by Jim Butcher
I pushed away from the door as silently as I could, trembling with adrenaline, fatigue, and cold. I had to think ahead of these assholes if I wanted to get out in one piece. Inky, Binky, and Pinky knew I’d come in here, and they weren’t about to give up the chase. Right now one of them was watching the door I’d come in to make sure I didn’t backtrack. The other two were circling the building, looking for a way in.
I was pretty sure I didn’t want to be hanging around when they found it.
I drew off the pentacle amulet I wore around my neck, murmured, and made a tiny effort of will. The amulet began to glow with gentle blue light.
I stood in a utility corridor of some kind. Bare concrete floor met unpainted drywall. There were a couple of doors on the right side of the hall, and another one at the far end. I checked them out. The first door opened into a room containing several commercial-grade heating and air-conditioning units, all hooked up to a ductwork octopus. No help there.
The next room was padlocked shut. I felt a little bad for doing it, but I lifted my staff, took a moment to close my eyes and concentrate, and then sent another pulse of energy down the rune-carved length of wood, this time focused into a blade of pure force. It sliced through the hasp and bit into the heavy wood of the door behind it. The lock fell to the floor, its cleanly severed steel glowing dull orange at the edges.
The room beyond was probably the workshop of the building’s handyman. It wasn’t large, but it was neatly organized. It held a woodworking bench, tools, and various supplies—lightbulbs, air filters for the units next door, replacement parts for doors, sinks, and toilets. I availed myself of a few things and dropped my last two twenties onto the workbench by way of apology. Then I stalked back out into the hallway and continued into the building.
The next door was locked, too. I jimmied it open with the crowbar I’d taken from the tool room. It made some noise.
A deep-throated bawl of animal sound came from the far side of the metal door. Something slammed against it, but not hard enough to bring it down, and the sound was followed by an immediate yowl of pain. I bared my teeth in a grin.
The far side of the door opened onto the lobby of an office building, very sparse. A light was blinking on a panel with a keypad on it, next to the door I’d just forced open. Apparently I had triggered the building’s security system. That was fine by me. The nearest police station was only a little more than a block from here, and the lights and the appearance of mortal police officers would probably make the gruffs fade and wait for a better moment to settle my hash.
But wait. If the building had a security system, I had to have tripped it when I came in the side door, and that had been a couple of minutes ago. Why hadn’t the cops shown up already?
The weather, most likely. Travel would be slow. Lines would be down, causing all kinds of power and communication problems. There would be traffic accidents everywhere there was traffic, and in the wake of all the manpower diverted to Marcone’s wrecked building, the station would be overloaded with work, even this late at night. It might take several minutes longer than usual for the police to respond.
A shadow moved outside the building’s front door, and one of the gruffs appeared there.
I didn’t have minutes.
I was moving before I had consciously recognized the fact, running for the elevators. The steel security gate inside the door would prevent the gruff from crashing through the glass to come at me, but that didn’t stop the gruff from lifting its submachine gun and opening up on me.
The gun sounded like heavy canvas ripping, only a thousand times louder. The window shattered and glass flew everywhere. Some of the bullets struck the security gate, throwing off sparks, most of them shattering, a couple bouncing wildly around the lobby. The rest came at me.
I had my left hand stretched out toward the gruff as I ran, and my will was focused on the bracelet on my wrist. Made of a braid of many metals, the chain of the bracelet was hung with multiple charms in the shape of medieval shields. The power of my will rushed into the bracelet, focused by the enchantments I’d laid upon it when I had prepared it. My will coalesced into a concave dome of barely visible blue energy between me and the gruff, and bullets slammed against it, shattering in bursts of light that rippled over the surface of the energy shield like tiny waves in a still pond.
All three of the elevator doors stood open, and I rushed into the nearest and rapidly hit the buttons for every floor up to the top of the building. Then I leapt out, repeated the process in the second elevator, and then jumped into the third and headed straight for the top. No sense in making it easy for the gruffs to follow me up, and even a moment’s delay might buy me the time I needed.
The elevator doors closed—then buzzed and sprang open again.
“Oh, come on!” I shouted, and hit the close-door button hard enough to hurt my thumb.
I growled and watched as the elevator twitched closed again, and then once more sprang open, a sad little ding emerging from a half-functioning bell. I was jabbing the button like a lunatic when the gruffs demonstrated their opinion of mortal security systems.
Sure, the touch of metal was anathema to the beings of Faerie. Sure, they couldn’t hammer their way through a metal door or bash through a heavy metal gate.
Brick walls, on the other hand, presented fewer problems.
There was a thunder crack of sound, and the wall beside the front door exploded inward. I don’t mean it fell in. It literally exploded as the momentum of a superhumanly powerful being struck the wall from the far side and shattered it. Bits of brick flew like bullets. A ceramic pot holding a plastic plant shattered. Several pieces zipped into the elevator and bounced around inside of it. A cloud of brick dust billowed through the lobby.
The gruff who had just one-upped the Big Bad Wolf bulled its way through the cloud, curling ram’s horns first. It staggered a step or two, shaking its head, then focused on me and let out another bleating howl.
“Augh!” I screamed at the elevator, jabbing the button. “Close, close, close!”
It did. The car began rising just as the stunned gruff brought his weapon to bear and opened up. Bullets ripped through the relatively flimsy metal of the elevator’s door, but my shield bracelet was ready and none of them found their target—who let out a howling, adrenaline-drunken laugh of defiance as the elevator rose.
What they say is true: There’s nothing as exhilarating as being shot at and missed. When the shooter happens to be a fairy-tale hit man, it just adds to the zest.
Fourteen floors later I emerged into a darkened hallway and, guided by the light of my upraised amulet, I found the door to the roof. It was an exterior door with a heavy dead bolt, and there was no way that the crowbar was going to get it open.
I took a step back, lifted my staff, and focused my will on the door. Once upon a time I would have just let fly with my will and blasted it right out of its frame, a fairly exhausting bit of spellcraft. Instead I pointed the end of the staff at the bottommost hinge on this side and barked, “Forzare!”
A blade of unseen energy, like that I had used on the padlock, severed the hinge with a miniature crack of thunder. I did it for the middle and lower hinges too, then used the crowbar to pry the heavy door out of its setting and hurried out onto the roof.
There was a lot of wind up this high, even though the night was fairly calm. The towers of the city could funnel even a mild breeze into a virtual gale, and tonight this rooftop was on the receiving end. The wind ripped my coat out to one side, and I had to lean against it. At least there wasn’t much snow—except where a portion of architecture created a lee against the wind. There it was piled deep.
It took me a second to orient. When you’re fourteen floors up, it gives you an alien perspective of streets and buildings that might otherwise be familiar. I figured out which side of the building I’d come in on and hurried to it, searching for the escape route I’d spotted on the way in.
It wasn’t the fire esca
pes, which decorated two sides of the building in a weathered steel framework. Those things are noisy as hell, and the gruffs would be watching them. Instead I leaned out over the edge and looked at the niche in the brick wall. It ran the entire vertical length of the building, a groove about three feet wide and two feet deep. There was one on either side of each corner of the building, probably there for the aesthetic value, rising like a three-walled chimney from the ground to the roof.
My breath went a little short. Fourteen floors is a much longer way down than it is up, especially when you aren’t using things like elevators and fire escapes. Especially when I noted the frost and ice forming on the building’s exterior.
I took a moment to debate the sanity of this plan. I’d cut the odds in my favor, assuming there were only three gruffs after me this time. One would have to watch the elevators. Another would have to watch the fire escape. That left only one to actively pursue me. I didn’t know how fast the gruff would get to the roof, but I had no doubt that he’d manage it in short order.
The idea of simply pushing the gruff off the roof with a blast of power had a certain appeal, but I decided against it. A fourteen-story drop might just piss the gruff off—and it would absolutely confirm my location. Better to slip away and leave them wondering if I was still hiding in the building.
So I climbed out onto the ledge amidst gusting winds. My nose and fingers went numb almost immediately. I tried to ignore them as I lowered my legs into the groove in the wall and braced my feet against the bricks on either side. Then, my heart pounding madly, I shifted my hips and wriggled a bit, until the outward pressure of my legs against the bricks was the only thing that kept me from kissing sidewalk. Once my arms were low enough, I was able to spread them and plant my forearms against the bricks as well, assisting my legs.
I cannot possibly explain to you how frightened I was, staring down. The swirling snow kept me from seeing the ground at times. Once I started there would be no going back. One slip, one miscalculation, one inconveniently placed patch of ice, and I would be able to add “pancake” to my impersonation repertoire.
I pushed hard with my arms and let my legs loosen. I slid them down a few inches and tightened them again, until they supported my weight once more. Then I loosened my arms and slid down a few inches before stopping, tightening my arms again and repeating the process.
I started climbing down, shifting my legs and arms in turn, five or six inches at a time, moving down the brick groove inchworm style. I made it about ten feet before an image invaded my mind: a gruff, aiming his gun down at me from a couple of feet away and casually popping several rounds through the top of my head.
I started climbing faster, my stomach turning with reaction to the height and the fear. I heard myself making desperate little grunting sounds. The wind howled, blowing snow into my eyes. Frost formed on my eyelashes. My coat did little to protect me from the wind swirling the length of my body, and I started shaking uncontrollably.
I lost the staff when I was about fifty feet up. It tumbled from my numbing fingers, and I held my breath. The rattle of its impact could attract the gruffs’ attention and ruin the whole purpose of taking the madman route off the building.
But the solid length of oak fell into a drift of snow and vanished silently into the white powder. I labored to emulate it, only less quickly.
I didn’t slip until I was ten feet up. I managed to take the fall well, mostly because I landed in the same snowdrift that had received my staff. I struggled up out of the freezing white, and almost went back down when my staff tangled in my legs. I took it up in mostly nerveless hands and staggered out of the drift.
A sphere of light whipped past the other end of the alley, then reappeared and shot toward me.
Toot-toot’s face was unusually sober, even grim. He zipped up to me and held a finger to his lips. I nodded at him and mouthed, I need to know how to get out.
Toot’s sphere of light bobbed once in acknowledgment and then sped away. I looked up. Other balls of glowing light darted about the skies, flickers that you would barely even notice if you didn’t know what to look for. I took a precaution while I waited.
As before, I didn’t wait long. Toot returned a moment later and beckoned me. He took the lead and I followed him. I was getting colder. The fall into the drift had covered me in a light layer of snow, which had then melted. Wet clothes are exactly the worst thing to be wearing in that kind of weather. I had to keep moving. Hypothermia isn’t as dramatic a death as being ripped apart by bullets, but it’ll get the job done.
When I got to the far end of the alley, I heard another bleating cry from a gruff, drifting on the moaning wind, softened by the falling snow. I glanced back and just barely saw motion as a gruff descended the side of the building the same way I had—though much more swiftly.
A second later there was an agonized, inhuman scream as the gruff got to the bottom and discovered that the snow had hidden the box of nails that I had stolen from the tool room and spread liberally over the ground. The screams went on for several seconds. One of the nails must have pierced the gruff ’s hoof, and as tired and cold as I was, I still had energy enough to grin. That one wasn’t going to be dancing in elf circles anytime soon.
I’d lamed two of them, and figured it would be enough to make them back off the chase, at least for the moment. But you never can tell. I wasted no time in following Toot through back alleys and away from the chosen emissaries of Summer. Around me the little glowing Christmas balls of light, the Za-Lord’s Guard, darted back and forth, a wary ring of sentinels spread in a perimeter that moved as I did.
Several blocks away I found an all-night grocery store and staggered in out of the cold. The clerk glared at me until I hobbled over, clumsily dug change out of my pockets, and left it next to the cash register before shuffling to the coffee counter. At that point the clerk evidently decided that he wouldn’t have to get out the shotgun or whatever he had behind the counter, and went back to staring out the window.
There were a few other shoppers there, and I saw a police car crunch through the snow on the street outside, probably responding to the alarm at the building. Nice and public. Probably safe. I was so cold I could barely fill up the cup. The coffee, which burned my tongue a little, was absolutely delicious, even served black. I guzzled the hot drink and felt sensation begin returning to my body.
I stood there for a moment with my eyes closed and finished the coffee. Then I crushed the paper cup and tossed it into the trash.
Someone had snatched John Marcone, and I had to find him and protect him. I had a feeling that Murphy wasn’t going to be thrilled with the circumstances around this one. Hell’s bells, I wasn’t happy with it. But that really wasn’t what was bothering me.
What really worried me was that Mab had been involved.
What was the deal with having Grimalkin along to do her talking for her? Aside from making her seem even more extremely disturbing than usual, I mean. Oh, sure, Mab may have seemed fairly straightforward, but there was a lot more going on than she was saying.
For example: Mab had said that Summer’s hit men were after me because Mab had chosen me to be her Emissary. But for that to be true, she had to have done it hours ago, at least a little while before the first crew of gruffs had attacked me at the Carpenter place.
And that had happened several hours before the bad guys grabbed Marcone.
Someone was running a game, all right. Someone was keeping secrets.
I had a bad feeling that if I didn’t find out who, why, and how, Mab would toss me into the trash like a used paper cup.
Right after she crushed me, of course.
Chapter Eight
A wide-axled, full-of-itself, military-wannabe truck crunched through the snowy streets and came to a halt outside the little grocery store. The lights glared in through the doors. I squinted at it. After a minute the Hummer’s horn blared in two short beeps.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,�
� I muttered. I hobbled to the door and out to the truck, which blended seamlessly with the background and the foreground, and with most of the air.
The driver-side window rolled down and revealed a young man whom fathers of teenage daughters would shoot on sight. He had pale skin and deep grey eyes. His dark, slightly curly hair was long enough to declare casual rebellion, and tousled to careless perfection. He wore a black leather jacket and a white shirt, both of them more expensive than any two pieces of furniture at my apartment. In marked contrast, there was a scarf inexpertly crocheted from thick white yarn around his neck, under the collar of the jacket. He faced straight ahead, so that I saw only his profile, but I felt confident that he was smirking on the other side of his face, too.
“Thomas,” I said. “A lesser man than me would hate you.”
He grinned. “There’s someone lesser than you?” He rolled his eyes to me on the last word, to deadpan the delivery, and his face froze in an expression of absolute neutrality. He stayed that way for a few seconds. “Empty night, Harry. You look like…”
“Ten miles of bad road?”
He forced a smile onto his mouth, but that was as far as it went. “I was going to go with ‘a raccoon.’”
“Gee. Thanks.”
“Get in.”
He took the monorail to the other side of the Hummer’s cab to unlock the passenger-side door. I showed up eventually, and noticed every little ache in my body on the way—especially the throbbing burn centered on my broken nose. I tossed my staff into the back of Das Truck, half expecting an echoing clatter when it landed. I got in, shut the door, and put on my seat belt while Thomas got the truck moving. He peered carefully into the heavy snow, presumably looking for some runty little sedans he could drive over for fun.
“That’s gotta hurt,” he said after a moment.
“Only when I exhale,” I said testily. “What took you so long?”
