MONDAY, MAY 1. Sam is away at a final tax meeting with his accountant when Sookie arrives at work. An anti-shifter protester enters the bar, and Sookie tells Kennedy to call the police and then notify Sam. Sookie and the bartender persuade the protester to leave, but to their dismay, there are about thirty other protesters in the parking lot. Police officers Kevin Pryor and Kenya Jones manage to disperse the crowd without incident, and Sam, having parked elsewhere and come in the back, arrives to thank them for their help. Sookie tries to be helpful by suggesting that Sam arrange to talk to the church the protesters attend, but Sam furiously refuses to have to explain who and what he is.

Sookie stops at the grocery store on her way home from work and is aware of the silence that greets her as she shops, knowing that word of the protest at Merlotte’s has already gotten around town. She is disturbed to realize that some of the townspeople support the pending legislation that would restrict the rights of shifters.

Jason picks up Sookie on time for the drive to Shreveport, and they discuss the various suspects in the killing of Basim on their way to Alcide’s house. Jannalynn greets them at the door and escorts them into the living room, where Annabelle is on her knees all alone in the center of the floor. Jannalynn instructs Sookie to go upstairs to Alcide. She finds him in the study waiting for her, and he bluntly tells her that a pack shaman would be able to determine what had happened to Basim. They haven’t had one in four years; she is the closest they’ve got. By drinking a shaman’s potion, she should be able to discern who was involved and their degree of guilt. When she tells him that a year ago he wouldn’t have asked her to do this, he replies that a year ago she wouldn’t have hesitated. Sookie drinks the potion.