Skin Game

Eleven

On the way down the stairs, Anna Valmont ditched her tunic and pants, and proved to be wearing a little party dress beneath. Once she’d kicked off her shoes and socks, she blended in with every other society girl fleeing the building. A small bag belted around her waist and concealed beneath the tunic became a clutch. She pulled her hair off, ditched the wig, and shook out shoulder-length dark blond hair from beneath it, fashionably tousled. She put on sunglasses, and appropriated Hannah Ascher’s heels. She hurried a little, caught up to the last group to head out in front of us, and blended in with them seamlessly. By the time we’d reached the ground floor, the shapeless, shorter, brunette hotel staffer had vanished, and a tall and lean blond woman in a black dress was tottering out of the building along with all the rest of them.

Valmont was no dummy. The Fomor servitors were waiting outside, in their caterer uniforms, scanning everyone leaving the building with their flat, somehow amphibian gazes.

“I’ll run interference. You get her to the car,” I muttered to Ascher as we exited the building.

Then I pointed a finger at the nearest servitor and thundered, “You!”

The man turned his eyes to me. I felt the rest of them do the same. Good. The more of them that were looking at me, the fewer eyes there were to notice Valmont making good her escape. I stalked over to the servitor like a man spoiling for a fight. “What do you people think you’re doing? I mean, I’ve heard of getting your sushi fresh, but that’s just plain ridiculous.”

Fomor servitors were not known for their bantering skills. The man just stared at me and took an uneasy half step back.

“I’ve got half a mind to sue!” I shouted, waving an arm in a broad, drunken gesture. “Do you see the state of my tux? You’ve taken something from me tonight. My wardrobe’s peace of mind!”

By now, I was getting the attention of all kinds of people-evacuated guests, hotel staff, passersby on the sidewalk. There are a limited number of blood-covered economy-sized males ranting at the top of their lungs in a shredded tuxedo, even in Chicago. Sirens were wailing too, coming closer. Emergency services were en route. Motorcycle cops and prowl cars were already beginning to arrive, lickety-split here in the heart of the city.

I saw the servitor take note of the same thing. His weight shifted uneasily from foot to foot.

“Yeah,” I said in a lower, quieter voice. “I don’t know which of the Fomor you serve. But tell your boss that Harry Dresden is back, and he says to stay the hell out of Chicago. Otherwise, I’m going to knock his teeth out.” I paused. “Assuming, uh, he has teeth, I mean. But I’ll knock something out. Definitely. You tell him that.”

“You dare to threaten him?” the servitor whispered.

“Just stating facts,” I said. “You and your crew better go. Before I start ripping off your collars and asking the police and reporters what’s wrong with your necks.”

The servitor stared at me with empty eyes for a long moment. Then he turned abruptly and started walking. The other guys in caterer uniforms went with him.

“Subtle,” came Karrin’s voice.

I turned to find her standing maybe ten feet behind me, her arms crossed, where her hand would be close to her gun. Had the servitor or his buddies drawn a weapon, she’d have been in a good position to draw and start evening the odds.

“Murph,” I said. “Did they get out?”

“They’re waiting.” Her eyes flickered with distress as they swept over me. “Jesus, Harry. Are you all right?”

“Aches a bit. Stings a bit. ’m fine.”

“You’re bleeding,” she said, hurrying closer. “Your leg. Hold still.” She knelt down and I suddenly realized that she was right-my leg was bleeding, the leg of my pants soaked, blood dripping from the hem of my pants leg and onto my rented shoes. She rolled the bloodied cloth up briskly.

“You’ve been shot,” she said.

I blinked. “Uh, what? I don’t feel shot. Are you sure?”

“There’s a hole right through the outside of your calf,” she said. “Little on both sides. Christ, they must have been close.”

“M240,” I said. “From maybe thirty feet.”

“You got lucky-it missed the bone and didn’t tumble.” She pulled a handkerchief from her jacket pocket and said, “This is what Butters warned you about. Not being able to sense your own injuries. I’ve got to tie this off until we can get it taken care of. Brace.”

Her shoulders twisted as she knotted the cloth around my calf and jerked it tight. That tingled and stung a little, but it didn’t hurt any more than that. I suddenly realized that Winter was sighing through me like an icy wind, dulling the pain.

I also suddenly realized that Karrin was kneeling at my feet. The Winter in me thought that was all kinds of interesting. Something very like panic fluttered through my chest, something far more energetic and destabilizing than the fear I’d felt in the conflict a few minutes before.

“Uh, right,” I said, forcing my eyes away. “What are we doing standing around here? Let’s go.”

Karrin rose and looked up at me, her expression torn between concern and something darker. Then she nodded and said, “Car’s over here. Follow me.”

* * *

Once in the car, I looked back over my shoulder at Ascher and Valmont while Karrin got us moving. We cruised out just as the majority of the emergency vehicles arrived. Valmont was staring out the window, her face unreadable behind her sunglasses. Ascher was looking over her shoulder, watching the scene behind.

When she finally turned around to see me looking at her, her face split into a wide smile, and her dark eyes glittered brightly. “Damn,” she said, “that was intense.”

“More for some than others,” Karrin said. “Miss Ascher, I’m going to take you back to the slaughterhouse to meet up with your partner.”

Ascher frowned. “What about you?”

“Dresden’s shot.”

Ascher blinked. “When?”

“Getting me out,” Valmont said, still staring out the window. “He got shot pushing me behind him.”

“I’m taking him to someone who can help,” Karrin said. “Tell Nicodemus that Valmont is with us.”

Ascher frowned at that, and eyed Valmont. “That what you want?”

“I’m not going to see that guy without Dresden around,” Valmont said. “You were smart, you wouldn’t, either.”

“Let her be,” I said quietly. “Ascher’s a big girl. She can make her own choices.”

“Sure,” Valmont said.

Ascher frowned at me for a long minute before saying, “I hear a lot of stories about you.”

“Yeah?” I asked.

“The warlock who became a Warden,” she said. “And then refused to hunt warlocks for the Council.”

I shrugged. “True.”

“And they didn’t kill you for it?” Ascher asked.

“Middle of a war,” I said. “Needed every fighter.”

“I hear other things. Wild things. That you help people. That you’ll fight anyone.”

I shrugged a shoulder. It hurt a little. “Sometimes.”

“Is he always like this?” Ascher asked Karrin.

“Only when he’s bleeding out,” Karrin said. “Usually you can’t get him to shut up.”

“Hey,” I said.

Karrin eyed me, a faint glimmer of humor somewhere in the look.

I shrugged a shoulder tiredly. “Yeah. Okay.”

“So if you’re such a tough guy,” Ascher said, “how come I didn’t see you kicking ass and taking names in there?”

I closed my eyes for a moment. I didn’t feel like explaining to Ascher about how the Winter Knight was built to be a killing machine, one that moved and struck and never paused to think. I didn’t feel like explaining what could have happened if I’d let that particular genie out of the bottle in the middle of one of Chicago’s premier hotels. Karrin was right. I’d burned down buildings like they were going out of style in the past. A fire in the Peninsula could have killed hundreds. If I’d lost control of the instincts forced upon me by the Winter mantle, I might have killed even more.

What I did want to do, in the wake of the life-and-death struggle, was rip her party dress off and see what happened next. But that was the Winter in me talking. Mostly. And I wasn’t going to let that out, either.

“We weren’t there to kill Fomor,” I said. “We went to get Valmont. We got her. That’s all.”

“If I hadn’t been there,” Ascher said, “that thing would have torn you apart.”

“Good thing you were there then,” I said. “You’ve got some game. I’ll give you that. Fire magic is tricky to use that well. You’ve got a talent.”

“Okay,” Ascher said, seemingly mollified. “You’ve got no idea how many guys I’ve worked with that don’t want to admit they got saved by a girl.”

“Gosh,” I said, glancing at Karrin. “It’s such a new experience for me.”

Karrin snorted, and pulled the car over. We’d made it back to the slaughterhouse.

“Tell Nicodemus we’ll be back at sunrise,” I said.

Valmont said nothing. But she took off the slightly too large shoes and passed them back to Ascher.

“Sure,” Ascher said. “Don’t bleed to death or anything. This is too interesting.”

“Meh,” I said.

She flashed me another smile, took her shoes, and slid out of the limo. Karrin didn’t pause to watch her reenter the building, but pulled out again at once.

I looked back over my shoulder at Valmont. “You okay?”

She took off the sunglasses and gave me a very small smile. “Nicodemus. He’s really back there?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“And you’re going to burn him?”

“If I can,” I said.

“Then I’m good,” she said. She turned her eyes back to the night outside. “I’m good.”

Karrin stared at Valmont in the mirror for a moment, frowning. Then she set her jaw and turned her eyes back to the road.

“Where?” I asked her quietly.

“My place,” she said. “I called Butters the minute the alarms started going off at the hotel. He’ll be waiting for us.”

“I don’t want anyone else tangled up in this,” I said.

“You want to take on the Knights of the Blackened Denarius,” Karrin said. “Do you really think you can do it alone?”

I grunted, tiredly, and closed my eyes.

“That’s what I thought,” she said.

The limo’s tires whispered on the city streets, and I stopped paying attention to anything else.