Unofficial Detective Read online

  Unofficial Detective

  Kathryn Wells

  Copyright (C) 2017 Kathryn Wells

  Layout design and Copyright (C) 2017 by Creativia

  Published 2017 by Creativia

  Cover art by Cover Mint

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the author's permission.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One: Introducing Thordric

  Chapter Two: The Inspector's Sister

  Chapter Three: A Death at the Council

  Chapter Four: Unfolding Suspicions

  Chapter Five: Odour of Magic

  Chapter Six: Unofficial Detective

  Chapter Seven: Intensive Training

  Chapter Eight: Firewood

  Chapter Nine: Watched by Watchems

  Chapter Ten: Pots and Potions

  Chapter Eleven: Out of Body

  Chapter Twelve: A Sad Past

  Chapter Thirteen: Winsome Sunbeam

  Chapter Fourteen: Lifting Illusions

  Chapter Fifteen: The Interrogations Begin

  Chapter Sixteen: A Convincing Disguise

  Chapter Seventeen: Interviewing Rarn

  Chapter Eighteen: Identity Revealed

  Chapter Nineteen: The Truth

  Chapter Twenty: Decorating the Station House

  Chapter Twenty-One: A Revolution

  About the Author

  To ma and pa, for believing

  Chapter One: Introducing Thordric

  'I'm telling you, Inspector, he's a sensible young man.'

  Thordric heard Inspector Jimmson sigh. His mother had been in the Inspector's office for over an hour, trying to negotiate with him to get Thordric a job at the station. 'I don't doubt it, Maggie, but there's no denying what he is.' The Inspector lowered his voice, so that Thordric had to strain to hear. 'He's a half-wizard, for Spell's sake. If it ever got out that one of his kind was working here—'

  'His kind? Inspector, I assure you that particular part of him is completely under control,' his mother retorted.

  'Maggie, Maggie. Think of what you're asking me to do here. You know you're the best pathologist I could possibly hope for, and I wouldn't want to do anything to upset you, but the reputation of the stationhouse…' There was silence for a moment. 'I just can't let the boy work here.'

  Thordric heard one of the chairs scrape back. 'Then you're not the man I thought you were,' his mother said. The door to the office opened and she walked out, holding her head high and clacking her high heels with proud deliberation. 'Come on Thordric, let's go home.'

  Thordric got up, a mix of relief and disappointment filling his stomach. They turned to go, but then the office door opened again. The Inspector walked out, eyeing Thordric up with a twitch of his bushy moustache. Thordric tried not to gulp under the Inspector's scrutinising gaze.

  'He's hired,' the Inspector said abruptly. 'Starts work tomorrow morning, seven thirty on the dot. Don't let him be late, Maggie.'

  'Thank you, Inspector,' his mother said. Thordric thought he saw a smile flicker across her lips.

  Later that day, she took him to the tailor to get his uniform measured. As he was only to be the Inspector's runner, he didn't need the full constabulary uniform.

  'Good thing too,' the tailor said, lifting a measuring tape up to Thordric's chest. 'I don't believe I have any small enough. No, indeed, it will have to be a plain jacket, though in a boy's size, I think.'

  He took the measurement, scribbling the number down in his leather-bound notebook. Thordric craned his neck to try and see what it was, but the tailor held his hand up. 'Please, sir, you shouldn't trouble yourself with the details. Leave that to me.' He turned to Thordric's mother then, and dropped his voice slightly. 'Are you sure he's fourteen? He looks to be no more than twelve at the most, if I am honest, Ma'am.'

  'I'm fourteen and a half,' Thordric said indignantly. The tailor smiled faintly and carried on taking measurements.

  A few hours later, Thordric came out with his new uniform in hand, ready to head home, but his mother caught his arm and took him to the barber shop instead. 'What are we doing here?' he said, standing in front of the entrance, looking at the red and white pole spinning around and around on the wall.

  'You'll want to look smart tomorrow, won't you dear?' she said mildly.

  The barber found fault with him too, complaining that Thordric's hair was in such bad condition that he couldn't possibly cut it into any of the regular constabulary styles (though it was not for lack of trying). After three hours, growing increasingly hot and flustered, he had declared that the only thing he could do to make Thordric look smart was to shave it all off.

  'Oh, do stop fussing, Thordric,' his mother said after the deed had been done. 'If that's what the good barber thought best to do, then it was best.'

  'But…but, it's so short. All I have is stubble. Everyone is going to laugh at me.'

  'Nonsense,' she chided. 'It looks very smart. I'm sure that no-one will say anything bad.'

  Unfortunately for Thordric, she couldn't have been more wrong.

  At seven thirty sharp she dropped him at the front desk, and there he stood in his new clothes with his bald head reflecting the morning light. The constable at the desk took one look at him and threw his head back; laughing so much that it brought all the other constables out to have a look. Some of them sniggered or tried to stifle their snorts; but most laughed just as hard as the desk constable.

  'Look at him,' Thordric heard one of them whisper. 'He's nothing more than a string bean. What possessed the Inspector to hire him?'

  All the commotion brought the Inspector looming around the corner, with his face resembling the very storm cloud that had drenched the whole town the night before. All the constables took one look at him and quailed, fleeing back to their desks and burying their heads in paperwork.

  'There you are, er, Thorbid,' he said, his eyes marking every detail of Thordric's clothes and physique. 'Hardly constabulary material, but I suppose you'll do. Come along.'

  'Inspector?' Thordric said with a squeak. 'It's Thordric, not Thorbid.'

  'Quiet now, Throbay. Follow me.'

  Thordric followed meekly, past the constables' desks and into the Inspector's office. It was a neat room, furnished with dark wooden bookcases and a wooden desk. There wasn't a single speck of dust to be seen. 'Now,' the Inspector said, sitting down in his vast leather chair. 'I'm sure your mother has explained your duties to you already. Still, I see no reason not to remind you again. Your role here is to be my runner. You will do as I say, fetch things and bring them back at my command, post any letters that need to be posted and make tea whenever I feel the need for it. You will not, I repeat: NOT, speak to any of the constables, and are absolutely forbidden to assist them with any policing duties. And if anyone finds out that you're a you know what, then you'll be out of here faster than your own feet can carry you. Understand?' he said, stroking his thick bushy moustache.

  'Yes sir,' Thordric said, his voice breaking awkwardly.

  'Inspector,' the Inspector said.

  'What, sir?'

  'You say “Yes, Inspector”.'

  'Oh, of course,' Thordric mumbled. 'Yes, Inspector.'

  'Good,' the Inspector said cheerfully. 'Go make me a cup of tea and fetch me some Jaffa cakes.'

  Thordric spent the rest of the morni
ng bringing the Inspector large cups of tea ('No, no, Thorble, two sugars and not so much milk!'), passing messages back and forth throughout the station house and pretending not to be there whenever one of the constables walked passed. He barely had time to visit his mother when she broke for lunch, and when he did he found she had no sympathy for him.

  'I don't know what you expected, Thordric. You knew life at the station was going to be hard.'

  'Yes, but not this hard.'

  'Oh Thordric. You're not a baby anymore, you're almost fifteen.'

  'I know,' he said, hanging his head. 'But why couldn't I have gone to the academy like all my friends?'

  His mother breathed out slowly. 'You know perfectly well why. This is the only way I could guarantee you a future.' She took a sip of her coffee, a special blend developed by the Wizard Council to help re-energize and focus the mind. 'You ought to be getting back now, the Inspector will be asking for you.'

  'But I haven't even had anything to eat yet!'

  'You should have thought of that before you came running to me. You shouldn't come here while you're working. I'm perfectly fine.'

  'Yes mother,' Thordric said, slinking off back to the station.

  The Inspector was waiting for him when he got there, his moustache curling up into his nostrils as he glared at Thordric. 'Thormble! Where were you? I've been looking all over for you! Go and fetch me a copy of the local newspaper.'

  'Yes, Inspector,' he said, walking as quickly as possible without making it look as though he was running away.

  It was raining when he got outside; the new rainbow colours that were now so popular with other adolescents his age. He looked up and saw them sprinkling the powder into the rain from the rooftop of the library, and as it mixed, the drops turned into bright reds, oranges and pinks.

  He would have loved to have joined them, to have a go as they did, but he was forbidden to touch anything that the Wizard Council had produced. His mother told him that if he did it would be incredibly dangerous. Anything could happen if it mixed with his rogue half-wizard magic. His mother had made sure that he'd grown up knowing the risk, telling him stories of half-wizards who had tried to experiment and had ended up losing various limbs, or turning themselves into animals, or in the case of a particularly unfortunate one, a pumpkin.

  It had scared him when he was younger, but now he wished that he could prove everyone wrong about it. He wanted to show them that half-wizard magic wasn't always harmful, that his magic wasn't harmful, but his mother would never forgive him if he tried. She had wanted to bring him up as a respectable young man, and to ignore his wizard side, forget it was there. But he couldn't. It took over his dreams, willing him to try things out, and once or twice had even taken control of his body.

  He remembered one time when he had been at junior school; one of the older boys had found out what he was and decided to tell everyone. Thordric had been so upset that he'd clapped his hands together and made everyone, including his teachers, forget all about it. Unfortunately, the boy who had started it was hit by Thordric's powers directly, resulting in him losing his entire memory.

  The school wrote it off as a freak accident, but Thordric's mother had known better. She had sat him down and asked, kindly, what really happened. He told her, knowing that it had been wrong, but that he simply hadn't been able to control it. She had comforted him, but said that if anything like it happened again, he was to tell her straight away.

  Sadly, despite his good intentions, she had been the victim of his power's next attack, while she had been telling him off for making a mess of her study. Unbidden, he had stamped his foot and sent her off on a completely different train of thought, and since she hadn't seemed to notice, he thought it better to simply let her carry on and not tell her what had happened.

  He sighed, thinking back to those days when he was younger, ruefully wondering how different it would have been had he been born normal. One of the coloured raindrops landed on his nose, and with a shake of his head he remembered that he was supposed to be on his way to the newspaper stand to get the Inspector a copy of the Jard Town Gazette.

  He quickened his pace, but when he got there he found that they had sold out. The vendor told him that he might try the stand across the town, and so he had to race over there to fetch one. The vendor there was on his last copy, and sold it to Thordric for double what it was worth, seeing how much of a hurry he was in.

  'Oi, you're not the Inspector's usual fry, are you?'

  'No, sir,' Thordric said, making to dash away.

  'When did you start then?' the vendor continued.

  'Er, today, actually,' Thordric said, and disappeared before he could be asked anything else.

  He ran back to the station, making record time, and was so impressed with himself that he didn't see the Inspector standing in the doorway of his office. The resulting crash echoed throughout the building, and once again all the constables dashed to have a look. They found the Inspector lying on the floor with his head in the waste paper basket. Thordric had bounced off the Inspector's considerable bulk to land over by the bookcase, with a copy of The Detective's Handbook open on his head. His eyes were vacant as the constables rushed past him to see to the Inspector.

  'Inspector?' one said, daring to shake him slightly. 'Inspector Jimmson, can you hear me?'

  The Inspector mumbled something incoherent. The constable rounded on Thordric. 'Look at what you've done, small fry! Didn't anyone tell you not to run in the station?

  Thordric didn't hear him. The constable slapped him hard. 'I'm talking to you, small fry.'

  'Wh-what?' Thordric said, his eyes just starting to focus. He saw the Inspector, still semi-conscious and unmoving. 'Blimey, what happened to the Inspector?' he said. The constable hit him again.

  'Ouch,' he said. 'What was that for?'

  'Oh, never mind,' the constable said, giving up. He turned to one of the other constables. 'Fred, see if you can get this twit home. He won't be any use to anyone for the rest of today. I'll deal with the Inspector.'

  The constable known as Fred grabbed Thordric and dragged him out of the station to the morgue, where the constable felt it was his duty to inform his mother of what had happened. She was less than impressed.

  'Thordric Manfred Smallchance! How could you? And on your first day, too!' She threw her hands up in the air, quite forgetting that they were covered with blood from the latest poor soul she was performing a post mortem on. 'Take him home, constable, and lock the door so that he can't cause anymore trouble.'

  Chapter Two: The Inspector's Sister

  Thordric woke to the sound of his mother rapping on his bedroom door. 'Thordric. Thordric! It's time to get up!'

  He furrowed his brow, his eyes still too heavy to open.

  'Thordric, get up,' his mother continued, still knocking on the door. 'You must go and apologise to the Inspector.' He heard her sigh and turn away.

  At first it didn't register with him what she had said, but then he remembered. He had fallen into the Inspector and left him barely conscious. Swallowing the sudden lump in his throat, he scrambled out of bed and fumbled on his clothes before bolting downstairs.

  His mother was waiting for him when he got there. He thought she looked especially pretty today. Her dark, wavy hair was loose about her shoulders and she wearing her crimson heels; but he knew that if he told her she would see it as buttering her up. That was one thing she hated.

  'I hope you realise the seriousness of the damage you did yesterday,' she said crisply. 'When the poor Inspector finally got his wits back I had to plead with him for hours to give you another chance.'

  'I…' Thordric began, but found he had no words.

  'I expect you never to make a mistake or cause trouble like that again. Had the Inspector not been the type to demonstrate perfect chivalry, then it may have well cost my job as well as yours. As it is, he values my friendship very deeply and has agreed to overlook the matter. But only this once.'

 
'I understand, mother. I won't do it again, I promise.'

  'Well, then,' she said. 'Off you go, and don't forget to make his tea exactly how he likes it. And don't complain about the constables, you deserve their crude remarks at the moment.' Thordric had to agree. How could he have messed up his first day so badly? Not even the other half-wizards he had read about had that much bad luck.

  He sped to the station, arriving even before the Inspector, and had a steaming mug of tea and a plate of Jaffa cakes ready for him. When the Inspector finally walked in he said nothing, choosing to ignore Thordric completely. Halfway through his fifth Jaffa cake, however, he decided to speak up. 'I never want to speak of what happened yesterday. It was a normal day like any other. Understood?'

  'Yes, Inspector,' Thordric said, bowing his head.

  The Inspector wiped the crumbs off his moustache. 'Here,' he said, thrusting a piece of paper at Thordric. 'Go to the dry cleaners on Warn Street and show them that. They will give you my sister's dry cleaning, which you will then proceed to drop off at her house. Here is her address.' He scribbled on another bit of paper and handed it to Thordric. 'You are then to ask her if any chores need attending to, and if she so wishes, you shall do them for her.'

  'But…' Thordric protested, but stopped at the Inspector's glare.

  'You are then to go to the bank and give them this,' he continued, giving Thordric yet another piece of paper. 'And then you are to get the Jard Town Gazette. Make sure it is today's copy, and not a leftover from yesterday. Is that clear?'

  'Yes, Inspector,' Thordric said, trying to keep his voice sounding positive.

  'Remember Thormble, no mistakes.'

  Thordric left the office with as much grace as he could muster. He looked at the notes in his hand, trying to remember which was which. The Inspector's sister's address was easy to recognise, but the notes for the dry cleaners and bank were both numbers. Each had been written in a great long line with no breaks, and there was nothing to differentiate between them. He gulped.