Dead Beat (The Dresden Files 7)

Mouse's snarl bubbled up into a more audible rumbling snarl.

The corpse sat up, opened milk-white eyes, and focused on me. It lifted a hand, in which it held a white lily, and held it toward me. Then the corpse spoke in a voice that was all rasp and whisper. "Wizard Dresden. A flower for your grave."

"Mavra," I said. "You're late."

"There was a headwind," the vampire answered. She flicked her wrist, and the lily arched up out of the grave and landed on my headstone. She followed it out with a similar, uncannily smooth motion that reminded me of a spider in its eerie grace. I noted that she wore a sword and a dagger on a weapons belt at her waist. They looked old and worn, and I was betting that they were not of modern make. She came to a halt and faced me from across my grave, her face turned very slightly away from the blue light of my amulet, her cataract eyes steady on Mouse. "You kept your hand? After those burns, I would have thought you would have amputated it."

"It's mine," I said. "And it's none of your business. And you're wasting my time."

The vampire's corpse lips stretched into a smile. Flakes of dead flesh fell down from the corners of her mouth. Brittle hair like dried straw had mostly been broken off to the length of a finger, but here and there longer strands the color of bread mold brushed the shoulders of her dress. "You're allowing your mortality to make you impatient, Dresden. Surely you want to take this opportunity to discuss your assault on my scourge?"

"No." I slipped my amulet on again and rested my hand on Mouse's head. "I'm not here to socialize. You've got dirt on Murphy and you want something from me. Let's have it."

Her laugh was full of cobwebs and sandpaper. "I forget how young you are until I see you," she said. "Life is fleeting, Dresden. If you insist on keeping yours, you ought to enjoy it."

"Funny thing is, trading insults with an egotistical super zombie just isn't my idea of a good time," I said. Mouse punctuated the sentence with another rumbling growl. I turned my shoulders from her, starting to turn away. "If that's all you had in mind, I'm leaving."

She laughed harder, and the sound of it spooked the hell out of me. Maybe it was the atmosphere, but something about it, the way that it simply lacked anything to do with the things that should motivate laughter... There was no warmth in it, no humanity, no kindness, no joy. It was like Mavra herself-it had the withered human shell, but underneath it all was something from a nightmare.

"Very well," Mavra said. "We shall embrace brevity."

I faced her again, wary. Something in her manner had changed, and it was setting off all my alarm bells.

"Find The Word of Kemmler," she said. Then she turned, dark skirts flaring, one hand resting negligently upon her sword, and started to leave.

"Hey!" I choked. "That's it?"

"That's it," she said without turning.

"Wait a minute!" I said.

She paused.

"What the hell is The Word of Kemmler?"

"A trail."

"Leading to what?" I asked.

"Power."

"And you want it."

"Yes."

"And you want me to find it."

"Yes. Alone. Tell no one of our agreement or what you are doing."

I took in a slow breath. "What happens if I tell you to go to hell?"

Mavra silently lifted a single arm. There was a photo between two of her desiccated fingers, and even in the moonlight I could see that it was of Murphy.

"I'll stop you," I said. "And if I don't, I'll come after you. If you hurt her, I'll kill you so hard your last ten victims will make miraculous recoveries."

"I won't have to touch her," she said. "I'll send the evidence to the police. The mortal authorities will prosecute her."

"You can't do that," I said. "Wizards and vampires may be at war, but we leave the mortals out of it. Once you get mortal authorities involved, the Council will do it as well. And then the Reds. You could escalate matters into global chaos."

"If I intended to employ the mortal authorities against you, perhaps," Mavra said. "You are White Council."

My stomach twisted with sudden, sickened understanding. I was a member of the White Council of Wizards, a solid citizen of the supernatural realms.

But Murphy wasn't.

"The protector of the people," Mavra all but purred. "The defender of the law will find herself a convicted murderer, and her only explanation would make her sound like a madwoman. She is prepared to die in battle, wizard. But I won't merely kill her. I will unmake her. I will destroy the labor of her life and her heart."

"You bitch," I said.

"Of course." She looked at me over her shoulder. "And unless you are prepared to unmake mortal civilization-or at least enough of it to impose your will upon it-there is nothing you can do to stop me."

Fury exploded somewhere in my chest and rolled out through my body and thoughts in a red fire. Mouse rolled forward toward Mavra a step, shaking the mist around us with a rising growl, and I didn't realize at first that he was following my lead. "Like hell there isn't," I snarled. "If I hadn't agreed to a truce I would-"

Mavra's corpse-yellow teeth appeared in a ghastly smile. "Kill me in my tracks, wizard, but it will do you no good. Unless I put a halt to it, the pictures and other evidence will be sent to the police. And I will do so only once I am satisfied with your retrieval of The Word of Kemmler. Find it. Bring it to me before three midnights hence, and I will turn over the evidence to you. You have my word."

She dropped the photo of Murphy, and some kind of purple, nauseating light played over it for a second as it fell to the ground. There was the acrid smell of scorched chemicals.

When I looked back up at Mavra there was no one there.

I walked slowly over to the fallen photo, struggling to slap my anger aside quick enough to reach out with my supernatural senses. I didn't feel any of Mavra's presence anywhere near me, and over the next several seconds my dog's growls died down to low, wary sounds of uncertainty- and then to silence. While I wasn't quite certain of the all the details, Mouse wasn't your average dog, and if Mouse didn't sense lurking bad guys, it was because there weren't any bad guys lurking.

The vampire was gone.

I picked up the photo. Murphy's picture had been marred. The dark energy had left scorch marks in the shape of numbers over Murphy's face. A phone number. Cute.

My righteous fury kept on fading, and I missed it. Once it was gone, there was going to be only sick worry and fear left in its place.