Free The Watchmage of Old New York (The Watchmage Chronicles Book 1) by C.A. Sanders Page B

didn’t move. “What do we do with this one?” 
    “Master Nathaniel will want to question and judge him.  I can bring him back to Turtle House.  Arrock is nearby with the carriage. Or should I stay with you?”
    His earnestness annoyed me.  He’s a pup, and he’s magicking his way around my kidnapping.  He’s ruining the fun.  “Go back to Turtle House.  Miss Hyde doesn’t know you, and you might frighten her.”
    He retrieved a book from inside of his coat.  “You’re right,” he stuttered and fumbled over his tongue. “I think I have a spell in here that’ll keep the Redcap sedate.”  He flipped through the pages.  “Don’t worry about us,” he said, but I was already walking away.

    Christopher the desk clerk sat behind a pile of papers when I entered the hospital.  The butt of a cigar jutted from his mouth, and he ashed in the general vicinity of a tray.  He looked up from the work he wasn’t doing.  “Afternoon, officer.  Looks like someone hit ya’ in the duke.  You come here for that?  Want the doc to look you over?”
    I put both hands flat on his desk and leaned over. A shot of pain went through my injured arm.  “I got anointed ten minutes after I left our lunch.  Know anything about it?”
    His face blanched.  “Me?  No, I didn’t do anything.  I don’t know anything.”
    “The three men that dusted my coat sat in the corner while we ate.”
    He squashed the cigar in the ashtray. The muscles in his throat squirmed like pigs in a blanket. “I didn’t notice them.  I swear, I didn’t know nothin’.  I was hungry.  It was the roas’ beef.  The great roas’ beef, remember?”
    I relaxed and took my hands off the desk.  “If I find out otherwise, I’ll be very put out, you understand.”
    “I didn’t do nothin’.  Honor bright.”
    I looked into the main room, where the crisp, white linens and straight lines suggested a parade or muster.  Molly’s bed was empty.  “Where’s Molly Hyde?”
    “They moved her into the back room.  She’s getting better.  The docs might even let you talk to ‘er.”
    I walked toward the back room, As an afterthought, I looked back.  “It was pretty good roast beef.  Too bad it comes with a beating.”
    The back room was much more pleasant than the front, with huge potted plants in the corners and under the large windows.  It was a smaller room, and the patients looked less ready to die.
    Three doctors were bent over one bed.  They talked in hushed tones.  I couldn’t understand them, so I moved in closer.
    I tapped one on the shoulder.  “Excuse me, doctor.  I’m looking for Molly Hyde.”
    The doctor waved me away as he continued to work.  A second doctor cursed and threw his hands up.  “It’s over.  We can’t help her.”
    “God’s wounds,” said another doctor.  “I don’t understand it, Stillwell.  This morning she was healthy as a horse.  Now…”
    The man I deduced as Doctor Stillwell looked down at the body.  “Man will never thwart God’s will.  We should find the priest.”
    I tapped Doctor Stillwell again.  “I’m looking for Molly Hyde.  Police business.”
    He looked at me with moist eyes.  “You missed her.”  He bumped the bed with his hip.  “The poor girl’s dead.” 

Nathaniel
     
    The Redcap turned cursing into an art form.
    “What a rude little man you are,” I said. 
    Jonas, Hendricks, and I stood in my laboratory.  The captured Redcap, who I knew as Mo’tok, sneered from inside a summoning circle.  The argent runes etched in the circle kept him within.  Not that he was much of a threat in his state.  His eyesight had returned, but his face was still burned from the salt.  A long burn mark from the poker streaked his head.
    He spat onto the floor.  “I ain’t scared a-you.  You’re a filthy pig like the rest of ‘em.”
    “Perhaps, but one that can send you spiraling across the Veil with hardly a thought,” I said.  “Unless you’d