Jim Butcher - Dresden Files Omnibus

by Jim Butcher

  Megan’s expression was twisted in pain and fear. I didn’t blame her. Holy crap, that was the biggest boogeyman I’d ever seen. They usually weren’t much bigger than a raccoon.

  “Meg!” Yardly screamed, and started forward.

  I caught his arm. “Don’t break the circle!” I shouted. “Get the kids out of here! Get the kids!”

  He hesitated for only a second before he seized Tamara and Joey and hauled them out of the room, one under each arm.

  I went to the edge of the circle and debated what to do. Dammit, what had this thing been eating? If I broke the circle, it would be free to escape—and it was freaking supercharged on the dark-spiritual equivalent of adrenaline. It would fight like hell to escape and come back the next night, bigger and hungrier than ever.

  Nasty as the thing was, Megan still ought to be able to beat it. She was a sensitive, feeling the emotions and pieces of the thoughts of others thanks to a naturally developed talent, something that would manifest as simple intuition. It would mean that she would have developed a certain amount of defensive ability, just to keep from going nuts in a crowd.

  “Megan!” I said. “You can beat this thing! Think of your kids!”

  “They’re hurting!” she screamed. “I can feel them!”

  “Your brother has them—they’re fine!” I called back. “That’s a lie it’s trying to push on you! Don’t let it trick you!”

  Megan glanced up at me, desperate, and I saw her face harden. She turned her face back into the shadowy assault of the flailing boggart and her lips peeled back from her teeth with a snarl.

  “They’re mine,” she spat, the words sizzling with vitriol. “My babies. And you can’t touch them anymore!”

  “Begone!” I called to her. “Tell it to begone!”

  “Begone!” Megan screamed. “Begone! BEGONE!”

  There was a surge of sound, a thunderous nonexplosion, as if all the air in the room had suddenly rushed into a ball just in front of Megan’s pain-twisted face. Then there was a flash of light and a hollow-sounding scream, and a shock wave lashed out, scattering the salt of the circle, rattling toys, and pushing against my chest. I staggered back against the wall and turned my face away as a fine cloud of salt blasted out and rattled against the walls with a hiss.

  Megan fell to her knees and started sobbing. I reached out around me with my senses, but felt no inexplicable absence in the aura of the house. The boogeyman was gone.

  I went to Megan’s side at once and crouched down to touch her shoulder. She flung herself against me, still sobbing.

  Ben Yardly appeared in the doorway to the room a few moments later. He had Joey in one arm and Tamara in the other. Kat stood so close she was practically in his pocket, holding on to the hem of his jacket as if he was her own personal teddy bear.

  “Okay,” I said quietly. “It’s okay. The thing is gone. Your mom stopped it.”

  Kat stared at me for a moment, tears in her eyes, and then ran to Megan and flung herself against her mother. That drove Joey and Tamara into motion, and they both squirmed out of Yardly’s arms and ran to their mother. “Thank you,” Megan said. She freed one hand from her children long enough to touch my arm. “Wizard. Thank you.”

  I felt a little bit sick. But I gave her my best modest smile.

  I FINISHED THE recounting for the young Wardens and let the silence fall.

  “What was my mistake?” I asked.

  No one said anything.

  “I trusted the process too much,” I said. “I thought I had already analyzed the whole situation. Found the problem. Identified the source of the danger. But I was wrong. You all know what I did. What happened?” No one said anything

  The boggart I’d identified wasn’t the source of the attacks. It was just feeding on the fear they generated in the kids. It hadn’t needed to expend any energy at all to generate nightmares and fear in them. All it had to do was feed. That’s why it was so large.

  “The source of the attacks wasn’t an attack at all,” I said. “Ben Yardly’s job had exposed him to some pretty bad things—memories and images that wouldn’t go away. Some of you who fought in the war know what I’m talking about.”

  McKenzie, Ilyana, and a few others gave me sober nods. “Kat Yardly was the eldest daughter of her mother, a fairly gifted sensitive. She was twelve years old.”

  “Damn,” McKenzie said, his eyes widening in realization.

  “Yes, of course,” Ilyana said. The other students turned to look at her. “The eldest daughter was a sensitive, too—perhaps a skilled one. She had picked up on those images in her uncle’s mind and was having nightmares about them.”

  “What about the little girl?” I asked.

  McKenzie took over. “Kat must have been a pusher, too,” he said, using the slang for someone who could broadcast thoughts or emotions to others. “She was old enough to be a surrogate mother to the younger daughter. They were probably linked somehow.”

  “Exactly, Warden McKenzie,” I said quietly. “All the pieces were in front of me, and I just didn’t put them together. I figured the situation for a simple boogeyman infestation. I set up Megan to do the heavy lifting because I thought it would be relatively safe and would work out the best for the family. I was wrong.”

  “But it did work out,” Ilyana said, something tentative in her voice for the first time that day.

  “You kidding?” I asked. “That big boggart inflicted mental trauma on Megan that took her most of a year to recover from. She had her own nightmares for a while.” I sighed. “I went back to her and gave her and her daughter some exercises to do that would help insulate them both. Kat’s problems improved, and everything worked out fine—but it almost didn’t. If Yardly had panicked and used his gun, if someone had broken the circle, or if Megan Yardly hadn’t bought my lie about the boggart pushing a falsehood on her, it might have ripped out her sanity altogether. I might have put three kids into the foster care system.

  “Arrogance,” I said quietly, and wrote it on the board, beneath the rest. “That’s the fifth A. We carry it around with us. It’s natural. We know a lot more than most people. We can do a lot more than most people. There’s a natural and understandable pride in that. But when we let that pride get in the way and take the place of truly seeing what is around us, there can be horrible consequences. Watch out for that fifth A, children. The Yardlys turned out all right mostly out of pure luck. They deserve better from me. And from you.

  “Always keep your eyes open. Learn all that you can—and then try to learn some more.”

  I took a deep breath and then nodded. “Okay. We’ll break for lunch, and then we’ll look at another case I didn’t screw up quite as badly. Back here in an hour. Dismissed.” The young Wardens got up and dispersed—except for McKenzie and Ilyana. The two came down to stand beside me.

  “Commander,” McKenzie said. “This girl, Kat. Most of the talented mortals only demonstrate a single talent. She demonstrated at least two.”

  “I’m aware,” I said.

  “This girl,” Ilyana said. “Her talents were born in trauma and fear. This is one of the warning signs of a potential warlock.”

  “Yeah,” I said. My talents had started in a similar fashion. “I heard that once.”

  “So … She is under surveillance?” Ilyana asked.

  “I drop in on her once in a while,” I said.

  “That poor kid,” McKenzie said. “What do we do?”

  I spread my hands. “It’s an imperfect world, Wardens. We do what we always do.” I smiled at them lopsidedly. “Whatever we can.”

  They both looked down, frowning, concerned—concerned for a little girl who had no idea of what might be waiting for her.

  Excellent.

  The lesson hadn’t been wasted. “Okay, guys,” I said. “Burger King?” That perked them both up, though Ilyana, benighted soul that she was, didn’t react with joy at the utterance of the holy name of the Mount Olympus of fast food. We left together.


  You do whatever you can.

  Heorot

  Harry

  I was sitting in my office, sorting through my bills, when Mac called and said, “I need your help.” It was the first time I’d heard him use four whole words all together like that.

  “Okay,” I said. “Where?” I’d out-tersed him—another first.

  “Loon Island Pub,” Mac said. “Wrigleyville.”

  “On the way.” I hung up, stood up, put on my black leather duster, and said to my dog, “We’re on the job.”

  My dog, Mouse, who outweighs most European cars, bounced up eagerly from where he had been dozing near my office’s single heating vent. He shook out his thick grey fur, especially the shaggy, almost leonine ruff growing heavy on his neck and shoulders, and we set out to help a friend.

  October had brought in more rain and more cold than usual, and that day we had both, plus wind. I found parking for my battered old Volkswagen Bug, hunched my shoulders under my leather duster, and walked north along Clark, into the wind, Mouse keeping pace at my side.

  Loon Island Pub was in sight of Wrigley Field, and a popular hang-out before and after games. Bigger than most such businesses, it could host several hundred people throughout its various rooms and levels. Outside, large posters had been plastered to the brick siding of the building. Though the posters were soaked with rain, you could still read CHICAGO BEER ASSOCIATION and NIGHT OF THE LIVING BREWS, followed by an announcement of a home-brewed beer festival and competition, with today’s date on it. There was a lot of foot traffic in and out.

  “Aha,” I told Mouse. “Explains why Mac is here, instead of at his own place. He’s finally unleashed the new dark on the unsuspecting public.”

  Mouse glanced up at me rather reproachfully from under his shaggy brows; then he lowered his head, sighed, and continued plodding against the rain until we gained the pub. Mac was waiting for us at the front door. He was a sinewy, bald man dressed in dark slacks and a white shirt, somewhere between the age of thirty and fifty. He had a very average, unremarkable face, one that usually wore a steady expression of patience and contemplation.

  Today, though, that expression was what I could only describe as grim.

  I came in out of the rain, and passed off my six-foot oak staff to Mac to hold for me as I shrugged out of my duster. I shook the garment thoroughly, sending raindrops sheeting from it, and promptly put it back on.

  Mac runs the pub where the supernatural community of Chicago does most of its hanging out. His place has seen more than its share of paranormal nasties, and if Mac looked that worried, I wanted the spell-reinforced leather of the duster between my tender skin and the source of his concern. I took the staff back from Mac, who nodded to me and then crouched down to Mouse, who had gravely offered a paw to shake. Mac shook, ruffled Mouse’s ears, and said, “Missing girl.”

  I nodded, scarcely noticing the odd looks I was getting from several of the people inside. That was par for the course. “What do we know?”

  “Husband,” Mac said. He jerked his head at me, and I followed him deeper into the pub. Mouse stayed pressed against my side, his tail wagging in a friendly fashion. I suspected the gesture was an affectation. Mouse is an awful lot of dog, and people get nervous if he doesn’t act overtly friendly.

  Mac led me through a couple of rooms where each table and booth had been claimed by a different brewer. Homemade signs bearing a gratuitous number of exclamation points touted the various concoctions, except for the one Mac stopped at. There, a cardstock table tent was neatly lettered, simply reading MCANALLY’S DARK.

  At the booth next to Mac’s, a young man, good-looking in a reedy, librarianesque kind of way, was talking to a police officer while wringing his hands.

  “But you don’t get it,” the young man said. “She wouldn’t just leave. Not today. We start our honeymoon tonight.”

  The cop, a stocky, balding fellow whose nose was perhaps more red than warranted by the weather outside, shook his head. “Sir, I’m sorry, but she’s been gone for what? An hour or two? We don’t even start to look until twenty-four hours have passed.”

  “She wouldn’t just leave,” the young man half shouted.

  “Look, kid,” the cop said. “It wouldn’t be the first time some guy’s new wife panicked and ran off. You want my advice? Start calling up her old boyfriends.”

  “But—”

  The cop thumped a finger into the young man’s chest. “Get over it, buddy. Come back in twenty-four hours.” He turned to walk away from the young man and almost bumped into me. He took a step back and scowled up at me. “You want something?”

  “Just basking in the glow of your compassion, Officer,” I replied.

  His face darkened into a scowl, but before he could take a deep breath and start throwing his weight around, Mac pushed a mug of his dark ale into the cop’s hand. The cop slugged it back immediately. He swished the last gulp around in his mouth, purely for form, and then tossed the mug back at McAnally, belched, and went on his way.

  “Mr. McAnally,” the young man said, turning to Mac. “Thank goodness. I still haven’t seen her.” He looked at me. “Is this him?”

  Mac nodded.

  I stuck out my hand. “Harry Dresden.”

  “Roger Braddock,” the anxious young man said. “Someone has abducted my wife.”

  He gripped too hard, and his fingers were cold and a little clammy. I wasn’t sure what was going on here, but Braddock was genuinely afraid. “Abducted her? Did you see it happen?”

  “Well,” he said, “no. Not really. No one did. But she wouldn’t just walk out. Not today. We got married this morning, and we’re leaving on our honeymoon tonight, soon as the festival is over.”

  I arched an eyebrow. “You put your honeymoon on hold to go to a beer festival?”

  “I’m opening my own place,” Braddock said. “Mr. McAnally has been giving me advice. Sort of mentoring me. This was … I mean, I’ve been here every year, and it’s only once a year, and the prestige from a win is … The networking and …” His voice trailed off as he looked around.

  Yeah. The looming specter of sudden loss has a way of making you reevaluate things. Sometimes it’s tough to know what’s really important until you realize it might be gone.

  “You two were at this booth?” I prompted.

  “Yes,” he said. He licked his lips. “She went to pick up some napkins from the bar, right over there. She wasn’t twenty feet away and somehow she just vanished.”

  Personally, I was more inclined to go with the cop’s line of reasoning than the kid’s. People in general tend to be selfish, greedy, and unreliable. There are individual exceptions, of course, but no one ever wants to believe that the petty portions of human nature might have come between themselves and someone they care about.

  The kid seemed awfully sincere, but endearing, awfully sincere people, their decisions driven mostly by their emotions, are capable of being mistaken on an epic scale. The worse the situation looks, the harder they’ll search for reasons not to believe it. It seemed more likely that his girl left him than that someone took her away.

  On the other hand, likely isn’t the same as true—and Mac isn’t the kind to cry wolf.

  “How long you two been together?” I asked Braddock.

  “Since we were fifteen,” he replied. An anemic smile fluttered around his mouth. “Almost ten years.”

  “Making it official, eh?”

  “We both knew when it was right,” he replied. He lost the smile. “Just like I know she didn’t walk away. Not unless someone made her do it.”

  I stepped around Braddock and studied the high-backed booth for a moment. A keg sat on the table, next to a little cardstock sign that had a cartoon bee decked out with a Viking-style helmet, a baldric, and a greatsword. Words beneath the bee proclaimed BRADDOCK’S MIDNIGHT SUN CINNAMON.

  I grunted and reached down, pulling a simple black leather ladies’ purse from beneath the bench seating. Not an expensi
ve purse, either. “Not much chance she’d walk without taking her bag,” I said. “That’s for damn sure.”

  Braddock bit his lip, closed his eyes, and said, “Elizabeth.”

  I sighed.

  Well, dammit.

  Now she had a name.

  Elizabeth Braddock, newlywed—maybe she’d just run off, but maybe she hadn’t. I didn’t think I would like myself very much if I walked and it turned out that she really was in danger and really did get hurt.

  What the hell? No harm in looking around.

  “I guess the game’s afoot,” I said. I gestured vaguely with the purse. “May I?”

  “Sure,” Braddock said. “Sure, sure.”

  I dumped Elizabeth’s purse out on the booth’s table, behind the beer keg, and began rummaging through it. The usual—a wallet, some makeup, a cell phone, Kleenex, some feminine sanitary sundries, one of those plastic birth control pill holders with a folded piece of paper taped to it.

  And there was a hairbrush, an antique-looking thing with a long, pointy silver handle.

  I plucked several strands of dark wavy hair from the brush. “Is this your wife’s hair?”

  Braddock blinked at me for a second, then nodded. “Yes. Of course.”

  “Mind if I borrow this?”

  He didn’t. I pocketed the brush for the moment and glanced at the birth control pill case. I opened it. Only the first several slots were empty. I untaped the folded paper and opened it, finding instructions for the medicine’s use.

  Who keeps the instruction sheet, for crying out loud?

  While I pondered it, a shadow fell across Braddock, and a beefy, heavily tattooed arm shoved him back against the spine of the partition between booths.

  I looked up the arm to the beefy, heavily tattooed bruiser attached to it. He was only a couple of inches shorter than me, and layered with muscle gone to seed. He was bald and sported a bristling beard. Scar tissue around his eyes told me he’d been a fighter, and a lumpy, often-broken nose suggested that he might not have been much good at it. He wore black leather and rings heavy enough to serve as passable brass knuckles on every finger of his right hand. His voice was like the rest of him—thick and dull. He flung a little triangle of folded cardstock at Braddock. “Where’s my keg, Braddock?”