Witch Hunt, A Paranormal/Urban Fantasy (The Maurin Kincaide Series) (4 page)

Matthison was already tearing into Mahalia when I got outside.
And she was giving it right back to him.

“It is irrelevant at this point, Ca
ptain. You’re here now and have been given the information,” Mahalia said.

“How is it irrelevant?
The girl hanging from the tree across the street wasn’t dead when you figured out the connection to the book and it seems to me that all of the evidence is pointing to this Inquisitor organization. If you’d been a little more forthcoming, then we might have prevented that girl’s death!” he snapped, the anger evident in his voice.

“Unfortunately, Captain, I think if you’re honest with yourself then you would admit that the poor young witch out there really was dead long before we made the connection.
So drop the bravado and try to keep up. I know what I’m doing. You’ll have to trust me on that,” Mahalia calmly replied.

“Until tonight I actually thought that you were different; I thought that we were legitimately going to work together on this.
But I can see now that you’re just like the rest of them; you’re working angles, trying to figure out the best way to use my team and me. Well, let me clue you in - that magical manipulation you’ve got going on with Maurin isn’t going to work on me!” he shot back.

“Matthison!” I scolded.

“If you want a ride home on something other than a broomstick, then I suggest you get your ass back to my car now,” he replied.

Whoa.
He was majorly pissed off. He was looking for me to choose a side. Right now. I was either with him or I was with them.

Before I could answer, Mahalia kept right on pushing Matthison to his limit.

“But Captain, I thought you wanted to be present for the recollection?” Mahalia taunted.

“You’re doing it now?
Outside?” I asked in disbelief.

Damn! Even with the coat on that I’d pilfered, it was cold.
I looked around to see everyone bundled up for casting spells outside in the December dawn, except for the wolves. They were always easy to spot; they were always dressed like it was twenty degrees warmer outside than it was. Roul sent over four of his best. I recognized a couple of them from my first Council meeting. I looked back over at Matthison, but he had become suddenly silent.

Holy shit. He was a shade of red I have never seen before.
I had no idea why Mahalia was antagonizing him, but Matthison’s head looked like it was about to explode. He didn’t say another word or move a muscle. He just stood there, frozen, like a lawn ornament. For a second I thought Mahalia had cast a spell upon him, but then his hard eyes turned toward me, silently telling me that I had better plant my feet right next to him and not move an inch or all of his pent-up anger would be unleashed on me. He wasn’t my boss anymore and I wasn’t scared of him. I could certainly handle him physically, but I still respected him. I still considered him a friend too, despite our argument earlier. I stood right next to him while Mahalia finished her preparations.

It was only a few minutes before more coven members arrived outside.
Amalie came bopping my way. I shook my head discreetly at her. I was pretty sure that under normal circumstances Matthison would enjoy Amalie’s company. Tonight was not what I would classify as normal circumstances, however. She took the hint, holding up her hand with two fingers extended in the universal signal for ‘call me later’. She went to stand by the sisters - Juno and Phallon. I half expected some giant circle formation, but everyone seemed to be broken off in their usual little groups, chatting away, their warm breath making little clouds in the air.

Oberon and Graive came out and the crowd hushed.
They made their way to Mahalia, stopping just outside her circle. I knew he was helping Graive with the spell, but did Oberon have to escort her everywhere while he was at it? I was pretty sure that she could make it across the backyard by herself. I shoved my hands in my pockets, as if I could shove my feelings down into them too.

The old wooden screen door slammed shut one last time as two men came out carrying a large linen-wrapped bundle.
They were struggling with the awkward package. It was hard to tell at first, but as they kept walking I figured out exactly what was shrouded in all that linen. At some point they had removed the body from the tree across the street and prepared it for the casting. Matthison and I seemed to reach that conclusion at the same time. Mahalia had been goading him into a fight as a distraction and Matthison was so pissed off already that it had worked. I hated being manipulated and I knew that my former boss liked it even less.

I started weaving my way over to Amalie.
I figured she was my best shot at getting any information right now. Matthison decided to give up his statue impression and follow me. I knew he would. He wanted to know the reason for the big ruse as much as I did.

“Don’t look at me, Maurin.
I had nothing to do with it,” Amalie said, her hands raised in mock surrender.

“That statement implies knowledge.
I know you know what’s going on. Spill it,” I said to her.

She hesitated, but only for a second.
She quickly came to the decision that while Mahalia would explain this all away with eloquent and political perfection, there was no way in hell that the two of us were going to wait that long to hear it.

“They knew that he’d be pissed off that they had to move the body and mess up the crime scene or evidence or whatever, so Mahalia kind of picked a fight with him to keep you both distracted while they pr
epared the body for the recollection.,” she confessed quickly.

“So she thought that once she moved the body and started working her magic that I would just go along with destroying a crime scene and contaminating evidence?
How the hell am I supposed to call this in now? This was not what we agreed on,” Matthison said.

I didn’t realize that Mahalia had agreed to anything, but I wasn’t about to point that out now because
Matthison’s angry whisper was actually a hell of a lot scarier than when he actually raised his voice. Mahalia could review the terms of their prior arrangement with him her damned self.

“Oh come on, Captain, don’t be so indi
gnant. Do you actually expect me to believe that Norms never contaminate a crime scene? You already have two bodies. This isn’t any different from any other serial killer case where you don’t have all the bodies. Charge and convict for two murders, when you know that they killed five. But let’s be honest, deep down you know this won’t end in a trial and that’s conflicting with your belief system. That’s why you’re so angry,” Amalie said.

The reality of what Amalie had just said really hit home with Matthison.
So did the fact that it was too late to do anything about it. Mahalia had, in fact, been honest when she told the Council that he could be useful in keeping the media and the humans away. They had been focused on his team’s investigation, and not the coven’s comings and goings. I expected more anger from him, but instead he just looked defeated.

Amalie sighed. “This is why I think that Mahalia should have explained it to you.”

While we had been brought up to speed, the coven members closest to the circle had been busy finalizing everything for the casting. I turned my attention back to them just in time to see Graive slice Oberon’s palm, letting his blood drip down into the salt circle. He wasn’t officially mine; a few dates obviously didn’t cement anything, but still I didn’t want her touching him. I only got a step closer before Amalie grabbed my arm, stopping me in my tracks.

Graive sliced her own palm, and then joined her hand with Oberon’s.
They walked the perimeter of the circle like morbid dancers.

I started to feel a little sick.
It wasn’t the blood. I’ve seen and unfortunately been covered in a hell of a lot more than that. It had to be the magic building as they walked the circle one more time. My chest tightened as they started their third pass, making it hard to breathe. I leaned forward a little, bracing myself with my hands on my thighs and tried to catch my breath.

“You okay?”
Amalie asked, bending down to eye level with me.

“Yeah.
Yeah, I’m fine. I probably just need to eat or something,” I replied, somewhat unconvincingly. I felt something tearing inside, like a rope being sliced apart with a dull knife.

“You sure?” Amalie asked, She took a
nother look at Graive and Oberon, who had completed their final pass around the circle.

I waved her off, forcing myself to stand up straight. I probably should have just kept my head down.
Someone had pulled away part of the shroud that covered the dead girl’s face. Apart for my distaste for Graive, the ceremony wasn’t that unusual. That is - until the corpse sat up. It was right about then that I realized just how far from normal my life had veered off course. If I thought it was strange, Matthison must be about to lose his mind.

“Don’t worry; it’s not going to get all ‘Night of the Living Dead’.
I mean she’s definitely got a healthy appetite for meat now that she’s a zombie - I mean an ‘animated corpse’, but the shroud that they wrapped her in is heavily spelled and she’s contained within a circle. They’re usually strong when they’re first made, but everything should hold. It should be fine,” Amalie said.

I glanced at Matthison, then back to Amalie.
“Not really helping,” I informed her.

“Bet you thought you’d seen it all, huh Matthison?”
Amalie quipped.

“I’m starting to see why Agrona and Kedehern have a strict ‘no Necro’ policy,” he said, without even looking at her.

So was I.

Graive stood in front of the zombie she had just raised, careful not to cross the circle. I didn’t know much about Necros or zombies, but I did know that the fresher the corpse was, the smarter the zombie was as well. If Graive was as good as they said she was, then this could all be over in a matter of hours. I could tolerate her for a few more hours if it meant catching the killers.

She started asking simple questions like: ‘What’s your name?, ‘Where did you live?’, et cetera.
The zombie answered those with no problem, despite not having a tongue, which was an enigma that someone would have to explain to me later. The night had gone completely silent as we all stood watching Graive talk to the dead girl, waiting for the one little detail that would lead us to her killers. Graive started asking her about the last day of her life. “Where was she when they took her?” Graive inquired. “In the coffee shop,” the girl replied. But when Graive asked her to describe the place where she had actually died, everything went to hell. Apparently some zombies don’t really understand or remember that they’re dead and don’t appreciate being reminded of it at all. I should have known our zombie would react this way.

The zombie started screaming that they had her, and wailing for someone to help her.
We all crept forward; we were hoping that the pleas for help would hold some clue. The zombie then started to struggle with its bindings. Her screaming became less coherent, quickly going from clear, concise yells for help to indecipherable shrieks of pain. Her eyelids flew open and she searched the crowd with nothing but the empty sockets that once held her eyes.

A feeling of blinding pain and blackness came over me.
I had to fight to stay on my feet. It was the same as in the morgue, which didn’t make sense because I wasn’t even touching this girl. I looked around to see if anyone else was experiencing the same thing. It was hard to tell. The winces and grimaces could just be from the horror of listening to the girl’s suffering, and not from anyone else actually feeling it themselves, the way that I was. Matthison looked at me; he could sense that I was struggling. He had been with me at the morgue and looked pretty pissed that I was going through that experience all over again. He started moving toward Graive, but I couldn’t go after him yet. I couldn’t call out to him either, not that he would have heard me over the zombie girl’s screaming. The pain hadn’t dropped me to my knees yet, but I didn’t have a handle on it either. If I moved now then I would probably end up on the ground, no better off than the zombie. I felt as helpless as a Norm and that really pissed me off for some reason.

Matthison made it to
Graive’s side and had his gun to her temple before anyone could do anything to stop him.

“Shut it down, Graive,” he ordered.

“That’s not your call, Captain.” She was eerily calm for someone who has a gun held up to her head. It probably wasn’t her first time.

“Five solid minutes of her screaming hasn’t gotten us any closer to a location.
Look around. Bringing you in was supposed to help the coven. They don’t look like they’ve been helped at all by you,” Matthison said.

“It’s a little early to tell,” she r
eplied.

I couldn’t hear him click the safety off, but I knew exactly when he did so by the subtle twitch in
Graive’s eye. The pain was suddenly gone, but it was replaced with an intense hunger. Graive was losing control of her zombie. Matthison was making it worse; he just didn’t know it yet.

The zombie thrashed on the ground, struggling to free herself from both the wrappings and circle that bound her.
This might have been my first (and hopefully my last) zombie-raising, but I was pretty sure that this wasn’t how it was normally done.