Battle Ground (The Dresden Files 17)

“The money stuff, they’ve got insurance and things for. There are economic safety nets everywhere. It’s the people we need to take care of. Anyone injured in the attack, we pay for it. Whatever they need, healing of the body or mind. We pay to bury the dead. And we pay a weregild to the survivors of anyone slain. I don’t care if they find buried gold or get a mysterious winning lottery ticket or what, but we owe them a debt for something priceless. And we owe them the gesture of helping to make their future more secure after what we took from them. And there’s a man in this room who can get down everyone’s freaking chimneys every year if he has to, so don’t tell me that there isn’t power to make it happen.”

“These numbers are very large,” Mab noted.

“Our debt,” I said, “is larger. Ask any child of the men and women who died.”

Mab looked faintly troubled at the thought.

“The Accords,” she said, “provide for reparations to damaged parties. This business of guest-right disturbs me greatly and demands care and respect. Making right the damages wrought upon the mortals seems meet to me—with the understanding that we will apply the resources expended for such repayment to the debt of those ultimately responsible, namely, the Fomor, once our conflict with them has been resolved.”

And it turned out that by unanimous vote, everyone in the Accords agreed on that, because everyone in politics enjoys giving other people’s money to good causes.

Whatever. I got people some help, did a little good.

But I wasn’t finished.

“There is also the matter,” I said, to Mab, “of personal debt. Ethniu was my kill, before all the Accorded nations, in defense of the demesne of Baron John Marcone of Chicago.” I turned to face him. “Acknowledgment of that act is due.”

Eyes turned toward Marcone.

“The Eye seems ample reward for such a deed,” Marcone noted.

“To some,” Sarissa said, her voice very dry.

“Do you have it?” I asked Marcone innocently.

He stood there, suddenly very wary.

“I mean, I’m not sure where it is,” I said, which was technically true—Alfred had it stashed somewhere and I’d told him not to tell me where, specifically for this conversation. Technical truth was, at the moment, the best kind of truth. “But if you want to hand it to me . . .”

“I assumed you claimed it from Ethniu,” Marcone said.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” I said.

“Are we to believe that you just left a weapon like the Eye lying upon the ground?” Marcone asked.

“Dude, there was an apocalypse on,” I said, in a very reasonable tone. “The earth shaking. Giant waves. I almost drowned, you know, in this giant stupid concrete teacup some fool made. It’s all kind of blurry.”

Marcone narrowed his eyes.

“The point is, my people fought and died for your land,” I said, my voice suddenly harder. “I fought and bled for your land. And if I hadn’t, you wouldn’t have a territory to defend. I defended your home. And I lost my own home doing it.”

I pointed at Evanna.

Everyone looked at her.

“There was . . . damage to that apartment during the attack,” she politely lied. “No replacement apartment is available at this time. As such, he may no longer be our guest.”

“See?” I said. “A debt is owed. And we take our debts pretty serious in Winter.”

I felt Mab’s gaze over my shoulder, like a cold draft in the room.

Only it was focused on Marcone.

Marcone eyed me and then Mab, and then Lara. “Surely you don’t believe him.”

A little smile played on the corners of Lara’s mouth. “The last I saw,” she said, “you were the one running off with the Eye, Baron.”

“Queen Mab,” Marcone said in protest.

“He has given me no reason to disbelieve him, Baron,” Mab said. She knew all about technically true things, too.

Marcone turned to me with his eyes narrowed. He regarded me and said, “I know you have it.”

Marcone had put me on a pedestal by telling people I’d taken out Ethniu. That act alone had probably scared enough members of the White Council to get me voted out. But if he was going to put me up there, he shouldn’t be too terribly surprised if I kicked him in the face.

I took a breath, enjoying the moment.

“Prove it,” I said. “Sir Baron.”

Marcone eyed me. Then glanced past me to the Queen of Air and Darkness.

Mab’s eyebrow went up so far that it threatened the line of her skull. Then she said, as if to Marcone, “Much is explained.”

Marcone’s gaze slid around the faces of the Ministry, weighing what he saw there. He yielded with reluctant grace. “Very well, Sir Dresden.” Marcone sighed. “What is it you wish of me?”

I leaned down to look him in the face.

“I want my lab back,” I said. “Move your stuff.”

* * *

* * *

I’ll give this to Marcone: When he gives his word, he’s good for it.

He emptied out the little castle built on the site of my old boardinghouse within twenty-four hours. Soldiers, personnel, furniture, lights—by the time we arrived the next day, all of it was gone. The castle was empty of Marcone’s presence, right down to the stones.

“What do you think?” I asked. I turned on a heel, regarding the main hall. There was still a big hole in the roof where Ethniu and the Eye had provided incentive to install a skylight. I pointed at it. “Maybe get one like Doctor Strange’s window, right?”

Molly looked around the place speculatively. “It looks . . . cold and slightly damp and gloomy. Like one big basement.”

“Glorious,” I said. “Your dad is coming over later to help me figure out how to make it a little more human-friendly. I mean, you could fit a basketball court in here. And I don’t need a throne room.”

“And you do need a basketball court?”

“It’s an idea—that’s all I’m saying.”

She shook her head. “Have you noticed all the enchantments on the place?” Molly asked skeptically. “There is some really old stuff here that is still working.”

In point of fact, I had Bob going over the entire thing now for an in-depth assessment. The defensive systems built into the castle had been laid up by a wizard with a particularly thorough breed of the crazies. My first read was that Marcone’s use of them had only touched the surface of their potential—maybe Thorned Namshiel hadn’t yet had time to teach him to make full use of them. Hell, the only reason I felt like I knew what I was talking about was that the enchantments hardwired into the stones of the castle bore a startling structural resemblance to those that had been used to create Demonreach. It was entirely possible that the castle’s magical defenses had been the work of the original Merlin or one of his inheritors.