Midnight Marked (Chicagoland Vampires 12)

“I’d appreciate that,” Ethan said. “As to Reed, he’s planning something big, and the alchemy is part of it. Farr, or what happened to him, could be, too. You want in—the investigation, the fight—you’re in.”

Gabriel nodded. “You keep me informed, and I’ll keep you informed.”

And that, I thought, was as much an apology as he was going to give.

• • •

“What a mess,” I said when Gabriel walked back to Fallon and Eli, began to talk about strategy.

“It’s the inherent danger of shifters,” Ethan said, “and one of the reasons they prefer to live away from humans. They’re as much wild creature as human. They’re strong, potentially violent, often unpredictable.”

“And sometimes amazingly loyal,” I said as Jeff helped a limping Juliet into the House.

“Indeed, Sentinel. Indeed.”

Mallory walked down the sidewalk, mouth agape and a large duffel bag in hand, weighted down in the middle by something relatively small and obviously heavy.

“What the hell?” she asked when she reached us, her gaze still tripping around the destruction.

“Confused shifters,” I said, so we could skip the longer play-by-play. “A shifter was manipulated by magic, and his friends blamed us.”

“I haven’t heard from Catcher yet, so I didn’t know. Damn, you guys.”

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s a disaster. And there’s something else. The shifter went postal because someone played puppet master with a shifter near the Wrigleyville symbols.”

Mallory opened her mouth, closed it again. “Say what, now?”

“You know what we know. Apparently made the controlled shifter beat the crap out of a fellow Pack member while the sorcerer played composer.” I waved a hand back and forth like conducting an orchestra.

“Holy shit,” Mallory said. “That’s . . . not good.”

“We’re agreed on that,” Ethan said.

“How did they make it work? Magically, I mean.”

“The shifter said the sorcerer drew a symbol in the air,” I said. “He couldn’t ID the symbol, but it was glowing shapes of some kind.”

She looked at the ground, processed. “So it was alchemy. And Paige had it right—the alchemy is about affecting other people.” She scratched her forehead thoughtfully. “But I just don’t see that reflected in the parts we’ve translated. I’m going to have to think about this. In the meantime, would you like some good news?”

“God, yes,” Ethan said.

“The machine’s ready. The alchemical detector—that’s what I’m calling it. We just need to make sure Jeff’s done with his part, and we’re ready to deploy. We just need some height.”

Ethan glanced back, lifted his gaze to the House. “I believe I know a place.”

• • •

We waited until the situation at the House was stable. Until the human guards had been cared for and shifters had covered the broken windows with plywood, installed a make-do door and make-do gate, and stood guard outside both. They’d stay until the House was secure again. Architecturally, anyway.

We also waited until Scott and the Grey House physician were let through the barrier, could tend to Jonah. Ramón had kept an eye on him during the fracas, monitoring him until the battle was over.

“Concussion,” the doctor said, but frowned. “I don’t like that he’s unconscious, but it’s not uncommon with a good knock to the head. Let’s get him someplace safe and stable, and I’ll monitor him from there.”

I pressed a very platonic kiss to Jonah’s cheek and watched as they drove him away.

Getting all that arranged put us on the House’s narrow widow’s walk only an hour before dawn. It was a narrow space accessible through the attic and a window to the roof and bounded by a wrought-iron rail.

Cadogan House was the tallest building on the street, which at least meant there weren’t too many line-of-sight issues. The city unfolded around us, a blanket of orange and white lights, buildings tall and short. And to the east, the lake spread like dark, rich ink, virtually untouched by artificial light. It looked as if the world simply stopped.