by Jim Butcher
“It isn’t going to be very helpful,” Bob said. “I mean, by the time something manifests enough to set off your web, it’s going to be all the way into the real world. While you’re running for the stairs, it’s already going to be tearing into somebody.”
“It isn’t perfect,” I said. “But it’s all I’ve got. Unless you have a better idea?”
“The thing about having several centuries of experience and knowledge at my disposal is that it doesn’t do me any good unless I know what it is you want me to help you fight,” Bob said. “So far, all you know is that you’ve got an inbound phobophage.”
“That’s not specific enough?”
“No!” Bob said. “I can think of about two hundred different kinds of phobophages off the top of my head, and I could probably come up with two hundred more if I took a minute to think about it.”
“That many of them who can do what this thing did? Take a solid form and attack?”
Bob blinked his eyes at me as though he thought me very thick. “Believe it or not, the old ‘take the form of the victim’s worst fear’ routine is pretty much the most common move in the phobophage handbook.”
“Oh. Right.” I shook my head. “But this whole place is open territory. There’s no threshold to use to anchor anything heavier than a web. At least if I do that much, maybe I can get into position fast enough to directly intervene when the thing shows up again.”
“Things,” Bob corrected me. “Plural. Phages are like ants. First one shows up, then two, then a hundred.”
I exhaled. “Crap,” I said. “Maybe we can come at this from a different angle. Is there any way I can redirect them while they’re crossing over? Make it harder for them to get here?”
Bob’s eyelights brightened. “Maybe. Maybe, yes. You might be able to raise a veil over this whole place—from the other side.”
“Urk,” I said. “You’re saying I could hide this place from the phages, but only from the Nevernever?”
“Pretty much,” Bob said. “Even then, it would be a calculated risk.”
“How so?”
“It all depends on how they’re finding this place,” Bob said. “I mean, if these are just naturally arriving phages finding a hunting ground, a veil won’t stop them. It might slow them down, but it won’t stop them.”
“Let’s assume that it isn’t a coincidence,” I said.
“Okay. Assuming that, the next variable is finding out whether they’re being summoned or sent.”
I frowned. “There are things strong enough to send them through from the other side? I didn’t think that ever happened anymore. Hence the popularity of working through mortal summoners.”
“Oh, it’s doable,” Bob assured me. “It just takes a hell of a lot more juice to open the way to the mortal world from the other side.”
I frowned. “How much power are we talking?”
“Big,” Bob assured me. “Like the Erlking, or an archangel, or one of the old gods.”
I got a shivery feeling in my stomach. “A Faerie Queen?”
“Oh, sure. I guess so.” He frowned. “You think this is Faerie work?”
“Something is definitely screwy in elfland,” I said. “More so than normal, I mean.”
Bob made a gulping sound. “Oh. We’re not going to go visiting the faeries or anything, are we?”
“Not if I can help it,” I said. “I wouldn’t take you with me, if it came to that.”
“Oh,” he sighed. “Good.”
“One of these days, you’re gonna have to tell me what you did to make Mab want to kill you.”
“Yeah, sure,” Bob said, in that tone of voice you use while sweeping things under the rug. “But we should also consider the third possibility.”
“A summoner,” I said. “Given that someone actually threw a ward in my way the last time the phage showed up, that seems to be the most likely of the three.”
“I think so, too,” Bob said. “In which case, you’re in trouble.”
I grunted, and started unpacking candles, matches, and my old army-surplus knife. “Why?”
“Without a threshold to build on, you can’t put up any proper defense. And even if you do cross over and set up a veil to try to keep the phages from finding the place…”
“Their summoner is going to draw them in,” I finished, following the line of reasoning. “It’s like…I could blanket the surrounding area in fog, but if they have someone on this end, the phages will have a beacon they can use to home in on the hotel.”
“Right,” Bob said. “And then the summoner just opens the door from his side, and they’re in.”
I frowned and said, “It’s all about finding the summoner, then.”
“Which you can’t do, until they actually summon something,” Bob said.
“Hell’s bells,” I complained. “There’s got to be something we can do to prevent it.”
“Not especially,” Bob said. “Sorry, boss. Until you know more, you can’t do anything but react.”
I scowled. “Dammit. Then it’s the web or nothing. At least if I use that, I might be able to identify the summoner.” At the low, low cost of the phages mauling or killing someone else. Unless…
“Bob,” I said, frowning over the idea. “What if I didn’t try to hide the hotel or keep these things away. What if I, uh…just put a little topspin on the phages on the way in?”
Bob’s eyelights brightened even more. “Ooooooo, classic White Council doctrine. When the phages come through, you point them straight at the guy who summoned them. Give him a dose of his own medicine.”
“Right up the ass,” I confirmed.
“There’s an image,” Bob said. “A summoning suppository.”
“It’s doable, isn’t it?”
“Sure,” Bob said. “I mean, you have everything you need for that. You know the phages are after fear, and that they’re probably using his power as a beacon. Your web tells you something is stirring. You conjure up a big ball of fear, target the same beacon the phages are using, and let it fly.”
“It’ll be like hanging a steak around his neck and throwing him to the lions,” I said, grinning.
“Hail Caesar,” Bob confirmed. “The phages will go right after him.”
“And once he’s out of the game, I veil the hotel from the phages. No more convention attendees get hurt. Bad guy gets a lethal dose of dramatic irony.”
“The good guys win!” Bob cheered. “Or at least you do. You’re still a good guy, right? You know how confusing the whole good-evil concept is for me.”
“I’m thinking about changing it to ‘them’ and ‘us,’ for simplicity’s sake,” I said. “I like this plan. So there’s got to be a catch to it somewhere.”
“True,” Bob admitted. “It’s gonna be a little tricky when it comes to the timing. You won’t be able to sense the beacon until the phages actually step through from the Nevernever and take material form. If you haven’t redirected them by then, it’ll be too late.”
I nodded, frowning. “That gives me what? Maybe twenty seconds?”
“Only if they’re really lame,” Bob said. “Probably ten seconds. Maybe even less.”
I frowned. “Dammit, that’s a small window.” I thought of another problem. “Not only that, but I’ll be shooting blind. There won’t be any way to tell who I’m setting the phages after. What if he’s standing in a crowd?”
“He’s going to be summoning fiends from the netherworld to wreak horror and death on the populace,” Bob pointed out in a patient voice. “That won’t lend itself to blending into a crowd.”
“Good point. He’ll probably be somewhere private, quiet.” I shook my head. “Even so, I’d be a lot happier if this was a little less dicey. But I don’t see any other way to stop these things from hurting anyone else.”
“Until we have more information, I don’t see what else you could do, boss.”
I grunted. “I’d better get this web up and running, then.”
Mouse
’s collar tag clinked against the buckle, and I looked over my shoulder. The dog had lifted his head from the floor, staring intently at the door. A second later, someone knocked.
Mouse hadn’t started growling, and his tail thumped the wall a few times as I went to the door, sounding the all-clear. “That was fast,” I said, opening the door. “I thought you were going to be half an hour, Murph—”
Molly stood in the hallway, an overnight bag hung over her shoulder. She drooped, the way my house plants always used to when I was still optimistic enough to keep buying new ones. Her pink-and-blue hair hung down listlessly, and her cheeks were marked with the remains of several mascara-laden tear tracks. She looked rumpled, tired, uncertain, and lonely.
“Hi,” she said. Her voice wasn’t much more than a whisper.
“Hey,” I told her. “I thought you were waiting for your mom.”
“I was,” she said. “I am. But…I’m kind of messed up.” She waved her hand gingerly at herself. “I wanted to clean up a little, but they won’t let me use the bathroom in Nelson’s room. I was hoping I could borrow yours. Just for a minute.”
It would have been easier to dropkick a puppy than to turn the kid away. “Sure,” I said. “Just keep it quiet. Okay?”
I stepped back into the room, and Molly followed me, pausing to scratch Mouse behind the ears. She looked past me, to the open floor space and the things I had sat out.
“What are you doing?” she asked me.
“Magic,” I said. “What’s it look like I’m doing?”
She smiled a little. “Oh. Right.”
I waved a hand at my materials. “I’m going to try to prevent another attack from hurting anyone.”
“Can you do that?” she asked.
“Maybe,” I said. “I hope so.”
“I can’t believe…I mean, I knew there were things out there, but my friends…Rosie.” Her lower lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears that didn’t quite fall.
I didn’t have much I could say to comfort her. “I’m going to stop it from happening again,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry I didn’t move fast enough the first time.”
She looked down again, and nodded without speaking. She swallowed several times.
“Listen,” I told her quietly. “This is serious stuff. You need to talk about it. Not with me,” I added, as she looked up at me. “With your mom.”
Molly shook her head. “She isn’t—”
“Molly,” I sighed. “Life can be short. And cruel. You saw that last night. You got a look at the kind of thing your dad deals with all the time.”
She didn’t respond.
I said quietly, “Even Knights can die, Molly. Shiro did. It could happen to Michael, too.”
She lifted her head abruptly, staring at me as if in shock.
“How does that make you feel?” I asked.
She chewed on her lip. “Scared.”
“It scares your mom, too. It scares her a lot. She deals with it by holding on hard to the people around her. Maybe too hard, sometimes. That’s why you feel like she’s trying to keep you a little kid. She probably is. But it isn’t because she’s a control freak. It’s because she loves you all so much—you, your dad, your family—and she’s frightened that something bad could happen. She’s desperate to do everything she can to keep you all safe.”
Molly didn’t look up or respond.
“Life is short,” I said. “Too short to waste it on stupid arguments. I’m not saying your mom is perfect, because God knows she isn’t. But my God, Molly, you’ve got the kind of family people like me would kill for. You think they’ll always be there later—but they might not be. Life doesn’t give you any guarantees.”
I let that sink in for a minute, and then said, “I promised your dad that I’d ask you to talk to her. I told him I’d do my best to get the two of you to work things out.”
She looked up at me, crying now, silently. More dark makeup trailed down her cheeks.
“Will you sit down with her, Molly? Talk?”
She took a shaking breath and said, “I don’t know if it will do any good. We’ve said so much….”
“I can’t force you to do it. No one can do that but you.”
She sniffled for a moment. “It won’t do any good.”
“I don’t expect miracles. Just try to talk to her. Please.”
She took a breath, and then nodded, once.
“Thank you,” I said.
She tried to smile once, and hovered outside the bathroom door for a moment more.
“Molly?” I asked. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, but she didn’t move, either.
I frowned. “Something you want to say?”
She looked up at me for just a second. “No,” she said then, and shook her head. “No, it’s nothing, really. Thank you. I won’t be long.” She stepped into the bathroom, shut the door, and locked it. The shower started a moment later.
“Wow,” Bob said from behind me, somehow inserting a leer into the word. “I didn’t realize you liked them quite that…fresh, Harry.”
I glared at him. “What?”
“Did you see the body on her? Magnificent rack! Blond Nordic babe-age, but all pierced and dressed in black, which means she’s probably into at least one kind of kink. And all tender and emotional and vulnerable to boot. Taking her clothes off right here in your room.”
“Kink? You don’t—look, there’s no way to…” I sputtered. “No, Bob. Just no. For crying out loud. She’s seventeen.”
“Better move quick, then,” Bob said. “Before anything starts to droop. Taste of perfection while you can, that’s what I always say.”
“Bob!”
“What?” he said.
“That isn’t how things are.”
“Not now,” Bob said. “But you go get in that shower with her and you’ve got your own personal cable TV erotic movie come true.”
I rubbed at the bridge of my nose. “Hell’s bells. The whole idea is wrong, Bob. Just…wrong.”
“Harry, even a nerd should know that it’s no coincidence when a girl shows up at a man’s hotel room. You know all she really wants is to—”
“Bob,” I snapped, cutting him off. “Even if she wanted to, which she doesn’t, nothing is happening with the girl. I’m trying to work, here. You aren’t helping.”
“I’d hate to disrupt your most recent attempt to court death and agony,” he said brightly. “You should stick me somewhere else, where I won’t distract you. On the counter in the bathroom, for example.”
I slapped open one of the empty dresser drawers and tossed the skull in there, instead. Bob sputtered a few muffled curses in ancient Greek, something about sheep and a skin rash.
I looked up from the drawer into the room’s mirror, and found myself facing not my reflection, but Lasciel’s image instead, angelic and lovely and poised. “The perverted little creep has a point, my host,” she said.
I jabbed a finger at the mirror and said, “Bob is my little creep, and the only one who gets to call him names is me. Now go away.”
“Ah,” Lasciel said, and the image faded to translucence, my own reflection appearing to replace it. “Fascinating, though,” she added, just before vanishing, “that boyfriend Nelson bears quite the striking physical resemblance to you.”
Then she was gone. Dammit. Stupid demons. Always with the last word.
Worse, she had a point. I eyed the bathroom door and reviewed the past day or so, and my interactions with the girl before that. I had always been someone her father respected and her mother disapproved of. I showed up once in a blue moon in a big black coat, usually looking roughed-up and dangerous, and I’d been doing so since she was young enough to be very impressionable. Hell, when you got right down to it, Charity’s disapproval alone might have been enough to make me seem interesting to a rebellious teenage girl.
I came to the reluctant conclusion that it was possible Molly might have certain ideas in her head. It might
well explain the most recent awkward silences and halting pauses. She’d always liked me, and it wasn’t outrageous to think that it might have developed into something more—and that I’d be a right bastard to do anything that might encourage those ideas, even inadvertently. Maybe Bob and Lasciel were wrong, and in fact nothing like that was going on, but the passions of youth, its attractions and desires, were a minefield one took lightly at one’s own peril.
Magnificent rack notwithstanding, Molly was still, in every important way, a child—my friend’s child, to boot. She was hurting. It bothered me, and I wanted to help her, but I had to be aware of the fact that my sympathy could be misinterpreted. The kid had issues and she needed someone to help her work things out. She didn’t need someone who would only make her more confused.
Steam curled out from under the bathroom door. An actual hot shower. Not merely the illusion of one.
I shook my head and got back to the detection web.
As spells went, this one was pretty big, but it wasn’t complicated. I’d created a long-term version of the same basic working in the neighborhood around my apartment, in order to detect approaching mystical entities. The one I wanted for the hotel was the same thing, but I didn’t have to bother with setting it up as a long-term construct. A sunrise, or two at most, would erode the spell, but with any luck I wouldn’t need it for any longer.
I took the Play-Doh in hand, grabbed three candles in their own wooden holders, poured the sand in a circle around me, and began gathering in my power, painstakingly creating mental images of the web of energy I needed to weave between the points of the hotel I’d marked out with Play-Doh. It didn’t take me a terribly long time to set it up. Anyone with some basic skills and desire enough could have done something like this—or at least, they could have done it on a smaller scale. Weaving a web throughout the whole building took a lot of heavy lifting, magically speaking, but it wasn’t complicated, and fifteen minutes later I solidified the image of the energy patterns in my mind, and whispered, “Magius, orbius, spiritus oculus.”
I poured my will and my magic out with the words as I spoke them, and my body briefly lit up with a flood of tingling energy that raced along all of my limbs, down into the lump of Play-Doh, and swirled in tight spirals around the three candles that would serve as my ward-flames. The spell’s energy flashed, appearing as a tiny stream of faint flickers, like bursts of static electricity, and the candles each flickered to life, steady little flames born of the spell. I broke the circle of sand as I spoke, and the power blossomed out through the hotel, into the shape I’d imagined, invisible strands flickering into instant shape, like ice crystals forming in the space of a heartbeat, spreading unseen strands throughout the hotel.
