I decided on a short route, taking the straight shot up Old Northern Avenue. “Oh No,” as the locals called it, was in its commuter mode. It didn’t have the rush-hour jams of other parts of the city because the Weird isn’t a shortcut to anywhere except maybe Southie. Office workers wandered down after to work for an esoteric errand. The few restaurants that the mainstream knew about had their Samhain specials running. Early Halloween parties would rev up later in the evening, and the neighborhood would do brisk business.

I made it to Harbor Street without incident. I passed the boarded-up offices of Unity, a neighborhood help center that had closed with the murder of its founder, Alvud Kruge. After his widow, Eorla, joined the Guild board as his replacement, the help center had closed. This Samhain would be tough going for her. I didn’t know her well, but I knew she loved her husband and missed him. Between that and her recent travails with the Guild, she had a lot to put behind her.

To shake up the run, I chose an alley route back. The alleys were the most unsafe parts of the Weird-but they made a fun run if you were vigilant and kept out of them too late at night. Lanes weaved in and out and appeared to go nowhere, only to open up into more twists and turns. It was early enough that I wasn’t likely to run into anything nefarious.

The back sides of warehouses sported a riot of graffiti. All of the Weird was gang territory to some extent, and gang members tagged the walls with their sigils to warn off rivals. Lately, the gangs had been in transition. Lots of strife from recent deaths and retaliations. New symbols had cropped up in the past few weeks, blotting out the old, challenging the existing rulers of the streets. The Taint wasn’t helping. New gangs formed, old ones merged, but the rivalries were still the same old petty posturing and grievances.

The alleys represented what people feared about the Weird, the signs of decay that threaten an entire city. Politicians claimed that the poverty and danger down here made the well-meaning citizens of the city vulnerable, which was why they did stupid things like put up police checkpoints. In reality, poverty and danger were filling the void left when prosperity and hope receded. The battered warehouses stood as forlorn reminders of better times. Shattered glass littered the ground, the evidence of windows no one cared to maintain or replace. It was all part of the life-and-death cycle of a neighborhood. What had once been vibrant and alive was now dark and still. Someday it will change course, but not today and not soon. And as with all cycles of change, pain would feed the process.

I heard the first whisper about a quarter mile from home. When you’re running, and you hear a whisper, you know it’s not natural. I reached a desolate stretch of alley paralleling Stillings Street, a dumpster-lined gauntlet behind bars that catered to the down-market crowd. At first, I thought it was the wind. Then it became louder, words on the edge of hearing. My skin prickled, and I slowed to a light jog.

The alley angled in such a way that I couldn’t see far in either direction. A limp breeze moved, barely enough to rustle the papers and garbage that lined the building foundations. The whispers rose, a run-on of voices tripping over one another almost rhythmically, like they had that morning in the Guildhouse storeroom. I turned in place, trying to locate the source of the essence. Nothing registered. The whispers faded.

I started running again. My skin prickled, and I had the sensation of someone coming up behind me. I dodged to the right and flattened myself against a wall between piles of trash. Empty alley. Not a sign of anyone. In my peripheral vision, flickers of essence moved, but whenever I looked toward them, they vanished.

I felt foolish, jumping at shadows among shadows. The whispers resumed, rising and falling in a pained cadence. Twice I jogged backwards a few feet, and still saw no one. The strange sensation faded. I relaxed, chalking it up to the general atmosphere. The Weird has a history and sometimes it likes to remind people. On the corner of the last block before my apartment, I skidded to a halt.

A fairy hovered in the air in front of me, his face suffused with anger. He blazed with an indigo essence, so intense he looked translucent. It took me a moment to realize he was an Inverni, a powerful clan the Dananns had conquered when they took over the Seelie Court.

The temperature dropped as the field of his essence swirled near. He folded his sharp wings back and dove at me. I threw myself to the ground as he swept over. My body shields flickered on, small patches of hardened essence softening my impact with the asphalt, but not by much.

I scrambled to my feet. My body shields were no defense against an Inverni. I ran, knowing it was pointless. I couldn’t outrun him, but I didn’t want to be another dead body in an alley in the Weird. The main avenue was less than a block away. My lungs burned with cold air as I sprinted, hoping he would leave me alone in front of witnesses.

He came up behind me, his essence preceding him like a fog. At the end of the alley, he hit me between the shoulder blades. Pain lanced through my torso as something pierced my spine, burning with cold fire. I stumbled against a wall, unable to draw breath. The pain intensified, and I watched in shock as the Inverni emerged from my chest. His forward momentum carried him into the air. He looked back at me with hatred and faded from view.

Clutching at the sore spot in my chest, I staggered the last few feet to Old Northern Avenue. Reality reasserted itself in a blare of traffic noise. People walked by as if nothing were amiss. I gulped for air, easing the tension in my lungs. My sweat-damp face felt cold as I made my way on unsteady feet to Sleeper Street. Leaning against a light pole, I glanced back. No one took an interest in me, no furtive looks or unnatural nonchalance. I had been attacked, and no one had seen it.

Baffled, I walked the last stretch of sidewalk to my apartment. Inverni fairies couldn’t make themselves intangible. And they didn’t teleport like flits. I had no idea what to make of it. Whatever mess the Taint was creating with essence was getting worse if stuff like this was happening.

I scanned the empty street one more time. Whoever it was had vanished. The security ward snapped into place as I closed the vestibule door behind me. It didn’t make me feel any more secure. If someone could literally slip through my body, I had my doubts a warding spell would keep anything out of my building.

The only thing more surprising than getting an appointment with Keeva macNeve on short notice was getting an appointment that did not require me to get up before noon. I wasn’t a morning person, and I didn’t apologize for it. Keeva, on the other hand, played the corporate game and was at her desk before most people got out of bed. She liked rules. That didn’t mean she always followed them. She’s more subtle about getting around them. Me, I break them if they’re in the way.

As I crossed the central lobby, the line for help looked like it hadn’t moved since the day of the hearing. But that was cynical. The line had moved at least twenty feet.

In the two years since my accident with Bergen Vize, I had regained minor essence abilities. For most of that time, I’d moped and whined about not being a top Guild investigator. I was over that part. I couldn’t go back. Not with Keeva in charge of my old department. I was bitter and angry with the way the Guild booted me out and kept me out. That part I wasn’t over. If I knew myself as well as I thought I did, I never would be.

A surprisingly long line led to the appointment desk. The elf receptionist had managed to personalize her security uniform by adding a bright yellow scarf. She probably wouldn’t get away with it for long. While I didn’t care for the style, I had to give her points for simultaneously matching her eye shadow and sticking it to the Man.