Page 117 of Roguefinder

Jesse pulled a card from his pocket and slid it toward Stefanos. “The Fae woman delivered this. By crow.”

Stefanos picked it up and examined it.

“Abigail Skinner,” Jesse said. “She wore a glamour at Carlo’s orgy.”

Stefanos lowered the card. “That’s her human alias. She’s the Morrigan.” He looked at me. “A very powerful Fae.”

“Is she really a lawyer?” I asked. Maybe Undersomm really did suck if she’d gone to law school to get out of it.

“Yes,” Stefanos said. “And one of the few Umbrals whose identity we know. She controls the crows. Her eyes are as old as battlefields.”

Not a battlefield, like the kind Jesse wrote about. Just…battlefields. All of them, ever.

I sat back, my head spinning a little. “Crows have been following us since we got to Rome.”

“No,” Jesse said. “Since London. We saw them outside Moray Tower.”

Stefanos studied the business card. “She watched you both and didn’t interfere. We can’t be certain where she stands. But it’s clear to me that Carlo didn’t know who she was. The Council believes some Umbrals oppose Donn’s faction.”

“So she’s an ally?” I asked.

“Impossible to say,” Stefanos said. “But we don’t want her as an enemy.”

Emile shifted in his chair and muttered in French. But I understood the word “cigarette.”

Stefanos focused on me. “There is something else, Caleb, and it’s the most important part of this tangled equation.”

My gut tightened. “What?”

“The Council has never been able to understand how Ulfrik turned you without also turning you rogue. You should never have been stable. You shouldn’t have a gift. But you do, and now I think we know why.”

An axe formed above my head. The other shoe dangled in the air, waiting to drop. Any number of expressions I’d never mastered in my English composition class hovered.

“Donn?” I asked. The mystery Fae was the only thing I could think of.

Stefanos nodded. “Alessia said Donn gave Carlo blood. But Carlo was already harvesting werewolf blood to sell. The Council believes Donn gave Carlo Fae blood and ordered him to inject it into Ulfrik. Perhaps others. We don’t know for sure.”

Jesse reached his good hand over and clasped my fingers. “You think Ulfrik had Fae blood and passed it on to Caleb?”

I waited for Stefanos to laugh and wave him off. Instead, he nodded. “It sounds like an enormous leap in logic until you remember that Caleb shouldn’t have mastered his shift. But he did. He doesn’t smell like a rogue. He has a powerful, unprecedented gift that continues to grow.”

My heart pounded. My fingers were all sweaty in Jesse’s, but he didn’t move his hand. Just hung onto me, keeping me steady.

Stefanos’s dark eyes held mine. “Some part of you is Fae, Caleb. Created, not born. It’s the only explanation that makes sense. You are an accident that was never supposed to happen.”

The kitchen was silent. Behind me, the refrigerator hummed quietly, oblivious to the bomb Stefanos had just dropped in the middle of the kitchen table.

“Whose blood is it?” I asked. “Donn’s?” Absurd, wild laughter tried to rise in my throat. Was Donn my new dad? How did that work? Would I spend Wednesdays and every other weekend in Undersomm?

“We don’t know,” Stefanos said. “Fae blood of any lineage would be potent beyond measure. Whether Donn gave Carlo his own, or…” He shrugged.

Cool. Cool, cool, cool. Totally shrug-worthy.

Emile drummed his fingers on the table. “How did Ulfrik get to New York? The rogues I’ve killed have all been”—he made the most stereotypical French gesture ever—“ravenous zombies.”

Zombeez. My inappropriate laughter bubbled higher. I was absolutely going to lose my shit in front of Stefanos and the sandwiches.

“Fae blood,” Jesse said. “According to Alessia, the blood Donn provided made Ulfrik stronger. She said he was still there underneath.”