knew that I would go after Azazel.”
“But that was before the Agency sent one of their goons to threaten you,” J.B. said. “The stakes are higher now.”
“I’m not leaving Chloe, or any of the others, to Azazel,” I said steadily. “Bryson’s out of the picture for now. Let’s work the problem a step at a time.”
“Is this how you get through the day?” J.B. asked. “By only looking at what’s directly in front of you?”
“Since my typical day involves conspiracies of the fallen, Agency and faerie nature, regular attempts on my life and a cascade of shocking revelations, yes. If I tried to take in the big picture, I’d probably lose my mind.”
“So what are we doing now, then?” Beezle asked. He still sat on the railing of the porch. I’d forgotten he was even outside.
“You go inside and help Samiel and Nathaniel,” I said. “Me, Jude and J.B. will go to Chloe’s.”
“I’m not a guard dog,” Beezle sniffed.
“You know, your job description includes the words ‘home guardian.’”
“That’s not guarding the home. That’s guarding some guy who knows two thousand ways to kill me with a toothpick.”
“Look, I want you to do what you do best,” I said.
“Make nachos?” Beezle said hopefully.
“No. I want you to badger and annoy Bryson until he gives up information on Sokolov’s plans for me.”
“That’s diabolical,” Jude said. “I thought you said you weren’t going to torture him.”
Beezle gave Jude a dirty look. “What makes you think he’ll crack?”
“I know you,” I said.
Beezle flexed his claws. “Fine. But I want compensation.”
“In the form of some trans-fat-laden pastry, no doubt,” I said as Beezle flew back inside.
“Where does Chloe live?” I asked J.B.
“Not far from here, actually,” he said. “Near Belmont and Paulina.”
“By the frozen custard place?” I asked.
“No, closer to the library,” he said, giving me a funny look.
“What? Beezle likes custard,” I said. “I can’t help it if my mental map of the city has all the sweets shops as landmarks.”
We decided to walk since Jude couldn’t fly and it wasn’t worth the effort to carry him there. He changed into wolf form so that we would look like a couple walking their dog late at night.
“We should have a leash or something, though,” I said.
Jude growled at me.
“Okay, okay. I was just trying to complete the illusion. Stay close to us so nobody gives us a hard time.”
“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem,” J.B. said. “Most normal people aren’t out and walking about on a night like this.”
Chloe’s apartment was about a ten- or fifteen-minute walk from mine. There was very little traffic on the street, and we saw no pedestrians from my house to hers. Most homes were darkened, their residents already tucked in bed for the night. I thought longingly of my own bed, but hard on the heels of that thought came the memory of Puck disguised as Gabriel.
Maybe I would sleep on the couch for a while and give Jude my room.
Chloe’s apartment was on Melrose in a white-siding two-flat not much different from my own. We walked up the porch and peered at the names on the mailboxes. Chloe was on the first floor, which was handy.
“I’ll go in through the wall and come out to let you two in,” I told Jude and J.B.
They nodded, and I laid my hand on the exterior door.
“I am the Hound of the Hunt, and no walls can bind me,” I said softly.
My hand slipped through the door like water, and the rest of me followed with it. I turned around and let the other two into the foyer, and then repeated the process on Chloe’s door.
A few moments later we were inside. I flipped on the light switch that was near the front door.
The place was trashed.
The apartment was an open studio with a small galley kitchen at the far end and a little corner reserved for a bathroom.
There were clothes everywhere, papers scattered willy-nilly and an open futon covered in tools and bits of metal. Her storage system seemed to consist of cardboard boxes and old milk crates, and they were used for everything from underwear to books. The sink was piled high with dirty dishes, and I think there was mold growing on the coffeemaker.
“Has someone been here before us, or does she live like this?” I said, horrified.
“You’ve never seen her cubicle, have you?” J.B. said. “This is actually somewhat organized for Chloe.”
Dismayed, I looked at all the paper all over the floor. “You don’t think she took the sheets out of Azazel’s binder, do you?”
Jude, who had been sniffing around the room, gave a short bark. He stood near a small, two-person card table that Chloe had shoved under a window.
Azazel’s binder rested on one of the chairs. I opened it up and found it empty.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said, scanning the mess on the floor. “We have to go through all this junk.”
J.B. sighed. “It’s you, right? Nothing can ever be easy.”
We spent the next hour or so on our hands and knees, crawling around collecting pieces of paper and sorting them into two piles—“Azazel” and “not Azazel.”
After a final walk-through we were pretty sure we’d gotten all of the documents. I’d noticed as we were collecting them that Chloe had made oblique notes on several of the pages in purple marker.
I shoved the papers back through the rings of the binder and shut it. “Let’s bring this home and look it over. I can’t take the smell of this place anymore. Hasn’t she ever heard of disinfectant?”
I shut off the lights and sent Jude and J.B. outside first so that I could lock the interior door. Not that Chloe would notice if someone broke in, but it seemed like the right thing to do.
I drifted through the outside door and saw J.B. and Jude waiting for me on the sidewalk.
We started walking north back to my place. J.B. carried the binder under his arm, and Jude trotted a little bit ahead, sniffing as he went.
We were on Lincoln, across from the Burrito House and near the public play lot, when Jude stopped.
“What is it?” I asked.
He whined, pawing at the metal fence that surrounded the play lot. I reached around him and opened the gate.
He darted inside, nose pressed to the ground, and crossed between the swings and the slide. The playground was bordered by a high wall that supported the Metra tracks that ran through the neighborhood.
Jude went right up to the wall, sniffing and whining so that we would follow him. J.B. and I followed, bewildered.
After a few minutes Jude stopped and barked. He pointed with his nose toward the wall.
There, inscribed in the metal support, was a tiny symbol—a circle topped by an upside-down V.
“The sigil of the charcarion demons,” I said.
Jude barked.
“This is probably a portal,” I muttered. “But why put it so close to my house? Why risk my finding it?”
“If it’s a portal, can you open it?” J.B. asked.
I stared at the symbol. The last time I’d opened a portal like this, I’d found the wolf cubs that had been taken from Wade’s pack. If I went through the portal now, would I find the missing Agents? Would I find Azazel?
Or was it a trick, a trap planted by Azazel? If I went through the portal, would I find nothing but my own doom?
I looked down at the tattoo of the coiling snake on my right palm. There was no tingle of magic, no prompting to open the portal.
