License to Ensorcell by Katharine Kerr

smear on her back that was too far from the wounds to be her own blood.”
    “DNA evidence! When will you find out the results?”
    “In a couple of weeks.”
    “Weeks?”
    “Nola, it’s not like the shows on television.” His voice dripped scorn. “These things take time, particularly with a small sample like this. Still, I have hopes it’ll match another sample we have, from the consular official’s apartment.”
    “I hope it doesn’t turn out that the official’s someone else that Pat bit. That’s a joke, by the way. As far as I know, the only person that Pat ever snapped at was the Greenbaum girl. He was too young then to control himself when she startled him.”
    “I see. I hate to admit this, but a pattern’s beginning to emerge here, if, that is, there really is such a thing as werewolves.”
    “Oh, come on, Nathan! Do you really doubt it?”
    “No, I don’t, not anymore. I just don’t like believing it.”
    Three concessions in one day. Somewhere a celestial slot machine was ringing “jackpot!”
    “If Mary Rose bit Johnson,” I said, “things could get real interesting for him.”
    Nathan did the last thing I would have expected from him. He laughed, a real honest laugh instead of his usual morbid chuckle. Since I was busy dodging traffic on the freeway, I had to keep my eyes on the road. When the traffic began to slow down and thicken on the Waldo Grade, I risked a glance at him. That grin of his—I reminded myself to keep from melting and concentrated on the traffic.
    The flow of cars stayed slow all the way through the rainbow tunnel. As soon as we hit the cooler air at the western exit, the traffic began to crawl. Since we had a couple of hours till the evening rush, I wondered if we had an accident ahead, but the electronic “CAUTION” sign on the approach to the Golden Gate Bridge stayed dark.
    “What is that? ” Nathan said suddenly. “Out to sea, up about forty-five degrees from the horizon, in the fog bank.”
    By then we were making five miles an hour because every driver on the highway was gawking at the sky. I could safely look and see a thick gray wave of fog oozing toward the bridge, a perfectly normal phenomenon except for the pair of bright green lights dancing inside it. They behaved in the classic manner of UFOs: flying too fast for normal aircraft, changing direction abruptly, glowing and flashing as if they signaled to someone on the ground.
    “I’ve never seen them in daylight before.” I turned my attention back to the sea of crawling cars ahead. “The fog gives them just enough of a dark background to be visible.”
    “Yes, but what are they?”
    “Chaos lights. I’ll bet the flying saucer people are going to have a field day over them, though. They want to believe in spaceships so badly.”
    Nathan made a strangled noise deep in his throat. I risked a quick glance at him and found the grin replaced by the reproachful stare.
    “I don’t know exactly what they are,” I went on. “No one does, except they’re manifestations of the Chaos principle. What we call matter is mostly empty space, you know. All kinds of things can slip through the cracks.”
    “Is that your idea of an explanation?”
    “As much of one as I can give you and still drive. Weren’t you briefed about my agency’s mission?”
    “Yes, but I didn’t believe it. I suppose I’d better try.”
    The pair of lights whipped around one another, then raced off, heading out to sea. After a few seconds they disappeared in a white flash that turned the fog around them silver.

CHAPTER 4

    AS SOON AS THE CHAOS LIGHTS SHUT themselves off, the traffic picked up speed and began to spread out. I managed to get into the far right lane at last. Just past the toll booth I made the quick turn that leads onto the back road to the Palace of the Legion of Honor and from there to a crosstown route. Instead of choking on the traffic fumes along Park Presidio, you travel through trees and get a nice view of