Peace Talks (The Dresden Files 16)

“Not if,” I said. “When. You can’t keep things like this hidden forever.” She shook her head wordlessly.

“It needs to be done,” I said. “You owe them the truth, at least.”

“I can’t,” she hissed. She opened her eyes and met mine. “It’s Papa. I’ve wanted to tell him, so many times. But he wouldn’t understand. I just … just imagine the look on his face when he knows … and it hurts, Harry.” She closed her eyes and shook her head again. “I can’t face that. I can’t.”

She broke off, and her tears fell in silence.

It hurt to see her suffering.

So I gave her a hug.

She clung to me, hard.

“This is hurting you. And it’s hurting them, too, even if they don’t know it yet.”

“I know,” she said.

I said gently, firmly, “It has to be done.”

“I can’t.”

“You can,” I said. “I’ll be there with you.”

She shuddered and clung to me. “I can’t ask you to do that.”

“You didn’t.”

The shudders eased after a few moments. “You will?”

“What are friends for?”

Her weight leaned harder against me for a moment, in gratitude. “Thank you.”

“Anytime.”

We went back down to the main hall, where I immediately walked across the room to the musicians’ alcove, reached up, and ripped down the swath of cloth covering it with an enormous rasp of tearing silk.

The music stopped instantly, and the entire gathering paused to stare at me with lifted eyebrows. I noted that Yoshimo, surrounded by her fellow Wardens and the Senior Council members, looked up with pained, furious eyes.

Behind the curtain, half a dozen Sidhe sat with musical instruments now silent in their hands and stared at me with their large jewel-like eyes. The ruling class of Faerie, the Sidhe were slim, beautiful, ancient, and deadly. The tallest among them was a male prettier than nine out of ten women on magazine covers, and he had silver-white hair and amber eyes. He carried a violin in one hand.

Without a word, I called upon Winter for strength and kicked him in the chest before he could rise fully to his feet.

The Sidhe crashed backward through the rest of the chamber orchestra, knocking over chairs and smashing instruments, and hit the stone wall with a crunch of broken bones. He staggered off the wall and fell to the ground, trying to scream in pain and unable to find enough breath to get it done.

I turned to Molly, hooked a thumb over my shoulder, and said, “That guy? He seemed the most douche-like.”

Molly blinked once and nodded.

I nodded back and turned toward the fallen Sidhe. “These people are guests, under guest-right,” I said in a voice meant to carry through the room.

“No harm was done,” spat one of the other Sidhe, a female holding a cello. “It was but a game.”

“Game over,” I said. I raised my right hand, called upon Winter again, and thundered, “Infriga!”

In an instant, the air screamed in protest as near-absolute-zero cold rushed out of my hand and enveloped the fallen fiddler in a block of glacier blue ice. Even the other Winter Sidhe recoiled from the savage bite of the cold and wound up with their hair, ears, and fingertips coated in ice. All of them stared at me, frozen, ba-dump-bump, ching.

None of them moved.

Except the fiddler. His eyes moved, desperate and agonized.

I turned to find Molly approaching in full Winter Lady mode, her steps decisive, her posture regal. I inclined my head to her and said, “My lady, what is your will?”

“This sort of behavior cannot be tolerated,” she said, her voice carrying to the entire room. “Though he is not one of mine, I offer my most sincere regrets to the White Council and to Warden Yoshimo for this incident.” She looked around the room and said, “Baron Marcone has given his permission, as host, for me to deal with this matter. Place this lawbreaker on the buffet table. An ice sculpture is appropriate. Should he survive to thaw, he is banished from Winter lands and holdings upon pain of death.”

She walked up to the block of ice and crouched down to face the fiddler’s wide eyes. She simply stared for a moment, cold and icy, and then said, in a very calm, very hard tone, “It’s not nice to do that to girls at parties.”

She rose and made an imperious gesture with one hand. Evidently, she knew how to convey that she meant business. Half a dozen Einherjaren in their red caterers’ coats immediately moved in, picked up the block of ice, and started carrying it toward the buffet table.

“Excellent,” Molly said. She turned to the room and said, “Please excuse this disruption, honored ladies and gentlemen. I regret its necessity.” She regarded the rest of the musicians, smiled, and said, with a very slight emphasis on the last word, “Please resume your duties.”

And the music, altered considerably, started up again tout de suite.

The Sidhe are predators. One does not show predators weakness or hesitation. It’s the easiest way to communicate with them. Molly had learned all about how to get her message across.

Within a minute, Lara swept up to us and gave Molly a polite bow of her head. Molly returned it.

“Lady Winter,” Lara said, “I need a breath of air outside. I wonder if you would loan me your Knight as an escort for a few minutes. I shall return him directly.”

Molly just stared at Lara, without expression. Then she moved her chin in the barest nod.

“Lovely,” Lara said. She gave me a radiant smile and said, “Shall we?”

I offered her my arm, and the two of us left as the chatter of conversation resumed. Though I was ostensibly escorting her, Lara directed me with firm pressure on my arm, until we were outside the castle and walking down the sidewalk toward the other houses in the neighborhood.

I glanced at her and saw her jaw set with determination, and sharp excitement in her eyes. When we were several hundred feet from the castle, she said, “I did it.”

“Did what?” I asked.

“I created options,” she said. “It was always possible that Etri was holding Thomas because he wanted a ransom, but that apparently is not the case. He wants blood. I wasn’t able to convince Etri to drop the charges against Thomas. But between Cristos and me, we convinced him that holding him prisoner in his own demesne made it appear as though vengeance was more important to him than justice.”

I lifted my eyebrows. “How does that change anything?”

“Baron Marcone, as host of this gathering, offered to hold my brother prisoner until the matter had been settled through an Accorded emissary.” Her eyes flashed. “My brother is being transferred to the castle.”

“Still don’t see how that changes anything,” I said.

“Negotiations begin in earnest tomorrow night,” she said. “Here. Not in svartalf territory.”

I took a slow breath. “Oh no. Tell me you’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking.”

“My brother will be here, in a building I know, and everyone will be preoccupied,” she said. “And I won’t be violating svartalf borders. I can work something out with Marcone after. He’s reasonable about business.”