Thaumatology 06 - Hammer of Witches Read online

  ‘Not a witch, not in the fifties. No one would’ve written a kindly, but wacko old witch into a movie back then.’

  Lily frowned. ‘I can’t imagine what it was like just after the Shattering. I mean, when I was growing up my mother was a bit worried about what might happen, but to just about everyone else I was just this cute little girl. The doctors said I was too thin, Dad said I was a little plump for a succubus child. Then I grew up, of course, but then it was what I did that caused the problems, not what I was.’

  ‘From what I was told it wasn’t as bad as people make out,’ Ceri replied. ‘There was prejudice, yes. I mean, there still is to some extent. But the Shattering didn’t hit Britain as badly as the rest of Europe and people just got on with life mostly. I think the lack of supernaturals in media was more to do with over-sensitivity than actual dislike among the audience.’

  The evening news was starting as they talked and what was being said suddenly impinged upon Ceri’s consciousness. ‘…Karen was at home with her boyfriend last night when she was attacked. Her companion was killed in the assault. At this time police are not giving out much information on the attack, but detectives from the Greycoats are investigating. Detective Chief Inspector Lionel Barry asked for any witnesses to come forward. Once again, Karen Mitchem, a reporter for BBC News was attacked and severely hurt in her home last night.’

  Ceri and Lily looked at each other as the presenter went on to the next item, then Ceri rushed to the phone.

  Westminster

  ‘She’s suffering from forty per cent, second degree burns,’ John said. ‘Her boyfriend took the brunt of it. On purpose, as far as we can tell.’

  ‘We think it was a fireball,’ Kate said, ‘a big one. He threw a rock through the back window, into the lounge, and then fired the spell in through the hole.’

  ‘Why?’ Lily said, frowning in confusion. ‘If this is our witch hunter, why them? Neither was a witch…’

  ‘Because,’ John said pulling an evidence bag from a file folder, ‘he was a werewolf.’ He held the bag out to Ceri. She took it and she looked at the sheet of paper inside.

  Lily looked over her shoulder and snarled, ‘Son of a bitch!’

  Printed on the paper in laser printed Times New Roman was a message. If a woman comes near any animal and mates with it, you are to kill the woman and the animal. They must be put to death; their blood is on them. Ceri grimaced. ‘We’re going to need to warn the packs.’

  ‘Suzie Shore was dating a wolf,’ Lily said. ‘There’s Jenny and Lee…’

  ‘And plenty of others,’ Ceri said. ‘You remember Bea said some of her people used human prostitutes. If he starts getting more enthusiastic, he could go after any of them.’ She frowned. ‘Has the Chief had any luck tracking him down?’

  ‘A little,’ John said. ‘We got a partial thumb print off the paper delivered to Blood Culture. They’re trying to locate matches, but so far there are just too many possibles. Lily’s idea about the churches paid off. We found three places where someone remembered an intense young man who came once, attended communion, and then never returned.’

  ‘One of them agreed to work with one of our artists to see if we can work up a picture,’ Kate added.

  ‘He’s Catholic then?’ Ceri asked.

  ‘Apparently,’ John replied.

  ‘I wonder what he’s been confessing to.’

  ‘Not any of this,’ Kate replied. ‘It’s on their own hands, remember?’

  Hammersmith, November 7th

  Karen Mitchem opened her eyes and wondered for a long second where she was. There was a beeping noise from nearby which she slowly recognised as a heart monitor. Turning her head, she first saw the rack of machines, then the old woman with long, silver hair sitting at her bedside.

  ‘Good morning, young lady,’ Alexandra said, her voice soft.

  Ceri appeared from behind her, a slightly nervous smile on her face. ‘Karen? Do you remember me? We met at…’

  ‘Ceri Brent,’ Karen said. ‘I remember you, I… Oh God! Did Alan make it?’ She tried to sit up, but Alexandra was there with a lot more speed than an old lady should have, pushing her back onto the sheets.

  ‘Ceri and I have taken care of your burns,’ the Alpha said, ‘but you need rest.’

  ‘Did Alan…’ Karen repeated.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Ceri said, ‘he… died protecting you.’

  ‘Oh…’ Karen said. Tears began to brim in her eyes. ‘Oh God…’

  ‘That’s why I’m here,’ Alexandra said, reaching out to touch Karen’s arm. ‘He was not one of mine, but he upheld the best of our nature. I felt I should finish his work. If you’re willing, we would like to give him a proper funeral ceremony when the police release the body.’

  ‘I, uh… I’m sorry, I don’t know…’

  ‘Oh!’ Ceri said. ‘Sorry, this is Alexandra, Alpha of the Battersea pack.’

  ‘P-pleased to meet you, ma’am,’ Karen said. There were still tears in her eyes, but now there was added confusion. ‘I, uh, I don’t think I have the right to say what happens to him. He was my boyfriend…’

  ‘He felt more for you than that, child,’ Alexandra said. ‘He would not have done what he did for just anyone. And I think you felt as much for him. It’s all right, you can admit it.’

  Ceri slipped out of the room leaving Alexandra to comfort Karen. Lily stood up from the chair outside and fell into step as Ceri marched down the corridor.

  ‘I want this one, Lil,’ Ceri said.

  ‘I know. What’s our next move?’

  ‘I don’t know, that’s the trouble. I can think of a lot of things I want to do to the bastard once I find him, but I don’t know how to find him.’

  ‘Something will come up,’ Lily said.

  ‘I wish I had your optimism.’

  ‘It’s not optimism. If we don’t get a break you’ll think of a way to find him. I have confidence in you.’

  Ceri grimaced; she wished she had the same confidence in herself, but right now all she was feeling was frustration.

  Kennington

  The phone rang and Ceri absently reached out for it, her eyes still glued to the equations on her tablet. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Miss Brent? It’s Alison Wentworth at the Wednesday Witch?’

  ‘Oh, hello Alison,’ Ceri said, finally looking away from the work she had been using to distract herself.

  ‘I did as you asked,’ Alison said, her voice a little distorted by a speaker phone. ‘No one in any media circles has commissioned an article of the kind you mentioned. No one has had such an article peddled to them. Whoever this man is, it’s unlikely he’s a reporter.’

  ‘Yeah, I was guessing that was the case.’

  ‘I did turn up one thing,’ Alison went on. ‘A couple of photographers around some of the recent big events that have been happening spotted someone new. Not too tall, dark hair, flat nose. One of them said he had kind of scary eyes. There’s a cockroach of a celebrity chaser named Donald Pugh says the guy got in the way of a picture he was taking. He wouldn’t sell it to me, but you might have more luck.’

  Ceri grinned. ‘I think you earned that interview. Where do I find this guy?’

  Canning Town

  Pugh lived in a bedsit in one of the more deprived areas of London and he fitted the neighbourhood well. He was practically the epitome of his profession; short, hunched, long in the nose, watery eyes. There was even a patchy, disreputable looking mackintosh hanging from the inside of his front door. The one incongruous thing in the front room was a high-end computer system with a couple of expensive cameras sitting beside it. Tools of the trade, Ceri guessed.

  ‘This is a really nice place you have here, Mister Pugh,’ Ceri said, her eyes running over the pile of dirty dishes in the sink.

  ‘Classy,’ Lily added.

  ‘Yeah, well,’ Pugh said, hurriedly picking up some magazines and stuffing them under a cushion, ‘the life of a celebrity photographer is all glamour.’

&
nbsp; ‘That’s why we’re here,’ Ceri said. ‘We heard someone got in the way of one of your shots.’

  ‘You want that one? The Wentworth woman asked about it. Wouldn’t pay what I asked though.’

  ‘What were you asking?’

  ‘Twenty thousand,’ Pugh said, straight-faced.

  ‘Without even seeing it?’ Lily asked.

  ‘If you’ve seen it then you won’t have to pay, will you? You’ll know what he looks like.’

  ‘This man may be a suspect in a series of murders,’ Ceri said.

  ‘It’s still twenty grand.’

  ‘I can get a squad of Greycoats down here with a warrant…’

  ‘And I’ll have erased it before they get here,’ Pugh replied. ‘That’s the beauty of digital photography.’

  Lily looked at the scrawny little man. ‘An hour with me,’ she said. Ceri frowned at her and she returned the look with a wink.

  ‘And ten thousand,’ Pugh said. There was a hint of eagerness in his voice.

  ‘An hour with both of us,’ Ceri said.

  ‘I don’t know…’

  ‘Full access,’ Ceri added, ‘no holes unbarred.’ She glanced at Lily. ‘Show him the merchandise, Lil.’

  Lily was in one of her jersey dresses. Reaching down without the slightest embarrassment, she grabbed the hem and pulled it up over her head. Ceri felt the wave of heat spread out from her body before the glowing pupils appeared as Lily shook her hair out. Pugh’s jaw fell open, then his eyes rolled back, and then he collapsed backward like a felled tree. Lily giggled.

  ‘Can you keep him like that?’ Ceri asked, heading for the computer.

  ‘Of course,’ Lily replied. She knelt down beside Pugh and began taking his trousers off.

  ‘What on Earth are you doing?’

  ‘We want him to think he got his money’s worth, don’t we?’

  The computer was logged in and Ceri quickly found the file folders where Pugh stored his photographs. ‘Yeah, I guess. This may take a while. He takes a lot of pictures.’

  Lily was yanking Pugh’s trousers down his legs. ‘Take your time. Donald isn’t going anywhere. Are you Donny Boy?’ The photographer moaned in reply.

  It took Ceri twenty minutes of searching to find the shot she suspected Pugh had been trying to sell them. ‘The prick!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘What is it?’ Lily asked, moving over to look. She was still naked aside from her shoes, which was a little disconcerting.

  ‘It’s a shot of the back of his head,’ Ceri said. ‘Well, you can see a slight profile, the line of his nose. I saw him better than that.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Lily said, her voice concerned, ‘but look at the background.’

  Ceri frowned. The man’s head filled most of the frame, but she could just about make out a portico and a glowing letter… She tapped a key and advanced to the next frame. She had been so concentrated on looking for some dark-haired head in the frame that she had just been flicking through the pictures without seeing them. She found herself looking at herself along with Lily, Sasha, and Tess. Pugh had been taking pictures at the Jade Dragon after the Samhain party.

  ‘He was watching us there,’ Ceri said.

  ‘Yeah, he was.’ Pugh let out a mumbling sort of groan and Lily said, ‘Take your T-shirt off and follow my lead.’ She turned back toward Pugh as Ceri did as she was told. ‘Oh wow, Don, you were awesome!’

  Pugh let out another groan and tried to sit up. He failed. ‘I was?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Ceri said, ‘amazing.’

  The photographer looked boggle-eyed at the two women. Lily started pulling her dress on and Ceri did likewise with her T-shirt. ‘I could barely keep up with you,’ Lily told him.

  ‘I’d, uh… better get you your picture,’ he said.

  ‘I got it, you already showed us,’ Ceri said. ‘Wow, you really were out of it there. You should hydrate.’

  ‘Uh… right,’ Pugh said as they headed for the door. ‘Uh… nice doing business.’

  ‘You think this guy is the witch hunter?’ Lily asked once they were out on the street.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Ceri said. ‘He could really be some freelancer. I don’t know if he connected Alec and Cheryl either, but I’m going to warn her. I’m pretty sure he’ll have connected us with Michael and the North Hills wolves though. In fact, he may have been at the Dragon because of me.’

  Lily ignored that little bit of self-recrimination. ‘So if this guy is our killer, this just got personal?’

  ‘Doesn’t it always? We’re trouble magnets’ Lily giggled in reply. ‘What?! It’s not funny!’

  ‘It is a bit funny.’

  ‘It’s not. People keep trying to kill us.’

  ‘But they never succeed, and the next time some mystery comes up we’ll be right back at it, putting ourselves in front of the bullet.’

  Ceri giggled. ‘Yeah. Yes, we will.’ Well, it was laugh or cry.

  Kennington

  ‘Michael’s in the lounge,’ Twill said as they entered the hall at High Towers.

  ‘He is?’ Ceri said. ‘I wasn’t expecting him.’

  ‘Not that she’s complaining,’ Lily added.

  ‘Not that I’m complaining,’ Ceri agreed, heading for the stairs.

  ‘I’ve been officially assigned as your guard,’ Michael said. ‘Alexandra and Anita were quite firm about it, so don’t argue.’ It was kind of defensive; Ceri and Lily grinned at him.

  ‘Just one wolf to guard us both?’ Ceri asked. Behind her she could hear Lily kicking her shoes off.

  ‘Well, we’ll be going to the Dragon with Lily this week, and I’m there for support more than physical force,’ the werewolf said. ‘My senses are better. I spot something, you blast it.’

  ‘Now that’s the kind of plan I can get behind,’ Lily commented. Naked, she walked over and cuddled up to Michael where he was stood in front of the fire. Not to be outdone, Ceri snuggled up on the other side, though she was still dressed so the effect was not quite so good. Lily, apparently, felt it was not good enough. ‘Come on, get naked. Our guardian wolf deserves the best.’

  Michael shuffled uncomfortably. ‘Don’t tease the guardian wolf,’ Ceri said, but she backed off far enough that she did not hit him when she pulled her shirt off.

  ‘What did I do to deserve the pair of you?’ Michael asked plaintively.

  ‘Oh,’ Lily said, ‘you’re just really, really lucky.’

  November 8th

  ‘We have a problem.’ Alec’s voice sounded tense on the other end of the phone.

  ‘Alec?’ Ceri said. ‘What’s wrong? Has something happened to Cheryl?’

  ‘Not Cheryl. Naira’s gone missing. She went out shopping this morning and never came back.’

  ‘Crap! Is Jasmine okay?’

  ‘She’s crying. A lot. Carter’s with her.’

  ‘Have the police…’

  ‘Carter put through a call to John Radcliffe about ten minutes ago.’

  ‘Well, they’ll canvas to see whether anyone’s seen anything. I’m not sure I can do…’

  ‘Carter wants you to try to find her location,’ Alec interrupted. ‘The way you did with Lily. We saw you, kid. I don’t know whether it’s special talent or sheer power, but you broke through wards to find her.’

  Ceri took a breath. ‘Okay. I’ll need something of hers, and Jasmine. Can you bring them here? I’d feel safer doing it here.’

  ‘We’ll be there in thirty.’ The phone went dead.

  ~~~

  ‘Do you think you can find her?’ Jasmine’s face was tear-stained, her eyes puffy. Somehow Ceri had never seen the strawberry blonde werefox stripper as the emotional type, but she had really got attached to Naira. That was what Ceri needed.

  ‘I’ll try. I can’t promise anything, but I’ll try.’ Ceri looked over at Lily. ‘Take her down to the summoning room. I need to talk to Carter.’ She turned to look at her sometime boss as Alec and Lily led the way downstairs, waiting for the door to close befo
re speaking. ‘You tried?’

  Carter looked tired, worried. He nodded. ‘I tried and hit a wall.’ He pulled a toothbrush in a plastic bag from his pocket and handed it over. ‘They don’t share. The police took her hairbrush.’

  ‘This’ll do, with some help from Jasmine.’

  Carter frowned. ‘How’s she going to help?’

  ‘Emotion. Love, worry, fear, all directed at Naira. I think that’s how I found Lily that time. The emotional attachment gave me the extra jolt.’

  ‘And you think you can tap it from Jasmine?’

  Ceri shrugged. ‘I can try.’

  The summoning room had already been tidied up before they had arrived. In particular the dragon statuette had been put in its screened box and tucked away in a corner where it looked like any other piece of equipment. Jasmine was looking uncomfortable around all the magical paraphernalia; Ceri remembered when Lily had felt off in that room. The summoning circle in here was meant for demons and it used to make the half-demon feel strange. It did not bother her now which seemed a little odd considering that she was now more in touch with her demon side.

  ‘Jasmine, you’re in the circle with me,’ Ceri said. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not going to power it. It’s just kind of symbolic.’ She walked into the circle, pulling the toothbrush out of the bag.

  ‘Do I sit? Stand?’ Jasmine asked, stepping in beside her. The werefox’s green eyes looked down at the complex sigils carved into the granite.

  Ceri held her hand out. ‘Doesn’t matter. Just take my hand and think of Naira.’ She began summoning her power as Jasmine took the offered hand. ‘Remember the last time you made love. Remember watching her dance. Remember having breakfast with her this morning. Remember what you said to her when she went out…’

  Jasmine fell to her knees, Ceri holding her hand as she went down. ‘Oh God, Naira!’ Jasmine’s wail filled the room, reverberating from the stone walls. The light followed it, flooding out from Ceri as she focussed on the traces of Naira still on the toothbrush and the outpouring of emotion from Jasmine. There was a gasp from the others in the room, but Ceri ignored it. She was flying, sweeping out across the city on widespread wings, following a trail of silver light through the air.