Rock Paper Sorcery

by L. J. Hayward

  And I would never have her. Not the way I wanted.

  But I would have this. One more time, I would have this, at least.

  The only thing wrong… I couldn’t taste her aura.

  I wanted, no, needed to touch it. To feel that sweet darkness surround me and invade me. But I couldn’t find it, no matter how hungrily I pulled at her or how deeply she looked into my eyes.

  It wasn’t her, though. It was me.

  No pain, no filter, no empathy, no aura.

  Just as Tanqueray had only had tattered remains of his aura.

  I pushed Erin away, gently, but firmly. She was breathing hard, wild eyed and blushing as if we’d done more than just look.

  “What was that?” she asked softly.

  I couldn’t tell her. It was too big, too terrible and I didn’t want her hurting for me.

  “I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “I think it all just hit me at once. Sean, Tanqueray, Dev being missing.”

  It wasn’t holding water. Erin eyed me sceptically. I didn’t blame her. I’d been acting the cold bastard all morning, dismissing not just Dev, but her concerns as well. The guilt for which curled in my stomach and I was happy to feel it. At least that much of me was still working.

  “Come on,” I said. “Let’s get out of here. We need to look at our wounds and I’d rather not do that here.”

  She agreed silently and we made our cautious way back to the car. I kept looking over my shoulder, checking for more mad mutant monkeys. Nine monkeys had gone missing and we’d only accounted for seven. Who the hell knew where the last two were, and what sort of state they were in. I guess we were just lucky none of the plant life had joined the homicidal game.

  Erin didn’t feel steady enough to drive, so I did, taking us back to her office. She protested, knowing what I meant to do even before I did it. Still, we sat on the couch with the first aid kit and cleaned our wounds. I bound the worst of Erin’s and she stuck a dressing over the cut in my side.

  “Salisbury next?” she asked, tidying away the remains of our triage.

  “Yeah, but just me.”

  Erin didn’t glare or yell, just continued picking up discarded wipes and dressing wrappers. “I think that’s a mistake.”

  Adjusting my worse-for-wear shirt back into place, I stood. “Why? Because I’m not acting like myself?”

  “That, and you might need backup. Again.”

  “I’ll be fine.” I carefully refrained from saying she would probably be in more danger with me, because I wasn’t acting like myself, apparently. “Besides, you should probably do more to find Dev. What if he really is in trouble?” Appealing to her PI professionalism would probably be more successful than relying on her sense of self-preservation.

  She did glare then. Her I-hate-it-when-you’re-right glare. “Fine. But call me the moment you find something out. Or if you need me. There’s two more monkeys out there, remember. Who knows what the hell’s been done to them or where they are.”

  “Sure, sure,” I muttered as I left

  God. It felt good to finally have her off my freaking back. Nag nag bloody nag.

  Downstairs, I clambered into Free Willy and hauled bulk back south.

  If I forced myself to think about it, to remember the dread and fear I’d felt in the abandoned monkey-house, then it scared me. I’d been ensorcelled. Something was happening to me I couldn’t control, couldn’t fully understand. The same thing that had happened to those monkeys, and to Tanqueray.

  I flexed my left hand around the steering wheel, feeling once again the fluidity of the joints, the ease of movement. Back to normal.

  But it was a lie. Yes, I had mobility back and I’d fooled myself into believing that had been the only problem, now fixed. It wasn’t, though. There was an added weight to the limb, a sense of density I didn’t feel in my right arm.

  What if the only cure was a sledgehammer?

  Then I pulled up outside the Salisbury address and all those concerns slipped away as if they were nothing. It was too hard to keep them front and present in my mind. All I really cared about was finding out who was behind this. Who this mysterious rogue sorcerer was who’d brought so much trouble to my city.

  Thankfully, this time the house was neat and tidy. A lowset brick place with a basic front yard comprising of a trimmed hedge along the driveway and garden-bed of easy to care for plants. The blinds on the windows were all drawn and there was no car in the carport. It appeared no one was home.

  Utilising Erin’s trick, I made a grab for the contents of the letterbox, coming up with a few envelopes. I got back into the Monster Mobile before anyone could yell at me for stealing, then looked at the name on the mail.

  Dr T Carver.

  The moment of shock faded all too quickly. In hindsight it all fit.

  He worked at the QEII hospital in Coopers Plains, where he’d encountered both Tanqueray and me. He was more than a few degrees shy of sane. For fuck’s sake, the man’s comb over was more complicated than a Rubik’s Cube. And the freaky-arse prose over the dead body, ‘Born of flesh, and at the end, stone and dirt.’ That most definitely could have been a trigger, like Dev’s gibberish.

  The only thing that didn’t confirm it was his age. Clearly heading toward sixty, Carver had exceeded the usual sorcerer life span by at least ten years. Still, the scales came down on the ‘he’s a nutter’ side of the argument and I was willing to bet a whole heap Carver was our rogue sorcerer.

  I considered for about two seconds calling Erin. Then decided against it. I was still phoneless thanks to Dev and she’d only slow me down with her demands for something other than circumstantial evidence.

  Ramming Andre the Prado into gear, I headed for Coopers Plains and the hospital.

  In the car park outside the morgue, I took a moment to remember what ‘normal’ was like. Almost found it for real, a flashing moment of worry at how I was acting, but it vanished quicker than it had arrived. Feeling cold and detached again, I went into the building.

  The receptionist was on the phone when I reached the counter. I waited patiently, smiling. Which apparently didn’t work, because when she glanced at me, she frowned and turned away slightly, finishing her call in a lower voice. But, honestly, screw her.

  “How can I help you?” she asked, eventually, plastering her own fake smile on.

  “Hi,” I said in a sickly sweet voice, “my name’s Matt Hawkins. I was here the other day with Erin McRea. We had an appointment with Dr Carver. I just have some follow up questions for him. Is he available?”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but Dr Carver is unavailable today. Perhaps you could come back tomorrow.” The smug smirk in her tone was a blatant challenge.

  “Perhaps if you could just call through, tell him I’m here. I’m sure he’ll be available for me.” To gloat at the very least.

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that, sir. Dr Carver is not actually in today.”

  “Fine. Can you tell me why he’s not here?”

  “I’m sure I can’t, sir.”

  Right. He was probably off making a replacement for the Colonel.

  “Thanks all the same,” I said in the same tone she used. “You’ve been a peach.”

  It was clear what my next move was. Carver hadn’t been at home, and he apparently wasn’t at work.

  Stakeout time.

  Chapter 41

  Erin had a distinct sense of relief after Matt left. He was acting so weird and unpredictable she’d been on egg shells since the performance at the hotel. As she sat at her desk and pulled out her phone, she finally acknowledged her mistake.

  She’d been wrong after Sean’s death. It wasn’t Mercy they’d had to worry about being traumatised. It was easy to see how she’d jumped to the wrong conclusion. She’d sat in the observation room, watching Mercy talk to Sean, with Matt in the room beside Erin. Even knowing it had really been Matt talking to Sean, Erin had still focused on the fact it had been Mercy down there, right across from the poor guy when he died.


  Mercy wasn’t suffering PTSD. Matt was.

  It was an explanation for the emotional ups and downs of the last couple of days. For those moments when he’d given her a thousand yard stare. Possibly even for the berserker outbursts. But not for the arm issues. No, that was something else. And today’s attitude, that wasn’t PTSD. Was it a coincidence these things had happened just when the city was becoming overrun with sorcerers?

  Erin snorted. Hadn’t they just blown the concept of coincidence out of the water?

  Matt was right. She really needed to find Dev. If she had any chance of reining in an emotionally traumatised, possibly ensorcelled berserker, she’d need help.

  Shaking her head, she checked the call log on her phone. Courey had been the call she ignored in the car. Thank God for small mercies. She shuddered to think how Matt would have reacted if she’d answered it, considering how polite and civil her conversations with Courey had been lately.

  Well, no time like the present to deal with the unpleasantness. Except that Courey didn’t answer. Which was equally fine by her.

  Instead, she checked her email, finding nothing but bland responses to her enquiries about Dev to the other branches of Sol Investigations. However, buried in the middle of all the nothingness was a report from one of the independent firms she’d contacted.

  There was a slightly more comprehensive coverage of his early life, detailing his GPA, scholarship, a few personal relationships while in college, but after that, nothing. Until four months ago, when Randy Devantier was admitted to a Los Angeles hospital with severe burns to his back. Three operations to graft skin to the worst injuries and one month of rehab before he disappeared again. The investigator had backtracked Dev’s movements prior to that, noting a police report for loitering, logged outside of the property of a Gereon Friedrich in Southern California. Dev had been picked up along with a young woman called Lana Devantier—his sister?—but let go without being charged.

  As an aside, the investigator added that Friedrich’s property had been destroyed by fire just last week. A couple of days before Dev had touched down in Australia. With burns on his arms.

  A polite tapping caught her attention. There was a slender silhouette hovering outside the frosted glass of the outer door. Erin hadn’t flipped the sign over from closed to open. No one should have…

  The rogue sorcerer. Dev had said he’d been here. He’d even said Erin shouldn’t be here and she had blithely ignored his warning.

  Slowly, Erin stood, loosening her Glock in its holster. On her way to the door, the ficus in the corner caught her eye. Could he…? A shudder ran down her back at the memory of those cold, rubbery tendrils wrapping around her arms and legs.

  Damn it. It was just a bloody ficus. At the first twitch of a hand, she’d shoot.

  She took a deep breath, one hand on her gun, and called through the door, “Who is it?”

  The shadow shifted nervously. “Ms McRea? It’s Belinda. From the morgue.”

  An explosive breath left Erin. Securing the Glock, Erin unlocked the door and opened it.

  The tall, skinny coroner’s assistant went deer in the headlights still. Her big eyes locked onto Erin with that same crosshairs intensity from their first meeting. “May I come in?”

  Shaking off the last of the shock, Erin nodded and stepped back. “Of course. Um, I’m not technically open for business at the moment, but I can talk for a couple of minutes.”

  Belinda came in, moving in that stiff limbed, jerky manner Erin remembered. “I have something I believe you should know.”

  Erin closed the door behind her but felt uncertain doing so, as if she really should leave the girl with an easy escape option, should she want it.

  “Something about what?” Nodding to the coffee machine, Erin asked, “Coffee?”

  “About your case.” Belinda ignored the offer. She took in the office with a quick, efficient look, then turned back to Erin. “About Sean Carey.”

  “Did Dr Carver send you? Did he discover something new?”

  “Dr Carver doesn’t know I’m here.” Her tone was inflectionless, flat. Chilling.

  Erin nodded slowly. Ah. So that was the game. Normally, she would have moved sensitive proceedings like this into her office to negate the chance of someone overhearing, but decided not to. She didn’t know about Belinda needing an easy escape, but Erin certainly felt the need for one.

  “Would you like to sit?” she said, moving toward the couch.

  This was ignored as the previous offer had been.

  “Dr Carver did not tell you all of his findings the other morning.”

  “No?” She left it at that, not wanting to push too hard and send this strange young woman running.

  “He didn’t put it in his official report, either. The police don’t know about it.”

  God. It was like pulling hen’s teeth. “So, why come to me? Why not tell the police?”

  For a second only there was a flash of something on Belinda’s face. A fleeting hint of vulnerability, a flinch in her otherwise obsidian eyes. Then it was gone, and the rock hard directness was back.

  “I don’t think the police will believe me.”

  “And I will?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. So what didn’t Carver want anyone to know?”

  “There were several odd findings in the body. Especially in the remains of the cranial cavity. Rocks, Ms McRea. There were stones in Sean Carey’s head.”

  Images of the mutated monkey at the abandoned house flickered before Erin’s inner eyes. Echoes of the small crunching sounds as she slammed the hammer into the poor creature’s brain. Not bits of its stony skull, but bits of brain matter, turned to stone.

  “But,” she muttered, “Dr Carver did tell us that. He said there were bits of the statue that killed Sean found in his… in the… remains.”

  “Yes, but there were two types of stone. The statue, and another. Further, there were stone-like growths on some of the body’s bones. In the arms and legs. Three of the ribs had changed entirely to stone, fusing together.”

  “Oh.” Just like the monkeys. And irrefutable proof the rogue sorcerer was linked to Sean.

  The next question, however, was why did Carver keep that information to himself? Because he couldn’t explain it and didn’t want to look incompetent before the police? Or because he was the rogue sorcerer?

  “McRea!”

  Erin jerked in surprise, but Belinda merely looked toward the door, expression unchanging.

  Another shadow lurked outside, this one wide enough to encompass all of the frosted glass. He lifted a hand and banged on the door.

  “McRea. I know you’re here.”

  Courey.

  “Sorry, Belinda,” Erin murmured. “I’ll get rid of him. Just give me a moment.”

  “It’s all right,” the young woman said. “I’ve said all I came to say.”

  Frowning, Erin said, “If you’re sure.”

  Belinda nodded precisely once.

  “I can see you!”

  Erin waved at the angry shape outside, but said, “Thank you for telling me, Belinda. This does help.”

  With Belinda stalking behind her, Erin went and let Courey in. He shoved through, stomping into the office.

  “Too far, Erin. It’s gone too far this—” He stopped and glared at Belinda. “Who the hell are you?”

  Belinda looked at him with the same sharp regard she gave everyone, then turned to Erin. “I will leave now.”

  Which she did.

  “What the hell?” Courey snapped, somewhat deflated but still steaming.

  “Nothing to do with you, Courey,” Erin lied.

  “She looks familiar.”

  “Lots of people look familiar.” She went into her inner office this time, comfortable with Courey, even if he was simmering and talking too loud. “Why are you here?”

  Courey followed her. Heading toward the mid-fifties, he was only just starting to lose the tone of a much younger,
fit man. When he’d worked at Ipswich, he’d been allowed to get away with jeans and a t-shirt. Now, in Brisbane, he’d conceded and wore button-downs instead of the t-shirt, albeit with the cuffs unbuttoned and sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He retained a full head of thick hair, even if it had turned completely silver in the time she’d known him. If he was in a good mood, he blamed her for it.

  He wasn’t in a good mood right now.

  “Was it him?” he demanded, taking his stance before her desk, feet planted, arms crossed.

  “Was what who?” Though she had a pretty good idea about what and who.

  “Don’t shit me, McRea. They’ve spent all fucking day dredging the river looking for Tanqueray. I’ve seen the bloody footage. It was Hawkins, wasn’t it.”

  A little icy fist balled up in Erin’s stomach. “What footage?”

  “More than your bloody troublemaker probably cares to know about,” he snapped. “No convenient lightning strike last night. There’s a dozen videos on the internet showing the fight on the ferry.” With visible effort, Courey pulled back on the anger and continued in a much calmer tone. “None of them are very good quality. Can’t make anyone out well enough to get any IDs, and the eye witnesses can’t say for sure if it was even Tanqueray, let alone finger a mug shot of Hawkins as the other guy.”

  Erin crossed her arms as well. “Then why think it’s him? Not every disturbance in this city is his fault, Miles.”

  “He’s got a history…” He shushed her automatic objection and continued. “With Tanqueray. That weaselly little agent of the Colonel’s, Bruce Fields, gave a good enough description of him from a little bust up they had the other night, not three blocks from where your case got splattered across half a street. Then there was the incident at the Royal Brisbane Hospital.”

  Okay. So not his irrational hate of Matt directing this questioning. “Are they pressing charges about the fight?”

  “Not at this stage, but when we hauled Fields in this morning, he spilled it all. Kept saying this violent behaviour of Tanqueray’s wasn’t normal, but that he had been acting odd for the last couple of weeks. Mood swings, unprovoked outbursts, memory loss, some physical issues too.”