Science and Sorcery

by Christopher Nuttall

  “She will have corrupted him slowly,” Golem said, as he stepped out of the bathroom. “It was always that way; the mentor offers shortcuts to power and success, and then outlines the price later. By the time he was pushed into sacrificing his classmate, he would have had real problems telling right from wrong.”

  “If he cared at all,” Matt said, glancing into a room that was alarmingly pink and decorated with pictures of strangely-coloured ponies. It had to be Mindy’s room. “Some people just grow up warped because of how they were treated as children. The children who were abused while young often become abusers themselves as adults.”

  Golem glanced over at him. “Do you think that is a good excuse?”

  “No,” Matt said. In the end, people made their own choices, even if they didn't see where they led before it was too late. Calvin Jackson had proven willing to sacrifice at least two people who had done him no harm. Matt might have suggested forgiving him for what had happened to Moe and his cronies – all the signs pointed to that being an accident – but he’d murdered Sandra and tried to do the same to Misty. “I don’t.”

  Calvin’s room proved to be a very typical nerdy teenager’s room, complete with posters of starships from a dozen different movies and a vast number of books. Matt glanced down at some of the titles and had to smile; science-fiction books looked to have slowly given way to fantasy books, including several written by authors who were now advising the Mage Force. And there was a small selection of library books on history...he guessed that Calvin’s mentor, like Golem, was trying to learn as much as she could about the modern world. Maybe the shock of discovering that she'd been imprisoned for at least six thousand years would kill her. Golem had taken it in stride, but then Golem wasn't exactly human.

  “He put a charm – two charms - on this box,” Golem said, picking up something that looked like a weekly pill box. Matt’s eyes kept refusing to look at it properly until he forced himself to concentrate. “One charm kept people from noticing it; the other kept it shut, in the unlikely event of anyone seeing past the first charm. Very refined work for such a new magician.”

  There was a flash of light as he opened the box. “Ah.”

  Matt blinked. “Ah?”

  Golem held the box out to him. Inside, there was a small collection of hairs, each one marked with a name. One of them was marked Gavin, the name of the teenage boy currently in custody for assaulting his Coach. He’d been telling the truth after all. No doubt Calvin, a nerd by any other name, had wanted to take revenge, deliberately setting out to ruin his enemy’s life. And he'd succeeded.

  “Basic sympathetic magic,” Golem said. “These will have to be burned, of course.”

  “Yeah,” Matt said. “Shouldn't he have had a voodoo doll around somewhere?”

  “If he needed one,” Golem said. They searched the entire room, but found no trace of any doll. “A magician with enough experience, or raw talent, could work the magic without needing the doll. It’s the shapes he forms in his mind that are important.”

  “Or perhaps he simply borrowed a doll from his sister,” Matt said, after a moment. “Would that work?”

  “For basic magic? Yes, it would work,” Golem said. “If he’d wanted something more complex, he might have had to produce the doll himself.”

  Matt had to smile. Some magic seemed to require symbols that were produced by the magician, even though few people had the required skills in this day and age. It was possible to produce a spell to cut through wards, but it required a sharp sword and that sword had to have been created by the magician who intended to use the spell. Exactly how that worked was beyond him, unless the symbol was the thing in magic. The Mage Force had resorted to hiring blacksmiths from the SCA and having them teach the basics of their art to new magicians. Some of them would have a talent for infusing magic into an object.

  There was a crash downstairs as the forensic team entered the house. Matt walked back to the stairs, called down to identify himself for the benefit of any nervous trigger fingers, and then issued orders. It was unlikely that Calvin was going to return to his house now – Matt doubted that anyone bright enough to master magic would fail to realise that the police would know where he lived – but they’d still have to pull as much evidence as they could from it. And besides, they might find something that would point them in Calvin’s general direction.

  “Keep me informed,” he ordered, finally. He’d have to call Caitlyn and confess their failure. Their political superiors were likely to explode. “I’ll leave Golem with you for the moment. He can spot any more magical traps.”

  Besides, he wanted some time to think alone.

  Chapter Thirty

  Washington DC, USA

  Day 34

  “The intensive manhunt for Calvin Jackson continues today,” the newsreader said, as the car pulled into the White House garage. “Calvin Jackson, the black magician responsible for the sacrifice of his classmate and the deaths of upwards of three hundred innocent victims remains at large, with a dozen reported sightings in different states. The FBI has issued a warning that he is to be considered extremely dangerous and not to be approached.

  “In related news, Gavin Harrison, another classmate of Calvin Jackson, has been released from police custody after evidence was discovered proving that he was not responsible for the assault on his Coach. Mr. Harrison’s father has announced that he intends to sue the NYPD for wrongful imprisonment, as Gavin’s claims were not believed by officers. The NYPD has issued no statement in response, but sources within New York’s Finest had pointed out that the physical evidence was all against Gavin...”

  Senator Thaddeus Whitehall rolled his eyes as the car came to a stop and a Secret Service agent opened the door. Nodding politely to the young man, he stepped out of the car and walked through the security precautions with only a glimmer of irritation. The President of the United States was the number one terrorist target in the world and they had to take every step they could to ensure his safety. Thaddeus might dislike the President, regarding him as a symbol of just how broken his country had become, but the thought of a President being assassinated was horrifying. There were plenty more Presidents where the currently serving one had come from, yet it would be seen as a major American defeat. And they’d be right.

  The request for his presence had stipulated, unsurprisingly, no aides or other assistants. That wasn’t uncommon in Official Washington; everyone knew that congressional staffers sometimes had divided loyalties or wagging tongues. Every reporter in Washington was supposed to have at least one source somewhere in Congress or the Senate, someone who would be happy to give them ‘off-the-record’ briefings that ended up in print. If Congress was supposed to be above suspicion – and that was an absurd concept – the same could not be said of the aides and staffers. And then there was the worrying suspicion that someone had managed to start using magic to spy on governmental discussions...

  It wasn't the first time he’d visited the White House, but he’d never actually been invited to a private meeting with the President before. That wasn't too unusual; the President knew that Thaddeus wouldn't support him, so they remained cordial enemies rather than pretending friendship. But the invitation had come right after the exposure of Calvin Jackson and Thaddeus rather doubted that it was a coincidence. His campaign was already starting to make political capital out of the whole debacle.

  He braced himself outside the Oval Office, and then allowed the President’s formidable secretary to invite him into the room. The President had hired an older woman with a mind like a steel trap, rather than someone young and pretty – which suggested that he was either smart enough to avoid the Clinton trap or that his wife had had a veto over the hiring arrangements. Miss Kale had been in Washington long enough to know where a great many bodies were buried, as well as acquiring a reputation for discretion that would have done credit to a nun. Try to bribe her and the FBI would be informed before you’d even finished the sentence.

&
nbsp; “Mr. President,” he said. If he didn't respect the man, at least he could respect the office. “Thank you for inviting me.”

  “Thank you for coming,” the President said. “The country is at a critical point in its history and we cannot afford to be partisan, not now.”

  Thaddeus nodded, without committing himself. Some Presidents had genuinely embraced bipartisanship, believing that it was the only way to achieve lasting reform. Others had used it as a tool and then discarded it when it no longer suited their purposes. It tended to cause political problems for his opponents if they were linked with an unpopular policy. But then, the Presidents weren't the only ones who played that game. Congressmen and Senators had been known to do the same too.

  Once, when he'd started on his political career, his mentor had made him sit down and watch a Japanese film about an absurdly powerful student council. It had made him laugh as the reporter for the school’s newspaper, who seemed to think of himself as a latter-day Woodward and Bernstein and acted more like Buck Williams, had chased the President around the school, hammering away at her administration. But in the end, the President and the reporter had swapped places - and the reporter had discovered that the President had actually very little power at all. There were limits to power, to what a man could hope to achieve even if elected into the White House. And there was no shortage of people willing to complain that the President had done nothing about the Cause of the Week.

  “You’ve been demanding measures to bring magical creatures – the Changed – under control,” the President said. “I assume that includes magicians as well?”

  “After the disaster yesterday,” Thaddeus asked, “do we really have a choice?”

  The country had been shocked after 9/11, but there hadn't been a major terrorist attack on American soil since then and the country’s mood had recovered. This was likely to be worse; there was no shortage of people playing with magic and a number of them had, partly by accident, succeeded in using it. A handful of reports that made little sense on their own, placed in context, suggested that there were other magicians out there...and then there were the Voodoo priests and other forms of ritual magic. And the Native Americans were still complaining about having their sacred sites closed by the military.

  Naturally, the media had been helping to spread panic. Interviews with Calvin’s former classmates had painted a picture of a loner who had been treated like crap, and was now lashing out at all of his enemies. A surprisingly high number of his fellow students had requested protective custody, confessing that they’d bullied him when he had seemed weak and worthless. The media’s pet talking heads had made the situation worse by attempting to psychoanalyse Calvin, pointing out that the abused often became the abusers. They blamed the President, the Mayor and whoever was in charge of the country’s schools for failing to bring discipline into the classrooms. If Calvin’s complaints – and there were many – had been handled, hundreds of people wouldn't have died.

  Thaddeus wasn't sure what to make of it himself. He had little respect for anyone who allowed themselves to be used as a punching bag, but he knew that there was a world of difference between telling someone to stand up to a bully and actually doing so. Calvin had needed a mentor, someone with experience and charisma and the training to teach Calvin to stand up for himself, probably by giving the bullies a black eye. Instead, Calvin had discovered his powers...and everything in his life had told him that he would be blamed for the deaths of three of his tormentors. Why shouldn't he keep his new abilities a secret?

  “I do not believe so,” the President said. “But there is another danger. Can we control the magicians?”

  “If we can't, we may as well run up the white flag now and save time,” Thaddeus pointed out, crossly. “There was a time when we believed we would be invaded by Japan. Hindsight tells us that it was completely impossible.”

  The President nodded. “From what we have been able to establish,” he said, “magic is either drawn out through training or emerges in highly stressful situation. In the latter, there may well be injuries – or deaths. How do we deal with that?”

  “I have no sympathy for bullies,” Thaddeus said, flatly. “And a suggestion that their victims might develop powers and kill them would certainly help to combat bullying, seeing giving them a nasty thrashing is frowned upon these days.”

  “Their parents still see them as little angels,” the President said. “Have you heard that the parents of Calvin’s first three victims are suing his parents?”

  Thaddeus hadn't – and he made a mental note to say a number of sharp things to his aides. “If Calvin actually acted in self-defence,” he said, “how can we condemn him?”

  “We could argue that his reaction was grossly disproportionate,” the President pointed out, mildly. “Do bullies deserve the death penalty?”

  Thaddeus snorted. “Ask their victims,” he said. “You cannot expect children to have an adult moral sense, if there is such a thing.”

  He shook his head. “Right now, we have a number of ticking time bombs we need to defuse,” he added. “And we don’t even know how many time bombs there are. Has there been no progress on picking out the genes that produce magic?”

  “Not yet,” the President said. “Some of the Changed show very radical physical changes, including rewritten genetic codes, but we don’t seem to be able to identify dormant Changed until they actually Change. And we’ve having even less success with magicians.”

  Thaddeus scowled. The vampire had been bad enough – and there were reports that there were at least five other vampires in the United States. Everyone who could afford it was buying guns, ammunition and garlic, ignoring local laws in the name of self-preservation. An ATF agent had been badly roughed up, nearly killed, for trying to interfere. A number of states were already under pressure to loosen their gun control laws, including New York. It was astonishing what the threat of vampires, of genuine threats out in the darkness, could do to concentrate a few minds. Several werewolves had been shot dead with silver bullets in the last full moon.

  It posed a whole new set of legal questions. If someone killed a werewolf, were they guilty of murder, manslaughter, or nothing more than self-defence? The latter wasn't a crime in most of the United States, despite the liberals. Thaddeus would have moved towards self-defence, but at least one report suggested that the shooter had deliberately chased the werewolf and then shot him. That probably counted as murder.

  And was the werewolf himself a murderer, or merely someone under the influence?

  “Very well,” he said. There was no time to play political games. “I assume you summoned me for a reason?”

  The President nodded. “This is a draft copy of the Magical Control Act,” he said, picking up a slim folder from the table. “I’m requesting your help to get it through Congress and the Senate as soon as possible.”

  “I see,” Thaddeus said. The President would get the credit for ramming the Act through if he played ball, unless he managed to get the President to share the credit. But if the Act was a failure, he’d wind up sharing the blame. “Let me see it.”

  The President passed him the folder. “One of the sections offers rewards for ideas we can use to deal with magical creatures,” he said. “A writer suggested modifying streetlamps to put out UV light, which vampires appear to find painful. Refitting them all would take years, but it would certainly help make the public safer.”

  Thaddeus nodded, absently. “What about the health risks?”

  “Very limited,” the President said, “or so I am told.”

  “Let’s hope so,” Thaddeus said. It would work, if the premise was accurate and vampires didn't like UV light, but it would take years and probably wind up costing a lot of money. In his experience, a relatively cheap program could suddenly blossom into an expensive nightmare once politicians and government contractors started getting involved. They’d probably strangle the entire initiative through studies of how to do it quickly. “What
happened to the garlic pills idea?”

  “The FDA got involved,” the President said. They shared a brief moment of understanding. There was nothing wrong with garlic pills – they were certainly freely available – but no one had ever considered the possibility of most of the country eating them regularly. It was unlikely that anything harmful would occur, yet the paper-pushers had to have their say. “Besides, everyone is also experimenting with garlic cooking. The price of the average clove of garlic has skyrocketed.”

  Thaddeus cracked open the folder and read through the summery, discovering that there were actually two sections to the Act. The Magical Control Act (Changed) invoked legislation intended to deal with people who were criminally insane to the point where they were unable to tell the difference between right and wrong, granting the government the power to confine any of the Changed who showed a complete inability to control themselves. Even the ones that did have complete control – the mermaids, for example – were expected to register with the government, giving the Navy the inside track on recruiting them. Thaddeus had heard that the early experiments were going very well, although the Navy had had to get used to the idea of mermaids serving as naked frogmen. Apparently, postings to the research ships were very popular, as mermaids outnumbered mermen four to one.