Ghost Story (The Dresden Files 13)

streets. After a lifetime walking them—and surviving—Nick was an expert. Chicago PD’s gang unit sometimes went to him for advice. Sometimes he even gave it to them.

But any expert could be wrong. If the Grey Ghost was wily enough to have a hideout separate from its material mooks’ living quarters and had stashed Mort there, I was about to waste a whole lot of time. But how would it get a setup of its own without physical help to establish it? If it was strong enough, I supposed, it could have a demesne of its own in the Nevernever—the spirit world. I’d dealt with a ghost named Agatha Hagglethorn once, and she’d had her own little pocket dimension filled with a Victorian-era copy of Chicago.

(It burned down.)

(I was not responsible.)

Anyway, I had to wonder if the Grey Ghost didn’t have a similar resource. It would make one fine hidey-hole to avoid annoying things like sunrise, daylight, and recently deceased wizards.

I paused for a moment to consider a notion. I wondered if I could establish a demesne of my own. I mean, theoretically, I knew how it would work. Granted, there’s as much space between theory and practice in magic as there is in physics, but it isn’t an unbridgeable gap. I was reasonably sure that it could be done. Maybe I could get Butters to let me talk shop with Bob for a few minutes. He’d know what I needed to make it happen, I was sure.

But what would I make it look like? I mean . . . in theory, I could make it practically anything I wanted. I’m sure there would be some kind of energy-to-area requirement that would limit it in absolute terms, but if I wanted, I could make it look like the Taj Mahal or the old Aladdin’s arcade where I used to play video games, back before my magic made it all but impossible. I could have a mansion. I could probably make some kind of simulacrum of a butler, if I wanted.

I sighed. Bob would, I was certain, suggest simulacrum French maids tottering around in stiletto heels as his first and most conservative contribution. It would only get more depraved from there.

In the end, there was really only one of a couple of things my demesne could possibly be: a Burger King restaurant or my old apartment. The one that had burned with the rest of my life.

Suddenly, there was no appeal in considering my own demesne anymore.

“Stop wasting time,” I told myself.

I shook off the thoughts and continued my stalk of the Big Hoods’ clubhouse, sniffing around for possible magical defenses; alarm spells seemed most likely, but I had to assume that a ghostly sorcerer could create as much destructive mayhem as a mortal one. I could run into anything from ill-tempered guardian entities to a magical equivalent of claymore antipersonnel mines.

Hell, I’d seen a vampire’s nest that used actual AP mines. Nasty toys. I would be keeping an eye out for any physical defenses as well, in the event I needed to warn Murphy or her crew about them when I showed up for the actual rescue operation.

“For the op,” I corrected myself. “Sounds cooler if you call it the op.” I moved closer, veil in place, senses tuned to the possibility of danger. “Definitely. Murphy would call it the op.”

The entrance to the hideout was just where Nick had said it would be, beneath an overpass where a steel door had once led to an old cityworks storage area. I found no suspect magic in the immediate area around the bridge, which made sense. If I had been spreading detection spells around my own hideout, I wouldn’t have gone to the trouble to set them up where the sunrise would obliterate them every morning.

To make something that lasted longer than a day or two at most, considerable effort was required. At the very least, you’d have to use some kind of physical object to harbor the spell’s energy. Technically, you could use any object, though it was not unheard-of for wizards to utilize whatever they happened to have in their pockets at the time. It’s probably where all the old stories of enchanted spindles, combs, brushes, and mirrors come from.

Most often, the magical energy was channeled into carvings or painted symbols. I’d once set up a rental storage unit as a short-term haven in case things ever went to hell. I’d laid up about a hundred small protective spells on