent, have been turned to mush."

Chloe looked decidedly peaked at that comment.

"What about the candles and the herb bag?  Anything there?" David asked, trying to move Chloe past her discomfort.

"The candles are sold in only two shops within a hundred miles of the murder site.  Here are the names and addresses.  The herb bag could have been produced by any decent herbologist.  The items together, however, indicate it was a necromancer who cast this spell."

"Wait... I thought all magic-users were called wizards," David objected.

"Necromancers are wizards that belong to a religious order.  They have a belief in the divinity of certain fairies.  Also, they perform rituals and spells that have been outlawed for their dangerous effects."

"You say 'certain fairies'... are we talking demons here?"

"Yes, as well as a few other lesser-known fairies that tend to cooperate with the demons."

"And they treat demons as... gods?"

"In a fashion.  It's a belief that the demons are the best of the fairies, willing to use their power for whatever they wish.  They worship the demons in the hope that the demons will aid them in performing their tasks."

"And do they?"

"Frequently, yes, but not always.  Demons do whatever they feel like.  Even the Fairy King doesn't have more than a basic control over them."

"Great.  So we're looking for an evil woman who makes agreements with demons."

"And uses candles sold at one of two shops."

"Unless she traveled to either buy her supplies, or to perform the murder."

"Why would she do that?" Jordan asked.

"Perhaps there is some significance to the particular location of that clearing.  Maybe a specific demon lives there."

"I hadn't thought of that... did you sense a demonic presence?"

"I wouldn't know what the hell I was sensing.  As far as I know, I've never been near a demon."

Jordan nodded.  "Well, that's what I've got.  Sorry it isn't more."

"That's okay.  This at least gives us something more to go on than a name.  Thanks."

"Good luck."

"Okay.  Keep after that guy, Tom.  We know he's working out of Carston.  Keep pushing until you find something."

"Yes, sir," Tom said.

Joe turned.  "David, Chloe?  What have you guys got going right now?"

David looked at his notes.  This was their usual Monday briefing on the active cases in Joe's squad.  It allowed everyone to keep up with what the others were doing.

"First off, Faggioni.  I'm still trying to keep my eyes open up in Gorumshead.  Haven't seen much in the way of Clan activity.  I'm hoping that, as we get further out from the arrests, they'll show themselves again.  Until I spot one, I'm in a holding pattern.  I've found no other means of catching Faggioni without intensive surveillance, and I simply haven't got the time to do that."

Joe nodded understanding.

"Next, we have the slaver case.  Right now, we've got ten pounds of air.  Chloe's going over the guy's records with a fine-toothed comb, but nothing's popping out at the moment.  We're considering branching out to known associates, and seeing if there are places there we might look."

"Keep on that.  The king expressed a desire to see that case wrapped up.  He doesn't like that sort of thing passing through his kingdom," Joe said.

"Can't blame him," David replied.  "In any case, until something turns up, we're still plugging away at it."

Joe nodded again, and waved him on.

"Last Friday we started a new case, an apparent necromancer murdered a young woman by draining her life force from her."

"Anything to go on?"

"We have to check on some candles that were used in some kind of ritual or ceremony surrounding the murder.  They're not sold widely, and it's possible we may get a lead on who bought them."

"Okay, good work.  What else?"

"What I shall, for your sake, refer to as the serial disappearances case."

Joe grunted.

"We have four victims, taken by identical MO, but with no obvious connection to each other whatsoever, other than that all four were, shall we say, unloved by their community.  None of the most closely involved people to the victims has panned out as a good suspect.  We are now seeking other possible connections, such as mutual friends, or even subscriptions to magazines or online services.  As of yet, nothing has turned."

Joe grunted again.  "You're still determined that it's one person?"

"Either one person, or an associated group.  The identical MO, even down to the type of victim, says that they are all related somehow.  If this was a common MO, like just knocking someone out and grabbing them, that would be one thing.  This MO has never been used before, that we can find."

"I'm beginning to agree with you, but I'm not there yet.  What about the wizard-for-hire angle?"

"We have contacted the FBI, and they are making the rounds of the various online and offline places where a dark wizard might hawk his tawdry wares.  If they've gotten wind of anything, they haven't told us yet."

Joe nodded.  "Contact them and touch base.  I'll start sifting through some of the possibilities for connections between them.  Anything else?"

"No, those are our active cases at the moment."

"Okay, good.  Well, that's it, folks.  Get back to work, you lazy bums," Joe said with a grin.

Someone threw a wad of paper at him, hitting him in the nose.  The group chuckled as he feigned serious injury, then waved them all off to their various tasks.

"So, what do we work on today?" Chloe asked.

"The murder.  We need to get on that quickly.  We shouldn't have even really waited over the weekend, but I'm not sure if these places would have been open, anyway."

"Burton's a long way from here."

"The glidetruck trip's not too bad."

"No, but we should get going."

"Right."

"Can I help you folks?" the woman asked once David and Chloe entered the shop.

"Are you Madame Rosemerta?"

"Depends on who's asking," she said with a grin.  "Are you here officially, or personally?"

"Officially," David said politely.

"Ah.  In that case, my real name is Martha Ross."

David chuckled.  "Not quite the mystical sounding name you were hoping for, eh?"

The woman smiled at him.  "How can I help you officers?"

David pulled one of the melted candles out of his coat pocket.  "Do you sell these?"

The woman looked at it, and said, "No, the ones I sell aren't melted."  She smiled again at David.  He responded in kind.

"Do you sell many of them?"

"No, not really.  It's not a very popular item.  They smell pretty bad when they're burning, and as you can see, they're not all that attractive."

"Then why do people buy them at all?" Chloe asked.

"Certain wizards have uses for them.  They have a magical essence that can be used to augment a variety of spells."

"Are those spells, generally speaking, malevolent in nature?" David asked.

The woman pursed her lips.  "As we all know, whether a spell is good or bad is all a matter of point of view.  The spells these candles aid are powerful, and can do harm to someone, if the wielder is so inclined."

"Do you keep any records of who you've sold things to?"

"Not written records, no.  But I can tell you who I've sold those to.  There are only about a half-dozen people who buy them."

"If you could give us their names and, if you know, their addresses, it would be appreciated."

"Is someone in trouble?" Madame Rosemerta asked.

"Quite possibly," David replied.

"Am I in trouble?" she asked.

"There's no crime in selling a magical object," David replied.  "It's the use that can be criminal."

"Well, that's a relief.  I don't like the idea that I may be getting one of my customers in trouble.  What have they done?"

"We don't know that they've done anything.  However, we are investigating a murder."

Madame Rosemerta paled - something that was hard to notice under her alabaster skin - and put her hand to her mouth.

"I want no part of that kind of evil.  I may... or may not... be a necromancer, but that's going much too far."

"Being a necromancer is also not illegal," David said.  "Generally considered a bad idea, but not illegal."

"Yes, well, many have closed their minds.  Have you been to the demon chapel in Mirelia?"

"No.  I have been to the Temple of Fire, but not into the Chapel."

"The power of that place... you should go.  It is an experience to awaken the mind."

"My mind's pretty awake already, thanks," David said with a slight grin.

Madame Rosemerta smiled at him, then wrote down the names of her customers and gave it to him.  "I don't know most of their addresses, sorry."

"I'm sure we can find them," David assured her.

"I hope you find who you're looking for," she said.

David nodded.  "We'll get out of your way now," he said.

"What is this?" Chloe asked, reaching her hand out toward an elongated object.

"A dragon's penis," Rosemerta replied.

Chloe's hand shot back to her side so fast that it slapped against her thigh.  David chuckled, and then nodded to Madame Rosemerta before heading for the door.

"Think she'll warn those people?" Chloe asked David once they were in the glidetruck.

"I don't think so," he said after a moment of hard consideration.  "She could have been faking it, but I felt as though her horror at the idea of murder was genuine.  I think she knows, too, that warning a possible murderer is against the law, and she seemed rather eager to not be seen as violating the law."

Chloe snickered.  "Yeah, she did some interesting linguistic gymnastics in there."

David grinned.  "Cute, though."

"Hmph," Chloe replied.

David chuckled.  "Come on, I'll buy you lunch, then we can try to track these people down."

"You got it."

"Any problems cropping up this year?" David asked.  He was walking across the terrace with Tanya, who was doing a casual patrol of the area.

"No, nothing like what you faced down.  With The Clan gone, and with how they were removed, even the students who would normally cause trouble are a bit leery of stepping out of line.  It's been amazingly peaceful."

"Don't worry, I'm sure the shock will wear off soon enough."

Tanya chuckled.  "Too true.  How goes the detective biz?"

"Aggravating, half the time.  Exhilarating the other half.  Not as satisfying as I'd hoped for."

"Life's like that sometimes."

"Yeah. I-"

David's sentence was cut off by a loud squeal from inside his coat.  He reached in and pressed the pin that alerted him to trouble around Christa.  He pulled out a map and said, "Show me Christa Aberlin."

He had fully expected it to show her in her dorm room, but it didn't.  She was, instead, in one of the classrooms in Santana Hall.

"You'll have to excuse me, I have to go check on someone."

"Need a hand?" Tanya asked immediately.

"No, I'm sure I can handle whatever it is."

"Right.  Be careful."

"Thanks."

David trotted off toward Santana Hall, hoping that he would get there in time for whatever trouble Christa had gotten herself into.  He knew that, given her attitude, she was fairly begging for trouble.

It took only a couple minutes for him to enter Santana Hall, and then he ran down two hallways and entered the classroom indicated by the map.  He came to a stop, because there was no one in sight.

"Christa?" he called out, now actually worried about what might have happened to her.  He walked up to the teacher's desk, looking across the entire room for any clues.

Pulling out the map, he asked it to show him where Christa was once again.  It clearly indicated she was in the room he was in.  In fact, it showed her as being very close to where he was currently standing.  But unless she could become invisible, that was impossible.

Suddenly, David felt a hand on his pants.  In a flash, his pants were undone, and both his pants and underwear were yanked off his hips.  He moved the map aside to look down, and saw a hand reaching out of one of the drawers of the desk.

Before he could even say anything, Christa's head appeared next, and it engulfed his cock.  She bobbed up and down on him with gusto, humming as she worked.

David closed his eyes.  A goddamned illusion.  I can't believe I fell for this!  He didn't stop Christa only because what she was doing felt very nice, and he felt he deserved a reward for her annoyance.

Christa worked him over, pushing him closer and closer to his climax as her tongue slid back and forth along the underside of his cock.  Finally, without so much as a grunt of warning, he blasted a load into the back of her mouth.  Christa coughed once, but, like a pro, backed off and took the rest of his cum before swallowing it all.

David took a deep breath as she let him loose, but he was not prepared for her to stand up out of the desk-illusion and be completely naked.

"Okay, your turn!" she said.  "We'll have to use something other than the teacher's desk, though!"  She giggled as she wiggled her butt at him while she walked toward one of the student work tables.

David sighed, then pulled out his wand.  She wasn't watching, and so was surprised when he uttered, "Reteni pida tatu gante."

Thin cords shot out of David's wand, wrapping around Christa's limbs.  They did not, however, cover any of her private parts; they merely held her immobile.

David put away his wand, pulled up his pants, and then moved around so that Christa could see him.

"Do you not understand the dangerous game you're playing?  If I can't trust that alarm, sooner or later I'm going to ignore it.  And then, if you ever do need me, I'm not going to be there."

"Oh, come on.  Who's going to attack me here?"

"You'd be surprised what shit goes down in this school," David said.  "Especially to people who make themselves a target like you do.  Now, in order for you to really 'get' this lesson, I think I'm going to just leave you here like this.  If anyone should happen to come in and see you... well, hey, you were naked in public, you kind of have to expect to be seen."

"You wouldn't dare!  I'll tell my father on you!"

"No you won't.  Because to do that, you'd have to admit that you were naked in public, and you're not about to look your father in the face and say that."

Christa blushed; he was right, she would never be able to do that.

"Maybe you'll learn something, maybe not.  At least I'll know you won't be bugging me for a little while."

David walked out of the room, then closed the door.  He then turned and cast a repulsion hex on the door.  It would take a strong wizard to break their way through that spell, he knew.  He didn't want to expose her to the danger that would result from someone actually seeing her, he just wanted her to be embarrassed by the thought of the possibility.

Sighing to himself about the trouble she was adding to his life, he headed off for his dorm room.  He had divination work to do.

"She pulls that stunt again while we're together, and she and I are going to have words," Lydia said lowly.  She was sitting with David, having dinner.  He had just related Christa's little prank to her.

David shook his head.  "You don't want the kind of hell messing with her would bring down on you and your family."

"To hell with my family.  I told you, I plan on starting my own."

"That would be very hard to do from the deepest, darkest cell in Barnard Hill.  Assuming he didn't execute you straight out.  And I wouldn't be able to offer you any protection, either."

"Why not?"

"I'm tasked with protecting her.  If I let you do something to her, then my head's as much on the chopping block as yours."

Lydia pouted.  "That's not fair."

"No one said he had to be fair.  He's the king."

"I don't like her interfering in your life."

"Me, either.  But there's not much that we can do about it."

Just then, almost as if she'd been listening for her cue to step in, Christa sat down across from David.

"That was a cruel thing to do to me," she said.  "I was there for three hours!"

"Yes, I'm well aware.  It was a three-hour spell."

"You mean... I didn't get free on my own?"

Lydia snorted derisively.

"Something funny?" Christa snarled.

"Yes, now that you mention it," Lydia said.  "I think it's funny that a wand-waver thinks she has any chance of breaking the spell of a full wizard."

"Mind your own business," Christa snapped.

"David's life is my business, bitch," Lydia replied.

"You can't call me that!  I'm the king's daughter!"

"That clearly doesn't stop you from being a bitch," Lydia replied simply.

"I will destroy you for that," Christa seethed.

"No you won't," David replied.

"Stay out of this!" Christa shouted.

"No," David replied calmly.  "I will not sit by and allow you to try to threaten my friends because you think your parentage gives you some kind of authority at this school."

"Paladinhoods can be revoked, you know," Christa warned darkly.

David shrugged.  "Yes, I'm sure they can.  But not by you.  And I very highly doubt that your father's going to indulge you quite that far."

Christa glared at him, then got up from the table.

"Don't go away mad," Lydia quipped.  "Just... go away."

"Fuck you, tramp."

"I don't do girls," Lydia replied quickly.

Christa snarled in frustration and stomped off.

"That was kind of fun, actually," Lydia said with a grin.

David shook his head.  "Don't go looking for trouble," he said.  "There are enough people in the palace that will listen to her to make life hard for you."

"And you," Lydia said in reply.

David shook his head.  "The palace staff isn't going to fuck with a Paladin.  They have to worry that I'll simply have a talk with the king."

"And you think you could, what, get them fired?"

"I don't think anything.  I have no idea what kind of pull I have with the king on that kind of issue.  But they would have thoughts and worries about it, and so aren't likely to push their luck."

"So what am I supposed to do, just let her harass you?"

"Pretty much.  I can handle Christa."

"Yeah, you're doing so well so far..."

David rolled his eyes.  He was about to answer her when his mirror buzzed.  He pulled it out and answered it.

"Hello?"

"David, how are you this evening?" the person on the other end said.

"Oh, hi, Mrs. Tighe.  I'm all right.  What can I do for you?"

"Prof. Zoroaster will be off campus for the next two days.  We were told to contact you regarding two of his classes."

David groaned quietly, then nodded.  "Yes, ma'am.  If you'll send me the times and the specific class numbers, I'll make sure to be there."

"Oh, good.  We appreciate this, David.  It makes life so much easier on us."

"As long as someone's benefitting from it," David replied.

Mrs. Tighe smiled, then said.  "Well, I'll let you get back to what you were doing.  Thanks again."

David nodded, then fogged off.  He groaned again as he put away his mirror.

"What's that about?" Lydia asked.

"I have to substitute teach for Prof. Zoroaster."

"What's the matter with him?"

"He has to leave campus.  I can't say any more than that."

"Oh.  So... why you?"

"Because he asked, and because no one else is available."

"Well, you did that whole teaching thing for Prof. Blackstone, so you should be okay, right?"

"I suppose."

"Cheer up.  Think of it as a chance to mess with their heads!"

David shook his head at her balefully.  "I take my tutoring seriously."

"Pfft.  Well, then let's go back to your place so I can help you relax before The Big Game."

David smirked, and the smile didn't entirely leave his face.  "That at least sounds like fun."

"Okay, today, we're going to work on divination in the family.  You might think that, hey, I know my family better than anyone, it should be a snap to see their futures.  Well, that's not how it works.

"The problem with divining your family is that you know them so well, you have an instant emotional response to each and every one of them.  Some are favorable, some are not.  In any case, all that emotion is always getting in the way of getting a clear divination.

"So, today, what I want you to do is to try to do a viewing on your closest family members.  See if you can make anything out.  If you can, write it down.  Prof. Zoroaster will go over it with you when he gets back.  If you have any problems or questions, just raise your hand.

"Okay, you can begin."

As the students lowered their heads to focus on the crystal balls before them, David slumped back against Prof. Zoroaster's desk.  He'd forgotten how nerve-wracking teaching could be, and he wasn't even as comfortable with Divination as he was with Conjuring.

For the next twenty minutes, the class was quiet as the students worked on their viewing.  Suddenly, one of the students cried out, throwing his hands up in front of his face, and throwing himself back away from his table, almost falling off his stool.

Other students, jarred from their own viewings, looked over at him and started to move toward him.

"Okay, get back to what you were doing," David said firmly.  "Everyone's had one of those viewings before.  If you haven't, count your blessings."

David moved over to the distraught student, and asked quietly, "What did you see?"

"I saw my family.  They were dead, and the house was half-collapsed, and there was fire next door, and..."

It was clear the guy was about to lose it altogether.  David took his shoulder firmly and squeezed.

"Okay.  Take a break.  Do not try to view any further.  I want to speak with you after class."

The guy nodded, and David went back up to the front of the room, to watch over the others and see if there were any further issues.

Once the class had ended, the troubled student sat still as the others left the room.  David came over to him and sat down on the stood across the table from him.

"So, tell me, in detail, what you saw."

For the next ten minutes, the guy described his vision in detail.  David did not interrupt.

"What is your temporal range?" David asked.  The student looked at him in confusion.  "How far into the future can you see?"

"Oh.  About a year.  And this image was really fuzzy."

David nodded.  "Okay, so we have some time.  Where does your family live?"

"In Erle."

David nodded again.  "Okay, what I'm going to tell you may distress you.  Listen anyway.  You are not to disclose this vision to anyone.  That includes your family.  I will be contacting the Ministry of Defense, and they're going to want to talk to you.  What you've seen is bigger than your family.  You will be allowed to warn your family in time to secure their safety.  On that, you have my promise.  But until you are told otherwise, this information is to be kept strictly confidential.  Do you understand?"

The student nodded.  David said, "Shit, now I know what Prof. Zoroaster felt like when he had to give me this speech."

"You've seen my family in trouble?"

"No, different vision altogether.  Long time ago.  In any case, for right now, try to not have that vision again.  You're clearly not up to the emotional impact of it.  We will get this matter cleared up, but if you talk about it, it will only cause problems."

"I understand.  My dad's in the military, so I know about that kind of stuff."

David said, "Good.  Consider this material to be 'Secret', then."

"Okay."

"I'll let Prof. Zoroaster know about this, as well, so that you won't have to live through telling it again."

"Thanks.  It was pretty intense, you know?"

"Yes, I do."

The student nodded, then he left.

David sat for a long moment, considering things.

Sighing, he said, "Shit."

"David?" Nancy called as he passed by her office on his way into the bull pen.  She was no longer responsible for the sign-in sheet; she was more important than that.

"Morning, Nancy.  What's up?"

"We had a call for you this morning from the Ministry of Defense."

"Oh.  Why did they call here?"

"We have a direct connection through the Senesty Division to the palace.  It's a form of communication that cannot be tapped."

"Oh?  I didn't know they'd managed to secure the mirrors."

"It's not a mirror.  It's more advanced than that... but it's not portable.  Think of it like a travel gate, but only for images.  It weighs like fifty pounds."

"Yikes.  Okay, so... did they leave a message?"

"They said that someone would be up to get the information you messaged them about.  I have no idea what they were talking about, but that's all he said."

David nodded.  "That's enough."  David had conjured a written report down to Senesty.  It was very tricky to do, but he was a good conjurer, and it had arrived with only one corner torn.  The report had been about the student's vision for Erle.

"Thanks for letting me know," he told Nancy, and then headed into the office.

"Morning, David," Chloe said in greeting.  Vivian did likewise.  He greeted them in return before sitting down at his desk.

Turning to Chloe, he asked, "Did you get anything on those people who purchased the candles?"

"Of the ten names we got, we've already ruled out three, because they were definitely in Earth at the time of the killing.  Two more are unlikely, given where they live and the time factors, but we can't rule them out.  Three live in the area around Burton, so would have easy access to the site.  So far, none of them has a connection to the dead woman that I've turned up."

"Where is the woman from, again?"

"Kellerton.  It's a small town outside of Cormatsen."

"Do any of our suspects live in that area?"

"One of them lives in Cormatsen."

"So we have suspects near the victim, and near the site."

"Correct."

"Question:  Are those candles made elsewhere in Callamandia?"

"They are, but don't you remember, the second store we went to was able to positively identify the candles as coming from their shop, due to the mark on the bottom."

"Shit, right.  I forgot.  Okay, so it has to be one of those seven people.  Or," he said hastily, "one of those seven people is involved.  It is entirely possible that they simply purchased the candles for someone else, to hide their identity."

Chloe nodded.  "So where do we go from here?"

"We'll have to go and talk to each of the suspects, see if they can account for their candles and their whereabouts at the time of the murder."

"This is going to take a while."

"Probably.  You didn't have plans for the weekend, did you?" David said with a grin.

Chloe just grunted at him, but smirked.

"So have you turned up any kind of connection at all?" David asked Joe.  They were sitting in the bull pen, discussing the serial disappearances case.

"Maybe.  I've discovered that all of these folks used the same law firm in their defense.  McKenzie, Brackman and Chaney.  They're a big law firm out of Boston."

"Did one person handle all their cases?"

"No, we're not that lucky.  Worse, the firm has several dozen employees for us to weed through, at least six of which are wizards... but we can't just look at the wizards."

"Why not?"

"Well, consider this idea.  What if we have an inside-outside job going on?  The guy on the inside finds the targets, and passes them on to the wizard, who is on the outside?  Then the wizard or wizards commit the crimes."

"Shit, I hadn't thought of that."

Joe nodded.  "So we have to look at each and every employee that could have known about all of these cases, and see what connections they might have to wizards.  It could take a while."

"What's 'a while' in this case?"

"A couple weeks."

"Could the FBI help us out on it?"

"Maybe.  I'm not sure how."

"I'll give them a call, then," David said.

"Not today, you won't," a voice said behind them.  As David turned, the voice said, in a louder volume, "Everyone, stop what you're doing.  I am Doug McKenna, from the Office of Outlawed Magic.  This division is being audited for improper procedure."

"What the hell is this shit?" Keef said, coming out of his office.  McKenna just handed him the official order.

David shook his head, then returned to what he was doing.  Joe and the others just stared at McKenna.

McKenna reached down and attempted to pull the file away from David.

"All work is to be halted while-"

"Would you like to remove your hand from my case file," David said darkly, "before I snap it off at the wrist, or after?"

"I am here to audit procedure.  I cannot do that while you are working on the cases I need to audit," McKenna said haughtily.  He still took his hand off the file, however.

"Here's the order," Keef said to David.  Keef wondered if David would see the loophole.

David read over the order twice, before he looked up at McKenna.  "Have you ever even been a Rimohr?"

"No, nor have I ever wanted to be."

"Then how the fuck would you know anything about proper procedure?"

"There is a manual of regulations to be followed."

"Uh-huh.  And do you follow your manual of regulations, down to the last dotted i and crossed t?"

"Of course I do.  I am an efficient investigator."

David snorted.  "That you think efficiency and regulations have anything to do with each other speaks volumes.  However, I would like to point out two very important things that you seem to have overlooked.  Either that, or you are violating your own regulations, which you say you don't do."

"And what might those two things be?" McKenna inquired archly.

"First, this order requires all case officers submit to your inquiry.  It says not a damned thing about case files."

"Obviously I cannot interview the officers without having the files present!" McKenna demanded.

"That's your problem.  Your order does not contain a directive to turn over case files to you, and as such, it would, in fact, be a breach of procedure to do so.  I'll just assume this is some kind of test on your part.  In any event, you're not getting any of my case files no matter how big a tantrum you throw.

"And I can back that up because of the second thing you've overlooked."

"And that is?" McKenna demanded.

"That I am an officer intern.  I am not an officer of the Bolmont Division.  Your order limits your authority to those officers serving as members of the Bolmont Division exclusively.  I am actually a member of the Academy Division.  I just happen to be stationed here."

"A semantic technicality!  You are required by the order-"

"To do nothing at all, because the order does not apply to me.  Hey, you're the one who said you abide by your regulations at all times.  So, was that true, or was it a bunch of bullshit to make you sound important?  If the regulations are the end-all and be-all of our job, then you should have absolutely no quibble with me.  I am obeying your order as far as I need to... which is not at all, because it is limited to a group of officers of which I am not a member.

"Now, if you will excuse me, I have work to do."

McKenna stood there sputtering while David turned to his mirror and contacted the FBI.

"Morning, Joe," David said.

Joe grumped at him.  While David had managed to flaunt the authority of McKenna, no one else in the division was getting anything accomplished.  David wondered what was supposed to happen with all the active cases, but that was clearly not McKenna's concern.

Joe had already been interviewed twice by McKenna, a rather unpleasant experience.  The man had tried to demand David submit to an interview, but David had told him what he could go do with himself.

"Hey, David.  McKenna wants to see you again."

"Uh-huh."

"Just get it over with, would you?"

"No.  Not until he starts acting with some civility and respect for the job we're doing."

"He can get you fired."

"If that jack-ass can get me fired, then I don't want to work here," David replied bluntly.

"Then you can tender your resignation right now, because I do have that power," McKenna said from behind him.

David turned around.  "Prove it," he said.  "Go ahead.  Mirror the Academy Commission and demand that they fire me, for actually trying to perform investigations without unwarranted interruptions from someone who has not the first clue about how to perform an investigation.  Go ahead, I'll wait right here.  I should warn you, though, that the Rimohr Commissioner and the King of Callamandia have expressed personal interests in my career advancement." 

Everyone nearby stared in utter shock as David squared off with someone they wouldn't dare challenge.  But they didn't have the kind of clout David had already developed within the organization.  David knew two things that aided him.  First, he knew he could probably get away with what he was saying, and second, he knew he didn't really care that much if he got fired.  It was a very liberating piece of knowledge.

"You seem very reluctant to talk with me, Mr. Stroud.  What, exactly, is it you have to hide?"

Joe got up from his chair, afraid that David would actually attack the man for that insinuation.

David said, "I have nothing to hide.  I simply don't like having my time wasted by an incompetent, self-important twit who doesn't actually know what he's doing."

"I have been doing this job for nearly a decade," McKenna said with a surfeit of pride.

"So for ten years, you haven't received a promotion?  I don't think it's our procedures you need to be auditing."  David turned to Vivian, who had been watching the whole scene with something akin to awe.  "Come on.  We have to go arrest somebody."

"Miss Columbo is under my authority, Mr. Stroud," McKenna snapped.  "She cannot perform case work during the audit!"

"She's not performing case work.  She's performing training supervision.  As I'm not allowed to act as a Rimohr without another Rimohr present, and as she has been appointed as my supervisory officer, she needs to accompany me.  Should you feel the need to prevent her from accompanying me, I will file Form 3825-dash-968 with your supervisor, which is a formal complaint that you are interfering in the operation of a Rimohr unit not under your purview."

McKenna paled, and David stepped close.  "Yeah, I know how to play your sleazy little game of politics, too.  Unlike you, I don't enjoy it.  But to get you to shut up and go away, I will happily destroy your career.  Now, leave me alone and let me do my job."

David turned, to find Vivian standing and waiting for him.  The rest of the office looked as though they wanted to applaud, but were scared of what McKenna would do.  David just smirked, shook his head, and left the office.

"How the hell can you do shit like that and get away with it?" Vivian asked.

"It's actually pretty easy," David replied.  "But the first thing you have to do is something most people are never able to manage."

"What's that?"

"Not give a shit what happens."

"If he gets you fired..."

"I won't really care that much.  I'm not enjoying this job a whole lot so far.  Too many people like him around."

"The Commissioner's trying to change things..."

"I know, and he's doing his best, I'm sure.  But that asshole's not even under the Commissioner's control.  He's from the OOM.  If the Executive Minister isn't trying to clean up his end of things, the problem will never go away."

"So why don't you just quit?"

"Because I'm still catching bad guys, and still helping good people.  I don't think that I will ever quit.  I just won't care that much if I get fired."

"So who are we going to arrest?" she asked as she climbed in the glidetruck.

"Johnathan Tuttle," David said.  "He's a clerk at a law firm."

"What's he done?"

"We think he's been kidnapping the various unsavory characters that have disappeared."

"Wizard?"

"Of course."

"This could be trouble."

"Could be, but I doubt it.  If he's killing people, I think he has to have a rationale for it.  I'm not sure if self-preservation is sufficient for him or not."

"It would be for most people."

"No, actually not.  If that were true, the police would end up killing almost everyone they try to arrest.  Most people will shy away from killing others."

"But if he's already killing people..."

"Consider who he's killing, though.  We're not in that class of individual.  We're law and order.  He might think he's helping us.  He certainly can't keep up that fiction in his mind if he goes and kills a couple of Rimohrs."

"I see your point, I guess.  Still, I think we should be careful."

"I'm always careful," David told her.  She just nodded.

"Mr. Tuttle.  Sleep well?"

"No.  How long do you plan on holding me?"

"Until we're sure of the truth," David told him.  "Your answers to our questions yesterday were not satisfying.  Let's try again, shall we?

"Where were you during the dark hours of June 22nd and 23rd?"

"How the fuck should I know?  That was like four months ago.  I imagine I was at home watching TV."

"Anyone corroborate that?"

Tuttle snorted.  "I doubt it.  I don't exactly get a load of dates.  Those days... are they a weekend?"

"No."

"Then no, there'd be no one to corroborate.  I live alone, and I only date on weekends, even when I can get dates."

"Does it help if I tell you that Ellen Lasbury disappeared the morning of June 23rd?"

"Um... not really."

"She was a client of your law firm.  You weren't aware of her disappearance?"

"There are hundreds of clients of our law firm.  I handle probably fifteen or so at a time myself, working for the three lawyers in my section.  I probably heard about her disappearance, if it was on the news, but I wouldn't have taken any special notice of it."

"How about Shaniqua Conyers, disappeared on the evening of August 8th?"

"I do remember hearing about that in the office, but again, I paid no particular attention to it.  What night was that?"

"The eighth was a Sunday."

"Yeah, I would have been alone.  I don't date on Sunday nights, only Friday and Saturday.  I have to be to work early enough that I do not want to be up late the night before."

"So, once again, you have no corroboration for your whereabouts," David said.

"Correct."

"The evening of Wednesday, September 1st.  The disappearance of Otis Hensley," David prompted.

"Wednesday... I was either at home, or bowling.  They run a special on Wednesdays, so sometimes I go, but I couldn't tell you about that night in particular."

"Antonia Casini, Sunday, September 19th," David said.

"Again, probably at home.  I don't go out much."

"So, in short, unless we find someone who saw you bowling on the first of September, you have absolutely no alibi for any of these disappearances."

Tuttle shrugged.  "I don't do much.  Really, don't you think, if I had done these crimes, I'd have come up with a better alibi than none at all?"

"Maybe.  Except that you would know that someone completely uninvolved with the crimes wouldn't remember these days as being any different from other days, so your non-alibi could be an attempt to look innocent."

"In other words, there's no way for me to make you believe me."

"Sure there is.  Tell me who kidnapped those people."

"I don't know."

"You're aware that you're the only wizard working for McKenzie, Brackman & Chaney?"  This was a lie; David wondered if Tuttle would call him on it.

"I'd never checked, but it doesn't surprise me."

David was surprised.  He also thought that perhaps Tuttle was lying now.  It seemed odd to David that wizards wouldn't seek each other out in Earth, as a kind of underground fraternity.

"These crimes were perpetrated by a wizard.  You had access to all of the information concerning their cases," he said, getting back to his interrogation.

"I never looked into their cases!"

"Four people, four huge cases, and you never once looked at them?"

"The lawyers I work for are junior partners.  They don't get to handle cases of that magnitude!  And I have enough to do during my day that I don't go looking for extra work!"

"But you apparently have plenty of free time on your evenings and weekends."

Tuttle opened his mouth to protest, then realized he had no rebuttal for that, and closed it again.

Tuttle asked, "So, what now?"

"Now, you're going to sit, and we're going to try to prove whether you did, in fact, take those people or not."

"Just great.  What about my job?"

"Your job is not my highest priority," David said coldly.

"Yes, can I help you?" Olissa asked the young man standing at the door to Pendergrast Manor.

"I have a document for Paladin Stroud."

"Oh.  I can take it," she offered politely.

The man shook his head.  "He has to receive it personally."

Olissa nodded.  She turned and saw Jailla sitting on the railing of the lift.  "Jailla, could you go get David for me, please?"

Jailla chirped and immediately winged off.  David was in his office, looking over information about new applicants to the Royal Potions Guild.

After a moment, David arrived in the entrance hall.

"What's up?"

"I have a document for you, Paladin Stroud," the man said.  "If you could please press your thumb here," he said, holding out a box which had a blue square on its surface.

David pressed his thumb against the blue square.  Instantly, a slot opened up, and a parchment slid part way out.  David pulled it out the rest of the way.

"Remember, sir, that the document is considered confidential, and should be treated as such."

David nodded, and the man left.

"What's that about?" Olissa asked.

"Prof. Zoroaster asked the king to keep me apprised of what's going on with the negotiations with Vrudena.  He thinks it might help with my visions if I'm more informed."

"Do you think it'll help?"

"No, but I'm not about to object to having more information about what's going on."

"You're an information junkie, you know that?" Olissa asked with a smile.

David grinned.  "I have a home to protect," he said seriously, despite the grin.  "If anything can help me do that, I'm all for it."

David unrolled the parchment as he walked back toward his office.  Olissa followed.

"Well, shit," David said.

"What's the matter?"

"Things aren't going well.  Vrudena is remaining stubborn.  They're still demanding a return of all lands north of Knolocley."

"Where is that?"

"Just a bit south and west of Cormatsen.  It would cut Callamandia in half... worse, really."

"The king's never going to go for that, is he?"

"He can't.  There's nowhere to put all those people from north of the line.  Besides, if he did, Vrudena would just push for more at a later date."

"Is there any sign of hope?"

David read through the entire document twice before answering her.  Finally, he put it down.  "Not in here," he said with a frown.  David tapped the document twice with his wand, and it vanished in a puff of flames.

"You don't keep those?"

"I'm not allowed to keep those.  Anything I decide I need to remember, I write down elsewhere.  And that notebook is kept under lock, key, and three hexes."

"Yikes," she said.

"Yeah.  Anyway, there's nothing new in that report, really... but the continued lack of progress is worrying all by itself."

"You don't think there's any hope of this thing blowing over, do you?"

"Not a chance in hell."

"Any thoughts about when the war will start?"

"Not precise ones.  Not soon."

"What do you mean by 'not soon', though?"

"Not before Yuletide.  Anything more than that gets iffy.  There are too many variables, and my visions get less clear."

"What can we do to prepare?"

"We're already doing it.  Keep up with your healing skills.  Healers will be important during the war.  We've already collected supplies here in the house for a couple dozen people for a year."

"You expect it to go on that long?"

"I don't know.  But I don't really expect those supplies to last that long.  I figure we'll have more people staying here than that, frankly."

"Oh.  Is there anything more I can do?"

"Work on enchanting a few more food cabinets, then stock them up.  Learn your protective charms and enchantments."

"What about fighting spells?"

"You will not, unless in immediate danger for your life, be fighting anyone.  Is that clear?" David replied sternly and with all the seriousness he could muster.

"Yes, Master," Olissa said softly.

"Good.  Now... I have to get back to work on these damned cases.  With that idiot McKenna in the office, we're not getting nearly enough done."

"He wouldn't be there today, would he?"

"He's there every day.  I don't think that guy knows what the phrase 'day off' means."

"Oh."

"Call me when lunch is ready."

"Yes, Master."

"Hey, David!" Tanya said as she sat down at the table.  David was in Byron Hall, eating lunch with several of the professors.  "Haven't seen you at this gathering in a while."

"I've been busy.  How goes things?"

"Oh, the usual.  Nothing particularly troublesome."

"Glad to hear that.  At least I didn't hand over a complete mess to you."

Tanya chuckled.  "No, you clean up after yourself pretty well."

The entire table laughed at that.  David just shook his head and rolled his eyes.

"Did have an interesting case pop up last week, though," Tanya said after a few bites of food.

"Oh?" David asked, interested.

"Seems a girl's necklace has gone missing.  She was with her roommates at the time, and in her room, so no one else really had a chance to take it."

"Well, that's... confusing.  Any leads?"

"We have one suspect... if you can call it that."

"Do tell."

"In the room at the time was a stray cat.  They've named him Tattered Tom.  He looks a bit ragged, black with a white blaze on his chest.  They say they've seen him around campus several times, and that day they invited him into their dorm room.  They gave him some snacks... apparently he likes to rub on their legs... and he kept pushing his nose under the one girl's skirt."

David snorted in amusement.  "Pervert cat.  Perhaps they should have named him Peeping Tom."

Tanya chuckled.  "Maybe.  In any case, that's the only suspect we have.  But what the heck would a cat want with a necklace, anyway?  And if he is some kind of weird packrat cat... pack-cat?  Anyway, we haven't spotted him to try to follow him to any sort of den or hoard or whatever."

David nodded.  "Ah, well.  At least it's an amusing little case, rather than real trouble."

"Yeah, I hear you.  Still, kind of frustrating to not have any clues."

"I know that feeling," David assured her.  "Good luck."

"Morning, Nancy," David said as he walked by her office door on the way back to the bull pen.

"Hey, David!  Hold up."

David stepped back and then stepped into her office.  "What's up?"

"We have a call in about another disappearance.  I should send it back to Agent Keef, but..."

"But if you do, it won't get handled till McKenna leaves.  Right.  Okay, let me have the information."

Nancy handed David the info, which was about a missing man in his early thirties.

"Hmm.  Oldest one so far, and he's not exactly ancient.  Thanks," he said to Nancy.  She nodded, and he stepped back out of her office.  He went outside to make his mirror call.

"Joe?  Where are you?"

"At home still.  I didn't see any reason to hurry in to the office.  I'll be there in a half-hour or so."

"Don't bother.  I'll come get you.  We've got another disappearance."

"Well, that blows that arrest," Joe said.

"Probably, but not for sure."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, if there's more than one person involved, even if they're both wizards, this could have been in the works before the arrest.  And, of course, we don't yet know that this newest disappearance was done by a wizard in the first place."

"Okay, that's true on both points.  Come on over, and we can go."

David fogged off with Joe, and then hopped in his glidetruck.  He'd not yet signed in with the clerk, so officially, he'd never been in the building.  He mentally gave the finger to McKenna, then headed out for Joe's place.

"Can I help you?" a uniformed guard asked when they arrived at the top-floor office of their victim.

"We're looking for the detective in charge of this case," David said.

The guard jerked his thumb toward the office behind him.  There was a man in a gray suit interviewing a nicely dressed woman.  David guessed she was either an executive assistant, or a secretary.  He nodded to the guard, and led Joe into the office.

"Can I... oh, shit.  Is this for-sure your case, or are you here on some kind of wild guess?"

"Somebody called us," David said.  He introduced them to the detective, who did likewise.  "Can you fill us in on what you've got so far?"

"This is Marilyn Briggs.  She is the victim's secretary.  She says a man came in here and demanded to see Dr. Maccarone, the victim.  She tried to get him to make an appointment, but he... well, her story gets a little far-fetched at that point."

David turned to the secretary.  "What did he do?"

"He produced a stick, waved it at the door, and the door just turned to dust and blew away.  I know it sounds insane, but that's what happened."

David closed his eyes and chanted a brief charm.  He could feel the magic in the air, so the charm was hardly necessary, but it was procedure.  He opened his eyes and looked at the woman.  "It's not insane."  He turned to the detective, "and we will be taking this case."

"Come on... the door turned to dust?" the detective asked.

David produced his wand.  "Look, a stick," he said.  He pointed it at a nearby potted plant and silently cast the hex.  The plant disintegrated in clear view of everyone around.

"As I said, not insane.  Magic, yes, but not insane.  The man was a wizard.  Did you get a good look at him?" he asked the secretary.

"Better than that.  He'll be on the surveillance tapes.  There are security cameras in every room in this building except the bathrooms."

"We'll want to see that, then," David said.

"It's down in the security office," she told him.

"Let's go," he said to Joe and the detective.  "Ma'am, if you'd come along, too, just in case we need some further information."

"Okay."

The four of them went down to the third floor, where the security office was located.

"We need to see the tapes of the abduction," the detective said to the security chief.

"Right.  What time was it?" he asked the secretary.

"About 8:15 or so."

The man typed in some commands to a computer, and an image came up on a nearby monitor.

"Okay, there's the office, you're at your desk.  I'll fast forward until we see someone else come in."

"Was Dr. Maccarone already in his office?"

"Oh, yes.  He was in by seven, most likely.  I didn't arrive until just before eight, myself, but he's a very early worker."

"And here's someone," the security chief said, slowing the footage back down to normal speed.

"That's him," she said.

"Pause the tape, please," David said.  The security chief did.  "Can you zoom in at all?"

"Sure."  The guy zoomed in, and David took a good long look at the perpetrator.

"Okay, let's go back to the playback," David said.  The security chief nodded, and the recording resumed.

"What the hell?" the security chief said.  "Where'd the door go?"

"You've not looked at this footage before?" the detective asked.

"No, I didn't think it was important.  We had a witness."

They watched as the perpetrator went into Dr. Maccarone's office.  The security chief typed in another command and said, "The doc's office is on this monitor here."

They now watched as the perpetrator brandished his wand, blasted some energy balls around the room, and then directed the doctor out the door.  On the first monitor, they watched as the kidnapper prodded the doctor to leave the office.

"Can we follow them?" David asked.

The security chief nodded, and typed in some more commands.  The monitors flipped now, showing a hallway.  The kidnapper led the doctor down to the elevator, and they stepped in.

"Any cameras in the elevator?"

"No.  Normally there would be, but we're in the midst of an upgrade on the elevator camera systems."

"I wonder if he knew that," David murmured to himself.

"The computer says the elevator stopped on the second floor," the security chief said.  "We'll bring that up on monitor two."

The video appeared, and they saw the elevator doors open, and the doctor exited, but the man behind him looked completely different from the one who had entered the elevator with him.

"Shit, the guy had an accomplice waiting," the detective grumped.

"Probably not," David said.  "That's probably the same guy."

"You think he could put on convincing prosthetics and wig that fast?"

David, in response, just waved his hand, and suddenly his face looked like the detective's.  "For us, it's just not that hard," David told him.  He ended the illusion after it was clear the detective was disconcerted at looking at his own face on someone else's body.

"So... do we have any way to know if the first image we saw was actually him?"

"Yes, but it would be very unpleasant for Miss Briggs, so we won't use it unless we have to.  For right now, no, we can't trust any description we have."

"Just fucking wonderful."

"Do you think this is related to our other cases, David?" Joe asked.

"What other cases?" the detective wanted to know immediately. 

David held up his hand to the detective, to tell him to wait.  To Joe, he said, "I'm not sure yet.  Depends on this guy's background."  Turning back to the detective, he asked, "What do we know about Dr. Maccarone?"

The detective flipped open his notebook.  "Age thirty-three, not married, rich bastard... convicted felon..."

"Oh?  What did he do?"

"Convicted of conspiracy to defraud.  He was the head of a medical group that was duping their patients into unnecessary tests and procedures.  The medical group had all the facilities: labs, radiology... even outpatient surgery.  Turned out that virtually everyone working there was in on the gag, and they would all write up their reports and diagnoses so that the patient was sent through all sorts of testing, which the facility itself performed, of course... then got paid for worthless acts.

"They all got caught when they got really greedy, and started to actually make patients sick intentionally, giving them infections, and even slipping them drugs to cause it to look like they were having heart attacks.  The clinic would 'treat' them... not using actual drugs, because of course there was no need... and charge the insurance companies an arm and a leg."

"Christ, and I thought the others were sleazy," David said to Joe.  To the detective, he asked, "Why isn't this guy in jail, if he was convicted?"

"Because he was never hands-on.  He could only be convicted of conspiracy, not the actual acts of harming the patients or of falsifying the reports.  He hired one hell of a lawyer, and made a deal with the DA.  He testified against everyone else, helping to put them all in jail."

"Why the fuck would the DA deal with this guy?  He's the one they needed to put away!"

"But they couldn't.  The conspiracy was the best they could hope for with him, and even had they gotten a conviction, you'd be looking at maybe five years, at most.  And without his testimony, a lot of the others wouldn't have been convicted at all."

"So what sentence did he get?" David asked angrily.

"Spent six months in a minimum security facility, and is now on probation for the next five years.  He's not allowed to treat patients directly, but, again thanks to his lawyer, he was allowed to keep his license to practice.  The company he runs here is a medical consultancy firm."

Turning to Joe, David said, "Yes, I think this is related to our other cases."

Joe just grunted in dark amusement.

"Question, though, is why he came here.  All of his other victims have been taken from their homes."

"Maybe there's something about his house that makes that undesirable to him," Joe offered.

David grunted.

The detective asked, "What are you two talking about?"

Joe said, "This is likely the latest in a string of serial kidnappings."

"I haven't heard anything about that," the detective objected.

"The kidnappings are widely spaced.  No two victims have come from the same jurisdiction yet."  They were currently in Concord, New Hampshire.

"How are you connecting them, then?" the detective wanted to know.

"Up until now, it was identical and unusual MO.  However, all of the victims have also had histories... much like Dr. Maccarone's.  They've been people who seem like they've gotten away with something."

The detective nodded.  "Some kind of vigilante?  Wiping them out for society's benefit?"

"We don't know that he's killing them," David said.  "In fact, the longer this goes, the less likely I think that he is."

"Why?" Joe asked.

"I'm not sure.  It just doesn't feel right.  I think he's either taking them somewhere so that a victim, or a victim's family, can get revenge... or he's doing something else entirely.  What that would be, I have no idea.  I just can't get over the notion that, if he wanted to just kill them, there is absolutely no reason to be this elaborate about it."

"Guns are noisy," the detective pointed out.

"Remember the trick with the potted plant?" David asked.  After waiting a second to see the recognition, he continued, "I can do that to a person just as easily."

"Shit," the detective said.

"Yeah."

"Well, if he's not killing them, he has to get rid of them somehow... unless he's keeping them in his own kind of prison, where he can determine the kind of treatment they'll get," the detective offered.

Joe nodded.  "We've considered that.  Unfortunately, it's not the kind of thing that leads us anywhere."

The detective nodded.  "Anything else you need here?"

"Not here, no.  We'll need to look at his house, though."

"Let's go."

"Well, there's the simplest answer," David said, before they made it anywhere near the doctor's house.

"What do you mean?" Joe asked.

"Gated community, with two armed guards at the gate."

"He could overpower them easily," Joe objected.

"But only by hurting them," David replied.  "Note that he didn't hurt Miss Briggs, either.  Hell, as far as we can tell, he doesn't even hurt his victims during the kidnapping."

"So, you think he went for the office because he figured he'd be able to actually get to him without having to go through a security force."

"Right.  Once he had custody of the doctor, he could dictate the level of violence.  Up until that point, it's not entirely in his control.  I think this guy has some rules he plays by.  If he is a vigilante, that would make perfect sense.  He would not want to harm the innocent.  Even if he's just some kind of psychopath, he'll have some weird mindset that might mean only his targets are allowed to feel his wrath."

"I get what you're saying.  Let's look at the house, though, to see if there might not be another reason."

"Yeah."

The house turned out to be a penthouse condominium.  The building had its own security team, also armed, and anyone entering the building for the first time was escorted to where they were going.

"This guy was paranoid," Joe said on their way out of the community.  "Guards to get into the community, guards to get into the building... on-call guards in case someone makes it past all of that..."

"Yeah, but it explains why our perp went for the office.  It was much less secure, thus easier for him to pull off without hurting anyone else."

"So, what does all of this tell us?" Joe asked.

"Not a goddamned thing."

"It tells us one thing," Joe contradicted.

"What's that?"

"We have to let Mr. Tuttle go.  This Dr. Maccarone didn't use McKenzie, Brackman and Chaney."

David just growled.

"What, you still think he had something to do with it?"

"No.  I'm just frustrated."

"I hear that."

"Where the hell have you two been?" McKenna demanded as soon as David and Joe entered the office.

"Working.  What were you doing?" David asked.

"Working on what?" he demanded further.

"Ice cream stick sculptures," David replied nonchalantly.  McKenna looked at him crossly.  "Well, what the fuck do you think a Rimohr was working on, you shithead?  We were working on a case."

"You are not allowed to work on cases," McKenna told Garibaldi, wagging his finger in Joe's face.

"Joe is my training officer.  He is required to view my work in the field from time to time."

"And why is it you seem to have adopted every single case in this office?" McKenna snarled at David.

"Because it's the only way the bad guys get caught, since you seem not to be too terribly concerned with that."

"Your protection from the Academy Commission will only go so far, Intern Stroud."

"I imagine so.  The question is whether my protection from the AC goes further than your protection from the... uh... um... who, exactly, is backing you?"

"I am appointed by the Office of Outlawed Magic.  Ultimately, my boss is the Executive Minister," McKenna said haughtily.

"And does the Executive Minister even know your name?" David asked astutely.  McKenna flushed red.  "That's what I thought.  You do your... uh... 'job', such as it is, and leave the real work to the adults, okay?  In other words, shut up and go away."

"I will break you for that," McKenna snarled, visibly shaking in anger.

"So you keep saying," David replied.  "Your threat is losing a lot of its impact with high repetition, and no follow-through."

McKenna growled loudly and stormed off.  The rest of the room applauded.

"Wish I had the ability to blow him off like that," Joe said.

"You do.  He's obviously just a bureaucrat."

"I need my job," Joe reminded David.  "And I'm not trained to do anything else like you are."

David just shrugged.

"Anyway, let's go over what we have on this case.  No, first, let me call and get Tuttle released."

"Yeah.  Do we compensate him in any way for arresting him?"

"We explain things to his boss... sometimes we will magically forge new memories... depends on how bad we fuck up."

"Okay.  You make your mirror.  I'll pull out the folders for the case.  Again."

"Hey, Tanya," David said brightly as he stepped into her office.

Tanya looked up from her paperwork.  "David, hey!  What brings you back to the old stomping ground?"

"Business, I'm afraid.  I was wondering if you'd happened to see any Clan members lately."

Tanya sat back in her chair and considered for a few seconds.  "No... at least not that I know of.  No one's been causing that level of trouble since the round-up, and we've not seen anyone with Clan tattoos.  Why are you still worried about it?"

"Trying to clean up the last of The Clan, and I need an active member to help me progress."

"Oh, I see.  Well, sorry, can't help you."

"No worries.  Say, your cat show up yet?"

"Not in the way we would have liked," she said with a growl.  "Turns out that Tattered Tom managed to nab another girl's bracelet.  Assuming, of course, that it's the cat in the first place, but the coincidence is pretty hard to deny."

David nodded.  "Any strategy yet for tracking him down?"

"Not really.  We have notices on the bulletin boards, but no one's called in to report him yet.  We'll get him."

"Yeah, but will you get him soon enough?"

"It's never soon enough.  You know that."

"Ain't it the damn truth.  Okay, well, I'll let you get back to that paperwork you looked like you were enjoying so much."

Tanya growled again.

David chuckled and waved at her as he headed out of the office.  He walked across the terrace, heading for the lunch room.  Jailla winged down and landed on his shoulder.

"Anything happening?" David asked.

"All's quiet on the Woodward front," Jailla replied.

David smirked.  "This is one time I'd rather you'd found something.  I'm getting sick of having to wait on that case."

"I thought you were working on the disappearances case."

"I am.  And the Faggioni/Beckel case.  And the necromancer.  And the daubentonian slaver case."

"How can you keep all that straight in your head?"

"Practice," David said.  "It's no worse than trying to keep all the various school subjects straight."

Jailla bobbed his head in acknowledgment.

"Now, c'mon, I'll take you to lunch.  Lydia said she wanted to eat together today."

"Any reason?"

"Not that I know of.  She's my girlfriend....ish.  Besides, anything that keeps Christa at bay is a good thing."

Jailla chuckled softly.

"Vivian, you find out anything about that necromancer down near Cormatsen?"

"She's on vacation in Mirelia.  If you want, we can have her brought in.  After all, no one's auditing the Mirelia offices..."

David smirked.  "No, it can wait for now."

Vivian nodded and returned to her paperwork.

"Chloe, are we anywhere with the slaver case?"

"Bunch of dead ends so far.  Nothing that's helpful."

"Shit."

"That about sums it up."

Joe said, "And nothing on the kidnapper, either."

"Or The Clan.  This is getting very frustrating.  Something tells me my frustration is due mainly to some bastard named McKenna."

"I heard that," McKenna said as he walked by.

"You were supposed to," David retorted.

As McKenna walked away grumbling, Nancy came up to David's desk and handed him a folded slip of parchment.  He nodded to her, and she went back to her office.

Unfolding the note and reading it, David asked, "So, who wants to get out of the office for a few minutes?"

McKenna's head turned.  "What are you talking about, Stroud?"

"Nothing that is any concern of yours.  This is grown-up talk."

"Listen, Intern-" McKenna started, storming over to David's desk.

"Shove it," David replied in a tone of voice that brooked no argument whatsoever.  "If you had any authority whatsoever over me, I would already have been reprimanded for disregarding you as the irrelevance that you are.  Since I haven't been, it means that you can't do shit to me, so shut the fuck up and stay out of my face, or I might do something to you that they will reprimand me for."

As David moved forward, away from his desk, McKenna backed up.  Once there was enough room for David to get past, he said, "Now, I have work to do.  Unlike you, my work is aimed at helping the innocent.  Don't bother me again."  Turning, he asked, "So which one of my myriad supervisory officers is going with me this time?"

"I think you're in such a frame of mind that there should be at least two of us," Joe said.  "But, just to play it safe, Chloe, Vivian and myself will all accompany you."

"Uh-huh," David said, glared over at McKenna, then led them all out of the office.

"There's nothing wrong with my frame of mind," David objected, once they were all in his glidetruck.

"I know that," Joe agreed.  "But it was a good way to get all of us away from fucking McKenna for a while."

"He's going to cause you trouble, you know that, right?" Vivian asked.

"How?  He has no authority over me.  I wasn't bluffing in there.  I have even contacted the Academy Commission to ask if he's filed a complaint.  They told me he did.  When I asked if I needed to do anything about it, they said the matter had already been handled.  Since they 'handled' it without even informing me it existed, I think that says all that needs to be said about how it was dealt with, and how much I need to worry about McKenna.  Now if I could just convince the rest of you how utterly powerless he is..."

"Yeah, the rest of us can't risk it," Chloe said.

David harrumphed, then got the truck moving.

"Holy crap, this house is huge," Chloe said.

"Eh," David replied.

Joe chuckled.  "You haven't seen David's house, have you?" he asked Chloe.

"No, why?"

"Oh, nothing."

Chloe looked at both of them as they shared a look.  David broke the moment when he got out of the truck.

"You cannot park here," someone said.  "This is a carriage way, meant for horses and carriages, not... that... thing."

"You are?" David asked.

"Finias.  The butler."

"That thing is an official vehicle of the Rimohrs.  It serves the same function as a horse-drawn carriage, only faster.  As such, it is where it belongs."

"It is ugly," Finias sniffed.

"So are you, but you don't hear us complaining," David replied.  Finias looked aghast.  "Where is the master of the house?"

"In the parlor.  Aren't you going to move this thing?"

"No.  And I wouldn't recommend you try it, either.  The security system's response could be rather painful."

David and the others headed for the house while Finias looked at the glidetruck in dismay.  Ultimately, he ended up creating the illusion of bushes to hide its presence.  That those bushes were blocking the carriage way didn't seem to bother him nearly as much as the affront of such an unusual vehicle's appearance.

"Since when does your glidetruck have a security system?" Joe asked.

"When I had it enlarged, I had them add a few other features.  No reason not to take advantage of the opportunity."

The four Rimohrs entered the house and found the owner staring morosely at an empty shelf.

"Mr. Crane?"

The man turned around.  "Yes?"

"Rimohrs.  We were told there was a break-in.  What happened, exactly?"

"I don't know.  The only person who was here at the time was Finias, and he was asleep.  I was off at a business meeting, and the maid was shopping."

"The butler and the maid, they are the only two servants?" Joe asked.

"The only two that live in, yes.  I also have a cook, a driver, and a gardener, but none of them live here.  The driver was with me, the cook was off at another job, and the gardener doesn't come on Wednesday, only Monday and Thursday."

"Your cook has a second job?  Does she not make you three meals a day?" Chloe asked.

"No.  She makes breakfast and dinner.  The maid fixes my lunch when I'm home.  It's usually just a sandwich, anyway.  During the day she works at a restaurant."

"We'll need the name of that restaurant, to verify," Joe said.  "And we'll need to talk with the gardener and the maid, as well."

"Of course.  Whatever you think is best."

"Is there any indication of how they got into the house?" David asked.

"None.  But then, the house wasn't secured very tightly.  What with Finias here, there was little need to lock it up completely."

"Right," David said, the sarcasm dripping from his voice.

Mr. Crane blushed, then said, "Yes, well... we've already had a talk about that."

"What was stolen?" Vivian asked.

"Several items.  Two paintings, a vase, one small statuette in marble, some silver candlestick holders, and my cell phone."

"You have a cell phone?" David asked,

"Some of my business dealings are in Earth.  I thought it wise."

"But you didn't have it with you," Vivian pointed out.

"I don't keep it with me when I'm here.  Why would I?  It's almost completely useless without Earth's technical gadgetry."

David nodded.  "Have you made a list of the items?"

"Yes, here.  All the details, as best I can remember them."

"Thank you.  This will help.  Now, do you mind if we look around?"

"Do whatever you need to.  I want my treasures back.  And I need the phone.  Some of what's in there is very important."

"Keeping it locked up would have been advisable, then," David said politely.

"Yes, well... barn door and the horse, you know."

"Right.  Do you have any business rivals who might have wanted what was on the phone?"

"No, I don't think so.  My business isn't that cutthroat, really.  I run an import business in home decor.  My phone contained a list of my contacts, but none of those are really secret.  It also had my appointment calendar, that sort of thing."

"So, nothing that would be of much use to anyone else."

"Exactly."

"Okay.  Thank you for your time, Mr. Crane.  We'll be looking for clues, and we'll let you know if we come up with anything."

"Very good."

A wasted day of looking around the manor, as well as interviewing everyone they could think of, turned up not a single clue that could be identified as relating to the burglary.  Several things in the house seemed unusual, but no one could say with any certainty that they had not been that way before the crime.

"Another frustrating one," Joe said with a sigh as they headed back to headquarters.

"Yeah... and this one either knows what they're doing, or they got very lucky."

"Let's hope for lucky," Vivian offered.

David snorted.  "Does that seem like the way our lives are going right now?" he asked.

At that, the three others snorted.

"David, I need to see you in here," Agent Keef called out.  He was not in his office, however, but in one of the conference rooms.

David put the folder he was working on in a drawer, and stepped over to Keef.  Keef led him into the room and closed the door.

In the room were Joe, McKenna, and the division's secretary.

"What's this?" David asked Keef.

"This is an interrogation," McKenna answered shortly.  "You will-"

"Stow it, McKenna," Keef said.  Turning to David, Keef answered his question.  "A complaint was received this morning claiming that Agent Garibaldi has been soliciting bribes."

David snorted derisively.

"You find this amusing?" McKenna said.

"Let me guess, it was an anonymous tip."

"Yes.  So?"

"The veracity of anonymous tipsters should always be called into question immediately.  They quite frequently have an agenda other than the truth."

"That is not your concern.  Your concern is the issue before us.  You could very well be tarred with the same brush, Intern Stroud," McKenna said.

"Why is he here?" David asked Keef, motioning to McKenna.

"I am the investigating authority," McKenna replied haughtily.

"No, you're not.  You are an administrative auditor.  You have no law enforcement capacity whatsoever.  The agency has a division within its ranks for handling these sorts of things.  Why hasn't the Office of Integrity Assurance been brought in?"

"McKenna wouldn't let me," Keef said.

"I see," David said.  He pulled out his notebook and started taking notes.  "And the reason he gave you, sir?"

"He claimed this fell under the purview of his audit, since it would involve procedure and the way those procedures were followed."

"Mm-hmm," David said, making notes.

"What are you doing?" McKenna demanded.

"Taking down facts for the report I intend to file about your abuse of authority.  You claim to love regulations, McKenna, so why is it you don't feel the need to obey them yourself?  Regulations require the presence of a full-fledged Rimohr for any investigation of officer or agent misconduct where it is alleged that a law has been broken."

"You can't bully me, Stroud.  This is my case."

"No, sir, it's not, because you cannot handle 'cases'.  Your job is audits, not casework.  Now, I will happily answer any concerns about Agent Garibaldi, as soon as both an agent of the OIA, and the Rimohr legal aide, are here."

"Have something to hide, Stroud?  Why do you need legal aide?"

"I don't.  But Agent Garibaldi is entitled to such legal assistance, and furthermore, it is mandated that the legal aide be present in any OIA interrogation.  In other words, you mealy mouthed little shit for brains, it's procedure.  The fact that you are either unaware of this, or willfully ignoring it, makes you either incompetent or corrupt... and in either case, it makes you unqualified for your job.  I will make sure to let your office know that."

Turning to Agent Keef, David said, "Sir, as soon as OIA and the aide have arrived, I will be available for questioning.  I'll remain in the office until they get here, but I do have work to do."

"Carry on, David."

David nodded and returned to his desk.

McKenna said, "He can't talk to me like that.  He's a shitty little intern!"

Keef said, "So call him on it.  Try writing him up on charges.  Challenge his claim that you're not allowed to investigate.  They sent Wilson to Ramius for butting heads with David.  It'll be interesting to see where they send you."

McKenna just glared at him.

"This witness is going to be hostile as all hell," McKenna said as David entered the room.  Now present in addition to the original people were a man and a woman.

"David Stroud, Officer Intern, reporting as ordered, sir," he said to Agent Keef.

The woman walked over to shake David's hand.  "Investigator Lisa Hayes, Office of Integrity Assurance.  This is Rick Hunter, Bolmont District legal aide.  I'm told you insisted we be called in."

"Yes, ma'am.  If a complaint was going to be made against my training officer, I wanted it to be handled properly, not by some fool with an axe to grind."

"I have no axe to-" McKenna started.

"Shut up, McKenna," David said.  "Why are you even in this room?"

"I've allowed him to stay," Investigator Hayes said.  "In the interest of not having to write up a report for him later."

David nodded.  She motioned him to a seat, and he took it.  He asked, "A full-on Investigator?  This case warrants that?"

"No, not really.  But all the Agents in the office are busy on bigger things, so I decided to take this one myself."

David replied, "Fair enough.  Where do we begin?"

"You have worked with Agent Garibaldi for how long?"

"Worked with?  In what capacity?"

"You have had multiple relationships with Agent Garibaldi?"

"Yes.  Of course, right now, I am a trainee.  That has been going on for a little over a year.  Before that, I interacted with Agent Garibaldi as a member of the security force at Woodward Academy.  Before that, I interacted with him as a volunteer investigator at Woodward Academy.  And, of course, before that, he was my control officer during my mandated supervisory period."

"Supervisory period?" Mr. Hunter asked.

"I am a demighost.  I was under judicial supervision during the two years of my training for licensure."

Hunter nodded and made notes.

"So you've known Agent Garibaldi for quite a while."

"Six years."

"Do you have a personal relationship with him?"

"Does being his daughter's godfather count?" David asked with a grin.

"Yes, quite," Investigator Hayes replied with a corresponding smile.  "So he is a friend."

"Yes."

"Would you lie for him?"

"No."

"You expect us to believe that?" McKenna sneered.

"I don't expect you to believe anything that you haven't already decided upon, McKenna.  You lack the ability to reason," David replied.

McKenna glared at him, and clearly wanted to say something, but didn't want to press his luck with Investigator Hayes, who had not been happy about his presence.

Hayes asked, "Do you know of any time where Agent Garibaldi has broken procedure?"

"Of course.  I've not yet met a Rimohr who doesn't break procedure on a weekly basis."

"Do you?" McKenna inquired.

"Daily," David said, leveling his gaze at McKenna.

"In what ways has Garibaldi broken procedure?" Hayes asked.

David shrugged.  "The same as the rest of us.  He doesn't fill out paperwork in a timely fashion.  He often is rude or abrasive to suspects.  He has been aggressive toward prisoners.  He uses word games to confuse suspects into giving more information than they intended."

Hayes nodded.  "And you break these rules, as well?"

"I don't even bother trying to follow them, ma'am."

"Why not?"

"Because doing so is in direct violation of the mission statement of the agency, which is to protect the innocent and punish the guilty."

Hayes nodded, and let that pass.  "Have you ever had chance to note Agent Garibaldi breaking procedure in ways that are actionable beyond a reprimand?"

"Only once."

Joe sat up straighter in his chair.  McKenna looked up in anticipatory delight.  Even Keef looked nervous.

Hayes asked, "When was that?"

"It was the summer between my second and third years of college.  Garibaldi and his partner were investigating one of the professors at Woodward Academy.  He and his partner allowed me to be involved in the case.  This was a flagrant violation of procedure, which could have gotten both of them suspension."

"The outcome of the case?" Investigator Hayes asked.

"The professor was exonerated by the evidence.  Her estranged husband was attempting to frame her in a custody battle."

Hayes nodded.  "You have seen no evidence, then, of Agent Garibaldi soliciting bribes?"

"I've never even seen Agent Garibaldi accept a gratuity.  The man has trouble accepting money from friends, let alone strangers.  No, I have never witnessed him soliciting a bribe.  Furthermore, I do not recall ever being in a situation where he could have been surreptitiously seeking a bribe while in my presence."

"What do you mean by that?" Hunter asked.

"I mean that there have not been situations where Agent Garibaldi has taken someone across the room to be out of my earshot to talk with them, except in cases where we have agreed to do so because we are talking to two suspects separately."

"But a bribe could have been sought out in those occasions?"

"Theoretically, sure," David said.  "But nothing in those situations led me to believe that sort of thing was happening."

"So you would not believe such a claim concerning Agent Garibaldi."

"No.  Did the, ahem, 'tip' point to a specific incident?"

"No, it did not.  It simply said that he was seeking bribes in return for looking the other way."

"Ah.  Well, ma'am, if that's what's being alleged, I can tell you that I take the lead on all cases I'm involved with, as part of my training.  Agent Garibaldi has never once attempted to alter the course of an investigation unduly."

"Define 'unduly'," Hunter requested.

"In investigative work, differences of opinion on what the evidence means is almost a given," David said.  "So yes, he has tried to get me to see his point of view before.  I don't consider that undue influence, that's just him doing his job.  He has always presented credible reasons for his opinion."

"And, in general, your opinion of Agent Garibaldi?"

"As an officer, or as a person?"

"Both," Hayes replied.

"As an officer, I think he does all right.  He's a bit too worried about keeping his job for my tastes, but not everyone has the freedom I do.  As a person, he is a close friend and mentor.  He is trustworthy, honest, and a good person, if often grouchy and a bit too private for his own good sometimes.  I trust him to back me up."

Hayes nodded.  "Very good.  I don't have any further questions for you at this time.  Anyone else?"

None of the others did, though McKenna looked like he did want to say something, but was afraid to.

Hayes said, "Thank you, Officer Stroud.  You can go."

David rose and nodded to everyone, then left the room.

Hayes turned to McKenna.  "I thought you said he was going to be hostile."

McKenna just growled lowly.

"What's going to come out of the thing with Investigator Hayes?" David asked Joe.

"I don't know.  She plans on interviewing the rest of the division tomorrow.  She hasn't turned up anything more damning than your testimony yet."

"My testimony was damning?"

"No one else mentioned me breaking procedure," Joe said.

Zyla looked at David.  "You didn't!"

David shrugged.  "She asked.  It wasn't a serious issue, and it happened like four years ago."  David explained the incident in question.

"Still, you could have 'forgotten' it," Zyla said.

"You're asking me to lie."

Zyla frowned.  "No, I don't want you to do that, but...  I'd like my husband to keep his job."

"If Hayes was going to get him in trouble for that, then she was going to find something to nail him for, anyway.  Actually, and I'm sorry for this, Joe, but I put him more in trouble with McKenna than Hayes."

"How so?" Zyla asked.

Joe said, "McKenna is an auditor.  Procedure is his 'thing'.  Me violating procedure, even four years ago, must have him salivating."

"Until I file my report with the Auditor General," David said.

"What report?" Zyla asked.

"About McKenna.  He's not doing an audit, he's on a witch hunt.  Do you know how far back into the records he's gone so far?"

"How far?" she asked.

"Two years.  I asked around, and a typical audit goes back no further than six months.  Only if they find something to be concerned about do they investigate further, to see if they can determine the depth of an issue."

"So maybe he's found something?" Joe offered.

David shook his head.  "If he had, he'd have filed a report already.  He has to.  If he finds any violations that are, as they say, 'actionable', they have to report it immediately, in case the officer in question needs to be put on desk duty until the issue is resolved."

"Wait, now I'm confused," Joe said.  "I thought you said that McKenna couldn't conduct investigations."

"Audits are completely internal," David explained.  "He's looking at how we did things from the standpoint of did it follow the regulations.  An investigation of wrongdoing can lead to a criminal procedure, which is then external to the agency, and has to be handled by OIA.  An audit can lead to an investigation, but as soon as it does, the auditor becomes a witness, not the investigator."

Joe nodded.

"Do you think McKenna's going to find anything?" Zyla asked with worry.

"No.  His lack of respect for the rules in his own behavior means that he's not looking for real procedural issues, he's looking for 'dirt'.  And as far as I know, the division is clean," David said.

"The real question that's bugging me," Joe said, "Is why did they decide to do the audit?"

"Yeah," David agreed.

"Where are we going?" David asked.  He was walking with Lydia down what was probably called a road, but looked like little more than a path.

"Halloween is the day we honor the dead.  The festival up at the school isn't for the dead, it's for the living.  Oh, sure, the ghosts get to have some fun, and Prof. Edgars has his little shrine, but it's still all about life.  Tonight I wanted us to be together somewhere that really belongs to people like us."

"People like us?"

"You're a demighost.  I'm a vampire.  Where else should we spend Halloween?" she asked, motioning to the gate they had just stopped in front of.

David looked up at it, and he realized that what they were standing in front of was the cemetery.

"You want us to have a date... in there?" he asked a bit nervously.

"You're not afraid of the cemetery, are you?" she asked with a bit of a challenge.  "You know there's nothing in there that can hurt you."

"It's not that... it just seems a bit disrespectful."

"Bah.  C'mon, it'll be fun."

"If you say so," David told her, following her in.  He was glad the gate didn't creak when she opened it.  Harmful or not, being in a cemetery on a windy, moonless Halloween night was creepy as all hell.

The owl which greeted them from a nearby tree didn't help his nerves in the slightest, its hoot sending a chill up his spine.

Lydia led David around several of the graves until she found the one she was looking for.  It was an elaborately carved tomb, resembling a stone casket but more intricately decorated than any casket David had ever seen.  It was also meticulously clean, so unless it was brand new, someone was maintaining it regularly.

Lydia turned to David and drew him to her.  She leaned up and kissed him, her passion rising as their lips danced.

Their kiss was broken as a swarm of bats flew low past them.  David jumped in surprise.

"You need to relax," Lydia told him with a smile.  "Maybe a little music will help."  She raised her hands and quietly murmured, "Cerdorieth ary gwint."

From all around, a soft music arose.  The tune was haunting and eerie.

"Oh, yeah, that'll help," David said with a grin.

Lydia smiled.  "Come on.  This is a vampire tradition."

"Oh?  Well, we wouldn't want you to break your traditions."

Lydia returned her lips to David's.  The two kissed wantonly for long moments as their hands roamed the other's body.  Lydia tugged on David's coat, then pushed it off his shoulders until it tumbled to the ground.  David pulled her blouse free of her pants, then began to undo its buttons, all the while continuing to kiss her.

By the time David finished unbuttoning Lydia's blouse, she had his pants and underwear pushed down off his hips, and was stroking his cock to hardness.  He pushed her blouse off, and then took care of her bra, as well.

Lydia pushed David back slightly, and then she sank to her knees, still holding his cock in her hand.

"Mm, I never get tired of this," she said, and she slipped it into her mouth.  Half of it disappeared before she pulled back, and then started a rhythm, sliding her tongue back and forth as she applied suction to his cock and bobbed her head in a smooth fashion.

David groaned quietly as she blew him, his eyes closed, just enjoying the feel of her mouth on his dick.  He knew it wouldn't take very long for her to bring him off; he could already feel his climax approaching.

After just another minute, David grunted in warning, then blasted a load of cum deep into Lydia's mouth.  She continued to blow him as he shot over and over again.  Finally, when his orgasm had subsided, she stopped long enough to swallow his jism, but then returned to blowing him.  She wanted him fully hard again, and soon.

David's erection returned in just another minute, long before he'd managed to really catch his breath.  Lydia let him loose from her mouth, and rose.  The two smiled at each other for a moment, but then Lydia turned to face away from him.  She bent down over the tomb, and then slipped her pants down, taking her panties with them.  Her pussy was now exposed as she rested her upper body against the cold stone of the tomb.

Knowing exactly what she wanted, David moved in behind her.  He rested his dick in the groove of her ass for a moment, while he ran his hands up and down her sides.  Lydia mewed in pleasure and anticipation.

After a time that went on at least twice as long as Lydia wanted it to, David reached down and positioned his cock at her opening.  Slowly, he rocked his hips forward, sliding himself deep into her in a single easy motion.  Lydia cooed in pleasure, her eyes closed, her hands gripping at the decorations on the tomb.

David took hold of Lydia's hips gently, and he began to rock his hips, slipping his cock in and out of her at an easy pace.  Lydia began to moan in enjoyment, pushing her hips back at him in time with his moves.

For long minutes, the two coupled.  Their moans grew louder, however, and Lydia's heat was rising.  She thrust her hips back into David harder and faster, forcing him to increase his pace.  His moves became more forceful, and his grip on her hips grew tighter.  Finally, Lydia could take no more and she cried out, her hips shuddering as her orgasm overtook her, gripping her in the throes of passion.

David slammed his hips against her one more time and froze, his dick buried to the hilt in her pussy so that it could squeeze and massage him, keeping him nice and hard for the next round.  He knew without a doubt that she wasn't finished yet.

After a minute to catch her breath, Lydia pushed herself up to a standing position, which caused David's cock to slip from within her.  Neither of them was happy about that, but they both knew it would be fixed soon enough.

Lydia turned and faced David, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him passionately.  His tongue invaded her mouth, and the two tongue-wrestled for long moments.

While their tongues were occupied, Lydia used her feet to push herself up onto the tomb, where she sat down, pulling David forward to keep him pressed against her.  She wrapped her legs around his waist, giving him complete access to her cunt.

Lydia broke their kiss and said, "Come on and fuck me again, you undead stud."

David grinned at her, and then reached down and positioned his cock head at her opening again.

"And don't go gentle this time," she told him.  "I want to be fucked."

"Your wish is my command," David told her, thrusting his hips forward and jabbing his dick into her all the way, his hips slamming against her.

Lydia screamed in pleasure.  "Oh, yes, fuck me!" she cried out, her arms and legs tightening around him so that he could not get away.

David obliged his lover, thrusting into her as hard and as fast as he could, his balls slapping against her with each plunge.  Lydia rolled and bucked her hips, driving him deeper into her.

The two coupled frenetically, their passions pushing higher and higher as they fucked.  As Lydia approached her peak, she hissed in a way that David rarely heard.  It was her vampiric hiss.  He looked and saw that her eyes had that somewhat manic look of vampires, and her fangs had emerged more fully.

In another second, Lydia lunged into David and sank her fangs into his neck.

"AAAGH!" David screamed, but he didn't stop fucking her.  The pain wasn't intense; it was the surprise that had gotten him.

Lydia, on the other hand, began to thrust herself onto David's cock with renewed vigor, moving faster and harder than he'd known she was capable of.  As her teeth remained locked on his neck, her pussy thrashed up and down on his rod, until finally she plunged down all the way onto him and froze, a muffled scream erupting from her mouth as her cunt juices poured down over his cock and balls.

For a long moment, David just stood there, holding Lydia and waiting for her to calm down.  Finally, she did, and released him.  Her eyes were back to normal, her fangs had retreated so that they were once again barely noticeable, and her manner was less crazed.  She was also panting like a race horse.

"What the fuck was that about?" David wanted to know.

"Like I said," she gasped.  "Vampire tradition."

"What kind of tradition?" David asked.

"Well, that depends on how seriously you want to take it.  If we talk about when the tradition started, we're married now."

David jolted at that.  "Um... don't you think I should have something to say about that?"

Lydia looked at him with a smile.  "Oh, don't worry.  Nowadays, it's just used to express commitment to each other.  Really, I just wanted to do it on this tomb."

"Why this tomb?"

Lydia just pointed to the name plate, which read "Gwen Corbray, loving wife of Mychel.  Like all love, she passed too soon and too suddenly."

"We just had sex on the grave of Mychel's dead wife?" David asked incredulously.

"I can't stand him.  I figured this was about as disrespectful as I could be and get away with it."

"If he finds out, he's going to be furious at both of us!"

Lydia uttered a dismissive noise.  "There's nothing he can do to you."

"But he could hurt you," David said.

"He wouldn't.  It'd make him look bad to the family.  He'd just banish me.  And I don't care about that, because I want out of his family, anyway."

"Uh-huh.  And you said this is a commitment ritual?  I thought you didn't want a long-term relationship."

"A girl's entitled to change her mind, isn't she?" Lydia asked with a pout.  After a second, she said, "We can't be together permanently.  It doesn't work.  That doesn't mean we can't get together every couple hundred years for a ten or fifteen year stretch..."

"Hmm," David replied.  It was an option he'd not considered.

"Anyway, I think I owe you something," she said, looking down at his still hard dick.

"Well, I wasn't going to complain, but..." he said with a grin.

Lydia was quickly sinking to her knees.