That spell wasn't the work of a novice or marauding sorcerer experimenting with magic he'd found in the metaphysical section of a bookstore. Whoever had put that thing together had been a true professional, one with centuries of experience.
One who was probably more capable than I when it came to magic.
Don't get me wrong: I'm hoss. When the spells start flying, mine are some of the flashiest, most violent on the planet. I'm like the Andre the Giant of the supernatural world. I've got a lot of power and mass to throw around.
Andre would be a great person to have on your side in a brawl against a rowdy tavern crowd. But in a more focused situation, he would be at the mercy of professionals who, while lacking his raw power, could nonetheless apply their own strength more efficiently and effectively. Murphy was an excellent example of that kind of fighter. She wasn't much bigger than a bread box, but I'd seen her toss around guys weighing most of three hundred pounds like they were unruly puppies.
If the Grey Ghost was responsible for that spell, then I was lucky to have survived our first meeting. The smart move would be to scamper. If it came to a fair fight, I might find myself completely outclassed.
I felt a shivering, cold presence on the back of my neck, and turned to find wraiths nearby. They drifted toward the hideout from all directions, coming in a slow, steady procession and moving in perfectly straight lines. The siren spell made sense to me now. It wasn't a guard spell, though it could certainly have that purpose. It was also a beacon, a dinner bell being rung to signal the mindless horde now approaching.
They never sped up, never slowed. They just kept floating forward until they began to pass through the closed steel door in groups of two and three as they converged upon it.
I pursed my lips, thinking. The Grey Ghost wasn't killing wraiths. It was using them. For the moment, at least, there wouldn't be any kind of guard spell on the other side of the door. There couldn't be, or the Grey Ghost would be slaughtering its own troops and wasting its own investment of time and energy to boot.
I might have an opportunity here. The inbound wraiths would almost certainly be routed by what amounted to a cattle chute. That route would most likely be clear of supernatural booby traps. It might be possible to gain entry, find a vulnerable point along the chute, and then duck out of it to run a quick reconnaissance of the Grey Ghost's headquarters and find Mort.
It took half an hour for the procession to be complete, and the flow of wraith traffic never let up. I stopped counting them at 450 and swallowed. That wasn't a herd of wraiths. That was a bloody horde horde. If one of the wraiths decided it wanted to eat me, it would have to perform a miracle to divide me into enough pieces to feed all of its dinner company.
My veil seemed to have prevented me from being noticed as they approached, but that could just as easily be the effect of the beacon spell. For all I knew, once the beacon shut off, they'd all turn around and come at me like greyhounds leaving the gate. It would require a singularly stupid man to go hang around in narrow tunnels and cramped spaces alongside a threat like that that.
"And I, Harry Dresden, am that man," I stated.
I waited for the last wraith to go in and counted to twenty. My mouth felt dry. Fear boiled in my belly and made my knees feel unsteady. My fingers trembled.
I told them all that they were just preconceived residual memories anyway and that I would tolerate no guff from them.
Then I ground my teeth and followed the horde.
Chapter Twenty-eight
I slipped through the steel door and into the blackness on the other side. I ignored the darkness until it went away, and then began to move stealthily forward. slipped through the steel door and into the blackness on the other side. I ignored the darkness until it went away, and then began to move stealthily forward.
I stopped with the Scooby-Doo action a couple of feet later and just started walking. I mean, honestly, sneaking. It wasn't as though I could step on a twig or accidentally kick an old can and make a sound, right? Being a ghost, the problem wasn't being sneaky-it was getting noticed in the first place.
Besides. Nobody who was concerned about detecting my presence would be using their ears to sense me coming.
I began extending my wizard's senses out in front of me.
When I say wizard senses wizard senses, I mean it in a similar fashion to spider sense spider sense. Spidey's enhanced senses detect when he's in danger and warn him that he's got incoming. A wizard's senses don't do that (though I suppose with enough work, someone could come close). What they do sense is the presence of magic, in both its natural state and its worked forms. You don't have to be concentrating to make it happen-it's natural in every practitioner.
The theory I've heard espoused most often is that the ability to sense such energies makes it possible for a regular person to become a wizard, providing the kind of sensory feedback he needs to gradually work with more and more energy. So while a regular person who lacked the sense could, technically, learn how to use magic without it, it would be a process as difficult as someone who was born blind teaching himself to paint.
I focused on that sense in me, partially blocking out my less important, physical senses to give greater attention to the presence of magic in my surroundings. It was pretty thick in here. The door led to a concrete stairway going down into the earth, and each step bore lit candles and thickly painted magical symbols. The latent energy in the paint was almost devoid of arcane power, barely detectable, but it was there and I saw it as faint phosphorescence. The energy of the beacon spell was still going strong. Somewhere in my head I had evidently decided to interpret it as a sound, because I could hear its slow throb like a bass beat on a big woofer.
I went down the stairs, my senses attuned to the ground at my feet. What looked like one more bit of barely magical scribbling could be concealing something far more potent and dangerous-but it didn't. I went down two flights of stairs unmolested.
The bottom of the stairway opened onto a rectangular room that had once been some sort of electrical junction. It obviously wasn't in service anymore. Large steel boxes and glass-faced readouts were spotted with rust and dust. There was more of the occult writing down here-all of it disjointed and fantastically disconnected, as if someone had composed a poem in a foreign language by randomly stringing together words from a dictionary.
It all bore the same trace amounts of magical energy as the writing on the stairs. The Big Hoods evidently had a certain amount of latent talent, which seemed to fit together with the idea of the Grey Ghost recruiting some mortal flunkies to assist it in ...
... In whatever the hell he or she was trying to do.
What was was he or she trying to do? he or she trying to do?
I mean, I knew the Grey Ghost had attacked Mort's place. But why? Why take Mort to begin with? Granted, the little ectomancer could probably be a pain in the ass to any ghost who got too ambitious in Chicago, but the Grey Ghost's ambitions seemed to have been limited to gunning for Morty. What could he possibly have to offer as a target?
At the far end of the junction room, there was a gaping, ragged hole in the wall that looked like it had been made with sledgehammers. It opened onto a rough tunnel beyond-the beginnings of Undertown proper.
A man's anguished scream came from the opening.
I nearly burst into a sprint but stopped myself. Unthinking sprints were a good way to get killed. Re-killed. Instead, I moved forward into the rough-hewn corridor. It was cold and damp, and slime and mold were everywhere. I unimagined the strong, musty smell that would otherwise have filled my nose and paced forward, watching for traps and working hard not to move my feet in time with the bass-drum rhythm of the beacon spell.
I passed a number of alcoves that joined the corridor. They were individual quarters for the Big Hoods, apparently. Each contained a mattress or an air mattress and something resembling bedding, only covered with mildew and mold. Each had a box or a couple of bags, containing what I presumed to be personal belongings. More arcane gibberish covered the walls, along with slogans such as THE LIZARD FOLK ARE ALREADY HERE! WATCH FOR THEIR EYES! A couple of them looked occupied, with large, bulky forms snoring under the disgusting blankets.
A minute or two later, the passage opened up into a torch-lit room about the size of a hockey rink. The entrance was high up on one wall, so that my head was level with the larger room's ceiling. There were stairs cut into the wall beneath my feet, so that I could walk down them into the large room-which I didn't, as it was packed full of bad guys. I swallowed and made sure my veil was still running strong.
The bass beat of the beacon hammered loudly here, coming from a pit that had been cut into the floor. It must have been at least ten feet across, and I couldn't tell how deep it was. It was surrounded by written formulae that were far less nonsensical than the others, and they sent out flashes of dim red light in time with each pulse of the beacon.
The pit was full of wraiths.
They swirled round and round in steady, mindless motion, each of them overlapping with dozens of others, so that it looked less like a group of beings moving in a circle than some bizarre stew with the occasional recognizable portion of human anatomy appearing above the mix. The hollow not-scream of the empty-eyed wraiths was a huge and hideous sound, one that surged in time with the beacon.
Maybe two dozen lemurs were scattered around the room. They'd lowered their hoods, and without their faceless menace to back them up, they just looked like people. Some were standing. Some were sitting. Another group was playing cards. Still others just stared at nothing, bemused.
A group of Big Hoods was gathered around the pit, all but two of them on their knees and chanting. They bowed at regular intervals and clapped their hands together at others. A gallows that looked like it had been constructed out of a driveway basketball goal hung over the pit, with a pair of Big Hoods holding one end of the rope.
Morty dangled from the other end, trussed up from his hips to his neck. He was swinging back and forth on the end of the line and slowly spinning. Gasps and broken sobbing sounds came from him.
Standing in empty air directly before him, moving as he did, was the Grey Ghost. The figure looked at least as menacing as it had the first time around. When it spoke, its voice was liquid, calm-and feminine.
"You need not do this to yourself, Mortimer," the Grey Ghost said. "I take no pleasure in inflicting pain. Yield. You will do it in the end. Save yourself the agony."
Mort opened his eyes. He licked his lips and said in a cracked, thick voice, "G-g-go fuck yourself."
The Grey Ghost murmured, "Tsk." Then nodded and said, "Again."
"N-no," Morty choked out, beginning to twist against his bonds. He accomplished nothing other than to start spinning more rapidly. "No!"
The two Big Hoods holding the rope calmly lowered Mort down into the swirling pit of insanely hungry wraiths. They collapsed in on Morty, as if the surf could choose where it wished to crash-and it all wished to crash on the little ectomancer. The cauldron of mad ghosts boiled and congealed onto him, all but hiding him from sight.
Mort began to scream again, a horrible, humiliated sound.
"One," counted the Grey Ghost. "Two. Three. Four."
At the last number, the flunkies hauled him up out of the pool of wraiths, and Morty hung there, swinging back and forth and sobbing again, gasping for breath.
"Each time you refuse me, Mortimer, I will add another second to the count," said the Grey Ghost. "I know what you're thinking. How many seconds will it take to drive you mad?"
Mort tried to regain control of his breathing, but it was a futile effort. Tears marked his face. His nose had begun to run. He opened his eyes, his jaw clenched, his bald pate scarlet, and said, his voice cracking, "Go watch the sunrise."
"Again," said the Grey Ghost.
The Big Hoods lowered Morty into the pit once more. I didn't know what happened to a living mortal attacked by a wraith, but if Morty's reaction was any indicator, it wasn't good. Again he screamed. It was higher pitched than a moment before, more raw. The screams all but drowned out the calm, monotonous count of the Grey Ghost. She went to five, and then the Big Hoods hauled him up again. He twitched in spasmodic motion, as if he'd developed a simultaneous charley horse in every muscle and sinew. It took his screams at least ten seconds to die away.
"It's more art than science," the Grey Ghost continued, as if nothing had happened. "In my experience, most minds break before seven. Granted, most do not have your particular gifts. Whatever happens, I'm sure I will find it fascinating. I ask again: Will you help me?"
"Go jump in a river, bitch," Morty gasped.
There was a moment of silence. "Again," the Grey Ghost snarled. "Slowly."
The obedient Big Hoods began to lower Mort slowly toward the wraith pit again.
Mort shook his head vainly and twisted his obviously battered body, trying to curl up and away from the swirling tide of hungry ghosts. He managed to forestall his fate by a few seconds, but in the end, he went down among the devouring spirits once more. He screamed again, and only after the scream had well and truly begun did the Grey Ghost start counting.
I'd never really had the highest opinion of Morty. I had hated the way he'd neglected his talents and abused his clients for so long, back when I'd first met him. He'd gone up in my estimation since then, and especially in the past day. So maybe he wasn't a paragon of virtue, but he was still a decent guy in his own way. He was professional, and it looked like he'd had more juice all along than I thought he had.
That said a lot about Morty, that he'd kept quiet about the extent of his ability. It said even more about him that he was standing in the lion's den with no way out and was still spitting his defiance into the face of his captor.
Dammit, I thought. I thought. I like the guy. I like the guy.
And the Grey Ghost was destroying him, right in front of my eyes.
Even as I watched, Morty screamed again as the wraiths surged against him, raking at him with their pale, gaunt fingers. The Grey Ghost's calm voice counted numbers. It felt like a minor infinity stretched between each.
I couldn't get Mort out of this place. No way. Even if I went all-out on the room and defeated every single hostile spirit in it, Mort would still be tied up and the Big Hoods would still be looming. There was no percentage in an attack.
Yet standing around with my thumb up my ghostly ass wasn't an option, either. I didn't know what the Grey Ghost was doing to Morty, but it was clearly hurting him, and judging from her dialogue (straight out of Cheesy Villain General Casting, though it might be), exposure to the wraiths would inflict permanent harm if Morty continued to refuse her. And there were the murderous spirits back at the ruins of Mort's house to think about, too.
And as if all that wasn't enough, sunrise was on the way.
Dammit. I needed an edge, an advantage.
The fingers of my right hand touched the solid wooden handle of Sir Stuart's pistol, and I was suddenly keenly aware of its power, of the sheer, tightly leashed potency of the weapon. Its energy hummed silently against my right palm. I remembered the fight at Morty's place and the havoc Sir Stuart's weapon had wreaked among the enemy-or, rather, upon a single enemy.
The Grey Ghost had feared Sir Stuart's gun, and I couldn't imagine she'd done so for no reason. If I could take her out, the other spirits who followed her would almost certainly scatter-the kind of jackals who followed megalomaniacs around rarely had the stomach for a confrontation without their leader to stiffen their spines. Right?
Sure. Just because the lemurs still outnumber you more than a dozen to one doesn't mean they'll see you as an easy victim, Dresden. You'll be fine.
There should be a rule against your own inner monologue throwing around that much sarcasm.
But there was still merit in the idea: Kill the Grey Ghost and then run like hell. Even if the lemurs came after me, at least the main voice who appeared to be guiding the Big Hoods would be silenced. It might even get all the malevolent spiritual attention entirely off of Morty.
All I had to do was make one shot with Sir Stuart's pistol. No problem. If I missed, I probably wouldn't survive the experience, sure, but other than that it should be a piece of cake.
I gritted my teeth and began to move slowly toward the Grey Ghost. I didn't know how close I could get before my half-assed veil became useless, but I had to do everything I could to maximize the chances of a hit. I wasn't a marksman, and the pistols of the eighteenth century weren't exactly precision instruments, but I couldn't afford to miss. Of course, if the Grey Ghost sensed me coming, she would have time to run, to dodge, or to pull some sort of defense together.
I had to kill her before she knew she was under attack. There was some irony there, considering the way I'd died.
The Grey Ghost finished her count, and the Big Hoods hauled a sobbing Morty out of the pit again. He hung there, twitching, suffering, making involuntary sounds as he gasped for breath. The Grey Ghost stood in front of him, motionless and, I felt certain, gloating.
Ten feet. I knew my veil was shoddy and my aim only middling, but if I could close to ten feet, I figured I had a fairly good chance of hitting the target. That would put me on the near edge of the wraith pit, shooting across it to hit the Grey Ghost. Of course, if I missed, the Grey Ghost wouldn't need to kill me. All she'd have to do was freaking trip trip me. The wraiths, once they sensed my presence, would be all over me. me. The wraiths, once they sensed my presence, would be all over me.
Then I'd get what Morty was getting. Except that as a ghost myself, they'd be tearing me into tiny, ectoplasm-soaked shreds. And eating them.
What fun, I thought. I thought.
I tried to move steadily, to keep myself calm. I didn't have any adrenaline anymore to make my hands shake, but they shook anyway. Dammit. I guess even a ghost is still, on some level, fundamentally human. Nothing for it but to keep moving.
Thirty feet.
I passed within a few yards of a lemur who was apparently staring into nothingness-though his eyes were lined up directly with me. Perhaps he was lost in a ghostly memory. He never blinked as I went by.
Twenty-five.
The wraiths wheezed out their starving, strangled howls in the pit a few feet ahead of me.
Twenty.
Why do I keep winding up in these situations? Even after I'm dead dead?
For the fun, I thought to myself. I thought to myself. For the fun, fun, fun-fun, fun For the fun, fun, fun-fun, fun.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Then the floor near the Grey Ghost's feet rippled, and a human skull floated up out of it, its eye sockets burning with a cold blue flame.
The Grey Ghost turned to look at the skull, and something about her body language soured. "What?"
"A Fomor messenger is at the outer perimeter," the skull said. It sounded creepily like Bob, but there was a complete absence of anything but a vague contempt in its voice. "He bears word from his lord."
I got the impression that the Grey Ghost tilted her head beneath its hood. "A servitor? Arriving from the Nevernever?"