Changes df-12

by Jim Butcher

  One of the fire spirits showed me an image that lasted for no more than three or four seconds—the face of the little girl in Susan’s picture, pale and a little grubby and shivering with fear or cold, reaching out to warm her hands over the fluttering lights of a fire. In profile, she looked a lot like her mother, with her huge dark eyes and slender nose. She’d gotten something of my chin, I think, which gave her little face the impression of strength or stubbornness. She was much paler than Susan, too, more like her father than her mother that way.

  But then the image was gone.

  That was as close as I got.

  I sat down on my stool after three hours of work and felt more exhausted than at any time I could easily recall. I’d gotten nothing that would tell me where she was, nothing that would tell me what was in store for her. Except for the single flicker of knowledge that Maggie was still alive, I’d gotten nothing.

  But even that might be enough. She was still breathing.

  Hang in there, kid. Dad’s coming.

  I sat there on the stool for a moment, wearily. Then I reached for a piece of paper, an old pencil, and wrote:

  Ivy,

  I need your help.

  It’s for a little girl who is being held by bad people.

  Please contact me.

  Harry Dresd—

  Before I’d gotten finished writing my name, the phone rang.

  I’d just made contact with the Archive, with the magically constructed catalog of every bit of knowledge mankind has ever written down. It resided in the head of a teenager, the sum of human learning in the hands of a girl who should have been going to ninth grade this year.

  Knowledge is power, and a couple of years before, the Archive had proved it. As a child not much older than Maggie, she had pitted her magic against the skills of beings with centuries of experience, and come out, for the most part, ahead. She was an unwholesomely powerful child, and while she had always comported herself with the gravity of a woman of forty, I had seen flashes of the child supporting the vast burden of the Archive. I knew what would happen if that child ever decided to take control of how the Archive was administered. It would probably look a lot like that episode of The Twilight Zone with the monstrous little kid with superpowers.

  The phone rang again. I shivered and answered it. We’d run a long line down into the laboratory, and the old rotary phone sat near Molly’s desk, benefiting from being on the fringes of such a well-organized place. “Hello?”

  “It’s Kincaid,” said a man’s baritone. Kincaid was Ivy’s driver, body-guard, cook, and all- around teddy bear. He was the single deadliest gunman I had ever had the terror of watching, and one of a relatively few number of people who I both disliked and trusted. He had once described the method he would use to kill me, if he had to, and I had to admit that he had an excellent chance of succeeding. He was tough, smart, skilled, and had a mercenary sense of honor—whoever held his contract was his charge, body and mind, and he never abrogated a contract once he had signed it.

  “Dresden,” I replied. “This line probably isn’t clear.”

  “I know,” Kincaid replied. “What do you want?”

  “I need to find a child. She was taken by the Red Court a few days ago. We believe her to be somewhere in Mexico.”

  “Somewhere in Mexico?” Kincaid said, and I could hear his grin. “You tried walking around and yelling her name really loud yet?”

  “I’m getting there,” I said. “Look, does she know anything or not?”

  Kincaid muffled the phone with something, probably his hand. I heard his low, buzzing voice as he asked a question. I might have heard a light soprano voice answering him.

  Kincaid returned to the phone and said, “Ivy says she can’t get involved. That the business you’re on is deadly. She dares not unbalance it for fear of changing the outcome.”

  I made a growling sound. “Goddammit, Kincaid. She owes me one. Remind her who came and took her away from those fucking Denarian lunatics.”

  Kincaid’s voice became quieter, more sober. “Believe me, she remembers, Dresden. But she isn’t free to share her knowledge like you or me. When she says she can’t tell you, she’s being literal. She physically cannot let such information leave her head.”

  I slammed the heel of my hand into a wall and leaned on it, closing my eyes. “Tell her,” I said, “that this is information I must have. If she can’t help me, I’ll be taking it up with other sources. The ones in my green notebook.”

  Kincaid spoke with someone again. This time I definitely heard Ivy’s voice answering him.

  “She can’t tell you where the girl is,” Kincaid said. There was a hint of steel in his voice, warning me not to push too hard. “But she says she can tell you someone who might.”

  “Any help would be greatly appreciated,” I said, exhaling.

  “She says to tell you that before you try the green book, there’s something else you might consider. The last man you want to see might have useful information.”

  I understood what she was talking about at once and groaned. “Dammit,” I muttered. “Dammit.”

  I dialed another number. A receptionist asked me how she could direct my call.

  “This is Harry Dresden,” I said quietly. “Put me through to Mr. Marcone’s personal line, please.”

  Chapter 20

  “I don’t like it,” Molly said, scowling. “You sure you don’t want me to go in there with you? He’s got people.”

  “Definitely not,” I said calmly. “I don’t want you showing up on his radar.”

  “I’d like to see him try something,” Molly said, clenching one hand into a fist and thumping the Blue Beetle’s steering wheel for emphasis. “I’d eat him for breakfast.”

  “No, Molly,” I said in a firm tone of voice. “You wouldn’t. Marcone might be vanilla mortal, but he’s dangerous. Most men have limits. He doesn’t. Never forget that.”

  “If he’s so dangerous, why are you talking to him?”

  “Because he also has rules,” I said. “And besides. I just had to see him here. Keep your eyes open for a third party interfering. I’ll worry about Marcone. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Molly said, nodding, her eyes intent. In a spectacular bid for the Do as I Say, Not as I Do Award, she took a long pull from an energy drink in a can the size of a milk carton. “Okay.”

  I got out of the Blue Beetle and walked into my meeting with Gentleman Johnnie Marcone, the undisputed gang lord of Chicago.

  Burger King had just opened its dining area, but it was already half-full. I ignored Marcone upon coming in and got in line. A sausage biscuit and cup of coffee later, I went to the back corner where Marcone sat and his retinue stood.

  Hendricks was there, of course, in an extra-large suit and a red-haired buzz cut. Maybe he’d been working out, because he looked like he’d put on a few more pounds. If he got any bigger, he’d need a building permit. Miss Gard stood a little apart from Hendricks, covering the angles the big man couldn’t. She was just as blond and athletic and Amazonian as ever, her suit and tie muting her curves without reducing her appeal.

  Marcone sat in the booth as if at a boardroom table. He wore a silk suit probably worth more than my car, and sat with his elbows on the table, his fingertips pressed together into a steeple. He looked like a man in his mature prime, neat and precise from his haircut to his polished leather shoes. He watched me come over to the table and slide my plastic tray into place before me. I dumped four or five packets of sugar into my coffee and stirred it with a little stick. “You’re not eating?”

  He looked at his watch, and then at me. He had pale green eyes the color of old bills, but less personal. His stare was unsettling, and he met my eyes without concern. We had already taken the measure of each other’s souls. It was why I knew precisely how dangerous the man sitting across the table from me could be, and why I insisted upon treating him in as cavalier a fashion as possible. One doesn’t show dangerous predators weakness or fear. It m
akes them hungry.

  I savored a bite of the biscuit, which was only a reminder of how good a real homemade biscuit and sausage was, but for the sake of my audience, I made sounds of enjoyment as I chewed and swallowed. “You sure?” I slurped some more coffee. “You’re missing out on ambrosia, here.”

  “Dresden,” Marcone said, “this is aggravating. Even for you.”

  “Yeah,” I said, smiling, and took another bite of sausage.

  Hendricks made a growling sound.

  I finished chewing and said, “You sure about that, big guy?”

  “Hendricks,” Marcone said.

  Hendricks subsided.

  I nodded. Then I said, “You have information I want.”

  “Undoubtedly,” Marcone said. “What information are you after, and what do you offer for it?”

  “I’m not here to trade baseball cards with you, Marcone,” I said.

  “And I am not a charity organization, Dresden,” he replied. “I take it this has something to do with your office building exploding.” He shook his head in a gesture of faint regret.

  “Right,” I said. “You’re all broken up over the destruction.”

  “I didn’t order it. I made no money on it. I failed to profit financially or politically from its destruction. And you survived. It was a complete waste.”

  Hendricks made another growling sound that might have been gorilla for a laugh.

  “Maybe it’s got something to do with the building. How much do you know about its owners?”

  Marcone’s smile was a wintry thing. “That they are a part of the organization whose servitors have been attempting to intrude upon my business.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. “Someone’s muscling in on your territory?”

  “Briefly,” Marcone said, “but incessantly.”

  “Then we might have a common problem.”

  Marcone looked at me as though I were a rather slow child. “Yes. Hence this meeting.”

  I grunted and finished the biscuit. “The Red Court is on the move. Trouble is being stirred up between them and the Council. My interest in the matter is an eight-year-old girl. The Reds took her from her home. I believe that they’re holding her somewhere in Mexico. I need to know where.”

  Marcone’s stare went on for several seconds before he said, “Somewhere. In Mexico. That’s as specific as you can be?”

  “It’s as much as I know,” I said.

  “For what purpose was she brought there?”

  “Why does it matter?”

  “If she was taken to be used as a sexual object, she would be in a different place than if she was going to be used as slave labor or harvested as an organ donor.”

  I clenched my teeth and looked away briefly, treated to a number of delightful images by his words.

  Marcone’s eyes narrowed. “Who is she to you, Dresden?”

  “My client’s kid,” I said, struggling to keep my voice level and calm. “I think they’re going to use her in some sort of sacrificial ritual.”

  “Then that narrows things considerably,” Marcone said. “As I understand the process, rituals such as the one you mention need to happen at a place of power.” He glanced up at Miss Gard, who nodded and immediately left the restaurant, heading for her car. “I suspect I can narrow it down even further for you, Dresden. Let’s talk price.”

  “I’m going to use the information to put a major hurting on the people trying to take your territory away from you, Marcone,” I said. “That’s more than payment enough.”

  “And if I do not agree?” Marcone asked.

  “Then we throw down, right here, and after I toss your attack dogs over the top of the Sears building, I hurt you until you give me the information anyway.”

  That cold smile returned. “Is that how you think it would happen?”

  I shrugged a shoulder and kept my expression bland. “I think there’s only one way to find out.” I leaned forward a little and pitched my voice in a conspiratorial murmur. “But just between you and me, I don’t think the terrain favors you here.”

  He stared across his steepled fingers at me for a time. Then he said, “It certainly doesn’t favor me in the manner I would prefer.” He laid his hands flat on the table and leaned back slightly. “There’s no sense in making a confrontation out of this. And I have never yet regretted it when I allowed you to rid me of an enemy.”

  “I didn’t do it as a favor to you.”

  He shrugged. “Your motivations are immaterial. The results are what matter.”

  “Just remember that you’re on my list, Marcone. Soon as I get done with all the other evils in this town, you won’t be the lesser of them anymore.”

  Marcone stared at me with half-lidded eyes and said, “Eek.”

  “You think it’s funny?”

  “I am not unduly concerned by dead men, Dresden.”

  I bristled. “Is that a threat?”

  “Hardly. One day, probably soon, you’ll get yourself killed thanks to that set of irrational compulsions you call a conscience, long before my name tops your list. I needn’t lift a finger.” He shrugged. “Giving you information seems an excellent way to accelerate that process. It will also tax the resources of my enemies.” Marcone mused for a moment, and then said, “And . . . I believe I have no objection to contributing against any organization which would victimize children so.”

  I glowered at him. Partly because he was probably right, and partly because he’d once again shown the flash of humanity that prevented me from lumping him in with every other evil, hungry, predatory thing lurking in the wild world. For his own reasons, Marcone would go to extreme lengths to help and protect children. In Chicago, any adult was fair game for his businesses. Any child was off-limits. Rumor had it that he had vanished every single one of his employees who had ever crossed that line.

  Gard reappeared, frowning, and walked over to our table.

  Marcone glanced at her. “Well?”

  Gard hesitated and then said, “He won’t speak of it over the line. He says that you have incurred no debt with him for asking the question. He will only speak to Dresden. Personally.”

  Marcone lifted his eyebrows. “Interesting.”

  “I thought so,” Gard said.

  “Ahem,” I said. “Who wants to meet me?”

  “My . . . employer,” Gard said. “Donar Vadderung, CEO of Monoc Securities.”

  Chapter 21

  Gard and I went to Oslo.

  It sounds like it would be a long trip, but it’s a hell of a lot faster when you don’t have to worry about boarding, clearing security, going through customs, or actually moving a linear distance.

  Gard opened a Way into the Nevernever down near the zoo, simply cutting at the fabric of reality with a rune-etched dagger. The Way took us on a short hike through a dark wood of dead trees, and ended when we emerged in what she said was Iceland. It sure as hell was cold enough. A second Way took us across the surface of a frozen lake, to stop before the roots of a vast old tree whose trunk could have contained my apartment with room to spare for a garage.

  From there, we emerged into what seemed like a cold, damp basement, and I found myself face-to-face with two dozen men wearing body armor and pointing sleek- looking, high-tech assault rifles at the end of my nose.

  I did absolutely nothing. Carefully.

  One of the men with guns said something, a short phrase in a language I didn’t understand. Gard answered in what I presumed to be the same tongue, and gestured to me.

  The leader of the guards eyed us both suspiciously for a moment, then said something quietly and all the rifles stopped pointing at me. Two guards returned to stand on either side of a doorway. Two more took up a station facing Gard and me, evidently cautious about getting more company through the same Way we’d just used. The rest returned to a couple of card tables and a few sleeping cots.

  Gard shook her head and muttered, “Einherjar. Give them a little sip of renewed mortality, and four thousand years
of discipline go right out the window.”

  “I recognize some of these guys,” I said. I nodded toward a trio playing cards. “Those three. They were some of the mercenaries Marcone brought to that party in the Raith Deeps.”

  Gard glanced at the three and then rolled her eyes. “Yes. And?”

  “And they’re just available for hire?” I asked.

  “If you can afford them,” Gard said, smiling so that her teeth showed. “Though be warned that prices may vary. This way, Dresden.”

  I followed her out into a hallway and past several rooms filled with enough weaponry to win a minor war in a century of one’s choice. Racks of ash-wood spears stood side by side with old bolt-action Mausers, which stood next to modern assault rifles. Katana-style swords shared a room with flintlocks and Maxim guns. One shelving unit housed an evolutionary progression of grenades, from powder-filled crockery with ignitable fuses to the most modern miniature flash-bang grenades. Judging from the variety of the place’s contents, it was like looking at a museum—but from the quantities present, it could only be an armory.

  We got to an elevator whose walls were a simple metal grid, so that we could see out of them as we went up. I stopped counting after seeing seven floors of similarly equipped armories go by.

  “Guess your boss believes in being prepared,” I said.

  Gard smiled. “It’s one of his things, yes.”

  “It’s a little extreme, isn’t it?”

  She looked at me with an arched brow. Then she said, “One can have only as much preparation as he has foresight.”