Witch on the Case: La Fay Chronicles 3

by Carter, Mina

  “Mind bleach!” the cat warbled, clapping his paws over his ears. “Lalalalalalala!”

  Oberon snickered and nodded toward the strands of hair Daffi pulled free from the case lock. “From our killer?”

  She nodded. “I’m assuming so.”

  She held the strands out to him and then froze as it hit her. “Shit. They’re not real. They’re from a wig.”

  She groaned as he took them from her, studying them. If the strands weren’t real, a location spell wouldn’t lead them to the killer like she’d hoped. Another groan escaped her as she scrubbed at her face with her hands. This was… crap, they had nothing.

  He smiled slowly as he rubbed them between his fingers. “This is excellent news!”

  She looked through her fingers at him. “Have you lost your moons-damned mind? It’s a wig. We can’t identify the killer!”

  He took a step toward her, crowding her against a cabinet.

  “Yeah… but we can track where it is? We might get lucky and it’s somewhere we can identify the killer. And we can prove the killer wasn’t really white-haired now. Can’t we?” he murmured, lips quirking as he lifted a strand of her bubblegum pink hair. “Which is somewhat pertinent. Isn’t it, my love?”

  Her eyes widened. He knew. He knew her hair was white.

  “Not many mortal witches have white hair,” he said in a low voice. “I can’t wait to see it in it’s true glory, without this… artifice muddying its true magnificence. I will have a crown made specially for you to match its beauty.”

  Her breathing hitched, her feminine instincts dragging all common sense down a dark alley and hitting it over the head. She softened against him, her lips lifted for a kiss.

  “Oh, for crone’s sake. Can you two keep your hands off each other for a moment or do I have to do everything myself?” Garlick hissed, jumping up onto the display case next to them. The carnivorous zombie butterflies inside fluttered madly on their pins as the case was rocked slightly.

  “Yes… right,” she managed, sliding from Oberon’s embrace. “Right, let’s see where these hairs lead us.”

  She held out her hand for the strands, holding them in her palm as she chanted,

  “Maiden’s patience and mother’s might,

  Lend me your eyes, lend me your sight,

  Track these hairs to their fellows,

  Their location revealed, for us to follows.”

  If Garlick had had eyebrows he would have raised one.

  “You try making up rhymes off the top of your head,” she hissed to him as her magic curled around the strands, lifting them in the air. They formed an arrow above her palm. No… more like the needle of a compass. She grinned as they pointed to the door.

  “Come on, boys. Looks like the game has begun.”

  “That’s it! Just a little more. To the left!” Garlick called out, suspended about twenty feet above Daffi and Oberon’s heads in a spell bubble. The location spell on the strands from the wig had led them to the side alley just around the corner from the hotel’s main entrance.

  “Yes, yes! I can see something. Get me closer!” the cat called out in excitement as he floated nearer to a grotesque on one of the ledges. Grotesques and gargoyles were often confused for each other since they both appeared to be architectural statues. But grotesques were just that, statues, as many a building cleaner had discovered when they’d tried to power wash down a frontage and been faced with a pissed off gargoyle covered in soap suds.

  “I got it! The wig’s up here!” Garlick called down, reaching out to grab something wedged between the statue and the wall.

  “Should have just had me fly up there,” Oberon sulked by the wall. “It’s not like I don’t have the equipment.”

  She spared him a look as she held Garlick’s spell bubble in place. “We can’t risk anyone seeing you. You don’t have a visa. Remember?”

  He shot her a look, and for a moment she saw the hard-edged fairy king of legend. “I am king. I do not need useless bits of paper.”

  Moon save her from men and their egos. “You do if you want to stay and not cause a diplomatic incident.”

  Oberon folded his arms and she almost whimpered. She really should have thought about it before putting him in a t-shirt with those muscled forearms on display. Arm porn or what? If she wasn’t careful, she’d end up licking a bicep or something.

  “What about the boggle?” he demanded. “Did he have one of these visas? If he did, then I, as his king, should also be granted that honor.”

  She sighed and considered dropping Garlick on him. It would serve them both. She still hadn’t forgiven the cat for allowing himself to be blackmailed. With takeout.

  “It doesn’t work like that,” she explained with the patience of a saint. She’d given serious consideration to that. Like, where did they get that sort of patience… was it something they were born with, or something they trained for? Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s some spurious honor granted by an ecclesiastical institution kind of thing?

  “Besides,” she added. “Jack was born here, so he didn’t need a visa.”

  “Will you two argue when I have all four paws safely on the ground please?” Garlick mumbled around a mouthful of dirty wig as he emerged from behind the statue.

  “Right! Of course!” Daffi said, waving her hands to bring him back down to ground level.

  Luckily, this alley wasn’t often used by norms, so she hadn’t had to cast a concealment spell. A flash of a white shawl... She shook her head to dislodge the memory assaulting her as she brought Garlick safely back down to ground level. He might have been an utter pain in the ass, but he was her utter pain in the ass. She wouldn’t ever see him harmed.

  The orb turned upside down, making him squeak with surprise and then outrage. She smothered her snigger. She wouldn’t ever see him come to harm, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t ruffle his fur a little every now and then. Because he had absolutely no qualms about putting claws in her legs to get her attention. Turnabout was fair play.

  “Heads up,” Oberon murmured, nodding toward the entrance to the alley.

  Whipsnide stalked their way, black cape flapping behind her and giving her the appearance of a large and ungainly bat. Sergeant Abberline walked behind her.

  Daffi sighed as she righted Garlick just before he reached the ground. As soon as he did, the bubble surrounding him burst with a pop.

  “There he is,” she shrieked like a banshee, threatening the structural integrity of the nearest windows, and stabbed a finger at Oberon.

  “Unregistered fae,” she hissed. “He’s dangerous, I tell you, dangerous!”

  “What the moon are you going on about?” Daffi asked, ignoring the cold feeling in the pit of her stomach. “Ron is a natural born fae, registered in Charnwood, in the Midlands.”

  The lie slid easily off her tongue, but sweat slithered down her spine. They couldn’t arrest Oberon. She was too close to cracking the case and she needed him.

  She nudged Garlick with her foot. If he could get them all on the MPI register, she was sure he could manage some papers for Oberon. Somehow. A little chirp at ankle height told her the message had been received and understood.

  “He’s fae!” Whippy shrieked again. If she’d been wearing pearls, she would’ve clutched them.

  “He came through with the dragon. A high court fae,” she added, giving Abberline a pointed look. “They hate the lower classes of fae with a passion. There’s your killer of the little boggle. You mark my words!”

  “What?” Oberon’s expression of surprise was almost comical. Then he laughed. “I didn’t kill the boggle. Why would I? I only met him once.”

  “Hatred does not need familiarity,” Whipsnide snapped. “You are high court and he was lesser fae. You killed him because of it.”

  Oberon folded his thickly corded arms over his massive chest. “I did not kill the boggle. And even if I had, I would not have used a cold-iron blade to do it.”

  “See?”
This time Whipsnide’s shriek was high enough to send the pigeons on the nearby buildings into the air. “He even knows what murder weapon was used! He’s the killer!”

  “He was at the murder scene with the body, Sergeant,” Daffi pointed out. “You yourself stated it was a different murder weapon to that used on… the first victim.”

  “Poor Sybil, moon rest her soul,” Whipsnide wailed.

  “Different weapon, yes,” Abberline replied. “But your fae here told us it was a cold-iron blade. Forensics have yet to confirm that.”

  “He knows because he killed the boggle!”

  No one was listening to Whipsnide’s dramatics anymore as Daffi’s gaze locked with the sergeant’s.

  “Why would he kill with a cold-iron blade, though?” she pressed Abberline.

  “They’re just as fatal to him and painful to hold. Am I right?” she directed to Oberon, who nodded.

  “Like ice and cold fire.”

  “To put us off the scent!” Whipsnide pushed forward to insist. “Sergeant, I demand you arrest this… this fae!”

  Abberline shot her a stern look. “Ms. Whipsnide, may I remind you that I am in charge of this investigation. I take orders from my superiors, not a private citizen.”

  Daffi smothered her grin as Whippy backpedaled so quickly she practically fell over her own ass.

  “Yes, of course, sergeant,” she murmured, folding her hands in front of her waist. “You must do as you see fit.”

  “Indeed.” Abberline looked at Oberon sternly. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask that you come with me, sir. I’m arresting you on the suspicion of the murder of Jack the Kipper.”

  13

  “I don’t like leaving him here,” Daffi muttered to Garlick as the pair left the City Watch House. Based in Whitechapel it had occupied the same site since before the police force itself had even been thought of. Around the corner from the norms’ police station, the two were rarely mistaken for each other.

  They passed by the main desk where a watchwoman was in conversation with a member of the public, a norm who had wandered in.

  “So you can’t repair this?” he asked, holding out a wrist watch.

  “No, sir,” she replied in the tones of someone who had heard that question and all its variants. “We are not horologists.”

  He frowned. “But the sign says this is a watch shop?”

  “Not that kind of watch, sir.”

  “So you can’t fix my watch? It only needs a new battery.”

  “No sir, try the cobblers next door.”

  The old man huffed and turned to storm off, almost trampling Garlick in the process. Daffi snatched him up so he didn’t get hurt.

  “Young ’uns!” he huffed, obviously in a snit because his watch couldn’t be repaired even though he’d walked into the wrong establishment. “Should respect their elders!”

  “Absolutely!” the cat agreed. “It’s a disgrace.”

  “Indeed,” the elderly norm replied, his eyes crossing and a look of confusion on his face as he experienced the confusion most norms did when they found themselves conversing with a familiar.

  “Behave,” she hissed to the cat as they walked out after the very confused norm. “You know you’re not allowed to confuse them that way.”

  He snorted and allowed her to carry him. It was easier here, so he didn’t get trodden on by someone in the crowds.

  “You do realize that grotesque was under Whippy’s window?” he asked suddenly.

  “No. I didn’t.” She blinked. In the confusion and drama of Oberon’s arrest, she’d not thought about exactly where they were. But the cat was right. The windows there were west facing, which was the side where all the offices were on the second floor. “Crone’s tits… she could have just dropped the wig out of the window!”

  “And there were cake wrappers back there as well,” Garlick informed her.

  She sighed and closed her eyes for a second. The missing afternoon tea was such an insignificant detail in the grand scheme of things, but it had niggled at her like a scab. She’d just had to pick it at. But Whippy had been adamant it had been just her that afternoon, showing her the single cake wrapper in her office rubbish bin.

  “So… Whippy was the last person to see Sybil alive,” she breathed. “She threw the wrappers out of the window and then got rid of the wig the same way… Jack saw her at the original murder scene so she killed him off as well…”

  She blinked and looked at Garlick. “She’s our murderer… but why?”

  “They will be reviled and persecuted through time.” She shook away the voice in her head and focused on Garlick.

  The cat opened his mouth to answer. “I—”

  “Fireball!”

  At the bellowed warning, Daffi flung herself to the side, wrapping herself around Garlick to protect him. The air on the street went still, and then… Whhhummmpphhh!

  She tucked her head in, a small scream startled from her lips as heat ripped across her back. She got it together enough to mutter,

  “Mother’s strength and crone’s might,

  Hide us from this spells sight,

  By your grace, protect us now,

  The caster I will find, this I vow.”

  Blessed cool washed over her back, creating a small bubble of ice against the enchanted heat of the spell. It roared around them like a dragon’s fury, until, abruptly, it cut off.

  Long seconds passed until Garlick, his face stuffed against her boobs, wriggled. “Can’t… can’t breathe…”

  She let him go, suddenly aware of people around her. Abberline’s concerned face came into view.

  “Miss? Miss McGee, are you okay?”

  She pushed upright, anger ripping through her. “For saying someone just tried to kill me outside the damn watch house, I’d say I’m doing just fine, thank you very much, Sergeant!”

  Her eyes narrowed as she looked around the street. Already watchmen and women were out here, helping confused norms and telling the tale of an underground gas explosion.

  Someone had just tried to kill her. In public. In front of norms.

  This wasn’t just a murder investigation now.

  Now, it was personal.

  She turned to Abberline. “I know who the killer is. We just have to catch them. And I have a plan to do just that…”

  14

  “I don’t like this,” Oberon grumbled in her ear. “My Queen should not be used as bait.”

  Daffi smiled at his protective protest, ducking her head and pressing her earring, currently be-spelled for communications, as she answered.

  “It has to be me,” she murmured, keeping her head down so anyone watching wouldn’t see her talking. “Sorry, handsome, but even if we put you in a dress, you still wouldn’t cut it. The killer is after me.”

  “Ugh, Sparkles in a dress. Are you trying to give me nightmares?” Garlick groused. Like Oberon, who had been released for this operation, and Abberline, he was concealed along the route she was taking to walk home. She’d made a big show of saying goodbye near the watch house, the boys loudly stating their intention to go watch the latest action film, and then made her way home. Alone. Apparently.

  In reality, her boys had joined Abberline and his men along her route—concealed and ready to pounce once the killer made a move.

  Taking a deep breath, she continued walking. All her survival instincts and hell, simple common sense, yelled at her that walking down the middle of an empty street in the dark was not just a bad idea. It was a running about naked in the middle of a zombie apocalypse level of stupid.

  Especially when someone was out to kill her.

  Her heels rang out against the cobblestones, and she took solace in the rhythm of the sound. Remember. Remember who you were before you forgot. The words were whispered in the back of her mind this time with a woman’s voice, as lovely as it was soft. She ignored it as she continued.

  Then it happened.

  A dark figure stepped out of the shadows
ahead, blocking her path between Cattermole Alley and Greek Street.

  “I have to say.” Ms. Whipsnide cast off her all-concealing cloak with a flourish. Beneath it she wore the robes of the Order of the Hidden Butterknife. “I didn’t think you’d be quite this slow.”

  “Oh?” Daffi stopped in the middle of the street, every muscle in her body tensed and ready for action. If Whippy so much as moved a muscle, she was ready to blast her into the next century. Witches didn’t duel often. It was illegal for the most part, not to mention dangerous.

  In a built-up area like this, there was always the risk of a spell rebounding off a building or norms getting hurt as well. That wasn’t to say it didn’t happen. The incident in Pudding Lane was a great example. Norms tended to notice a little thing like the entire city being on fire, so there was a ban on dueling within London.

  Whipsnide all but hugged herself in glee, her pinched face twisted into an unaccustomed smile. It didn’t look right on her face, like her muscles weren’t used to making the expression.

  “You’ve walked right into my trap, finally!” she crowed in triumph. “The grand master will be so pleased with me.”

  Remember, my daughter, the woman’s voice whispered on the soft breeze that lifted Daffi’s hair on her shoulders and fluttered the skirts of her dress around her legs. Remember who you were before we made you forget.

  “I wonder,” Daffi mused, cocking her head and studying Whipsnide. The older witch was almost haglike in her glee. “Would your grand master be happy with all your mistakes?”

  Whipsnide paused, her eyes narrowing. “I do not make mistakes. I have brought in a La Fay—a minor one, yes, but still a La Fay. I will be rewarded.”

  “You don’t make mistakes!” Daffi barked a laugh. “Oh, that’s a good one. Let’s go through them. Shall we? You killed Sybil to frame me, but you were sloppy and there was a witness. Wasn’t there? Jack.”

  Whipsnide folded her arms over her skinny chest with her lips pursed. “Meddling little fae shouldn’t even have been there,” she huffed.