Nick stomped up the stairs to Dominic and Rook’s apartment that evening, Jamie close behind him. After Jamie received the note, Nick hadn’t been willing to let the witch out of sight. He took Jamie back to his apartment, threw some ledgers at him, and told him to make himself useful. After a final admonishment not to set foot out the door, Nick retreated to the saloon until it was time to collect him for dinner.

“I think this is it,” Nick said, pausing outside a door on the second floor.

“You ain’t been here before?” Jamie asked in surprise.

“No.” The word came out shorter than Nick had intended. “Rook knows where to find me if he needs something. You can stop giving me that pitying look right now, witch.”

Before he could knock, the door swung open. Nick found himself staring down at bright red hair, accompanied by a cheeky grin. “Well, looks like the wild horse dragged himself here,” Mal said. He wore a suit far too expensive for the neighborhood. The benefits of having a rich witch, no doubt. At least Mal hadn’t sold himself cheap, which was more than could be said for most of the MWP familiars.

“Wine,” Nick said, and thrust the bottle at Mal, before pushing past him into the apartment.

Though the place was spacious by most tenement standards, it felt cramped at the moment. Yates sat at a table, looking as out of place as it was possible to be. Cicero, in cat form, sprawled in the center of the table, ignoring Isaac who was trying to lay out plates and forks. Rook, Dominic, and Bill Quigley crowded around the stove, while Tom Halloran perched in the open window leading out onto the fire escape.

The smells wafting from the stove sent Nick’s stomach to grumbling. Jamie grinned and patted his own belly. “I’m so hungry, I could eat a…” he caught himself, but not before Mal let out a bark of laughter.

“Aye, I bet you could,” he said, winking at Nick. “Nothing like a bit of the old—”

“Shut it,” Nick said, cheeks growing warm. Which was stupid; this lot had no right to judge him, given what most of them got up to. “Jamie got a threatening letter today.”

Yates sat forward. “Really?”

“Can’t we have dinner first?” Rook asked. “Cicero, move your furry ass off the table; we have to eat there.”

Cicero twitched an ear in Rook’s direction but didn’t move. Isaac scooped him off the table and unceremoniously dumped him into Tom’s lap.

“Let me pour you a drink, Nick,” Quigley offered. “Beer or wine?”

“Beer.” He watched Quigley pour expertly from the bucket. “Are you a witch?”

Isaac stiffened slightly, though Nick didn’t know why. Quigley didn’t see, too intent on his pouring to notice. “I took the tests, when I was younger. I’ve a bit of potential, just enough to be on the charts, but not enough to think about making a career out of. So it was off to the regular police I went. Didn’t think a jot about witches for the next few years, until a fellow by the name of Tom Halloran got himself into a bit of trouble.”

“More than a bit,” Tom said, scratching behind Cicero’s ears.

“That was the first time we encountered blood hexes,” Yates put in. Apparently, he was as eager to get on with things as Nick.

Nick accepted the beer from Quigley and drifted over to the stove. “Smells good,” he told Rook grudgingly. No wonder Kopecky had developed a comfortable paunch, if Rook did the cooking.

“Of course it does.” Rook cast a look over his shoulder, at the other witches and familiars gathered around the apartment. “This reminds me of how everyone would get together after church, when we were little. Do you remember, Nick?”

An unexpected pang touched Nick’s heart at the memory. In fair weather, everyone in the neighborhood would gather outside the church Sunday afternoons. Set up tables laden with food, enjoy a big communal meal while children played and couples courted, and the adults exchanged gossip or discussed the news. In the rain or cold, the gathering moved indoors, rotating from house to house so no one had to play host every time.

That community had kept them afloat, after their parents died and before Nick was old enough to support his younger brother as well as himself. He couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to some of them since. If he went back, who would have gotten married, or had children, or moved away, or passed on? Would they even remember him now?

“Haven’t thought about that in a long time,” he said.

“I miss it, sometimes.” Rook glanced up. A strand of his silky black hair stuck to his brow from either steam or sweat. “But living in the barracks, with the other MWP familiars, was similar in a lot of ways. The sense we could rely on each other, even if we didn’t get along all the time.” Rook hesitated. “I suppose you found that at Caballus, eventually? That sense of belonging?”

Nick hadn’t, not really. He did everything he could for the ferals under his protection, but there weren’t any Sunday dinners. No sense that if he stumbled, someone would be there to keep him from falling too far.

His eyes strayed to Jamie. Jamie had saved his life, not once but twice. Shown up unasked on his day off, to work on the books without wanting anything in return. And last night, his concern and fear had been so damned obvious, along with the care later.

Nick had told himself they had to part ways after this was all over and their bond broken. But the thought of never seeing those particolored eyes again, never hearing Jamie’s laugh, made Nick feel lonelier than he ever had in his entire life.

As if he’d heard Nick’s thought, Jamie glanced up from where he’d taken a seat at the table. He flashed Nick an unselfconscious grin, and Nick found himself smiling in return.

Rook whacked Nick’s arm with a wooden spoon. “Move it,” he said. “Dinner’s ready. Let’s feast.”

Jamie leaned back in his chair with a groan. Only scraps remained of the dinner: aloo gosht, corned beef, potato dumplings, salad courtesy of Yates, and apple pie. He felt like he could have closed his eyes and dozed off right there at the table.

“So what’s this about a letter?” Yates asked. Jamie had the feeling he’d been waiting impatiently for everyone to have their fill.

Nick’s chair creaked as he shifted in it beside Jamie. “The Wraith tried to kill me last night.”

“What?” Rook yelped. “Why the devil didn’t you say something earlier?”

Nick folded his arms over his chest. “Because someone didn’t want to talk about any of it until after dinner. Now who was that again?”

“Enough,” Dominic said. “Nick, tell us what happened. And what it has to do with this letter of Jamie’s.”

They took turns, Nick explaining that the Wraith had tracked him after leaving Caballus. No one asked him why he’d been out late; Jamie had the impression they assumed he’d been coming over to Jamie’s apartment to begin with. Nick did nothing to disabuse them of the notion, and so Jamie didn’t either.

Jamie passed around the note. “Do you think it was from the Wraith?” he asked. He’d had all afternoon alone in Nick’s apartment to ponder. “Maybe he thinks we’re close to catching him, and so attacked Nick to scare us off?”

“It’s possible,” Yates murmured. He studied the note closely, then handed it to Dominic.

“You sound doubtful,” Jamie said.

Yates took off his spectacles and polished them absently with a silk handkerchief. “Dominic and I have some ideas about the bones the Wraith has been using. We don’t think the Wraith is acting alone.”

That didn’t sound at all good. “What, you mean he ain’t just some looney?”

“I’m afraid not,” Dominic said. “It was your trip to the Menagerie that got us thinking. This note means your work on the case has been noticed, either when you fought the Wraith in the park, or when you visited the Menagerie. Going by what happened last night, Nick has clearly been surveilled. It’s likely you have as well, Jamie.”

Cicero’s yellow-green eyes widened. “Or all of us.”

“Let’s not get too paranoid yet,” Yates cautioned. “Killing Nick would have effectively removed Jamie from the case, as he’d no longer be an MWP detective.”

Which was the least of Jamie’s problems. He swore, drawing a startled look from Yates. “If our bond is putting Nick in danger, we should break it tonight.”

He’d miss it. Miss that warmth in his chest. But anything was worth keeping Nick safe.

“No,” Nick said. He put a hand to Jamie’s arm; out of the corner of his eye, Jamie saw the startled looks the gesture received from everyone else.

Jamie focused on Nick’s gaze, so dark he felt like he could drown in it. “I ain’t going to let you get hurt.”

Nick’s mouth curled up into a small smile. “I appreciate the concern, but the threat means we’re close. Or close enough to worry someone. We can’t give up now.”

“We might be close enough to worry someone, but who?” Jamie tore his gaze away from Nick and glanced around the room. “Surely you don’t mean to imply the guards at the Menagerie have something to do with the Wraith, do you?”

Yates and Dominic exchanged a look. But it was Nick who said, “You said it yourself—the Dangerous Familiars Squad and the Wraith had the same hex. The one to force us into human shape.”

Jamie wanted to argue, but wasn’t certain what to say. “The squad’s got nothing to do with it,” he settled on at last. “Uncle Hurley might be more focused on climbing the ranks than me, but he’s still a good man.”

“We’re not making any accusations yet,” Dominic said carefully. “But after hearing that prisoners are disappearing from the Menagerie, and seeing Luther’s teeth had been pulled out, it got us to thinking about the hexes scratched on bone.”

Cold settled into Jamie’s gut. “Saint Mary, you can’t be saying what I think you’re saying.”

“It’s possible the charms the Wraith uses were made from the body parts of familiars,” Yates said. “The hexes might not even need a witch to charge them, if they could draw upon the latent magic of the dead familiar.”

Jamie’s dinner threatened to return the way it had come. Nick swore savagely.

“Of course—it isn’t enough for witches to control our lives.” He brought his fist down on the table, making the plates jump. “Now you’re just killing us outright, hacking us apart—”

“Nick, stop.” Rook shoved his chair back and stood. “No one here is doing that. We’re going to put an end to it.”

Nick covered his eyes with a hand. Jamie had the horrible feeling Nick was fighting back tears of rage or grief or both. Very cautiously, he put a hand to Nick’s shoulder and stroked it, like he would to calm a frightened horse.

“We’ll catch the bastards, Nick,” he said. “I promise.”

“We don’t know for certain that this is what’s happening.” Yates spoke carefully, as though afraid of setting Nick off again. “I hope we’re mistaken. But it would explain a great deal. The Wraith might be using the most primitive of all magics, lost in the mists of time. Left over from the days before we moved out of caves.”

“What do you mean?” Isaac asked. His face was drawn and white, and he huddled down into his chair. Quigley cast him an anxious look, but Isaac didn’t respond.

“You see it in cave paintings, like in the Cave of Altamira.” Yates’s silvery eyes looked even paler in the glow of the hexlights on the table. “Depictions of men donning skins, for example, then taking on the attributes of the animals they belonged to. I’ve heard the images interpreted as familiars in mid-transformation, and perhaps they are. But what if the skins didn’t belong to hunted animals? What if they came from familiars? What if those men took the magic of the familiars and used it to give themselves animal attributes?”

“The speed of a cheetah,” Jamie said, feeling as though his lips had gone numb. “The strength of a bear.”

“Oh God,” Cicero said. “We’re all going to die.”

“You ain’t going to die, cat,” Tom said, slipping his arm around Cicero’s shoulders.

“That’s why they took Luther’s teeth,” Jamie said. “To use in the hexes. And the other prisoners disappearing from the Menagerie…”

So there was a link between the Menagerie and the Wraith. And it was even worse than he’d ever imagined.

A growl escaped Isaac, and Rook’s shoulders hunched. Nick surveyed the scene for a long moment, then wiped his hand across his face. “Halloran is right.”

Rook looked at him incredulously. “What did you say?”

“This is sick, no doubt about it,” Nick said. “I hope every bastard guard at the Menagerie dies slow and painful. But this won’t become widespread. A few people might want to be strong, or run fast, or the rest of it. But what good does that do the average person, let alone the rich nobs on Fifth Avenue? Like it or not—and I don’t—society runs on hexwork. Tell a Vanderbilt or a Carnegie that he can’t have hexlights in his mansion, and his wife can’t have a hexed hat to make her look ten years younger, or whatever foolishness the rich use magic for, and he won’t like it. He’ll like it even less when the equipment in his factories breaks, or his hotel burns down because there aren’t any familiars left to charge the fire-retardant hexes.”

Yates straightened his cuffs. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree with Nick. It’s the same reason the Heirs of Adam will never grow past a certain point. Their anti-vice campaigns are all fine and good, but outlaw magic as a whole? They might as well try to outlaw trains or electricity. It will never happen.”

“Doesn’t mean things will be easy,” Nick cautioned. “Wholesale slaughter of familiars for body parts might not be useful, but anything short of that, to make it easier to control us…that’s a different story.”

“I could bring this to my uncle,” Jamie offered uncertainly. “He don’t have anything to do with the Menagerie directly, but he’s well-respected. He could help us put a stop to it.”

“No,” said several voices at once. Dominic held up his hand, and the rest fell silent. “I’m not impugning your uncle’s character,” he said. “But we have to be very, very careful about who gets wind of this. Right now, as far as I’m concerned, the only people we can unreservedly trust with this information are the ones sitting at this table.”

“So what do we do next?” Jamie asked.

“Taking the Wraith alive would be ideal,” Yates said. “Assuming he could be persuaded to confess and name anyone who might have been helping him at the Menagerie. Even if he’s a guard himself, he couldn’t possibly remove, kill, and dismember ferals on his own.”

Cicero shuddered. Tom hauled him tighter and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “Ain’t no one going to lay a finger on you. I’ll keep you safe.”

Cicero managed a faint smile. “I know, Thomas.”

Tom lifted his face from Cicero’s hair. “Plain talk,” he said. “Nick, Bill, and I ain’t exactly small fellows. If the three of us can corner this Wraith, it won’t matter what hexes he has.”

Jamie shook his head. “You didn’t see it. Him. He was fast. Strong. He tossed Nick like he didn’t weigh anything at all.”

“I’m a hexbreaker. He lays a hand on me, he’ll regret it.”

“Rodrigo is still watching the park,” Nick said. “Along with one or two other bats he managed to talk into helping. The next time they spot the Wraith, I’ll send one straight to Halloran’s apartment. If he can break the Wraith’s hexes, we’ll have the bastard.”

Tom nodded. “Aye. I’ll go nowhere but the Coven and the apartment until this fellow is caught, so you can find me easy.”

“But Thomas,” Cicero pouted. At Tom’s look, he sighed. “Oh, very well. No socializing until the Wraith is behind bars.”

“Nick and Jamie are in the most danger at the moment,” Dominic said. “I implore you, don’t go anywhere alone if at all possible.”

“Jamie’s staying with me,” Nick said.

Jamie bit back the impulse to say that was the first he’d heard of it. Rook gaped openly. “He is?”

“Why shouldn’t he?” Nick asked, the words a challenge.

“Because you’re—”

“Good,” Dominic interrupted. “Then we’ll all have one less thing to worry about.”

The dinner party broke up after that. Jamie followed Nick down to the street. Rain had set in while they ate, a steady shower that gave no sign of stopping anytime soon. “Are you all right, staying with me?” Nick asked as they walked.

Jamie nodded. “Aye. Just a bit surprised you listened to reason, that’s all.”

“Reason, is it?” Nick shook his head. “Not what I’d call it.”

“What would you call it, then?” Jamie asked.

“Madness,” Nick said with a soft laugh. Then he took on horse form. “Mount up—no sense in staying out in the rain any longer than we have to.”