I opened the first one. The second. The third as more and more dropped in front of me.
Nothing. No payments under those initials. No transfers. No contracts. No names. No mentions anywhere in the financialrecords. Unfortunately, everything mentioning December in an abbreviated form had been pulled.
I sighed. “Fuck.”
I placed my hand back over the glowing blue rune. “Remove all files pulled for referencing December.”
The towers of files shot to the ceiling before returning to their homes in swift, single file order. There was nothing left. Not a single thing.
“It’s not in accounting.”
“Try something else,” Wickett suggested quietly from the door. “Check for initials. Personal files.”
The Registry of Magical Persons.
I touched a different rune, this one carved with the symbol for identification and registration.
“Geneva Kirr.” Vitoria’s real name.
New files began their flight toward me, arriving before spreading themselves across the podium.
NoGenevaKirr.
But I plucked out the one labeled: Kirr, Malachi and Sera. Her parents. Deceased five years ago. Cause of death: murder.
I’d known Vitoria for five years, lived with her for three. The timeline matched.
Except according to the registry, Malachi and Sera Kirr never had a daughter. No children listed. No offspring recorded.
“That’s not possible,” I breathed. “The registry records every magical birth. It’s required by law within twenty-four hours.”
“Unless someone removed the entry,” Wickett said, moving to read over my shoulder. His presence was warm at my back, distracting in ways I couldn’t afford.
Or unless Vitoria had found a way to erase herself completely.
My eyes scanned the form, catching on an address in the corner. Faded but legible.
The Ruby District. Seventeenth street.
“Most witches live in the Crook or stay close to the Tangles. The Ruby District is for merchants, higher government, people with money and status.”
“Or people pretending to have both,” Wickett replied. “But you live in the Ruby District. So, it can’t be a hard and fast rule.”
“I live with Calder. He has no rules.”
A section at the bottom of the form caught my attention: ‘Known Associates: Subject to Monitoring.’
Two families listed. I committed them to memory, fingers tracing over each one. Then another thought struck me. If everything was being monitored, if every witch had a file tracking their movements and associations, then I had one too.
How much did they really know?
I touched the rune again. “Syneca Black.”
The files returned themselves. New ones should have come.
Nothing arrived.
I waited, counting heartbeats. Still nothing.
