by Jim Butcher
“No. It’s me. If I was something out of the Nevernever, could I have crossed your threshold uninvited? Do you know anyone else who knows how you set up your wards?”
“Anyone could figure it out eventually,” I said.
“All right. Does anyone else know that you failed your driver’s test five times in one week? Or that you sprained your shoulder trying to impress me going out for football our freshman year? That we soulgazed on our first night together? I think I can still remember our locker combination, if you like.”
“My God, Elaine.” I shook my head. Elaine, alive. My brain could not wrap itself around the idea. “Why didn’t you contact me?”
I saw her, dimly, lean against the wall. She was quiet for a while, as though she had to shape her words carefully. “At first because I didn’t even know if you had survived. And after that . . .” She shook her head. “I wasn’t sure I wanted to. Wasn’t sure you’d want me to. So much happened.”
My shock and disbelief faded before a sudden aching pain, and an old, old anger. “That’s putting it mildly,” I said. “You tried to destroy me.”
“No,” she said. “God, no, Harry. You don’t understand. I never wanted that.”
My voice gained a hard edge. “Which is why you hit me with that binding. Why you held me down while Justin tried to destroy me.”
“He never wanted you dead—”
“No, he just wanted to break into my head. Wanted to control me. Make me into some kind of . . . of . . .” Words failed me in the face of my frustration.
“Thrall,” Elaine said quietly. “He’d have wrapped you in enough spells to guarantee your loyalty. To make you his thrall.”
“And that’s worse than dead. And youhelped him.”
Her voice crackled with anger of its own. “Yes, Harry. I helped him. That’s what thrallsdo .”
My rising ire abruptly quieted. “What . . . what are you saying?”
I saw her dim shape bow its head. “Justin caught me about two weeks before he sent that demon to capture you. That day I stayed home sick, remember? By the time you got home from school, he had me. I tried to fight him, but I was a child. I didn’t have enough experience to resist him. And after he had enthralled me, I didn’t see why I should fight anymore.”
I stared at her for a long minute. “So you’re telling me that you didn’t have any choice,” I breathed. “He forced you to do it. He made you help him.”
“Yes.”
“Why the hell should I believe you?”
“I don’t expect you to.”
I rose and paced back and forth restlessly. “I can’t believe you’re trying to tell me that the devil made you do it. Do you have any idea how lame that excuse sounds?”
Elaine watched me carefully, her grey eyes pensive and sad. “It wasn’t an excuse, Harry. Nothing can excuse the kind of pain I put you through.”
I stopped and frowned at her. “Then why are you telling me?”
“Because it needs to be said,” she murmured. “Because that’s what happened. You deserve to know that.”
It was quiet for a long time, then I asked, “He really had enthralled you?”
Elaine shivered and nodded.
“What was it like?”
She fretted at her lower lip. “I didn’t know it was happening. Not at the time. I didn’t have the ability to think clearly. Justin told me that you just needed to be shown what to do and that if I would hold you still long enough to let him explain things to you it would all work out. I believed him. Trusted him.” She shook her head. “I never wanted to hurt you, Harry. Never. I’m sorry.”
I sat down and rubbed my face with my hands, my emotions running high and out of control again. Without the anger to support me, all that was left inside was pain. I thought I had gotten over Elaine’s loss, her betrayal. I thought I had forgotten it and moved on. I was wrong. The wounds burst open again, as painful as they had ever been. Maybe more so. I had to fight to control my breathing, my tone.
I had loved her. I wanted very badly to believe her.
“I . . . I looked for you,” I said quietly. “In fire and water. I had spirits combing the Earth for any trace of you. Hoping that you’d survived.”
She pushed away from the wall and walked to the fireplace. I heard her putting in wood, and then she murmured something soft and low. Flame licked up over the logs easily, smoothly, low and blue, then settled into a dark golden light. I watched her profile as she stared down at the fire. “I got out of the house before you and Justin were finished,” she said finally. “His spells had begun to unravel, and I was struggling against them. Confused, terrified. I must have run. I don’t even remember doing it.”
“But where have you been?” I asked. “Elaine, I looked for you for years. Years.”
“Where you couldn’t have found me, Harry. You or anyone else. I found sanctuary. A place to hide. But there was a price, and that’s why I’m here.” She looked up at me, and though her features were calm and smooth, I could see the fear in her eyes, hear it coloring her voice. “I’m in trouble.”
My answer came out at once. For me, chivalry isn’t dead; it’s an involuntary reflex. It could have been any woman asking for help, and I’d have said the same thing. It might have taken me a second or two longer, but I would have. For Elaine, there was no need to think about it for even that long. “I’ll help.”
Her shoulders sagged and she nodded, pressing her lips together and bowing her head. “Thank you. Thank you, Harry. I hate doing this, I hate bringing this to you after all this time. But I don’t know where else to turn.”
“No,” I said, “it’s all right. Really. What’s going on? Why do you think you’re in trouble? What do you mean, you’re paying a price?”
“It’s complicated,” she said. “But the short version is that I was granted asylum by the Summer Court of the Sidhe.”
My stomach dropped about twenty feet.
“I built up a debt to Titania, the Summer Queen, in exchange for her protection. And now it’s time to pay it off.” She took a deep breath. “There’s been a murder within the realms of the Sidhe.”
I rubbed at my eyes. “And Titania wants you to be her Emissary. She wants you to find the killer and prove that the Winter Court is to blame. She told you that you would be contacted tonight by Mab’s Emissary, but she didn’t tell you who it was going to be.”
Elaine’s eyes widened in shock, and she fell silent. We stared at one another for a long moment before she whispered, “Stars and stones.” She pushed her hair back from her face with one hand, in what I knew to be a nervous gesture, even if it didn’t look it. “Harry, if I don’t succeed, if I don’t fulfill my debt to her, I’m . . . it’s going to be very bad for me.”
“Hooboy,” I muttered, “tell me about it. Mab’s more or less got me over the same barrel.”
Elaine swore quietly. “What are we going to do?”
“Uh,” I said.
She looked at me expectantly.
I scowled. “I’m thinking, I’m thinking. Uh.”
She rose and took a few long-legged strides across the living room and back, agitated. “There must be something . . . some way out of this. God, sometimes their sense of humor makes me sick. Mab and Titania are laughing right now.”
If I’d had the energy, I’d have been pacing, too. I closed my eyes and tried to think. If I didn’t succeed on Mab’s behalf, she wouldn’t grant rights of passage to the Council. The Council would judge that I had failed my trial, and they’d wrap me up and deliver me to the vampires. I didn’t know the specifics of Elaine’s situation, but I doubted she had a deal that was any less fatal. My head hurt.
Elaine continued pacing, exasperated. “Come on, Harry. What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that if this dilemma grows any more horns I’m going to shoot it and put it up on the wall.”
“I know this will never sink into your head, but this isn’t a time for jokes. We need to come up wit
h something.”
“Okay. I’ve got it,” I said. “Get your stuff and come with me.”
Elaine reached back to the shadows beside the fireplace and withdrew a slender staff of pale wood, carved with swirling, abstract shapes. “Where are we going?”
I pushed myself up. “To talk to the Council and get their help.”
Elaine lifted her eyebrows. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Harry, but are you crazy?”
“Hear me out.”
She pressed her lips together, but gave me a quick nod.
“It’s simple. We’re in way over our heads. We need help. You’ve got to come out to the Council in any case.”
“Says who?”
“Oh, come on. You’re human, Elaine, and a wizard. That’s what is really important to them. They’ll side with us against the faeries, help us figure a way out of this mess.”
Elaine twitched at my use of the word, flicking a look around her as if by reflex. “That doesn’t sound like the Council I’ve heard of.”
“Could be that you’ve heard a skewed point of view,” I said.
Elaine nodded. “Could be. The Council I’ve heard of nearly executed you for defending yourself against Justin.”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“They put you on probation under threat of summary execution, and you all but had to kill yourself to get cleared.”
“Well, I was all but killing myself anyway. I mean, I didn’t do it so that the Council would—”
She shook her head. “God, Harry. You just can’t see it, can you? The Council doesn’tcare about you. They don’t want to protect you. They will only put up with you as long as you toe the line and don’t become an inconvenience.”
“I’m already inconvenient.”
“A liability, then,” Elaine said.
“Look, some of the Council have their heads up their rear ends, sure. But there are good people there, too.”
Elaine folded her arms and shook her head. “And how many of those good people don’t want a thing to do with the Council?”
“Elaine—”
“No, Harry. I mean it. I don’t want anything to do with them. I’ve lived this long without the Council’s so-called protection. I think I can muddle through a little longer.”
“Elaine, when they find out about you, it needs to be from you. If you come forward, it’s going to cut down on any uneasiness or suspicion they might feel.”
“Suspicion?” Elaine exclaimed. “Harry, I am not a criminal.”
“You’re just asking for trouble, Elaine.”
“And how are they going to find out about me? Hmmm? Were you planning on running off to tattle?”
“Of course not,” I said. But I was thinking how much trouble I was going to be in if one of the Wardens heard I was associating with someone who might be a violator of the First Law, and one of Justin DuMorne’s apprentices at that. With the cloud of disfavor I was already under, adding that kind of suspicion to it might be enough to sink me, regardless of how the investigation turned out. Do I have a great life or what?
“I won’t say anything,” I said finally. “It has to be your choice, Elaine. But please believe me. Trust me. I have friends in the Council, too. They’ll help.”
Elaine’s expression softened and became less certain. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Cross my heart.”
She leaned on her oddly carved staff and frowned. She was opening her mouth to speak when my reinforced door rattled under the rapping of a heavy fist.
“Dresden,” Morgan growled from the other side of the door. “Open up, traitor. There are questions I need you to answer.”
Chapter Nine
Elaine shot me a wide-eyed look and mouthed the word “Council?”
I nodded and pointed to my staff, in the corner along with my sword cane. Elaine picked it up without a word and tossed it to me. Then she moved silently through the door of my darkened bedroom and vanished inside.
The door rattled again. “Dresden,” Morgan growled, “I know you’re in there. Open the door.”
I swung it open before he could go on. “Or you’ll huff and you’ll puff and so on?”
Morgan glowered at me, tall, sour, and dour as ever. He’d traded his robes and cloak for dark slacks, a grey silk shirt, and a sport coat. He carried a golf bag on one shoulder, and most people wouldn’t have noticed the hilt of a sword nestled among the golf clubs. He leaned forward, cool eyes looking past me and into my apartment. “Dresden. Am I interrupting anything?”
“Well, I was going to settle down with a porn video and a bottle of baby oil, but I really don’t have enough for two.”
Morgan’s expression twisted in revulsion, and I felt an absurd little burst of vindictive satisfaction. “You disgust me, Dresden.”
“Yeah, I’m bad. I’m a bad, bad, bad man. I’m glad we got that settled. Good-bye, Morgan.”
I started to shut my door in his face. He slammed his palm against it. Morgan was a lot stronger than me. The door stayed open.
“I’m not finished, Dresden.”
“I am. It’s been one hell of a day. If you’ve got something to say, say it.”
Morgan’s mouth set in a hard smile. “Normally I appreciate that kind of directness. Not with you.”
“Gee, you don’t appreciate me. I’ll cry myself to sleep.”
Morgan stroked his thumb over the strap to the golf bag. “I want to know how it is, Dresden, that Mab just happened to come to you about this problem. The one thing that can preserve your status with the Council, and it just happened to fall to you.”
“Clean living,” I said. “Plus my mondo wheels and killer bachelor pad.”
Morgan looked at me with flat eyes. “You think you’re funny.”
“Oh, Iknow I’m funny. Unappreciated, but funny.”
Morgan shook his head. “Do you know what I think, Dresden?”
“You think?” Morgan didn’t smile. Like I said, unappreciated.
“I think that you’ve planned all of this. I think you are in with the vampires and the Winter Court. I think this is part of a deeper scheme.”
I just stared at him. I tried not to laugh. I really did.
Well. Maybe I didn’t try all that hard.
The laughter must have gotten to Morgan. He balled up his fist and slammed a stiff jab into my belly that took the wind out of my sails and half dropped me to my knees.
“No,” he said. “You aren’t going to laugh this off, traitor.” He stepped into my apartment. The threshold didn’t make him blink. The wards I had up caught him six inches later, but they weren’t designed to be too much of an impediment to human beings. Morgan grunted, spoke a harsh word in a guttural tongue, maybe Old German, and slashed his hand in front of him. The air hissed and popped with static electricity, sparks flashing from his fingertips. He shook his fingers briefly, then walked in.
He looked around the place and shook his head again. “Dresden, you might not be a bad person, all in all. But I think that you’re compromised. If you aren’t working with the Red Court, then I am certain that they are using you. Either way, the threat to the Council is the same. And it’s best removed by removing you.”
I tried to suck in a breath and finally managed to say, “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Susan Rodriguez,” Morgan said. “Your lover, the vampire.”
Anger made bright lights flash behind my eyes. “She’snot a vampire,” I snarled.
“They turned her, Dresden. No one goes back. That’s all there is to it.”
“They haven’t. She’s not.”
Morgan shrugged. “That’s what you would say if she’d addicted you to the venom. You’d say or do just about anything for them by now.”
I looked up at him, teeth bared. “Get the fuck out of my house.”
He walked over to the fireplace and picked up a dust-covered gift card I’d left sitting on the mantel. He read it and snorted. Then he picked up
a picture I had of Susan. “Pretty,” he said. “But that’s easy to come by. Odds are she was their pawn from the first day she met you.”
I clenched my hands into fists. “You shut your mouth,” I said. “You just shut your mouth about her. That’s not how it was.”
“You’re a fool, Dresden. A young fool. Do you really think that a normal mortal woman would want anything to do with you or your life? You can’t accept that she was just a tool. One of their whores.”
I spun to the corner, letting go of my staff, and picked up my sword cane. I drew the blade free with a steely rasp and turned toward Morgan. He saw it coming and had already drawn the bright silver blade of the Wardens from the golf bag.
Every tired, aching, angry bone in my body wanted to lunge at him. I’m not heavy with muscle, but I’m not slow, and I’ve got arms and legs miles long. My lunge is quick, and I can do it from a long way back. Morgan was a seasoned soldier, but in such close quarters it would be a question of reflexes. Advantage to the guy with the sword weighed in ounces instead of stones.
In that moment, I was sure that I could have killed him. He might have taken me with him, but I could have done it. And I wanted to, badly. Not in any sort of intellectual sense, but in the part of the brain that does all of its thinking after the fact. My temper had frayed to bloody tatters, and I wanted to vent it on Morgan.
But a thought snuck in past the testosterone and spoiled my rage. I stopped myself. Shaking, and with my knuckles white on my sword cane, I drew myself up straight. And I said, very quietly, “That’s number three.”
Morgan’s brow furrowed, and he stared at me, his own weapon steadily extended toward me. “What are you talking about, Dresden?”
“The third plan. The Merlin’s ace in the hole. He sent you here to pick a fight with me. With my door still standing open. There’s another Warden outside, listening, isn’t there? A witness, so that you have a clean kill. Hand the body over to the vampires. End of problem, right?”
