Prologue

Celaeno looked down on the blocked street and squinted her eyes against the flashing red and blue lights of the police cars. A gust of wind blew toward her and she was bombarded with the scent of blood. She grimaced when her stomach growled in complaint. It was the scent of blood that had attracted her here in the first place. Celaeno took the sharp nail of her index finger and made a scratch on the building’s stone ledge.

A car that was admitted entrance to the crime scene caught her attention. Two men stepped out. One was portly with graying hair. The other: lean, dark haired, and looked fresh out of college. She focused on the younger man intensely and felt his emotions tingle around her. Tiredness, grim annoyance. These two men were the lucky detectives to get this gruesome case.

Celaeno sighed. Humans couldn’t leave well enough alone.

Chapter 1

Alex got out of the car first, followed by his partner, Travis Bunker. A policeman approached them.

“Detective Greyson, Detective Bunker. This one is…bad.”

If this hardened police officer standing before them said it was bad, then it was worse. Being that it was close to two in the morning, didn’t make it any better. Alex and Travis trudged over to the body.

A cold feeling spread through Alex’s body. It was a feeling of indifference, and he was glad for it. The body lay on the cement in two pieces. The blood was still fresh, still oozing from the body. He heard a sharp intake of breath to his left and turned to see Travis with his eyes closed taking a few deep breaths. Alex left him to it and walked over to another police officer.

“Did he have any I.D.?”

The officer turned towards him, then looked at the body, and grimaced. “No, but from what’s left of his clothes we figured he had a well paying job.”

Alex nodded in agreement with her and went back to see how Travis was doing. He was crouched, inspecting the body and watched a few drops of blood fall from the piece of spine sticking out. He gulped and stood up.

“Any I.D.?”

Alex shook his head. “No, but he may be rich.”

Travis looked again at the shredded material that had once been clothes. “Yeah.”

“Is it a full moon tonight?”

Travis gave his partner an odd look. “No, why?”

“Because it might explain this mess.”

Getting the joke, Travis smiled grimly. “Yeah, then we could pass this off to Animal Control.”

The detectives decided to split up, each taking one side of the street to see if they could find any witnesses. So far, all Alex had managed to get was an old man saying that he had heard something heavy moving around on the street, but his next door neighbors couldn’t confirm anything. Alex gritted his teeth while he walked past apartments and alleys to meet Travis at the crime scene.

A movement in one of the alleys caught his eye. His gun was out and in hand pointing at a girl. Her long black coat nearly made her invisible in the darkness, but the silver loops tracking along her ears made her face stand out. Her black hair was pulled away from her face with a tie. A few wisps of bangs framed her face. She began walking towards him, hands out showing she had no weapons.

When they were only a few feet apart, he told her to stop, which she did. He put his gun back in his holster and walked the rest of the way towards her.

“I’m going to pat you down now to make sure you don’t have any weapons, okay?”

She nodded and he gave her a quick frisk. This case was bad enough without adding crazy gun/knife wielding hobos to the mix. Although this girl, who looked around his age, didn’t seem to be a hobo by the way she was dressed. He still wasn’t about to take any chances.

Alex finally turned to face her and saw in the better light that she had violet eyes. “What’s your name?” If she was a potential witness, some name would be helpful.

“Celaeno.” The name was delivered with a calm, smooth voice.

He waited for a last name, and waited and waited... “Do you have a last name?”

She smiled at him, as if sharing in a joke. “No.”

He narrowed his eyes in annoyance. “Come, it’s three in the morning, I have a body torn in half, and I’m tired. Give me a name!”

“Tateton.”

Alex took out a small hand-held notebook. The second most important tool an investigator will use. The first being a gun.

“Okay, Celaeno Tateton.” He said, as he wrote it out.

“No.”

He looked up at her. “‘No,’ what?”

“No. Tateton is not my last name.”

Alex gritted his teeth; she was still smiling at him. “Then why the Hell did you give me that name?”

Celaeno’s eyes gleamed as she said, “Tateton was his name.”

Alex looked at her with narrowed eyes. “His name…”

A shout split the air and Alex turned sharply. Travis was walking across the street to meet him.

“You find anything?”

Alex nodded, “Yeah, this girl here, told me --”

“What girl?” Travis looked confused.

Alex whipped back around to find Celaeno, the violet-eyed girl, gone from sight. Alex jammed his teeth together once again, wanting, wishing desperately that he could yell or, at least, hit something. He had a body that looked like it had been attacked by a cannon ball, an old guy that might have been hearing things, and a girl with violet eyes and a strange name that liked to play disappearing acts and mind games!

He lifted the hand that was holding his pen and started to massage the bridge of his nose.

Travis looked at him expectantly, “Um…Alex?”

Alex groaned out, “What?”

“What girl?”

He looked back up and into his concerned partner’s eyes. “Let’s go back to the crime scene, I’ll tell you what I found on the way.”

Alex was checking out the body once again. Travis was talking to their lieutenant asking if he wanted them to do anything more tonight. Alex was quite sure Travis didn’t believe what he had said about the girl. They both agreed to wait for any feedback on the names “Celaeno” and “Tateton” before either one would jump to conclusions.

Alex turned his green-blue eyes back to where the head was and felt the goose bumps track up his arms as he stared at the exposed skull and brain matter. He looked away from that half and moved down to the others, but as he scanned across the cement he found a peculiar pattern in the blood. He lifted up his head and found who he was looking for.

“Hey, you!”

The crime scene investigator turned around, “What?”

“Come over here for a minute.” When she was standing next to him, he pointed out the pattern to her. “What do you think of this?”

“We’ve been trying to figure that out ourselves. It was measured and samples and pictures were taken so we’ll tell you if we find something.”

Alex thanked her and walked back to the car where Travis was waiting. The man was playing with the radio when he got in.

“I’m getting old.”

Alex looked sideways at his partner’s graying hair and the lines tracing his round worn face. The suit he wore was a little frayed and the tie was faded blue. His brown shoes were scuffed with creases marring the tops and sides. Travis Bunker was going to retire soon. This was to be his last case.

Alex was sad at the thought of it, “All the more reason to spend the rest of your days with your family.”

The sixty your old man had a wife who worked as a nurse at the local hospital and had two kids. One had taken four years of college; the other was graduating from high school.

Travis sighed, “Yeah.”

Alex drove him home, because his car was in the shop for repairs. Travis promised him it was only for tonight. Alex didn’t care, that’s what partners were for.