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Release	By : KaticaLocke Category: G through L > Law & Order Views: 3499 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Law & Order, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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As Alex entered the interrogation room, Raum rose to his feet, the chair squealing across the cement floor. An officer was at her back immediately, but she motioned him back outside. Raum smiled and nodded courteously.

�Good day, Detective Eames,� he said, his silky, sibilant voice giving her a slight chill. �You look tired. Have trouble sleeping?�

�It�s been a long day,� she replied. God, it felt more like a week. �Please, have a seat.� She took one of the two chairs facing away from the two-way mirror. �Mr. Raum, do you know why you are here?�

�Of course,� he replied, leaning back in the uncomfortable metal chair like it was a lay-z-boy. �What time is it, if I may ask?" Alex glanced at her watch.

"It's a quarter to four." Raum looked slightly disappointed.

"Shame," he said quietly, then to her, "Will Detective Goren be joining us?� He glanced toward the mirror. �I was very much hoping to speak with both of you.�

�He�ll be along shortly,� Alex said. �I wanted to have a few words first. I was hoping you could clear up a few things while you still possessed the ability to speak.� Raum�s eyebrows lifted and an amused smile lighted his face.

�Is Detective Goren really that angry? I suppose I overestimated his ability to take a joke.�

�Is that what this was, a joke?� Alex asked, keeping her voice calm and level, though inside she was seething. A joke! If Bobby didn�t kill him before the Council got there, and if Elliot didn�t, she sure as hell would.

�I found it very entertaining, didn�t you?� Alex couldn�t keep the cold fury out of her eyes, so she didn�t even try. Raum�s cheery smile faded. "I told you already, Detective Eames, this was a matter of revenge. The fact that it was so much fun was just an added bonus." Raum glanced away as the door opened, but Alex kept her gaze fixed on his unremarkable, unassuming face. She could have passed him on the street a hundred times and never noticed. He smiled warmly. "Ah, Detective Goren, how good of you to join us." Bobby walked behind her, placed his thick leather binder on the table, grabbed the empty chair and turned it around so that he straddled it.

"Tell me, Raum, Detective Munch says that you won't lie. A - a nasty son-of-a-bitch like you - I find that hard to believe."

"He is correct," Raum said. "Nothing but the truth as I know it ever passes my lips."

"And why - why is that ... exactly?"

"If you were an electrician, wouldn't you be careful when working with electricity, Detective?"

"Of course." Raum leaned forward, his voice low when he spoke.

"I juggle lightning bolts, so I have to be extra careful." Bobby stood up and began to pace the floor behind Raum's chair. The evil warlock watched him in the mirror, but kept stealing glances at Alex. She just sat back and watched the show, waiting until it was her turn again.

"I still don't buy it," Bobby said, leaning down and peering into Raum's face. "You always tell the truth? Isn't that ... inconvenient?"

"It can be," Raum admitted, "but it beats walking up as a toad." Bobby made a thoughtful noise and went back to his pacing.

"So, Raum, you're a warlock? You can do magick? You can turn into a - a crow?"

"Yes, to all three questions. But you already knew that."

"Is it true that you killed -" He walked to his notebook and peered inside. "- Kia Lighthawk, also known as Amanda Harris?"

"If you mean the little witch from yesterday, then yes. I didn't happen to catch her name."

"You admit to killing her?"

"Why not? Name one of your prisons that could hold me once this herbal cocktail wears off. You can't keep me drugged forever." Bobby went on as if he hadn't spoken.

"And you killed her with magick?"

"Of course. How else do you explain what happened?"

"You freely admit to working magick?"

"Yes, already," Raum said, a hint of annoyance showing through at last.

"We ran your prints, you know," Bobby said suddenly. "We're having one hell of a time figuring out who you really are. Care to help us out?"

"Not really." Bobby was back down in his face again.

"What is your real name?" he demanded. Raum laughed.

"I may not lie, Detective Goren, but that doesn't mean I have to answer." Bobby straightened up and started to turn away, then grabbed Raum by the front of his shirt and hauled his smug ass out of the chair. Alex stood and walked around the table as her partner slammed the smaller man against the wall. The sight of his feet dangling a good six inches off the floor brought a hard smile to her lips.

"Who are you?" Bobby asked again. Alex glanced behind them at the sound of the door opening, but it was just Munch coming in to join them.

"Take your hands off me," Raum said, his calm facade wearing thinner, allowing annoyance, fear and anger to show through. "This is police brutality, you can't do this - "

"Oh, are there rules now?" Alex asked. His eyes widened slightly.

"My lawyer is going to - "

"Who said you get a lawyer?" Bobby countered. Alex stepped up next to her partner, her head tipped back to meet Raum's eyes. They were a pale, greenish-gray color.

"Allowing you a lawyer would suggest that we have arrested you, filed papers, filled out the necessary forms ... but you know what -" She shrugged. "- I just didn't feel like it. So as far as the legal system is concerned, you are not here. In fact, you don't even seem to exist, so I can't see the point of allowing you to call your lawyer."

"So you hold me without cause for how long?"

"Just until a representative of the Council gets here," Munch said. Raum not only went pale, his skin turned a nice greenish-gray color to match his eyes. "Oh, good, you do have some idea of what they'll do to you." Raum's eyes darted to Alex.

"You can't let them take me - what they do, it's - it's inhuman."

"So are you," Alex replied coldly. "It's the rule of three, remember - whatever you do shall return to you threefold, be it good or evil."

"And you're about as evil as we come," Munch added. "I can't think of a single reason not to turn you over to the council." Something dark and predatory moved behind Raum's eyes as his Teflon exterior slid back into place.

"I think we both know that's not true, Detective," Raum said smoothly. He glanced at Bobby. "What I was saying earlier about juggling lightning - when you're only playing with lightning bugs, you don't have to be nearly as careful. Do you mind?" He glanced pointedly at the floor. Bobby dragged him back to the table and dropped him into his chair. "Thank you." He tugged his shirt back down where it belonged as best he could with his cuffed hands. "You see, what could not possibly have escaped Detective Munch, is that if I am handed over to the Council, all the power I have amassed - and it is a staggering amount - will be lost into whatever Hell the Council decided to damn me to. If, however, he were to retrieve a certain book from locker 12D at Grand Central, and if he were to read a certain incantation, and then if he were to kill me himself - "

"Why are you telling us this?" Munch demanded. "No one wants to hear - "

"Tsk tsk tsk, what a liar you are." Munch stared down at him, his face pale, lips pressed into a thin line, then he turned and stalked from the room. Alex followed. Ahead of her, Munch pushed his way through a small group of officers talking to a blonde woman with a briefcase - probably somebody�s lawyer - and caught up with him halfway to the main doors.

�What is going on?� she asked, grabbing him by the arm. He stopped in his tracks, his head tilted back and eyes closed behind his smoky glasses. Alex stood there, her hand on his arm, and waited.

"I am a liar," Munch said at last, "more than he knows." He glanced at Alex out of the corner of his eye. "His power, Alex ... I am tempted, especially knowing where that book is ... but, no, I can't. No matter how good my intentions, that kind of power would find ways to work evil within me. He must go to the Council." He said this with an air of finality, but Alex could see the indecision in his eyes.

"Why don't you take a break," Alex suggested. "Get some rest, coffee, valium, -" This brought a smile to his lips. "- let us work on Raum some more. Trust me, Bobby's got this guy just where he wants him."

~*~*~*~*~*~

Bobby was pacing again as Alex let herself back into the room. She strolled over to her chair, quickly taking in the scene as she sat. Raum was pale and harassed-looking, a slight scowl darkening his unremarkable face.

"Tell me again, where is Nicole?"

"I don't know." He was sounding very irritated now.

"You're sure she's dead, though?"

"She died in my arms, Detective, what do you think?"

"I think you're lying, I think she's alive and - and using you -"

"I don't lie," Raum said, raising his voice.

"I don't believe you," Bobby responded, raising his more. He bent down beside Raum, speaking in almost a whisper. "Make me believe, tell me something that I - I can believe. Tell me why you put this curse upon me ... the real reason."

"You want to know why I'm here?" He sat back in his chair, his chin raised defiantly. "Munich, April, a little antique shop, an old puzzle box - am I ringing any bells?" Alex glanced up at Bobby, who's face had gone strangely expressionless. "I wanted that box, Detective, but you got there first. I let it go then, but I never forgot. As I told our lovely Detective Eames, I have a penchant for revenge, and once I learned who it was that had killed poor Nicole, well, I couldn't resist."

"This is about a damned wooden box?" Alex asked, not quite sure she was following. Neither Raum nor Bobby answered her. "That's - that's so ... stupid. That's the dumbest reason I've ever heard."

"But it's the truth," Raum said, giving her a smug smile. "It must be almost four o'clock by now. It's a pity I slept so long - I would have liked more time to play." He suddenly leaned forward in his chair, resting his forearms on the table. �Do you like surprises, Detectives?� The words had hardly left his lips when the door opened and a disgruntled-looking Munch stepped half into the room.

"There's a woman out here claiming to be Raum's lawyer," he said, shooting a hard look at Raum. "She's threatening to go to the justice department if she isn't allowed to see her client immediately." Bobby and Alex exchanged similar looks. It seemed Raum had more than doves up his sleeves.

"Well, by all means, show her in," Bobby said, walking around to have a seat beside Alex. "Oh, and we'll need a - another chair." He pulled his binder around and began to thumb through it, as if some new information might have magically appeared inside it since he last looked. Alex glanced back at the door as an officer carried in another uncomfortable metal chair and set it next to Raum. He started out the door, then stepped back to allow in a briefcase-toting woman in a well-cut dark blue suit, the same one Alex had seen talking to the officers in the squad room earlier, only ... only ...

Alex gasped. Beside her, Bobby glanced up from his notebook. He leaped to his feet, his chair flying over backward and hitting the cement floor with a clatter. The lawyer stopped, regarding them with a stone-cold lack of interest. Her blonde hair was close-cropped, a severe pair of gold-rimmed glasses framing hard, dark eyes, but there was no mistake. It was Nicole Wallace.
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