alleyway with no one the wiser to the arrival of a werewolf in Canterbury.
He rested against the BUR office's front doorjamb, dozing softly, until morning caused the first of the standard-issue clerks to make his appearance.
“Who are you, then?” the man wanted to know.
Professor Lyall eased himself away from the door and stepped aside so that the clerk could unlock it. “Well?” The man barred the way when Lyall would have followed him inside.
Lyall bared his canines. It was not an easy trick in the morning sun, but he was an old enough werewolf to make it look easy. “Woolsey Castle pack Beta, BUR agent. Who is in charge of vampire registration in this office?”
The man, unperturbed by Lyall's demonstration of supernatural ability, replied without shilly-shallying. “George Greemes. He will be in around nine. Cloakroom is 'round that corner over there. Should I send the boot-boy to the butcher for you when he gets in?”
Professor Lyall moved off in the direction indicated. “Yes, do: three dozen sausages, if you would be so kind. No need to cook them.”
Most BUR offices kept spare clothing in their cloakrooms, the architectural conceit of cloakrooms having spawned from generations of werewolf arrivals. He found some relatively decent garments, although not precisely to his exacting taste, and, of course, the waistcoat was significantly under par. He then gorged on several strings of sausage and settled in on a convenient ottoman for a much needed nap. He awoke just before nine, feeling much more human—or as human as was supernaturally possible.
George Greemes was an active BUR agent but not a supernatural one. He had a ghost partner who compensated for this disadvantage but who, for obvious reasons, did not work until after sunset. Greemes was therefore accustomed to quiet days full of paperwork and little excitement and was not pleased to find Professor Lyall waiting for him.
“Who did you say you were?” he asked as he came into his office to find Lyall already in residence. Greemes slapped his battered pork pie hat down over a pot full of what looked like the internal guts of several much-abused grandfather clocks.
“Professor Randolph Lyall, second in command of the Woolsey Castle pack and assistant administer of supernatural relations in London central,” said Lyall, looking down his nose at Greemes.
“Aren't you a mite scrawny to be Beta to someone as substantial as Lord Maccon?” The BUR agent ran a hand distractedly down his large sideburns, as if checking to ensure they were still affixed to his face.
Lyall sighed. His slender physique engendered this reaction all too often. Lord Maccon was so large and impressive that people expected his second to be of a similar stature and nature. Few understood how much it was to a pack's advantage having one who always stood in the limelight and one who never did. Lyall preferred not to illuminate the ignorant on this subject.
So he said, “Fortunately for me, I have not yet been called upon to physically fulfill my role. Few challenge Lord Maccon, and those who do, lose. However, I did attain Beta rank by fully following all aspects of pack protocol. I may not look like much for brawn, but I have other germane qualities.”
Greemes sighed. “What do you need to know? We've no local pack, so you must be here on BUR business.”
Lyall nodded. “Canterbury has one official hive, correct?” He did not wait for an answer. “Has the queen reported any new additions recently? Any blood-metamorphosis parties?”
“I should say not! The Canterbury hive is old and very dignified, not given to crass displays of any kind.” He actually seemed a little offended.
“Has there been anything else out of the ordinary? Vampires turning up unexpectedly without metamorphosis reports or proper registration? Anything along those lines?” Professor Lyall kept his expression mild, but those hazel eyes of his were startlingly direct.
Greemes looked annoyed. “Our local hive is very well behaved, I will have you know; no aberrations in recorded history. Vampires tend to be fairly cautious in these parts. It is not comfortable to be supernatural in a port town— too fast-paced and changeable. Our local hive tends to produce
“What about new unregistered roves?” Lyall refused to let the subject drop.
Greemes stood and went to crouch over a wooden wine crate filled with documents. He rifled through them, pausing periodically to read an entry. “Had one in about five years ago. The hive queen forced him to register; no problems since.”
Lyall nodded. Clapping his borrowed top hat to his head, he turned to leave. He had a stagecoach to catch for Brighton.
Greemes, sorting the parchment sheaves back into the crate, continued muttering. “'Course, I have not heard from any of the registered roves in a while.”
Professor Lyall stopped in the doorway. “What did you say?”
“They have been disappearing.”
Lyall took his hat back off. “You made this fact clear in this year's census?”
Greemes shook his head. “I submitted a report on the matter to London last spring. Didn't you read it?”
Professor Lyall glared at the man. “Obviously not. Tell me, what does the local hive queen have to say on this particular topic?”
Greemes raised both eyebrows. “What does she care for roves in her feeding ground except that, when they are gone, things are easier for her household brood?”
The professor frowned. “How many have gone missing?”
Greemes looked up, his eyebrows arched. “Why, all of them.”
Lyall gritted his teeth. Vampires were too tied to their territory to roam away from home for long. Greemes and Lyall both knew that missing roves most likely meant dead roves. It took all of his social acumen not to show his profound irritation. This might not interest the local hive, but it certainly was significant information, and BUR should have been told immediately. Most of their vampire problems involved roves. As most of their were-wolf problems involved loners. Professor Lyall decided he had better push for Greemes's reassignment. The man's behavior smacked of drone thrall, those initial stages of over-fascination with the ancient mysteries of the supernatural. It did no one any good to have someone firmly in the vampire camp in charge of vampire relations.
Despite his anger, the Beta managed to nod a neutral good-bye to the repulsive man and headed out into the hallway, thinking hard.
A strange gentleman was waiting for him in the cloakroom. A man Professor Lyall had never met before but who smelled of fur and wet nights.
The stranger held a brown bowler hat in front of his chest with both hands, like a shield. When he saw Lyall, he nodded in a way that was less greeting and more an excuse to bare the side of his neck in obeisance.
Lyall spoke first.
Pack dominance games might seem complicated to an outsider, but very few wolves in England outranked Professor Lyall, and he knew all of them by face and smell. This man was not one of them; therefore, he, Professor Lyall, was in control.
“This office has no werewolves on staff,” he said harshly.
“No, sir. I am not BUR, sir. There is no pack in this city as I am certain your eminence is well aware. We are under your lord's jurisdiction.”
Lyall nodded, crossing his arms. “Yet, you are not one of the Woolsey Castle pups. I would know.”
“No, sir. No pack, sir.”
Lyall's lip curled. “Loner.” Instinctively, his hackles raised. Loners were dangerous: community-oriented animals cut off from the very social structure that kept them sane and controlled. Alpha challenges invariably came from within the pack, following official lines, with Conall Maccon's unexpected ascension to power the most recent exception to that rule. But brawling, violence, feasting on human flesh, and other such illogical carnage—that was the loner's game. They were more common than vampire roves, and far more dangerous.
The loner clutched his hat tighter at Lyall's sneer, hunching down. If he had been in wolf shape, his tail would
