The Frenzy Way

by Gregory Lamberson

  The boat headed downriver.

  “He left messages at the scene of most of his murders,” Mace said. “We managed to keep some of them from the public. He scrawled the messages in his victims’ blood: ‘skinwalkers,’ ‘nahual,’ ‘ulfheonar.’ ‘Okmiohtoki.’ ‘Loup-garu.’ I thought the messages were meant for us.”

  Angela shook her head. “They were for us, but he wanted you todiscover them. Those words have a derogatory meaning among our kind. To be a ‘skinwalker’ is to choose the flesh of Man over Wolf Form. To an extremist like this Berserker, a sign of weakness. He’s been taunting us, challenging us to prey on mankind. At the same time, he wants to expose our existence to your kind.”

  “For what reason?”

  “To provoke open warfare between our species.”

  “Surely that would be suicidal …”

  “He doesn’t care. He’s a terrorist willing to die for his cause. Fear and anarchy are his allies. Look how he’s turned this city upside down in just one week’s time.”

  “Was Stalk a Wolf?”

  “No. He saved my life once, and we became lovers.”

  “Is that against the law?”

  She nodded. “‘Do not reveal your true self to man.’ The pack wanted to kill him. My father persuaded them that breaking one law to protect another was morally shaky.”

  “What about Peter Danior?”

  “He was a member of our pack.”

  Mace tried to hide his surprise. “I assume his wife is human.”

  “She is. But Peter honored our laws. She didn’t know he was a Wolf.”

  “I think she figured it out.”

  “Peter underestimated her superstitious nature.”

  Mace needed more. “Does the name Rodrigo Gomez mean anything to you?”

  Angela held his gaze for a moment. “Your Full Moon Killer.”

  Mace nodded.

  “He’s one of my kind, but he never belonged to our pack. He’s one of those born in human form who grew up never knowing the truth about himself. The Full Moon Killer had us worried. We thought he might be a Wolf but didn’t know his identity. Gomez came into the shop once—that’s its purpose, to serve as a beacon of sorts. My fatherspoke to him. He sensed something off about Gomez. We were about to abduct him when you arrested him, and we learned our suspicions were correct. The trial was a tense period for us; we had no idea what would come out. It was a big relief that he knew nothing. You did us a favor.”

  Some favor. “Who’s the Berserker, Angela?”

  “His name is Julian Fortier, though he calls himself Janus Farel.” Reaching into her pocket, she withdrew a piece of paper. “This is his address.”

  Taking the paper, Mace read the address scrawled on it.

  “I tracked him there myself. The married couple who owned that brownstone died in a terrorist attack almost twenty years ago. Their name was Fortier, and they left their estate to their eleven-year-old son. Julian was sent to live with his mother’s father in Colorado, with rent on the building supporting him. The Fortiers belonged to our pack.”

  “And two decades later, Julian has returned to the henhouse?”

  “The Berserker lives in the Fortiers’ old home. It has to be Julian. The name on the mailbox says Janus Farel. An alias, using his real initials.”

  “And your people can’t stop him?”

  “They don’t know where he is yet, and I won’t tell them. My brothers would risk great danger to the pack in order to kill him. I can’t allow that to happen. For similar reasons, I can’t help you do what must be done.”

  Mace fixed her with an even stare. “What makes you think I’m going to do your dirty work?”

  “You’ve seen the Berserker. You know he’s real. Even if you believe nothing else I’ve told you, you know he has to be stopped. It’s why you’ve been looking for me, why you went to the shop or my apartment when John was murdered, why you agreed to meet me here today.”

  Mace glanced at the darkening sky. “I’ve been discredited in the police department. My bosses would rather believe I’m crazy than believe what I told them I saw. So I’m all on my own. I can’t just break into this building without a warrant and arrest a guy you say is a werewolf.”

  “I never said anything about arresting him.”

  He didn’t miss the meaning of her words. “I don’t even have a gun anymore. I can’t exactly go in blasting silver bullets.”

  “You don’t need a gun,” Angela said. “You need the Blade of Salvation.”

  “The magic sword? That’s a little hard for me to swallow. Besides, it’s broken.”

  “The Berserker’s parents belonged to our pack, but he was raised by his grandfather. At some point, he must have moved to Europe and joined a cell of extremists there. He became a religious fanatic. The Blade can destroy him because he believes it can.”

  Mace thought of the broken blade he had seen in Central Park. “What makes you so sure?”

  “Because he killed Glenzer for it. It only has value to those who believe in its power.”

  “Unfortunately, both halves of the Blade are in police custody. There must be some other way …”

  “We’re not indestructible. We have remarkable healing powers in comparison to yours, especially during Transformation. And our skeletal structure affords extra protection for the brain and heart. But Torquemada nearly exterminated the European Wolves by having them decapitated with the Blade. If you had an Uzi or an AK-47 in your hands right now, you could cut me in half, and I promise that would be the end of me. But these are extreme methods that will no doubt draw attention. You can kill the Berserker with the Blade, and no one will ever be the wiser.”

  The boat cruised around the financial district, massive buildings filling their vision.

  “And then what?”

  “When I hear back from you, I’ll arrange for my brothers to destroy the body. Things will be as they were. Balance will be restored.”

  “I have a wife,” Mace said in a quiet voice, “with a baby on the way. They need me. I can’t take care of them if I get myself killed facingthis thing alone.”

  “I won’t try to convince you to do this. Only you can make that choice. I’m just telling you what must be done, and I’m giving you the opportunity to do it.”

  Mace parked the Impala in a lot near Park Row in Chinatown. Walking to One Police Plaza with a compact umbrella in his trench coat pocket, he glanced at the Brooklyn Bridge, towering against the dark sky a few blocks away. A helicopter rose from the heliport on the Puzzle Palace’s rooftop, and NYPD Hummers rolled through the intersection near the ramp. He passed the concrete barriers that had been constructed in the days following 9/11, entered the building, and bypassed the metal detectors.

  Glancing at his watch, he saw the time was 3:45. Then he scanned the lobby for familiar faces he hoped to avoid and took an elevator to the second floor, where he strode to room 208. Two uniformed clerks engaged in separate conversation with civilians, a heavyset Caucasian man and a short Hispanic woman.

  His heartbeat increased as a third clerk appeared from the back room and motioned him forward. “Can I help you?” the black woman said.

  Mace produced a requisition form he had downloaded from the department’s intranet and filled out in the rental car.

  The clerk skimmed the form, including the signature of an assistant district attorney who owed Mace more than one big favor. “Can I see your ID, sir?”

  Mace handed her his police ID.

  She matched the numbers and handed the leather holder back to him. Then she took his form into the back room. The male civilian exited the room with an item bagged in clear plastic; then the Hispanic woman departed empty-handed, with a displeased expression on her face. Now both clerks were free. The last thing Mace wanted was foranyone to notice him. He knew that the bosses had kept quiet about his suspension, but there was no way to prevent gossip. Here he stood in the very center of police power, stealing crime-scene evidence.

>   The clerk assisting him emerged from the back room, holding one large bagged item and a smaller object sealed in a padded envelope in her free arm.

  The Blade of Salvation, Mace thought. At least part of it.

  The clerk set the Blade on the counter and keyed Mace’s information into her computer terminal, and Mace held his breath.

  “Okay, Captain,” she said. “You’re all set.”

  “Thank you.” Clutching the heavy sword hilt in his left hand and tucking the envelope in the crook of his arm, Mace moved away from the counter. He grasped the doorknob and hesitated. There’s still time to call this off, he thought. You don’t have to sacrifice your job.

  Then he slid the evidence into his inside coat pockets, exited the Property room, and followed the wide corridor past the elevators to the lobby.

  “Tony!”

  His body turned rigid at the sound of Hackley’s voice, and he debated whether or not to make a run for the doors. Instead, taking a deep breath, he turned and faced his former mentor.

  “What are you doing here?” Hackley said when he caught up to him.

  Mace’s mind raced. What excuse would satisfy the chief of detectives who had been so complicit in suspending him? “I had to keep an appointment with an ADA who needed my signature on an old case file.”

  “You don’t answer your cell phone?”

  “I’m sorry, Dennis. I’m sure you can understand that my mind’s been all over the place the last couple of days.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m sorry about how everything went down, but what did you expect?”

  Mace smiled. “I didn’t expect anything.” Turning, he headed toward the doors.

  Hackley fell into step with him. “Don’t give me that shit. Youwent into that meeting knowing damned well that no one could possibly buy those fairy tales you were selling. You’ve got no one to blame but yourself for how this played out.”

  “Who’s arguing?”

  Hackley grabbed his shoulder. “It doesn’t have to be like this. Think about your career. Think about your family. There’s still time to amend your report.”

  “You’re wrong. There’s no time left.” Mace pushed the door open, stepped outside, and took a deep breath of damp air.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  The rain came in great sheets as Mace drove along West Houston Street. The Impala’s windshield wipers did little to make the street ahead visible, and he eased up on the gas. He glimpsed a green traffic light through the downpour and inched the car forward. Two blocks later he made a right turn, then a left, then another right. He passed a shuttered gas station, then a rubble-strewn lot surrounded by a chain-link fence.

  And then the building came into view: a three-story brownstone with black bars over its windows and cruddy gold curtains behind them. The building on its right had also been demolished, leaving an industrial garbage dump where it had once stood and the brownstone isolated and monolithic. The address above the structure’s wide door taunted Mace.

  There it is, he thought. Right where it’s been for years in front of anyone who cared to see it. Rolling through the onslaught, he crossed the intersection and pulled over to the curb in front of a bodega. Switching off the engine, he unbuckled his seat belt, reached inside his coat, and withdrew the evidence bag, which he unsealed with numb fingers. Taking the Blade out, the eyes of the hooded priest carved into its hilt stared at him. He had no doubt that members of the Catholic church knew about the existence of Wolves and that Father Hagen’s monsignor had dispatched him and the Dominican man to kill Janus Farel.

  Can this really kill the thing I saw murder Stalk? Mace curled his fingers around the pommel and felt the wolf head on the other side press against his palm. Picturing Patty, he opened and closed his hand until he felt his skin threatening to break. Switching the Blade into his left hand, he gazed at the imprint the wolf head had left in his flesh, then closed his fingers into a fist. He tore open the padded envelope and removed the second piece of crime-scene evidence he had obtained despite his suspension: the blue steel, snub-nosed .38 that had been strapped to Patty’s inner thigh when she was torn to pieces. As rain pelted the Impala, he loaded six rounds into the weapon’s cylinder. If the Blade failed to kill the monster, Mace intended to finish the job with Patty’s gun.

  Jerking the car door open, Mace stepped into the downpour. He used the remote control to lock the car and ran across the street, dispensing with his umbrella so he would be unencumbered; he had already stuffed his coat pockets with all the gear he could carry. He took the six concrete steps two at a time, then grasped the brass handle on one of the two front doors and pulled it. Moving inside the darkened foyer, he allowed the door to close behind him. Water dripped down his face as he gazed at the only name in the narrow directory mounted on the wall: Janus Farel.

  This is really it, he thought as a tremor ran through his body. So far, Angela’s information had panned out. Looking over his shoulder, he saw that the rain streaming down the glass panes in the front doors obscured his vision of the outside world. Call Willy. Call in Hercules. Bring this fucker down in a hail of NYPD gunfire.

  But that hadn’t worked yet.

  I’m on my own.

  He ran his right hand through his wet hair, pushing it back, then took out a pair of latex gloves and stretched them over his hands. While gripping the butt of Patty’s .38 in his pocket with his left hand, he aimed his right pointer finger at the doorbell button next to Janus’s name, wavered, and pressed it.

  Unprepared for the old-fashioned bell that rang in response, he flinched. Facing the stained-glass window set within the inner door, he unbuttoned his raincoat and dropped his right hand to his side like a gunfighter, poised to draw the Blade from his inside pocket.

  I’ll kill him when he opens the door, he thought. No questions, no arrest—I’ll just drive the Blade straight into his heart and be done with it. Then Angela and her people would have to dispose of the body.

  Holding his breath, he waited.

  No one answered the door, so Mace rang the bell again. He leaned close to the stained-glass pane and peered inside, but his vision could not penetrate the darkness. Was the building empty, or was Janus Farel hiding? Stepping back, he reached into the inside breast pocket of his coat and removed a small leather case, which he unzipped. New York State had illegalized lock-picking kits, but most of the experienced detectives he knew owned one. Since he had bypassed getting a warrant and intended to commit murder, he gave little thought to the consequences of using such a device. If he succeeded in killing Janus, he would cover his tracks as best as he could manage and wrestle with his conscience later.

  I have a child on the way.

  He selected one of the seventeen assorted picks, fiddled with the lock, then returned the pick to the case and drew another. His second choice fit the lock better, and he wiggled the precision tool around at various angles. Thunder rumbled overhead like distant cannon fire.

  The pick caught part of the mechanism, and he gently lifted it, producing a sharp click. Turning the knob, he opened the inside door just a crack. With a loud exhale, he returned the picks to their designated pocket. For an instant he considered praying but rejected the idea. He had come to confront Farel alone.

  Pushing the door open and facing darkness, he discerned hazy colors in the space ahead. He raised his eyes to a stained-glass skylight three floors above, and a curved stairway came into focus, with a wide Colonial style archway to his right. A hallway along the bottom of the stairway led into a wide room somewhat illuminated by light seeping through the curtained windows. He took out his cell phone and opened its cover, casting dull blue light ahead of him. Then he armed his right hand with the .38, knowing that if he encountered Janus, he would have to drop the flashlight and move the gun back into his left hand to draw the Blade. He closed the door behind him and twisted the dead bolt. As he entered the main hallway, he gagged with such force that he doubled over and nearly e
xpelled his lunch. Retreating into the foyer, he held down the vomit that had crawled up the back of his throat.

  What the hell?

  Lightning flickered through the curtains, and Mace saw that small piles of filth covered the hallway floor. When the darkness returned, he aimed the cell phone at the floor, illuminating the dried clumps.

  Dog shit, he thought. Wolf feces?

  Pocketing his gun for a moment, he reached back into his coat, took out a small jar of Vicks VapoRub, unscrewed the cap, and dabbed the gel inside his nostrils, covering the stench. The feces reminded him somewhat of the scene at Glenzer’s condo, except that had been an act of disrespect.

  This is—what? Marking his territory?

  No. Seeing his footprints in the moldy waste, he realized he had violated a primitive security system. With his stomach settled andthe VapoRub returned to his pocket, he reentered the hallway. As he peered through the archway on his right, he saw that the wooden floor of the empty living room was unsoiled. Reaching into his pocket once more, he fished out two disposable shoe covers that he pulled on before entering the deep room with his gun drawn, ensuring that no tracks revealed his path. Standing in the living room, he observed piles of wood stacked in each corner. Much of the wood had been broken. Marks on the floor showed where the room had once been divided in two. The brownstone had been split into multiple apartments, and Janus had begun to restore the building to its original design by tearing it apart.

  Nice job, he thought, examining the debris.

  Then he crossed the wreckage to another archway. The next room was twice as wide as the living room and held twice as much broken wood and pieces of drywall. The main hall also led into this empty room.

  A music room once, perhaps?

  Mace passed beneath yet another archway, this one leading into a dining room, also empty.

  Lighting his way with his cell phone, he opened a white paneled door on his right. He leaned through the doorway and craned his neck to the left. A narrow servants’ stairway led upstairs. Closing the door, he continued on, pushing the door at the end of the dining room. He had only set one foot inside what he assumed was the kitchen when a sudden cacophony caused him to jump: flapping wings, frightened hisses, and groaning wood.