“The public has the right?—”
“What sort of circle could even begin?—”
“I’m going to contact my teacher and then see if the alchemy council has any?—”
Everyone was talking on top of each other, captains and detectives. Zahide strategized with Tate, her eyes going to Nick, trying to get his attention, but Nick was watching Parker. His husband had walked over to the pictures, his eyes focused on a headshot of Cayo Durkavic.
“How did Durkavic get infected?” Parker asked.
His question cut through the noise in the room. McArdle turned away from her captain to stare at him.
“What?” she asked.
“Cayo Durkavic. He’s the first one we know of, right? Our patient zero, the guy who won’t admit he smuggled a monkeyinto the country, the guy who got bit by a zombie and doesn’t tell anyone back at the human-only zone? How did he get infected? The CSI and Gile only showed evidence of itafterDurkavic. That tells me they got itfromhim or what was left of him, so how did Durkavic get it?” Parker asked.
“It feels like you have an idea,” Tate said. “Spit it out, Ferro.”
“No, that’s the thing—I really don’t have any idea. I am a blank slate, no daily specials written on this blackboard,” Parker said. “Durkavic wasn’t a practicing alchemist. At least, nothing in his car or house indicated that he practiced on the side.” Parker shrugged. “So where did he pick up an alchemy spell so complicated that it became a parasite able to speak?”
“And how exactly do you know what’s in his car and home?” Owens, the Major Crimes captain, asked.
“The important thing is he didn’t practice alchemy,” Parker said loudly. “So…”
“So who in his lifedid?” McArdle asked. She walked over to the board.
“Some of us haven’t become familiarized with the case yet,” Rios said. “Could you read us in?”
“Of course, sir.” McArdle straightened her shoulders, hands clasped behind her back. “Yesterday, we received a call at 1:17 p.m. about a murder. The initial response indicated that there was only one living person found—Parker Ferro. From what we can determine, based on evidence left at the scene, Cayo Durkavic arrived, entered the facility, and exploded within two minutes. A lack of blood spatter on his clothing indicated that Mr. Ferro was not in the room at the time.”
“Or he had a shield like his husband used to save both of us,” Murtola said.
Rios raised both eyebrows and turned to Parker. “Can you tell us what you saw?”
“I already explained to Major Crimes, but I’d been following Durkavic for a few weeks. He had some honeypot scheme with an older lady who lives in the hills. I haven’t quite figured out his angle yet, but the daughter seems absolutely convinced that he wants Mom’s inheritance.” Parker shook his head. “This guy is a fitness freak. I can’t see him going into a smoke shop, even for cannabis. He got Mom off of most of her medications, convincing her that ingesting any chemicals would only shorten her life.”
“So what was he doing there?” Nick asked. “Did you find whoever was working the counter? Or who called 911?”
“The 911 call came from a prepaid cell phone.” Murtola shook his head. “We called the owner of the smoke shop. He gave us the name of his employee, Frederick Learn, but the guy is in the wind, gone.”
“Or we’re about to find a puddle of person soup somewhere else in San Amaro,” Parker muttered.
“That’s a possibility.” McArdle turned, frowning at the board. “But we had 911 operators tag anything with unusual blood evidence. Nothing has come in so far.”
“So a fitness freak walks into a smoke shop. We don’t know why. The man working the counter is gone.” Tate crossed his arms. “We don’t know if Durkavic came in infected with the alchemy circles or if he got infected in the shop. We need nine points of contact, but we don’t know if Durkavic is the first one?—”
“Or someone else infected him,” Nick said. “Durkavic would have had to come in infected. Parker, you said he was only in there a couple of minutes, you heard shouting, and you came to the door.”
Parker nodded. “And you were saying that the circle takes a few minutes to jump from one person to another. It took hours for it to get large enough to kill Buford—the CSI.”
“Maybe that was it,” Nick said, slowly, working out the logic, even as it gave him a headache. “Zahide, the circle was trying to jump to usas we were in the room.Beforean explosion. But what if the reason it took so many hours to get large enough to kill him was because it started small instead?”
“You’re suggesting it was on the bone fragments,” Zahide worked out. She made a face. “How could a circle that complex be small enough to work on a bone fragment?”
“I don’t know. But if… if Durkavic was the carrier, he probably infected Learn.” Nick looked at Captain Tate, as the captain made a face.
“We need to get an APB out on Learn.” Tate turned and looked at Rios. “How public should we be with this?”
“It’s a highly contagious new form of magical parasite.” Rios rubbed his hands over his face. “We need to be as public as possible.”
