Adventures with gregarious wonderhaus - a cat and a hat

A short story that I tried shopping for a little bit. Currently the basis of a personal game project that I am working on in my spare time. The ending is a bit abrupt as I was rapidly approaching a predefined word limit and was hoping to get the help of an editor to slim it down a bit, but overall I’m happy with what I was doing with this story.

“It was a chilly morning in Tidehaven and…”

“Whoa, hold up,” Maya said, setting her drink down on their table in the tavern. “You don’t have to say the name of the city where we all live. And didn’t you tell me it was last week? It’s the middle of summer it couldn’t have been that chilly.”

“Hey, this is my story!” Sid protested. “I’ll tell it how I want to. And we did have that one cold morning. A little chilly. Look, I didn’t wear my jacket that morning so maybe that’s coloring my memory.”

Maya took another long draw from her mug, eyeing her old school friend with a measuring stare. Finally she set it down once more. “Alright, go on. I’ll try to keep my interruptions to a minimum. Tell me all about your grand adventure with Gregarious Wonderhaus.”

“Thank you,” Sid said with all the false graciousness he could muster. “As I was saying…”

⧫ ⧫ ⧫

So there I was last week on a mildly cool morning without a jacket. Greg, my boss, had woken me up early for a case that he assured me would be very exciting. I guess the guard captain had personally called on him which is usually a pretty big deal. Still, I took my time getting up.

After a short carriage ride we walked quietly toward the site, me with Greg’s unnecessarily heavy crate full of instruments and books strapped to my back, and Greg with his half-cape, jeweled cane, wild grey hair, and very serious face. We walked for a few city blocks and over a canal bridge before Greg stopped suddenly and pulled out a slip of paper and studied it.

“Hmm,” he said, “the address for our crime scene should be right around here, dear boy.”

“You mean that house over there?” I suggested, pointing at the house with two town guards milling around in the yard next to a large sign reading Active Crime Scene - No Admission Without Permission.

Wonderhaus checked the written address against the number plaque hanging from the house’s exterior. He gave the paper a nod, pocketed it and approached the house with me trudging behind. He walked up to the guard  and with a flourish of his cape and cane he presented his calling card.

“Greetings, brave protectors of Tidehaven, it is I, Archmage 3rd-Class Gregarious Wonderhaus, Consulting Detective,” he said.

The two guards looked at each other quizzically before turning back to address the wizard in front of them.

“Uhh,” one of them began, “we know who you are sir, on account of you having worked with us several times. You really don’t have to keep introducing yourself like this.”

“You came to me son’s birthday last month, sir,” said the other. “‘e really liked the book you gave ‘im. Good illustrations ‘e said.”

I peered out from behind my boss and said, “Hey Kris! Hey Dag!”

“Good to see you, kid,” said first guard, Kris. He calls me kid, but he’s pretty alright.

“Cap’n’s ‘xpectin’ you inside up the stairs,” said Dag. I have no idea where his accent comes from.

“Thank you both, gentleman. I will attend to the Captain immediately,” Greg said before brushing past them.

I gave them both a shrug and followed as quickly as I could behind. I want to make it clear that the box is still very heavy and absolutely filled with expensive equipment.

We made our way through the entry with its bright, gaudy chandelier and up the stairs. The cramped hallways of the house had high ceilings and were covered in bright, floral wallpaper which smelled new. Despite that, there was some heavy scoring along one of the walls which had to have been recent. Ahead could be heard the muffled sounds of a conversation, which we soon found to be coming from a large and impressive office. Along one wall was a gilded writing desk upon which was a mess of papers and a reading lamp with glow bulb. Above the fireplace on the opposite wall was a bare wall and a hint that something large may have been hanging there once before. Most of the room was lined with bookshelves stuffed with thick tomes and odd trinkets, except for the wall with three massive ceiling-to-floor windows - one of which had a remarkable hole almost precisely person-sized.

Also there was the corpse of a man on a very nice rug. Or at least it must have been nice before all the blood, you see.

“So it’s a murder then?” I asked Wonderhaus quietly so as to not interrupt the captain and the man who I didn’t recognize.

“Quiet, my boy,” he whispered back. “It’s best not make such assumptions until we have all the facts.”

“Archmage Wonderhaus!” called Captain Fiona Bridgewater turning from her companion and walking over to us. “Thank you for being available on such short notice. As you can see, there’s been a murder.”

Greg nodded knowingly, which I found infuriating. “Who is the victim this time?” he asked.

“Leobald Flannelly, a successful merchant specializing in imports,” said the captain.

“And a very good man,” said the man behind her in fine clothes and an undersized top hat. “I serve as...served as his personal assistant. My name is Baggabon Flower.” 

He came forward, refusing Wonderhaus’s outstretched hand, and continued speaking.

“I’m the one that called for the guards, you see,” he said. “I found poor Mr. Flannelly in this state at around dawn for his breakfast. It is all quite a shock, I assure you. Though I was in some distress, I did notice that the large painting he keeps hanging above the mantle is now missing, if it helps. It was a very valuable original, I believe. Could this potentially be a burglary?”

I believe I was visibly frowning as I looked at the small size of the hole in the window and mentally comparing it to the imprint of the missing frame on the wall. But more on that later.

“Yes, that’s all very good information Mr. Flowers…” began Greg.

“Flower, sir.”

“Right, of course. That’s all very good information Mr. Flowers and I will get to the bottom of this in a hurry.” He turned to me and ordered, “My boy, I need you to fetch me Oswald’s Investigative Necromantations from the pack and draw me a standard level four circle around the body in salt, thank you.”

I tried my worst to hide the distaste I felt for the task as I finally set down the heavy box and pulled out the requested book and a sack of salt. The two others in the room stood back and watched on with studious expressions.

“Greg,” I began as I handed over the tome, “do we really need to speak to the dead for this case? It really doesn’t seem necessary. We should at least look for physical evidence first.”

“Sid, my boy,” he replied, “don’t let your distaste for interactions with the departed cloud your judgement. There is none more qualified to speak of their own demise then the demised themselves. It is likely that the assailant was someone known to Mr. Flannelly.”

“I know that, boss, but they’re so damned spooky and they always complain about being dead. I’m not sure they’re very reliable witnesses either.”

Wonderhaus laughed at this. “Very true, young Sid, very true. But they do have insights that we require from time to time.”

I shook my head, gave the onlookers a sidelong glance, and went about spreading salt around the corpse in a level four pattern. It’s got more lines, you see, than a level three circle but not quite so many as a level five. This laborious process took about fifteen minutes and the circle filled most of the available space in the room. By the time I was finished, Greg had finished refreshing his memory of the incantation and retrieving the rest of the necessary ingredients from the pack.

“Anything else?” I asked him as he completed preparations.

“Yes, Summon Recent Dead  puts a toll on my soul which will require tea, as you know. I would like you to conduct the interview this time while I recover in the dining room.”

I refrained from complaining and simply nodded before getting out of the way and joining Captain Fiona and Baggabond. The look on Baggs’s face in particular was one of nervousness, but I figured that this would be his first time witnessessing necromancy. The good captain had seen this plenty of times on previous cases and even she seemed a bit apprehensive.

Gregarious took a moment to consider the placement of the sun outside before finding the southern edge of the circle. In one hand he held his raven-headed cane with blue gemstone eyes. In the other he held a fistful of powdered silver. With everything in place, he began the incantation with an unnatural boom to his voice. I think he does this for dramatic effect.

“Dearly departed dead, return. Suddenly silenced soul, come forth. Your time has come, but your work is undone, awaken again under the sun.”

And with those words still ringing in the air, Wonderhaus blew the silver dust from his outstretched palm with one powerful breath and struck the edge of the circle with his cane. The silver took a life of its own, swirling around the edge of the circle as if caught in a wind, though the salt on the ground remained motionless. The particles spread, obscuring our vision of everything remaining with the circle as the cloud turned into a whirling silver pillar. After a few long moments the whirling silver cloud burst into green, heatless flames and suddenly collapsed into the salt lines, staining the white circle with its eerie, color.

And in the center of the glowing circle, standing on top of the dead body of Leobald Flannelly, was a spectral cat.”

⧫ ⧫ ⧫

“Oh, is that where she came from?” asked Maya. She was currently failing to pet the translucent green cat that was sitting in her lap. She couldn’t quite make sense of the physics of this.

“Yeah,” Sid said simply.

“I thought you hated ghosts, though? You’ve complained about them several times.”

“Well, yeah, but I suppose I only meant human ghosts. Shadow here is fine. She doesn’t complain about being dead and I don’t even have to feed her or take her to a veterinarian.”

Maya look at at Sid, disappointed. “You named your ghost cat Shadow? That’s incredibly lame.”

“I figured that if she doesn’t cast a shadow then she is the shadow, you see?”

“Whatever, Sid. Anyway is this legal? You’re definitely not supposed to raise the dead without a license and it’s usually frowned upon to keep the dead around when you’re done with them.”

Sid shrugged. “Maybe I can finish my story?”

Maya took another drink as Shadow gave her an unearthly meow.

⧫ ⧫ ⧫

It was a few minutes later and I could hear the conversation happening in the hallway outside the door. I was trying to pet the cat at the time.

“Lazaphroth’s blessings, how did this happen?” asked Captain Fiona incredulously. 

“Ah, well, you see,” stammered a very tired Wonderhaus, “I have one theory. The spell summons the most recently departed soul within a small area. I believe the evidence points to our attacker leaping out the window. Where they landed, I suspect you’ll find the body of a cat.”

“Aww,” I said to the cat as she chased around a piece of string I was dragging through the salt circle around her “did the mean, fleeing criminal crush you? Poor girl.”

“I apologize but I must rest,” I heard Greg say to the two other before he called out to me. “Sid, my boy, would you be so kind as to tidy our mess up? I will join you shortly and we will attempt a more precise spell.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” I said and waited until they were downstairs before I stood up. “Hey, girl, I don’t know if interviewing you is going to be much help, but do you want to help me solve a crime?”

“Meow” said Shadow, eerily.

I walked over to the window and looked out into the garden beyond. The broken pieces of the pane had dried blood on them, so it was definiltely true that someone had leapt out this way. Making sure to keep my neck clear of the glass, I peered outside. Sure enough, right there among the glass shards in the grass was a small, unmoving, furry body. When Greg finally makes an assumption he’s usually right, so I wasn’t terribly surprised.

I came back inside and looked around for anything else out of place. What I found was my new friend perched on the writing desk, having just knocked over a few of the papers.

“Heh, even in death you can’t stop knocking things over, can you?” I said, walking over to pick up the papers. “Silly dead cat.”

Now, I have it on good authority that cats can’t read, so I’m not sure I can explain this. In my hands I had everything to solve the whole riddle. It’s usually more difficult than that. I looked down at where she sat on the desk, but she just flopped over on her side and looked back up at me. So I told her my plan.

After my sleuthing I did as had been asked and tidied up the magical mess. Gregarious, Captain Fiona, and Baggabond returned to the room as I finished using the vacuum rod to retrieve the last of the salt, which had returned to its original color by this point.

“All done, sir,” I said, placing the sack of salt back in the pack. I looked over at Greg who was honestly still struggling at this point. “Oh! You still look so tired, let me help you.”

I began to walk over to give Wonderhaus a shoulder to lean on, when I was tripped by the cat and stumbled right into Baggabo, toppling him over and knocking the strange hat right off his head. I landed on top of him and when I looked up I was met with something not exactly surprising but…

“Dear gods, you need to see a healer!” I exclaimed at the face of Leobald Flannelly, whose disguise hat was no longer casting its illusion from on top his head. His real face was still quite cut up from throwing himself out the window the night before.

“What is the meaning of this?” said the captain, surprised.

Meanwhile, I noticed Greg looking down at his feet to see the documents I had left there. He picked them up and only needed a moment to understand what had happened in full.

“Hmm, I’m afraid, my dear captain,” he began, “that our friend here is not, in fact, Mr. Flowers.”

“Flower, sir,” I tried to correct.

“Right, yes, of course,” he said with a nod. “Baggabond Flowers is the real victim here. It appears that this man, Leobald Flannelly, is our murderer. In our haste, I believe we overlooked some very vital documents.”

Captain Fiona took a look at the fallen man still pinned under my weight and then walked over to Wonderhaus to see the documents herself. He continued to explain.

“You can see in this Final Notice here that Mr. Flannelly was in some very serious debt. It also appears that Baggabond attempted to resign last night with this letter, but all things considered that seems have not gone over well. And this may be explained by another document, recently notarized I might add, that designates the beneficiary to Mr. Flannelly’s rather large life insurance policy to his personal assistant. No, it appears that not only is Mr. Leobald Flannelly a murderer, but has also attempted insurance fraud, which I do believe the city takes quite a serious issue with.”

“Fine work, Archmage,” said Finoa, pulling a pair of manacles from her belt. She pulled me off of Leobald easily and clapped them around his wrists. “You’re coming with me.”

⧫ ⧫ ⧫

“And that’s it. That’s all that happened,” Sid finished.

“What? No it’s not,” Maya said incredulously. “None of that explained what happened to the painting.”

“Oh yeah, I found out later that Leo, in his attempt to make the whole thing look like a burglary gone wrong, had stashed that painting in the basement. He really messed up one of the walls lifting that heavy frame alone.”

“How do you know how heavy the frame was? Was there some other clue?”

Sid took a long drink before finally saying, “I stole it later that night.”

Maya gave a long, hard laugh at this.

“Of course you did,” she said, shaking her head. “Even an honest job can’t make an honest one of you, huh?”

“It’s really not that honest a job, I think,”

“So Gregarious is going to just let you keep the cat? Couldn’t he get in trouble for that?”

“Eh, he seemed fine with it. He told me that one of the city council members keeps their childhood dog’s ghost around, so probably nothing would come of it if I was reported. And honestly he seemed excited that I showed any interest in something other-wordly.”

The two friends sat and drank for a bit longer, Shadow’s head peering up over the table watching them. Finally, both drinks finished, Maya spoke.

“So, I’ll get us another round and you’ll tell another?”

“Absolutely.”