In the Werewolf's Den (6 page)

She dumped Carl's still body into the passenger seat of the normal's van, vaulted over him, and took off.

Behind her, three shots crashed into the stolen van, then she turned a corner and left them behind.

That hadn't gone well.

"We need more help."

Carl looked like he'd aged twenty years. The silver bullet had ripped through his thigh, broken his leg, and lodged barely above his knee. Danielle had cut into his leg to remove the poisoned bullet, but he was still hurting.

A
Were
heals quickly, though, and Carl already looked a lot better than he had the previous evening, so Danielle wasn't sure what he was getting at.

"You're going to be fine. Besides, no doctor will come into the zone.” She could take him to a normal-side hospital, but his treatment there would be no better than it had been at the restaurant that first day. He'd be lucky if he was ignored. It was possible that some doctor would decide to finish what the thugs had started.

"I'm not talking about that."

"What, then?"

He ticked off his slender fingers. “Last night proves that things are getting worse. Those gangsters would have killed both of us for no reason beyond simple prejudice. If we wait too long for the cure, it'll be too late. There'll be too much distrust between normals and the impaired."

"I'm in as big a hurry as anyone."

"I need a research team.” He held up a hand to forestall any suggestion that she play that role herself. “People with training. I mean, let's be honest. I'm trying to save the world and I'm working by myself."

"I can see that."

"And second, I need some field workers. The return of magic is the most important event of our generation and you know what? No one has even bothered to undertake a systematic analysis of the DNA sequence of the different magical talents. We've assumed that something in the makeup of the victim defines the type of magical being that they become, but we don't really know this. We've assumed that the normals have some sort of resistance, but we don't know that either."

Danielle put up a hand. “Everyone knows normals are different. That the magic infected the already defective, people with holes in their souls."

Carl laughed. “Show me somebody with a perfect soul and maybe I'll believe that. Come on Danielle, I'm no different than I was a year ago."

"Then why is late onset so rare?"

"That's another good question. I proved that magic is a virus, but what is its vector? Does it spread from person to person, or are there some intermediate hosts? We don't even know that. Why did it hit once, then mostly stop? If it was a one-time event, why are there any late-onset victims at all? I need to know that before I can be sure I have a cure. It's up to me to do the basic field work the NIH should have done ten years ago when this whole thing started."

Danielle stood, paced across the living room a couple of times and then stopped in front of him. “Bringing in additional people will increase the risk of your project. There's still rioting going on in the zone, you know. After we left, those lowlifes called in some friends and went on a rampage. Seven normals were killed. If we hire someone and they're killed, the authorities will shut down your project so fast you'll be back in jail before you know what happened."

"Seven normals and how many of the magical?"

Danielle shrugged. Nobody counted magical deaths. In this case, Danielle knew that the normals were at fault, but surely that was exceptional. And if a few impaired got hurt as a result of their own terrorist activities, nobody was going to cry.

"Once we finish our cure, they'll be normal again,” Carl reminded her. “So their deaths do matter. Your normals are killing people who can be saved."

Danielle didn't like to think about it that way. If her stepfather had been cured after killing her mother, would he simply have used the impairment as an excuse? Still, many of the impaired hadn't killed anyone. And they did deserve to be saved.

"Can we afford to take the chance, Carl? Bringing normals into the zone is asking for trouble."

"I'm not looking for normals,” he explained. “I need people who can work the zone without warder escort. People who don't mind going door-to-door asking for blood samples. People who will make the magically enabled open their doors rather than hide under their beds."

Danielle froze. “It's unlawful to hire an impaired for any job for which there is a qualified normal applicant."

Carl's knuckles whitened. But he managed to hold himself in check. “That is one of the stupid laws that causes all of the problems."

"I think you're blaming the victim here,” Danielle reminded him. “Normals need to protect themselves. And don't give me crap about impaired people not being responsible for their actions. They kill without caring."

He shook his head, and she wasn't sure whether he was angry or just frustrated. “Forget what I said because it doesn't matter. We're not talking about jobs that any normal would want, anyway. Or jobs any normal could do. First, they'll have to work with the magical, get their trust, and gain their sympathies. Second, no normal could be qualified for this job. Third, I'm an impaired. No normal would work for me and I'm not even sure it's legal for me to hire one."

Danielle nodded even as she looked for some trick in his logic. “Okay. We'll post a job listing. You know you'll have to pay for the team yourself?"

"As if I hadn't paid for everything since you sprung me from prison."

"Going back is still an option."

He smiled. “Then again, my money wasn't doing me much good when I was rotting at Lew Sterrett. Of course I'll pay."

Danielle's warder senses almost overloaded at the long line of magically impaired waiting outside the building that she and Carl shared. She'd posted a small notice on the web and had wondered if they'd have any job applicants at all. Instead, it seemed that half of the zone turned out.

The scent of magic, normally a low-level irritant, welled up in her like an agoraphobic panic. Except it wasn't a smell, exactly. It was a special sense that warder training had developed in her. A sense that made her skin want to crawl back, away from all of this disease. Worse, there were vampires in the group. She could understand keeping some of the impaired alive, but vampires had lost their souls anyway. She didn't understand why the government didn't outlaw them completely. According to Joe, they were working on it. And it couldn't happen soon enough.

Danielle's distress over the crowd was made worse by Carl's attitude. He seemed totally unsurprised by the turnout. She'd always thought scientists were nerds with unrealistic views of any reality they couldn't see through a microscope. Carl had confounded that belief, just as he'd turned around so many of the other understandings that had been pounded into her head by years of government television, ignorant teachers, and even warder instructors who taught to kill first and think second.

Her fingers itched to do something. It was illegal for impaired to gather in large groups like this. It could be dangerous. Hell, it was dangerous. If they decided to attack, they could swarm her under. All of her warder skills wouldn't keep her alive for more than a few seconds.

Carl limped out to the landing in front of their building and began organizing the throngs into groups by job function, potential lab assistants on the right and potential field workers on the left.

"How about you interview the field workers,” he suggested to Danielle. “I'll have my hands full with the technical folks for the lab."

Just what she needed. Up-close contact with the impaired. She suppressed the shudder. “You haven't told me what sort of skills you're looking for."

Carl shrugged his shoulders. “You know. The usual. Initiative, intelligence, a way with people, and enough physical strength and stamina to pull some long hours. Some medical training would be good, too. It doesn't take a genius to get a blood sample but I'd like to know that they won't faint at the sight of it."

She nodded. She could do that. Those were the same abilities, or at least some of the same abilities, required for potential warders. Certainly no warder could let a little blood make them queasy.

"Let's get to work, then,” Carl concluded. “See if you can hire me about five for a start. But get a list of any more that we might want to add later."

Five was more than she'd thought, but she trusted Carl at least as long as his invention was involved. She turned to go, then stopped. “How much should I offer?"

He didn't even pause. “Let's start them around eighty thousand."

She felt her jaw drop, but couldn't help staring. “That's twice what I make. You can get one of them for about five thousand, tops."

Carl glared at her. “Please don't forget that I am one of them. I'm going to put a lot of demands on these people and I want them to know that I appreciate their work."

"But—"

"And it isn't my responsibility that the government chooses to pay warders so little. Maybe it's because all of the warders’ expenses are picked up by their prisoners."

Danielle's body shifted into blur mode without her conscious volition. Carl's last slam had been too close to an attack.

He must have sensed the changes within her because he shifted his weight into a cat stance. Now that was interesting, a wolf imitating a cat. She hadn't known he'd studied the martial arts.

She forced herself to back down. She could take Carl, whether in human or werewolf form. She'd done that before. But getting into a fight wouldn't prove anything. It certainly wasn't going to get her promoted into the hunters. Not that she'd have much of a chance for that if word ever got out that she was the reason for the latest Dallas riot.

"Hey, it's your money,” she told him.

"Yeah. For now."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He closed the distance between them. “Read the tea-leaves, Danielle. The magical community is being systematically deprived of basic rights. Do you really think the government won't see whatever fortunes we've amassed as fair game? If I can't get to the bottom of this magic virus or mutation or whatever it is, I won't have anything anyway. I might as well spend it while I have it."

She thought she should argue, but she couldn't really disagree. Even four years in the Academy hadn't prepared her for the reality of the two worlds, normal and magical. She hadn't suspected the misunderstandings, the ways that the two groups could see exactly the same evidence and come to such radically different conclusions. She knew the rules were put in place to protect society, but they could be rough on those society decided were on the outside.

"I'll hire you some good ones, Carl.” It was as close as she could come to backing down.

He nodded his thanks and called for the first of the lab assistant applicants.

A terribly long day later, Danielle stepped into Carl's office.

"Don't you ever knock?"

She shook her head. She didn't have to knock. She was Carl's herder. If he had any secrets from her, it was her job to know them. Not that he was likely to have any. She'd bugged his computer and office so completely that she knew it every time he blew his nose.

"I'm finished."

"Yeah? Have any luck?

"Sort of.” She was going against everything she believed in, but the vampire had convinced her. After all, who could be better at collecting blood samples?

When Carl heard what she had waiting, he was surprised. Not as surprised as she had been.

"You said you wanted people with a good attitude,” Danielle reminded him.

"Yeah, but—"

"So, who would be more interested in picking up blood samples than a vampire? Who would be less likely to be fooled by someone trying to substitute someone else's, or coming back to give for a second time?"

"Nobody, but—"

"Look, Carl. I don't try to tell you how to run the lab, now don't you try and tell me how to run a street gang."

"That's just it, honey. This isn't—"

She held out a hand. “Don't call me that. Ever."

He stopped abruptly. “It's been a long day."

Finally she put him out of his misery, slamming her hand into the table so hard all of the resumes jumped. “Just shut up, Carl."

"Good thinking. Now back to the vampire. What's the idea there? Besides the fact that he likes blood and wouldn't mind taking a few samples?"

"The idea is that he's got ambition, drive, and energy. Plus the fact that he was involved in medicine before the return and knows how to do the basics. Like you asked for, remember?"

Carl pressed his palms into his forehead. “Vampires are demon-possessed, Danielle. That's a lot different from a
Were
or an elf. We're only DNA challenged."

As if she didn't know that. “Hey, don't think this was an easy decision for me."

"It isn't like the demon is going away if you don't hire him,” she continued. “Besides, demon or not, Mike the Vampire seems qualified, anxious for the work, and fearless. I don't know of you noticed, but a lot of the applicants seem afraid of their own shadows. It's pathetic."

"It's the environment. They're denied basic rights, terrorized by the normals, and forced to live without basic services like running water."

Danielle shrugged. “Everyone has problems."

"But a vampire?"

"Talk to him, Carl. If you don't like him, tell him to get lost. But he's the lynchpin. I don't think the rest of your mob will amount to much without him."

"It's not a mob. It's the key crew for my research."

Danielle's smile didn't even reach her lips. “Sure."

"All right. Let's have a look at them. Mike first."

He sat there waiting. As if he expected her to get up and show the candidates in. Clearly power had gone to his head. Fortunately, Danielle was real good at fixing that problem.

She just stared at him.

Finally, he got it, went and opened the door himself.

The magically infected tended to be a disorderly group—part of the reason the zones had been established in the first place—so Danielle was surprised to see the two lines of finalists neatly queued, each holding their resumes in neat, matching, folders."Which one of you is Mike?"