Jim Butcher - Proven Guilty

She nodded and closed her eyes for a moment. Poor kid. She looked so damned young. I was fairly sure I had never been that young.

Then she drew in a deep, shaking breath and said, “I want to go to the Council.”

I talked Molly into staying at the church with her family until everyone had gotten some rest and we could talk things out with her mother. Any sane man would have hopped a bus for Las Vegas or somewhere rather than wait around and tell Charity Carpenter he wanted to haul her first baby in front of a gang of powerful wizards for trial and possible execution.

I found an unused cot and flopped onto it. My shins hung off the end of the undersized thing, and I didn’t care a bit. Nails clicked in unsteady rhythm on tile, and I felt Mouse’s warm, silent presence limp carefully to the floor beside my cot. I reached out, ruffled his ears, and laid my hand on the thick ruff of far across his shoulders. I was asleep before he settled himself down to sleep beside me.

I woke up later, in the same position I’d fallen asleep. I had a crick in my neck, and one hand dangled over the side of the bed. It had lost enough circulation to feel numb and floppy, and I had to squint over the side of the cot to see that it was still resting on Mouse’s furry back. The room was unlit, but the door to the hallway was open, and afternoon-flavored sunlight lit the hall.

I wanted to go back to sleep, but I hauled myself to my feet and stumbled down the hall to the bathroom, Mouse limping along beside me without complaint. I availed myself of indoor plumbing, and found myself wishing that they had a shower. I made do with a birdbath in the sink, and shambled back down to Forthill’s guest room.

The cots were all but empty. Nelson slept in one of them, faint twitches randomly stirring his limbs. His closed eyes rolled back and forth, and he had broken into a light sweat. Nightmares, I supposed. Poor kid. I wished I could have helped, but realistically there wasn’t anything I could do for him.

Molly slept in another cot; the motionless, black sleep of the truly exhausted. Charity sat in a chair beside the cot, her head tilted back against the wall. She snored a little. One of her hands rested on Molly’s hair.

I regarded them both in silence for a while. I thought about writing the whole thing off, conjuring up a wistful image of digging a hole, getting in, and then pulling the hole in after me. Hey, it worked for Bugs Bunny.

“I should have taken a left turn at Albuquerque,” I sighed to Mouse.

Mouse settled down on the floor again, and lay on his side, holding his injured leg clear of the floor.

“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. “I’m too stupid to be uninvolved. No sense in putting off the inevitable.”

So I got up, went over to Molly, and gently shook her shoulder. Charity woke up when I did, blinking disorientation from her eyes. Molly took a little bit longer, but then she took a sharp breath and sat up in bed, mirroring her mother.

“Yes? Is everyone all right?” Charity asked.

“As far as I know,” I told her. “Where are the other kids?”

“My mother took them home.”

“Any word from Michael?”

She shook her head.

“We need to talk about something fairly important, please.”

“And what is that?” she asked.

“Worth waking up for. Maybe you could get up, get some water on your face while I hunt down some coffee.”

“We do need to talk, Momma,” Molly said in a gentle tone.

She frowned at me for a moment, and I thought she was going to argue with me about it. Then she shook her head and said, “Very well.”

I made it so. I raided the small staff kitchen and came away with not only coffee, but several bagels and some fresh fruit. I left a few bucks on the counter under a saltshaker, then went back to Molly and Charity.

We sat down to eat our breakfast in the shadowy room.

I laid it out for Charity just as I had for Molly.

“Black magic,” Charity whispered, when I had finished. She glanced at Molly, a faint frown troubling her features. “I never thought it had gone that far.”

“I know, Momma,” Molly said quietly.

“Is what he says true?”

Molly nodded.

“Oh, baby,” Charity sighed. She touched Molly’s hair with one hand. “How could I not have seen this happening?”

“Don’t beat yourself up over it,” I told her. “At least not right now. It won’t help anyone.”

Anger touched her features and she said, “Neither will this nonsense with the White Council. Of course she will not go.”

“I don’t think you get it,” I told Charity in a quiet voice. “She’s going. She can go voluntarily, or she can go when the Wardens find her. But she’s going.”

“You plan to inform them of what has happened, then?” Charity asked, her tone gaining frost as it went.

“No,” I said. “But that kind of magic leaves a mark. There are plenty of things in the Nevernever who can sense it-and, in fact, they had already tipped off the Council that there was black magic afoot here. Even if I never say anything else about it, it’s only a matter of time until another Warden investigates.”

“You don’t know that for a fact.”

“I kind of do,” I said. “And this isn’t just about accountability, either. The things she’s done have already left their mark on her. If she doesn’t get support and training, those changes are going to snowball.”

“You don’t know that,” Charity insisted.

“I kind of do,” I said, louder. “Hell’s bells, Charity, I’m trying to protect her.”

“By dragging her in front of a kangaroo court of egotistic, power-mongering tyrants? So that they can execute her? How is that protecting my child?”

“If she goes in voluntarily, with me, I think I can get her clemency until she has a chance to show them that she is sincere about working with them.”

“You think ?” Charity said. “No. That’s not good enough.”

I clenched my fists in frustration. “Charity, the only thing I am sure about is that if Molly doesn’t come out, and if one of the other egotistical, power-mongering tyrants finds her, they’re going to automatically declare her a warlock and execute her. To say nothing of what will happen to her if she’s on her own. It’s more than likely that she’ll deserve it by then.”

“That’s not true,” Charity snapped. “She is not going to become some sort of monster. She is not going to change.”

“My God, Charity. I want to help her!”

“That isn’t why you’re doing it,” she snarled, rising. “You’re trying to get her to go with you to save your own skin. You’re afraid that if they find her, they will brand you traitor for not bringing her in, and execute you along with her.”

I found myself on my feet as well. Silence fell heavy and oppressive on the room.

“Momma,” Molly said quietly, breaking it. “Please tell me what Harry has done in the past two days to make you think that he is selfish. Or cowardly. Was it when he turned to face the ogres so that we could escape? Was it when he traded away the obligations the Summer Lady owed him in order to attempt the rescue?”

Charity was shocked silent for a second. Then her face heated and she said, “Young lady, that isn’t-”

Molly went on smoothly, her voice quiet, calm, displaying neither anger nor disrespect-nor weakness. “Or perhaps it was when you were unconscious and no one could have stopped him from simply taking me to turn over to the Council, and he instead stopped to give me a choice.” She chewed on her lip for a second. “You told me everything he’s done since I was taken. Now he’s offering to die for me, Momma. What more could you ask of him?”