I could smell the faintest stink of long-burnt coffee. I must have left it on. My desk had a similar fungus coating of loose papers, and several drawers in my filing cabinets stood open, with files stacked on top of the cabinets or thrust sideways into their places, so that they stood up out of the drawers.
My ceiling fan whirled woozily, clicking on every rotation. Someone had evidently tried to straighten things up. My mail sat neatly stacked in three different piles. Both metal trash cans were suspiciously empty. Billy and company, then. In the ruins of my office stood a woman with the kind of beauty that makes men murder friends and start wars. She stood by my desk with her arms folded, facing the door, hips cocked to one side, her expression skeptical.
She had white hair. Not white-blond, not platinum. White as snow, white as the finest marble, bound up like a captured cloud to bare the lines of her slender throat. I don't know how her skin managed to look pale beside that hair, but it did.
Her lips were the color of frozen mulberries, almost shocking in a smooth and lovely face, and her oblique eyes were a deep green that tinted to blue when she tilted her head and looked me over. She wasn't old. Wasn't young. Wasn't anything but stunning. I tried to keep my jaw from hitting the floor and forced my brain to start doing something by taking stock of her wardrobe.
She wore a woman's suit of charcoal grey, the cut immaculate. The skirt showed exactly enough leg to make it hard not to look, and her dark pumps had heels just high enough to give you ideas.
She wore a bone-white V-neck beneath her jacket, the neckline dipping just low enough to make me want to be watching if she took a deep breath. Opals set in silver flashed on her ears, at her throat, glittering through an array of colors I wouldn't have expected from opals—too many scarlets and violets and deep blues. Her nails had somehow been lacquered in the same opalescence. I caught the scent of her perfume, something wild and rich, heavy and sweet, like orchids.
My heart sped up, and the testosterone-oriented part of my brain wished that I'd been able to bathe. Or shave. Or at least that I hadn't worn sweatpants. Her mouth quirked into a smile, and she arched one pale brow, saying nothing, letting me gawk. One thing was certain—no woman like that would have anything less than money. Lots of money. Money I could use to pay the rent, buy groceries, maybe even splurge a little and get a wheelbarrow to help with cleaning my apartment.
I only hesitated for a heartbeat, wondering if it was proper for a full-fledged wizard of the White Council to be that interested in cash. I made up my mind fast. Phenomenal cosmic powers be damned. I have a lease. Sommerset, I presume," I managed finally. No one can do suave like me. If I was careful, I should be able to trip over something and complete the image. Sommerset had a voice like her outfit—rich, suggestive, cultured.
Her English had an accent I couldn't place. Maybe European. Definitely interesting. I don't like to be kept waiting, so I let myself in. I didn't hear you were coming until, uh …" I looked around at my office, dismayed, and shut the door behind me. Would you like a cup of coffee or anything? Why should I take the risk?
They were a cool, noticeable weight on me as I moved, and I sat down at my desk, frowning. I have come here today to decide whether or not I shall gamble a great deal upon your abilities. I know that all this probably makes me look like—" "A desperate man?
I think you need the work. At least let me hear you out. If it turns out that I think I can help you—" She lifted her chin and interrupted me effortlessly. You have shown me nothing to make me think that you could. About the ability to look into their eyes. It just happens. You call it a soulgaze, do you not?
Seeing the truth about the person upon whom you look? Then I will know if you can be of any use to me. Surely it will cost me nothing. It's the sort of thing that stays with you. When you look on someone's soul, you don't forget it. Not ever. I didn't like the direction this was going. Then, if you will excuse me—" This time I interrupted her. Sommerset, I think you may have made a mistake in your estimations. I opened the drawer to my desk and took out a pad of paper. I've had a rough time of things lately.
Then you come in here. Rich, gorgeous—kind of too good to be true. I drew the. Put your hands on the desk, please. Those gorgeous eyes widened enough to show the whites all the way around them. She moved her hands, swallowing as she did, and laid her palms on the desk. I kept the gun and my eyes on her and opened another drawer.
So it's made me do some thinking about what kind of trouble to expect. And I think I've got you pegged. A moment later I lifted a plain old nail of simple metal out of the drawer and put it on the desk.
Then I flicked the nail gently with one finger, and sent it rolling across the surface of my desk and toward her perfectly manicured hands. She didn't move until a split second before the nail touched her—but then she did, a blur of motion that took her two long strides back from my desk and knocked over the chair she'd been sitting on. The nail rolled off the edge of the desk and fell to the floor with a clink. Faeries don't like it.
One moment, there had been arrogant conceit, haughty superiority, blithe confidence. But that simply vanished, leaving her features cold and lovely and remote and empty of all emotion, of anything recognizably human. That was the deal. If she's trying to weasel out of it, I'm going to be upset. It was unsettling to see a face so lovely look so wholly alien, as though something lurked behind those features that had little in common with me and did not care to make the effort to understand.
That blank mask made my throat tighten, and I had to work not to let the gun in my hand shake. But then she did something that made her look even more alien, more frightening. She smiled. A slow smile, cruel as a barbed knife. When she spoke, her voice sounded just as beautiful as it had before. But it was empty, quiet, haunting. She spoke, and it made me want to lean closer to her to hear her more clearly.
Not too distracted to think. Just what I need. Just the sound of her voice made the room feel colder. Proven your worth. How did you do it? You shouldn't have been able to get in here, so you must have gone through it.
And you danced around my questions rather than simply answering them. Not many women go out in a three-thousand-dollar suit and no purse. You'll do perfectly, Mister Dresden. Get out of my office. Cat-eyed, she regarded me, unblinking. I plan to gamble. And I will gamble upon you. Something precious has been stolen. I wish you to recover it. I wish you to discover and catch the thief and to vindicate me. My agent. That made something else come into those perfect, pale features—anger.
Anger, cold and terrible, flashed in her eyes and all but froze the laugh in my throat. I don't even know who you are. You gave your life, your fortune, your future, in exchange for power. With my godmother. And that's still being contested. Selling mortgages, yes?
It wasn't a smile. I have purchased it. You are mine. And you will assist me in this matter. I took out my letter opener, one of the standard machined jobs with a heavy, flat blade and a screw-grip handle. For all I know, you're trying to trick me. I watched, startled, as I gripped the letter opener in my right hand, slasher-movie style. In a panic, I tried to hold back my hand, to drop the opener, but my arms were running on automatic, like they were someone else's.
She regarded me, cold and distant and interested. I slammed the letter opener down onto the back of my own hand, hard.
My desk is a cheap one. The steel bit cleanly through the meat between my thumb and forefinger and sank into the desk, pinning me there. Pain washed up my arm even as blood started oozing out of the wound. I tried to fight it down, but I was panicked, in no condition to exert a lot of control. A whimper slipped out of me. I tried to pull the steel away, to get it out of my hand, but my arm simply twisted, wrenching the letter opener counterclockwise.
The pain flattened me. I wasn't even able to get enough breath to scream. The woman, the faerie, reached down and took my fingers away from the letter opener. She withdrew it with a sharp, decisive gesture and laid it flat on the desk, my blood gleaming all over it. Were you not bound to me, I would have no such power over you.
Faeries don't just get to ride in and play puppet master. You have to let them in. I'd let my godmother, Lea, in years before, when I was younger, dumber. I'd given her the slip last year, forced an abeyance of her claim that should have protected me for a year and a day. But now she'd passed the reins to someone else. Someone who hadn't been in on the second bargain. I looked up at her, pain and sudden anger making my voice into a low, harsh growl. She lifted it to her lips and idly touched it to her tongue.
She smiled, slower, more sensual, and every bit as alien. Queen of Air and Darkness. Monarch of the Winter Court of the Sidhe. A Faerie Queen. A Faerie Queen was standing in my office. I was looking at a Faerie Queen. Talking to a Faerie Queen. And she had me by the short hairs.
Boy, and I'd thought my life was on the critical list already. Fear can literally feel like ice water. It can be a cold feeling that you swallow, that rolls down your throat and spreads into your chest. It steals your breath and makes your heart labor when it shouldn't, before expanding into your belly and hips, leaving quivers behind.
Then it heads for the thighs, the knees occasionally with an embarrassing stop on the way , stealing the strength from the long muscles that think you should be using them to run the hell away. I swallowed a mouthful of fear, my eyes on the poisonously lovely faerie standing on the other side of my desk. It made Mab smile. To understand, at least in part. How does it feel, to know what you know, child?
Maybe she didn't get the reference. Or maybe she didn't like being compared to a thirtystory lizard. Or maybe she did like it. I mean, how should I know? I have enough trouble figuring out human women. I didn't meet Mab's eyes. I wasn't worried about a soulgaze any longer. Both parties had to have a soul for that to happen. But plenty of things can get to you if you make eye contact too long. It carries all sorts of emotions and metaphors.
I stared at Mab's chin, my hand burning with pain, and said nothing because I was afraid. I hate being afraid.
I hate it more than anything in the whole world. I hate being made to feel helpless. I hate being bullied, too, and Mab might as well have been ramming her fist down my throat and demanding my lunch money. The Faerie Queens were bad news. Big bad news. Short of calling up some hoary old god or squaring off against the White Council itself, I wasn't likely to run into anything else with as much raw power as Mab. I could have thrown a magical sucker punch at her, could have tried to take her out, but even if we'd been on even footing I doubt I would have ruffled her hair.
And she had a bond on me, a magical conduit. She could send just about anything right past my defenses, and there wouldn't be anything I could do about it. Bullies make me mad—and I've been known to do some foolish things when I'm angry. Get it over with and blast me. Lock the door on your way out.
She folded her arms and murmured, "Such anger. Such fire. I watched you stalemate your godmother the Leanansidhe autumn last. Few mortals ever have done as much. I admire that kind of strength, wizard.
I need that kind of strength. So do whatever you're going to do or get out of my office. I purchased your debt in order to make you an offer. To give you the chance to win free of your obligations. Save it. I'm not interested. As a meal. Do you not wish to be free? We go our separate ways? I adore freedom. Anyone who doesn't have it wants it.
I couldn't let either fear or anger do my thinking for me. My instincts screamed at me to go for the gun again and give it a shot, but I had to think. It was the only thing that could get you clear of the fae. Mab was on the level about her offer. I could feel that, sense it in a way so primal, so visceral, that there was no room left for doubt.
She would cut me loose if I agreed to her bargain. Of course, her price might be too high. She hadn't gotten to that yet. And the fae have a way of making sure that further bargains only get you in deeper, instead of into the clear.
Just like credit card companies, or those student loan people. Now there's evil for you. I could feel Mab watching me, Sylvester to my Tweetie Bird. That thought kind of cheered me up. Generally speaking, Tweetie kicks Sylvester's ass in the end. When you have fulfilled three requests, your obligation to me ceases. That's it? Any three requests? I mean, you say it like that, and I could pass you the salt three times and that would be that.
It was a simple bargain, as these things went. They could get really complicated, with contracts and everything. Mab had offered me a great package, sweet, neat, and tidy as a Halloween candy.
Which meant that I'd be an idiot not to check for razor blades and cyanide. You, not I, will choose which requests you fulfill. Or whistling up the lackeys to chastise or harass me by proxy. This remains between the two of us. Fool me twice, shame on me, wizard? Had I left her any openings? Could she get to me any other way?
Or less in pain. The events of the day and the impending Council meeting this evening hadn't exactly left my head in world-class negotiating condition.
But I knew one thing for certain. If I didn't get out from under Mab's bond, I would be dead, or worse than dead, in short order. Better to act and be mistaken than not to act and get casually crushed. My wounded hand twitched in an aching, painful pang. Mab closed her eyes, smiling a feline smile with those dark lips, and inclined her head.
Coyote's face, when he runs at full steam off the cliff and then realizes what he's done? He doesn't look down, but he feels around with one toe, and right then, right before he falls, his face becomes drawn with a primal dread. That's what I must have looked like. I know it was pretty much what I felt like.
But there was no help for it. Maybe if I didn't stop to check for the ground underneath my feet, I'd keep going indefinitely. I looked away from Mab and tried to tend to my hand as best I could. It still throbbed, and disinfecting the wound was going to hurt a lot more. I doubted it would need sutures. A small blessing, I guess.
A manila envelope hit my desk. Dead Beat by Jim Butcher. Small Favor by Jim Butcher. Changes by Jim Butcher.
Fool Moon by Jim Butcher. Backup by Jim Butcher. Summer Knight by Jim Butcher. Roc , ISBN : , p. Harry Dresden is a down - on - his - luck gumshoe in the classic hard - boiled mode. He solves crimes , makes wisecracks , but can't get his Skip to content Then when things are at their worst, the Winter Queen of Faerie saunters in with an offer Harry can't refuse.
Author : James A. Dresden furiously demands that Arianna return the kidnapped girl. In front of a thousand wizards, Dresden challenges Arianna to a single combat under the Code Duello. Being granted diplomatic immunity and safe passage, she refuses, and Dresden storms out, and runs into The Merlin, who does not believe Arianna's words of peace, and vows to exterminate the entire Red Court.
The Merlin wants the vampires to tip their hand, by attacking and exposing their vulnerabilities. If Dresden interferes with the This book provides detailed synopses for more than 1, works of fiction significantly set in Chicago and published between and The synopses include plot summaries, names of major characters, and an indication of physical settings.
An appendix provides bibliographical information for works dating from well into the 21st century, while a biographical section provides basic information about the authors. Hundreds of popular fantasy fiction titles are described and categorized according to their underlying features, including coming of age stories, Arthurian romances, breaking of curses, and barbarian warriors. But even a career of narrow escapes and supernatural shenanigans hasn't prepared Harry for this.
A vampire with a grudge has kidnapped his daughter. A daughter he never knew he had. Furthermore, this vampire plans to use her blood in a violent ritual sacrifice - designed to kill Harry, his ex-partner Susan and their child. As allies are perilously thin on the ground, Harry must find a new source of strength.
In the past, there had always been a line he wouldn't cross, and he's never given in to the full fury of his own untapped dark powers. But then, only his own life was at stake. Harry has always tried to keep his nose clean where the White Council of Wizards is concerned, but past misdeeds haven't gone down well. Which places him in an awkward position. Morgan, formerly his chief persecutor on the Council, has been wrongly accused of treason.
Facing the ultimate punishment, Morgan needs someone with a knack for backing the underdog, however much that someone isn't interested. Soon, Harry is working to clear the less-than-agreeable Morgan's name, hiding from the Council and bounty hunters alike and seeking the true turncoat.
A single mistake may mean that heads - quite literally - could roll. And one of them might be his. All new and original to this volume, the 21 stories in Dangerous Women include work by twelve New York Times bestsellers, and seven stories set in the authors' bestselling continuities-including a new "Outlander" story by Diana Gabaldon, a tale of Harry Dresden's world by Jim Butcher, a story from Lev Grossman set in the world of The Magicians, and a 35,word novella by George R.
Martin about the Dance of the Dragons, the vast civil war that tore Westeros apart nearly two centuries before the events of A Game of Thrones. Stirling, Sharon Kay Penman, and many others. Writes Gardner Dozois in his Introduction, "Here you'll find no hapless victims who stand by whimpering in dread while the male hero fights the monster or clashes swords with the villain, and if you want to tie these women to the railroad tracks, you'll find you have a real fight on your hands.
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