The man seated at the head gave him a half-smile. "Welcome, my friend," and nodded Richard to the low, heavy chair at the foot of the table.
Richard didn't accept the invitation. He moved to the offered chair, but remained on his feet, gripping the bowed top lightly. The door was still open, and he made no move to close it.
He didn't have to: it closed on its own seconds after he touched his chair.
"Richard, are you well?"
"Well enough, John."
Even seated, John Chesney was tall, with sharp planes and deep shadows in his face that made him appear as if a lifetime of dissipation had caught up with him overnight. His hair was thick, pure white, and brushed straight back had gotten from the movies. He also supposed Chesney believed it lent him an air of authority.
He didn't need it.
He had eyes that could boil blood if he ever lost his temper.
To Richard’s right, beside Chesney, was Maurice
Poulard, a stocky man with a florid, pudgy face that left little room for his eyes. His gray suit looked like silk; his red club tie undoubtedly was. He was bald; deliberately bald. In his right hand he held a lace-edged handkerchief he used to mop his scalp, to wave a point, and to touch to his oddly thin lips whenever he wanted to hide what his mouth might reveal. He waved the handkerchief now, his voice reed-thin: "Oh, do sit, Richard. We're not going to bite, you know."
The woman on his left laughed silently. She wore a tailored burgundy suit, a ruffled cream blouse, and a huge ruby ring on her left hand. Her hair was short and brushed back over her ears, a style that suited her ageless features. She could have been thirty, could have been sixty, but apparently that didn’t matter to those reputed to be her lovers. "You're confused, dear," she said, her voice soothing and smooth.
He nodded. "I am, Vi."
"Then sit. Please. John has things to tell you, and we don't have much time."
"The others?" he asked as he obeyed.
Poulard waved the handkerchief dismissively "Not here, not coming."
Richard almost said, that’s impossible, but the look on the man’s face stopped him.
He had been right—he shouldn’t have knocked, he shouldn't have come in.
This was the chamber of the Warders of the Veil. Seldom used, but when it was, it held a representative of most of the thirteen tribes of the Garou.
Never just three.
Never.
His unease increased as he waited for Chesney to make up his mind when to begin. The man was an actor. Nothing he did was done without consideration of its dramatic effect, including the annoying, overhead lighting. It was he who had named the group, he—along with Viana laye, Maurice, and two others now dead—who had seen the need, and he who had recruited Richard into their midst.
The reason, in the beginning, had been simple and right: Gaia was dying, and along with her, the Garou.
The Earth, in spite of the best efforts of some, had begun to flounder in the aftermath of steadily increasing populations. Urban centers expanded with little planning, waste was more stockpiled than converted for reuse, and what was once pristine had become irrevocably soiled.
The Garou, because they were so intricately involved with the system that supported both Man and Gaia, thus found themselves in danger as well. Their numbers had never been that great in the first place; now each of the tribes found themselves much smaller, with less protection, fewer chances of survival.
The Veil was that which separated men from the Garou. For men, Richard and the others were the stuff of legends and tales told around campfires— werewolves. Man-beasts. Evil creatures that stalked movie screens and novels and children’s nightmares in autumn. As long as it remained that way, the Garou could manage, doing what they could to keep Gaia from collapsing.
When the Veil was lifted, however, and however briefly and accidentally, something had to be done.
The Warders had been created when it was evident that recent breaches of the Veil weren't accidental at all.
Chesney put his glass down and cleared his throat. .
Richard glanced at the others, leaned back, and said with a brief smile, "John, I'm falling asleep."
Vi laughed; Maurice scowled.
Chesney at least had the grace to look embarrassed, caught in his own acting. He folded his hands on the table and cleared his throat again. "Richard," he said, “there’s a rogue."
Two vicious murders in Tennessee, near Chattanooga and the Georgia border, and at least two more missing, Chesney explained. Even discounting the natural hysteria in the media concerning such brutal and puzzling acts, it was clear to the Warders that a rogue had moved into the area, and he had to be stopped before the police caught him
Richard didn’t respond; it wasn't expected of him.
Every so often, it happened; a Garou from any tribe could break under the pressure of either living in both worlds, or keeping his pact to protect Gaia. In this way, they were no different from humans— they had their weak links, and sometimes they snapped.
It was his job to make sure the rogue was never caught, dead or alive, by humans. If he failed, the truth of the Garou would be out; it didn’t take a genius to figure out what would happen then.
So far, he hadn't failed.
But what he still didn't understand was why the full group wasn't here. The first known attack had been back in October, the latest only last week, the disappearances sometime between. Someone should have been investigating from the first killing—plenty of time to convene a strategy session, and to contact him. Waiting this long to suspect a rogue .. .
Still, he held his peace. While the others were of tribes whose lives revolved around packs, he was called Silent Strider. His kind were loners. Travelers. As such, and as now, most of the other Garou either held them in mild contempt, or outright distrust that sometimes bordered on fear.
A wolf, alone, wasn't natural.
Rogues they could understand; someone like Richard they couldn't.
Vi dusted a finger across the tabletop. "There's more, of course."
He smiled at her wryly. "I'd be surprised if there wasn’t."
“Oh, for God's sake," Poulard snapped. "Get on with it. I’m a busy man.” His handkerchief flapped at the others. "This is getting us nowhere."
Chesney’s face darkened briefly, his eyes narrowing as he turned toward Poulard and silently demanded he hold his tongue. Poulard snarled but sat back, almost pouting.
Well, Richard thought; well, well.
Chesney turned his attention back to Richard, all signs of displeasure gone in a blink. "You know there are humans who suspect who and what we are."
Richard nodded impatiently. He didn't need, nor did he appreciate, a history lesson. Yes, there were humans who suspected what lay beyond the Veil; yes, some had actually begun to accumulate evidence of it; and yes, some had the potential to be more than a small threat to the Garou's existence. But they didn't work together; they didn't share what they knew. All had their own agendas, and so far, luckily, cooperation hadn't been part of it.
"Well, there's something else," Chesney said, and hesitated. Vi whispered something Richard couldn't catch, and the older man nodded. "The rogue. We think he might be a trap. We ... think he’s out there, specifically, to lure you into the open.”
"Somebody wants you dead, Richard," Vi said.
"Or more likely," Poulard added impatiently, and without much sympathy, "somebody wants you in hand so you can lead them to us.” He folded the handkerchief into a rectangle on the table and carefully smoothed out its wrinkles with the side of his hand. "It is also possible that this someone is one of us."
"No," he said without having to think. He looked at the others. "That's impossible."
Poulard stared at him without raising his head. "Is it, Richard? Is it really?"
"Of course it is," he said automatically.
The tribes, while all Garou, weren't always in harmony. They had their common goal, but the means to achieve it were often sources of dissension, and causes of rivalries that in some cases were generations old.
But nothing like this.
No matter how bad relations got, tribes didn’t go to war with one another.
Not at the risk of rending the Veil.
He shifted uncomfortably when no one reacted. "Who told you this nonsense?"
No one answered.
He shook his head in disgust and stared at the wood surface immediately in front of him. Despite the high polish, there was no reflection, just the grain, it didn’t give him any answers, or any inspiration.
"This rogue," Chesney said quietly, "has to be brought back, I’m afraid."
That snapped Richard's head up. “What?”
It was difficult enough to hunt down one of your own kind, one who had been overcome by rage-filled madness; the outcome was always the same. It had to be. There was no cure for the sickness that created a rogue, and no safe way or place to detain him. But to say that he had to be captured was madness of its own.
"There’s no other way. We need to know, Richard. We need to know."
Poulard pushed his chair away from the table, to the edge of the reach of his light. He leaned back and folded his hands over his stomach. "It's quite simple. You do what you always do, Richard, except that you don’t kill him.” He smiled without humor. "Do you think you can handle that?’’
"That's not the point," he said.
"Oh, but it is." The smile remained. "Unless you don’t feel that you can. Succeed, that is. Feeling a little old these days?"
Richard looked to Vi, but she too had retreated, and all he could see of her without straining were her hands and her torso. It was as if someone had suddenly cut off her head.
"That's not the point either, Maurice," he said, struggling to keep his temper intact. “But if I'm even going to consider this .. . this assignment, I'll need to know more.” He looked directly at Chesney. "Like, who else I'll be up against, if what you say is true.”
"Unknown," was all Chesney answered.
"Then why do you suspect it may be one of us?”
"Our privilege," Poulard said quickly.
Right, Richard thought; catch a rogue, but wear a blindfold while you’re at it, and don’t worry about your back, you don't need to know who's got the knife.
Chesney coughed lightly into a fist. “You'll have to leave tonight, Richard. We can't waste any more time arguing. Or," he added pointedly to Maurice, "speculating, lust bring us what we ask."
"And if I can't?"
Vi slipped back into the light. "I fear, Richard, that's not an option in this case.” She spread her hands. "I'm sorry."
"And if I can't," he persisted.
"We'll get someone else," Poulard answered blithely.
Richard inhaled slowly, but said nothing more. It was an empty threat. He knew as well as Maurice did that there was no one else. The Warders were select. The only way he could be replaced was if he was killed.
Still ... "Well, if you do, Maurice, be sure to let him know that someone's been poking around out here."
"What?" It was Poulard's turn to slip back into the light. "What are you talking about?"
Richard gestured vaguely over his shoulder. "It may be nothing, but I’ve had the feeling all day that someone’s been following me.’’ He reached into his jacket pocket and tossed the ragged swatch onto the table. "I found this just before 1 arrived.’’
Poulard slammed a palm on the table. "You irresponsible son of a bitch! Why didn't you say anything when you got here?"
"Because he’s gone, Maurice," he answered calmly.
Chesney stared down the length of the table at the piece of cloth. "How do you know, Richard?"
"Because I do, John."
Poulard mopped his scalp nervously. "And you didn't go after him?’’
"I had been summoned, remember?"
"And the danger?"
Richard’s voice flattened; the fat man was rapidly getting on his nerves. "If there had been danger, I would have ended it." He had had enough. He stood, picked up the swatch and his jacket, and held out his left hand. "John?"
Chesney hesitated before taking an envelope from an inside pocket and sliding down the table. Richard picked it up, folded it, and stuffed it into his hip pocket, the move deliberately casual, just to taunt Poulard. Then he pushed his chair aside and strode to the door, opened it, and turned around when Vi said his name.
"You'll do it, won't you?"
"Like 1 said, Vi—if I can." But he relented when he saw her stricken expression. "Don't worry. Anything else will only be a last resort."
He stepped into the hallway.
The door closed silently behind him.
For a long moment he didn't move. He could hear raised voices in the chamber, Poulard's in argument, Chesney’s snapping. A trickle of ice touched the length of his spine.
That wasn’t simple rivalry in there.
He didn't need extra senses to know it was fear.
There were no shapes or shadows now; the night had taken them, and had replaced them with long stretches of nothing but the reach of the old car’s headlamps, turning the tarmac gray, blending the trees along the highway into a mottled, black wall.
He almost made it to Knoxville before weariness overtook him, abrupt and unexpected. It less on the early start and all the driving he'd done, and the startling realization that he had been barely aware of the road since leaving Virginia.
Neither the interstate's sparse evening traffic nor the darkened landscape had registered except as flashes of headlights, glimpses of illuminated signs pointing this way to fuel, that way to food.
He had been functioning on automatic, his concentration focused on trying to understand what had really happened at the curious meeting with the Warders. It wasn't only the assignment—bring the rogue back alive—it had also been almost as if they wanted him in there and gone with as little fuss and discussion as possible.
That wasn't like them.
Most of the time, similar meetings took at least two or three hours, while ramifications were debated, reasons for a Garou’s turning rogue were offered, sides were taken, and demands were made. To a virtual outsider like him, they were almost comical, and would have been had they not been so potentially dangerous for his kind.
But today had been nothing short of unnerving.
Currents and undercurrents.
And not a single mention of Fay.
He yawned suddenly, and so widely and noisily that he laughed aloud and decided Chattanooga could wait until morning. He needed to sleep before he wound up wrapped against a tree, or nose-down in a ditch.
He found a Ramada Inn half a mile off the highway just east of Knoxville, and took a room. He had barely set his bag down on a low and long chest of drawers when he began to pace from door to window, over and over. As soon as he caught himself doing it, he went outside, to walk for a while, to stretch his iimbs and breathe the night air.
Despite the weariness, he was restless, too restless to stay in a place with four walls.
The two-story motel was on a knoll, surrounded by a parking lot that seemed like a moat between the building itself and the woodland around it. The nearest community was a few miles farther north, and the still-hovering cloud cover reflected no lights at all.
With his jacket open and his hands in his pockets, he walked the perimeter slowly, smelling the pine, the cedar, the earth still damp from a recent light rain. He heard muffled music drifting from the motel's bar, and from the rooms a voice raised in querulous complaint, someone laughing gently, someone slamming dresser doors; from the highway he heard the grumble of a truck.
He trotted a few steps, then walked again, keeping close to the trees in case someone should look out. -
He wouldn’t be seen; he was as much at home out here as he was in there.
His third circuit had just begun when he realized that the world had suddenly fallen silent.
He stopped and cocked his head, straining for a sound, any sound, beyond the rasp of his own breathing.
It lasted only a few seconds, but it was long enough to remind him, for reasons he couldn't immediately understand, that his restlessness wasn't entirely due to the disturbing Roanoke meeting.
Most of it, he realized, was because it been a while, much too long, since he had last hunted.
Since he had last taken the form.
Since he had last marked his prey.
Since he had last tasted blood.
A slow smile almost parted his lips. A rumbling in his throat almost tickled.
A glance at the building, few of the windows lighted, and he wondered what they would think if they heard something howling out here. Would they come out, or would they hide? Investigate, or call for help?
It was tempting, so wonderfully, dangerously tempting that he might have done it had not a first-floor drapery parted, and he could see a shadow there, someone looking out at the night.
He sighed for good sense, and headed back to his room.
Tomorrow, he promised himself; tomorrow night he would allow himself a few hours of freedom.
For now, however, there was rest to be taken, and maybe a quick call to Fay to find out where she had been, and what she had meant when she had warned him to be careful. But once in the room, he barely had time to take off his clothes before sleep dragged him onto the bed.
There was only one dream:
In the desert, in the ruins, the jaws of Anubis dripped blood.
A faint rumble of thunder echoed across the city, and a flare of pale lightning marked the horizon between the sky and the Pacific.
In the street, down in the Tenderloin, among the crowds, a trio of well-dressed drunks argued loudly and profanely, while a woman leaning against a lamppost laughingly shrieked for the police. The sidewalks and tarmac reflected the garish neon as if the rain had already arrived. A police car ghosted through, and no one paid it any mind.
A telephone rang, and Miles Blanchard groaned at the intrusion and rolled over, clamping the bed's other pillow over his head. When the ringing persisted, he cursed loudly, in several languages, as he flung the pillow aside and fumbled with the receiver, nearly dropping it to the floor. He cursed again and sat up, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles, demanding the caller's identification even before he put the receiver to his ear.
As soon as he heard the telltale high-pitched whine, however, he hung up and swung out of bed.
Within seconds he had the proper equipment attached and ready.
Exactly one minute iater, the telephone rang again. The whine was gone, and he was wide awake.
"Mr. Blanchard."
"Yes, sir.”
"Are you rested?”
Blanchard thought of the woman who had left not two hours ago, trailing a ratty mink stole behind her, and grinned at the empty room, barely clean enough not to be called seedy. Sometimes, he thought, you just had to make sacrifices.
"Are you rested, Mr. Blanchard?"
"Yes, sir, as well as 1 can be, sir." He hoped the innuendo hadn't been lost. Not that it would matter. Crimmins wouldn’t care if Blanchard was a monk.
‘Excellent. And your assignment?”
"Completed, sir, no problems at all. You’ll have your report before sunset, as usual."
"Again, excellent.”
The man scowled at the far wall, its dull floral paper waterstained near the ceiling. This call wasn't usual, and he didn't much care for the questions he had and knew he couldn't ask. As a matter of fact, the more he thought about it, the more he realized he couldn't recall Crimmins ever contacting him like this, without prior arrangement.
He didn't like the chill that suddenly crawled up his spine.
"Uh, sir, is there a problem?”
There was a pause, and Blanchard frowned again.
The thunder grew louder.
Lightning flared around the edges of the cheap heavy drapes that covered the room’s single window.
"Mr. Blanchard, do you recall your stay in the South last autumn?"
He answered without hesitation: "Yes, sir, 1 certainly do."
No lie; it was the first time Crimmins had ever authorized a bonus.
"Well, Mr. Blanchard, it appears as if we now have a situation down there.’’
"Yes, sir."
"Leave immediately and take care of it, Mr. Blanchard. Do you understand me? Take care of it."
Blanchard grinned without humor. "You can count on me, sir. Is there something special . . . ?"
Again, the long silence.
He rubbed his chest with his free hand.
"He’s coming, Mr. Blanchard."
"I'm sorry?"
"Pay attention, Mr. Blanchard," Crimmins snapped. "I said, he's coming."
Blanchard caught himself before he laughed aloud in delight; instead he raised a fist and punched the air. He didn’t have to ask who, or how Crimmins knew. At last, at long last that damned Strider would be in his sights; would be his for the taking. “I’ll leave on the first plane I can get."
“See that you do, Mr. Blanchard, see that you do."
Blanchard frowned—what the hell did that mean?
"And Mr. Blanchard, please understand me. This time there are no options."
The frown faded quickly. "There never are, sir, I know that.”
"No, you don’t understand. I'm not only talking about him, I'm talking about you."
Blanchard stiffened, but the phone went dead before he could respond. Angrily, he dismantled the equipment; in a rage, he prowled the tiny room, fists clenched, eyes narrowed. The man had threatened him; actually threatened him. Him. As if he were some pissant amateur, some goddamn water boy, some goddamn servant, for God's sake.
He yanked the drapes aside and stood in the window, glaring down at the neon blurred and softened by rain.
He stood there for over an hour.
He didn't move.
Not once.
Shapes and shadows.
"It isn't going to work."
"Of course it will, Maurice. You must have faith."
"There is no faith. There is only what is.”
"Gaia will be displeased."
"Gaia is dying, and we’re doing nothing to help .Her." ... , - ■ = !•= . , ' ; ‘
"This is nothing?"
"Yes. It's nothing. The rogues increase, and there are too few to fight them. The Veil isn't permanent. One of these days, it's going to be nothing more than shreds,"
"Which is why we have Richard."
"Viana, for someone so smart, so . .. mature .. you are one of the most naive people 1 have ever met. That smug bastard is going to die, and for Gaia's sake, you don't have to look so pained. You agreed, just like the rest of us."
"I agreed, yes. That doesn't mean I have to like it.”
"Well, 1 do.”
"I know, Maurice. 1 know."
"I just hope it’s soon. We don’t have much time.”
In a chair by the bedroom door sat a large stuffed panda, a green bow loose around its neck, its black button eyes gleaming faintly in the glow from a panda night-light in the bathroom. On the opposite
wall was an oil landscape, framed in scrolled dark wood, highlights faintly glittering. Beneath the painting was a king-size bed with a brass headboard and solid wood footboard. Beside the bed was a nightstand, with a stuffed pink alligator coiled around a stubby pewter lamp and a French provincial telephone.
The telephone rang.
A long-fingered hand reached out from beneath the quilt, grabbed the receiver after several clumsy attempts, and pulled it back under the covers.
"This had better be good."
"it is. He's coming,”
"When?”
"Probably tomorrow.”
"Goody. Can 1 go back to sleep now?"
"But—”
The hand reappeared, dropped the receiver onto its cradle,
and vanished again.
Hunger.
There was nothing else but the hunger.
The river was dark, a rippling reflection of the clouds that sat motionless over the city. There was no traffic on the water, no sign of movement on the opposite bank or the inhabited hills that rose behind it.
Although the air wasn't cold, it still felt like snow.
Richard shifted uncomfortably.
He sat on a bench facing the embankment, hands deep in his topcoat pockets, an occasional gust sifting hair into his eyes. He had arrived in Chattanooga just before noon, checked into a third-floor room at the Read House, and waited for someone to make contact.
No one had.
There had been no message for him at the desk, none while he ate a late lunch in the hotel restaurant; none when he returned to the room to pace and grow impatient. Fay still wasn't home, and that didn't help his already fraying temper. He had been seconds shy of placing an angry call to Chesney when a bellman delivered an envelope.
The folded cream paper inside said nothing more than aquarium park and the bellman hadn’t a clue who had brought it; it had been left at the front desk, that's all he knew..
The park on the river was more a plaza than a park, with paving stones, a few benches, young trees barely tall enough to be worthy of the name. No one had been there when he had arrived, and he was the only one here now. On his left, the Tennessee Aquarium rose in contemporary design and dark brick, the only windows on the ground floor, where the entrance and gift shop were.
He shifted again, and tucked his chin into his coat.
He had been here over an hour—it was just past four-thirty—and the only life he had seen was a group of schoolchildren heading noisily inside, herded by a pair of young, harried teachers. A short while later, he heard traffic slowly building behind him on Broad Street, a wide four-lane boulevard that cut through the city’s center, the south end ending at the aquarium park; the north end narrowing and forking as it approached Lookout Mountain.
Ten minutes, he thought sourly; I'll give them ten minutes.
Excited voices turned his head. The kids were finally leaving, their tour over, and a school bus coughed impatiently at the curb. One child raced away from the others toward the water, bundled in bright colors, mittens dangling from strings on his sleeves.
"Don't," warned Richard softly as the child waddled past him.
The little boy stopped, tilted his head, and grinned. "Fish," he declared, pointing at the aquarium. His cheeks and the tip of his nose were already red.
"Right.”
"Fish," the boy said, pointing now at the river.
Richard shook his head. "Nope. Not today."
At that moment one of the teachers rushed up and scooped the child into her arms. Flustered, face drawn with anxiety, she scolded the boy softly for leaving the class and, in the same breath, thanked Richard for stopping him.
"No problem,” he said with a smile. "He wants to learn, that's all."
"Fish!" the boy yelled happily as he was carried away. "No fish!"
Suddenly Richard felt very old indeed.
But not so old that he didn't hear the footfall behind him. He straightened just as a woman came around the bench and sat on the far end. She wore a long emerald coat and matching scarf, obviously chosen to set off her dark-red hair cut short and brushed back over her ears. Black gloves, black shoes, black purse on a thick strap over her right shoulder He guessed her to be in her early thirties.
"Sorry I'm late,” she said without looking at him. Her voice was soft, and her accent clearly marked her as from Tennessee. "I got tied up.”
He said nothing.
She did look then, mild doubt in her expression. "Oh, God, you are Richard, aren't you?”
"What if I’m not?”
"Then I've just made a complete ass of myself."
He smiled crookedly, tempted to deny it just to see her blush, then nodded before saying, "All this is a bit melodramatic, isn't it? It would have been warmer in the hotel. And a whole lot less public."
Unconcerned, she shrugged and looked at the sky, at the river. "People meet here all the time. No big deal. It's not like the CIA is watching us, you know.” She slipped a hand inside her coat, pulled out a large manila envelope sealed with clear tape and dropped it on the bench between them. "Here’s some stuff in here you should look at soon as you can." As he reached for it, she added, "Copies, of course. Police reports, the Medical Examiner, stuff like that. A few of my own notes, just to get you started."
He didn't open it. Instead, he folded it in half and jammed it into his pocket. "How’d you get this?”
She shrugged again. "That's easy. I’m a cop.’’
With every assignment large or small came a local contact, someone paid to bring him information, to open doors where necessary, and to forget he ever existed when he finally left town. They were usually told he was Government, nothing else, and seldom tried to mine him for more; those few who did were easily, gently thwarted. When he was gone, however, they were watched by others, just in case the money they received wasn’t enough of a guarantee.
That had only happened once.
The contact hadn't survived.
Neither had any of the contacts been Garou. The Warders had decided that might pose more problems than they were worth. It was bad enough they had to hunt one of their own down; asking one to help a Strider was asking for trouble.
Nor had a contact ever before been as intimately knowledgeable with the cases at hand as Detective Sergeant Joanne Minster.
Another first.
Richard wasn't at all sure he liked it.
Police, the best police, had unspoken loyalties beyond the reach of a lucrative, extracurricular job. They also tended to ask too many questions. The right questions. The questions he would not be able to answer without lying. And lies had to be kept track of, had to be covered with virtually every word he said.
He wondered, then, as he looked at her, and liking what he saw, if she actually knew.
"If you're going to stare," she said softly, slowly turning her face toward him, "do it so people will think you're either getting ready to pop the question, or that you're just smitten with my incredible earthy beauty."
A heartbeat later she grinned.
He couldn’t help it; he laughed and shook his head in apology.
When she rose, he stood with her, and they headed for the street, her arm tucked around his.
It felt good, her closeness; it felt natural.
And that, too, disturbed him.
He was used to being alone, that was his nature. Lately, however, alone had begun to feel too damn much like lonely.
The city had gone dark except for the streetlamps, and a few lighted offices and the large red letters atop the Chubb Building far to his left. He couldn't see the clouds, but he could feel them, waiting. An automobile passed, tires sounding wet on the tarmac; it was the only one he could see in any direction. Chattanooga was not, he realized, a city whose downtown held much life beyond ordinary business hours, despite the obvious attempts at urban revitalization.
"When's your next shift?" he asked as they walked toward the hotel, several blocks away.
"Don’t have one. I’m on administrative leave."
He frowned. "Meaning?"
He felt her stiffen slightly. "Meaning, until I .A. finishes their investigation.” She glanced up at him. "That's Internal Affairs."
It was his turn to stiffen, but she tugged lightly on his arm, waving her free hand vaguely toward the street.
"It’s all right, they're not following me, it's nothing like that. Corruption or anything, I mean." A deep breath that exhaled quietly. The grip on his arm didn't change. "There was a shooting over at East Bridge last weekend—that's a mall, by the way—and I was involved. A daylight robbery attempt. The guy's dead." She hesitated. "I was the shooter."
He heard no remorse in her tone, nor did he sense any.
"The trouble is, he was black, and I'm not."
“So . .
"So it was either desk duty and a whole bunch of stupid papers, or leave until everything's sorted out and the protests calm down a bit. I took the leave."
They were the only ones on the street.
No cars, no buses; it might as well have been midnight.
A faint mist began to fall, and it felt as if they were walking through fog.
Another block, and there were curbside trees, their branches bare, skeleton shadows cast across the damp pavement. Treed islands in the center of the street as well, now, and in the distance the faint sound of an ambulance wailing.
"Here's the thing," she said, fumbling in her purse with her left hand. "Check those reports out tonight. I assume you'll know what you're reading."
"Pretty much," he answered, taking a business card from her. On the back she had written what he gathered was her home telephone number.
"I'll meet you tomorrow for breakfast,” she continued. "If you have any questions, ask them then. Then .. . whatever you need me for."
"We can't talk tonight?’’
"Is there a rush?"
The last killing had been a fortnight ago, according to the sketchy information Chesney had given him. Anything fresh would have been gone days ago.
He shook his head.
"Good. Because I have a date, and i’ll be damned if I’m going to stand him up."
The Read House was on the corner, a narrow canopy stretching from its brick front to the curb. There was no doorman, only a trio of empty newspaper machines. Long windows stretched left and right away from the glass-door entrance—to the right, they displayed clothing for the half-dozen expensive shops inside; to the left he could see small restaurant/bar tables, empty of patrons, in a section cut off from the rest of the room by a latticework wall.
Across the boulevard someone laughed drunkenly, and someone scolded.
They stood for a moment beneath the canopy, backs to a sudden wind, before she released his arm and looked up at him, one eye partially closed. Examining him, the ghost of a smile at her lips .
She wants to ask, he thought, but she probably won’t. Not tonight.
"Nine o’clock," she said abruptly, turned, and walked across the street without checking for traffic, toward a large and largely empty parking lot on the opposite corner. He watched until she let herself into a small sedan and drove away. Then he went inside, took the elevator to his floor, and stood for a second in front of his door, searching his pockets for the electronic key.
He hated those things.
They didn’t seem real, just stiff cardboard with holes punched in them.
When he found it, he let himself in, softly kicked the door closed behind him, and flicked the wall switch on as he shrugged off his coat. A table lamp was the only illumination, but he didn't need anymore.
One look told him someone had been here while he'd been gone.
It wasn't the maid.
The room had been searched.
The room had once been two, the center of the connecting wall replaced by an archway that accentuated the high plaster ceiling and pale floral wallpaper. Opposite the door was a three-cushion couch fronted by a glass-top cocktail table and flanked by end tables on which stood two tall brass lamps; a high window behind the couch overlooked Broad Street, hidden now by thick drapes. To the right was a closet and an inset wet bar backed by a mirror; to his left, a cherry-wood table with three matching padded chairs set around it.
Richard dropped the coat onto the nearest chair and moved toward the arch.
Beyond was a king-size bed with two low night-stands, a window behind it. Facing the footboard was a tall cabinet of scrolled walnut—behind its upper doors was a television, with three drawers set below it. In the far wall was another closet, and the bathroom door.
The sitting-room lamp didn't quite reach that far; all he could see was the near side of the bed. The rest were shapes and shadows.
And a scent.
Before he had left the hotel for the park, he had made sure he'd spoken to the maid who had cleaned his room, a flimsy excuse about misplacing an important paper. They hadn’t chatted long, but it was long enough for him to learn her scent.
This wasn't it.
His left hand closed into a loose fist.
He swallowed several times and tightened his jaw to keep his temper from overriding his good sense.
It was a struggle he wasn't so sure he wanted to win.
What he wanted to do was let the Garou take him, take the form and let him rip the place apart; what he had to do was find the one who had invaded his place. And that sparked his anger further, because he knew he wouldn't be able to do it here. As he prowled, nostrils flared, gaze searching slowly, he realized that whoever it had been, had been extraordinarily careful.
Nothing had been disturbed except a drawer not quite closed all the way, a pen not quite in the same position beside the bed s telephone.
He growled quietly.
Scent on his clothes in the drawer, scent on his clothes in the bedroom closet.
His left hand tightened.
Scent in the bathroom.
It hadn't been the cop, the woman. Although she hadn't worn perfume, he could still recall the clear scent of her shower-fresh and warm despite the winter air. He would know it anywhere. And this wasn't it.
When he returned to the sitting room, he switched off the lamp and forced himself to sit on the couch, his eyes narrowed, his breathing deliberately slow.
This wasn’t the work of the Warders; they knew better. .
It couldn’t have been the rogue, because it—he or she—didn't, couldn’t, know he was here. Neither would it have been so cautious.
His lungs filled and emptied.
Muted voices in the corridor rose and faded.
The dark took on weight and made his lungs work harder.
Somebody else knew, and his frustration grew when he couldn't focus his concentration on anything but the invading scent that threatened to overwhelm him.
Out, he decided then; he had to get out.
Five minutes later he was on the deserted street behind the hotel, the air much colder, moisture on the tarmac slowly turning to wafer ice. He crossed over and walked on, more rapidly now, lights from a motel across the way blurred as the mist thickened into a light rain.
His shadow kept him company.
A few cars passed, none of them slowing down.
Faster still, nearly running, as he made his way under the interstate overpass, listening to the traffic above him fleeing to the suburbs here and in Georgia, not five minutes away.
Eventually, the land rose to a low, shapeless hill on his right, a few houses at its base, nothing but trees above that he could see.
Faster, trotting, ignoring the rain, the slippery pavement, swerving abruptly into a narrow street without illumination save from a porch-light or two.
His shadow changed.
There was no agony in the transformation, and at his level, no need to discard his clothing.
What he wore merged; what he was, was human no more, although it still ran on two legs.
A dog howied hysterically
A door slammed.
He ducked into a wooded lot and let his new vision take him through to the hillside, into the trees and up, the rain comfortably cool on black-and-silver fur, the wind taking the scent of him away from the now-invisible houses.
But not away from the creatures whose territory he passed through—dark things stirred and froze at his passing, or bolted from beneath the brush; nesting birds called out softly, a few taking wing, most simply trembling; a rabbit darted across a small clearing, zigzagging, soundless.
It wasn't fast enough.
In a lunging stride, the Strider caught it, and its fangs gleamed wetly despite the dark as they tore into the creature’s neck.
Soundless.
Except for the faint raindrop splash of blood on the ground's dead leaves.
Farther up and farther west he caught another, ate, drank, and settled easily on his haunches, bobbing his great head as he tested the air. He was alone. Except for a few nervous birds nearby, he could sense no warm blood, and his hunger subsided, the bloodlust stirred by his temper finally gone. Or at least satisfied for the moment.
Slowly he rose to his full height, grunted, and made his way to the top of the hill. A small clearing sat just below the crown, an irregular oval charred by a summer fire. It was on the back slope, giving him a fairly unobstructed view of the land beyond the city, at least in this direction. It surprised him to see no more than a handful of lights below. Although most of the trees appeared to be pine, he could see, now, how isolated Chattanooga really was in spite of its urban sprawl.
If the rogue he was after was native to the area, finding it was going to be much more difficult than he'd imagined. Too many hills, too many mountains, too much untended, uninhabited woodland.
He turned away, flexed his legs, and began to run again, easily this time, lopping up to the crown and down the other side, branches slapping lightly against his shoulders and sides, at one point slipping on the increasingly slippery ground and nearly falling.
A quick laugh at himself as he regained his balance, exhilarating in the freedom he felt.
He ran for the joy of it until he felt his limbs tiring, and made his way slowly back to level ground.
Shifting on the way.
Thinking about the rogue and relishing the challenge.
Whatever side issues there were, no matter what the Warders had said, the hunt would be for the rogue—everything else would have to wait.
He grinned; he laughed aloud; he felt better than he had in months, and only vaguely noticed the increased activity at the Read House as he made his way quickly to his room. Once there, he changed into dry clothes—dark shirt and jeans, leaving his feet bare—and sat at the table, Chesney’s envelope and Minster’s folder spread before him.
He knew what would be in the Warder's package— instructions to take care, do not bring attention to yourself, do not (this time) kill the rogue if you can help it, be as swift and silent as you can. There would also be money to take care of his incidentals; the room and its charges would be taken care of by the company he supposedly worked for.
He was in too good a humor to have to read what he already knew.
He opened the folder instead, ignoring the fading scent of the room's intruder. By morning it would be gone, but he wouldn't forget it.
Two hours later he slumped back and rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands.
“Damn," he whispered.
From the newspaper clippings the detective had also included, he saw that most of the details in these reports hadn’t made it into the media, otherwise the story would have made the national news. The last death, Trish McCormick’s, was still a frontpage topic, however, partly because of the woman’s evident beauty, and partly because it had happened only last week. What the clippings didn't tell their readers was how the bodies were when they were discovered.
"Mauled" was too mild a term.
“Partially consumed” was the M.E.'s verdict, something Richard would have guessed anyway.
The second victim had been found in the river, snagged in the branches of a fallen tree only a few hundred yards north of the aquarium; what was left of the third had been found stuffed in a Dumpster out of the valley, behind an upscale mall north of the city.
The first victim, Kyle Gellman, had only been attacked. Richard assumed the reason no feeding had taken place was because the man had been found too soon.
From what he could see, the police investigation had changed its focus from a possible human maniac to the more likely solution of some kind of animal, possibly a panther drifted up from Florida once the second victim's condition had been examined. Yet here and there, he could see doubt among the investigating officers assigned to the hastily assembled task force. Cannibalism, apparently, was not being ruled out.
He groaned aloud to release some tension, rubbed his face again, and stood, stretching until he felt that his joints threatened to pop. Bed, he ordered; take some rest, talk to Minster tomorrow and have a look around the mountain where Gellman and McCormick were killed. And probably the second victim, a man, had been as well. He had. a feeling the woman found behind the mall was an aberration in the pattern.
The doorknob rattled.
Richard whirled, breath held, until it rattled again.
Two strides took him to the peephole, through which he saw a short man with astoundingly thick long white hair, glaring at his electronic key. Richard opened the door, and the man jumped back, one hand at his chest.
"Wrong room," Richard said with a polite smile.
The man closed his eyes briefly and sighed. He held up the key and snarled at it. "I hate these things. They never remind you what your number is." He glanced at the door’s brass numbers, looked to his left, and shrugged. "Damn, there is it. Sorry to have bothered you."
"No problem," Richard said, aware now of a constant noise in the background. People; lots of people.
The floor was shaped like a capital I. His room was at the base, just to the right of the corridor's intersection. The white-haired man's room was at the east end of the base, the only other room on this side, and it had double doors, the sign of a large suite.
Richard frowned as he listened. It was late, it was Thursday, so what was going on?
The man had his door open now, and nudged a suitcase over the threshold with one foot. “You part of the convention?" he asked as he stepped inside.
"Convention?"
The man raised his eyebrows. "You’re not, I guess. Odd. They usually try to keep the guests all here in one place." He smiled. "So they can keep track of them, I reckon."
The door began to close.
"Excuse me,” Richard said, raising his voice. "What convention?"
"Hope you don't like a good night's sleep," the man said, laughing silently. "By dinnertime tomorrow, there'll be a couple of thousand of them crawling all over the place. They take over the whole building until Sunday. Noisy as hell, too. 1 love it."
The door closed.
Richard stared for a moment before backing into his room. He turned over the bolt, set the chain latch, and scratched idly at his cheek as he headed for the bedroom.
A convention.
Two thousand people.
His first reaction was to swear at Chesney for being such a fool; his second was a slow, careful smile.
Although there would undoubtedly be some inconvenience, this could very well work to his advantage: it was easier to disappear in a crowd of businessmen and their wives, than in a mostly empty building.
Besides, how bad could it be?