Charms and Death and Explosions

by Honor Raconteur

  “The doctor sent a telegram to all police stations, hoping for a response,” she answered. “I stopped by the front desk to help Mitch sort through the correspondence, as he looked overwhelmed, and saw it. It’s probably our charms, isn’t it?”

  “Even if it isn’t, we need that area locked down before it can become an epidemic,” I assured her. “I can do that with my authority, and if nothing else, can get one of my fellow Magical Examiners to work the case. However, I’m inclined to believe in your instincts. A bad anti-sickness charm will cause harm to the people in immediate contact to it, but it never spreads further than a household. It doesn’t have the power to do so. I would have said the same of Garner’s charms, except he’s added the element of the Destroying Angel mushrooms.”

  “That’s a game changer, I take it,” Jamie stated with a glance at me.

  “Yes, quite. It would have the power, or at least the deadly influence necessary, to cause an outbreak.” This was why half-finished degrees were so dangerous. The student left school believing they were sufficiently trained to go about the business. Nothing could be farther than the truth.

  Leaning to the side, I gained the leverage necessary to retrieve the chocolates without elbowing Jamie in the ribs in the process. I handed it over to her and she cast me a thankful look before opening the top and popping one into her mouth. In a bout of charity, she tilted the box toward McSparrin, and the other woman juggled the reins long enough to fetch a morsel as well.

  We’d need the sugar to see us through the rest of the day. Yesterday had been harrowing, emotionally speaking, and we’d stayed very late making sure that every particle of Destroying Angel was properly taken out. Today saw us drained of our normal energy and motivation. I’d need artificial stimulants to offset the mood. If there really was an outbreak here caused by the charms, we’d have our work cut out for us.

  McSparrin drove directly to a doctor’s office on Sea Lane, pulling up in front of a two-story building that looked old, but well-cared for. The white and black sign out front announced it the practice of Dr. James Cartwright. Stepping off the wagon, I offered a hand up to Jamie, then went around to hitch the horses to the post. I took in the measure of the place as I did so, and didn’t care for what I saw. The building bulged so full of patients that some made do with the wide front porch. Grimly, I grabbed my bag before hustling down the gravel pathway and up the front steps.

  The interior was as fully crammed as I’d anticipated. Patients lined the hallways—some of them too ill to remain standing, instead sitting apathetically upon the hardwood floors. I saw signs of influenza immediately upon entrance. Every person was coughing, sneezing, their noses running, faces unnaturally pale or flushed with fever, and sweating. An outbreak, yes, we definitely had that.

  I stopped abruptly and pulled out an anti-sickness charm amulet, thrusting one at each woman following me. “Keep this on you at all times.”

  Jamie held up a staying hand. “I won’t need it.”

  Perplexed, I cocked my head. “Of course you will.”

  “No, remember?” she replied in a patient, somewhat smug manner. “This is a magically started sickness. If it’s magical, it can’t do anything to me.”

  I kept my hand extended, the amulet still in my palm. “Jamie. The first generation of the sickness is magically caused, yes. But once released, a virus can adhere to other strains of sickness and become a different beast altogether. That you will have no immunity to.”

  Her smugness dropped abruptly. “Oh. Well that’s no fun. Alright, amulet it is. Will it do the job in my pocket?”

  “Yes, as long as it’s on your person.” With them sorted out, I put an amulet into my own pocket, searching visibly for a nurse or the doctor who had called for help. There was a staircase and hallway dead ahead of me, a receiving room crammed full to my right. Did that mean his patient rooms were to the left?

  I attempted it and found to my relief a nurse behind her desk, frantically filling out prescriptions from the look of it. She looked entirely exhausted, hair escaping her bun in tendrils, the white uniform and apron far from clean or pressed. She looked up at us with a hopeless resignation, then spied the uniform McSparrin wore and straightened abruptly, hope flaring to life. “May I help you?”

  “I’m Doctor Henri Davenforth, Magical Examiner for Fourth Precinct,” I introduced myself. “My colleagues, Detective Jamie Edwards and Officer Penny McSparrin. We received a telegram asking for aid and are here to give it. Can you direct us to Dr. Cartwright, Nurse…?”

  “Fraser,” she introduced with a relieved smile. “Yes, please wait one moment.” Springing up from her chair, she rushed through the door and into the room behind, calling as she went, “Doctor!”

  Jamie stepped in and murmured near my ear, “Henri, this looks bad. Can you tell if there’s magic behind this or not?”

  “It would take an actual analysis, I can’t tell from sight alone,” I responded in the same low tone. “As soon as the doctor gives us parameters to work from, can you have the streets cordoned off to quarantine the area? I’d rather it not develop into an epidemic.”

  “Sure, Penny and I won’t be much use here anyway. The thing that bothers me, though…” she half-turned to indicate the view through the front window, “is that. Those are company apartments, aren’t they? For Reggie’s business?”

  In my preoccupation of cause, I had overlooked the obvious. I swore roundly, pushing a hand roughly through my hair, my fingers catching on the curls. “Blood and magic, so they are. Jamie, do you know how to reach my brother-in-law?”

  “I do. I’ll send him a quick message alerting him to the problem.”

  Dr. Cartwright—I presumed him to be so, at least—bustled into the room at such speed that he nearly skidded the last three feet. His white coat hung askew, shirt untucked from his pants, tie missing altogether. His blue eyes latched onto mine with fervor as he asked, “Dr. Henri Davenforth?”

  “The same, sir,” I returned, extending a hand, which he latched onto with more eagerness than politeness. “We received your telegram and believe it might be connected to something we’ve investigated for the past several days. A charm maker released bad charms into the market, ones that we know for a fact sometimes cause sickness. I’ll help you investigate this further and help as I can, but first, can you tell me which areas need to be cordoned off? Detective Edwards and Officer McSparrin can see to that.”

  “Yes, of course.” He gave both women the widest smile, tinged with overly bright eyes. I felt that this was a man at the end of his rope, desperately glad to get any helping hand. “I’ve had patients from Sea Lane to Harvest Street, the furthest north being Market Corner, and right down to the docks.”

  I followed that direction, aligning it with a mental map in my head and winced. That was a nearly two square mile radius. “Good grief, man! You said outbreak, but it’s more along the lines of an epidemic with that kind of area.”

  Jamie’s mouth was tight, flat and unhappy. “I’ll say. Doctor, you tell Henri everything you know. I’ll handle the situation outside. Penny, chop chop.”

  Trusting that my partner could handle things sufficiently, I turned to Dr. Cartwright. “You said in your telegram that you believe this was magically inflicted. Why?”

  “Every person has complained to me that they shouldn’t have been sick because they have an anti-sickness charm in their house,” he answered, anger rising in a hot tide across his cheeks. “I didn’t pay much attention to it at first, as this is a poor area. These people are factory workers, for the most part; they wouldn’t be able to afford good charms. Mostly bargain bin charms, and those are practically useless. But by the twentieth patient, I started to question it. By this morning, I was sure. It had to be the charms. I now have over two hundred patients. I literally can’t see them all, and I’ve had to call in favors from other doctors in my acquaintance to manage the workload.”

  I took in what he said, turning my head to regard the multip
le patients still waiting upon him. “Do you mean to tell me that their practices are equally as filled to the bilges as this one?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  There was one more question that I needed answered. “How long? When was your first patient?”

  “Seven days ago to the day, I believe. Between my practice and the others, we have over seven hundred patients who have reported in.”

  Shaking my head, I informed him flatly, “That’s not an outbreak, Doctor. According to the Disease Prevention standards, that’s an epidemic. You have too many patients in a very short amount of time. I’m calling this in.”

  Far from being chastised, he nodded, exhausted in his relief. “Please do.”

  If he hadn’t been so worn down, if he’d possessed more clarity of thought, I believe he would have already come to this conclusion and acted appropriately. But it is difficult to think clearly when the mind is fogged with fatigue. I ‘cut him some slack,’ as Jamie would put it. “I’ll start examining patients myself after I’ve reported this in. I’ll determine the cause and work on eradicating that.”

  “It’ll make things simpler, cut out the middleman,” Cartwright agreed. “I’m going back to my patient. Call me with any news or questions.”

  “I will, sir.” As he left, I pulled the texting pad out of my bag and wrote quickly: Seaton. There’s an epidemic near the docks, Sea Lane. Might be magically caused. I’m investigating, but send me help.

  It took a moment for him to respond with his usual flare: Sod it, man, I want GOOD news! What kind of epidemic?

  Influenza, I believe. Started seven days ago, reportedly by bad charms.

  Zounds, that sounds like it might tie to our case. Alright, I’ll notify the authorities, then join you.

  Good, thank you. These texting pads were very handy in such emergency situations. I hoped I got to keep this one.

  Shaking the thought off, I went back to the front receiving room, pulling out my wand as I did so. Stopping in the doorway—I’d little choice about that, as the floor was fully occupied—I cleared my throat and gained perhaps the attention of half the room. “Hello. I’m Dr. Henri Davenforth, Magical Examiner with the Fourth Precinct. I understand that you might be victims of a bad anti-sickness charm. Might I examine all of you?”

  “Please do, Doctor,” an elderly man croaked, his voice raspy, skin too bright with fever. He extended a shaking hand toward me, dark eyes beseeching. “Please.”

  I had three different messages out to people, one via a message boy. Part of this territory fell in Third Precinct’s area, and I had sent off a scorching note to the captain, not mincing any words about how they’d better back us up here because it was their own laziness that had allowed the situation to get out of hand. We were operating a little out of our jurisdiction as it was. I copied my own captain in on the message so he got one as well, fully explaining the situation. I knew Gregson, at least, took me seriously, as he sent in a dozen officers with several wagons of cordon rope to start locking the place down. I made sure to send a separate message out to Gerring, reinforcing that he was not to come help us. Right now, we needed him to continue his work through the morgues and going through Garner’s files. If we had a better idea of just how many of Garner’s charms had sold, we’d be better braced for how many patients we were likely looking at.

  But at the moment the best that Penny and I could do was cordon off the roads, try to contain the influenza. It was regular police rope, nothing magical about it, but I had no doubt that when the cavalry arrived, the magicians would apply anti-sickness charms along the barriers to prevent anything from spreading. By itself, the influenza wasn’t deadly, or so I was told. However, it apparently had a bad habit of blending with other viral strains and becoming some sort of super bug. People who were already ill, or had poor immune systems, would die from it. I’d like to prevent that as much as possible.

  Penny was off on the north side with several other officers, cordoning off the area up there, and we had people on the east and west side, so I started with the streets down near the docks. I’d been reliably informed by the locals they had ten streets coming into the area, which meant a lot of rope. I was only taking three streets, but still. I’d grabbed more than a few rolls before leaving, thick golden rope with cloth ‘keep out’ signs woven into them. Hopefully I had enough to go the distance.

  “Excuse me, young woman,” a male voice hailed from behind me.

  I turned, pausing in knotting the rope around one of the street lamps. He seemed a nice enough fellow, ordinary working class, brown hair tousled a bit by the sea breeze careening up the street. “Yes?”

  “There’s laws about tying something here or obstructing the street,” he informed me, pointing to the rope.

  “Yes, so there is,” I agreed, a little amused. “I’m Detective Edwards, Fourth Precinct. There’s an influenza epidemic here. We’re cordoning off the area.”

  He looked alarmed by this, but not unduly so, as if I’d just said something that didn’t jive with what he’d expected me to say. “But you can’t do this without proper notice first.”

  Ah. One of those types. They did make my life difficult. “Proper notice is in the works. In the meantime, we want to prevent the disease from spreading. Now, do you live in this neighborhood?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “Then you have a choice right now. Either go in and stay there for several weeks, or stay out.” I stared him down, not impatiently.

  Meekly, he backed up. “I think I’ll stay out.”

  “Not a bad decision,” I agreed. Picking up the rope, I carted it across the street.

  I made it sound easy, didn’t I? It wasn’t. I had to stop traffic, explain to people over and over again that the area beyond was now quarantined. That they couldn’t travel through. Some people were angry, some were scared, some asked me the same question three times in different ways, trying to find a loophole. It took me almost an hour to get it through their heads that quarantine meant just that—quarantine—and no one was coming in or out. Only when they were more or less cowed into obeying did I dare head for the next street.

  This whole situation just made me so mad. First, that so many bad charms could even be sold in stores to unsuspecting victims. That was just wrong, right there. People scrimped up the money to pay for a charm to keep sicknesses away, and instead it sabotaged them. And then, to add insult to injury, a doctor sees the problem and reports it, only to end up begging for help. Why would he have to do that? Why wasn’t there a protocol in place for a more immediate response? The more I thought about it, the madder I got.

  So, of course, the bane of my existence showed up.

  I could hear her before she caught up with me, as the woman insisted on wearing heels on the job, and she had a very distinctive stride, like a mouse scurrying. Then again, she likely had rodent in her family line somewhere. It would explain much about her personality.

  “Detective Edwards!”

  Sighing, I let my head hang for a second, cursing the woman as vilely as I knew how. Then I turned around, shoulders thrown back, as you absolutely couldn’t give any sign of weakness in front of reporters. It was like throwing blood in the water. “King. I’m a little busy at the moment.”

  She ignored me. She was good at that. Hand bag swinging from her elbow, ever-present pad of paper in her free hand, and a camera man jogging to keep up with her, she was the ever-unchanging picture of a reporter after a scoop. “Detective Edwards, what are your thoughts on this outbreak happening on the very anniversary of your killing Belladonna—”

  “I think—” I bit my tongue, hard. I didn’t dare say what I actually thought. Sensing she’d caught me at a verbose time, King’s eyes went alight, limbs practically quivering in her lavender dress. I’d only ever seen her in that exact color. Didn’t she own any other dresses? I deliberately rephrased. “I think the epidemic here isn’t these people’s fault. I think that when we do figure out who’s responsible for t
his, heads will roll. I really think that my being here, and Belladonna, has absolutely nothing to do with it. And King, if you report me saying otherwise, your head will roll.”

  She paused in her scratching to give me a winsome smile. “Of course, I wouldn’t dream of doing so, Detective.”

  “Remember that I am not the most high-ranking person involved with this case,” I tacked on in warning. “Don’t think you can ignore me. They won’t be as patient. Now, that’s all I have to say. Get out of here before I slap you with an obstruction of justice charge.”

  She frowned, a pretty pout of frustration, got one picture of me frowning at her, then clacked off.

  Growling a curse to myself, I went back to hauling rope.

  My safety valve for frustration was singing. For that matter, my safety valve for basically everything was singing. People who knew me well no longer batted an eye. The ones who really knew me well joined in. As I tied ropes off to lamp posts, I sang to myself in a mocking tone, “This is the charm that never ends, yes it goes on and on my friends! Some people started using it not knowing what it was, and they’ll get sick of using it forever just because—”

  “I haven’t heard that one yet,” Sherard noted as he joined me.

  I hadn’t heard him pull up, but he must have just done so, as I saw his motorcar parked along the curb on the other side of my cordoned line. “Yeah, it’s not the original lyrics. You got here fast.”

  “I’ve been messaging Davenforth back and forth the past hour,” he answered with a long expression. Cats dealing with barking, stupid dogs wore that sort of expression. “He’s reasonably sure at this point that at the very least, a bad batch of charms is responsible for all of this. He’s half-convinced that it’s our murdered duo’s charms, although he said he won’t be satisfied on that point until he has their charms in evidence. Fastidious man, isn’t he?”

  “He’s that, alright. Then again, he wouldn’t be a good Magical Examiner if he were anything else. Are you here to hunt down the charms?”