Page 11 of Quest of the Wolf

“Their willingness to imbibe substances that require illegally acquired ingredients did disturb me.”

“Yeah, that’s why I hate them too. Do you have anything that could help me find Duncan? He’s…”

Rue arched her eyebrows.

“I owe him,” I said to stave off further suggestions that we were mates. “I want to make sure he’s okay.”

“I see.” Rue headed for a shelf lined with books and tiny jars of colorful liquids. “I do have numerous recipes for location potions.”

I rubbed my eyes, the pungent haze making them water, and thought about stepping outside, but if she could truly help…

“I believe all of them require cells from the body of the being one wishes to locate.”

“Cells?”

“Yes, a physical manifestation of the person’s essence.” Rue pulled down a thick tome with yellowed pages, the binding loose. Very slight magic emanated from it. An enchantment to keep it from falling apart with time, perhaps.

“So, more than their scent, such as would be used for tracking?”

“Correct. I would need something from the body.”

“A hound could sniff a T-shirt he’d worn.”

“Should the services of a four-leggedanimalbe what you required, you would not have come to my door.” Rue sniffed and opened the tome, the binding creaking.

“True.” Besides, I could have turned into my wolf form to track someone if I’d thought that would work. But days had passed since Duncan’s disappearance outside my cousin’s burned-down home, and it had rained since then. There wouldn’t be much of a trail. Even if there had been, tracking someone twenty miles through the suburbs wasn’t easy, and if he’d gotten into a car at any point…

“Here is a tried-and-true formula.” Rue rested a finger midway down a page near the front. The text had been handwritten whoknew how many years—centuries?—ago. “I have many of these ingredients and could acquire most of the others.”

“Is rabbit spleen one of them?”

“It is not, but the same supplier could get most of these.” Rue looked at me. “If I were properly compensated.”

I sighed and checked my phone to see if Jasmine had called or texted yet. Thus far, herfatherhadn’t asked for compensation when researching things. But no new messages had popped up.

“I’m willing to pay a fair price,” I said.

“I would also, as I said, need some of his cells. Not very many. If you’ve had intercourse recently, I might be able to take a sample of his essence from your vagina.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “Hisessenceisn’t in there. Even if it were, I bathe frequently to clean my body of sweat, grime, and other people’s cell samples.”

“Unfortunate.” Rue lifted the page to show me the recipe, though it wasn’t written in English. “This mentions that blood, saliva, semen, or excrement would do.”

Excrement? Ew.

“I can let you into Duncan’s van,” I said. “Maybe something in there would work. If you want, you can swab the inside of his composting toilet.”

Her lip curled. “That… could be sufficient. However unglamorous. I do charge extra for travel.”

“The van is in the parking lot.” I pointed in its direction, the lot only fifty yards away.

“I chargeextrafor travel,” Rue said firmly.

Since swabbing a toilet might be involved, I decided not to object. “Okay.”

Rue set the book aside, plucked a small leather kit out of a drawer, and gestured for me to lead.

Outside, rain pattered on the concrete-aggregate walkways and the asphalt parking lot. One of the landscaping lights along theway was burned out, and I made a mental note to change the bulb in the morning. I’d finished my maintenance to-do list before my sword-fighting lesson, but new duties came up every day here.

---