Adamant (8 page)

“I’ll head back to work, then,” said Skyla. “I’ll message you, okay?”

“Sure.” I’d have to run if I wanted to make the meeting.

“I’ll come for moral support if you buy me a Coke,” said Alber.

I needed more than moral support. I needed a miracle.

***

KAY

“This is a disaster,” Markos said.

“No shit,” I said. Markos, Ellen, Lenny and I hovered around the main office the following afternoon, all in varying degrees of tiredness. Markos stood by a filing cabinet and occasionally shuffled papers. Ellen had given up on work entirely and was texting someone. And Lenny hadn’t stopped shaking. He’d been called out for questioning three times already—the rest of us had got off lightly with once each, but Lenny had made the mistake of admitting he’d been the last person to speak to Mr Clark before he’d died. It was obvious he was the least likely candidate to commit murder, but then again, there was no evidence to speak of.

With no one to leave instructions, we were at a complete loose end, turfed out of our old office, and most of the area was under investigation. Nothing was out of place; all the offices had been in the same state we’d left them at the end of the day. That was the last time we’d seen Mr Clark alive.

How could any of us have known that? Death wasn’t uncommon in the Alliance, by any means—the average guard ran into more than their fair share of near-fatal situations, and Ambassadors risked their lives every time they went into hostile offworld territory. The death list was a mile long. But there was a world of difference between that and a brutal murder right here at headquarters.

I’d been too rattled by the murder to sleep in the few hours at my apartment last night and now that I was wired on caffeine, hanging about the office all day was slowly driving me insane. I paced back and forth, counting the seconds to my next patrol shift so I could get the hell out of here and do something useful.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Markos. “Quit your bloody pacing. You’re making my head spin.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do?” I said. “It’s a waste of time us even being here.”

“Tell me about it,” said Ellen, yawning. “It’s all right for you guys. You have an alibi. I arrived ten minutes before Clark died and they’ve given me a right grilling.”

“It’s awful,” Lenny mumbled. “And that’s just the regular police. The Law Division’s going to be involved later, and then we’ll all be screwed.”

“Your optimism is infectious,” said Markos. “Where’s that idiot Aric?”

Good question. He had zero moral scruples, if the wyvern incident proved anything. But killing our supervisor? Even I thought he’d have to have a damn good reason. Besides, he’d been with us.

“No idea,” said Ellen. “That guy’s the most disrespectful ass I’ve ever met.”

Markos looked at me. “What’s your guys’ problem with each other?” I groaned inwardly. I was not in the mood to discuss Aric. Typically, we were both on the same patrol later. Someone up there was having a really good laugh at my expense.

“We both went to the Academy. He didn’t quite grasp that he needed to actually study and not try to bribe people to do it for him. He scored an ‘A’ in ‘Being a Twat’, of course.” I stopped pacing to open the window. It was too damn stuffy in here.

“Hmm,” said Markos, plainly not satisfied with that explanation. “He needs a reality check. Most offworlders wouldn’t stand for his bullshit.”

“Well, he must have got in on connections,” I said. “His family are offworld technology tycoons with links across three universes.”

“That explains it,” said Markos. “I tried to quiz him on the new restrictions in offworld trade. He didn’t seem to appreciate it.”

“Considering it probably lost his family a crap-ton of money, I’m not surprised,” I said absently. The Alliance were right to push up barriers on offworld trade, considering the absolute chaos that inevitably resulted when magic-based technology went wrong on worlds like Earth, where knowledge of magic was next to none. It was like time-travelling back to the Stone Age and handing out grenades.

“Most Academy graduates who come in here haven’t a clue how to deal with the reality of non-Earth negotiations,” said Markos.

“The Academy did cover offworld law, believe it or not,” I said, pacing again.

“Thought it was more about chasing monsters,” said the centaur.

“That too,” I said, and Ellen laughed.

“Sounds exciting.”

“Sounds
mental,”
said Lenny, shuddering.

“Not the first time I’ve heard that,” I said.

“Wow,” said Ellen. “I think I’m glad I went through an apprenticeship instead, but I always wondered.” She was still looking at me. “Did you get to go offworld?”

“Aside from the Passages? No. Guess they didn’t want a bunch of teenagers running amok with hover cars in Valeria.”

Ellen grinned. “Fair point.”

“Never been offworld?” Markos inquired, giving me an assessing look.

“Not yet.” I
could
have, since I’d turned twenty-one, but the permit application process was so long-winded and tedious that ultimately I’d decided to hold off until I’d graduated and had full access to the Passages and the main allied worlds as an Alliance employee. Now I was regretting that decision.

I paused by the filing cabinets at the office’s end, checking my communicator again. “Law Division’s coming down here this afternoon, by the look of it.”

“Crap,” said Lenny, paling. “They’re not going to arrest me, are they? I didn’t murder anyone. None of us did.”

Ellen sighed. “I think we should do something.” She indicated the walled-off section of the corridor outside, which led to Mr Clark’s office.

“Leave it to the Law Division,” said Lenny. “Can they use magic to track who killed him? Or weren’t there DNA traces or anything?”

“Apparently, the killer hid their tracks,” said Ellen. “Didn’t you hear them?”

“He was being questioned,” Markos reminded her. We’d all eavesdropped on one of the discussions that had taken place among the guards and law enforcement, in which it seemed apparent that the killer had somehow removed their own DNA traces from the victim.

Magic, was my immediate thought. Surely they’d have taken it into consideration. Though I had no idea how many magic-wielders there were at Central. I’d never met another. You couldn’t tell by glancing at someone. That was what made magic so damned unpredictable. I’d expected the question to come up when I’d been interviewed for the job here, but it hadn’t, so I’d played it safe. For all I knew, being a magic-wielder might work to my advantage later on, but I’d also discovered it while breaking the law. Not exactly something I wanted to mention on the job application.

“The Law Division. Christ.” Lenny shuddered.

“I wouldn’t have thought they’d get involved just yet,” said Ellen. “I know it’s murder, but there’s nothing offworld about it, is there?”

“Don’t be so sure,” said Markos. “Clark was strangled, but it could have been done with magic. If they’d had a source. A stunner wouldn’t do it. They should have magic experts on the case soon, I’d assume. In a place like this, sad to say, it’s always a possibility.”

Of course. It had slipped my mind that on Aglaia, Markos’s homeworld, magic was second nature, at least to humans. Centaurs, not so much. But there were bound to be more offworlders here.

“Interesting,” said Ellen, switching off her communicator. “I’ve always been intrigued how it works. Magic, I mean.”

Don’t be,
I thought. If I never had anything to do with magic again, it’d be too soon. “Useful interest for a secretary,” said Markos.

“Everyone needs a hobby.”

“Looks like Clark’s cost him his life,” Lenny said, and I glanced in his direction. “He was poking into weird things when he died. So the officers said.”

Weird things. Bloodrock.

“He’s always had odd interests,” said Ellen.

“How long have you worked here?” I asked, out of curiosity.

“Two years,” she said. “It’s going to be weird without Clark here.”

“It is,” said Markos. “He was a good guy. Not that I’d normally say that about a human, but he was.”

It felt like I trespassed on a stranger’s funeral. I’d been here only a day. I hadn’t known Mr Clark, at all. And yet the image of the strange file on bloodrock was never far from the back of my mind. No—I was being paranoid. His death had nothing to do with that. Right?

But it didn’t take a genius to see the wrongness
screaming out from the whole situation. Even the police’s interrogations were directed solely at people in the building. No one seemed to take into account the girl who’d broken into Central last night. I hadn’t seen her face, but like the bloodrock file, it kept coming back to me. I guessed the file was back in Clark’s office, and it took all my willpower not to pace in that direction to have a look.

Paranoia. Just paranoia.

Someone rapped on the door, making Lenny jump.

“Are you admin?” A fair-haired man opened the door. His name badge identified him as Alan Gregory.

“Yeah,” said Markos. “You know that, Alan. I’m the only centaur in the building.”

“All right, just checking. Your new supervisor’s been assigned. One Ms Danica Weston.”

Markos’s face pinched inwards. “Ouch.”

“I wouldn’t say that in front of her,” said Alan, withdrawing. “Best of luck.”

“Well, that sounds encouraging,” said Ellen. “Weston… crap. She’s not from this department.”

“She’s transferring over from the Law Division,” said Markos, forehead creased in a frown. “I’ve never heard of that happening before.”

“Well, what’s she like?” I asked, seeing as Lenny didn’t seem inclined to ask the obvious question.

Before anyone could answer, Alan opened the door again. “By the way,” he said, “the Law Division has sent out an official announcement. As of today, all patrols have new privileges, approved by the police… to arrest and apprehend anyone they find acting suspiciously in or around the Passages.”

“Wait, what?” said Markos.

“What I said. Who has a patrol today?”

“I do,” I said. “They’re giving us permission to arrest people?”

“So it would seem,” said Alan. “Good luck.”

“Well, damn,” I said. Okay, I’d been through the drill a hundred times at the Academy, but this had got serious fast. I’d never thought I’d have the authority to make arrests on my second day at Central.

Alan left, and I turned and saw Markos smirking at me. “What?” I said.

“Nothing,” he said. “I just find this amusing. You look so thrilled to be playing at law enforcement.”

“Ecstatic,” I said. I was fully aware of the irony, though there was no reason for the centaur to know I’d been arrested twice before. My record was clean, thanks to the Academy, who’d decided it was in the Alliance’s interests if the rest of the world didn’t find out it had been the youngest Walker who’d burned down the family estate. Besides, murder was a tad more serious than that brief spell of delinquency when I was sixteen. Markos’s questioning had lasted three times longer than mine had. He’d spent the past hour muttering about ‘bloody suspicious humans’.

“I wouldn’t think you’re off the hook,” said a voice from behind a filing cabinet. I recognised it as Aric’s.

“What’re you doing back there?” Markos said. “Eavesdropping?”

“It’s a creepy habit of his,” I said.

“Doing my job.” Aric’s face appeared around the corner, levelled in a glare. “Getting the office ready for our new boss.”

“I thought we weren’t allowed back in the office,” said Ellen, putting her phone away.

“We are now,” said Aric, with an air of superiority. “Which you’d know if you weren’t slacking off over there.”

“Oh, pull your head out your ass, Aric,” I said, earning a
neigh
of laughter from Markos. “We’re coming.”

“You watch it,” said Aric. “I hear the Law Division thinks it was a rogue magic-wielder who killed Clark. You’d better watch your back on patrol later, Walker.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said, scanning the message on my communicator screen to distract from the urge to punch him in the face.
Crap.
The Law Division really did suspect illicit magical activity. It was more than a theory.

And I knew already that in the Passages, it could be fatal.

ADA

“Nell’s going to kill me,” I said to Alber later. We hung out at a coffee shop waiting for Skyla to come and meet us.

“Yes,” he said, ever the supportive sibling. “She is. You really landed yourself in it now.”

Nell would
not
be happy that I was now officially unemployed. No job, and potentially on the Alliance’s “wanted” list. I’d really screwed up.

“That job was crappy, but at least it was paid.” I stared dismally into my hot chocolate like it could give me answers.

“Yeah. Should have heard Nell ranting the other night, when you were out. We’re in debt.”