Page 5 (1/2)

Chapter Seven

We went back toButters inside and behind the protection of my wards Mouse loomed up fro

"Holy crap," Butters said "You have a pony"

"Heh," I said Mouse sniffed at my hand and then walked over to snuffle around Butters&039;s legs with a certain sole his tail

"Can I pet him?" Butters said

"If you do, he won&039;t leave you alone" I went into s fro on the hearth, poking the fire to life and feeding it fresh wood Mouse sat nearby, watching with patient interest

"What breed is he?" Butters asked

"Half chow and half wooly mammoth A wooly charin

"Wow Some serious teeth there," Butters said "He doesn&039;t bite, does he?"

"Only bad guys," I told hirabbed Mouse&039;s lead and clipped it to his collar "I&039; him back in; then I want you to lock up and stay put"

He hesitated in ?"

"It&039;s safe," I said "I&039;ve gotyou by ical ?"

"Yeah," I said "My spells should counter Grevane&039;s and keep his done"

"You won&039;t be here?" Butters said He didn&039;t sound too steady

"Grevane won&039;t find you," I said

"But what if he does it anyway?"

"He won&039;t"

"Sure, sure, he won&039;t I believe you" Butters sed "But what if he does?"

I tried to give hi smile "There arein Mouse will keep an eye on you, and I&039;ll leave a note for Thoht, just in case"

"Who&039;s Thoed a piece of paper and a pen out of a cabinet in the base of the coffee table and started writing the note

Tho to kill the little guy in the living rooet hiotiate with theet back

Harry

I folded the note and stuck it up on the h I&039;m not sure when he&039;ll be back When he does, tell hiive him the note You should be okay"

Butters exhaled slowly "All right Where are you going?"

"To the bookstore," I said

"Why there?"

"Grevane was reading a copy of a book called Die Lied der Erlking I want to knohy"

Butters stared at me for a second and then said, "In all of that, with threats and guns and zo, you noticed the title of the book he was holding?"

"Yeah Daood"

"What do I do?" he asked

"Get some sleep" I waved a hand atin the kitchen Oh, one : Do not open the door for any reason"

"Why not?"

"Because the spells on it ht kill you"

"Oh," he said "Of course The spells"

"No joking, Butters They&039;re et caught in the backwash Thomas has a talisman that will let him in safely So do I Anyone else will be in for a world of hurt, so stand clear"

He sed "Right Okay What if the dog has to go?"

I sighed "He can&039;t mess the place up any worse than Thomas Come on, Mouse Let&039;s make sure you&039;ll be settled"

Mouse seemed to have a sixth sense about when not to take his tihouse&039;s yard, and ent to our little designated area and back with no delays I got him back inside with Butters, revved up the Beetle, and headed for Bock Ordered Books

Arteo &039;s oldest occult shop, had been a fixture near Lincoln Park for years before I had ever hborhood was a bizarre blend of the worst a large city had to offerside by side with the erudite acadeo It wasn&039;t the kind of place I wanted to walk around after dark, wizard or no, but there wasn&039;t much choice

I parked the Beetle a block down from the shop, across the street fro colors on the s nearest the doors I wasn&039;t too worried that so to steal the Blue Beetle while I was in the shop The car just wasn&039;t sexy enough to warrant stealing But to be on the safe side, I un as I left the car and slipped it into a shoulder holster under my duster I had ht hand as I shut the car door and started down the street with a purpose, my expression set and cold I didn&039;t have a concealed-carry per it along with me On the other hand, this part of toas a favorite spot for some of the nastier denizens of the supernatural community Between them and the very real prospect of your everyday urban cri it I&039;d err on the side of survival, thank you very much

On the short walk to the store, I stepped over a pair of winos and tried to ignore a pale and too-thin wohts, a leather coat, and a bra Her pupils had dilated until her blue eyes looked black, and she was nearly too stoned to walk She probably wasn&039;t old, but life had used her hard She sawto display her wares But she got a closer look at my face and skittered to one side and tried to become invisible I went by her without coht was very cold In a few h that people like the two drunks and the stoned girl would start freezing to death Someone would see a body, and eventually someone would call the police The cops would show up and fill out on the police report that the body had been found and presumed accidentally frozen to death Sometimes it wasn&039;t an accident The weather was a convenient way for a dealer or for the outfit to kill so to knock the, and leave theht to devour Most of those bodies were found within a few blocks of where I alking

Maybe thirty yards short of the shop, I crossed soerous atrees A few steps later I caught , far down the block I felt myself relax a little in response, but that unspoken promise of safety and the rule of laas only an illusion The closer you got to ca other than convention and slightly more frequent police patrols to keep the darker ele the boundaries

Well, there was one et involved with it Mavra&039;s prohibition against involving anyone else meant that even if I wanted extra help, I didn&039;t dare ask for it I was on , I&039;d have to handle it alone

Predators respond to body language I walked like I was on my way to rip someone&039;s face off, until I made it to the shop and entered the store

Arte the door He was a bear of a man in his late fifties, broad-shouldered, unshaven, and heavyset eatheredHe had knuckles the size and texture of golf balls, marked with old scars from whatever career he&039;d pursued before he&039;d beco as a wizard, but he knew his way around Chicago, around basic ical theory, and his shop was protected with half a dozen subtle wards that did a lot to encourage people looking for trouble to look elsewhere

The door chimes tinkled as I came in, and there was a deeper chime from somewhere behind the counter Bock had one arht under it until he peered over his reading glasses at ain, hunched over what looked like an auto azine, and said, "Mister Dresden"

"Bock," I replied with a nod

His eyes flickered over ot the iun under the jacket

"I need to get into the cage," I told hiether "The Wardens were here not a o I run a clean shop You know that"

I lifted esture "This isn&039;t an inspection tour Personal business"

Hehalfway between a sound of acknowledg and snagged a key fro on the wall behind him He flicked it at me I had to let my staff fall into the crook of ht hand to catch the key I doubt it looked graceful, but at least I didn&039;t drop the staff and the key both, which would have been ?" I asked hie without supervision

"What ae in his azine

I nodded and started for the back of the store

"Mister Dresden," Bock said

"Hmm?"

"Word is on the street that there&039;s dark business afoot Will was through here today Said things were getting nervous"

I paused Billy Borden was the leader of a gang of genuine olves who called thehborhood around campus About four years before, the Alphas had learned how to shapeshift into wolves and had declared the ca h that the local underworld of vahouls, and various other nasties found it easier to hunt elsewhere

The o -of people, I hborhoods in town The clump around campus was the smallest, but probably thearound the occult crohen so to seek shelter or keep their heads down It was a survival instinct on behalf of those ere blessed with one foric, but who didn&039;t have enough power to be a credible threat, and one that I heartily encouraged Things were bad enough without so to hat up and take on the bad guys

Of course, that was precisely what Billy Borden had done Billy and co on people on Grevane&039;s level Don&039;t get e dark whatever, especially working together, but they weren&039;t used to dealing with soht class Billy needed to keep his head down, but I couldn&039;t contact him to tell him that Hell, even if I did, he&039;d just stick his jaw out at me and tell et hiain," I told Bock, "let him know that I&039;d appreciate it if he&039;d keep his head down, his eyes open, and to get in touch with &039;s happening," Bock said His eyes nickered over to his calendar

I suddenly became conscious of the eyes of three or four other customers in the store It was late, true, but the occult community doesn&039;t exactly keep standard hours, and Halloas only two days off Scratch that, it was almost one a for some people, but it meant sacred Samhain for others, and there were a number of other beliefs attached to the day in the occult circles There was shopping to be done

"It ht want to be behind a threshold after dark for the next day or two Just to be careful"

Bock&039;s expression told ave him a look that told him to mind his own damned business, and headed for the back of the store

Bock&039;s shop was bigger than you&039;d have expected from the outside It had been a speakeasy back in the day, fronting as a neighborhood grocery The front of the store offered a browsing area for custo from crystals to incense to candles to oils to wands and other syey stuff There were various statues and idols for personal shrines, meditation mats, bits of furniture and other decoration for any alternative religion you&039;d care to naures of Buddha and Ghanesh

Behind the occult area were several rows of bookshelves holding one of the largest selections in town of books on the occult, the paranormal, and the mystical Most of the books were chock-full of philosophy or religion-predominantly Wiccan of one flavor or another, but there were several texts slanted toward Hindu beliefs, drawn frorounded in ancient beliefs in the Norse or Greek gods I steered clear of the whole od, or gods to help you with, but a lot of people felt differently than I did Even soious convictions, and felt that they were bound intricately to their ic

Of course, if they believed it, it was as good as true Magic is closely interwoven with a wizard&039;s confidence Some would say that it is bound up with a wizard&039;s faith, and it wouldYou have to believe in the ic for it to work-not just that it will happen, but that it should happen

That&039;s what ic is essentially a force of creation, of life Grevane&039;s necromancy made autterly profane about usingsemblance of a hu about what it ht be like to work a spell like that And Grevane believed in it

Which really seemed to make him look more and more like soent lunatic I shook et h the bookshelves to a door in the back wall While it wasn&039;t precisely hidden, the door had no frame and was set flush with the wall around it, and was covered with the sa as the wall Once it had opened to allow custoal booze Noas locked I used Bock&039;s key to open it and let myself into the back of the store

The rear area wasn&039;t large-nothing le roo bookshelves set behind a heavy iron grille on the wall opposite The room was full of boxes, shelves, tables, where Bock would keep his spare inventory, if any, and where he handled his lowing on outlets on the walls The office door was partly open, and the light was on I heard the office radio playing quietly on a classic-rock station

I went to the door set in the iron grille and unlocked it, then rolled open the cage door Bock kept all of his valuable texts in the cage He had an original first printing of Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll, autographed, on the highest shelf, carefully sealed in plastic, and several dozen other rare books, so shelves were filled with serious texts on ic theory A lot of them were almost as occluded with opinion and philosophy as their more modern counterparts on the shelves in the front of the store The difference was that most of them ritten by members of the Council at one tiic in its y, the way I&039;d been taught about it One of the notable exceptions was Eleic by Ebenezar McCoy It was the first book most wizards ever handed an apprentice It dealt with the nuts and bolts of y around, and stressed the need for control and responsibility on behalf of the wizard

Though now that I thought about it, Ebenezar hadn&039;t handedme He hadn&039;t even lectured me more than a couple of times He told me what he expected, and then he lived it in front of

I drew out a copy of his book and stared at it for a moment My sto tome, he&039;d been under orders from the Council to execute me if I wasn&039;t perfectly behaved I hadn&039;t been perfect The old h to coe of dirty jobs for the Council That he was their orks , who betrayed the same responsibility he wrote about, talked about, and had apparently lived

He was trying to protect you, Harry, I told ht

He never tried to be your hero, your role e a da