"Not at all," Roger assured him. "It's not much different from our own custom of shaking hands."

"Normally, it would be a Warrior who would challenge guests that way," Iolanthe said. "Since our group doesn't include any Warriors, Yannis asked if he could do it."

"I thought your roles were rigidly enforced," Caroline said.

"They are," Iolanthe agreed. "But Yannis isn't old enough for the testing, so we don't yet know what his Gift is. Until we do, it's permissible for him to play at any role he wishes."

"The loopholes of a modern society," Vasilis said, grinning at Roger. "As a paralegal, I'm sure you can appreciate that."

"All too well," Roger conceded. "It's certainly a lot friendlier than the reception I got at Aleksander's place yesterday."

"You weren't an invited guest then," Iolanthe reminded him.

"Speaking of whom," Vasilis added, his eyes flicking over Caroline's shoulder, "here's our other guest for the evening."

Caroline turned to see a tall Green with an age-lined face and short-cropped salt-and-pepper hair step into the living room through an open doorway. "Roger and Caroline," Vasilis said, gesturing toward him, "may I present one of the leaders of our people. This is Persuader Aleksander."

"Good evening," Aleksander said, his voice calm and cultured and resonant, his eyes glittering as he looked back and forth between them. "I'm so very pleased you could join us."

"Did you get any pictures of this couple?" Fierenzo asked into his phone.

"About half a dozen," Smith said. "You want me to stay with them?"

"Definitely," Fierenzo said. "I want to know how long they stay in there, and whether they come out alone, with this first couple, or with someone else."

"Got it," Smith said. "Talk to you later."

Punching off his phone, Fierenzo pushed open the door beside him and stepped back into the lab.

"Secret conference all done?" the short redhead in the lab coat asked blandly, straightening up from her microscope.

"Just trying to give you a little room to work," Fierenzo told her in the same tone as he returned the phone to his pocket. "Anything?"

"Well, it's definitely blood," she said. "Whether it's human or not—" She shrugged. "I don't know."

"Why not?" Fierenzo asked. "Can't you do a DNA or something?"

"Sure," she said. "I can also do glucose levels, tox screens, and about a hundred different tests for various genetic diseases. But you asked for something fast and cheap. Are we changing our instructions?"

Fierenzo made a face; but there was no way he was going to get the lieutenant to pop for a whole battery of expensive tests and the personnel to run them. "No," he conceded. "So what can you tell me?"

"Like I said, it's blood," she said. "The sample you gave me was pretty minuscule, but there were definitely red cells in it. Where did you get it, anyway?"

"Off the wall of an alley near 101st and Broadway," Fierenzo told her. "What makes you think it's not human?"

"Mainly, because I can't get it to type," she said.

"Could it be something rare?" Fierenzo suggested. "AB negative or something?"

She shook her head. "The test should work with anything, and I can usually do it with even less than I've got here. A few days' exposure to the elements shouldn't have messed it up, either."

"Any guesses?"

She shrugged. "Could be animal blood," she said. "I can't tell without further tests; and I'm out of time for any more freebies. You get me an official request, and I'll put it in the stack with all the rest."

"Pass," Fierenzo said, heading for the door. "By the time you got to it, it'd probably be too late to do me any good anyway."

"So get me more personnel," she suggested.

He snorted. "You must be kidding. We get more people in the department and I'm taking them.

Thanks, Kath."

He left the lab and headed for the lounge, a creepy feeling shivering along the surface of his skin. So Jonah's blood wasn't human. It was a thought that had been trying to force its way into his mind ever since he'd found the injured man at the end of that vertical blood trail. But up to now he'd been reasonably successful at tap-dancing his way around it.

Now, the dance had come to an end.

So who were they? A lost Neanderthal colony? A vampire nest? An alien invasion?

Of more immediate concern, what should his response be to the situation? Alert the mayor? Call out the S.W.A.T. team?

He grimaced as he strode down the hallway. No. So far, no one seemed to be doing anything dangerous to the city or its inhabitants. True, a girl was missing, but he still had no proof that any crime had been committed.

So he would sit on this, and wait until such time as he could determine that such a threat did exist.

Sergeant Abramson was chatting with a young, dark-haired man when Fierenzo reached the lounge.

"You must be Oreste Green," Fierenzo said, nodding to him. "I'm Detective Fierenzo. We appreciate you giving up part of your Saturday to come here today."

"More of it than I'd expected," Green said pointedly as he stood up.

"I know, and I apologize," Fierenzo said, glancing at the other cops sitting around the lounge. "Let's go someplace where we can have more privacy," he suggested, backing toward the door.

"Why?" Green asked, making no move to follow. "I gave my statement, and I gave the descriptions to your artist. What more do you want?"

"I'd like to go over all of it with you," Fierenzo said.

"I did that with the other detective," Green said. "Don't you talk to each other?"

"Come on, fella, give me a break," Fierenzo said, lowering his voice. "His handwriting's lousy. I'll get a migraine if I have to get this from his report."

Green hissed between his teeth. "Fine," he said. "But make it fast."

The interrogation room was just down the hall. "Can I get you some coffee?" he asked as he ushered Green inside.

"No, thanks," the other said, his pace faltering as he looked at the bare walls and simple table and chairs. "The other place was cozier."

"But not as private," Fierenzo said, sitting down at the table and gesturing to the chair across from him. "Have a seat."

"Ten minutes," Green warned, reluctantly sitting down.

"Ten minutes," Fierenzo agreed, pulling out the sketches and spreading them out across the table.

"Tell me what happened."

Green sighed. "I saw a car racing down Waverly Place toward a man—"

"This man?" Fierenzo interrupted, tapping the sketches of the adult.

"Right," Green said. "He was pointing some kind of gun at the car, but I never heard any shots. The driver had his hand out the window, and I think he was pointing something back."

"No gunshots from him, either?"

"Nothing that I heard," Green said. "The car missed the guy and kept going—"

"Missed him how?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean how exactly did the man avoid the car?"

"He jumped between two of the parked cars along the curb," Green said. "The car kept going, coming toward where I was standing. I ducked around the side of the building, heard the car stop, then saw a kid come running out."

"This kid?" Fierenzo asked, indicating the other set of sketches.

"That's the one," Green said. "He ran to Greenwich Avenue and disappeared around the corner; and when I looked back down Waverly I saw the car sitting there with the other man running the other direction."

"I see," Fierenzo said, collecting the papers together again. "And why exactly did you help our artist make these sketches?"

Green frowned. "I was just trying to be a good citizen."

"No, I don't think so," Fierenzo said, leaning back in his seat. "Good citizens in your situation generally make more of an effort to tell the truth."

"What are you talking about?" the other demanded cautiously. "I told you exactly what I saw."