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Polka music, heavy on accordion and clarinet, oompahed cheerfully through the room from a little stereo on the desk. At the desk sat a small man with a wild shock of black hair. He was dressed in medical scrubs and green bunny slippers, complete with floppy ears. He had a pen clenched in one hand, and scribbled furiously at a stack of forms.
It wasn’t a bear. Not unless a bear can have six legs and a pair of curling ram’s horns wrapping around the sides of its head. Not unless bears can somehow get an extra pair of eyes, right over the first set, one pair glowing with faint orange light and one with green. Not unless bears have started getting luminous tattoos of swirling runes on their foreheads and started sprouting twin rows of serrated, slime-coated teeth.
“I’m not a witch,” I said, glancing out the door. “I’m a wizard.” Sanya frowned. “What is the difference?” “Wizard has a Z.”
“I wouldn’t burden any decent system of faith by participating in it.”
In this corner, one missing Shroud, one impossibly and thoroughly dead corpse, one dedicated and deadly vampire warlord, three holy knights, twenty-nine fallen angels, and a partridge in a pear tree. And in the opposite corner, one tired, bruised, underpaid professional wizard, threatened by his allies and about to get dumped by his would-be girlfriend for John Q. Humdrum.
Kincaid fixed his empty eyes on me and said, “Be nice to the little girl, wizard. I’ve handled your kind before.” “I get more threats before nine a.m. than most people get all day,” I responded, and shut the door on him. Purely for effect, I locked it too. Me, petty? Surely not.
“If you know that much,” I said, “if you are that powerful, why did you hire a bodyguard to bring you here?” “My feet don’t reach the pedals.” I felt like smacking myself on the forehead. “Oh, right.”
Ivy blinked and looked down at Mister, and her child’s face was suddenly suffused with a pure and uncomplicated joy. She said, “Kitty!” and immediately knelt down to pet Mister. Mister apparently liked her. He started purring louder, and walked around Ivy, rubbing up against her while she petted him and spoke to him quietly.
“Molly?” I asked. “Wow, you sound all grown-up now.” She laughed. “Yeah, the breast fairy came to visit and everything. Did you want to talk to my mom?” Some might find it significant that it took me a second to realize she wasn’t being literal about the faerie. Sometimes I hate my life.
“Ungh,” I said. “Okay, then, Caveman Og. Where germs go?” “Sunrise,” I said. “Poof.” Butter’s voice sounded bewildered. “Vampire germs?” “The tiny capes are a dead giveaway,” I said.
“Ohhhh,” Molly said wisely. “Those are fun-time handcuffs, not bad-time handcuffs. I gotcha.”
Molly clucked and dipped into the backpack again. She grabbed my wrist firmly, shook out a ring of small keys, and started trying them in the lock of the cuffs. “So give me the juicy details,” she said. “You can say ‘bleep’ instead of the fun words if you want.” I blinked. “Where the bleep did you get a bunch of cuff keys?”
“I’d think a good Christian boy wouldn’t be puffing down the cigars.” “Technicality,” Shiro said. “The cigars?” “My Christianity,” Shiro said. “When I was a boy, I liked Elvis. Had a chance to see him in concert when we moved to California. It was a big revival meeting. There was Elvis and then a speaker and my English was not so good. He invited people backstage to meet the king. Thought he meant Elvis, so I go backstage.” He sighed. “Found out later I had become a Baptist.”
I am just another blind man. I do not get the whole picture of what transpires in all places. I am blind and limited. I would be a fool to think myself wise. And so, not knowing what the universe means, I can only try to be responsible with the knowledge, the strength, and the time given to me. I must be true to my heart.”
“Just keep the shirt clean,” Susan muttered. “No problem. I can wipe my fingers on the cummerbund.” “I can’t take you anywhere,” Susan said.
He pointed the gun at the terror-stricken Valmont and said, “Shall I count to three?” I threw on a puppet’s Transylvanian accent. “Count as high as you vant, but you von’t get one, one detonator, ah, ah, ah.”
Nicodemus nodded to one of the goons. The man walked over to me, drawing a jewelry box out of his pocket. He opened it, offering it out to me. I mimed a gasp. “But this is so sudden.” The goon glared. Nicodemus smiled.
“I’m a disciple of the Tao of Peter Parker, obviously,” I said. I guess Nicodemus was a DC Comics fan, because he didn’t get it.
“Are you certain, Dresden?” Nicodemus said in a quiet voice. “This is your very last chance.” I slumped weakly. There didn’t seem to be much of a point to bravado anymore. I’d made the call, and that was that. “I’m certain. Fuck off, Nick.”
I kicked him in the head with my rented formal shoes. My shoe went flying off, which I was pretty sure never happened to James Bond.
“For much the same reason any man can kill another,” Forthill said. “He is intelligent. Cautious. Skilled. Ruthless. Like his patron fallen angel.” I guessed at the name. “Badassiel?” Forthill almost smiled. “Anduriel.
The blood on their hands does not make it right to bloody my own. My choices are measured against my own soul. Not against the stains on theirs.”
“People like you always mistake compassion for weakness. Michael and Sanya aren’t weak. Fortunately for you, they’re good men.” Cassius laughed at me. “Unfortunately for you, I’m not.” I spun around, swinging the bat as hard as I could, and broke Cassius’s right kneecap. He screamed in shock and sudden surprise, and went down. Odd crackling sounds came from the joint. I swung again and broke his right ankle. Cassius screamed. I broke his left knee for him too. And his left ankle. He was thrashing around and screaming a lot, so it took me maybe a dozen swings.
The Russian grinned. “Was that a quarter you gave Cassius?” “Yeah.” “For the phone?” “Yeah.” Michael noted, “Phone calls cost more than that now.” I slouched back and allowed myself a small smile. “Yeah. I know.”
I squinted my eyes and made my voice gravelly. “Deserve’s got nothin’—” “So help me God, if you quote Clint Eastwood at me, I’m wrapping this car around a telephone pole.” “Do you feel lucky, punk?” I smiled and turned my left hand palm up.
He wore tight blue jeans and a black T-shirt with a Buffy the Vampire Slayer logo.
Compassion dictates that we must make allowances. Mister Dresden is a diplomatically challenged individual. He should be in a shelter for the tactless.”
Dear Mr. Dresden, By the time you read this letter, I will be dead. I have not been given the details, but I know a few things that will happen over the next few days. I write you now to say what I might not have the chance to in the flesh. Your path is often a dark one. You do not always have the luxury that we do as Knights of the Cross. We struggle against powers of darkness. We live in black and white, while you must face a world of greys. It is never easy to know the path in such a place. Trust your heart. You are a decent man. God lives in such hearts. Enclosed is a medical report. My
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Sanya sat in a recliner, his expression puzzled, blinking at the phone. “Again,” he said. Molly sat cross-legged on the couch near him with a phone book in her lap and my shopping list she’d picked up in the tree house laid flat over one half of it. Her expression was serious, but her eyes were sparkling as she drew a red line through another entry in the phone book. “How strange,” she said, and read off another number. Sanya started dialing. “Hello?” he said a moment later. “Hello, sir. Could you please tell me if you have Prince Albert in a can—” He blinked again, mystified, and reported to
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It isn’t good to hold on too hard to the past. You can’t spend your whole life looking back. Not even when you can’t see what lies ahead. All you can do is keep on keeping on, and try to believe that tomorrow will be what it should be—even if it isn’t what you expected.
