The Prophecy (Saga of the Chosen Book 1)

by Petra Landon

  “You are welcome to look through the reports of our investigation any time, Guardian LaRue, but I’m afraid that we cannot extend that courtesy to the Shape-shifters. Those reports contain confidential information” the Registrar said firmly.

  “This team has the stamp of approval from the First Wizard herself” Jason reminded the Registrar smoothly.

  “I respect that. We at the Chicago Registry hold the First Wizard in the highest regard. But these are uncertain times. And there has been a spike of interest in the old investigation. Given that, we have to be careful who we allow to see our confidential reports.”

  The Registrar directed a fleeting glance at the Alpha who sat silent and implacable beside the Guardian, his face carefully devoid of all expression.

  “The explosion killed a lot of wizards from this Registry. The investigation that followed destroyed even more lives. It impugned the reputations of our friends and colleagues here as fingers were pointed at security lapses. Whispers of collaborators abounded and for years, those few who survived the explosion were looked at askance by their colleagues who wondered whether they had helped to smuggle the bomb in. After the conclusion of the investigation, we were determined to move on – to finally turn the chapter and leave all that behind. Your request to allow the Shape-shifter to see confidential details of the investigation will re-open old wounds. Those wounds are very old now and should be allowed to remain closed, Guardian” he said with great dignity.

  Jason sighed wearily. He was not authorized to share the news of Lady Bethesda’s miraculous survival from that explosion with the local wizards here in Chicago. And he did sympathize with the Registrar’s position on the issue. Most Wizard Registries were tight knit communities. He could empathize with the hell this particular one had gone through all those years ago. The head of the Registry had every right to fight hard to not damage the amity that the community here had managed to build up painstakingly again after so much loss and heartache. Especially not for a twenty-four years old investigation that was dead and buried as far as the Registrar was concerned. Unless there was a good reason to re-open the old investigation which Jason could not provide them with.

  “I understand your concerns, Registrar” Jason made one more attempt. “Would it help if I told you that there’s a specific reason why we want to take a look at the old reports. Some new evidence about the explosion has come to light that the First Wizard wants to ensure had been taken into account during the original Registry investigation. The First Wizard respects the right of local Registries to handle their own affairs and is confident that the aftermath of the unfortunate events twenty-four years ago was handled as it should’ve been.”

  The Registrar inclined his head at the compliment from the Guardian.

  “Thank you. Please convey my regards to the First Wizard in appreciation for her kind words. If you can share with me what you’re looking for, I’ll have my people brief your team about our investigation.”

  “I’m sorry, Registrar. I’m not authorized to discuss the new developments with anyone yet. I hope you understand that I cannot do so without the direct authority of the First Wizard or the GCW” Jason responded, a hint of apology in his voice. As far as he was concerned, the Registrar was well within his rights to ask this question before he spilled confidential information about the Registry and wizard business to outsiders like the Shifters.

  “I see” the Registrar remarked thoughtfully. “In that case, I hope you understand why I can allow only you access to our report, Guardian. I’m a little puzzled about why the Wyrs are even involved in this matter” he said evenly, a mild query in his voice.

  “Fair enough” the Alpha interjected mildly, speaking up for the first time. “I can appreciate the Registrar’s concerns. I’m not a wizard and frankly, I don’t give a damn about your politics. I’m here because of Faoladh. It would be nice if my report to him consisted of more than the statement that the local Registry denied us access to information that your First Wizard has assured Faoladh my team will have access to.”

  The Registrar looked taken aback by the Alpha’s blunt words. In the world of wizard politics, polite skirmishes were the order of the day, not such blunt rejoinders.

  “I cannot give you access to the investigation, Alpha” the Registrar reiterated. “However if there’s some other way the Registry can be of assistance?” he left the query open.

  It had been clear to Raoul since stepping foot in the Registry that the wizards were not going to budge on the investigation. There was no way they would give Shifters access to their old records. He’d have to trust the Guardian to brief them later about the findings of the Registry investigation. It was high time the wizards did some digging of their own anyway. Raoul reminded himself that the First Wizard, who had the most to lose from this particular investigation, had handpicked this Guardian, so Jason LaRue might just come through for the team he was now a part of.

  “I’d like to visit the site where the explosion was set off. I’m sure your investigation was able to establish that without doubt” the Alpha said, his eyebrow arched in mildly sarcastic query.

  “That should be possible” the Registrar said after a moment of hesitation when the entire room seemed to hang on his response. “Will it just be you, Alpha?”

  “And one member of my team” Raoul said firmly “You can have as many wizard chaperones as you want accompany us.”

  Jason, who’d pricked his ears at the Alpha’s request, had a sudden inkling which member of his team the Alpha wanted to accompany him. He decided to make it easy for the Alpha. A little penance for the fact that he had been unsuccessful in getting the Alpha’s team access to the reports from the Registry investigation despite the First Wizard’s assurances.

  “We have two wizards on this team, apart from me. If you have no objections, perhaps they could accompany the Alpha and his Shifter while I look over the reports” the Guardian interjected smoothly.

  Jason could sense Merceau’s surprise as well as suspicion at his suggestion. This way, the Alpha could take along one more member in addition to Tasia. Jason guessed that Merceau would pick Duncan. It would also serve to keep Sienna under the observant eyes of the Alpha and Duncan. While he was otherwise engaged, Jason did not intend to leave Sienna unguarded amongst the wizards here. He’d rather the two Shifters keep an eye on Sienna than the wizards at the Registry.

  “All right” the Registrar agreed.

  He murmured a few words to two wizards beside him.

  “Please follow me” said the older male wizard. “I will escort you to the basement where the bomb was planted.”

  Duncan, Tasia and Sienna stood up while the Alpha exchanged a fleeting glance with Luis.

  “Watch over Sienna” the Guardian whispered softly into his ear as the Alpha stood up.

  “We will” he assured Jason.

  The four accompanied the male wizard and his companion down a flight of stairs into the basement. A contingent of four wizards followed them at a safe distance. The basement was enormous and dimly lit. The electrical and water mains for the building were accessed through here. One end was jam packed with storage boxes. The rest was mostly empty with a few odds and ends scattered around. Their escorts unerringly led them to a small closed off room at one end of the basement before gesturing at it.

  “This is where our investigation determined that the bomb had been planted.”

  “Is there any other way in?” Duncan asked.

  “Only the way I brought you.”

  “No other exits or windows perhaps?”

  “No” the wizard shook his head, brief and to the point.

  Tasia walked the perimeter of the basement with Sienna, always aware of the watchful Duncan who kept an eye on both women. Their wizard escorts milled around, observing their peregrinations with avid albeit silent curiosity. After about twenty minutes of poking around the dusty and musty place, the Alpha professed himself satisfied. They followed their wizard escorts up
the same way and into the conference hall where the rest of their party, bored to tears, awaited them. There was no sign of the Registrar or the Guardian although the room was still full of wizards who watched them like hawks.

  The Alpha turned to Duncan.

  “Take a team with you and walk the perimeter of the blast – in case, something interesting strikes you” he said easily.

  Duncan gestured at Luis, Hawk and Tasia to accompany him. As the four walked out of the hall, followed by their wizard escorts, Sienna turned impulsively to the Alpha.

  “I guess I’m to stay here to run this gamut” she said softly, gesturing discreetly at their curious wizard audience.

  “Yes, unfortunately” the Alpha acknowledged, not without sympathy. The Guardian seemed wary of Sienna’s safety and he’d given his word to the wizard that he would look out for his charge. So, Sienna was to stay in here with him.

  Chapter 17

  An unlikely, shaky and tentative alliance is born

  “Yes” Sienna confirmed slowly, her eyes on the photograph in her hand. “This is the same man I saw all those years ago in our house.”

  “You’re sure, Sienna?” Jason asked.

  “I’m sure” she affirmed confidently. “It helps that he doesn’t look a day older from twenty-four years ago.”

  “A benefit of being a leech, as our Shifter friends would say” Jason quipped much to Sienna’s amusement.

  The team was closeted in the tiny sound-proofed room for a confidential discussion. Dinner had been a quick affair, hastily put together from the supplies that Elisabetta and Luis had stocked up this afternoon. After that, everyone had trooped up the stairs by unspoken consent to discuss the day’s work in their temporary Pack Room.

  “Anything of interest in the Registry report?” the Alpha directed his query at Jason.

  “Well, they gave me a massive folder stacked with reams of paper detailing reports from various inquiries that formed the Registry investigation” Jason shrugged. “I will say that they did as thorough a job as they possibly could, given that most of the evidence and a majority of the witnesses had fallen victim to the explosion.” Jason leant back comfortably in his chair, attempting to precisely summarize his findings from the Registry investigation, mindful of the fact that he was likely to be the only member of this team to have access to these reports. “I tried to peruse the results pertinent and of interest to our investigation. The Registrar has invited me back tomorrow to take another look at their files. I plan to take him up on his offer if we determine a second look at their reports might benefit us.”

  The Alpha nodded his assent, responding to the inquiring look from Jason.

  “First the bomb itself” Jason continued. “Both the GCW and Registry investigations came to the same conclusion – that the explosion was set off inside the Registry building. The Registry report also inferred that the bomb was smuggled in by one or more wizards who worked at the Registry.”

  “What about the bomb itself?” Owen O’Brien inquired. “Anything special there that might give us additional leads.”

  “No” Jason shook his head decisively. “Your standard piece of explosive, set off by remote detonation and with enough power to take out a few blocks around the epicenter. Nothing fancy and no sophistication involved in choosing the explosives, design or detonator. Hence absolutely no way to trace it.”

  “How was it smuggled into the building?” Elisabetta interjected. “Was any magic deployed to hide it?”

  “I doubt it. Someone smuggled it in, probably in a box that he placed in the basement, ostensibly for storage. No one would’ve questioned that. There was no reason to suspect that someone might plant a bomb in the Registry. In the entirety of wizard history, nothing of this kind had ever happened before in a local Registry.”

  “Did the Registry have any security?” Luis asked.

  “Most Registries, especially in the bigger cities, have ramped up their security since the explosion. Back then, the Chicago Registry, like other Registries, had minimal security. To go by their report, they had one security guard at night patrolling the building and twenty-four-hour security camera coverage at the entrance.”

  “Were they able to retrieve the camera footage for that day or was it also destroyed by the explosion?”

  “They were unable to recover the footage for the day of the explosion. However, there was something rather interesting in the security log for the week. The routine then was to change the tape in the camera every morning. A member of the staff would then give it a once over to record the previous day’s entry in a security log. Every Friday afternoon, the Registrar would be provided with the security log entries for the week as part of his weekly status from various departments. The Friday of the explosion, the Registrar had received and already signed off on the security logs for the week. There had been no suspicious activity for either Thursday evening or the days before that. No alarms were raised. That’s why their investigation concluded that the bomb was smuggled in during the day, not the evening which would, at the least, have caused comment. Very likely, it was brought in Friday morning before the explosion ripped through at four in the afternoon. Friday morning seems logical – less likely for it to be discovered by anyone. There isn’t a lot of traffic into the basement, but it isn’t that unusual for wizards to head down there during the day. All Registry records, archives and a lot of their equipment is stored in the basement.”

  “Friday morning means that whoever smuggled the bomb in had plenty of time to be safely away before it went off” Duncan remarked.

  “Precisely” Jason acknowledged. “The bomb went off late on a Friday afternoon before the start of a long weekend when the Registry was functioning with minimal staff. Everyone who could leave early was already gone. It helped keep their casualties low.”

  “So well planned in that sense, if you will” Duncan added quietly.

  “Very well planned” agreed the Guardian somberly.

  “Who picked the Chicago Registry as the venue for Lady Bethesda’s questioning and potential surrender to the Guardians?” the Alpha asked the question.

  “I don’t believe that aspect was covered by the Registry investigation” Jason responded.

  “Are you saying that you don’t know who made the decision, Guardian?” the Alpha inquired, his tone even.

  “Nope” Jason retorted mildly. “Just that it was not a part of the local investigation. I do know the answer to your question because the GCW investigation covered it.”

  He glanced around the room, meeting the eyes of the Shifters and wizards gathered there squarely.

  “What I say now is confidential GCW information designated strictly need-to-know. The First Wizard has directed me to provide Raoul Merceau’s team with any information that he needs from the GCW investigation - that is good enough for me. However, I must ask that this information not leave this room” the unusual soberness from the usually laidback Guardian was a sign of how seriously he took this matter.

  “My Shifters will not discuss anything you disclose to us with anyone not on this team” the Alpha assured the Guardian.

  “Fair enough” Jason said. “Twenty-four years ago, when the allegations against Lady Bethesda piled up until they could no longer be ignored, a decision was finally made to question her. It was not to be a formal questioning, just an informal chat. At that point, it was still a lot of supposition without any real evidence against her even though the allegations had been steadily piling up from multiple sources. Word was sent to her through friendly channels that the powers that be at the GCW would like her to come in voluntarily for an informal chat at the newly created Wizard Headquarters in San Diego. She responded that she was amenable to a chat but insisted that it happen at the local Registry in Chicago where she was currently residing. The GCW, of which she was an influential member, strongly believed that she was innocent of the allegations and should therefore be allowed to choose the venue for this meeting. A local Registry was
acknowledged to be a reasonable compromise. It was felt that it would be humiliating for an eminent Guardian presumed innocent to be summoned to Wizard Headquarters for questioning. The First Wizard, on the recommendation of the GCW, agreed to send a team to Chicago to talk to Lady Bethesda.”

  “Why send a ten strong Guardian delegation for an informal chat with a wizard, no matter how powerful she is. A bit of overkill, it seems to me” Elisabetta remarked.

  “Oh, that was by no means Lady Bethesda’s only demand. By the time the date of the meeting was agreed upon, there was a growing realization within the GCW that she had no intentions of co-operating with anyone sent in to question her. The Guardians still believed in her innocence but they’d started to realize that her intentions regarding this meeting were a tad more complicated than providing a simple explanation to put to rest the allegations against her. Lady Bethesda insisted that she be questioned at the Chicago Registry by the First Wizard herself. As you can imagine, that set off all sorts of alarm bells at the GCW, even amongst those who believed in Lady Bethesda’s innocence. The office of First Wizard was barely a year old at that time and the Guardians knew that this would set a precedent that would undermine the office itself before it’d even had a chance to get off the ground. It was also felt that Lady Bethesda, by making this demand, was attempting to lend credence to what a substantial segment of the wizard population believed - that this hounding of Lady Bethesda was a result of a personal vendetta by the First Wizard to even personal scores. So the GCW rejected this particular demand of Lady Bethesda, instead dispatching two Guardians to get some answers out of her. Eight additional Guardians were sent along in case Lady Bethesda did not show up at the Registry voluntarily or refused to co-operate once there. The extra contingent of Guardians was more of a show of intent directed at Lady Bethesda. Some of the more influential and respected Guardians of that time were included on that team as a message to Lady Bethesda that despite the personal opinions of individual Guardians, the GCW was determined to act as one unit in this endeavor and stand together with the First Wizard.”