Author's Note: Happy Halloween, everyone!
It was late October when Sifu Halsey was sent on a mission to San Diego to meet with a potential client, and as he always did when he traveled for the Lin Kuei, he took Kuai Liang, Tomas, and Bi-han with him to help reinforce his cover of being a single father traveling with his teenage sons for business. In California, they had rented a beach house for the week, and because they would be there through Halloween, Bi-han excitedly taught Kuai Liang and Tomas how to carve pumpkins for the holiday. Even more exciting, at least to the boys who'd never known such luxuries before, Sifu Halsey would be taking them to a costume party hosted by their neighbors on the beach who magnanimously invited the "widower" and his young sons to attend.
That morning, Tomas sat calmly at the small dining room table, eating a bowl of oatmeal as he heard Kuai Liang and Bi-han thunder down the stairs. It was nice, he mused, not having to worry about walking on eggshells like they did in the Temple. For a few days, they could pretend to be normal brothers and not worry about getting whipped for being too noisy and rambunctious.
"Hey, Tomas," Bi-han said when he walked into view.
"Hey, Tomas," Kuai Liang echoed, stepping closely behind his much taller brother.
"Happy Halloween," the older of the Cryomancers said.
Tomas feigned surprise. "Wow, is it Halloween already? Must've slipped my mind!" he smiled. "Hey, before you guys go for your walk on the beach, can you get me some more orange juice?" He held up his glass for the other to take.
"Sure," Bi-han shrugged. He took the glass and walked to the refrigerator. Inside were packed grotesque rubber body parts. "Oh, that's cute, Tomas!" Clearly, he was unmoved. He yanked out an ugly severed head and tossed it to his fourteen-year-old brother.
"Nice severed head," Kuai Liang declared, mildly impressed. Now he passed it to his friend.
"Cute?" the Czech teenager said, wounded by the declaration. He sadly looked at his severed head. He'd spent his spending money on these rubber limbs. And for what?
"Did I say cute?" Bi-han quickly amended. "I meant terrifying."
Kuai Liang, on the other hand, didn't even try to make him feel better. Sarcastically, he waved his hands at Tomas and said, "Ooooh."
"That didn't shock you at all?" he asked, crestfallen.
The younger Cryomancer shrugged. "Well, Tomas, I tried to be scared."
Bi-han walked to the table and, in a fatherly sort of way, patted Tomas on the shoulder. "Look, you Czechoslovakian Q-tip, you've gotta face it. It's a fact of life, you know? People grow up."
"Then how do you explain me?" he countered.
The Elite sighed. "I gave up trying to do that a long time ago." He nodded to his brother. "Come on, Kuai Liang." And then the brothers went outside.
"Good morning, lad," Sifu Halsey greeted Tomas as he now walked into the kitchen.
"Good morning," he greeted back.
"I've got so many things to do today, I don't know where to get started," his teacher muttered. "I've got to meet that client for the Lin Kuei, and then I've got to-"
"Hey," he interrupted, "you should start off with a nice, hot, relaxing cup of tea, Sifu."
"Oh, that's a good idea, boy," he agreed as he grabbed the teapot and turned on the water faucet. Immediately, a severed arm popped out of the disposal like a can of snakes. For a moment, Hydro looked at it in bewilderment, not afraid, but definitely puzzled. And then, dawning spread across his face. "Oh, by the Elder Gods, today is Halloween! I almost forgot, I've also got to pick up the costumes before the party tonight."
Once more, Tomas felt a great, hard blow to his pride. "Sifu?" he called.
"What?" his teacher asked, prompting the teenager to gesture towards the bloody stump in the kitchen sink. Once again, Halsey's lavender eyes lit up in recognition. "Oh, oh! I'm sorry, boy. That - that was really an adorable gag. Ya really got me."
Tomas sighed. "I've heard this happens to other guys like me, but I just never thought I'd be susceptible." He paused and looked up at his teacher. "I can't perform."
"Well, by the Elder Gods, I should hope not. You're too damn young for that, ya idjit."
The teenager wrinkled his nose in both disgust and annoyance. "Not that. Gags! I used to be the King of Pranks around here. But so far today, I've got nothing."
Halsey crossed his arms. "Well, look, ya git, you've got sixteen hours left. I'm sure ya can come up with something totally gross and disgusting by then."
Sighing heavily once again, he looked away. "You're just saying that."
"No, no," his Sifu argued. "I mean that from the bottom of my heart. But really, I've got a lot to do today, okay? I'll see you this evening. Stay out of trouble." He turned and opened the door to the garage where he was keeping his rental car, and immediately, a fake skeleton dropped from the rafters in front of him. It dangled there, and Halsey just blankly looked at it. Once again, realization struck. In an attempt to spare the boy's feelings, he yelped, "Oh! Oh, you crazy git! That was so scary!"
"Oy," Tomas grimaced as his face fell into his hands, his soul defeated.
That afternoon, as Bi-han and Kuai Liang were helping some of the neighbor women set up for their party, Tomas was hard at work outside with Sifu Halsey, splitting wood for the beach bonfire they were going to make later that night. The Czech teenager did not like his chore, and he resented being made to do it. This was his vacation from the Temple, as he saw it, and he didn't understand why he had to work. Thankfully, he had something in mind to show his teacher what he thought about it.
"Just about finished splitting the wood for your bonfire, Sifu," he panted as sweat dribbled down his face.
"Well, thank you, lad," he said, leaning against a handful of the neighbor's tiki torches that he'd been asked to erect around the shore. "You're an idjit, but you're a good boy. I've come to rely on you a lot more lately than I ever thought I would."
"Are you feeling alright, Sifu?" Tomas suspiciously asked. He raised his eyebrow. "For a moment there, it sounded like you were being nice to me."
Halsey chuffed. "Well, the truth is, I've met a lovely lady since we've been here in San Diego. She works with the client we came here to see. And since you three idjits are the closest things I've got to sons, I'm very anxious to get your opinion of her."
The Czech teenager's eyes went wide in surprise. "But Sifu, I thought relationships like that were forbidden by the Temple-"
"Oh, they are, ya git," he cut him off. "I'd be beaten within an inch of my life if Oniro ever found out. That's why I'm counting on ya to keep your mouth shut."
"I won't say a word, Sifu. But I don't like her." He was surprised by the truth of his words. A twinge of unexpected jealousy pinched his heart, and he scowled at the idea of sharing his teacher, even for such a short interlude, with someone else.
"Ya haven't even met her," Halsey admonished him.
"Doesn't matter," he shrugged and resumed his work. "She-devils are nothing but trouble."
His remark earned a hearty chuckle from his teacher, who said, "Oh, boy, ya always know how to make me laugh." He turned and disappeared into the shed, and while his back was turned, Tomas started screaming for help, as if he was in the most horrible pain of his life.
As expected, Sifu Halsey came running. The color drained from the man's face when his eyes found Tomas' axe stuck through the top of the boy's hiking boot. Blood spurted through the hole and he was wailing loudly, laying it on thick to sell the severity of his injury.
"Oh, by the Elder Gods!" his teacher cried. "Tomas! Put direct pressure on it! I'm going to get help!"
"Hold on, wait a minute!" he cried, still grunting. "You know what you should do first?"
"What, lad? Anything!"
"See if my boot fits you." Tomas grinned as he calmly yanked off the boot, with the axe still embedded through the toe. His foot and his sock were perfectly fine.
When Halsey realized it had been nothing more than a sick prank, his face turned scarlet. "By the Elder Gods, Tomas! Are ya trying to kill me? I nearly had a heart attack, ya stupid git!"
"Now, you're not just saying that?" Tomas asked slowly and somewhat insecurely.
"No, ya stupid git! I'm still hyperventilating!"
"Oh, I am the King!" he happily cried. "Yeah!"
"One of these days, your jokes are gonna catch up to ya," he reprimanded. "And you're gonna be sorry ya did things like this to all of us! I'm not gonna be around forever, ya stupid git. And what exactly will ya do if I keel over?"
The Czech boy shrugged. "I guess I'll just have to work harder at getting Bi-han and Kuai Liang, Sifu."
Halsey growled deep in his throat, his face flushing purple with rage. He lifted up his finger and opened his mouth as if to say something, but no words left him. Instead, he dropped his hand and shook his head, his hot breath snorting out of his flaring nostrils. And with that, Halsey turned and stormed off into the house.
"Happy Halloween, Sifu!" Bi-han greeted his teacher as he led Kuai Liang and Tomas onto the dark beach where a bonfire was raging and licking the sky with a forked orange tongue. He was dressed as a medieval knight. At this late notice, there weren't many costumes left to choose from.
"Oh, Bi-han, that costume looks fantastic!" Halsey told him. "Much better than I expected it to."
"Yeah, maybe we can go invade the Holy Land later," Tomas, who was dressed like a monkey, joked. He now studied his teacher's costume. Halsey was dressed like Captain Hook. He pointed to the great hook that had temporarily replaced his hand. "Wow, nice hook!" he sincerely praised. "Is that cold-forged carbon steel?"
Halsey shrugged, still sore about the prank Tomas played earlier. "It was my gran's," he flatly replied. "Tomas, I'd like you to meet Morgan Billingham. He's a lawyer and he's helping me redo my will while we're in town." He pointed to a short man wearing an ugly mask with big ears.
"I hope that's just a mask," Tomas drily remarked.
As Halsey and Mr. Billingham laughed at his joke, the teenager wandered away and looked around at the gathering crowd. Neighbors from the houses lining the beach had all made their way to the bonfire and were now dancing and laughing as they ate and drank. They were talking and carrying on like they didn't have a care in the world, every last one of them dressed like vampires, witches, ghosts, and many other characters he couldn't identify if he tried. He suspected they were characters from movies or television shows here, but he wasn't familiar enough with cinema to even take a guess at what they were. He'd never seen anything like it before, even at Paldam Llamo, a Tibetan holiday with similar parallels to Halloween and his favorite holiday. The Czech boy mingled, feeling far too warm in his monkey costume, and his cheeks flushed even hotter in embarrassment when a couple of pretty blond teenagers pointed and laughed at his outfit.
He was saved from total humiliation then when Halsey grabbed him and Kuai Liang and pulled them towards a woman that could have been a goddess in a different life. Her complexion was flawless, like that of a very young woman, and yet she felt much older for some reason. Perhaps it was because of her delicate, aquiline nose, or maybe her stubborn mouth and chin that seemed hard with age. Her dark, mahogany hair fell haphazardly in loose ringlets to her waist, hiding beautifully arched brows that framed her large, expressive eyes. Like Halsey's eyes, they were shaded the most delicate violet, which struck Tomas as an extremely unlikely coincidence.
"Kuai Liang, Tomas, I'd like ya to meet Catja, my special friend," Halsey introduced them.
"Hello, Catja, I'm Tomas Vrbada," the Czech boy grumpily announced, though he behaved himself for his Sifu's sake.
"Hello," she greeted, her mouth upturned in a faint and arrogant smirk, as she took his hand and shook it firmly.
Tomas now looked to his teacher. "Gee, I thought I was your special friend," he teased, prompting a chuckle from Hydro.
"See, Catja's the woman I told ya both about," he explained.
"Oh!" Kuai Liang yelped when he realized at last who she was. "It's so nice to meet you." He offered his hand to her to shake, and she took it and held it tightly.
She stared at him for a long, hard moment, long enough that even Tomas was growing uncomfortable. It was like she was sizing him up, but more than was normal in this situation. But just as he was about to break the ice and make a joke, she finally released his friend's hand and said, "It's nice to finally meet you as well, young man," she said. "I've heard many things about you. About both of you."
Halsey patted Kuai Liang on the back and smiled broadly. "I'll let ya all get acquainted and go spice up me brew."
As he walked towards the punch, the young Cryomancer pointed to Catja's outfit, a black dress and a long, velvet cape. "Nice cloak," he complimented. "Are you a vampire like me?"
She flashed another smug grin. "No, I'm a witch," she declared.
"Where's your pointy hat?" Tomas asked. He thought all witches had to wear hats. He was fairly certain it was a law here in America. Back in the Czech Republic, witches didn't look anything like they did in America. They were more like gypsies.
She looked at him like he was a moron. "I don't wear hats, Tomas. I'm a real witch."
"And I'm a real monkey," he scoffed, suddenly uncomfortable by the awkward turn the conversation took.
Kuai Liang clearly felt uncomfortable as well, but tried unsuccessfully to hide it. "So…a real witch?" he nervously asked. "What kind of witch are you?"
Catja lifted her chin proudly. "I'm a dianic witch. I realized my power twelve years ago. Now I'm a high priestess at the Society of Sisterhood Coven."
Tomas chuckled. "Well, you know what they say," he began. "Nothing says lovin' like something from the coven!" He was the only one who laughed - albeit uncomfortably - at his own joke. Kuai Liang merely looked away and shifted his weight awkwardly from one foot to the other.
Later on, after the boys had mingled, played around, and flirted with pretty girls, Kuai Liang made a beeline for his best friend and said, "Tomas, I just had my palm read. Guess who I was in a former life?"
Tomas, who was heading towards the refreshment table to get a cup of punch, shrugged. "An Irish lap dancer?"
"I hate you," the Cryomancer glared at him and stalked away.
The Czech teenager laughed and then glanced at the punch bowl where he saw Catja pouring herself a cup. "Ooh, save me some punch!" he called to her as he trotted that way. "Hey, I'd love some punch. But I hope you didn't make it 'cause I'm eye of newt intolerant," he teased her.
Catja narrowed her eyes and tilted her chin up arrogantly. "You seem to be intolerant of quite a bit," she replied.
"No, I'm actually - I tolerate quite a bit," he retorted, his smile falling from his face. He didn't like the accusation she'd implied against him. If only she knew what the Lin Kuei was like, she wouldn't say that. But just as quickly as his smile faded, it returned. He pointed to her cup of punch. "You know that's water-based so you better be careful. You might melt. I read that in a book once, and-"
The woman laughed, but there was no mirth in her voice. The sound was decidedly sinister. "Ohhh, you have no idea who you're dealing with, do you?" she asked.
Tomas bristled, but he was unafraid. "Come on, lady, talk to the hand," he retorted as he threw his palm in her face. He'd seen that on the television inside the beach house.
Catja's fingers now wrapped around a large crystal that dangled from her neck, and she held it up for him to see. "Young Tomas, a witch is one you should not test or else her wrath will never rest," she replied in a rhythmic cadence.
The teenager's amusement was immediately gone, and in irritation, he hissed at her. Then, he stormed off to find his teacher. Halsey needed to know that this She-devil was a certifiable lunatic.
When he found his Sifu a few minutes later, the dark-haired man patted him on the back and asked, "Are you having fun, boy?"
"Mostly," he answered. "I wish the Lin Kuei could be like this all the time, Sifu," he quietly mused. He knew these people wouldn't know what he was talking about, but he still didn't want to advertise what they were.
"I wish it could too, ya git," he sighed, squeezing the boy's shoulder reassuringly. "I wish it could too. But it makes you three appreciate times like this even more."
Tomas nodded. "Yeah," he agreed. "And it's a great party. But what's up with Catja?"
Now Halsey smiled. "Oooh, you think she's odd, don't you?"
"Well, odd's kind of a strong word," he replied. "Confusing, interesting, in a kind of an-"
His teacher cut him off. "Oh, Tomas, you think she's mildly delusional."
He grimaced. "I think she's a certifiable nutcase, to be honest with you."
"I find her a little bit peculiar myself," Halsey admitted.
"Then why is she still your special friend?"
"Well, Tomas, truthfully, I've tried to end it with her three times since we'll be returning home soon, but she just won't take no for an answer. I mean, if you were in my position, what would you do?"
Tomas shrugged because he truthfully had no clue what to do short of killing her and making it look like an accident. But the Lin Kuei never killed someone they weren't paid to. "Well, like you would tell me, um...be honest, be straightforward," he thoughtfully replied. "Just tell her that it's, just nicely, tell her that it's over."
"Well, I could definitely try that," he hummed in agreement.
Now the teenager clapped his Sifu on the shoulder. "And if that doesn't work, just drop a house on her."
The following evening, after Sifu Halsey had been gone all day, having left before the boys even woke that morning, and he was long overdue to return, Kuai Liang decided to call him from the land line. He'd called their teacher's burner phone multiple times in the past hour, but the man never answered. And now, he was starting to get worried.
"Sifu's phone is still busy," the Cryomancer reported, his face a fearful mask as he sat on the kitchen counter and looked at Tomas.
"It's probably Catja trying to yak her way back into his life," Tomas replied, his nose deep in a book called The Witches by an author named Roald Dahl. It was actually kind of interesting, he thought.
"I don't like this," his friend lamented. "He should be back now."
Now Bi-han stampeded down the staircase and into the kitchen. "Hey, guys, when's dinner? I'm starving."
"We're waiting for Sifu Halsey," Tomas explained. "He was supposed to be back from his work over an hour ago."
"This is not like him," Kuai Liang nervously twisted his hands. "He's usually very punctual."
"Well, maybe the wind shifted and he caught a whiff of you," the other teased.
"What are you two babies talking about?" Bi-han now asked. "His rental car is in the driveway. He's back from his meeting."
Now both boys exchanged a confused look. "Well, then why don't you go upstairs to see what's keeping him?" Kuai Liang asked Tomas.
The Czech boy shrugged. "Okay." He headed towards the staircase and then looked back at his friend. "And Kuai Liang, while I'm gone, spray some deodorant on you."
"Oh, shut up, you jerk," the Cryomancer shot back as Tomas climbed the stairs, chuckling quietly at his own wit.
Upstairs, he knocked on Halsey's door, and called his name, but when there was no answer he tried to turn the knob. It was locked. Still, that posed no problem to him. Ordinarily, he'd never break into his teacher's room and invade his privacy like this. But Kuai Liang was pretty worried, and truth be told, he was starting to get worried as well. He'd never admit it in a thousand years to his friends, but his teacher never had behaved like this before, and it was pretty disconcerting. He just hoped that he didn't find his teacher rolling around in the hay with that Catja lady. There wasn't enough bleach in the world to get that mental image out of his head.
Calmly, trying not to think about his teacher having sex with a woman, Tomas slid into a cloud of smoke and glided through the door, emerging on the other side. And what he saw startled him. It was not his teacher messing around with a woman, but there was a mess. His bed had been upheaved and his clothes were scattered everywhere. Lamps tilted askew on their end tables and papers littered the floor. Tomas' heart immediately leaped into his chest.
"Oh, my God, what happened here?" he breathed, suddenly scared. "Sifu? Sifu?"
He wandered to the open window and looked out, but saw no sign of Halsey, not even tracks like someone had dragged him out by force.
Now Tomas turned around and caught sight of something even weirder. A wooden board with strange symbols burned into its otherwise polished surface sat close to his private bathroom door, and multiple black candles were ritually arranged on and around it. The dwindling flames flickered sadly as the breeze from the open window threatened to blow them out. In the middle of the board was the hook that Halsey had worn with his costume the previous night. The Czech teenager knelt before it to have a closer look, and found Catja's necklace, that strange crystal she'd threatened him with, carefully placed beneath the hook.
Now seriously freaked out, Tomas unlocked the door and bolted from the room, leaping down the stairs four at a time until he crashed into the kitchen like a bull in a china closet. There, the Cryomancer brothers both looked at him expectantly.
"Something is really weird in Halsey's room," he declared. "It...it looks like it was broken into. His room has been ransacked. In the middle of the floor, there's a bunch of these candles laying around, and underneath his hook is Catja's necklace."
Kuai Liang jumped to his feet. "Oh, my God, what do you think is happening?" he asked, the color fading from his cheeks.
"Well, I think that hex nut has done something to Halsey!" he yelped.
"You're crazy," Bi-han said. "How could anyone have done anything to him in our house and we not hear it?"
Tomas wrinkled his face in disbelief at him. "We're Lin Kuei, Donkey Breath," he shot back. "You know we're not the only people in the world that can slip in and out of places unnoticed if we want to."
The Cyromancer nodded. "That's true," he agreed.
"Do you think a rival clan figured out that we're here and took him out?" Kuai Liang now asked. "Maybe we should try to get in touch with the Lin Kuei."
"No, this has Catja written all over it," Tomas replied. "I'm gonna call the police. We all just need to remember our cover story."
"Halsey put the number on speed dial three," his best friend said, pointing to the phone.
"Who's Catja?" Bi-han now wondered.
"She's that witch Halsey has been seeing since we've been here," Kuai Liang told him.
His brother crossed his arms. "Kuai Liang, it's okay, you're old enough. You can say the b word now." His ill-timed joke earned him an evil side-eye glare from the younger Cryomancer.
Tomas held the phone to his ear and, when the police officer on the other end answered, he said, "Yes, I'd like to report a break-in and a missing person." He gave the man all his details and then finally hung up the call.
"The police are on their way over," he reported. "I'm going to wait outside for them," he announced as he headed towards the front door.
It didn't take long for the police to arrive at the beach house, and Tomas wasted no time leading the detectives upstairs to Halsey's room. While a few of them poked around and looked for clues, a detective named Roberts interviewed Tomas.
He was the lead cop, or so Tomas gathered, and had pulled a pocket notebook out and glanced around before he turned to the teenager. "So when was the last time you saw your father?" he asked.
The boy thought about it. "Uh, last night at the party. He was wearing his grandmother's hook."
The detective, Roberts, gave him an odd look and then shook his head. "You know of anyone who might hold a grudge against your father?"
Well, Halsey was Lin Kuei. They had at least a dozen enemies just off the top of Tomas' head, most of them rival clans looking for any chance to put the drop on one of the forest ghosts. But Roberts didn't need to know that. Besides, only one name stood out at the moment anyway.
"Yeah, there was this woman. Catja."
"You got a last name?" he asked.
Tomas shook his head and sighed. "No. He just met her recently."
"Can you give me a description?"
The teenager thought about it. "Yeah, she was uh, 5'8, dark brown hair, uh, very good-looking, purple eyes. Oh, and, um, a witch."
Roberts looked at him in staunch disbelief. "A witch?" he repeated skeptically. "I better call the boys from the Emerald City Precinct because I'm not sure we're qualified to handle this one."
Tomas rolled his eyes. "No, no, no, no. She said she was a real witch."
"Uh-huh," he replied, his voice still not convinced, "do we have anything to link her to the crime scene? A black cat, a broom?"
"How about her amulet she wore around her neck?" he tersely shot back. "It's right here." He knelt beside the board with Halsey's hook and lifted it up. He expected to find Catja's crystal amulet, but instead, he found his monkey mask. "Hey, it's my mask," he quietly muttered in surprise. "I've been looking all over for this thing because Sifu - I mean, my father - has to return our costumes before we leave."
"Your mask?" Roberts now asked, puzzled. "What happened to the amulet?"
Tomas, equally perplexed, looked at him. "Well, I- I had it in my hand," he stammered. What in the world was going on around here?
"You tampered with the crime scene?" the detective cried.
The teenager looked at him, now flustered. "I did not know it was a crime. I did not know it at the time."
Roberts raised an eyebrow and shook his head. "Dr. Seuss claims there was a witch," he said aloud while he scribbled in his notebook.
Now a second detective joined them in the hallway, and Tomas saw he was holding a few pieces of paper. "Got something here, Roberts," he said. "Tomas, were you aware that your father had recently changed his will?"
The teenager thought about it, and he remembered Mr. Billingham. "Yes!" he cried enthusiastically. Yes, yes. I met the lawyer at the party. He had big ears. Probably came in handy at his hearings."
Neither cop laughed at his joke.
Instead, the second cop looked at him with a stone-sober face. "Are you also aware that you're now named as the sole beneficiary?" He thrust the will in Tomas' face, and once the boy scanned through some American legalese, he got to the meat of the document. Indeed, he was named as Halsey's heir.
He wrinkled his nose in confusion. He could almost understand being named alongside Bi-han and Kuai Liang. But there was no way Halsey would exclude the Cryomancer brothers. Sometimes, Tomas thought he loved them far more than he loved him. And especially Kuai Liang. There was no way this was right. But he saw the seal of a notary public at the bottom, and he knew that in American law, that made it official. Tomas swallowed hard.
"I-I'm his special friend?" he squeaked.
"And possibly his wealthy friend," the detective now replied. "You stand to receive substantial cash assets and a uranium mine in Brazil."
The declaration shocked Tomas. As far as he knew, none of the Lin Kuei were independently wealthy. All of their worldly possessions belonged to the clan. He looked from one cop to the other. "I-I didn't know he was rich."
Roberts scoffed and looked at his partner. "Special friend had no idea. That's a new one."
But that riled up the younger detective. "People like you make me sick!" he yelled. "You expect us to believe that this man is your father and you had no idea he was loaded?" He stepped towards Tomas like he was going to punch him, but his partner stood between them and pushed him back.
"Calm down, MacIntyre, you just got your badge back!" he cried.
Tomas' heart was racing a mile a minute. "Guys, guys, forget about me!" he yelled. "Shouldn't we be out there, looking for my father?"
Roberts calmly looked at him. "We'll get that in motion just as soon as we get some more information. Now, look, Tomas- Can I call you Tomas?"
"I'd like that," he drily remarked.
"You really had no idea about your father's financial situation?"
"No," he emphatically replied. "I mean, he's a real simple guy. He eats a lot of rice and has been wearing the same socks for fifteen years."
McIntyre noticeably bristled. "Yeah, and that bothered you, didn't it, Tomas?" he snarled.
Tomas looked at Roberts as the younger detective stormed back into Halsey's room. "Are you- are you guys accusing me of something?" he wondered, suddenly afraid. Maybe calling the police wasn't such a bright idea. No matter the outcome of this night, Oniro would whip him with the cat o'nine tails for sure.
"No, no," Roberts assured him. "We'd never consider you a suspect until we had some hard evidence."
But now, McIntyre peeked around the door and looked at them. "Take a look at this, Roberts," he said as he motioned for both of them to come inside the room. Immediately on the other side, Tomas' axe, still sticky with fake blood, had been embedded in the door. "Property of Tomas Vrbada," the detective read aloud.
"Okay," Roberts said. "You have the right to remain silent-"
"Hold it!" Tomas yelped as McIntyre cuffed his hands behind his back. "That's just a silly Halloween prank. I just used that to scare my father."
"Well, perhaps you scared him to death," McIntyre suggested, crossing his arms.
"I am the King," he half-heartedly laughed.
"All right, Tomas, let's run through it one more time," Roberts said. "We've got your fingerprints on the back door, a will leaving everything to you-"
"A crime scene you've tampered with, and a bloody axe with your name on it," McIntyre growled.
"Okay, back off Turner. Hooch," he retorted, thinking of a movie about a cop and a dog that he just watched on television the other night when he was supposed to be sleeping. "You've also got my theory."
"Right," he said. "A witch did it."
"Right!" he exclaimed. "You see, I told my father that I thought she was a little nutty and he might consider breaking off his relationship with her."
"Oh, so you're a buttinski who can't let your father be happy too?"
Tomas glared at McIntyre. "My point is that I think she did this to get back at him for breaking up with her, and she's blaming me to cover her tracks."
"What a bunch of bull," the young detective snarled. "This one's a sicko. Taking you down would be worth losing my badge, pal!"
"Easy, MacIntyre, easy," Roberts said. He grabbed Tomas by the elbow. "Let's go downstairs and talk to your brothers."
He escorted the Czech teenager down to the kitchen where both brothers were anxiously sitting at the table, waiting for someone to explain things to them.
"Hey, Tomas, what's going on?" Bi-han asked. "Why are you handcuffed?"
He shrugged. "Well, Starsky and Hutch think I had something to do with Dad's disappearance."
"You?" he asked, puzzled.
"I told them about the witch," he said. "Tell them about the witch at the party."
Dawning lit Kuai Liang's face. "Oh, she seemed very nice," he said.
"Can you corroborate your brother's whereabouts during the time of your father's disappearance?" McIntyre asked.
The younger Cryomancer nodded earnestly. "Oh, yes, I can. He was with me the whole time-"
"Thank you, bro," Tomas said.
"-except for that 45 minutes in the middle of the night," Kuai Liang finished. Now, both detectives looked at him.
"I was in the bathroom," he hastily explained.
"Alone?" Roberts asked.
"Believe me, nobody would be brave enough to go in there with him," Kuai Liang muttered.
"You were in the bathroom for forty-five minutes?" McIntyre asked, his voice like iron.
Tomas gulped. "Well, I-I had the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition," he quickly replied.
Now, both cops nodded at each other in understanding.
But now Bi-han spoke up. "So for forty-five minutes, you have no alibi?"
The Czech teenager glared at him. "Thank you, bro," he growled.
Roberts shook his head. "Okay, I think we're ready to take you down to the station for more questioning."
"You can't do that! He's innocent!" Kuai Liang yelled on his behalf.
"It's that crazy witch!" Tomas cried. "She's the one who did this!"
Now a third detective came into the house and looked at the first two. "You better come outside. There's something you should see," he said.
The cop led them to the beach behind the house where a slew of cops and forensic experts were combing the sand. Among their number was Catja, dressed in a finely tailored black suit, wearing a badge. Her hair was done in a tight bun at her crown, and she wore little gold studs in her ears.
When Tomas saw her, he felt a triumphant surge of victory. "Good going, men!" he praised the American police. "You found her! That's the witch. There she is. Right there."
"Witch?" Roberts repeated like he was crazy. "Mary's not a witch. She's in charge of our crime lab."
"No, no, no, that's Dad's girlfriend," he argued. "She was at the party." He looked at Kuai Liang. "That's the witch, right?"
The Cryomancer shrugged and wrenched his face in uncertainty. "Well, there is a slight resemblance, Tomas. But I don't think that's her."
"Slight resemblance?" he yelped, annoyed with his friend. Now he looked back to the woman. "Catja, right?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," she replied, arrogantly raising her chin and lilting her voice higher. "What I do know is that is is officially a murder investigation."
"Murder?" all three boys yelped as one.
Tomas' heart sank. Not at the prospect of being arrested for Sifu Halsey's murder - he could break out of their jail easily enough - but rather, losing the only father he'd ever known. He gulped, swallowing sudden tears. "Are you saying that my father's dead?" he asked. He couldn't bear to know the answer, but deep down, he did.
McIntyre nodded somberly. "Yes, he's dead and you're under arrest for his murder."
"You have the right to remain silent," Roberts now said. "Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law."
"But I'm innocent!" he yelped. "I've been framed here!"
"We just need a positive ID on the body," Catja/Mary said as she waved her underlings over.
"Body?" Tomas cried. Now, real tears streaked down his cheeks.
"Bring it in," she commanded her people as they wheeled a stretcher towards them. A body was laying on the stretcher, but it was covered with a sheet. Reverently, she peeled back the sheet from his face, revealing Halsey's stiff, lifeless face.
"Is this your father?" Roberts now asked the Cryomancer brothers.
Bi-han didn't say anything at first, merely gulped down his anguish. A tormented expression crossed his face as he looked to the Czech boy. "Oh, God, Tomas. Why'd you do it?"
"I didn't do anything!" he protested, the tears falling more freely now. Grief-stricken, he leaned in closer to look at his Sifu Halsey. A thousand different memories flashed through his brain as he crept towards the motionless man. There he was, teaching young Tomas how to fight off Jiao-long and the other bullies with his crutches after the boy first came to the Temple. There he was, helping him understand how to use his powers of smoke and invisibility to his advantage. There he was, trading insults with him as they walked through the forest around the Temple. There he was, giving him a present just because. There he was, taking the beating with the cat o'nine tails for him because Tomas' failure to win the sparring match against Bomani was really his failure to teach him properly, and not the child's. This wasn't happening. Sifu Halsey just couldn't be gone...could he?
"Sifu?" he whispered uncertainly.
Suddenly, Halsey sat upright like a shot and screamed "Boo!"
Tomas screamed like a small child and fell backwards into Kuai Liang while everyone else started raucously laughing at him. Halsey, meanwhile, rose to his feet with his biggest grin, ripped the sheet from his body, and pointed to the Czech boy.
"Gotcha!" he yelled. "I am the true King around here, Tomas! And don't you forget it!"
"This was all just as trick?" Tomas muttered in shock while Roberts uncuffed him. "You mean, you were just teasing me?"
"Hey, we were all in on it," Kuai Liang proudly told him, earning a frog to the arm from Tomas, who then whirled around angrily and pointed at his teacher. "This was not funny!" he cried. "Death is not a laughing matter."
"Oh, how many times have you used death as a prank on us?" Bi-han pointed out.
"Not his death," he hissed, pushing him into the support beam underneath the beach house. He was this close to punching someone.
"Calm down, you stupid git," Halsey said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "At least now I know that you wouldn't just try harder to scare your brothers."
Tomas looked up at his smiling face and remembered what he'd told his teacher the day before - that if the man died, he'd just try harder to get Kuai Liang and Bi-han. And suddenly he wanted to tell Halsey everything trapped in his heart, all those feelings of respect and love for him, and appreciation for everything big and small. But he just couldn't do it, especially in front of these people who were laughing at him like they were. So instead, he threw himself into the wall of a body that was his teacher and hugged him.
"I'm sorry, Sifu," he muttered.
The following morning, Catja came to see them all off to the airport for their long flight to Japan, and from there to Tibet. Tomas, who was carrying his monkey costume, accidentally lost his grip on his mask and chased it towards the beach where the wind was carrying it while Halsey and Bi-han loaded up the car.
"So, you know who we are?" Kuai Liang asked the woman in amazement while she beamed at all of them.
"Oh, yes," she nodded. "I've been a dear friend of your teacher's for many years." She winked at Halsey, who now joined them. "And when I heard he was going to be in San Diego with you three, and wanted to play a trick on Tomas, I knew just the thing to do."
"It was really impressive how you got the police to help you," Bi-han praised her, and she nodded.
"Well, being a nurse in an emergency room occasionally has its perks," she said. "I've helped an awful lot of policemen in my day. They were down for a little fun."
"Definitely the most elaborate prank I've ever been a part of," he grinned.
"Catja has one mischievous spirit in her," Halsey praised as he side-hugged her and kissed her cheek. "I wish you boys could know her better. I think it'd do all ya gits some good."
"I don't think Tomas would agree with you," she said as she looked up at him.
"Nah, he was sore at first, but he's a pretty forgivin' young man," he said.
"Yeah, once he gets even," Kuai Liang muttered.
"Speaking of the Devil, where has that little git gone off to?"
As if he heard Halsey speaking, Tomas now shouted at them from the roof of the beach house. "I'll be right there, Sifu!" he yelled. "My monkey mask just got stuck in this palm tree. I'm gonna get it down!"
"Tomas, you be careful!" he hollered back, leading the crowd of them towards the back of the house.
"Oh, no, I've got it," he replied. Silence followed. And then there was a horrendous crash followed by the buzz of a live wire. A shower of sparks rained down upon the side of the house. Then a loud thud.
"Tomas!" Halsey wailed as he bolted towards the beach.
On the sand in the back, close to the house, was a blackened lump in the shape of a burned body. Steam wafted off it and vanished into the air.
"Oh, by the Elder Gods! Tomas!" Halsey yelled again as he slid to the boy on the ground. "Catja, help him!"
As the four crouched around the charred body, Tomas slid from his invisible state and crept up behind them. "Boo!" he shrieked, earning a unified scream from the rest of them. Halsey jumped to his feet and stumbled through the sand, clutching his chest.
"Gods damn it all, ya stupid idjit!" he yelled.
"What was that?" Tomas asked as he cupped his hand around his ear. "If I'm not mistaken, that was the sound of the King reclaiming his throne."