"Sebastian, explain." Ciel ordered, his usual bored tone replaced with a level of interest at these new developments."

"How can he? He's a mundane." Gabriel said pointedly.

"Sebastian..." Ciel repeated impatiently.

"Yes, my lord." Sebastian smiled, and retold their tale of the past week faultlessly and at great speed. Gabriel and Gideon looked put out, the two warlocks confused, and Will and Jem – who had grown somewhat immune to these unusual displays – merely showed mild impression. Ciel remained as unmoved as ever by the act. "And that is how we happened upon you two fellows and this fine abode," Sebastian concluded. "And now we merely require your talents to track our criminal using the opium sample that I do believe is in Master Carstairs's left jacket pocket.

Jem started and nodded, reaching into his jacket.

"Oh, um, yes." He handed the pouch of opium to Ragnor. "Here it is."

Ragnor's green palm closed around it, and he nodded. "How much are you paying for this?"

"How much do you want?" Gideon countered.

Ragnor thought about this momentarily, then smirked. "Perhaps we should wait and see how laborious and time-consuming a process this looks to be before we finalise payments."

Jem was aware this translated roughly to 'I'm going to clarify this is not too labour-intensive and then vastly overcharge you as if it was'. But he wasn't too concerned. This case was intriguing and he didn't really mind how much it cost to satisfy his curiosity. This was affecting mundanes, and had brought two highly interesting ones into their world.

"Come along then." Ragnor said. "We may as well start now."

Ragnor ushered the group up two flights of narrow, steep staircases to a large, mostly empty room at the very top of his house in what appeared to be the attic. The room extended across the entire storey, leaving the splintering wooden floorboards open. Along the back wall, three tall bookcases stood, overflowing books so that the excess tomes rested in precariously-leaning piles on the floor. Wooden crates full of candles and burnt loose sheets of paper rested in the corner by huge windows with wooden shutters. The floor was dotted with paper covered in diagrams and sketches, words written in a language Jem couldn't read but recognised as Chthonian; the language that warlocks cast spells in.

"Okay, let us proceed." Ragnor said.

Ragnor sat himself on an upturned crate and tapped a little of the drug out and into his palm. He closed his fingersm feeling the drug, grainy under his touch.

"A man, with a suit. Quite tall. Sells opium. By the name of...Alderton?"

"No, no. that's the person who gave us that sample." Ciel said.

"Okay, thank you for giving such in-depth information before I began." Ragnor grumbled.

He closed his eyes again and after a couple of minutes another image formed.

"A man slumped over a table. He's in a dark room. He seems like he is under the influence of opium."

Jem exchanged a look with Will, who looked just as encouraged by this information as Jem felt.

"He's talking to someone, telling them that the drug is magic, saying he bought it in another den." Ragnor went on. Will and Jem glanced at each other, the look passing between them one of confusion.

"That would be the gentleman Mr Alderton spoke about." Sebastian said. "The member of his clientele who provided that sample."

Jem sagged on his feet. Of course. He hadn't thought of that, but now it seemed so obvious. However...

"Hang on a second," he said and all eyes swivelled to him. "Only one other person was in possession of this. There was Will and I, Mr Alderton, his client, and..."

"The culprit." Gideon finished.

"So this next person; that's definitely them." Ciel said, realisation dawning in his blue eye.

"Thank goodness." Gabriel muttered. "The sooner this is over with, the better."

"And the way to speed that process, Lightworm, is if you all shut your mouths and just let Ragnor do his job." Will said shortly. "So knock it off."

Magnus laughed and turned to Ragnor. "Oh yes, I definitely like this one the best."

Ragnor closed his hands around the pile of opium he was keeping carefully from running between his fingers. He dug around inside his mind for the face, the person whose tie to this drug would make him his months wage. To mundanes, the money a couple of hours work like this would make him was unthinkable. He told himself to focus and a face formed blurrily in his mind; curtains of curls and a heart-shaped face, wide, bright eyes. His own eyes flew open.

"Out."

"Ragnor?" Magnus asked, looking concerned as his friend's verdigris paled to a delicate – if worrying – mint colour. "What's wrong?"

"Get them out." Ragnor said. "Now."

Magnus spun on his heel to face the others.

"Okay, you lot can wait out in the hallway. Or down in the drawing room if you'd prefer. Help yourself to some tea or whatever you fancy. Preferably not valued possessions, though I wouldn't object if you were to take that atrocious tea service."

The others left but Will remained where he was, with Jem calling half-heartedly from the doorway.

"Wait, what is so secretive? This does involve us, you know."

Jem flinched. Trust Will to incur the wrath of two High Warlocks; but whilst Ragnor merely stood up looking troubled, Magnus sighed.

"Have you never heard the saying 'curiosity killed the cat'?" he enquired, sounding exasperated.

"'Helter skelter, hang sorrow, care will kill a cat, up-tails all, and a pox on the hangman.'" Will quoted with perfection Jem knew would be enhanced little by any number of Mnemosyne runes. "That was Ben Jonson in 'Every Man in his Humour'." Will added.

Magnus raised an amused eyebrow, lifted his hand and flicked a finger in a circle then swished it toward the door. Will, to his immense surprise, found an invisible force turn him and push him out of the door, leaving it to slam shut behind him, with a thud of finality.

Ragnor waved a hand, applying some soundproofing spells to the door, clearly highly suspicious of the shadowhunters and their possible eavesdropping. Then he spun angrily to Magnus.

"You aren't meant to do that, especially to Nephilim!"

"They hardly seem like the type to run and tell tales on us to their Head of Institute, do they?" Magnus reasoned.

With a defeated sigh, Ragnor slammed the window shutters closed, laid a circle of candles and lit them, all in a large explosion cloud of emerald sparks.

"Dimmed lights and candles?" Magnus joked, eyebrow quirked. "Careful, Ragnor. People will be expecting you to declare your intentions."

Ragnor snorted. "Don't flatter yourself, Bane." Then his expression fell grave. "I think you ought to see who the drug was tracked to."

Before Magnus had time to question this, Ragnor walked to the edge of the circle of candles, threw the opium into the centre where some slipped between the floorboards. The majority, however, remained in a small mound. Ragnor raised a hand and began casting a projection spell, a tracking spell, and something else that Magnus did not understand. Then a shadowy, translucent figure of a lady appeared; narrow hips, blonde curls, wide eyes the colour of spring grass. She lounged barefoot on a chaise longue, smirking provocatively with a man whose hands were in her ashy curls, surrounded by half a dozen sickly subjugates. She leaned back and pouted prettily, making her cheekbones and jaw look even more defined. She rested her head against the man's stomach and Magnus's own stomach turned over.

"Camille." He said, voice hollow with shock and sadness.

"I thought you should see it without the others here." Ragnor said, with a tact highly uncharacteristic of the warlock. "If you don't want to continue with this job – or don't want me to – then I understand."

"No, it'll pay really well." Magnus replied, seemingly emotionlessly.

"It doesn't matter." Ragnor shrugged. "I'll cheat a couple more mundanes and I'll have made up for it."

Magnus cracked a weak smile. Ragnor did not show it often, but he really did care for Catarina and Magnus, and seeing his charming, humorous friend so heartbroken was devastating.

"Ragnor," Magnus said, and waved an absent hand at the image of Camille, still lounging inside the ring of candles.

"Sorry," Ragnor said, lowering his hand and causing the image to melt into non-existence.

"I'm going to go and talk to her. Don't negotiate anything with the shadowhunters yet." Magnus said, and left the room quickly.

As he hurried down the stairs, retrieving his coat and hat from the stand in the entrance hall, Will and Jem appeared.

"Magnus," Will said. "Where are you going?"

Jem's eyes searched the warlock's face, concerned by the lack of amused glint in his cats eyes that, over a very short time, he had become accustomed to. Magnus forced a smile and a humorous tone.

"As far away as I can from here. I know when to get out of a situation, and you shadowhunters seem more trouble than you're worth. I'm escaping now before it's too late and condemning Ragnor to this fate." He winked. "I think I shall see you two again soon, though."

He ducked out into the rain, and hurried to the street corner, then sat against the wall, the rain plastering the hair to his head and wondered how it could all go so wrong so quickly. His lover was as loyal as Judas, and also happened to be the centre of an enormous drug scandal affecting both his world and the mundane world.

Oh, Camille, Magnus thought as he set off at a run towards the vampire clan headquarters in London. What on earth have you done? And, his heart sunk. Why aren't you in love with me anymore?

Were you ever even in love with me to begin with?