The Illustrious Adventures of Jace Camerons

Chapter One

Chapter One

 

I worked for Wellington’s Wizarding Press -- the first and longest lasting wizarding newspaper that has existed in the United States of America. Here in the America’s, the muggle and wizarding worlds were very intertwined, despite the fact that the muggles were still oblivious to the fact that magic existed.

I currently resided in the Bronx, a very well-reknown ghetto here in New York. I lived in an apartment building that was filled with other beings of my kind. The woman above me, a witch who was well-known for being one of the few women to ever take part in the wizarding-mafia. My next door neighbor -- a single, mudblood father with two witches for daughters and a squib for a son. Shame really.

And below me was one apartment that was not always occupied, yet the lease always stayed under one name, Minerva McGonagall. I met the lady once -- nice, pretty and British. She had the tendency to call everyone  in the building  a colonist. Still, besides that point, she was a nice lady.

I was on my way to a crime scene to snap some shots when I spotted the lady walking up the steps. I took note of some black stockings dressed in black heels, going with her deep-green skirt, white blouse, and a black-feathered hat, the fabric around it matching that of her skirt. All-in-all, she looked like a detective from those cheesy-movies that played in the cinemas every now and again.

“Off to a scene, Mr. Camerons?” she asked me in a standard-British tone.

“You know it,” I replied, before apparating to the scene.

 

*

 

“Apparating again, Jace?” the lead-detective Anderson asked me.

“Fastest way to get places.” I replied.

“Honestly, I just don’t get how you can stand it.” Well, it’s not that apparating was easy for me, it took a lot of energy and always left me with mild nausea and a bagning migrane that I was accustomed to getting after a night at the bar. Yet it was the easiest option when deciding between broom, and dare I say, muggle-created engines. I had both a fear of heights and exploding things, so apparition was once again, the best choice. Of course a man never admits to his fears, so I always replied with a ‘never bothered me, Frank.’

The crime scene was first apprehended by some muggle police, so in order to daze them, I held up my charmed, muggle press pass, freeing their minds up to my charm speak, and then telling them to scadaddle, rid of any reports on this case and to go back to from which they came.

“Thanks, Jace.” Frank Anderson said to me as the muggles left the scene.

“Eh, it’s part of the routine.” I replied.

The routine? Well it went like this:

Since I was one of the few wizards on the East Coast with the ability
to charm speak, the NY Wizarding Police Force needed me to help
muggles of the area forget anything magical they may have seen. In
return, they would allow me to the first on-scene whenever there was a
big crime incident that needed my inspection.

 

I mean, how else was I able to pull of the title of Best Wizarding Journalist
in all of New York.

 

I entered the scene with camera ready, already prepared for the shots that would accompany the headliner for tomorrow’s newspaper.

“Gordi’s Gang at it -- Stealing Magic”

 

Stealing magic? How about that? Before ten years ago, that kind of power was only rumored, but when the entirety of the British Ministry of Magic had their magic wiped when visiting, we knew something was up.  And when discovering the Gordi Gang’s insignia cinged on everyone’s chest, we knew who exactly was up to it. The question on everyone’s mind was how?

I walked into the building and I first caught wiff of the smell of aslphalt -- the same signature smell that was always left when magic was stolen. Sitting on the steps of his home was Reegan Johnson, an accountant at the American branch of Gringrott’s Banking.

He was a very large man, known for wearing brown and yellow, vertically striped suits, in which the jacker never buttoned. He wore suspenders in a very similar fashion, which for some reason, complimented his appearance. He was bald, except for his beard and the hair that wrapped around the edge of his head, evading the actual top of it. According to the older witches and wizards, back in his prime, he was very popular among many callers. He is the only wizard that I ever met that had a tendency to swing both ways.

I snapped a picture of the man, and to my total surprise, I was not greeted by foul language. He just turned and looked at me with sad, sad eyes. Frank came up to my side and began whispering in my ear.

“They cut off his tongue,” Anderson whispered, “because they knew he was not afraid to talk.”

“Couldn’t he write it?”

“Hexed his hands, they are no longer in any way useful.”

“For guy, he’s basically a vegetable.”

“Not quite. We flew in a woman who is known for reversing hexes. Perhaps you heard of her?”

“Well what’s her name?”

“Minerva McGonagall.”

 

Well I’ll be damned. Miss Minerva McGonagall was busy working on the case that I was writing.

“I do know her. She has a lease for an apartment in my building. Think I’ll get a quote?”

“Only one way to find out.”

“I gotta ask her--”

“Take her to dinner and woo her.”

 

*

 

Frank and I had been friends since we went to Lancington’s School for Young Wizards. We met back during our Freshman year, as he was a transfer from Hogwarts. He was, quote, ‘probably the only American in that damn school.’

And like Always, Frank was determined to help me catch the attention of a lady, any lady. Of course, I wasn’t having any of it. I was too busy focusing on a career in journalism. I even tried telling him I was gay, but he charmed some pop I was drinking, and he got the truth right out of me after the first sip.

“I’ma ask her for a quote, Frank. Nothing more.”

“Alright, but she’s a catch.”

“Is she now? How do ya know?”

“We went to Hogwarts together. I heard a lot of great things from those Ravenclaw boys.” Ravenclaw? If I recall correctly, Frank said they were one of the houses at Hogwarts.

“Well I am not a Ravenclaw boy, Frank. I have no interest other than a quote.” And at those words, I was once again aparating.