“Severn should be in meetings this afternoon.”

“Great. I’ll take front desk from whomever it was handed to. Can you let Sergeant Keele know?”

Kaylin had a to-do list that was impressively long, considering her lack of active, ongoing investigation. Mrs. Erickson, and things tangential to Mrs. Erickson, occupied almost all of it. Mrs. Erickson could see the dead children and—if Jamal was right—had always been able to see them. She could see Amaldi and Darreno, two people who Kaylin felt instinctively weren’t actually dead. She could see Severn’s belt. Or rather, could see that it was magic, and a strong enough magic that it made her squint. Mrs. Erickson had probably never been tested for magical aptitude.

“Caitlin, do you know Mrs. Erickson’s actual name?”

“I believe it was Imelda. Imelda Swindon Erickson.”

“Thanks.”

On the off chance Mrs. Erickson had, at some point in her early life, been tested, some information would be in Records. In Records as well would be information about the former owners of that house. And the current owner of the house one over.

She had the first names of the four children. She knew they were dead—long dead by this point. She knew where they’d probably died: the house itself. Who had the previous owners been? Whoever they were, they were dead and out of the reach of Imperial justice. But the children were still trapped in the house.

She needed to ask questions about Severn’s weapon. Amaldi and Darreno had been terrified at the sight of it. Enough that they had trouble believing Severn was human.

“Records: Missing Persons. Date range: one hundred years ago, to eighty years.”

“Search criteria?”

“Children, age eight to twelve. Also: Esmeralda, Jamal, Callis, and Katie.”

“Full names?”

“Those are the only names I have.” She frowned. Many people avoided the Halls of Law; not all missing persons became the subject of reports. Those that didn’t wouldn’t appear in Records at all—but she had four names, and one of them might. They didn’t look like they were the children of the wealthy, or the reasonably well-off, given the clothing they wore—but she didn’t know enough about the dead because, until yesterday, she mostly hadn’t believed ghosts existed.

No, that wasn’t completely true. She just hadn’t believed human ghosts existed. “Time?”

“Seven forty-five.”

She had to reach the front desk in fifteen minutes, and while the front desk was possessed of a mirror, searching Records in front of civilians was heavily frowned on.

Sergeant Keele wore an expression very similar to Caitlin’s, but with an added dash of deep suspicion. People didn’t volunteer for front desk duty; they were assigned it, and they went with minimal—but obvious—grumbling. Severn was still unavailable, which meant Kaylin was off her beat, and in any other circumstance, she would have stayed quiet and hoped to be passed over.