CANIS MINOR

4

HETTY RAISED A HAND to the band of fabric at her neck, tracing a finger along the raised stitches of the star sigils hidden among the floral flourishes. At her touch, the sigils unbound themselves from the fabric, flowing into the form of a woman.

Her eyes were the black of the night sky, and twinkling blue composed her skin, her long braided hair, and the pouches dangling from her waist. At her feet, two hunting dogs strained against their leashes.

Hetty nodded at the Herdsman, and the woman made of stars released the dogs. The beasts ran along the alley. They bounced off walls and stone, erasing all traces of the lingering spells as they made contact. What they didn’t touch the Herdsman cleared away with the sweep of her staff.

In any other situation, Hetty would have directed the Herdsman to define the boundaries of the residue. Then slowly she would slice, crumple, smash, and otherwise destroy the traces remaining of the magic she and Benjy had performed. In alleys such as this, all sorts of enchantments littered the ground. Erasing them all would be as telling as patching a lace dress, but there was no time for the fine work required. This drastic measure was a necessity, especially after what she had just seen.

The Serpent Bearer.

Something like bony fingers glided along her arms.

Benjy might not believe in cursed sigils, but Hetty had seen that sigil with her own eyes many times before, and each time it had been in close quarters with death.

This time would be no different—if they weren’t careful.

With a flick of her hand, Hetty dissipated the spells and a burst of light flooded the alley.

That was a bit dramatic, but it would also blind anyone skulking around.

There was no one about, however. No one rubbing their eyes frantically at the alley’s opening. No one lingering on the street corner with a knife. No one following her along the street as she hurried as quietly as she could to Oliver’s.

Hetty took twists and turns, roundabouts when she could, and even jumped a fence that wouldn’t tangle her skirts. The only time she looked away from the patch of street in front of her was to look upward at the glittering stars to regain her bearings. The pinpricks of light were dimmer in the city, but they gave her guidance all the same.

Only when Hetty caught sight of the abandoned cigar shop that stood on the corner of Oliver’s street did she breathe easily.

Opening the unlocked door and entering, she was greeted by cutlery and dishes left in piles on every available surface in the kitchen. Trousers hung from the ceiling, and one of the lamps flickered like a twitching eye, drawing moths that fluttered inside. Though she wasn’t sure which was the worse sight: a pair of mud-caked shoes sitting on a counter, or the Eventide Observer serving as a tablecloth for a bowl of congealed stew.

Hetty remembered a time when this place didn’t look like a hurricane blew in and parked itself in place for a few days. But that was a time before Thomas left to open a school in Texas for the newly freed.

Thomas left at the top of last fall, and everything about his leaving was a surprise. He wasn’t a teacher, having only recently learned to read. His only talent in carpentry was handing tools to Benjy, and not always the right ones. The day before he told them about Texas, he was making plans to open up a barbershop. And most importantly, Oliver did not go with him.

Thomas and Oliver had been an inseparable pair ever since Hetty matched them up at her wedding. In the years since, they had been a rather steady source of comfort and good sense in their circle of friends. When Hetty first learned of Texas, she assumed they would both be leaving. However, when Thomas carried his bags onto a train headed south, Oliver hadn’t even come to the station to say goodbye.

In fact, Oliver, who freely complained about the slightest upset, had yet to acknowledge Thomas’s departure in any manner. Not by speaking his name, or even cleaning the mess that engulfed the house.

The mess that thankfully hadn’t drifted into his work.

Oliver worked as an embalmer, which made him the perfect person to take in victims of murder and other violence. He always fussed about it, but he never turned them away. Oliver even put on funerals for people who would get pauper’s graves otherwise. Although, that only started because of a few misunderstandings and Hetty spinning a tale about Oliver’s gladly taking on the work.

In the cellar, Benjy peered down at the table with Charlie’s remains.

With a candle floating nearby, it was easier to see the exhaustion that weighed down Benjy’s broad shoulders. A shadow of grief touched his eyes, and perhaps a touch of guilt.

On the opposite side of the table, Oliver sat on a stool, stirring a spoon into a cup of something that was probably too strong to be considered tea. Although the hour was late, he hadn’t changed out of his stained and wrinkled clothes.

But then again, these days he rarely made it to bed at a reasonable hour.

“I’m sure you’re right about that.” Oliver tugged at his beard. “I’m just more concerned that whoever killed him might find their merry way to my home.”

“No need to worry.” Hetty placed the lantern on the bottommost stair. “I took care of it.”

“As I told you she would,” Benjy said, giving her a strained smile. “Hetty is true as the North Star.”

Oliver huffed as he shoved his glasses up his nose. “You mean your wife insisted and you didn’t argue for a change.”

“There wasn’t time.” Hetty approached the table. “Once we saw this.”

Oliver waved a hand over the wounds that the brighter lights only made more grotesque. “You mean this carving on Charlie’s chest?”

“You’ve heard about the cursed sigil, haven’t you?”

“It’s hardly a curse,” Oliver replied, though he absently rapped his knuckles on the table. “Nat Turner used it in his uprising. It was the only sigil he knew, and he burned it into land and flesh alike. What makes it a curse comes from the part of the tale where white folks get their revenge. They don’t know a whit about our magic, or even how the sigils work, but they know enough to memorize that one.”

“And use it to bring destruction,” Hetty said.

“Do you actually think it’s a curse?” Oliver’s smile was bitter and brittle and made him appear even older than what he was. “I can’t believe Benjy hasn’t changed your mind.”

Hetty stepped around the table and drew the Leo sigil in the air. A star-speckled lion lunged at Charlie’s body, only to meet a wall of silver light head on. It vanished on impact.

“I see you set boundary protections.” Hetty found the sigil Oliver had drawn on the table. Pisces pulsed against the wood. “Yet you say you aren’t worried about a curse?”

“These are just the usual protections,” Oliver blustered, nearly sloshing his drink onto his clothes. “I had to set them up after the last man you brought me nearly burned my house down.”

“We learned to check for latent magic.” Hetty met his gaze and only saw her scowling reflection in his glasses. “We wouldn’t have brought him here if it wasn’t safe. You don’t need the boundary.”

“I most certainly do.” Oliver stood, using what little height he had over her to his benefit. “I need to find out how he died. Given the circumstances, I wish to be a bit cautious. Or maybe I won’t be here to collect dead bodies the next time you come around.”

This bit was directed over her head at Benjy. Hetty snapped her fingers to bring Oliver’s eyes back down to her. “You don’t need protections. I already know how he died.”

“You do?” Benjy asked. “You didn’t get that close to the body.”

“I didn’t. But you’re covered in blood. It’s hardly a big mystery.”

Benjy looked down at his shirt and stared a bit too long at the dark splatters across his chest and arms. The location as well as the shape had given Hetty pause when she first noted them, but hardly enough to worry. She was more surprised he hadn’t noticed. Benjy was usually three steps ahead of her. Was Charlie’s death that shocking that he could have missed such an obvious thing? Or was the failing on her part? Now that the shock had passed, she found herself annoyed by the mess that remained. In some ways, it felt like Charlie’s last laugh.

“This happened when I carried Charlie here,” Benjy murmured.

“That can only mean one thing.” Oliver put his mug aside and rubbed his hand across the sigil drawn onto the table. The boundary faded, and Oliver reached to turn Charlie over.

The light revealed a large dark spot between Charlie’s shoulder blades. “He was stabbed in the back.”

“He wasn’t wearing these clothes when he was killed. Yet he bled again.”

“It might not be blood,” Oliver said. With a jerk of Oliver’s hand, Charlie flipped back onto his back with a small thump. “It could be the sigil. Perhaps you might want to try a purification spell on yourself. It could be poison.”

“I doubt that’s the case.” Benjy touched the splotches on his shirt. “It’s trouble—not curses—that seems to follow Charlie.”

“It certainly does.” Oliver’s shoulders sank. “What are we going to do about him? Surely you’re not going to leave him with the police?”

“No,” Hetty interjected. “Not with that mark on him. It’ll cause a panic.”

Oliver looked to Benjy.

“It will,” was Benjy’s simple reply. “I don’t want to draw attention.”

“I can’t see how you’ll avoid that,” Oliver said. “This is Charlie Richardson, not some old man you found in a park missing his hands. People will notice he hasn’t been seen around town for several days. You can’t keep this quiet.”

“This was never going to be quiet.” Benjy shook his head. “Someone killed Charlie with great deliberation, and we need to find out why.”

“Then he needs a funeral,” Oliver said.

“Are you offering to put together services?”

“It will give me a reason to keep him here longer, to discover all I can.”

“I think you’re both galloping after a star that hasn’t fallen yet,” Hetty interjected. “Marianne needs to be told about Charlie. I’m certain she’ll have a few opinions about you handling the funeral, especially if she has no say in the matter.”

“That’s right.” Benjy nodded. “She needs to be told. I’m glad you agreed to do it, Hetty.”

“Me?” Hetty crossed her arms over her chest. “I never said anything about that!”

“Who else would do the honor? You’re so much better with words. Marianne will appreciate hearing the news from you.”

Marianne would not, for a variety of reasons, but Benjy always said the wrong thing when talking to mourners—and Oliver was even worse.

“Should I tell her about the sigil carved in his chest?” Hetty asked as Oliver pulled a sheet over Charlie. The light of a preservation charm shone as fabric touched skin. “She might know something.”

“I wouldn’t.” Benjy shook his head. “I want to keep that bit quiet. I don’t believe in curses, but if we’re going to find out who did this, we don’t need to make a monster out of a mere mortal.”

“Too late,” Hetty said. “Only a monster could have done this.”