Following the events of The Message and Zoological Interlude
Muggle London
A bit after 10 PM

The charming little street in Muggle London had already largely settled for the night, and only a few bright windows still shone along the row of matching townhouses, keeping a sleepy watch on the roadway below. With the lingering quiet, the muted crack that split the night sounded less like the boom of thunder and more like a backfiring automobile, letting out one last muffled protest before giving in to the unobtrusive peace that was falling comfortably over the neighborhood.

It took Kurby a moment to catch himself again, to swallow past the sharp pain that had shot back through his shoulder. Finally straightening, he took a moment to examine the neat row houses in front of him. Aileen Reid had given him her address back in December, when they’d been exchanging letters back and forth about the girls at Grimshaw’s, but he never would have guessed that she lived in a Muggle neighborhood like this. For half a second, he nearly thought he’d gotten the address wrong, but a quick check for wards left no doubt as to which of the small townhouses belonged to a witch.

He hadn’t seen the Runes scholar since New Year’s Day. That had certainly been the result of his own doing, but for all Kurby knew, Reid could have also decided to wash her hands of the mess that he’d dragged her into. There was all manner of things that he was probably interrupting, not the least of which was that Aileen didn’t owe him anything. Since he’d started coming up with excuses to see Oz as infrequently as possible, he didn’t even know if she’d remarried.

But if things were somehow escalating with Lorelei Hunt, then the Reids at least deserved to know about it. And if he were being honest with himself, he didn’t exactly want to keep all of this a secret.

The townhouse looked like most of the others along the road: red brick with white gables. Taking a deep breath, the werewolf hunter carefully unlatched the wrought iron gate, stepped past the shimmer of the initial ward, and made his way through the garden to the front door.

A soft light was glowing in one of the upstairs windows, hinting that someone was still awake. With a tired sigh, Kurby considered his options. If the elder Reid sister was half as paranoid as he was, she wasn’t going to trust a knock on the door, and he somehow doubted that she was used to pebbles rapping on the window as a signal for a visitor.

There was one other easy way to verify his identity, one type of magical messenger that wasn’t easily kept out by wards. Drawing his wand, he thought of visiting friends over the holidays and murmured, “Expecto patronum.”

A moment later, the silvery wolf spider was making its way vertically up the red brick, and Kurby sank down to rest on the stoop, keeping a wary eye on the quiet street behind him.

A lone light still flickered in the window of Aileen's bedroom, where she sat at her desk, penning the last few pages of a report that she intended to owl to one of her colleagues in the morning. Animated photographs, maps, and field survey results were ordered in rows on her desk, and the papers rustled as she lifted each with her wand. Consulting remotely wasn't the same as being there, but it was easy to let the hours slip by, and to convince herself that moving the papers from her study to her bedroom would encourage her to get some sleep at a decent hour.

She would, actually. Her colleagues expected a thorough response, not an immediate one. Though they'd all moved on elsewhere from the haunted tombs in Ireland, the remaining team consisted of those who were too stubborn to run away from a challenge and those who were too young to know when to. Aileen hated to think of how long ago the latter had applied to her, but anyone who kept up with the news about the Hunts could understand why she'd want to stay close to home for a while.

At home, everything was back in order. On one bedside table, she'd stacked several books that had also migrated from the study. On the other, she'd arranged a set of glass perfume bottles, vintage, from Egypt. Her cat, Crabapple, was nested in the center of her bed, and was narrowing her eyes and slow-blinking at Aileen in hello. The music she'd left on in the study drifted faintly up to the room, a soft backdrop to the quiet of her own thoughts.

She was taking a sip of her tea when a patronus crawled in through the window and stood on eight spindly legs.

She stilled, the tea cup to her mouth.

As the gigantic white spider spoke in a familiar wizard's voice, Aileen set the tea cup down. Bagnold? Bagnold was here? She glanced at the clock. Something must have happened. Grimshaw's ghost, Hunt, or another wounded McBoid must have shown up at his door.

Aileen stood, glancing at the window for a moment. He wouldn't bring a problem to her unless he had to, and just as his message suggested, he would have found a roundabout way to visit. She did believe that.

Aileen slipped a letter into her pocket that started with: 'about those bone runes you alluded to...'. She then stepped down the hall, past Abby's old room and to the stairs, where she flicked her wand to turn off the wireless. In the living room, she turned on the light, and started dispelling a row of runes built into the frame of the front door.

Wand at her side, she opened the door. It was dark and quiet out. Bagnold was slumped on the porch step.

She stared at him in concern, stepping forward quickly, and sparing a glance into the darkness of the street.

"Bagnold? Are you alright? Come on in," She gestured him inside and hovered a hand at his elbow, should he need it.

She'd been meaning to reach out to Bagnold, but Nemo with the found flute still worried her, and the information she'd shared about Abby couldn't be unsaid. Her hesitations seemed trivial, now.

As soon as he was inside the house, she set about waving runes over the doorframe again, and gestured at the chair in the living room in case there was any question.

Though the living room was pristine and clean as always, she'd updated a few things since she'd come home, allowing the slightest touch of warmth in mementos from family - her sister, mainly, and a recent photo from Christmas of her two nieces.