I suddenly thought of Kirsten’s book of magical history. I had seen dozens of other books on witchcraft and witch history at her house, and it occurred to me for the first time that perhaps Dashiell had an equivalent collection. Had anyone truly written about magic or history from the vampires’ perspective? I crossed back to the chronological beginning of the nonfiction section, hunting for anything that looked homemade or cheaply published, or anything with “magic” or “vampire” in the title. I worked my way down the shelves, but it didn’t take long for me to realize that if Dashiell collected rare books, he was keeping them somewhere else—there was nothing here that wouldn’t be in an ordinary library. With nothing better to do, I kept going, anyway—and was rewarded on the second wall with a single piece of brown paper, folded in half, that had been stuck between two books on the shipping trade in the late 1800s. I pulled it out carefully and took it over to the couch, opening it gingerly on the coffee table. I perched on the edge of the couch so I could lean over to examine it.
The paper wasn’t really brown; it was just very old, I realized. I was looking at a large map of the United States that had been crumpled and creased many times, like when you keep consulting the map of Disneyland and then shoving it in your pocket during the rides. The state lines were barely visible, and I squinted at the title at the top of the page. The first few words had been smudged or faded away, so that all I could make out was Cities, 1910. Obviously it was United States cities, but most of the ones pictured were along both coasts, and there were plenty missing, so these had to have some significance. There were light circles drawn around several cities in black ink: Baltimore, New York, Chicago. But the City of Los Angeles, as it was called on the map, had a much darker line of ink circling it several times.
I knew that Dashiell had been turned in 1819 in Great Britain, but I had never really thought about when he’d come to the United States. Was this the map he’d used? And if so, why’d he choose these specific cities? I looked closer, and realized that all the cities that had been highlighted—even the ones that didn’t touch a coast—were on some kind of body of water. Which meant—
“Port cities,” said a voice by the door.
I very nearly fell off the couch. “Thanks, Will. Now I won’t need caffeine again. Ever.”
The alpha werewolf of Los Angeles smiled apologetically and made his way into the room, inside my radius. He paused to take a deep breath, in and out, and then dropped into the armchair next to the table. “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to scare you. Kirsten texted me to let me know where you were, since Dashiell’s out for the day.” He said “out for the day” like Dashiell had run to a business meeting in Santa Barbara or something. Really he was just dead in the basement, however many stories below our feet.
“And you decided to check on me?” I said, keeping my voice even. I was beyond sick of the let’s-protect-Scarlett game.
But Will shook his head. “Not exactly.” He leaned over to look at the map. “Nineteen ten, huh? I think Dashiell immigrated here right around then.”
“That was my guess. But why these cities?”
Will shrugged. “These are vampire cities.”
I looked down at the map, and up at him. “Why?” Then I got it. “Oh. Because vampires had to travel to North America by ship.”
“Well, everyone did back then, but yes. Most vampires still travel by ship, if they have to go long distances. Unless they can afford a private plane, like Dashiell.” He traced a finger along the East Coast cities. “By default, this is also a map of vampire-controlled cities in the US.”
I looked at the browned paper with renewed interest. “Really? Still?”
“Yes. The wolves like medium-sized cities that are close to wild areas—we don’t have much use for the ocean. Actually, we don’t have a lot of use for controlling big cities, period. The cities that are werewolf-run mostly got that way because the local pack was tired of taking shit from the vampires. Or, in a couple of cases, the witches.”
Will had basically just tripled my knowledge of the US Old World scene, and I was momentarily diverted away from finding out why he was there. “Really? There are witch-run cities?”
“Sure.” He shrugged and gave me a conspiratorial grin. “But mostly because the wolves and the vampires didn’t want them anyway,” he stage-whispered.
“Are we the only big city where everyone has a say?” I asked.
“In America, anyway. We’re the only place with regular meetings, with a shared cleanup person, with a trial system to keep the peace. We get away with it because LA is such a joke in the Old World.” He looked up to study my face. “Olivia didn’t tell you any of this stuff?”
I blushed. “Olivia trained me pretty early not to ask too many questions.”
Will sighed and looked away. “What is it?” I asked him. When he didn’t answer right away, I pushed. “Will, if you’re not just checking up on me, why are you here?”
“There’s something you need to know,” he said. He stood up and began pacing a few feet in either direction, staying within my radius. Pacing is a wolf habit, and apparently it didn’t fade even when the werewolf in question was currently human. “I…I owe you quite the apology.”
Eli had told me once that Will felt guilty about how Olivia had treated me, like maybe he could have figured out what she was up to and stopped it. “Will, if this is about how Olivia took me in, it wasn’t your fault.”