Dark Wizard's Case

by Kirill Klevanski

  “Oh, Chon, I’m just here to pay all you incredible demon fighters a friendly visit.” Summerfall’s tone left no doubt about his actual opinion of Chon Sook’s department. “Give this case to my department, where we have real operatives, and we’ll have it closed in less than a week.”

  “The door is behind you, Summerfall. See you at the weekly department head meeting.” Chon Sook pointed at the exit, still without turning.

  “Up to you, old friend,” Summerfall replied with a shrug. “But if you think this case will help you make up for your failure in the Czech Republic…”

  For the first time, Alex saw emotion flash across the Asian’s steel eyes. And, hell’s bells, that was scary.

  Summerfall abruptly turned to Alex.

  “Oh, I see you brought the toy the little birds in payroll have been chirping so much about. Professor Dumsky. Who could have ever thought? Is headquarters now the kind of place that welcomes scum like arrested and convicted black wizards?”

  “Yep,” Alex said, adjusting his glasses with the finger tattooed with DOOM.

  Major Summerfall was astonished.

  “Do you really not know who I am?”

  “Summerfall,” Chon Sook said, a warning in his voice.

  “Please, enlighten me, Sir Major,” Alex snorted, “as to who you—”

  Before he could finish, the newly arrived major removed his gloves. Both hands were tattooed all over with tiny black skulls, so many and so close together that they could have easily been mistaken for scales.

  Black Hands.

  Alex stood up; Gribovsky aimed his enchanted gun at him.

  “Murderer,” Doom hissed.

  “But you’re still breathing, Professor,” the major mocked as he slipped his gloves back on. “Though that’s just because an old friend of mine needs you for some reason.”

  “Get out, Summerfall,” Chon Sook pressed.

  Black Hands. The most infamous black wizard hunter of all time. It wouldn’t have been an overstatement to say that four out of every ten black wizards killed in the previous several decades had fallen victim to that very bastard.

  Every skull tattooed on his hands stood for a life he’d taken.

  Damn. Damn. Damn.

  Alex had always thought of Black Hands as nothing but a bugaboo for those who were bugaboos to the rest of the world.

  And imagining the psycho serving in the Guards, who were supposed to be judicial defenders protecting the whole world, was beyond him.

  When the door closed behind the scumbag, Alex turned to Chon Sook.

  “Major?”

  “Permission to speak, Major,” the Asian corrected him. “Go ahead.”

  “Next week, on Friday, send Gribovsky to the Schooner.”

  “Why?”

  “Because there’s only one place in the city where we can find a clue about why the Mask took the orb.”

  “Where’s that, pumpkin?” Gribovsky tossed another brightly colored piece of candy into his mouth.

  “The Abyss Club.”

  The lieutenant choked.

  “That’s…just…a…city myth.”

  “Bring your best weapons,” Alex replied with a mysterious smile.

  Gribovsky arched his brow as Alex’s smile gradually faded.

  “The club owner swore to kill me the next time we meet.”

  “Damn you, pumpkin. Is there anywhere in this city forgotten by gods and demons where no one wants to kill you?”

  Alex pondered for a second.

  He really did.

  The question was a complicated one.

  “What a shitty life.” Taking a long windup, Gribovsky clapped his forehead.

  Chapter 30

  The following week was as calm as it could have been for a black wizard employed as a full-time professor in the holy of holies of Atlantis’ magic education, one who also had a side job with the glorious Guards and a debt of 100,000 credits he needed to pay back to the Syndicate.

  Surprisingly enough, neither the Guards nor the Syndicate reminded Doom of his obligations. His workdays all blended together into a single bleak gray mush.

  His time from getting up until 4 or 5 p.m. belonged to the university. Lecturing turned out to be a piece of cake—all Doom had to do was turn on the projector.

  The seal did the rest.

  From first-year students to sixth-year students, no one had yet unraveled the mystery. But that was only to be expected. Alex had long since given up solving it himself.

  If he couldn’t do it, no one could. At least, no one on New Earth. As for Old Earth, particularly eastern Europe and Asia, where the dark arts hadn’t been extinguished, there might have been some wizards skilled enough. It was just that hiring one of them as a consultant would have cost more than his debt to the Syndicate.

  Alex rued the day he was tortured with that bloody cross and told he’d be needing some Vaseline. Luckily enough, he’d had the connections he needed to buy the Syndicate’s protection and preserve his male honor and dignity.

  Anyone who might have said he should have scattered the attackers Chuck Norris-style, going at it like a lone wolf, probably never found themselves in a cramped room face to face with several thugs for whom killing a man is just as easy as going to the bathroom.

  Enough negativity. How about some ugliness?

  After finishing his lectures and escaping the paperwork and his supervisor responsibilities (Doom had used the roof exit for that purpose the last time), he headed home.

  He scrubbed the Schooner’s floor. Washed the toilets. Did the dishes. Sometimes poured whiskey, but only when the Boatswain wasn’t around. And only straight into his mouth.

  Actually, Alex could have paid the rent without doing the menial work, but that would have burned through his money quickly. And every single credit he earned at the university went toward repaying his debt to the city.

  Brutal.

  Things were made even worse by the groups of B-52 students visiting the Schooner every evening. The mixed youngsters drank soft cocktails, gobbled down food, and tried to chat with Alex. He’d been successful in avoiding them to date.

  “Professor!” The security guard, whose name was Ban, lifted his cap to Alex. He was a pleasant elderly man whose mana level was just a touch above a non-magical person’s, barely enough for him to activate the magic barrier in the university gate. “You parked in the wrong spot again.”

  Alex looked back.

  His chrome and steel horse stood by the curb, right on a yellow zigzag. The holographic sign above it said that a city bus was due to stop on that very zigzag in a few minutes.

  Alex lit a cigarette and waved a hand.

  [Spell used: UNDEAD of Black Magic and Necromancy School. Mana used: 75 points/one + 1.2 points/min.]

  Clouds of black smoke gathered around the bike. One by one, seven-foot skeletons climbed out of them, stringy flesh hanging from white bones where their skin used to be. Most were clad in shabby old leather armor that looked to be the veteran of dozens of battles, while a few were wearing chainmail with broken rings. They held long, broken sabers and steel shields in their hands.

  The spell wasn’t particularly strong or cutting-edge, but Alex liked it. While effectively harmless, it was impressive and very cheap in terms of both its retail value and its mana consumption.

  “Professor?” The guard closed the lattice of his hut. “Could you please find a… a more attractive way of protecting it next time?”

  “This is just the second time I’m parking here,” Alex replied, inhaling and puffing out a dense cloud of smoke. “How’s your grandson, Ban? Did they stop bullying him?”

  “Yes, they did, ever since then.”

  “Excellent.”

  “Why didn’t you walk here the way you usually do, Professor?” Ban livened up—his thick, reddish-gray moustache bounced up and down like a cockroach. It looked more funny than disgusting. “You live across the street.”

  “I have a date today, Ban. Right a
fter work.”

  “Oh. With Miss Perriot, right?”

  Alex choked on the smoke and coughed, clutching at the wrought-iron fence.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Professor, I shouldn’t have said that. Here, let me slap you on the back.”

  Alex eyed the hand poking out of the hut. It could have probably broken nails with a slap, not to mention a black wizard’s back.

  “What made you think of Miss Perriot, Ban?”

  “Well, after the museum incident, the whole university’s been talking…”

  “Talking,” Alex grumbled, squinting maliciously. “Looks like some people have too much free time during my lectures.”

  Thinking to himself how to fix that, Alex started toward the central building. Even then, surrounded by the bare trees of winter slowly giving place to spring, the main university building looked immaculate and airy.

  Like a castle from an old fairy tale.

  “Have a good day, Professor!” Ban shouted at his receding figure.

  Alex replied with quick wave of his hand and, flying up the stairs like a bat, jerked the door open to see…an absolutely empty hall.

  For once, luck showed him her face, and not her other side.

  Alex’s schedule was set up such that his lectures didn’t begin until noon. Right then, half an hour before, everyone was in their other classes.

  Walking down the halls, he only came across a few students on break, fellow professors, and secretaries.

  Alex’s luck ran out when he was almost to his lecture hall and bumped smack into Mrs. Hopps. Judy Hopps. She had the very same name as the rabbit from that movie about the animal city, and even her personality was somewhat similar.

  Unfortunately, Alex had ruined their wonderful relationship before it ever got going.

  It didn’t matter that they hadn’t started an actual relationship because Secretary Hopps turned him down; Alex kept right on believing.

  Like Romeo and Juliet. Or a vampire and a school outsider.

  In prison, he hadn’t had much to do, so he’d amused himself by reading about a weird vampire who refused to devour his human dinner.

  “Miss Hopps!” Alex tried to give her a hug, but the agile brunette sidestepped him. “It’s so great to see you—your pretty face would salvage even my worst day. Hey, did you make me a cup of hot chocolate? Or a latte at least?”

  “I’m Dean Lebenstein’s secretary, not yours, Professor Dumsky,” Hopps snapped. “And if you keep harassing me, I can—”

  “Sure, sure.” Alex, who’d already made it halfway to his lecture hall, waved vaguely as he left the secretary behind. “I think we make for the perfect couple, too, you and I. But, unfortunately, the path taken by two loving hearts is never an easy one. It’s such a shame you can’t break off your sinful affair with your husband.”

  Judy, complete with an armful of papers, just froze on the spot. Alex was a master at finding new ways to dumbfound her and avoid being buried under the papers she was holding.

  He would have had to do an overwhelming amount of paperwork for free otherwise.

  That was definitely not what he’d signed up for.

  Signed up for? The pun wasn’t just stupid; it was downright scary.

  “Stop!” the usually calm secretary barked and, off like a shot, jumped around Alex to push the lecture hall door open with her shoulder. “You won’t be getting away that easily, Professor.”

  “Get away? I dream of you every night, Mrs. Hopps. I can’t even sleep, I need you so badly. My heart is broken.” Alex all but shed an actor’s tear. “And you—”

  Suddenly, he heard a click.

  Judy flashed a small recorder at him.

  “I recorded everything you said, Professor,” she crowed triumphantly. “That’s harassment, and you could be sued for it. Although, I don’t think you want that. Why don’t you take this paper mountain off my hands, fill out all the forms by the end of the week, and I’ll forget I have this recording.”

  Alex shifted his confused stare from the device to the secretary’s triumphant face, then back to the device. “Are you…blackmailing me?”

  “You leave me no other choice, Professor.” Judy was offended, her pretty face taking on the look of a perplexed Fury. “I’ve been waiting a week for you to fill out all the forms, and I have neither the time nor the desire to do it for you.”

  “Why can’t we just forget about them? That would be a simple enough way out for both of us.”

  “No, not for me. My boss won’t leave me alone until I submit a full report to him. And I can’t put it together without your papers.”

  Doom could have cracked a joke about the boss not leaving her alone, but he was a black wizard, not a complete jerk.

  Although many women would have argued that he was both.

  “You have my respect,” Alex nodded, then moved his hand through the air. “That was a smart move.”

  Screaming, Judy dropped what had just a second before been her recorder. It quickly turned into a small hissing pool of melted plastic and metal spreading across the floor.

  “But I put up my shields! I used a protection artifact!”

  “So you did. I could see it from the stairs.”

  Hopps looked up at Alex with resolute, unwavering eyes. She was not about to give up.

  “But still, I’ll…” Doom took the pile of papers from her. “I hope you don’t have a draft because of the broken door, Miss Hopps.”

  Closing his own door behind him and leaving the perplexed secretary outside, Alex, muttering the filthiest curses he knew, plodded toward his desk to dump the papers on it.

  How did tiny Judy even lift the bloody pile? It felt like it weighed as much as the dumbbells Doom had spent so much time with in prison. And each of them weighed twenty pounds at least.

  Well. He had to come up with a way to fill out all the forms. It wasn’t anything he was about to himself.

  “Professor Dumsky?” came a familiar voice from behind Alex.

  Did I accidentally grab the lucky leprechaun coin from the museum when I was fighting that gorilla?

  Looking over, Alex saw his whole group. All five were there, from the weird, affected Leo, the male model, to their true leader—gray-haired Mara Glomebood. A pretty half-blood girl, she mixed human and, oddly enough, dwarf.

  “My darling students!” Doom rejoiced. “I could really use your help…”

  As the wheels in Alex’s head started turning at triple speed, it struck him that something was wrong.

  “Why aren’t you in class?” he asked, squinting at them.

  “We’re skipping,” Travis, the red guy, told him defiantly.

  “And we’re going to keep it up,” the Wessex blonde added. “Every class we miss will be another paper pain in your neck.”

  “Wow,” Alex drawled, leaning back against his desk and crossing his arms over his chest. “Are you threatening me? Color me intrigued. What do you want?”

  “We need your help,” Mara said as she stepped forward. She may have been the bravest of the five or…well, the devil only knew what traits it took to be a leader in a human group. Alex was too anti-social to have a clue. “We need it so badly we’ll keep causing problems for you if we don’t get it.”

  Doom sighed and massaged the bridge of his nose.

  “My dear students,” he said in a whisper that was loud enough to be heard at the opposite end of the lecture hall. “This is the second time I’m being blackmailed in the past five minutes. Why don’t you rephrase your request for help, preferably to include money as some sort of an offer to collaborate in a way that is mutually beneficial? Otherwise, you’re going to share the first blackmailer’s fate.”

  As he said that, he lit a purple fire around his hand.

  His mentees exchanged glances.

  “One sixth of the prize fund,” the Asian, whose name was Jing, said coldly. He was the most dangerous-looking one in the group, at least as dangerous as an uneducated kid could be.

&nbs
p; “Too little… Hey, wait. What prize fund?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Do I look like someone who would ask questions when he already knows the answer?”

  For a moment or two, there was a weird silence. Then Mara took the lead again.

  “There’s an incoming student magic tournament in a month, this time with a much larger prize fund because of the jubilee. Half a million credits. We want…no, we have to get it. That’s why we need your help, Professor. You defeated that demon, and… Professor? Professor Dumsky, are you listening to me? What are you looking for, Professor?”

  “I think,” Alex called from underneath his desk, “the coin must have rolled over here.”

  “What coin?”

  “The lucky leprechaun one.”

  The students exchanged glances, suddenly doubting their brilliant plan.

  Chapter 31

  Because of all the information Alex’s students had dumped on him, his work day lasted well beyond what he’d initially planned. It had long been dark when he stepped out onto the street. The streetlamps were lit, bright yellow skirts of light rescuing parts of sidewalks and flower beds from the tender but cold embrace of darkness. There were lights on in the campus buildings and distant dorms, the voices of never-sleeping students drifting over on the breeze.

  Doom turned up his jacket collar. Spring was slow to come to Myers City, the freezing winter still holding its own. An unpleasantly damp easterly wind was blowing, promising a heavy rain soon and perhaps the last thunderstorm as the year slipped away.

  He needed a cigarette.

  He always needed one.

  It was an old habit.

  Overcoming the urge, he walked over to the guard hut. Ban was fast asleep on the gate console the way he always was by the end of his shift. The gate closed and opened automatically all the same; the guard’s post was just a tribute to the old days when the university was actually guarded.

  That was back during the Magic War. It ended roughly the same time as Atlantis and the lands of the magic races separated from the rest of the world.