“Fine Dad,” Greg grumbled. “But I want pie when you come back.”
10
Caroline sipped her water and decided that a burger sounded perfect. They’d eaten at this diner twice now, and she’d enjoyed the breakfasts immensely so if the dinner menu stood up to that level of deliciousness, she was all in. It was a typical overgrown diner with maroon and white vinyl booths and never-ending coffee which Darien was taking full advantage of.
“Ugh, I should call my mom tonight, too,” she groaned, the thought popping randomly into her head.
“Is she worried that you’re not making curfew?” Darien grinned.
“Basically. She’s going to have kittens when she finds out that I was down here during that storm. She’s going to freak out that I’m not in a musty file room in the back of the office.” Caroline dropped her head onto the table.
“Tell her I’m here, that should work things out for you.”
“Smartass.” Caroline rolled her eyes. He wasn’t wrong, though. After the kidnapping, her parents treated Darien like a hero out of ancient mythology. He was a superstar in their house for ‘rescuing our sweet little girl.’ Caroline had come close to pointing out that the big bad vampire had been about two minutes from bleeding out if not for her, and that she’d taken out several of the terrorists on her own. That would have caused an even bigger mess, though, and nobody wanted to deal with that.
“Good evening.” Mitch sat down next to Darien, forcing him to scoot further into the booth. She looked at them and had to grin. If you were asked to point at the vampire here, just about everyone on the planet would point at Mitch. His black hair and dark eyes were set off by milky pale skin and only made more obvious by the black turtleneck and suit jacket. He was slim and both his face and bearing were aristocratic.
He was, as Caroline learned on her first day, an entirely human mage and one of Ollie’s finest lab technicians.
“How is Greg? You said over the phone that you ran into difficulty?” Mitch picked up the menu and glanced over it.
“He’s okay. Resting up and grumpy. Wants pie,” Darien said.
“Of course he does,” Mitch’s lip twitched like it wanted to smile whether Mitch liked it or not.
“So, you sat through that storm last night, correct?” Darien turned to him and frowned. “What was your impression?”
“Definitely related to your case,” Mitch said. “I got checked into the motel just before it hit and noticed the magical charge right away. Then when I got to the museum this morning the residue in the horn display was similar enough to cause concerns.”
“How is that even possible? I mean a huge storm like that?” Caroline leaned forward. The whole subject was fascinating to her.
“That is an excellent question. It is fairly well known that mages can work together to enhance or enlarge a spell. It’s not terribly common outside of organizations like the government, but that’s how many security enchantments work. A team of mages go in and combine their power to cast the enchantment over a larger area than a single mage possibly could.” Mitch folded his hands together on the closed menu, his long fingers lacing together.
“So, if someone got enough mages together you could make a storm like last night?” Darien asked.
“Well— oh yes. Hello,” Mitch stuttered to silence when the waiter came up to take their orders. A few minutes later and they turned back to a still flustered Mitch.
“You okay there?” Darien raised a brow.
“Fine. Where was I?” Mitch glared at Darien for a moment before transferring his glare to the table. Caroline didn’t need to hear the discomfort in his voice to want to let him off the hook.
“Um, you were talking about a group of mages making a storm.” She shot a glare of her own to Darien when he started to say something else.
“Ah, yes. So a storm of that size would take a nearly unmanageable group size. Fifty or more mages, all working together and casting at the same time, in the same place. It’s simply untenable,” Mitch said. He refolded his hands on the table.
“Well, how do the government mage groups do it then?” Caroline asked.
“They are significantly smaller in number, for one thing,” Mitch said. He took on a lecturing tone and Caroline started to wonder if this was what she had to look forward to when her classes started again. “The largest group I’ve heard casting together has been eight mages, and that was for the high security area of the last Olympics. Those were experienced government casters, working on a long-term project and learning to mesh together for over a year before they started casting the relevant protection spells. They’d had years of training and group casting experience before they were even brought aboard the project, then spent six months working together to assemble the spell they intended to cast, and that much longer to perfect each individual aspect as well as coordinating between the other mages involved. It was a huge undertaking, one of the largest in mage history, and while it was a brilliant success, three of the mages involved retired immediately after the event, and another two have taken extended sabbaticals to extremely difficult to reach areas far away from each other.”
“Woah,” she said.
“Mages are not known for playing extra well with other mages,” Darien put in drily.
“Apparently not. Why, though? I mean, you seem really nice, Mitch. I can’t see myself wanting to move across the country to get away from you after a case.”
Mitch flashed a smile at her and Darien almost choked his coffee.
“Thank you. You are not a mage, however. Our powers are often inimical to each other, and are more often than not reflected in our personalities.”
“Guess what Stoney here specializes in,” Darien grinned. Mitch turned and glared at him.
“Darien, be nice.”
“He is not wrong. My own speciality is stone and earth spellwork,” Mitch turned back to Caroline. “I have been accused of being somewhat stiff in social situations.”
“He’s also a rock solid guy to have on the team, and his research and forensic work provide an extremely reliable foundation for our cases,” Darien said. Mitch sent him a startled glance. “What? It’s true. I even actually enjoy your dry sense of humor. Usually.”
“Here you go folks, can I get you any refills?” The waiter started putting places on the table and the discussion stalled again. Caroline’s stomach almost rolled over in anticipation when the smell of a perfect hamburger hit her nose.
“So the storm couldn’t have been magic, but it was definitely magic,” Caroline said, taking the conversation back after they all spent several minutes eating. “That’s helpful.”
“Well, if the stolen horn was being used for its enchantment, that would reduce the number of mages needed somewhat. I haven’t found any notes on that horn specifically, but Phineas Morgan did work with several other mages on occasion, and an enchantment to call a wind big enough to push a merchant vessel of that time would have needed power from at least three mages.”
“How many do you think would be necessary to call a storm that large, if they used the horn?” Darien asked.
“Even using the horn it would take more mages than is feasible. I’d estimate at at the very least ten mages, but most likely more than that. It was a significant storm.” Mitch sipped his soup carefully and sighed with contentment. “Chicken soup is one of humanity’s finest creations.”
“I actually can’t argue with that. It’s true,” Darien grinned. “If you can substitute mages using an enchantment, could they have simply used several enchantments? It sounds like you can replace a large number of mages with a single enchantment.”
“Well, it depends heavily on the enchantment in question and who was involved the original casting, and the power of the mage or mages involved in the enchantment, and a few other factors. While there has been limited success in combining the effects of enchanted objects, those successes have been small, and have involved enchantments created by the same mage, or by
two mages with very closely related magics, such as siblings.” Mitch frowned. “The mages involved in the combining also had magic that was strongly sympathetic to the magic of the original caster or casters.”
“You know, I was reading the news this morning and while nobody can figure out where the storm came from, meteorologists don’t seem shocked by how fast it developed once it got going. Apparently with the humidity and the air pressure, and the type of storm it was…” Caroline scrunched up her face and shook her head. “Nevermind. I don’t understand weather at all, even when I’m standing in it.”
“No, you might have a point, actually.” Darien leaned over the table. “What if a group of mages were trying to create a test storm— last night’s storm started out over the water in the Bay. It would have been out of the way for the most part, only boaters would have been affected but it probably wouldn’t have been much of a blip. Just some bad weather. But it got too big because the conditions were just right, and the whole experiment spiraled out of control.”
“That would be incredibly irresponsible to say the very least,” Mitch grumbled.
“So what if—”
“What the hell are we going to do now, though?” A woman from the back of the diner stood up and started shouting. Caroline heard the anguish and stress in it, and the anger was obvious in her face. “We have rights, and just because the goddamn storm flooded the basement and first floor units that doesn’t mean they can just toss us out into the cold!”
She was waving her arms and pointing wildly at some place out the window. The woman at her left reached up and pulled her back to her seat, murmuring something that was clearly supposed to be soothing, but wasn’t quite making as much of a dent as hoped.
“You know this is just the excuse that bastard has been looking for! He can’t get the zoning he wants while the building is occupied, then he’ll kick us all to the curb and do whatever he wants!” She was still speaking loud enough that everyone could hear, but she was settling down somewhat.
“We know, Luce. We’re not going to let him steamroll us. But we can’t live in a building with flood damage that bad. You know that.” The man across the table from her reached over to hold her hand and she glared at him, but after a moment she seemed to deflate.
“Whoever is responsible for that storm, experiment gone awry or not, has to be found.” Darien said.
“So, which of us gets to tell Greg that our case just got bigger?” Caroline asked with a sigh.
“Who gets to call Point and tell him?” Darien groaned, then signaled for the check.
11
Point was not thrilled to hear that the storm that had caused millions of dollars of damage in a swath across Virginia was magically induced. Nor was he happy to hear about the werewolf attacking his agents while they were performing a rescue. He had a number of choice words that Caroline had never heard before and wondered what language they were from. Did trolls speak Trollish or did they just speak English with a few extra words?
“So Mitch will stay through the end of the case. If you need a mage, you’ve got one,” Point growled over the speakerphone sitting in the middle of the table in the guys’ room. “The insurance companies are going to have a collective aneurysm, then cackle in glee when they hear that storms that large might not be considered natural disasters. If we can keep a lid on this for the time being, I’d consider it a favor. I don’t need the headache of spending the next six months in congressional hearings answering questions.”
“Yeah, I can’t see that being a lot of fun,” Darien agreed.
“Just get it sorted out as fast as you can. This was supposed to be a simple theft. Good luck.” He was grumbling by the time he disconnected the call.
“Well, that went better than I thought it would,” Greg said. He was up again and prowling around the room, juggling three brightly colored tennis balls. His leg and arm were mostly healed over now, but the jagged line of stitches up his side had still looked painful when Caroline changed his bandages.
“I can’t blame him for being upset. I mean, we just told him that someone uncovered a way to completely break mage spell casting as we know it,” Darien leaned back in his chair and rubbed his hands over his face.
“So…” Caroline looked at the men. Darien still hiding behind rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes and Greg grumbling softly while he paced and juggled. “So now what?”
Darien groaned and Greg sighed.
“We’re not really any further,” Greg said. “We have a bunch of things that might be related.”
“The horn goes missing,” Darien said, pulling his hands off his face to tick his points off on his fingers. “The storm rolls through. We find out that the horn was used to somehow summon the storm.”
“Greg was attacked,” Caroline pointed out. “Don’t forget that part.”
“Yeah, it’s not very common to attack someone doing rescue work. And that guy was definitely targeting us, not just taking advantage of the situation,” Greg said. The colorful balls blurred and wove around each other as he changed the pattern of his tosses.
“I’m not going to lie, I’m not good at this sort of case. How are these all connected?” Darien frowned and watched the blurring rainbow.
Well, I’d guess that you guys were attacked because whoever is doing all this doesn’t want to be caught and taking out the FPAA agents working on the case was considered a good way to avoid it,” Caroline said.
“That’s not really how it works. Now he’s on the hook for not just theft, but for arranging for the assault of a federal officer.” Greg shifted the pattern again.
“And whatever charge we’re going to have to come up with for this storm situation,” Darien groaned.
“That’s probably another reason Point was so grumpy. There’s no laws about destructive weather manipulation.” Greg nodded.
“Wait,” Caroline frowned.
Greg caught his tennis balls and lowered his hands and Darien rolled his head on his shoulders to blank at her.
“Wait what?” he asked.
“Destructive weather manipulation.” Caroline frowned at the guys who blinked back at her. “What if that was the point? Not just proving that it could be done, but that it could be done to damage something specific?”
“Like an attack spell, but bigger,” Darien sat up and stared at her.
“That storm got bigger than was probably intended, right? The TV weather people have been saying that the conditions were good for growing a storm if one started, they just hadn’t expected one to start, right? What if it got bigger than the people who cast the spell meant it to, but they still wanted something big enough to destroy something? Or at least damage it.” Caroline thought of the woman in the diner having to evacuate her apartment.
“Why would someone do that, though? Here, anyway. I could see that maybe further north a bit, there are a ton of sensitive areas nearby this close to DC, but nothing right here that I can think of.” Darien frowned.
“Insurance?” Greg tipped his head to the side. “Point is worried that they’ll want to start charging for magical-weather coverage, but right now it’s just a natural disaster. We just have speculation right now about all this so they can’t refuse an insurance claim. Oldest motive in the book: money.”
“Let’s see if we can find out what properties were badly damaged in the wake of that storm. I’ll call Lena back at the office and see if she can track down a list for us.” Darien grabbed his phone and hit a button.
Greg grinned at Caroline. “Good thinking.”
“I used to read a lot of mystery novels,” Caroline said. She had the bad feeling that she was blushing, but refused to glance at the darkened window to see.
“I’m a fan of Rex Stout, myself, but some of the cozy mysteries are a ton of fun. I really enjoyed the Mrs. Murphy books. Housepets solving murders. Love it.” Greg grinned, and Caroline could only laugh.
“Seriously, though. You’re doing great. I can te
ll that you’re nervous about all this, but you don’t need to be.”
“I’m…” Caroline took a deep breath and thought for a moment. “I’m less nervous than I was when we got here, which is kind of hilarious considering I got into a bar fight, helped stitch you up after a werewolf attack, and witnessed what I assume was the first magically induced storm known to man. Or person, I guess.”
Greg laughed. “Fair enough. But then, considering you met your first vampire after you got kidnapped by terrorist elves, this seems to be pretty average for you.”
“Wasn’t, till that day,” Caroline grumbled. “Before that it was just normal human bullies at school.”
“Well, you’re doing great. I know this is your first official case, but you’re rolling with it like a pro.” Greg clapped her shoulder with a surprisingly soft palm and then turned back to his juggling.
“So Lena is going to take a look and email us a list.” Darien waggled his phone through the air in front of him for a second when he turned back to them. “Until then, I’d say we should all get some rest. Some of us are still healing, and the rest of us are worn out.”
“Sounds good. I could use a hot shower and some actual rest,” Caroline said with a smirk. “Shockingly enough, crashing for a few hours while hunched over a motel table and waiting for you two to get back so I can practice my first aid isn’t a very relaxing way to spend the night.”
12
The next morning they were most of the way through a late, takeout breakfast when the motel phone rang. Darien answered it and after a few minutes replaced the receiver and grabbed his wallet.
“Be right back. There’s a delivery up front that I need to sign for.”
He bustled back in a few minutes later with a sealed document folder, that rattled slightly. “It’s the info that Lena dug up, and feels like a thumb drive, too.”
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