July, Monday 14th, 1961, 12:45. Wetborough, North Georgina Kingdom, United Countries of Faeldris.

I had to take a train back to Wetborough with quite the feeling of exhaustion. I had gotten nowhere with this case except further strengthened my hunch about what was going on with everything. I couldn’t imagine how he had managed to make money off these businesses and I wasn’t allowed to see his tax information without a warrant. I didn’t get any good company on the train ride home.

I was driving in my slow car. It was an old warhorse of a vehicle that rumbled down the street easily. I pulled up the Grinkle’s office and stepped inside. I waved my face with my hat as I approached my favorite receptionist. “Eerinas, what a pleasure to meet you.”

She smiled broadly with large flat teeth, her horns curled, gimlet eyes wide, and fluttered her eyelashes at me. “John,” Holding out a hand I took it and gave it a peck as she giggled. “The boss is waiting for you,” Eerinas stood up and came around the desk walking me towards the door, “Are you ever going to take me out on a date again?” Her hooves clacked on the wooden floor as we walked.

“You know our schedules never lined up my dear. You were always the most pleasant company.” I stepped through the door to the smoky room that was Grinkle’s private office. I handed my coat and hat to Eerinas for her to put away.

Grinkle looked worse for wear. His eyes were haggard and a cigarette hung out of his mouth. His normally smooth face was covered in days long growth. The mop of blood red hair was greasy and lanky. Hanging down from his face. Those yellow intense eyes fell on me as he motioned for me to sit.

Taking the seat I pulled out my own cigarette and lit it with a wave of my hand. Taking a deep breath we both sat in silence for a moment. I was waiting for him to start, but he was waiting for me to ask. I gave in, “What do you have for me my friend?”

“I don’t know if I should call you that anymore. I was almost caught twice by this wizard and he for sure knows someone has been watching him.” The redcap reached down and pulled out a thick envelope stuffed with information. I took it from his hands as I opened it and started to shuffle through it on his desk.

“What am I looking at? Want to give me some highlights?” I asked taking a drag from my smoke. The stills were high quality but barely showed anything that the wizard was doing himself.

“Well, he owns more than just the businesses in town. He has a metal mine of some sort a few miles out of town. I couldn’t get close enough or in his records to figure out what kind of metal he is getting. A few days after I was watching him he went from a full head of short growth hair down to being bald as a baby halfling.” Grinkle pulled up a photo and started to tap on it. “This is the strangest thing I found. He has got a whole set up for creating bot fly larva. He donates most of their dried husks to the local farms for a pittance but not nearly his whole stock.”

“That is really strange,” I took the picture and looked at the wizard taking a bucket inside his home. The rest of the pictures showed hobgoblins loading up sacks of feed into the back of a truck. The next few slides showed a large flat cloth that fluttered out the window. Shadows of something was on the cloth but whatever was there was washed away. “What’s this?” I flipped the picture to Grinkle.

He shook his head, “Couldn’t figure that out. Once a day he hangs it out the window and beats it with a large paddle.” Putting out his cigarette he placed another picture in the center of the desk. “Every day, I can’t even think about what he was doing.” He leaned over and pushed his call button. It crackled to life, “Eerinas be a darling and bring me a cup of coffee please.”

“That would be your fourth cup today, are you sure?” Her voice was full of worry.

“Yes, two creams and a sugar,” He leaned back and rubbed at his face some more. “Day three he had laid a trap where I had been the day before. A full capture circle with runes to set off an alarm. If I wasn’t on the watch for it I would have been caught. Just in case he was tracking me I drove to a river and washed myself in natural running water to shake off any magic trails.”

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I took out a few copies of deposit slips from several of the businesses. All of them were disastrously small. “These are worse than I thought. I knew they would be bad, but this is crazy. It wouldn’t even cover wages.”

“Yeah, and those were real bastards to get a hold of.” Grinkle tapped his empty pack of cigarettes looking for another but he was out. “Magical wards, easily slip past with some pixie dust.” He closed his eyes and almost nodded off for a second. “They were in a safe though, that took quite a bit of magic for me to crack.”

I nodded and shuffled through all the written reports that he had scribbled out. All of it with details much deeper than the small verbal report. I looked through them as the cup of coffee came in and slid in front of my friend. “This just makes things more bizarre. I have no idea how all of these connect.” I put out my spent cigarette in the tray and flipped through all the stills again.

Grinkle looked at them all thinking about what else to talk about. “Also, start of the week he took a crate to the bank. I couldn’t find out what was in them but it was heavy enough to need three hobgoblins to carry. Something pretty heavy. Later that day a new crate was brought in, just as heavy.”

“A crate?” I looked at the two stills showing the struggling men loading a crate. “What the hells could that be about.” I frowned as I looked at everything he gave me. “I don’t know if this is enough for me to get a warrant for his financial records. Which is a problem. There is something we are missing. Any other details you got for me?”

The redcap was sipping his coffee as his eyes glimmered with thought. “Well, he picked up a case of thread from the clothes store he owns. I couldn’t get a look at what kind of thread he was picking up though. That and I didn’t see him step out of his house with any new duds to wear.”

I kept looking through them over and over again. There was something I was missing and it was driving me crazy. I scooped it all up and tucked it away in my briefcase for safety. “Why are you staying awake when you look this tired?”

Grinkle’s head snapped up and he shook the sleep out of them. “I have a feeling at the back of my mind that someone is watching my dreams. Maybe a small curse, I’m not sure. I have a voodoo doctor appointment in another hour to cleanse me of any malevolent magic.” He started to down the coffee with heavy gulps.

I stood up, “Well, consider your debt cleared Grinkle. What do I owe you for your fees?”

“Settle it with Eerinas, I’m not sharp enough to figure that out right now.” He reached out and we clasped hands ending the deal between us. The magic that I held over him for so long slipped from me and back into the fae man.

Stepping into the greater office I approached the lovely satyr. “Hello dear, what do I owe the boss?”

She cupped her chin in her hands and fluttered her eyes at me. “Well, he needs some magical reagents to trade to some pixies. Do you have any trapped sunshine? The gasp of a tired man? What about the deepest thoughts of boredom?”

I smiled at her and shook my head, “I’m not that magically gifted to harvest those kinds of things. I have coins?”

“What about a few treasured memories I could harvest. It won’t take them away from you just give us a copy of them. Something pleasant? Maybe romantic?” She gave me a saucy wink.

“Ok, I can give you three memories of first kisses. Will that settle us up?”

“As long as I’m not one of them I’ll be fine with that. Let me get a couple sleep lined bottles.” She shuffled through her desk as I sat in the open chair and set everything down. Slowly closing my eyes as I focused on the memories of a few first kisses.

Soon enough I could feel the cool touch of Eerinas’s forehead on mine as she started whispering ancient fae words. I could feel her reaching into my mind and grasping them memories I was conjuring. As she pulled away those memories grew slightly duller until I focused on them. They began to clear up and become solid once more as I opened my eyes. Three silver globes of light floated above me as they swirled with images of lovely women. I could see Heratrude’s hopeful face in one of them. Eerinas held up a bottle and the first one fell inside it filling it like liquid. She corked it and repeated with the other two.

She smiled at me and pat me on the head, “Lovely memories John. These will do nicely.”

“Thanks for not taking the whole memory. I know they’re much more valuable if it's taken fully.” I said as I stood and swayed on my feet for a moment. The after effects of the magic slowly faded from my mind.

“Grinkle wouldn’t have liked that. Ruins business relationships. Unless I take the memory of the transaction as well.” Eerinas leaned back in her chair and her eyes went glossy. “If I gave away my full memory you could always give me another first kiss, right John?”

“Don’t be like that, you know we wouldn’t work out.” I chastised her as I pulled my hat and jacket back on.

Letting out a long sigh she leaned back and fanned herself off with one hand. “Can’t blame a girl for trying, handsome. Maybe if you didn’t sweep me off my feet that night I would give up entirely. You’ll want to settle down someday, and I’ll be long gone in another man’s arms. You’re missing your chance.”

I grabbed her hand and kissed it once more, “I hope you find someone twice as interesting as I am.”

“Tall order,” Eerinas sighed as I settled her hand back on the desk. “I hope you find some poor girl with wanderlust that you can drag all around the countries. Good night John.”

“Good night Eerinas, until next time.” I stepped outside of the office and stretched my arms. The wave of sleepiness from the memories being extracted flowed through me until I washed it away with my own meager magic.

I did a couple squats to get my blood flowing before climbing into the car and drove back to my office.