A plate of pancakes was deposited in front of Magnus, and he and Greg stopped speaking for a moment. Greg stubbed out his barely smoked cigarette.
“I gotta go,” he said. “I was out patrolling to see if anyone had been attacked, and I saw you through the window. Wanted to say hi. It’s nice to see you back.”
Magnus dropped five dollars onto the table and pushed the pancakes away.
“I’ll come with you. I want to see this for myself.”
The temperature had shot up in the hour or so he’d been in the diner. This amplified the pong of the overflowing trash—spilling out of metal trash cans (which only cooked it and intensified the scent), bags of it piled up on the curbs. Trash just thrown down onto the street itself. Magnus stepped over the hamburger wrappers and cans and newspapers.
“Two basic areas to patrol,” Greg said, lighting up a new cigarette. “This area and midtown west. We go street by street. I’m working west from here. There are a lot of clubs over by the river, in the Meatpacking District.”
“It’s quite warm.”
“This heat, man. I guess it could be the heat making them freak out. It gets to everyone.”
Greg pulled off his vest. There were certainly worse things than taking a walk with a handsome, shirtless man on a summer morning. Now that it was more of a civilized hour, people were out. Gay couples walking hand in hand, in the open, during the day. That was fairly new. Even as the city seemed to be falling apart, something good was happening.
“Has Lincoln spoken to Camille?” Magnus asked.
Max Lincoln was the head of the werewolves. Everyone just called him by his last name, which fit with his tall and gaunt frame and bearded face—and because, like the more famous Lincoln, he was a famously calm and resolute leader.
“They don’t talk,” Greg said. “Not anymore. Camille comes down here for the clubs, and that’s it. You know what she’s like.”
Magnus knew all too well. Camille had always been a bit aloof, at least to strangers and acquaintances. She had the air of royalty. The private Camille was a different beast entirely.
“What about Raphael Santiago?” Magnus asked.
“He’s gone.”
“Gone?”
“Rumor is that he’s been sent away. I heard that from one of the fey. They claim to have overheard it from some vamps walking through Central Park. He must have known about what was happening and had some words with Camille. Now he’s just gone.”
This didn’t bode well.
They walked through the Village, past the shops and cafés, up toward the Meatpacking District, with its cobbled streets and disused warehouses. Many of these were now clubs. There was a desolate feel here in the morning—just the remains of the abandoned parties and the river slugging along below. Even the river seemed to resent the heat. They checked everywhere—in the alleys, next to the trash. They looked under vans and trucks.
“Nothing,” Greg said as they peered into and poked the last pile of trash in the last alley. “Guess it was a quiet night. Time to check in. It’s late.
This required a quick walk in the ever-increasing heat. Greg couldn’t pay for a cab and refused to allow Magnus to do so, so Magnus unhappily joined in the jog all the way down to Canal Street. The werewolves’ den was concealed behind the facade of a takeout-only restaurant in Chinatown. One werewolf stood behind the counter, under the menu and the stock photos of various Chinese dishes. She looked Magnus over. When Greg nodded, she let them pass through a beaded curtain to the back.
There was no kitchen behind the back wall. Instead there was a door that led to a much larger facility—the old Second Precinct police station. (The cells came in handy during the full moon.) Magnus followed Greg down the dimly lit hallway to the main room of the station, which was already full. The pack had gathered, and Lincoln stood at the head of the room, listening to a report and nodding gravely. When he saw Magnus, he raised a hand in greeting.
“All right,” Lincoln said. “Looks like everyone is here. And we have a guest. Many of you know Magnus Bane. He’s a warlock, as you see, and a friend to this pack.”
This was accepted at once, and there were nods and greetings all around. Magnus leaned against a file cabinet near the back to watch the proceedings.
“Greg,” Lincoln said, “you’re the last in. Anything?”
“Nope. My patch was clean.”
“Good. But unfortunately, there was an incident. Elliot? Want to explain?”
Another werewolf stepped forward.
“We found a body,” he said. “In midtown, near Le Jardin. Definitely a vampire attack. Clear marking on the neck. We slit the throat so the puncture marks were hidden.”
There was a general groan around the room.
“That will keep the words ‘vampire killer’ out of the papers for a while,” Lincoln said. “But clearly things have gotten worse, and now someone is dead.”
Magnus heard various remarks in low voices about vampires, and some in louder voices. All of the remarks contained profanity.
“Okay.” Lincoln put his hands up and silenced the general sounds of dismay. “Magnus, what do you think about this?”
“I don’t know,” Magnus said. “I only just got back.”
“Ever seen anything like this? Mass, random attacks?”
All heads turned in his direction. He steadied himself against the file cabinet. He wasn’t quite ready to give a presentation on the ways of vampires at this hour of the morning.
“I’ve seen bad behavior,” Magnus said. “It really depends. I’ve been in places where there was no police force and no Shadowhunters nearby, so sometimes it can get out of hand. But I’ve never seen anything like it here, or in any developed area. Especially not near an Institute.”
“We need to take care of this,” a voice called out.
Various voices of assent echoed around the room.
“Let’s talk outside,” Lincoln said to Magnus.
He nodded at the door, and the werewolves parted so that Magnus could pass. Lincoln and Magnus got some burned coffee at the corner deli and sat on a stoop in front of an acupuncturist’s shop.
“Something’s wrong with them,” Lincoln said. “Whatever it is, it hit fast, and it hit hard. If we have diseased vampires around causing this kind of bloodshed . . . eventually we’ll have to act, Magnus. We can’t let it go on. We can’t let murders happen, and we can’t run the risk of bringing the Shadowhunters down here. We can’t have problems like that starting up again. It will end badly for all of us.”
Magnus examined the crack in the step below. “Have you contacted the Praetor Lupus?” he asked.
“Of course. But we can’t identify who is doing this. It doesn’t seem like the work of one rogue fledgling. This is multiple attacks in multiple locations. The only luck for us is that all of the victims have been on various substances, so they can’t articulate what happened to them. If one of them says vampire, the police will think it’s because they’re high. But eventually the story will take shape. The press will get wind of it, and the Shadowhunters will get wind of it, and the whole thing will escalate rapidly.”
Lincoln was right. If this went on, the werewolves would be well within their rights to act. And then there would be blood.