Ghost Story (The Dresden Files 13)

to leave and help Marci get untangled from her dress. Forthill and Abby looked at each other and left the room without a murmur. Molly sat completely still during this, staring down at her folded hands.

“You don’t have clue one, do you?” she asked Murphy quietly. “You don’t have any idea what you’re asking me to go through.”

“If I could do it myself, I would.”

Molly looked up sharply at that. Her smile was unpleasant. Bordering on creepy.

“Easy words,” she said. “Easy words. They leave little trails of slime on your lips when they pass them. But it doesn’t make them go down any more smoothly.”

“Molly . . .” Murphy sighed and sat down and spread her hands. “You won’t let us help you. You won’t talk to us. But this is something I literally cannot ask of anyone else.”

“You always asked him,” Molly said, her tone spiteful.

“There’s a boiler about to burst,” Sir Stuart murmured to me.

“Shut your mouth,” I said quietly, coming automatically to her defense. But he was right. The kid was teetering on a cliff as I sat there looking at her.

I stared at Molly and felt absolutely wretched. She was my apprentice. I was supposed to have taught her to survive without me. Granted, I hadn’t planned on taking a bullet in the chest, but then, who does? Or was her condition simply symptomatic of the world she lived in?

Murphy regarded the younger woman for a long moment and then nodded. “Yes. I know enough to know when I’m out of my depth. My instincts say Mort isn’t trying to con me, but we’ve got to have more than just my intuition. I need your help. Please.”

Molly shook her head very slowly, shivering. She wiped at her face with her grimy gloves, and clean streaks appeared on her cheeks. “Fine.” She lifted her head, looked at Mort, and said calmly, “If you’re running a con, I will peel the skin off your brain.”

The ectomancer spread his hands. “Look. Dresden’s shade came to me. If it isn’t him, that ain’t my fault. I’m operating in good faith, here.”

“You’re a roach,” Molly said pleasantly. “Runs and hides from any threat, but you survive, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Mort said frankly.

“Maybe I should have been a roach, too,” Molly said. “It would be easier.” She took a slow, deep breath and said, “Where is he?”

Mort pointed a finger at me. I took a few steps until I stood in the mouth of the hallway that led down to Murphy’s bedrooms. I gestured to Sir Stuart to stay back.

“Why?” he asked.

“She’s going to use her Sight. The less she has to look at, the better.”

Sir Stuart shrugged and stayed near Mort. He watched Molly through narrowed eyes, his fingertips on the handle of that monster pistol.

Molly grabbed her cane and rose to her feet, leaning on it, taking the weight off the leg that had been shot at Chichén Itzá. She straightened her back and shoulders, turned toward me, took a deep breath, and opened her Sight.

I’d never seen such a thing from this angle before. It was as if a sudden light, burning steady and unwavering, kindled just between and above her eyebrows. As it flooded out of her, I felt it as a tangible sensation on my immaterial flesh. It was blinding. I lifted a hand for a moment to shield my eyes against it before I looked up to meet Molly’s gaze.

Her lips parted. She stared at me and tears blurred her vision. She tried twice to speak before she said, “How do I know it’s you?”

I could answer her. It’s called the Sight, but it embraces the entire spectrum of human perception, and then some. I met her gaze and composed my face. Then I said, in my very best Alec Guinness impersonation, “You will go to the Dagobah system. There you will learn from Yoda, the Jedi Master who instructed me.”

Molly sat down abruptly, missed the couch, and hit the floor instead. “Ohmygod,” she breathed. “Ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod. Harry.”

I knelt to be on eye level with her. “Yeah, kid. It’s me.”

“Are . . . are you really . . . really gone?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I am. I’m sorta new at this, and they aren’t in danger of winning any exposition awards around here.”

She nodded as more tears came, but she didn’t look away. “D-did you come to take me away?” she asked, her voice very small.

“No,” I said quietly. “Molly . . .