“What?” Cold horror curled in my gut, and I stared at Widler in disbelief.
“A deer shifter?” Fenris echoed, shock and disgust evident in his tone as well. “Are you certain?”
Widler snorted. “I’ve been on this job for a long time. I know my shifters, and I know how crazy it sounds, but it’s true.” He shrugged. “Whatever shit she’s on must’ve really fucked with her head. Guess drugs affect shifters differently than humans. I never heard of drugs turning us into cannibals or anything like that.”
I decided not to point out that a deer shifter eating a raven wasn’t cannibalism, mostly because there wasn’t any point – this was just as awful in its way.
“You found drugs on her?” I demanded.
“Yes.”
“I want a sample.”
“This is our investigation –”
“A sample, and I want to question the suspect.” I pinned Foreman Vance with a glare. “Or I take all your porno paintings down and burn them to ashes, so you can’t even enjoy them from the comfort of your home.”
The Crew Foreman blanched again. “Fine.” He shoved up from his chair, and Fenris and I followed him out of the room. Looked like I was calling the shots around here after all.
Chapter Seventeen
“Well shit,” I muttered as we trotted down the steps of Enforcer’s Guild HQ. “That was a total bust.”
“Not a total bust,” Fenris argued, holding up a little silk bag of powder between his thumb and forefinger – the sample we’d threatened out of Widler and Vance. “We got this, didn’t we?”
I sighed. “True… but I was hoping the suspect would have been more helpful.” She wasn’t, not even remotely. When the guards had brought her into the interrogation room, she’d been limp and glassy-eyed, her body trembling from withdrawal. Hearing about it from Widler and Crew Foreman Vance had been one thing, but seeing it was another, and it shocked the questions right out of me at first. Not that it had mattered – she couldn’t seem to remember much of anything except that she’d gotten the drug from human dealers hanging around the border where Shiftertown and Downtown met.
Part of me itched to go Downtown – the slums and the Black Market were located there, and if ever there was a likely place to find drug dealers that was it. But the other part of me wanted to get this drug to Com and Noria, so they could get it analyzed along with the cerebust I’d given them earlier.
“Oh well. At least we managed to get one of these.” I held my wrist up to the light and grinned as my Enforcer bracelet gleamed. I was happy to have that little bronze shield back on my arm again, even if half the Guild did hate me right now. It meant my life was one step closer to normal.
Fenris grinned. “True. Guess it pays to be the Chief Mage’s apprentice.” The grin faded as he noticed we were approaching my steambike. “No. Not happening. I’m calling a cab.”
“Not yet you aren’t. We’ve got one more place to visit.”
Fenris groaned.
By the time I parked the bike outside Comenius’s shop, Fenris’s tan was tinged with green. “Don’t worry,” I said, gingerly patting him on the shoulder – I didn’t want him to hurl all over Com’s storefront. “Comenius’ll fix you right up.”
The shop was crowded, Comenius working double-time by himself to service the customers, so Fenris and I hung off to the side while we waited for the rush to subside. Nearly half an hour passed before everyone finally filed out of the store. By that time Fenris’s nausea had passed, and he was across the room rifling through a basket of handmade bath salts.
“Hmm.” He sniffed it. “Very interesting. You’ve infused these crystals with basil, chamomile, and cloud wort. I imagine the user would feel relaxed, their mind free of clutter, after bathing with these.”
Comenius smiled at Fenris as he came around the counter. “That’s why that particular blend is called ‘Calming Focus’.” He embraced me, and I inhaled his woodsy, herbal scent as his strong arms wrapped around me. “Naya.” He beamed down at me. “I’m still getting used to the fact that you’re a free woman again.”
I grinned. “Business seems to be good,” I remarked, looking around the shop. The shelves normally filled with amulets and charms were practically empty. “There a new trend going around?”
“People have been buying protection amulets and warding charms,” he said, looking suddenly uncomfortable. “In response to all the panic being spread by the Herald regarding shifters.”