“What is?”
“Feel that.”
Looking at her partner as if he were crazy, she asked, “What?”
“The parchment, on the spot where the closet is, feel it.”
Shrugging, Danthres did so-and was surprised to feel something etched into the parchment. “It feels like a character of some kind.”
Torin looked up just as Jonas came zooming in, a cloak in his hand. “Sergeant, could you fetch Boneen, please?”
Jonas handed Danthres her cloak in the manner one would give a diseased rat to a waste disposer. After Danthres snatched it out of his hands, the sergeant said to Torin, “He’s on a call right now-Dru and Hawk found that invisible robber’s house, and he needs to do a peel-back on it.”
Nodding, Torin said, “Fine, when he gets back, could you ask him to tell us what the sigil is on this section of the parchment?”
Jonas looked at where Torin was pointing and nodded. “Oh, by the way,” he said as he turned to leave, “they couldn’t do anything for your boots. The Cleaning Spell didn’t work for some reason.” With that, the sergeant left the squad room again.
“You know, it might not even be a sigil,” Danthres said, “though I agree that’s the most likely thing.”
“Either way, best to sound sure with Boneen-otherwise he’ll yell at us for wasting his time.”
Danthres snorted. “Like he won’t anyhow.”
“Fair point. I wonder what the problem was with the boots.”
Shrugging, Danthres said, “They probably got a cheap Cleaning Spell that doesn’t actually work.”
“Probably.”
“Lieutenant?”
Since no name was given, both Torin and Danthres turned at the sound of the voice, which came from one of the guards assigned to the castle. Danthres couldn’t remember his name, so she just thought of him the way she did most of the guards: he was the stupid one.
“Yes?” she said.
“There’s someone here to see you both-she says it has to do with the Jaros case.”
“Who is she?” Danthres asked.
The guard said, “Her name’s Amaralla, and she says she-”
Suddenly, a very short, dark-haired woman barrelled past the guard and said, “Enough of this, I’m busy, dammit, don’t have time for this. Are you two Trestle and bag Wyverin?”
“I’m Lieutenant ban Wyvald,” Torin said slowly to make sure the woman realized just how badly she’d mangled their names, “and this is my partner-”
“Yes, yes, yes, you’re the ones investigating what happened to the Jaros house, right?”
“We are,” Torin said. “How may we-”
“You can do your damn jobs, that’s what you can do. You’re supposed to be able to stop this kinda thing, right?”
“Actually, no,” Danthres said with as insincere a smile as she could manage-which was pretty insincere indeed. “Our job is to find who did it and stop them from doing it again.”
“Well, then who’s responsible for stopping it?”
“I’m sorry, who are you again?”
Sighing dramatically, the woman said, “As I told this mouth-breather with the mite-sized brain-” She indicated the guard, who took the insult with aplomb. “-my name is Thea Amaralla, and I represent the Amaralla Cleaning Service.”
That’s two cleaning services in Cliff’s End I despise, Danthres somehow managed not to say out loud. “And what is your connection to the Jaros case?”
“If you’d just listen, I’d tell you. They hired us to clean up the mess in their place.”
“In that case,” Danthres said, “the answer to your question is you.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You wanted to know who’s responsible for stopping it. It’s a mess, you’re a cleaning service-I would think the answer would be obvious?”
Turning to Torin, Amaralla asked, “Is she always like this?”
“No,” Torin said cheerily, “usually she’s belligerent. Madam, I’m afraid my partner is correct, cleaning up the mess is your job. We simply need to find out who did this and-”
“Not did.”
“I’m sorry?” Torin frowned in confusion.
“Not did. Is doing. The mess is getting worse. And every attempt we’ve made to clean it up has met with failure. Nothing will make it go away-and now it’s growing.” She stomped her foot. “So will you please figure it out? The Jaroses are demanding their money back!”
Just as Danthres was about to speak, Torin cut her off. “I’m afraid that issues of payment must be worked out between you and the Jaros family, madam. However, you can rest assured that we will be looking into this new development.” He looked over at the guard. “Will you please escort the lady out?”
Smiling nastily, the guard said, “Gladly, Lieutenant.” He grabbed Amaralla by the arm and yanked her toward the door.
“I will not be treated this way! Let go of me! This is an outrage! This is-”
Whatever else it was became lost in her rapid, guard-aided retreat. Danthres made a mental note to be less nasty to that guard in the future.
Torin looked at her. “There would appear to be more to this than we thought. I suggest we go back.”
Danthres desperately wanted to argue the point, but she found she couldn’t. And that only made her mood worse.
Before they could even make it to the door of the Jaros house, Millar Jaros intercepted them, screaming a blue streak.
“What the hell’s wrong with you people? You see the mess in there? Well? Didja? It’s a mess! How’re we supposed t’live in there if it’s such a mess?”
Next to him was Abbi, who put a hand on his shoulder. “Father, take it easy, they can’t-”
Whirling on his daughter-in-law, Millar said, “How’m I supposed t’take it easy when there’s such a mess in there!”
“I know, Father, but-”
Torin finally said, “May we please take a look?”
Throwing up his hands, Millar said, “Sure, take a look, but all you’re gonna see is a mess!”
Danthres shot Torin a look, as if to say, What else were we supposed to see? Torin shrugged back, and the two of them then walked past the Jaroses to the guard who’d been assigned by Dragon Precinct to stand at the front door.
“Open it,” Torin said.
Nodding, the guard opened the front door.
The smell was the first thing to hit Danthres. On their previous visit, the place had smelled bad, but no worse than the thoroughfares of Goblin Precinct during midsummer, or the docks of Mermaid Precinct in the afternoon after the fish came in.
Now, though, the Jaros house made the docks seem like an orchard by comparison. Danthres’s nose wrinkled up immediately and pretty much stayed that way as she surveyed the sitting room.
Not that there was much of the sitting room to survey-it was covered, wall to ceiling, in the same dark muck. She could make out small shapes under the muck that she assumed to be the furniture, and she also saw other bits and pieces jutting out from it.
“Lord and Lady,” Torin muttered.
“Close the door,” Danthres said to the guard. “We need to get Boneen in here.”
It took the better part of an hour for the magical examiner to make his appearance. During that time, Danthres tried to ignore Millar Jaros’s complaints, mostly by coming up with entertaining ways of flaying the old man alive.
When Boneen did arive via a Teleport Spell, he looked even more perturbed than usual. “I’ve already been here.”
“Yes,” Danthres said, “and all you told us was that it was unlicensed magic. What kind of magic was it?”
Boneen sneered. “The unlicensed kind. Why am I wasting my time with this?”
Torin asked, “Boneen, did you identify the sigil on the blueprints on my desk?”
“Yes, right before I was told to come here. It’s the symbol for hiding something.”