by Rhiannon Lee
“Okay then. Thank you for removing my guise thingy. I guess that’s it then?”
“Yes, that’s it,” I answered.
“I think I’m going to go work on my case a bit before bedtime since I’m not really tired,” she said, and walked out of the kitchen.
I pondered her situation as I cleaned up the mess and put everything away. Maybe the guise really hadn’t worked all of this time. I couldn’t imagine her bird form was the only magic she actually had though, so if that were true, there had to be other signs of power we were missing.
I heard a knock on the door and Bea’s footsteps to get it.
“Who is it?” I asked, but I already had a hunch. I was too late for polite company. Just as I suspected, Isaac came traipsing in the kitchen.
“How did it go?” he asked.
“Well… it went, I guess,” I answered as I put the paper with the spell back under the sink in the cubby. It was the last trace that indicated anything had happened in here.
When I stood up, I turned to Isaac and leaned in close so only he could hear me. “Nothing happened.”
“Nothing happened?” he asked suspiciously.
“I mean, the guise is gone, but she didn’t feel a thing. It was as if I had done nothing at all.”
“Did you recheck to make sure it was gone?” he asked. I glared at him. “Okay, okay, don’t get testy, I was just asking.”
“What if she was right? What if the only magic she has is Mimic shifter magic?”
“There is no way that’s possible, Poppy. We felt her power when she was born, remember? There is no way that’s the only talent she has. We just need to give it a few days to settle in,” he said.
I didn’t like it, but maybe he was right, and I was just being impatient. “There’s nothing to be done about it tonight anyway,” I conceded.
“I swear, you worry more than anyone I know,” he said, wrapping an arm around my shoulder.
I leaned into his hug. “I can’t help it,” I muttered.
“I know. I wouldn’t want you any other way anyhow. You’re perfect exactly as you are.”
Chapter 15
Bea
A knock on the front door hoicked me from sleep. “Hang on, I’m coming!” I yelled groggily as I moved to grab some clothes.
Once I was sufficiently covered, I moved to look out the peephole. I wasn’t exactly afraid per se, but after learning about an entire community of people with powers, most of which I still didn’t know about, I wasn’t being as carefree as I used to be.
Victor stood on the other side with a half frown, half amused look.
I blinked my eyes to clear the sleep and snapped my fingers. Then I sighed. Still nothing.
When I woke the morning after my guise removal, Poppy and I spent hours attempting different techniques to tap into my magic. Whistling was the first thing we had tried, but I ended up just looking stupid and sounding like a breathy dying bird. I finally got frustrated and stormed off after she asked me to blink rapidly at the couch to see if I could set it on fire.
“I’m not in the mood, wolf breath,” I deadpanned loud enough for him to hear me through the wood.
“Thain doesn’t know I’m here,” he said. Instead of sticking with my original plan to ignore him and go back to bed, I stayed.
“This better be good,” I hissed through my teeth after I partially opened the door.
“Can I please come in? I need to talk to you in private.”
“You’re pushing it,” I warned with a squint, but stepped back so he could come inside.
He pushed the door out of his way and closed it behind him. “You look different.”
At my desk, I sat down as nonchalantly as I could. “What do you mean?”
Victor’s eye suddenly lit up. “You removed your guise, didn’t you?” he asked as he sat in the chair I set out for clients. It creaked from his forceful descent, and for a moment I thought it was going to break. I found myself smiling at the thought of him sprawled on my floor with a chair leg protruding from his thigh.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You’re lying. I can feel your magic,” he said.
“We’ll that makes one of us,” I huffed.
He tilted his head. “You don’t have any new powers yet?”
“Nope. No rush of magic or choir of angels singing. Nada.”
“You felt nothing?” he pressed.
“My sinuses were irritated from all the incense smoke. Does that count?” Through some miracle, I hadn’t sneezed. I did not know how.
“Huh.”
I squinted at him. “What the hell does that mean?” I asked.
He shrugged his shoulders. “It doesn’t mean anything, it’s just curious is all.”
“I didn’t want magic anyway,” I lied.
He cocked an eyebrow.
“Okay, fine. The idea was growing on me, but it doesn’t really matter, does it? I’m a dud. Poppy was probably wrong. I’m not a Godkin, I’m just a Mimic and all I can do with change into a bird,” I pouted.
My eyes narrowed further as he grinned. “You don’t feel like a Mimic. I bet your powers will show themselves soon.”
“Feel like a Mimic? What the heck does that even mean?”
“Your energy,” he said and waved his hand in a circle in my direction.
I sighed and leaned back. “Whatever. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”
He leaned forward with an intense glare. “Okay then. I saw you. You’re damn lucky I was the only one.”
I now glared at him. “You’re annoying me.”
“You’ve been staking out Thain’s office for the last two nights. I saw you with my own eyes. You need to stop before he gets angry,” Victor warned.
“You’re mistaken. I’ve been right here for the last two nights working cases. Normal human cases,” I stressed. “Besides, what do you care?”
Of course, he was right. The monotony of searching through the data mining results on the guy who had threatened Anna was making me want to stab my eyeballs out. So, for the sake of my sanity, I’d split my time between it and stalking Thain’s office, among other things in my quest to find her.
“I know you’re upset, but I only told Thain what I did to protect you. If he didn’t handle the situation, then someone less civilized would have, especially with the way you were going about your investigation,” he answered.
“Did you just come here to insult me?”
Victor rolled his eyes. “You ask too many questions to the wrong people. People are talking and wondering who you are.”
“Well, how am I supposed to solve my case without asking people things? That’s how investigation work works,” I said, stressing my words.
“It’s not your case anymore, Bea. You need to let it go and stop taunting Thain. If you cause trouble and he doesn’t discipline you, he loses the respect of the Tolve. But worse than that, others will take it as a sign of weakness and start testing him. That means if you don’t stop, I will have to tell him. I won’t have a choice.”
“You’re just going to run back to him and tell him anyway,” I countered. “Why are you even here?”
"Thain is not the bad person you seem to think he is," Victor said.
I crossed my arms over my chest.
"Out of all the people who represent the Tolve, Thain has been the fairest leader I've worked for. His first response is not violence like a lot of sheriffs that I've seen come and go over the years. And he's not wrong, you need to stay out of things until you can protect yourself better."
"I repeat, why do you even care wolf?"
"Because you're growing on me, bird girl, and I want us to be friends," he said easily.
I rolled my eyes, but I felt my cheeks heat at the same time.
"Are you a whistler?" he asked.
"A what?"
He cocked his head to the side. "You know, a whistler. Magic through sound?"
"I told you no
thing happened!" I snapped.
"You remind me a lot of my sister," he said, changing the subject.
"Well then, why don't you just run along and go talk to your sister and leave me alone then?"
When Victor's head dipped, I realized my mistake. I shrugged off my attitude and waited quietly for him to say something.
"I would if I could," he whispered.
Well, color me a jerk. "I'm sorry, I didn't even consider…"
"No, it's okay. It was a long time ago," he said vaguely, looking back up at me with a weak smile.
An awkward silence fell over the room. I struggled with how to react. Half of me wanted to hug him while the other half still wanted to throw him out a window.
After a few moments, he got up and walked to the entrance of my apartment. I let him go without protest. Maybe it was better this way. Besides, he needed to stop prying into my life. Even if I could do some wondrous magic, I wouldn't have told him about it for fear that he would run back to Thain and blab. If he wanted to be my friend for real, I had to trust him and right now I didn't. Sure, he was growing on me, but I wasn't an idiot.
Rather than exiting when he opened the door, he turned to me. "Please stop pursuing this thing with Thain, it will not end well."
"You say you want to be my friend and then you throw a backhanded threat at me. Just go, Victor."
He nodded, then silently left my apartment. What was it about him that kept pulling at me? I thought about him often, and then when I actually saw him, he opened his mouth and made me want to murder him. I didn't think I would ever understand my feelings for him. I wasn't sure I wanted to.
I sat in retrospective silence for a while before I realized my door wasn't locked. I quickly got up and secured it, then sat back down at my desk. Clearly, I wasn't being sneaky enough, so if I wanted answers, I was going to have to get smarter. Victor's last comment combined with the mention of discipline made me uneasy. I was still admittedly unsure about how to gauge Thain, but I also couldn't let him control me. Sure, he was in charge, but that didn't make him some kind of god. And Ellen and Anna were depending on me.
Just then, a thought occurred to me. Shifting, I picked up my phone and dialed Ellen's number.
"Hello? Bea? Do you have news?" she asked as soon as she answered.
"I'm sorry, no, but I need your help. Can you meet me at my office? I need to speak with you in person." My conversation with Victor also left me more paranoid. I was now worried about the possibility that Thain or someone else in the supernatural community could be listening in on my personal calls.
"Yes, of course. Is the address on your ad correct? I'll come right over."
"Yep, it's correct. I'll be watching for you. I'm on the ground floor," I replied.
"Okay great, see you soon," she said before hanging up.
I really hated putting Ellen in the middle of my mess, but I was running out of options.
She arrived before I could finish compiling a full set of questions that I wanted to ask her, but it didn't matter. I knew what I needed to know.
"Please come in," I said as after identifying her through the peephole and opening the door.
"You haven't heard anything?" she asked as I ushered her to the chair Victor occupied earlier.
"No, I'm sorry, nothing yet," I repeated with a sympathetic frown.
She sighed heavily and sat down. "How can I help?"
I got right to the point. "I know Anna's a Mimic which means you are too."
Ellen's eyes went wide.
"It's okay, I am too," I revealed. I had mentioned nothing about the Godkin bit because I was worried she would expect me to actually use my magic. Plus, I hoped she would feel more relatable to me this way. She let out a long sigh of relief. "Just to be upfront with you, Thain has ordered me off the case. He said he is taking care of it."
Ellen responded to my words by suddenly looking around my apartment as if she were worried someone else was here. "Thain?" she asked in a whisper.
I nodded. "Mm-hmm. Can I ask why you didn't go to him first?"
"Because…" She looked around the room again, "I was worried he had something to do with it."
Interesting. "Why do you think that?" I pushed.
"It's what they do when you step out of line," she answered nervously.
"What do you mean?" I had a hunch about what she meant, but I needed to hear her say it.
"They make you disappear," she whispered.
I caught her gaze. Victor said punish. He hadn't said anything about offing people.
"Ellen. What are you not telling me about Anna? If you want me to do my job, I need you to be honest with me."
Ellen's shoulders fell as her body slumped into the chair. When she glanced back up at me, I could see shame. "Anna started an online blog about Mimics and some people found out about it. They threatened her but she wouldn't take it down. I begged her to do what they asked! You have to believe me!"
Mimics had obviously been around for a while. Surely this wasn't the first time someone tried to make a website about them.
"Do you know who threatened her? Their names?" I asked the sobbing mother.
"I don't know their names, but I'm pretty sure they work for Thain. That's why I came to you instead of him. I just know he had something to do with it!" she wailed. "Please Bea, you have to find Anna, she's my entire world!"
"I still don't understand why you think they work for Thain."
"Because when Anna came to me, she was worried that Thain and his crew found out about her site. She was scared. And then a few days later she called me, rambling about people threatening her. She tried to tell me about them, but she was so upset I could only understand every other word, so I hung up and raced to her house. But by the time I got there, she was already gone."
"Thank you for the truth. I'm not dropping your case, but there's a problem. I just found out about the Tolve and that complicates things. I need information about how things work, and about Thain and his business," I explained, leaning forward to emphasize my point. "Ellen, I need a way in and you're the only one who can help me.
"What do you mean you just found out?"
Oops. "I knew nothing about our people until recently," I repeated.
"But… how is that…" she stopped and stared intently at me. "You're not a Mimic at all, are you?"
I swore mentally at myself. If I straight out lied to her, I would lose her trust, and maybe her help. "No, I'm not. I'm sorry I should have said."
She narrowed her eyes and concentrated on the air around me. "But… what are you then?"
I wanted to say, 'Lady, I have no idea,' but I didn't. Instead, I told her the truth. At least the truth that Poppy believed. So far, the word had meant nothing to me.
"A baby Godkin," she whispered. The word baby made me cringe.
"Do you understand why I need your help now?" I asked.
"I don't know if this is such a good idea," she hesitated, standing.
"Please, Ellen!" I begged. "I'm a damn good PI, I don't need magic to find your daughter, I just need enough information to point me in the right direction."
She stood the rest of the way up. "You don't even have magic?"
Double crap. "I promise, I will do everything in my power to find your daughter. Please help me, Ellen."
"Why do you care so much? Anna is my daughter, not yours."
"Because she deserves to be found in one piece, and I'm not ready to give up on that," I answered vehemently.
She stood in silence for a few moments before sitting back down.
"This could get us both killed, but if you can find Anna, I don't care what happens to me," she said, wiping away her tears with her sleeve. "What do you want to know?"
Grabbing my pen and paper, I started firing questions.
Chapter 16
Poppy
"Your ward is stalking me. She thinks I'm a criminal who murders people," Thain said in a level tone as soon as I walked into his office.
I raised my eyebrow. "Are you?"
He blew out an exaggerated breath. "Jesus Poppy, is that what you think I've become?"
I sat down gingerly. "Bea isn't stupid. Why does she think that?"
Thain sighed again and pressed his fingertips into his temples. "She assumed I had something to do with that girl's disappearance. That isn't why you're here though, is it?"
I shook my head.
"We have a lead on the magic drain," Thain revealed. "It's an Ouphe. The one who seems to be leading this show has apparently developed quite the following. We're trying to find out where he is so we can bring him in and question him, but he always seems to know when we're coming."
"Are you sure?"
"I know this isn't how you wanted it to turn out, but the things we've heard aren't good. And even if they aren't the cause of the problem, they are a problem."
"But why are we just hearing about it now? If he's a threat, surely you would have heard something before now," I said.
He steepled his fingers and stared off in thought for a moment before looking back up at me. "You would think so, wouldn't you? It seems I have an even bigger problem on my hands. I thought I had a couple inside people in the Ouphe community, but apparently they've gone wrong, too."
I leaned forward and gave him my full attention. "You have spies?"
"Had spies. Past tense," he said with a flip of his hand.
"Did they just stop reporting in?" I pressed.
"No, they've been reporting in like usual. Well, until a few days ago. It seems they've been leaving out a few important details about this guy who's supposed to be running the show over there."
"But what about the elders?"
"They aren't talking about it either. In fact, they refused to see the men I sent over to question them. I've been completely blocked from learning anything that could help us."
I was growing more concerned by the second. "So where does that leave us?" I asked.
Thain leaned closer. "They are leaving me no choice."
"I don't understand what that means, Thain," I said, but I had a bad feeling in my gut that I wasn't going to like his answer.
