I shrugged. “Just a few touches. I think they will actually make him look better, in the end. Or at least more like his real self.” I had made his nose hang down over his lips, and had made him bald.
Sarah took the phone away from me and called Claudio back. He didn’t answer.
“He’ll live,” I said. “For a little while, anyway.” No one had ever died of being ugly, more’s the pity.
“You two need some cheering up,” said Margaret. “I say it’s time we hit the mall.”
I was not normally a fan of mall shopping, but anything was better than sitting around watching Sarah mope. “I’m in,” I said.
“OK,” said Sarah.
“Retail therapy,” said Ursula. “The best there is.”
And we went to drown our sorrows in the fountains at the mall.
Chapter 14: Ben
A woman scorned and all that. Beatrice had turned me into a hideous version of myself. A nose like an anchor and all my hair gone. Funny how that makes you more aware of how big your ears are.
In Hollywood, Heros like Beatrice who can use the beauty spell on others to make them look in character for a part are worth a lot of money. Not everyone can do it well, but apparently Beatrice was very talented in that area, at least when she was angry.
“Look on the bright side,” said Pedro, as he and Claudio stared into my reflection in Pedro’s bathroom mirror.
“You mean she didn’t do anything lower than my shoulders?” I said. I had checked there, just in case. But either Bee had some pity on me or she just hadn’t thought of it yet. I was guessing the latter, and thinking it might not be a good idea to call her again and give her a second chance. I was hoping she had to have at least some contact with me, and couldn’t just use the beauty spell on me remotely by thinking about me.
“I mean she still feels something for you. That’s good news, isn’t it? If she were indifferent, that would mean she hadn’t ever really loved you to begin with,” said Pedro.
I hadn’t talked to him about what he’d told Dogberry during his interrogation. We were all running on little to no sleep and it was almost dark again, but I didn’t feel tired at all. I was too nervous about what Dogberry was going to say to the World Council. He hadn’t left us with much hope. People who are investigated by the World Council usually disappear. I didn’t know why we hadn’t already, frankly. They could certainly interrogate us away from home if they wanted to, in whatever dungeons the World Council has hidden in Swiss castles where they operate.
“Sarah will keep working on her,” said Claudio. “She promised me that Beatrice isn’t someone who can stop feeling so quickly.”
“Maybe it would be better for all of us if she did,” I said. Though I couldn’t help but think that I didn’t want that, either. I’d rather think of Beatrice just the way I had always known her, her eyes bright with passion, her whole body tense with the need to do something, her voice snapping insults and corrections right and left.
“We need to start thinking of more than love,” said Pedro. “This is serious. Who could have recorded the money spell? And what are they doing with it? It has to be part of a larger plan.”
“What about your substitute, John?” I said, thinking back on my conversation with Beatrice, though perhaps that wasn’t something to rely on.
“But he’s always had my back,” said Pedro. “I can’t believe it is him. We’re like brothers and always have been.”
“You think of him like a brother, Pedro. But I don’t think he sees you that way.” I’d never used a truth spell on John, but I bet it would be interesting to do it. Dogberry had warned us that we couldn’t run, that we were being watched, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t leave the house and do some of our own investigating.
“You know, John once told me that he’d have been demi-head except that you had a more commanding voice,” said Claudio. “And you knew how to dress to make people take you seriously.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard him say that, too, but as a joke. I always thought he was relieved about not being demi-head all the time. He said he was glad he didn’t have all that responsibility,” said Pedro.
I shook my head. “What he says and what is true are not often the same thing.” I’d heard John act like it was a joke, too, but I’d also seen the jealousy in his eyes.
Pedro looked at Claudio.
“I think he should be the top of the list of people who have it in for you, Pedro,” said Claudio. “You just don’t see the darker side of him. He makes sure you don’t see it.”
“But why would he wait until now to act against me? If he’d wanted to take over, wouldn’t he have done it while I was gone to Europe?” argued Pedro.
“He didn’t need to do it while you were in Europe. He was in charge then. And now that you’re back he’s proven to everyone that he can manage. He just had to make sure that when you went down, it looked like it was your own fault for carelessness—or worse,” I said, thinking aloud.
“I’ll call him,” said Pedro. “Talk to him.”
“But if he’s the one, we don’t want him to have any idea that we suspect him,” said Claudio.
“Right. And how will I know if he’s the one?”
“Call him over and I’ll use the truth spell on him,” I said. “But don’t give him any hints before he gets here that you suspect anything.”
“I can do that,” said Pedro. “After all, I don’t think he’s guilty. Not yet.” So he dialed John on his cell phone.
“John, this is Pedro. Yeah, some crazy stuff on the news. Listen, I was wondering if you would come over. I need your help. You know you’re the only one I can trust right now.”
John said something.
“No, just you and me. I don’t want anyone else around,” said Pedro. “Yeah, I think it’s probably Ben, but it might be Claudio, too. It hurts a lot when someone you thought of as a friend betrays you. I’ll see you soon.” He hung up the phone.
“So he’s coming over?”
Pedro nodded.
“And?”
“I want to talk to him alone first. I want to give him a chance to explain himself.”
“You mean to kill you or pin something on you,” I said cynically.
Pedro shrugged. “He might try that. But he has to know it won’t be that easy, not with you two as my best friends. You won’t let him get away with that.”
“If the World Council decides we’re the ones who stole your spell, then I’d say he doesn’t have to worry about Claudio and me much,” I said.
“Maybe. But how can he be so sure that it will work? No, I’m going to see him. And I told him you two weren’t going to be here, so why don’t you clear out for now?”
“And leave you as easy pickings for John? Not for a second, Pedro. We’ll go into another room so he doesn’t see us, but if you call out for help, we’ll be here.” I motioned to Claudio to follow me.
“Fine,” said Pedro.
Claudio and I went into the den and closed the door.
“You know, whoever it is isn’t just taking down Pedro,” I pointed out. “They’re taking out all three of us. Pedro will be the visible one gone, but you and I won’t last long afterward. Then three of the five clans will have missing demi-heads here in town. That will leave quite a vacuum. And it may implicate a lot of other people, all the way up to the top. It may also make everyone wonder who’s loyal. The clans might even start fighting again.”
Seeing the magic spells set against each other was not something I wanted to happen in my lifetime, whether or not I was innocent of starting it. The Arragons could buy weapons and clanless soldiers. The Florentines obviously had the muscle. The Heros could distract everyone and make themselves look different if they had to. The Paduans were the ultimate spies. We’d had two World Clan Wars and no one wanted to see another one. The magic had been weak for years afterward, not to mention the devastation on the population. There had been plenty of smaller wars before that, but now that the c
lans could communicate with technology, wars between them would just get more dangerous. It was exactly what the World Council was supposed to prevent.
“We have to do something,” said Claudio.
“Yes, but what?” I asked. The one good thing about worrying about the destruction of the world by magic was that it made my problems with Beatrice look a lot smaller. If I was going to be dead, I wouldn’t have to worry about how much it was going to hurt knowing that she hated me as much as ever.
Pedro popped his head in to ask if I would mind using the truth spell on John.
“That’s the first thing you’ve said all night that makes any sense,” I said.
“Only if he agrees to do it,” said Pedro. “I’m not going to force it on him.”
But refusing the truth spell would say a lot, in my opinion. “Good luck,” I said to Pedro.
“You, too,” he said, nodding to me and Claudio.
Claudio and I sat in the den in silence for about ten minutes. Then we heard the sound of a car outside.
John, obviously.
We could hear Pedro open the front door and let him in.
“I hope this isn’t a really bad idea.” If John had brought a knife or a gun, would anyone bother with a truth spell before condemning me and Claudio for the crime?
After a few minutes of conversation, I heard a thump on Pedro’s side of the wall. And then another thump.
I looked at Claudio and we both ran in.
Maybe I should have used the truth spell first, but I was feeling like I needed more physical satisfaction. So I threw myself at John, punched him a couple of times in the face, and just when I was starting to think I could work out my frustration on him, Pedro stopped me.
“It’s not him, Benedick,” he said. He got in front of me and instead of hitting John, I accidentally got Pedro.
Blood spurted from his mouth, and I stared in horror. “Nice one. Glad you’re on my side,” he said, putting up his hands.
I grumbled a little and let John go. He stumbled to his feet.
“What did he tell you?” I asked. I could do the truth spell right now and we’d have no more questions.
“He has proof that it was someone else,” Pedro said. “Incontrovertible proof.”
“Then why not let me do a truth spell on him?” I asked.
“Because then I’ll know that Pedro doesn’t trust me and I’ll never be able to work under him again,” said John fiercely.
Not such a loss, if you asked me, but obviously Pedro cared.
“Let me guess. Number three to be demi-head?” I asked.
“No, no one in our clan,” said Pedro.
“Then who?”
Pedro glanced at Claudio. “I think you’d better sit down,” he said.
“Why?” said Claudio.
“It has to do with you.”
John looked at Claudio and then at me. I’d given him at least one black eye. It was going to look like hell in the morning, unless he had someone in the Hero clan close enough to him he trusted to give him a quick magical makeover.
“I bet I look about as bad as you do,” said John, nodding to my face.
“Yeah, well, mine was from a woman, so I couldn’t hit her back,” I said.
“Beatrice Hero?” he asked, grinning.
“The one and only.” Who else would I let do this to me without any consequences?
“She is a dangerous one. Beautiful, but I’ve always thought just an inch away from homicidal. I’d keep away from her if I were you, Benedick. Just some friendly advice.”
“Thanks so much,” I said sarcastically. “You know how much I value your opinion.” I really wanted to use the truth spell on him.
“Maybe you should,” said Pedro.
My eyebrows rose.
“What is going on?” asked Claudio, sitting down. “Who’s behind all this?”
“Yes, I really want to know who John thinks we should blame for all of this.” If he said it was Beatrice, I was going to laugh at him because Beatrice was the one person I knew cared least about the magics of the clans. She didn’t even want to use the magic of her own clan, let alone everyone else’s.
But Pedro surprised the hell out of me and Claudio when he said, “It’s Sarah Hero.”
“What? That’s impossible,” said Claudio.
“Uh, Sarah? She’s about as sneaky as an open book,” I said.
“That’s what she wants everyone to think. That naïve thing is just an act,” said John.
I turned to Pedro. “You believe this?”
Pedro rubbed his face with his hands. Then he took a breath and nodded. “She’s the one who betrayed me. She stole the money spell. John, show them the proof.” He looked sick about it.
“Caught on video a couple of hours ago,” said John. He nodded to Pedro’s computer screen.
“Go ahead. Queue it up.”
John touched a button and in a moment, Claudio and I were both watching an image of Sarah and Beatrice laughing together. They were at the mall, and they walked into one of the expensive department stores together.
There was a flicker, and then the image changed to another camera, by the cash register. Sarah whispered something and Beatrice turned her back. Then a moment later, Sarah opened her purse and there was a big wad of money inside of it.
“That’s only the first place she used the money. It was a shopping spree. By the time it was over, she’d spent almost a million dollars. In a place as small as this one, that gets noticed by the World Council.”
We’d spent a lot less than that on our whole trip to Europe and even so, Pedro had had to have permission before we left. Arragons had a limit of a thousand dollars before they had to get approval, in case their spending ended up disrupting international money policy. You couldn’t have too much money moving from one country to another without it causing problems.
“Sarah,” whispered Claudio. He had a hand outstretched to the screen, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to touch it.
“She must have gotten close to you because she wanted to have a chance to get the money spell from Pedro,” said John.
But wasn’t Claudio the one who had asked us to intervene for him? How could Sarah have anticipated that? I suppose she might have been sending him subtle signals all along, but Claudio was pretty slow on the uptake. She must have been awfully patient.
“Why me?” asked Claudio. “Why not just go directly through Pedro if it was his spell she wanted.”
John and Pedro exchanged a glance. “Probably because she thought you were an easier mark,” said John. “She might not have thought she could get Pedro to believe she was in love with him.”
“So she recorded his spell at the dance? I was watching her most of the time,” said Claudio.
“But not all of the time, surely,” said John.
“No,” said Claudio faintly.
“See?” said John.
“I’m sorry, Claudio. So sorry,” said Pedro.
“Me, too, man,” said John.
“So it was all about the money spell? She never really cared about me?” said Claudio. He seemed completely deflated, despite his muscles.
“When did you use the money spell anyway?” I asked.
Pedro sighed. “I had to pay the band. I forgot to get money out of the safe before it was locked for the night, so I figured I would just use my spell. I didn’t think about the dangers of it.”
“Did you take any precautions?” I asked.
“I looked around and didn’t see anyone, but I was in a hurry,” said Pedro. “I might not have noticed someone who was hiding to record it.”
“What else?” I asked, because it was clear he was hiding something.
“Well, afterward, when I walked away, I noticed that Sarah and Beatrice were pretty close. I never thought they would do something like that, but they might have. They were the ones who had the most opportunity that night. And it looks like they had motive, as well.” He gestured to the computer
screen.
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
“What more do you want?” asked John.
What I wanted was to use the truth spell on him anyway. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was exactly, but I didn’t trust him. Sure, the video evidence against Sarah was pretty damning, but what if John had convinced her to do it? What if he was still behind making Pedro look incompetent so he could take over his post as clan demi-head?
“It doesn’t make sense. They’re Heros,” I said. “Why would they be so desperate for money to go shopping? They can look good in any old rag with their beauty spells. And besides, they took no precautions in those videos. Like they wanted to be caught.”
“And that makes you think that they’re innocent?” said Pedro. “They could just be stupid.”
Beatrice, stupid? I could believe a lot of things about her, but never that.
“What’s your explanation?” I asked John.
He shrugged. “Do you know what it’s like inside the Hero clan? With all that magic for beauty, they have to do other things to stand out. I assume that they were feeling competitive with some of the other women and this was the way to beat them. Better clothes, and the knowledge that they have something no one else does.”
“You think they would risk being punished by the World Council in order to get some nice clothes and jewelry?” I asked, shaking my head.
“I understand how difficult this is for both of you,” said John, his eyes shifting back and forth between me and Claudio. “You thought you had found the loves of your life and now this.”
I was getting awfully tired of him. I took a step closer to him and said in a low voice, “Let me use the truth spell on you,” I said.
“Ben, no,” said Pedro. “I need to trust someone in the clan if the World Council takes me away for a while.”
If the World Council disappeared us, it was not going to be “for a while.”
“I’m going to do it,” I said, and started speaking the truth spell.
John’s angry look gradually faded into compliance
“Only ask him about the video,” whispered Pedro.
But that wasn’t what I cared about. “Are you trying to take over Pedro’s place as demi-head of the Florentine clan?” I asked directly.
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