Legacy of the Mad Mages Read online

  “Uh. He says that he’s sent us a screenshot of some website that has him worried,” she said. They stepped out of the elevator and into the back hallway.

  “Well, that’s not ominous or anything,” Darien said. He shot a look at Greg’s back as they walked toward Shakes’ office.

  “Yeah,”

  They squeezed into his office and Caroline hopped up to perch on the worktable again although now it was covered in bits and scraps of circuit boards and computer guts. Zanna sat in an office chair at Shakes’ side leafing through digital pages on a tablet while Shakes did something on one of his screens. Darien leaned on the table next to Caroline’s knee and Greg pulled out another stress ball and started fidgeting.

  Caroline noticed it was one of the balls from the apology basket, and smothered a grin.

  “So, anything useful?” Greg asked.

  “Not as such, no,” Shakes said. He clicked a few more times before turning to face them. “There’s a lot to go through here. I got a bunch of files sent to me from an anonymous tipster on surprisingly the exact people you arrested this evening in Amberlight’s office. Mayor Deans has a lot to answer for, it turns out. And the other guy— Crispin Copperleaf— isn’t the sweetest smelling rose in the garden either, though he’s more just recently dipping his toe into this muck.”

  Zanna sighed. “It’s going to take a while to go through all this stuff, then verify it all. Grab a virtual stack and start sifting.”

  “I’m more interested in hearing about this tipster.” Darien’s eyes narrowed and his gaze slid to Caroline. “How does he know to look for this stuff?”

  “What? I’m not telling anyone anything that I shouldn’t,” she protested. And honestly it kind of hurt that he’d think that. She thought Darien knew her better.

  “I don’t think he suspects you, Kitten,” Greg said. “I bet he’s thinking of your not exactly stainless buddy Lucas.”

  “I am, in fact. How did he know we were out tonight? Is he watching us?” Darien asked. “I think you should turn your phone over to Shakes to have him check for bugs or tracking apps.”

  Seriously? This is what he wanted to focus on right now? His distrust of a nice guy who had helped them?

  “Fine.” She dug her phone out of her pocket and tossed it to Shakes They wanted to suspect her– and Lucas– of something, they could go ahead and check for it. “And when he finds nothing there, he can go on and find nothing on my laptop and my office computer, and my tablet. And then you can apologize to me. And to Lucas, who is worried about all of us.”

  “Um, you guys?” Shakes’ eyes were bouncing between her and Darien and Greg with a nervous expression. “I can look into Lucas again later, but when I checked on him the other day he was still in North Carolina. He’s been hanging out with another P.I. down there but otherwise, I think mostly he’s just writing his books.”

  Caroline’s gaze swiveled to Shakes. “You keep track of Lucas?” She wasn’t sure who she was angrier at here.

  “Um, just once in a while. You got that funny warning email the other day, so Darien asked me to check. That’s all,” Shakes looked back and forth between them again. “Look. If he is the one who sent all this, then he’s pretty much nailed these guys to the wall all on his own. And some of this will actually lead us to other politicians involved in this plot. Amberlight hasn’t been anywhere near as clever as he thinks he has, and there are names and dates and all sorts of information in here, we just have to sort through it.”

  “That’s good to know. Thanks, Shakes,” Caroline stopped glaring at Darien long enough to actually smile at tech in his giant computer chair. “Any information on Amberlight’s backer?”

  Shakes made a face, and everyone turned their attention back to him as he shook his head.

  “No, and it’s irritating the hell out of me.” He swiveled his chair back to the keyboard and started typing away so furiously that it sounded like he was banging out a very angry email. “Amberlight was sloppy as heck, but this other guy? He’s slick. He never emailed Amberlight, never contacted him digitally at all, as far as I can tell. And the phone he used to talk to Amberlight was a burner, so no luck there either. I can trace the calls to Cleveland, but that only narrows it down a little bit.”

  “So, we have no idea who this guy is? Someone funded this garbage, and was apparently asking Amberlight to use the golems to steal something else,” Darien said. Caroline glanced up at Greg who was leaning against the wall, stone-faced and still. Not even his stress ball twitched.

  “Well, all we can do is dig through this stuff the tipster sent and see if there’s anything here, but no. The phone records were a dead end.”

  “Well, send me a file and I’ll get started,” Darien sighed. Caroline and Greg nodded agreement and after a few minutes, they were all settled around the work table with tablets, sifting through the data.

  25

  Caroline sat at her desk in her bedroom and listened to Julia humming along to the music in the living room. She had spent the last three days in the office, wading through the files and paper trails that spiraled out of all the information. Now ex-mayor Deans was being prosecuted by his city for fraud and embezzlement of city funds, on top of all the charges that the FPAA were bringing against him.

  Copperleaf was a minor player, both in politics and in Amberlight’s plots. Still, he was another strand in the web that was being put in place to bring down the U.S. government. Caroline was pretty sure she never wanted to work on another treason case again, but she wasn’t going to hold her breath.

  All this from some golems and one nutjob elf.

  The museums were thrilled to know that their artifacts had been found and were being properly cared for, but were irritated that they couldn’t be returned yet since they were evidence. Amberlight was collecting artifacts from important elven mages who held what he considered to be his philosophical forbearers. He glorified the ideas they had held, back before the rest of the paranormal community drove them out of power and erased themselves from the history books, and ha planned to showcase them as artifacts leading to his so-called glorious vision. Still, that felt like a damned thin reason to go to all this trouble, and she wasn't completely convinced that this was over, somehow.

  Caroline sighed and slumped in her chair. Sometimes people were the worst.

  She turned her attention back to her computer and grimaced at her email. Her advisor had finally worked out the classes that she would need to take next semester to make her faster graduation schedule work out. It wasn’t a bad schedule, mostly, just had early morning classes four out of five days of the week.

  Still, at least that was one less thing to stress out about. She didn’t need to think about school again now until next August. And to heck with the dorms. Caroline had that experience, and now she could move on. Not that living with Julia was all that much different some days.

  The shower was much better here, though, and she was less likely to walk into her bedroom to find someone else making out with a stranger on her bed.

  A knock on the doorframe jolted her back to the present. Darien leaned in the open door, smirking slightly.

  “Lost in thought?”

  “A bit,” Caroline admitted.

  Darien stepped into the room and lounged across her bed, kicking his shoes off and propping his feet up on her knee when she turned to face him. She grinned and shook her head at him.

  “Comfy?”

  “Getting there. This week was exhausting,” he said, settling in. Caroline draped her arms over his legs and let him get cozy. It’s not like they weren’t close. Voluntarily feeding a vampire– twice– tended to create a bond that lasted even after the magical bloodbond wore off.

  “Agreed,” she nodded. “At least we got Amberlight and some of his circle off the streets and out of circulation.”

  “Yeah,” Darien sighed. He reached up and ran both hands over his face, digging his fingers slightly into his eyes and rubbing them. “I know th
is reaches way beyond the guys we picked up. It’s never-ending, trying to stem the tide of hate and bigotry, it seems some days.”

  Caroline grimaced and nodded, having nothing to add. She would once have said that’s just how humanity is, but obviously it was a trait shared by all the sentient creatures on earth, human or not.

  “I’m a little worried about Greg,” Darien said after several minutes.

  “Yeah, he seemed really grumpy when we all headed out for the day,” she said. “I guess I can understand it. He was made out to be a victim, even though nothing happened to him, right? We all know better than to treat him like a damsel in distress because he’s the farthest thing from it, but we also all want to protect him. Keep him safe from whoever this bozo is that’s looking for him.”

  “We think the bozo is looking for Greg. It’s what makes the most sense, but we don’t know for sure,” Darien corrected her. He grimaced and shifted, swinging his feet onto the bed and propping himself up on the pillows.

  “That’s maybe the worst part, I think. Not knowing for sure,” Caroline sighed and slumped back in her chair. “Nobody likes an unsolved mystery.”

  “Especially not federal agents whose job it is to solve them,” Darien grinned.

  “No. Especially not us,” Caroline felt herself grin back for a moment before the good cheer fell away again. Darien sat up and reached out to put a hand on her knee.

  “We’ll keep Greg safe. It doesn’t matter who’s after him,” Darien said. Caroline could hear the conviction behind his words, and the clear faith in Greg’s skills and the skills of the team as a whole.

  Caroline felt her smile returning and nodded.

  “If anyone wants one of us, they’ll have to go through all of us,” she said.

  About the Author

  About the Author

  Katherine Kim is a lifelong lover of fantasy. She started early, being read Tolkien as bedtime stories, which honestly explains a lot. More recently she’s been drawn to more urban fantasy stories through both books and television, and reading continues to be a passion. She is an American that lives and writes in Tokyo, with her family.

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  If you liked this book, I hope that you’ll leave me a review! I read every review and it makes a huge difference to me and to my work. You can also join my newsletter for news, announcements, and snippets of my life in Tokyo!

  Books by Katherine Kim

  Books by Katherine Kim

  The Demon Guardian

  A Demon’s Duty

  A Demon’s Sanction

  A Demon Saved

  The Riverton Demons

  Personal Demons

  Spirits of Los Gatos

  Sarah’s Inheritance

  A Spirit’s Kindred

  Finding Insight

  Brewing Trouble

  Spiritkind

  Federal Paranormal Activities Agency

  Quick Study (Prequel)

  Caroline’s Internship

  In The Blood

  Heavy Traffic