Chapter 3

When I first landed in an MPD holding cell, I'd realized immediately that a spell prevented any magical high jinks from going down within the cell block. It'd been easy to guess—even without anti-magic cuffs on, it'd felt like having a limb amputated.

Somewhere between then and my interrogation, that spell must have failed.

Gripping my elbow with painful pressure, Blythe steered me through the diminishing chaos. We passed unconscious people, bleeding people, and angry people. Everyone was angry, but it wasn't "tear out the throat of anyone nearby" rage anymore.

Avoiding provocative eye contact with anyone, I slunk beside Blythe as she passed the interrogation room and turned the corner.

Lienna, with the help of a few agents, had extinguished the battle. Various mythics were in handcuffs or magic-snuffing bracelets. Others were unconscious and/or bleeding all over the floor. Lienna was leaning over one such victim and chanting softly. Something small glowed in her hand.

"Agent Shen," Blythe called as Lienna straightened. "I want every inmate who isn't dying locked in a cell in the next five minutes."

"Yes, ma'am." Lienna hesitated as though unsure if she was about to poke a shark in the eye. "How did this happen? The holding spells—"

"—were tampered with," Blythe cut in. "Might have been an inside job. The security guild is on the way to rebuild them."

Half listening, I watched a tall, spindly dude with bright red hair down to his shoulders—the precinct's resident healer?—pour a potion on a woman's gouged arm. He had a backpack full of vials and plastic baggies, which he administered to the worst-off combatants with frazzled expediency.

Blythe slapped a hand between my shoulder blades and shoved me at Lienna. "Keep an eye on this one. I caught him halfway up the south stairwell."

Lienna glared at me. "Of course you did."

I wasn't sure what a shit-list looked like—aside from the expected scatological characteristics—but I had the distinct feeling I was officially on one.

"At least the containment floor didn't fail," Blythe grumbled as she surveyed the damage. "The moment you're done here, Agent Shen, I want you on the hunt for the empath."

On the hunt? So, Quentin had escaped. I wasn't surprised.

Quentin was many things: the most powerful empath alive, according to basically everyone; a cunning bastard who didn't hesitate to use his ample power; my former guildmate and coworker; and the nearest thing I had to a best friend. Going out for beers to shoot the shit and complain about work once or twice a week was something friends did, right?

I wasn't one hundred percent sure on that. Friendship wasn't really a thing I did.

"Containment floor?" I asked, homing in on Blythe's offhand comment. "What's that?"

The captain headed back down the hallway.

"You're going to leave me hanging like this?" I called after her.

Lienna grabbed my sleeve and hauled me to the end of the corridor, where a sorry-looking bunch of inmates in cuffs were sitting on the floor.

She plunked me down against the wall. "If you try to escape again, I will send your testicles into another dimension."

Well, that was horrifying. And intriguing. "Can you actually do that?"

"Test me and find out." With a stern stare, she hurried off to arrange my and my fellow detainees' immediate return to our cells—or so I assumed.

"Hey Kit," an unpleasantly familiar voice said. "What's up?"

Slouched against the wall across from me was the equally unpleasant face of my cellmate, Duncan. A pair of handcuffs like mine enclosed his wrists, which was a damn relief to see.

"Not much," I replied. "Just trying to survive the Mystical Melee at MagiPol."

"It got a little wild, didn't it?" he agreed casually, as though we were discussing the weather forecast. Overcast skies and a chance of prison riot.

Duncan was… well, let's just say he was a real piece of work. I've watched a lot of crime shows in my day, and I even endured a stint in juvie, but no episode of Criminal Minds could've prepared me for Duncan. He might have been a middle-aged white dude with a potbelly and a Jason Alexander hairline, but he scared the shit out of me.

Our first conversation, after I'd been unceremoniously tossed into a cell with him, had gone something like this.

Him: "What're you in for?"

Me: "Fraud, I guess. You?"

"Murder."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Just the one?"

"No."

There I'd hesitated. What was the protocol in that situation? Should I inquire further or let it go? Drunks, pickpockets, and street-corner drug dealers I could handle. Murderers, though? Then again, if I was sharing cramped quarters with a serial killer, I wanted to know how many eyes I should keep open while sleeping on the cot above his.

So I'd asked, as nonchalant as him, "How many?"

"Seventeen," he'd replied with a yawn.

Our subsequent conversations—which I'd participated in so as not to offend the nice serial killer—had revealed he was a hydromage. I'd assumed drowning would be his modus operandi, since he was a magical murderer who could control water, but he'd explained how he preferred to slowly suck all the moisture from his victims' bodies.

Delightful.

I resumed my observation of the demolished post-riot hallway, and a few minutes later, an MPD agent with a shaved head, lumberjack beard, and shoulders like a linebacker arrived to escort me and Duncan to our holding cell. The solid concrete walls, with a cage-style front facing a wide corridor, had sadly survived the riot with only a few scorch marks.

The agent pulled open the cell door. "Get in there."

We complied. The man swung the door shut, locked it, and marched back the way we'd come.

"Hey!" I yelled after him. "What about the cuffs?"

Duncan and I were still sporting our incarceration bracelets, which weren't particularly comfortable.

My cellmate, already perched on his cot and staring unblinkingly at the sink, seemed unbothered. A minuscule bead of water clung to the faucet for several long seconds, then lost its hold. It plinked against the drain, and a nearly imperceptible smirk slipped onto Duncan's lips.

I shuddered. If only Quentin's emotional storm had worked out as well for me as it had for him.

* * *

Handcuffs suck.

A loud clang jolted me from an uncomfortable doze. As alertness returned, so did the dull ache in my arm and shoulder joints, and the much sharper ache in my wrists where the metal bands dug into my flesh. Leaving a prisoner in handcuffs overnight should be illegal.

Stifling a groan, I sat up, almost knocking my thin blanket off my bunk.

"Kit Morris." The Paul Bunyan agent stood at the cell door. He rapped his knuckles against the metal bars. "Get over here."

I didn't move. "What's up, Lumberjack Stan?"

Seeing I would require further encouragement to get off my ass, he held up a plain manila envelope. "This is for you."

"What is it?"

He waved the envelope and waited.

I swung my legs off my bed and dropped to the floor. Duncan was sitting on the lower bunk, staring fixedly at the toilet, and we ignored each other as I ambled to the bars.

"So, what is it?" I asked again. "A love letter?"

He pushed it between the bars. "It's your summons. For sentencing. For your crimes," he added at my blank expression.

Oh. Crimes. Right.

I took the envelope and tore it open with my teeth—damn handcuffs. Inside was a multi-page form titled C-1001A-34: Summons for Sentencing – Judiciary Council. A lot of jargon that fell somewhere between legalese and bureaucratic bullshit filled the page, but the important bits explained that a panel of MPD judges would sentence me on Thursday, June 14 at 8:30 a.m.

Sentence me to what, though? Community service? Jail time? A Braveheart-style draw and quarter? I frowned at the page. What were they even charging me with?

Don't get me wrong. I knew I'd broken a few rules during my time at KCQ. I just didn't know which rules.

Flipping to the next page, I discovered an equally dense block of text that filled me in with chilling concision:

9 count(s) of Conspiracy to Commit Fraud

16 count(s) of Inflicting a Mythic Ability on a Non-mythic Entity

3 count(s) of Second-degree Larceny involving a Mythic Ability

23 count(s) of Theft over $10,000

1 count(s) of Petty Theft under $2,000

9 count(s) of Aggravated Assault with a Mythic Ability

A fun note at the end revealed the MPD could add, remove, or alter the charges at their discretion any time prior to sentencing.

So… not community service, then.

At the metallic rasp of a key sliding into a lock, I looked up. The agent swung the cell door open.

"Captain Blythe wants to see you." He gestured impatiently. "Let's go."

I folded the packet and shoved it in my jumpsuit pocket. "You're a courier and an escort? What a career!"

Scowling, he led me away from the cell block. Though my mind was on other things—namely my impending doom, aka sentencing hearing—I was a bit surprised. Draconian authoritarians or not, these agents sure could clean up an ugly mess real fast. It'd been less than twenty-four hours, and everything looked about the same—minus the scorch marks and broken walls. I couldn't help but imagine an agent dressed like Mickey Mouse in Fantasia, musically directing dancing mops around the precinct.

Grumpy the Wonder Beard chained me to the table in a new interrogation room—or I assumed it was a different room. I couldn't see any puddles of hardened lava on the floor.

Less than a minute later, Captain Blythe and Agent Shen walked in, looking as put-together and unfrazzled as they had yesterday.

"Déjà vu," I remarked. "I feel like we've already done this."

Blythe sat across from me. "Do you know Quentin Bianchi?"

No time for cordiality, I guess. "Yeah."

No point in evading the question. Quentin had been taken into custody weeks before me and had spilled an unknown number of beans about his guild and acquaintances. I couldn't imagine why, but the empath always had a reason.

"How would you describe your relationship with Quentin?" the captain asked.

I rolled my eyes thoughtfully toward the ceiling. "We were like Jay and Silent Bob—no, more like Timon and Pumbaa."

Her face went so stony that it lost all resemblance to living flesh.

"We were guildmates," I added expansively. "We worked together on a few assignments."

"What kind of assignments? How often? How closely did you work together?"

I leaned back in my chair as far as my handcuffs would allow. "Can't find him, can you?"

Blythe and Lienna stiffened, and I had to hold back a smile.

"You arrested him, what, four weeks ago? That's pretty good. Holding him that long, I mean." I tried to buff my fingernails on my sleeve, but the rattling chains ruined the effect. "And now you need my help to catch him."

"We don't need anything from you," Lienna retorted coolly. "But if you recall those embezzlement and extortion investigations I mentioned yesterday—and the potential new charges against you—maybe you'll consider sharing whatever information you have about Quentin."

"I'll consider it, but first I want to know what, specifically, I get out of this deal."

Blythe's eyes narrowed. "What?"

"Telling the judge how I was a good little convict who helped you catch the bad empath isn't nearly enough motivation for me to turn snitch. You're gonna have to do better than that."

Blythe assessed me with stony calculation, and I let the silence stew. There was a shift in power happening here and I fully intended to take advantage of it.

Lienna stepped away from her spot by the one-way mirror. "What do you want, Kit?"

"Two things. First, I want leniency."

Blythe raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Meaning?"

"Meaning, in exchange for helping you re-arrest Quentin, I want the assault charges against me dropped, because those are bullshit, and I want leniency in sentencing for the rest of the charges. You're important enough to make that happen, aren't you, Almighty Empress of the Precinct?"

A slight twitch dimpled Blythe's cheek, but I couldn't tell if she was amused or annoyed. "And your second request?"

"To catch Quentin, I can't just sit here and psychoanalyze his behavior patterns. Pro-tip: psychoanalyzing empaths is a waste of time." I braced my elbows on the table. "To do this properly, I need to go out there and find him."

"Hell will freeze over before I set you loose—"

"Not by myself." I rolled my eyes. "With the abjuration queen. Agent Shen can handle me, don't you think? This'll all go much smoother—and faster—if I accompany her on the manhunt. I know how Quentin operates."

"Then you can tell Agent Shen exactly that," Blythe snapped, "and your ass stays right here in the precinct."

I sighed. "Okay. I'll give you a freebie so we're on the same page. Do you know how Quentin's abilities work?"

"He's an empath," Lienna answered swiftly. "He can influence the emotions of the people around him."

"Yeah, that's the baby version. Quentin is the Thanos version of an empath." And I had it on good authority that, unlike most empaths, his gift was of super-villain quality. "His power works in two ways—input and output. The input is intuitive. He can sense the emotions of anyone nearby."

"We know th—" Blythe began irritably.

"Did you know emotions are contagious?" I interrupted. "When you see someone who's scared, you get a zing of fear too. When you see happy people, you feel uplifted—unless you're completely heartless, like a precinct captain or something."

Blythe's lips thinned.

"Now imagine how contagious emotions are when you're a powerful empath." I tapped my finger on the tabletop. "The output is where things get interesting. If Quentin makes someone feel scared, the input kicks in and he feels their fear. That kicks his fear up, which feeds back into his target, which feeds back into him, and the next thing you know, everyone in the room is terrified out of their mind."

"Or," Lienna muttered, "everyone around him is thrown into a murderous rage."

Pretty much exactly. By my educated guess, jail had really pissed Quentin off. And while he was having a temper tantrum over his imprisonment, the abjuration spells on the holding cells collapsed. His anger had gone off like a nuke, which bumped everyone else's rage-o-meter into the red, which fed back into his own ire. One thing led to another, and well, we all know what followed.

"And that," I concluded cheerfully, "makes Quentin extra super dangerous."

Of course, various factors affected, and limited, Quentin's ability—things like targeting a specific person or a group, how susceptible someone was to the emotion, the distance of his target, and Quentin's own mental state. But I didn't mention any of that.

"So." I propped my chin on my hands. "I know how to find Quentin and how to handle him. If you want to catch him before he skips right out of the country, you need me out there with Agent Shen."

Blythe studied me for a long minute, and though her expression remained stoic, I could see the hot frustration building in her eyes. Her quarry already had an alarming head start. She didn't have time to waste sparring with me, and she knew it.

I let a smile creep onto my face. "Did I mention I know exactly where Quentin went the moment he escaped?"