We arrived at Murder Burger with a few minutes to spare.
Mina held open the door, shooing Seoul in first. She stopped me right before I got in.
“Hallow, you going to be okay?”
There was more behind the words—a load of things. At least, that’s what my brain told me. But figuring out what they were and making them into conscious messages to act on, that took effort and energy which I couldn’t muster up. I just accepted the vague notion that she was worried. Specifically what, though? One could only guess.
The blank stare went on for too long, and Mina didn’t wait for the answer. “All right, let’s get in there then.”
We entered Murder Burger.
For a burger joint that opted to have a gallows-humor-themed name, the place tried its best to be fancy. They separated the dine-in area from the take-out area, with the former decorated to the T with Victorian-era motifs. Flowing colors of black, grey, and red adorned the walls, dotted with photos of people biting into a juicy burger that spurted out ketchup disguised as blood. I put the hood over my head and tried to hide my face.
“How many?” the hostess asked. She gave me a look, but there was no recognition in those eyes. Just the same tiredness that I had, except her mouth still had energy to form a smile.
Customer Service in a nutshell, I guess. Except, I didn’t have an excuse.
“We have a table waiting for us,” Mina said when it was apparent I wasn’t going to do the talking. “A party of three?”
“Please head on in,” the hostess said and returned to staring blankly out the glass doors.
I followed Mina in.
There were some foggy recollections of Wol relaying Mina’s messages to me. Something about Society sending practitioners to conduct interviews-slash-orientation. That not only were they to assess me, but they were to recommend me to a job function for Society. I couldn’t remember the rest of the message, because I recognized them right away.
Three powerful people sitting drew a lot of eyes in their direction, and something told me it wasn’t just because I could see their familiars. Other patrons—and keep in mind that they can’t see—kept shooting them glances, though if asked why, none of them would have a reason. It would be their instincts, telling them that something was different. Age-old, buried survival-based instincts told them to stay close. Because when things came out at night, these people were their only chance.
Mina took a seat. “Practitioners. This is Jain Shin Hallow, the current head of the Shin family.”
“Hi,” I mumbled. “I’m Jain.”
The elderly black man didn’t so much as give me a chance to sit down before he turned sideways in his chair and snorted. He had a Southern accent. Texas? No, a little too rounded. Mississippi? Somewhere swampish. “This? This boy right here is the new Shin?”
“I’m sorry?” I asked, taken aback. His eyes were hidden behind a pair of jet-black sunglasses.
“Craig,” the asian woman chided softly in a distinct accent. She couldn’t be too old. Late thirties at most. Her attire was part of the reason why they were garnering so much attention—a bona fide kimono. I mean, in New York, anything’s possible, and people have seen stranger things. It was just on the fringe of the realm of possibility for New Yorkers to stare a second or two, then get back to what they were doing.
Craig leaned on his cane, lip upturned and giving me a downright scowl. His familiar, a Black Dog, sat behind him, his head high enough to rest on the man’s shoulder. “I don’t see nothing special about him.”
Mina stepped in. “Practitioner Richtor. Let me finish the introductions, then we can start discussing.” She cleared her throat, pointing to each of them in turn. “This is Craig Richtor, one of the oldest practitioners in North America. He generally looks over the affairs in the Southern States on behalf of Society.”
I nodded along.
“This is—”
“I can introduce myself, Journeyman Baek,” the Japanese Woman said. “Ayumi Tachibana, Guji of Taichi Shrine. You may call me Ayumi.”
The next woman had dark skin and darker hair. Before she spoke, she tapped a cigarette case on the table and slid one out. In one smooth movement, she had it clenched between her lips.
“Maria will do,” she mumbled. There was a faint accent—Southern American, I suppose.
Then, to my horror, she brought out a lighter and lit the cigarette, taking a long drag before letting it out.
“Hey, what the—you can’t—” I began.
But Maria never stopped. She opened one of the salt shakers, outlining a circle and a symbol that I’ve never seen within it. I felt the working come to life, my senses barely able to make out what it actually did. It was an enchantment working, meant to… control? No, it was too soft for that. Redirect. Yes. That felt more right.
“Great, now the waitress will never come this way,” Craig grumbled.
“Attention.” I caught on. “You’re redirecting attention.”
“Not redirecting. Dispersing.” Mina sighed, looking annoyed. “It’s not going to work for long. Practitioner Orlais, may I remind you that you are breaking one of the Statutes”
“It’ll be gone before they notice,” Maria replied, taking another drag of her cigarette. “And I’ll be done with my smoke by then.”
Mina clenched her fist. I knew that look very well. She was resisting the urge to roll her eyes. Huh. It looked like the fancy new title came with its own set of headaches. “Okay. Well, I’m going to go order something then. Does anyone want anything?”
“Hot water, please,”Ayumi said immediately.
“I’m good,” Maria said between taking another drag from her cigarette.
Craig was the only one who bothered to take a look at the menu. He peered through his reading glasses. “Let me see here… I’ll take the Texas Chainsaw Special. Extra sauce.” He handed Mina the menu.
Mina looked at me expectantly.
“I’m ok. I ate before this,” I said, feeling small. Truth be told, I was starving. But I didn’t have a single cent to my name. And I’d be damned if I said that was the reason why I didn’t want to order anything.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Craig’s scowl deepen in intensity. If he stared any harder, I’d be worried about a heart attack or something, given the man’s age.
Mina nodded and headed towards the counter.
No one else spoke while she was gone. Craig started muttering something under his breath, staring off into space. Ayumi sat straight, her eyes on mine, which I refused to meet. Maria smoked, tapping her cigarette once in a while to drop the ashes into the now-empty salt shaker.
This was a motley crew if I ever saw one, and it didn’t inspire confidence in my immediate future.
Not like it mattered. There was no future worth a damn for me anyway.
Mina returned a moment later. She stared at the table, and I could see her visibly composing herself. She took her seat. “Okay, I’ll start this meeting then.”
“Where’s my food?” Craig grumbled.
Mina wisely ignored him. “I made this meeting the first step in our process of interviewing Jain to determine his eligibility to be a citizen of Society. It’ll be a multi-step process where each interviewer will examine you as they see fit.”
The words sent alarm bells ringing through me. “Hold on a second. What do you mean by examination? That sounds like a test.”
Maria and Ayumi shared an almost imperceptible look. I’m good at catching things like that, being the butt of people’s secret jokes throughout the entirety of my life.
“It’s not like there’s a pass or fail, Jain,” Mina said.
“Let me interrupt, Journeyman,” Ayumi said. “The more proper term in your language would be ‘Assessment’, Mr. Hallow.”
“An assessment of what?”
“Character, boy,” Craig said. “Whether you’re fit to serve.”
“Serve?” I asked.
Craig scowled some more. “Boy, listen before you speak. You talk too damned much.” He turned to Mina and gave her a curt nod.
The usual tongue might have had more nip to that reply. I bit my tongue and decided to do as he suggested.
“The interviews will take place over a month,” Mina continued. “You’ll meet with each proctor individually. The contents of the interview will be between you and the Practitioner in question, no one else. There is no minimum number of meetings required, but there is no maximum either. But none of the Practitioners may make appointments that infringe upon another’s schedule.” She said the last part with a look at the three Practitioners.
Maria flicked her cigarette into the salt shaker and twisted the lid shut.
“After the interviews are over, they will be sending their assessments as well as recommendations to your status back to Society,” Mina finished. “Now you can ask questions.”
“I need more details,” I said. Wol nodded eagerly from my shoulder. “Like… what’s the end goal here? To see if I’m Society material?”
“Oh, you’re part of Society already, boy. Whether you like it or not, that’s a fact. Now what’s up for debate is what part of Society they decide to let you be part of. One of them pompous—” Craig began.
“What Richtor means,” Ayumi interrupted at just the right time to disrupt Craig’s tempo. “Is that, depending on our recommendation, there will be different privileges. Rights to vote on certain matters of Society, for example.”
“And if I fail, I don’t have a right to vote?”
“There is no failure here, Shaman,” Ayumi said. “Only that we are assessing what role in Society you would be appropriate for.”
Craig snorted.
Ayumi continued. “But rest assured, no matter the result, your place in Society is guaranteed.”
Craig snorted again. Maria’s eyes danced with something dangerous. I wasn’t getting the message here. Of course, they were saying things. But there was something else. As always, when dealing with practitioners, there were some underlying meanings I had to interpret. Except there was no freaking dictionary for the code.
Craig definitely had a point about them being pompous… whatever he had been about to finish his sentence with.
I could guess, though.
The buzzer vibrated.
“I’ll get it.” Mina left to get our food.
“Don’t be nervous.” Maria drummed her fingers on the table.
“Huh?” I looked at her.
Maria was attractive. And I don’t mean that in the sense that she was just pretty—which she was: soft brown skin, large eyes, sharp cheekbones—you get the point. No, it was the air about her. She had that allure that mature women have; like she could teach you things. Not in a trashy way. But really teach you: how to treat a woman, how to take her out to dinner, how to lean in for a kiss, what the right things to say so you don’t sound like a blustering fool. She was like this hot teacher that everyone has a crush on, plus your friend’s older sister who just graduated from college.
“You’re nervous,” she said, shrugging, a playful smile flashing across her expression. “It’s not serious. This… interview. Just a formality.”
Ayumi smiled warmly. “Yes. Formality,” she agreed. There was a bit of strain in her voice as she said ‘formality’.
“Bullshoot,” Craig swore. “If it’s formality, they wouldn’t have sent us now, would they?” he glared at me over his glasses. “Boy, the rumor is that you killed Charlotte Valentine. That true?”
“Uh… no?” I ventured.
“Involved, then,” Craig said, folding his arms. He leered at me.
“I’d say I was less of an active participant and more of an innocent bystander,” I said.
That got me a bark of laughter from the old Southerner. “Right. Innocent bystander.” He shook his head. “My ass, boy. My ass.”
I desperately wanted to change the subject. If these people were interviewing me for Society material, then there wasn’t anything to be gained by being marked as the killer of one of their esteemed members. “Can I ask what these assessments will entail?”
Mina returned just then and wordlessly dropped Craig’s Chainsaw Massacre Special in front of him. She had ordered the Jr. Detectives meal for herself. My stomach growled in protest, and I scooted my chair to make a scraping noise to hide it.
“Without revealing too much, it’s to assess where your talents lie. Whether you are suitable to serve in some capacity, and to see if your talent is considerable enough to be part of the Citizenry,” Ayumi explained. “You will do fine, Shaman. As long as you answer truthfully, I don’t foresee a problem.”
“Uh,” I trailed off, my thoughts overtaken by the tantalizing scent of the meal before me. “Let’s say I do get a stellar recommendation from each of you. What does that mean? Besides the voting thing, I mean.”
“Hopefully, you’d be officially recognized as a Citizen, granting you several benefits, albeit responsibilities of equal measure,” Ayumi answered. “Access to the Society Network, Library, Catalog, among other things.”
“Knowledge,” I whispered.
Ayumi nodded wordlessly.
Knowledge was the currency of the preternatural world. Knowledge meant you could do things. Make trinkets, sell stories, try and manipulate relationships and connections between things—and every practitioner I’ve come across who wasn’t part of Society had been practically thirsty for knowledge.
“But it ain’t for free, Boy. Nothing is,” Craig said.
I looked at him, but it was Maria who elaborated.
“Small things.” At my blank stare, she shrugged. “Like this interview.”
“I want to get a clearer idea of what makes someone eligible to be a Society Citizen,” I said.
They all spoke over each other.
“Vision,” Ayumi said.
“Character, Boy.”
“Talent,” Maria said last.
I sniffed, starting to get a general sense of how this would play out. “Thanks,” I said sarcastically.
“Jain,” Mina said. There was a bit of ketchup on the corner of her lips. I mimed wiping at my own, and she dabbed at it with a napkin as proper ladies do. “Jain,” she repeated. “I know you’re thinking this is some other version of the trial, and you’re looking for a trick somewhere.”
I gave her a more or less affirmative grunt.
“But I swear, there isn’t a trick. The Shin Estate is yours. Period. And as far as Society is concerned, so is the Hallow Estate. There’s no need for you to be nervous. As Practitioner Ayumi said, this is a formality. And it’s more for you than it is for us.”
“How so?”
“Well, we want to make sure your talents will be put to the right place,” Mina said. “And it’s not like it’ll be a nine-to-five job. It won’t interfere with school or your life. Think of it more like an annual club membership that you pay dues to once in a while.”
“I have to pay money?!” I nearly yelled.
Mina looked confused. “W-well, yes. Of course.”
I looked at her, slack-jawed, shook my head, and stuffed the thought to a place where the sun doesn’t shine in my brain along with every other crushed dream. It was something to worry about later.
I bit my lip, taking a deep breath to calm myself. Money… was some foreign concept to me at this point. Too many envelopes marked with the words ‘Last Notice’ were showing up at the RV, and staying in bed all day didn’t help. But even thinking about it made my heart quicken and my vision narrow; I knew that being a fragile little flower didn’t help with the problems going away. But pretending they weren’t there was way better than trying to do something about them.
And in the end, this interview started to fade into the background of my mind like the rest of those things—just another thing to do. The debris of shock settled among the list of numerous daunting tasks ahead of me, that wouldn’t really amount to much even if I did them. But my mind told me there were more questions I should ask. Just to let them know I was listening.
“What happens if I’m not, you know,” I said, shrugging a shoulder, “not citizen material?”
Ayumi’s stare never left mine. “You’d be put under protective custody.”
I frowned.
Mina stabbed at a fry with her fork. “But you’d still retain ownership over the Shin and Hallow properties, as well as the knowledge in them,” she said hurriedly.
I wanted to ask more about the protective custody. It didn’t sound good. It probably wasn’t. I sucked in a breath to say something, but the only thing that came out was a sigh instead. It was easier pretending that I understood than to start asking questions which might lead to answers I wouldn’t like. Worse yet, answers that might make me do things.
“So when do we start?”
Craig finished his burger. “Tomorrow. You’re with me, Boy,” he said. He wiped his hands on a napkin, cleaning around his mouth too. “You know where the Old Tree is?”
“The Mother Tree?” I asked, echoes of events a month prior coming flooding back. With the memories came things I didn’t want to face. I pushed it aside. I didn’t want to process it. Not yet. Not ever. But it did awaken something, and the next words spilled out of me. “She’s… she’s gone. And it’s still Winter, so the dryads are sleeping. They haven’t had time to choose a new one yet.”
Ayumi frowned at that. She turned to Mina. “I’d like to check on this matter. To make sure the damage isn’t extensive.”
“That’ll require the Hudson Witch’s permission,” Mina replied. “But I can arrange a call.”
Ayumi didn’t look happy at that. Not more than she had been during this entire talk anyway.
“Then it’ll be Central Park,” Craig said. He got up. “We done here? I have some personal business.”
“Yeah,” Maria got up too. “Be seeing you.” She gave me a wink and followed Craig and his Black Dog out.
Ayumi was next. “Then I shall take my leave as well, Shaman. I look forward to speaking with you. Journeyman Mina, will you join me?”
“Yeah, one second,” Mina lingered, then turned to me. “Jain, I don’t know what’s going on with you, but you better shape up quick. These guys are not playing around.”
“It’s just talking, isn’t it?” I said weakly.
“It’s—“ she began, then cut herself off. Both of her brows furrowed in annoyance. She turned to Wol who had been silent until now. “What’s going on with him?”
“…I will speak to him,” Wol said evenly.
“Talk to him. And talk to him fast. Because this is serious, Wol. I said a lot of good things about Jain, and if he’s not what I said he is, they’re going to take advantage of it.Then my position is at risk as well, okay?”
“I understand, Child,” Wol replied.
Mina gave me one last scathing look. “And Jain… take a shower, okay? Just because you won the trial doesn’t mean you’re some big-shot. Hardly. Don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who becomes a lazy bum the moment they hit it big.”
And for the first time today, fire rose up to my throat. But it settled there, refusing to come out. There were a dozen things I wanted to say to her.
But she was already walking out the door.
I sat there for a moment, watching through the window to make sure they were gone.
Then almost shamefully, I reached over and grabbed Mina’s unfinished burger and started eating it. I took some of Craig’s fries too. It felt horrible: the feeling of getting something in my stomach while looking around, praying that no one would notice.
I finished the food. The drinks too.
They were cold.