Wilkes patted down his hair for the umpteenth time and stared glumly at the saloon across the road. It wasn’t evening yet but the temperature had considerably (and thankfully) dropped from its abysmal spot in the high twenties which had reigned the week. How did these people live here? There was nothing but dust, rocks and more dust. He sighed and looked across the street again. The Silver Sickle, the battered signboard in front of the ramshackle building read in uneven, hand-painted letters. He steeled himself and let his feet automatically carry him to his assignment.

For days, he had carefully watched the comings and goings of the denizens of Opal Valley. It had been mind-numbingly boring, the only change in the mediocrity of it all being the faces of new miners, lost strangers and opportunistic traders — there’d been no sign of the man he was supposed to find. Until yesterday. He had watched him with something akin awe dancing at the back of his mind, and a healthy dose of trepidation. The man was legendary, with most cases closed than any other Inquisitor in the last half century, and a track record of being the Ministry’s best augur since Zia Nedely. They called him the Undertaker for gods’ sakes. How the hell was he going to go about this?

Threaten him, if possible; you must not fail, Knott’s voice had angrily whispered in his ear and then his target had turned to look at him, as if he had a third eye at the back of his head. Their eyes had met; his brown to other’s blue, and he’d immediately felt awfully tense. He had broken eye contact and looked anywhere but the man’s face. By the time Wilkes had gathered his wits, Tony Bones was gone.

Now, though, was the time to confront him. As soon as he opened the Sickle’s door he was assaulted by the smell of alcohol, sweat and cigarette smoke. Wrinkling his nose in barely veiled disgust, he let his eyes wander over the many patrons’ heads until he found his target. He was seated in a corner at the back of the saloon, staring intently at what looked like a newspaper. He steeled his nerves and made his way to him.

“Hello.” Wilkes started.

The man did not answer and merely tapped his pencil against the paper. He was playing Sudoku.

“I’m Jonathan Wilkes, sir, and I work for the Ministry—”

“—of Higher Mysteries, I figured.” He murmured.

Well, they say it takes one to know one.

He tapped the paper again and peered up at Wilkes. He was surprisingly ordinary-looking for a man whose name instilled terror in any sane person working for the Ministry — a nondescript face, average height, dull, grey-speckled brown hair.

“What do you want?”

“I’m here on a discreet assignment from the Undersecretary himself. To find you, Mr. Bones.”

“And why is that, Mr. Wilkes?”

“Your presence is required at once. Other information pertaining to this situation will be given to you once you arrive at your destination.”

Bones stared at him blankly. “No.”

“No?” This was going to get nasty.

“If you weren’t aware Mr. Wilkes, my days of getting tied up in Ministry business are over. I’m retired.”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“It’s urgent.”

“I don’t give a fuck.”

“It’s imperative that you do what you are ordered to do. Should you continue to be unhelpful, there will be severe consequences.”

A beat of silence.

“Will there?” the question was said lightly and the older man’s unnerving eyes stared intently at him. He was not fazed, and withdrew from his breast pocket a photo. He didn’t know who the people in the old print were, but he wagered that Bones did.

Threaten him, if you must, Knott’s voice said again. He doubted much could scare the Undertaker, but was proven wrong almost immediately.

He prided himself as an extremely observant man. If it had been someone with a less keen mind and sight, he believed they wouldn’t have noticed anything. The change in Bones’ face was barely discernible. Shock, indignation, rage, a hint of fear — all these emotions passed through his features in the span of a second before he schooled back his expression to one of neutrality.

“You have an obligation to fulfill your vows, vows which are under Imperia, Mr. Bones. If you find these simple instructions distasteful then I assure you the ramifications of your oath-breaking—”

“Sit.”

Something strange took hold of him, a bubble of an even stranger force that wasn’t his own, and he immediately sat down before he could question why exactly he was doing it. He didn’t know where the sudden compulsion came from, but he had obeyed nonetheless. What the hell?

“What’s your full name?”

“Jonathan Ryan Wilkes,” he found himself saying, his voice coming out heavy and monotonous. What was happening to him?

“Hmm,” said Bones and picked up his pencil again, casually jotting on the previously abandoned paper.

“Where do you live?”

“12 Bolleria Street, Fazanno.”

A condescending wolf whistle. “Fancy, that. Could barely keep myself out of King’s Hollow back in the day.”

“What do you do at the Ministry?”

“I’m Overseer for the Department of Mystical Phenomena.”

“How come you’re here, then? DMP doesn’t directly answer to the Undersecretary.”

“Mr. Knott thought it would be beneficial for me to see you in the flesh.”

“Still a right bastard, that Knott. What can I say, there’s no cure for being an asshole, eh?”

Wilkes had nothing to say to that. In just a few seconds, he had told a stranger significant information about himself that he wouldn’t have revealed otherwise. He felt the odd cocoon that had enveloped him and made him mysteriously susceptible to Bones’ questions release him, if only for a while. He still sensed it nonetheless, hovering above his mind like a predator watching prey. What was this?

“What did you do to me?” he angrily demanded. Inwardly, he was panicking. He hadn’t heard a spell being uttered — a non-verbal one might be possible but this was unquestionably mind magic, a field that took years to master, let alone practice effortlessly. He was an Overseer, gods damn it, and he should’ve sensed something.

“What did you do to me, you son of a bitch?!” he yelled, undoubtedly causing more than a few heads to turn their way.

The older man’s eyes flashed and Wilkes felt something tug and harshly force open the doors of his psyche. It was odd to describe the feeling. One moment he had been trying to intimidate the Undertaker and the next, the full weight of a freight train bore down on him and utterly crushed whatever defenses left that were protecting his mind from intruders.

And it hurt. Like hot needles walking all over him, and all too suddenly he felt his brain scream at him painfully, crammed in an invisible and too small container. For the first time in many years, he wanted to cry. And as if sensing that shameful need, whatever foul magic Bones had evoked increased the agony tenfold. He opened his mouth—

“Don’t scream,” the fiend said to him softly, attention drawn back to his stupid Sudoku.

—and instantly clamped it shut, biting his tongue instead. Gods, it was awful. Bones was awful. The man was a charmspeaker. How could he not be when it was so obvious? Nobody had ever escaped his questioning methods without spilling a boatload of their secrets. And nobody had ever asked why he was so good at what he did, including him. How could he be so ignorant?

“You’re a right brat, aren’t you?” the pencil stabbed the paper suddenly and Wilkes felt it.

“Strutting in here, telling what to do, when to do it.” It was now scrubbing at a crossword puzzle furiously, and he felt every single stroke of it. He could taste blood in his mouth, and the symptoms of a heavy headache were starting to exhibit themselves. Black spots danced in his vision.

“Get up,” Tony Bones said, “we’re going for a ride, boy."