The docks are never a nice place no matter where you are. It certainly was no place for a respectable person to be, and if they were there on business, that business should be concluded swiftly before the musty smell settled into their clothes.
Now if one sees a woman around the docks, that usually means one thing. She was a doxy and she was looking to ply her trade among the burly dockworkers. Such...business was usually engaged once the sun began to set but none of the workers were likely to be complaining if one came to flaunt her wares during the day. Sunlight illuminated features all the better.
Though most doxies dressed and portrayed themselves provocatively, that didn't mean all of them did. Obviously, the higher class ones could sometimes be mistaken for ladies of fashion. And so, if one certain young lady was to go walking around the docks unattended, and there are those who like the idea of ravishing the apparently innocent proper types, you can hardly be surprised by the kind of attention she gets.
"I want to know whether you were around this area the night the boat smashed into the dock." Lina was on a short fuse, a slowly burning one, but a short one nonetheless. She had managed to come down to the dockside without Zelgadiss but questioning the workers her for any leads had proved to be frustrating and infuriating. The catcalls and whistles she could take and ignore. The blatant leer on the face of the burly, tatooed worker she was inquiring was rapidly wearing down her temper.
"Well, milady," since it never hurt to be polite, one might get some extra, "that's not exactly something I think we should be discussing outside, if you know what I mean."
Lina contemplated on what she could gain if she purposely misinterpreted that last phrase in a way he didn't mean it to mean.
"Some place private and I can show you what I saw that night." He leaned down toward her, much closer than Lina would like since it only increased the stench of sweat and ale in her face. "Make it worth your while. And mine."
To make it worth her while, Lina would have to fireball him to the moon and then freeze him there. Men, always thinking with their pants. She took a step back.
"Hey there, we aren't done yet!" The dockworker's arm grabbed Lina roughly by the arm. Either he didn't know his own strength or he didn't care but she was sure her arm was going to be bruising tomorrow. "The fun's just starting."
"I think not," said another hand clamping down on the wrist that held Lina.
Her first thought was that it was Zelgadiss. That brought mixed feelings. One, to her disgust, was relief since this could very well get messy if she had to use a spell or something to cool off this brute. It may work but then she could hardly expect the other dockworkers to look too kindly to it. Two other feelings were humiliation and anger, because of the situation she had let herself get caught in and that he got to see.
Then of course her common sense gave her brain a kick and pointed out that the hand of her 'saviour' was rough and callused, like that of a laborer. No way would Zelgadiss's hands look like that.
"Pike off. I saw her first."
The hand didn't move. "That isn't anyway to treat a lady, or any women for that matter."
The last thing Lina expected to find on the docks was chivalry, and certainly not in a dockworker, which was what this man obviously was. The surrounding workers had paused in their work to watch this. It looked to be an odd pair-up. One side was rough, uncouth, and burly. The other was blond, taller, and certainly not as muscular.
"My grandmother always told me-"
Lina groaned. What kind of man goes around spouting what his grandmother told him?? Her captor also found it amusing and guffawed once, before letting go of Lina to give the upstart a heavy punch. He never connected as the younger man caught him by the jaw first and sent him flying backwards into some crates.
"That you should always be nice to them," he finished, oblivious to the stares from Lina and the crowd around him. Then everyone remembered that they were supposed to be doing something, namely working, and got back to it. "You alright, miss?"
Lina wondered if he was a complete idiot. Oh well, he did get her out of a sticky situation even if this incident probably put an end to any other questioning she wanted to do around here. That only left inspecting the boat but she could hardly do that during in broad daylight when everyone could see her. It was still off-limits by order of the authorities.
"I heard you were asking around about that boat." He jerked a thumb toward the boat and the ruined dock. "Don't know why you want to know but all it did was just sail right into the pier as if it didn't even know it was there."
"How do you know that?" She figured he was too simple-minded to be pulling her leg and he didn't have that look that several other workers had about luring her into room with promises of information. His face was like an open book, an open blank book.
"Because I saw it."
"You what?!"
"You know, it just went WHOOSH!" He made a sliding motion with his hand. "People were screaming er...well, they were screaming at the boat. But it was late and I was tired and hungry so I went to get something to eat over at-"
Lina grabbed him by his shirt. "You actually saw the whole thing and just walked away from it?!?"
"Hm? Well, yes. It's none of my affair. I'm just a dockworker. Just load and unload what I'm told to, never talking about what goes in and out, and stuff. Life is much simpler if you just do what you're told to do and don't stick your nose in other people's business."
Well, that was kind of true. Most of her trouble did come from getting mixed up in other people's problems... But this wasn't the time for reflections on her life!!
"Did you see anyone leaving the ship?"
He gave her a look. "I was leaving. How could I tell?"
Lina's head dropped in exasperation.
"By the way," he said, tapping her arm, "could you let go? I need to get back to work."
"Oh sure. Go on. Thanks for your help." As little and unnecessary as it was, she thought privately. She wasn't staying here any longer, she had already memorized the layout of the area for her little excursion tonight.
So caught up in her thoughts, Lina didn't notice that the blond dockworker didn't go straight to one of the loading areas but instead headed toward one of the several taverns along the docks. He paused next to the side of one of them.
"Didn't really look like she needed any help," he noted to the air apparently. But the air was listening since a small bag fell into his hand with a noticeable clinking of coins. "And not that my opinion counts for anything but I think if you can do something, you should do it rather than hiring a third party to do so. But who am I to judge? I just mind my own business."
"Until next time, Gourry." The voice was hushed, coming from the half-shuttered window of the tavern's second story where the private rooms were. Gourry's words were true, but seeing the pains to which Lina had tried to sneak away from him this morning, Zelgadiss figured it would be more interesting to loosen the leash for a bit. He'd definitely have to rethink that idea after today.
"Until next time, milord."
So in the end, it looked like she would have to inspect the cargo and the ship herself. The problem being the former was under the jurisdiction of both the authorities and their respective owners and the latter was roped off and guarded by the authorities. Well, it was unlikely she'd be able to take a look around the ship with their blessings so. . .
"What are you, some kind of stalker??" Lina hissed at the dark blob next to her on the warehouse rooftop. The docks weren't very well lit like the inner city so few people would notice a person flying above them, much less if a little fog rolls in.
"I have a interest in this case as well and I doubt you'd obliged me to give me regular updates on how it was going. It's much easier simply to tag along with you." It was hard to tell whether he was actually smiling though it was in his tone. Lina couldn't help wondering where he had dug up the dark, non-descript work clothes he was wearing and how many times they had to be washed before he could convince himself to put them on.
"You'll just get in the way."
"It may be useful to have another pair of eyes for collaboration."
"The last thing I would need is help from you-"
"Down."
He pushed her head down as a patrolman passed below them. Lina also hated the heavy-handed way he treated her. She was not one of those empty-headed, dressed-up ninnies in those social circles he frequented. That's one reason she quickly dropped her idea of marrying high and rich, she couldn't stand the society.
"I don't need you patronizing me." She brushed off his hand and floated away from the roof, keeping a good distance between herself and the ground and wandering eyes. This was probably not the use of magic that the city officials were thinking about when they gave her the license but what they didn't know couldn't hurt them. And she's used magic in the past for less innocent purposes than bypassing a police line.
For those who were wondering, no Lina wasn't flying around in a dress or skirt. Besides the extra weight of all those petticoats, she wasn't about to give anyone who was looking up a scandalous view, even if no one was supposed to be watching. Lina had a very comfortable suit of dark clothing she used for purposes like this, sneaking around, that ah few people would expect much less realize she had. Of course, it wasn't expected that women who worked or traveled around should dress up when it was impractical. That didn't make it any more acceptable to those whom 'work' was a foreign and almost unknown concept.
Lina let herself down slowly over the ship but didn't let herself down on it. Just one squeaky board or misstep could bring the watch on them and she hadn't even begun looking yet. Though useful in getting to the ship, the fog was a damned nuisance now when she was trying to get a look at her surroundings.
"The cargo hold is this way," whispered a voice right by Lina's ear. Zelgadiss had also flew over to the ship. Yes he knew magic too though Lina doubted if he even had a license for spellcasting. Not that it mattered, he could probably pay off the fine. Buying the license would be no hardship to him.
Reluctantly, Lina followed him down into the cargo hold since she wasn't familiar with the ship and didn't want to spend too much time topside. Once downstairs, where it was too dark to see even the person next to her, Lina fumbled for the matches she needed to light her dark lantern. It would be difficult to manage two spells at once, even if the spell for light was a childishly simple one. Besides, she would need that extra room for thought to scour this place for clues.
A match sparked to light and then vanished briefly as it disappeared into the interior of a dark lantern and then there was some light. Enough for Zelgadiss to see Lina scowling at him.
"What? You didn't expect me to come without my own means of seeing."
She just growled and lighted her own lantern. It wasn't because he was also carrying a dark lantern that made her scowl. It was because, with the light, she finally noticed that he wasn't floating over the floor. Well, she wasn't exactly sure how strong his magic was, perhaps he couldn't maintain a spell for a long time like she could. But how then had he managed to walk all the way down here without making a single sound?!?
Between the two of them, there was a respectable amount of light but the dark lantern kept it directed where they wanted it go so most likely no one would notice anything from the open cargo hold door. It was a bit of a mess in the hold, tumbled cargo boxes and crates from the crash. There was a notable area of empty space.
"That's our cargo," Zelgadiss informed Lina, raising his lantern to swing it around their surroundings. "No blood down here. Apparently the vampire managed to catch everyone on the deck, or rather, everyone eventually came to him there."
"Like we could inspect there," she snorted, walking, or rather floating over the mess and trying to reconstruct in her mind where everything had been. "Give ourselves away for sure. Can't even put everyone to sleep with the number of other people walking the docks. Someone is bound to notice."
"Besides the fact that they're protected against it," the gentleman-turned-sneak commented. "But I'm sure you've already attempted that before." He knelt down to inspect something. "Either way, I doubt you could decipher anything from stains of blood."
"Except that perhaps our 'vampire' was more interested in a slaughter than feeding. Or perhaps he managed to sate himself by gorging on several people. He must have been feeding off of rats while hiding on board." Lina looked behind a large crate near the ship's brow and wrinkled her nose. "Ewww. Sometimes I hate being right."
"However, the only extra person on board was Appleby and the entire crew was accounted for. Unless he was part of our cargo, it's rather questionable as to how he got his coffin and himself on board." But judging from his tone, Lina didn't think Zelgadiss sincerely believed the vampire had been part of Rezo's wish list, at least not officially perhaps.
Speaking of officially...
"There could have been some unregistered crew mates. I've heard that ships sometimes force beastmen into service, treating them horribly like slaves, throwing them overboard when they die or are no longer useful," Lina thought out loud. "Of course, something like that would be hard to prove. Anyone who had been engaging in that kind of practice for a while would know how to get that past port and dock inspections."
"Hmmm..."
She looked at the gentleman who was sniffing the air. It probably didn't suit his delicate senses, the rank smell of fish and murky water, the smell of wet wood, and that kind of metallic smell that left a bad taste in the back of your mouth. Lina wished she could take a look at this during the day when there was more light to see. While she was at it, she wished she didn't take this case and had the money so she wouldn't have had to. She wished-
Something glistened, catching the light of her lantern.
Lina turned the light fully onto it. It was several lines of some kind of line or wire. They seemed to travel around the hold, as far as she could see them. She debated asking Zelgadiss whether he knew what they were but then, why would he know anything about ships anyway?
"Do you smell something strange?"
"I smell something that stinks."
"That's not what I'm talking about."
He sounded rather disgruntled about her flippancy and was studying something with fierce concentration. Floating over, Lina followed his gaze to those lines she saw earlier.
Somewhere, someone smiled.
Zelgadiss's eyes grew wide. "Lina! We have to get out of here!!" he yelled, grabbing her arm and running for the stairs.
"Wha -- !? Zel, what are you -- "
The rest of Lina's words were lost as the ship exploded into flames, rocking the docks' nighttime peace twice in one week.
Someone chuckled at the fireworks over the river. "Looks like someone tripped the little surprise I left behind."
Someone else rolled his eyes. Not that you could see that, but you get the feeling he would be engaging in some kind of expression of exasperation. "You couldn't just put a hole in the hull and sink it like any other person could you?"
"Where's the fun in that?"
"This isn't about fun. It's about cleaning up the master's tracks."
"He doesn't leave tracks."
"It's a human expression."
"Eww. Why would you want to remember that?"
The dim light of the moon and stars grew even dimmer as something large passed by the skylight of the room they were in. The darkness slipped into the room, forming, for those capable of seeing in such poorly lighted conditions, a person with wings. He appeared to wipe his mouth.
"Did you feed well, master?"
"Delightful." And with that, he disappeared into the shadows of the room, leaving his two servants to their devices.
"It'll probably be in the paper tomorrow."