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Chapter Text

"Dresden, I swear to God I am going to kick your ass if you hum the Ghostbusters theme one more time."

"Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do, Ghostbusters!" Harry continued with blithe disregard for the threat. I wasn't even sure if he'd heard me.

I sighed and gripped the steering wheel harder. The backroads that wound through the Ozarks hadn't seen a paver in years, making the rainy night all the more treacherous. Every now and then the frankensteined monstrosity that Harry called the Blue Beetle hit a pothole, jounced, and then slid on the pavement as I struggled to course correct. I wasn't sure how Harry could stand to drive this thing. Though, to be accurate, he hadn't been driving it for the past week. One of his arms was tucked into a sling and held close to his body, but the injury didn't stop him from being a backseat driver.

"Seriously. If I wanted to listen to a Halloween soundtrack I'd have bought a CD or something."

"But you have me."

"I wish I didn't," I sniffed. "Your singing voice could make a saint's ears bleed. I'd be doing the public a favor by strangling you."

"You know you're not the first woman to say that to me."

I fought to keep the smile off my face. Dresden could be an annoying ass, but he was also a funny one. Or maybe he was just wearing me down after so many months on the job, and I'd adapted to preserve my sanity. Six of one and half a dozen of the other, really.

"Why are we traveling to the ass end of nowhere again?" I asked, punctuating the question with a curse when another pothole attempted to swallow our tires whole.

"It's called Hog Hollow, actually," Harry said. "It's a little valley in Carter County. My mentor lives there and he wants a consult on a case. He thinks there's something from our side of the block causing trouble."

"Enough trouble to make you agree to drive nine hours and fork over a bundle for gas? This thing gets what, ten miles per gallon?"

"Twenty," Harry sniffed. "And the money isn't the point."

"It is for me. I still have to pay rent and cases have been scarce. At least tell me that he'll cover the expenses on the way down. Burger King charges excepted of course. There's only so much enabling one can tolerate."

"Ha, ha," Harry said, giving me a dirty look. "You're very funny. And no, he's not going to stiff us. He'll try to pay my fees and then some. That's just the sort of man he is. I'd appreciate it if you could keep the mockery to a minimum. He's one of the only men to ever earn my respect."

The solemn expression on his face brought me up short. In the time I'd known him, Harry was rarely unsmiling unless lives were on the line. He was serious about this. I nodded once. It was too early in the case to be clashing, especially over something so trivial. Politeness cost nothing and I could always be rude later if the situation really called for it.

"You said there was trouble?"

Harry nodded. "Ebenezer called yesterday while you were out with your boyfriend."

Was I imagining it, or was there a hint of jealousy in his tone?

"Zerbrowski isn't my boyfriend, Harry. He's been happily married for ten years. He's just an outrageous flirt and he doesn't know when to quit. That's what landed him in Special Investigations in the first place. We went to the mall to buy Katie a gift for their anniversary. For some reason, he thought I'd be better at picking out jewelry than he was. In the end, the clerk ended up embarrassed for both of us. I'm truly lousy at some of this girl stuff."

Because I'd never really been taught. Even if I had been, the makeup and hairstyles of the previous century wouldn't have flown in this day and age. So far as I knew, modern makeup didn't contain mercury or arsenic. But my childhood hadn't ever contained anything as frivolous as hair combs or face paint. Nothing so trite for the daughter of Heinrich Kemmler. The only thing to ever stain my skin was blood from human sacrifices. I'd seen my first body at two years old and had performed my first direction at five under my father's supervision to get an idea of the pieces of a body slatted together to form a whole. Necromantic theorems were my bedtime stories and requiems had been my lullabies.

Fear had kept me in seclusion even after I'd escaped him. Only now in this lifetime did I dare try to interact with my fellow human beings. I was trying to do penance one case at a time.

"What about that Richard guy? Didn't you go out with him?"

I poorly hid a smile. Someone was being transparent. I would have called him on it if I didn't need to keep my attention on the road. Richard Zeeman was my neighbor and unofficial repairman. Things broke down with distressing regularity now that I wasn't wearing my modified thorn manacles. It was a condition of my secret probation as imposed by my new teacher, Mortimer Lindquist. It was a pain and the landlord was becoming increasingly certain I was sabotaging things on purpose. If it weren't for Richard, I'd probably have been evicted by now. I was preemptively searching for an apartment that would pose fewer problems than the one I was currently in.

"A few times," I said. "I'm not sure it's going to work out."

Because I was pretty sure he was slated to die in the next year or two and I didn't want to get attached. There was a barghest lurking around our apartment complex. I would have written the spectral dog off as a consequence of my presence in most circumstances. The dead were drawn to necromancers whether they liked it or not. Death omens and scions of gods closely related to death felt a similar pull. I'd spotted this barghest in Undertown and kept a close eye on it while Mort and I fled from a scourge of Black Court vampires. But it hadn't been me it was after. Or more accurately, it wasn't only me. I'd spotted the dog lurking in the halls at night, staring at Richard's door. It stalked after him on rainy days and let out plaintive howls that only I could hear.

"Well that's a shame," Harry said, and couldn't quite make it sound sincere.

"What did your mentor say?"

The half-smile that had formed on his face evaporated, leaving him looking tired and more somber. He scrubbed at his face with his good hand and sighed.

"There's a small, unincorporated community near his farm. He goes there to sell things at the farmer's market and get feed for his animals, but yesterday when he went, he found everyone dead. The newscasters are saying that it was carbon monoxide poisoning because there aren't any marks on the corpses. If you really push, the medical examiners will admit they don't know what happened. There's no reason they should be dead."

My skin prickled with unease and I adjusted the air conditioning to hide a shiver. I thought I had an inkling why Harry had brought me in on this one.

"Black magic?" I guessed.

"He's pretty sure of it," Harry agreed. "But he's not sure what's big enough to kill this many people all at once. The M.E. said the liver temps matched exactly on every body. An entire town gone, wiped out in an instant."

"And we're going to tweak the nose of whatever did it?"

"Sounds like us, doesn't it?"

I sighed. "Yes, unfortunately, it does."

Chapter Text

Lerwick was one of those blink-and-you'll-miss-it towns that routinely popped up around the swaths of farmland so common in the Midwest. The roads had devolved into alphabet soup thirty miles ago, and the homes were few and far between. Rolling hills and naked cliffsides soared above us. The trees that topped them slanted with every slope, moving ever downward in a slow-motion landslide. The rain had finally let up ten minutes ago, which was the only reason I didn't sideswipe a pickup truck parked on the narrow shoulder.

The black Ford pickup was nearly indistinguishable from the surrounding hillside. It was an older model, as tough and enduring as a battleship. A gun rack held a double-barrel shotgun and a weathered oak staff. There were more notches in the wood than I'd put on my own belt in the last century and change.

As I watched, an older man unfolded his bulk from the cab of the truck, faded work boots hitting the ground with an audible thud as we pulled up, window cranked down. Ebeneezer wouldn't have stood out from any crotchety old farmer in these parts, if not for the power crackling like a localized thunderstorm around him. There was something dark and turbulent streaking like lightning through his aura, and I pressed my back flat against the driver's seat.

I reluctantly put the Blue Beetle in park on a stretch of the almost non-existent shoulder just ahead of the truck. What I really wanted to do was gun it in the opposite direction. I had a finely tuned sense for dangerous people, and I was parked only a few yards away from one of the most powerful I'd met in a while. I waited in the Beetle, listening to the Beetle's engine settle with a grateful groan. The talent of one practitioner was enough to strain the poor thing to its limits. With two of us running around Chicago week in and week out, it needed an obscene amount of preventative maintenence to run at all.

There was a minute of quiet conversation outside the car that I didn't strain hear. Eventually, my name was dragged into it, and I had to unlock my rigid limbs, forcing myself like a badly tuned animatronic from the Beetle's cab.

I half-expected to see an ancient wizard glowering down at me, staff raised in a defensive gesture. He looked...ordinary. On the shorter side, with tufts of snowy hair migrating from his head to his chin and ears. He looked like a man on the far side of sixty, which meant he was an actively mature practitioner of the art. He had broad, scarred hands stuffed into the pockets of his mud-splattered overalls, with only his thumbs visible. There was something almost familiar about the genial twinkle in his eyes. He held out a hand to me as I approached.

"You must be Anita Blake. Hoss said you might be able to help us with a problem we're having."

"You must be Ebeneezer. And I told Harry I'd try," I said dryly, not taking the offered hand. He let it fall with a frown a second later. "No guarantees, though. I only started formal instruction a few months ago."

Ebenezer shot Harry a reproving look. "This is delicate work, Hoss. I don't think it's an appropriate first outing for your apprentice."

Harry actually looked sheepish and bobbed his head in acknowledgment. I just stared. Harry Dresden, the great insouciant fool, actually bowing his head to someone? Now I really had seen it all.

"Maybe, Sir, but she's the best person I could find for the job. And while Anita is my business partner, she's not my apprentice."

I wanted to bury my face in my hands and groan. Now this was a lot more like the Harry I'd grown to know. Concealing the facts until they could come together in some grand and arrogant wizardly plan that he'd deign to impart on the rest of us. If there was ever a time to forgo the obfuscation, it was now. I knew the age and caliber of the wizard in front of us, and my skill set would make him less inclined to like me, just on principle. If Harry had told everyone the full truth, for once, he might have had a few hours to digest the prospect before I arrived.

Ebenezer's bushy brows bounced toward his hairline. "Is that so?"

"I'm studying under Mortimer Lindquist," I said before Harry could launch into whatever well-meaning speech he'd prepared. "I am a sorceress and an ectomancer. If you don't like that, I am more than happy to climb back into the Beetle and drive the nine hours back to Chicago."

"Anita..." Harry began.

I ignored him, stepping closer to the old man. I didn't dare meet his eyes for more than a second at a time, but I gave him the best eye contact I could under the circumstances. I drew upon every meager inch this body had to offer and stood tall, daring him to judge me.

"I am tired of people looking at me like I'm about to turn into a mustache-twirling villain. I don't care that crusty old men think that ectomancy is just a gateway drug to necromancy. I don't particularly care what you think of my skill set. I'm here to solve a mass murder. If you can't get past the source of my magic, you can have fun sorting through the evidence by yourself."

Harry looked like he wanted to throttle me. He was actually blushing. I'd have taken a picture if my irritation wouldn't have blown a camera to shrapnel. He really did care about what this man thought.

By the time my common sense caught up to what I'd said, the words were already out. I wanted to swallow my tongue. But to my surprise, Ebenezer smiled. He nodded once to Harry, something like approval shining in his eyes.

"She'll do, Hoss. She'll do."

Chapter Text

"Any reason why we're up here, Sir?" Harry asked. The deference in his tone threw me any time he addressed the older wizard. "There's a perfectly good road leading into town."

"Aye," Ebenezer said. "And it's being blocked by a line of police and the vultures. You know the type. Gets a thrill outta seeing or hearing about a tragedy."

"Plenty of those in Chicago," he acknowledged.

"Anywhere you go, really," I added, the words slipping from my mouth before I could veto them. My mind wandered involuntarily back to the days when a hanging was a public spectacle.

Sometimes my father would pay families for the corpses of their loved ones. Most families were too poor to refuse even a modest amount of money. The bodies were something for me to practice on, he told Mother. It was worth the expense to train up a prodigy.

I wanted to spit.

I wondered if Ebenezer was thinking along the same lines. He nodded solemnly with a soft, emphatic, "Indeed. There are always gawkers."

He let the unpleasant statement hang for a few minutes before adjusting his weight. The Ozarks were replete with cliffsides, and a particularly steep one overlooked Lerwick. Despite this body's general fitness level, I'd been clutching a stitch in my side by the time we reached the top. From here the city looked like a simple grid, dotted here and there with some of the more outrageous colors people had chosen for their homes. I was particularly interested in knowing who'd owned the bubble gum pink two-story at the back end of town.

"So how are we getting in?" I asked, breaking the silence at last.

Ebenezer jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. The only thing behind I could make out in that direction was a gnarled old cedar tree. "That right there. This is the Armstrong family tree."

"Was it passed down through their line for generations?" I quipped, the words once again escaping my sputtering 'shut up' filter.

Ebenezer and Harry looked at me like I'd lost my mind. I supposed they hadn't watched much television in the last few decades. With my modified thorn manacles, I could usually manage to make it through at least a half hour without any incidents.

"Not in the way you're implying," Ebenezer said slowly. "The tree is on public land. It's just got significance to the family. Their matriarch was murdered in these woods. Rumor has it that she fled her house from her abusive husband and he beat her to death at the roots of that very tree. Urban legends about ghosts carved out a small gateway from the family home."

"It doesn't really matter where she really died," I said, completing the thought. "The belief was enough to gain metaphysical significance on its own."

"Bingo," Ebenezer said. "We'll be taking that corridor into town. It should dump us out just before the back door. We'll be in and out before any police know we're there."

There wouldn't be a threshold to deal with. There had to be living occupants inside to fuel that particular protection. None of us brought that unpleasant thought up either. Death was always a silent specter in every room, but people liked to ignore its presence whenever they could. It was more comfortable to live that way.

Lucky bastards.

Ebenezer raised the notched oak staff in his right hand, pointed it at the base of the tree and muttered a quiet word. The Way poured open, expanding rapidly like a bloodstain. The irregular pool of reality expanded until it touched our toes, and then I was flailing, the ground itself yanked like a rug from beneath my feet.

I would have landed hard on my ass if Harry hadn't shot out a hand to catch me. One of Harry's large, calloused hands shot out and caught me deftly by the wrist, hauling me to my feet as if I weighed no more than a feather. I stared at him for a few seconds strictly longer than necessary, taking in the gentle grin like rain on my upturned face. No one had smiled at me like that in...God had it really been almost a century?

I yanked my gaze away when the eye contact threatened to become more. I took a step back with a muttered, "Thanks" and he let me. I didn't think the color in his cheeks had anything to do with the hike we'd made to the top.

The Armstrong House was the bubblegum pink monstrosity I'd seen from above. Aside from the coat of Pepto Bismol, the house was almost cute. It certainly didn't look haunted. The white trim made the whole thing looked like a Valentine's Day confection. It stood a little way back from the street, shielded from a direct line of sight by a pair of oaks. Ebenezer was right. If we did this quickly, we'd be gone before the local police could investigate.

I turned for the backdoor, steeling myself.

"Okay," I said, more to myself than them. "I'm ready. Let's go."

Chapter Text

There was a difference between a house and a home, metaphysically speaking. It was a topic of much debate at which point one became the other. Did you go by the amount of lives in a home or the quality of those lives? For those on the fleshy side of things, the numbers game was usually in their favor. The more people in a space, the stronger the threshold would be. But for practitioners like me, quality mattered a hell of a lot more than quantity. There was no set recipe for making a spook, but a lot of negative energy lent itself to that purpose.

I expected to feel the buzz of black magic riding the air like untethered power lines. At the very least, I expected some mark of spiritual disturbance. A creak on the stairs. A muted whisper from behind a door. A cold spot. Anything to indicate that a shade was beginning to form. But there was nothing like that here. The house was just...pink..

Sunlight streamed through the wide front window, tinging the room blush pink as the light filtered through violently fuchsia curtains. The faded wallpaper had been done up with fat magenta cabbage roses. The sofa and overstuffed armchairs were an unappealing shade of salmon. Normally, I would have been grateful that the carpet was white, but the discolored stains where the body had lain, possibly for days, put a damper on my appreciation.

"Sensing anything?" Harry said, taking up a position at my elbow. He had his staff gripped loosely in his good hand, eyes scanning the room like something might lunge at me from behind the doiley-covered coffee table.

"Putrifaction," I said, scrunching up my nose. "Hard to forget that smell once you've gotten a whiff."

"And where'd you encounter a dead body?" Ebenezer said, entering the room just behind Harry. I was sure he meant the question to sound innocuous, but I bristled anyway.

"I was a detective with Special Investigations before my powers started acting up. Or didn't Harry mention that?" I asked, shooting a dirty look at my partner. "No spoilers only apply to movies. Next time we take a murder field trip, fill all of us in on the details first."

Harry held his good hand up in a defensive gesture. "I didn't think it was going to be a problem."

Uh-huh. And I was a Kewpie doll. Even someone as socially impaired as Dresden couldn't miss the Council's disdain for my art. I was torn between wanting to pinch his cheek and call him cute, and a more satisfying smack to his bicep.

No, scratch that. I'd have to jump to do either. Hard to maintain my street cred in front of the suspicious old man if I had to perform acrobatics to shush his protegee.

"We'll set up in the bedroom," I decided after a second of thought.

Harry paused, and I felt his awareness brush past me. Just the brush of his power made me burst out in gooseflesh. He was just too damn powerful. He really should have warned a girl before he whipped it out like that.

"I can't sense anything back there," he said when he was satisfied with his examination. "Is there a ghost?"

"No ghost," I confirmed. "Not even a whisper. That's odd in an older home like this. Even if no one died horribly in these walls, there should be something. A sense of the lives lived here. Life. But the place is..."

I searched for a word and drew a blank. How did I explain it to him? Dresden, for all his power, was terribly young. He hadn't even seen a century yet. He couldn't feel how common accumulated power was in mortal dwellings. It just took sympathetic magic to draw it out to fuel a spell. There was nothing here. No laughter or quiet evenings imprinted into the wall. All the furniture and knick-knacks looked like bad props on a theatre stage. The set dressing was there, but the actors were gone.

"Sterile," Ebenezer said with a frown. "Someone's scoured this place."

The grateful smile I offered him felt like physical blasphemy. Smiling at a wizard of the White Council. What would Heinrich Kemmler say? Tsk, tsk. That thought filled me with enough spiteful glee to give an almost genuine cast to the expression.

Rot in hell, Father.

I looked away, plucking the prickly projectiles from a bush we'd passed on our hike from my jeans. I wasn't sure what expression I wore, but it wouldn't be pleasant.

"The bed is the safest place for me to attempt this."

Harry half-raised his hand. The staff nearly clipped a vase of wilted tulips. I managed to catch it before it could leap from its shelf.

"I have a question."

I sighed. "You don't have to raise your hand, Harry. Is this a real question or a dirty joke?"

Harry's mock outrage swung my pendulum back toward pinching his cheeks. Damn, but he made the snark seem charming at times.

"Would I do that to you, Anita?"

"If you didn't, I'd be checking for the zipper. Clearly, someone with manners stole your skin."

He drew himself up a little, trying to look wounded. The effect was somewhat ruined by the laughter dancing in his eyes. After a moment it dimmed and he let his hand fall to his side. "Seriously, though. Why the bed?"

"Because it's the softest surface in the house, and I'm new at this. Mort can call spirits standing up, but I usually stay on the floor. Falling a few inches hurts less than falling a foot."

It wasn't a complete lie. Mort took a completely different tack to the art. The balding ectomancer didn't pit his strength against the dead in a contest of wills, the way my father taught me. My father treated ghosts as cattle, things to be driven violently toward a second, eternal demise. I still tended to fall back on old habits, and the spirits were allowed to push back on me--violently. I didn't usually fall. I was pushed.

Ghosts weren't the people they resembled, but they were still people. To be conscious was to exist, in some form. Mort never let the ghosts hurt me, but he had let them teach me forceful lessons. If you attacked a person, it was their right to defend themselves. Putting your psychic mitts on someone without their permission was wrong. Might did not make right.

But no need to spill that secret to the overprotective lug. He'd probably clout Mort over the head with his staff in defense of my honor.

"Besides, the bedroom is close quarters. If something manages to possess my body, it'll be easier to subdue me."

"Possess you?" Harry echoed.

"It's usually the other way around," I explained. "You can sort of...borrow the impression of someone if you need their skills. Sort of a reverse possession. Ghosts need permission to enter. Other entities don't. We have no clue what did this. "

I tried not to glance at the photos on the walls. I didn't want to see a kindly old grandmother with more love than good taste. I didn't want to wonder if her grandchildren had visited the day of the attack. I didn't want to shade in the impression that the house gave of her. I didn't need the guilt and accompanying nightmares. Maybe if I didn't look, they wouldn't come.

Yeah, right.

Harry stood in the doorway to the bedroom, watching me chalk out the circle and series of sigils Mort had taught me during our first official lesson.

"This is designed to keep me in," I explained. "If something from the other side tries to go all Exorcist on my ass, it shouldn't be able to cross this. Physical matter can, but spiritual matter can't. Think of it as kind of a spook trap. A lot more specific than a regular circle trap. I'd kill for a little ghost dust to make damn sure, but beggars can't be choosers. Harry's all out."

"That accident wasn't my fault," he said defensively.

"The ghost was only a foot away from you. How could you have missed it? I'm just glad the dust didn't get in my eyes. Only my feet are mildly radioactive."

"I said I was sorry."

"Sorry doesn't treat a rash."

Ebenezer cleared his throat. We both glanced up. I hadn't realized I'd pushed up on tiptoe as we bantered, putting my face a little too close to Harry's for polite conversation. I took a hasty step back, heat stinging the back of my neck like a sunburn.

"Are you certain this is the best way to go about this?"

"Best, no," I said. "But it is the most direct. When time is of the essence, that's better than best. I should be able to take stock off the field if I enter a deep enough meditative state. It could take several minutes. If you can't keep quiet, go to the living room and keep watch."

Neither of them replied. So Harry could shut his mouth when things were dire enough. Good to know. I was beginning to think that not even God himself could wire his trap shut for more than a few minutes at a time. It was as great a liability as it was a strength.

Meditation wasn't something to approach with a time limit in mind, but I'd gotten used to doing so on a time crunch. Mort kept a log of how quickly I could access the spiritual planes with only my mind. I should be able to make contact with friendly spirits in under ten seconds. I hadn't been able to get my instincts in check and get consent from specters to gain their skills in less than five minutes. The methods my father had figuratively (and sometimes literally) beaten into my head were hard to shake.

I hated that the instinct to lash out saved my life. The second I reached out, something seized my outstretched hand and tried to yank my soul straight down to hell.

Chapter Text

The Nevernever is reactive, shifting like the coils of a snake if something of enough importance happens in the physical realm it borders. That was what I expected when I sank down into a meditative state, opening my mind to allow spirits to touch me. I expected to be swarmed. To be bombarded by the unwary dead, most of whom had no idea they'd even passed on.

What I found was a cold and barren wasteland. The remnants of the Armstrong house had been flung into the distance, standing out like pale, bloodstained teeth jutting from rotted gums. The earth for miles was stained with a dusting of pale ash. Lerwick had been leveled, reducing the spiritual manifestation of every life here into only so much wood and shattered glass. It looked like a very localized explosion had gone off, scouring all traces of life from the place. There were no ghosts. There hadn't been enough left of any of them for a shade to condense.

I crossed myself, as was the body's habit. I could usually ignore the impulses that came with my body, but it felt right, somehow. I didn't put any particular faith in the Christian god. I'd seen and done too much for that. But he was generally opposed to evil, so perhaps he'd overlook that. What happened here wasn't just murder. It was annihilation.

And the monster who'd done it was still here. The psychic stench that accompanied his magic was so cloying it made me gag. Rotted flesh and stale perfume. Silks over maggot-riddled meat. Formaldehyde and wood varnish. The trappings of the grave mingled within a single, fetid note.

The figure standing in the midst of a forest of burned-out trees looked cadaverous. What I could see of him, anyway. Most of his body disappeared beneath a gray cloak. Yellow parchment skin stretched over a grinning skull. The eyes that burned far back in the sockets were feverish. A mad giggle issued from between chattering teeth. Its bones cracked.

And it spoke.

"Feed."

The earth at my feet simply exploded, scything out from under me as a dozen hands reached for me from below. My shoes disappeared, yanked painfully from my feet. One of the zombies shoved my big toe into his hanging jaw and clamped down, ripping through the flesh and bone as though it was no more than a particularly tough carrot.

I screamed.

The blood-curdling sound carried farther than it should have, echoing through Lerwick as though the acoustics had been designed to project my voice. The tattered remains of reality shifted to the sound of my voice, responding to the power in it. The zombies hesitated.

And I realized, stomach sinking, that I knew exactly what I was dealing with. Necromancers. Motherfucking son of a bitch.

I kicked hard at the zombie's skull, pushing as much of my magic as I dared into the blow. The skull shattered like fine china, bone shrapnel flying up to hit my face and neck. Small, stinging cuts opened in my skin and this time I screamed in utter rage, driving my heel down at the nose of the second zombie. My bare foot punched through the zombie's skull like it was made of tissue paper. The bonds that connected his magic to the corpses were brittle, and easily snapped if they remained in range. The practitioner who'd called the dead wasn't a novice, but he didn't have near the power he needed to consume me.

Which was enough to convince me that this wasn't Mother's work, or Grevane's. This plan had no subtlety. No chance at truly ending me. Any of the Heirs would have bided their time and waited for a chance to consume my spirit whole. You don't give another necromancer a chance to fight back. He wasn't smart enough to realize that facing Julienne Kemmler on a newly formed micro-death plane was almost as stupid as sticking one's junk into a badger's mouth. Even if you survived, your idiocy would only inspire mockery, not empathy.

So this guy was new. The real threat wasn't a wannamancer controlling these dead. It was the person who was guiding things behind the scenes. The mentor had plans to get me here. The only question was, how long had they been watching me? Months, at least, if they knew who I worked with and what my new job was. Had this been a ploy to hurt Mort while I was away?

Argent light exploded from me, setting everything within a foot of me ablaze with cold, furious fire. It chewed through zombie flesh with astonishing speed, reducing them to nothing but charred bone.

I stared. I'd never done that before.

When I glanced back up at the treeline, I found that Darth Wannamancer had disappeared. So he had at least an ounce of common sense. He'd fled, rather than face me. After all, there were always more dead to raise. He'd strike again. I knew that much.

Surfacing felt like paddling desperately for the surface of a dark lake. My lungs burned, my head pounded, and my fingertips tingled unbearably. When I broke through with a gasp, I found Ebenezer and Harry leaning as close to the circle as they dared. Harry looked pale. Even Ebenezer looked troubled, concern carving new furrows into his sunbaked skin. When I looked down at myself, I saw why.

I was bleeding from at least a dozen different bites. At least one toe was broken. Blood dripped from my chin and collected on my collar. I hadn't realized how close to accurate my Exorcist quip had been.

"What happened?" Harry asked, voice quiet with the strain of containing some emotion. He was trying to maintain professionalism. And failing.

"Necromancer," I whispered. "The town was a sacrifice an ectomancer made to become a necromancer. He ate them. Every damn one of them. This isn't a tomb. It's nuclear fallout. Nothing survived. Nothing will be able to survive here for a long time. It's officially cursed."

My arms trembled with the effort it took to sit up. Harry broke the circle and braced my shoulder so I wouldn't droop back down to the floor. My magic was flabby and out of shape from disuse. Darth Wannamancer might be able to take me in a fight if he caught me by surprise. Only reflexes kept me from being hurt badly. I needed to build up some endurance.

"I broke some of the bonds to his zombies, I think," I continued. "He retreated. He probably intended to use the bodies in Lerwick to build an army, but they were discovered too quickly. Taking them from the morgues now would just make a scene. He'll be heading to the nearest cemetery to make more. If we're fast, we might be able to beat him there. I think he's new."

"What makes you say that?" Harry asked.

"Because he couldn't kick my ass and I'm a novice. It means he's either new or he was pathetic enough to escape the Council's notice. Either way, I think that means we have a chance."

"To do what exactly?" he asked.

"To catch him, Hoss," Ebenezer said grimly.

"Oh," Harry said, seeming to get it. His expression fell. "Oh. Oh boy.."

Chapter Text

Ebenezer's pickup went a whopping fifty miles an hour at full speed, and he goosed everything he could from the old, rattling engine. I was more fearful for any wildlife that decided to dart down the backroads leading toward Hog Hollow, Missouri. The back tires slewed this way and that on the loose rock. Ebenezer rode out each skid with the reflexes and calm of an experienced surfer catching a wave. His face was set in a rictus of determination, his teeth showing. I couldn't figure out whether the expression was a manic grin or a grimace.

The truck was a relic, kept in working condition by someone who predated it by a few centuries. It wasn't likely to go down under an onslaught of magic, like the Beetle, which itself was a classic. Which is how I found myself the meat in a wizard sub sandwich. The hairs on Ebenezer's forearm were tickling my elbow. And speaking of elbows, Harry's was jabbing hard into my shoulder. I was tempted to climb into his lap like a child, rather than endure the game of Twister I was currently losing.

Harry's back hit the passenger's side door with an audible smack as Ebenezer took a sharp curve at forty miles an hour. The earth disappeared from beneath our back tires for a few heart-pounding seconds before the suspension settled with a tortured groan.

"Where are we going?" I said, shouting to be heard over the growl of the engine.

"There's a family plot up ahead," Harry shouted back. "The Thompsons, I think. They were a really distant neighbor. Lived between Hog Hollow and Lerwick. Grant Thompson tried to start fights with me when I was training with Ebenezer. I didn't engage, but it didn't stop the name-calling."

Of course, it wouldn't. To a bully, the lack of response would completely neuter what they'd been trying to accomplish. Bullies rarely grew up, they just got better at hiding what they were. The abuse came out in more socially acceptable ways. It was easy to conceal a lot of nastiness when you owned a house with a tall picket fence.

"Any chance the little bastard had any magical talent?" I asked hopefully. "I mean, it's never that simple, but a girl can dream."

Harry shook his head. "I would have felt something like that. Skin contact is usually a tip-off. Hard to conceal your aura at all, let alone when you're a complete rookie."

Which meant he'd been hit or shoved by Grant at some point. Would it be completely unethical of me to hope that he'd been in Lerwick when Darth Wannamancer strolled through? Probably.

"Grant Thompson couldn't have done it anyhow," Ebenezer said. "He's in the morgue with the rest of 'em. He was staying at his mistress' house when the necromancer struck."

And now I regretted my petty wish. It didn't feel half as satisfying as I'd hoped to hear the little jerk had shuffled off the mortal coil.

"How's the wife taking that?" Harry asked.

"Can't say," Ebenezer said, grip tightening on the wheel as we began another swift skid. I wasn't sure how he managed to steer through the dust clouds billowing around us and floating in our wake. "She's been missing for a few months."

I glanced up at Harry, eyebrow raised. It couldn't be a coincidence that a small-town scandal had coincided with a minor necromantic working. Someone with power had decided that an entire town should pay for the actions of one man. That level of insane devotion usually came with a side order of what they believed to be love.

But it wasn't truly love. Nothing that selfish could be. It was possession. The mindless desire to consume until you were sick. The vomit, and then the swift return to your gluttony. That kind of relationship wasn't satisfied with mere love. Nothing a sane person could offer would compare to the fantasy they'd constructed in their head. I knew. Jean-Claude wanted to devour me, inch by bloody inch, stringing out my demise for the next few decades. I'd die long before my heart actually gave out, but it wouldn't matter to him. He'd never wanted my mind. He just wanted his favorite fucktoy back.

"Did she run away?" I asked. "Take the kids and flee a bad marriage?"

"No kids," Ebenezer said, whipping around another corner. Dust pressed like an opaque wall on either side of the truck. "Just one sad woman. He got her pregnant once. We can't prove he's the reason she miscarried after they were married. He was a piece of work. Always cheating. Always drinking. One day she just didn't show up for work. The police didn't find anything. Cadaver dogs couldn't find a body. The case is still open, as far as I know."

The cruelty was so utterly mundane that it didn't merit anything more than a cursory glance to most people. Just another in a long putrid line of adulterous, abusive men. It was so disgustingly ubiquitous that it made me want to scream. The police had only done the bare minimum, by the sounds of it. Worse, they could have been complicit. How many of Grant's childhood friends had gone into law enforcement? Probably at least one.

It was enough to make you want to burn the whole place to the ground. The darker part of my nature whispered that everyone was guilty in that scenario. Anyone who'd seen something but taken no action. The silent enablers, who had the gall to gossip about it only when it was too late to help. It only took one person to make a difference. No one had come to my rescue when I'd been the one with a boot on my neck. No one dared. And I suspected no one had come to her rescue either. I'd been where she was, but I was a lot harder to kill.

But...the rational side of me argued, I had also been complicit in worse. I hadn't simply failed to do the right thing. I'd done the wrong thing over and over and over again. I'd killed and maimed. I'd brought untold grief to thousands. People were a lot more myopic than we gave them credit for. How could they spot the abuse when they were too busy gazing at their own navel? Their complicity came from ignorance. I'd been an active participant in a cycle of violence. I'd need an alpaca and a really good map to find high ground here.

Harry spoke, asking the question I couldn't voice. "Was she close to anyone in particular? An affair partner? A friend? A brother?"

Ebenezer shook his head. "No. Caroline was an only child and both her parents died in a car crash when she was nineteen. That girl was as timid as a field mouse. Taught kindergarten in the next town over. I don't think she even had the ability to confront him, let alone two-time her no-good husband right back."

He paused, tilting his head a little as he pumped the brakes. We were approaching a small, fenced-off plot with a wrought iron gate. It looked out of place in the nearly overgrown field. Stones peeked through the long grass, pale and ghostlike against the foliage. Some were so old that the details had worn down.

"Though...there was that one kid."

"Kid?" I echoed.

"Yeah. High schooler. Luke...ah...Luke Hill. Worked at the grocery store. He was smitten, I think. Awkward as hell when she was around. Smart, quiet, good worker otherwise. He took it hard when she went missing. Started acting out. Got himself fired."

Harry and I traded a loaded glance. It was a high school kid, probably just coming into his powers. Of course, he'd sacrifice a town full of innocent people to kill one man. A hormonal teen boy with a crush and too much magic was a dangerous thing. Add in a necromantic mentor, a juicy reason to want revenge, and the mind-warping effects of black magic use, and you have the recipe for mass murder.

And he wouldn't stop there. If we were dealing with a true edgelord, he'd spend the rage on the innocent alongside the guilty. The entire world had failed, and it was his right to demand satisfaction for that. Hog Hollow would be next. He'd eat his way through the entire Midwest if he could.

"Keep driving," I said after a moment. "We don't have to get out of the car."

Ebenezer raised one bushy brow. "We don't?"

"No. I could scan the place, but I don't have to. I know the sort of person we're dealing with. He already raised this plot. It's part of his vision to use that man's family to kill the next town over. It's," I made a face. "Poetic, if you like writing emo poetry in the margins of your notebook. You're dealing with a theatre kid with social anxiety and a hideously twisted crush, not a serious bad guy. He's powerful and he's stupid, so we don't have time to waste examining each grave."

I didn't say the part that truly worried me though. Where was the person holding Luke's leash? Who'd taught him how to perform the rite? Which of my father's lickspittles was sacrificing the idiot high schooler like a pawn on a chessboard? What was this loud distraction really a cover for?

"You're sure?" he said, glancing over my head to Harry.

I cleared my throat, fixing him with a hard stare. "I'm the expert here, Sir, not Harry. If you've got a question, you look at the person who can give you an answer."

Ebenezer met my gaze for a dangerous second before he slowly inclined his head. "Aye. You're right, lass. Are you sure?"

In answer, I put a hand on the Browning in its shoulder holster. I stared ahead. I could feel magic brewing like a storm on the horizon.

"I'm sure that more people will die if we don't move."

Ebenezer nodded again, and the truck lurched into motion once more, letting out a bass snarl as we shot down the road.

Chapter Text

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Harry said, craning his neck to look out the back window. His eyes were wider than I'd ever seen them. "He sent zombie cows to attack us? What is this, a Looney Toons sketch?"

The glass was plastered with mud. Ebenezer's truck was ill-equipped to deal with a herd of undead cows running it into a nearby field. We were ruining someone's soybean crop with our escape attempt. The tires would spin and squeal with alarming frequency, the mud trying to suck us down into a quagmire. There was no way we'd outpace the herd on foot. If we had to abandon the pickup, our choices were to be trampled or to hurl magic at a group of overactive hamburger. I wasn't sure which would be the more humiliating way to go, honestly.

"I mean," Harry said, voice rising a little as the cows closed on us. The scalpel-like cuts that had opened their throats would have been invisible if you were looking at them straight on. Unfortunately, they were running. The heads flopped with each stride, exposing a bit of glistening spine. "How? I thought zombies had to be human."

"No. Any dead matter will do," I said, the words slipping out before I could stop them. "It's thaumatergy. Like to like. A necromancer's power resonates with the absence of life as surely as a wizard's tap into the opposing force. Human practitioners of the art are drawn to dead humans. Again, like to like. You could use animals, but there's only so much power you can pour into a vessel with limited capacity."

I felt Ebenezer's eyes land on my profile. The intensity of his interest made me itch. "You know a lot about it for an ectomancer, Miss."

The tone was cordial. Or as cordial as a snake could make a threat sound. A suspicion had been building from the moment we met, and I was all but certain now. This Ebenezer McCoy knew something of my father's craft. He'd practiced it, at least once. Like called to like. This man had done necromancy before. And he recognized the potential for it in me. Neither one of us would tell on the other. It would be mutual destruction.

The real question was: How the hell had he managed not to be tainted by it? And why the hell was a warlock this old and canny so protective of Harry Dresden?

The only thing I was certain of? Ebenezer wasn't the teenager's mentor. He was too smart for that.

"Mort says that most people need to understand the principle of a rule before they'll follow it. It isn't just about knowing what not to do. It's the reason why doing it will harm other people. Raising a dead relative sounds like a completely victimless crime, but it's still a violation of the Laws. If you're too short-sighted to understand why a rule is in place, you'll be arrogant enough to try your luck."

I could tell he didn't believe that was the whole truth, but the old man let it lie. Harry nodded along, seeming thoughtful. For once, he seemed to approve of something Mortimer had said or done. And he had said something to that effect when he'd been laying ground rules. I didn't need the necromantic primer, though. I'd learned the ins and outs of death before I ever learned to spell.

"I sort of wish I'd had a similar rule when I'd been training Kim."

"Kim?" I echoed, casting a nervous glance over my shoulder. The cattle were gaining. At this rate, it looked like we were about to enter the bovine blitz, may the best mammal win.

"Kim Delaney. She was my apprentice for a while."

"And she graduated?" I guessed.

Harry's expression closed off, and he turned to look at the undead stampede, rather than meet my gaze.

Oh. Well, that explained a lot. It probably also explained his reaction to learning about my talents months back. I couldn't be sure of the details, but the parting had probably been bloody. He'd failed Kim At least, that was the way he'd view it. The man did love to perform astonishing feats of contortionism to make anything that went wrong his fault.

What happened next was over too quickly for me to be certain of the exact series of events. There was a massive jolt and I was flung against my seatbelt with enough force to bruise. I was just grateful McCoy had outfitted the truck with them. I'd bet the jalopy hadn't had belts when it was first manufactured. Without the restraint, I would have been flung forward through the windshield and pulverized beneath the pickup as it rolled.

Even with the safety features, the revolutions were enough to make my stomach revolt and my guts turn to water. I didn't realize I was clutching Harry's arm for dear life until we came to a trembling stop seconds later. My brain rattled like BBs in a can. I felt something warm slide down my cheek and soak into my hairline.

I was staring at the rearview mirror from the wrong angle. The scented tree brushed the roof like a felled pine. I reached out a shaking finger and mumbled, "Purple."

"Anita," Harry said, fumbling for his belt. He cursed when his long, spindly legs came down at an angle, folding him like a fan. He flopped in an utterly undignified fashion for a second before he rose up on his knees. "Anita, are you okay?"

Harry's voice sounded small and hushed after the crunching impact we'd just gone through. I struggled to focus my eyes on him. When I finally managed it, I found him jerking at the latch, trying to undo my seatbelt. Ebenezer was already out, somehow coming away from the impact better than either of us. I had a feeling it wasn't his first rollover crash.

"The tree is purple," I insisted.

"I think she hit her head, Hoss."

"Or the curse made contact. You felt it only a few seconds before I did. That wasn't a novice spell. It was meant to kill."

"Aye," Ebenezer said, clutching his staff tighter, taking a defensive position as the lowing cattle grew closer. "Seems like our warlock has decided he's taking a stand. Bad terrain for it, but counting on him to have brains might be giving him too much credit. Bad aim, too."

Or excellent aim. Maybe Luke knew where the real threat lay and had tried to double-tap the enemy before she even had a chance to take a defensive position. It was a solution my mother would applaud. She'd used the same logic to sell me to the White Court. The competition couldn't best you if she was too drugged or dead to participate. A more solid hit might have actually done serious damage. My chest was burning with the effort it took to breathe, but once the seatbelt came off I'd be fine.

Harry gave up trying to unbuckle the belt and flicked his wrist at the latch muttering a terse, "Forzare!"

The fragile plastic flew in every direction, and I had to throw up an arm to shield my face from the shrapnel. It felt harder than it should have and I realized dimly that the burning sensation was spreading. It centered over my heart, the old phantom wound splitting open as the curse took root.

Some injuries went soul-deep. Dying at your father's hands was one of them. It had split my soul twain, leaving a portion of me sane but comparatively powerless. The other half had the magical prowess of a demigod and the madness of Kemmler's true Heir. I hadn't realized the split had occurred until a lecherous air spirit had shared his theory. I was definitely feeling it now. I felt the absence like a gangrenous wound. There was a chunk of me missing, and it hurt.

"She's hit, Sir!" Harry said.

It sounded like he was shouting from the opposite end of a tunnel. By the time the words hit my ears, they'd been slurred into unrecognizability. Prying my eyelids open felt like trying to deadlift my own body weight. Impossible when I felt this weak.

The lowing of the cattle was nearer now. I could feel the tremors beneath the roof as a few dozen hooves hit the ground in rapid succession.

"Sir!" Harry insisted.

"Gimme a minute, Hoss!"

The earth heaved with enough force to rock the truck back onto its side. I landed with my head in Harry's lap. With my chin touching my chest, I spotted something inky black pulsing like blood from my chest with no wound in sight.

That can't be good, was my last, semi-coherent thought before the blackness seized me by the throat and dragged me under.

Chapter Text

There was no blood when my father snuffed out an entire Russian village. The minor Hallow had been too precise for any extraneous carnage. People simply dropped, sagging down into death without warning as their souls were ripped violently from their bodies.

Bursting free of my body had been the most agonizing experience of my life. So much so that I'd blocked all but a few snippets from my memory. The rest came back in nightmares like this one when I could feel their screams resonating through my soul. I was a sieve, separating the essential spark from the minds that molded them. I felt each and every one of them go silent, pulled under by a riptide of pure, necromantic energy. I screamed in their place. Screamed and tore at myself, and tried to divest myself from the tormented chorus.

When I opened my eyes, I was still folded over in the bench seat like a broken pinata. The pickup was still resting on its side like a crumpled tin can. Ebenezer and Harry had taken up positions on top of each wheel, gaining the high ground as the cows advanced. Neither looked at me when I crawled onto the muddy ground outside.

I flopped onto my back, trying to drag in a deep breath. I couldn't seem to suck in enough air. My chest was burning. Everything hurt.

A light, tinkling laugh drew my gaze upward. The sky above was overcast, half of it blotted out by a thin, angular face. The loose brown curls cascaded over her shoulders and tickled my face as she leaned over me.

She was at once familiar and alien. I'd seen her in the mirror, a long, long time ago. I knew the modestly endowed woman kneeling over me. I knew the shape of her chin, as pronounced as her father's. The eyes she'd inherited from her mother. I liked to fancy that the thin, almost hooked nose came from a grandmother, but I could never be sure. I'd never known my extended family. Lines fanned out around her eyes when I reached up to tap her nose with the end of my finger.

"Julienne," I said.

Her lips quirked. "Anita."

I shivered. I was staring at something I'd once considered me. It was an amputated limb, festering with sickness. You wouldn't have known, looking at her from the outside. She looked, for all the world, like the young woman I'd been when my father chained me to an altar and spilled my blood to further his own quest for power. I'd been through so much, been so many different women since that day. A name was only a jumble of letters and the meaning we assigned to them. The belief that there was meaning behind those sounds had a power all its own. In a metaphysical sense, she and I were different people. She'd forever be the girl who died on the altar. I'd become something different. That was the difference between a shade and a soul.

"You're the one," I said, sounding much calmer than I felt. I could barely breathe. She allowed me only enough for speech, not enough to calm my racing pulse. "You taught Luke. Lerwick was your fault."

"Our fault," she said, twirling one of my curls idly around her finger. They were longer and more slender than I remembered them being. Piantist's hands. Perhaps I could have been a mistro of another sort, instead of a necromantic prodigy. I'd never know.

"Yours," I insisted. "I didn't teach him to raise the dead. I didn't give him the secrets of Father's ascension rite. He didn't even get the boost in power, did he? You absorbed that yourself. He's just a useful idiot. He doesn't know you're going to chew him up and spit him back out."

Julienne got a hand under me and lifted me into a half-seated position. She cupped my cheek fondly, the spectral cold of her digits sinking like icicles into my skin. I shuddered, lips parting when she ran a thumb over my bottom lip. The drugging serenity that came with the art tried to pour in through my mouth. I grit my teeth and spat it out, though I wanted to drink the power down.

"Look at the hand-wringing hypocrite," she mocked with another trilling laugh. "As if you haven't done the same dozens of times since we parted. At least I'm honest about who I am and what I want."

"What he wanted," I whispered. "Not what we wanted. There's a difference."

She showed her teeth, but the expression was too manic to be called a smile. I imagined a psychotic inmate would give you a similar look before he bashed your head in. I couldn't reach her. Not really. Sanity and madness don't ever exchange pleasant dialogue.

"Indeed. The doddering old man gave us something he never achieved himself. The ability to live without fear. Stop scuttling like a roach and choke the life from the arrogant old windbags on the Council. It's your world. Your rules. You just have to be strong enough to claim it."

The thought was so impossible I almost dismissed it out of hand. It would only take a handful of wardens to end me. Dresden might even accomplish it if he managed to sucker punch me. The might of the White Council would crush me flat.

But it wouldn't crush Julienne Kemmler. We were separate beings, but we didn't have to be. She'd been a part of me once. She could be again. I was the only vessel perfectly suited to fit her. And yet, at the same time, I felt I'd outgrown this portion of myself. Her power was vast, but her mind was narrow. She couldn't squint past her own skewed view of the world to look at everyone around her. Did I really want to step back into a myopic echo of myself? Was that worth the false promise of safety? Because nothing was guaranteed. Not even when the other party was a demigod.

I shook my head slowly. "I'm not like you."

"You are me," she insisted. "I was born from your weakness. I am the fruit of your blighted womb. I am every memory you are too cowardly to face."

I tried to lurch to my feet but only managed to knock Julienne onto her back. She smiled smugly up at me, expression barely flickering when I slammed her head into the mud.

"I am not a coward!" I snarled into her face. "That is bullshit and you know it! What happened to us was not our fault. We were a child! I survived. I got through it. Whatever I did to accomplish that is my business, and mine alone. I didn't make my rage the world's problem. You would. They don't deserve what we'd do to them."

Julienne's eyes narrowed to slits. "They deserve to die. Everyone was complicit. It only took one to make a difference."

Another quiver ran through me. I'd thought something similar not so long ago. There was an echo of her in me. Which probably meant there was an echo of me in her. Something that wanted to change.

"You're not me," I said slowly. "And you won't ever get that far if I indulge you. I get it now. You wanted my attention. This was how you got it. Make me think one of the Heirs has found me. Possibly sell me the promise of power if the opportunity presented itself. You wanted to be the seductive devil on my shoulder. Convince me to give you a body. Well, you can take the fan dance and fuck off. I'm not letting you in."

Her face paled, blanching so hard that the skin was almost indistinguishable from the bleached bone beneath. Her eyes were voids as deep and terribly compelling as black holes. Her will was immense, but it couldn't crush me. For all her power, her confidence was brittle. Being murdered by your beloved father and reborn as a cosmic entity was a traumatic way to start a new life. She'd been through hell. More of it than I'd ever know. I pitied her. And I never wanted to be her again.

"You'll beg for me one day," she whispered, voice strained tight with rage. "And I'll remind you of your words. I'll force-feed you every one of them."

"And until that day, I want you gone. Get the fuck out of here, Julienne. I have a self-destructing kid to sort out."

"This isn't over."

"It is for now. Leave."

Julienne blipped out of my sight as though she'd never been. The world lurched into fast motion, sound and feeling coming back like a sensory thrashing. The pain in my chest was gone, but the ache behind my eyes was enough to make my eyes cross.

I only had time to blearily out of the window. I was still in the car. The hallucination or revelation or whatever hadn't even lasted a full thirty seconds since I'd passed out. Which meant cows were still trying to turn us into salsa.

I crawled from the car on my belly, certain of what I had to do next. I called forth my will.

"Caroline Thompson," I called into the void. "Come to me."

Chapter Text

Ghosts never seemed to fit me perfectly. Mortimer insisted the difference was all in my head. A ghost was immaterial to all but a select few and could conform to the shape of its container like vapor in a glass. Caroline Thompson's ghost wasn't actually too big for my body. In life, she'd been a little over three inches taller than I was and significantly slimmer. She wasn't actually wearing me like an ill-fitting sweater. But that was how it felt when she stood, smearing a bit of blood from the back of my hand onto my jeans.

Harry and Ebenezer both reacted to my sudden appearance like a gunshot, swiveling in my direction at the sound of my passing. Harry tried to sweep me behind his body with his staff. I dodged. Well, I staggered to one side and managed to get clipped on the elbow. I only felt the sting distantly. I was the passenger in this car, not the driver. Mort didn't encourage a more direct possession. Get used to letting spirits take center stage, and they demanded it. Better to only allow them in enough to use their skills, not to allow their consciousness to dwarf yours.

But Luke wasn't going to react well to someone borrowing the skills of his unrequited love. He wanted Caroline back, in so much as he could have her. It hadn't been easy to convince her. She didn't really want to face him. She just wanted to rest.

"Anita, get back!"

Harry tried to lunge after me again, only to come up short when Ebenezer seized his bad arm. The jolt of pain successfully diverted his attention long enough to let me pass. Our eyes met for a protracted second. He knew what I was trying to do, and he didn't like it. He also knew it was the best way to prevent casualties. Since Harry's safety was on the line, he'd let me try my cockamamie plan. It didn't matter if I died, so long as Harry kept breathing. I could almost respect the single-minded protectiveness.

Almost.

"Luke?" I called. My voice sounded small and barely carried over the sound of lowing cows.

I saw Harry jerk once in my periphery. It was my voice speaking, but that didn't mean much when you were an ectomancer. The tone and intonation were different. Softer than I'd ever be. The immense weariness of life had curled Caroline's shoulders when she'd lived, and death hadn't changed her much. Parts of my body were coiled tightly, ready to run, trained by a lifetime of abuse to flee a dangerous situation when possible.

"Luke?" Caroline repeated. It sounded louder now. The cows had stopped lowing. "Luke, are you here?"

For a moment, no one moved. The only sounds in the field were the exhausted wheeze of the still-running truck engine and the rustle of the wind through the trees. He appeared between two trunks, looking smaller and more vulnerable than the depraved grinning skull caricature he'd been in the Nevernever. The kid looked like a young seventeen. He was nineteen max, and even that was stretching credulity to its breaking point. He had pimples for God's sake. Then again, I hadn't even been a preteen when I'd begun. It seemed wrong to spoil someone so young with this kind of magic. There should be a rule. Let he who is without blemish raise the first corpse.

Luke's voice was a wavering tenor when he called, "Caroline?"

I felt my face stretch into a weary smile. "Luke. There you are."

The teenage necromancer cast a nervous glance behind my position. I didn't look behind me to see what Harry and Ebenezer were doing. He was like a nervous dog. If I twitched wrong, he'd maul me.

"It's not really you," he said, voice breaking on the last word. It was hard to believe a kid this young and distraught was the co-conspirator of a mass murderer. "You're just a ghost. You're trying to trick me."

Caroline's shade took the news she was gone in stride. Death was the first rest her spirit had in a long time. She wanted to get back to it, and not even the realization of how her peace came to be would deter her.

"Maybe. But I feel like me. And I can tell you that I wouldn't have wanted you to do this. It's wrong, Luke. You have to see that."

Luke's eyes welled with tears, and his mouth mashed into a thin line. He was too pale, like someone on the edge of illness. The minor Hallow should have given him a boost, even with only a few hundred souls. I doubted my alter ego had given him even a tenth of what she'd received. He was probably about to pass out.

"He beat you to death! I found your body buried in the Thompson cemetery in an old grave! He didn't even leave you alone when you died. He put you on top of his pervy Uncle Stan who had a stroke a month before your murder."

I grimaced inwardly. It was hard to blame Luke for his desire to murder Grant. I would have at the very least kicked the man's teeth in. But this hadn't been proportional. A mountain of dismembered eyes for an eye.

I couldn't tell you how I knew, but her expression became softer than I thought my face was capable of. She stepped closer to him, reaching toward his cheek. A shudder ran through him when my fingertips brushed his cheek. His skin was clammy beneath my hand.

"I know. But this wasn't right, Luke. You need to stop. Don't hurt anyone else in my name."

The tears fell, and he scrubbed at his face with a dark sleeve before they could drip off his chin. Hard to maintain your badass necromancer cred if you cry in front of the girl you liked. Well, the spirit of the dead girl you used to like, now possessing the borrowed body of a fugitive wizard.

"No," he said, a fine tremor running beneath my fingers. He was shaking. I couldn't tell if it was grief or rage. "I can't. I won't. You don't get an opinion anymore. You're gone. They're the reason why."

I could practically hear the lid to his casket slam shut. He was stubborn, but not nearly as strong as he'd need to beat two wizards of the White Council. Let alone the daughter of Heinrich Kemmler. And by God was the naive teenager going to make a last, suicidal stand rather than give up on a twisted crush.

"Luke-" Caroline began.

Luke backhanded me so hard that he slapped the ghost from my body. Caroline's ghost evaporated seconds after, too weary to remain where she couldn't effect change. I wouldn't have dragged her back, even if she could have been some help. She'd earned her rest.

I hit the ground with a whoosh of expelled air, knocked too senseless to even cry out. I expected a boot to come down hard on my face, cracking my skull like an egg. If I was quick, I could escape as a specter, but even that was dangerous. McCoy would sense something like that.

But the lethal boot to the head didn't come. Luke let out a rather high roar of challenge and thrust a hand toward one of the wizards behind me.

I'd never be sure which of them fired the bullet that showered me with Luke's gray matter. I was pretty sure there were just some things that a girl shouldn't know.

Chapter Text

"Ouch!"

Harry leaned closer to me, dabbing at the cut on my lip with an alcohol swab. I tried to smack his bicep, which also hurt. There was barely a surface on my body that wasn't cut, swollen, or turning colors. The rollover crash had left me feeling like I'd been ambushed by a determined kickboxing team and used as a practice dummy. The curse Luke had hit me with had never been meant to kill, but it had hurt. Like a son of a bitch, it turned out.

"Hold still. You don't want any dirt in this. Or worse. We were in a pasture."

Not to mention the brains, I wanted to add. I kept it to myself. If Harry had been the one to kill Luke, I didn't want to know. I didn't want to change the way I thought of him. Not now. Not while the quivering possibility of more remained between us.

"Still. Did you have to use alcohol?"

"It's what Ebenezer had on hand. Do you want this clean or not?"

I slumped back down. The overstuffed sofa was comfortable, and the fire in the grate across from us was soothing. I was exhausted from the day's exertion. I wanted nothing more than to curl up and sleep.

It took five more minutes of fussing before Harry was satisfied with my cleanliness. I should have showered, but I honestly didn't have it in me. I ended up with my head propped on his shoulder, watching the flames lick across the kindling. The warmth was glorious after my encounter with my alter ego. There wasn't anything colder than the heart of an insane necromantic demigoddess.

"Stay with me until I wake up?" I mumbled sleepily, eyes falling to half-mast. I couldn't seem to guard my tongue. "I know I'm going to have nightmares about Luke tonight."

Visions of myself in his place. The best way to deal with a necromancer was to play dirty. I'd wonder if he could put a gun to my head and pull the trigger if he had to. And I didn't want to. I wanted to breathe in the scent of his leather duster, soaking it in until I drifted off to sleep.

"Would you kill me if I turned evil?" I wondered aloud.

Harry paused. "Why? Was that on your to-do list? Because I'm gonna need your resignation before you enroll in a school of villainy."

An exhausted laugh bubbled from my lips, dying a swift death in moments. I couldn't even keep that up for long.

"Just answer the question, please."

Harry thought about it. "It depends, I guess."

"On what?"

"Why you went to the dark side. Things are never simple. Sometimes people make choices because they're in bad spots. Not everyone gets the luxury of having clear-cut options. If you were hurting people, I'd stop you, but that doesn't mean I'd double-tap you on the spot."

I closed my eyes and curled closer to him. "If I go evil, you should. It's the only way you'll beat me."

I could almost hear his smile. "Oh yeah? You think you're a tough guy, huh?"

"Tougher than you."

"Probably. But I won't pick on you. You look like you need a nap."

So did he, apparently, because his arms came around me a moment later, and I ended up with my head in his lap, propped by a throw pillow and an arm around my shoulders. When I peeked, I found him reclining with his head lolling back. His eyes were closed. I think he might have snored. I closed my eyes and let myself drift.

In Harry's arms, there were no nightmares.

Chapter Text

Sweat slicked my brow. I sucked in air shallowly through my mouth, trying to avoid the overpowering odor rolling through the car. The heat on top of me was immense, threatening to melt me into an Anita-shaped puddle in Harry's passenger's seat. I could barely see past the shimmering heat haze rolling off my lap.

"Did we really need eighteen pizzas?" I asked weakly. "We're after a stalker, not some kid who only emerges from the basement at mealtimes."

"If you ask Murph, those are usually one and the same. I mean, the ability to spew your thoughts and get easy access to people on the internet is kind of scary. Some people have nothing better to do than make other's lives worse. I'm glad I don't have to futz with it. Saves time and misery."

I happened to like the ease of the internet. It was so much more convenient to rely on GPS to get where I was going than to drudge up the long-ago memories of my lessons in tracking magic. I missed being able to browse Google for easy answers. I hadn't cracked an encyclopedia in years. Now the library and occult bookstores were my go-to.

"Still," I said impatiently, shifting under the weight of the leaning tower of pizza. The heat seeping into my lap was beginning to get uncomfortable. "Eighteen of them? Do they really need this much?"

Harry had stubbornly kept his secret for months, never telling me how he'd managed to conscript so many of the Wee Folk to do his bidding. I'd thought it was binding magic. It turned out it was bribery. With pizza. A lot of pizza.

Harry's lips twitched. "They can really put the stuff away. We're asking them to scour all of Chicago and risk being swatted when they get a bit of his hair. I need to catch him in the act before I can have Murph bag him. The weasel gets away with terrorizing her because there are gaping blind spots in the justice system. By the time anyone takes it seriously, it has usually escalated to violence."

"Oh, believe me, I know," I said, wincing at the bitterness I could hear in my tone.

Harry shot a glance my way. I would have snapped at him to watch the road if we hadn't been idling for the last fifteen minutes waiting for the logjam ahead of us to clear. Traffic was squeezing through at a pace that molasses would have envied. I kept my eyes straight ahead. I hadn't outright said it yet, but he could guess what I'd gone through. I was too twitchy, unable to help myself when we were in public. Jean-Claude was still in town. He hadn't gone so far as to buy the building yet, and I was grateful. I liked my place. It was cozy and functional. I'd grown attached to the people there. It would hurt to lose any of them.

Especially Richard. The handsome schoolteacher was being stalked by a barghest for months. Having a death omen stalk your every step could only mean a bad end. It was part of why I'd been avoiding him. The less I knew about him, the less it would ache when he was gone.

Harry opened his mouth and then seemed to think better of it. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel uncomfortably, sinking in his seat. I could feel the topic looming, unspoken and terrible.

"I can see lights ahead," I said when we closed the few feet that had opened up between us and an Oldsmobile. We were dangerously close to tapping its rear fender.

"Cops?"

"Yeah. Near the new trendy dance club that everyone's raving about. Rosia, I think."

I'd learned about it from one of Jean-Claude's missives. He'd sent a dozen roses and a backless dress with the note. I'd stopped reading the note three lines in when the cordial tone gave way to the seductive whisper of his Hunger, reminding me how utterly captive it had kept me for years. I knew he was trying to get in my head.

And it was working. It took me hours to get to sleep, despite my exhaustion. Between Mort's lessons and the cases I consulted on, I should have been worn down to the quick. And yet, Jean-Claude always knew how to dig into me and scoop out what he wanted.

Harry nodded, as though that made sense and thankfully dropped the issue with a shrug. "Let's get setup with the Guard. After that we're taking a detour to the Cook County Morgue. Murphy has something she wanted us to see."

Another corpse I'd have to struggle not to raise. Wonderful.

I smiled tightly. "Can't wait."

Chapter Text

I'd met Waldo Butters once in passing. Or maybe it was more accurate to say I'd run away from him once before he could discover me looming over a corpse. To Butter's knowledge, this was our first meeting. I tried not to look guilty when he was pumping my hand enthusiastically. Between the wiry, unkempt hair and upbeat demeanor, he reminded me of a black lab. With a pair of spectacles perched on his nose, his eyes were a little too large for comfort. They were deep and brimming with quiet intelligence. I knew a sharp mind when I saw one, even if the outward appearance made others discount him.

"It's a pleasure to talk with you finally, Detective Blake. I've heard a lot about you from Harry and Murph. I'm glad we could meet in person."

I pasted on a smile that was as soulless as the corpses I could feel all around us. "Me too. I wish it could have been under better circumstances."

Something flickered in his eyes. Doubt, maybe. "Is something wrong?"

I sighed. I didn't have to put much weariness into the sound to sound convincing. The day had barely begun and I already wanted to throw myself into bed with a box of chocolates and a good book. Instead, I was about to witness some fresh horror and try to track down the creepy-crawly that did it.

"Not really. I just..." I cast a glance around, rubbing my arms to dispel the goosebumps straining the skin. It had nothing to do with the cold emanating from the wall of freezers. It was the potential energy wafting through the room. The dead were near. I could command them if I wanted to.

"Just?" Harry prompted.

I shrugged. "It's a lot. I can sense them in there. It creeps me sometimes."

Harry nodded, seeming to accept that. He turned back to Butters with an apologetic smile. "She's an ectomancer."

Butter raised a brow. "Am I supposed to know what that is?"

"She sees dead people," Murphy drawled. "Ghosts, mostly. It's apparently a talent wizards have."

I ducked my chin, resisting the urge to reach for the handle of the nearest unit. Inside, there was a small figure. The proportions were childlike, the figure pudgy with baby fat that would never fall off. It was a kid. Jesus.

"Not all," Harry said. "It's a specialized talent. You have to be on the right wavelength to interact with the Beyond in any meaningful capacity."

Butters blinked owlishly for a few seconds, absorbing that. He brushed his scrubs down, as though trying to smooth the wrinkles out. I thought it was more likely he was searching for something safe to do with his hands. I could tell he had a difficult time accepting the answer he'd gotten. Some vanilla humans were like that. Squeezing their eyes shut in the vain hope the monster wouldn't check their hiding place.

"Sure, sure," he agreed. "The body we're looking for is on the top, three units from the left. Could you help me lift her, Harry? It's a little unwieldy to get them from the top row. Brioche usually takes those. Damn tall bastard."

The last was said in a cheerful tone, as though the thought of inconveniencing another M.E. was the highlight of his day. Harry obligingly stepped forward and together they managed to wrestle a black body bag onto the gurney at the center of the room. I fought not to lean forward eagerly when the bag was unzipped. Most people found it unseemly to ogle the dead.

The woman was probably in her mid-to-late twenties. Just the hint of a darker color showed near the roots of her platinum hair. Something brown and sticky had matted on one side of her head. Purple-blue blotches stood out on her skin like ink spots on a white tablecloth. A y-shaped incision ran down the midline of her body, stitched with care to leave as little damage as possible. I could admire the patience and skill it took to make the incision neat for the family waiting to receive the body.

Harry reached out, stopping a few inches from her skin, running his hand through the air above the body. I mimicked him and found what he had with a few minutes of searching. A tingle of residual magic remained on the dead woman's upturned face, increasing in potency until the spell culminated at the feet. When Butters finally yanked the bag away from her ankles, I sucked in a breath through my teeth.

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph," Murphy muttered.

The poor girl's feet were hideously swollen, the flesh ballooning out until I feared it would pop like an overripe pustule. The bruises were thicker here, a solid blue-black that made my feet ache in sympathy. It looked like someone had used a hammer to break her ankles. They lay at odd angles, unnervingly loose compared to other joints.

"What caused the indents here?" Harry asked.

When I peered a little closer I saw what he meant. There were irregular indents here and there, pushing the swollen skin down in places.

"The straps of her shoes, I imagine. I heard EMS had to cut them off."

"What did this?" Murphy asked.

"So far as I can tell? She was partying and broke her ankle. She fell and half a dozen pairs of heels did the rest. I couldn't tell you whose feet did the deed, but she was basically trampled to death. What I can't figure is why she kept dancing after the injury."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I mean she was a socialite. She was at a trendy new club. Observers said she took a nasty fall earlier in the evening and returned to the dance floor only minutes later. She kept dancing, even though it would have been agonizing to do it. That's the real kicker. The guy who brought her in thought she was too blitzed to feel it, but when I ran a tox screen I only found marijuana in her system. Definitely not enough to blunt the pain of that kind of injury."

"A curse," Harry said under his breath. "A compulsion. I can't tell what kind."

"The kind that makes you dance to death?" I guessed. "Sounds a little like the plague that swept through Europe at different points in time."

Murphy's gaze bounced between us, taut with whatever sour thing she wanted to say. She finally relaxed and muttered 'Wizards' before rounding on Harry. "What does this mean, Dresden? In layman's terms."

"That someone probably got into her head," Harry said, lip curling faintly in disgust. "They planted the urge there, binding it up with her psyche. She literally couldn't stop. Someone meant to kill her. Not only that, but made it hurt when she went. I'm guessing that the people who stomped on her skull weren't in control either."

Butters nodded. "I have another waiting next to the first."

"The rest survived, but they're in bad shape. One had to have part of her skull removed to keep the brain swelling down," Murphy said.

Fucking hell. Dancing spells weren't usually this immediately lethal. They were annoying sure, but the victims died of exhaustion or dehydration, not blunt force trauma. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make sure this girl suffered before she dropped dead.

"Any we can talk to?" Harry asked, leaping on the question before I could.

"Probably not. When they're conscious, they don't make much sense. There's a reason I asked you to meet me at the morgue, not the hospital. You'll get clearer answers from the dead than the living. If it's not a faerie, what else could do this?"

"Anyone with access to a ritual or enough power of their own," I said. "In this case, I'd say that it was probably thaumatergy. Someone got a hold of her hair or blood and used it to kill her."

"Like snapping the leg of a voodoo doll?" Murphy asked, raising a skeptical brow.

"Exactly like that," Harry said. "I'd like to take a look at the scene when we're done here and at the hospital. I'll get a better sense of what I'm dealing with if I'm where it occurred. Black magic like that leaves an imprint."

I fought not to squirm. I wasn't exactly as pure as the driven snow. I kept waiting for the day he'd round on me and shove his blasting rod in my face, declaring me a no-good traitor. So far only his mile-wide blind spot about women had kept him from prying into the misdeeds of my past.

"The nightclub is named Rosia."

Well, that was just great. I could throw in a likely encounter with my rapist into the mix.

This was just shaping up to be a fun, fun, fun day.

Chapter Text

I balked in the doorway of Murphy's office, my stomach performing a painful freefall to my toes as my eyes landed on the figure sitting in the chair opposite her. For a frozen instant, I was sure that Jean-Claude had snared one of the few allies I had, forcing her to arrange an ambush for me. It was ballsy of him to think he could get away with it in a police precinct, but I couldn't rule out the idea he'd plunge us all into an orgy for a chance to steal me away. My heart skittered like a trapped thing, throwing itself against the cage of my ribs with enough force to bruise. The air seized in my lungs, locking me into complete immobility. I couldn't move. Couldn't think. Couldn't breathe.

Harry ran into my back, knocking me forward a step. I staggered like a drunk, landing in the empty chair beside the vampire. My mind screamed at me to get up, to run, to throw a spell over my shoulder and pray to absent God that I could make it to the front doors before Jean-Claude could. At the same time, despair crested like a wave. Even if I was on my feet and in a prime position to run, I couldn't beat him in a foot race. I was trapped in the cage with my predator and he was going to eat me. Force me to fuck Harry so he could touch me at last, dragging my body and mind back into the Inferno. I couldn't help a frightened glance up, a vain attempt to gauge how much time I had left to flee. A second? Less?

It wasn't Jean-Claude. There were superficial similarities that seemed to be universal in House Raith. Glossy black hair. It would be soft to the touch. I knew that from experience. Jean-Claude's body was a carnal delight, perfect in almost every way. And this vampire made him look like the ugly stepbrother. My lungs seized painfully, trying and failing to suck in air. He was too close. Too much. I couldn't tear my eyes away from him. I could feel his demon already whispering silvery lies to me. Peace. Oblivion. Unthinking ecstacy. Jean-Claude had leached most of my sanity over the years. Life was painful enough that it was tempting to face that abyss. Toss myself into it. I was primed for the attention of this creature.

I felt myself sink to my knees, a sob caught in my throat. The despair was total. No escape. There was no escape. It wasn't Jean-Claude. It was worse. A more powerful vampire still. I couldn't stop him if he wanted to take me.

The vampire's gaze found mine, those silvery eyes flying wide in alarm as he took me in. He could feel me in a fashion no one in this room could. Must feel the instantaneous fear and anguish that kept me locked in place. I couldn't tear myself away. Neither could he. Our eyes met for a dangerous second, and then I was tipping forward into the blackness.

I found him at the bottom of an impossibly deep lake. He was the only luminous thing in the dark, a deep-sea creature only seen in the periphery. When you turned, it was gone. The demon here was a playful thing, a predator that amused itself with the prey before killing it.

"Go to hell."

To my surprise, I wasn't the one who'd uttered the words. When I craned my neck, I found someone floating not far away, fingertips inches from mine. He was almost lost to the inky water, but I could catch glimpses of him. Shorter, near-sighted, handsome, but in a soft, approachable way, instead of the sculpted profile he ordinarily wore. His eyes were blue-gray. They gleamed with hatred, tracking the thing circling us with weary resignation. He didn't look upset when I pulled back from his grasping fingers. I didn't want to touch him. Didn't want another invasion of my mind. Once had been more than enough. I could feel myself like a fragile honeycomb, hopelessly marred after Jean-Claude had gouged what he wanted out of me. I bled with feelings. I couldn't staunch the flow. It was fucking catnip to the demon.

"What?"

"It isn't me. I refuse to believe that. I'm in charge. It can go to hell."

I blinked a few times in confusion. I'd never heard a vampire talk like that. Jean-Claude was his demon where I was concerned. He was always hungry, always clawing at me, peeling away layers of me until I was nothing but a pile of twitching meat. He'd left me mangled. If I hadn't escaped him, I'd be dead.

Then it was over. I was hunched over the chair, gasping in air. The hiccuping sob clawed its way from my throat. I tasted blood in my mouth. Harry's voice was loud, but I couldn't make out a word he was saying. Even Murph looked worried, hovering over Harry's shoulder, demanding to know what was happening.

Oh nothing. Just my sanity snapping like a brittle rubber band. Don't mind me..

The vampire stood abruptly, toppling the chair he'd been sitting in. It hit the ground with a clatter, startling a yelp from me. I hated the sound. Hated knowing that he knew he'd scared me. That some part of him liked the fact I couldn't stop him. That I was already tenderized, ready for consumption. I was an easy meal.

"I need to go," he said, voice rough.

"Thomas-" Harry began.

Thomas' eyes flashed entirely white for an instant. Harry froze, hand clamping painfully on my shoulder. He didn't let go until I let out a soft groan of pain.

"Now, Harry. I mean it."

Harry nodded after a second. "Call me later with the details. I think I need to get Anita home. She's having some sort of reaction to that soulgaze. If it's her first, it's probably traumatic."

Thomas' smile was a touch bitter. "I wouldn't want my mind to be someone's first rodeo. Talk about a disappointment."

It was said in a light, disparaging tone, though I could tell he meant every word. I couldn't make sense of his attitude. He wanted to round on me, seize me by the back of the neck, and take me against the nearest wall. Why was he just standing there, looking at me?

Harry waved an impatient hand. "Get lost. I'll handle things from here. Meet me at the boarding house by eight."

Thomas nodded tightly, shot me a worried glance, and then disappeared around the corner in one long, purposeful stride. I could finally breathe normally when his presence retreated down the hall.

"What happened?" Murphy asked.

"Soulgaze. She got a peek into Thomas, and Thomas got a peek at her. It's always disconcerting, and in this case, I think it was actually traumatic. I should get Anita home. Think you could send Zerbrowski over to babysit her?"

"I don't need a babysitter!" I snapped, shoving at his arm.

Harry let me go, turning his face away before I could watch hurt flash across his face. Damn him, he did not get to make me feel guilty while I was having a nervous breakdown!

"You need somebody to be there," he said gently. "Even if you don't want it. I've seen some shit with my Sight. I know it's bleak in there. Just let me help you, okay?"

Help. He wanted to help? How about starting with how the hell he was on first-name terms with a fucking White Court vampire?

I almost smiled when the terror thawed into a light, simmering anger. It felt better. Warm. Safe. I could be angry with him, and he'd take it. He'd answer my questions or there'd be hell to pay.

"Sure," I gritted out. "Let's go."

Chapter Text

I think Harry would have been content to let the silence simmer until we reached my front door. He wasn't going to be that lucky. My restraint only lasted until we reached the highway.

"What the hell was that back there?" I demanded, words exploding from my mouth when the fury became too much to contain. Angry fingers had undone the cold knot of terror in my stomach. I was pissed.

The outburst startled Harry enough to make him swerve into the next lane. A chorus of honks went up around us in protest. I could barely hear them over the pounding of my heart. He steered the car back into our lane with a soft curse before turning wide eyes to me.

"What the hell was what?"

"Why the hell was there was there a fucking White Court vampire in Murphy's office? Don't you know how dangerous those things are?" I asked, horrified when my voice broke on the word 'vampire.'

A knot formed in my throat, sealing it shut. I wanted to puke. No, I wanted to scream, cry, and then puke. Jean-Claude had put the fear of himself into me a long time ago. Even now, in my somewhat privileged position, I was afraid he'd find me. Afraid he'd trap me in a room and steal my mind, one bite at a time. It had taken years to find myself again. I still didn't have all the pieces. There were some mangled beyond repair, others lost entirely to my time with him. I turned my face away before Harry could see me cry.

"Thomas isn't a thing," he said, a sour note in his voice. "He's a person."

"He's a predator, Harry."

I caught sight of Harry's reflection in the window. His jaw was clenched tight. Angry. He was angry at me? He was the one acting like a fool. For a wild second, I considered running. I couldn't take chances with a new vampire nearby. This Thomas person wasn't who he was presenting himself to be. I knew that for sure. Underneath it all, I knew what he was. A monster who would eat me if he got hungry enough.

"That's not all he is. You don't know him."

"I know enough," I snapped, rounding on him.

I was sure the look in my eyes was half-mad. I could feel the desire to crumble taking hold of my mind. The despair was nearly total. I'd caught the attention of another, stronger vampire. I was so damn screwed.

"No, you don't. Just listen to me, Anita. He's-"

"A killer. He's killed people."

"So have I," Harry argued. "And so have you."

"It's different."

"How?"

"Because I didn't rape them during the act," I said, voice shaking. With grief or rage, I wasn't sure. "I didn't target a fourteen-year-old girl on the streets of Paris. I didn't rip her sanity away right alongside her virginity."

Silence. Harry had gone utterly still, absorbing my words. We both knew the conversation had pivoted away from Thomas. Harry wasn't a dummy. He knew what I was getting at. He stared forward with sudden intensity. He couldn't meet my eyes. He knew I wouldn't like what I saw there. If I spied pity, I'd slug him. If I saw anything else, I'd slug him again. For once, he seemed to pick up on the cue to keep his mouth shut and actually think before he spoke.

"Anita..." he finally managed.

"Don't. It was a long time ago. I just...I can't be around him, Harry. I can't. He's..."

I wrapped my arms around myself, clutching at my middle. The urge to be sick was overwhelming. I hadn't wanted to shout the words at him. Admitting it felt like ripping the wound wide open and guiding his fingers inside. Intrusive. Painful. Unsanitary. Jean-Claude made me feel disgusting. He'd ruined something that should have been mine to explore at my own pace. I hated him. Hated him so much it made my guts churn.

"I understand," Harry said slowly. "But he's our ticket in. He has connections. Murphy wants us to scope the place out before S.I. investigates. She needs probable cause. If you want to stay home, I get it, but I need him on this one. I solved a case for him once. He owes me. I'll tell him to steer clear of you, okay?"

As if it would be that simple. Thomas Raith would find me, one way or the other. It was in his nature. I'd just have to be ready to run before that day came. I couldn't return to that life. I'd die first.

"And let you get eaten? I think not."

"He doesn't swing that way."

"They all do if the need is dire enough. Thomas will eat a man if he's starving. If we're locked in a room with him, he'll go for me first, but you'd still be on the menu."

Harry pulled a face. "It's not like that, trust me."

I shook my head. He was going to get himself killed. If he thought Thomas was anything less than a demon, he was deluding himself. I'd felt the Hunger. It wanted me.

"I'm going," I said as Harry took the exit that would lead to my apartment building. "I'm not leaving you alone with it."

"Him. Could you at least say him?"

"No."

The word was so frosty it made him cringe. He ran a hand through his hair, eyes wide and stricken. A traitorous part of me wanted to cradle his face in my hands and tell him to stop giving me that look. I wasn't a broken dove he needed to nurse back to health. I could practically see him donning his shiny armor to play gallant knight. It would get him killed.

"Is he still alive?" Harry asked as he took a right.

"For now. I can fix that if Thomas tries anything."

Harry cursed. "You know that's not what I mean. That bastard who hurt you. Is he still alive?"

The tension that banded my ribs eased a fraction. It was nice to hear someone else's outrage on the topic.

"Yes, and he's in Chicago. I've tried moving a few times. Covering my tracks. Transferring departments. It never works. Jean-Claude always finds me. He won't stop."

"Jean-Claude?" he echoed.

"Don't," I whispered. "Don't say the name. I already feel sick. If I think about him, I'll puke."

"But-"

"Drop it, Harry!"

He did. He fell silent, shoulders going rigid with barely leashed anger. Power gathered around him in a nebulous cloud. It stuttered when I smacked his bicep.

"Don't hex the Beetle. I want to get home in one piece. It's nice you want to go caveman and smash his face in, but you wouldn't be doing me any favors. He has connections. He'll make your life a living hell."

"At least until I can get my hands on him," Harry muttered darkly.

"He'll kill you," I said.

"Don't be so sure. I have a good track record against vampires."

But none as ruthless or petty as Jean-Claude. I had no doubt he'd go to great lengths to torment Harry before he went in for the kill.

"I don't want to lose you. Promise me you won't go after him."

"No."

"Harry-"

"I said no, Anita. I'm not going to let him get away with that. You're not ready to go after him, I get that. But I'm not letting it stand. He hurt you. Hurt a kid who couldn't defend herself. He's going to pay for that."

My heart let out one painful, stuttering squeeze. Sweet boy. Sweet, naive boy. Someone had to protect him from himself.

"Drop it," I said, more gently than before.

"For now. I mean it. You don't have to come."

"I'm not losing you."

Harry's smile was a touch sad. "Not if I can help it. Are you sure about doing this?"

Not at all, but someone had to save this poor bastard.

"I'm sure."

Chapter Text

I smoothed my hands down over the dress self-consciously for the umpteenth time. I'd found myself gravitating toward the full-length mirror in my bathroom more than I liked, as if my reflection might have changed since the last time I looked. Given who I was and what I could do, it wasn't out of the realm of possibility. I could technically make a swap at any time, if I were willing to force another soul out of their rightful place. It took a lot more effort to find someone already on their way out and catch them on the precipice of death. I'd been lucky to find Detective Blake. Even less lucky that she was in Special Investigations. And incredibly rotten luck that the only necromancer in the department was forced to consult with the only professional wizard in town.

It would have been a loaded situation without any additional contact. If I was smarter, I would have packed up the second I met Harry Dresden. He was a member of the Council, duty bound to report my identity if he ever learned it. I certainly shouldn't be concerned if he liked my outfit or not. I'd gone with a more conservative long-sleeved, scoop-necked cocktail dress with the barest of slits up one thigh. I'd been planning to wear the even racier strapless number the real Anita had purchased for a date years ago, but the vampire's involvement had thoroughly nixed that plan. No way was I putting more of myself on display in front of a predator. I'd adhere to nightclub etiquette. No more, no less.

Still, I couldn't help but adjust the neckline, wondering if the amount of cleavage on display was too much. I'd thought it looked tasteful enough when I'd put it on, but now I could only see the curves that the eyes would follow. Raith would be looking at me, and the weight of his attention would make me want to run screaming. I still wasn't sure how I was going to make it through the night, but I'd scrounge the determination from somewhere. The only thing worse than going with Harry was sitting at home alone, waiting for a phone call that he was in the hospital or the morgue.

After a little consideration, I paired the dress with a pair of sensible heels and a clutch with a false bottom for a Seecamp. The tiny handgun wasn't much in the face of supernatural nastiness, but it was enough of a comfort to let me step outside of my front door.

Where I promptly ran into Richard.

It was a lot like colliding with a brick wall. I hit him broadside and stumbled back, resisting the urge to reach for my smarting nose. He caught my wrist and pulled me upright before I could go tumbling to the floor. The heels might have been small, but they were still enough to make me overbalance after smacking into a wall of muscle. Richard was already spouting apologies as he helped me to stand up straight.

"Anita, I am so sorry! I didn't see you and-"

Richard caught off mid-sentence, mouth working soundlessly for a few seconds when he finally got a good look at me. He couldn't seem to help a small eye flick down my body, to see if the rest of the outfit went well with the cleavage.

"Anita you look..." he cleared his throat, ducking his head a little as color rose in a wave up his neck. "Nice. Really nice."

I resisted the urge to reach up and push a lock of honey-brown hair out of his eyes. His hair fell in soft, foaming waves around his shoulders. He looked perpetually boyish, despite the bulging muscle and killer jawline. There was a softer man at his center than he'd ever let me see.

"Thanks," I said.

"Are you going out on a date?" Richard asked.

His voice was tight when he asked the question. It was probably wishful thinking on my part but he seemed very concerned about my answer. I thought about telling him I was just going out dancing with friends. I might have done just that if the barghest hadn't nosed its way around the corner, slinking toward Richard by inches. The spectral dog's smokey tendrils filled the hallway, stalking forward with inevitable purpose.

Richard was going to die. The thought curdled in my gut, making me abruptly nauseous. I didn't want to lose another friend, but I couldn't let him continue to pine after me. If he only had a little time left, I should let him find someone who could give him everything he wanted. I was a shell of a person, a slightly unstable and morally dubious sorceress who could only bring this good man pain. So I lied.

"Yeah. I'm going out with Harry. We're going to a nightclub tonight. Rosia."

Richard's lips thinned. "Is that right? I've heard about him from mutual acquaintances. He doesn't look like the clubbing type to me."

"Maybe I was the one asking."

Richard's mouth twitched, wrestling with the desire to laugh in my face. Even I hadn't bought that one.

"You don't seem like the clubbing type either."

I sighed. "I'm trying something new, alright?"

Richard shrugged and dropped his gaze from the side of my face. I'd mastered the art of not looking directly into someone's eyes. He was a good man. I didn't need to inflict my soul on him.

"Okay," he said. "Have fun, I guess. Just...watch yourself, okay?"

Concern won out over his distaste. He stepped a little closer, extending a hand in my direction, wincing when I skittered back like a frightened dog. The barghest at the end of the hall watched me with patient, unfathomable eyes.

"I'll do that," I said in a small voice.

"Call me if you need a ride home," he insisted. "You have my number."

And no cell phone with which I could call him. I'd fry one at fifty paces even if I wasn't trying, but he didn't know that.

"Sure thing. Goodnight, Richard."

"Goodnight, Anita."

Chapter Text

I had to park several blocks up from the club, and couldn't help uneasy glances around myself as I made my way up the street to Rosia. There was the usual, uneasy tension of being a woman walking alone. It didn't matter that I was armed and equipped with more magical know-how than I'd possessed in a long while. There'd always be the bone-deep fear of being overpowered and hurt.

More than that, I was afraid I was walking into a predator's lair. This was precisely the environment in which Jean-Claude liked to hunt. Last I'd seen, he'd taken to seducing up-and-coming models, each dying in some tragic 'overdose' years after they'd met him. He could take home a young hopeful at the end of the night, stripping away her life with every ruthless thrust.

The thought made me nauseous. For a second, I was sure I'd vomit and ruin the preparation I'd done earlier in the evening. I didn't want the barrage of images that accompanied the bitter thoughts. I hated him for what he'd done to me. Hated that I craved him, even after all he'd put me through. The fear that he'd find me before I could reach the safety of Harry's company was enough to speed my pulse and have me moving faster, skirting passersby with anxious haste. Maybe I should have taken Richard up on the protection he offered months ago. I didn't want to be caught alone. A human science teacher wasn't much of a deterrent, but he'd at least be a witness if I were snatched up by one of Jean-Claude's toadies.

Assuming Richard survived, which was a big if. The barghest was creeping ever closer to him, and I had a sinking feeling I might have something to do with his passing. A responsible friend would distance themselves to decrease the likelihood of a fatal act of chivalry.

I was jarred from my anxious musings when I passed through a bitterly cold spot on the sidewalk. The mere brush of it was enough to make my hair stand on end, squirming with the sudden and eager desire to wrap myself in the cloak of death and let my soul harden into an unbreakable stone. It hurt less.

I stepped through the spot, steps coming to a halt as I rubbernecked to find the source. I saw a tall, slim man in a bowler hat stroll past, barely sparing me a glance. He only paused when he caught me staring. He reached up for his hat, running the brim nervously through his fingers. It looked like a nervous habit. Those could be hard to break, even in death.

"Can you see me, Miss?"

I glanced around, unsure if I should reply in kind. Letting specters know you could see them was generally a bad idea but...

"Yes, I can."

His eyes brightened. "Oh, wonderful. My name is Henry Hatfield. Could you-?"

"Get a message to your loved ones?" I guessed. "Yes, I can, if they're still living. Time passes differently as a spirit. More time may have passed than you believe."

The ghost glanced around as if only now noticing his surroundings. He paled a little and ran the hat more forcefully between his fingers. If he'd been living, I was sure his knuckles would have been white. Now they sort of blurred into translucency.

"Still," he said more quietly. "I'd like to make the attempt."

"I'll give you an address to Mort's house. He'll have the resources to help." A thought struck me and I seized on it before he could slip away. "Could you do me a favor before you go?"

Henry nodded. "Of course, Miss."

"Anita," I corrected. "And I just need you to go down the street. You can see me, and I can see through you if you let me. I want to be sure someone I don't want to see isn't waiting for me at the club's door."

I peered around the corner and pointed toward Rosia. There were figures huddled outside it, but at this distance, I couldn't see more than that. The possibility that Jean-Claude might be waiting for me, ready and willing to kidnap me was too much to abide. I needed to do a little surveillance first.

Henry took my hand when I offered it. We both gasped when living flesh made contact with the ectoplasm that made up his new form. Unless I was paying attention, I'd phase through it, just like everyone else, but unlike your average wizard, I knew how to manipulate souls. This was dancing perilously close to the line. Mort would surely give me a scolding since piggybacking on Henry before he knew who I was seemed unethical. Still, I couldn't go back to a life with Jean-Claude. I'd die first.

I felt Henry when he pulled away from me, leaving a tingle of my magic on his spectral skin as he floated in the direction I'd pointed. He seemed to glide above the sidewalk, never quite touching down. It was odd in a specter of his age. I'd put him at thirty when he died, and his post-death years at close to a hundred. It was a long time to be an uneducated spook.

I forced my eyes to focus, to see. This was the one part of the art I'd been better at than Mother. She was a real threat when it came to capturing and killing ghosts, but she'd never worked with them. She'd never seen the point, considering the dead so far beneath her that their minds and desires didn't factor into the equation. I could touch a dead mind gently, which had its advantages. A ghost couldn't cross a threshold, but it could peer in at windows. Or doors, as the case may be.

I wasn't sure if I was grateful to find Thomas lounging near the doors of Rosia or not. On the one hand, he was still a hungry White Court vampire. On the other, it wasn't Jean-Claude. What was more, Harry was with him and they were talking in low voices. I had to strain Henry's ears to catch what was being said.

"It's not personal man. Just keep your distance, okay?"

Thomas' mouth twisted into a bitter little smile. "Of course it's personal. It's very personal to her. She was attacked. I could see it all over her soul. The wounds go so deep. It doesn't matter if I keep my distance or not. She's going to be uncomfortable with me anywhere in the same state."

Perceptive vampire. It made me like him just an iota more. I didn't like that he'd seen what Jean-Claude had done to me, but it couldn't be helped. The soulgaze had happened. I had to live with the consequences.

"Sorry."

Thomas shook his head. "Not your fault. Not hers, either."

Harry heaved a sigh, sinking a little further down the wall, arms crossed. He looked almost petulant, as though he'd been hoping I'd be just thrilled to see his incubus friend.

"Do you happen to know anyone by the name of Jean-Claude?"

A soft snarl escaped Thomas' throat. I cringed away from it on reflex, used to the violence that usually accompanied the sound. It didn't matter that he was still a block away. I could feel the rage and didn't want it directed at me.

"That prancing peacock? That's the one who attacked her?"

"Who is he?"

"A performer for Silverlight Studios. Father called some of the extended family from Europe to Chicago to perform."

"In a porno?"

"What else does Silverlight make?"

"Point." Harry tapped his lips. "Want me to go on set and drop a light on him or something?"

The visual that came with those words was simply delightful. I didn't want Jean-Claude to have a pitched battle to the end. I wanted Harry to humiliate him. A Looney Tunes death was about all the dignity he deserved.

Thomas allowed himself a brief smile. "Nah. I'll contact Lara. Tell her to keep an eye on him and alert me if he moves in on her."

"And why would she do that? Aren't you persona non grata at the moment?"

"I am, but I still have blackmail material on her. I'll just tell her you're insane enough to blow her secret wide open because you're chasing a damsel in distress. That Jean-Claude hurting Anita is a hard line for you. She'll believe that."

The term 'damsel' rankled, but in this case, I couldn't deny that it applied. The idea that Harry might also hold enough sway to shoo Jean-Claude away from me was also intriguing. It was comforting enough to let me relax back into my absurd shoes and start moving again.

I sent a vision to Henry as I disengaged from his mind. I showed him the way to Mort's house, and to tell him I'd sent him. He disappeared moments later with a cheerful wave back in my direction. He'd been a sweet man, from what I could tell. I hoped he managed to pass to the other side peacefully.

Both men's heads snapped up when I approached, but only Harry kept his gaze on me for long. Thomas averted his eyes, and I was grateful. I couldn't have looked into those silver eyes for long without panicking.

"Ready?" I asked.

Harry offered me his arm in a courtly gesture that didn't belong to the club we were visiting. "Yep. Let's boogie."

Chapter Text

Despite all my misgivings, even I could admit that Rosia was beautiful.

No, scratch that. The interior of the place was simply stunning. The club's lighting was recessed but somehow managed to convey a sense of dappled moonlight on the dance floor. The shifting neon lights I was accustomed to weren't in attendance. The silvers and shining white somehow managed to accentuate each dancer, rather than wash them out. I watched a nearby dancer, a fit young man, move with abandon and couldn't help but watch. I didn't pick up anything inherently magical wafting off him. No coercive magic that made him look incredible.

Was I just that hard up? Possibly. It had been decades and this new body had younger drives than I was used to. Not to mention how much baggage I had to kick aside to even consider sex with a man. That I'd found two I liked within months of each other was nothing short of a miracle.

When I glanced up I found Harry and Thomas scanning the room, each taking a side as though they'd planned it. That type of synchronization usually only came from a deep feeding. Did Thomas like men more than I'd originally assumed?

"You getting anything?" Harry asked.

"An eyeful," I said, skirting the dance floor. The room was done in shades of silver and gold. Delicate traceries of the stuff were splashed onto the walls or wrought in iron on the balconies. The art was vaguely suggestive of trees, giving the room a feeling of enclosure, though the place was otherwise huge. "I'd say potion, but I'm not picking up anything overt."

"We should probably hit the bar then," Thomas said. "Seems wise to avoid the dance floor unless something happens."

I eyed him surreptitiously. "Don't even think about buying me a drink."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Thomas said without a trace of charm. His voice was too pretty to sound entirely flat, but his tone was close.

"Am I allowed to buy you a drink?" Harry asked hands shoved into his duster's pockets.

I allowed myself the brief fantasy of stepping inside his coat and drawing the leather closed around us both. He'd be so warm. So close. So tempting.

"When we're not on the clock, maybe," I said.

Harry's hand lifted tentatively, brushing my wrist. The barest of contact felt like fireworks against my skin. Our eyes met for a dangerous second, but I yanked my gaze away before he could look at my soul. It could only hurt him.

"MacAnally's okay?" he said, taking a deliberate step away.

The air suddenly wooshed back into me, and I felt furious heat rise up the back of my neck. I felt like a teenager again, giddy and flushed with nerves in equal measure.

"Sure," I said, voice less certain than I wanted. Call me paranoid, but I didn't want to arrange a date with Thomas so near. For all I knew, he was my competition.

Harry took the tone for hesitation because he took a full step away, putting distance between us. I almost yanked him back. I wasn't letting him out of my sight until this mission was over.

"As sweet as your inept flirting is, Harry, don't we have a job to do?"

Harry turned a scowl on Thomas. "I don't criticize your game."

Thomas smirked. "Because my technique is flawless."

"Asshole."

"Oh please, you can do better than that."

"Sure, but there are ladies present."

Thomas' eyes met mine for just an instant. I looked away quickly. I didn't want to be suckered by the swirling silver at their center.

"Ah, of course."

The exchange was lighthearted and a little too...couple-y than I liked. I gave them both a look.

"Are you two...erm...together?"

Harry's face showed horrified comprehension a moment later. "Oh God no. It's not like that. Thomas is a friend."

Thomas' smirk turned a shade more wicked and he said in a stage whisper, "He doesn't like labeling things."

Harry gave the vampire a shove and a furious scowl. "Do you have to insinuate that I'm gay every five seconds? You can sense appetite, you know I'm straight."

"Ragingly heterosexual and as repressed as a Victorian. For the love of God man, get laid."

"That's not...I'm not...oh fuck you," Harry said, trailing off into a furious mutter by the end.

"Eloquent. I'm sure Miss Blake will throw herself on you know. Gotta love a man with a vocabulary."

"Indubitably," I said dryly. "Can we focus, please? Curses to break. Bad guys to stop. You can flirt on your own time."

Harry's face turned an interesting shade of pink. "Oh for the love of...Let's go."

"I'll buy you a drink," Thomas said.

Harry punched him in the bicep and waded into the crowd with another muttered tirade.

"Do you have to tease him?" I asked.

He nodded. "It's my job."

"Because he's your boy toy?"

Some of the wicked amusement dimmed. "No. Because he's important. Keep that in mind before you hurt him."

I glowered up at him. "I'm not going to hurt him. Not on purpose. I'm not even sure I can pursue anything. I have protection now but if I lose it..."

I trailed off, unable to stop a shudder from clawing its way up my spine. I never wanted to face Jean-Claude without that layer of protection. I'd die first.

"Ah," Thomas said, tone gentler than before. "I get it now. Why you're so twitchy around him. You don't trust him."

"I do. Mostly. But not with this. It's not something I can play around with. It's like juggling explosives. There's so much that could go wrong."

He shrugged. "But something could theoretically go right. Try to look on the bright side. He's not exactly a casual person. He'll get his head out of his ass eventually. It's probably good that you're guarded. It's going to take months for him to realize you're even interested. The poor bastard is blind sometimes."

"I'll...keep that in mind."

He nodded and then followed Harry's retreating back through the crowd. I watched him go.

Good advice from a vampire. Would wonders never cease?

Chapter Text

"So, Harry," I said, lifting the rim of my appletini to my lips. I made the barest motion toward swallowing before I set the glass back down, deciding against it. I wasn't really in the mood to lower my inhibitions with a vampire of the white court so near.

"Yeah?"

"Did Thomas style you tonight? Because no offense, I don't believe this outfit existed in your closet."

The crisp dress shirt and sports jacket looked good on him, but it was hardly the kind of thing I could picture him selecting for himself in a department store. As I watched, color crept up his neck in a wave. It didn't quite spill into his cheeks, but it was a near thing.

"I could have bought it," he hedged.

I couldn't help it, I laughed at him. "Harry, you wouldn't know the word suave if it grew fangs and bit you on the ass."

Harry spluttered, searching for something, anything to say to that. Thomas smirked into the rim of his cocktail glass.

"The coat and shirt are mine. He's too damn tall to wear my slacks, so we went shopping. I think that he's still pouting. The saleswomen made the same assumption you did."

"I'm not gay," Harry said, almost desperately now. "I like girls. I like soft skin and boobs."

"I believe you, Harry," I said sweetly.

Harry looked ready to take a swig of his beer, then seemed to think better of it. He set the bottle down gingerly, some of the keyed-up energy washing out of him as he examined the coaster.

"Don't drink anything," he said after a moment. "If there's a dancing contagion going around, the booze is one of the best ways to spread it. Everyone here is sloshed or well on their way. If we keep an eye on who orders what, we might be able to find the spiked batch when someone starts dancing strangely."

Thomas grimaced and set his cocktail glass down with a muttered swear. "Monsters. Always interfering with a good time."

I wanted to snap back that he'd know that better than anyone. I kept my mouth shut. For Harry's sake, not because the silver of his eyes made me want to weep.

"They're inconvenient like that," I agreed, voice only a little tight. I managed not to look in his direction. Bully for me.

Harry caught the reflexive twitch in Thomas' direction, though. His eyes flashed up to meet mine for a dangerous second. I got a good look at the drowning dark, so different from Thomas' keen, cutting silver. I'd never thought the darkness could be warm, but at that moment, I wanted to wrap him around me and beg him to keep me from the predator lurking nearby. It was selfish in the extreme to throw him between our bodies, but I was tempted anyway.

Harry broke first, dropping his eyes before he could sucker me into a soulgaze. On the one hand, that was probably a smart move. I wasn't sure what Thomas had seen or relayed to Harry about the state of my soul, but I knew things were lurking in the dark corners of my soul. Things that a wizard like Harry Dresden might be able to make sense of.

On the other hand, I couldn't help but feel cheated. It was the longest look we'd ever shared, and there had been something crackling between us before the abrupt cessation of eye contact. I wanted to label it judgment. Harry knew how I felt about his so-called friend. Maybe he'd been about to scold me. But somehow, I doubted it.

"Sorry about this," Harry said, and he sounded sincere. "All of it. If I'd known..."

If he'd known, he would have left me behind and gotten eaten. I had many regrets in my life, and defending Harry Dresden might end up being one of the worst. It would be smarter to skip town. But if I'd done the smart thing and scampered, I wouldn't have the life I have now. Uncertain and frustrating as this new life could be, I...liked Dresden. A lot. There was undeniably something between us, but damned if I could tell exactly what it was at the moment.

"Be sorry later," I advised in a softer tone than I'd used before. "Apologies can be passed around once we catch the freak behind this. How do we proceed if we're not dancing or drinking?"

Harry clutched the base of his beer with a little more force than necessary. He turned it on its coaster a couple of times before scrunching his nose in distaste.

"Looks like we're going to have to socialize."

I shuddered. The real bane of the private investigator's existence. We were used to being solitary creatures. The sort of people who enjoy a night out in a place like this were foreign to me. It was difficult to get answers when you barely spoke the other person's language.

Thankfully, we had a translator handy.

Thomas shot us both an amused glance over his shoulder before beckoning us to follow. He was leading to the dance floor and its ring of onlookers.

"Come along, children," he drawled. "Let me show you how it's done."

Chapter Text

Thomas cut through the eligible bachelorettes like a hot knife through butter. It might have been funny if it weren't so damn disturbing. I felt like a horrified voyeur, watching helplessly as a predator slunk through the crowd. Not a single one of them saw the monster behind the mask. They gathered close around his silver light, heedless of the teeth waiting beyond the lure.

I wanted to look away. Wanted so badly to run that my stomach ached. I wanted to watch Harry ineptly trying to flirt with the bartender, Sanda. I kept my eyes on Raith, ready to storm in if he snagged a woman he liked from the crowd. I wasn't above playing a girlfriend scorned if he decided to indulge his Hunger. A bit of embarrassing theater was worth saving a life.

He was all smiles and smoldering eyes. A smokescreen that few would see through. If I hadn't been immersed in Court politics for years, I might have bought the act. After my time with Jean-Claude, I had a knack for reading the pale, perfect planes of a devil's face.

This one looked...strained. Thomas kept a careful distance, even as women crowded close. He couldn't keep their hands off him for long, but he disengaged when decency allowed. It was so fucking odd that I couldn't help but stare.

He caught me at it, and his eyes bled to pure, reflective silver. Desire, sudden and painful, ripped at my guts until I gasped. I staggered, hands flying out to brace against the wall. The edge of one metal leaf bit into my palm as I steadied myself. The pain was cleansing enough to clear my head of the burst of sudden, ecstatic lust he'd foisted onto me.

I don't know when I decided to move toward him. It was almost a shock to find myself storming through the crowd. Blind rage propelled me up onto the balls of my feet so we could stand nose-to-nose. It took real restraint to simply seize him by the wrist. I wanted to leave the blackened imprint of my hand on his cheek. I dragged him down so that the silk of his hair formed a curtain around me.

"Get your demon the fuck off me," I hissed.

Thomas wrenched away so violently that it hurt. He held his wrist close, easing the fabric over a ring of overlapping burns in the shape of my fingers. I felt a moment of sick satisfaction when the cloth rasped over the damaged skin. His face blanched with pain, and his voice came out with an edge of rasp.

"Sorry. I didn't...I..." He blew out a breath. "I'm sorry."

"Bullshit."

Thomas' gaze flicked up sharply enough to cut. It was my turn to release a startled exhale. His eyes were a silver so pale I could see my reflection. I looked wan. Tired. Scared. Like prey.

"I am," Thomas said. His voice sounded like a velvet snarl. Even enraged, the White Court couldn't be anything but seductive. "I'm sorry that I'm Hungry. I'm sorry you smell life food. I'm fucking sorry that I'm a reminder of the worst fucking day of your life, but we're supposed to be on the same team, remember?"

I stood there for a minute, breathing hard. My arms ached with the need to wade into him with looping punches, staining that pale skin plum. I forced myself back down into my ridiculous heels and took a step back, breathing hard.

"Team members don't eat other team members," I said, voice a terse undertone.

"I'm sorry," he said, and his voice had lowered a little. There was no anger now just weary resignation. "You're right."

The easy acquiescence threw me off guard. I distrusted it instantly.

"You're a damn liar."

Thomas' lips twisted into a rueful smile. "Usually. Not about this, though. Not my business to come between you and Harry."

"There's not a me and Harry," I snapped.

"And there never will be if one of you doesn't make a move. Honestly, it's sad watching you two dolts trying to muddle through it."

"You're right. It's not your business."

Thomas sighed. "Just trying to help. Not my fault you two are blind."

I might have said something cutting then, but I was distracted when there was a cry from the dance floor. I clutched the purse with its hidden gun a little tighter and turned toward the sound.

"Trouble?" Thomas checked.

"Trouble," I said with a sigh. "C'mon. Let's go."