Peace Talks (The Dresden Files 16)

I can earthwalk. Technically. I mean, if I really, really, really wanted to, I could do it. Wizards can pull off almost anything other supernatural beings can do, if we want to work at it.

But why would I want to?

Evanna’s hand pulled me down and I sank into the ground as if it had suddenly become thick Jell-O. Dirt-flavored Jell-O. We began moving, and the ground passed through us in the most unsettling way imaginable. I could feel the earth grinding at every inch of my skin, as if I was thrashing my way through fine sand, and my clothes didn’t do a thing to stop the sensation. Worse, it gritted away at my eyelashes, forcing me to blink and hold my hand up over my eyes—which also did no good whatsoever.

Worst was the phantom sensation of earth in my mouth and my nose and tickling at my throat. Technically, I think she was using magic to slide our molecules around and through those of the ground around us. Practically, I was enjoying the experience of a slow and torturous sandblasting, including getting punched in the taste buds with overwhelming mineral sensations.

Seriously. It’s revolting.

We emerged from the earth into one of the residential corridors below the main building, which was presumably burning merrily somewhere above us. You couldn’t have guessed it. There was no smoke in the air, no sound of any fire, no leak of water from above.

I fought against the urge to spit as Evanna let go of my hand—and looked up at my grimace with amusement. “Mortals find it unpleasant, I know. Do you need a cup of water?”

I lifted an eyebrow and looked down at her. Way, way, down. Evanna is six inches shorter than Karrin, though the two of them shared something in the way of the same solid, muscular frame. “Are you patronizing me?”

“Wizard. Would I do such a thing?” She started walking and I set out behind her.

“I’m not familiar with this level,” I said.

“We’re a level below our guest apartments and staff homes. These are the family quarters,” Evanna replied. “Etri, myself, our mates and children, a few cousins from time to time,” she said. Her feet made no sound on the stone floor.

“Uh. Shouldn’t everyone be leaving? You know, the fire and all?”

Evanna cocked her head to look back and up at me. “We took precautions.”

“Precautions?”

“With guests like yourself, it seemed wise,” she said. Her delivery was stone-faced, completely dry. “We had heard rumors of other buildings burning down. The upper levels have been isolated from the quarters below. If the administrative offices burn to a pile of ash, it will not touch these levels.”

I let out a breath in a sharp exhale, a sound of relief.

She inclined her head to me. “Your daughter is safe. We assume.”

“What do you mean, you assume?” I asked.

“Once the fire began, security forces attempted to enter your quarters,” she said. “The Guardian would not permit us to remove her.”

I suddenly felt a little sick. “Mouse. You guys didn’t …”

Evanna stared hard at me for a moment. Then her expression softened very slightly. “No, of course not. The character of the Temple Guardians is well-known. We would never desire to harm such a being unless at great need. And we do not harm children. That is why I was sent to watch for you.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Wait. You’re saying that you couldn’t go get her.”

Evanna shrugged a slender shoulder. “The Guardian seemed very determined.”

I walked a few steps, thinking. She was right about Mouse. He was a good dog. Or maybe even a Good dog. But he had an unerring ability to determine when someone or something was hostile. He’d die before he let any harm come to Maggie.

Which meant that if Mouse was defending her from the svartalves …

I had to consider that they might be up to something he considered to be no good. They were a very insular people, and they weren’t human. They might not necessarily think or feel about things the way I would expect them to. I’d lived among them for a time now, and while I was comfortable interacting with them, I wasn’t fool enough to think that I knew them.

Evanna stared at up my face as I thought, and I suddenly realized that she was reading my expression. Her own face went completely blank, completely empty of any emotion, as she regarded me.

“What’s going on here?” I asked her carefully.

“You tell me,” she said.

I made an exasperated sound. “Hell’s bells, Evanna, how should I know? I’ve been at my girlfriend’s all evening. I just got here.”

She turned abruptly, in front of me, confronting me exactly as if I wasn’t two feet taller and two hundred pounds heavier than her. “Stop,” she said firmly.

I did.

She narrowed her eyes and said, “Say that again.”

“Why is everyone so shocked that I have a girlfriend?” I asked.

She closed her eyes for a moment, as if silently counting to three, and opened them again. “Not that part. Your explanation of events.”

“Oh,” I said. I began to speak but stopped myself at the last second and took a moment to think. I’d only met Evanna in passing, but she was looking remarkably intense by svartalf standards—which is to say, she was working as hard as she could to give away nothing by her expression or body language. I had to wonder what else she was concealing.

I looked around us. Then I focused and used my wizard senses, looking deeper. I could feel the energy moving around us, feel the disturbances in the stone beneath my feet, in several discrete locations.

Evanna wasn’t alone. There were half a dozen of the embassy’s security personnel shadowing us, earthwalking through the safety of the stone.

The svartalves were being polite about it and had sent a pretty and charming captor to round me up—but subtle or not, I suddenly realized that I was a prisoner being escorted. And that my next words were going to count for more than most.

In moments like this, I generally try to tell the truth, because I don’t have the intellectual horsepower to keep track of very many lies. They add up.

“I’ve been at my girlfriend’s all evening,” I said. “I just got here. I don’t know what’s going on.”

As I spoke, her eyes closed. She opened them again slowly after I finished speaking and said quietly, “You speak the truth.”

“No kidding!” I blurted. “Evanna, I know that I’m a guest, but you are officially starting to freak me out. I want to see my daughter, please.”

“You are under guest-right,” she said quietly. Then she nodded once and said, “This way.”

We went up the stairs, down a hall, and through a set of doors and were suddenly in territory I recognized—the hall outside of the apartment. There were a number of svartalf security staff gathered outside the door, and they were talking among themselves as Evanna and I approached.

“… doesn’t make any sense,” one of them said. “The lock is disengaged. It should open.”

“It must be a spell holding the lock closed,” said another.

The first twisted the doorknob by way of demonstration. It turned freely the way unlocked doorknobs do. “Behold.”

“A ram, then,” said the second.

“You’d ruin the wood,” I told them as we approached. “And you still wouldn’t be able to get past.”