by Jim Butcher
Translation: Don’t start another war, Harry.
“But,” she continued, “we can afford to lose the paths through Winter even less.”
Translation: Unless you really have to.
“I hear you,” I said. “I’ll do my best.”
“Do better,” Luccio said, her tone blunt. “There are those on the Senior Council who hold the opinion that we’re already fighting one war because of your incompetence.”
I felt heat flush up my neck. “If they bring that up, remind them that my incompetence is the only reason they weren’t all blasted to molecules by a newborn god,” I shot back. “And after that, remind them that because of my incompetence, we’re enjoying a cease-fire that we desperately needed to replace our losses. And after that—”
“That is enough, Warden,” the captain snapped.
I fought down my frustration and clamped my mouth shut.
Hey, we were coming up on the holidays. They’re a time of miracles.
“I’ll notify you when I learn something,” Luccio said, and hung up the phone.
I hung up too, harder than I really needed to. I turned to find Michael and Sanya staring at me.
“Harry,” Michael said quietly, “that was Captain Luccio, was it not?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“You never told us that Mab threatened to go back on her bargain.”
“Well, no.”
Michael watched me with troubled eyes. “Because she didn’t. You just lied to Luccio.”
“Yeah,” I said shortly. “Because I need the Council’s say-so to set up the meeting. Because I’ve got to set up the meeting so that the gang of murdering bastards who tortured Shiro to death will have a chance to prove to you that they’ve still got it coming.”
“Harry, if the Council learns that you’ve misled them—”
“They’ll probably charge me with treason,” I said.
Michael rose from his seat. “But—”
I stabbed a finger at him. “The longer we delay, the longer those creeps stay in town, the longer Summer’s hit men keep coming after me, and the more likely it is that innocent people are going to get hurt in the cross fire. I’ve got to move fast, and the best way to get the Council to move is to let it think its own ass is about to fall into the fire.”
“Harry—” Michael began.
“Don’t,” I said. “Don’t give me the speech about redemption and mercy and how everyone deserves a second chance. I’m all for doing the right thing, Michael. You know that. But this isn’t the time.”
“Then what is right changes because we’re in a hurry?” he asked gently.
“Even your Book says that there’s a time for all things,” I said. “A time to heal—and a time to kill.”
Michael looked from me to the corner by the back door, where the broadsword Amoracchius rested in its humble leather scabbard, its plain, crusader-style hilt bound in wire. “It isn’t that, Harry. I’ve seen more of what they’ve done than you have. I have no qualms with fighting them, if it comes to that.”
“They’ve already blown up a building, tried to murder me, and set off a situation that nearly got your own children burned down in the cross fire. In what way has it not come to that?”
Instead of answering, Michael shook his head, took up Amoracchius, and walked further into the house.
I scowled after him for a minute and muttered darkly under my breath.
“You confused him,” Sanya rumbled.
I glanced at the dark-skinned Knight. “What?”
“You confused him,” Sanya repeated. “Because of what you did.”
“What? Lying to the Council? I don’t see that I had much choice.”
“But you did,” Sanya said placidly. He reached into the gym bag on the floor next to him and drew out a long saber, an old cavalry weapon—Esperacchius. A nail worked into the hilt declared it a brother of Michael’s sword. He started inspecting the blade. “You could have simply moved to attack them.”
“By myself? I’m bad, but I’m not that bad.”
“He’s your friend. He would have come with you. You know that.”
I shook my head. “He’s my friend. Period. You don’t do that to your friends.”
“Precisely,” Sanya said. “So instead you have placed your own life in jeopardy in order to protect his beliefs. You risk your body to preserve his heart.” He brought out a smooth sharpening stone and began stropping the saber’s blade. “I suppose he considers it a particularly messianic act.”
“That’s not why I did it,” I said.
“Of course it isn’t. He knows that. It isn’t easy for him. Usually he’s the one protecting another, willing to pay the price if he must.”
I exhaled and glanced after Michael. “I don’t know what else I could have done.”
“Da,” Sanya agreed. “But he is still afraid for you.” He fell quiet for a moment, while his stone slid along the sword’s blade.
“Mind if I ask you something?” I said.
The big man kept sharpening the sword with a steady hand. “Not at all.”
“You looked a little tense when Tessa’s name came up,” I said.
Sanya glanced up at me for a second, his eyes shadowed and unreadable. He shrugged a shoulder and went back to his work.
“She do you wrong?”
“Barely ever noticed me. Or spoke to me,” Sanya said. “To her I was just an employee. One more face. She did not care who I was.”
“This second of hers, though. The one who recruited you.”
The muscles along his jawline twitched. “Her name is Rosanna.”
“And she done you wrong,” I said.
“Why do you say that?”
“’Cause when you talk about her, your face says that you been done wrong.”
He gave me a brief smile. “Do you know how many black men live in Russia, Dresden?”
“No. I mean, I figure they’re kind of a minority.”
Sanya stopped in midstrop and glanced at me for a pregnant moment, one eyebrow arched. “Yes,” he said, his tone dry. “Kind of.”
“More so than in the States, I guess.”
He grunted. “For Moscow I was very, very odd. If I went out to any smaller towns when I was growing up, I had to be careful about walking down busy streets. I could cause car accidents when drivers took their eyes off the road to stare at me. Literally. Many people in that part of the world had never seen a black person with their own eyes. That is changing slowly, but growing up I was a minority the way Bigfoot is a minority. A freak.”
I started putting things together. “That’s the kind of thing that is bound to make a young man a little resentful.”
He went back to sharpening the sword. “Oh, yes.”
“So when you say that Tessa prefers to take recruits she knows will be eager to accept a coin…”
“I speak from experience,” Sanya said, nodding. “Rosanna was everything that angry, poor, desperate young man could dream of. Pretty. Strong. Sensual. And she truly did not care about the color of my skin.” Sanya shook his head. “I was sixteen.”
I winced. “Yeah. Good age for making really bad decisions. I speak from experience, too.”
“She offered me the coin,” Sanya said. “I took it. And for five years the creature known as Magog and I traveled the world with Rosanna, indulged in every vice a young man could possibly imagine, and…obeyed Tessa’s commands.” He shook his head and glanced up at me. “By the end of that time, Dresden, I wasn’t much more than a beast who walked upright. Oh, I had thoughts and feelings, but they were all slaves to my baser desires. I did many things of which I am not—” He broke off and turned his face away from me. “I did many things.”
“She was your handler,” I said quietly. “Rosanna. She was the one getting you to try the drugs, to do the deeds. One little step at a time. Corrupting you and letting the Fallen take control.”
He nodded. “And the whole time I never even suspected it.
I thought that she cared about me as much as I cared about her.” He smiled faintly. “Mind you, I never claimed to be of any particular intelligence.”
“Who got you out?” I asked him. “Shiro?”
“In a way,” Sanya said. “Shiro had just driven Tessa from one of her projects in…Antwerp, I believe. She came storming into Rosanna’s apartment in Venice, furious. She and Rosanna had an argument I never completely understood—but instead of leaving when I was told to do so, I stayed to listen. I heard what Rosanna truly felt about me, heard her report about me to Tessa. And I finally understood what an idiot I’d been. I dropped the coin into a canal and never looked back.”
I blinked at him. “That must have been difficult.”
“My entire life has been one of a snowball in Hell,” Sanya said cheerfully. “Though the metaphor is perhaps inverted. At the time I judged the action to be tantamount to suicide, since Tessa was certain to track me down and kill me—but Shiro had followed her to Venice, and he found me instead. Michael—not the Chicago Michael, the other one—met us at Malta and brought Esperacchius, here, with him, offering me the chance to work against some of the evil I’d helped to create. From there I have been Knighting. Is good work. Plenty of travel, interesting people, always a new challenge.”
I shook my head and laughed. “That’s putting a positive spin on it.”
“I am making a difference,” Sanya said with simple and rock-solid conviction. “And you, Dresden? Have you considered taking up Fidelacchius? Joining us?”
“No,” I said quietly.
“Why not?” Sanya asked, his tone reasonable. “You know for what we fight. You know the good we do for others. Your cause runs a close parallel to ours: to protect those who cannot protect themselves; to pit yourself against the forces of violence and death when they arise.”
“I’m not really into the whole God thing,” I said.
“And I am an agnostic,” Sanya responded.
I snorted. “Hell’s bells. Tell me you aren’t still clinging to that. You carry a holy blade and hang out with angels.”
“The blade has power, true. The beings allied with that power are…somewhat angelic. But I have met many strange and mighty things since I took up the sword. If one called them ‘aliens’ instead of ‘angels,’ it would only mean that I was working in concert with powerful beings—not necessarily the literal forces of Heaven, or a literal Creator.” Sanya grinned. “A philosophical fine point, true, but I am not prepared to abandon it. What we do is worthy, without ever bringing questions of faith, religion, or God into the discussion.”
“Can’t argue with that,” I admitted.
“So tell me,” Sanya said, “why have you not considered taking up the sword?”
I thought about it for a second and said, “Because it isn’t for me. And Shiro said I would know who to give it to.”
Sanya shrugged and nodded his head in acquiescence. “Reason enough.” He sighed. “We could use Fidelacchius’s power in this conflict. I wish Shiro were with us now.”
“Good man,” I agreed quietly. “He was a king, you know.”
“I thought he just liked the King’s music.”
“No, no,” I said. “Shiro himself. He was a direct descendent of the last king of Okinawa. Several generations back, but his family was royalty.”
Sanya shrugged his broad shoulders. “There have been many kings over the centuries, my friend, and many years for their bloodlines to spread through the populace. My own family can trace its roots back to Salahuddin.”
I felt my eyebrows rise. “Salahuddin. You mean Saladin? King of Syria and Egypt during the Crusades?”
Sanya nodded. “The same.” He paused in midstrop and looked up at me, his eyes widening.
“I know you’re agnostic,” I said. “But do you believe in coincidence?”
“Not nearly so much as I once did,” Sanya replied.
“That can’t be a coincidence. Both of you descended from royalty.” I chewed on my lip. “Could that have something to do with who can take up one of the swords?”
“I am a soldier and an amateur philosopher,” Sanya said. “You are the wizard. Could such a thing be significant?”
I waggled a hand in midair. “Yes and no. I mean, there are a lot of factors that tie magic to matters of inheritance—genetic or otherwise. A lot of the old rites were intimately bound up with political rulers.”
“The king and his land are one,” Sanya intoned solemnly.
“Well, yeah.”
Sanya nodded. “Michael showed me that movie.”
“Merlin was the only good thing about that movie. That and Captain Picard kicking ass in plate mail with a big ax.” I waved my hand. “The point is that in many cultures, the king or sultan or whatever held a position of duty and authority that was as much spiritual as physical. Certain energies could have been connected to that, giving the old kings a form of metaphysical significance.”
“Perhaps something similar to the power of the Swords?” Sanya asked.
I shrugged. “Maybe. By the time I was born the planet was running a little low on monarchs. It isn’t something I’ve looked at before.”
Sanya smiled. “Well. Now you need only find a prince or princess willing to lay down his or her life over matters of principle. Do you know any?”
“Not so much,” I said. “But I’ve got a feeling that we’re onto something.” I glanced at the clock on the wall. “It’s getting late. I’ll be back here in about two hours, or I’ll call.”
“Da,” Sanya said. “We will watch over your criminals for you.”
“Thanks,” I said, and went back out to the workshop. Hendricks had slumped to the floor and was sleeping. Gard was actually snoring. Thomas had been pacing restlessly when I entered.
“Well?” he asked.
“Gotta get to Mac’s and meet Murphy,” I said. “Let’s roll.”
Thomas nodded and headed for the door.
I reached into the trash can by the door, took out an empty motor oil can, and tossed it into the least cluttered corner of the workshop. It bounced off something in midair, and Molly let out a soft yelp, appearing there a moment later, rubbing a hand to her hip.
“Where’d she come from?” Thomas demanded crossly.
“What did I miss?” Molly demanded, her tone faintly offended. “I had all the senses covered. Even Thomas didn’t know I was there.”
“You didn’t miss anything,” I said. “I just know how you think, grasshopper. If I can’t make you stay where it’s safe, I might as well keep you where I can see you. Maybe you’ll even be useful. You’re with us.”
Molly’s eyes gleamed. “Excellent,” she said, and hurried over to join me.
Chapter
Sixteen
I was more than an hour late, and Murphy was not amused.
“Your nose looks worse than it did yesterday,” she said when I sat down at the table. “I think the black eyes have grown, too.”
“Gosh, you’re cute when you’re angry,” I responded.
Her eyes narrowed dangerously.
“It makes your little button nose all pink and your eyes get bloodshot and even bluer.”
“Did you have any last words, Dresden, or should I just choke you now?”
“Mac!” I called, raising a hand. “Two pale!”
She fixed me with a steady look and said, “Don’t think you can buy your way out of this with good beer.”
“I don’t,” I said, rising. “I’m buying my way out of it with really, really good beer.”
I walked over to the bar as Mac set two bottles of his microbrewed liquid nirvana down and took off the caps with a deft twist of his hand, disdaining a bottle opener. I winked at him and picked up both bottles, then sauntered back over to Murphy.
I gave her my bottle, took mine, and we drank. She paused after the first taste and blinked at the bottle before drinking again more deeply. “This beer,” she pronounced after that, “just saved your life.
”
“Mac’s a master beeromancer,” I replied. I’d never tell him, but at the time I wished he’d serve his brew cold. I’d have loved to hold a frosty bottle against my aching head for a moment. You’d think the pain from the damned broken nose would fade eventually. But it just kept on stubbornly burning.
We had settled down at a table along one wall of the pub. There are thirteen tables in the room, and thirteen wooden pillars, each extensively carved with scenes mostly out of Old World fairy tales. The bar is crooked and has thirteen stools, and thirteen ceiling fans whir lazily overhead. The setup of the entire place is designed to diffuse and refract random magical energies, the kind that often gather around practitioners of magic when they’re grumpy or out of sorts. It offers a measure of protection from accumulated negative energies, enough to make sure that annoying or depressing “vibes,” for lack of a more precise term, don’t adversely affect the moods and attitudes of the pub’s clientele.
It doesn’t keep out any of the supernatural riffraff—that’s what the sign by the door is for. Mac had the place legally recognized as neutral ground among the members of the Unseelie Accords, and members of any of the Accorded nations had a responsibility to avoid conflict in such a place, or at least to take it outside.
Still, neutral ground is safe only until someone thinks they can get away with violating the Accords. It’s best to be cautious there.
“On the other hand,” Murphy said, more quietly, “maybe you’re too pathetic to beat to death right now.”
“My nose, you mean. Compared to the way my hand felt, it’s nothing,” I said.
“Still can’t be much fun.”
“Well. No.”
She watched me through her next sip and then said, “You’re about to play the wizard card and tell me to butt out.”
“Not exactly,” I said.
She gave me her cop eyes, all professionally detached neutrality, and nodded once. “So talk.”
“Remember the guys from the airport a few years back?”
“Yeah. Killed the old Okinawan guy in the chapel. He died real bad.”
I smiled faintly. “I think he’d probably argue the point, if he could.”
She shrugged and said, tone quietly flat, “It was a mess.”