Fly by Midnight (3 page)

3

H
onora’s mind was buzzing as she left the police station. The case appeared to be settled, but appearances could be deceiving. An average private investigator would call the client and gracefully bow out, but Honora wasn’t your average investigator. She reviewed the facts on the way back to her office: missing husband, concerned wife, and a police investigation that originally turned up nothing. Until suddenly, “Detective Undress Me” found an evidence trail that convinced him, the police, and the Witch Council that the case of missing wizard Jonathan Rainer was really just an embarrassing affair. At the request of the council, the detective closed the investigation to quell the gossip about a respectable member of the council gone lying, cheating rogue being plastered over the parchment scrolls of
Witch World Daily
.

Scandal avoided. Scorned wife sent packing.

Neat, tidy, and over.

That was the problem. Her years as an investigator had taught Honora one thing—life was never
that
easy, and it certainly wasn’t tidy. Something was amiss. She was going to find out what was
really
going on.

Honora rented office space in a building right in the hub of the action in Stargazer City. She was two blocks away from the Witch Council building, which was across the street from the courthouse and three blocks away from the police station. She entered the lobby of an elegant office building and rode the elevator up to the tenth floor. She pushed through a glass door into hushed stillness. Her office was the epitome of order and calm. Two white leather chairs faced her sleek desk, and a dark blue velvet sofa filled out the room. Her assistant had a small office adjacent to hers, and a tiny kitchenette finished off the space.

She slipped out of her jacket and tossed her purse in a drawer. Sitting in a tall leather desk chair, Honora pulled out a piece of parchment and sent an urgent note to Harper, asking her to dig up anything she could on Jonathan Rainer and suggesting they meet up as soon as possible to discuss anything she could find out from her work sources. Since her friend worked for the council, she was a perfect contact. Honora heaved open the window to find Barnaby perched on the ledge. “Got a delivery,” she said, attaching the note to his leg. Within seconds, he was airborne—much faster than using a courier.

With a renewed sense of determination, Honora tore into the package Jane had given her. The parchments contained numerous photos and detailed documentation on Jane’s missing husband. Jonathan wasn’t exactly what Honora had been expecting, and he definitely didn’t look like the type of wizard who slept around. In the photo, he was wearing wire-rimmed glasses on a slightly crooked nose, which wasn’t too strange, except for his long gray hair and beard. Honora wondered what spell he was using to get his hair to grow so long without the ends splitting. He was also sporting a deep burgundy robe, similar to those worn by professors at the academy. She easily pegged him for at least three hundred and fifty years old, which was middle-aged for witches and wizards.

Another photograph caught Honora’s attention. This one was of a much younger wizard who looked like he could be the older man’s son. Now
this
guy she could see with Jane. He was clean-shaven with short brown hair and wire-rimmed glasses. He had a medium build and was wearing creased khaki pants, ironed to perfection. He was pure vanilla. Honora was relatively certain he owned more than a few sweater vests.

So who was who? Now the
secret
started to come out. Honora immediately suspected identity magic, like a glamor or potion, was at play.

Performing some serious magical conjuring with her kettle, Vivi had invented a potion so Clover could change her identity into the fictitious author Cassandra Reason while doing promotional appearances for her magical romance novels. Potions and spells that camouflaged a witch’s identity weren’t impossible to come by, but they were easy to detect with security spells, so no witch could commit a crime wearing a different face without his or her true identity being discovered. Identity spells were also practical for low-level security, and the police often used them to protect witnesses. Basically, any witch or wizard who had the means and wanted to maintain a low profile could obtain the spell.

For witches like Clover, it was a fun way to hide her face for a few hours while she did readings for her adoring fans and still keep her privacy. But the spells were temporary, never lasting more than a few hours at most, and unless a witch had a connection like a potion-making sister, maintaining the false identity got very expensive.

The question now was: Why was Jonathan Rainer hiding his face, and which Jon was the real one? Curious.

Honora made herself a cup of black tea and dug in to the rest of the materials, reading through the notes. Jonathan was a magical physicist. He’d graduated top of his class at Haven Academy and at the College of Advanced Magic. The wizard had multiple degrees—so many that he also taught and advised training methods for other witches and wizards at the academy. Honora’s respect for him grew by the second. He’d also been awarded numerous grants from the Witch Council over the years to study magic, including barrier spells, large-scale wards, and protection magic. In fact, it appeared he was currently working for the council on a top-secret project worth millions of pounds of gold.
The Rainers must be loaded
, Honora thought. At least she wouldn’t have to worry about Jane covering her fee.

Honora narrowed her eyes and read further. The grant focused on a new barrier spell and protection ward combination, but what interested her was the size. The magic was large scale. Huge. What did Everland need all that protection from, and if one of the council’s top magicians went missing, why weren’t they looking for him at a higher level? Or had the council already known about the affair and hadn’t bothered? An alarm bell went off inside of her.

This seemed like a perfect case for the Hex Division.

Hex Division was a group of secret magical investigators who worked on the most dangerous and classified cases for the council. Honora couldn’t stand Hexers. They were high achievers who didn’t think rules applied to them. She and Vivi recently had a run-in with a hotshot Hexer named Rye Finn. He was arrogant, cocky, and powerful, which also made him annoyingly attractive.

Honora was sure the Hex Division would have worked this case, and if so, why was Jonathan Rainer’s wife seeking a private investigator on her own? She needed more information on this so-called affair.

A knock rapped on the half-opened door to her office. “What’s up?” Sawyer said, a mug of fragrant tea in his hand.

Honora had been so focused on the documents she hadn’t even heard her assistant come in. Sawyer personified hip and casual. His daily uniform consisted of jeans, a long-sleeve gray shirt, leather jacket, and big black boots. He was tall, had light brown skin, and wore his black hair buzzed short. He was an uncomplicated kind of wizard—loyal, dependable, and the smartest guy she’d ever met. She was lucky to have him, and she knew it. But sifting through the exclusive résumé of Jonathan Rainer made her curious about her overachieving assistant.

“Why do you work for me?”

“Because I need the gold card credit. A wizard has to eat,” he said, half-jokingly. “You aren’t thinking of replacing me, are you?” His smile collapsed.

Honora stared out of her office window, her sight focused far off into the distance. “You’re smart, Sawyer. You could work for anyone and make triple what I can afford to pay you. You could work on important projects for the council.”

“Actually, I could make quadruple what you pay, but who’s counting? And as far as the council goes, I’ll never work for them. Never.” He set his mug on the desk with a clank.

“Why?” She looked up at him.

“Because once you’re in with the council, you never get out.” He shook his head and frowned. “I value my freedom more than all the gold in Everland.”

The words made her pause. “It can’t be that bad.”

He grunted and changed the subject. “What’s up with you today? You’re acting stranger than usual.”

Honora ran her fingers through her hair and sat up. “A case I picked up last night has my mind racing. What I thought was going to be a simple missing-wizard case just seemed to fall in my lap.” She motioned to the material on her desk, and he curiously scanned the pile.

“This is good, right? We’ve been a little slow,” Sawyer said as he sifted through the parchments.

“Sure, as far as the gold goes, but it’s turning out to be more complicated than I’d realized. From now on, this case is top priority. I’ll need you to review the material and go through our usual channels to investigate the subject.”

“Who’s the subject?” he asked, pulling out a reed pen and thin parchment notepad that he kept in the inner pocket of his jacket, making him look like a reporter for
Witch World Daily
.

She showed him the pictures and tapped the two of Jonathan Rainer. “That’s him, and that’s him, too.”

Sawyer was a top researcher and practically lived in the city archives. He gleaned information from the public records, archives, libraries, and newspapers with unsurpassed speed and accuracy. His magical
persuasion
was intelligence-based, including speed-reading, retention, and memory. The two of them dug into the life of Jonathan Rainer with the materials Jane had given them and copies of records and data that Sawyer had amassed in the “library” he was building until it was time for her to head out and meet Harper. They found mostly easily verifiable résumé information, educational history, and known address. Nothing unusual or suspicious jumped out.

“I’m headed to the council building for a quick chat with Harper. I’ll be back soon.” Honora zipped up her cherry-red flying jacket, matched with a pair of black pants, black aviator cap, and goggles. She popped the window latch and stepped out onto the ledge.

“I’ll visit the archives to see what else I can dig up. Then I’ll head over to the public records,” Sawyer said as Honora stepped off the edge. “I’ll never get used to seeing you walk out of the window.” He grinned with wide-eyed appreciation.

Her body floated on air. She lifted her chest and ascended to about fifty feet above the Silver Train track. She was only going a few blocks, so she stayed in a sight line of the traffic below her. Even though her office was in a building across the street from the council building, she still had to fly down the block to enter from the front.

There were rules to flying, especially in Stargazer City. The council took midair collisions seriously. Within the city, the transportation system consisted of commuter walkways, hovercraft lanes, and the train system. A flyer couldn’t just take flight and zoom around wherever she liked. Flyers weren’t allowed to fly in or near traffic—they had to fly at least twenty feet above the Silver Train System, sticking to the upper skies. Most flyers liked it that way, preferring to stay high above the bustling streets below.

The council building had always been a favorite place to visit when Honora was young. The arched stone room containing a bronze statue of Hazel Meriwether was awe-inspiring. The most famous witch in Everland, the mother to them all, she was immortalized, standing guard with one palm outstretched in welcome and the other hand held up flat, as if stopping those who would advance against her—a sign of both strength and protection.

The origin story of Everland had been passed down for generations. Hazel had been born a young witch in the dark ages of man. A sinister tyrant had emerged in those troubled times, calling himself the Black Bishop, and he ruled over the land with an iron fist, ridding the countryside of unexplainable acts deemed witchcraft and the women who performed them. A powerful healer and midwife in her village, Hazel saved many lives, but when a young noblewoman died in childbirth, she was blamed. Men on horseback, accompanied by a pack of dogs, ruthlessly hunted the fleeing witch, captured her, and dragged her back to the village, only to put her on a quick one-sided trial.

Not surprisingly, the Black Bishop found her guilty, and Hazel was burned at the stake while the villagers gawked and cheered. But the spectators were shocked when the brave witch didn’t scream or wail as the flames engulfed her body and licked at her tender skin. She held her head high, refusing to grovel or beg for mercy. And most importantly, she refused to go up in flames. The night lingered, and the fire died out. Quietly tied to the stake until the morning came, Hazel stood with eyes of quiet fury, completely unharmed in the wreckage of the charred ash heap.

The Black Bishop flew into a rage. The devilish witch had obviously used her powers to outsmart him, for who else could survive the burning hellfire? Drowning, he determined, was the only way to deal with a fire-vanquishing devil girl. Under his orders, the villagers carted Hazel off to the river, bound her hands and feet, tied a rock to her back, and tossed her into the murky water. Submerged for hours, her hair swirled around her body like marsh weeds. Her skin turned gray and mottled. When they pulled her up, her clothes were sopping black rags. Surely she was dead. But suddenly she blinked her eyes, and the villagers erupted in screams.

Hazel was
still
alive.

And that was exactly how the frantic villagers buried her, upside down in a plain pine box, at a crossroad.

But what the Black Bishop and the other villagers didn’t know was that Hazel’s reputation was spreading. She was much more than a healer and midwife; she was a powerful witch. Covens of witches formed a caravan, traveled for miles, plotted her rescue, and hatched a grand plan to leave the world of man forever. They camped out around a lonely road at the edge of the village and waited. Under the cover of darkness, they dug her up, pulled her from her coffin, and disappeared.