Hedley led us north, further out of the city centre. We walked: now I was warm, dry, and had clean socks, I was happy to enjoy the brisk evening air and take a little time to trail my fingers in the unseen magic streams as we wound our way through sleepy residential streets. After the wrongness of the magic around the kelpie, the familiarity of the buzz of the city was a balm. Hedley, full of anxious energy, fairly twitched along, talking non-stop but apparently mostly for his own benefit; his long legs - longer even than mine, and I was usually the tallest person in the room - carried him ahead so that he often had to stop and wait for us when he realised he was alone. Rowan walked between us, diminutive by comparison.

I cast a sidelong look at her. Today, she'd picked her purple biker boots to contend with our urban wanderings. Stylishly ripped jeans, bomber jacket with carefully curated sew-on patches, she was a paragon of trend that put my ratty old trainers and oversized jumper to shame. She's chopped her auburn hair short recently, and it now just brushed her chin. With big blue eyes and a smattering of freckles across her pale nose, she looked like a pixie, if pixies were five foot tall, Irish, and quite happy to stomp on your toes should you accidentally eat all of the takeaway you'd promised to leave for her.

She was following my lead, only half listening to Hedley's babbling, more focused the slow shift of magic as the terraced streets grew wider and leafier as we entered suburbia. Rowan had been my apprentice for a few years now, and she was gifted. I wasn't too big to admit I was a little jealous; she had an innate sense for magic that it'd taken me years of hard practice to master. She was young though, and despite her natural skill she lacked the experience to deploy it, so I wasn't out of a job yet. Master and apprentice was still a strong tradition in the magical world. I had a master once, and one day Rowan would have an apprentice of her own, and so the world continued to turn from one generation to the next.

"You're messing with my zen, Sam." Rowan broke my reprieve with a bump to my shoulder. Or, near enough - her shoulder only came up to my midriff. "Did you know your magic starts to smell like burning rubber when you think too hard?"

"Liar." I bumped her gently back.

"Will the pair of you stop dawdling, please?" Hedley had stopped up ahead outside a house that was no different from any of the others on the quiet road. Set back slightly from the street, a gate opened onto a short brick path that lead to the painted front door, edged by well-kept flowerbeds.

I looked up at the house. It was still and dark. "No housemates? Girlfriend?" I asked.

"No." Hedley answered a little too quickly. I looked at him, and the tips of his ears turned the same colour as his hair. He coughed. "No girlfriend, he lives alone."

I raised an eyebrow but didn't inquire further. "Bit fancy for a student, isn't it?"

Hedley, thankful for the change of subject, opened the gate and lead us up to the house. "He's from old money. Father was a banker, mother some fancy sculptor."

"I see." Probably the only reason anyone studied folklore to PhD level was if they had rich parents and didn’t need to get a real job. "You know, Hedley, if we're breaking in, it's usually advised not to do it in full view of the street."

"I never said we were breaking in."

"Then how-?" Hedley produced a key. "Ah."

"He asked me to water his plants while he was on holiday a little while ago, that's all. Don't judge me." He said defensively.

"I'm not judging, Hedders."

"I can totally feel you judging."

"I swear I'm not. Are we judging, Rowan?"

"Oh, I'm totally judging." My apprentice said, sly grin on her face. "Do you have your own drawer yet?"

"My own drawer?"

"Got to be pretty serious if you've got a key." I agreed.

"Wait, does he know you have a key? It's kinda creepy if he doesn't."

"He knows!"

"How does it work, what with you being", Rowan's flapping hand encompassed all of Hedley, "Well, you, and him being, I assume, human?"

"It?"

"You know." She made a lewd gesture. Hedley choked.

"It's not like that!" He spluttered.

"Aww, Hedders, you can tell us. Is he cute? Does he buy you flowers?"

"What do I want with flowers? I'm a bogeyman!"

"A bogeyman with a big crush!" Rowan clapped her hands in delight. "Come on, come on, get us inside, I want to hear all about him. How did you meet? Did he sweep you off your feet? Or did you do the sweeping?" Hedley gave me a pleading look, a shapeshifting deer stuck in Rowan's pinpoint headlights. His hair had started to turn from keratin to actual copper in his distress.

Having received a similar grilling several times before, I came to his rescue. "Rowan, perhaps you can interrogate him once we've tracked Oscar down, hm?"

Rowan pouted. It was a powerful pout. I turned away from the temptation to give in and let the teasing continue, took the key from Hedley's unresisting hands and let us in to Oscar's house.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

I believe you can tell a lot about a man from the place he chooses to call home. My cramped little flat, though small, was full to bursting with echoes of my life. Kitsch little knick-knacks from my travels, where every destination was a challenge to find the most garish memento yet. Pictures of people and places, each with their own story mapped out in photographic film; books, old, new, all well loved; piles of laundry that never quite made it to the wardrobe, wine glasses still out from the previous night's company, fast food menus tacked to the fridge. It was very much lived in, and very much mine.

My home and Oscar's could have been a study in opposites. Though tidy and well tended, the house felt empty, and not least because its occupant was missing. There was a small pile of mail collecting on the doormat; Hedley scooped it up and took it through to the kitchen. Rowan and I trailed after him, through a living room that was clearly perfunctory rather than comfortable, probably only present to satisfy convention. The kitchen itself was modern, all chrome and granite, but looked about as used as the living room. I opened the fridge out of idle curiosity. A few microwave meals past their sell by date and half a bottle of white wine. The only thing to mark the room as belonging to an actual human being, rather than a clinically clean showroom, was an array of potted plants lined up along the back of the counter. I had no idea what they were, not having much of a green thumb myself, but they were looking a little sad and limp. Hedley tutted and watered them.

I continued to wander through the house. Upstairs, a bedroom, bed made. Bathroom, spotless, single toothbrush. Finally, at the end of the hall, a study.

This was clearly where all the living had been happening. Notes had been pinned up on the walls, covered in a tiny, looped writing. Occasional sketches were scattered amongst them, annotated in the same hand: his research subjects, I guessed, and beings I knew. Here, Yallery Brown, a spirit from the north that was helpful up until it was no longer needed, then capable of a powerful grudge. There, Habetrot, with her distended lips, spinner of cloth and magics. A kelpie – though not the one I'd met today - a bluecap, and even one or two of the friendlier trolls to be found around the city. They were good likenesses, features picked out in hard graphite strokes and soft charcoal smudges.

The desk was groaning under the weight of yet more notes and books. There were new collections of children's fairy stories with pastel-toned watercolour illustrations, old tomes of yellowing vellum bound in cracked leather, handwritten sheathes laid out with careful attention to conservation. I picked up a few pages and scanned over them. It was all familiar to me – the research spread over the desk, creeping in photocopied stacks across the floor, and climbing the walls with the help of push pins and bluetack, laid out the world I knew, the world I lived in. I was impressed. The flow of magic in the room was tight, focused, drawn in by the fulcrum of knowledge represented in one man's obsessively thorough PhD project.

"Blimey." Rowan had followed me, Hedley behind her. "Is he, like, Rain Man or something?"

Hedley sniffed. "I don't know who that is."

"Blimey." Rowan repeated. "We really need another film night." She came up beside me and picked up one of the papers from the desk. "The Nuckelavee. Half water horse, half skinless man." She gave a theatrical shudder. "Never heard of it."

I glanced over. The paper was short compared to the others, just a few paragraphs of text, but looked to be still in progress. "I can't say I've come across it either." Rowan raised an eyebrow, and I gave her a half shrug. What can I say? You can't know everything.

Hedley joined us, looking over Rowan's shoulder - it wasn't difficult for him, given the height difference. "That's because the Nuckelavee doesn't exist. At least, not any more."

"It doesn't exist?" Rowan's other eyebrow joined its fellow in her surprise. She had very expressive eyebrows. "If there's one thing that all this sorcery stuff has taught me, it's that everything I ever thought was a fairytale actually exists, out there, somewhere. Some of those fairytales even live on my street."

"It existed at one point. Just, not now."

I could see Rowan wasn't satisfied with Hedley's explanation. "Not all magical creatures are still around." I said. "They're subject to Darwin's laws just as much as the rest of us. Over time, most of them evolve with the world around them, but those that don't die out. Think about the trolls – no more living in the dank shadows of bridges, now they've unionised and got themselves fancy little toll booths. Perhaps the Nuckelavee just couldn't keep up with the times."

"Probably a good thing too." Rowan said, scanning the page. "Sounds like a nasty bugger."

I hummed agreement, but then spotted what we came for: Oscar's diary. Like the rest of his notes, it looked well thumbed. The ribbon bookmark was still in place for Wednesday, now three days out of date. There was a name and a time noted down in the same tiny handwriting.

"Looks like he might have met up with someone." I showed them the page. "And I know where to find them."

***

As we left, my mobile rang. I fumbled, trying to remember how to answer. It was new, its flashy handset and slick touch screen Rowan's latest attempt to drag me reluctantly into the modern era; I was now regretting ever letting her come phone shopping with me.

Rowan patiently took it from my clumsy hands, worked some magic – not the metaphysical kind – and handed it back. I mouthed a thank you, and she rolled her eyes. I didn't recognize the number, so I waved her and Hedley to go on ahead as I answered.

"Sam Finch speaking."

"Hey, Sam."

I suppressed a groan. "Not using your own phone, Alex? That's a new one. You're getting wily in your old age."

My youngest brother snorted, but it was good natured. "I wouldn't have to if you actually picked up when you saw it was me calling."

I sighed. I didn't want to start a fight with the only member of my family I was still on friendly speaking terms with, but the night was already rolling on and we had a mission. "Alex, I'm sorry, I've been busy. As I am right now. I'll give you a call in a couple of days -"

Alex scoffed. I could picture him doing it: cheeks - still with a touch of puppy fat even though he was only a few years younger than me - screwing up as if I'd made a crude joke. "No, you won't. Doesn't matter though. Peter just wanted me to find out if you've sent mum a birthday card."

I should have known. Even Alex didn't do social calls much any more. "Tell our brother dearest that if he wants to pester me about things there's not a snowball's chance in Hell I'm doing, he can ring me himself."

"Sam -"

"Sorry Alex, but mum gave up her right to birthday cards a long time ago. You all know this." I tried to keep my voice level, even though I was prickling at being told - and I was under no illusion that Peter's message was a demand rather than an inquiry - to send a birthday card to the woman who disowned me. Why Peter still tried, I didn't know; probably to satisfy some inherent older brother need for control.

Alex made a small noise of distress, or possibly frustration, and I softened a little. I had no beef with Alex: he'd always been the baby and never called me a heretic, or a Satanist, or tried to get me to disavow my magic in favour of the one true Lord and Saviour. On the other hand, I'd had it up to my neck with Peter's games at being family patriarch. "Look," I said, "I will call in a few days. Maybe next time you're down this way we can grab a beer? But Peter can go fish elsewhere."

There wasn't much left to say, after that. The phone call had soured my mood again, so we said our goodbyes, and I caught up with Rowan and Hedley. My apprentice gave me a knowing look, but I waved her away.