Brief Cases (The Dresden Files, #15.1)

by Jim Butcher

The wisest option would have been to report in to the captain, send for reinforcements, veil myself, and follow them. I had never been a particularly cautious person.

Who do you think you are?” “My name is Wyatt Earp,” said the deputy. “And I think I’m the law.”

Magic is well and good, but bullets are often swifter.

Then I cocked my revolver, turned to Earp, and nodded. “Seems like a bad hand, Miss Anastasia,” Earp said. “But let’s play it out.” And with no more fanfare than that, Wyatt Earp calmly opened the door to the jailhouse, raised his rifle to his shoulder, and walked out shooting, and I went out behind him.

“To the roof!” I snarled to the näcken. And the dark fae let go of his disguise.

“Who was that German?” I felt my mouth twist with distaste, even as a sour taste of fear touched my tongue. “If our information at the White Council is accurate, his name is Kemmler,” I said. “That Briton was one of his apprentices, Grevane.” “Bad men?” “Some of the most dangerous alive,” I said.

It is a source of considerable personal pride to me that I can honestly and without reservation type the next sentence: It came to me as a great shock and professional failure when one day I realized that I had made insufficient allowance in my work life for Bigfoot.

The smart ones come to me because they know I can help; the desperate come because they don’t know anyone else who can.

My newest client wanted something different, though. He wanted me to meet him in the woods. This did not make me feel optimistic that he would be one of the smart ones.

“You’re . . . ,” I said. “You’re a . . .” “Bigfoot,” he said. “Sasquatch. Yowie. Yeti. Buncha names. Yep.”

A lot of supernatural folk can and do interbreed with humanity. The resulting children, half-mortal, half-supernatural, are called scions.

“It might be difficult to get you something actionable.” Pounder’s eyes almost seemed to turn a green-tinged shade of gold, and her voice became quiet and hard. “I am not interested in courts,” she said. “I only care about my son.” Yikes. Bigfoot Irwin had himself one formidable mama bear.

“You’ve read the Hitchhiker’s Guide?” “Forty-two times,” I said.

I’d been making an educated guess, but the svartalf didn’t need to know that. I knew precious little about the creatures. They were extremely gifted craftsmen, and were responsible for creating most of the really cool artifacts of Norse myth.

“Thinking for yourself is the most valuable skill you’ll ever learn.”

So once again, I met with Inspiration at the corner of Late and Hurry Up.

The first thing I thought, looking at the roomful of baby Wardens, was, They all look so darned young. The close second was, My God, am I getting old?

“You can’t ever be sure what you’re going to come up against. But you can be sure about how to approach the investigation.” I turned to the old blackboard on the wall behind me and scribbled on it with the stub of a piece of chalk. “I call it the Four As,” I said, and wrote four As down the left side of the board.

Ascertain the threat. Become aware of the problem.”

SECOND A,” I said to the Wardenlets, writing on the chalkboard as I did. “Analysis.”

I got a bigger laugh than the heckler. Which is how you make sure the heckler doesn’t steal the show from you.

“Honestly,” I said into the silence, letting my voice become gentler, more conversational, “the best thing you can do is communicate. Talk to the people involved. Your victims, if they can speak to you. Their family. Witnesses. Friends. Most of the time, everything you need is something they already know. Most of the time, that’s the fastest, safest, easiest way to get it.”

She and her children lived in a suburb that was more sub than urb, southeast of KC, named Peculiar. Peculiar, Missouri. You can’t make these things up.

“Oh, God,” she said. “I think I like you.” “Give it time,” I said.

“THIRD A,” I said, writing on the board. “Assemble.” “Avengers,” said McKenzie. “Assemble!” crowed the young Wardens in unison. They’re good kids.

“A boogeyman,” I said. “Sometimes known as a boggle or a boggart. It’s a weak form of phobophage—a fear-eater, mostly insubstantial. This one is pretty common. Feeds on a child’s fear.”

“LAST A,” I said, writing. “Act.”

You can use just about anything to make a magic circle, but salt is often the most practical. It’s a symbol of the earth and of purity, and it doesn’t draw ants. You use sugar to make a circle on the carpet only once. Let me tell you.

Holy crap, that was the biggest boogeyman I’d ever seen. They usually weren’t much bigger than a raccoon.

“Arrogance,” I said quietly, and wrote it on the board, beneath the rest. “That’s the fifth A. We carry it around with us.

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

“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.

was written as part of correcting the injustice of not having considered Bigfoot sufficiently in my previous world building. For that reason alone, it was a totally necessary story.

The idea of the consequences of your actions coming back to you in the future is ingrained into the fabric of the Dresden Files—and

Granted, my perspective is different from that of nonwizards, but marching out into the woods, looking for a very large and very powerful creature by blasting out what you’re pretty sure are territorial challenges to fight (or else mating calls) seems . . . somewhat unwise.

It was beautiful magic, which was rare for me. I mean, explosions and lightning bolts and so on were pretty standard fare. This kind of gentle, interrogative spell? It was a treat to have a reason to use it.

Irwin’s aura was bloody strong, standing out several inches farther from his body than on most humans. I was a full-blown wizard and a strong one, and my aura wasn’t any more powerful.

“Wah,” I said, Bruce Lee style, and looked at the other two goons. “You boys want a choo-choo ride, too?”

“I was a Venator. One of the Venatori Umbrorum. Retired.” The Hunters in the Shadows. Or of the Shadows, depending on how you read it. They were a boys’ club made up of the guys who had the savvy to be clued in to the supernatural world, but without the talent it took to be a true wizard. Mostly academic types. They’d been invaluable assets in the White Council’s war with the Red Court, gathering information and interfering with our enemy’s lines of supply and support. They were old allies of the Council—and any Venator would know the price of violating the Laws.

“Why?” I asked him quietly. “Why were you taking essence from the boy?” “H-he . . . He had so much. I didn’t think it would hurt him, and I . . .” He cringed back from me as he spoke the last words. “I . . . needed to grow some hair.” I blinked my eyes slowly. Twice. “Did you say . . . hair?”

“You used black magic. To grow hair.”

One of the most frequent requests I heard from fans who lived in Chicagoland and loved their Cubbies: What about the Billy Goat Curse in the world of the Dresden Files? This is the story I wrote to answer that question—and because I honestly wanted to know myself, and sometimes writing the story is the only way for me to get it.

“Or maybe . . .” My voice trailed off, and then I barked out a short bite of laughter. “Oh. Oh, that’s funny.” Bob spun in my hand to look up at me. “It wasn’t Sianis who put the whammy on the Cubs,” I said, grinning. “It was the goat.”

Obviously, I am not Harry Dresden. My name is something I rarely trouble to remember, but for most of my adult life, I have been called John Marcone. I am a professional monster.

“The Fomor are an ancient folk,” she said. “Water dwellers, cousins of the jotuns. Extremely formidable. Sorcerers, shape changers, seers.” “And signatories,” I noted. “Yes,” she said.

“I am not a humanitarian. When I offer charity it is for tax purposes.”

It was probably the Fomor who created those cat things the Knights of the Blackened Denarius used.” I twisted my mouth in displeasure at the name.

“The Fomor practice entropy magic. They make the antitechnology effect Dresden puts off look like mild sunspot activity. Modern systems are going to experience problems near him.”

The new military AA-12 automatic shotguns are not the hunting weapons I first handled in my patriotically delusional youth.

“Sir,” Justine said. I looked up to see Mag standing on the landing, cloaked in random shadows, smiling. The emergency lights on the stairwell blew out with a melodramatic shower of dying sparks. “Ah,” I said. I reached inside the safe-room door, found the purely mechanical pull-cord wrapped unobtrusively around a nail head on the wall, and gave it a sharp jerk. It set off the antipersonnel mines built into the wall of the landing. There were four of them, which meant that a wash of fire and just under three-thousand-round shot acquainted themselves with the immediate vicinity of the landing and with Mag.