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When Father Vincent answered my knock, I kicked the door into his face as hard as I could He fell back with a grunt of surprise I caer in my hands, and jabbed the broad end of the bat into Vincent&039;s throat

The old priestsound and clutched at his neck on the way to the floor

I didn&039;t let it stop there I kicked hiet away froun, and shoved it against his skull

"Dio," Vincent whi "Dio, wait! Please, don&039;t hurt me!"

"I don&039;t have time to play pretend," I said "Drop the act"

"Please, Mister Dresden, I don&039;t knohat you , and I saw droplets of scarlet dripping onto the carpet I&039;d bloodied his nose, or maybe his lip He turned his head a tiny bit, eyes ith panic "Please, don&039;t do anything to me I don&039;t knohat you want, but I&039;m sure that we can talk about it"

I drew back the hammer on the revolver and said, "I&039;m sure that we can&039;t"

His face hite "No, wait!"

"I&039; pretend Three"

"But I don&039;t know-" He choked, and I heard hi not to retch "You have to tellto elaborate about the other number"

"You can&039;t! You can&039;t!"

"One," I said, and pulled the trigger

In the instant between the word and the deed, Vincent changed A sheath of green scales appeared over his skin, and his legs twined together into a serpent&039;s long and sinuous body The eyes went last, changing to vertically slit yellow orbs while a second set of glowing green eyes opened above the first

The trigger came down on an empty chamber Click

The snake twisted to biteout of the way Michael cariht The snakeman whirled to face Michael with a hiss Michael tried for a clean horizontal cut, but the snakeleareen scales

When the snaketh of two-by-six down on its head The blow drove the snakeround It twitched a couple of tiht," Michael noted He slipped the sword away into its sheath

"Better get him back inside before sorabbed the snakeman&039;s tail, and hauled him back into the hotel room

Sanya looked in, nodded, and set the end of the length of heavy board doith a certain a with one ar Russian said "Let me put this back in the truck, and I will join you"

A few minutes later, the snakeman woke up in the corner of the hotel rooue flickered out and in a few times, and his two sets of eyes darted around the room

"What did I e helping of S sounds

"A tattoo," I said "Father Vincent had a tattoo on the inside of his right arm"

"There was no tattoo," the snakeman insisted

"Maybe it was covered with all the blood You made a stupid mistake It&039;s understandable Most cri uphill fro its scales restlessly, a cobralike hood flaring around its neck and shoulders

Michael drew Amoracchius Sanya did the saht over the snake back from them "What do you want?"

"To talk," I said "See, the way it works is that I ask you questions You answer the as you do we&039;ll all be happy"

"And if I don&039;t?" the snakeet a new pair of boots"

The snake&039;s scales and coils twined around on one another, rasping Its eyes rehts "Ask"

"Here&039;s what I figure happened So hired to find and take the Shroud You thought you&039;d just nip it froht Gaston LaRouche, but he didn&039;t have the Shroud So you tortured hi"

"And after he told us everything," the snake his little bitch"

"I think it&039;s sweet to see a father and daughter doing things together So you found out what LaRouche knew, killed him, and left his body where it would be found, pointed at where the Shroud was going You figured you&039;d let thethem for you, and take the Shroud when they did"

"Drudge work Unworthy of us"

"You&039;re gonna hurt s, snakeboy You found out who the Church was sending over Then you grabbed poor Father Vincent at the airport You took his place"

"Any infant could reason as much," the Denarian hissed

I pulled up a chair and sat "Here&039;s where it gets interesting Because you decided to hire me on Why?"

"Why do you think?"

"To keep tabs on the Knights," I said "Or to distract the theht I could really turn up the Shroud for you Probably all three No sense doing things for one reason when you can fit in a few ulterior ave me a sample of the Shroud to make it more likely I&039;d find it" I leaned back in the chair "That&039;s where I started seeing so for me, and he blinked"

"I don&039;t knohat you are talking about," the snakeman said

"Marcone was the buyer"

A cold laugh slithered out of the snake ured out that Father Vincent had been replaced, and he sent an assassin to kill you The new guy wasn&039;t shooting at me outside of Fowler&039;s studio He was after you"

"Is Marcone wasn&039;t born yesterday"

"I am sure you have pleased yourself with your cleverness, wizard"

"It gets better," I said brightly "See, Nicodemus didn&039;t let much drop, other than that he was on a deadline and he needed soh She asked if he didn&039;t want a silver bowl That&039;s a cere, I&039;d say it was meant to be used to catch lifeblood Fuel a ritual"

The snakeman&039;s tail lashed around restlessly

"I think Father Vincent was a warm-up A test for the ritual I think he came over here with two samples from the Shroud, and you used one of theue curse that killed him Once you kneould work, you went after the Shroud itself"

"You know nothing, wizard," said the snakeil on his forehead throbbed in time with the extra set of eyes "You are pathetic"

"You&039;re hurting et the baseball bat," I said "Nicode down the building you&039;d been in I suppose he sent you to cover everything up nice and neat with the cops and within ht So why not make this a comparatively pleasant discussion and tell htenmen more powerful than you before this pathetic nation was born"

"Where is Nicodeive you a hint It&039;s got soue curse"

"I have served Nicodemus since-"

"Since et it," I said "But letout to you Nicodemus isn&039;t here" I held my palentlery"

Sanya stared at the Denarian, the saber in his hand swishing back and forth a little He growled It was enough to e away fro to find Nicode to shut dohatever he&039;s got in et Shiro back And you&039;re going to tell us e need to know"

"Or?"

Michael said, in a very quiet voice, "I end you"

The snake time Then he started to rasp and shake It tookat hter It didn&039;t sit well on a serpentine body

"You cannot threatenyou can do to me"

"I see a couple of holy swords here that make me think otherwise"

"No," the Denarian said He reached up to his forehead and clawed at the sigil there, as if trying to peel off his own skin The sy with the second set of eyes The whole of hi away For a second, the features of Father Vincent eed from beneath the scales Then they too faded away, replaced by a man&039;s pinched and hardened features He was dark of skin,Five feet and a little change, and not o

The htly tarnished silver coin roll across the floor to Michael&039;s feet "My na been slave to the will of the delittered withyou for mercy and the chance tothe lance at Michael

The big man frowned at snakeboy Cassius, but didn&039;tout a white handkerchief e the coin up in it Michael and Sanya exchanged a long look, and then both of theuys What the hell are you doing? Dangerous demon murderer here, remember?"

"Harry," Michael said "We can&039;t Not if he&039;s surrendered the coin and asked mercy"

"What?" I demanded "That&039;s stupid"

"Of course it is," Cassius said Glee danced in his voice "They know that I am not sincere They knoill turn on them at the first opportunity That I will obtain one of the other coins and return to what I have done for centuries"

I stood up, angry enough that the chair fell over "Michael, if you turn the other cheek on this bastard he&039;ll tear it off your face You&039;re supposed to be the freaking Fist of God"

"No, I&039;hts is not to destroy those who serve evil"

"Indeed not," Cassius said Somehow, there was more of a hiss in his voice now than when he&039;d been a snake "They&039;re here to save us"

"To save the?"

Michael shook his head "No one else can face the Denarians, Harry No one else can challenge the Fallen This ht be the only chance Cassius has to turn aside froe his path"

"Great I&039;e it to a direct line to the bottoan"

Michael&039;s expression was pained "The Knights are here to protect freedoive those who are under the oppression of dark forces the chance to win free of thement on this man&039;s soul, Harry Dresden Not for you Not for anyone All I can do is re Give him the chance to see hope for his future To show hi should show another The rest is out of my hands"

I watched Cassius&039;s face while Michael spoke His expression changed It became harder More brittle And bitter What Michael said had touched him I didn&039;t believe for a second that it had touched Cassius enough to change his h to drive him toward fury

I turned to Michael and said, "Do you really think that thing is going to start sipping of the milk of human kindness?"