Archive of Our Own

I’d never much been interested in my soulmate. I know crazy concept, you’d think with my tendency for romance I’d be falling all over myself to find the one who was meant for me.

But soulmarks weren’t that simple. They were unlucky, not in rumour, but in statistics and rigorous scientific studies, though, perhaps more importantly to convince me, in personal anecdote.

My father never had a mark, he was alive, mom did and she wasn’t.

At six years old I’d concluded with absolute certainty people with marks died young. Believed them a hint to hurry up on the entire love thing because you didn’t have long to live.

But then my dad died as well, and I was busy trying to survive foster care and DuMorne to rethink my initial conclusion. There was one point, when me and Elaine were stupidly in love, when I’d wanted her mark. But that was before Justin showed his true colours, before ‘he who walked behind’ and the Leannsidhe.

After that I didn’t want it.

Didn’t want it and when it turned up, on the eve of my seventeenth, I was determined to ignore it, after all Elaine was dead.

Sure she’d betrayed me, but I’d killed her. Whoever the tiger, alert and on the prowl through a concrete jungle of a city scape, represented they’d be better off without me.

With time Eb talked me around from hating myself, but the hatred of my mark slipped past his notice. Hell it slipped passed mine as well, it’s a crazy thing about humans that we can remain completely unaware of our motivations yet act on them fine.

For example, when I moved to Chicago, the place I’d been born and had fond memories of living in with my father, I’d wander the streets looking at the skyline. To this day I don’t know whether I’d have run, those first few months, if I’d found the spot and angle in the city in which the skyline matched the tattoo.

I suspected I would have.

I’d continued checking the skyline unconsciously all through my series of odd Jobs while new to the city. But only stopped and noticed when Nick Christian, my private investigator mentor had called me on it.

It was at that point I couldn’t live in denial anymore. Self-knowledge is useful for the average person, but it is critical for a wizard. The night after Nick had brought it up, I’d retreated to my apartment for some self-reflection.

 My new apartment was the approximate size of a shoe box, but it was home. And more importantly on this brisk fall evening it had a fireplace, though I’d need to find a cheap source of rugs or carpet before winter proper hit. Already I could tell the bare concrete floors would be hell. I’d taken to wearing fluffy socks around a couple of weeks ago.

Slipping my feet into them I went to build a stack of wood in the fireplace. Unfortunately for me it didn’t take a long time to set the fire, I’d always had a talent for wielding it.

Staring into the crackling flames I forced myself to think.

I’d been comparing the skyline to my mark; I had been since I arrived. I’d come to that realisation even as I’d been talking to Nick. But why? My mind twisted trying to get out of thinking, of feeling the discomfort which had always accompanied the topic of soulmarks for me. I looked down at my mark, Shifting the thin metal wire which had been my first attempt at runic magic, a flimsy veil, hiding the mark from sight.

I say hiding, but I don’t think I managed more than a simple misdirect of attention. Hell’s bells considering the creatures out there, the amateur veil would be a declaration I had something to hide more than an actual disguise, and I knew it.

And yet I still wore it.

Oh I had other plans, a more advanced foci which would let me focus defensive magic more efficiently and allow for a more complicated and comprehensive veil embedment too. But I hadn’t made it yet. Magic takes knowledge effort and planning, and though I was working on it I wasn’t ready yet.

I thought about taking the bracelet off.

The mark wouldn’t be abnormal, sure only 5% of people, those with sufficient magical potential get a Soulmark sometime in their sixteenth year. But, in either a herd instinct to huddle for a chance to survive predators in the night, or a desire to not miss out, most Sixteen-year-olds got tattoos meant to imitate the mark.

I fingered the bracelet intending to take it off, but before the thought even finished, my heart sped up to that of a racehorse after its final lap.

I was scared.

But why? I was behind my threshold. Nothing was watching, it was perfectly safe and yet… it was for me, the veil, it let me ignore the mark. My mind without my permission moved to my stomach; it was time for dinner.

No, I told myself sternly, no skiving, I’m staying right here until I’d figured this out. I didn’t want to see my Soulmark, didn't want to be reminded of it.

Was it because of its grisly purpose?

See I was right, ten-year-old me was right, at least partially when he thought the soulmate mark was a curse.

Sometime around the scientific revolution, allegedly the obvious magic setting it back a few years. Drakul, Dracula’s dad, yes that Dracula, grew tired of spicey food. And by spicy, I mean a well-meaning minion occasionally captured a magic user. Mages as a rule like living and are, if not capable of outright killing the creatures of the night, at least able to give them mild indigestion.

The marks were the equivalent of a bee’s stripes, a warning to predators that this one could sting. Or at least it would be if the mark didn’t show up at sixteen alongside a claxon of magical energies. Most sixteen-year-olds were so new to any talent, it might as well be a dinner bell for every supernatural baddie who wanted to chow down on some inexperienced wizard before their teeth, or magic in this case, grew in.

There were devastating losses at the start, before the White council, a collection of the most powerful and knowledgeable magic users in the world got their collective asses into gear. They weren’t able to remove the mark, Dracul wasn’t stupid and had designed it, so such a goal was near impossible. Protecting its existence by twisting the killing mark with love and survival until it was impossible to target one without the other. Thus, you couldn’t remove the mark and leave the victim alive.

Needless to say, as the recipients of the marks the White Council didn’t go that route. Rather they focused on mitigating it. No monster, save perhaps the White Court, did a strip search before eating you, it was the energies which gave you away, and those could be dispersed. Spread out so rather than a claxon on your sixteenth, it was gentle windchimes spread over a year. The more power you had to hide the more spread out it had to be and the later your mark came in.

It was still more dangerous to be a young wizard than it had been before the curse, but it didn’t alert every nasty in fifty square miles either.

But I’d passed the danger age, I was a full wizard of the white council. No longer easy prey and I might not be able to kill whatever came looking, but I’d be the damned definition of spicy.

Sure the purpose of the Mark still disturbed me, but it wasn’t a reason for me to hate my mark.

I sighed, this had something to do with Elaine didn’t it.

It took me until my stomach was well and truly rumbling, to sort it out. I hated my mark because Elaine would never get one, never meet her someone.

“Damn it.”

I rubbed at my mark. This was hatred of myself appearing by another name, again. I didn’t manage to convince myself out of the hatred by the time I gave into my stomach, but I had come to an uneasy alliance. I wasn’t ready for a soulmate, not even close. I couldn’t continue to ignore it, not when it led me to doing things unconsciously, but I needed time.

Okay, simple answer then, delay. Any hint of my Soulmark and I’d go in the opposite direction. Not forever, but for now at least.

Over the next few years, I got my PI licence, struggled to make rent, struggled to get trust from SI and Karrin Murphy, and I struggled not to look at the skyline as it morphed with the passage of time. But I was doing better, I was doing good work, proving despite my past I could still be a good person. And I was content, at least until the Victor Sells case.

If there was ever an excuse for a lack of contentment, I felt seeing people’s hearts ripped out of their chest was certainly it. Not to mention the sinking certainty I’d be blamed.

But what really through me was the stuttering moment I left the hotel, intending to walk back to my office only to look up for a moment and find the skyline a perfect match for my mark.

Before I’d even caught my breath, I was hustled into the back of a car to undergo some subtle threats, less than subtle bribes and a damned obvious soulgaze with the head of the Chicago mob. A soulgaze with a man whose soul could only be described as a predator, specifically a tiger. A tiger in a concrete jungle, I rubbed my wrist raw, no way…no fricken way. Marcone couldn’t be my soulmate. What kind of monster got a crime king pin for a partner?

I consciously controlled my breathing, fighting off panic with the same will which allowed me to control the fundamental forces of the universe.

Don’t panic, there was no guarantee that Marcone was my soulmate. Yeah, that must be it, there was another tiger out there, one who was cute, fluffy and the kind of person I could stand.

And once I believed that, I had a bridge to sell myself at a really, very reasonable price. 

But I had been taught the ins and outs of the curse. Soulmates was actually a misnomer. After all it was intended to be a curse, the positives came about by necessity to make it hard to undo. To that end it was tied to life, both living and living. It was a hint towards both physical survival and a life full of things which make your soul light up, the things which make getting out of bed worth it. A compromise between living the longest and living the most.

Which, given the probability of me falling for John Marcone, didn’t say very complementary things about my survival chances. You know, if he was my soulmate, which he wasn’t.

And he wasn’t. No really, the mark was a sign based on, yes where you needed to go, but also where you were. At the risk of anthropomorphising magic, the spell knew I’d hate my mark, knew I wouldn’t willingly act on it, knew I’d never be happy on the gilded leash Marcone would offer. So rather than indicating my soulmarked, it was pointing me in the opposite direction.

Yeah that was it, my soulmarked was a cop or something, working in the gang unit to take down Marcone. Then, my distaste for my Soulmark would result in me falling headlong into their arms.

In other news, I’d recently discovered I was a long-lost Duke of Nigeria. See a Duke, that wasn’t anywhere close to something as unbelievable as a prince.

Either way it was a theory I could live with and cheerfully did. And If Susan became more attractive when she wrote an article decrying Gentleman Johnney’s business practices, that was something I kept to myself.

In the years I spent with Susan, my Soulmark was something I could forget, almost.

Sure, if I didn’t have the mark, perhaps I would have given in to his pressure tactics at the full moon garage. What can I say, Lycanthropes slavering to tear out your throat were very convincing. And perhaps later, I wouldn’t have turned around and tried to save him as desperately as I had.

Or perhaps, I would have done everything the same.

Loving Susan almost let me forgive my mark for not being Elaine’s. I was, for the first time, if not able to love it, at least like my mark, for pushing me towards giving her a chance.

But our relationship wasn’t perfect. There were times we argued, sanding off the rough edges of our relationship. But there were the worse moments, times when I felt cheap, felt as if Susan cared more for my supernatural connections than me. For all I was certain all relationships had times like that, in those moments I’d find myself hyperaware of the Mark. My mark which despite my wilful self-delusion I hadn’t shown to Susan.

I never felt as stupid for those delusions and ignoring the issues I had with our relationship as when she forged my invitation, dismissing my warnings. Despite that, I tried, I tried desperately to save her from my own foolish choice to trust. She wasn’t my soulmate, but I loved her, so I started a war.

 I was too late.

God dammit.

None of which endeared me to my mark. Could you hate a mark for misleading you, when you went in the opposite direction with full knowledge? I quickly discovered I could. But I could no longer justify going in the opposite direction.

I’d have to be alone.

But then something happened which broke my hatred of my mark, shattered it irreparably right down to the core.

Elaine was alive.

After all these years hating my mark, myself for her, she’d had one of her own. I hadn’t killed her too young to get one. In fact she’d got it several weeks before everything went down. Some of the coolness, which in retrospect I’d attributed to her betrayal, was due to her mark coming in.

She showed me hers in a gesture of trust, it was a sword so thin it could be a rapier crossed with a wizard staff and it wasn’t me. The staff was too thin for my preference, and I might be able to swing a sword, but I wasn’t great and it wasn’t part of my soul, particularly not one of those. For all it was thinner than Morgan’s it was still recognisably a Warden’s sword.

And it didn’t resonate; a Soulmark, a sign written on someone’s very skin pointing to you was personal. At the least it got your attention like someone calling your name in a crowd. I got nothing off hers.

And I never needed to be told the tiger wasn’t her, it never fit no matter how you distorted both.

After Elaine left, Murphy came around to interrogate me. Well interrogating wasn’t fair, she’d brought a pack of beer.

If there was one place, I never allowed my self-delusional lies about the mark to cloud my judgement it was in my relationship with Murphy. I knew from the moment I saw Marcone’s soul our relationship, no matter how little I wanted it, would complicate things for her.

 Which meant despite the lack of intention to ever so much as contact Marcone, I always felt a little guilty around Murphy. But I’d decided to trust her and that meant opening up no matter how little I liked it.

It took until our third beer, but the dreaded question did come up

“What about soulmarks”

I froze, and Murph’s eyes narrowed, poker face I do not have, but what I do have in plenitude are Smart arse comments.

“Why? You get a tattoo on your sixteenth?”

Murph winced.

“That bad?”

She stuck out her leg and pulled up her jeans, scrunching them beneath her knee. There, covering half her calf was a slightly faded but very clichéd rose entwined with barbed wire.

“I was sixteen and certain I’d be in love with my boyfriend forever.” Karrin said, jamming her jeans down to cover her shame.

 I chucked my head back and laughed.

“You?”

I shook my head, “au natural.” Pulling back my sleeve, shaking my shield bracelet back and out of the way, dissipating the small veil, and showing her the tiger. Murph hovered her fingers above the design until I nodded at her and she began tracing it, with light careful fingers.

“It’s so detailed.”

I nodded, my mark was barely the size of a post-it-note and yet in the black outlines of buildings there was enough detail a photo shrunken to that scale couldn’t compete. Detailed enough I was certain if you got a microscope, you’d be able to see even more. Real marks didn’t have to worry about practicalities of needles and ink. Hell I doubted the best tattoo artist in the world would be able to add the small tiger in at that scale, much less so skilfully as to get its nature, its power as a predator into its prowl.

“One of the best ways to tell a natural mark from a tattoo is the detail.” Murph said. “That and ink bleads and softens while marks never do.” She handed me back my wrist.

“I always wanted one, but Grandmama and everyone said they were bad luck.”

I shook my head to answer her unasked question, then changed my mind and nodded. “Marks only come in for practitioners—”

“Great Aunt Alice wasn’t a wizard.”

“Not a Wizard but she had power. Probably not much, hell she might not have even known. Most people with power don’t get flashy stuff. It might be as little as being a good judge of character or being excellent at predicting the weather.”

“She didn’t do any of that.”

“It’s just an example, it could be anything, a quirk or a knack. Do you know how long after her sixteenth birthday the mark came in?”

“It was the next day. Does it make a difference?”

“It means she had next to no power, the mitigation spell tries to spread out the energies as wide as possible, but there is a minimum level. The next day means that minimum level was reached after splitting her potential in two.”

Murph thought about that, taking a swig of her beer.

“I’m going to circle back to my questions on the subject—” of course there were questions. Soulmarks were the one place in which magic was clear for all to see. Questions bubbled up whenever someone turned on the answers. “—but for now, what’s with the guilt?”

I attempted to widen my eyes and look innocent. Murph raised an eyebrow and I cracked. Perhaps that was why I was meant to be John’s soulmate, an easy target for police interrogation.

“I know who my Mark refers to.”

Murph let the silence hang.

“Look it’s not exactly someone I approve of. Not someone I agree with, and not someone I’ll ever be with.”

Murph watched me, her eyes flicking to the mark still visible on my wrist, but she let it drop.

And it stayed dropped, at least until a year later when I wanted her help with a scourge of Black Court vampires.

“No, Dresden I’m not breaking the law with you.”

“Murph these things will already have a body count. The police aren’t going to find them, even SI aren’t going to be able to deal with them.”

“And what if I’m seen? Seen near a building which might explode? I’d lose my Job, everything I’ve worked towards, the people I’ve put away.”

I snorted, which I tried to cover up as a sneeze when I saw Murph’s face.

Not that it worked, “don’t kill me Murph but most of your collars dissolved into ectoplasm.”

“But not all of them, and I don’t want them out on the street.”

I closed my eyes and breathed in.

“What am I meant to do?” I couldn’t face them on my own, not with the near certain chance of them having a living larder. Sure I had an idea of who else to call in, but I didn’t trust Kincade, and without Murphy watching my back? I wasn’t sure I was willing to risk him. Not to mention I doubted the Hell hound came cheap.

Murph opened her mouth to reply but cocked her head to the side.

“Ask Marcone.”

I flinched, my left hand, the one with the mark, almost withdrawing from the table completely before I managed to stop it.

“Marcone, why would I ask him?” My voice rose in pitch, far higher than was dignified.

Murph looked pointedly at my wrist, letting me know with absolute clarity that she knew who my mark referred to. Which, if I had any denial left, would have blown it away. Hell’s Bells it was so obvious Murph had figured it out.

Murphy gave me a tight smile, “to start there will be several people in the area paying for his protection.”

It said something about how extensive Gentleman Johnny’s reach was, when she could say that, and be right, without knowing where the vamps were held up.

“Yeah, but those protection rackets don’t include Black court.” I made finger quotes around ‘protection’.

“No but most protection rackets aren’t run by John Marcone either. He takes that shit seriously, particularly if they’ve taken kids. Something about how people under sufficient stress don’t make good business decisions, which cuts into profit.”

I winced but nodded.

“But he’s…”

“A criminal? I hate to break it to you, but anyone involved in this will be.”

“Yeah but—”

Karrin held out a hand, “there’s no other choice? And it’s the right thing.”

I saw the pain in her eyes as she admitted the law which she had dedicated to protecting the innocents of Chicago might not be sufficient in this case.

I groaned and sat back, “He’s going to try and sliver in and take my soul.” Sure he’d do it, but he wouldn’t be the boss of Chicago unless he took every opportunity as two.

Murph smiled, looking pointedly at my wrist, “isn’t that sort of already the case.”

I pounded my head back into the seat, but sighed, resigning myself to it.

Finding Marcone ended up being easier than I expected, saying my name the key to getting passed up the chain, in short order I was directed to the madison hotel.

It was a quick trip in the blue beetle, but I had to circle the block a few times to find parking. The area in front of the Madison was blocked off for construction, temporary walking paths encroaching onto the shoulder of the road outlined with cones. The usual footpath blocked off by plywood walls covered in advertisements for what the space was intended to look like in a few years when the construction was due to finish. It was going to be turned into an office block with shop space for rent on the lowest levels.

It unnerved me, I’d expected the building I’d attended a murder scene in several years prior. The Hotel with the horrific murder a backdrop to the slightly less horrific truth of who my mark pointed to. I’d, stupidly perhaps, expected it preserved in reality the same way it was in my memory. But worse than being unnerved was the fact it unnerved me at all.

I didn’t care about my soulmarked, I was ignoring it, ignoring him.

Speaking of he who should not be thought about, I hadn’t expected him to invite me to a construction site. That plus instantly being handed up the chain was too much special treatment for me to be comfortable.

I took a breath and found the section of plywood which doubled as a gate, lifting it up enough to push it open from where it sagged on its temporary hinges.

The jobsite was abandoned, nail guns, drills, and circular saws littered the jobsite, placed down next to half finished work. It wasn’t so careless as for me to believe they’d been abducted, no it was more like every worker decided to pack up for lunch, fast, at the exact same moment. Lunch at eleven o’clock in the morning.

Which left the question had they cleared out for Marcone’s visit or mine.

I worried for a moment I wouldn’t know where to go, it wasn’t like I could search every floor for him and his hulking guard dog. But I needn’t have worried as a moment later the familiar and intimidating form of Hendricks appeared nodding towards the door he’s stepped out of.

Inside I found Marcone and Gard. John was perched on the edge of a plastic folding table, a half-finished pot of coffee and several mugs on it, while Gard hovered at the side of the room.

“Mr Dresden, to what do I owe this pleasure?” Marcone’s smile was wicked sharp.

“Pleasure’s all yours,” I said. But as much as I enjoyed needling Marcone I should be on my best behaviour, “so did you clear out this place to give me concrete shoes without witnesses?”

Marcone’s smile grew wider, I would have loved to say it was a shark’s smile. But it wasn’t, it was pleasant, highlighting laughter lines around his eyes. “If you want to be seen with me, all you have to do is ask.”

I scowled.

“But in this particular instance I was more concerned about what a power saw would do in your presence.”

“Yes, weaselling out of paying workmen’s comp would take too much time out of your busy schedule.”

A shutter fell over his eyes, the sparkling humour fading to nothing in half a second, now I could see the predator which his smile had hidden before.

I gulped, waving a hand, trying to move on, Marcone looked after his people, criminals to construction workers and he did not appreciate me implying otherwise.

“For your information, things go wrong in the most likely way, tripped fuses and burnt-out motors, not final destination gore fests. It’s not like I set every building I walk into on fire.”

Marcone raised an eyebrow.

“Acci… accidentally,” I said, stumbling halfway through as I realised what I was admitting to, but it was too late to reverse course so I pushed through.

Marcone’s smirk reappeared.

I looked down reaching for a witty come back but the best I could do was a Buffy miss quote, “I did. I really did, but... but you're not seeing the big picture here. I mean that brothel was full of vampi... Uh, asbestos.”

“I can assure you all my properties have excellent asbestos management plans, including this one.”

I blinked at the non sequitur, unless? I snorted, “a brothel, really?”

“Well someone so thoughtfully opened up the market. I hear my previous competition wasn’t complying with asbestos regulations.” His smile dripped with satisfaction in a way which boiled my blood.

I wanted to scream; I hadn’t done it for him. I’d been hurt, lost Susan, started a war. For him to take it as an opportunity? I wanted to slam doors and light something up on the way out. But I took a breath, Murph had already refused and I didn’t want to see what a mercenary of Kincade’s calibre would cost. So instead I took a breath.

“So how about it, you want to go on an asbestos removal raid.”

John cocked his head, “I thought you ran all the Vampires out of town.”

“Yeah, but the black court moved back in, and their infestations become blood baths sooner or later.”

“Black court…”

Gard stepped forward, “Pretty much Bram stokers Dracula, the Wizard is right, unless eradicated early, the nest will quickly become an issue for all Chicago.”

Marcone tapped his fingers on the desk, “why not simply handle them yourself?”

“One Mavra is old, old enough to have survived the Dracula craze, which means she’s powerful and worse smart. Two she has magical power, and not a small amount or in a specialised area.”

“You mean she’s a Wizard.” Gard said.

 I nodded in confirmation, at the very least she was one hell of a sorcerer.

“I’ve got someone coming into town who’s capable of locking her down. But I don’t want to deal with her, anyone she’s turned, Renfields, and thralls all while getting out anyone she’s got in the larder.”

“She’ll have hostages?”

I nodded; sure, I didn’t know she did, but human shields were a good bet. Wizards were pretty good at the whole sale destruction lark, forcing them to be precise for fear of collateral was good strategy.

“My wheel man is getting into town tomorrow, and I should have their location by then.”

“How many people?”

“Black court are tough, unless they’ve been inducted into the supernatural the hard way, they’ll be more trouble than they are worth.”

“How many?”

I decided not to question if Marcone had heard and understood me. John didn’t miss things like that and he’d take my advice seriously.

“At least two heavily armed but the more the merrier.”

“And payment?” John said.

“For helping get rid of a problem which will be yours soon enough?” I wasn’t paying him squat.

John smirked, “So your normal rates then?”

“I…arg…” I spluttered, “I’m not working for you John, ever.”

“You sure? our employee packages are quite generous.”

I rolled my eyes, Marcone was playing with me, he knew I would never consent to working for him. With him on the other hand well… desperate times made for strange bedfellows and all.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” I spun to leave but looked back over my shoulder, “and keep your dirty money to yourself.”

The raid both went well and didn’t, on the downside I’d nearly lost my hand. On the plus side we’d squished the Black court infestation thoroughly, even if we’d missed Mavra herself. Marcone took my restrictions to heart and had both found and shelled out for Kincade himself, introducing him as the foremost expert on killing black court.

Given Kincade, Gard, John and Hendricks I almost felt bad for bringing in Ebenezer. Particularly after the fight with Kincade, revealing my mentor was keeping secrets from me. If I’d known the whole of it and hadn’t been concerned about looking weak in front of John and Kincade I might’ve delayed a day, going into a fight without your head screwed on and your feet planted was a bad idea for anyone but particularly a wizard.

My faith took a hit, particularly when he explained his role as Blackstaff in full after the raid.

See Ebenezer took me in when I was hurting, when I’d only had Justin and the Leannsidhe as role models. He’d shown me, not how to use magic, but why to use it. To learn he was effectively another Morgan, a man with the authority to kill me if I stepped a toe out of line. Knowing that? It broke something fundamental in my self-knowledge.

But if I wanted to live I couldn’t let it, nor my newly crisped hand stop me, I still had senior Raith to take out tonight.

Fortunately, Marcone’s medic, the one he’d insisted on, seemed to be used to patching people up well enough to go back into the fray. And it could have been worse, much, much worse. If Marcone hadn’t thought himself funny and brought along a firefighting kit, a kit which included a reflective fire blanket. If he hadn’t thrown it over my arm, protecting it from the worst of the heat, as my shield held back the flame thrower. If he hadn’t held it there, scorching his own hands alongside mine, I would have lost my hand if not our lives.

My teeth clenched in effort to be polite as I endured the treatment. It was a near instinctual thing to protest both the medical care and giving Marcone credit, I think it was my fairy godmother, but I hated to be in debt. And though I was fairly sure John wouldn’t hold that debt over me, considering medical aid part of being on my team tonight, it itched.

At least Marcone didn’t try to keep me longer than necessary and I was able to ditch him and pull in Murphy for the Raith fight, which made me at least a little happy. Better yet my brother, Murphy and I all survived the night and though my hand was a little worse for wear, it was going to recover.

Thomas was kicked out of the white court, though he’d squirrelled away at least enough money from the white court over the years to buy the old boarding house my cramped little apartment was in. It was half so he could move in and we could get to know each other as brothers and half, the annoyingly accurate reasoning, that an enemy was inevitably going to come after me in my home and having neighbours who were unable to run and didn’t have wards was risky.

So we moved in together, all be it floors apart and thank God for that. The number of joggers going in and out of the house at all hours of the night was more than enough information on my brother’s sex life for me.

But the best part of winning and cleaning up the entire mess was I didn’t have a reason to see John Marcone for the foreseeable future. Which made it just my luck my third day back at the office had him striding in the door.

“No.”

Marcone smirked and came inside. “And after I made certain to roll out the welcome mat at my place of work.”

“I didn’t ask for that, and I don’t work for you.”

Marcone spread his hands, “I’m not asking for me.”

I sighed, unfortunately Marcone was the sort of person who heard about all sorts of problems I, as resident crazy person who thinks they’re a wizard, didn’t. A supernatural problem had reached his ears, and if I could help I would. Because even the worst of Marcone’s people were fundamentally just that, people.

“Can’t Gard help?”

“Apparently it’s a mortal matter,” John said, a bite of bitterness in his voice, well-hidden but he was mad Gard wouldn’t help.

“Fine, what is it?” I said, giving in, knowing I’d regret it even as I did.

John smiled, full on genuine, crinkles at the corners of his mouth, smiled and despite my best intentions I couldn’t help but notice how good he looked. Damn he had to be a good ten years my senior but with that smile and the salt and pepper hair which would be at home on a movie star, he looked good in a way even my mostly straight arse noticed.

“One of my employee’s children recently turned sixteen and came into a Soulmark.”

“And you want to know what truth there is to the unluckiness.”

“Statistics can tell me that, I want to know how to avoid it. I don’t like children getting hurt.”

“How long after his birthday did the mark show up?”

“Three days, from my understanding that makes his power negligible, but he’ll have a knack or two.”

I nodded. “Your intel is good.”

John cocked his head at me, a question poised, glinting there, paused in a crouch waiting to pounce on the poor trapped mouse.

“Just ask,” I rolled my eyes to hide my nerves from myself as much as anyone else. I was not a mouse, John couldn’t pounce on me.

“When did yours show up?”

“Eve of my seventeenth.”

“Ahh that would make you…”

“In terms of brute power, once I’ve fully come into it, I’ll be one of the strongest wizards alive.”

John’s eyes sparkled.

“I’m not working for you, get that look out of your eyes. Besides raw power gets thrashed by experience, finesse and brains.”

“All of which you are sadly lacking in.”

Oh what a bastard.

“Anyway, third day talent is noticeable but nothing useful. Without instruction they’d likely live their entire life in the dark. In short they’re a nice snack and bragging rights to a creature of the NeverNever but nothing elsewise to be interested in. The most important thing is to keep their mouth shut. As long as the fact it isn’t a true mark doesn’t come out, they should be fine.”

I eyed John. Poised to know about problems or not, the head of the Mob was hardly someone you brought concerns to. If he was here talking about it, people already knew, it would get out.

“Hell’s bells, they’re the biggest gossip in the place, aren’t they?”

John nodded, “Mrs Venter, his mother, is hardly known to keep her mouth shut, Jacob on the other hand isn’t liable to talk.”

“Do they own their own home?”

“I believe they rent.” Damn if they had a threshold it’d be limited.

“They’re happy?”

“Jacob’s father died, and there is some tension between them. Mrs Venter is a single mother who’s made some difficult decisions—”

“—And Jacob is a sixteen-year-old boy, but…”

“Love stands behind their disagreements.” John smiled, “Even if Jacob rather disapproves of his mother’s chosen employer.”

“Where do they live?”

John stood up.

“Ahh no, I’m not going with you.”

“You want me to tell them to let a strange man, they’ve never met before, past their threshold?”

Snarling I stood grabbing my duster and my staff, I stalked over to one of my filing cabinets, the cheap metal door rattling as I jammed it open, reaching in I pulled out a bracelet made of knotted blue embroidery floss, with small rune etched beads threaded through. It wasn’t pretty and in terms of function it wasn’t as good as my awful veil on my shield bracelet. But it was something, a notice me not spell as subtle and long lasting as I could make it. It was better than nothing and the physical materials and labour were cheap enough I could, and did, give them away like candy

I slammed the draw shut and stalked to the door, waiting for Marcone to follow before locking up and heading to the stairs.

I couldn’t help the smirk as Marcone glanced towards the elevator. The technology issues those elevators had weren’t my fault, that was my story and I was sticking to it, sure the giant scorpion was chasing me when it smashed, but I hardly wanted to be running for my life.

John didn’t say anything though, following me down the stairs without complaint, then taking the lead, guiding me to the large idling black sedan. Unsurprisingly Hendricks was inside, but Gard was missing.

The car pulled away from the curb with a purr.

“So Gard doesn’t help with mortal matters?”

“Her contract is…” Marcone tapped his fingers against his thigh, “complicated and somewhat limiting. She provides priceless advice but only in certain areas.”

“And this is one of the area’s she won’t help in?”

John shrugged, “It’s only tangentially related to my interests, therefore MONOC securities has less than no interest.”

 “Tangentially, it’s one of your people’s kids.” Gentleman Johnny didn’t let kids or his people get hurt. I figured the kids of his people were double protected.

“A mortal hang up.” It was subtle but there was real venom in the sentence. “I intend to renegotiate, but that has yet to come to fruition.”

And Gard wasn’t here now because John had dismissed her from service until the glaring hole in the contract had been rectified. Risking his own wellbeing to make a point to MONOC securities, his people and their families were John Marcone’s business to the core.

I closed my eyes and considered using percussive maintenance on my head in hope to reestablish sense, John was a criminal bastard with no redeemable qualities. But no matter how I tried, his fierce defence of Amanda, kids and his people swam in front of my vision. Not to mention the time he’d used a priceless artifact to pull me out of a river, or a few weeks ago with his hands blistering in front of my eyes, holding steady, despite what had to be agony, to save my hand.

Perhaps I’d never love him, but he was certainly fulfilling the keeping me alive part of being my soulmarked.

“Is the White Court Vampire your soulmate?”

My eyes flashed open and I struggled to breathe through the startled coughing. I couldn’t afford to give too much away. John’s green eyes were sharp, and he wasn’t even trying to hide his staring, openly analysing my response.

“I’m sorry what?” My voice squeaked.

“The Vampire who brought your building, is he your soulmate?”

“Hell’s Bells no! Why would you even think that?”  He was my brother! Not to mention the brutal cruelty of giving white court vampires, for whom love was a poison, soulmarks.

“Why would I wonder if you had a reason for trusting a vampire, who you’ve just met, enough for him to own your building?”

“I haven’t just met Thomas; he’s saved my life a few times.”

“So have I, yet I doubt you’d have taken it as well from me.”

“You run the mob…do I have to stick allegedly on the end for legal reasons?”

“And Thomas eats souls…allegedly.”

“Oh fuck you, and what can I say I like his soul better than yours.”

“You soulgazed him.” John said like it answered all his questions.

Soulgazes let you see the truth of someone, to the core of their personality, down to what makes them tick. Wizards can get that info and more for the low low price of looking someone in the eyes for too long. Warning, it might drive you insane.

A wonder why I didn’t use it all the time.

“From what I understand,” John said hesitantly as if checking I was in an answering mood. Apparently, I was giving cooperative vibes because he continued, “each wizard experiences soulgazes differently.”

“Each person,” I corrected without thinking whether I wanted to be cooperative or not. But I loved magic, someone being wrong about the technicalities ground my gears like Klingons in Star Wars does to a nerd. I resigned myself to cooperating and continued my thought. “You wouldn’t see the same thing as Thomas did. it only really resonates with you. Someone deeply affected by music might get a song, other’s might see a painting, a sculpture, or a poem. I know of one wizard who sees people as architecture. Same logic as a Soulmark, it’ll only make sense to you.”

“And not immediately.”

“Often not, the more you understand either the person or how soulgazes work for you the closer your initial assessment will be, but often it’ll still take a lifetime to figure it out.”

“And soulmarks?”

“they’re easier, they’re meant to be markers pointing you on the path. Not much sense in that if they’re too mysterious.”

“They’re not representations of a person’s soul?”

That was the pop culture version of soulmate marks. That the tattoo encompassed the soul of the person you were bound to, or perhaps the potential nature of your relationship. A thorny rose meant a complicated love.

“you’ve been in a soulgaze, already metaphor and layers are doing heavy lifting to compress the complexity of a human soul, can you really expect to contain that in a static picture?” I shook my head, “They’re signs pointing out the path, if they’re ambiguous it’s because confusion is the shortest route. But chances are if you think it refers to someone it does.”

“And they always reciprocate?”

I paused thinking, “Not a clue. Often people are paired to those without talent.”

“Therefore without marks.”

I nodded “But fundamentally its aimed at getting you happy. It’s hard to be truly happy when you’re in love with someone who isn’t interested.”

“Aimed?”

“People are complicated,” I shrugged. “Free will is still a thing. And, I hate to crush what’s left of your romanticism—”

“What’s left of my romanticism has been through worse than whatever you can throw.”

“A true romantic as a teen were you, John?”

“Alas I was beat down by the cruel, cruel, world.” His voice was utterly flat, but his eyes sparkled with humour

I glared at him, “Well here’s another blow Johnny, truth is there are hundreds, if not thousands of people who you’re utterly capable of loving completely. Soulmark’s are a maximisation of Schrodinger’s cat kind of situation.”

“Allowing for interpretation of your unique turn of phrase, the mark wants you the most in love—”

“—The most alive, soul lit up, living each day to the max alive, balanced with keeping you physically alive for as long as possible. Love is a common by product but not the point.”

Marcone blinked. That actually surprised him, but he moved on. ”and by Schrodinger I assume you mean the act of observing the mark might change it?”

“Say I get a picture of a moose, so I move to Canada and have different life experiences.”

“You become a different person.”

“Exactly, therefore I’d need a different soulmate and a different mark.”

“And because you don’t have a moose, you never move to Canada, a paradox.”

“An iterative one, with finite possibilities. I’ve been reliably informed by people who have more math than my GED such equations are solvable or at least have a maximum.”

“And there are only so many people in the world who you’d be happy with.”

“And only so many paths which you would take. You might be willing to move to Canada on a soulmark’s say so, but what about someplace you don’t speak the language? Or perhaps someplace war torn? It depends on the person but there are practical limits to what someone will do.”

“So it selects from the options the one with the best results.”

“Maximised life” I said.

 “And the Soulmark changing your actions becomes an asset, widening the number of people you meet, the opportunities open to you. So if there were unreciprocated marks out there a happy ending is still a possibility.”

“Mooning forever isn’t the goal,” I confirmed. “If you’re not a romantic, why are you asking all these questions?”

“I find it hard to believe I’m the first to interrogate you. Someone with actual answers on a subject which has been thwarting our best philosophers for centuries.”

I rolled my eyes, “not even close to it.”

Marcone shrugged, “then is curiosity such an unbelievable answer?”

I had an awful thought.

 “You don’t have a mark right? You are just a vanilla mortal.”  Perhaps his aim was a little superhuman, I hadn’t sensed anything from him, but I could have missed a small enough talent.

The thing was, all my complicated feelings about my mark were all fine and good if they were only hurting me. If Marcone knew I was his soulmarked and yet I was ignoring him, well, that could hurt even a man who’d taken his heart out back and shot it. And for all I didn’t like what Marcone did, such an act would be cruel and reflect on me, not him. The basic respect due a fellow human didn’t change no matter the scumbuggery involved. People often forgot that, allowing themselves to match despicability’s with monsters.

I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get over my issues, but he at least deserved a conversation about it.

“No,” Marcone’s eyes narrowed and I was reminded forcefully of why it was a bad idea to let this man see weakness. Alarms blared in my head, all hands to battle stations, Marcone was going to ask a question I didn’t want him to. Come on communications officer Smart mouth you’ve never let me down before.

“What? can’t I be concerned? You’re scary enough without a lick of magic. If you’d somehow concealed a talent all this time, I’d worry about you taking over the world.” I hid my wince, great job officer smart mouth, admit to being intimidated to a predator, great going.

“Oh the world would be far too much work Mr Dresden.”

“Oh I don’t know,” I shrugged, “I reckon you could do it.”

That’s right, ignore the fact I said you scared me, focus on the bickering.

“hmmm, do I scare you Mr Dresden.” His smile could give crocodiles lessons

Damn it all.

“I would like to take this moment to point out my Godmother is the Leannsidhe and I’ve been regularly harassed my adult life by a man who would absolutely kill me given half a chance. I’d love to say next to that, you don’t even rate but in the spirit of honesty…”

“Please,” he, I kid you not, purred. And despite my best efforts to ignore it, my pants were definitely tighter than they had been. No bad libido, you don’t want that voice whispering in your ear while you roll around in a bed together.

I’m not sure my libido and I agreed, so I imagined taking my staff and rapping the stupid thing over the head, turning my attention to answering.

“Yes you fuckin terrify me.” I glared at him, “and I regularly poke things which terrify me with sticks and light them on fire. So back the hell off.”

To John’s credit he backed the hell off, the tiger packed back into the businessman. My libido pouted but the rest of me was ecstatic.

Which was how my suspicion that my libido was planning to kill me became a certainty. I mean after it insisted Mab and Lara were a great idea I’d had my suspicions but Marcone too? well that was conformation.

A small voice in the back of my head whispered the second purpose of the soulmark was to keep a person alive. I pointed right back animals on leads or in a zoo were a hell of a lot safer than wild ones. So unless I wanted to don a collar it needed to shut the hell up.

“So why are you curious?” Not the smoothest segway, but the quiet was getting to me,

“Why am I curios about the one phenomenon which holds out against scientific curiosity? And effects, at least tangentially, the entire human population?”

I rolled my eyes, “Thanks I got that, but Gard is meant to inform you on the supernatural, I don’t doubt she’s given you the low down.”

“Again her contract is complicated, given its limits spending it on curiosity is a waste.”

I snorted, “it’s not something like three comprehensive answers a week is it?”

John smiled, “Miss Gard is primarily a bodyguard against supernatural threats, and to that end, she believes a good defence is for me to be fully informed, so I can make good decisions.”

“And given you don’t have a Soulmark it’s not even theoretically relevant.”

John inclined his head, “Sigrun herself is inclined to answer curiosity and share her knowledge, but she’s been remarkably tight lipped on the subject of Soulmates.”

MONOC probably had an agreement with the white council to keep the information on the down low.

“You know why.”

“Why might people not want to piss off mortal magic users by spreading word on how to both identify young defenceless members and how to judge their power levels? All that means is MONOC securities aren’t total arseholes.”

“I would never…”

“Not while they’re kids no, but you’re telling me you’re not putting weather they have a natural soul mark and how late into the year they got it into your hiring questionnaire.”

John waved a hand, “Most people lie on those things, 5% of the population get a natural soulmark and yet over 50% say that they do. And most of those with natural ones don’t admit to it. The knowledge they’re unlucky is too widely believed.”

“It’s already in the questionnaire.” I snorted. “it’s the kind of thing you wish for when the consequences aren’t hanging over your head anymore.”

The year people at school were due to turn sixteen had this odd air about it, as teens in the mix of hormones, decided whether or not to get fake marks. Talking to their friends about their options in hushed whispers. But it was all overhung with a fearful excitement, would they be one of the unlucky ones who was destined to either die young or love fiercely, or would it pass them by. And even though you were most likely to get it in the first few days of your sixteenth year, the potential lingered unbearably long.

“When did you know your mark would come in?” John asked.

I glared at him and he raised his hands in surrender. “I’m curious.”

“You know what they say about cats and curiosity.”

“It tends to get them set on fire?”

“or poked with a stick, I’m not fussy”

John smirked, but anything he might have said in return was cut off by Hendricks pulling over to let us out in front of a block of apartments.

This time John didn’t even bother to look at the elevators leading us up the stairs without comment. Five floors up I was reconsidering my stance on elevators, generally speaking the actual mechanical bits were located far away from the box itself. As long as I wasn’t stressed it was fine.

 My libido recovered from being clubbed over the head and hadn’t reconsidered its stance on the ethics of lusting after mob bosses. I’d been a few steps behind the entire way, far enough behind his well fitted slacks showed off one hell of an arse and thighs, and despite my will my eyes were inclined to wander.

No bad libido he was going to notice. I used my long legs to miss a few steps and draw level with John, focusing on my burning legs for the remainder of the climb.

The apartment door itself was the cheapest hollow core door they could find. Only differentiated from an internal one by the peep hole and safety chain which gave more of an illusion of safety than any actual protection.

Marcone knocked on the cheap wood, though calling it wood was a complement beyond what it deserved, but it had probably seen a tree once. There was shuffling on the other side, the door pulling open as far as the chain allowed.

The young black man on the other side scowl was a thing of beauty which made my day. More people should scowl at Marcone like that.

“What do you want?” My smile widened, I liked this kid.

“Jacob, is your mother home?”

“No, who’s he?” He jerked his chin in my direction.

“A likeminded conscientious objector to the presence of John Marcone.” I said sticking out my hand, “Harry Dresden.”

“You’re the nut who advertises as a Wizard right?”

“Because Magic is so totally not real, why there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for Soulmarks.”

That was pretty much a got you for those who doubted magic. “Father Smith said it was God, giving love to those who were destined to die young.”

“And the Hindu’s say it’s a sign of true devotion to a partner in a past life. There are a thousand different explanations, most a mix of a curse and a blessing, but boiling down to we don’t know, but we’re meant to, so here’s a bullshit explanation.”

Jacob snorted. “Doesn’t matter, I know my Mom’s been freaking out about it, but I lied to her. I went down to the shops with friends, and then she didn’t approve so…” he shrugged

I froze, that was my exact advice down to the letter. Which meant either some well-meaning individual had beaten me to the punch, which was way too good to be true, or option two. We were too late, something already tagged him and it didn’t want anyone else to interfere with whatever games they intended to play.

And games meant faeries.

“Who gave you that line?” Marcone asked.

“It’s not a line, it’s the truth.”

“Are they in there with you?” I hissed.

Jacob was ripped back from the door, even as Marcone kicked the door off its security chain and reached inside his jacket drawing a gun free.

I pulled my blasting rod from its leather strap inside my duster. Not that I could do much, sure the apartment was a rental, but it was still a home, the threshold would seriously hamper my power. I’d be able to get some passed but not a lot. Not enough to deal with the creature inside, revealed by the newly smashed open door. Particularly not when it held Jacob by the neck covering its body with the boy.

The creature itself looked human, almost. It had the perfect inhumane beauty, the lithe grace and flawless skin which left him one of the ageless sidhe. The one detail which didn’t fit was a somewhat tattered red baseball cap, browning at the corners. I gulped, I tried not to be an expert but those colours together…no way it wasn’t blood.

“What are you doing man?” Jacob stuttered.

“Wizard,” the redcap said.

“Redcap, let the kid go and this doesn’t have to get messy.”

“Invite me in,” I said.

“Don’t, only vampires need invitations.”

“Anyone with power does,” I said, “he waited for one didn’t he.”  Strictly speaking faeries could enter uninvited if their intentions were benign, but threatening a kid’s life was anything but. And he’d brought props to get invited inside, beside the couch further back in the room there was a tattoo gun and binder filled with the artwork of a truly talented individual.

“You were planning on a cover up?” I said. It was said if you defaced the mark the bad luck would pass you by. It wasn’t effective or at least not more so than going to get a tattoo was. Still it was proactive, he’d realised he couldn’t keep his Mom quiet and took the best steps he knew to keep himself safe.

So that was this creature’s game, he might be sidhe, but he wasn’t one of the powerful ones. The powerful ones would be able to enchant the blood on the cap fresh. So rather than relying on power he got smart and waited, waited for those scared kids who wanted a coverup, and reassured them. Spoke to them, validating their fears, in a way that adults often forgot for their own worry when dealing with the issue. And when he had their trust and learnt they didn’t have the power to be a true threat, he’d offer a home visit, pouncing once past the threshold and afforded privacy.

The redcap got the glory, the power, and influence from killing practitioners, never mind they were scared kids with little more power than the majority of humanity. It was a coward’s method, lazy, but doubtless effective.

Nausea roiled through me, I wanted to ask how many, how many children this monster had killed. But if I did, whatever that number was would be plus one. Jacob was still alive I had to focus on that.

And to do that I had to keep the creature on me, John was the one who could get past the threshold, in fact he’d already done so, crossing his feet over one another as he walked around the edge of the room, a shuffle which allowed his gun to remain trained on the faerie as he edged around the room , either going for a clear shot or the cast iron skillet hanging in the small kitchenette.  Either way he was forcing the redcap to split its focus or choose who to pay attention to, which made it my job to make him pick wrong.

“So Jacob, I dropped out during my sixteenth year at school, but I remembered it was pretty tense. Have they figured out better strategies yet.”

“Ahhh…” Jacob looked, or tried to look, twisting his eyes in his sockets at the man who held his neck hostage, the faeries sharper than average canines flashed. “N…not really man, like you said no one knows shit, but they’re all pretending to.”

I smiled, more sharp edges and teeth than anything remotely reassuring, but it was the best I could do. I made a carry on gesture to Jacob, forcing my eyes away from Marcone. But there was little need, the redcap was ignoring Marcone completely. Which was not good, this plan was smart, ignoring an armed John Marcone was anything but, which hinted at another player, and I hated dealing with intelligent ones.

“Ahh…” Jacob said, “You got one?”

I nodded, “came in on the eve of my seventeenth.” I stared down the redcap as I said it. He was smart enough to flinch.

“That’s right big guy, I’m the kind of powerful that makes Mab sit up and take notice. You might be behind a threshold right now—” John made it into my field of vision, skillet raised. “—but the second you’re not...” I let the threat hang keeping his attention utterly focused on me.

Three things happened simultaneously, one Jacob’s eyes flew wide his mouth opening to invite me inside, two the redcap realised leaving Jacob free to do so wasn’t the smartest idea and three John swung the frying pan.

The blow tore the redcap away from Jacob, its skin hissing, burning with a green flame. I released the spell I’d been holding at the ready with a whispered word, a small sun burst forward zipping toward the redcap’s restraining hand. Sure technically speaking Jacob hadn’t finished inviting me in, but the intent was there, strong enough the threshold parted to allow my spell through.

Just in time too, John’s hit with cold iron was more than enough to end the fight but the clawed fingers were still far too close to the boy’s neck to be safe. Added to that the last command the fairy had given was to tighten his grip enough to stop the boy speaking. It could have been bad if it weren’t for my spell, the ball of light zipping straight through the muscle, bones, and sinew of the creature, leaving nothing but dead flesh to slip harmlessly from the kid’s throat.

Fights can change fast but it took no more than a second for us to go from the losing side to victory. Or I would say that, but I’ve been burned celebrating pre-emptively before. John Marcone either wasn’t as stupid as I was, or had learnt the same lesson, staying on guard, out of limb reach pan raised.

Jacob was staring in shock but shook himself out of it, and once more proved his brains by doing the smart thing. “Ahh… please come in.”

I took a deliberate step inside the room, then placed myself between Jacob and where the redcap was curled into a ball around his smouldering stump, coincidentally that also put me between him and Marcone. And even though I didn’t for one second think Marcone was going to hurt the kid, Jacob knew. He’d have heard stories of people disappearing and Marcone being pegged, and what’s more John had shown himself to be eminently capable of violence, I don’t care if it’s visited for your sake violence of any kind can shake a person.

“What do you suggest we do with him?” Marcone asked.

“Well for starters he can tell us how his little scam worked,” I said. “Then he can give us the names of anyone he ran his mouth to or is in on it. And once that all over, I’d rather like the names of everyone he’s killed.”

“They’ll kill me.” The creature whined.

“Red… can I call you Red? What makes you think you’re walking out of this alive?” I stepped forward. “What makes you think any of your buddies are walking out of this alive. I mean you killed kids in John Marcone’s territory and if that wasn’t stupid enough you targeted one of his people.”

“The Mortal?” red sneered.

I mean I knew a lot of the sidhe didn’t rate mortals a threat. Those were either idiots or they had the power to back it up and even then, the disregard was mostly a front. Red did not have the power, and given it was a mortal who took him down, I ranked him as all sorts of idiot.

Normally I’d allow Marcone to re-educate him but…

“how ‘bout me? I mean I might not claim territory, but this is damn sure my town. And even if it weren’t, us mortals tend to get right unreasonable when it comes to kids.”

I summoned up my will again, a small star of heat and light appearing above my hand, with a thought I sent it to hover menacingly above his cheek.

“Who told you about this little scam?” With barely a flick of will I jammed the ball close enough for the heat to be uncomfortable before backing off.

I was overly conscious of the kid behind my back; he didn’t need to see torture, the threat of it was pushing the envelope.

“Just tell him,” John said. “Then he’ll leave you alone.”

“Ace… it was Ace, the changeling.”

“If you think that vague information—”

I ignored the remainder of what John was saying, because I knew Ace. He’d been a member of Lily and Fix’s gang back when they’d been changelings, victims of the winter knight huddled together for whatever protection they could get. And sure he’d tried to kill me, but he was a kid who wanted protection for himself and his friends. This was beyond a step up. This was far beyond what I’d thought him capable of, giving away ideas of how to kill and hunt mortals, kids like he, Lily, Fix and Meryl had been, to the sidhe.

“I don’t know his last name, all I know is he’s one of the Redcap’s children.”

“The redcap, isn’t that you?”

The sidhe laughed, “I’m a redcap not The Redcap, you won’t be so—”

“He’s a groupie with no particular power or influence,” I said. “That’s what this entire thing is about, gaining street cred. I know Ace, I can track him.”

John raised an eyebrow, “and are you going to go easy on him?”

“Go easy? He’s mortal.” And a misguided kid to boot, or was he? He’d been on the edge of adulthood two years ago. A kid making bad calls in a nasty spot. But he’d be legally an adult now and deliberately spreading ideas of how to kill actual kids, wasn’t close to innocent. I didn’t know why he’d done it, but there weren’t many good reasons to do such a thing, in fact I’d go so far as to say there were none.

I shook my head, “I won’t go easy.”

“And if you don’t have the stomach?”

I looked away, unwilling to admit John had got me there. I’d been lucky so far, all my problems with Mortals had been solvable without cold blooded murder. I wasn’t sure I had the nerve; wasn’t sure I wanted it; I couldn’t be a hatchet man.

“I’ll handle it,” I growled.

“And if you can’t.” John pushed.

“If I can’t, I’ll hand him over.” I felt sick even saying it, but I had little choice in the matter. Ace needed to be handled before he gave anyone else the same idea. Hell we needed to know if he already had.

I found Ace a week later; his apartment was a dump of a place. My apartment was small, this was smaller. It was a single room, with a shower curtain where the door to the bathroom should be, the bed nothing more than a mattress on the floor. Empty bottles of beer littered the room with a few bottles of harder stuff mixed in. It was dark, a blanket tacked up in place of curtains.

I stepped past the non-existent threshold, kicking a can out of my way, its skittering across the floor announcing my presence. Not that anyone in the apartment hadn’t had a clear view of my entrance, there wasn’t exactly anywhere to hide. A lump of human misery emerged from what I’d mistaken for dirty laundry on the bed.

“Watissit?”

The noise of still drunk mumbling was faintly interrogative but otherwise indecipherable.

“Hell’s Bells man you can’t live like this,” I said. It was only half on his behalf, had Ace grown up into a moustache twirling villain I’d have had no problem taking him down. But this pathetic pile of mess wasn’t exactly triggering murderous urges.

Even so kids. Marcone had gotten a list out of Red, ten all up and that was only Red, who knew how many Ace had let into his scheme. I strode over in less than five steps, grabbed him by the collar and hauled him upright, dragging him another three to the kitchenette. I turned on the sink grabbing a bowl crusted with what looked like weeks of caked on filth, filling it with water and dumped it over the kid’s…man’s head.

Some reasoning entered his eyes, widening as he began to struggle.

“Ah,” I waved a finger threatening. “Do you know why I’m here?”

“To kill me,” Ace growled. “Just like you did Meryl.”

“I didn’t shoot her,” I said. “You did that. As for the killing part... that rather depends on what you’ve been up to.”

“Up to?” Ace said. “Does it look like I’ve been up to much.”

I looked around the pigsty of a place, the mountains of trash, and the bare walls…the mark of someone in the grips of depression, or…. no something was off, I threw Ace away from me, shaking out my shield bracelet and bringing up my will. Just in time too. Blue white sparks flickered off my bracelet as bullets tore through the paper thin walls of the apartment, impacting my shield as Ace and people in the neighbouring rooms open fire.

“What the hell are you doing,” I screamed over the noise. I might as well be whispering in a hurricane for all the good it did me. Guns are loud, the kind of guns which could shoot this long without reloading are deafening.

I couldn’t stay here. My bracelet had taken serious damage back with the scourge of flamethrower wielding black court, it was heating up and threatening to reburn my recently healed hand. Not only that but the effort required to keep a shield up from all sides would exhaust me sooner rather than later. And most importantly high-powered bullets were flying in a cheap apartment building. Bullets would be flying everywhere and judging by the terrified shouts we weren’t alone. It’d be a miracle if no one died, I needed to stop them firing now.

To that end I did something utterly stupid, I ran straight at the window. Curling myself up I jumped simultaneously shaping the shield into something pointed enough to shatter the glass, flying through the window and out over the street. Once clear of the building I reshaped my shield again, this time turning it into a semi-circle above me. This did two things, protected me from any bullets coming from above and caught air, turning my suicidal jump out of a thirteenth-floor window into a slightly less suicidal fall.

That being said I couldn’t do both well, to keep my shield thick enough to catch bullets my parachute couldn’t be big, my landing was going to be rough. But Murphy had taught me to fall and I dissipated the impact allowing my jarred legs to collapse into a roll. I came up fast and glanced up to see several beings, even from this distance a few clearly not human, leaning out of the windows above. Before they could decide to continue the shootout I gave them a middle finger salute and booked it.

I’m a big guy but when I want to run I can move. I practice, too many things want me dead to not be able to haul ass when I need to. That being said I hauled ass only until I was out of sight. Then I got smart.

Running wouldn’t solve the problem of Ace going around giving faeries pointers in tracking down practitioners by their soulmarks. It wouldn’t solve all of those already in on the scam. But I couldn’t confront people who were willing to use machine guns in a populus city either.

Fortunately the building I’d tracked Ace to was in the lower income area, which in practicality meant close to the never-ending noises associated with an industrial area, heavy machinery and trucks operating day in and day out. It was Saturday too and though there’d still be people round there wouldn’t be the endless pool of potential victims of a residential neighbourhood. Plus all I needed to do was stall, the police don’t have short response times, to machine gun shots.

I found the first abandoned looking yard, its heavy construction machinery paused in whatever its goal was. I vaulted the iron fence, hoping it’d slow the faeries down. A quick glance over my shoulder told me I was too late to hide, the group of six Faeries plus Ace already in view. One of the group moved to the lock pulling, what was probably lockpicks out of his pocket.

I ran to the bucket of the closest excavator. I wasn’t exactly sure of the bullet proofness of an excavator scoop but I was willing to bet it, my spell worked duster, the chances of ricochets and Faeries instinctive dislike of iron would give me a decent chance of not being shot from behind. Leaving me free to shield from only the front and buying time for the police to show.

Ace walked forward his hand held up to stop fire. “Dresden, I wondered when you’d catch on.”

“To your scheme of killing kids?” In the shock of seeing Ace as a curled up pathetic excuse of a human, the rage, the absolute disgust, someone, someone apparently human would do such a thing, had been forgotten. It was coming back to me now. But I held it in, I had no idea how long I’d need to hold my shield and emotions, particularly strong ones are power, I might need my rage.

“I would think really carefully about whether you want to live through the next few minutes,” I said. “I am not going to be playing with kid gloves this time.”

“Like you were last time?” Ace said with a scoff.

“Yeah, I was trying to get you all out alive. Didn’t do a great job but I was trying, this time, you killed kids.”

Ace gestured around at the faeries backing him up. “Not going to be so easy this time.”

I acknowledged the point. His back up was heavily armed, gloved hands holding iron machine guns and wearing red caps of a variety of shapes. I made a note that the non-human ones I’d seen before were either glamoured or left behind. Some of those creatures out there might have teeth the length of my forearm.

“Hell’s bells man, kids. Please tell me you didn’t do it for the cred with your Dad.” I gestured at the Redcapped lackies.

Ace’s cheek pulled up in a scowl, distorting his face into something nasty. “I had nothing, nothing at all, no protection from Maeve. I survived the only way I could by teaming up with the other people who were trampled all over.”

“And once you were friends what? You decided to help them gain more influence in order to give yourself more?”

“We helped each other.”

“See there’s this thing I can’t get over, kids.” I was fairly certain my own face was pulled up into an awful scowl.

“Like you’ve never killed anyone.” Ace said.

“For my own personal power, hell no I haven’t.”

“For my own survival, in Winter they are one and the same.”

 “If you believe that…” I allowed my mouth to continue to banter on its own while I looked for an advantage.

I didn’t have to look long, iron isn’t a scarce resource on a construction site, in particular the piles of rebar stacked up against the side of the building next to where the Faeries stood looked hopeful.

Keeping my shield primed I waved one of my force rings at the pile releasing it with a whispered word. The rebar behaved exactly as I wanted pushing up against the wall behind it and bouncing forward tumbling down the pile and rolling at speed towards where the Faeries stood.

Several of the Faeries went down in blistering skin and screams but not all of them. The sidhe are the kind of graceful which make world class dancers look like they have two left feet. Those who got out of the way did it with style, barely sweating as they leapt pirouetted and dove clear of their bane.  Two of the faeries glamours fell, the iron not taking them out, but distracting them enough to reveal their distorted animalistic forms.

Ace of course wasn’t affected, which left me with four machine gun touting bad guys, one of which was lion adjacent and would be just as much trouble hand to hand. I raised my shield just in time as a barrage of bullets fired at me.

I wouldn’t be able to hold the shield forever, but I didn’t need to I was playing the odds. The chances of a bullet hitting either my shield or the steel of the scoop and ricocheting were good, but the chances of those wild bullets bouncing back and hitting one of the Faeries weren’t. But when you’re talking about a gun which can shoot 200 times a minute even long odds got likely.

One of the Sidhe grunted falling back, blood or the Fairy equivalent blooming on its shirt. The bullet wouldn’t have had any iron in it, but it was still a projectile, the Sidhe would recover fast but not instantly.

Ace stopped shooting for a moment looking back at the sidhe before raising his hand for a stop. The firing continued for a few more seconds, disciplined fighters they were not, but the firing did peter out.

“How long can you keep that shield up for Dresden?” Ace said. “I’d wager it’s not forever, but we can stand here for an awful long time.”

Which was a damn good point, except…

A car screeched to a stop and three forms climbed out in seconds. One was tall, nearly as big as me, only she was a woman with muscles which made mine feel like curling into a ball and whimpering, as if her physical stature wasn’t intimidating enough she carried both a semi-automatic, all be it holstered, and a heavy iron battle axe which was absolutely not and as I watched, it swung down to decapitate one of the faeries my rebar trick had taken down.

I winced Fairy or not, child murderer or not, I didn’t like cold blooded assassination, I wasn’t built that way. But it was Marcone’s call right now and they’d taken children.

It might be cowardly, but I turned my head away as the second form, a redhead with enough mass to make rugby players think twice about going for a tackle, reached the next Fairy. Two shots rang out, next to the noise of the high calibre machine guns the handgun seemed almost quiet, but they shivered deep into my soul, and the lionish faerie collapsed to the ground, green fire spewing from the wound.

Ace spun, yelling at them to stop.

A second later there was a wet gurgle and I knew the third member of the team, the one with greying hair and a perfectly pleasant face had cut another’s throat without an ounce of consideration or humanity, and he was my soulmate folks.

I forced my attention back to the fight, for all I didn’t like Marcone or Ace, I felt a certain level of responsibility for them both. Ace had been a kid when we met, a stupid ass kid, willing to kill for his own goals, but a kid none the less.

And Marcone, soulmarked or not, I personally believed once you’d saved each other’s lives you stopped keeping score and I had no idea which one of us were in the others debt right now. Not at all helped by the fact both of us were prideful, either blustering or certain we could have got out of the situation without the others help just fine.

For example now, John had stopped machine guns firing on me, but I could have held out till the clips were empty, probably. And now he and his people had missed one of the Faeries taken to the ground by the rebar, and the faerie had pulled himself over the ground to pick up his gun and was now aiming at the back of Marcone’s head.

But though some of the group had turned their attention away, one still had his gun trained on me. To save Marcone I’d have to drop my shield. I’d have to be fast, really fast.

Keeping the steps in my mind I dropped my shield, aimed, and summoned my will

“Ventus servitas.”

The wind gathered and blew right past Marcone, Gard and Hendricks flinched but Marcone stayed as steady as a rock. My spell whipped up a smaller cutoff of rebar and flung it into the neck of the recovering Sidhe. The same gurgling sound came from his neck as the other on the ground.

I switched my attention to defence, focusing my will on my bracelet, calling my shield back up, not two seconds after I’d dropped it.

I would have been too late.

The Sidhe’s surprise I’d dropped the shield gained me time, but not long enough. If the Sidhe had to move to make the shot, I’d have a chance. In a battle between movement and thought I don’t care how fast you are, thought wins. But in this case, all he had to do was pull the trigger, it was thought against thought, and I’d had to change my focus. In the competition of speed between us he would win there was no doubt.

Marcone won.

His gun barked thrice hitting my would-be killer once in the head and twice in the heart before the sidhe’s nerves could flex.

Just like I’d known he would, see what I mean, we’d both saved each other’s life not even seconds apart, trusting the other to do exactly that, despite ostensibly not liking each other.

Keeping count would be pointless.

Speaking of saving the scumbags life, he was now facing two active shooters with no cover. With an effort of will I focused on sending my newly formed shield racing across the space between me and the gun wielding Ace and remaining redcap. The wall of shield rammed them in the back, right as they were going to open fire. Knocking them their shots wild while John, Hendricks and Gard’s shots all met flesh.

The Fairy fell to the ground still, but Ace cried out in pain. My push to throw off his aim also saving his life, at least for now. Steading myself with a hand on the edge of the bucket I pulled myself clear.

Sirens wailed in the distance.

“Mr Dresden, can I give you a lift?”

“Nah I don’t take lifts from criminal masterminds.”

“Mastermind? You do flatter.” Marcone stepped up to Ace gun pointed at his head.

“Wait.” It was barely considered; I wasn’t actually certain I wanted to have someone who was responsible for the deaths of children and wanted me dead to boot running around kicking.

“You’re still protecting him?”

“We’ll need someone to blame for this mess,” I said. “If he ever walks free of mortal prison, or so much as sneezes wrong inside you can take him.”

Marcone’s money green eyes searched mine but nodded, crouching down instead. He spoke to Ace in a quiet enough voice I couldn’t hear it past the ringing in my ears, but I could see him nodding emphatically.

Marcone then did something unexpected, he handed over his gun. Exchanging it for the machine gun Ace had used. Raising the gun, he pointed it at the scoop I’d been sheltering in. seeing his plan moments before he did it, I raised a shield, angled to give Marcone room to shoot but covering the majority of the ricochet angles. The remaining ammo discharged in less than two seconds. Taking a moment, he discarded the clip and gun in opposite directions.  

For a frame job it was quick and dirty but with Ace’s confession and cooperation it’d do.

Given even now the Sidhe’s forms were sublimating ectoplasm by the time the police got here the bullets would have only hit one person.

Marcone gave me a look which promised a visit to my office in short order, but not keen to wait around for the cops and their questions, they disappeared as quickly as they’d come. Their car slipping away driving at a perfectly respectable pace and becoming one of millions on the road.

Sighing I walked over to Ace kneeling to observe the damage. I’m no expert, but I knew enough to say a gut wound combined with a spreading puddle of blood wasn’t good. I yanked off my duster then my tee-shirt, replacing the coat and it’s bespelled protection as fast as possible. I ripped the shirt in half, rolling Ace as little as possible to place one half in a crumpled wad under the exit wound, using the second half and my own body weight to stanch the bleeding of the entry wound.

Having done what I could Ace’s survival became a matter of time, how fast we could get him to real help, fortunately even as I thought it the flashing blue of police lights pulled into the drive. Two police exited the vehicle, guns pulled and scanning the area as they surveilled the scene.

“Hey over here,” I called, “He’s hurt badly.”

My call wasn’t necessary, I was sat in the centre of absolute destruction in clear daylight, they’d have to be blind not to see me, but the faster they classified me as a harmless bystander trying to help the better for everyone.

It worked, the officer which got out of the driver’s side kept his gun trained on me, but he waved the other off to secure the weapons laying about from where the redcap’s corpses disappeared.

“Where did the gun men go?” The cop with his gun on me didn’t look the fittest, soft in the face and the chin, but his eyes were vigilant scanning the area all while keeping an eye on me and his partners back.

In fact I was a little surprised only one squad car and two policemen had shown, you didn’t answer a call for a machine gun in a populated city undermanned, where was SWAT? The heavily armed backup I was expecting.

Even as I thought it several SUV’s screeched onto the scene spilling out heavily armed men.

“Ahh…” I looked around for a plausible route and waved to the back of the yard, “the rest went that way.”

“I got him…I got him,” the Officer said. “The rest ran off.” He repeated my gesture and the majority of the squad moved out, leaving one behind with the officers to secure the scene. The heavily armed forces didn’t move fast, but they were trained that way, moving in practiced routines, clearing corners, covering each other’s blind spots and not risking tripping for speed. They might not have moved fast but they moved sure and they were out of sight soon enough.

“The rest?”

“Huh?” I grunted.

“You said the rest went that way.”

“Oh right.” I nodded down at Ace, “he was one of them, the idiot forgot bullets bounce and open fired on…” I nodded at the shot-up bucket.

“And you’re just an unfortunate bystander?” It was the SWAT guy who spoke, his voice seeped in scepticism, and though his gun wasn’t trained on me it was certainly held ready, with a clear shot.

I shook my head, “Harry Dresden, I’m a PI.”

“Right you work with Special Investigations sometimes,” the Cop said. “Officer Jones, Lieutenant Murphy’s come in on a few of our weirder calls.”

“SI, great their scenes never make sense.” The SWAT guy said, but his weight shifted until he didn’t appear ready to open fire at a moments notice. “It’s hours of debrief and your superiors all decide you’re misremembering it anyway.”

I snorted, figuring I’d endeared myself enough to the people with heavy weaponry I got to the point, “Yeah that sounds about right, listen is there an ambulance coming? As much as chatting’s nice, and I’m happy to do so down at the station. I’d really rather not have a person bleed out on me today.”

“Ambulance is on its way. But we’ve got to clear the site.” SWAT said.

“Then do it.” I said.

“Any weapons on you?”

“I’ve got a knife—” had I taken out my swiss army knife? “—or two in my pockets. And a couple of other things which might classify as weapons.” My blasting rod made a mean truncheon in a crunch, “Feel free to pat me down. But I’m not taking pressure off.” I’d decided to leave my gun in my car today, thank the stars, carrying a concealed weapon would not go down well now. 

Officer Jones stepped back allowing the SWAT officer to do the actual pat down. He was thorough even though I knew he was compromising protocol to allow me to keep pressure on the wound. Ace had long since fallen still, only his shallow breathing letting me know he was still alive.

I’m not sure what they thought as they pulled odd wizardly accoutrements from my pockets, but at least a thimble and miniature teacup, though odd, didn’t scream weapon.

“Listen if I was a woman, I’d have a massive purse, and no one would look at me twice. But fill up pockets with random detritus and you get weird looks.”  

Finally satisfied, SWAT stepped back, checked the second police officer had finished securing all the guns, said something into his radio, which was thankfully still working, and seconds later an ambulance was driving up.

I stayed on Ace until the medics asked me to move. After that I fell back clearing the area for them to work by virtue of falling back on my ass. I leant back looking up at the sky, allowing the adrenaline and shock to fade.

Officer Jones stared down at me, mildly amused.  “You put your jacket back on?”

I looked down at my stark white chest, “didn’t want to stand out like a fluorescent target” I waved a hand, “I know, I know probably stupid and a waste of time—” they couldn’t know the coat was bullet proof, “—but it made me feel better about sitting around in clear view.”

“It’s probably better if you wait until we’re being recorded to talk.”

I nodded, tired to the bone but this wasn’t going to be over for a good while yet. For a moment I was sorry I’d let Hendricks, a good getaway driver, get away.  

“Off the record?”

Jones raised an eyebrow but nodded.

“You’re not going to find the other shooters, at least not breathing.”

“You admitting to something? Because if you are, you’re going to find ‘off the record’ isn’t the magic words you think.”

I shook my head, “No but this group has been targeting kids, and he’s been ‘round.”

It might be vague as all hell, but the man was a Chicago cop, and Chicago cops were well aware of the rules John Marcone held the underworld to and, in most cases, they respected him for it.

“You see anything that’d hold up in court?”

“Yeah, being on record claiming to be a wizard will go down great. A lawyer which can’t discredit me on cross examination got their law degree in a cereal box.”

“Your testimony might still be helpful.”

“If only,” I said.

The whole true, full truth, and nothing but the truth, made testifying in court something I couldn’t do. A wizard’s word has power, an oath sworn thrice? Unless I was willing to lose a significant portion of my power I’d have to follow through.

Ahh…I swear your honour he killed something out of this world which melted back to ectoplasm. Why? Because that’s what happens when Faeries die. One straight jacket for Harry Dresden coming right up.

Not to mention there was the whole Soulmark debacle, I had reason to believe the man in question was my soulmarked and that made testifying against him in court legally dicey to say the least.

And I’d been fighting a sinking feeling he knew exactly what he was to me for days. A sinking feeling which had only gotten worse when Gard backed him up today like nothing happened.

“We’re going to have to give him protection,” Jones nodded at where the ambulance was pulling away.

“Yeah…” I sighed and stood up, “he’s responsible for ten kids’ disappearances at least.” The number of victims the redcap we’d interrogated had claimed. “Probably more.”

The cop winced. It wasn’t an easy thing to protect someone you knew was evil. Particularly when it’d let them skate the consequences they deserved.

“Hey, buck up, that was a messy gut shot, he might not make it to the hospital.” In fact, without supernatural intervention, I’d wager he wouldn’t.

But Ace was a changeling and at any time they had the opportunity to choose their fairy half. In that much pain? Near delusional from it, facing down dying or spending your life in jail?

There was every chance he’d make the choice to become a fairy and it would be the wrong one.  The bullet might have exited but it might have fragmented and even if not, out of the tools the EMT’s were using to save his life, a few were certainly steel. If the pain, or survival instinct at this point, overrode good sense he’d die a fairy, in more agony than he escaped because the people trying to save his life were suddenly using kryptonite.

If he held out against the power and relief offered long enough, he might have a chance, a slim one but a chance.

“So…station?” I said.

The police interrogation took less time than I thought it would, though I was asked to remain available for further questioning. It was fast because the second I mentioned the scheme to kidnap kids, everyone was riding on the rescue wagon, willing to delay dotting their I’s in their haste. I’d be right there with them, hell if I thought there was even a chance I’d be leading the charge.

But the redcap’s confession only left bitter despair, their hope, their determination, pointless. The kids taken to the NeverNever, killed, and dropped in a nasty section where something would eat their bodies. The redcap hadn’t lied, couldn’t, not as directly as he had.

There would never be any evidence. The marked kids vanishing into a statistic about how unlucky marks were.

But I’d do what I could.

I spent the next two days figuring out the rest of the victims’ names. But when I passed them on to Officer Jones it turned out the police already had most of them. Missing persons, the profile, and the story breaking in the media had uncovered most of the victims. Hell, they’d turned up several names my methods missed entirely. I ran them down, checking there weren’t more predators operating in my city.

I found two more monsters I blasted to hell, one entirely vanilla mortal I sent to Murph, and three runaways I directed to Father Forthill.

But after that… there was nothing more I could do. And that meant sitting with helpless fury, this happened in my town, to kids which I was meant to protect.

I had to do more, even if it was to avoid going insane. Some people out there can sit with rage, calmly plan, or turn the other cheek, but not me, it eats me up inside unless I do something.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t thought about it. Hell what we could do about Soulmark related deaths was a common discussion point amongst the best and brightest of the White Council, we’d all come to the same depressing realisation of not much.

But the White council was made up of arrogant arseholes and it had been years since I’d taken a serious look at the problem. Not only was I different but my philosophy, my abilities and, perhaps most importantly, my friends were different now.

My philosophy changed from the wizard typical of ‘we know more, therefore we know better,’ to the hard learnt lesson that people made stupid decisions if they had limited information. I mean they still did, but at least I didn’t have to feel guilt.

My abilities though admittedly had grown, in this case would be close to useless, but I’d become used to that. Used to coming across situations where casting more magic fire was worse than useless, I’d learnt to think of other solutions.

And my friends…. Well, they were rather the lynch pin of this plan.

Arrogant perhaps, believing I could make a difference when so many others had failed, but I’d earned my stole.

I was putting the final touches on my plan when John Marcone entered my office.

“Ohh come on, I was having such a good day too.”

Marcone’s polite smile grew until it was genuine and he came fully inside shutting the door behind him.

I grunted unhappily as he eyed the leaning piles of paper scattered over my desk, drafts I’d written up. I’m hell on computers which meant I had to use a typewriter, and typewriters didn’t have a useful invention called backspace.

“So you will be doing something about soulmarks.”

I huffed a frustrated breath, “Not sure how much good it’ll do.”

Marcone picked up one of the neater piles on the desk, the type covered in corrective red pen, but they were mostly spelling and structure problems, the basic information was good.

I was tempted to snap the papers out of Marcone’s hands, but as much as I hated it, Marcone… honestly, Marcone was on my list.

My list of friends, or contacts if Marcone was on it, who had pull. Had people who listened to them. Marcone might not be able to reach as many people as Father Forthill in his daily masses, Murph with her contacts amongst Cops who went round to schools and did talks about drugs and alcohol, or the Alpha’s with their access to something called social media. But Marcone had access to an audience they did not.

Or perhaps an audience not inclined to listen to the first two.

John was absorbed by the papers and I let him be, returning to my own work.

“What stops the monsters—”

I jumped, somehow comfortable enough in his presence to forget it.

John raised an eyebrow, “What stops the monsters preventing the dissemination of information, I assume it has been tried before.”

“You know what they say about assume…” My heart returned to rest, far too fast for being in the presence of an enemy and I made a note to take it up with my subconscious later. “But in this case, you’d be right, the white council tried something similar in 1848.”

John cocked his head to the side, “the telegraph?”

Of course he could already see the shape of my plan, “The Reds were able to get ahead of our messages using the ways, stealing them and killing any witnesses. A lot of people died, enough this might be a terrible idea. Not all of the blood spilt in those revolutions were due to peasants hating the ruling class.”

“But only so many people could decode morse or have the equipment to intercept a telegram. We have the internet, TVs and Radios in our homes and offices.”

I nodded, “It’ll get around the world in an eyeblink, saved in a thousand places and in ‘meme’ form three seconds after it went live. I figure if I get it enough places, there will be nothing any monster can do. Plus, I’m not blowing the secrecy entirely out of the water, simply pointing out some conclusions from the evidence available to everyone. The smart monsters will sit down, shut up and wait for it to blow over.”

John held out the bundle of papers, offering it back, I waved a hand, “take it. Keeping this under wraps is the last thing I’m trying to do.”

“And if I’m the first to publish it, what? I’m the one the monsters target?”

“If you release it in a way they can track, you’re stupider than I thought you were.”

John smiled, “Ahh… who have you got braving computers for you?”

I raised an eyebrow, John wouldn’t turn anyone over to monsters, not ones which wanted free reign to hurt kids at least. And my young, hip, techno savvy heroes, the Alpha’s weren’t helpless with their fangs and claws, but I wouldn’t risk them regardless.

John smile widened as if he’d wanted me to refuse. As if it was a test, like he’d had a lecture on revenge and operational security ready to go. Hell’s Bells considering his work he probably had several.

“And the rest of your plan?”

I shook my head, it wasn’t something John needed to know either. The information I was polishing was due to go live tomorrow morning. I’d raised the idea the unlucky marks were a reverse survivorship bias, a death bias as it were.

From studies we knew 5% of people had marks. We knew 85% of those publicly on record as having a mark died within three years. But nowhere near 5% ever registered, we couldn’t be certain they didn’t die young, the marks fading in death, but we had no evidence they did either.

Andi, the Alpha with a communication’s major, told me to keep it simple so the message boiled down to, if you want to live shut the hell up.

This had disturbing implications which would be pointed out sooner or later, implications of the Marked being hunted. Which is where the human monster I’d found going after the marked came in. Sure, they’d only found evidence of him killing two victims, but who knew?

Officer Jones’s boss, would arrange a press conference, Murph had called in several favours to make it happen at the right time. The conference was apparently claiming they’d found the person responsible for the missing. But in truth it would point out people knew Marked were unlucky, and their disappearances and death investigation were often glossed over for how frequent and often leadless they were.

As much as the price sucked, the 30 missing kids was international news already and there would be countless people watching. Human predators, a close enough lie to the truth people should make smart choices, but far enough away I was hoping the monsters would let it slip by.

I thought those two should be enough to spread the idea, but while I was going for it, I might as well go all out. As such I’d roped Father Forthill into responding to the disturbing case with a sermon for Sunday at St Mary’s most populated mass. Which next to a world impacting press conference didn’t seem like much but apparently impactful sermons were shared amongst the clergy and he was confident, with the renewed fear amongst the marked, he could get his sermon or a minor variation of it in most major catholic churches’ world over within two weeks.

Which if he could pull it off, would have the biggest impact, the catholic church had a long memory, while the press and the internet’s attention was notoriously fickle.

The Father’s speech didn’t have exactly the information I wanted; the priest was squeamish about telling his congregation to outright lie about the marks.  But it get people thinking and talking.

I wasn’t sure how well it’d work, but people who understood information dissemination, thought it had a good chance, so I held out hope.

Marcone tucked the pile of paper into his pocket, but instead of heading to the door as I’d hoped, he sat down, looking for all the world as if he owned the seat.

I picked up my typewriter and plonked it out of the way so I could glare him down properly.

“What do you want Marcone?”

“Oh so, so much. You haven’t reconsidered working—”

“You have Gard. Gard who I couldn’t help but notice was fully contracted.”

“MONOC securities and I sorted out our differences.”

I snorted, “Don’t lie, there were no differences. You wanted me on this for some godforsaken reason which only makes sense in your twisty head.”

“You think MONOC would be willing to risk the ire of supernatural nations on my behalf?” John waved a hand at the scattered papers.

I shuddered, if any of the predators found out I’d released the information my life would get…complicated. But I had the white council to, at least theoretically, close ranks around me, Marcone did not.

“Quit playing, I’m tired.”

Marcone lent forward eyes blazing into mine, “I’m not playing, you are uniquely inventive towards problems when sufficiently motivated.”

“So you motivated me?” I snarled but it was half hearted, more soul wary than angry, because surely out of everyone Marcone should know me better. “It’s not like I haven’t thought about the problem before. Not like I haven’t gotten missing marked cases, cases which got me angry.” I had a thought, “Did you know kids were going missing?”

Marcone nodded, his gaze not letting up. “Soulmarked are always going missing, but the uptick… it was… noticed. And noticed by more people than me. But finding an angle for an investigation, without risking kids, is difficult.”

“So when Jacob…?”

“When his mother kept talking to anyone who would listen,” Marcone corrected. “I do not endanger children Mr Dresden, particularly not one of mine.”

“But why me? Gard is more than capable, and if it was motivation… you know me better than that.”

“Fresh motivation was certainly a reason, but I’ll admit to having another.”

“Of course you do.”

Marcone smirked.

“Out with it.”

Marcone’s entire demeanour changed, sitting back in his chair, face falling, not to neutral, Marcone did neutral with the best, and this wasn’t it. Perhaps off was a better term, there was no show, rather open human honesty. Despite myself, I sat up and paid attention. Marcone didn’t let his human show often, if ever.

“I saw your soulmark.”

My stomach sunk, my fear confirmed. My shield bracelet, which held the veil for my mark had near melted off my wrist while I shielded us from a flamethrower. The shield only kept working because I was pouring will into it, actively holding its purpose in my mind. But the veil for my mark? That would have stopped working the instant the runes distorted from the heat. And Marcone had been right there, I’d hoped with the fighting, flamethrowers and Vampires, John would be too busy to notice. I should have known I wouldn’t have gotten so lucky, Marcone was sharp even in a fire fight.

“It resonated with you, didn’t it?”

“Should it?”

I closed my eyes, considering lying. But for all I disliked what Marcone did, and perhaps even him as a person, he was a person, and that entitled him to a base level of respect and kindness.

“Maybe…” Then admitting it as much to myself as to him, I continued, “yes.”

“And yet…” John said, letting the questions and accusations hang silently.

“Listen Marcone, I have complicated feelings about my mark alone…. My mark plus you.” I shook my head. “I was hoping you wouldn’t notice ‘till I figured out at least half of those feelings.”

“So I should expect your call around, say the heat death of the universe?”

 “Optimistically,” I snarked, unreasonably grateful the conversation was moving back to familiar territory.

Marcone ruined it. His nod was a simple gesture, it should’ve been nothing more than an acknowledgement, but I could see it in his eyes, he’d settled, he knew what came next. As if he knew what I’d say when the heat death came. I didn’t like that, because how dare he know when I was clueless.

“What?”

“Nothing to concern yourself with Mr Dresden.”

I narrowed my eyes, “No, out with it.”

“You might not yet know your answer Mr Dresden, but I do.”

“If I don’t, you certainly can’t.”

Marcone rolled his eyes, “Mr Dresden, when have you ever compromised your ethics, cowboy and somewhat naive though they may be, for your happiness? Or for your safety?  Which is what a Soulmark offers you, what I have offered you in contracts, and I’m sure others have done the same. You have always refused. This, I’m, not going to be an exception, mark or not. It is arrogance to believe otherwise.”

I blinked, the tangled knot of guilt and confusion around my Soulmark finally releasing, because he was right. Absolutely right, I wasn’t going to betray Murphy and SI, what I believed in because of the promise of happiness and safety, any more than I’d sign a contract he offered me.

Marcone stood, striding the two required steps to the door.

He might be right about my answer, but I was unwilling to let the door completely shut on the possibility, so before I could think better of it, I spoke. “You could always change.”

Even as I said it, I knew he never would, he was what he was, a predator, he wouldn’t change for me any more than I would change for him. But there were always those annoying moments of humanity which refused, rather rudely in my opinion, to let me label him the bad guy and move on. If those came out more often…well perhaps there could be something.

Marcone snorted and finished opening the door, stepping out of my life until the next time we were inevitably thrown together.