COMPASS

25

RECOUNTING A VICTIM’S LAST STEPS was typically largely guesswork, even when you were doing so within days of their death. Even then, it wasn’t always particularly useful.

“It’s like making tea after the water has cooled,” Hetty complained to Benjy as they stood on the corner of the street that led to the Duval home. “There’s too little to follow.”

“It all flows backwards in the end.” He paused, giving her one of those particular looks when he thought he was being funny. “You can always go home without me.”

“If that was the case, I wouldn’t be here in the first place.” Hetty hooked her arm through his. “Lead on!”

They headed west as Benjy flipped through the journal. “According to his last entry, Duval left his home bright and early the day he died. He dropped by his usual spot to get coffee. Collected a newspaper and noted with amusement the day’s letters in the Miss Carole column. Then he went to Olmstead. He doesn’t mention the classes by name, but we have his schedule. Three alchemistry classes, plus one at an advanced level. There was a test that day he surprised students with. He also writes about preparing to have a conversation with a student about a project. The entry ends with him going to the meeting. We know from other accounts he talked with this student for some time. You remember the one. We spoke to him after the funeral.”

The funeral had been a bit chaotic. People from all walks of life had come to mourn the beloved teacher. Hetty remembered it had been by sheer luck that she and Benjy had even been able to find the last student Raimond spoke with the day he died.

“He said Raimond went down this street.”

“Which wasn’t in the papers,” Benjy said.

“Neither were a number of things,” Hetty reminded him. “The things we found out, what wasn’t deemed important, and what we don’t know.”

“The last of which is the largest,” Benjy replied, although his soft murmur did not seem meant for her ears.

“From here to where he was found on Powell Street is quite a distance,” Hetty said. “There’s nothing that tells us he did anything more than take a long walk.”

“There’s a dozen reasons that could explain that, starting with he ran there on foot to he was placed there.”

“And the other ten?”

“Involve magic.” Benjy ran his fingers against the wall, drawing the star sigil Pyxis, the mariner’s compass.

The spell glowed silver against the brick, and the needle spun around, seeking north.

“There won’t be enough magic traces to point the way,” Hetty scoffed. “You’ve tried this trick before, and it never works!”

“Never works the way I want it to,” he corrected.

“Too much time has passed. Too much magic has been cast about since then. Plus, you don’t even know if magic was used in the first place.”

“There was magic residue near where he was found. Some of it had to come off his body.”

“That’s speculation,” Hetty said. “And it’s quite unlike you to suggest something so far-fetched that​—”

The needle inside the compass sigil stopped, pointing to the east. The stars that made it glowed even brighter until a ball of light shot from it. It sped down the street, leaving in its wake a path of starlight.

“Not a word.” Hetty waggled her finger at Benjy, who smirked at her. “Not a single one!”

They ran after it. The pulse of magic darted along the street, disappearing like ice in the summer sun.

Down the streets they went, pushing past pedestrians and carts as they chased after the spell, which kept increasing in speed. Benjy had clearly messed up the spell, because even if Raimond Duval had been chased by the murderer there was no way he​—

Benjy stopped suddenly in the middle of the street. Hetty ended up spinning on the ball of her foot to avoid colliding with him. As she regained her balance, she demanded, “Why did you stop? We’re losing it!”

“We know where it leads. But we just found something else that’s even more important.”

“What?” Hetty asked, but as she turned to look in the direction he faced, the scowl on her face went away.

Across the street was the old boardinghouse they used to call home. It had hardly been a few months since they had moved away, yet it looked very different to her eyes. Older, and more worn down. It hadn’t exactly been the finest accommodations while they’d been living there, but Hetty supposed she’d gotten used to it over time, so much that now it was shocking to think she’d ever tolerated it in the first place.

“I think I know why the pastor is upset with us,” Benjy said softly. “Raimond told him about a problem, and Jay told him to go see us, but forgot to mention our change of address. Raimond came here and couldn’t find us.”

The night Raimond Duval died they had been at their new home on Juniper Street, having a rare night to themselves not occupied with their friends or murder. Hetty remembered being on the roof with her telescope, working on her star map. Benjy had sat out with her for a bit, and they talked about nothing in particular.

If Raimond Duval had come there that night instead of their old address, they would have seen him and certainly would have listened to what he had to say. Perhaps then his death might not have occurred.

“Powell Street isn’t that far from here,” Hetty reminded him, as if that detail could ease the guilt rising in her chest. “He could have been passing through. It’s only a coincidence.”

“Maybe,” Benjy said, but he was only humoring her. “Let’s see where the trace continues to go.”

The magic they had followed was long gone now, but Benjy had clearly seen enough of it to know where to go next​—​something he proved when he started up the same spell once more, although with much less fanfare.

While it moved just as quickly as before, they didn’t have to chase after it for long. After a few turns, the magic stopped.

But it didn’t disappear.

Benjy’s magic swirled along the wall, creating an outline of a doorway on a wall.

“That can’t be,” she murmured as Darlene’s map fluttered into her thoughts. In her mind’s eye, she traced the blue lines on the map that made up the confirmed tunnels, recalling the nearby street names. “But there’s no tunnel here.”

“That we know of.” Benjy strode to the wall and kicked where the wall met the ground.

The slab of stone fell backwards, revealing the tunnel’s entrance. With a quick flick of his fingers, Benjy summoned Canis Major. The star-speckled dog dashed forward, showing the way.

After being in so many tunnels recently, Hetty didn’t find anything particularly special about this one. The walls were smooth. The tunnel had been carefully dug with magic during its construction. This observation had a familiar ring to it . . . No, it was an echo of what Benjy had said before. He’d told her this very recently, when they were in the tunnel under​—​

“Barclay Street!” Hetty exclaimed. “We’re under Barclay!”

As she turned to her husband, he grinned, as he must have known this from the start. “We’re in the same tunnel of the first one we found, just on the other side of the collapsed portion,” Benjy said with great relish. “Raimond Duval must have thought he could escape his murderer by going through here.”

“To Valentine’s house. It’s just above us!” Hetty recalled.

“That’s what he was doing down here. But his luck ran out.” Benjy pointed out the signs of a struggle in the dirt before them. “Look. He tried to fight off his attacker. Duval was not just a scholar of magic. He was a skilled practitioner.”

“And his murderer?”

“Must have been better.”

Hetty frowned. “But why not leave him down here? Why take him to a building streets away and start a fire there?”

“His death was a warning.”

“But to who?” Hetty asked.

She really shouldn’t have asked the question. She knew what the answer would be. Even if she didn’t want to admit it after staring it in the face. But like most things, it didn’t feel real until Benjy put the words out into the air.

He seemed to know that, because he paused before speaking.

“Us.”