They came out of the hospital, which was sleeping in an enchanted sleep. Brannon gave his mask to the sergeant on duty on the porch, explained what had happened, and ordered all the windows in the building to be opened. Redfern stood silently beside him, eyes downcast, and only glanced at the commissar from time to time. Nathan felt his piercing, gaze every time - as if the pyromaniac was touching by his hand. After giving orders, the Commissar walked to the hospital gates, lost in thought about this woman, and did not immediately realize that Redfern was following him.
"What do you want?" Brennon asked genially, feeling faintly grateful at last. The pyromaniac stared into his face, and his gaze became surprised, and tense, and confused.
"How do you do it?" Redfern asked.
"What?" Brannon went to the department: business was not waiting.
"This," the pyromaniac did not lag behind and kept trying to look into Nathan's face as he walked. "What have you done with her? Why did she tell you everything?"
"It's called interrogating a suspect."
"This is not an interrogation!" Redfern exclaimed. "I know what an interrogation is, I was interrogated, and I interrogated!"
"I can imagine," Brannon chuckled. "Tell the truth, or I'll cut off your fingers."
To his amazement, the pyromaniac blushed. Well, not like a tomato - pale red stripes appeared on his cheekbones.
"How else?" he said with annoyance. "If you need to achieve recognition?"
"I don't need to achieve recognition. I need to they tell the truth. And when a person speaks, he blurts out."
"And you talk to them?" Redfern asked incredulously.
"Yep."
"Do you talk to everyone like this?"
"Why? With each in its own way."
"But she wanted to kill Margaret! Killed nine girls! Or maybe the devil knows how much more!"
"I know," Brannon said calmly. "I also know why. Do you feel the difference? To know that someone has killed and to know why makes the difference. You just need to know who, and you immediately lay out a fire. And I need to know why in order to report in court."
"In a court!" the pyromaniac snorted with deepest contempt.
"It's called justice. Equal for everyone. Got it?"
For a while, the pyromaniac walked silently beside him, looking down and thinking. Brannon could smell the wheels spinning in his head.
"But she won't get equal justice," Peggy's mentor said unexpectedly, and looked up at the Commissar. "You understand that she will never be condemned for being a necromancer, gathered a necromorph and wanted to rip the soul out of Margaret's body in order to put her daughter in her place. They just won't believe you."
The commissar slowed down. That's it! That was what "indwelling" meant, about which he was about to ask Longsdale.
"She will be convicted of nine murders and kidnapping and hanged."
The pyromaniac grabbed him by the shoulder, and Brennon nearly jumped back.
"Is that enough for you?" Redfern asked; The commissar involuntarily flinched at this look - burning, concentrated: it seemed that the pyromaniac was trying to look directly into his soul.
"You would have burned her. Alive in the square."
"Burn her?" The pyromaniac leaned forward and his nose almost brushed the Commissar's nose. "Ask me," he whispered unexpectedly. "You have never asked - who I am, and what I am, and why I need... ask me, you are asking well!" his muffled voice became demanding and passionate. "Ask me, come on!"
Brennon moved away carefully.
"Not immediately," he said, shaking off the bewitching effect of that fanatical gaze. "At least not on the street."
The incisive smile crossed the pyromaniac's face.
"What, in the interrogation room? Call the witch for help again?"
Brannon looked at him thoughtfully.
"Have you been beaten so often to get an answer that you have lost the habit of normal conversation?"
Redfern's grin faded, and his lips and teeth clenched until the muscles in his cheekbones stood out. Brennon expected a vicious taunt, but the pyromaniac's face suddenly changed again.
"You really had no idea what she would do to me?" He asked, unexpectedly softly. The commissar sighed heavily and walked over to the cab he saw at the corner to go to the department.
"No," he grunted. "I'm sorry. I didn't consider. That is, it flew out of my head. Why the hell were you rummaging around my crime scene?"
"At your crime scene?" Redfern cried with a laugh. "Oh, how lovely!" and deftly jumped into the cab. Before Brannon had time to be indignant, the pyromaniac purred: "But I never answer when the answers are pulled out by force, remember this, and everyone who tried paid."
The Commissar realized with grief that Redfern would not leave behind.
"What do you want?" Nathan asked meekly. On the other hand, this is a good chance to get some careless confession out of the pyromaniac. But what a bad time it is! The Commissar's mind was still occupied by Pauline Defoe, and when the pyromaniac leaned towards him and whispered, "Come on, ask!" - Nathan felt rather irritated. The cabman whistled loudly, smacked his lips, and the horse dragged the cab through the thick February mud.
Besides, the trump cards must be laid out carefully, Brennon thought. He had two of them: Jen's words about the pyromaniac's kinship with Longsdale and what Valentina said about the portal's effect on Redfern.
"When did you come here?" The Commissar asked.
"What? No!" Redfern exclaimed with a laugh. "It's not that!"
"I'll ask you about what I need and how I need it," Nathan said with deliberation. The pyromaniac pursed his lips, sniffed angrily. "You either answer or leave."
"You talk to me not like that," Redfern whispered. "I do not evoke your sympathy?"
"Should you?"
The pyromaniac pulled away, dark eyes glittering from the depths of the cab at the commissar.
"You have human eyes," Nathan said. "Or are you pretending?"
"You can identify evil spirits and undead by the eyes," Redfern replied with a measure of admiration that surprised Brennon, "but you don't guess who I am?"
"No. Tell me," the commissar said indifferently and leaned back in his seat. The pyromaniac paused, stroking his cane, and then suddenly pulled out of its sheath the blade flashed green.
"I am the one who creates this all," Redfern said simply. "All these consultants' tools, amulets, weapons, potions, ingredients, mixtures. Everything they need."
"You?!" Brennon choked on air. If the cab suddenly collapsed into the underworld, he would not be so shocked. Of all the things that came to mind, the last thing he thought about that the pyromaniac was... that he was... Redfern sheathed the blade and pulled out a wallet, and from the wallet there was a letter.
"See? This is an order for a consignment of amulets from the enchantment of compulsion."
The Commissar snatched the piece of paper from him. Everything matched, down to the number of amulets and the date.
"But this is..." Nathan squeezed out, lost. "So much time it takes..."
"I have a long life," Redfern said coldly. Suddenly he tore the paper from the commissar's fingers, crumpled it up, threw it away, and jerked forward: "Only this is not enough!"
"Why?" Brennon asked; the dark eyes opposite lit up with an insane, fanatical glow.
"Because these creatures are legions! You only touched the edge, saw a tiny part - but you don't even know, in a nightmare you won't be able to see how many of them are crawling on our land! How many undead are waiting for us in the dark, how many evil spirits are gnawing their way from the other side - and how many..." Redfern gasped. His face was pale, spots burned on his cheekbones, his fingers clenched convulsively on the commissar's hand.
"How many scum and scumbags appeal to them every day! Unwittingly or on purpose, they drag them here, and the more such Edmoor crashs there are, the more plague barracks, where thousands of people died in torment... plague barracks!" the pyromaniac grabbed Brannon's shoulder: "Do you know what the hell was going on in them?! Have you ever seen how the cry of these unfortunates finally splits the sky above your head, and then... then... you see with your own eyes what you cannot imagine even in the Hell!"
"What did you see?" The Commissar asked quietly.
"Portal," Angel whispered, his gaze as if turned back to the past. "A funnel over this damned island, and it's me... me... oh God, if only I knew!"
"Did you open it?"
"No man can open such a thing," Redfern replied almost inaudibly. Brennon could feel the small tremors of his hands and such a rapid beating of his pulse, as if the veins were about to break through the skin. "Ten thousand, my God! Ten thousand dying in agony, plagued, barely infected and healthy, guilty only of kinship with the sick..."
"Oh my God," the Commissar muttered. The cab finally stopped, and the cabman impatiently banged the handle of the whip on the wall. "Calm down!" Brennon snapped, and the knocking stopped.
"Because there aren't enough consultants," Angel whispered. "Too few! We need something else..."
"What else?" Nathan asked, already fearing that Redfern was delirious.
"Organization," the pyromaniac unexpectedly clearly, though barely audible. "Not loners, but the army. Those who know who can be trained... people."
"Yeah," Brennon concluded. The shadow of fanatical flame flickered in Angel's dark, damp eyes, under half-lowered eyelids, and he suddenly gripped the Commissar's hand tenaciously. The grip was like a tiger's.
"That's why I need you," Angel said. His eyes, in which all his life and strength were concentrated, were burning like coals on a deathly pale face. "You will gather me an army."
***
The commissar sat in his office in deep stupor and stared blankly at the pile of reports. Entering the department, he told the officer on duty to gather the detectives and the police in the conference room, mechanically brought the news of the case to their attention, mechanically gave out instructions and, without leaving prostration, wrote for Broyd a short report on the interrogation of Pauline Dafoe. Now, sitting over a stack of reports by Byrne, Gallagher, and Kennedy trainees, Nathan felt like he was about to fall into the coma. He had already taken a glass of whiskey, but did not notice the drug effect. Probably need a barrel.
"But Peggy talks to him almost every day!" the commissar thought with horror. How?! The pyromaniac managed to bring him to insanity in a matter of minutes, but what happens with regular communication?!
Brannon didn't have time to ask him a single question. Having destroyed his world view, the pyromaniac sat near the Commissar for a minute, opened the door and was gone. Judging by the cabman's scream, he didn't pay. When the Commissar was able to move and climbed out, only traces of Redfern remained in the dirty mess. Nathan did not pursue him. He wanted to be among the normal for a little while. Even if they are not really human.
Still, something did not allow Brannon to tell that the pyromaniac was completely crazy. Anyway, Nathan now knew why Angel behaved like the fairies from the hill, about which his grandmother told him, emphasizing that they were all slightly insane. Hardly anyone who has experienced something like this will keep their brain intact.
Frowning, the Commissar pushed the reports aside. Something like this... the picture finally began to converge, although the consultant still did not fit into it.
But leaving him aside, Brannon thought, it's pretty clear.
If, as Valentina had said, Angel had suffered the impact of the spontaneously opening portal, Nathan now knew how it happened. That is... the Commissar tried to put things in order and realized that he was rushing about clarity. Island? Which island? Ten thousand plague patients? Oh, my God, when was all this?! Brennon knew of rare outbreaks of plague, but ten thousand...
"A long time ago," the Commissar clasped his head in his hands. "A very long life," the pyromaniac said; and how long, damn it?! How old is he? How much is needed to create everything that Redfern talked about - after all, before doing it, you must first find out what and how to use, and against whom, and first samples, then production...
"Factory production of amulets against undead," Nathan thought longingly. "Mother of God!" and reached for the whiskey.
It didn't get any easier. How is Longsdale related to this? A relative of Redfern, um... maybe the consultant, having learned what happened to the relative, introduced him to the rest of the hunters? And Redfern (by no means a fool) adapted into it and began improve the system? The only thing that scratched Nathan in this well-made version was the words of the pyromaniac " You will gather me an army." Me! For him personally, or what? Does not look like. Nathan had seen such fanatically believing fighters for the idea in his youth, even before the army - one continued to preach about the freedom of Riada (then still Kantamor, the province of the Deir Empire), already standing under the gallows. Then why "me"?
"And why me?" Brennon sighed heavily and rubbed his wrist. Look, grabbed! The bruises have already appeared. But, damn it, Longsdale doesn't remember anything about himself! Maybe it's Redfern found and recognized him? Then why does he shy away from Longsdale? Maybe they had a fight, and the pyromaniac in the heat of the discussion did something, why is Longsdale now so strange?
Maybe, Brannon decided. After all, he did not see other consultants and did not know what they were. Maybe his idea that someone makes them out of ordinary people is wrong? The witch immediately doubted in it. In the end, who are you need to be to think of such a thing!
Brennon finally found peace in his perturbed soul, closed his flask and stuffed it under the papers in a drawer. Why the hell did the pyromaniac decide that the Commissar would become the ideal recruiter - for Nathan it remained a mystery, and now he did not want to think about it. He finally took the records of the interns Kennedy had sent to rummage through the archives. To the credit of the suckers, they worked conscientiously. Brennon already concentrated on reading when the attendant timidly scratched at the door, and reported:
"Mister and Missis Sheridan are here."
***
Margaret lowered her book and thought. Angel left her a whole stack, bookmarking how much she should read before his return, but the girl's thoughts wandered far from the basics of alchemical formulas. She thought about Mr. Longsdale.
What Angel had told her explained a lot. If, as a result of the process of becoming a hunter, a person loses memory, then... then... then why go through it at all?! Margaret shivered. She would never agree! Not for anything! But since Mr. Longsdale agreed, it means that the other one is the man he used to be. And this man... and what he agreed to sacrifice... Oh, if she only knew then! The very thought of what sacrifice this man made caused Margaret an infinite tenderness for him.
"But he hasn't disappeared," Miss Sheridan frowned. "He's still here. Why? Did something go wrong? Or is Angel wrong about something?"
He was so desperate to get through! This man wanted to return, Margaret felt, knew - he looked at her with such longing in those fractions of a second that he had!
"Maybe Angel can help him? If he knows about the process, then he can probably figure out how to convert it - well, or at least bring back his memories."
She felt uncomfortable. She couldn't think of both Mr. Longsdale and Angel at the same time — the feelings she had for the two of them (at the same time!) embarrassed her. Although she had never been bothered by how many young men lost their heads in her presence at a time. Perhaps because they didn't evoke anything in her like what she felt about Angel or that man inside Longsdale.
"Margaret?" it was heard outside the door. "May I come in?"
"Yes, yes, of course!" the girl responded nervously, grabbing the book. But when Angel entered, Margaret instantly forgot about alchemy and cried out in dismay:
"My God, what's wrong with you?! Are you unwell?"
The mentor sat on the edge of the bed and hunched over. He was tired and pale, without a frock coat, waistcoat and even without a tie, and it flashed in the girl's head for a moment that this was indecent - but anxiety instantly displaced all this nonsense.
"What happened?" Miss Sheridan asked, touching his arm.
"I told your uncle," Redfern muttered indistinctly.
"About what?"
"About the undead, that there are not enough consultants, that..." Angel sighed intermittently and told her everything. "It's hard," he finished deafly. "It's hard to talk about it."
"Why?" The girl asked affectionately.
"I don't know, it's just hard. It's hard to talk about the things that I have always thought about alone for so many years," Angel took her hand and pressed it to his chest; the rapid pounding of his heart echoed in Margaret's palm. "They are always with me, these thoughts, but I'm not used to sharing them with anyone, because... because... who would listen?" he sighed. "I'm not even sure that your uncle understood why I suddenly trusted him..." Angel rubbed his forehead. "I do not fully understand why he."
"Well, uncle knows how to inspire confidence. Besides, you said that you watched him and therefore considered him appropriate."
Margaret thought. In general, of course, telling a sober-minded police Commissar what Redfern thinks he is suitable for is not a test for the weak.
Angel kicked off his shoes, climbed onto the bed and stretched out on the covers. Miss Sheridan, embarrassedly wrapped in her shawl, leaned back on the pillows, pulled the covers up. How else to explain to a mentor that his behavior is simply awfully obscene?
"But you would still have to tell him if you want to involve him in your organization. Moreover, so far no one but you is in it."
"Yes," Angel muttered. "Of course... that is, how else would he know, right?" and laid his head on Margaret's shoulder. As if it should be! But she couldn't push him now...
"How did he take it?"
"I don't know, I left."
"He ran away," Margaret thought, and something inside whispered: "To me." But the girl tried to quickly drown out the shameful feeling of smug superiority. The fluffy curls on the back of Angel's head tickled her neck, and it was pleasant and very, very indecent. Margaret was absolutely sure that she should have immediately stopped such an outrage, indignant, as it should be for a virtuous girl, and... and... but it's pleasant!
"Stay with me," Redfern said suddenly.
"What?"
"Stay with me," he repeated, "here in my house."
"But I cannot!" Margaret exclaimed in dismay. She suddenly very acutely realized that Angel was lying on her, pressing her by his weight to the bed, his head bent on her shoulder, and they were separated only by a blanket.
"But why?" the mentor got up, leaning on his elbows, and loomed over her. "Like my student! You wanted to!"
"What about my mom and dad? And my brothers? What will I tell them? Or do you think that I will leave them silently, just staying here?"
Angel sat down.
"Mom and Dad," he muttered. "Do you love them so much?"
"Yes," the girl said in amazement. "Didn't you love your own?"
"No," Angel replied.
"Why?!" Margaret almost blurted out, but she bit her lip. His tone ruled out further inquiries. He turned away, and Miss Sheridan began to persuade him kindly, like an offended child:
"Angel, now you want me to stay, but living under one roof all the time and meeting from time to time are not the same thing at all. Thank you, I am grateful to you, but your impulse will pass, and then what?"
"Impulse?" He asked bitterly. "Do you think I'm doing something because I have an impulse? Do you think I am six years old?"
"Angel, you must understand that I will not be able to come home if... because a girl who goes to live with a man without marriage is a fallen girl. Do you really not understand?"
"I see. A stain on your honor, the good name of your family, the condemnation of neighbors and society."
"Well, you understand."
"And you want it?" Angel asked sharply. "Still? Marry some degenerate, give him a brood of children, watch out for servants, gossip with all sorts of idiots..."
"No," Margaret said and suddenly realized that it was true. "No, I do not want. I don't want to get married," she repeated slowly, in order to realize even more clearly this sudden truth. Such a life suddenly seemed to her an unbearable prison, and the suitors! Oh! At the mere thought that someone else's hand would touch her in the same way as the hand of Angel or the consultant, the girl winced in disgust.
"So what's the deal?" The tempter asked quietly. "You already know that life is not limited by the walls of the living room and baby diapers. There are thousands of possibilities, especially for you! So why don't you want to get to them? Why are you so attracted to your cage? Stay with me, Margaret, and I promise you that..."
"I can't," Margaret whispered, trembling at the fact that such freedom was suddenly so close. "I can't, really! I don't know how..." but mom and dad! And brothers! And all that life with family, with friends, with her uncles and aunts, and cousins, cousins, and... and...
"Child," Angel said and kissed her forehead tenderly. "You are still quite a child."
The girl squeezed his hand.
"But you still have to choose, do you understand, child?"
"Yes," she whispered, "but I can't yet...���
But what will happen to her if she stays at home?..
"Okay," Angel said suddenly in a completely different tone. "Get up, get dressed, I'll go out so as not to hurt your modesty - and get down to business."
"What?" Miss Sheridan blinked, not keeping pace with the change of topic.
"A trap for the necromancer. Your uncle still harbors illusions about who he contacted. It is time to save him from the consequences of this delusion."
***
The conversation with his sister was not easy for Brannon. She demanded that her daughter be returned to her - and Nathan had no idea where Peg was now. The Commissar could not tell Martha that it was better for her daughter to stay there for the time being, since Redfern at least would not tear her soul out of her in order to instill the deceased in the vacated place. Joseph tried to calm his wife's ardor, but as he left, he quietly asked if Nathan could give him his word that Peggy was fine. And worst of all, Brannon gave that word.
To console himself, the Commissar went down to the morgue. He carried with him a memo from Gallagher and some of the descriptions of the unidentified deceased. The students had already left, and Kennedy was studying their autopsy reports alone.
"Ah, here you are, young man," the pathologist said amiably and wiped the stool opposite the table with a rag. "Sit down, sit down!"
Brannon put the folders in front of the old man.
"These are the unidentified corpses that best match the body parts you described used by the necromancer. It looks like she was working here for three months, and we did not notice anything. What does this say about us?"
Kennedy took off his pince-nez and stared shrewdly at the Commissar with clear, bright blue eyes.
"From a medical point of view, this suggests that a dismembered corpse is easier to hide and more difficult to identify. In addition, parts decompose faster than the whole. Therefore, your sensitive conscience can calm down."
"They were looking for them," the commissar muttered. "Someone was looking for these girls, but we didn't even notice..."
"Do you know that the madness is progressing? Perhaps at first, she hid the bodies more carefully, and then, as the disease progressed, she began to attach less importance to this. What is more surprising," the old man continued after a pause, "is that this is a woman."
"Her name is Pauline Defoe. She was with her daughter Marie Noel and her husband, a surgeon, on the Edmoor train at the time of the crash." Brannon tossed Gallagher's report over the folders. "They went to a medical conference on the continent."
"Pauline Defoe?" Kennedy repeated in surprise. "Pauline Defoe?! Oh Lord, this is how a woman's training ends in a job to which nature has not adapted them!"
"What are you speaking about?"
"She assisted her husband," the pathologist explained. "The first female surgeon in the country! No joke. Crowds of people flocked to their joint operations, like to circus performances. And that's how it ended. You cannot force nature! Women are inherently incapable of mastering such a difficult and terrible profession. No wonder the poor thing went crazy. This is not for a woman's mind."
"I think she went crazy because her only daughter died in the Edmoor crash," Brannon said. "Not because her husband taught her surgical tricks. You said yourself that she sews perfectly."
Kennedy snorted and muttered:
"But I would not advise you to turn to her now."
"Well, what to do with her? Some kind of brain surgery can neutralize her?"
"Neutralize? What are you speaking about? My God, do you believe in this nonsense about the fact that she is a witch and by force of will forced people to serve her?!"
"She's not a witch," the Commissar said. "If you had seen a real witch, you would never have confused them."
"Oh," the old man sighed. "I will not argue. At heart, you are still a superstitious peasant. But try giving her some sedatives. They relax and immerse her in a drowsy state. Some scientific psychiatrists believe that this relieves the pressure that the patient's psyche is experiencing."
"Yep," Nathan said with grim skepticism.
"Sir!" it echoed in the corridor, and the Commissar with some joy recognized the voice of the witch. "Sir, are you there?"
"Here!" Brannon indicated, and Jen ran into the morgue.
"Look what I found at her place," the girl said without preamble, and laid a velvet blue box on the table. Brannon opened it and tensed. Inside were six golden glass balls, almost exactly like those in which Jason Moore the Strangler had imprisoned the souls. Maybe smaller.
"They're empty," Jen said. "But completely ready. Longsdale has already found a suitable ritual."
"Young people!" the representative of science raised his voice. "If you continue to discuss this heresy in my morgue, then I will use a scalpel and a saw!"
The witch gibingly grinned. Brannon slammed the box shut.
"Okay, one last question and we'll leave," he said conciliatorily. "Do you remember the recent massive outbreaks of plague? Ten thousand victims?"
The pathologist thoughtfully bit his pince-nez chain.
"I remember the flash in Imperial Dartsworth. It claimed two thousand lives, and that was in eight hundred and thirty-one. But ten... where did it happen?"
"I don't know," Nathan sighed. "That's why I ask."
"I can ask my colleagues at the medical faculty."
"I will be grateful. Come on," the commissar nodded to the witch fidgeting with impatience.
"What happened?" she whispered, as soon as the morgue door closed.
"I had a frank conversation with the pyromaniac. He mentioned the plague, and... what is it?" Brennon asked in surprise when he saw the attendant rolling down the stairs almost head over heels. He looked dazed and unhappy.
"Maniac, sir!" He blurted out. "The maniac ran away!"