a chemical analysis on it?” Lucy looked horrified.
“Only a very small piece from the core of the page. We inserted a microscopic probe into the edge.
You can’t see the hole it made—not even with a magnifying glass,” Matthew assured her.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Lucy said.
“That’s because Professor Clairmont developed the technology, and he hasn’t shared it with the rest of the class.” Chris cast a disapproving look at Matthew. “But we’re going to change that, aren’t we, Matthew?”
“Apparently,” said Matthew.
Miriam shrugged. “Give it up, Matthew. We’ve used it for years to remove DNA from all sorts of soft tissue samples. It’s time somebody else had fun with it,” she said.
“We’ll leave the page to you, Scully.” Chris inclined his head toward the other end of the lab in a clear request for a conversation.
“Can I touch it?” Lucy asked, her eyes glued to the page.
“Of course. It’s survived all these years, after all,” Matthew said. “Mulder, Scully, can you help Ms.
Meriweather? Let us know when you’re ready to leave, Lucy, and we’ll get you back to work.”
Based on Lucy’s avid expression, we had plenty of time to talk.
“What is it?” I asked Chris. Now that we were away from his students, Chris looked as if he had bad news.
“If we’re going to learn anything more about blood rage, we need more data,” Chris said. “And before you say anything, Miriam, I’m not criticizing what you and Matthew have managed to figure out.
It’s as good as it could possibly be, given that most of your DNA samples come from the long dead—or the undead. But DNA deteriorates over time. And we need to develop the genetic maps for daemons and witches and sequence their genomes if we want to reach accurate conclusions about what makes you distinct.”
“So we get more data,” I said, relieved. “I thought this was serious.”
“It is,” Matthew said grimly. “One of the reasons the genetic maps for witches and daemons are less complete is that I had no good way to acquire DNA samples from living donors. Amira and Hamish were happy to volunteer theirs, of course, as were some of the regulars at Amira’s yoga classes at the Old Lodge.”
“But if you were to ask for samples from a broader cross section of creatures, you’d have to answer their questions about how the material was going to be used.” Now I understood.
“We’ve got another problem,” Chris said. “We simply don’t have enough DNA from Matthew’s bloodline to establish a pedigree that can tell us how blood rage is inherited. There are samples from Matthew, his mother, and Marcus Whitmore—that’s all.”
“Why not send Marcus to New Orleans?” Miriam asked Matthew.
“What’s in New Orleans?” Chris asked sharply.
“Marcus’s children,” Gallowglass said.
“Whitmore has children?” Chris looked at Matthew incredulously. “How many?”
“A fair few,” Gallowglass said, cocking his head to the side. “Grandchildren, too. And Mad Myra’s got more than her fair share of blood rage, doesn’t she? You’d be wanting her DNA, for sure.”
Chris thumped a lab bench, the rack of empty test tubes rattling like bones.
“Goddamn it, Matthew! You told me you had no other living offspring. I’ve been wasting my time with results based on DNA and three family samples while your grandchildren and great-grandchildren are running up and down Bourbon Street?”
“I didn’t want to bother Marcus,” Matthew said shortly. “He has other concerns.”
“Like what? Another psychotic brother? There’s been nothing on the Bad Seed’s video feed for weeks, but that’s not going to continue indefinitely. When Benjamin pops up again, we’ll need more than predictive modeling and hunches to outsmart him!” Chris exclaimed.
“Calm down, Chris,” Miriam said, putting a hand on his arm. “The vampire genome already includes better data than either the witch or the daemon genome.”
“But it’s still shaky in places,” Chris argued, “especially now that we’re looking at the junk DNA. I need more witch, daemon, and vampire DNA—stat.”
“Game Boy, Xbox, and Daisy all volunteered to be swabbed,” Miriam said. “It violates modern research protocols, but I don’t think it’s an insurmountable problem provided you’re transparent about it later, Chris.”
“Xbox mentioned a club on Crown Street where the daemons hang out.” Chris wiped at his tired eyes. “I’ll go down and recruit some volunteers.”
“You can’t go there. You’ll stick out as a human—and a professor,” Miriam said firmly. “I’ll do it.
I’m far scarier.”
“Only after dark.” Chris shot her a slow smile.
“Good idea, Miriam,” I said hastily. I wanted no further information about what Miriam was like when the sun went down.