Murphy casually bumped her shoulder against my arm when I was between steps, making me wobble, and I grinned. We emerged onto the mostly empty street. The firemen had been wrapping up their job when I arrived, and every truck but one had departed. Once the flames were out the show was over, and there were no rubberneckers anymore. Only a few cops were in sight, most of them in their cars.
"So what happened to your face?" Murphy asked.
I told her.
She concealed a smile. "'The Three Billy Goats Gruff '?"
"Hey. They're tough, all right? They kill trolls."
"I saw you do that once. How hard could it be?"
I found myself grinning. "I had a little help."
Murphy matched my smile. "One more short joke and I'm taking a kneecap."
"Murphy," I chided, "petty violence is beneath you. Which is saying something."
"Keep it up, wise guy. I'm always going to be taller than you once you're lying unconscious on the ground."
"You're right. That was a low blow. I'll try to rise above it."
She showed me a clenched fist. "Pow, Dresden. Right to the moon."
We reached Murphy's car. Rawlins was in the passenger seat, pretending to snore. He wasn't the sort to just fall asleep.
"So, Summer made a run at you," Murphy said. "You think the attack on Marcone's building is connected with that?"
"I lost my faith in coincidence," I said.
"Get in," she said. "I'll give you a ride home."
I shook my head. "There might be something I can do here, but I need to be alone. And I need a doughnut."
Murphy arched a delicate dark-gold eyebrow. "Ooooooo-kay."
"Get your mind out of the gutter and give me the damned doughnut."
Murphy shook her head and got in her car. She tossed me a sack from Dunkin' Donuts that was sitting on Rawlins's side of the dashboard.
"Hey!" Rawlins protested without opening his eyes.
"For a good cause," I told him, nodding my thanks to Murphy. "Call you when I know something."
She frowned at my nose. "You sure you want to be alone?"
I winked one of my blackened eyes at her. "Some things a wizard has to do for himself," I said.
Rawlins swallowed a titter.
I get no respect.
They drove off and left me in the silently falling snow in the still hours before dawn. There were still a couple of fire crews and uniform cops there, the latter blocking off the street, though the former weren't actively firefighting. The building was out, and coated in a layer of ice-but I guess there always could have been something hidden in the walls and ready to pop out again. I overheard one of them telling another that the road crew that was supposed to clean the rubble out of the street was helping a city plow truck stuck in the snow, and would be there when they could.
I trudged to about a block away, found an alley not choked, and went in with my doughnut. I debated for a moment what approach I would take. My relationship with this particular source had changed over the years, after all. Reason indicated that sticking with longstanding procedure was my best bet. Instinct told me that reason had disappointed me more than once, and that it wasn't thinking in the long term anyway.
Over the years, my instincts and I have gotten cozy.
So, instead of bothering with a simple bait-and-snare, I braced my feet, held out my right hand palm up, placed the doughnut upon it like an offering, and murmured a Name.
Names, capital N, have power. If you know something's Name, you automatically have a conduit with which you can reach out and touch it, a way to home in on it with magic. Sometimes that can be a really bad idea. Speak the Name of a big, bad spiritual entity and you might be able to touch it, sure-but it can touch you you right back, and the big boys tend to do it a lot harder than any mortal. It's worth as much as your soul to speak the Name of beings like that. right back, and the big boys tend to do it a lot harder than any mortal. It's worth as much as your soul to speak the Name of beings like that.
But the Nevernever is a big place, and not to mix metaphors, but there are plenty of fish in that sea. There are literally countless beings of far less metaphysical significance, and it really isn't terribly difficult to get one of them to do your bidding by invoking its Name.
(People have Names, too. Sort of. Mortals have this nasty habit of constantly reassessing their personal identity, their values, their beliefs, and it makes it a far more slippery business to use a mortal's Name against them.) I know a few Names. I invoked this one as lightly and gently as I could in an effort to be polite.
It didn't take me long, maybe a dozen repetitions of the Name before the entity it summoned appeared. A basketball-sized globe of blue light dived out of the snow overhead and hurtled down the alley toward my face.
I stood steady as it came on. Even with relatively minor summonings, you never let them see you flinch.
The globe snapped to an instant halt about a foot away from the doughnut, and I could just make out the luminous shape of the tiny humanoid figure within. Tiny, but not nearly so tiny as the last time I had seen him. Hell's bells, he must have been twice as tall as the last time we'd spoken.
"Toot-toot," I said, nodding to the pixie.
Toot snapped to attention, piping, "My lord!" The pixie looked like an athletically slender youth, dressed in armor made of discarded trash. His helmet had been made from the cap to a three-liter bottle of Coca-Cola, and tufts of his fine lavender hair drifted all around its rim. He wore a breastplate made from what looked like a carefully reshaped bottle of Pepto-Bismol, and carried a box knife sheathed in orange plastic on a rubber-band strap over one shoulder. Rough lettering on the box knife's case, written in what looked like black nail polish, proclaimed, Pizza or Death! Pizza or Death! A long nail, its base carefully wrapped in layers of athletic adhesive tape, was sheathed in the hexagonal plastic casing of a ballpoint pen at his side. He must have lifted the boots from a Ken doll, or maybe a vintage GI Joe. A long nail, its base carefully wrapped in layers of athletic adhesive tape, was sheathed in the hexagonal plastic casing of a ballpoint pen at his side. He must have lifted the boots from a Ken doll, or maybe a vintage GI Joe.
"You've grown," I said, bemused.
"Yes, my lord," Toot-toot barked.
I arched an eyebrow. "Is that the box knife I gave you?"
"Yes, my lord!" he shrilled. "This is my box knife! There are many who like it, but this one is mine!" Toot's words were crisply precise, and I realized that he was imitating the drill sergeant from Full Metal Jacket Full Metal Jacket. I throttled the sudden smile trying to fight its way onto my face. It looked like he was taking it seriously, and I didn't want to crush his tiny feelings.
What the hell. I could play along. "At ease, soldier."
"My lord!" he said. He saluted by slapping the heel of his hand against his forehead and then buzzed a quick circle around the doughnut, staring at it intently. "That," he declared, in a voice much more like his usual one, "is a doughnut. Is it my my doughnut, Harry?" doughnut, Harry?"
"It could be," I said. "I'm offering it as payment."
Toot shrugged disinterestedly, but the pixie's dragonfly wings buzzed in excitement. "For what?"
"Information," I said. I jerked my head at the fallen building. "There was a seriously large sigil-working done in and around that building several hours ago. I need to know anything the Little Folk know about what happened." A little flattery never hurt. "And when I need information from the Little Folk, you're the best there is, Toot."
His Pepto-armored chest swelled up a bit with pride. "Many of my people are beholden to you for freeing them from the pale hunters, Harry. Some of them have joined the Za-Lord's Guard."
"Pizza Lord" was the title some of the Little Folk had bestowed upon me-largely because I provided them with a weekly bribe of pizza. Most don't know it, even in my circles, but the Little Folk are everywhere, and they see a lot more than anyone expects. My policy of mozzarella-driven goodwill had secured the affections of a lot of the locals. When I'd demanded that a sometime ally of mine set free several score of the Folk who had been captured, I'd risen even higher in their collective estimation.
Even so, "Za-Lord's Guard" was a new one on me.
"I have a guard?" I asked.
Toot threw out his chest. "Of course! Who do you think keeps the Dread Beast Mister from killing the brownies when they come to clean up your apartment? We do! Who lays low the mice and rats and ugly big spiders who might crawl into your bed and nibble on your toes? We do! Fear not, Za-Lord! Neither the foulest of rats nor the cleverest of insects shall disturb your home while we draw breath!"
I hadn't realized that in addition to the cleaning service, I'd acquired an exterminator too. Handy as hell, though, now that I thought about it. There were things in my lab that wouldn't react well to becoming rodent nest material.
"Outstanding," I told him. "But do you want the doughnut or not?"
Toot-toot didn't even answer. He just shot off down the alleyway like a runaway paper lantern, but so quickly that he left falling snow drifting in contrail spirals in his wake.
Typically speaking, faeries get things done in a hurry-when they want to, at any rate. Even so, I'd barely had time to hum through "When You Wish upon a Star" before Toot-toot returned. The edges of the sphere of light around him had changed color, flushing into an agitated scarlet.
"Run!" Toot-toot piped as he streaked down the alley. "Run, my lord!"
I blinked. Of all the things I'd imagined hearing from the little fae on his return, that had not been on my list.
"Run!" he shrilled, whirling in panicked circles around my head.
My brain was still processing. "What about the doughnut?" I asked, like an idiot.
Toot-toot zipped over to me, set his shoulders against my forehead and pushed for all he was worth. He was stronger than he looked. I had to take a step back or be overbalanced. "Forget the doughnut!" he shouted. "Run, my lord!"
Forget the doughnut?
That, more than anything, jarred me into motion. Toot-toot was not the sort to give in to panic. For that matter, the little fae had always seemed to be...not ignorant so much as innocent innocent of the realization of danger. He'd always been oblivious to danger in the past, when there was mortal food on the line. of the realization of danger. He'd always been oblivious to danger in the past, when there was mortal food on the line.
In the silence of the snowy evening I heard a sound coming from the far end of the alley. Footsteps, quiet and slow.
A quivering, fearful little voice in my head told me to listen to Toot, and I felt my heart speed up as I turned and ran in the direction he'd indicated.
I cleared the alley and turned left, slogging through the deepening snow. There was a police station only two or three blocks from here. There would be lights and people there, and it would probably serve as a deterrent to whatever was after me. Toot flew beside me, just over my shoulder, and he'd produced a little plastic sports whistle. He blew on it in a sharp rhythm, and through the falling snow I dimly saw half a dozen spheres of light of various colors, all smaller than Toot's, appear out of the night and begin to parallel our course.
I ran for another block, then two, and as I did I became increasingly certain that something was following in my wake. It was a disturbing sensation, a kind of crawly tingle on the back of my neck, and I was sure that I had attracted the attention of something truly terrible. Mounting levels of fear followed that realization, and I ran for all I was worth.
I turned right and spotted the police station house, its exterior lighting a promise of safety, its lamps girded with haloes in the falling snow.
Then the wind came up and the whole world turned frozen and white. I couldn't see anything, not my own feet as I struggled through the snow, and not the hand I tried holding up in front of my face. I slipped and went down, and then bounced back to my feet in a panic, certain that if my pursuer caught me on the ground, I would never stand again.
I slammed a shoulder into a light pole and staggered back from it. I couldn't tell which way I was facing in the whiteout. Had I accidentally stumbled into the street? There would probably be no cars moving in this mess, but if one was, even slowly, I'd never see it in time to get out of the way. I wouldn't be able to hear a car horn either.
The snow was coming so thick now that I had trouble breathing. I picked a direction that seemed as if it would take me to the police station and hurried on. Within a few steps I found a building with one outstretched hand. I used it to guide me, leaning one hand against the solid wall. That worked fine for twenty feet or so, and then the wall vanished, and I stumbled sideways into an alley.
The howling wind went silent, and the sudden stillness around me was a shock to my senses. I pushed myself to my hands and knees and looked behind me. On the street the blinding curtain of snow still swirled, thick and white and impenetrable, beginning as suddenly as a wall. In the alley the snow was barely an inch deep, and except for a distant moan of wind it was silent.
At that instant I realized that the silence was not an empty one.
I wasn't alone.
The glittering snow on the alley floor blended seamlessly into a sparkling white gown, tinted here and there with streaks of frozen blue or glacial green. I lifted my eyes.
She wore the gown with inhuman elegance, its rippling fabric draping with feminine perfection, her body a perfect balance of curves and planes, beauty and strength. The gown was cut low, and left her shoulders and arms bare. Her skin made the snow seem a bit sallow by comparison. Glittering colors flickered at her wrists, her throat, and upon her fingers, always changing, cycling through deep blue and green and violet iridescence. Her fingernails glittered with the same impossibly shifting hues.
Upon her head was a circlet of ice, elegant and intricate, as if it had been formed from a single crystalline snowflake. Her hair was long, past her hips, long and silken and white, blending into the gown and the snow. Her lips-her gorgeous, sensual lips-were the color of frozen raspberries.
She was a vision of beauty, the kind that has inspired artists for centuries, immortal beauty that is rarely imagined, much less actually seen. Beauty like hers should have struck me senseless with joy. It should have made me weep and give thanks to the Almighty that I had been allowed to look upon it. It should have stopped my breath and made my heart lurch with delight.
It didn't.
It terrified me.
It terrified me because I could also see her eyes. They were wide, feline eyes, vertically slitted like a cat's. They shifted color in time with her gems-or, more likely, the gems changed color in time with her eyes eyes. And though they, too, were beautiful beyond the bounds of mortality, they were cold eyes, inhuman eyes, filled with intelligence and desire, but empty of compassion or pity.
I knew those eyes. I knew her her.
If fear hadn't taken the strength from my limbs, I would have run.
A second form appeared from the darkness behind her and hovered in the shadows at her side like an attendant. It resembled the outline of a cat-if any domestic cat ever grew so large. I couldn't see the color of its fur, but its green-gold eyes reflected the cold blue light, luminous and eerie.
"And well should you bow, mortal," mewled the feline shape. Its voice was damned eerie, throbbing in strange cadences while producing human sound from an inhuman throat. "Bow before Mab, the Queen of Air and Darkness. Bow before the monarch of the Unseelie fae, the Winter Court of the Sidhe."
Chapter Six
I gritted my teeth and tried to summon up a salvo of snark. It wouldn't come. I was just too scared-and with good reason. gritted my teeth and tried to summon up a salvo of snark. It wouldn't come. I was just too scared-and with good reason.
Think of every fairy-tale villainess you've ever heard of. Think of the wicked witches, the evil queens, the mad enchantresses. Think of the alluring sirens, the hungry ogresses, the savage she-beasts. Think of them and remember that somewhere, sometime, they've all been real.
Mab gave them lessons lessons.
Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if she'd set up some sort of certification process, just to make sure they were all up to snuff.
Mab was the ruler of fully half of the realm of Faerie, those areas of the Nevernever, the spirit world, closest to our own, and she was universally respected and feared. I'd seen her, seen her in the merciless clarity of my wizard's Sight, and I knew-not just suspected, but knew knew-exactly what kind of creature she was.
Fucking terrifying, that's what. So terrifying that I couldn't summon up a single wiseass comment, and that just doesn't happen to me.
I couldn't talk, but I could move. I pushed myself to my feet. I shook with the cold and the fear, but faced the Faerie Queen and lifted my chin. Once I'd done that, proved that I knew where my backbone was, I was able to use it as a reference point to find my larynx. My voice came out coarse, rough with apprehension. "What do you want with me?"
Mab's mouth quivered at the corners, turning up into the tiniest of smiles. The feline voice spoke again as Mab tilted her head. "I want you to do me a favor."
I frowned at her, and then at the dimly seen feline shape behind her. "Is that Grimalkin back there?"
The feline shape's eyes gleamed. "Indeed," Grimalkin said. "The servitor behind me bears that name."