The Ultimate Dresden Omnibus, 0-15

by Butcher, Jim

  And Gard hadn’t made me ask for it.

  She held up her hand, palm up—another one of those gestures, their meanings forgotten by everyone except for long-term wackjobs like Dresden. I returned it. She nodded in approval, got into her car, and left.

  Will came up to stand at my side, watching her go. Then both of us turned to watch the sun beginning to rise over the lake.

  “He’s really gone,” Will said quietly. “Dresden, I mean.”

  I frowned and stared at the waters that had, by every rational indication, swallowed Dresden’s lifeblood. I didn’t answer him.

  “Was she telling the truth, you think? That Marcone’s the one standing in the gap now?”

  “Probably,” I said, “to some degree. But she was wrong.”

  “Wrong how?”

  “Dresden’s not gone,” I said. I touched a hand lightly to my brow. “He’s here.” I touched Will’s bare chest, on the left side. “Here. Without him, without what he’s done over the years, you and I would never have been able to pull this off.”

  “No,” he agreed. “Probably not. Definitely not.”

  “There are a lot of people he’s taught. Trained. Defended. And he’s been an example. No single one of us can ever be what he was. But together, maybe we can.”

  “The Justice League of Chicago?” Will asked, smiling slightly.

  “Dibs on Batman,” I said.

  His smile turned into a real grin for a minute. Then sobered. “You really think we can do it?”

  I nodded firmly. “We’ll cover his beat.”

  “That will be a neat trick, if you can do it,” Will said.

  “If we can do it,” I corrected him. “I’ll need a deputy, Will. Someone I trust. You.”

  He was quiet for a moment. Then he nodded. “I’m in. But you’re talking about some very, ah, disparate personalities. How long can you keep it up?”

  My answer surprised even me. “Until Dresden gets back.”

  Will frowned. “You really think that’s possible?”

  I shook my head. “It doesn’t seem to be. But … There’s this voice inside me that keeps pointing out that we haven’t seen a body. Until I have …”

  The sun rose over the horizon, burning gently through the morning haze over the lake, and golden light washed over us, warm and strong. We turned to watch the prisoners, and as the light touched them, they began to shudder. Then they began to stir. The first to rise was Georgia.

  Will sucked in a long, slow breath, his eyes shining.

  “Until I have,” I said quietly, “I can’t believe he’s dead.”

  We walked back to the warehouse together, to see to the business of getting the prisoners safely home.

  Acknowledgments

  As always, there are too many people to thank and only a little bit of space to thank them in. This time around, I must especially thank my editor, Anne, for putting up with my delays in writing. I’m sure I gave her, along with several of the folks trying to schedule things at Penguin, headaches. My agent, Jenn, was invaluable in getting everything straightened out, as well as in helping me through the bumpy bits, and I owe her my thanks, as well. I would apologize to you all abjectly if I were sure it would never happen again. Seems sort of insincere to do it otherwise, all things considered, so I’ll just thank you for your patience and understanding.

  To the inhabitants of the Beta Asylum, many more thanks than usual are owed, especially for everyone who sacrificed so much of their time and focus in the last few weeks before the revised deadline. Your feedback, support, and advice were particularly invaluable.

  To my dear patrons, the readers, I can only thank you for your patience, after leaving the last novel the way I did, then making everyone wait another three months past the usual delay while I made sure this book was ready to go. Enjoy! (And, technically, guys, Changes did NOT end in a cliff-hanger. Seriously.)

  And to Shannon, who had to live with me during this more-franticthan-usual period of insanity: I’m almost certain I’ll be sane again at some point in the reasonably near future. I’ll try to make it up to you.

  ALSO BY JIM BUTCHER

  THE DRESDEN FILES

  STORM FRONT

  FOOL MOON

  GRAVE PERIL

  SUMMER KNIGHT

  DEATH MASKS

  BLOOD RITES

  DEAD BEAT

  PROVEN GUILTY

  WHITE NIGHT

  SMALL FAVOR

  TURN COAT

  CHANGES

  SIDE JOBS (ANTHOLOGY)

  THE CODEX ALERA

  FURIES OF CALDERON

  ACADEM’S FURY

  CURSOR’S FURY

  CAPTAIN’S FURY

  PRINCEPS’ FURY

  FIRST LORD’S FURY

  Author’s Note

  When I was seven years old, I got a bad case of strep throat and was out of school for a whole week. During that time, my sisters bought me my first fantasy and sci-fi novels: the boxed set of The Lord of the Rings and the boxed set of Han Solo adventure novels by Brian Daley. I devoured them all during that week.

  From that point on, I was pretty much doomed to join SF&F fandom. From there, it was only one more step to decide I wanted to be a writer of my favorite fiction material, and here we are.

  I blame my sisters.

  My first love as a fan is swords-and-horses fantasy. After Tolkien I went after C. S. Lewis. After Lewis, It was Lloyd Alexander. After them came Fritz Leiber, Roger Zelazny, Robert Howard, John Norman, Poul Anderson, David Eddings, Weis and Hickman, Terry Brooks, Elizabeth Moon, Glen Cook, and before I knew it I was a dual citizen of the United States and Lankhmar, Narnia, Gor, Cimmeria, Krynn, Amber—you get the picture.

  When I set out to become a writer, I spent years writing swords-and-horses fantasy novels—and seemed to have little innate talent for it. But I worked at my writing, branching out into other areas as experiments, including SF, mystery, and contemporary fantasy. That’s how the Dresden Files initially came about—as a happy accident while trying to accomplish something else. Sort of like penicillin.

  But I never forgot my first love, and to my immense delight and excitement, one day I got a call from my agent and found out that I was going to get to share my newest swords-and-horses fantasy novel with other fans.

  The Codex Alera is a fantasy series set within the savage world of Carna, where spirits of the elements, known as furies, lurk in every facet of life, and where many intelligent races vie for security and survival. The realm of Alera is the monolithic civilization of humanity, and its unique ability to harness and command the furies is all that enables its survival in the face of the enormous, sometimes hostile, elemental powers of Carna, and against savage creatures who would lay Alera to waste and ruin.

  Yet even a realm as powerful as Alera is not immune to destruction from within, and the death of the heir apparent to the crown has triggered a frenzy of ambitious political maneuvering and infighting among the High Lords, those who wield the most powerful furies known to man. Plots are afoot, traitors and spies abound, and a civil war seems inevitable—all while the enemies of the realm watch, ready to strike at the first sign of weakness.

  Tavi is a young man living on the frontier of Aleran civilization—because, let’s face it, swords-and-horses fantasies start there. Born a freak, unable to utilize any powers of furycrafting whatsoever, Tavi has grown up relying up on his own wits, speed, and courage to survive. When an ambitious plot to discredit the crown lays Tavi’s home, the Calderon Valley, naked and defenseless before a horde of the barbarian Marat, the boy and his family find themselves directly in harm’s way.

  There are no titanic High Lords to protect them, no legions, no knights with their mighty furies to take the field. Tavi and the free frontiersmen of the Calderon Valley must find some way to uncover the plot and to defend their homes against the merciless horde of the Marat and their beasts.

  It is a desperate hour when the fate of all Alera hangs in the balance, when a
handful of ordinary stead holders must find the courage and strength to defy an overwhelming foe, and when the courage and intelligence of one young man will save the realm—or destroy it.

  Thank you, readers and fellow fans, for all of your support and kindness. I hope that you enjoy reading the books of the Codex Alera as much as I enjoyed creating them for you.

  —Jim

  ALSO BY JIM BUTCHER

  THE DRESDEN FILES

  STORM FRONT

  FOOL MOON

  GRAVE PERIL

  SUMMER KNIGHT

  DEATH MASKS

  BLOOD RITES

  DEAD BEAT

  PROVEN GUILTY

  WHITE NIGHT

  SMALL FAVOR

  TURN COAT

  CHANGES

  SIDE JOBS (ANTHOLOGY)

  THE CODEX ALERA

  FURIES OF CALDERON

  ACADEM’S FURY

  CURSOR’S FURY

  CAPTAIN’S FURY

  PRINCEPS’ FURY

  FIRST LORD’S FURY

  Chapter One

  Life is hard.

  Dying’s easy.

  So many things must align in order to create life. It has to happen in a place that supports life, something approximately as rare as hen’s teeth, from the perspective of the universe. Parents, in whatever form, have to come together for it to begin. From conception to birth, any number of hazards can end a life. And that’s to say nothing of all the attention and energy required to care for a new life until it is old enough to look after itself.

  Life is full of toil, sacrifice, and pain, and from the time we stop growing, we know that we’ve begun dying. We watch helplessly as year by year, our bodies age and fail, while our survival instincts compel us to keep on going—which means living with the terrifying knowledge that ultimately death is inescapable. It takes enormous effort to create and maintain a life, and the process is full of pitfalls and unexpected complications.

  Ending a life, by comparison, is simple. Easy, even. It can be done with a relatively minor effort, a single microbe, a sharp edge, a heavy weight . . . or a few ounces of lead.

  So difficult to bring about. So easy to destroy.

  You’d think we would hold life in greater value than we do.

  I died in the water.

  I don’t know if I bled to death from the gunshot wound or drowned. For being the ultimate terror of the human experience, once it’s over, the details of your death are unimportant. It isn’t scary anymore. You know that tunnel with the light at the end of it that people report in near-death experiences? Been there, done that.

  Granted, I never heard of anyone rushing toward the light and suddenly hearing the howling blare of a train’s horn.

  I became dimly aware that I could feel my feet beneath me, standing on what seemed to be a set of tracks. I knew because I could feel the approaching train making them shake and buzz against the bottoms of my feet. My heart sped up, too.

  For crying out loud, did I just say that death isn’t scary anymore? Tell that to my glands.

  I put my hands on my hips and just glared at the oncoming train in disgust. I’d had a long, long day, battling the forces of evil, utterly destroying the Red Court, rescuing my daughter, and murdering her mother—oh, and getting shot to death. That kind of thing.

  I was supposed to be at peace, or merging with the holy light, or in line for my next turn on the roller coaster, or maybe burning in an oven equipped with a stereo that played nothing but Manilow. That’s what happens when you die, right? You meet your reward. You get to find out the answer to the Big Questions of life.

  “You do not get run over by trains,” I said crossly. I folded my arms, planted my feet, and thrust out my jaw belligerently as the train came thundering my way.

  “What’s wrong with you?” bellowed a man’s voice, and then a heavy, strong hand wrapped around my right biceps and hauled me off the track by main force. “Don’t you see the damned train?”

  Said train roared by like a living thing, a furious beast that howled and wailed in disappointment as I was taken from its path. The wind of its passage raked at me with sharp, hot fingers, actually pulling my body a couple of inches toward the edge of the platform.

  After a subjective eternity, it passed, and I lay on flat ground for a moment, panting, my heart beating along lickety-split. When it finally began to slow down, I took stock of my surroundings.

  I was sprawled on a platform of clean but worn concrete, and suddenly found myself under fluorescent lights, as at many train stations in the Chicago area. I looked around the platform, but though it felt familiar, I couldn’t exactly place it. There were no other commuters. No flyers or other advertisements. Just an empty, clean, featureless building.

  And a pair of polished wing tip shoes.

  I looked up a rather modest length of cheap trousers and cheap suit and found a man of maybe thirty years looking back at me. He was built like a fireplug and managed to give the impression that if you backed a car into him, he’d dent your fender. His eyes were dark and glittered very brightly, hinting at a lively intellect, his hairline had withdrawn considerably from where it must have been at one point, and while he wasn’t exactly good-looking, it was the kind of face you could trust.

  “Southbound trains are running pretty quick lately,” he said, looking down at me. “I figured you probably didn’t want to hook up with that one, mister man.”

  I just stared up at him. I mentally added twenty years and forty pounds to the man standing in front of me, subtracted more hair, and realized that I knew him.

  “C—” I stammered. “C-c-c—”

  “Say it with me,” he said, and enunciated: “Carmichael.”

  “But you’re . . . you know,” I said. “Dead.”

  He snorted. “Whoa, buddy. We got us a real, gen-yoo-wine detective with us now. We got us the awesome wizardly intellect of mister man himself.” He offered me his hand, grinning, and said, “Look who’s talking, Dresden.”

  I reached up, dazed, and took the hand of Sergeant Ron Carmichael, formerly of the Chicago Police Department’s Special Investigations division. He’d been Murphy’s partner. And he’d given his life to save her from a rampaging loup-garou. That had been . . . Hell’s bells, more than ten years ago. I saw him die.

  Once I was standing, I stared down at him for a moment, shaking my head. I was a lot taller than he was. “You . . .” I said. “You look great.”

  “Funny what being dead can do for you,” he said, widening his eyes dramatically. “And I tried Weight Watchers and everything.” He checked his watch. “This is fun and all, but we’d better get moving.”

  “Uh,” I said warily, “get moving where, exactly?”

  Carmichael stuck a toothpick in his mouth and drawled, “The office. Come on.”

  I followed him out of the station, where an old, gold-colored Mustang was waiting. He went around to the driver’s side and got in. It was dark. It was raining. The city lights were on, but the place looked deserted except for the two of us. I still couldn’t tell exactly where in Chicago we were, which was damned odd; I know my town. I hesitated for a moment, looking around, trying to place myself by spotting the usual landmarks.

  Carmichael pushed open the door. “Don’t bother, kid. Out there’re all the buildings that coulda been, as well as the ones that are. You’ll give yourself a headache if you keep thinking at it.”

  I looked around once more and got into the old Mustang. I shut the door. Carmichael pulled sedately into the empty streets.

  “This isn’t Chicago,” I said.

  “Genius,” he said amiably.

  “Then . . . where are we?”

  “Between.”

  “Between what?” I asked.

  “Between what?” he said. “Between who. Between where. Between when.”

  I frowned at him. “You left out why.”

  He shook his head and grinned. “Naw, kid. We’re real fond of why around here. We’re big fans of why.
”

  I frowned at that for a moment. Then I said, “Why am I here?”

  “You never even heard of foreplay, didja?” Carmichael said. “Cut straight to the big stuff.”

  “Why am I here as opposed to—you know—wherever it is I’m supposed to be?”

  “Maybe you’re having a near-death experience,” Carmichael said. “Maybe you’re drowning, and this is the illusion your mind is creating for you, to hide you from the truth of death.”

  “Being here? With you? I’ve met my subconscious, and he’s not that sick.”

  Carmichael laughed. It was a warm, genuine sound. “But that could be what is happening here. And that’s the point.”

  “I don’t understand. At all.”

  “And that’s the point, too,” he said.

  I glowered.

  He kept on smiling and said, “Kid, you’re allowed to see as much as you can handle. Right now, we’re someplace that looks a lot like Chicago, driving along in the rain in my old Mustang, because that’s what your limits are. Any more would”—he paused, considering his words—“would obviate certain options, and we ain’t big on that around here.”

  I thought about that for a moment. Then I said, “You just used obviate and ain’t in the same sentence.”

  “I got me one of them word-a-day calendars,” he said. “Don’t be obstreperous.”

  “You kidding?” I said, settling back in the seat. “I live to be obstreperous.”

  Carmichael snorted, and his eyes narrowed. “Yeah, well. We’ll see.”

  Chapter Two

  Carmichael stopped the Mustang in front of a building that reminded me of old episodes of Dragnet. He parked on the empty street and we walked toward the entrance.