Брайан Макклеллан - Blood Tally

Part of my job – a disturbingly large part of it – is the expectation that I will be sworn at, spit upon, punched, stabbed, and even shot. The fact that I work for the supernatural elements of this world rather than, say, a loan shark doesn’t seem to make a lick of difference. Nobody likes debt collectors. That’s just human – and sometimes inhuman – nature.

I’m lucky that I’m well-equipped for the job. I wear a flak vest, have a handful of magical tattoos, as well as the thick skin of a guy with troll ancestry. I go into every situation armed, though not always openly. And best of all, I have a ring on my finger that belongs to my best friend Maggie. She might be trapped in there just as surely as I’m trapped in my job, but she’s still a powerful jinn; an ace in the hole that nobody sees coming.

Basically I’m trying to say that I have a dangerous job and I’m always ready for those dangers. Which makes it disconcerting when the job is too easy.

I stood outside my truck, wearing my flak vest loose over an old Tom Petty T-shirt, eyeballing the little suburban house that matched the address of this morning’s collection. The house was … picturesque . It was a little three-bedroom on a third of an acre not far from the square in Chardon, Ohio. It had brick siding, seventies-style metal trim, and someone had ripped up all the lawn in order to plant dozens of raised garden beds. A sign beside the mailbox asked passersby to “please not pick from the garden unless given permission” in perfect, hand-painted lettering.

There was another sign in the window. In the same neat, hand-painted lettering, it said “Scrying, Healing Remedies, Palm Reading, and Misc. Sorceries. Weekdays 10 a.m.–4 p.m. or by Appointment.”

Why aren’t you going inside? A voice in my head asked. You’re sweating like a pig.

I took off my ball cap emblazoned with the winged Valkyrie Collections logo and wiped a forearm across my brow. Maggie was right. I don’t do well with heat – I’ve got northern-European troll blood in me, after all. Summer had come on hot and strong this year, and the air conditioning in the truck hadn’t worked right since coming back from the shop after my run-in with Nick the Necromancer and his draugr earlier in the spring.

“I don’t trust witches,” I muttered under my breath.

I could practically hear Maggie roll her eyes. Nobody trusts witches. That’s part of their schtick. But she called you, so this shouldn’t be a problem. Besides, I’ve never met a witch who couldn’t be dealt with by a quick punch to the nose. They’re more dangerous when you don’t know that they have it out for you.

“Yeah, yeah. I know.” I continued to hesitate, uncomfortable memories flitting around the back of my head.

Something you want to talk about? she asked.

For the last couple months, we’d been trying to be more honest with each other. Ten years of an ask-no-questions partnership had trained us both to keep a lot back, but the events surrounding that aforementioned draugr incident had forced us to reassess our relationship. We both needed to be more open. “I was seventeen,” I finally said. “Collected from a witch who owed one of our clients. She cast some bullshit hex on me that gave me hives. Ada had to get an OtherOps injunction to make her get rid of them.”

Maggie laughed for just a few seconds too long.

“That’s enough,” I told her peevishly, scratching under one arm at the memory. “Let’s get this over with.” I pulled out an embossed envelope containing the name of the item I’d come to collect, as well as a very brief file on the person I’d come to collect it from. I tapped it against one palm. “What do you have on her?”

Maggie hummed softly to herself for a moment, then said gave an indeterminate Hmm .

“What’s that mean?”

The house is protected by the normal sorts of wards. Basic stuff, nothing fancy, but woven exceedingly well. There’s a rock golem in the corner of the garden who appears to be attached to some kind of alarm. One of the bedrooms is protected from even high-level scrying.

“I repeat my previous question.”

It means, Maggie said, that she’s not very powerful, but she’s quite talented. She uses the tools she has at her disposal better than most witches I’ve met.

“But there’s nothing that’s going to kill me when I ring the doorbell?”

Don’t be dense. She’s a small business owner. You think she’d booby-trap her own front door against potential clients?

“Point taken.” I headed up the narrow flagstone walk to the front door, raising one hand toward the doorbell only to have the door swing open to reveal an old woman. She couldn’t have been taller than five foot two, bent and gray, her face covered in warts, wearing a black cloak and a black, pointed hat. She looked like something out of a cartoon, and she grinned up at me with yellowed teeth.

“Good morning, my dear,” she crooned. “Come for a healing potion, have you? Scrying on a woman? A man? Hoping to cast impotence on a rival?”

I lifted the embossed envelope. “Olivia Martin?” I asked. “My name is Alek Fitz, from Valkyrie Collections. You have an overdue library book I’ve been sent to collect.”

In the back of my head, Maggie laughed about something.

What’s so funny? I asked her.

Just wait and you’ll see.

Olivia blinked at me for a few moments, then retreated into the house, leaving the door open behind her. “Come in, come in,” she called.

I followed, letting my eyes adjust to the dim light of the home. “Are you Olivia Martin?” I asked, trying to keep my tone neutral.

“That’s me.”

“It’s just that your file says you’re twenty-seven.”

“You know,” Olivia responded, “you’re a lot better looking than I expected.” Her voice sounded different, and I couldn’t quite place how. Maggie continued to chuckle in the back of my head.

“Uh, thanks?” I responded. “You’re not quite what …” I trailed off as my vision finally adjusted to the dim light of the interior. Olivia had gone into her kitchen. She’d taken off the pointed hat and the cloak and tossed them on the couch. In the place of the old woman was an athletic blonde with long hair tied in a ponytail over one shoulder. She wore yoga pants and a tank top, padding around barefoot. She was almost petite, with a sweet face and tired eyes. “Oh,” I finished.

She pursed her lips as she returned to me, handing me a glass of ice water. “That’s sweet, but I don’t date cops.”

“I … what? I didn’t ask you on a date, and I’m not a cop.”

“No, but you were thinking it. I can see it in your eyes. You ogled me.” She sighed, as if being ogled was an annoyance she’d learned to live with. “Reapers. Cops. Same difference. Meatheads all around.” She gave me an apologetic smile.

“I did not ogle you.” I had definitely ogled her. “And I don’t date debtors.” Even to me it sounded petulant.

“Good,” she responded.

“Good,” I said.

We stared at each other for a couple of moments before I cleared my throat and pulled on my best professional face. “Never say that to either an OtherOps agent or a reaper. They’ll be super pissed.”

“I just did.” Olivia tilted her head to one side. It was a challenge. One of those “I don’t like authority figures and I want you to know it” sorts. I’d met plenty of them in my line of work, so I didn’t rise to the bait. Instead I gulped down the ice water and found a coaster on her coffee table where I could set the glass.