Crime Spells

His mind traveled down multiple paths simultaneously as he struggled with the problem. All the while something bothered him, as though he should recognize the strange astral print, but nothing came to mind. Though he eventually came up with nothing, he knew one thing for certain. This was new. And Adrian hated new.

He sucked on his teeth momentarily, then braced for the pain and relaxed his fist; he unleashed his iron-clenched will and slid from astral space, the frozen flash gone in an instant. The pain enveloped him as the clockwork mechanism of the mundane world hammered back into motion and the astral inertia it imparted slammed into the one responsible for its arrest. Despite the years of practice, he staggered under the molten spike stabbing downward through his chakra points across head, spine and finally into the belly, where his intestine stretched under the final throes of the energy until only clenched teeth kept the scream at bay.

“What did you see, boss man?”

Adrian breathed in deeply, nostrils flaring as he sought to extricate his mind from the pain’s tentacles. For once Martinez’ unwashed pungency remained mostly buried under the harsh chemicals used to keep the subways clean, with a hint of sulfur quality behind it all; the victim and whatever had happened.

“Nothing,” he finally rasped out. “I saw nothing.”

“Right,” Martinez responded, voice childlike in its sulle

Adrian took another deep breath to finally start the pain onto the path of distant memory, nerves more jangled than ever. But I did not see anything. Anything at all.

God, Adrian hated riding the subway.

Despite such a short distance as two stops, he hated stepping foot on the crowded meat carriers. Hated the occupants and their vacant stares as they tried to pretend they were anywhere but wedged into cars like cattle to the slaughter. Hated their hostile and fearful, surreptitious glances. Most of all, hated that he needed them. Needed every one of them.

They pulled into the Harrison stop, and a new gaggle of warm bodies squeezed in. The bitter December cold-much more acute above ground, the lake-effect snow and wind swirling with gusto across the concrete platform-pushed in as well. Others shivered uncontrollably at the gusts, but with so many about, he remained blank-faced, coat undone, unfeeling of the cold.

The greatest show on Earth… his sardonic i

Despite the press of bodies, Adrian ’s cool gaze and body stance-the absolute knowledge in those bicolor eyes that the cold really didn’t affect him-kept an invisible shield all around him. A modicum of breathing room, more effective than a real force screen. Despite his obvious wealth-the subtle hint of silver threads woven with intricate runes along the coat sleeves and down the front and back almost gluttonous in this impoverished part of the city-no pick-pocket dared approach. No ganger moved to bully with a raised gun. It’d happened in the past. Still did happen now and then when someone new came along. But these? They were regular commuters. Knew him. He’d made sure of that. Had to make sure of that all the time. Why he chose the stinking cattle car when he traveled throughout Chicago.

God, he hated them.

Despite his best efforts to avoid focusing on any of them, he abruptly noticed a face in the crowd. A female face. One he recognized with a jolt of echoing pain. Regardless of resolve, he swept into motion, the crowd parting like the Red Sea before a mad Moses. He stopped mere feet from the terrified woman, mind finally registering the only passing resemblance to her.

Of a sudden he shivered. Must be the cold. Must be.

The train dragged to a halt at the Cermak-Chinatown stop, and Adrian was out the door with a flourish of the floor-length coat (never forget the charade!), the hard air almost burning his lungs as he pulled in huge amounts to banish the stink of the L-CAR. To forget what just happened. To forget…

“So what do you think’s up, boss man?” Martinez asked, apparently unconcerned with Adrian ’s strange behavior, already over his petulance from the scene of the murder. “I spoke with the cops, and they got nothing.”

As if they’d tell you anything of worth. “Of course they have nothing. If there were even one scrap of evidence that pointed to a mundane murder, they’d hound that trail wherever it led, even if it was a dog chasing its tail round and round. Anything but call in my services.” Now away from so many people, he was forced to cinch his coat up as the cold worked past his shield. Stepping carefully down the stairs, he came out under the El-no pigeons overhead to drop their surprises during winter- Cermak Street ru

“So, what we doing, then?”

“Back to the warehouse.”

“Not the estate?”

“Are we not here in Chinatown?” he responded, arm sweeping to the right to take in Chicago ’s Chinatown. “Would we not need to be someplace markedly different if we were heading to the estate?”

“Right…” Martinez responded, voice trailing off as though in amazing discovery. “Will I finally get into the sanctum, boss man? Or do I have to stay in the mundane again? It’s been a year.”

Adrian ’s silence was answer enough.

“Right.” The man could teach a course on sulle

A sigh. He glanced to the left to see how long the Cermak bus would take, and a reminder that he needed the man. Would never be caught without a follower again. “Because there’s something about that death, some astral signature that reminds me of… something.”

“Yeah, boss man? You remember everything. I bet you remember exactly what I said to you the first time we met, after your other assistant ran away.”

In excruciating detail.

“So how you couldn’t recognize an astral print… wacky.”

From Adrian ’s peripheral vision he watched Martinez put down the last of the teeth-killing drink. He then flicked the bottle toward the trash can with its side opening and it sailed right in. Adrian slowly blinked at the surprising dexterity from the usually ungainly, overweight man.

“Yes,” Adrian spoke slowly. “As you say. Wacky.” The few other individuals at the bus stop abruptly began shuffling toward his position at the edge of the street, a sure sign of the approaching bus that they dared come so close.

The tick in the back of his mind became an itch, one that he finally acknowledged after leaving astral space and the murder scene with only a negative shake of his head to the on-scene officer; they knew he’d get back to them. There’s only one way that I couldn’t recognize the astral print. That’s if it was obscured. No undead, werecreature, or spirit-unbound or not-would think of obscuring its astral signature. Most wouldn’t even know how, and the few spirits that have pilfered enough essence from the mages that have summoned them to know such a thing was possible wouldn’t consider it. No, this was different. Trepidation and yearning filled him in equal measure. There was only one answer. An answer to a question he’d spent his life trying to find.

Another magus.

A lifetime of learning through ancient, crumbling tomes taught him that magus existed in the past, oftimes learning and teaching together. Yet he’d almost given up, convinced that he alone wielded magic in this modern world. The abrupt irony was almost more than he could take. For though the answer must be another magus, it was someone that knew Adrian… and Adrian didn’t know this man! He knew enough about Adrian to know exactly how to obscure his astral print, to bar him from any ability to tweak out the littlest detail. That type of intimate knowledge wasn’t just u