The Apprenticeship of Julian St. Albans (6 page)

Fischer made a face that confirmed for Julian that
he either really didn’t like Alex, or didn’t like the idea of Alex in a
relationship with Julian. “And you’re certain that… activity… lasted
until after midnight?”

“Yes, I remember him teasing me in the shower
after that I’d be tired the next day, because it was nearly 1am. But I always
find our Temple visits very energising, and sleep was quite restful,” said
Julian. “Alex even got up when I did, so he was awake when I left.”

“Properly awake, or Alex in the morning
awake?” teased Thomas.

Julian decided right then he needed to do something
nice for the agent for being so very determined to protect Julian from
Fischer’s bad mood. “Mostly awake. Enough that he got to the crime scene
pretty soon after Agent Lapointe, anyway,” said Julian with a grin.
“He’s not so bad these days, because I know how to cheer him up.”

“I bet you do,” said Thomas, sounding
envious, though Julian knew it wasn’t of him so much as what they had.

“So you woke at what time?” said Fischer,
determined to finish as he’d begun.

“The alarm goes off at eight thirty, and then
I have to leave by quarter past nine so I can walk the greenhouse before we
open at ten,” said Julian. “We got up pretty much on time, from what
I remember, and had tea and scones with cream and jam, and I had two runny eggs
with toast soldiers while Alex has bacon and eggs with toast.”

“That’s not really necessary, but thank
you,” said Fischer. “You cook?”

“Oh, no, we have house-brownies,” said
Julian innocently. “There’d never be time to bake before I have to go, and
I never learned, anyway.”

“So there’s no clean-up, either?” asked
Fischer, starting to look a little envious.

“They get mad if we try,” assured Julian.
“Alex got them a tablet computer, so they even do the grocery
ordering.”

“All right, how do you get to work?”
asked Fischer. “Do you have a car?”

“No, no, I never learned to drive, I’m afraid.
It’s a common foible of my class,” Julian put on the airs of someone
trying to be modest and failing. “I take cabs everywhere, unless we’ve got
a car for the day, and so does Alex. My apprenticeship isn’t a paying one,
anyway, so the cost doesn’t matter.”

“You work for free?” said Fischer,
dubious all over again.

“I’m Apprenticed to Master Stone,” said
Julian, putting the capitals into his speech this time. “Mary Margaret is
a Master of the Grower’s Guild, and I petitioned to do a formal Apprenticeship.
This way she spends a lot of extra time teaching me when it’s quiet at the
nursery, and I work for free to repay her for her time and knowledge. It’s a
very old system, though not many people can afford to do it properly.”

“Was that Alex’s idea?” asked Thomas,
clearly curious.

“Nope, it was mine,” said Julian proudly.
“I don’t think Alex even knew Mary Margaret was in the Guild until after I
got tested and they referred me to the Guild for training.”

“When did you get tested, and why?” asked
Fischer.

“I went back in February, after Alex observed
that the plants I was keeping for him seemed more potent when he used them in
potions.” Julian chuckled at the memory. “I was apparently
responsible for two sets of twins, which fortunately made Alex’s customers really
happy. I tended the plants for some Satyr’s Gift charms he made because he got
a case after the plants were bought, but before the charms were made.”

“So the charms were especially potent because
of your talent,” said Fischer, making notes.

“Right, so we went to the Temple for testing,
because Father Stephen offered to arrange it, and then they sent me to the
Grower’s Guild, where I found out we already knew a Master Grower. After that,
we worked out the Apprenticeship, because I knew how busy Mary Margaret is, and
I can afford not to be paid while I’m still learning,” said Julian.
“I’m already a lot better than I was, Alex helps me with the magic parts
and Master Stone teaches me all her wisdom and plant-lore.”

“All right, back to the morning, you arrived
at what time?” asked Fischer, flipping pages so he was looking at the old
report.

“Around half nine, I unlocked the door and
went in, then locked up after myself and started the walk-through of the
nursery. The lucky clover aren’t very far along the path, so it was only a few
minutes before I found the, the body.” Julian didn’t have to fake his
distress at that part of the memory, the poor victim slashed horribly and left
there in the ruined bed. “I called emergency, then Agent Lapointe, then
Alex, and that’s the order people showed up in.”

“Did you touch the body at all?” asked
Fischer, his tone coaxing, like it would be okay to admit it this time.

Julian thought he was an idiot. “No, it was
obvious that whoever it was, was dead, and even if they weren’t they’d be
better off in the hands of the paramedics. I didn’t even step into the flower
bed, I made my calls where I was standing, just around the edge of the
hydrangeas.”

After that, it was just more of Fischer asking
stupid questions and trying to see if he could slip Julian up, until Thomas
actually chided him for wasting Julian’s time.

“Thanks,” said Julian after they closed
the door on Fischer, who had stopped the recorder and commenced muttering at
his notes. “I thought he was never going to let me leave.” Julian led
Thomas straight to Lapointe’s office, much to the agent’s poorly-concealed
delight.

“It wasn’t right, him treating you like a
suspect after you did all the right things,” said Thomas sincerely.

“I see you got sprung,” said Lapointe,
glancing up from a mountain of paperwork. She was doing something for a waiting
lab tech involving a sealed evidence bag.

“Thanks to Agent MacLean,” said Julian.
“He told Fischer to stuff it.”

MacLean blushed. “Not in so many words,”
he prevaricated.

Julian giggled. “No, but you reminded Agent
Fischer that I was a member of a prominent family, and still had enough clout
to make his life difficult if I were to take offence,” he said, “So,
thank you.”

Thomas ducked his head, looking adorably abashed at
the praise.

Lapointe put her pen down and stood, handing the
papers to the tech. “Here you go, call me if you need anything else. Have
you two met?”

The tech shook his head, and Julian stepped forward
and offered his hand. “Julian St. Albans, I’m Alex Benedict’s boyfriend,
but I don’t work here even as a consultant.”

“Except to keep Lapointe’s plant alive,”
said MacLean, pointing to the little potted African violets flourishing
abundantly on one corner of Murielle’s desk.

“Arthur Fenway,” said the tech, shaking
rather limply and retrieving his hand quickly. “It’s a nice plant.”
He scurried out, clearly wanting nothing more than to get back to work.

“So, um, more tea?” asked MacLean with a
teasing grin.

“Let’s go get something in the cafe, if you’ve
got time still?” Lapointe said. “I’d like to ask you more about the
magic you felt, you give a different kind of evidence than Alex, and our mage
was a little baffled when we presented him with a wormwood seed.”

Julian lit up. “I’d love to, and I can thank
Thomas with some decent coffee as well, if you’ll come?” Julian shot him a
wink, then glanced over to Lapointe, making it clear he knew just why Thomas
might want to accompany them.

Thomas grinned. “I’d love to, thanks.”

Fischer was just emerging from the interrogation
room when they all trooped past, looking very cranky indeed. “Do call if
you have any new questions,” said Julian sweetly as they passed.

“Now, that was just mean,” said Lapointe,
once they were out of earshot.

“I don’t know what you’re referring to,”
said Julian innocently. “I’m eager to help any officer of the law, you
know that.”

Thomas snickered, but managed a straight face as he
added, “Julian answered all of Agent Fischer’s questions.”

“I just didn’t give him the answers he was
looking for,” said Julian wryly, getting on the elevator with them.
“I don’t know why he’s got it in for Alex so much, Alex did solve his case
for him.”

“I don’t think that’s a point in Alex’s
favour,” said Lapointe wryly. “Fischer seems to resent anyone’s help,
he’s certainly barrelling ahead on this case without stopping to ask questions
or read reports.”

Julian hmphed. “He probably plays golf with
Armistead or something.”

Thomas laughed. “Don’t even suggest
that,” he teased. They were all grinning as they walked through the lobby,
past Lapointe’s boss, and out the door.

“Maybe he’s mad his case had to take on some
of the expense of Alex’s bill,” said Julian, after they got outside.
“Smedley didn’t seem to mind, but if looks could kill your boss would be a
very guilty man right now.”

Lapointe snorted. “I really don’t think that’s
it, Alex is expensive, but he never bills unfairly, and we’ve been using him
for years now.”

“Some guys just don’t like it when other
people get to save the day,” said MacLean. “I always thought it was
important that the day got saved, but you know,” he shrugged.

“That’s why we like you, you’re
sensible,” said Julian. “Well, and you’ve got good taste in
pizza.”

“Does he?” asked Lapointe, interested.

“Oh, yeah, we visited that one time and he
ordered from this local place around the corner and it was so good, you have to
come along next time we invade his flat,” said Julian.

“As I recall, last time there was rugby
involved,” said Lapointe, making a face. “I’m not sure there’s any
pizza worth that.”

“I was thinking maybe a movie, I’ve never seen
a lot of popular things,” said Julian, feeling a bit shy. “Thomas had
a lot of stuff at his house, I mean, if you’d be willing?”

Thomas grinned. “I’d love to, if you can get
your anti-everything boyfriend to agree. I was surprised he consented to the
rugby.”

They got settled in their usual booth, and the
waitress came over. “You’re missing your mage,” she said cheerfully;
she’d been disappointed to realise Alex was unavailable, but her service never
wavered. Julian thought it helped that Jones kept trying to ask her out, even
if she’d yet to say yes.

“He’s at home working,” said Julian,
pulling out his phone, “though I ought to text him and see if he’s willing
to be dragged over to Thomas’ flat sometime soon.”

“You’re welcome any time, though I don’t have
any house-fairies, so the place is a bit of a mess right now,” said
Thomas, his face saying that ‘a bit’ meant ‘really a lot so not right now
please.’

Julian chuckled. “I’ll just suggest we ought
to do it soon,” he teased, finding he already had a text from Alex asking
if he needed rescuing. He smiled fondly as he replied that Agent MacLean had
done the honours and wanted them to drag Murielle over for movies, and also
needed some lessons from Alex on how to actually ask out the person they liked.
A few seconds later, Thomas’ phone pinged, and he blushed red when he read the
text.

“From a girl?” asked Murielle teasingly.

“No,” said Thomas. “I’ll have a
coffee and some of your banoffee pie, please.”

“Ah, an order!” said the waitress,
writing it down. “Anyone else want actual food?”

“I’ll have tea and a cinnamon roll,
please,” said Julian, and Murielle ordered her usual coffee and bagel.

Once she’d left, they managed between texts and all
of them consulting their phone calendars to decide on Saturday afternoon for
their movies and pizza, case willing, which gave Thomas two days to clean up
enough to impress Murielle. Alex kept sending him texts that made him squirm,
which got Murielle curious and made Julian determined to give Alex a proper
reward when he got home. The handsome agent might be a little young for
Lapointe, but he’d held onto his torch long enough it didn’t seem like it was
just a crush anymore.

Even if Alex did liken him to a puppy.

“All right, now that you’ve forced Alex to
have a life outside your flat,” said Murielle, amused, “I wanted to
ask you again about what you felt when you walked the nursery with Alex.”

“We didn’t do the whole thing together, mostly
just the, um, the site, and the special greenhouse where we kept the
virgin-pure plants before sale,” said Julian, sitting back and sipping his
tea, thinking of the things he’d felt. “The plants were all really sad, I
would’ve expected angry but they were just hurt and sad and dying.”

“All of them?” asked Lapointe, making
notes in her little flip-top notebook. Julian always thought she used them just
to feel more like a proper police officer, but he thought perhaps that was just
the reason he’d have done it. They were probably really useful, too. Or
department issue.

He shook himself to stop avoiding the question, and
thought back again. “All of them, but the ones in the greenhouse were the
saddest, because they’d been drained and hurt where they thought they were
safe. The clover were sad because of the person, too, is that weird? But the
greenhouse plants didn’t know about that, I mean, as much as a plant knows
things.” Julian looked sheepish.