12 Days of Fiction 2017: Day 6.

Private Eye Work

Elianora Kellerhouse and Mirilla Finken lived (or lived and died? Which tense do you use for a situation like theirs now, when one was dead and one was alive, hoping, I’m sure, she wasn’t?) in what I could only describe as a fine neighbourhood. An apartment eco-building, complete with its own recycling facilities in the basement, I was sure.

“Becca, I must insist,” Maren said.

“Maren, I feel I need to do this.”

“Oh, that oracle training of yours,” she said.

“Maybe. I’m not really sure. My gut says so.” And, truth be told, I couldn’t tell whether it was the oracle, the detective or the magic wielder speaking. Possibly a bit of each one. “And Neodyne isn’t going to disappear as if by magic, is it?”

“Ha, very funny.”

“Look, Maren, let’s do this, then we recapitulate and see where we are with the Neodyne affair. We’ll even check with Mignon if you want to. But now, please…”

“Okay, okay…”

Maren worked her own kind of magic, with me staring through my goggles at her working the passwords, and within seconds the gate opened. Large side mirrors saluted infinite versions of me to left and right. I shivered. I didn’t like that at all. Perhaps I should have worn camouflage. The technological kind would have sufficed for this. It was too late now.

“Left lift,” Maren said. The indicator lights were already showing the car going down. A woman carrying a shopping bag walked out of the lift and stared at me. I nodded, brushed past her and let Maren kick the lift up. I smiled mischievously to myself: I knew how unsettling my goggles could be.

The lift stopped on the seventh floor.

“712,” Maren said. I saw she was already calling up the building plans from public databases, and concentrating on this floor. That was my Maren.

I tried the door, but it was locked. Good. Either Mirilla hadn’t been so shocked or she had had help. Possibly the ambulance people she had surely called, or the cops.

“Want me to try it?” Maren said.

“I’ll do it. They were wielders after all.”

I searched my grimoire and called in the spell I needed. I saw the lines on the palms of my hands begin to glow, then expand until my whole hands were bright orange. I took out my set of picks, and started working on the lock. I let the magic in my hands guide me to find the guarding spell I was expecting. And sure enough, there it was. A quick sweep of my own spell dismantled it. The rest was physical lock picking.

The door unlocked with a click. I got in and closed it behind me. I switched on the lights.

“This is nice,” Maren said.

I had to agree. The Finken family had money, but from what I knew from Mirilla and Elianora, they had worked hard themselves for this. Their apartment had two floors: a straight staircase to my left led up to the, I imagined, bedrooms. The living quarters were down here: I was standing in a wide space that, I guessed, served as living room, and dining room. What I judged to be a damned fine kitchen took a full corner, island and everything.

“Full scan, Maren, please.”

“On it.”

Immediately the overturned rug called my attention. I leaned down and touched it, letting my mind wander…

Elianora must have been lying here after she had had her stroke. I looked up to the door. I visualized Mirilla coming home, finding her here. Dropping everything, falling down to her knees, checking Elianora’s pulse. Telling her AI to call an ambulance, even though she couldn’t feel her breathing.

Shit.

“Becca! Someone has called the police right now! To this apartment!”

“The neighbour from the lift,” I said. “We have no time to lose.”

I would have liked to do a thorough, traditional search, but that wasn’t possible. I checked my grimoire’s database again, and activated a quest spell. Blue runes burned in my forefront and slid down towards my eyes, then sideways to my ears. I decided to run a risk, and called in a retardator spell: red snake-like lines slithered over my forearms, and then time slowed.

“Becca!”

“I know what I’m doing,” I said. Yes, I did exactly know. I planted myself in the middle of the room, and extended my arms. The blue quest runes flowed down my neck to the tips of my fingers, and spilled out.

Seconds ticked…

Slowly…

“Becca…” Maren’s voice came from far away…

Reality came rushing back, leaving a feeling of momentary nausea and then, emptiness. And of course, weakness.

Damn. Damn. Nothing. Elianora’s grimoire wasn’t here.

“Let’s go,” I said, panting.

Too late. The door slammed open. Two police officers pointed their guns at me.