Battle Ground (The Dresden Files 17)

“Or what?” I asked him, lightly.

Marcone’s stare was not a matter for lightness. “I will pursue my rights under Mab’s Accords. And she will not protect you.”

I felt a little cold chill go through my guts, way down low. Marcone had me dead to rights there. I had violated his territory under the Accords, more than once. He’d just never wanted to shove it in the face of the White Council, who would have had no interest in bowing to a lesser power. Offhand, I wasn’t sure what the penalty would be for that kind of lawbreaking, but Mab’s idea of justice wasn’t exactly a progressive one. More to the point, her idea of justice was damned near an absolute: If I had broken her laws, I would deserve to be punished under them. My status as the Winter Knight would not matter to her in the least, except that she might be that much more annoyed before she executed me.

Dammit, Thomas. Why in the hell do you get me into messes like this?

“As long as we’re being honest,” I said, “you should probably know that I still think you’re a prick. I still think you’re responsible for a lot of good people getting hurt. And I’m going to tear you down one day.”

Marcone stared hard at me for a moment. He wasn’t afraid of my eyes. He’d taken my measure, too, and I remembered the cold, fearless core of him, of an apex predator who happened to wear a human form. Then he, too, did something eerie.

He smiled.

A wolf would have been jealous.

“Excellent,” he said.

Then he left.

* * *

* * *

I walked back out onto the roof, the heat of the summer night wet and heavy against my face. My duster hung heavy over my shoulders, too hot for the night, the spell-infused leather a comforting weight around me. I gripped my staff in my left hand. From one hip hung my big .50-caliber revolver. The scabbard for the short coach gun, loaded with Dragon’s Breath rounds, hung from the other. My Warden’s cloak was fastened over one shoulder, where it would be adding the least to my discomfort in the sultry air, yet still declare my allegiance to the Council.

Over on the eastern edge of the roof, Mab, Lara, the Senior Council, Vadderung, the Erlking, and the Summer Lady had gathered together in a silent group, with River Shoulders looming over them in the back. They were staring out at the night, now lit by more fires, and the wind coming off the lake brought us the distant scent of burning rubber and black smoke.

I looked down at the shadow being cast in front of me. The long, billowing outline of the duster. The slender length of my staff. The outline of my head, with my ears sticking out a little, my hair a mussed mess.

I’d been doing this for a while. The duster and the staff and the attitude. I mean, you’d think I’d have grown up at some point. But I was, in a lot of ways, still that dumb kid opening up his own private investigations business, all those years ago.

Across that roof stood some of the greatest monsters, legends, even gods of our world. They were staring out at the night, standing together.

They were frightened.

Underneath the calm, the steady action, the relentless calculation, the superhuman power—they were frightened. Them.

And I was just me.

I took a deep breath.

My sneakers squeaked as I paced across the roof and joined them.

The Erlking nodded to me as I stopped by his elbow. “They’re moving now,” he reported. He nodded out toward the original explosion. “Hear that?”

The gunfire had increased to a frantic pace. Heavier ordnance was going off from time to time. Maybe grenades or something? I wasn’t all that familiar with the practicalities of military weapons in action.

The Erlking directed my attention to the north and south. “There, that dark space, that’s where my troops are. They’re forcing the Fomor to move around them, to the north and south. See the fires?”

I looked. He was right. Fires had begun to burn in a path around the embattled position.

“There’s too many of them,” I breathed.

The Erlking nodded. “For the time being. Do not be distracted. This battle is not about Corb or his forces. It is about Ethniu.”

“Right,” I said, watching the fires spread through my city, lighting more and more of it, and bringing with them a pall of smoke. “Right. Be cool.”

My stomach hurt, and I realized, dimly, that somewhere deep down I was furious. Foes had come to harm my neighbors, my city, my home. There could be no fires too hot to devour them. And I was just standing there, doing nothing.

My knuckles ached as I gripped my staff.

“Contact!” shouted one of the Einherjaren.

Without hesitation, Vadderung pointed at another of the eternal soldiers, standing near him. The man lifted one of those grenade launchers with the big cylinder like a giant revolver to his shoulder and aimed it up. He fired three times, phoont, phoont, phoont, and within a few seconds a number of flares were falling from high above, showering light onto the neighborhood around the castle.

There were bipedal forms out there, shadows really, stalking down the streets, sidewalks, yards, moving stealthily—freezing in place where the light fell on them, while the shapes moving in the deeper shadows seemed to become that much more furtive and agitated.

“Ready stations,” called Marcone’s voice. “Prepare to fire.”

I turned to see the Baron of Chicago walk briskly onto the roof, flanked by Gard and Hendricks. He ignored me as he walked past to stand beside Vadderung. “An assault force?”

“Light infantry, I think, Baron,” Vadderung said, squinting his eye out at the night. “Their forward elements. Scouts. They haven’t shown us their strength yet.”

Marcone nodded. “Hold fire unless the enemy engages us,” he said to the nearest of the Einherjaren, and one of the tallest. The man nodded and passed the order down the line.

“Wait,” I said. “What?”

From down the street, my street, I heard the sound of shattering glass.

Someone screamed. I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. It was high-pitched and desperate. The human voice rang out surprisingly loud in the stillness of the night.

That was a person. Terrified.

Someone who lived on my street.

I heard the frantic panic fire from a pistol, maybe someone’s revolver. A scream, something that sounded too harsh and brassy to be human. There was a long, drawn-out howl, then a flash of light, and I saw something red and flickering hit a car about a hundred yards down the street. There was a breathless quarter second, and then the car went up in a fireball as its gas tank exploded.

I could see figures, furry or fur-clad, rushing toward the open front doors of one of a row of rental houses. There were few supernaturally significant thresholds to speak of on such properties, little protection from the powers of darkness.