"I found that on the victim. It had a strange essence on it that was dissipating, so I took it to be examined before it was gone."

The commissioner leaned forward and picked up the bag. He held it up to see more clearly. "An awful lot of stones seem to land on your desk, Captain Ruiz."

"Um ... yes, sir," he replied.Poor Ruiz. Sweat poured off his forehead as he tried to look involved. I had never seen a police captain so marginalized. Of course, with the level of power and animosity in the room, no other captain had ever been in such a situation.

The commissioner handed the bag to macDuin, who took it like someone had given him a dead mouse. While macDuin made a small show of examining the stone, a soft chirping sound filled the silence. Murdock glanced at his beeper and turned it off. MacDuin tossed the bag on the desk."Another convenient coincidence. No one saw this at the murder scene."

"Perhaps you'd like to discuss the coincidence with Bri-allen ab Gwyll. I took it to her for examination." To his credit, macDuin didn't quite blanch. He retained his composure fairly well, but obviously he hadn't expected me to bring up Briallen. The commissioner chuckled. "Curiouser and curiouser someone once said. I think, Lor-can, that we should reward this young man. I haven't seen someone slip out of so tight a web of yours in ages."

"I don't know what you mean," said macDuin.

"I mean I think his story is exactly what he says it is.Unless, of course, you care to dance with the old witch on this."

I hadn't realized Murdock still had his hand on me until he squeezed my arm in warning. He needn't have worried, though. I'm sure Briallen had been called worse things in her time. Besides, I knew a glimmer of light when 1 saw one, and at least the commissioner's tone held some respect. MacDuin's eyes burned coldly as he looked at me. The image of his wings appeared faintly in the air behind him, challenging the glamour to its limit. "Assuming for the moment your story is true, what did you find?"

"I'm ... not sure. I mink it's confirmation of a theory I have that the killer has some kind of birth defect. There was some essence on the stone that didn't feel right. These murders might be related to the defect in some way."

"In other words, you have nothing," said macDuin.

I shook my head,then tapped my nose. "I have his scent. I can find him. I just have to figure out where he'll be next. But not if I'm in a jail cell."

The commissioner frowned in annoyance and flicked his hand. "You're not under arrest."

"Commissioner, I must insist..." macDuin began, but the commissioner cut him off.

"Let it go, Lorcan. We're wasting time. You're not the only one who has to worry about politics. I am not going to embarrass myself by having yet another person in custody if yet another murder is committed. As it is, the press is going to have a field day with this. I want hard evidence, and I want it yesterday." He glanced up at Murdock. "Am I clear, Detective?"

"Yes, sir," Murdock said.i "Then get moving," the commissioner said. He didn't have to tell me twice. I opened the door and was into the squad room before he had a moment to reconsider. Murdock was right behind me, his face grim. We retraced our steps through the building and got back in his car.

"Not that I'm not grateful, but why did your father help me?" Murdock started the car and eased onto West Broadway. "Maybe he doesn't like macDuin more than he doesn't like you."

He took a left turn from the right lane and drove upPittsburgh Street . We drove slowly down the alley. A small Honda that had seen better days was parked next to a dump-ster. Murdock pulled up beside it. The dirty driver's window rolled down, and Barnard Murdock smiled into my face.

"Hey, Bar," I said. Murdock's younger brother looked exactly like he was his younger brother.Same dark hair. Same dark eyes set off by that same hawk nose. Only everything looked slightly smaller. Everyone called him Bar. No one dared called him Barney.

"Connor!The man of the hour.Can you step in it any deeper?" I smiled modestly. "Nice to see you, too, Bar."

He cocked his head forward to look around me at Murdock. "You didn't answer your beeper."

"I am answering it. He in there?" said Murdock.

"Yep.You want backup?"

"Nan.We can handle him."

Bar shrugged. "Suit yourself.You coming to dinner on Sunday, Connor?"

"I'm the last person your father wants to see at the table right now." Bar laughed in appreciation. "Yeah, I just got off the line with someone who filled me in. After you guys left, the Guild guy tore out in a rage.Nice going."

Murdock drove the rest of the way into the alley and parked by Shay's door. My knees ached as I stretched outside the car. I needed sleep badly. Murdock came around the car with his gun drawn but held down at his side.

"Is that necessary?" I asked.

He gave me an annoyed look. "We lost Robin last night. You want to confess to the murders, I'll put it away."

I held my hands up."All right, all right. I just think it's a little heavy-handed.""Fine. You go in first." I hesitated, and Murdock brushed past me with a smug look on his face. Just because I didn't think Shay was capable of murder didn't mean I was stupid. Murdock pulled open the door. The bright hall light was on. We moved slowly along one side of the hall, not quite touching the wall. When we reached the inside door, Murdock paused. We could hear movement on the other side of the door. We kept back."Shay?" Murdock called out. The movements inside stopped. "Police, Shay, open up." He didn't answer. Murdock looked at me, and I nodded. Murdock aimed his gun at the door as I crossed to the opposite side of the hall. The prickly sensation of my body shield activating swept over my head. Just as I tensed myself to kick open the door, it opened.

Shay stood on the threshold. He froze when he saw the gun just as Murdock lifted the muzzle away.

"Jesus, Shay. You could have answered."

"Sorry," he said. He turned away and went back in the room. At first glance, the room looked like it hadn't been straightened up since the last time we were there. Clothes were still everywhere, mostly piled on the beds. Then I noticed the open suitcases on the floor. "What do you want this time?" Shay asked. He bent over and folded a pair of jeans.

"Are you going somewhere?" Murdock said. He hadn't put the gun away.

"Like I said the other day.I've had it. I'm getting out." He continued packing clothes as he spoke.

"I don't think you should leave right now," said Murdock.

Shay stopped and looked up. "Is this about the sketch? If you need a witness, you don't need me. Ask Robin. He lied. He saw him, too."

"Where were you last night, Shay?" Murdock asked.

Shay's cheeks colored as he nervously brushed his hair back over his shoulder. "I was working."

"Were you with Robin last night?" I asked. ;?¦.-< "Yes.For a while. We argued about that stupid glamoui stone. I realized you guys just forgot it in the confusion, bui Robin wanted to play with it anyway. I told him it was dangerous to pretend he was fey when he isn't."

"Why did you think it was dangerous? We had someone in custody," said Murdock. He shrugged. "I heard that guy was human. I don't know what the guy I saw was, but he definitely was not human."

"When did you see Robin last?"

His eyes narrowed. "Why?"

"Just answer the question," said Murdock.

"About midnight."Shay sank slowly to the bed, not taking his eyes off us. "I left him at some dive on Congress. Why do you keep asking me about Robin? Where is he?" His voice grew calmer the more agitated he looked. Neither of us answered him. His face dropped a litde. He was neither in complete control nor overwrought, but had the barely contained hysteria of someone trying very hard not to believe what he was thinking. I'd worked enough cases to have seen it before. I looked at Murdock, and he nodded. "We found him in an alley last night, Shay." Shay closed his eyes and slumped forward, clutching his waist. He sobbed quietly as we watched awkwardly. I didn't think he was faking. I stepped over to him and gently placed my hand on his back. Murdock frowned and shook his head, but I ignored him. I looked around for some tissue and found a box on the nightstand. I handed several to Shay, and he wiped his face roughly before lifting his head.

"He was murdered. The killer got Tansy, too," I said.

Anger fluttered across his face. "And the killer got away, didn't he?" It felt like an accusation. I nodded.

"Why did you leave him?" Murdock asked.

"I had an appointment," said Shay.

"With?"

"He didn't show me his ID." "I think that's a convenient way of telling me you recognized him anyway."

"Murdock ..." I said. I didn't see the point of his pursuing this.

"Even if I did know his name, do you dunk he'd admit being with me?" Shay glared at Murdock like he was an idiot. Frankly, I thought he was pretty damned close to it.

"Did you see the guy from your sketch last night?" I asked.

"No." He hesitated the slightest moment, just enough to make me uneasy. I still didn't see how Shay could be involved. All along, his stories had been plausible, if uncomfortably coincidental, and his involvement made no sense. He wasn't fey. He wasn't strong. And he wasn't trying to hide anything, or seemed not to be. Maybe it was that he was me least likely suspect that kept Murdock skeptical. No one really has so much bad luck.Except me, maybe.

"Where's my equipment?" Murdock said.

Shay rose from the bed and fished around in the pile of clothes on die bed opposite. He found the wire and handed it to Murdock.

"You're not going anywhere, Shay. Understood?"

He nodded.

Murdock walked out of the room, and I followed him. I turned at die door to see Shay staring forlornly at the floor. He really did look too young to have survived as long as he had, but dien all the kids like him in the Weird did. "I'm sorry, Shay."

He gave me barest hint of a smile. "Thank you, Connor. It's nice to know someone else is." Murdock was already in the car when I came out. As we drove back past Bar, we all waved halfheartedly.

"You were pretty hard on him," I said.

"What did you expect? He's die only real lead I have, and he has no alibi." „s "I thought you had surveillance on him." "We did. He went out an exit of the bar last night we didn't know about."

"It's not him, Murdock. He wasn't at the scene last night."

"How do you know he wasn't?"

"Because I would have sensed his essence."

Murdock pulled in front of my building. He put the car in park and turned to me. "How do you know you didn't?"

I looked at him in confusion for a moment, but he just sat patiently staring back.

"Connor, you said you get a funny vibe from him.Your words." I still didn't say anything.

"And the killer has a weird essence you've never encountered before..." I fell back against the seat. "Ha!" I said.

"Thank you," said Murdock.

"Let me think a minute." I didn't know if it were possible. Shay definitely had a strong essence, but he was also definitely human. He obviously had a lot of fey paraphernalia in his apartment. I suppose it was possible he had stumbled on something that could alter his essence and even give him strength out of proportion to his actual ability. It would have to be something pretty potent. I doubted a human could sustain it.

"Why kill Robin?" I asked.

"Maybe he found out," Murdock suggested.

"Even if it's him—and that's a big 'if—what's the motive?"

Murdock shrugged."Revenge?Jealousy? Thrill? Pick one."

I let out a sigh. "It's a stretch, but at this point, I won't discount it. I'm soexhausted, I can't think anymore, Murdock." I got out of the car.

"You look like hell." He smiled and drove off. I love his social skills. I lifted my face to a sky white with haze. Already I could feel dense humidity descending. I needed a shower and my bed. I could feel weariness in every bone of my body. I yawned deeply as I let the elevator slowly pull me up through die building.

Maybe Briallen was right. Maybe I was taking it all too personally. Robin in all likelihood would have ended up dead one way or the other. And Tansy was too naive to stay away from the wrong elements. As I let myself into me apartment, I thought maybe things might not have turned out differently. And I also thought that maybe, just maybe, Briallen was wrong.

10

I've always been fascinated that when I wake up wearing the same clothes from the previous night, they smell a lot worse than I thought they did when I went to bed. Of course, managing to sleep over fifteen hours before waking at four in the morning doesn't help either. I couldn't stand my own stench, so I hauled myself out of a nest of sheets and took a shower. Dried sweat and not a little blood sloughed off like a layer of dead skin. When I came out of the bathroom, I was too awake to go back to bed. I made myself some coffee, slipped on a pair of shorts, and went up to the roof. Even though I was practically naked and it was still technicallynighttime , the air felt hot on my skin. The humidity of the previous day had never fully dissipated, promising an even muggier day to come. I settled into the lawn chair and sipped from my mug. Regardless of the temperature, I always drink my coffee. A day with no caffeine is like a day with no meaning whatsoever.

Across the channel, a muddy haze hung around the docks like a dirty skirt. Lighted windows dotted the office towers where no one would be working for hours to come, empty offices vibrating with stillness. The taillights of cabs silently slipped in and out of sight on mysterious nightly errands. The only sounds were the hollow white noise of the city and the occasional siren off in the distance. After the bars have closed and even die drunks have made it home, the city still rustles like an insomniac. Complete rest hovers just out of reach until dawn arrives, dien there's no time left. The city doesn't sleep, but it dreams. It dreams of regrets and promises.

I felt that way too damned much of the time. Ever since my accident, I'd been poised between future hope and past glory. I hated it, hated die unknown state in which I found myself. If I could never regain my abilities, what would I become? Briallen's words kept cycling tiirough my head. What did it mean to be a body without talent? I know she meant mat mere's no such tiling, but mat didn't really answer the question.

For the longest time, I'd beaten myself up over my arrogance. How I didn't appreciate what I had until I lost it. How I'd looked down on everyone else who couldn't compete with me. But now I needed to get past the self-flagellation. I had to find my way back to the path, and die only way to do that was to act. Otherwise, I'd end up with nodiing better to do but collect disability checks and sit half-naked sipping coffee in me middle of die night.

As me sky began to lighten, I sat in front of die computer. Methodically, I recorded everything mat had occurred in the past forty-eight hours. It was me longest single entry in die file. Nodiing is harder for an investigator man to become part of his own case. Even though Briallen and Murdock came at me from different angles, they had made die same point: Don't make it personal. It was hard not to. They were right, but it was hard.

The first tiling I did was to retire the Tuesday Killer moniker. It had forced me into a mind-set diat left me unprepared for what had happened. I had forgotten that Occam's razor is a process, not a solution. By focusing on the obvious weekly cycle, it never occurred to me to look for something else. A cheap bank calendar would have spelled out the phases of the moon for me had I bothered to look. I had the urge to toss all my analysis for fear that I had constrained myself too much. After Murdock's comment in the car, the whole ska thing was starting to bother me. Did Tansy, with her limited vocabulary, have only a word for wrong birth to describe the nasty essence she felt, or was she on the money? Was I congratulating myself a little too much for connecting the cross-species cases in Gillen's files? Avalon Memorial was the only fey hospital in the Northeast outside ofNew York . It would have been unusual if I hadn't found any. On top of that, I'd only found the connection by following other links. Computer search engines are notorious for linking completely disparate information because they're set up by people who don't think exactly like you do. I was surprised some pornography hadn't popped up. It usually does, no matter what gets searched.

I called up Murdock's notes on Shay. As far as I could tell, he was born of human parents. The only people from Faerie to appear after Convergence were fey—always some type of druid, fairy, elf, or dwarf—never a normal human without so-called fantastic abilities. According to the stories, humans certainly played a part in Faerie, but they didn't seem to come through in the unexplained merging of the two worlds. Without a distinct connection to Faerie, I could not see how to link Shay into the killer's profile.

It came down to essence. Essence is like an energy that can be manipulated in different ways. That's one of the things that make the fey races vary from each other. Druids actually join their personal essence to whatever other essence they're working with. It's why we're very good at it, but also why we get tired. Fairies don't have to do that. They can literally pluck essence out of anything with no depletion of their own essence, unless they want to use it. It makes them very powerful, but the trade-off is a lower level of skill in use. And elves manipulate essence only through chanting. They didn't seem to have any direct control of any essence except their own, which they use only in dire circumstances. Humans can activate essence, but only if someone fey has set things up for them. Someone like Shay couldn't do it on his own. I jumped as my answering machine beeped loudly to indicate it was full. I had turned off the volume and the ringer before passing out the day before. I raised the volume in time to hear Murdock say, "You idiot." He disconnected. I hit playback. The first message was from Murdock telling me he was sending a case file update via email. The next four were also Murdock, all with the same message to call. The last one was the one that had just come in. An annoyed Murdock said, "Call me. Your cell phone's dead, you idiot."

I called, and he picked up immediately.

"The Guild took the case," he said. Good old Murdock, right to the point. I felt like I'd been sucker-punched. "The last victim's father kicked up a stink. I told you he was someone big inNew York . I don't think macDuin had a choice."

"That's too easy. MacDuin knows something. I think he's wanted this buried all along," I said.

"Well, it's his case now," said Murdock. "Wrap up your notes and email them to me. I have to turn everything over to the Guildhouse this afternoon."

I could hear in his voice that he was already thinking of something else. "That's it? You're just going to let it go?"

Murdock chuckled dryly."Welcome to theBoston P.D., Connor. Once the Guild asserts its right, we're out of it. You probably did it to us a couple of times yourself." He was right. The rules of the game proscribed it. If a crime were fey-related, the Guild could take the case without question. I'd been pissing and moaning that the Guild took only cases it had a political benefit in taking, and they had just proved my point. "Come by for dinner on Sunday," Murdock said into the silence.

"I'll think about it." Personally, I still didn't think the commissioner wanted to see me at his table. I put the phone back on the cradle and stared out the window. Daylight had returned the city to its waking state. Traffic backed up along the elevated highway; planes took off and landed; and people moved lethargically along the streets in the heat. The Guild had taken the case, and the world hadn't ended. I was mildly surprised.

In the past, I would have taken the opportunity to sweep the desktop clear, perhaps throw a book or two or knock a hole in the wall. After a while though, it began to sink in that I didn't have a maid anymore and would have to clean the mess up myself. Instead, I gripped the edge of my desk and counted to ten. It's not as satisfying, but it is tidier.

MacDuin probably was forced to take the case officially if the last victim's father had any pull. That much I could believe. I just had no faith the other victims would have any justice. They were important to no one but themselves and maybe a small circle of friends. All macDuin had to do was find the killer, or at least set up another sucker and connect him to the last case, and that would be the end of it. The Guild would focus on the one case and nothing else would matter. The denizens of the Weird wouldn't matter. And whatever macDuin was trying to pull with the fake perpetrator would get buried. I checked my records to see which files hadn't been sent to Murdock yet,then checked them again. While I didn't particularly like helping macDuin, I hated not finishing a job more. I dropped everything into an e-mail and sent it off. No sense causing Murdock grief by not closing up the files. I wandered about the apartment at loose ends, widi nothing to do unless Murdock came up with another case. It was an odd feeling—hoping something bad would happen to someone so that you could get work. Frustration gnawed at me. As a general rule, when all else fails, sublimate. Grabbing a sponge, I cleaned the kitchen and bathroom to occupy my mind. As I tossed the remnants of Chinese takeout from the fridge, I jostled the box of glow bees. I decided to warm one up and send it to Stinkwort. I could at least let off steam by yelling at him for his bad behavior at Briallen's. I didn't know how long it would take for him to get the message.

As I found myself crouched on the floor hunting dust bunnies from under the couch, I sat back on my haunches. "Okay, this is getting out of hand," I said aloud. 1 could care less if mere were dust bunnies under my couch. I wiped my hands, grabbed my keys, and left the building. I couldn't let it go. I had to go to the Guildhouse and find out what macDuin was up to.

While I liked living in the Weird, its one drawback was inconvenient public transportation. Nothing goes anywhere in the middle of the day except downtown, then you have to make a connection to get anywhere else. For a small city, it can take way too long to get to where you're going. More often than not, it's easier to walk. I got lucky and caught the number seven bus onCongress Street , which got me to the Orange Line station in fifteen minutes. As I stood at Downtown Crossing, I opted to walk upWashington Street the rest of the way instead of taking the sweltering subway. Washington Streetused to run right through the old Combat Zone, some urban planner's brilliant idea of a legal human sewer. Now the area consisted of boarded-up buildings and the occasional social service office. Prostitutes still prowled the area at night, which infuriated the residents of nearbyChinatown . Their only consolation was mat one of the remaining theaters ran decent chop-socky movies. The other two theaters still catered to the raincoat crowd. During the day the businessmen from the Financial District spent their lunch hours looking for a quick thrill in the peep booths while trying not to soil their suits. It was like the Weird, only for humans. It was an entertaining walk if you didn't think about it too much. I turned towardPark Square and paused at the corner ofCharles StreetThe noonday traffic flowed briskly past me. Even with my sunglasses on, the bright sunlight felt like knives in my eyes. All the sleep I had gotten helped, but I still felt like I'd been run over by a truck. I couldn't imagine how I would have felt if Briallen hadn't propped me up a little.

Across the way, the Park Plaza Hotel retained the air of an old Brahmin stronghold, with its prim cornice and orderly tan blocks of hewn granite. Like so many city buildings situated at the intersection of six or seven streets, it pointed into the square like a ship coming into port. As the traffic slowed for the light, I craned my head up at the building next to me.

The Guildhouse looked like anything but an oldBoston building. Slab upon slab ofPortland brownstone towered up haphazardly into crenellated towers that reached heights unheard of back in Faerie. A little fey ability and modern structural engineering knowledge will do that to an architect. Gargoyles perched on every conceivable surface. They weren't part of the original design, but had accumulated over the years, attracted by the levels of power emanating from the building.

I made my way to the arched main entry facing the square. The sharp end of a portcullis hung suspended over the huge glass doors. I didn't know if it was operational or just kitsch. Directly over the main doors, a stone dragon's head jutted out, its mouth agape, long sinuous tongue curling over needlelike teeth. Unlike the other gargoyles, the dragon was part of the original design of the building but never seemed to attract a resident spirit. Too stressful a position, I guessed.

I felt a flutter across my mind, like a cool dry puff of wind. The feeling was familiar but one I hadn't experienced in a long time. It came again, followed by a sound like stone grating against sand. You return, whispered the dull dry voice in my head. I leaned back, scanning the upper vault of the entry way. Hundreds of gargoyles clustered in the recesses of the arcli— demons, animals, reptiles, and the occasional human joke all staring back at me.

Here, said the voice. I stepped back from the building and examined the pillars near the front. After a moment, I spotted him—a squat little man, no bigger than a house cat, nestled in among the acanthus leaves ©f a capital. He was chubby, naked, and enormously endowed for his size. A single eye stared out from the center of his forehead, right under a small spiraled horn, and his ash gray face bore a noncommittal expression. As gargoyles went, he was a nice guy.

I relaxed my mind and thought, Hello, Virgil. It wasn't quite a sending. You didn't so much send your thoughts to gargoyles. They just listened if they chose to. Virgil was an old friend of sorts. At one time, he sat on the ledge outside my office window in the Guildhouse. The first time he spoke to me, I was rereading Dante, hence the name. I have no idea what his real name is or even if he has one. I was surprised to find him in such a conspicuous place.

Have waited, he said.

Forme?I asked.

Yes. > Gargoyles are the damnedest things. They come from their own tradition out ofEurope , but you can find them most anywhere. It's not clear if the animated ones became animated post-Convergence, but they definitely went on the move at about the same time. They love Guildhouses especially. The first Guildhouse inNew York collapsed from their weight, so later Guildhouses were all built with the eventuality of a couple tons of stones sitting on them.

They almost never speak. I don't know if all of them can, but the ones that do, do so rarely. They move only at night, very slowly unless under extreme duress, and never when anyone is watching. I once monitored the progress of a winged frog from my window ledge to the floor below. It took him a month and a half. He stayed there a day or two,then disappeared. I still don't know why. Can I help you with something? I asked. I couldn't imagine how I could help a spirit-inhabited lump of stone that had been around for centuries. Gargoyles didn't need a lot of taking care of. A dry, rasping sound answered me, which I think might have been laughter.

Not your moon, Virgil said.

I don't understand, Ithought.

Do not know. Will.

Will? Do you mean you will or I will? I thought as loudly as I could. Even though none moved, I felt the attention of several other gargoyles. Virgil didn't respond. I stood patiently, waiting for him to say more, but he just stared resolutely down at me. When it became clear he wasn't going to speak again, I nodded courteously. Thank you.

A cold knot formed in my stomach. Had I leaped to yet another wrong conclusion? Was the lunar cycle yet another too-convenient theory? I had never quite figured out why Virgil spoke to me at all and whether it was supposed to help. His words only made sense after the fact and usually referred to something incredibly obvious I had missed. I knew I would end up kicking myself when I finally understood.

For the first time in almost a year, I walked into the GuiJdhouse. The vaulted marble foyerrose two stories, lit by wall sconces resembling torches. A tour group huddled to one side while their guide pointed out the nondescript space. The Guildhouse is a working building, not a museum, but that doesn't stop people from wondering what it looks like. They don't get any farther than the foyer most of the time unless they're lucky.

To the left of the entrance, a long curving line of fey and humans waited, their faces in various stages of desperation or fear or hope. I used to call them supplicants. Some were looking for lost loved ones, others had a grievance againsta iey, and still others had nowhere else to turn for help in whatever dire circumstances they found themselves. They came every day to wait in line to fill out audience requests that were rarely granted. What most people don't realize is mat they have better odds of getting into Harvard than getting an appointment with a Guild member. When I bothered to notice them before, they annoyed me. I was like everyone else who worked upstairs; I couldn't care less if it didn't help my career. Now I just saw them as people who could probably use some help. I moved around the line to get to main reception. Two women, both elves, worked the desk. I didn't recognize either of them. As I approached, the one with the ponytail and too much blue eye shadow held out a clipboard. "Fill out the application and deposit it in the bin on the end of the desk."

"Connor Grey to see Keeva macNeve."

"Do you have an appointment card?"

"No."

"We don't just call up without a card, sir. You can fill out an application if you like." She turned back to her paperwork.

I glanced at the people waiting. 1 was breaking the monotony, and some were paying particular attention. Leaning over the desk, I grabbed a pen and wrote Keeva's phone number on the form. She'd kill me if anyone overheard it. "This is Keeva's direct line. If I didn't know her, I wouldn't have it. Call her please."

She looked at the number dubiously, but I could tell she knew it was an internal line. With several shades of annoyance, she picked up the phone and dialed. "Her voice mail's picking up. Do you want to leave a message?"

"No. Can I just go up to her office and see if she's in?" I said.

"No." She hung up the phone and turned back to her paperwork again. Once I'd had a sweet office in an end turret overlooking the Common. Now I couldn't get past the first floor without an appointment. As I debated what to say next, a familiar figure pushed through the front door with double slices of pizza. She glared at someone who came too near as she passed. She wore a black lacy shawl draped over one shoulder, a black sundress, and combat boots. Her skin had the white pallor of someone who rarely went outside. The only real color about her was her hair. I'd seen it black, red, plum, and one entire week it was blue. Today it was orange and clipped in a spiky bowl that set off her pleasantly round features.

Meryl stopped short when she saw me. Wary eyes looked up at me from under her bangs. She only came up to my shoulder, but she had enoughattitude for someone twice her height. She bit the tips off both slices of pizza simultaneously. "Grey. Need another favor?" I could feel heat rise on my cheeks. "As a matter of fact..." I gestured at the desk. "They're being officious and won't let me in."

The receptionist overheard and glared at me.

Meryl looked me up and down. "Are you armed?"

"I have a knife."

She nodded once. "Good. I can claim self-defense if I have to kill you." She walked past the reception desk. "He's with me," she said over her shoulder.

"I need to see your pass," said the receptionist.

Meryl turned slowly. "On average, I pass you four times a day. I think you're a twit. You think I'm.a bitch. Ring a bell?" She resumed walking. I trailed along behind her.

"Did you find the stones you lost?" she asked.

We arrived at the elevator bank just as the doors opened, and I followed her in. "I didn't lose them. This place did."

The elevator descended. "Whatever," she said around a mouthful of pizza. "They got checked in.Made it to macDuin's department. No one remembers seeing them after that." Three levels below the street, the doors opened onto a long, brick-lined, vaulted hallway. Closed doors were set in the walls at regular intervals, and every other light in the ceiling was out. A dry musty smell hung in the air.

Meryl walked out of the elevator. "Are you following me?' 'in"Well, I did want to talk to you." We stopped at an old oaken door with ornate iron hinges and a huge old lock. "Oh, I thought you just wanted to run loose in the building. Did you know no one can hear you scream down here?" She screamed.

The lock jiggled and popped open as the hair on my head stood on end. No one came running. She giggled and opened the door. "I've been playing with sonic cantrips. They work pretty well, except last week I had sinus congestion, and it took me twenty minutes to get the pitch right." After the dimness of the hall, I blinked at the bright white walls in her office. Blue lateral file cabinets lined the right side of the room, while boxes of various sizes leaned against the left. The center of the room was dominated by an old gray army desk on which sat a computer that looked like its guts had blown out the side of the hard drive. Wires and cables snaked from it to a credenza on the back wall, where another computer sat. Something told me she had a nice little black box operation working into the building mainframe.

"Sit down and don't touch anything," she said. She scooted sideways around the desk to her chair, tossing her empty pizza plate into the wastebasket.

I picked up a stack of papers on her guest chair and lowered them to the floor. As I leaned back in the chair, I noticed the bulletin board on the wall over her head. Magazine photos and news articles covered almost the entire surface. Dumbfounded, I realized notes tucked in here and there had ogham writing on them with numbers scrawled along the bottom. More of the same littered her desk.

"Damn. Meryl, what are these?" Annoyance crossed her face. "If you had occasionally done your own research instead of sending one of your minions down here, you'd know." I smiled playfully at her. "I have a knife, remember."

She smiled right back. "And there's a stick of dynamite taped under your chair and my body shields work."

"That's a low blow," I said. It was such a bad pun, I could taste it. She laughed. "It's my filing system. The Dewey Decimal system doesn't quite work in a place where putting the wrong things next to each other can cause hair to grow in unsightly places. You have to balance die energies to keep everything flowing peacefully. I've tried to get the other 'Houses to adopt it, but they're waiting for a full chthonic breakdown before they'll admit it works." I grabbed a pen and drew the ogham script from the flyer in Murdoch's car. "Does this mean anything?" She looked at the paper, then back at me. "What? Are you becoming a mineralogist in your old age?

Those stones went missing last winter."

"What stones?"

She tossed the paper on her desk and gestured at the glyph."Those stones.Five of them.High-quality selenite.Pre-Convergence.Seized in an illegal container shipment a few years back."

"You know that just by looking at the glyph?"

She nodded. "That's where they were filed. I found them missing. I was using them to anchor a couple of wards. When I walked in the room, there was a hum that told me the wards weren't working anymore. I checked. They were gone. I had to file a cartload of forms over it. You think you found them and lost them again?"

"I didn't lose them," I said.

"Whatever."

"Can you show me?"

We left the office. Meryl led me farther down the hall to a spiral staircase. We went down another level to a hallway identical to the one upstairs and walked deeper into the building. All kinds of resonant essences bounced through the air. My head began to buzz.

"Man, what the hell do you have down here?"

"Just about everything: weapons, armor, crystals,books . You name it, we got it. Some ofit's evidence for ongoing investigations; some of it's archives for research. A lot ofit's crap. Did I mention you'd know that if you bothered to do your own research occasionally?"

"Not that you're bitter about it or anything," I said.

She held up her hands in a warding gesture.'Touchy-touchy. I'm sorry I mentioned it." We stopped in front of a door. Meryl positioned her palm outward on the wall near the lock. She muttered something in what sounded like Middle English. A momentary shimmer of light bounced from her hand to the wall, and a keypad appeared. I turned my back and out of habit automatically memorized the sound of the tones. "Don't waste the brain cells. I'm changing the code after you leave," she said. We entered a high, dimly lit storeroom. I whistled in appreciation. Rack upon rack of steel shelving marched to the right and left and up twenty feet. The lower levels held cabinets and drawers. Judging from the length of the aisles branching out to either side and in front of me, the room had to cover an acre. It had to be deep under the subway system even to exist in that much space. My head still buzzed, but I had a cottony feeling as well, which told me dampening wards were in place.

"Now I know why you like your job," I said.

She grinned. "I don't like my job. I just like where it is." Weaving our way around boxes on the floor, we walked down an aisle of meticulously labeled drawers. My foot connected with something, and it skittered across the floor with a clunking sound. I leaned down and picked up a small bowl. It was carved from a single piece of wood and fit perfectly cupped in my hands. "This is nice. Olive wood, isn't it?"

Meryl sighed loudly. "That damned Parker. He's a new temp who can't file his own fingernails. You'd think he'd be a little more careful, considering."

"Considering?"

She pointed at the bowl. "That's the Holy Grail."

Shocked, I held it away from me as though it were ready to bite."The Holy Grail!" Laughing, she plucked it out of my hands. She pulled open a drawer, revealing several more bowls, and dropped it inside. "And so are these. Can you believe some dope managed to sell a few of them? I mean, really, anyone can see the wood's not even two hundred years old. If we ever have another clearance auction, I might take them home for salad bowls." She hip-checked the drawer closed and walked away humming. I have to admit her attitude was growing on me.

I joined her at a bank of drawers. She pulled open a small one and hopped back, looking at me in surprise. "Did you feel that? Something just went off."

I shook my head. "My abilities aren't great under the best of circumstances, and you've got mis place heavily warded."

We peered into the drawer. An inset of black velvet filled the entire space with five cupped indentations. Two of them were occupied.A white stone and a black one. I recognized both. "Are these the same stones that went missing last year?"

She nodded. "I've stared at their photos enough."

"Mine, too."

"But why put them back?" said Meryl.

I smiled. "The best place to hide something is where they're missing from. No one looks once they're gone."

"So whereare the rest of mem, smart guy?"

"A gray one's upstairs with macDuin in the case file for the bogus killer; another gray one's at Boston P.D., probably on its way to macDuin as we speak. And the last one's with the killer."

"It's black," Meryl said.

"I know. I thought the killings were a weekly cycle until I realized that they're keyed to the phases of the moon. White for the full, gray for the quarters, and black for the new."

"We just had a quartermoon two nights ago."

"And I found a gray stone in a dead fairy's chest."

Meryl shook her head. "Damn! Who'd've thought my stones would turn up this way." As she finished speaking, I heard the distinctive sound of a door closing. Judging from Meryl's reaction, she heard it, too. I held my finger to my lips.

She frowned at me. "Bob? Parker, is that you?" she called out.

"Shhh!"I hissed.

"You shhh.I'm supposed to be here," she said. "Don't move." She went quickly back down the aisle and out of sight. Moments later, I heard her call Parker's name again, but no one answered. I could hear her footsteps fading away and a door latch opening. She called out a few more times, her voice becoming more andmore faint . After a long stretch, I realized I didn't hear anything anymore. It occurred to me that Meryl might have set off an alarm spell when she opened the drawer. Whoever had cast it would eventually make their way to the aisle I was standing in. I looked around, but that end of the room was too neat, and there was nothing to hide behind. Quietly, I closed the drawer that contained the stones and opened another one enough to get my foot on the edge. As silently as possible, I boosted myself up to the first set of shelves. From there I climbed the remaining shelves like a ladder until I reached the top. I lay flat in the thick dust and peered over. Seconds stretched into minutes which stretched into eons. I could almost hear my own heartbeat without trying. A cool waft of air washed over me. With all the wardings in the room, I couldn't tell if it had essence tangled in it or if it was just the ventilation system. Moments later I could hear footsteps coming down the aisle, and I slid back. They came closer, a steady gait with a firm destination. They stopped right below me.

I startled as a voice whispered in my ear. "Do you want to come down from there?" I raised my head and looked below. With her hands on her hips and clearly amused, Meryl looked back at me. I swung my legs over, clambered down the shelves, and dropped the last ten feet to the floor. I brushed at the dust * and cobwebs that completely covered me.

"Nothing," she said. "Someone was definitely there, but I couldn't make heads or tails of the essence." We stood in silence for a moment. "It was Bob," Meryl decided.

"Why didn't he answer?"

"Because he's a temp, and he thinks he's being paid to sleep in the storeroom when I'm not looking."

"Someone who wanted to lead me to that drawer left me those ogham runes, Meryl, and they set an alarm on it to see if I figured it out."

"I led you to the drawer, Grey. Someone who didn't want to get involved remembered the burglary and slipped you a tip that panned out."

I retrieved the stones. Pointedly, Meryl held out her hand. After a moment's hesitation, I dropped them into her palm. I had no authority to keep them, and if she wanted to be a bitch about it, Meryl could have me detained before I even got to the elevator.

"We can't tell anyone about this," I said.

"Are you kidding? Do you have any idea of the hell I caught over these babies?"

"Meryl, someone didn't want those stones found, and someone else did. We can't tell anyone until I figure outwho and why."

She considered for a long moment. "I'll give you until Monday."

"Only if I find the killer.Otherwise, I'll need until the new moon on Wednesday." An exasperated look came over her face. "Haven't you learned anything, Grey? The phases don't care about the calendar. The new moon's next Thursday."

A cold feeling of dread settled over me. Next Thursday.Midsummer's Eve. And thousands of people would be filling the Weird for the festivities.

Meryl escorted me back to the elevator. "Before you go, I have to tell you about a dream I had about you."

Great, I thought. This could be awkward.Intriguing, but awkward. "You had a dream about me?" I said as neutrally as possible.

"Not just a dream. I'm a Dreamer. I have a geas on me to share my True dreams," she said. That startled me. Most of the fey had some kind of geas. It's an obligation placed on you that you can't ignore. If you do, really bad things can happen. You end up with a geas all kinds of ways. Some people get them when a vision comes upon someone present at their birth. Some people get them like a curse, when uiey've wronged someone. They're not given lightly and have a bit of fate bound up indiem . What surprised me was that Meryl just out and told me hers. Given the compelling obligation, most people keepdiem secret so that they can't be manipulated. I have a couple on me myself, and only a handful of people know some ofdiem , and no one knows all of mem. "I can't believe you just told me your geas." She shrugged. "It's hardly a secret when die geas is to tell." She smiled wickedly. "Don't worry. I doubt you'll ever figure out my secret ones." "So what did you Dream?"

"I dream in metaphors. I've seen you bound in chains, but you break free. I've seen you sinking in a pool of ogham runes—I think we just figured that part out. I've seen you surrounded by knives and stars and hearts. You enter the Guildhouse through a black hole and roam empty corridors. And I saw you broken and alone, surrounded by dead bodies. And I'll tell you this, even though it's not part of the Dream: I haven't Dreamed a single thing since. Every Dream I have thesedays ends with you crushed on the ground."

"Shit," I said.

The elevator bell toned, and the doors opened.

Meryl smiled."Yeah.Anyway, nice seeing you."

11

Sweat poured off me as I ran. I had hoped that jogging right after greeting the sun would be cooler than waiting until later in the day. I was wrong. After slacking off all week and skipping a gym date with Murdock, I was paying for it. Of course, I could count chasing a murderer at a full sprint and almost going into a coma as exercise, but I really hadn't been wearing the right shoes then. My hamstrings sang as my feet hit the pavement.

I didn't care that I was no longer "officially" on the case. "Officially" didn't mean anything to me anymore. Not being on the case didn't stop me from being involved when Robin and Tansy died. After all that had happened, I couldn't just let it go. My record back at the Guild was perfect. Except for Bergen Vize, I had closed every case I'd ever worked on and even that case was still open. Vize had gone into hiding after what he did to me, so at least he wasn't pursuing his usual extremist environmental agenda. For the moment, I had time to get him. I didn't have time with this case, and I was going to finish it one way or another. In five days, the Weird would be teeming with Midsummer celebrants. On a normal holiday, the police and the Guild are stretched to their limits. With the Guild taking the case, the P.D. would be more than happy to disband their task force to increase their street presence. And even given its usual penchant for silence, I hadn't heard the slightest whisper that the Guild was forming its own task force. Maybe macDuin thought he would do it on his own.

The sound of thunder rolled overhead. A dull white haze had settled in overnight, the clouds laced with sheet lightning that had been flickering since the earlier-morning hours. It looked like it would continue throughout the day. I quickened my pace through the empty streets in case it actually rained. By the time I reachedSleeper Street , it hadn't and probably wouldn't. I ended my run with a warm-down in front of my building. As I lingered on the sidewalk, a familiar old Chevy that screamed "undercover cop" pulled up.

"You're out early," Murdock said when he rolled down the window. The refreshing breeze of air-conditioning radiated out of the car. Though his shirt and tie were as neat as usual, the stress of dealing with the politics of the case showed in the tightness around his eyes. Being on an unsolved case could be a pressure-cooker in the station house. Watching it slip away without a conclusion can be even worse.

"Just working off some steam."

Murdock raised his eyebrows. "Anything you'd like to share?" I nonchalantly stared up the street as I stretched my legs."Depends. If I came into certain information that macDuin might find interesting, would you feel obligated as an officer of the law to pass it on?" Murdock gave me an amused, measured look. "Well, naturally, I support open communications between law en-forcement agencies, though I do admit that when things get busy, communications sometimes break down."

I studied him for a moment. Murdock was a relatively by-the-book kind of guy, but he was also a friend. I'd never had cause not to trust him. "So are things busy?" He grinned. "Actually, they're extremely busy right now, and I don't see that changing for the foreseeable future."

"I found the stones." I filled him in on the details but left Meryl's name out of it. While she had shared information with me fairly easily, she wasn't a paid informant. Even Murdock could understand that. Everybody had a source they liked to keep quiet about.Being too free with people's names tended to dry up information pretty quickly. Besides, if I gave her name without her permission, Meryl would probably gut me.

Murdock didn't say anything for the longest time. "Why are you pursuing this?" he said at last.

"Because I have to."

"It's too hot to talk with the window open. Get in."

I opened the door, nudged a McDonald's bag to the floor, and sat down. The air-conditioning cooled off my damp T-shirt more quickly than the rest of me, and I shivered.

"Connor, no one is paying you to solve this case anymore. You need to be realistic."

"Hey, Officer, whatever happened to truth, justice, and the American way?" Murdock rolled his eyes. "Capitalism is the American way. Cost-benefit analysis is the American way."

"That's pretty cynical coming from a diehard like you."

"You know as well as I do,Connor, that you have to care about the job to do the job. But if you make it personal, you burn yourself out in no time. You can't care too much, or you're dead."

"Maybe I can. For the last year, Murdock, I've worked with you on lots of cases, but they've been advisory. This is the first real case I've had to deal with since I got out of the hospital. It feels good. It feels important. It's about murdered people whom no one else caresabout, people who needed the overworked police department and the indifferent Guild to do something about it. We both know that hope might be misplaced. Look, the Guild took the case, and it's barely in the news. You lost the case, and you're ready to move on. And, yes, it's about me. It's about the fact that I don't like it. I don't like that not enough can be done. I don't like that someone twisted enough to commit murder is smart enough to escape me. I don't like that shit happens. Not anymore."

Murdock nodded slowly. "Just don't let it control you."

I shrugged. "Besides, it's not like I have anything better to do." He just looked at me from beneath his eyebrows. After that little speech, I wouldn't have believed the cavalier attitude either.

"So what do you think about the stones?" I asked.

Murdock sighed heavily and tapped his fingers against the steering wheel. "Someone at the Guild has a secret. The stones lead to the secret. Figure out the stones, and you figure out me secret."

"Well, we know the stones are being used in a ritual. I've been trying to track that down from day one." Murdock shook his head.'That's not die secret. Take yourself out of the box. The stones were stolen long before these murders."

I sighed. "So I'll keep looking into the stones. Belgor had a customer looking for selenite last fall when the Guild got robbed. I don't mink that's a coincidence." I let myself out of the car. "So what brings you down here?"

'Two things.One, I wanted to make sure you sent all your files in. And two, I'm back on another case that I've had on hold since this whole serial killer mess started."

"Yes, I sent the files. Anything I can help with on the new case?" It was the most polite way I could think of asking for work.

"Not right now. I've got a dead drug dealer. I doubt it'll go anywhere. Call me if I can help you though." I nodded and closed the door. As I watched him drive away, I realized our roles had reversed. His case had somehow become mine. At least I didn't have to pay him for help if I needed it. Once upstairs, I reviewed the update Murdock had sent me before he lost the case. The fourth fairy victim was a young Danann named Galvin macTiarnach.In town for Midsummer. I actually knew his father from my early days at the Guildhouse inNew York . Tiarnach Ruadan was an Old One, born of Faerie, and all around nice guy. When I knew him, he had no children. A mild depression settled over me as I looked at the scene photos. It must be a special hell to wait centuries to have a child only to lose him so senselessly. I hoped he would give some of that hell to macDuin.

The rest of the file gave a routine catalog of phone calls and informant contacts that had led nowhere, followed by Murdock's description of the day before. It's odd reading someone else's version of the same events. Murdock made it clear that he held strong suspicions about Shay. He was nicely dismissive of macDuin's charges against me, though.

At the bottom of the last page was a brief entry note. He had tracked down two of the women from our ska list. Both of their children were dead of natural causes. He had found the third woman as well, a fairy named Dealla Sidhe. Next to her name he had simply written an address right inSouth Boston with the notation 'No phone. Not home again.' Flipping back through previous reports, I realized he had stopped by her house several times. I made a note to ask Meryl if she would check the Guild records on her. I toyed with the idea of callingGermany . They still hadn't returned my call. The Germans liked doing things their own way in their own time. They didn't take kindly to pressure, especially from someone asking a favor. If I called, I risked being perceived as a nuisance and they could very well not give me the information I needed for even longer out of spite. I decided to exercise caution for the moment, if only because it was a Saturday.

I spent the remainder of the day ensconced in my study, poring over stone rituals. Most druids fall into two groups: sticks or stones. Wood has some wonderful properties, but it has a tendency to react too much with the user for my particular taste. Because they retain some of their own innate essence, using wands becomes almost a partnership. You have to be very nature-oriented to use them to their best advantage.

I have to admita certain affection for stone work. They do what you want them to, when you want them to, regardless of whether you are tired or it is raining. They always give out exactly what you put into them. And you can start them going and leave them to finish your work, something you can't do with wands.

Personally, when I was well, I tried not to rely on either. No ego about it—the stronger your ability, the less likely you are to use any type of auxiliary apparatus. The tough stuff you do with your hands or your voice or your mind. Actually, that's not quite true. The more power you have, the more likely you are to use wands and wards incidentally. That, in fact, is about ego. In some quarters, nothing demonstrates your ability more than how casually you used it. When I was cleaning the apartment the day before, I noticed the protection wards around the window had been recharged, and so had the ones on the roof. Keeva had probably done it while she sat talking to me without showing any effort whatsoever. Stones are useful things for people without any ability. You can buy them and pay someone to charge them. Of course, depending on the quality of stone and the strength of the charger, the price can go up considerably. Plenty of the fey makea decent living servicing wards for humans. For someone with no other skills and a dislike of manual labor, it has quite an upside. Nooverhead, and all it takes to replenish one's essence is a good nap.

Most stone-charging has a purpose. You can set up alarms like I had done in my apartment. Wards can be used to keep someone awake or put them to sleep. They can even be the catalyst for killing someone, though that takes some doing and is extremely illegal. The wards placed on the wings of the murder victims simply immobilized the victims. That was their only point as far as I could tell. Which is why I was having such a hard time figuring out the selenite stones.The point of charging them with essence escaped me. It didn't seem to do anything to the corpses. It just dissipated. The stones weren't catalysts, at least not in any sense I could understand. The cause of death was not fey ability-related. Cutting out someone's heart takes only a knife, physical strength, and at least a little psychosis.

The missing hearts were another matter. As the seat of essence, they were powerful organs. Taking them was obviously about taking their power. The essence the hearts contained could be stabilized and held for periods of time, the same way Briallen had held the flit body in a kind of chrysalis to prevent it from disappearing. Just because I didn't know how to do it didn't mean it couldn't be done. I sat up so sharply, my desk chair squealed in protest. Essence was the connection. The hearts and the stones both held it. The killer wasn't just leaving stones as tokens for the hearts. He was leaving a vessel of essence for the vessel of essence he took.

I tried to go through the idea step by step. It was an exchange, but it wasn't equal. He took more than he left. He needed more.But for what? So far, all the other ska births had turned up dead. Was he dying?

Were the murders some kind of twisted revenge? Had he somehow discovered a way to make himself well? I shook my head in frustration. Only someone with access to secret knowledge and the will to use it would take someone's essence, like Briallen had taken mine to keep Stinkwort from dying. Only she wasn't about to hand the knowledge over to me on a silver platter. I had to find it some other way. I paced into the living room. My mind felt numb from the circles it was running in. Outside, orange light smeared across the hazy sky as the sun set. Lightning flickered as it had all day, followed by a lethargic rumble of thunder. My stomach grumbled back. I hadn't eaten, and I needed food. I debated ordering something for delivery but didn't have enough cash for a tip. Murdock was still processing my fee, and my disability check wasn't due for another week. I slipped on an old pair of boots and left the apartment. Down in the vestibule, mail was scattered on the floor. As I picked it up, a prickling ran along the back of my neck, and my defense shields triggered. Dropping the mail, I spun toward the door in a crouch. The slab of steel was propped open with a newspaper. Flattening my back against the wall, I pushed the door open with my foot. A wave of humid air rolled in, rank with the smell of the channel. The street was dark and empty. The lamppost was out again, a fairly common phenomenon. I could sense no one nearby, though the whispering remains of essence hung in the air above the sidewalk. Some of them felt vaguely menacing, and quite a few trailed into the building.

Behind and above me, I could hear a door open for a moment, releasing a dull roar of music and voices before it closed again. My shields let go as I began to relax. A party was just getting into swing, and some idiot had propped the door open. Shaking my head, I let the door close firmly behind me and walked up the street.

Reaching the corner of Sleeper andSummer , I turned left. Three doors up, the lights of the Nameless Deli washed out onto the street, an oasis of activity on an otherwise dead block. I paused at the door. Druids can sense the essence people leave behind like perfume. Someone who had been hanging around the front of the deli had also been in front of my apartment building. The person's essence was elfin in nature, but otherwise unremarkable. The coincidence made me pause, especially since I hadn't sensed it between the two places. Looking up and down the street, I saw no one. I pushed open die door. Walking into the Nameless is always a bit of a shock. The harsh fluorescent lights flare so bright, they make one squint even on a sunny day. At three in the morning, they can be excruciating. Very few people know it is the side effect of a protection spell that makes people less inclined to be aggressive. It is a shoddy spell, but potent enough. For such a bad neighborhood, the Nameless is rarely robbed, and even then only by someone so hopped up on drugs that diey end up being arrested right outside the door. Dmitri leaned on the counter in the empty store, reading a car magazine. He was a dark-skinned Greek with honey-colored hair who'd probably been charming his way into beds since he was twelve. He'd been working for his grandparents since he was a kid and still filled in on the occasional weekend when he didn't have too heavy a class load at UMass/Boston. He glanced up at me with a brief smile, closed the magazine, and trailed along with me to the deli case. I ordered a sub with everything on it. A bell rang as die door opened, and I tensed. Without turning, I sensed an elf come in behind me, the same one who had been in front of my building. In my peripheral vision, I saw him step up to the register and toss a pack of gum on the counter. Dmitri looked up, grabbed a towel, and wiped his hands. He went behind the register and rang up the sale.

Casually, I looked over. The elf was not quite my height, decently built, and dressed in old jeans and a white T-shirt. Two little earrings hooped around the point of his right ear, and dark sunglasses covered most of his face. I hate people who wear sunglasses at night. He nonchalantly looked over at me as he collected his change and gum,then strolled out.

Dmitri came back and finished making my sandwich. He wrapped it up, and we went to the register. I handed him a few bills. "Ever see that guy before?"

Dmitri shook his head and gave me change. "Not really. He was in about an hour ago."

"Thanks." He picked up his car magazine again.

I stood in front of the deli for a long moment. The street was empty again, but I could sense the elf's essence trailing to the right—toward my apartment building. Shaking off my apprehension, I walked home. The elf was probably just a party guest, and I wasn't about to go a block out of my way just to satisfy a little prickling paranoia. As I turned the corner, I realized that this would be the scene in a movie where I would think, "Why would that idiot walk around that corner?" Sleeper Street was quiet. Too quiet, I thought with delicious omen. I mentally chuckled at my own melodrama. Sleeper Street was always quiet; that's why I liked it. A few cars were parked haphazardly along the curb, sharing space with an old refrigerator, mildewed cartons, and glass fragments. No one ever parked in the loading lane of the warehouse across the street. Delivery trucks showed up way too early in the morning for most of my neighbors to get up and move their cars. In the dimness ahead, I saw movement near my building. A bit of sheet lightning flashed against the overcast and in the brief instant of light, I could see it was an elf with a crew cut. Dressed in a tank top and shorts, he was leaning against the building. He pushed himself away from the wall and moved toward me slowly. I purposely activated my shields. He wasn't the guy from me deli, but that guy was nowhere to be seen. I gauged how far ahead of me he could have gotten before I left the deli and came up with a very short distance. Without breaking stride, I cut into the street. If the guy coming toward me were innocent, he would probably think I was an overly cautious wimp.

In the light of a loading dock, I stopped and made a show of tying my boot-laces. As I came up from the crouch, I discreetly pulled my knife out of my boot, using the sandwich to hide the motion. I held the shaft against the bag, the six-inch blade pressed between it and my forearm. As I started walking again, I heard footsteps behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I saw the elf from the deli about thirty feet behind me. He had doubled back somehow. Not a good sign. Turning away, I felt a rush of adrenaline. The other elf had stepped into the street as well.Definitely not a good sign. I kept moving at my normal pace, closing the distance between us,pretending I noticed nothing amiss. I could hear the one behind me pick up his pace. The one ahead of me made no pretense of nonchalance. He came directly toward me. When he was ten feet away, I put on a sudden burst of speed and gave him a flying kick to the chest. Before turning away, I had only a brief moment of satisfaction at the startled look on his face as he fell over backwards.

I moved into a fighting stance, flipping the knife forward in my hand as I dropped the sandwich. The other elf ran toward me, shouting in German. A momentary wave of paralysis hit me. The little punk was trying to immobilize me with a grade school spell. His research obviously hadn't revealed that some of my defense shields still worked. They were good enough to blunt the thrust of a simple spell, but not anything stronger. Instinctively, I muttered my own warding spell, forgetting that no ability had responded to my command in months. A spasm of pain flickered in my head, and my knees went weak. He was chanting again, a more focused immobilizer. I lunged at him with the knife. He smiled cockily at me as he easily avoided the blade. The move was enough to let me know I wasn't dealing with a professional. I hadn't meant to connect. I wanted to distract him from chanting, and he'd amateurishly obliged. With a quick roll to the left, he lost the physical advantage of pinning me between himself and his accomplice. I came up on my feet at a run. If I could make it to my building, I'd be safe. The front door had been keyed to my voice for just that sort of situation. If I could get through it and into the vestibule, no one would be able to open it again until I released it—or someone from the Guild showed up. Something hit me hard in the back of the knees, and I fell. As I rolled onto my back, the elf in the shorts grabbed me by the shirt and hit me in the face. The blow glanced off my cheekbone, but still hurt. The other elf was chanting again from a safe distance.As the one who held me hauled his fist back for another blow, I could feel my limbs starting to compress against my sides. Before I lost all mobility, I heaved up and grabbed him in a hug. We fell to the ground together in a tangled knot of arms and legs. I would have laughed if my situation hadn't been so precarious. I had broken the spell by using the puncher as a shield. Whoever the guy in the jeans was, he wasn't adept at spell-casting if he needed a clear line of sight and an isolated target to succeed. Score one for me.

Before short pants could get his bearings, I bit him on the shoulder. No one ever expects a guy to bite. It's dirty fighting, but so's two on one. He made an odd barking sound and wrenched himself away. I scrambled to my feet. The apartment building door was still too far away to make a run for it fully exposed like I was, so I turned toward the spellcaster and ran right at him, my knife held ridiculously out in front of me like a spear. He tried his damnedest to keep chanting this time, but he still didn't get that the knife was just a feint. I didn't want to kill him, just shut him up. He backpedaled away in fear and never noticed my fist making for his throat until the last second. With a pained choking sound, he grabbed his neck. I gave him a knee in the stomach for good measure, and down he went. Before I could step back, short pants sucker punched me in the kidneys, and I clumsily fell over the caster. He recovered enough to grab my legs. This time I slashed at him for real. He gasped as the cloth and skin split open on his chest but held on to me. The other one kicked the knife out of my hand and hit me in the ribs. As he leaned over to punch me again, a blaze of white lightning shot over our heads. I could feel the electric charge dance through my hair.

"Leave off!" someone shouted.

We all froze. At the end of the street, the black silhouette of a woman strode toward us, her hand raised palm out and glowing white. Short pants chose to ignore her and hit me in the face again. Blood shot out my nose. Another bolt of light blazed at us and knocked him off his feet. She came nearer. "I said leave off!"

The spellcaster released my legs and crawled away a few feet.

"Face me or flee!" she shouted, boosting a litde power to her hand to make her point. They didn't need any more time to consider. In seconds, they were on their feet and running. I sat up and cradled my nose with my hand. With all the blood pouring out, I couldn't sense who my savior was. She moved out of the light from the end of the street and leaned over me, and I saw her face more clearly."Hi, Keeva."

She knelt on one knee beside me with a concerned look on her face. "Is it broken?" I shook my head."Looks worse than it is."

She stretched her hand toward my face. "Here, let me. I'm not much of a healer, but I can" mute the pain." I felt a brief surge of warmth, and the pain did lessen. The blood still flowed copiously though. I let her help me to my feet. "Don't waste time here. Go get them."

"It's over, Connor."

"They were trying to kill me!"

She sighed and shook those long red tresses. "Only you can turn a mugging into a murder conspiracy." I peeled off my T-shirt and wadded it up. Gingerly, I pressed it to my nose. "What are you doing here?"

"Saving your ass, as usual."

"I want to know what you're doing on my street."

"I don't need this." She started to walk away, and I grabbed her arm. She glared at me with her best imperious haughtiness. "You dare!"

I dropped my hand. "Can the more-royal-than-thou crap. You know I couldn't care less. I want to know what you're doing here, and you're going to tell me or I will make your life miserable until you do." She compressed her lips into a very thin line. I didn't have much concrete to hold over her except for the same petty stuff everyone has. But I had gotten hints of bigger stuff here and there when we were working together. Nothing I couldn't follow up on if need be. I could see Keeva's mind working dirough the same chain of thought.

"I'm working on an investigation that macDuin wants kept quiet."

"And how does following me fit into it?"

She folded her arms across her chest. "I am not following you. I had no idea I'd end up talking to you tonightIf I see you getting beat up again, I promise I won't interfere." I dabbed at my nose. The bleeding had slowed, but some swelling had begun. I knew Keeva well enough to know that would be the end of her explanation. I couldn't force her to tell me any more than she had. I leaned down and picked up my knife. "Who's working the serial killer case?" She smiled smugly. "I am, like I told you I would. MacDuin spent today reviewing the files. I'm getting it tomorrow."

"Want some help?"

She laughed, like I knew she would. "You are priceless, Connor. The last thing macDuin wants is you anywhere near this case."

I shrugged. "He doesn't have to know."

"But he would. He probably has someone watching us right now." Looking for a clean spot, I refolded the bloody T-shirt and pressed it against my nose again. "And you like working under those conditions?"

She found something fascinating to stare at on the ground. "It suits my purposes for the moment. Stay out of it or he'll force me to bring you in on interference charges. We've already got you for tampering with a murder scene."

"You forget, Keeva. I was born here. I may be fey, but I'm also an American citizen. He only has free rein with non-citizen fey. He'd need the Commissioner's approval—which I'm betting he won't get—and a federal court order—which won't happen quickly on such a minor charge."

"Just stay out of it," she said.

"Suit yourself. I'm not backing off." I walked angrily away from her toward Summer Street. Scanning the sidewalk, I found my sandwich and picked it up. Thankfully, the bag was still intact and closed. I walked back to Keeva and passed her without a word. "I can make your life miserable, too, you know," she called out.

I looked back at her, but kept walking. "Keeva, I just picked my dinner out of the gutter. I doubt you can make my life any worse."

12

The Murdock residence onK Street inSouth Boston had the kind of silent repose that buildings have on Sunday mornings. The well-kept row house had stern black shutters and double-mullioned windows in a brick facade, the forest green door firmly shut. A cement urn on the top step overflowed with white petunias. It was all very respectable. I felt awkward hesitating on the sidewalk, praying that I had arrived afterMass. The Murdocks were church-going Catholics, and I had a vague recollection that services ended about noon. Dinner followed at two, so I had planned on arriving about an hour before. Whenever I had visited in the past, the door had stood ajar, and someone was either coming or going. Most people seemed to just walk in without knocking, a custom I had not grown up with just a few blocks away. That kind of familiarity meant family or very close friends. As I debated whether to knock or ring the bell, someone called my name, and I turned.

I breathed a small sigh of relief at the sight of Kevin Murdock. I had debated how casually to dress for dinner and gambled that even the commissioner would not mind shorts in such unbearable heat. To hedge the bet, I wore a polo shirt so I would at least have a collar. Kevin strode toward me wearing cargo shorts and a T-shirt. Cradling several loaves of bread in one arm, he extended the other to shake my hand.

"Nice eye. What's the other guy look like?" he said, as we walked up the steps. My hand went up to my cheekbone, and I winced. It was still tender, a little dark under the left eye, with a nice red-black smear near the bridge of my nose. "I think I broke his sunglasses." Kevin mock-cringed, sucking in air between histeem . "Damn. Oakley's, I hope?" I followed him into the oddly quiet house. "Urn, a drugstore brand, I think." He led me through the front hall, past the formal parlor, and into a kitchen rich with the smell of pot roast. He dropped the bread on a pink Formica counter and opened the refrigerator. He handed me a beer and started pulling plates out of a cabinet. Checking the stove, he sipped broth out of a pot and adjusted the spice. I couldn't help thinking of him as a kid. He was still in his early twenties, the last of seven children, and given that the next oldest sibling was pushing thirty, probably a surprise baby. He didn't even look like a Murdock, with his almost black hair and deep blue eyes, but then I'd never met Mrs. Murdock. All I knew about her was that she was gone some fifteen years and not a topic for conversation with anyone.

"Your turn to cook, I see."

He went back into the fridge and rummaged around. "Oh, we always follow the schedule around here. Everyone's up on the roof.Go on up. I'll call everyone down in a bit." I had never been beyond the first floor of the Murdock house. As I climbed the stairs, I passed two men in deep conversation on the first-floor landing. I recognized one of them as a city councilor. They nodded courteously as I passed but continued talking. On the next floor, Grace Murdock sat in one of the bedrooms talking with her sister Faith and two other women. They waved at me in a way that said join us or not, either way's fine. I didn't know them more than to say hello, so I waved back and kept going. I always had to make a conscious effort not to make fun of their names in front of Murdock. Whatever his religious convictions were, his father's were definitely enough for the whole family. The next two floors held more bedrooms and a closed door that, by the look of the other rooms, probably was the commissioner's bedroom. To the left of the door, a last flight of stairs was a little steeper, added on well after the townhouse was built, when homeowners finally shed the old Brahmin decorum and started hanging out on the roof.

A burst of conversation surrounded me as I stepped out of a skylight and onto the deck. My eyes picked out faces I knew: Murdock, of course, his brother Bar, the commissioner, a couple of obvious cop-types, a neighborhood activist whose name I didn't think I knew, several more people whose identities I couldn't begin to guess.

"Glad you came," Murdock said from behind me. When I turned, he pulled back in mild surprise.

"Whoa! Do I want to know what happened?'

"Let's just say it was a mugging that went bad." ,n

He grinned. "You should have called the cops."

"I had some unexpected backup."

Murdock looked at me with curiosity,then smiled. "House rules: no business discussions on Sunday. Let me introduce you around." He ran through the guests, giving me brief bios under his breath. Nearly everyone had some political agenda, which was no surprise given whose house we were in.

"I never realized you can see the harbor from here," I said, changing the subject. The Murdocks' home sat in the middle of Southie, with the Weird and the downtown skyline beyond it to the north and the harbor directly east. West and south, the low-rise neighborhoods ofDorchester and the South End out to Roxbury spread out. If the neighborhood ever got discovered, they could make a mint selling the place.

"It's going to ruin the whole damn game!" said the man standing next to me and talking to the commissioner. Mur-dock had said he was a local political fund-raiser. I groaned inwardly because I knew what was coming. A fairy had just won a case before the Supreme Court, allowing him to play for the Red Sox. Always a place where baseball ruled the hearts, if not the minds, of its fans, most ofBoston was in an uproar over it.

"I think we'll have to wait and see," the commissioner said diplomatically. The man looked at him in horror. "Wait and see? Come on, these guys got powers the average Joe can't compete with. How are we going to keep 'em from flying from base to base? The only way to compete will be to just hire more of them until there ain't any normal people playing." The commissioner seemed to look around to see who was listening. He glanced once at me before saying, "I agree that will probably happen eventually. The only way to fight fire is with fire sometimes." The fund-raiser nodded vigorously. The commissioner placed a companionable hand on his shoulder.

"The fey may intrude in areas they don't belong, but God knows we need a better outfield."

"What!" the fund-raiser said, then almost choked onhis own laughter. "You're too much, Commissioner." He smiled indulgendy. "Yes, well, I believe dinner should be about ready." The fund-raiser laughed again and followed the commissioner downstairs.

I arrived in the blessedly cool dining room just as everyone was jostling for chairs and ended up sitting between die fund-raiser and a young black woman from a nonprofit arts council. The dinner was served family style, and dishes were passed with the overt politeness of people who did not normally share food. That is, until the banal pleasantries became exhausted, and someone said something more pointed. I had only half an ear to an arts funding lament, when the woman next to me said, "And, of course, the fey don't help."

"How do you mean?" I asked.

She shrugged as she moved steamed potatoes around on her plate. "It's trendy to be associated with fey art, so fey artists attract money that should rightly be going to struggling organizations."

"But is that the fault of the fey or the people who buy their art?"

"Of course, it's the fey," the fund-raiser interrupted, as he took an oversize bite of pot roast. "They push in everywhere—sports, politics, the arts."

A quick glance around the table made me realize there were no other fey present, unless someone was a druid I couldn't sense. "Isn't mat generalizing a bit?" I tried to maintain a neutral tone.

"It's hard not to be annoyed by someone who smears some paint on pointed ears, then rolls on the canvas. That idea is decades old, but it sells simply because a fey is doing it now," said the woman.

"And now they want to be categorized as a minority so that they can force themselves into other neighborhoods and destroy them like that Weird place," said the fund-raiser. I sipped water from my glass to remain calm. I had grown up not two blocks from the table we were sitting at. "The fey live all over the city, even here in Southie," I said.

"Oh, I don't mean those. They're working folks like you and me. I don't think I've met you before, by the way."

"I'm a friend of Leo's," I said. It always felt odd for me to use Murdock's first name. "Are you on the force?"

"No. I run an art gallery for druids."

The fund-raiser chuckled. "Everyone's a comedian today."

"I don't think that's funny," the arts woman snapped as she shifted her back to me slightly. That pretty much killed the conversation. As I finished eating, I glanced up at the commissioner. He was nodding as the man on his left spoke, but his eyes were on me. He didn't change his expression for a long moment, then the slightest smile fluttered across his lips. No business on Sunday, my ass, I thought. After the meal, I lingered in the parlor mentally debating how long I had to remain in the name of politeness. The conversation often veered into complaints about the fey— sometimes subtly, sometimes obviously. I kept quiet, merely nodded at occasional remarks to fend off any actual verbal exchanges. It struck me at how vocal people could be with their animosity when they found themselves in like company. I had done it myself at the Guild, but the level of anger, even hate, in the room surprised me, all the more so considering so many of those in attendance were theoretically civic leaders. After another hour, I approached the commissioner when he was briefly alone.

"Thank you for dinner. I'm sorry I can't stay longer, but I have an appointment," I said.

"Really?" he said in a way that made me feel instantly guilty. I wanted to say, no, I just can't stand being around your guests anymore, but I refrained. He continued smiling. "Well, it was goodlo see you under less unfortunate circumstances. Have a good evening."

Maybe from his point of view, I thought. We shook hands, and I made for the door. As I stepped outside, the doorknob pulled out of my hand, and I turned to see Mur-dock standing on the threshold.

"Leaving so soon?" "Why did you invite me today?"

He glanced over his shoulder, stepped fully out of the house, and closed the door. "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean. You knew who was going to be here today, but you invited me anyway. I haven't heard so many sophomoric comments about the fey since, well, since I was a sophomore." He crossed his arms and leaned against the arch of the doorway. "I thought it was important for you to see you're not the only one who dislikes the Guild."

"You could have just told me."

He shrugged. "You wouldn't have heard me."

Annoyed, I looked away up the street. I didn't like being played, but he was right. After a couple of calming breaths, I felt the anger in my chest dissipate. Murdock was one of the few people I knew who could get away with a stunt like this, especially when he was right. "Okay, lesson learned. Happy?"

"Satisfied is more like it. You have a tendency to get incredibly focused, which is a good thing sometimes. But you need to keep it in perspective. The Guild doesn't do what it does justto personally piss you off. It pisses off a lot of people."

"What, so I should ease up on the Guild?"

He gave an exasperated sigh. "No, I'm just trying to tell you that the only way to change the Guild is to work with it, not against it. Though they wouldn't say it quite that way, most of the people inside the house understand that. That's what they work for every day: change everyone can live with."

"Even people who hate me?"

"The way of the world is conflict, Connor. That won't change. You can only change the resolution." I looked at him curiously. "When'd you become such a philosopher?" He grinned broadly then. "I keep telling you not to make things personal. You'll accomplish more and regret less. If that makes me a philosopher, then, hell, kiss my ring." The air felt slightly damp on my skin and it moved enough to persuade me it would be bearable to walk. I like walking everywhere, but the ongoing heat was getting to be depressing. As I moved northward, the neat, trim row houses of Southie gave way to a section of warehouses that still served as offices and storage. Long blocks empty of even parked cars stretched out, ranks of loading docks closed tightly against the Sunday silence. Crossing overCongress Street and into the Weird proper brought more traffic but no one on the sidewalks. It was like taking a walk from content to depressing. Murdock's little speech about working with the system got me thinking. It only made sense if both sides were willing. And for the moment, the Guild wasn't playing. So I decided it was time to help them cooperate.

I got on my computer and put in motion a chain of user accounts I had set up on various servers. I watched as one account after another opened and closed, hiding my tracks through the Internet. The accounts jumped fromBoston toTexas down intoMexico then over toJapan . From there I traveled to a cybercafe frequented by kids who liked to launch poorly written viruses fromMalaysia . The server there was a chaotic mess as a result, but nice camouflage. From there I set a random jump toMorocco , which brought me to the log-in at the Boston Guildhouse. I typed in my user ID and password and hit enter. The screen refreshed and asked me to reenter the password. On the off chance I had mistyped, I entered it again. I got another reenter password and jumped out.

"Damn," I muttered. Rubbing my eyes, I leaned back in my chair. My back door into the system had been closed. Someone had done a sweep and found me, or rather thebo - gus identity I had set up. Taking a deep breath, I started again, except when I reached the final log-in at the Guild, I used die user ID of a temp account I knew in payroll. It let me in with no problem. No problem except it was a low-level account withno privileges.

I began poking around in the directories but stopped. It would take too long to set up another account. I debated whether to crack macDuin's. The beauty of having worked at the Guild was that I knew the system, how passwords were set, and where to look for them. The downside was that I might be discovered. I had no idea when they had found my account or whether they were monitoring for illegal code more than usual. I knew the folks in the tech department were pretty good. I had taught them a fair amount. I decided to go hunting for a remote access number instead.

Since I was already in, I made my way into the system's password files. It's a lot easier than you would think. I found the file I wanted,then looked for another account with the same dial-up access number. I was only slightly surprised that I didn't find what I was looking for. A little burst of inspiration hit me. I jumped into the system log, scanning for the access number from the first password file. I had to go back a couple of weeks, but I finally found a remote dial-in. There was a routine, obviously permissible, log-in at 1:32 A.M. followed by a logout a little later at 1:48. Two minutes later there was another log-in from a different access number, an access number that was sodifferent, in fact, it didn't belong on the Guildhouse server. But it was there. I smiled broadly. Knowing Meryl, she had wired it herself and was working an untraceable line from the phone company.

"Gotcha" I said softly to the screen. I went back into the password directory, used the illegal phone number as a search criterion, grabbed a copy of Meryl's backdoor password file, and logged out. I then dialed in to a randomlocal university, launched my password cracker program, and set it to work on Meryl's password. Local universities expected extensive CPU activity. They tended to let students mangle the system as long as it didn't slow it down too much or screw up someone's work. It would take a while for the program to run, so I made coffee. I settled on the futon with Woodbury's Stone Magic: The Simple Explanation. It clocked in at over one thousand pages in very tiny type. Despite its density, the author had endeared herself to me with some very simple advice about stones: When all else fails, throw 'em. I made my way through a good chunk of the selenite section. There were an enormous number of uses for the crystal, and it would take some time to follow up on all of them. My computer chimed.

I strolled into the study sipping my coffee and pulled up the chair. The program had cracked the password. It was "HiConnor." I sat stunned as I stared at the screen. Then I laughed so hard, I almost fell out of my chair.

I dialed in to the Guild on Meryl's illicit line. A plain box opened asking for user ID and password, and I typed them in and hit Enter. I knew Meryl's skills well enough to know that once I was in, no one at the Guild would know I was there.

The screen became a black hole, and I was in. A car-toonish white stone gate slowly resolved itself into view with an inscription on the lintel: Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch'entrate.Very cute. The gate faded and a standard Windows desktop appeared. A text box popped up that read "Answer the Phone." The phone rang, and I jumped. I picked it up.

"You took only slightly less time to get in than I thought you would. I'm impressed," said Meryl.

"Are you enjoying playing with my head?"

"Oh, hold on," she said. I heard what I thought sounded like a lighter and some muttering. A wave of static welled out of the phone and encased itself around my head. The receiver stuck to my ear, and I couldn't move my hand. Meryl giggled. "Now I'm playing with your head. I don't want anyone tracing the call or listening in."

"How did you know I would break in?"

I could hear her take a drag on a cigarette. "Only two kinds of people don't ask about my computer setup when they see it: those that are completely clueless and those that know exacdy what it is. They did a cleanup recently, and your account got wiped. I knew it was only a matter of time."

"So now what?"

"So, feel free to come on in. I have a fair idea of where you might want to look, but I've locked down certain areas that are just asking for trouble."

"What if I want to get into those areas?"

"This isn't a negotiation, Connor. I'm protecting my access. You go anywhere I don't want you to, and session ended. Needless to say, this line and die account will disappear after you log out."

"Will the Secretary disavow any knowledge of my activities if I'm caught?" I asked sarcastically.

"The Guild already has," she shot back.

"Why are you doing this?"

I could picture her shrugging. "I like having people in my debt, and this is a big one. If you get caught, I will trash your system so bad, the new box you get to replace it won't work. Have fun and make it quick." She disconnected. The static popped like a soap bubble. I hung up the phone with grudging admiration. I didn't know what game she was playing with me. Whatever it was, I had a feeling she was merrily leading me down the path to hell.

I decided to play by her rules and just get in and get out. She had guessed I'd be interested in macDuin and had left his files wide open. I checked to see what word-processing documents he'd been working on recently and what databases he had accessed. I grabbed copies of anything that looked interesting. He'd also spent a lot of time looking up books in the Guild library. I scooted over to the library log and grabbed whatever searches he had run. Then I entered the open cases database, found the files for the murders and the selenite theft as well, and took those.

I looked for Keeva's files and found them easily. Meryl had locked me out of email, but everything else was open territory. I just skimmed. Keeva was smart enough not to leave a paper or electronic trail, and the slim amount of material in her directories proved it. I didn't even bother opening anything. I was tempted to crack the emails, but truth be told, it was more about ego than a desire to read them. I felt voyeuristic enough already. While I had no compunction about violating macDuin's privacy, I at least owed Keeva some courtesy for her recent intervention. That, plus, I had a sneaking suspicion she was helping more than she wanted me to know.

I sat for a moment, willing myself to think quickly and, if possible, brilliantly. Once I logged out, I'd have a hell of a time getting back in. I would have dearly loved to just sit and do some spell research, but that might show up as a lot of time on the system. Without knowing how well camouflaged Meryl's account was, it might raise questions. I ran a mental checklist like a nervous shopper before leaving the store. Taking a deep breath, I logged out.

I stared for a long moment at the list of files now innocently residing on my hard drive. I'd never stolen files before. I'd used my back door in the system when I occasionally lost access under my regular account or had to go into someone else's files for more information than they were willing to share. But I'd never considered those times as theft. I always had the rationale that I had a right to the information that someone else hadn't quite figured out yet. But I'd never actually taken anything I simply shouldn't have. Having entered the Guild and wandered around unseen, I wondered if I had realized Meryl's dream and sealed my own fate. If I was going to end up dead, I might as well find out why. I opened the files. 13

I woke to the sound of crunching. Rolling over, I peered into the kitchen through the predawn light. Stinkwort sat on the edge of the counter, an almost empty bag of Oreos lying beside him. I fell back on the bed, rubbing my eyes. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Busy," he said. A moment later, his voice was closer. "I just got a half-dead glow bee about an hour ago."

I opened my eyes again. He hovered over the bed.

"I'm pissed at you, you know, but it's too early to yell."

He shrugged. "Then don't. Come on, get up. Thesun's rising." I swung my feet onto the floor. Stinkwort doffed his tunic and let it flutter to the coffee table. He flew to the window, facing out, his arms and wings spread wide. I stood up and pushed the futon closed. The sun crested the horizon, and I automatically started the greeting ritual. Stinkwort swooped and whirled around me in a complex aerial pattern, his wings occasionally touching my skin as he wound about me. We began to move in our own rhythm, pulling the sun's energy in and reflecting it back and forth between us. A pleasant resonance developed between our bodies, amplified by our movements. It felt very sensual without being sexual. As I relaxed more, I let my body respond, shedding the strictly prescribed motions I normally practiced. My limbs felt fluid, more in tune with the ritual than usual, as Stinkwort swirled and dove, his wings becoming so bright the edges lit white. I lost myself in the sway of the light. I became still, more by feel than any conscious -thought. The newly risen sun blazed in my eyes, and it felt glorious.

For a long moment, neither of us spoke. I felt simultaneously exhilarated and spent. I went into the bathroom and came out wearing my bathrobe. Stinkwort had dressed and settled on the coffee table.

"What just happened?" I asked.

He stretched. "Now you know why flits like to greet the sun together."

"I can't believe how good I feel. Even myheadache's gone." It was true. The thing in my head caused a chronic low-grade headache. I had become so accustomed to it that I judged my discomfort by its severity instead of whether I was in pain or not.

"It's a flit thing, Connor. We can ride the currents of someone else's essence. When a clan flies together, we generate enormous power. The Danann Sidhe would, too, if they would let it happen, but you can't get two of them to agree on the time of day, never mind surrender to someone else's flow. And, of course, you druids can't fly."

As he spoke, he kept flexing his fingers and stretching his left arm. A sharp white scar wrapped around the forearm vividly displayed the path the knife had taken as he had twisted away from it. "How's the arm?"

He looked down at his hand and waggled his fingers. "It's numb in the morning, and I never seem to have any strength in it. The Lady Briallen did something to my right arm to make it stronger. I'm taking that as a sign the left won't get any better."

"You were foolish to face him alone."

Stinkwort flew away from me and stood on the win-dowsill looking out. "I don't want to talk about that night. What happened to your eye?"

"I got mugged. Where've you been?"

"I've been looking for that damned belly-crawling sarf," he said sharply.

"And?"

He shrugged."And nothing. I put the word out to the clans, but no one's found anything that feels as ska as this bastard. Wherever he is, he's got heavy protection wards. What about you?"

"I stole some files from the Guild."

Stinkwort gave me an indifferent stare over his shoulder. "That's it?"

"It's a failure, Joe. I've resisted doing it because it would mean I couldn't do anything else. I tried to solve this case like I've solved my other cases: by using my abilities. But I couldn't do it, so I stole some files." He looked back out the window, scanning the docks below. "So, you stole some files from the Guild. What's the big deal?"

"The big deal is I've been reduced to breaking and entering. I can't do anything anymore." Stinkwort tapped his chin in thought. "Bullshit."

"Don't patronize me, Joe. If I still had my abilities, I would have caught this guy a long time ago. I could have donea scry to find out things. I could have cast a spell to trail him from the first murder scene. I could have chased him the other night and caught him with my bare hands. If I still had my abilities, Tansy would still be alive."

He sat down on the windowsill and crossed his arms. "Connor, I've lived too long to play this game. It's pointless, and you know it. You use what you have. Wishing doesn't make a flit a fairy." I smiled in spite of myself. It was an old sayingmothers used. The obvious implication being, of course, that it's better to be a fairy. I didn't think I'd ever hear a flit say such a thing. I raised my head and saw that Stinkwort had a small, curling sneer on his lip. Some people might think it's better to be something else, but no flit thought it was better to be a fairy.

"That doesn't make me feel any better."

Stinkwort fluttered up. "I have to go, Connor. I've got people waiting."

"I think I know me blood ritual he's using." He hovered for a long moment, just staring at me. I leaned back in die chair and made myself comfortable. "I don't know exactly, but I've found an empowerment spell. The stone used is bloodstone, ironically, and the blood is goat. I imagine fairy blood could be used for greater results."

"Connor, knock it off."

I ignored him. "The spell's only temporary, but it definitely has the ability to increase die strength of the spell-caster's essence. I'm not quite following the substitution of selenite, though. It's mostly used for moon rituals, which we know is related now, and I'm guessing it gives the spell an added boost."

"Connor..."

I ignored him and just kept talking. 'The problem is the temporary nature. My guess is our guy's dying, and he's trying to save himself. All the other ska births have turned up dead. Whatever this guy's doing, he's playing for keeps. He knows he can't keep killing fairies. He's figured out a way to maintain the stolen essence. But from what I've surmised, it takes a lot of power to catalyze the spell and make it permanent. If he had that kind of power, he wouldn't need to do all this in the first place. It's got to be something about the selenite. What do you think?" "I think you're out of your freakin' skull.You don'l guess with blood rituals, Connor. And you don't go off trying to figure them out on your own. I've got enough goin' on without worrying about you."

'Tell me what you know about them."

'Trust me, Connor. You're in no condition to mess with blood rituals. When things go wrong with them, they go seriously wrong. Ask the Lady Briallen. She knows."

"I've already asked. She said no."

Stinkwort flew straight up with his hands held out against me. "If she won't tell you, I sure as hell won't. Keep out of it, Connor. Let the Guild handle it."

"Joe, it's not like I'm going to perform the ritual. I'm just trying to figure it out."

"Then do it the sane way. We both got his scent that night. Help me search that way." I gestured toward the bruise on my face. "I can't smell a damned thing." He stared down at me."Fine. I'm going to find this guy before you get hurt." He vanished.

"Well, that went well," I said to the empty room.

I let my head roll against the back of the armchair and stared at the ceiling. I could understand Stinkwort's concern. Plenty of spells could be done without innate ability. Even humans could activate an enchantment with the proper tools. The four elements of Air, Fire, Water, and Earth could generate a flow of essence from their natural surroundings. Even chanting under the right circumstances could be done with decent results if the environment were prepared. The power of words could bend ambient essence even to a novice's command. Problems cropped up when someone did something beyond their ability, or lack thereof. It's pretty easy to snuff out a candle if you need to. It's another thing entirely if you've accidentally caused a bonfire. No matter what the ritual, spell, or incantation, blood was like gasoline. One of the first things you learn on the druidic path is don't mess with blood. The injunction is strictly enforced. Even promising students can find themselves shunned by mentors for mild transgressions. After over twenty years of study, I had still not been initiated into the workings of blood. At the rate I was going, I wasn't ever likely to be.

I had found the blood ritual in the late evening in an old poem tucked in among folklore fromEastern Europe . Either the author had thought it inconsequential, or she had missed editing it out. It gave me enough to figure out what it could do. If you read enough spells, you tend to recognize a True one from neopagan chuckles.

But the big payoff of the night came when I went looking at macDuin's files. The name 'Dealle S.' had popped up in a list of contacts relating to the selenite theft the previous fall. MacDuin had made the entry. An 'S' followed by a period was a typical Guild abbreviation for sidhe, and Dealle was the same as the name of die woman Murdock had been trying to contact. In a world where people went by their first names unless they were royalty, the odds of two people having the same name were high. I was willing to bet good money that the odds of two people having the same name connected to two different Guild cases and macDuin were low. I still hadn't heard fromGermany about the elf/fairy hybrid named Gethin, but Dealle and her son Corcan were looking pretty interesting now.

I took my time showering and getting dressed. I didn't want to show up at Dealle's house so early she would be angry, but not so late that she would be gone again. I didn't have to check Murdock's file to know he had tried her house at different times of day. He had even done the before-work check like I was about to. If she wasn't home, I had nothing else to do but sit on her porch until she returned. Dealle Sidhe lived inSouth Boston , but near enough t< the Weird to keep it cheap. I made my way down A Stree until I came to Second. The street had a multiple personal ity disorder. Buildings of every conceivable type had beei put up as though the neighborhood couldn't decide what i wanted to be. Blank-faced wooden houses sat next to smal warehouses with the odd chunk of row house here anc there. Most of them looked abandoned, but the closed-uj feel had more to do widi protection than emptiness. Peo pie did live mere, people desperate for a sense of security but without enough money to buy it. It was safer than the Weird, but a far cry from the safer sections of South Boston Windblown newspapers cluttered doorways instead of white petunias.

Dealle Sidhe's address turned out to be a wooden triple-decker townhouse. A bay window marked the living room, and a small porch fronted on the street. The upper windows were boarded. At one time, the house had been white, but it had long since gone gray, the paint peeling in sheets. A wire fence of windowpane mesh enclosed the five-foot patch of front yard.

As I opened the gate, it scraped against the chipped concrete sidewalk. At the base of the steps sat a business card. I picked it up.Murdock's. I was about to mount the steps when I noticed a second card in the grass just off the walk. A third had blown against the side fence. I looked down at the card again. No surprise she hadn't called. Looking up at the house, I wondered if she even lived here anymore. I decided to try the door, or at least leave the card more securely.

I mounted the steps. No sound came from the house. No one was home.No one at all. Murdock's file had not mentioned if Dealle had a job. It seemed incredible that four visits by two investigators had come up empty. I reachedA Street again and turned the corner. In my peripheral vision, I noticed something white flutter into the gutter. I took another step and paused, looking up and down the street. A mild disorientation skittered over me, butA Street looked as it always did. I resumed walking. I went another block before abruptly turning and retracing my steps to where 1 had first stopped. Stooping, I picked up Murdock's card where I had dropped it. I looked downSecond Street and smiled. I returned to Dealle's house and stood at the gate. I tried to take a deep breath through my nose, but I still had too much congestion, to sense anything. I looked at Murdock's card and walked up to the steps again. No sound came from the house. No one was home.No one at all. This time I had gone only a few houses away before I realized I had left the porch. Murdock's card was still in my hand. I went back. I stared intently at the front of the house. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Some fey put small signs for those who could see, a few ogham runes scratched into the doorjamb that could be easily overlooked or perhaps herbs hanging over the door a certain way. I had even seen joke signs planted on lawns that read BEWARE OF THE TROLL. But Dealle's house looked nondescript by any of those measures. It wasn't until my eyes had passed by the woven rush doormat several times that I noticed it didn't sit quite level on the ground. A thin dark line ran along the whole front edge of the mat. 1 was willing to bet it was a smoothly cut stone, perfect to charge as a ward. Dealle didn't want visitors. Whether it was paranoia or privacy, I was determined to find out.

The spell was elegant and subtle. Rather than bluntly repelling any intrusions, it answered a question anyone approaching would be wondering—was anyone home? Unless someone had been specifically invited, the answer was no, and to avoid any persistent knocking, the ward deflected visitors calmly on their way. Since it responded to the intent of someone approaching, I changed my intent. My question was no longer was anyone home? I assumed that. Now I had to resist the compulsion to leave. I took a deep breath and strode to the door. I made it al the way to the mat before I felt the urge to run. I pressec forward, reached out my hand, and grasped the handle ol the storm door. Over and over, the thought that no one was home beat against my mind. I held on to the door and the knowledge that Dealle was inside. Sweat broke out on my forehead as I lifted my hand to knock. I could feel nausea beginning to well up from the strain of resisting. I desperately wanted to run, but I brought my fist down firmly and banged against the door. It sounded unconscionably loud. No one answered. I shoved the thought that no one was home out of my head. I banged again and again, keeping my eyes focused on my fist around the handle. I stopped wondering if she were home, stopped caring even. The only thing that mattered was that I kept bringing my fist down.

The door opened. I almost stumbled from the release of pressure as the ward deactivated. Inside the dim hall, I could see a small figure through the cloudy glass of the storm door. I let go of the door handle and flexed my fingers to relieve the cramping. The knuckles on my other hand were bright red. At least they weren't bleeding.

"Dealle Sidhe?" I managed to say. I was practically hyperventilating.

"Yes," she said. Her voice had a soft, musical quality.

"My name is Connor Grey. I used to work for the Guild. I'm helping out the police with a case. Can I speak with you for a few minutes?"

I still couldn't see her face clearly. Without speaking, she opened the door and held it for me to enter. I stepped into the front hall. Dealle closed the door and gestured toward the parlor to the left. She was a small woman, dressed in a simple white gown, her long brunette hair tied back loosely. She seemed aged, unusual for a fairy, her face lined with worry. In the dimly lit room, her wings gave off asoft pearlescent glow as they undulated in the small draft of my passing.

"I will bring some refreshments," she said.

"That's not necessary."

She paused. "Please allow me. It will be my apology for the door," she said softly. Four large armchairs sat in a loose circle before die fireplace. The room had a Victorian air to it, overstuffed and cluttered, but impeccably clean. Little animal figurines crowded onto several tables interspersed with clocks and candlesticks and finely wrought boxes in metal and wood. An old air conditioner labored in the side window, cooling the air enough that if you didn't move too quickly, it was comfortable. I sat in one of the chairs. I could feel a vague buzz across the back of my head. Dealle evidently had lots of spells simmering about the house.

She returned with six small crystal glasses on a tray that she placed on the buder's table in the center of the chair grouping. Primly, she sat opposite me.

"Welcome to my home." She leaned forward and picked up the glass wim the water in it. I couldn't resist smiling as I picked up the matching glass of water. She was treating me like a formal guest in the old tradition. InBoston , it was saved for special occasions. Since Convergence, it denoted a sign of class in better homes.

I downed the water. "Thank you, that was very refreshing."

She returned her own empty glass to me tray and picked up the next one wim mead in it. I leaned forward and did the same.

"I hope you didn't have too much trouble finding the house." She sipped the mead more slowly than the water.

"No, it was quite easy." We both took a moment to look around. A little thrill of discovery ran over me when I noticed a picture on the mantel. It was of a man with an oddly angular face, almond-shaped eyes and completely bald. Even though it was just a head shot, he looked big. He also looked a lot like Shay's description. I wished my sinuses were clear so I could sense his essence in the house. "This room is lovely, by the way. You must spend a lot of time here."

"Yes, I do. The streets are not safe." She replaced the empty mead glass and picked up the whiskey. She raised the glass."Slainte."

"To your health as well," I said and sipped the whiskey.Jameson's. Gods love the Irish.

"How may I help you?" Dealle asked.

"I'd like to ask you about your son."

Her eyes went down to her glass. "Has he caused some trouble?" Well, that answered whether he was alive. "Is he at home?"

She shook her head. "No, he's at school. Well, we call it school. It's more of an institution."

"Is he ill?"

Her eyes met mine. The old fey make unnerving eye contact. They have a stillness and patience about them that comes with unimaginable age. Dealle's eyes had a flicker of defensiveness behind them as well.

"I believe the phrase current these days is 'mentally challenged.' I suppose that's an improvement. A couple of decades ago, they officially called him a moron."

"Is his father here?"

She did look away then. "His father is ... German. I have not seen or heard from him in years."

"Dealle, I don't mean to embarrass you, but by German, do you mean elfin?" She nodded. "When I discovered I was with child, I was ecstatic. I had never had a child. I knew there were risks involved for a child of an elf and a fairy, but I was willing to take them. When Corcan was born, the way he is, his father left."

"How long has he been hospitalized?"

"He's not. It's a day program, five days a week at the Children's Institute near Day Boulevard. He's functional, but needs supervision. They teach him basic skills, and he gets to play with other children."

"Children?He's an adult about fifty years old, isn't he?"

She smiled coldly. "What's fifty years to me but a flicker of time? He's a child and has the mind of a child."

"Does he ever go out alone?"

"Just to and from school."

"Never any other time?Not at night, maybe, after you've gone to sleep?" She hesitated an awfully long time. "No." She gestured toward the front door. "There is more than one ward in this house." Since she was being so forthcoming, I decided not to point out that I had overcome one of her wards. Someone with ability would have an even easier time.

"Has his behavior changed recently?"

"Why are you here, Connor Grey?"

She caught me being sloppy. I hadn't planned the interview out. I was hoping I would show up, recognize the killer's essence, and call Murdock. As it was, I couldn't very well say to this woman I thought her son was a psycho killer with absolutely no evidence. "I'm doing background research into cross-species progeny. It may be connected to a case I'm working. If I could have a better understanding of the behavior of such individuals, it might be predictive of future behavior." She leaned farther back in her chair. "What kind of behavior?"

"Given my profession, it shouldn't surprise you I'm interested in aggression. Specifically, aggression as it relates to fey abilities." "My son has hurt no one." I didn't like the harder tone her voice was taking. I was clearly treading on mother-bear territory.

"I didn't say that, Dealle. But since you've brought it up, what can you tell me about Corcan's abilities?" She shrugged. "I've been told he has a strong essence, but he doesn't understand that. When he's angry or upset, rooms tend to get a little overturned. The Institute is working on that. He's never hurt anyone."

"May I see his room?"

The question startled her, and she didn't immediately respond. "I suppose. Why?" I shrugged. "It's nothing. I'd just like to see the environment he spends time in." She rose from her chair and led me back into the hall. Corcan's room was the first bedroom on the left. A large bed took up most of the floor space. It had a bright red comforter with racing cars on it. A straight-backed wooden chair stood against the wall by the door and beneath the window on the opposite side was a small chest of drawers. The walls were vibrant yellow and white painted in Celtic spirals. Centered on each wall, up near the ceiling, pentagrams had been stenciled in blue. They were later additions. The spirals flowed behind them.

I pointed. "Whose pentagrams are those?"

"They help him focus when he's upset. He doesn't understand it has to do with ability. We're teaching him how to channel his aggression into calmness. It didn't seem to work at first, but his caregiver kept adding pentagrams. Now there is one wherever he turns. It seems to help." I nodded and walked to the chest of drawers. Resting my hand lightly on a handle, I looked at Dealle.

"May I?" Annoyance crossed her face, but she nodded. I went through each drawer. The top held some nonsense toys hidden beneath several pairs of underwear. The next drawer held shirts and the bottom, pants. All of it was neatly folded. I made sure not to disturb anything. I closed the last drawer and opened the closet without asking this time. More clothing hung neatly, and a few pairs of shoes lined up perfectly against the back wall.The shelf across the top held sweaters. Dealle obviously kept close tabs on her son. No hearts in bottles. I didn't think there would be.

"Are there any other places your son might keep things?" I asked. She shook her head. "He's not allowed in the living room. Mostly he plays in here, watches TV in the kitchen, or plays in the yard."

"May I see the yard?"

She led me farther down the hall to the kitchen and pointed at the back door. I looked out die multi-paned window to see a tiny, blacktopped space with a basketball hoop. A couple of balls sat on the ground, and a bicycle was chained to the back fence.Nothing out of the ordinary. No shed to hide things. No turf to bury things. I could feel another nasty buzz at the base of my skull. Another ward must be hidden under die back doormat.

I looked around die kitchen.Again nothing unusual. The place hadn't seen a remodeling in fifty years. White chunky woodencabinets widi metal drawer pulls. Glass-fronted upper cabinets with plates, cups, and bowls all neatly stacked on the shelves. Next to the hallway entrance was a closed door.

"Do you have a basement?"

"He doesn't go down mere. He's afraid of the dark."

We stood uncomfortably in the cool white of the overhead fluorescent light. Nothing fit. Corcan didn't sound like serial killer material, but mere had to be a reason Dealle Sidhe's name was in macDuin's files.

"Dealle, why did die Guild contact you last fall?" She looked at me curiously. "They didn't. I contacted them." She pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down. "I thought they could help." That took me by surprise."With what?"

She hugged herself as an old anxiety creased her face. "Corky didn't come home from school on time one day. When he didn't show up by nightfall, I went looking for him but couldn't find him. I called the police and the Guild. Neither was particularly helpful. It didn't matter anyway. Corky showed up the next day in front of the house. He was scared and confused. He had taken a wrong turn and got lost."

"Was there any change in his behavior after that?"

She shrugged."Nothing surprising. He was afraid to go out by himself for a while."

"And when was this exactly?"

"Last September. I don't remember the date. It was the last week of the month." I nodded. The selenite stones had gone missing shortly before that. Not to mention that Belgor's strange customer had shown up around then, too. The stones aspect of the case was starting to tie together.

"You seem quite adept with wards, Dealle. Do you ever work with selenite?" Her eyes narrowed at me. "It's an old stone to work with. I don't care much for the power of the Moon. It's the work of secrets and sunderings."

Personally, I couldn't argue with her. Moon-work was mostly women's. I never had much success with it myself. Give me the Sun and a sharp edge any day.

"It's just a Power. Its use can be positive or negative depending on the user. You know that." She smiled thinly. "I'm a bit older than you, Connor Grey. I lived in theTrueLand before we were thrust into this sickened place. Trust me. The Moon is no friend. The Light of Day reveals all." Her phrasing gave me pause. TheTrueLand was how elves, not fairies, referred to their lost home. I suppose given her choice of mate, it shouldn't be surprising. I had a hunch Dealle was an elf sympathizer, as in superior to the rest of us, we-should-rule-the-world kind of way. "And the True Land remains the True Land, beneath the Light of Day/Take me back to the True Land, and out of the World of Decay," I recited. It was part of an old ballad from World War II that the fey ofGermany sang. Bingo. Dealle's eyebrows shot up. "I didn't think someone so young would know that song." I shrugged. "I have an interest in history."

She sighed with resignation. "Yes, it is history. I was happy in a very sad time, but this is the world we live in now. Trudis were told, and mistakes were made. And love lost. Some of my old acquaintances still fight for Faerie. I only have time for Corcan now."

"I didn't mean to bring up painful memories." I didn't know what to say. She had that exhausted tone that people have when they've lost their ideals.

"You were born here. You know nothing," she said, her voice bitter. She stood and walked out of the kitchen. I hesitated before following her down the hall to where she held the front door open. I had no authority to insist on staying.

"I'll be the judge of my memories," she said.

I bowed slightly."Of course. Thank you, Dealle. You've been helpful." As I walked down the front steps, she called my name, and I turned. "My son's a good boy. You remember that."

I didn't say anything, but smiled and nodded. She closed the door. I could feel a little buffer of air tickle my face as the ward reactivated.

I shoved my hands deep into my pants pockets as I strode up the street. I had gone to the house with the hope of finding a killer, with the added bonus of embarrassing macDuin for overlooking evidence in his own files. Instead, I found a mentally challenged man without the skills to find his way home, never mind slaughter six people. Corcan "Corky" Sidhe had vanished for a night about when the selenite stones were stolen. Given that the Guild hadn't officially investigated his disappearance, macDuin's note at the time practically confirmed there must be some connection. What I couldn't figure out was why Dealle's name was in the file if no one had bothered to follow up on it. And why macDuin in particular hadn't followed up made that even more interesting.

For all her willingness to answer questions, Dealle made me uncomfortable. Fairies and elves always made a toxic mix, and Dealle obviously hadn't let go of all her political sympathies. And she knew stone work.

An old man walking toward me glanced uncertainly away as I stopped short on the sidewalk. MacDuin had been an elf sympathizer during the War, too. It was possible he knew Dealle from that time. And if he knew Dealle, he probably knew about her son. Stinkwort had said once that there was no blood on macDuin's hands. I wondered if macDuin or someone he knew was somehow controlling Corcan. But the level of Power required was significant, and I didn't think macDuin had it in him. Still, the reduced mental capacity might make it feasible, especially if macDuin had found a way to augment his abilities. I started walking again. The frustrating part was motive. If macDuin was connected to the murders, what could he hope to gain? A cold thought occurred to me. Tiamach Ru-adan, the father of the latest victim, was a war hero on the front lines for the last push intoBerlin . Although the humans had reconciled their differences decades ago, relations between elves and fairies had only begun to approach resolution at the Fey Summit. Could macDuin be seeking some kind of delayed revenge?

If the idea that someone would want to disrupt the peace process weren't so horrible, I would have laughed at myself. But if enough paranoid people believed something, it didn't take too long for them to start their own conspiracy. And if macDuin had come to the conclusion that working within the system wasn't changing anything, maybe he had nothing left to lose.

14

Tuesday morning I returned to my apartment without the usual cleansing feeling I get from my five-mile run. Instead of doing my normal route around the old fort, I had spent much of the time running through the Weird and passing the murder sites. The experience was both frustrating and strange. I tried to find some pattern to the locations, some unifying characteristic that would clue me in to where the killer might pick next. A simple glance at a map demonstrated no pattern other than the general neighborhood and opportunity. All the deaths had occurred in places with only the similarity of isolation. Not much help—most people try to keep out of sight-when they are gutting someone. Running from empty, trash-filled alleys into the brash activity of the Avenue made the whole experience surreal. Midsummer activities were coming into full swing, with all manner of people roaming the main streets, laughing and singing. I had to wonder if they were blissfully unaware of the killer in their midst, coldly indifferent, or merely unconcerned. As I sat at my computer, I reviewed the evidence again. Contrary to my conversation with Stinkwort, I wasn't all that sure I had the stone ritual nailed. I had a strong hint at best, but the effects of substituting different types of stone remained a mystery, to say nothing of whatever incantation might be involved. Thinking of the stones made me realize I hadn't heard from Meryl. I took that as a sign she was keeping her word not to disclose their mysterious return to the Guild until Thursday.

I looked back at the case hies. All the evidence had been consistent until the last death. The killer had left dirt in the chest cavity of the most recent victim. Or, more precisely, sand.Clean, sterile sand according to the analysis. I had an uncomfortable tactile memory of my hand covered with sand grit and blood.

I opened the file on Ragnell, the first victim. The P.D. had taken its time with tests because Ragnell's clothes were so dirty. He had been sleeping on the street. He couldn't have charged much for his services unless the client was into unwashed clothes. I had no delusions that such people didn't exist. Murdock had appended an undated forensics report. It read like a catalog of debris: cat and dog hair, multiple human hairs from different people, food particles,bits of lavender, hawthorn leaves, hore-hound, cloves, unidentifiable ash, and good old marijuana stems.

The hawthorn leaves didn't surprise me. The tree was sacred to fairies, and many of the fey carried leaves as protection or touchstones. The lavender, clove, and dope didn't surprise me either. Even humans, mostly of the alternative music bent, would have them these days. But the horehound struck me as odd. It was used mainly as a curative for coughs and colds. I skimmed back through the rest of the report, but I didn't see any indication that Ragnell was sick. A red flag jumped out at me. The medical examiner had made a note that ash had been on the body, not just the domes, but the body itself. Some of it was near the chest wound. I sent Murdock an email to see if he could find out if any herbs were in the wound. I didn't think I was wrong though. I had no doubt they were on the body, at least in charred remains. Ingested in certain forms, horehound could be used for colds. But burning it in conjunction with hawthorn leaves was a restorative of spirits. That fit neatly with my theory about the killer trying to heal himself .

I scrolled through the forensic reports of the other victims. My momentary elation began to fade. No herbs showed up in the other cases. The only oddthing about Pach, the second victim, besides the gaping hole in his chest, were a couple of fresh minor burn marks. No ash residue. There were no indications of anything like herbs or ashes on the third victim. It had been raining that night, and the body, like all the others, was naked. Some evidence had probably been lost. And men me fourth victim just had the sand. I made a list of one to four on a piece of scrap paper and wrote the anomalies for each victim: ash, minor burns, nothing, and sand. The first two items obvious were connected by fire, but that left me with two more unrelated items. I looked back at Gamelyn, the third victim, and read through the file again slowly.Nothing. I stared at the crime scene photos.

I remembered that my senses were in overdrive that night. Because of the rain, everything had smelled more intensely. It was how I had caught Tansy's essence even over the stench of the dumpster. That night had been the last time it had rained in two weeks. Weather forecasters, the meteorologist kind, had remarked that every storm front in the last two weeks had skittered south toward Cape Cod without touching theBoston metro area. Strange for the region, especially this time of year. At number three on my list, I wrote the word "rain" next to the nothing.

Some people get goose-bumps when they realize something exciting. Me, I get a rush of adrenaline. As I looked at my list, I got one huge burst. It wasn't about the ash. Ash was just the residue when incense is burned. Incense is burned to invoke the power of Air. Another check of Rag-nell's scene photo revealed a candle stub in plain sight. Dripping wax could burn skin. Candles are lit to invoke the power of Fire. Gamelyn was killed on a rainy night. That everything at the scene was wet would have obscured the fact if Water had been present in the ritual. And then there was the sand at the last scene.Earth. I knew now that only one more murder waited to occur in two days' time. A new moon on Midsummer's Eve would complete the lunar cycle of the ritual. While many people work with the four natural elements, a fifth element can be included, and I was sure it was about to be invoked: Spirit, which some call Essence. Air, Fire, Water, Earth, and Spirit.The five primal elements of Power.The five points of invocation of every ritual invoked with a pentagram. With his surprising room decorations, Corcan Sidhe was back in the picture.

In reviewing macDuin's files, I had come across numerous library searches for old grimoires. I had reprints of some of them in my study, but none made any connection for me. I spun in my chair and called Meryl. She answered on the first ring.

"Hi, Meryl.I'm in my apartment. I feel safe here because the Guild put in protection wards." I listened to several moments of nonresponse while I hoped Meryl got me message.

"I'm busy now. I'll call you tomorrow." She hung up. I quickly turned off the ringer. Anxiously, I stared at the caller ID on the receiver. The display changed from idle mode to indicate someone was calling from a masked phone number. I put the receiver to my ear and hit the on button. A familiar sensation of static bristled out of the phone and surrounded my head.

"So you mink yourapartment's bugged?" she said.

"Just a precaution.I'm getting paranoid."