Elliot Stabler had seen many strange things in his time. Several years working for the Manhattan Special Victims Unit had immunized him to many of them; these days, he simply went through the motions of each case. Every once in a while, though, a particular case piqued him and revived in him the reasons he'd taken the job in the first place. This was going to be one of those cases, and he first knew it from the smell.

"Victim?"

"White female in her twenties. More than that we can't tell you. Found naked in the grass over there"–the officer pointed at a large clump of bushes about thirty yards away–"with these on her." She withdrew a large plastic bag containing a few items. Stabler held out his hand for it; she let go of it extremely quickly. He inspected it for a moment, then put it in his own pocket. He'd already made sure they wouldn't call Olivia and wake her up; it was one o'clock on a Saturday night, Fin was probably out, and Munch was easily reachable. He didn't know why he'd taken such pains to make sure his partner slept undisturbed, but he could only muster up the reason that she deserved a rest.

But he had that whole thing about pushing himself too much.

"Elliot?"

"Munch. How is it over there?"

"They don't know what she died of," he replied. "No marks on her. They only found that stuff and a couple of calling cards. Here's one." Munch flicked him a card. "It looks like something I heard about in college. The Order of the Black Rose."

Elliot glanced at the card.

On one side, it had an imprinted image of a fully bloomed black rose with bloody thorns. On the other side was a cryptic message: Magisters beware. Elliot flipped the card and looked at the inside, but there was nothing else there, not even a word.

"Whatever a Magister is, I'd hate to be one right now."

"Should I call Cragen and tell him about it?"

"Good thinking, John. And if Casey isn't there by now, see about waking her up. We may need a court order for records on this stuff."

"You'd think I was your secretary."

"I got bad news for you, John . . . while we're the only two here, you are."

He left Munch looking even sourer than usual and walked down to the grass in time to see the victim wrapped up. Though death had definitely ruined some of her, the girl must have been beautiful in life; he tsked to no one but himself and crouched in the bushes, put on his latex gloves, and looked through the grasses, separating even the individual blades to make sure he hadn't missed anything. But after a few moments, he stood again and drew out the plastic bag with what had been found on the victim. After dropping the card in, he removed two pieces of jewelry; an old ring and a necklace with a Swiss cross as the pendant. Both were silver, and though Elliot was no damned jeweler he could tell they were of good quality. He wondered if the girl had been rich.

"Casey's not too happy with either of us."

"Why?"

"She was asleep." Munch shrugged. "You know, I'm only here because there's no better idea for a fun midnight hour. I imagine our dear ADA gets a lot more sleep."

"Did she agree to a court order?"

"For what, Elliot, the city's Red Squad files? You have to be a little more specific, which is another reason she's not too happy with us. On the other hand, mentioning the card seems to have done the trick on her."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because she told me she knew something about it. Apparently some universities have a chapter of a group called the Order of the Black Rose. It's generally nonviolent, a kind of genteel fraternity – no hazing, that kind of thing – but if they need someone to be humiliated, they usually are. I thought I'd heard of something like that."

"Does this usually happen?"

"Usually the victim's not dead."

"They never got punished?"

"They were rich kids. Their parents would just offer donations to half a dozen good causes to cover it all up. I know very little about it, though, so I'd ask Casey next time I saw her around, if I were you. It seems she's had her brushes with it."

"Hmm. What do you make of the jewelry?"

"Why? Do you want to steal it?"

"Not particularly," Elliot replied, "but now that you mention it . . ."

"I was kidding."

"Sure you were. Anyway, do you think either of the pieces has any significance?"

"Won't know until we talk to Casey. Elliot, damn it, I'm not the encyclopedia. I know you expected a smarter partner on this one, but right now I just feel like going back home and watching teenage slasher movies on television until I pass out from the torture of watching how badly they're made. I'm not in my best condition right now."

"All right, all right, John . . . don't have to get in my face about it."

"You wouldn't listen if I didn't."

Elliot forced himself to admit that that was true and wondered who the hell would have killed this girl. Certainly she wasn't mugged – no blood, no robbery, and the calling card. It all seemed to lead to this Order of the Black Rose and nothing else. He wondered if it would really be so easy to demand records for Order members and begin looking at them, seeing who had known the girl, who had fought with her, behavioral reports . . .

"That was Casey."

"What'd she say?"

"Well, she wants to have a specialist on the Order. As you might think, most of them are the members and former members of the Order itself, which are the fathers of the present membership, so they won't be too keen to give us information. Instead, she's talked to a professor of philosophy at Princeton to come over and help us out."

Elliot waited for the punchline. Sometimes specialists came from everywhere – but a philosophy professor was not high on his list of "People Who Can Help Me Figure Out This Goddamned Murder." On the other hand, Casey wouldn't have called if she did not think the man knew something, a fact of which Elliot was very much aware.

"Who is he?"

"Oliver Priest," Munch replied at once, "but that tells me squat. As far as I know, the only connection he has is that he taught Casey. I hope there's more to it than that."

"I gotta agree with you there, John."

Elliot clapped his temporary partner on the back and walked up towards the bus. He could already tell that this was going to be a very long day.