(September 28th, 1986)

It had rained the night before, so in a way we were in luck. The soft, wet ground had taken tracks magnificently, and the policeman who dropped me off mentioned that the forensics team was going to be able to take good clear castings of the strange prints they’d found.

Unfortunately, it meant that I nearly had to yank my ironwood cane free of the muddy ground several times as I limped across the park towards Ben. My right knee ached fiercely…based on that and the ominous clouds overhead, we were probably due for a fresh downpour any moment.

Ben glanced over, saw me coming and lifted a hand in greeting. I returned his wave with my free left hand and plodded on towards him. I silently reminded myself that he hadn’t chosen the location, nor had he made it rain, and it certainly wasn’t his fault that my knee had been almost completely demolished less than six months earlier. Nor was it his fault that I’d had physical therapy earlier that morning, and was already tired and sore.

Oh boy. I was in a cranky mood.

Suck it up, Alys. Ben deserves the very best you can bring to the table, so get with it.

Dr. MacMoran had assured me that I’d regain full control of my emotions again as my mind healed from Brenna’s psychic attack. It had already gotten easier to control them, but some days were worse than others. I categorically refused to let this - my first time actually working in the field since returning to London - be one of those days. Oh, I’d consulted on a few cases; given my professional opinion. But Ben had finally asked me to join him on-site, and I wasn’t going to let him down.

Ben seemed to sense my mood and gave me an apologetic smile. “Sorry for having to call you all the way to Swindon, love.” He bent and gave me a little kiss as I finally reached him. “This is a really weird one, and I need a specialist.”

In all honesty, he probably didn’t. Granted, he didn’t know as much about the supernatural in general and magic specifically as I did, but he was really good at this job. One did not achieve the rank of Detective Inspector in New Scotland Yard without being at least competent...and Ben was better than that.

But he knew how desperately I wanted to get my life back to normal (or what passed for normal for a Wizard-in-training), and that meant working.

He was such a sweetheart.

I looked up at him and put what I hoped was a convincing smile on my face. “It was only an hour and a half drive. And you did send a car for me, so I’m not going to complain. Much. What’ve you got?”

Artemis brushed against my left leg as she passed by on silent paws, head down as she sniffed at the wet grass. > she reported. >

“Don’t go far,” I replied.

“Did she pick up a scent?” Ben asked as Artemis continued away from us, her tail swishing slowly.

Athena came up on the other side of him and nodded. “I’ll go with her, just in case.”

“Good idea.” I watched her hurry to catch up with Artemis, moving with none of the stiffness that I still felt. I was pleased that she’d recovered from her injuries so completely, and smiled as I saw her tail swaying jauntily behind her as she strode away from us.

The peace and alertness I felt from her were a good reminder of how centered I should be right now.

I caught Ben watching Athena too, and was amused. Granted, she was quite a sight...Athena, like most Elevated female familiars, tended to prefer dressing in clothes that were functional and protected the places where her fur was thinnest, while still being stylish. Her usual daily outfit was a sleeveless leather bodysuit (lined with a blade-resistant fabric and reinforced with thin, flexible striking plates) and thigh-high leather stockings (similarly reinforced) which left her feet mostly bare for better traction.

While her feet are very much human in appearance, their soles are more like a cat’s paws, with tough pads and retractable claws for toenails. With all that added traction, she can move over even the worst terrain almost effortlessly.

It’s pretty cool. I might be a little jealous. But just a little. Today, however, she’d bowed to the weather and was wearing a pair of boots.

“Are you sure I can’t convince you to dress like that?” Ben asked impishly.

“I’ve already told you,” I shot back lightly, “I will if you will.”

I wondered what he’d think if he knew I’d been wearing a nearly identical outfit under my street clothes pretty much all the time since I’d gotten out of the hospital. I didn’t feel quite safe without them anymore. Dr. MacMoran had assured me that it wasn’t an unreasonable precaution to take, nor an unhealthy one.

It was still making me feel a bit paranoid.

Ben glanced down at me - I’m a full head shorter than he is - and his shoulders relaxed a little when he saw the teasing smile on my face.

“So,” I repeated, “what’ve you got?”

“A couple of kids - teenagers on a date - were stalked by some kind of predator here last night,” Ben said, gesturing towards a boy and a girl sitting on a bench not far from where we stood, with their parents hovering protectively behind them.

“They were sitting on the swings over there,” Ben continued, nodding towards a swing set that was currently surrounded by a Yard forensics team, “and could just see the creature out beyond the edge of the light thrown by the lamp above it.”

I let my gaze drift from the swing set and saw Artemis sniffing at the ground near where the forensics team was pouring plaster into a squared off mold. “Footprints?” I asked.

“All over the place,” Ben confirmed. “Most of them in a circle about fifteen yards out from the swings, but there’s a trail that leads from the woods and back.” He pointed to the dense-looking woods at the eastern edge of the field.

“Human, or inhuman?” I asked.

“Humanoid,” Ben replied unhelpfully. “Maybe. The footprints look sort of human-ish, and there's what looks like knuckle prints here and there…but it also looks like something heavy was being pushed ahead of the prints, or maybe pulled behind them. Anyway, they're not a type I’m familiar with, which is why I called you. I was hoping you would be.”

“Bugger,” I muttered. As much as I hated the unpredictability of a human killer and the inherent dangers of an inhuman one, dealing with a humanoid - a creature of roughly human shape and appearance - could be more difficult than either. Few human-sized creatures were more dangerous than the ones that looked human, but had no human morals or ethics...especially if they were sufficiently close to human appearance that they could blend into crowds easily.

Of course, plenty of human-shaped killers that lack human morality turn out to actually be human. I suppose they might qualify as ‘humanoid’ too.

“Well,” I sighed, “I’ll take a look at them. I’d like to talk to the kids first, though.”

Kids. I shouldn’t call them that. They probably weren’t even ten years younger than me.

Ben smiled. “I was hoping you’d want to. They’ve been...not actually uncooperative, but it’s obvious they’re not comfortable talking to me or other adults about it.”

I gave him a sideways look. Athena, standing near Artemis, glanced over.

Ben held up his hands defensively. “You’re an adult. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. But you’re a lot closer to their age than anyone else here.”

Athena turned her attention back to what Artemis was doing. I thought I saw her smirking.

“You were in danger of losing certain privileges there for a moment,” I said with mock severity.

Ben mimed wiping sweat from his forehead. “Whew. I’ll be more careful in the future.”

Deciding I’d teased him enough for the moment, I shifted my cane to my left hand so I could take his hand in my right, twining our fingers together. “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure they’ll talk to me.”

His answering smile warmed me down to my toes. “Of course they will. You’re a lot cooler than the rest of us old fogeys, too.”

“Bloody right,” I replied with a nod. “But it’s nice of you to say.”

That was roughly the point where someone watching us might’ve started to get a little nauseated, so by mutual unspoken consent we eased back on the flirting and got down to work.

“While I talk to the witnesses,” I liked that better than ‘kids’, “why don’t you see what Artemis has found?”

“Will Athena translate for me?” Ben asked hopefully. “I don’t speak cat.”

My lips twitched as I resisted the urge to smile. Okay, maybe a little more teasing. “I’m sure she can be convinced to.”

He smiled and squeezed my hand before releasing it and heading off towards where Artemis was sniffing at the ground. Athena, I noticed, had bent to examine something. Probably one of the footprints.

> I asked Athena.

> she replied without looking up. >

>

Her reply was laced with a warm affection that was very close to the love she felt for me. >

I smiled. She and Artemis were developing an easy, affectionate relationship with Ben playing the big brother. It was quite a lot of fun to watch, and reassured me that he was a good fit for us.

I shook off my musings about my boyfriend...now was absolutely not the right time for it. My head must’ve been more scrambled than I’d thought it was if I was getting that distracted by Ben at a crime scene. I was usually much more professional than this.

You know, barring that one time when I had to run back outside to throw up. None of the police on-site at the time had held it against me, at least.

Squaring my shoulders and giving my head a little shake to finish clearing it, I shifted my cane back to my right hand and limped across the field towards the two teenagers. It was a fairly chilly morning for late September, and the rain the night before had left a light fog drifting everywhere. I was glad I’d chosen to throw on my long brown leather coat over my jeans, high-necked green shirt and leather ankle boots.

Elsie, as usual, had been right about the weather. I made a mental note to thank her when I got home. I was nice and warm and dry.

The teenagers, on the other hand, looked tired and miserable. They appeared to be about sixteen or seventeen and were dressed a lot like I was, except they didn’t have even light jackets on and looked chilly. I hoped the similarity of our dress - compared to Ben’s more professional dark pants and jacket and the police officers’ uniforms - would make it easier for them to open up to me.

I’d like to claim that it was done intentionally to set people at ease with me, but honestly I’m just more comfortable when I’m dressed casually. It also keeps the inconvenience of dry-cleaning to a minimum. Leather is easily cleaned, and jeans can be thrown out and replaced inexpensively when they’re covered in some nasty goo encountered while working; more upscale clothing can’t be.

“Hi there,” I said as I approached them. “My name is Alys Kinnear, I’m a Mage consultant working with Detective Donovan. I was hoping I could have a few minutes of your time.”

Their parents were watching me with a mixture of confusion and uncertainty, looks that I was getting used to. I don’t really look like a traditional Mage training to be a Wizard. I grew up in rural Ireland, outside Killarney, and I’ve never put on any of the (somewhat eccentric) airs and affectations that many wizards favor for impressing and intimidating clients. I don’t wear robes, I don’t sew mystical symbols into my clothes in glittering metallic thread, and I don’t favor large, pointy hats.

Partly that’s my old teacher Jonathan Tremane’s fault. He never dressed in ‘traditional’ Hermetic wizard-wear either, favoring his own brand of eccentricity: black fedoras, cloaks and coats, and red scarves. He was nuts for The Shadow pulp novels.

Partly it was my mom’s fault. She’s a Druid and not at all traditional by their standards, dressing in much the same way I do...for comfort and utility.

In other words, with my leather coat, jeans and cane, I didn’t exactly present the textbook image of a practicing Wizard-in-training. Or any other kind of spellcaster, for that matter.

But it obviously put the teens at ease. They looked up at me, the girl smiling uncertainly as the boy said, “I’m Tom. This is Liz.”

I smiled. “Hi Tom, Liz.” I looked up at their parents. “I need to ask them some questions about what they saw last night. It’ll help me get a handle on what was here and what we can do to track it down and stop it. Could you give us a few minutes?” Translation: I’m a trained professional and you’re making your kids uncomfortable. Please let me do my work.

They looked at one another, and one of the mothers looked like she was going to object before her husband took her arm and led her away. The other mother nodded to me seriously and gently led her husband away as well. I nodded my thanks as they moved away, then carefully sat down beside Liz.

“So,” I said quietly, pitching my voice to show friendly concern, “what happened last night?”

Tom and Liz looked at one another for a moment before Liz met my eyes and started to speak.

“There was a school dance last night,” she began, “so we were there until a little after ten. We didn’t feel like going home, so we walked around for a while, then came here.” She blushed a bit, and I understood. They’d probably found some dark corner somewhere, but nothing in their body language suggested more than a bit of heavy snogging.

It was none of my business anyway, unless their stalker turned out to be attracted to that sort of thing. “Did you notice what time you got here?” I asked, taking out a small black notebook and a pen.

Liz shook her head a little, but Tom nodded. “It was just before midnight,” he said quietly. “We were both pretty wound up and didn’t feel like going home, and it wasn’t raining anymore, so we sat on the swings and talked for a while.”

I smiled a little and wrote that down in my notebook. “How long were you here before you saw it?”

They exchanged another look. “An hour or two?” Liz asked Tom.

Tom nodded. “Probably about two. I looked at my watch afterwards and it was about 1:50 in the morning.”

I jotted that down. “Okay. Can you tell me what it looked like?”

“We didn’t really get a clear look at it,” Liz said hesitantly. I heard the quaver in her voice and saw the fear in her eyes. Whatever it was, it had rattled her.

It had rattled them, I corrected myself. Tom looked pretty pale too.

“I tried sending a fairy light towards it, but it didn’t do much good,” he said.

Fairy lights, sometimes called wisps, are one of the basic, cross-tradition spells that everyone with magical talent learns in school. Since the majority of the population these days - seriously, over 90% - has at least enough magical talent to light a candle, just about everyone knows how to cast fairy lights. They’re not bright and don’t last very long without constant concentration, but they’re sufficient to read by or see a path by...about as bright as a candle flame.

But they’re not really enough to see clearly with at a distance of more than about five or six feet.

“That’s all right,” I told him reassuringly. “Tell me what you saw, even if it was just impressions. Anything you can remember might help.”

“It was black,” Tom said without hesitation. “Or some other really dark color,” he amended after a moment, “because it was really hard to see at first.”

“It stayed right at the edge of the light from the lamp,” Liz added, pointing to the pole-mounted electric lamp that stood to one side of the swing set. “Out in the shadows, you know?”

“It looked kinda like it was moving on its belly,” Tom said, “pushing itself along, sort of, with its face to the grass.”

“I don’t know if it had arms, but if it did it wasn’t using them, or had them tucked in against its sides or something,” Liz said.

“I couldn’t see arms either,” Tom agreed, “but we could see its legs. They were...I don’t know...backwards.”

“Backwards?” I asked curiously, taking notes.

“Yeah,” Liz said, “like...it was on its belly, but its knees were pointing towards the sky, and it was moving slowly by pushing itself along first with one leg, then the other. We could see them going up and down.”

“How do you know it wasn’t on its back, then?” I asked, keeping my voice carefully questioning. I didn’t want them to think I was implying any disbelief or doubt. I believed every word they were saying. They were simply too scared to be lying.

“Because it lifted its head to look at us,” Liz whispered, hugging herself and shivering.

Tom wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “It really did. It was pointed towards us, and its head came up off the ground. I could barely make out a face, but I couldn’t see any eyes. If it had eyes, they weren’t reflecting the light. You know?”

I nodded and wrote that down. “Anything else?”

They both shook their heads.

“We took off running at that point,” Liz admitted.

“It sounded like it was chasing us until we reached the edge of the park,” Tom added. “There was a weird slapping-shuffling sound behind us the whole way.”

“And once you left the park it stopped?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Tom replied. “One second I was hearing that weird sound behind me, and the next we were out in the street and it had stopped.”

“I couldn’t hear it all that well,” Liz admitted. “Tom was behind me, so mostly I just heard him.”

“That’s all right,” I said with a smile. “You’ve given me a lot of good information. Thank you both very much.”

They both returned my smile, and if theirs were a bit shaky, they were at least smiling. I rose stiffly, pushing myself to my feet with my cane and blowing out a little breath once I was standing. My right knee throbbed unpleasantly and sent a little stab of pain down into my foot and up into my hip, as if to ask why I was doing this to it on a rainy day.

“Are you okay?” Liz asked quietly.

I smiled at her, a little surprised. “I’m all right. I’m still recovering from some injuries, and my knee has apparently decided it’s not going to like rainy days. But thanks for asking.”

She returned my smile, her expression one of curiosity and what I thought was admiration...and for a moment, I wondered what I must look like from her perspective, compared to the professional-looking police: my casual (and, after the ride from London, slightly rumpled) clothes, the fact that I was leaning on an unusual but elegant-looking cane, my paler-than-usual skin and the dark circles under my eyes - I hadn’t been sleeping well - all added up to...what?

A young woman who was consulting for Scotland Yard in spite of being only 24 years old and who had - I’d been told - an aura of quiet power around her. One who was recovering from relatively recent injuries, and who had arrived with not one familiar but two, one of whom was Elevated.

I hoped I was a good role model.

I dug in a pocket of my coat and handed her one of the business cards Hollis had made for me, then gave one to Tom as well. “That’s a phone number where I can be reached...and if I’m not there, they’ll know how to find me. If you think of anything else, call. Okay?”

They both nodded.

I smiled. “Good. Thank you again.”

I shook Liz and Tom’s hands warmly, then limped off across the park towards Ben and Athena. They were standing together on the other side of the swing set, watching Artemis following a trail of flattened grass that led towards the trees.

“That’s the way it went?” I asked as I approached them.

“The way it arrived,” Ben corrected. “There’s a second trail just like it a few yards to our left, but with footprints facing towards the trees.”

“Those footprints might not be a reliable indicator of what direction it was moving in,” I warned. “You were right, this is a weird one.”

“What did they see?” he asked.

I told him what Tom and Liz had related to me, from start to finish. He listened in silence, taking it all in and evidently trusting that I already had it all written down. More likely, I realized, he’d seen me writing it down. I was definitely not in top form if I hadn’t realized that right away.

“The way they describe it,” Athena said thoughtfully when I was finished, “it almost sounds like this thing has chosen the park as a hunting ground.”

“That is what it sounds like,” I agreed.

Ben sighed. “Our next step then should be trying to find it tonight.” He turned a little and gave me a winning smile. “Care to join me on a stakeout, Mage Kinnear?”

“Sounds delightful,” I said dryly, glancing pointedly up at the sky. It was still threatening rain. “I should have a look at the footprints.”

> Artemis said from several feet away, looking over her shoulder at me.

I carefully settled to my left knee beside her, resting my hand on her shoulders and ruffling her fur a little as I looked at the indicated print. It was firmly embedded in a long trail of flattened grass and muddy earth, where it did indeed look like something had been pushed or dragged along the ground. The print was longer and wider than a human foot, but definitely the same shape as one. Except...

“Are those claw marks?” I asked. At the end of each toe-print was a gouged indentation, as if a curved blade had dug into the ground and been pulled out again.

> Artemis replied quietly. >

Behind me, I heard Athena whispering...probably telling Ben what Artemis had said.

“That’s what they look like to me too,” Ben agreed a moment later. “The plaster castings should be coming up in another five or ten minutes. If there were decent enough claw holes for it to fill in, we’ll find out for sure.”

I planted my cane firmly on the ground, wrapped my fingers around the stainless steel grip - which was shaped like a sprinting snow leopard - got my right leg under me, and started to rise. I was putting a lot of my weight on the cane...which immediately sank two inches into the soft, wet earth, throwing me off balance.

Instinctively, I shifted my weight back to my right leg. The spike of pain from my knee made me gasp, and I ended up back where I’d started, kneeling beside Artemis and leaning on her for balance.

Artemis pressed up against my side reassuringly, her concern and sympathy flowing into me as I swore under my breath in Gaelic.

“Why aren’t you wearing your knee brace?” Ben asked as he and Athena got their hands under my arms and lifted me gently to my feet.

“Trish said I could go without it today if I was careful,” I said through clenched teeth, leaning on them as I lifted and slowly flexed my knee. The pain was already fading...I hadn’t done any damage to it. It just wasn’t up to snuff yet.

“Trish didn’t know you were going to be tromping around in a damp field,” Athena said dryly, “let alone kneeling down in one.”

“Neither did I,” I shot back, turning a little to glare at her.

She lowered her head slightly, meeting my eyes. > she murmured, almost inaudibly, and her centered emotions flowed over me.

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, smothering my irrational anger. >

She smiled a little. > “It’s a good thing I put it in the bag before we left.”

Ben had mentioned the case might keep us here overnight, so we’d put a few extra things in our bottomless bag before leaving. I hadn’t seen her add my knee brace, but I was very glad she had. “Thanks.” I steadied myself and plucked my cane from where it was still standing a couple of inches deep in the ground. “I’m all right now.”

Athena nodded and released my left arm. Rather than releasing my right, Ben shifted so that my arm was linked with his, still supporting some of my weight. It was a courtly gesture, and one which made me feel warm inside. His silent, uncomplaining and unconditional support was as reassuring as that of my familiars.

I was honestly amazed at times by his willingness to weather my worse days and moods without complaint. Athena and Artemis were integral to my healing, helping me find my way back from the worst moments by being there to remind me of who I was. But they were parts of me, as I was of them...their help had, in a way, been expected (but never unappreciated).

Ben took it on without a word of complaint, because...I still wasn’t sure why. But he never tried to offer advice, never told me to calm down, never told me I was being unreasonable. He expressed concern, reassurance and confidence in me simply by being there to help when I needed him. He, Athena and Artemis were the rocks on which my emotional storms crashed, broke, and finally calmed.

They made me feel very special indeed.

“Come on,” Ben said, “I took the liberty of booking a couple of rooms at a cozy little B&B not far from here. We can have some lunch and then lay our plans for this evening.”