Legally Red

by A. A. Albright

  ‘It’s Jinx poisoning,’ she said, bending down to examine the body. ‘You were right, Melissa. I hate that poison. Why do people have to go and make their victims suffer through agonizing stomach cramps and vomiting before they die? Couldn’t they just, I dunno, kill them cleanly? Anyway, I’d better call in some back-up.’ As she fished her phone from her dressing-gown pocket, she looked up at me. ‘I have a feeling we’ve met this guy before. I just can’t place him.’

  I peered closer at the body. She was right. I did know that guy, but I couldn’t figure out from where. He had a shaved head, a scarred face, and a strong build. He’d definitely stand out in a crowd, that was for sure.

  As soon as Wanda got on the phone, Wayfarers began to appear. I was in the middle of telling Wanda and Finn (the captain of the Major Crimes team) how we’d found the body, when Wanda’s eyes suddenly widened. ‘Melissa!’ she cried. ‘It’s twenty past nine. You’re late for your interview.’

  ‘Of course I am,’ I muttered bleakly. ‘Okay, well then I guess I’m going to head there now. Can you make sure Wolfie and Princess get home safe?’

  ‘Well, yeah but … you’re in your yoga clothes,’ Wanda pointed out. ‘Don’t you want to go home and change first?’

  I shrugged. ‘I’ve dressed up to the nines for half a dozen interviews in the past month, and I’ve not gotten so much as a call back. If anything’s gonna mess this interview up, it’s not the yoga clothes. It’s me.’ I glanced at the stash on the ground. ‘I don’t suppose I’m going to be able to grab my lucky anklet before I go, am I?’

  Wanda looked at the pile, then shook her head regretfully. ‘Sorry. I wish I could give it to you but …’

  ‘I know. This is a murder scene, and everything here is evidence.’ I held out my hand, preparing to click my fingers. ‘Well, seeing as I can’t have my anklet, then will you wish me luck?’

  ‘Good luck!’ called Wanda, Finn, Princess and Wolfie, as I clicked my fingers and magicked myself away.

  ≈

  When I was a kid, I dreamt of being the good witch who fought the bad. I’d ride my broom or click my fingers to the scene of the crime, and then I’d take part in the kind of magic-on-magic battle that ballads were written about. They’d call them things like Melissa the Magnificent, or Melissa’s Magic Saves the Day Again. Kids would learn about me in their Tall Tales class, and when the teacher asked them what they wanted to be when they grew up, they’d say, ‘Melissa Wayfair.’

  Nowadays I did fight crime, in a way. I just had to do it whilst wearing smart slacks and a blouse, and carrying a file instead of a wand. Yip, I was a trainee lawyer at the Wyrd Court, and I had no idea what in Hecate’s name I was doing with my life.

  I’d worked for lawyer after lawyer, and even clerked for the Minister of Magical Law for a while, but none of those jobs had ended well. I didn’t have nearly enough credits to put towards the LOL exam, and as I hinted at earlier – if I didn’t get this job today, I was probably going to have to wait until the following year to sit it.

  Fun fact about the Wyrd Court – you can finger-click your way to the steps out front, but not actually into the building. So once I arrived on the steps, I had to run up three floors and down six corridors before I finally arrived at the office of Miles Master. And I had to do all of that with bare feet. So far, this was going swimmingly.

  I knocked at the door, panting and clutching my stomach. As a dark-haired man pulled it open, I said, ‘I … I’m … I …’

  Eloquent, I’m sure you’ll agree.

  The dark-haired man looked at me. From what I could see through the haze of sweat and exhaustion, this was Miles Master – the man who would be interviewing me today. He was even more intimidating looking than in his Super Social profile (because of course I’d researched just about everything I could about the man). He wore an immaculate grey suit with a red tie, shiny gold cuff links, and an expensive watch. His dark hair was styled in a short and neat fashion, and he was a little bit taller than me. He looked like he’d just walked off the set of a cologne advertisement. He also looked like the kind of guy I used to find attractive, back before I had a boyfriend.

  For a split second our eyes met, and I felt … I don’t know … some sort of flicker of recognition. Sure, I’d seen him in photos online, but this wasn’t that sort of recognition. This was something different. I thought I saw his Adam’s apple bobble and his eyes widen a bit, but he immediately averted his gaze, and his face grew expressionless.

  ‘Melissa Wayfair, I presume.’ He spoke with a London accent – a posh London accent at that. ‘No need to explain your tardiness – or your inappropriate attire. I just got off the phone with Finn Plimpton. He called to make me aware that a rather gruesome discovery is the cause of your being late.’

  Oh, I could have kissed Finn. ‘That’s … I’m …’

  ‘Rather. Well, come in. We might as well get this over with. I’ve got better things to do with my day than interview a woman in yoga pants.’

  As he moved into the office I hobbled in after him, pulling twigs and leaves from my feet and looking around for a bin. The room was about as perfect as Miles himself – consequently, I loathed it as much as I was growing to loathe him.

  I knew he hadn’t worked at the Wyrd Court for long, but he’d certainly made his stamp on the office. There were photos of him on the walls, shaking hands with magical dignitaries from all over the world, as well as framed certificates listing his many qualifications and achievements. A small lizard lay on the edge of his desk, basking beneath the light of the desk lamp.

  ‘A basilisk lizard?’ I questioned, finally finding my voice.

  He nodded, pouring a glass of water and passing it my way. Oh, sweet nectar of life! ‘Indeed. The lizard is my familiar. But let’s not ask any more personal questions, shall we? I doubt we’ll be acquainted with one another very much longer than the next five minutes.’ He opened up a file, frowning as he read its contents. I could see my name typed on the cover.

  ‘So.’ He continued to frown, nodding and murmuring to himself as he read. ‘You’re a Wayfair. Interesting. And you want to clerk for me. Hmm.’

  Did I though? Did I want to work for him – or any lawyer for that matter? This wasn’t the plan. This had never been the plan. I wanted to fight for right, like the other members of my coven. A temporary recruitment freeze was what had led me into working at the Wyrd Court instead of pursuing my childhood dream. And this morning, I had no idea what it was that was keeping me from the job I really wanted to do.

  ‘Melissa, I agreed to this interview more out of curiosity than anything else. You graduated top of your class from Crooked College last year,’ he said. ‘But now, an entire year has passed by, and yet you’ve only accumulated twenty points towards your LOL. You know that even if you score one hundred percent in the exam, you’ll never manage to be a legally operating lawyer. Not this year. Not unless you manage to stack up at least sixty – and preferably eighty points – between now and the end of the month.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’m well aware of that, Mr Master.’

  He took a sip if what looked like green tea, rubbed his temples and said, ‘Do you even want to be a defender, Melissa? Most of the other lawyers you’ve clerked under have been prosecutors. Normally, people are desperate to work with me because of my reputation. But it seems you might be desperate, full stop.’

  And there was me thinking that the morning couldn’t get any worse – turns out, all it needed was a great big insult to send it over the edge. But it wasn’t time to get bogged down by how rude this guy was being. Whilst I might not know if I actually wanted this job, I knew I was more than capable of doing it.

  ‘Mr Master,’ I said, sitting forward and trying to quell my nerves. ‘I am not desperate. Like you said, I graduated from Crooked College with the highest grades in my class. Any lawyer would be lucky to have me clerk for them. Your file probably tells you about all the lawyers I have worked for. But maybe it hasn
’t told you why I no longer work for them, or why they gave me sod all credits – and in some cases, revoked the points I’d already earned.’

  He lifted one hand to look at his watch, while he tapped the other impatiently on his desk. ‘I suppose this is the part where you tell me how very unfair it all was.’

  ‘Yes!’ I stood up, hands on the desk. ‘Because it was unfair. My first job out of college, I worked as an assistant to the ex-Minister for Magical Law – you know, the one who put the crime in criminal – and even though I banked eighty points whilst working for her, she stripped them all away and sent me back to zero, all because my coven sent her down. Next I worked for Mr Rundt, who is now serving time in Witchfield Prison for murdering his mother-in-law. While I clerked for him, I stocked up fifty points – mostly by doing his expenses and leaving his suits in to be cleaned, but that was hardly my fault. And because I gave vital evidence against him, he rescinded every single point he’d ever granted me. Then there was Christy Dempsey, who promised me the full available credits, but she didn’t actually want me to work for her. She just wanted to get me to lie on the witness stand. After her there was …’

  I kept going right up until I’d listed off all of my former employers, then I took a breath and said, ‘So you see, Mr Master, I have had plenty of experience working for corrupt politicians and lawyers. I have run around after them, even been asked to lie for them, and never once did I lose my integrity. Which leads me to you. You’re a public defender, Mr Master. The only public defender in recent years who has actually tried to win cases for his clients. You want someone like me on your team. No, you need someone like me on your team. Because I know the lawyers you’re going to be up against. I’ve worked for them, each and every one.’

  I sat back down and took a drink of water, while Miles placed his hands under his chin and regarded me. He carried on regarding me for an uncomfortable amount of time. Somewhere during all of that time, I fancied that I saw his basilisk lizard send a wink in my direction, but I could have been wrong.

  Eventually Miles stood up, took hold of his briefcase, and said, ‘Well, I suppose it couldn’t do any harm to give you a trial.’ He waved his fingers, and an untidy pile of papers appeared on the desk. ‘For the duration of this trial, you shall follow my every instruction to the letter. You shall give me, as your employer, the respect I am due, and never question the tasks you are given. Do you understand?’

  I stared at him for a moment, wondering how to respond. Eventually, my mouth ran away with my mind and I said, ‘Sure. Whatever. Hey, while we’re at it, why don’t we give ourselves a name? Melissa and the Master has a bit of a ring to it, don’t you think?’

  There was a slight twitch at the side of his mouth, but I sincerely doubted it was the beginnings of a smile. A smirk, maybe. A maniacal grin, perhaps. But there was no way this man would ever deign to smile.

  ‘Jokes are for clowns and jesters, Melissa. Not for lawyers.’ He pushed the pile of papers towards me. ‘Until lunchtime I want you to do my filing. Alphabetically, by coven name. Just before lunchtime I shall message you with a list of your afternoon duties.’ He looked me up and down. ‘And I expect you to use your lunch hour to change into something more suitable.’

  3. Silence is Goldie

  My morning was about as miserable as a morning can be. The papers in question were records of hours spent with clients, and I had to file them so that they could be sent to the Wyrd Court’s accounting department. There really wasn’t a morning’s worth of work there. In fact, I had it done in under an hour. The lizard had gone wherever Miles had gone, so I had no company whatsoever. I tried tidying things up to pass the time, but how do you tidy the tidiest office in the world? After trying for quite a while, I came to the conclusion that it was better left alone.

  With nothing better to do, I did the worst thing possible. I went onto the internet via my phone, and watched Mack’s interview on the Magic Music channel. And then I watched it again. And again. I hadn’t spoken to him since he’d given the interview. First it had been full moon, so that had given me a plausible reason, but after that … after that I’d come up with one flimsy excuse after another. But tonight I had planned to go to his house, and I desperately needed to decide what to say when I saw him.

  ‘Oh, hey Mack. Yeah, I saw that interview. What’s that you ask? Do I have anything devastatingly romantic to say in the aftermath of your televised declaration of love? Um …’

  Um indeed. Sure, he’d said incredibly romantic things to me on many an occasion, but I didn’t know he saw me as the one. I was still gobsmacked. We’d only been together for a few glorious months, after all. I was wavering between three moods: being delighted about what he’d said, being nervous as heck, and being convinced he must have been talking about someone else.

  I was on the sixteenth replay of the morning when I did the stupidest thing known to witch. I looked at the comments below the video:

  Melissa Wayfair gets less good looking by the day. Is she using anti-glamour spells or something?

  Julie Rayn said she has a thing for Mack. Why doesn’t he go out with her instead? She’s much prettier than Melissa and she’s a supermodel.

  Melissa Wayfair has red hair. You know what they say about redheaded witches.

  I threw the phone away from me in irritation. Those were the three nicest comments I could find in a whole slew of nastiness. And what did they say about redheaded witches? Darned if I knew. I was just about to turn my phone off, possibly forever, when it beeped. Much as I wanted to do anything else (scrubbing my eyeballs or swimming in lava seemed like preferable options), I read the text message that had just arrived from Miles:

  This afternoon I want you to go to Witchfield remand wing to interview prisoner 106. I shall be recording your meeting and scoring you on it, so try to smile for the cameras. You shall find the necessary case files on my desk. Once that’s done, you can go home, and return to work tomorrow at nine a.m. Precisely. Unless you happen to stumble across any more murder scenes, of course.

  I stared down at the message, seething. Miles might not do jokes, but he sure did do sarcasm like a pro. I seriously considered smashing my phone against the wall for a moment or two. And when the most irritating folder appeared on the desk courtesy of Miles’s Magic, it didn’t improve my mood. How can a folder be irritating, you ask? Good question. And the answer is … when it has a Post-it note attached that says: Try not to spill anything on this.

  Although now that I think about it, maybe that just made it the most irritating Post-it note in the world, rather than the most irritating folder. Either way, I clicked my fingers and took myself home for lunch.

  ≈

  I was surprised to find Wanda on the sofa, biting into a veggie burger and watching TV.

  ‘You don’t normally come home for lunch.’ In fact, she rarely came home at all when she was working on a case. ‘Don’t tell me you already found the murderer.’

  She looked at me, lifting a chestnut brown eyebrow. ‘Didn’t need to. He found himself. By which I mean he handed himself in this morning. We’re still investigating, but with a very small budget.’ She sighed. ‘Remember I said I recognised the murder victim? Well, I was right. Remember that obnoxious bouncer at that werewolf bar, Moony’s?’

  I shuddered. I liked werewolf bars, and went to a lot of them with Mack. But Moony’s was a place I hoped I never had to enter again. The last time Wanda and I had been there we’d been whisked away in a teleportation device and kidnapped by the assassins known as the Dark Team, so that might have increased my dislike of Moony’s just a little bit. But that, as they say, is a whole other story.

  ‘Yeah. I remember him. So he’s the dead guy?’

  She nodded. ‘Decon Phelan is – or was – his name. Apparently he was the alpha of the Lupin Lane pack. Him and his wife – a woman called Nails, would you believe – bought Moony’s after the last manager was jailed for aiding the Dark Team.’

  ‘So … this h
ad nothing to do with the She-Wolves?’ I didn’t really think it had, seeing as Marion had seemed genuinely shocked and upset by the discovery, but I couldn’t help the evil little thought that, if she was a murderer, it might get rid of her for a nice long while and make my life a whole lot easier.

  Wanda shook her head. ‘The body was probably left there about half an hour before you found it. The familiars never saw it. Neither did any of the She-Wolves. That much I have no trouble believing.’

  ‘So what bits don’t you believe?’

  She ran her fingers over her plate, picking up the crumbs. ‘Honestly? I don’t believe that the guy who handed himself in actually did it. But you don’t need to worry about that.’ She fished about in her pocket, drawing out my Ádh Stone ankle bracelet. ‘On a brighter note, you can have this back. We’re done with it. I left a box outside your bedroom door, too. Seems like the She-Wolves have been nicking our stuff for a while now. I’ve already given Wolfie back his toys – and most importantly, his stick. It looks like any old stick, but he assures me that it’s one of a kind.’

  As I grabbed the anklet, she swallowed down the last of her food and stood up. ‘It’s a good thing you’re here, actually. There’s another three burgers on the grill, so you can help me finish them off.’

  I shot her a grateful grin and followed her to the kitchen. Wanda always cooked far more than she could eat – and that was saying something, seeing as she ate a lot. It was never a bad thing, though, having a housemate whose eyes were bigger than their stomach. It meant that there were always leftovers aplenty.