A Murder of Mages (39 page)

“Rutting sticks!”

She pulled away and got back on her feet. Where was she? Looked like the backroom of a tailor. She ran through the separating curtain to the shop floor. Drops of blood led to the front door. Satrine followed, to see her quarry chasing after a tickwagon.

“Hold fast!” she shouted, running after the man. She knew that wouldn’t stop him, but it might stop the wagon driver. If she still had her crossbow on her, she could take him down now.

He ran away from the wagon, and she went right after him, shouting again and again for him to hold fast. The street opened up, people clearing out of her way.

She closed the distance, drawing out her handstick. Once she caught him, she’d have no choice but to drop him hard. She wasn’t carrying irons. She had her whistle, but she’d be damned if she could remember the page call.

He tried to dodge behind a pedalcart, but his coat caught on a handle, tripping him up. That was all Satrine needed to catch him. She grabbed his shoulder with her left hand, and slammed the handstick into his back with her right. He dropped to the ground.

Satrine didn’t give him a chance to strike back, wailing on his arms and head before dropping one knee onto his back. She locked her handstick against the back of his neck, pressing his face into the ground.

“Stupid skirt, do you have any idea who I am?” he snapped.

“Not a clue,” Satrine said. “You’re bound by law, though. You will be held and ironed, and brought to trial for your crimes.”

“I’ll see you burned for this!”

Satrine dug her knee deeper into his back. He screamed out, but offered no further comments. She glanced up at the small crowd that had gathered around them. “Could one of you call for a page? I seem to be lacking a set of irons.”

Minox’s head was swimming, still recovering his breath from being knocked to the ground. He sat against the barn doors, able to watch the business inside the warehouse and the street outside. The raid was done, twenty men apprehended. They were kneeling in the street, hands in irons behind their heads. Kellman strolled back and forth in front of them, swinging his handstick as if he was hoping one of them would give him an excuse to use it. Minox could hardly blame him for that.

He felt sick to his stomach. He hadn’t eaten much this morning, and he was glad for it. The sight of the children, locked in their cages, the scent of them sitting in their own filth, it was more than Minox could easily stand. Footpatrol were busy getting the cages unlocked, which was taking far too long for Minox’s taste. He had half a mind to blow the cages apart with a wave of his hand. He resisted the urge, though, as he had no idea if he could do such a thing without injuring the children.

Four of the twenty men were Constabulary from their stationhouse, including Kelsey, the night horsepatrolman. Corrie would be glad to know that she didn’t target him in vain. He was deeply involved in whatever atrocities were occurring in the warehouse. The other sixteen were an unsurprising collection of the usual dregs of society, more than a few of them bearing tattoos from street gangs or Quarrygate.

“Where’s Tricky?” Mirrell stood over Minox, taking a drag off his pipe.

“I’m not sure,” Minox said, forcing himself to stand up. “Someone ran, and . . . she—Inspector Rainey went after him.” He knew he shouldn’t give her nickname any more credence than the one they insisted on using for him.

“Hmm,” Mirrell said. “Good luck to her, then.” He glanced over to the cages, puffing away. “So what’s your reckon on this? Slave trade of some sort?”

“Possibly, but I would think such an enterprise would require being closer to the river. I cannot even fathom what horrors occurred here.”

“Is that an official statement?” Minox hadn’t noticed that Mister Rencir had approached the two of them. “Quite an action, Inspectors?”

“Official statements will come from the stationhouse,” Mirrell said, all but spitting on Rencir. “I have to help open those cages.” He stalked off.

“Always a pleasure, Inspector,” Rencir called after him. He turned back to Minox. “Any unofficial statements?”

“I’m still recovering from being knocked on the ground,” Minox said. “You can print that if you really wish.”

“Heroically injured inspector saves tortured children,” Rencir said. “That should sell some sheets.”

“We all do our part,” Minox said. He lowered his voice. “I’ll make sure to get details to you once I have them clear.”

“I appreciate it,” Rencir said. “Though this whole thing must be making a stir throughout the city.”

“The whole city?” Minox asked. “That seems premature.”

“I’m not sure,” Rencir said. “I just know that Constabulary Commissioner Enbrain was spotted coming across the bridge into Inemar. He doesn’t do that every day.”

Minox’s mind whirled. No, the commissioner certainly did not. Four men were caught here, embroiled in whatever corruption was involved. But there was no way the commissioner could have received word and already come across the river so quickly.

“Did I miss everything?” Inspector Rainey came around the corner, dragging her quarry in irons. “No more excitement?”

“Caught one more, Trick?” Kellman asked. “Add him to the pile.”

“You can’t prove a blasted thing,” her prisoner said. She pushed him on the ground next to the others. Minox recognized him: Lieutenant Haimen, a ranking patrol officer for the day shift.

“Haimen,” Kellman said, his face a strange combination of rage and pleasure. “I was so very disappointed that we didn’t have you in our little group here. I was certain we’d drop the hammer on you today.”

“Hammer ain’t on me,” Haimen said.

Kellman grinned. “Tricky has you caught and ironed, Haimen. That’s quite the hammer.”

Haimen’s mouth trembled, as he looked down the line at the others ironed up. “I’ll talk and walk.”

Inspector Rainey knelt down in front of Haimen. “I don’t think we need you to talk, Lieutenant. So I doubt you’ll get to walk.”

“We’ll see what the protector has to say,” Haimen said. He had a strangely smug smile, which turned Minox’s stomach further.

Inspector Rainey shook her head and came over to Minox. “Missed you back there.”

“I was in no condition to follow, Inspector,” Minox said. She gave a slight smile. “I’m still a bit dizzy.” Minox noticed Rencir had slipped away.

“You going to be all right?”

“I just need a few more minutes. I’m impressed by the relative ease with which you apprehended Haimen. I would hardly think a Waish princess would need to do such things.”

She chuckled. “I was a
quia
, not a princess. You’d be surprised what the Waish expect out of their nobility.” The hint of deception on her face.

“Are we done here?” Rainey asked. She reached out to his head, reminding Minox briefly of Ferah or Aunt
Beliah, but then she pulled back. “Unless they need us here, we should get back to our own cases, right?”

“Right,” Minox said. “Inspector Mirrell, do you still require our assistance?”

Mirrell strolled back over to them. “Not specifically. Though we need to figure out what to do with all these kids.”

“They’ll end up at an orphanage, won’t they?” Rainey asked.

“Unless we find specific places for each of them,” Minox said. “Though we would be negligent if we didn’t send them to Ironheart Ward first. A Yellowshield call would not be out of order.”

“Do you need a Yellowshield, Jinx?” Mirrell asked.

“I am fine enough,” Minox said, which was only a minor bit of dissembling. He was capable of performing his duty, and that was fine enough. “If you’ll kindly excuse us.”

“Sure, go,” Mirrell said. He glanced back over to the group of prisoners, clearly noting Lieutenant Haimen. “That’s a good catch, Tricky.”

“Just doing the job, Mirrell,” Inspector Rainey said. Mirrell only shrugged and walked back to the cages.

“I probably shouldn’t expect more gratitude,” Inspector Rainey said as they walked back to the station. “Civility from those two will have to do.”

“Civility from Inspectors Mirrell and Kellman is probably the best either of us can hope for,” Minox said.

“We need nicknames for them,” Rainey said. “It would improve my mood.”

“I would prefer not to engage in such behavior,” Minox said. There was no need to discuss such things. A fair piece of the morning had been spent assisting those two on their case; Minox had no further desire to waste valuable time not in consideration of their own case. “We need to find out if our killer struck again.”

“You think there will be a fourth murder?” Rainey asked.

“I have not determined how many murders our quarry intends,” Minox said. “However, I am confident that he has not yet finished with whatever he is trying to achieve.”

Rainey stopped walking. “You think that when he’s done, it will all be clear?”

“I think the patterns will be easier to determine in hindsight,” Minox said. “Not that it will be helpful to his potential future victims.”

“Maybe that’s what we need to figure out,” Rainey said. “Who might be next. Get one step ahead.”

“A valid idea,” Minox said. “Though I’m not sure what we can do to determine that.”

Inspector Rainey pointed over to Missus Wolman’s stand. “We should probably get you something to eat.”

“That’s probably true,” Minox said. They walked over to the stand, though Minox had to admit that he wasn’t exactly in the mood for one of her fast wraps. Between the blow to his head and the thought of those poor children, his stomach was hardly ready to handle any heavy food.

“Two Firewings, followed by a Light and Stone,” Rainey said. As she said it out loud, she had a vague sense of something familiar in the names of the Circles. Almost a memory. She shook it off, unable to connect it to anything solid. “I suppose it would be too easy if the next victim would be another Light and Stone.”

“It would be foolish to presume that the specific Circles of the victims mean that much to the killer. There must be a thread of connection that we are unaware of.”

“All right, maybe this is magic politics. I mean, Harleydale appeared to be the leader at Light and Stone. At least in that household. And the Tomars, what sort of influence or rank did they have?”

“We don’t know how devastating an impact these murders have had on the Circles as a whole.”

“It could be one or both Circles have been crippled by the loss.”

“Or not affected beyond personal grief. Given how still-tongued both Circles are about their membership, we can’t even speculate.”

Inspector Rainey sighed and rubbed her shoulder. “We’re really just stabbing into the shadows.”

Minox nodded, noting that Missus Wolman was slapping together several wraps for him, despite the fact he hadn’t ordered any. “We should walk through each murder, figure out the details of how each one was accomplished. Perhaps then we can—”

“This might be some news,” Inspector Rainey said. A page—Hace, Minox noted—came out of the stationhouse and hurried over to them. His face made it clear that whatever news he might have, it was unpleasant.

“Inspector Rainey?” he said when he came close. “I need to take you to the captain’s office. He and the commissioner are waiting for you there.”

Chapter 26