4

It's a nine-hour drive, and you've researched motels and abandoned buildings starting at Albuquerque in case traffic or trouble leaves you stranded.

Fortunately, traffic is light. You drive east on the 10 and pass the spot where you ditched your Honda CR-X. Idly curious, you spend twenty minutes exploring the abandoned filling station, but the wight is long gone. You wonder if Dove was able to track down her sire.

Julian texts you as you're heading back to your car:

She's going to turn you into a newt when she learns the Eagle's cut her off.

Before you can respond, another text: Get her on our side. Or try to recruit her scholars, scientists, etc. I need good people, and unlike some Usurpers I could name, I don't spit acid at people when I lose my temper.

An hour later, he texts, Learn everything you can about the facility. Collect blood samples if possible. I hear she's captured a witch. I don't believe in witches but check it out anyway.

Twenty minutes later, a final text: I've ruined another of your phones. Drop it off in the bathroom of the next Shell station. Don't destroy the SIM card. There's a replacement under the sink.

Next

A few more minutes up the road, you spot the Shell station. You pull in and do the phone trick again.

Next

A few minutes later, you pass a garage marked with Julian's karambit and make a mental note of its location.

The hard-copy map on your dashboard insists that you're going from one town to the next, but you don't see anything, just the road and distant lights. From the highway, even Albuquerque is just a blur of low buildings and exit ramps. Past Santa Fe, the landscape grows more lush, with scrubby trees lining the highway and the distant hills dotted with green—subtle hues visible to your sensitive eyes.

The drive takes you through lots of towns named after bigger towns. The landscape grows rocky and pale cliffs rise beside the road. You stop at the last all-night gas station to fill your Mitsubishi's tank, then head into a wild and unGoogled landscape that stretches flat all the way to…St. Louis, for all you know. There's no radio out here, so you try to enjoy the sound of the engine, because you don't want anything on your disposable phones.

No trouble, though. No tails. No weird unmarked cars. No circling eagles—for now.

Next

Researching Invidia Caul has been difficult even with Julian's interest in recruiting her. Invidia first popped up in a major New York chantry as the errand girl for a far more powerful member of Clan Tremere. When the Beckoning lured elders to the Middle East and the Second Inquisition destroyed the Tremere's most important chantry in Vienna, she grabbed as many resources as she could and fled into the desert. Like plenty of scholarly Kindred, Dr. Caul dreams of breeding animals with human-quality blood.

You're not sure if she's been successful, but you know that her facility, Kiowa Xenogenetics, has connections to biomedical firms all over the world. Too many connections, in fact—those connections don't exactly represent a breach of the Masquerade, but the whole situation is too close to daylight for Prince Lettow's liking. No wonder he's shutting her down. He'd probably wipe KXG off the map if he could.

She isn't going to like that. And vampires tend to shoot the messenger.

Next