The Detective's Guide to Practical Sorcery

Dawarians By Daylight

A funeral was not the way Reiko had intended to spend her Saturday. She wasn't even there yet, she reminded herself, it was still three hours away. But that was a useless way to try and think when your brain never cooperated with you.

She stood in front of a cop car that hadn't bothered to turn its lights off as she spilled mechanically the way she'd figured out who the killer was.

"He left highly traceable spells."

"Your point being?" asked Vincent Black, a man who was ignorant enough about magic to keep asking for her help.

"This is what he was after, leaving all those sigils on his victims' corpses. They were a map straight to him, 'cos that's all he really wanted. Some attention," she said.

"Hmm," remarked Vincent, scribbling something down. "So, uh... how are we s'posed to keep a guy like him in prison?"

The detective snorted as they watched a young man being dragged towards the car. His blonde hair fell in front of his eyes, obscuring the rage that filled them. But he'd gotten what wanted, Reiko thought.

"Don't worry about it. The guy couldn't even get past me," she said. "He's got the spellcasting technique of a toddler."

"I'll take your word for it," said Vincent. He would have to.

The smoke of a recently lit cigarette wafted their way; Reiko let out a horrible, wracking cough that was completely unfeigned.

"You okay...?"

Her cheeks, permanently tinged pink, tinged pinker. "I'm fine, it's just... not a very good day."

"Whadya mean? You just solved a case," said Vincent. "What could be better?"

It was true, but reality was still there waiting for her. "I have a funeral to go to."

His eyes expressed more disbelief than, y'know, literally any other emotion one should be expressing when they hear a comment like that. "Oh? Whose?"

"My best friend," said Reiko plainly. The chief of police immediately realized his mistake.

"Oh, um... I'm sorry for your loss."

Not as sorry as she was, but she took it in stride anyway. The thought occurred to her that all she really wanted to do was sleep for a few days.

Silly Reiko for thinking that there were constants in life. What the hell kinda world was she living in where an immortal woman could up and die? Wasn't that an oxymoron?

Her dark almond eyes scanned the reception for someone, anyone that she recognized. Sorcerers of all shapes and sizes were gathered in the massive dining hall of The North American University of Sorcery-- NAUS, if you were in a hurry. Many of them were students, but the real sorcerers outnumbered them by far. The headmistress (she hated calling her that; she was nothing so formal by any stretch of the imagination) had been extremely well-known throughout the entire society, even more so than Reiko'd imagined. Made sense when you thought about it, though; she had been alive for hundreds of years before Reiko was even an itch in her dad's britches.

"Reiko? You showed!" There was note of genuine pleasant surprise in his voice.

"'Course I did," said Reiko, turning to face the body that belonged to it. "Why wouldn't I?" Especially when she was waiting for some good news. They would never tell her here, of course, and she almost felt bad for thinking ahead when Avalon had only died four days ago. But her friend wouldn't have wanted her lying in the bed taking depression naps for ten hours straight, even if that's what she'd been up to lately. Sleeping to forget and throwing her mind at anything that wasn't her.