“You pretend to be a knight of the Order.”

I took the badge out of my pocket and put it on the table. “Feel free to clear it with Nick Feldman.”

“Your badge is real. Your knighthood isn’t. I’ve got two words for you. Jaiden Higgs.”

“Is that supposed to mean something?”

“Seven years ago Knight-Defender Jaiden Higgs suffered a psychotic break. He thought he was possessed, and demons were talking to him. He took three people hostage and barricaded himself in an elementary school on Jefferson Street. Jaiden was sent to Atlanta after he had some issues, and Nick Feldman took him under his wing.”

I could guess where this story was going, and the end wouldn’t be happy.

“Nick did everything he could to get Jaiden out, and when that didn’t work, he called Pastor Haywood. The pastor went into that elementary school and came out sixteen hours later with Jaiden and the hostages unharmed.”

“Was Jaiden possessed?”

“Nobody knows. He hung himself a month later in the psychiatric ward.”

Yes, just another sunshine and rainbows fable of post-Shift Atlanta.

Derek pointed the remainder of his sandwich at me. “Nick Feldman owed Pastor Haywood. He held him in the highest regard. Right now, Feldman should be tearing this city apart looking for his killer. Even if he received a direct order from the Preceptor himself, he wouldn’t let this go. Instead he gave it to you, a knight nobody knows who’s been in the city for five minutes.”

Two could play this game. “You seem to know a lot about me. Here is what I know about you. You’re an alpha. You have your own pack. You aren’t a member of the Atlanta Pack, nor are you affiliated with them in any way. If the Beast Lord finds out a foreign shapeshifter is running around in his territory, the entire Pack will hunt you down. You seem to already have some kind of beef with Ascanio Ferara, whose boudas your people are right now trying to evade. Why hasn’t he turned you in? Do the two of you have some sort of history?”

Derek raised his eyebrows half a millimeter.

“Maybe we should stick to the facts of the murder,” I suggested.

“Yes. That would be best.”

“Tell me about the artifact,” I said.

If Derek was surprised, he didn’t show it. “It’s a box of some strange material, two feet long, one foot wide, and about one foot deep. It has a cross engraved into its lid.”

“What kind of cross? A Christian cross?”

Derek shook his head. “Pastor didn’t think so. He said it emanated magic. Trying to probe it was like holding your hand to a spraying fire hydrant. The magic felt old. He said pre-Hellenistic. It disturbed him.”

“In what way?”

Derek frowned. “He said it was like looking at a radiant diamond. It had complexity and facets on a level he hadn’t encountered before.”

Sounded like an object from the old ages. Never good. “Did he say who hired him to authenticate it?”

“No. Your turn.”

“Someone hired Pastor Haywood to authenticate a magical artifact. The next night the pastor was murdered. The killer broke through the skylight, ripped out his heart, and left the same way. Last night Professor Walton, an expert in early Christian history, was also murdered. The killer came through the third-floor window, ripped out her heart, and left through the same window.”

He focused on me with single-minded intensity. It was slightly unnerving. “It’s a creature.”

“I believe so. It’s highly likely the artifact is bound to a guardian. That guardian can track anyone who touches the artifact and will continue killing until it’s able to regain its treasure.”

“What are you thinking?” he asked.

My heart squeezed itself into a tight, painful ball. This was us. This is how we used to do it when we were solving a thorny problem together: we would sit down some place with food and bat theories back and forth until we decided what to do next. Dear gods, it hurt. Oh wow.

I made my mouth move. “Something with wings and claws. Any beast with sufficient magical power can be bound. Could be a griffin. A manticore. A zilant…”

“Not a griffin. They have a distinctive stink.”

That’s right. I was sitting across from one of the best trackers in the entire Pack. “What did it smell like?”

He shook his head. “Not anything I’ve come across.”

Derek remembered thousands of scents. Worse and worse.

“What’s the deal with fire?” he asked.

“That’s a personal matter. It doesn’t concern you.”

“I’ll decide what concerns me.”

I burst out laughing. He looked just like Conlan when he’d said that, too.

“Did I say something funny?”

I waved my hand at him. “No.”

The other shapeshifter reappeared, hovering in the doorway. I turned and looked at him.

The other shapeshifter raised his hand and gave me a small wave. “Hello. I’m Zahar.”

“A stoat?” I guessed.

Zahar shook his head.

“What is it?” Derek asked.

“He’s brought in a second crew. Females.”

The bouda females were larger and stronger than the males.

“Looks like our charming chat is coming to an end,” I said. “You’re clearly needed elsewhere. Let’s not do this again.”