“I should introduce you to my sister.” I squinted at the fence. It was about eight feet high, and the neighbor on that side didn’t have a dog. “Come here.”

“Why?” asked Shelby suspiciously.

“I’m going to boost you up so you can see into the next yard. It looks like our cockatrice went over the fence.”

To her credit, Shelby came right over, putting her hands on my shoulders as I stooped to form a basket for her foot. “I didn’t stay with you only because your cousin was a Johrlac, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Then why?”

She stepped into my joined hands, smiling impishly before she said, “The sex has been amazing.” She pushed off the ground before I could formulate a reply. I straightened automatically, boosting her until her head cleared the top of the fence. Shelby put her hands on the wood, steadying herself.

Silence fell. She wasn’t getting heavier, so she wasn’t in the process of turning to stone—good. Finally, when I could restrain myself no longer, I asked, “Well?”

“We need to go next door,” she said, voice sounding strangely hollow, like she was trying to divorce herself from the scene. “There’s a dead man on the back porch.”

This time, the pause was mine. “All right,” I finally said. “Let’s get you down.” It was time for a little recreational breaking and entering. If it’s not one thing, it’s another.

My family has always had what can most charitably be called a complicated relationship with the law. We understand the need for laws that cover an entire population. We just get cranky when those laws are applied to us. It’s hypocritical as hell, but when you’re trying to balance the needs of several dozen nonhuman species against the needs of the human population, sometimes hypocrisy is the only answer. In the four generations we’ve been active in North America, we’ve racked up charges ranging from breaking and entering and vandalism to assault with a deadly weapon and murder. So far, we’ve been able to make all those charges go away. Our luck isn’t going to hold forever, and every time we stretch the law, there’s a chance that this will be the time that things fall apart.

All this ran through my mind as my grandfather boosted me over the fence and into the yard of Bill O’Malley, aka, “the dead man on the porch.” He’d been living there alone since his wife had died some eight years previously, which was a good thing for us; it lowered the odds of someone coming in and finding us creeping around the property. I’d already been questioned by the police once today. I really wasn’t in the mood for a second conversation.

I hit the grass in a crouch, straightening and turning to help Shelby lower herself down. Then I grabbed her hand and pulled her farther into the yard, moving away from the fence as fast as I could without actually running. Shelby frowned at me.

“What’s the hurry?” she asked.

“Grandpa’s coming.”

She opened her mouth to ask another question, before Grandpa answered it the easy way, vaulting one-handed over the eight-foot fence and landing on the grass so hard that it seemed to vibrate the ground. I winced. The thump made by his impact meant that we weren’t going to be finding a cockatrice in this yard—the vibrations would have driven it as far away as its wings could take it.

“That’s amazing,” said Shelby.

“That’s engineering,” said Grandpa. He started toward the porch. I moved alongside him, watching the ground for signs that the cockatrice wasn’t as far off as I thought. Nothing moved within my field of vision, and so I turned my attention to the body.

Bill O’Malley had been in his seventies, still the kind of man who could manage his own house, although he’d been using a yard service for the past few years, according to my grandparents. He was lying facedown on the brick of his back porch, one arm straight out in front of him like he was pleading with something. I moved closer, crouching for a better look.

The tips of his fingers were gray.

The door was still open. Looking through into the kitchen, I saw nothing that seemed out of the ordinary or even out of place. He’d probably heard a noise and gone to investigate. There had been no one there to mix a poultice for him. He’d never had a chance.

“Poor bastard,” I murmured, straightening. “Grandpa, do you think you can jump the fence while carrying Mr. O’Malley? I want to examine his body under better light.”

“How invasive?” he asked.

“We won’t be able to put him back.” I felt a pang of guilt at that, and knew I had some sleepless nights ahead. Any family he still had would never know what had happened to him. But I needed to confirm, once and for all, that this was a cockatrice, and that meant a physical examination. This was how we’d save lives. I tried, with only limited success, to put the thought of his grieving family out of my mind.

Sometimes it can be hard to reconcile being a Price and a scientist with being a decent human being.

“What are you going to do with the remains?” asked Grandpa.

“Crunchy.” Alligator turtles are immune to petrifaction, as are all true reptiles. He’d enjoy the meaty bits, and any rocks that wound up in his dinner would just be spat out like so much unwanted roughage.

Grandpa nodded. “All right.” He cast a regretful look at the house. “He was always a good neighbor. Never asked too many questions. I like that in a man.”

“I’m sorry.”

“So am I, Alex. So am I.” With that, Grandpa knelt and scooped Bill O’Malley into his arms. The old man’s face was uncovered in the process, revealing eyes the solid, unwavering gray of granite. Grandpa carried him like he was light as a feather, walking back toward the fence. Shelby and I followed. With no reason to suspect foul play, our footprints would be gone long before the police came to check on Mr. O’Malley. Even Grandpa hadn’t been able to dent the sunbaked Ohio ground.

One by one, we climbed and boosted each other over the fence into our own yard, leaving the dead man’s empty house behind us, lights burning in the windows like signposts, trying to beckon their departed owner home. But he was never coming home again.

Twelve

“I knew Evelyn was the one for me the very first time I met her. She slapped me so hard that my jaw hurt for three days, and all because I’d said that sometimes, werewolves could be dangerous. Love is a painful thing.”