A Murder of Mages: A Novel of the Maradaine Constabulary Read online

  Raves for Marshall Ryan Maresca’s

  The Thorn of Dentonhill:

  “Veranix is Batman, if Batman were a teenager and magically talented. His uncompromising devotion to crushing the local crime boss encourages him to take foolish risks, but his resourcefulness keeps our hero one step ahead of those who seek to bring him down. Action, adventure, and magic in a school setting will appeal to those who love Harry Potter and Patrick Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind.”

  —Library Journal (starred review)

  “Maresca brings the whole package, complete and well-constructed. If you’re looking for something fun and adventurous for your next fantasy read, look no further . . . an incredible start to a new series, from an author who is clearly on his way to great things.”

  —Bibliosanctum

  “Books like this are just fun to read.”

  —The Tenacious Reader

  “This is hang-on-to-your-toothpicks adventure with a mystery bent as Veranix tries to learn how to control the new magic he has and discover why some powerful people want to kill him for it. It’s action-oriented—swashbuckling Indiana Jones meets the burglar Bilbo Baggins of The Hobbit—but the characters have a warmth and conflicting goals and attitudes that make them worth following.”

  —Kings River Life Magazine

  “I loved every minute . . . this was a great debut novel and I can’t wait to see more of Maresca’s work”

  —Short and Sweet Reviews

  “Maresca’s debut is smart, fast, and engaging fantasy crime in the mold of Brent Weeks and Harry Harrison. Just perfect.”

  —Kat Richardson, national bestselling author of Revenant

  DAW Books presents the

  novels of Marshall Ryan Maresca:

  THE THORN OF DENTONHILL

  *

  A MURDER OF MAGES

  Copyright © 2015 by Marshall Ryan Maresca.

  All Rights Reserved.

  Cover art by Paul Young.

  Cover design by G-Force Design.

  DAW Book Collectors No. 1696.

  DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Group (USA).

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious.

  Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  ISBN: 978-0-698-18010-9

  DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED

  U.S. PAT. AND TM. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

  —MARCA REGISTRADA

  HECHO EN U.S.A.

  Version_1

  Contents

  Praise for Marshall Ryan Maresca

  Also by Marshall Ryan Maresca

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Acknowledgments

  Maps

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Acknowledgments

  This book would not exist without the assistance of quite a few people.

  First of all, there is my amazing and incredibly patient wife, Deidre Kateri Aragon. She has been an anchor in my life for the past fifteen years, giving me the ability to pound away at a keyboard day after day to make this book happen. But more importantly, she got me on task in the first place, moving me from being that guy who just talked about “writing a book at some point” to actually making writing a real focus in my life. She, as well as my son Nicholas, have been a source of constant support and strength through the process of becoming a novelist.

  No less important to thank are my parents, Louis and Nancy Maresca, and my mother-in-law, Kateri Aragon, all of whom have contributed in innumerable ways to make it possible for me to write this book.

  Next, there are all the many people who read versions and drafts of A Murder of Mages, and gave useful advice that helped shape it into a stronger, better work. This includes Anne Soward, Amy Sterling Casil, Miriam Robinson Gould, and the Bat City Novelocracy crew: Kevin Jewell, Abby Goldsmith, Ellen Van Hensbergen, Katy Stauber, Nicole Duson, and Amanda Downum. And a huge portion of those thanks have to go to Stina Leicht, who has been running the ArmadilloCon Writers Workshop for many years, and after I had attended it several times, brought me on board to run it with her. Stina has been a friend, a mentor, a sympathetic ear, and a good source for the occasional much-needed whap upside the head, which is exactly what every writer needs.

  I can’t emphasize enough how much is owed to my agent, Mike Kabongo. He’s handled with grace and humor the arduous task of dealing with my constant harassment while shopping my work. Back when he first responded to an unsellable draft of Thorn of Dentonhill, he said, “Clearly you are a writer I want to watch. Even if you decide I’m not the agent for you, do let me know when you hit the shelves, I want to buy something with your name on it.” So far he’s continued to show the same enthusiasm for each manuscript I’ve sent him, and I hope to not let him down.

  Further thanks are owed to my editor Sheila Gilbert, Joshua Starr, and everyone else at DAW. I am deeply grateful for all the hard work they’ve done to make this the best book it can possibly be.

  Finally, there is my dear friend Daniel J. Fawcett, who has been my sounding board and bent ear on everything creative I’ve done since the seventh grade. Nothing in this book would be what it is without his influence. I wouldn’t be who I am today without his friendship.

  Chapter 1

  SATRINE RAINEY WALKED TO the Inemar Constabulary House carrying a lie. It gnawed at her, every step she took across the bridges to the south side of the city. Taking it across the river would help it pass. The one person who knew the truth was up in North Maradaine, and he almost never crossed the river. The Inemar Constabulary House, on the south bank, might as well have been in another city.

  The lie would pass. It was wrapped up in enough truth to pass.

  The wind whipped past Satrine, cold and riddled with wet. She pulled her coat tight around her and quickened her pace, overtaking a pedalcart that trundled along one side of the bridge road. The path split on a tiny jut of rock in the middle of the river, the water below choked with sails and barges. Satrine turned onto the Upper Bridge, leading to the neighborhood of Inemar, the heart of the south side of Maradaine.

  Satrine hated Inemar. She hated everything south of the river. Not that it mattered. She had to go. And if all went well, she would come ba
ck tomorrow, and every day after that.

  The steps at the end of the bridge were crowded, people shouting at everyone as they went down to the street level. Dozens of voices selling useless trinkets, witnessing stories of saints, pleading for coins. Two newsboys from competing presses called out lurid stories over each other. Satrine pushed her way through the throng and pressed her way down to the street. She dodged through the traffic of horse carriages and pedalcarts, without missing a step. Muscle memory.

  Gray stone dominated Inemar. Gray and tight, this part of the city didn’t waste an inch, buildings pressed up against each other. Not a bit of green in this neighborhood. No trees shading the walkways. Iron grates bordered properties instead of hedges. Even the weeds between the cobblestones were trampled and dead.

  “Hey, hey, Waish girl! Waish girl!”

  Satrine grimaced. She knew someone was calling her. Most people presumed she was Waish. Here in Maradaine, people forgot that red hair was a common trait in the northern archduchies of Druthal.

  “Waish girl! I’m talking to you!” A hand clasped her shoulder.

  People had no damn manners in Inemar.

  Satrine spun around and swatted away the offending hand. Its owner was a young man with beady eyes and ratlike teeth, wearing a threadbare coat and vest and bearing a disturbingly wide grin.

  “Not Waish,” Satrine said. “And not a girl.”

  The young man didn’t blink, he just charged on into his spin. “You’re new down here, though, don’t know your way around, just crossed the bridge, am I right? You need yourself a guide and escort, am I right?”

  “Not right.” Satrine had already said eight more words than she had planned to say to anyone on the street, and she turned to head back on her way.

  “That’s all right, that’s all right.” The young man kept pace with her. “Even if you know your way about, it’s always good for a girl like—lady, I mean—a lady like you to walk with someone, don’t you know. Lot can happen in these streets, you know.”

  “I know.”

  “So there you have it, miss,” the young man said, crooking his arm through hers as he spoke. “You walk with me and—”

  He got no further in his speech. Satrine twisted his arm behind his back, and a moment later she had him on the ground, face pressed into the cobblestone.

  “I know where I’m going,” Satrine growled into his ear.

  He only grunted in reply. Satrine released him and walked away at full pace, giving only a glance out the corner of her eye to see that the young man was not following her. He had probably slunk back to the bridge to harass another newcomer.

  She pushed through the crowd, the usual diverse mix of folks seen in Inemar; most were Druth, with fair skin and brown or blond hair. There was a smattering of greasy-haired Kierans, tanned Acserians, and a handful of other exotic faces, having wandered out of their enclaves in the Little East.

  The Constabulary House was only two blocks from the bridge, a small fortress of stone and iron towering over the corner square markets. The building itself had to be ancient. Inemar was full of relics, both buildings and people.

  Satrine passed through a gated stone arch where two Constabulary regulars stood at attention, their dark green and red coats crisp and clean in sharp contrast to the gray and rust surroundings.

  The regulars just gave her a nod as she passed. And why wouldn’t they? She was a respectable-looking woman, her hair tied back, her face clean. She wore what any decent woman in Maradaine might wear, though her canvas slacks and heavy blouse were hardly what anyone would consider fashionable.

  Satrine entered the building itself, into a small lobby, where a wooden counter restricted her from the cramped and crowded Constabulary floor. Desks and benches shoved into every corner, men in Constabulary coats on the benches, behind the desks, pushing through the narrow spaces. Some of the men were Constabulary regulars, some officers.

  One woman pressed her way through to the counter. She wore the Constabulary coat, but Satrine noticed a key difference in her uniform. She wore a skirt that stopped just below the knee. It conformed to standards of decency, but it was more like what a schoolgirl should wear rather than a constable.

  “Ma’am, can I help you?” The woman’s hair was pulled back tight, which matched the stress in her voice.

  “I’m looking for Captain Cinellan?” Satrine asked.

  “Second floor,” the woman said, pointing to a narrow corridor to her left. “The inspectors’ offices are up there.” Someone else dropped a pile of papers in front of the woman, and her attention left Satrine immediately.

  Satrine went down the corridor, which ended in a tight spiral staircase, solid stone masonry. Satrine went up the steps, running her fingers along the cool wall, her thoughts filled with the paper that felt like it was burning a hole in her coat pocket.

  She came out of the stairway to a wide room, bright sunlight streaming through the windows along the eastern wall. The far wall was lined with cabinets and slate boards, and there were desks sparsely placed about the floor, each one with an oil lamp—unlit—hanging above them. Men wearing Constabulary vests worked at the desks while a handful of boys ran through the room. Two boys bolted past Satrine as she came up, racing down the stairs.

  A fair-haired woman at the closest desk—the only other woman Satrine saw on the floor—smiled brightly when Satrine approached. “Careful of them.”

  “Fast runners,” Satrine said.

  “Fastest we have. Did they send you up here with a report?”

  “A report?”

  “For one of the inspectors?”

  “No.” Satrine took a deep breath. This close, the lie was a weight pressing on her chest. “I’m here to see Captain Cinellan.”

  “All right,” the woman—Miss Nyla Pyle, based on her brass badge and lack of marriage bracelet—said. “Can I have your name?”

  “Rainey. Satrine Rainey.”

  Miss Pyle’s eyes flashed with recognition. She gave a small nod as she bit at her bottom lip. “This way, all right?”

  The woman led Satrine through the inspectors’ work floor, past various men discussing the cases they were working on. Satrine only caught snippets of conversation before reaching the door with a brass plaque on it: CAPTAIN BRACE CINELLAN.

  Miss Pyle knocked and opened the door simultaneously. Captain Cinellan’s office was dim, no windows, only burning oil lamps and candles on his desk. The man himself was hunched over the desk, the muscular frame of an old soldier, beat down and bent with age. Not that he was that old; his face had few lines and his hair untouched by gray. But he held himself like an old man. A tired man.

  “Yes, Miss Pyle?” he asked.

  “Missus Satrine Rainey to see you, Captain,” Miss Pyle said, putting a strong emphasis on Satrine’s last name. Captain Cinellan’s weary eyes glanced over to Satrine, and they sparked with sympathy.

  “Yes, of course,” he said. He got up from the desk and crossed over to Satrine, extending his hand. “Missus Rainey, very good to meet you.”

  Satrine took his hand and shook it, giving him a strong, solid grip. She wasn’t going to give him anything less, give him any cause to doubt her resolve.

  Cinellan gestured to her to take the chair on the other side of his desk, despite it being full of books and ledgers. Miss Pyle grabbed them off the chair before anyone else spoke.

  “Return these to the archives, Captain?”

  “Yes, Miss Pyle. And, um . . . tea with—”

  “Honey and cream,” Miss Pyle finished. “Anything for you, Missus Rainey?”

  “Tea, yes,” Satrine said. “Cream only.”

  Miss Pyle nodded and left the office as gracefully as possible with her arms full, deftly shutting the door with a swing of her foot.

  Captain Cinellan sat down behind his desk. “So, Missus Rainey, let
me just say . . . when we all heard about what happened to your husband, well . . . most of us didn’t know him down here on the south bank, of course, except by reputation. And when something . . .” He faltered, biting at his lip.

  “Devastating occurs?” Satrine offered. That was the best word to describe what had happened to Loren.

  Cinellan nodded. “Absolutely. It gives a man pause. Especially for all of us here in the Green and Red.”

  “What happened to my husband was—is—tragic, Captain Cinellan, but I have to . . .”

  “Yes, I know,” Captain Cinellan said. He dug through the papers on his desk. “I received word from Commissioner Enbrain that you would be coming here.”

  Satrine’s heart jumped to her throat. If Enbrain had sent a letter here as well, then that would ruin everything. She couldn’t have that. Loren needed her to succeed. The girls needed it.

  “He sent you my orders?”

  “Orders, what?” Cinellan looked confused. “No, he just sent a runner with word you were going to be coming in here today.”

  “So you don’t have the orders?” This was the moment. She forced the words out despite the rising bile in her throat. “You’re to give me a position here.” She pulled the letter out of her pocket.

  Cinellan glanced at the letter, waxed shut with Commissioner Enbrain’s seal. Or, more correctly, an excellent forgery that Satrine had spent hours copying. Cinellan gave it no more than two seconds of regard before cracking it open and reading the letter.

  “I’m to make you what?”

  Satrine almost answered, but she bit her tongue before she revealed that she knew the contents of the sealed letter.

  “This can’t be serious!”

  “What is it?”

  “According to this, I’m to make you an inspector.”

  Inspector Third Class, to be precise. Satrine dared well enough putting that on the letter.

  She had worked on her expression in the mirror for an hour. Old skills, long unpracticed, but still in her muscles. She needed to convey just the right degree of pleasant surprise without approaching shock. She opened her eyes wide and drew her breath in sharply. She put her hand over her chest, as if her heart was racing, and asked, “And what would the salary be?”