Dragon Precinct (9 page)

“Not surprising, that.” Jonas shook his head. “I’ll get right on this, Lieutenant.”

“Thank you, Jonas.”

Once the sergeant left, and with Danthres gone, the squad room was again empty, save for him. Torin sighed. He had been hoping to use one of the other detectives as a sounding board—especially Iaian, whose years of experience often aided in the thought process.

Torin thought back over the statements he’d gotten from the few witnesses to both murders, but came up more or less empty. The chambermaid who found Brightblade just filled in details of what they were able to reconstruct on their own. The people who saw them carousing at dinner the night before didn’t give any indications that anyone there had been sufficiently put out to commit murder—certainly not a murder as elaborate as this.

What drove Torin craziest was the total lack of any kind of evidence turned up by the M.E. Normally, a case like this would have been put down already, by virtue of Boneen providing a description of the murderer—or, at the very least, there’d be sufficient evidence of magic that the case would be kicked over to the Brotherhood for
them
to deal with. Not always satisfying, but at least it didn’t leave Torin and Danthres with a perpetually open case. Osric hated those, as they made the Guard look bad in the eyes of Lord Albin and Lady Meerka.

Instead, they had a genuine mystery, one complete with major political hassles guaranteed to make their lives more complicated.

At least we got the unlimited overtime.

A member of the youth squad came in then. Torin recognized her as one of the kids who worked the docks. After Torin provided the girl with a copper, she gave a message that no one matching the descriptions of any of Brightblade’s party had been seen on the docks.
So they really hadn’t gotten to the hiring part yet, nor have they since Brightblade’s death.
He had been hoping for some revelation about their journey from a more impartial source than the party members themselves.

That left them with damn little—less for lothSirhans, owing to their incomplete interrogation of the person who found the body. The only other witness was that old man….

Frowning, he thought back over the witnesses he’d talked to after Brightblade’s murder. The old man who claimed to have seen lothSirhans going upstairs to his room was probably related to one of the younger men who told Torin about the revelry the night before Brightblade’s murder.

Just then, a guard came in with a parchment. “Lieutenant, this just came for you—from the Dog and Duck.”

Torin looked up to see that the fresh-faced young man was delivering the guest list, copied from the register by Olaf. Torin perused it, looking for any male-male combinations with the same family name. None came up—not that that meant anything in and of itself. They might not have used family names, they might have had different ones due to marriage.
Or you’re just letting your imagination run away with you,
he chided himself.
Focus on the case, Torin, not the irrelevant side issues.

Of course, that would be easier if the case itself weren’t so maddening.

Jonas came in then, holding a much smaller piece of parchment. “One of the youth squad dropped this off at the gate.”

Taking the parchment, Torin smiled. Some of the youth squad didn’t like to set foot in headquarters. Bad luck, they thought, though it decreased their chances of getting their usual copper-piece tip. Unfolding the parchment, Torin saw that it was written in Old Myverin, and simply had the words “Come see me.” It was unsigned, but the writer of the note hardly needed to sign—her handwriting was quite distinctive, and she was likely the only person besides Torin outside of Myverin’s borders who could write in the old tongue in any case.

Informing Jonas that he’d be in Goblin for a while talking to an informant and asking him to let Danthres know that he’d meet her at Dragon Precinct later, Torin grabbed his cloak and proceeded to the seedier part of town.

Meerka Way—the primary thoroughfare, which led one from the castle to the Docklands—was always packed with people, but it provided the most direct route to Torin’s destination. As he went, the mansions gave way to large houses, then smaller houses, then even smaller houses more crowded together, then shoved-together structures, culminating in the chaos that was the center of Cliff’s End, at the border between Dragon and Goblin. The quality of the construction was in inverse proportion to the quantity of it per square foot.

The smell got worse as well. In Unicorn, his nose mostly detected foliage, some of it freshly cut and groomed. On this warm day in particular, it reminded him of the manors of Myverin, though how much of that was due to the note he’d received he wasn’t sure. The farther into Cliff’s End he progressed, the ranker the aroma became, from the less-well-hidden cesspools, to the poorer kitchens, to the less-well-groomed citizenry.

How that citizenry reacted to his presence altered as he went as well. In Unicorn, he was often greeted, sometimes warmly, but at least always politely, as if his presence were appreciated. In Dragon, the greetings were fewer and more guarded. By the time he crossed Axe Lane, the official demarcation point between Dragon and Goblin, few would look him in the eye, and those who did were either utterly contemptuous or scared.

No one batted an eyelash when he turned down Sandy Brook Way. Guards were often known to head that way, ostensibly to make arrests, but usually for pleasure. Prostitution was legal in Cliff’s End—Lord Albin and Lady Meerka had never seen any good reason for selling sex to be against the law—but whorehouses were often used as fronts for shadier activities, and most of the best (and worst) whorehouses in Cliff’s End were on Sandy Brook.

Torin passed several structures advertising assorted forms of negotiable sexual activities, some with the potential sex partner in question hawking the wares in front of the door. One establishment guaranteed that no glamours were used on their women, an assertion belied by the perfection of the woman standing in front of the door.
Perhaps,
he thought with a smile,
it would be more accurate to say that no
decent
glamours are used….
A good glamour looked perfectly natural, of course, but good glamours were also very expensive.

At the cul-de-sac following the intersection of Sandy Brook and Doila Lane sat Torin’s destination: Suzett’s. The place was quiet and unassuming, only a small sign in the front window identifying the name of the establishment. Constructed primarily of dark wood, the place could easily be mistaken for one of the middle-class houses in Dragon. Suzett’s women generally didn’t use glamours, because they didn’t need to—she knew how to dress them and make them up in such a way that magic was not required. And in the seven years she’d been running the place, they had never been connected to any illegal activity, which made them just about unique.

When he stepped through the giant wooden door, Torin found that the smells of rubbish, rotten food, unkempt living creatures, and their assorted waste products were replaced with a floral aroma that seemed to permeate the entire lobby. Curtains kept the sun out of the room, leaving the illumination to dozens of scented candles festooned about. Aside from the small desk in the back, the place was furnished entirely with couches and cushions, all in subdued solid colors, which matched the soothing dark wood of the walls. This entire place was designed to make one relax.

A tall elven woman wearing a small top over a large pair of breasts—the cloth barely covered her nipples—a small strip of cloth suspended from a belt across her narrow hips, and nothing else walked forward from the desk. This wasn’t a bad glamour, all things considered—she looked just like an elf, except for the disproportionately large chest. Humans sometimes achieved that lack of symmetry, Torin knew, but elves never did. The glamour either made her look elven or made her breasts seem larger; given her occupation, the former was more likely.

“Can I help you, Guard?” she asked, voice smooth as any elf’s.

“Lieutenant, actually,” Torin said with a smile. “I’m here to see Suzett.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

From behind him, a voice that was even smoother, though it came from a human, said, “Lieutenant ban Wyvald needs no appointment to see me, Elshra.”

Torin turned to see the unusually tall form of Suzett herself. She wore a blue silk gown with a scoop neck to accentuate her cleavage, and just enough makeup to highlight her soft features and cover up the very few lines and wrinkles that age had at last started to slice into her smooth skin. Her thick black hair fell loosely about her shoulders.

“One could argue that I
do
have an appointment,” Torin said, removing the parchment from his belt. “You did send for me, after all.”

Suzett’s mouth had never, in all the years Torin had known her, formed a smile, yet her eyes would sometimes sparkle with amusement. They did so now. “True. Come with me.”

She walked into the back room through a doorway covered in strings of beads that clacked slightly as she went through. The larger Torin with his leather armor and cloak made considerably more noise as he followed her through the beads.

This room had none of the peaceful qualities of the entry room—it was all parchments, scrolls on shelves, and a cluttered desk. This was where Suzett did the behind-the-scenes work that allowed her establishment to run smoothly. Torin was likely the only nonemployee who ever saw this part of the place.

“Elshra?” he asked as they entered the room. “What’s her real name?”

“Does it matter? To the customers, she is a woman with an elven face and a human body—that is the greatest sexual desire of about half the men and a quarter of the women in this city.”

“If you say so.”

“I understand that you’re investigating the deaths of Gan Brightblade and Olthar lothSirhans,” Suzett said as she sat at the desk.

Torin took a seat in the wooden guest chair, which creaked from his weight, compounded by the armor and sword he carried. He suspected that the chair was chosen with lithe women in mind. Neutrally, he said, “Word travels fast.” In truth he would have been amazed if Suzett didn’t know he and Danthres were the investigating officers before they themselves knew.

“Many words have traveled to me, my sweet lieutenant. Including a report that your magical examiner found no traces of sorcery.”

Torin raised his eyebrows. “And how did you come by
that
information?”

Suzett’s eyes sparkled again. “Do you really expect me to answer that?”

“No, but I still had to ask.”

“Well, the reason why this surprised me is that dear Gan—” Suzett hesitated. “I’ve known Gan for quite some time, from back in the days before I was a successful entrepreneur.”

Laughing, Torin said, “I’ve known you as far more than an entrepreneur, Suzett.”

“True. And if anyone else were investigating this murder, I would never share this information, but since I do owe you…”

“Suzett, you do not have to justify yourself to me. If you have information, please provide it.”

She shook her head. “Always straight to the point, aren’t you, Lieutenant?”

“It
is
part of the job description. A fact of which you should be aware, given what happened eight years ago.”

Now the sparkle left her eyes altogether. Torin knew she did not like being reminded of the events that led to her status as one of his best informants—and also his only unpaid one.

“Gan used a glamour potion.”

Torin frowned. “That’s not possible. Boneen would have detected that. He must have stopped using it.”

“I saw him two days ago when he and his friends checked into the Dog and Duck.”

At that, Torin smiled. “What were
you
doing in the Dog and Duck?” Suzett rarely ventured outside her place.

“I had business—an itinerant barber who did not perform his tonsorial services after payment was rendered.”

Torin shook his head. Suzett usually didn’t fall for such scams. “Bad day?”

“My day off, actually.” Her lovely, porcelain face grew hard. “It is the last time I will leave Cosra in charge.” Then her features softened. “In any case, the glamour was still in full effect when I laid eyes upon him. His eyes were clear, his hair solid brown, his face unlined, just as it was when I first met him.”

“He used a potion, you say—not a gem?”

Suzett shook her head. “A potion. He said he didn’t trust gems, and he could afford the potions—especially given how many wizards he was friends with.”

Torin scratched his beard. “That is useful.”
I’m not sure how yet, but it is.
He rose. “Is there anything else?”

“Are you still partnered with that half-elven creature?”

“Her name is Danthres.”

“She’s a horrible woman, my sweet lieutenant. You should find yourself someone more pleasant.”

“Danthres can be quite pleasant.”

“When she’s asleep, perhaps. I’ve never met anyone so embittered.”

“She comes by it naturally. Unlike your Elshra out there, she is
naturally
half-elf and half-human, and that comes with a price in the real world.”

Once more, Suzett’s eyes sparkled, even as she rose from her chair. “Then perhaps she should indulge in a fantasy world a bit more often.”

Torin laughed again. “I’ll pass that on to her.” He walked toward the beads. “Thank you, Suzett.”

“You have no need to thank me, my sweet lieutenant, ever, for anything. You know that I am forever in your debt.” Her lips did curl slightly, and she leaned forward, making sure that Torin could see her cleavage quite clearly. “Another man would take more advantage of that.”

“Good thing I’m not another man, then.” Torin grinned and left.

As he headed back down Sandy Brook toward Meerka Way, he pondered both Suzett’s body and her oh-so-tempting offer, as well as the cleaning woman at the Dog and Duck, and what she said about Gan Brightblade’s appearance when his body had been discovered.

Apologizing to Sir Rommett took Danthres about two hours, which proved Torin wrong. He had said it would cost her nothing, but in fact it cost her two hours of her life. Still, the shit-brained aristocrat accepted the apology and lectured her for an hour about any number of things that Danthres could not recall by virtue of not having paid any attention to him. She departed his rather posh office in the western wing of the castle as the possessor of both her job and one of her worst moods in recent memory. More than anything, she felt the urge to strangle a small, defenseless animal.