Page 10 of Any More Questions for the Corpse?

“He wasn’t hiding any shame or guilt, for what it’s worth,” Hala said.

“I can’t see a motive,” Mal said. “Is there any connection between the victims?”

“None that we can find. They were all killed late, between seven and midnight. One was killed here in Avalon, just down by the coast; the rest were in Dunwich. One by the University, one found in a park, and the fellow you met, Mal, was found in an alley off Copperfield Street.”

Mal wondered how Walters had explained that, if he had at all. “Why would he want to kill four random people?” Mal said.

“That’s what we wondered.” Des nodded approvingly at Mal’s contribution. “It’s more likely to be some sick puppy with a Merlin fetish, or someone with a grudge against his family. Plus Taran has an alibi.”

“True. I’m not sure I’d trust Elaine, though,” Hala said. “I still don’t like her.”

“We’ll verify everything they’ve said with traffic cameras and phone logs. It’ll be easy enough to tell if they weren’t home.”

Mal thought about what Murray had said, how he’d heard a woman’s voice. The pair matched what he could have seen, but Mal couldn’t imagine those two running around the country killing people. Walters had also said that the girl was “new,” meaning she was only at the last murder. Why wouldn’t she be present for the first murders? There didn’t seem to be anything obvious that could explain any of this. Not that he knew what that would look like.

“So what now?” Hala asked, keen for reasons Mal still didn’t fully understand.

“Well, I’ll follow up on those people Taran mentioned and see where it leads. Hopefully one will confess and make my job easy.” Hala seemed disappointed there wasn’t anything further for her to do. Mal was just happy this outing had come to an end without them finding out anything too damning about him.

Their pace picked up as the wind grew harsher. They made their way back through the cobbled streets of Avalon and into the portal station. It was quiet and calm, with barely any queue at all. They headed through and said their goodbyes. Des let Mal know that this wasn’t the end of it, and Mal prayed that it was. He had other things to be worrying about now—first and foremost a necromancy lesson with Kosh. He really wasn’t looking forward to his “assignment” afterward, but perhaps Kosh could give him a few pointers that would make the whole thing less terrifying.

He made his way through the network of portal doors that crisscrossed the city and made it to the crossroads of Copperfield and Bow Street. Mal couldn’t help but dread what awful lesson awaited him as he found himself in front of the tiny wooden door hidden from the crossroads above. Mal went to place his hand on the door, as Walters had, but before he could his world swirled violently, and the ground around him disappeared. He fought the magic to no avail, having just enough time to yell “FU—” before he disappeared.

5A Lesson in Death

“—CK,” Mal said, as he landed on a hard wooden floor. Whatever words he had tried to say during transit had been censored by the void. Mal tried to rise to his feet and found that nothing he possessed functioned as it should. His legs were jelly, his arms could not hold any weight, and his head could not determine which way was up. After a few moments, Mal’s facilities began to return and he found Kosh standing over him.

“Sorry about that,” Kosh said, helping him up and back into an armchair. “We haven’t got you set up on the system yet; you would have lost that hand if I didn’t warp you here. Admin at this place moves at a troll’s pace. Apologies.”

Mal vaguely understood that what Kosh spoke were, indeed, words and nodded politely as if he understood. Of course he didn’t understand; he was still trying to figure out what was happening and where he was. It took a few full minutes before up was up, down was down, and Mal was Mal again.

“Was I hit by a truck?” Mal said, his mouth finally cooperating.

“Not so much,” Kosh said, chuckling to himself. “I assure you this is better than losing your digits.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Mal said, pulling himself up in his chair.

Having now had time to orient himself, Mal could see he was in a rather quaint little office. Kosh sat behind a sturdy wooden desk; the walls were a yellowish stone, and around them in every corner, in every nook, and in multiple crannies lay a mess of papers and scrolls. Stacked high, scattered, distributed, splayed, and sprawled. It was as if a hurricane had passed through several ancient libraries, then suddenly stopped in this tiny room. Between the various papers lay odd artifacts: a strange pink doohickey sat on the desk partly filled with sand, several wands lay scattered about, and Mal could have sworn he saw something moving at the back of the office among all that paper.

“Tea?” Kosh said, gesturing to an empty area on the table. (Empty in this sense meaning only three or four papers deep.)

“Yes, gods yes,” Mal found himself saying. With a pop, a tea set appeared in the “empty” space Kosh had gestured to. Mal noticed Kosh’s eyes change, just for an instant, in time with the pop; his pupils flattened into lines, then returned, like a camera flash. Kosh poured them both some tea, at one point conjuring milk, Mal hoped from a nearby fridge, to complete their brews. Mal sipped his tea and luxuriated in how combobulated he now felt.

“How did the interview go?” Kosh said, easing back into conversation.

“It went well I think. Not that I’d know either way.”

“You think he did it?” Kosh said with an inquisitive eye. Mal thought for a moment Kosh might be testing him, but couldn’t tell through his now-unmoving poker face.

“I don’t know. Probably not. He doesn’t seem the murdering type.” Mal thought back to the kindly seeming old man. He wondered what the “murdering type” would look like. He wasn’t sure he actually knew.

“You haven’t heard much about his youth then. I say youth—he was in his eighties. He had quite the body count. Many long-time villains retired specifically to avoid facing off with him.”

“Really?” Mal said, as if he’d suddenly become an inquisitive child.

“Those trophies on his wall, did you sense anything from them?” Kosh smiled, as if revealing his hand to be a royal flush.

“I did, actually … Wait, how did you know about that?” Mal, while not normally this dull, was slow to the take today.