Proven Guilty (The Dresden Files 8)

"Or what?" I asked. "You'll kill me? From where I'm standing, that isn't a worst-case scenario."

"True," Crane murmured. He withdrew a small handgun from his pocket and without so much as blinking shot Rawlins in the foot.

The big cop jerked against the cuffs that held him. His face contorted in surprised pain and he fell. The cuffs, fastened to the beam at shoulder level, cut cruelly into his wrists. Rawlins got his legs underneath him and let out a string of sulfurous curse words.

Crane regarded Rawlins for a moment, smiled, and then pointed the gun at the cop's head.

"No!" I shouted.

"It's entirely up to you, wizard, whether or not his children lose their father. Behave." He smiled again. "We'll all be happier."

Again the rage threatened to drown any rational thought in my head. Threatening me is one thing. Threatening someone else to get to me is another. I'm sick of seeing decent people suffer. I'm sick of seeing them die.

Patience, Harry. Calm. Rational. I was going to have to discourage Crane from this tactic with extreme prejudice as a deterrent to future weasels. But not yet. Keep him talking.

"Do you understand me?" Crane said.

I jerked my chin in a brief nod.

He smirked. "I want to hear you say it."

I clenched my jaw and said, "I understand."

"I'm so glad we had this talk," he said. There was a low buzzing sound, the almost-silent alert of his cell phone, I suppose, and he walked away again, taking it out of his pocket and lifting it to his ear.

"How long have we been here?" I asked Rawlins.

"Hour," he mumbled. "Hour and a half."

I nodded. "You okay?"

He let out a pained grunt. "Tore open the stitches on my arm," he panted. "Foot, I don't know. Can't feel it. Doesn't look like it's bleeding much."

"Hang in there," I said. "We'll get out of this."

Glau's rubbery lips stretched out into a silent little smile, though he looked at neither of us.

"Bull," Rawlins said. "If you can get out, you should go. Once he gets what he wants, he's going to kill me anyway. Don't stay on my account."

"You're siphoning my noble hero vibe," I told him. "Cease and desist or I'll sue."

Rawlins tried to smile, and leaned against the wall, weight off his injured foot. The lower portion of his left sleeve had soaked through with blood.

Crane returned a moment later, smiling like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. "Start building more tax shelters, Glau. This is going rather well."

"Yeah?" I asked. "So who's going to pony up for one Harry Dresden, slightly used?"

Crane showed me all his teeth. "I'm holding an auction as we speak. A rather energetic one."

"Yeah?" I asked. "Who's leading?"

His smiled widened. "Why, Paolo Ortega's widow. Duchess Arianna of the Red Court."

I suddenly felt cold, all over.

I was captured by the Red Court once. Held in the dark by a crowd of hissing, monstrous shapes.

They did things.

There was nothing I could do about it.

I still had the nightmares to remind me. Not every night, maybe, but often enough. Often enough.

Crane closed his eyes and inhaled with a satisfied expression. "She'll be quite creative when it comes to dealing with her husband's bane. I don't blame you for feeling terrified. Who wouldn't?"

"Hey," I told him, grasping at straws. "Call the White Council. If nothing else, maybe they'll run the bidding up for you."

Crane laughed. "I already have," he said.

Hope twitched somewhere inside me. If the Council knew I was in trouble, then maybe they would be able to do something. They might be on the way even now. I needed to stall Crane, keep him occupied. "Yeah? What did they say?"

His smile widened. "That the White Council's unyielding policy is one of nonnegotiation with terrorists."

Hope's corpse went through some postmortem twitching.

His phone buzzed again. He stepped away and spoke quietly, his back to us. After a moment he snapped his fingers and said, "Glau, get on the computer. The auction is closing in five minutes and there's always a last-second rush. We'll need to verify an account." He turned back to the phone. "No, unacceptable. A numbered account only. I don't trust those people at PayPal."

"Hey!" I protested. "Are you selling me on eBay?"

Crane winked at me. "Ironic, eh? Though I confess a bit of surprise. How do you know what it is?"

"I read," I told him.

"Ahhh," he said. "Glau. Computer."

Glau nodded but said, "They should not be unwatched."

"I can see them," Crane replied, irritation in his voice. "Move."

By his expression, Glau clearly did not agree with Crane, but he went.

I licked my lips, struggling to think through my headache and anxiety and a solid lump of despair. There had to be a way out of this. There was always a way out. I had found ways out of desperate straits before.

Of course, I'd had my magic available then. Damn those manacles. As long as they kept my power constrained, I would never be able to free myself or Rawlins.

So, moron, I thought to myself. Get rid of the manacles. Get around them. Do something. Ifs your only chance.

"How?" I muttered out loud. "I don't know a damned thing about them."

Rawlins blinked at me. I grimaced, shook my head at him, and closed my eyes. I shut away the distractions and turned my focus inward. It was easy to imagine an empty place; flat, dark floor illuminated from above by a single light shining without apparent source. I imagined myself standing beneath it.

"Lasciel," my image-self said quietly. "I seek counsel."

She appeared at once, stepping into the circle of light. She wore her most familiar form, the functional white tunic, the tall, lovely figure, but her golden hair now appeared as a waist-length sheet of deep auburn. She bowed deeply and murmured, "I am here, my host."

"You changed your hair," I said.

Her mouth flirted with a smile. "There are too many blondes in your life, my host. I feared I would be lost in the press."

I sighed. "The manacles," I said. "Do you know of them?"

She bowed again. "Indeed, my host. They are of an ancient make, wrought by the troll-smiths of the Unseelie Court, and employed against those of your talents for a thousand years and more."

I blinked at her. "Faeries made those?"

I was dimly aware that, in my surprise, I had spoken the words aloud. I clenched my physical jaws shut and focused on the image-me, briefly wondering just how badly cracked my engine block was going to get by trying to keep track of my own personal internal reality in addition to the actual, threatening reality where Rawlins and I were in deep trouble. Hell, for that matter, I supposed it was entirely possible that I already had snapped. It wasn't as though anyone but me had ever seen Lasciel. Perhaps, in addition to existing only in my head, she was all in my imagination, kind of a waking dream.