The Velvet Key

( In which a deer, teal in color, emerges. )

(Video)

The feed clicked on half a moment before Lord El-Melloi hit the ground, having turned on after it fell from his pocket.  For several moments, he is the only in thing in the frame, lying still and unmoving.  It is difficult to see much of him, as part of his face is blocked by how his arm is lying, and more of it is obscured by his dark hair, but what can be seen of it is covered in something shiny and slick and possibly red.  It's hard to tell in this light.

Then there is the sound of footsteps, and the phone is picked up by an unseen person; they kept the camera facing away from them, never revealing any more than a few brief glimpses of a hand and sleeve.  Very deliberately, the camera was turned toward the prone form of Lord El-Melloi, lying on the pavement with a small pool of liquid forming on the ground around his face.  This picture stayed on the screen for several long moments-- he did not move.

Then it dropped, and the feed cut out.

[Today was October 3rd.]

[For most people, this was probably a day like any other, except perhaps for that whole bodies thing that was going on at the shore.  That was, really, a bit disturbing and unsettling, of course.  Though Lord El-Melloi was as concerned about the whole situation as anyone else was, without any further information and the usual suspects ruled out, there was little that he could do about it.  The police were investigating, and getting in their way would not be helping anything, even if he might have liked to get a better look at things himself.]

[Aside from that, it was also his birthday.  Figures.]

[Lord El-Melloi II was thirty years old today, and he was going to spend the evening as he did every year, which was with a glass of gin and tonic to keep him company and if he'd had a video game system, he'd be playing games in his boxers while he drank it, like the classy motherfucker he was.  Birthday parties were for children, not magi of high standing.  Besides that, it wasn't as though he really had very many people to celebrate it with, even if it had been appropriate.]

[Which it wasn't.  Could you imagine anyone with a 'lord' in their name wearing a party hat?  Inconceivable.]

[He was perfectly content to sit in a bar with his gin and tonic and his dignity, anyway.]