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Chapter Forty-seven

Morgan&039;s trial was held the next day, but since Scotland was six hours ahead of Chicago, I wound up getting about three hours&039; worth of sleep sitting up in a chair My head and face hurt too ot back to the apartone

I had been pretty sure she would be

I got up the nextand took stock of e was renade I was lucky If I&039;d have been standing where Lara had been when Binder&039;s grenade went off, the overpressure would probably have killed me I was also lucky that we&039;d been outdoors, where there was nothing to contain and focus the blast I didn&039;t feel lucky, but I was

It could have been a frag out a lethal cloud of shrapnel-though at least my duster would probably have offered ainst the blast wave of an explosion, it didn&039;t do jack Having gained so like respect for Binder&039;s knohen it ca exactly that when he picked his gear for the evening

I couldn&039;t shoithout getting es, I took a birdbath in the sink I wore a button-up shirt, since I would probably corabbed my formal black Council robe with its blue stole and my Warden&039;s cape I did h only about a third of it was showing And I shaved

"Wow," Molly said as I e this pretty seriously" She was sitting in a chair near the fireplace, running her fingers lightly down Mister&039;s spine She was one of the few people he deemed worthy to properly appreciate him in a tactile sense Molly wore her brown apprentice&039;s robe, and if her hair was bright blue, at least she had it pulled back in a no-nonsense style She never wore a lot ofnone at all She had made the very wise realization that the less attention she attracted from the Council, the better off she would be

"Yup Cab here yet?"

She shook her head and rose, displacing Mister He accepted the situation, despite the indignity "Coo before we head out"

The big dog happily followed her out the door

I got on the phone and called Thomas&039;s apartment There was no answer

I tried Lara&039;s nu "Ms Raith&039;s phone"

"This is Harry Dresden," I said

"Hello, Mr Dresden," Justine replied, her tone businesslike and formal She wasn&039;t alone "How may I help you today?"

Now that the furor of the manhunt had blown over, my phone was probably safe to talk on But only probably I e to inquire after the condition of Thomas"

"He&039;s here," Justine said "He&039;s resting comfortably, now"

I&039;d seen what terrible shape Tho comfortably, it was because he had fed, deeply and intently, with instinctive obsession

In all probability, my brother had killed someone

"I hope he&039;ll recover quickly," I said

"His caretaker-"

That would be Justine

"-is concerned about coinal condition"

I was quiet for a moment "How bad is it?"

The businesslikewith raw anxiety "He&039;s under sedation There was no choice"

My knuckles creaked as they tightened on the earpiece of the phone

I left nothing behind You don&039;t have words for the things I did to hied"

She recovered, shifting back into personal assistant mode "I&039;ll consult Ms Raith," Justine said "It may not be practical for several days"

"I see Could you let me know as soon as possible, please?"

"Of course"

"My number is-"

"We have that information, Mr Dresden I&039;ll be in touch soon"

I thanked her and hung up I bowedhad doneto find the naagloshii and rip hierbil-sized pieces if I had to blow up every cave in New Mexico to do it

Molly appeared in the doorway "Harry? Cab&039;s here"

"Okay," I said "Let&039;s go spoil someone&039;s day"

I tried not to think too hard about the fact that Wile E Coyote, Super Genius, pretty near always took a hideous beating at the hands of his foes, and finished the day by plunging off a two-ht to myself, you&039;ll just have to remember not to repeat Wile E&039;safter he runs off the cliff, rather than looking down at his feet, everything would be fine

They held the trial in Edinburgh

There wasn&039;t much choice in that Given the recent threats to the Senior Council and the unexpected intensity of the attack at Deet The trial was supposed to be held in closed session, according to the traditions of how such things were done, but this one was too big Better than five hundred wizards, a sizable minority of the whole Council, would be there Most of them would be allies of LaFortier and their supporters, ere er to See Justice Done, which is a eance

Molly, Mouse, and I took the Way, just as I had before This time, when I reached the door, there was a double-sized co Scandinavian, all of thelare frouise it as indifference I ignored it I was used to it

We went into the couard stations-they were all fullyRooeneral that the place was called "the Speaking Roo Room" or, in the more coh, rows of stone benches rising in a full circle around a fairly se, rather like the old Greek theaters But before we got to the Speaking Rooe

With difficulty, I got the Wardens on guard to allow me, Mouse, and Molly into the Ostentatiatory while one of them went to Ebenezar&039;s room and asked him if he would see me Molly had never been into the enormous room before, and stared around it with unabashed curiosity

"This place is as only, or do you think they&039;d ?"

"Ancient Mai doesn&039;t weigh much more than a bird," I said "LaFortier&039;s dead, and they haven&039;t replaced hiure there&039;s extra"

She frowned "But is it supposed to be only for thery It&039;s food What do you think?"

"I think I don&039;t want to rier"

The kid has better sense than I do, in someme up to his room at once, and he&039;d already told the man to make sure Molly was fed from the buffet table I tried not to smile, at that Ebenezar was of the opinion that apprentices were always hungry Can&039;t iiven hi roo Ebenezar was an eclectic reader King, Heinlein, and Clancy were piled up on the sa and Nietzsche Multiple variants of the great religious texts of the world were shas of Julius Caesar and D H Lawrence Hundreds of books were handriiven the chance Books were crah the spines were mostly out, it seemed clear to , unless one remembered where it had been most recently placed

Only one shelf looked neat

It was a row of plain leather-bound journals, all obviously of the san, but made with subtly different leathers, and subtly different dyes that had aged independently of one another into different textures and shades The books got older and ht to left The left to dust The right open A pen held the pages down, lanced at the last visible page, where Ebenezar&039;s writing flowed in a strong, blocky style

seeinal purpose I so as fate-or at least a higher power of soe events in our favor despite everything we, in our ignorance, do to thwart it The Merlin has demanded that we put the boy under surveillance at once I think he&039;s a da hie of people, but I&039;ot a solid head on his shoulders, generally And of all the wizards I know, he&039;s a to see take up that particular ain, I trusted Maggie&039;s, too

Ebenezar&039;s voice interrupted"Hoss," he said "How&039;s your head?"

"Full of questions," I replied I closed the journal, and offered him the pen

My old mentor&039;s smile only touched his eyes as he took the pen from me: he&039;d intended me to see what he&039;d written "My journal," he said "Well The last three are The ones before that were from my master"

"Master, huh?"

"Didn&039;t used to be a dirty word, Hoss It uide, protector, professional, expert-as well as the negative things But it&039;s the nature of folks to reood, I suppose" He tapped the three books previous to his own "My s" He tapped the next four "His s, and so on, back to here" He touched the first two books, very gently "Can&039;t hardly read thee"

"Who wrote those two?"

"Merlin," Ebenezar said simply He reached past me to put his own journal back up in place "One of these days, Hoss, I think I&039;ll need you to take care of these for me"

I looked frohts of ods and little fishes

That would be one hell of a read

"Maybe," Ebenezar said, "you&039;d have a thought or two of your own, someday, that you&039;d want to write down"

"Always the optis you here before you head to the trial?"

I passed hiiven h pictures His frown deepened, until he got to the very last picture

He stopped breathing, and I was sure that he understood the irass grow under its lobes

"Stars and stones, Hoss," Ebenezar said quietly "Thought ahead this tiets it right occasionally," I said

He put the papers back in the envelope and gave it back toout?"

"At the trial Right before the end I want hiotten aith it"

Ebenezar snorted "You&039;re going to make Ancient Mai and about five hundred forry"

"Yeah I hardly slept last night, I was so worried about &039;eot a theory about so"

"Oh?"

I told him

Ebenezar&039;s face darkened, sentence by sentence He turned his hands pal, seamed, and callused ork-and they were steady There were scabs on one palht&039;s ertips

"I&039;ll need to take soet a move on"

I nodded "See you there?"

He took his spectacles off and began to polish the lenses carefully with a handkerchief "Aye"

The trial began less than an hour later

I sat on a stone bench that was set over to one side of the stage floor, Molly at my side We were to be witnesses Mouse sat on the floor beside h I was the only one who knew it The seats were all filled That hy the Council met at various locations out in the real world, rather than in Edinburgh all the tih room

Wardens fore, at the doors, and in the aisles that came down between the rows of benches Everyone present earing his or her for black, with stoles of silk and satin in one of the various colors and patterns of tri the Council&039;s members Blue stoles for members, red for those with a century of service, a braided silver cord for acknowledged old-stitched caduceus for master healers, a copper chevron near the collar for those with a doctorate in a scholarly discipline (some of the wizards had so many of them that they had stretched the fabric of the stole), an embroidered white Seal of Solomon for master exorcists and so on

I had a plain blue stole with no orna with the idea of e "GED" on it in red, white, and blue thread Molly was the only one in the roo our gazes

The White Council loved its ceremonies Anastasia Luccio appeared in the doorway in her full regalia, plus the grey cloak of the Wardens Her ar, but she carried the ceremonial staff of office of the Captain of the Wardens in one hand She entered the roo buzz of the crowd fell silent She slammed the end of the staff three times upon the floor, and the six members of the Senior Council entered in their dark robes and purple stoles, led by the Merlin They proceeded to the center rear of the stage and stood sole desk, and sat down on the far end of the bench fro

I put in-because that&039;s all this was A show

Two an was brought in and stood as all accused brought before the Council did-with his hands bound in front of him and a black hood over his head He wasn&039;t in any shape to be walking, the idiot, but he wasphysically supported by either Warden He e it

The Merlin, speaking in Latin, said, "We have convened today on a an, who stands accused of the premeditated murder of Senior Council Member Aleron LaFortier, conspiracy with the eneainst the White Council We will begin with a review of the evidence"

They stacked things up against Morgan for a while, laying out all the da there with the murder weapon in his hand, over the still-warhtly less than sixin it The fact that he had escaped detention and badly wounded three Wardens in the process, and subsequently co other wizards-Molly and I were just barelyhian," the Merlin said, "have you anything to say in your defense?"

That part was sort of unusual The accused were very rarely given

It clouded issues so

"I do not contest the charges," Morgan said firh his black hood "I, and I alone, am responsible for LaFortier&039;s death"

The Merlin looked like he&039;d just found out that soe at breakfast thatHe nodded once "If there is no other evidence, then the Senior Council will now pass-"

I stood up

The Merlin broke off and blinked at me The room fell into a dead silence, except for the scratch of Peabody&039;s pen He paused to turn to a new page and pulled a second inkwell out of his pocket, placing it on the writing desk

Anastasia stared atWhat the hell was I doing?

I winked at her, then walked out into the center of the stage and turned to face the Senior Council

"Warden Dresden," Ebenezar said, "have you some new evidence to present for the Senior Council&039;s consideration?"

"I do," I said