by Jim Butcher
* * *
The rest of the night passed without anyone getting killed. I sat down with my back against the outside wall of the cottage, to keep an eye on my “guests” down the hill, but when I blinked a few seconds later, my eyes stuck shut, and then didn’t open again until I heard, distantly, a bird twittering.
Footsteps came crunching up the hill, and I opened my eyes to see Kringle approaching. His red cloak and gleaming mail were stained with black ichor, the hilt of his sword was simply missing a chunk, as if it had been bitten away, and his mouth was set in a wide, pleased smile. “Dresden,” he said calmly.
“Kringle.”
“Long night?”
“Long day,” I said. Someone, during the night, had covered me with an old woolen army surplus blanket that had been in a plastic storage box in the cottage. I eyed him. “Have fun?”
A low, warm rumble of a laugh bubbled in his chest. “Very much so. If I don’t get into a good battle every few years, life just isn’t the same.”
“Even if it’s on Halloween?” I asked.
He eyed me, and his smile became wider and more impish. “Especially then,” he said. “How’s the leg?”
I grunted and checked. Butters’s dressing had stayed on throughout the events of the night. The constant, burning sting was gone, and I peeled off the dressing to see that the little wound on my leg had finally scabbed over. “Looks like I’ll live.”
“Hawthorn dart,” Kringle said. “Nasty stuff. Hawthorn wood burns hot, and doesn’t care for creatures of Winter.” His expression sobered. “I’ve a message for you.”
“Ah?” I asked.
“Mab has taken the new Ladies with her,” he said. “She said to tell you that the new Winter Lady would be returned safely to her apartment in a few days, after some brief and gentle instruction. Mab is on excellent terms with the svartalves, and anticipates no problems with your apprentice’s… new position.”
“That’s… good, I guess,” I said.
“It is,” Kringle replied. “Dresden… this is the business of the Queens. I advise you not to attempt to interfere with it.”
“I already interfered,” I said.
Kringle straightened, and his fierce smile became somehow satisfied. “Aye? Like to live dangerously, do you?” He leaned a little closer and lowered his voice. “Never let her make you cringe—but never challenge her pride, wizard. I don’t know exactly what passed between you, but I suspect that if it had been witnessed by another, she would break you to pieces. I’ve seen it before. Terrible pride in that creature. She’ll never bend it.”
“She’ll never bend,” I said. “That’s okay. I can respect that.”
“Could be that you can,” Kringle said. He nodded to me and turned to go.
“Hey,” I said.
He turned to me pleasantly.
“The whole Winter Knight thing,” I said. “It’s made me stronger.”
“True enough,” he said.
“But not that much stronger,” I said. “You could have beaten me last night.”
“Oh?” Kringle’s smile faded—except from his eyes.
“And I’ve seen goblins move a few times,” I said. “The Erlking could have gotten out of the way of that shot.”
“Really?”
“You meant me to have the Wild Hunt.”
“No one can be given a power like the Wild Hunt, Dresden,” Kringle said. “He can only take it.”
“Really?” I said, as drily as I knew how.
That got another laugh from Kringle. “You have guts and will, mortal. It had to be shown, or the Hunt would never have accepted you.”
“Maybe I’ll just punch you out whenever I feel like it, then,” I said.
“Maybe you’ll try,” Kringle replied amiably. He looked out at the lightening sky and let out a satisfied breath. “It was Halloween, Dresden. You put on a mask for a time. That’s all.” He looked directly at me and said, “Many, many mantles are worn—or discarded—on Halloween night, wizard.”
“You mean masks?” I asked, frowning.
“Masks, mantles,” Kringle said. “What’s the difference?”
He winked at me.
And for the briefest fraction of a second, the shadows falling from the tower and the cottage in the gathering morning behind us seemed to flow together. The eye he winked with vanished behind a stripe of shadow and what looked like a wide scar. His face seemed leaner, and for that instant I saw Vadderung’s wolfish features lurking inside Kringle’s.
I sat straight up, staring.
Kringle finished his wink, turned jauntily, and started walking down the hill, humming “Here Comes Santa Claus” in a rumbling bass voice.
I stared after him.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered to myself.
* * *
I stood up and wrapped the army surplus blanket around myself before I walked into the cottage. I smelled coffee and soup, and my stomach wanted lots of both.
There was a fire going in the fireplace, and my coffeepot was hanging near the fire. The soup kettle was hanging on its swinger, too. The soup would be made from stock and freeze-dried meat, but I was hungry enough not to be picky. Everyone else there probably felt the same way.
Thomas was sacked out on one of the cots, snoring. Justine had spooned up behind him, her face pressed into his back. They both had clean faces and hands, at least. Mac was snoozing on the other cot, bare to the waist, his chest and stomach evidently washed free of any dirt—and any blood or any injury as well.
Sarissa was gone. Molly was gone. Fix was gone. I felt confident they had left together.
Karrin sat at the fire, staring in, a cup of coffee in her hands. Mouse sat beside her. When I came in, he looked over at me and started wagging his tail.
“You leave the blanket?” I asked quietly.
“Once we got the fire going,” she said. “I suppose I could go get you your duster now, though.”
“I’d look like a flasher,” I said.
She smiled, very slightly, and offered me two mugs. I looked. One had coffee, the other very chunky soup. She passed me a camp fork to go along with the soup. “It isn’t much,” she said.
“Don’t care,” I said, and sat down on the hearth across from her to partake of both. The heat gurgled into my belly along with the food and the coffee, and I started feeling human for the first time in… a while. I ached everywhere. It wasn’t at all pleasant, but it felt like something I’d come by honestly.
“Christ, Dresden,” Karrin said. “You could at least wash your hands.” She picked up a towelette and leaned over to start cleaning off my hands. My stomach thought stopping was a bad idea, but I put the mugs aside and let her.
She cleaned my hands off patiently, going through a couple of towelettes. Then she said, “Lean over.”
I did.
She took a fresh towelette and wiped off my face, slowly and carefully. There were nicks and cuts. It hurt when she cleaned one of them out, but it also felt right. Sometimes the things that are good for you, in the long run, hurt for a little while when you first get to them.
“There,” she said a moment later. “You almost look human—” She paused at that, and looked down. “I mean…”
“I know what you mean,” I said.
“Yeah.”
The fire crackled.
“What’s the story with Mac?” I asked.
Karrin looked over at the sleeping man. “Mab,” she said. “She just came in here a few minutes ago and looked at him. Then before anyone could react, she ripped off the bandage, stuck her fingers into the wound, and pulled out the bullet. Dropped it right on his chest.”
“No wound now,” I noted.
“Yeah. Started closing up the minute she was done. But you remember the time he got beaten so badly in his bar? Why didn’t his injuries regenerate then?”
I shook my head. “Maybe because he was conscious then.”
“He did turn down the painkillers. I remember it seemed odd at
the time,” Karrin murmured. “What is he?”
I shrugged. “Ask him.”
“I did,” she said, “right before he passed out.”
“What’d he say?”
“He said, ‘I’m out.’”
I grunted.
“What do you think it means?” she asked.
I thought about it. “Maybe it means he’s out.”
“We just let it go?” she asked.
“It’s what he wants,” I said. “Think we should torture him?”
“Point,” she said, and sighed. “Maybe instead we just let him rest.”
“Maybe we should let him make beer,” I said. “What about Thomas?”
“Woke up. Ate.” She frowned and clarified, “Ate soup. Been asleep for a couple of hours. That big bone thing really clobbered him.”
“There’s always someone bigger than you,” I said.
She gave me a look.
“More true for some than others,” I clarified.
She rolled her eyes.
“So,” I said, a moment later.
“So,” she said.
“Um. Should we talk?”
“About what?”
Mouse looked back and forth between us and started wagging his tail hopefully.
“Quiet, you,” I said, and rubbed his ears. “Bad guy made of bones and he gets the drop on you? Charity giving you too many treats or something? That fight should have been like Scooby-Doo versus the Scooby Snack Ghost.”
Mouse grinned happily, unfazed, still wagging his tail.
“Don’t be so hard on him,” Karrin said. “There’s always someone bigger.” Then she shook her head and said, “Wow, we are such children. We’ll grab at any excuse not to talk about us right now.”
My soup did a little flip-flop. “Um,” I said. “Yeah.” I swallowed. “We… we kissed.”
“There’s a song about what that means,” Karrin said.
“Yeah. But I don’t sing.”
She paused, as if her soup had just started doing gymnastics, too.
Then she spoke very carefully. “There are factors.”
“Like Kincaid,” I said, without any heat or resentment.
“He’s not one of them,” she said. “Not anymore.”
“Oh,” I said, a little surprised.
“It’s you, Harry.”
“Pretty sure I’m supposed to be a factor.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Just… not against.” She took my hands. “I’ve seen things in you over the past day that… concern me.”
“Concern you.”
“They scare the holy loving fuck out of me,” she said calmly, by way of clarification. “This Winter Knight thing. You’re not changing. You’ve already changed.”
I felt a little chill. “What do you mean? Tonight? Hell, Karrin, when haven’t we done monsters and mayhem?”
“We’ve done it a lot,” she said. “But you’ve always been scared of it before. You did it anyway, but you thought it was scary. That’s the sane thing to think.”
“So?” I asked. “What was different about it tonight?”
“The way your erection kept pressing into my back,” she said wryly.
“Uh,” I said. “Really?”
“Yeah, a woman kind of notices.”
I hadn’t.
Gulp.
“It’s just… Karrin, look, that thing hardly ever does something that isn’t ill-advised. Doesn’t mean it’s going to make the calls.”
“I will never understand why men do that,” she said.
“Do what?”
“Talk about their genitals like they’re some other creature. Some kind of mind-controlling parasite.” She shook her head. “It’s just you, Harry. It’s all you. And part of you was really loving everything that was going on.”
“And that’s bad?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. Then she made a short, frustrated sound. “No. Maybe. It’s a change.”
“Do changes have to be bad?”
“Of course not. But I don’t know if this one is bad or not yet,” she said. “Harry… you are the strongest man I know, in more than one sense of the word. And because you are… it means that if you do change…”
“You think I’d be some kind of monster,” I said.
She shrugged, and squeezed my hands with hers. “I’m not saying this right. It’s not coming out right. But I felt you, when we were with the Hunt. I knew what was driving you, what you were feeling. And in the moment, I was down with it—and that scares me, too.”
“So am I too much of a monster or are you?” I asked. “I’m getting confused.”
“Join the club,” she said.
“You’re saying that the problem is, you think I could go bad,” I said.
“I know you could,” she said. “Anyone can. And you’ve got more opportunity than most. And maybe you shouldn’t be rocking your emotional boat right now. When Susan broke your heart, right after she was changed? You went into a downward spiral. If that happened now, with the kinds of things you’re facing… Harry, I’m afraid you might not be able to pull out of it.”
That much sure as hell was true. “You aren’t wrong,” I said. “But we haven’t even gone on a date yet and you’ve already skipped ahead to the ugly breakup?”
“There are factors,” she repeated in a firm, steady voice.
“Like what?” I asked.
“Like this thing with Molly,” Karrin said.
“There’s no thing with Molly,” I said. “There’s never going to be a thing with Molly.”
She sighed. “You’re a wizard. She’s a wizard. Now you’re the Winter Knight. And she’s the Winter Lady.”
“Karrin,” I began.
“And I’m going to get old and die soon,” Karrin said very, very quietly. “Relatively soon. But you’re going to keep going for centuries. And so is she. The two of you are close—and even if nothing ever happens… it’s one more thing. You know?”
We held hands and the fire crackled.
“Oh,” I said.
She nodded.
“So there are things stacked against us,” I said. “What else is new?”
“You are the captain of disaster in the supernatural world,” she acknowledged. “But I’m the one who has repeatedly taken relationships into icebergs. I’ve done it enough to know that you and I are the Titanic.”
“We’re people,” I said. “Not some fucking ship.”
“We’re also people,” she said. “A kiss when we’re both ramped up on adrenaline is one thing. A relationship is harder. A lot harder.” She shook her head. “If it ends in tears, I’m afraid it could destroy us both. And there’s a lot on the line right now. I don’t think this is something we should rush into. I need time to think. To… I just need time.”
I swallowed. She still wasn’t wrong. I didn’t like what she had to say, not one bit, but…
She wasn’t wrong.
“Is this where you tell me we need to be friends?” I asked.
She blinked and looked up at me. She touched my face with her fingertips. “Harry, we’re… We went past that a long time ago. I don’t know if we can… if we should be lovers. But I’m your friend. Your ally. I’ve seen what you want, and what you’re willing to sacrifice to make it happen.” She took one of my hands between hers, pressing hard. “I feel lost since they fired me. I don’t know what I’m meant to do or who I ought to be. But what I do know is that I’ve got your back. Always.” Tears fell from her blue eyes. “So goddammit, don’t you start taking the highway to Hell. Because I’m going to be right there with you. All the way.”
I couldn’t see her face after that. I felt her head underneath my chin, and I put my arms around her. We sat together like that for a while.
“Things are going to get bad,” I said quietly. “I don’t know how or when, exactly. But there’s a storm coming. Being near me isn’t going to be… sane.”
“Let’s just agree that I’m not all the way t
ogether, and save us both some time arguing,” she said. “Always, Harry. I’m there. End of story.”
“Okay,” I said. “One condition.”
“What?”
“That’s not the end of the story,” I said. “I mean, maybe neither one of us is ready. But we could be, one day. And maybe we will be.”
“Optimistic idiot,” she said, but I could hear the smile.
“And if we get to that place,” I said, “you don’t chicken out. You don’t run away, no matter how it looks to you. We set course for the fucking iceberg, full speed ahead.”
She started shaking. She was weeping.
“And the sex,” I said. “It will be frequent. Possibly violent. You’ll be screaming. Neighbors will make phone calls.”
She started shaking harder. She was laughing.
“Those are my conditions,” I said. “Take them or leave them.”
“You’re such a pig, Dresden,” Karrin said. Then she drew back enough to give me a look through tearstained blue eyes. “Maybe you’ll be the one screaming.”
* * *
“You sure about this?” asked Thomas. “Out here by yourself?”
“Cold isn’t really an issue anymore,” I said, untying the first of the lines from the Water Beetle to the Whatsup Dock. I was wearing some of his clothes from the ship. The sweats were too short, and the shirt was too tight, but the duster hid most of that. “And I’ve got supplies for a week or so, until you can make it back. You sure that tub’s going to make it back to town?”
“Put three patches on the hull after I got her off the beach, and the pumps are working,” Thomas said. “We should be fine. What about you? That thing the island said was in your head?”
“Another reason to stay here,” I said. “If Molly’s the one who can help me, I’m on my own for now. But Demonreach seems to be able to make it leave me alone, at least while I’m here. Pretty much means I need to stay until Molly gets herself back together.”
My brother exhaled unhappily, and squinted up at the noonday sun, south of us, hidden behind grey clouds. “Heard from Lara on the radio.”
“And?”
“Both her team and Marcone’s found rituals in progress at the two sites. They broke them up. Someone really wanted this place to get screwed up.”
“Or something,” I said with a melodramatic waggle of my eyebrows.