Chapter 11 - the Roaring Lion

6th January

"So," said Brennon, "we are looking for a second."

Detectives and policemen sighed, some louder, some quieter. Regan timidly asked:

"Sir, are you sure that two persons were the Strangler?"

"Sure. The only question is who we are free now - Father Grace or number two."

"But the arsonist may be someone else."

"Maybe," Nathan agreed eagerly, "but I prefer to believe in the best and hope that there is one crazy killer hanging around the city, not two."

Regan wilted. Dwyer grunted and patted his shoulder.

"You will once again go around all Grace's neighbors and find out if the church has undergone floor repairs in the last eight years, if so, when and by whom. Further, you should interrogate the same neighbors, and at the same time all the relatives about their home libraries," the commissar jabbed a finger over his shoulder at the portraits on the wall, "It's best to examine it with your own eyes. All suspicious books and things - to describe and trot to me. It may turn out that we did not have a pyromaniac, but the vigilante. Byrne, to comb the Farrell family frequently for contacts with the victims' relatives, Grace's neighbors, and Grace himself. Is the task clear?"

The police responded in an unstable chorus.

"Regan, keep in touch with the seminary, Grace's sister, and friends. At the same time, go to the train station and stagecoach stations and find out who came to Blackwhit from December twenty-fifth."

"But Christmas, sir!" The young man moaned in despair.

"Yeah, get lost in the crowd - just spit. Dwyer, you have the former maid, doctor and pharmacist of Father Grace, and also the ex-owner of a bathtub store. As you will find them - shake out everything about strange behavior, unusual acquaintances, some drugs that the pater bought. Also," Brennon took his cane and pulled a blade out of it, "go around all the gun shops, find out if anyone has bought a blade in a cane lately."

"For eight years, sir?" Dwyer softly said in the bass.

"Not necessary. But probably."

The detective sighed quietly.

"Mister Longsdale..."

The hound nudged the consultant's leg in the sideways. He enthusiastically read some mighty dusty tome in Caliphatian; he started, raised his head, and looked around the audience with bewilderedly scattered eyes.

"Mister Longsdale," Brennon continued, not without menace, "will not be able to restore the victim's face in the church by the skull, but he will try to find out if our priest is alive. He also has to decipher the notebook, right?"

"Ah, yes, yes," Longsdale muttered, "of course," and again buried himself in the book.

No one laughed. Some police officers secretly crossed themselves.

"Questions?" The commissar asked. "Then legs in hands and forward."

They moved out of the room, skirting a tight group of consultant, his hound and butler. Raiden watched the police with a mocking look.

"Why didn't you tell them anything? Not a word about the ifrit, witchcraft, potions..."

"Because that's enough for them," Nathan said sharply. "No magic. Enough of them being baptized as they walked past," he nodded to the consultant. "The less they think about all the devilry, the easier it will be for them to work."

"But they still know. About magic, about the arsonist, about Farrells."

"To know and think about what you know are two different things. Let them focus on the normal, and the rest is my business. Hey you!"

The hound looked reproachfully at Brennon.

"You can't hide an elephant forever," Raiden narrowed his black eyes like a cat. "Sooner or later you will have to tell them that they are catching the warlock with the ifrit."

The commissar held back his annoyance: he had planned a conversation with the butler in the end, when the guy relaxed, deciding that the storm had passed.

"Back to the murder weapon," Nathan put his cane next to the plaster casts from the marks on the bones. "What do you shake your head?"

"I don't think this is a murder weapon anymore," Longsdale said. "It is rather an instrument of sacrifice."

Brennon armed himself with the last reserves of patience and inquired:

"Why didn't you tell me anything before? Out of girlish modesty?"

"I cannot remember everything," the consultant imperturbable answered. He closed the tome, put it on the table and began to carefully wrap it in a velvet rag. "In addition, the ifrits are rare - both in our country and in general."

"So what? I mean," suddenly it came to the Commissar, "you want to say that for each otherworldly bastard there is a separate ritual?!"

The sound that the hound made, coupled with the loud laughter of the butler, could destroy the commissar's self-respect in the bud if Nathan was worried about their opinion.

"Of course," Longsdale tied the book with a silk cord. "Fortunately, I finally found a treatise of Mahmoud al-Basmi," he gently stroked the velvet, "where are listed..."

"In short," Brennon demanded grimly, gripped by a bad foreboding.

"In order to open to the entrance to our world for the ifrit, one more sacrifice is needed. She or he is placed in the heart of a nine-pointed star and the veins are opened, so that she nourishes the portal with the blood. As I understand it, this is exactly what happened to the man killed in the temple."

The Commissar cursed long and confusedly.

"Maybe," Longsdale continued melancholy, looking at the children's portraits, "Father Grace guessed what fate was in store for him, although I can't understand how he managed to stop the accomplice. After all, the portal was completely ready, there was only one sacrifice."

"Or vice versa, the number two gave leg-bail, leaving your Grace with nothing," the butler said.

"No," Brennon muttered sullenly. "I'm pretty sure Grace is just a performer. If he was an organizer, he would have brought the matter to an end a long time ago, with a ready-made portal under his feet. And even more so, he would not write encrypted notes to himself and hide them in the bathroom."

"Well, senile dementia, loss of memory..." Raiden sarcastically began.

"No dementia," Nathan snapped, somewhat offended: he was a year older than Grace. "There's a list of drugs and prescriptions. Pater did not complain about the memory."

"But he might be afraid of a roaring lion," Longsdale remarked in an undertone.

"Leave your idiotic idea. A man who can summon such a beast from the other side - who can afraid him?"

The hound squinted at the commissar mockingly, and it seemed to Nathan that only own wordlessness kept the animal from announcing the entire list.

"Why do you think so?" the consultant nodded at the cane. Brennon shrugged.

"I could not think of another way to cut our deceased veins without crawling to him on the back of the lap."

Longsdale rubbed his chin, took the blade and figured the length on his fingers.

"In principle, it is possible. Especially if the arms are long enough and the victim is standing with his back and not moving. For an experienced fencer, quite."

"Total," Nathan crossed his arms and sat down on the table, "eight years ago, a certain gentleman had a desire to conjure the ifrit. The devil only knows how he got Grace to do it; ask when we catch. During the year, they scored the right number of victims, hiding with the help of witchcraft, and organized a portal in the temple for a solemn meeting. Which did not take place for an unknown reason. Apparently, Grace realized that he would not survive until the meeting, since he was appointed the main dish. The question, of course, is how he prevented his accomplice... However, for eight years he never showed up. Grace just in case hid a notebook in which he encrypted the name of the accomplice. And then suddenly Grace is killed, or rather, sacrificed, the portal opens, ifrit comes into the light, to people, and someone rushes around here all the time. Either he locks this beast in the church, then he sets it on a gawker when we took out the remains, then he drags it to your house, then he protects..." Brennon fell silent. He turned his eyes from the hound who sat in front of him and listened with interest to the butler. "So, man, do you want to share anything with us?"

"Me?!" Raiden jumped to his feet. "Why on earth?!"

"Indeed," Longsdale asked somewhat puzzledly, "what does my butler have to do with it?"

"Well, the last five years he has been with you, and before that?"

"Why should I conjure the ifrit?" Raiden cried out with sincere indignation; sparks of fire flashed in his eyes. "What the hell do I need that for?!"

"There are many reasons," the commissar shrugged.

"Indeed, Brennon," the consultant said, "witchers and witches don't need to summon evil spirits, they are already..."

"Well, somehow your butler became a witcher, since you admit it."

"Became?!" the sparks flared up in flames. "I was born that way!"

"Nathan, you may not understand..."

"I understand that your guy is hiding something," Brennon said calmly.

"You do not understand," Longsdale repeated with pressure, "witchers and witches by birth do not need for what people usually conjure evil spirits. Moreover, the witching clan is hostile to evil spirits."

"Why?" Nathan squeezed out, pretty stunned by such revelations. So this guy is not a human at all?!

"Because the hunting lands are common," the butler hissed through his teeth. Brennon hardly forced himself not to stare at him, like a juvenile moron - to candy. The real witcher! Holy cripes...

"What life has brought to something," the Commissar thought bitterly. He is told that in front of him is a sorcerer, and even "by birth," and he still believes in all this...

"Witchers," Longsdale said, in the tone of a patient teacher explaining common truths to an idiot, "feed their magical powers with pain and suffering, I told you already. Thus, evil spirits, also feeding on people..."

"So where you walk your witcher order he eat his fill?"

The consultant coughed in embarrassment and looked away. The hound clearly enjoyed the performance, watching all the participants with unflagging interest.

"I do not allow him to kill people."

"Oh, for the sake of the Pramater!" Raiden exploded. "I'm still here, and I'm not an animal to show me how in a zoo!"

"Sometimes he walks in criminal blocks," Longsdale said hastily.

"So rapes and stabbing?" The commissar said coldly. A muffled roar erupted from the butler. The room has become warmer. Standing in front of Raiden, Nathan felt the heat coming from him.

"Come on, man," Brennon said, ignoring the consultant's attempt to fit between them, "lighten your soul. What are you silent about, huh? Who is "she," who, in your opinion, is protected by an unknown sorcerer? What does the fiances have to do with it..." the Commissar stopped short. The grin disappeared from Raiden's face; the butler still looked like a wild cat before the jump, but the fire in his eyes went out - illuminated from the inside with an orange flame, they already seemed not black, but dark brown.

"I met her on the street, near our house," Raiden said; there was almost sympathy in his voice, damn him! "Immediately after the ifrit left."

"And you were silent," the Commissar said quietly.

"I was convinced that everything was okay with her, and took her to The Shell, to her companion."

"Knew and was silent," Nathan repeated. A couple of steps separated them, and Raiden stepped back one more. The hound crept up cautiously, Longsdale moved closer. The commissar rested his hands on the countertop, studying the butler frowningly.

"What else do you say?"

"She was not alone there."

Brennon pushed himself off the table, rushing forward and sideways. Raiden dodged, saving his snoot, but the Commissar did not aim at it. He grabbed the butler by the arm and twisted behind his back, while twisting his wrist.

"She wasn't alone, with some kind of sorcerer and the ifrit, and you were silent all this time?" Nathan hissed muffledly and squeezed the other hand in the grip. The butler froze like a compressed spring; the commissar felt how he carried the weight on one leg and leaned forward slightly.

"Raiden, don't you dare," the consultant said coldly. Raiden grunted:

"That's why I was silent. I wanted to find out for myself. Although this is why the ifrit climbed into your house - he remembered this fool and tracked her down. And if someone had not slipped into her defense..."

The hound poked its face in Brennon's thigh.

"Nathan, please let go," Longsdale asked. The commissar unclenched his hands, sank into a chair and clasped his fingers in the lock. The butler drew back, but did not whine, only rubbed his wrists and smiled with satisfaction, as if after that Brennon had grown in his eyes.

"No one wants to say," the consultant continued, "that Margaret is an accomplice of the Strangler. She may not even remember meeting him if he erased her memory."

"Oh God," Nathan muttered, "he could have killed her. The ifrit. Warlock. She was very close..."

Raiden snorted loudly:

"I would be in your place more worried about the one who so protects your little Margot that he was not afraid to grapple to the ifrit."

Brennon put his forehead into his clasped hands. These two prevented him from finally catching a thought that flickered on the edge of consciousness.

"In the end, you can always find another virgin for..."

"Raiden!" The consultant barked.

"Oh, you tell him. In the end, you still have to."

The hound put his paw on Nathan's knee. The commissar raised his head and measured both with a heavy look.

"What virgin?"

Longsdale paused, biting his lip. The butler impatiently fidgeted on the spot, as if he were bursting with some knowledge.

"Hey?!"

The hound soothingly patted Brennon paw on the foot.

"Well, you see," the consultant replied with obvious reluctance, "the fact is that in order to close the portal, as well as to open it, sacrifice is necessary."

"I mean... Do you mean to bleed someone into that damn star?!"

"Yes."

The hound's paw froze. Nathan watched with detachment as the hair on the scruff of the hound stood on end.

"But then..." the Commissar muttered, finally catching his thought. "Then what is the point... Lock, release, lure, scare away... Oh Lord," he rose sharply, "Regan is right. There are two of them."

***

"In my opinion, he is off his head," the butler said rather rudely to his master and lord.

"But in a way, the assumption is logical and explains a lot," Longsdale notised.

Brennon snapped at them from the table in exasperation. Ayrton Broyd, as luck would have it, wore off to some vile charity meeting at City Hall to improve the image of the police in the eyes of the authorities. Nathan scribbled a report to his chief, in a hurry to share his thoughts, and the hound wandered around his office, sniffing all the time, one to the other. Finally, for some reason, Paw licked the windowsill, scratched the floor under it with his claws and slipped out of the office. Brennon mechanically traced for the hound - through the open door he saw that the hound sniffed the doorknob of the room with evidence, bit, thoughtfully licked its teeth, pulled the doorknob by its teeth and disappeared into the room. The commissar shook his head and focused on the report again.

"Your niece is safe. I took care of protecting the house."

"Yeah, until he gets out of there," the butler said impudently. "Or don't let anyone in."

Brennon looked up at him. Raiden quickly looked away.

"You," the Commissar hostilely said through set teeth. "Again you are not talking? By Jove, you shouldn't have stopped me, Longsdale. Your servant need a thrashing."

"Oh," the witcher grunted, "he stopped me, and not you, or..."

"Indeed," Longsdale said coldly, "I myself can talk heart to heart with you."

Raiden fell silent.

"He won't like it," he nodded to the Commissar. "that his niece is walking arm in arm with the warlock."

"Shut up both," Nathan muttered. From thoughts of Margaret, everything was seething inside him, and he wanted to concentrate on the report. The conversation between the consultant and the butler was also interrupted - Longsdale, frowning thoughtfully, went to the window and began to move his finger on the windowsill. Then, absentmindedly he licked this finger, sniffed a pile of papers, which Brennon had unloaded on the window to free the table, and followed the hound out. Raiden traced for him with a quiet, almost doleful sigh. Nathan was surprised to realize that he was still capable of sympathy.

"It's hard, right?"

"To each his own," the butler muttered, "to whom the niece, to whom the master..."

Ten minutes later, Brennon sprinkled the sheets with sand and, while the ink was dry, began to wind the scarf. No sooner had the Commissar buttoned his coat when Longsdale returned to the office (the hound sniffed something eagerly on the stairs) and said from the threshold:

"Someone penetrated in your office and room with evidence tonight."

"What does you mean - penetrate?" Nathan did not immediately understand.

"He opened the locks with the help of magic and penetrated. All traces are carefully erased, but..."

"Into my office?!" Brennon roared. Longsdale shuddered, the butler whistled delightedly. Footsteps clattered down the stairs, and a sweaty attendant appeared in the doorway:

"Sir?!"

"Who was on duty yesterday night?" Nathan inquired with formidable calm.

"Hayes, sir. Passed the post today at seven..."

"Did he sleep there all night?!" The commissar barked. "Some kind of scumbag rummaged around here, as at home, pawing evidence... Evidence! Damn it!"

He flew out of the office with a bullet, burst into the hall with material evidence and froze on the threshold, circling the tables with a blazing gaze. The attendant gone at the drop of a hat.

"Well, it's not his fault," the consultant conciliatoryly said. "He was most likely euthanized, and in the room everything was fine in the morning, nothing was lost."

"How do you know?"

"I enchanted both rooms from strangers and from theft," Longsdale said in a slightly apologetic tone. "If a stranger tried to steal something..."

"Could you tell me about this?!"

Longsdale looked down. Raiden chuckled softly.

"Why so yell?" He asked philosophically. "Anyway, this type turned out to be cunning enough to somehow crawl here without disturbing the spell, and then everything was so cleverly wiped out that if it weren't for the hound..."

"Can you tell who it was?" The commissar interrupted angrily. Longsdale shook his head. "Well, what's the point of your spell?"

"Apparently, he somehow deceived them," the consultant rubbed his chin. "Maybe he works here? Or subordinated one of the policemen to his will..."

"It's just one thing after another!" Brennon moaned.

"All evidence is here. Some trifle like a pencil also disappeared from your office. Why are you so worried?"

"Why am I worried?!" - Nathan tore his scarf, turning into a boiling geyser again. "It turns out, that In the department the Strangler or some unidentified sorcerer can hang around freely, and you suggest me not to worry?!"

"Yes," Longsdale answered after a moment of thought. "This is not good, I didn't count... Well, do you want me to check all the department employees for signs of hypnosis and masking potions?"

"I want," Brennon answered vindictively, "even if we all have to spend the night here!"

"Not a bad option," the butler said. "Suddenly he will return?"

"I'll go to the city hall. I will give everything personally, so faster. To my return..."

"Raiden, come with the Commissar," Longsdale ordered.

"Me?!"

"What the hell do I need him for?"

"If the Strangler goes to the department, as you put it, as if to his home, then nothing will stop him from approaching you," the consultant said calmly. "I don't want anything to happen to you."

***

Brennon often thought that the kingpins from the city hall feel when, inadvertently looking out the window, see behind him the wall of the cathedral and the cemetery spread out beneath it. Nobody was buried on it for a long time, except for the city nobility, which kept family crypts in such a prestigious place. The sight of crosses, fences, and cemetery ministers, melancholy correcting the first or painting the second, could hardly inspire optimism and faith in the best. Nathan took out his watch and noted with annoyance that he had been sticking out in the hall of the city hall for forty minutes, which could have been spent with much greater benefit. The butler, crossing his arms over his chest, contemplated the cemetery. The commissar's stomach rumbled hungrily.

"Go get some food," Brennon ordered, handing the butler small money.

"No."

"Why?"

"I have been told to guard you."

"From the Strangler?" The commissar asked skeptically. "And what can you do to him?"

"More than you can imagine," Raiden meanly smiled; black eyes flashed unkindly.

"Then wait here, I'll go down myself."

The butler turned his back on the window and stepped in front of Brennon.

"No," the guy said, looking up at him confidently. The commissar almost was touched and weighed a cane in his hand.

"Try it," Raiden whispered with anticipation. Nathan backed off. Not at city hall, really.

"Okay, let's go together, bodyguard," he muttered. Raising someone else's servants is, after all, not his concern.

On the contrary, there was an restaurant, the prices in which the Commissar considered shameless robbery. But from any window the city hall and the white marble staircase were visible, with the money from the construction of which it would be possible to build a new wing in the department. Brennon took a comfortable position at a table between the window and the fireplace, ordered the pie with meat, tea and generously inquired about the wishes of Raiden.

"Not hungry, thanks," the butler answered. He looked around the restaurant with the appearance that he suspected every first visitor of killing. The Commissar, too, just in case, looked around the hall. It was many people - lunchtime was already beginning: officials, clerks, priests from the cathedral were gradually taking a table at a table. Someone smoked, someone read newspapers, here and there a quiet humming of voices came. The pie was brought to Nathan, and the commissar, without taking his eyes off the city hall, began to eat. Raiden sat next to him, his back to the fireplace, facing the hall and remained vigilant.

When Brennon finally threw the napkin on the table and sat back satisfactorily, the door opened again, and a cold wind started to go around his feet. Conversations for some reason subsided; the butler suddenly started up and leaned forward. The commissar turned around just in case and shook his hand in search of a cane. He correctly understood that such people could not come into this institution by chance.

There were five of them - some in raincoats, some in jackets; under their clothes, Nathan noticed, with an expert eye, sawn-off shotguns, holsters for a small firearm, axes hanging on loops sewn from the inside; and this silent company did not hide sticks, chains, and knives.

"Oh," whispered Raiden, and stood up. "They're after you."

"Don't burn anyone!" Nathan hissed.

"Is that your order?" The butler asked. "Okay," on his face suddenly the expression appeared at the same time greedy, mocking and cruel. "Well..."

Five lingered for a minute in the middle of the hall, looking at visitors at the tables, and just as silently and resolutely moved to the Commissar. Brennon shook the cane from the blade, put it on his knees and pulled the revolver out of its holster.

"Look for who controls," muttered Raiden. Nathan did not understand what it was about. "He's here somewhere."

The butler retreated to the fireplace, and the commissar suddenly remembered that the guy, apart from the fiery tricks, was completely unarmed. And now he's not capable of tricks.

"Get out of here," Brennon said through set teeth and got up to face the troubles. "Come on, to the department."

Five were divided: two stopped half a step away from the Commissar - their eyes were somehow glazed, devoid of any expression. Three surrounded Raiden, cornering. The butler pulled a poker from an iron bucket by the fireplace.

"I'll call the police!" Finally, someone yelled with a goat tenor.

"Raiden!" The commissar barked. The guy can't fight off three armed men... The butler tossed a poker in his hand with a grin and biffed the first bandit on his knee. The shriek and the characteristic crunch of a crushed joint had not yet subsided, and visitors to a respectable establishment screamed out of the hall.

Before Brennon could blink Raiden grabbed this robber by the scruff and hurled him at those two who had crept up to Nathan. The poker flashed, and the second robber, howling and pinched his face with both hands, collapsed onto the Commissar's table. Blood flowed densely from under his fingers, interspersed with bone fragments. The third managed to grab a gun, got a kick in the groin and a poker hit on the arm. The wrist cracked; Raiden twisted it so that the bandit screamed to his knees. The butler tore the gun from him, threw it into the fireplace, grabbed the enemy by his hair and hit his head on the sharp corner of the countertop. Blood spattered on Brennon, and the commissar woke from a stupor. But he did not manage to do anything - the butler, like the kite, rushed at the enemies.

One whined over the crushed knee; another pulled a sawn-off shotgun from under the raincoat, and the third an ax. Raiden's eyes flashed greedily. Slammed a shot from a sawn-off shotgun. The butler smeared a finger across the long abrasion across the shoulder; Brennon plopped down on a chair, like a bag with potatoes. He had never seen anyone dodge a shot almost point blank.

The poker clanged about the ax. Raiden threw the attacker with such force that he crashed into the next table. At the turn, the Butler dodged the shotgun, grabbed it by the muzzle, and yanked it toward him. The bandit left hold of the weapon of his hands, but swayed, hesitating for a second, and Raiden hit him with a butt across his face, kicked it in the knee and laid it on the floor with a poker blow to the back of the head.

The last more or less surviving robber rushed at the butler, brandishing an ax. Raiden dodged several swings with a laugh, then parried the poker, fell to his knee, slipping under the edge of the ax, and drove the poker flat under the ribs of the opponent. The bandit gasped frantically and fell down on the floor like a bag. The butler sprang up to his feet, crushed his fingers with the hilt of the poker and kicked the ax out of his hands. Finally, Raiden slashed the enemy with the edge of his hand across the throat and, leaving the battlefield behind him, headed for the commissar. Nathan sat like that, clutching his revolver with one hand and his sword with the other.

"Well?" the butler asked with a smile, playing with a poker. "Did you miss out?"

"Whom?" the Commissar squeezed out hoarsely. The consultant's servant snorted.

"The puppeteer! He was somewhere here, a human can't control others from too great a distance."

Brennon silently examined the butler from head to toe. He was not even out of breath, there was a blush on his cheekbones, his eyes were gleaming well-fed like a cat after hunting, and the only abrasion from a bullet on his shoulder was already tightening, as if it had been put into batter. Raiden leaned toward the Commissar, hiting in a hot breath.

"Do you want," he whispered greedily, "do you want me to kill them all?"

Instead of answering, the commissar pressed the barrel of a revolver to his chest. The butler drew back with a chuckle.

"Let's interrogate them," he suggested enthusiastically. "This one, without a knee, still talkative. Please!"

"Go away," the commissar ordered muffledly.

"Oh, well, please!"

"Out!"

Raiden wiped blood off the table, licked his fingers, and slipped out into the street. Brennon got up heavily and went in search of waiters, a manager, or at least a dishwasher.