The Kansas City Warlock Weekly Series

My name is Levi and I swear I didn’t kill her. Sure, I was the only person found at the scene of the crime, and maybe her blood was literally on my hands, but I can explain all that. I’m a journalist writing for Kansas City’s magical community. So when I suspected that a woman had been cursed, it’s only natural that I went to learn more. I couldn’t have known she’d be dead before I arrived. Seriously, I write headlines about bridge trolls and solstice events, not murder. The Wizard’s Council thinks I did it, and I’m going to have a hard time convincing them otherwise.

Even when I’m not chasing kidnappers, I don’t keep normal hours. I’m a journalist; late nights, burnt coffee, and energy potions come with the territory. When I get lost in a story or deep in pre-publication crunch time, I can’t quit just because the sun’s been down for eight hours. So when my best friend called me well after midnight to say she was being followed, I was already halfway out the door before the call could be hexed. I wasn’t fast enough. By the time I arrived she was gone--vanished from within an impenetrable magical ward.

It’s not every day that a whistleblower shows up and drops a satchel full of damning documents in my lap. Photographs, audits, and reports, all showing willful wrongdoing by a major magical manufacturer; everything a journalist could ever want for a front page story. Then the whistleblower wound up dead, and my easy work week was shattered. Despite official reports, I knew he didn’t die in a workplace safety accident. What was less obvious, at least until I started digging, was how much fallout his death would leave behind.