As decades passed, the gossip of the Cedonia Scrolls slowly faded away—until a year ago, when whispers said the scrolls had been stolen from an art lover named Charles Nicholson, who was in hospice, now dead. Over the following weeks, three of the four scrolls popped up at various private art auctions, where each was stolen sometime in the night. An anonymous witness to one of the heists dubbed the thief the “Black Bandit,” a nod to the black suit, hat, and mask it wore. The story quickly became sensationalized—gossip colored with stories of witchcraft, curses, and supernatural power.
The fourth scroll was MIA until it turned up at a local art shop, Mystic Maven’s. According to the shop owner, Hazel De Ville, she’d purchased the scroll at a thrift store for two dollars. The infamous piece of art had found its way out of the black market and into the hands of someone who had no clue what they had. After bragging about her find to everyone in Donny’s Diner, Hazel locked the scroll in her art shop, where it was stolen that same night.
During the robbery, the station received a call about a “suspicious person” wearing head-to-toe black, lurking around the building. Lieutenant Jack Seagrave was the first one on the scene—where he was shot to death moments after the Black Bandit escaped with the fourth scroll.
“It’s all connected, Colson,” I said. “A cursed Wiccan scroll was stolen. Then Seagrave gets shot while responding to the heist. Then on the day of his funeral, a voodoo shrine is assembled ten yards away, at the very tree that is said to be depicted on one of the scrolls.”
He slowly nodded, then asked, “Anything on the car?”
Earlier that day, I received the surrounding street camera feeds from the scene and hit my first lead. My first in three days.
“Nothing worth anything,” I said. “I ran the description through the system. There are no blue, four-door sedans associated with any recent crimes in the area. I reached out to a few of my counterparts across the state to see if it rang any bells.”
“No luck?”
“No luck.”
Colson blew out a breath. “Could’ve been anyone, you know.”
“Or it could be Seagrave’s killer. A rundown sedan with no license plate was caught on camera outside the art shop, moments after Seagrave was shot six times. Why wouldn’t you think it was the shooter?”
“But there were also two other vehicles that passed by within thirty minutes, right?”
“Sandra Nickels, on her way home from the night shift at the processing plant, and Carlos Muniz, on his way home from a gig at a bar in Eureka.”
“You talked to them both already?”
I grunted.
“Did you verify Muniz’s story?”
“With the bar and his roommate.”
“Humph.” Colson chewed his lower lip.
“I’m telling you, the unmarked blue sedan is our guy. Just have to find him.”
“I’m assuming you’ve been to Ron’s used car lot?”
I nodded. “His, and two other lots in town. I still need to hit up the surrounding towns. There was one blue sedan sold to an old lady named Ingrid two years ago. She stillowns it today.”
“You talk to her?”
“Went to her house before the funeral.”
“Of course you did. See any pentagrams on her front door?”
“No.”
Colson took a swig of his beer, then blew out a breath. “So we’re assuming the blue sedan belongs to the Black Bandit…”
“And that the Black Bandit killed Seagrave.”
A moment slid between us as we contemplated that assumption.
“What about the dumpster diving?” I asked. “Anything turn up?”
“No murder weapon, if that’s what you’re asking.”
