A Hero at the End of the World (15 page)

“However,” she added ominously, “kill him if he gives even a hint at remembering what happened.”

“Yeah, I’m not going to do that,” Ewan replied. He glanced over to the bar, wondering if he could convince her to buy him another round. “Are you going to teach me how to zaubneg now?”

Louise reached across the table and patted his hand. “All in due time, my dear. First, I have
so
many things to do regarding the Lord Ravager’s estate. He left everything to me, did you know? Once these issues are handled, I’ll personally oversee your training. You’ll finally be one of us.”

“You’ll
love
Zaubernegativum,” Archie told him, beaming. “It opens so many doors.”

“Literal doors or metaphorical doors?” Ewan asked.

“Meta—are you serious?” Archie squinted at him. “Anyway, as I was saying, when you have the power of the universe surging through you, you can do anything. You’ll be so angry when you’ve learned that people have been lying to you your whole life. For example, did you know that you don’t need to say spells aloud to perform magic?”

That was the most ridiculous thing Ewan had ever heard. “Yeah, you do. You have to use the right combination of words. Everyone knows that. Even
I
know that.”

Thinking about it, though, he couldn’t recall Archie chanting while performing incantations, and during the duel, Ewan had only heard spells coming from Oliver.

Uncertain, he asked, “Right?”

“When you’ve reached the highest echelon of Zaubernegativum, you’ll be utterly invincible,” said Louise. “You could do anything you wanted. Fly, shapeshift, control an entire population with your mind... anything you can imagine.”

“
Fly
?” Ewan repeated. He looked between them. “How’s that possible?”

“Because your totem is blocking your true magical ability,” Archie said confidently. “It’s like a filter. Yes, your totem is part of the universe, and, as such, contains the same power as the rest of the realms. But you’re focusing so much of your true ability on just that one object that you’ve blocked out the rest of creation. When you take your power from everything, not just your totem—why, you’ll have reached your full potential.”

Ewan was having a difficult time understanding what they were saying. It sounded like rubbish. “But,” he said, completely confused, “how can I take power from the universe? My totem
gives
me power.”

Archie blinked at him. “Your totem doesn’t give you power, you take power from it. My god, Ewan, didn’t you take Physics in school?”

“Yeah, but...” He trailed off, not wanting to say that he hadn’t turned in a single assignment and had still received an A.

“They have you all mixed up,” Archie said, shaking his head.

Louise nodded. “I’m afraid they do, Ewan. But don’t fear, we’ll sort you out.”

“If you’re invincible, why did you need—” He glanced round the pub and lowered his voice, even though it was likely that the barman was a Sazzy, too. “Why did you need Oliver to kill Ralph the Ravager? If you’re that powerful, why couldn’t you do it yourself?”

Louise fixed him with a long, hard stare.

“It’s true,” she said finally. Her chin lifted, as though she were embarrassed. “I’ve not yet reached the highest level of Zaubernegativum, I must admit. I’m only a Destiny Captor Guardian.”

“I’m only a Celestial Adventurer,” Archie murmured, looking sheepish.

“What,” Ewan said.

“That reminds me,” said Louise. She picked up her half-empty wine glass. With the only light in the pub coming from the lit fireplace, it looked as though she were drinking blood. “To Ewan, who has not only changed his life forever, but mine as well. Cheers.”

Out of nowhere, the barman placed a new pint of ale and a bag of cheese and onion crisps in front of him. Before Ewan could thank him, he scuttled off.

“Cheers,” Ewan repeated, downing his pint.

Chapter 15

T
hey had replaced Oliver with First Class Agent Rice. She smiled at him from behind his own desk.

“I’ve been gone
one day
,” he said.

“Technically, three and a half,” Sophie replied, but then she looked vaguely guilty.

Rice replied, “You didn’t think they would put a good investigator like Agent Stuart on hold whilst you recovered, did you?”

“I’m on sick leave, not dead,” Oliver retorted.

The truth was, Oliver was bored. In addition to the horrible feeling he had every time he thought about his missing fortnight, he hated sitting around doing nothing while criminals and evildoers plotted their deeds—especially given that Sophie had been trying to tell him something for days. He’d intentionally snuck out of his flat before Ewan’s usual arrival time.

Seeing Rice at his desk sparked something territorial in him. Months’ worth of files, notepads, and papers he had painstakingly organized had been haphazardly pushed to one side of his desk; Rice had even put up a small potted plant and a framed photo of her kids.

Oliver grabbed the chair from the nearest desk—Agent Comtois’, who was on paternity leave—and dragged it beside Sophie’s.

“Are you allowed to be in here without being on active duty?” asked Agent Rice, a line forming between her brows.

“They didn’t revoke my access to the building,” Oliver pointed out.

Rice’s eyes darted to Sophie. “We really must get to work.”

“I have a new case,” Sophie murmured nonchalantly. After checking over her shoulder, she added in a hushed tone, “But after I left you at the hospital, I sent out a request for this. It was on my desk when I came in today.”

She lifted a stack of folders. Shoved in between the blue Unusual files was a yellow folder stamped with the London Metropolitan Police logo. She slid it across the desk to him, while Rice looked on with blatant disapproval.

“You’re the best,” he said sincerely.

Oliver couldn’t help but think that it seemed as though the Met had investigated this rather quickly. His suspicions were confirmed when he opened the folder and found little inside. Aside from the statements that he and Ewan had given, there were several pages outlining his various injuries and which known spells he had been hit with. Behind that was a report of what Oliver had been carrying when he’d been attacked; on the list was his wallet and his Oyster card, for travelling on London transport, as well as his totem, which had a citation beside it to say that he had been allowed to keep it around his neck. But the last item, a hand-held tape recorder that had been damaged in the attack, puzzled him. There was no tape listed in the inventory, only the player.

Oliver turned the page. According to the sentry report, he and Ewan had been arguing, and then Ewan had sent an aggro spell at him, knocking him into the trees.

Something tickled the back of his brain.

“Why would I be carrying a tape recorder but no tape?” he asked. He flipped through the pages of the report. “Didn’t anyone look into this?”

“They were probably afraid to, in case you were doing something unlawful,” Rice offered unhelpfully. “You killed someone. The last thing the Government needs right now is for its hero to be—”

“To be what?” Sophie demanded, her expression stormy.

Rice audibly swallowed. “Never mind, forget I said anything.”

“So no one bothered to do a proper investigation?” Oliver asked.

“There
isn’t
an investigation,” Sophie replied grimly. “The Crown has already decided that it was an act of self-defense, given that Ralph the Ravager had been a suspect in our case. They think that he found out that we were interested in him, and ambushed you in the Heath.”

Oliver grimaced. “What was he doing that was bad enough to want to kill me?”

“He was the leader of the cult we were investigating—”

“Another one?” he asked in surprise. “We can’t move for cults in this country. Didn’t anyone take a lesson from the Order of the Golden Water Buffalo?”

“Apparently not,” Sophie said.

“Agent Stuart,” Rice interjected, looking exasperated, “I really must insist that you examine
solved
cases in your spare time.”

Sophie’s mouth pinched, but she replied, evenly, “Of course, Agent Rice. Please hand me the transcripts from your interviews yesterday.”

Oliver went back to the file. It was entirely possible that the Crown was right and Ralph the Ravager
had
assaulted him because of the case they had been working on. But an entire fortnight had been wiped from Oliver’s memory; he couldn’t remember killing Ralph the Ravager, much less whether or not the Ravager had made a confession before attacking him. And there was something about that missing tape that didn’t sit right with him.

Frustrated, Oliver ran a hand over his forehead. He tugged his writing pad out from the mess Rice had pushed to the edge of his desk. Perhaps there was a clue in his notes.

Instead, Oliver found four pages of
Ewan Mao
scribbled over and over.

“Sophie,” Oliver called, “did I at any point in the last few months completely lose my mind?”

“Not
completely
,” she replied without looking away from her computer screen.

He flipped a page. A strange word jumped out at him. “What’s Zaubernegativum?” he asked.

Sophie stopped typing and turned back to him, blinking. “Oh... it’s the type of magic that the cult practices. They call themselves the Society for the Advancement of Zaubernegativum, and they power their magic by drawing energy directly from the universe.” She dug an enormous book out of her drawer and dropped it on the desk; it hit the surface with a heavy thud, causing her half-full cup of tea to wobble. “This is Ralph the Ravager’s manifesto,
The Void
.”

As if conjured by a spell, Oliver recalled learning about Zaubernegativum in A-level History. “I remember that now,” he said with a sense of foreboding. “That’s a dangerous sort of magic. Are you saying people are using it?”

“They are,” she replied. “And, Oliver... before you went to meet Ewan at the Heath, we saw him sitting at the same table as Ralph the Ravager’s right-hand woman. I don’t think it was coincidence that Ralph the Ravager knew where you’d be.”

“Ewan, conspiring with a cult to kill me?” Oliver couldn’t help but laugh at the thought. “Are you being serious? Have you met him?”

Poor Ewan, Oliver thought: the sad bloke had somehow got himself entangled in their investigation.

Sophie’s face hardened. “I thought he was innocent at first as well, but then he was there when you were attacked. We need whatever you recorded on that tape. If he’s one of them—”

Abruptly, Rice slapped her hand on the desk. They both startled, and the noise around them died as other agents turned to stare at them. “
Agent Stuart
,” she practically shouted.

“I’m so sorry, Agent Rice,” Sophie replied, quickly putting all the papers back into their file. “Oliver, perhaps you should go. You’re still recovering from your injuries.”

“Yeah, you’re right, I’m knackered,” he lied. “Sorry, Agent Rice.”

Rice looked horribly confused. “Thank you.”

With a last look at Sophie, who met his eyes and nodded so slightly that he could almost have believed he’d imagined it, he left the Home Office, heading north to Hampstead Heath to see for himself what had happened in that field.

Chapter 16

I
t was a cold, crisp morning in West London. Ewan sat alone in a hired car across the road from London Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bancroft’s home, waiting for him to leave for work. The white terraced houses of the Royal Borough were so foreign to him, with their columns, bright flower boxes, and signs that asked for the help to use the service entrance, that he might as well have been in a different city.

A quiet sense of apprehension had been growing inside of Ewan since that morning, when he had shown up at Oliver’s only to find the flat empty. It wasn’t a great sign that Oliver had disappeared on him already—but there was always the possibility that he had just grown tired of Ewan’s company.

The driver side door of the car opened, and Archie climbed in, letting the cold air in with him. The chilly weather had made bright red splotches stand out on his cheeks that on most other people would’ve been very unattractive.

“Croissant or pain au chocolat?” he asked, digging into a brown paper bag.

“Chocolate me, mate,” Ewan replied, holding out his hand and wiggling his fingers.

Archie handed it over. “Did anything happen?”

“Bancroft hasn’t come out yet.” Ewan tore into his pastry. Between bites, he managed, “I really thought being your mum’s assistant would be more exciting.”

Archie frowned at him. “Do you know why we’re watching the Police Commissioner’s house? What is it you think we’re doing here?”

“I thought he was a Sazzy and that we were protecting him or something,” Ewan replied, licking chocolate off his fingers.

“We’re waiting to see if he has wards on his flat so our covert team can break in later and collect something to blackmail him with. There are some records that we need to have purged, and it’s much easier to do it when the head of the police is the one doing the purging.”

Ewan scrubbed a hand over his face. “I was a hero once,” he muttered dejectedly.

“We all weep for your wasted life,” Archie replied. “Anyway, there are much worse things we could be doing for Mummy right now, believe me.”

Apprehensive, Ewan asked, “What sort of worse things?”

“Oh, you know,” Archie replied, waving a hand, “reeducation, intimidation...”

“Reeducation?” Ewan repeated. He shot up straight in his seat. “What’s that?”

“It’s when someone leaves the fold, so to speak, and needs to be gently guided into seeing the error of their ways.”

“Gently,” Ewan said flatly.

Archie laughed, sounding nervous. “Come on, it’s not as though we beat them or frighten them or tie them to a chair in a dark room and force them to watch informational videos about the history of the organization and remind them that, according to written agreement, their soul belongs to the Lord

Ravager. Don’t be silly.”

“That last one was rather specific,” said Ewan.