“I met with him during the negotiations to accept a new diplomat to the court. I am frequently my mother’s errand boy,” he said, and he didn’t look too happy about it.
I supposed I could be annoyed at J.B. for not telling me about this sooner, but really, what right had I to the information? We were friends, but nothing more than that. Still, it made me look at him in a new light. He seemed just as constrained by his heritage as I.
“Are there any useful tips you can give me at all? I’d really like to make it through my first diplomatic mission without getting my head chopped off.”
J.B. blew out a breath. “There are so many rules, so many potential breaches of etiquette . . .”
“I am not entirely sure that Madeline is the best person for this mission,” Gabriel said.
“Sarcasm is not productive,” I said.
“I am not being sarcastic. Lucifer surely has members of his own court that understand the complex rules of the faeries and could negotiate them better than you.”
“That means there’s some special reason why he wants me there,” I said.
“What reason could that be?” J.B. asked.
“I don’t know yet,” I said grimly. “But I will find out, sooner or later.”
“Let’s hope that in the meantime you manage to keep your head,” J.B. said.
Literally and figuratively, I thought. My temper always ran close to the surface. And when my emotions were high it became difficult for me to think clearly. For some reason, my magic seemed to feed off this and encourage it. A quick temper and unstable emotions—not to mention almost total lack of knowledge about the species in question—were not the best combination for a delicate diplomatic mission.
Lucifer was obviously up to something—besides yanking my chain, that is. He had some plan that I couldn’t see yet. And while I was trying to figure out that plan, I had to make sure I didn’t take an early trip to the Door.
J.B. seemed recovered enough to head home and rest, so Gabriel and I helped him into a cab and sent him on his way. As J.B.’s cab pulled away in the light of the rising sun, I remembered that I had another pickup—an early one.
“No rest for the weary,” I said, sighing.
Gabriel glanced at me. “Or the wicked.”
“Hey, I’m supposed to be one of the good guys,” I said, a little offended.
“Try to remember that when you are about Lucifer’s business.”
I felt myself growing angry. “Do you think I chose this?”
“I know that you did not,” he said patiently. “But Lord Lucifer has a way of making choices seem . . . gray.”
I wanted to tell Gabriel that one of the reasons I was forced to do Lucifer’s business in the first place was to keep him breathing, but I didn’t. I knew enough about Gabriel to know that he wouldn’t want me to do anything for his sake. And anyway, it was my choice, even if it sometimes seemed like my options had been taken away from the moment I had discovered I was Azazel’s daughter.
“I think I can hold my own against Lucifer,” I said. “I am aware of his reputation.”
“Do not make any assumptions where Lord Lucifer is concerned,” Gabriel warned. “He has forgotten more about human nature than you will ever know.”
“That’s the second time today I’ve been told that,” I said. “Don’t you have any faith in me?”
“I have plenty of faith in you, Madeline,” Gabriel said. “I just know Lord Lucifer better than you do. He has been playing chess for centuries, and he knows how to win. And who to sacrifice.”
I felt myself grow cold. Somehow, I hadn’t considered that Lucifer might be sending me to the faerie court to get rid of me.
“I thought that I would be more valuable to him, being the last direct descendant of his union with Evangeline.”
Gabriel stared broodingly after J.B.’s taxi. “I’m not sure that family ties are that meaningful to Lord Lucifer. I am his grandson, after all, and I only barely managed to escape the knife at my birth.”
“But he was furious with me for killing Ramuell,” I said thoughtfully. “I think maybe his family is more important than you think. I don’t think he would have let the Grigori kill you no matter what. I bet he just wanted to see how things would play out, and who would speak out against his grandson. I’m sure he’s holding it against any Grigori that did so.”
“I suppose it is possible,” Gabriel said, still staring off into the middle distance somewhere.
“Hey,” I said, taking his hand. I felt the familiar hum of electricity that always sparked between us at the slightest touch. “It doesn’t matter what Lucifer wants or doesn’t want. I want you, son of Ramuell or not.”
His hand gripped mine tighter but he still did not turn his head in my direction. “Son of Ramuell is what I will always be, and that is why we cannot do this. I have told you over and over and you will not listen.”
I pressed closer to him, made him look at me. His eyes were tormented.
“And I have told you over and over,” I said, my face very close to his, “that I do not care what the rules say.”
He gave me what I wanted, pressed his mouth against mine for an instant, and then pulled away. His face was full of need and regret.
“It is madness, Madeline, and I cannot do it. I will not be responsible for your death.”
There wasn’t a lot I could say to that. I watched him walk away from me, the way he seemed to over and over.
4
MY HAND HOVERED INSIDE THE BAKERY CASE. I WAITED a second or two, trying to decide which doughnut was the right one. The two doughnuts that remained were filled with some kind of cream and both had chocolate icing on top. I grabbed the one on the right.
“That’s not the right kind,” Beezle muttered from the inside pocket of my coat. “That kind has cream inside, not custard.”
“How can you tell from there?” I hissed, putting the doughnut back.
“I can smell it,” he replied, his voice muffled by the wool.
“Well, I can’t tell the difference so you get what you get,” I said.
“Just get the other one,” he said. His short gray horns and yellow cat eyes peeked out from underneath the lapel of my black winter coat.
A harried-looking woman with two small boys in her grocery cart pushed past us to get at the baguettes.
“Look, Mommy, there’s a rat in her pocket!” one of the boys shouted, pointing at me. Several other people shopping in the section turned to look.
The mother widened her eyes at Beezle, grabbed her French bread and tossed it in the cart. She “shushed” the little boy while moving away from me as quickly as possible.
I gave the other shoppers a sickly smile. “It’s my guinea pig,” I said, moving away from the doughnut case and shoving Beezle back in my pocket with my free hand.
I’d completed my pickup and decided to hit the Jewel for a few necessities. Of course, Beezle had a different notion of necessity than I did.
“What about my doughnut?” he whined.
“You only get doughnuts if you can stay incognito,” I hissed.
“How is this not incognito? Am I inside your pocket or what?” Beezle grumped. “It’s hot in here.”
“Yesterday you were cold; now you’re hot,” I said.
“People are staring,” Gabriel murmured next to me.
“Oh, gee, why would they stare?” I said. “It’s not like I’m having an argument with my coat lapel or anything.”
The corners of his mouth turned up as I tossed a couple of oranges in my basket.
“That is fruit, not a doughnut,” Beezle muttered. “We don’t want any of that healthy stuff.”
“You know, it would probably be good for you to replace some junk food with fruit. You’re getting pretty heavy in there.”
“Gargoyles are supposed to be round,” Beezle said, and his tone was clearly miffed. “We are home guardians.”
“And I ask it again: then why the hell don’t you
stay at home instead of making me drag your heavy ass all over town?”
I was spared Beezle’s reply because just then I felt a wave of energy pulse through the store, the same power signature that I’d experienced only a few hours earlier. Gabriel looked alarmed, and I felt Beezle stiffen inside my coat.
“The wolf-killer,” I said, dropping my basket on the floor and heading toward the front of the store. “Where?”
Gabriel fell into stride beside me. “Nearby, but not too close. The pulse didn’t disable you this time?”
I felt the familiar flicker of magic under the surface of my skin. “No. Either I’m getting used to it or ground zero was far enough away not to harm me.”
“Or you were protected by the building,” Beezle said, his voice still muffled. “Earlier you were in the sky, completely exposed.”
I looked at Gabriel questioningly and he shrugged. “Your magic is a constant mystery to me, Madeline. It seems to operate differently from others I have known.”
We exited the store and stood for a moment in the morning sunshine, trying to get our bearings. It was hard to find the source of a supernatural event that had already happened, but Gabriel had some skill in tracking power signatures. He looked around, then pointed north.
“This way,” he said.
We crossed the parking lot and then Wellington. This was a busy area, with two strip malls right next to one another and a large development of condos across the street behind them.
“I can’t believe this creature would do anything in an area this crowded,” I said. “Someone must have seen it.”
Gabriel didn’t look at me. He was intent on following the traces of magic to their source. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. People tend to see only what they want to see.”
The two strip malls faced Ashland, which was a main thoroughfare that ran north-south through the city. A few blocks away was the Lincoln-Belmont-Ashland intersection, a major convergence of traffic and businesses. In between were blocks stuffed with homes and apartments.
Gabriel tracked through the post office parking lot, across another street, and into an alley. We wandered for a few moments, turning left and right, and then I could smell it before I saw it. Burnt cinnamon, and raw meat.
“He’s killed someone again,” I breathed.
We turned to the right at a T-junction and saw the bloody remains scattered all over the alley, just like the last time.
I heard bone crunch underneath my boot and looked down to see the shredded remains of a furred paw.
“Another wolf,” I said, breathing shallowly. “Why is Samiel killing wolves?”
“How do we know it’s Samiel?” Beezle said, sticking his head out of my pocket.
“Are you trying to say that Ramuell might have another unknown child running around somewhere?” I said, as I picked my way carefully among the remains. Gabriel moved silently through the alley, checking as I did for a clue, something that would tell me why these wolves were being targeted.
“It might have nothing to do with Ramuell at all,” Beezle said insistently. “Someone could just be trying to point you in that direction.”
“But why?” I said. “How could anyone know that I would just happen to be nearby two murder sites? Don’t you think it’s a little presumptuous to assume this is all for my benefit? And besides, if this death was planned, a part of the natural order, where is the Agent? Where is the soul?”
“Could have come and gone already,” Beezle said stubbornly.
“Well, it’s easily checked,” I said, thinking I would do just that the next time I was in the office. I crouched down by what appeared to be a pair of jeans covered in blood. There were some pieces of broken plastic embedded in the cloth that might have been bits of a credit card or ID. “But the wolf murders still don’t make sense. I thought the werewolf packs in this area mostly stayed out of the city.”
“And so we do, unless business requires us to be here,” growled a voice from nearby. “Whoever has done this will pay, Agent.”
I looked up to the T-junction and came to my feet. Gabriel was at my side in an instant, his hand on my shoulder.
Two of the biggest men I had ever seen stood just past the T-junction. They both easily cleared six feet, and the one on the right wore only a plain white T-shirt and denim vest over jeans, despite the chill. Everywhere I looked muscles bulged through the cloth. His pale face was covered in a red beard liberally streaked with white, and eerie blue gray eyes watched me with suspicion. I could see the faint traces of long scars that puckered the skin underneath his beard.
The man next to him was African American, just as tall and strong looking, but with a slight paunch and a much friendlier look. He looked like the sort whose natural expression was a smile, despite the obvious grief in his eyes as he surveyed the remains in the alley. He wore square-framed metal glasses and also had a heavy salt-and-pepper beard above a blue StarCraft T-shirt and jeans.
There was a third man with them, hovering a step behind, not quite as muscular or burly as the other two. He was built more along the lines of a long-distance runner. He also seemed younger. He didn’t wear a beard like the other wolves and his dark hair was free of gray. But it was his eyes that attracted my attention. They were silvery blue and burning with anger when he looked at me. I wondered what I’d done to this man to make him hate me so, for it was obvious that he did.
The one on the right spoke, and it was his voice that I had heard before.
“What business have you here, Agent? I see no soul to collect.”
The other wolves approached us he spoke. I could see them sniffing the air, their nostrils flaring.
“You smell like Lucifer,” said the wolf in the StarCraft shirt. He had a deep, booming bass voice. The third wolf still hadn’t said anything.
I raised my eyebrow at him. “That doesn’t sound like a compliment.”
“It’s not,” he said, frowning. “And you were at the other place, where Dagan died.”
The redhead narrowed his eyes at me. “What were you doing there, Agent? If I discover that you had some hand in Dagan’s death . . .”
He stepped forward, and before Gabriel could do anything I conjured up a ball of nightfire. I gave the wolf a steely-eyed look.
“Don’t make dangerous assumptions, wolf.”
He eyed the ball of nightfire with a sneer.
“Don’t presume that a werewolf can be intimidated by an Agent’s power.”
I felt my magic rise to the surface, and I knew that my eyes had changed, become a field of stars on a canvas of black.
“What makes you think I am nothing but an Agent?” I replied.
The other wolves growled, and the air crackled with energy. I could see bones shifting beneath his skin, and for a moment I looked into a snarling canid face, and then he was a man again.
“Madeline,” Gabriel said, and there was a warning in his voice.
“Let me handle this,” I said quietly. I knew a little bit about wolves, having encountered them a time or two as an Agent. They respected strength, and they wouldn’t respect me or allow me to help them if I cowered behind Gabriel.
“You don’t want to make an enemy of me, Agent,” the redheaded wolf said.
“And I don’t want to be your enemy,” I said steadily, still balancing the ball of nightfire on my hand.
The smaller wolf that stood just behind the other two looked like he might be calculating how best to leap over his compatriots and rip my throat out. I hoped that Gabriel would jump right into the fray if that happened, because the big guy seemed like he was working up a good head of steam.
I prayed that no one was looking out their back windows into the alley, because if they were, they were going to get a show. The last thing I wanted was a video of me throwing nightfire at a couple of werewolves to end up on YouTube.
The second werewolf cocked his head at me, doglike and curious. “What is it that you want, then?”
“To find out why these w
olves are being killed,” I said.
He gave me an appraising look. Then he laid a restraining hand on the first. “Jude, enough.”
I realized that I’d gotten their relationship wrong. The redhead was beneath the second wolf in the social order. I’d assumed that since he had taken the lead and acted aggressively that Jude was more alpha than the other. Those kinds of prejudices could get me killed. The alpha was always the most dangerous wolf in the pack.
He studied me, sniffing the air as he did so. “You’re telling the truth.”
“Of course I am,” I said, a little miffed.
“But the truth can hide evil intentions,” the third wolf said, and I hadn’t been wrong about the venom in his eyes. It was in his voice, too. “And you do smell like Lucifer.”
“I’m his great-granddaughter,” I said. This wasn’t information that I usually liked to share with strangers, but they would continue to be suspicious of me without it.
The alpha raised an eyebrow at me. “Then you can only be Madeline Black, daughter of Azazel.”
I mirrored his expression. “You seem to have the better of me.”
He narrowed his eyes for a moment, then seemed to come to some decision. “I am Tyrone Jackson Wade, alpha of the Red Pack of Wisconsin. You may call me Wade. En Taro Adun!”
I was a little disconcerted by his odd greeting, but before I had a chance to ask him about it, he stuck a huge hand out for me to shake. I realized I was still holding the ball of nightfire. I quickly doused the fire and put my small hand in his.
Wade gripped it, and pulled me closer, his eyes searching. “Are you a true friend of the wolves?”
Something about the way he asked it made me think that this wasn’t a casual question, and I’d been around the magical block enough to know that some words were binding. I saw Gabriel shake his head, ever so slightly, out of the corner of my eye.
I took a deep breath. I had no quarrel with the wolves. Lord knew that Lucifer and Azazel probably had some master plan involving werewolves as they seemed to have for every race, but I wasn’t privy to all of their machinations. And I wasn’t about to let Gabriel dictate whom I could and could not befriend.
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