Ritual Magic

FOURTEEN

“LILY?”

“I’m okay.” Embarrassed, but okay. Lily put both palms flat on the ground, patted around, and felt nothing but dirt and rocks. So she pushed back into her crouch, steeled herself, and stretched out her right hand to touch dead flesh again.

When she’d learned everything she could, she stood and walked back to Karonski, digging in her purse with her left hand for a wipe.

“Obviously you felt something. Death magic?”

“I don’t know. That first touch . . .” She repressed a shudder and started scrubbing her right hand with the wipe. She wished she had some holy water like Cynna used sometimes. Clorox didn’t seem like enough. “Maybe it’s a variation on death magic. Is there such a thing? This stuff is every bit as repellent, and the sensation is similar, but not quite the same. Mushier. Whatever it is, there’s a lot of it, and it . . . it’s in motion. It’s crawling around on that body.” This time she couldn’t keep from shuddering. “It tried to crawl up my hand.”

“Son of a—Lily, are you—”

“I’m okay. It couldn’t stick to me. It tried, but it couldn’t. Take my hand.” She held it out.

“I didn’t touch the body,” he said, but he let her check anyway. His palm was firm and slightly moist, and the only magic she felt was the kind he’d been born with. Karonski’s Gift was a variant of Earth magic called psychometry—the ability to read emotions from objects. A strong psychometor could pick up images and thoughts if they were connected to strong emotion. Karonski’s Gift wasn’t that strong, but he was exceptionally well trained. When Lily touched him, she felt moss-covered stones. Stones were Earth; the mossy sensation was how her Gift interpreted both his particular variant and his years of training.

When she dropped his hand he asked, “Is this stuff anything like what you touched on the amnesia victims?”

“I don’t know. What I’m aware of touching is magic—nasty, icky magic, and lots of it. Trying to find some arguai mixed in with that would be like trying to spot the Big Dipper when the sun’s up. I can’t do it. Karonski, we need to make sure no one touched that body. The first-on-scene said he didn’t, since the vic was obviously dead, and I shook hands with him. I didn’t feel any trace of magic. But the boys and Hardy—the boys say they didn’t touch him, but we need to know for sure.”

“Shit. You don’t feel any magic in the air, do you?”

“No, and I checked the ground. The dry ground, that is. Nothing there. I can’t say about the blood-soaked area. I didn’t think I should touch it.”

“You’ll probably need to, but later. Let’s go.”

She tucked the wipe in a pocket and started up out of the gully. Up was harder than down, and she needed both hands for the first part. The paramedics were going to have a fun time getting the body up if they used this route . . . if the body could be safely handled. “How do we keep the icky magic from crawling on people?”

“Silk, maybe. It’s worth a try. I’ll need you to check to see if it can get through silk.”

That was going to be fun. “What did your spell tell you?”

“Two spells, actually. The first one should have let me see if there was any death magic in the area.”

“Should have?”

“The results didn’t make sense.” He was huffing a bit from the climb. “You want the long version? It’s technical.”

“Later. What was the other spell for?”

“It’s a way to contact the vic’s ghost, if there’s one around. Nonverbal, since ghosts mostly aren’t good with words. That spell would have let me see what the ghost remembered about his death.”

“It didn’t work?”

“No ghost this time. Speaking of ghosts . . .” He paused to catch his breath. “Have you heard from yours?”

Lily scrambled up the last bit and saw Officer Crown waiting. He looked very curious. She grimaced. She hated it when people referred to Drummond as her ghost. “Not since last night. I could try calling him. He said that wouldn’t work as well this time, but I could try.”

That was too much for Officer Crown. “You’ve got a ghost?”

“I have occasional contact with one. Karonski? Should I call Drummond?”

He heaved himself up onto level ground. “Probably, but you need to check out the kids and Hardy first. Officer, I’d like you to stay here, where you can keep on eye on the scene. We’ve got a serious magical contamination problem. No one can approach that body but me or Agent Yu for now. No one. The mayor shows up, you keep him away.”

Crown’s eyebrows lifted. “Yes, sir.”

Lily and Karonski set off at a quick jog. “I’m betting on at least two perps. You?”

“Probably. The vic looks to weigh around one eighty. He could have been unconscious or drugged, so one person isn’t impossible, but it’s unlikely.”

“The gag suggests they wanted him alive and aware when they started hurting him.”

“Yeah.” His words started getting spaced between breaths. “Theoretically one guy . . . might have done the staking . . . if the vic was unconscious. But they had to get him down there first. Hard for . . . one person . . . to do that.”

“No drag marks.”

“Exactly.”

“Why here, do you think? Plenty of dogs, bikers, runners in this park. They performed their little ritual as far from the trails as they could, but still. Why not head outside the city altogether?”

“Ley line. Might be some other . . . significant factor but . . . the body’s smack on a whopping big ley line that’s . . . close to the surface. That isn’t . . . as easy to find as you might . . . look, you go on. I can’t talk and run, and I need to . . . call our people about . . . the contagion.”

They weren’t running. They were jogging. “You okay?”

“I’m pathetic, is what I am. Go.” He flapped a hand at her as she stopped. “I’ll call your Detective Erskine, too.”

She gave Karonski one more dubious look, but he didn’t seem to be having a heart attack. He was just really out of shape. She nodded and set off. The ground was too rough for real speed, but she could pick up the pace.

Lily had started running in college because it was a cheap, quick way to get in a workout. When crunched for time, she could get in a run, shower, and dress in thirty-five minutes. Forty-five, if she dried her hair.

She’d discovered she liked it. Needed it. Running cleared her brain better than anything, with the possible exception of the kind of cardio that took two people. She’d run in exactly one marathon, and while her time hadn’t sucked, she’d decided she wouldn’t do it again. It brought out her competitive instincts, and that messed up the experience. Made her think about the wrong things. This turned out to be a good decision, because these days she usually ran with Rule or one or more of the guards. No way a human could compete with lupi, so it was just as well she hadn’t built her runs around the idea of winning.

She wasn’t winded when she slowed as she neared the bike trail. A uniform was stationed there, making sure no one wandered toward the scene. She told Lily that a van from a local TV station had shown up at the parking lot.

No doubt more reporters were on their way. Lily grimaced and picked up her pace again. The trail wasn’t paved, but it was a lot smoother than the ground. She didn’t have to pay such close attention to where her feet landed. She could think about other things . . . like how many perps were involved.

It would have taken at least two people to carry the victim down into the ravine, all right. Or one lupus. Lily hadn’t mentioned that possibility. She gave it less than one chance in a hundred. Lupi were as capable of wrongdoing as humans, but no lupus would knowingly help the Great Bitch, and if Friar was involved, the Big B was, too. Of course, Lily didn’t know for certain that this victim was connected to the amnesia victims. She had a strong suspicion, yeah. If you have two creepy-freaky things happen close together, you suspect they’re connected. But suspicion is not fact.

Rule would be able to tell. As soon as he got here—and a quick check of the mate-sense told her he was close and getting closer. Good. He’d be able to sniff out how many perps were involved and if they were all human. Or not. No point in raising that particular issue unless she had to.

Black-and-whites with their strobing red lights were clustered at one end of the parking lot. They’d used the cars to section it off, keep the civilians away. A thin woman trailing a cameraman was arguing with one of the uniforms on the civilian side of the patrol-car fence. Lily had no trouble picking out Erskine in the crowd of cops on the near side of that barrier. He looked like a pudgy, faded leprechaun in black-framed glasses. He frowned when he spotted her.

Erskine was a good cop. Lily had worked with him sometimes back when she was in Homicide, so she knew this. More by-the-book than brilliant, maybe, but competent and thorough. She hadn’t liked him back then, but that was mainly because he hadn’t liked her. She’d never been sure what about her rubbed him the wrong way, but from day one it was clear something did. They’d put up with each other for the sake of the job.

These days he couldn’t stand her. He blamed her for Mech’s death.

Sergeant Homer Mechtle had been a good cop, too. And a friend. He’d committed suicide last year. When Lily killed a telepath named Helen, the psychic backlash had killed or damaged a number of the people she’d been controlling, aided by an ancient staff. Mech had been one of them.

Sometimes Lily blamed herself for Mech’s death, too.

The uniforms parted to allow her to jog up to the detective. “I need to—”

“Your boss told me,” Erskine said curtly. “I talked to Springer. He okayed you checking out his boys. The boys don’t know about any possible contagion. Keep it that way.”

Well, darn. And there she’d been looking forward to scaring the snot out of them. “My consultant will be here soon. Rule Turner. Karonski told you about him.”

“Is that what you call him? Your consultant?” Erskine could sneer without moving a muscle on his face. It was a good trick, especially on a face like his. Erskine had one of those round faces that look boyish no matter how old its wearer gets. “Yeah, Karonski mentioned him. You want to keep chatting with me, or would you like to find out if those boys are okay?”

Her lips tightened. She turned without a word.

“Agent Yu!” a woman called. “What can you tell me about the murder?”

That was the reporter. Lily ignored her with the ease of long practice.

Samuel Springer and his sons stood near a large oak, well away from the patrol-car fence and the eager reporter. He was a tall, skinny man with dark hair, a luxuriant mustache, and glasses. One of the boys looked exactly like him, done smaller and without the mustache. The other was sandy haired and lacked glasses, but had the same sharp features. Springer had his arms around both boys. He watched warily as she approached.

“Special Agent Lily Yu,” she said, holding out her hand. “You’re Samuel Springer?”

The man eyed her hand a moment, then turned loose of one of his sons to accept the handshake she was silently insisting on. “I am.”

No magic. Lily released his hand and looked at the taller of the boys. The dark-haired one. “Are you Ryan? I’ve got a friend named Ryan.” She held out her hand to him, too.

He glanced up at his father uncertainly. Springer nodded. “Go on.”

Ryan took her hand. She shook with him solemnly, but inside all kinds of knots relaxed. No magic. Not a trace. “Good to meet you, Ryan. You’ve had a really rough day.” She turned to the younger boy, the one with sandy hair. “And you’re Pat, right? Again she held out her hand.

This one didn’t hesitate. He put his hand in hers and pumped it like a politician. “Yeah, and you’re an FBI agent? For real? I guess you’re investigating the dead guy, huh?”

“I am.” No magic here, either. At least none to worry about. He had a tiny trace of a charisma Gift, but that was all.

“Cool.”

“I didn’t let him see . . . it.” That was the dark-haired Ryan, assuring her that he’d done his duty by his younger brother. “I got him away from there.”

“I did, too, see! You kept getting in the way, then you dragged me back to the bikes, but I saw the singing man and—and the other man.”

And maybe now he wished he hadn’t, but pride would not let him admit this. Lily looked from one young face to the other, then up at their dad. She gave him a small, reassuring smile and a nod to let him know his sons were okay. His face sagged a little in relief. “Mr. Springer, boys, I think we’ll be able to let you go home pretty soon. I’ll need to talk to you first, but before I can do that, I have to have a word with the man who was singing.”

“‘The Old Rugged Cross,’” Ryan said.

“Pardon?”

“That’s what he was singing, which was pretty gross. Considering.”

He was right. It was pretty gross, considering. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. You need anything?”

“They said they didn’t have any Coke,” Pat said hopefully. “The police officers, I mean. Just water. Do you . . .”

“I’m afraid I don’t have any Coke, either.”

“Stupid,” Ryan informed his brother as Lily turned away. “As if FBI agents carry Cokes around with them everywhere.”

His brother said hotly, “You know who’s really stupid? People who don’t even bother to ask!” Their father was shushing them as Lily reached Erskine.

“They’re clean,” she said. “Where’s Hardy?”

“You’re sure?”

“Ninety-five percent. To be one hundred percent, I’d have to touch them everywhere, which would be scary and intrusive. But magic tends to—to spread or leak or something like that when it’s in a living organism. Even if only one part of the body is affected, there’s almost always some trace of it on the skin.”

“Almost always,” he repeated. He glanced over at Springer and the boys.

“Best I can do.” They needed Cullen. Seeing magic was better than feeling it for some things, but Cullen wouldn’t be available for hours, maybe days, depending on how hard covering Sam’s security arrangements hit him. And that made her think about what Cullen was doing right now, and what Sam was doing, and how much longer it might be before they knew if it had worked. Her stomach knotted up in a sick lump. She forced those thoughts back down. Buried them nice and tight. “Hardy?”

“In Delacroix’s squad car.” He nodded at the black-and-white at the end of the row. “We put him in there so we could take the cuffs off. He behaved himself once we got him away from the scene. Didn’t want to leave it, though. Got pretty agitated, according to Crown. That ‘person of interest’ notice you people issued said this guy can’t talk.”

“Brain damage, I’m told. Something that affected the speech center. Music is stored differently than speech, so he can sing, but he can’t put together a sentence.”

“Well, we tried getting him to write something out for us, but he couldn’t or wouldn’t do that, either. Seems to understand us when we talk to him, though.”

“Hey!” shouted one of the uniforms.

The thin woman had slipped between two of the patrol cars while the uniform wasn’t watching. She trotted up to Lily. “Special Agent, why is the FBI involved? Was this a ritual murder? Is there a connection with the amnesia victims you’ve been visiting?”

Well, damn. Looked like the story had broken after all. Lily recognized the reporter now. Milly Rodriguez was young, ambitious, and pushy as hell. That was her job, but she hadn’t figured out how to push without crossing the wrong lines. “Ms. Rodriguez, if you’ll wait where you were told to, I’ll speak with you as soon as possible. If you won’t, you go on my list. The list of reporters I do not take questions from. Ever.”

The woman considered briefly, then nodded. “Fifteen minutes.”

“No guarantees. As soon as I can.”

“I won’t wait forever,” she warned, but she retreated.

Lily and Erskine reached the patrol unit where Hardy was locked up. Erskine nodded at the patrolman sitting in the driver’s seat. “Open up.”

The moment Lily opened the door Hardy turned to look at her. He didn’t try to get out, but he turned in the seat and stretched out both hands urgently.

Automatically she bent and took his hands.

No icky magic. She exhaled in relief. No blood, either. At least none she could see.

He kept hold of one of her hands, patting it as if reassuring her. Lily gently tugged it free. “Hello, Hardy. Please step out of the car so we can talk without me bending over.”

He climbed out. He wore the same blue flannel shirt and worn gray pants she’d seen him in the night before. He stood there looking down at her sadly.

“You understand that it looks bad, don’t you? You were found with that body. You didn’t want to leave it.”

He started humming.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know that song.”

“‘Washed in the blood,’” he sang soft and slow, “‘washed in the blood of Jesus.’”

Lily didn’t react, but it wasn’t easy. “You wanted to wash in the blood?”

He shook his head and frowned at her as if she’d disappointed him. Then he tried again. This time he sang an old commercial ditty.

“Mr. Clean? You, uh . . . you were trying to clean something?”

He nodded quickly, then sang, “‘Move, Satan, move on out of my way.’”

“You were casting out the devil?”

He cocked his head as if considering her word choice, then nodded slowly.

Weird. The body really did need cleansing or the casting out of devils, or something along those lines. Hardy’s singing hadn’t done the trick, but he’d tried. Or claimed he had, she reminded herself. It was harder to think of him as a possible bad guy when she stood in front of him. “Was that man alive when you first saw him, Hardy?”

He shook his head, his eyes dark with sorrow.

“Did you see anyone near the body?” Another head shake. “Do you have any idea who did it?” Another. “Do you know who the murdered man was? No? Ever seen him before? Okay. I can’t think how to make this next one a yes or no question. How did you find the body?”

He hummed a few snatches of tunes, as if he were hunting for the right lyrics, then started singing about coming into a garden alone where a voice that “‘the Son of God discloses . . . bids me go.’” He stopped, switched tempo and key, and added, “‘Angels we have heard on high, sweetly singing o’er the plains.’”

“Jesus told you about it? Or an angel?”

He nodded.

“Which one was it?”

He spread his hands. Shrugged.

“You don’t know?” He nodded and she looked at Erskine, raising her brows to see if he wanted any more questions right now. He shrugged. When she looked back at Hardy she saw Karonski wending his way to them through the cars and officers. She told Hardy she’d talk to him some more later. “Do you need anything? Some water?”

He nodded and smiled.

“I’ll see that you get some. Oh. One more thing. Is Hardy your first name? No? It’s your last name?” He nodded. “All right, Mr. Hardy, I’ll—” He was shaking his head again. “Okay. Just Hardy, no ‘mister.’”

Karonski arrived and gave a little jerk of his head. Erskine told one of his men to get Hardy some water and get him back in the patrol car, then walked with her to where Karonski waited.

“I called the coven,” Karonski said. “We need a strong circle set around that body while we figure out what we’re dealing with. You learn anything?”

“No contagion on the boys or Hardy.” As she summarized what she’d learned from Hardy, she felt the subtle easing that meant Rule was here. She glanced at the entrance to the parking lot and saw his Mercedes pulling in. “Does that conform with what Hardy told you, Detective?” she asked Erskine.

“You got more from him than I did.” He snorted. “Jesus told him to do it.”

“You’re jumping to conclusions. There’s no blood on him.”

Erskine gave her a scathing glance. “So he stood back while his partner did the slicing. He’s a brain-damaged man who hears voices, for God’s sake.”

Lily wasn’t about to tell Erskine that Hardy might be a saint, but she didn’t like the way Erskine was zeroing in on the homeless man. “We’re not dealing with your typical crazy-guy killer. Whoever murdered that man knew exactly what he was doing, and he generated a whole lot of bad magic doing it. Hardy doesn’t have any magic on him.”

“So he didn’t get any of the magic his partner cooked up. Doesn’t prove anything. There’s clearly a religious twist to the killing, the way that body was staked out like they were crucifying him. Your buddy over there has religion on the brain.”

Karonski had taken out a piece of gum while they talked. He folded it into his mouth. “Religion may be involved, but not necessarily Christianity. There are well-established ritualistic reasons for using some form of a crucifixion pose. Did you think the Romans invented that? People were doing that to each other long before Jesus of Nazareth came along. Doesn’t prove Hardy wasn’t involved,” he added, “but it doesn’t link him, either.”

Erskine looked dubious. “The magic part is your deal, I guess. But there was more than one person involved. I don’t see any reason Hardy couldn’t be one of them.”

“Or any reason to think that he was,” Lily said. “Being brain damaged is not a reason.”

“Being found singing to the body just might be considered significant.” He looked away dismissively to ask Karonski something about the body.

Rule had parked while they were talking, trailed by a familiar Toyota that disgorged four guards. Lily nodded in that direction to let Karonski know where she was going. He broke off what he was telling Erskine about containment procedures to say, “Good. Looks like Dr. Two Horses came prepared. Bring her over here, would you? I’d like her take on this.”

“Who’s that?” Erskine asked.

“Shaman,” Karonski said as Lily started for the other end of the parking lot. “Damn fine one, too.”

Rule and Nettie started toward Lily. Nettie held a tote bag, not her medical bag. She was saying something to Rule, who’d tucked a small woven rug under one arm. Lily’s eyebrows lifted. Nettie had brought the big guns. That rug had been woven by Nettie’s great-great-grandmother. Family magic, Nettie called it, though the rug held no magic Lily’s fingers could detect. And the tote held bottles of the colored sands that Hatałii—medicine makers—had used for countless generations.

Lily knew only bits and pieces about Nettie’s religious practices, but she did know that sandpainting was done on the ground, not the upper floor in some building. How had Nettie known she’d need the sands today? She’d expected to be headed for the hospital, not an outdoor murder scene. Nettie was no precog. Had she been tipped by her deities?

Lily did not like that idea one bit, and not just because of her little phobia about organized religion. If actual gods were involving themselves in the situation, it made things large. Downright vast. Vastly less predictable, too. She moved faster.

Milly Rodriguez had spotted Rule, too. She was making a beeline for him, cameraman in tow, and she was closer than Lily. She got there just as Lily passed the car holding Hardy. Lily could hear her badgering Rule.

Rule was used to this sort of thing. He said something to Nettie and stopped, smiling at Milly as if he’d been waiting all day for the chance to chat with her. “Ms. Rodriguez. It’s been awhile. I hope you’re well?”

Nettie kept going. One of the guards went with her; the other three stuck with Rule.

Behind Lily, Hardy screamed.

She spun. Hardy was banging on the window of the patrol car and yelling wordlessly.

A white shape materialized between Lily and the agitated Hardy. Drummond pointed off to the right. “Stop him! Stop him!”

Lily spun back—and saw Officer Crown. He stood about twenty feet away grinning like a kid in a candy shop as he snatched his weapon from the holster and lifted it in the approved two-handed grip—

“Stop!” Lily yelled, grabbing for her Glock, her gaze flicking in the direction Crown’s weapon pointed, where Nettie was headed toward Lily and Rule stood next to his car, talking to the reporter. Scott leaped in front of Rule, his jacket flipping up and one hand reaching inside it for his weapon—

Crown fired twice. Double-tapping.

Nettie went down. Not Rule. Nettie.

Officer Crown pivoted, gun still held out, aiming—

Lily exhaled. Squeezed her finger. And shot him.