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Chapter Twenty-seven

I went to my office Traffic wasn&039;t as bad as it could have been It looked like the commuters hadn&039;t poured into town in the usual voluhts were out, but there were cops at most of the proble slowly and reasonably during the crisis That&039;s what they were calling it on the radio-the crisis There were a lot more people than usual out and about on the street, and with far less of the usual brisk, businesslike manner

All in all, it was about the best reaction to the situation you could hope for It seeo one of tays: Either they freak out and start rioting, or they actually act like huht to, and look out for one another When LA blacked out, there had been big-tiether

It was just as well that people hadn&039;t reacted quite so blindly as they , I could feel the slow, sour tension of black h the city With the subtle influence of all that dark energy behind it, even a ly, and fast

Of course, it wasn&039;t dark yet Nightfall could change things

As advanced as e-old, prier co We don&039;t like to think that we&039;re afraid of the dark anymore, but if that&039;s true, then why do ork so hard to make sure our cities are constantly lit? We cloak ourselves in so ht

Fear is a funny thing In the right light, even tiny and insignificant fears can suddenly groelling up toaround the way it was, that instinctive fear of the dark would feed upon itself, doubling and redoubling, and with no explanation to tell thehts hadn&039;t coet their carefully rational reasons not to be afraid in favor of panic

Even assu froht could be bad It could be very bad

I got to my office and tried to call Shiela&039;s nu with me, which hardly came as a surprise They rarely worked perfectly on the best of days I kept a copy of a reverse phone book at h, and I found the address of her Cabrini Green apartment While it wasn&039;t as bad as it had been in the past, it wasn&039;t exactly the best part of town, either I had a brief pang of longing for the gun I&039;d lost in the alley behind Bock&039;s place It wasn&039;t that the gun was s I could do to defend myself, but it was a hell of a lotthan a carved stick

Just for fun, I tried the phones again, dialing my contact number for the nearest outpost of the Wardens

So help

"Yes," answered a wohened voice

I fumbled my little notebook of security phrases out of my duster&039;s pocket "One second," I said "I didn&039;t think the call would go through" I flipped the little notebook open to the last page and said, "Uh, chartreuse sirocco"

"Rabbit," answered the voice I checked the notebook It was the countersign

"This is Wizard Dresden," I said "I have a Code Wolf situation here Repeat, Code Wolf"

The woman on the other end of the phone hissed "This is Warden Luccio, wizard"

Holy crap, the boss herself Anastasia Luccio was one of the next in line for a seat on the Senior Council, and was the coh old bird, and she was the field commander of the Council&039;s forces in the ith the Red Court

"Warden Luccio," I said respectfully-both because she probably deserved it and because I needed to get along with her as well as I possibly could

"What is the situation?" she asked

"At least three apprentices to the necroo," I said "They found the fourth book They&039;re going to use it tonight"

There was a stunned silence from the other end of the phone

"Hello?" I said

"Are you sure?" Luccio asked Her voice had a faint Italian accent "How do you knoho they are?"

"All those zoiveaway," I said "I confronted them They identified themselves as Grevane, Cowl, and Capiorcorpus, and they each had a drummer with them"

"Dio," Luccio said "Do you knohere they are?"

"Not yet, but I&039; on it," I said "Can you help?"

"Affiro immediately They will arrive at your apartht not be the best place," I said "I was attacked there last night, and ot torn apart The apartment may be under surveillance"

"Understood Then ill rendezvous at the alternate location"

I checked the notebook I&039;d have to meet them at McAnally&039;s "Gotcha," I said

"Che cosa?" she asked

"Uh, understood, Warden," I said "Six hours, alternate location Don&039;t skimp on the personnel, either These folks are serious"

"I ah her tone was reement than reprimand "I will lead the teaht Six hours"

She hung up the phone

I settled it back onto its cradle, lips pursed in thought Hell&039;s bells, the war captain of the White Council herself was to take the field That ency tantamount to a terrorist with an ar out to battle, itto pull out all the stops

I was going to have a lot of help for a change Help that held ht execute me if they learned some of my secrets, but help nonetheless I felt an odd sense of coest fears practically since I had learned about their existence There was so the object of that fear take a hostile interest in Grevane and coainst the e quite so cool as seeing soo at an eneht occurred to me: Why in hell was the war captain of the White Council answering the freaking phones? Why wasn&039;t a juniorthe receptionist work?

I could think of only a couple or three reasons

None of them were pleasant

My brief flash of relief and confidenceit did, too I&039;m sure the world would come to an end if I were allowed to feel a sense of relief and well-being for any length of time

I shovedThe only one I could count on to ride to ed to do it anyway, it would be a nice surprise, but I had to getIt was the sa a reallyyou have to do You focus on one thing and get it done, then move on to the next

I needed the suet that, I had to talk to Shiela Right, Harry Get a uess I&039;d already won the functional tech lottery: All circuits were busy

I hadn&039;t been sitting down very long, but it was long enough forto make it clear to the rest of my body that it didn&039;t want to be walked on anyseverely "You don&039;t have to be happy about it, but I need you functional"

My leg sat there in sullen silence and throbbed, which I took as assent I reached for my keys, and then heard a soft sound at my office door

I whirledupwith sullen orange light when the door opened

Billy stood in the doorway, his expression frozen in surprise, hisjeans, cowboy boots, and an old leather jacket He hadn&039;t worn his glasses much over the past several years, but he had thehed against in to fall, striking with dull taps on the glass

"Um," he said after a minute "Hi, Harry"

I scowled at hi the power ease out of it The warood under my hand, and the faint scent of wood s suddenly in my office door," I said

"Next ti," Billy replied

"How&039;d you find me?"

"It&039;s your office" He looked around the place "You talking to someone?"

"Not really," I said "What do you need?"

He opened his coat The handle of a gun protruded from his belt- my revolver "Artemis Bock came by my place He said there was souys were trying to rough hiued with them about it"

Billy nodded "That&039;s what he said He found this in the alley outside He said there was blood"

"One of theot it taken care of" Billy nodded, worried "Um He orried about you"

"I&039; "Bock okay?"

"Um," Billy said He looked at me, his expression clearly concerned "Yeah Not hurt, I e to the store, which he said he didn&039;t un out of his belt and said, "And I thought you ht need this"

"Shouldn&039;t carry it in your pants like that," I said "Good way to sing soprano"

"It&039;s eun

I took it, flipped the cylinder open, and checked it The gun wasn&039;t loaded I slid it into the pocket of my duster, then opened the drawer of my desk and took a small box of a with the gun "Thanks for bringing that by," I said "Why&039;d you co here?"

"You didn&039;t answer the phone at your place I went by there It looked like someone tried to tear the door off"

"Soht?" There was a little ht on the question than I would have expected

"I&039; iot soo ahead and say it"

He inhaled deeply "Um Well I&039;m sort of afraid to"

I arched a brow at hiain

"Look You aren&039;t acting right, Harry"

"Meaning?" I asked

"Meaning not like yourself," Billy said "People have been noticing"

"People?" I asked My leg pounded I had no tiical patty-cake "What people?"

"People who respect you," he said carefully "Maybe who are even a little bit afraid of you"

I just stared at him

"I don&039;t know if you know this, Harry But you can be a really scary guy I mean, I&039;ve seen what you can do And even the people who haven&039;t seen thelad you&039;re one of the good guys, but if you weren&039;t"

"What?" I said, suddenly feeling more tired "If I wasn&039;t, then what?"

"You&039;d be scary Really scary"

"Get to your damned point," I said quietly

He nodded "You&039;ve been talking to things"

"Excuse s I s when I was outside your door"

"That was nothing," I said

"Okay," Billy said, though his tone suggested that he was placating -to-things crap? Did Bock say I was doing that?"

"Harry- " Billy said

"Because I wasn&039;t," I said "Good God, I do sooing to work but I have to try it&039; variety of crazy I&039;m not insane"

Billy folded his ar If you were truly insane, would you be able to realize it?"

I rubbed at the bridge of ht Because Bock said so to myself, suddenly I&039;m ready for the room with rubber walls"

"No," he said "Sort of Harry, look, it isn&039;t like I&039; to accuse-"

"That&039;s funny, because it sounds like an accusation from this end," I said

"I only- "

I slammed my staff down on the floor, and Billy flinched

He tried to cover it, but I had seen the enuinely afraid that I was going to hurt him

What the hell?

"Billy," I said quietly "There is so on I don&039;t have time for this I don&039;t knohat Bock told you, but he&039;s had a bad couple of days He&039;s rattled I&039;ainst hiht," he said quietly

"I want you to go ho out word around to the in crowd Everyone wants to be behind a threshold tonight"

He frowned and took off his glasses, scrubbing at them with a corner of his shirt "Why?"

"Because the White Council is sending a war party to town You don&039;t want anyone you know to get caught in the backwash"

Billy sed "This is big, then?"

"And I have to getI don&039;t have time for distractions" I stepped forward and put my hand on his shoulder "Hey, it&039;s me Harry I&039;m as sane as I ever am, and I need you to trust me for a little while Tell people to keep their heads down Okay?"

He took a deep breath and then nodded sharply "I&039;ll do it, man"

"Good I don&039;t knohy you&039;re so worried about me But we&039;ll sit down and talk after the dust settles Figure out what&039;s up Make sure I haven&039;t stripped a gear when I wasn&039;t looking I pro "Thank you I&039;h with sharing the eonna turn into women as we stand here Get a move on"

He chucked my arm with a mostly closed fist, and left

I waited for hi down in the elevator with hi on hi

I leaned on ht about it for a second Billy was really worried about ht do so to him What the hell had I done to set that off?

And an even better question, which I had to ask myself, followed on the heels of that first one

What if he was right?

I poked atI didn&039;t feel insane But if you&039;d really lost it, would you have enough left upstairs to know? Crazy people never thought they were crazy

"I&039;ve always talked to things," I said "And to reed with "

"I don&039;t need wiseass remarks," I told myself severely "There&039;s work to do So shut up"

All I could think was that it had been Georgia&039;s idea She was always buried to the ears in her psych textbooks Maybe she had fallen victiical hypochondria or so

Thunder ru down harder

I didn&039;t need any doubts distracting ed off the whole conversation with Billy, tabling it for later I loaded ood as not having it, then slipped it back into my pocket, locked up my office behind et to Shiela and see if her remarkable memory could call up the poeure out how to call up a wild and deadly lord of the darker realms of Faerie and sidetrack him so that the heirs of Keod status And along the way, I had to find The Word of Keet it to Mavra, so what I was up to

Easy as breathing

As I rode down in the elevator, I had to adht have a point

Chapter Twenty-eight

The Cabrini Green tenement Shiela lived in had seen better days-but it had seen worse, too The city had dumped a lot ofprocess Shiela&039;s building was still undergoing renovation, and the lobby and many of the floors were only half-finished No work when I went into the lobby, but there were dozens of tarps, stacks of drywall and raw lumber, heavy tool lockers that had been bolted to the floor, and other evidence of the contractors ould doubtless have been working had the city&039;s lights not been out

I walked over to the elevators and to the security panel there, and found the button of Shiela&039;s apartment on the ninth floor I pressed it and held it down for a minute before I realized that, duh, the poas out and I wasn&039;t going to be able to ring her apartrihts up onto feel nice, but it wasn&039;t as though I had an infinite number of options

The door to the stairs was locked, but it was a standard fire door with a push bar on the other side I lifted my staff, looked around the lobby to estured with the staff and murmured, "Forzare"

I sent a bare whisper of h the door and then drew it back toward ht the push bar on the other side with it, and the door tre open by an inch or two I thrust the end of rabbed on and heaved I stared at the stairs for a second, but they didn&039;t get any shorter or turn into an escalator or anything, so I sighed and started painfully hauling myself up them, one step at a time

Nine floors and 162 steps later, I paused to catch my breath, and then opened the door to the ninth-floor hallway in the same manner I had the one in the lobby The ninth-floor hallas still under construction, and several of the apart until I found Shiela&039;s apartling tension over the door as I touched it-aas the ones on my apartment had been, but it was stable That was fairly iht not have a ton of inborn talent, but she evidently had enough discipline to offset the lack I held htly, just over the surface of the door, sendingth It couldn&039;t have stoppedenough to give me a solid kick in the teeth if I tried it physically It would certainly scare the hell out of a would-be burglar Not bad

After a minute I heard footsteps and the door opened a little I could see a security chain and a slender stripe of her face that included one of Shiela&039;s dark, sparkling eyes She let out a surprised little sound and then said, "Harry Just a minute"

I waited while she shut the door and took off the security chain Then she opened the door again, s atit with one of my own

She was dressed in a scarlet sequined bodice thatvery difficult not to stare at, nearly translucent baggy leggings, leather sandals that wrapped around her calves, and 65 les on her arh ponytail fixed into place to rise over some kind of mesh headdress, and her s