Peace Talks (The Dresden Files 16)

She reached out a hand to touch Corb on the shoulder as she glided past him, showing more of the same metallic flesh. She was graceful despite her stature, her strides long and purposeful. Corb fell in at her side, a pace behind her. Without looking at him, she extended a hand. Corb reached into his robes and withdrew a length of chain maybe ten feet long from them. One end was attached to a steel band around the base of his throat, mostly concealed by his robes. He handed the other end to the Titanic woman.

She took it without breaking stride and strode into the castle, the soldiers falling in behind their leaders as they went in, weapons up.

“Stars and stones,” I breathed.

A hit was going down.

Wars had begun that way.

I was arrested by a hideous, nauseating apprehension that went deep enough for my toes to have a bad feeling about this.

“Harry,” Murphy hissed. “Get in.”

“I can’t,” I decided. “I’ve got to see what’s happening here.” I leaned down to look at Murphy. “Get them to the island.”

“Why?” Murphy demanded. “There’s no point to it if you aren’t there, too.”

“I’ll be along,” I said. “Cross my heart.”

Murphy’s eyes widened. “You’re scared.”

“I need you to trust me on this,” I said. “There’s no time.”

Murph looked like she wanted to argue, but instead she grimaced and put her gun away. “Goddammit.”

“Dresden, this is not the plan,” Lara said in a warning tone.

“No,” I said. “It isn’t. Get going and I’ll meet you once I know what’s happening.”

“If you’re caught—”

“I’ve still got the potion,” I said. “In and out, Miss Law. Like the wind.”

Lara looked from me to her brother, torn. The moment of indecision cost her. Murphy put the car in gear and accelerated smoothly eastbound, away from the castle.

I was left alone in the immediate vicinity of a number of ridiculously powerful supernatural beings and a small mound of bodies that seemed to promise that the night was young.

This showed every sign of working out very, very badly.

I swallowed and then set out to follow the murderous King of the Fomor and what was apparently the Power Behind the Throne into the peace talks.

29

King Corb and company strode into the great hall like they owned the place.

They entered amid the chaos in the wake of my previous departure. Voices were raised in tension, a chatter of sound in the crowded hall, as each nation, seemingly by reflex, withdrew to its originally assigned area.

I checked the hall and made my way toward where Ramirez and the Wardens were standing in front of the Senior Council members. That also put me within a few long steps of the high seat at the rear of the hall, where Mab currently stood with Molly, the Redcap, and four other Sidhe.

Corb and his retinue seemed to enjoy giving everyone time to settle into an uncomfortable silence. Then he strode forward, his chain clanking, and pitched something into the air with a casual underhand toss.

There was a heavy clump as the thing, about the size of my fist, bounced and then rolled.

It came to a halt at the foot of the dais where the high seat stood.

It was a very small severed head. It had been a while since the head had been taken, the skin shrunken tight, patches here and there beginning to fall to decay.

I recognized the features.

It was Gwynn ap Nudd, King of the Tylwyth Teg, one of the larger subnations of Faerie. I’d done business against him once in the past, and he still sent me season tickets to Cubs games once in a while. He’d been responsible for the famous Billy Goat of the Unseelie Accords.

A gasp went through the room.

Mab stared down at the severed head for a solid three seconds. Silence stretched out into an endless crystalline moment.

The Queen of Air and Darkness lifted black, black eyes to King Corb. The temperature in the room plummeted. A film of frost crystals began to form over every metallic surface, and swirls of darkness appeared, spreading through Mab’s silver-white hair and continuing through into her gown.

She spoke in a whisper that was heard by every ear in the hall. “Explain yourself.”

The Fomor swaggered forward a step. “A peace gift,” he said. His tone was velvety, completely sincere—and it was readily offset by the smile on his froggy face. His bugging eyes were coldly mocking, his sneer absolutely malevolent. “For an old woman past her time.”

Corb flicked his hand and his men moved. A dozen suppressed weapons coughed and clacked, and every caterer and server in the hall dropped.

Marcone came out of his seat. Hendricks slammed a hand down onto his boss’s shoulder, and Miss Gard stepped in front of him, her back to Marcone, her hand on her axe. A muffled cry of shock and horror went up from the guests.

Because they were guests.

Mab rose slowly, and by the time she stood, her hair and eyes and raven-claw nails were all black as pitch, her skin whiter than Death’s horse. “You dare. YOU DARE! YOU ARE A GUEST IN THIS HOUSE!”

“Read your own laws, woman,” Corb spat. “These hirelings were no members of a house, not vassals or lackeys. They’re chattel at best.” Corb turned to Marcone and with a contemptuous flick sent a velvet bag sailing through the air. It landed in front of Gard with an unmistakable metallic tinkle. “Your weregild, little man.”

The room grew colder yet. Anxious, quickened breaths began to plume in front of tension-tightened faces.

“Old woman,” Corb taunted. “I remember you as a bawling brat. I remember your pimply face when you rode with the Conqueror. I remember how you wept when Merlin cast you out.”

Mab’s face …

… twisted into naked, ugly, absolute rage. Her body became so rigid, so immobile, that it could not possibly have belonged to a living thing.

“Tell me,” Corb purred. “If he was yet among the living, do you think he would still love you? Would he be so proud of what you’ve become?”

Mab did not descend from her high seat so much as reality itself seemed to take a polite step to one side. One moment she was there; the next there was a trail of falling snow and frost-blanketed floor in a laser-straight line, and Mab stood within arm’s length of Corb. “Your maggot lips aren’t worthy to speak his name,” she hissed.

“There you are,” Corb said, his tone approving. “I knew you had to be inside all of that ice somewhere. Gather all the power you wish, old woman. You know who you are, and so do I. You are no one.”

Mab’s face twisted in very human-looking fury, and that scared me more than anything I’d seen in a good long while. Her lips lifted into a snarl and she began to speak—before her black eyes widened. Her focus shifted, her gaze swiftly tracking up the chain to the bronze-and-crystalline fist of the woman who held it.

Corb let his head fall back and let out a delighted, crowing cackle.

The cloaked figure moved every bit as quickly as Mab had. One moment she was ten feet behind Corb. The next, there was a sound like thunder.

There was no way to track what happened clearly. I think the cloaked figure lashed out with a kick. I had the sense that there were defensive energies beyond anything I could have managed around Mab, and that the kick went through them as if they had not existed. The thunder was followed almost instantly by a second sound, a roar of shattering stone.