JIM BUTCHER - SMALL FAVOR

But at least the kid knew it. She might not like it very much, but she’d applied herself diligently to finding other ways to help fight the good fight. I was proud of her.

“And don’t forget your homework,” I said.

She frowned. “I still don’t understand why you want to know about our family tree.”

“Humor me, grasshopper. I’ll buy you a snow cone.”

She glanced out the window at the world of white outside. “Goody.” She looked back at me and gave me a small, worried smile. “Be careful.”

“Hey, there were almost twenty of these losers at the Shedd. Now we’re down to six.”

“The six smartest, strongest, and oldest,” Molly said. “The ones who really matter.”

“Thank you for your optimism,” I said, and turned to go. “Lock up behind me.”

Molly bit her lip. “Harry?”

I paused.

Her voice was very small. “Look out for my dad. Okay?”

I turned and met her eyes. I drew an X over my heart and nodded.

She blinked her eyes quickly several times and gave me another smile. “All right.”

“Lock the door,” I told her again, and trudged out into the snow. The lock clicked shut behind me, and Molly watched me slog through the snow to the street. Thomas’s military moving van came rumbling through the snow, tires crunching, and I got in.

He turned the heater up a little while I stomped snow off of my shoes.

“So,” he said, starting down the street. “What’s the plan?”

I told him.

“That is a bad plan,” he said.

“There wasn’t time for a good one.”

He grunted. “November is not a good time to be sailing on Lake Michigan, Harry.”

“The aftermath of a nuclear holocaust isn’t a good time to be sailing there, either.”

Thomas frowned. “You aren’t just running your mouth, here, are you? You’re serious?”

“It’s a worst-case scenario,” I said. “But Nicodemus could do it, so we’ve got to proceed under the presumption that his intentions are in that category. The Denarians want to disrupt civilization, and with the Archive under their control, they could do it. Maybe they’d use biological or chemical weapons instead. Maybe they’d crash the world economy. Maybe they’d turn every program on television into one of those reality shows.”

“That’s mostly done already, Harry.”

“Oh. Well. I’ve got to believe that the world is worth saving anyway.” We traded forced grins. “Regardless of what they do, the potential for Really Bad Things is just too damned high to ignore, and we need all the help we can get.”

“Even help from one of those dastardly White Court fiends?” Thomas asked.

“Exactly.”

“Good. I was getting tired of dodging Luccio. There’s a limited amount of help I can give you if I have to stay out of sight all the time.”

“It’s necessary. If the Council knew that you and I were related…”

“I know, I know,” Thomas said, scowling. “Outcast leper unclean.”

I sighed and shook my head. Given that the White Court’s modus operandi generally consisted of twisting people’s minds around in one of several ways, I didn’t dare let anyone on the Council know that Thomas was my friend, let alone my half brother. Everyone would immediately assume the worst-that the White Court had gotten to me and was controlling my head through Thomas. And even if I convinced them that it wasn’t the case, it would look suspicious as hell. The Council would demand I demonstrate loyalty, attempt to use Thomas as a spy against the White Court, and in general behave like the pompous, overbearing assholes that they are.

It wasn’t easy for either of us to live with-but it wasn’t going to change, either.

We got to my apartment and I rushed inside. It was cold. The fire had burned down to nothing in the time I’d been gone. I lifted my hand and murmured under my breath, the spell lighting half a dozen candles at the same time. I grabbed everything I was going to need, waved the candles out again, and hurried back out to Thomas’s car.

“You’ve got Mom’s pentacle with you, right?” I asked him. I had a matching pendant on a silver chain around my own neck-which, other than Thomas, was my mother’s only tangible legacy.

“Of course,” he said. “I’ll find you. Where now?”

“St. Mary’s,” I said.

“Figured.”

Thomas started driving. I broke open my double-barreled shotgun, which I’d sawed down to an illegal length, and loaded two shells into it. Tessa the Mantis Girl had rudely neglected to return my.44 after the conclusion of hostilities at the Aquarium, and I have rarely regretted taking a gun with me into what could prove to be a hairy situation.

“Here,” I said when the truck got within a block or so of the church. “Drop me off here.”

“Gotcha,” Thomas said. “Hey, Harry.”

“Yeah?”

“What if they aren’t keeping the little girl on the island?”

I shook my head. “You’ll just have to figure something out. I’m making this up as I go.”

He frowned and shook his head. “What about those goons from Summer? What are you going to do if they show up again?”

“ If? I should be so lucky.” I winked at him and got out of the Hummer. “The real question is, what am I going to do if they don’t show up, and at the worst possible time to boot? Die of shock, probably.”

“See you soon,” Thomas said.

I nodded to my brother, shut the door, and trudged across the street and into the parking lot of St. Mary of the Angels.

It’s a big church. A really, really big church. It takes up a full city block, and is one of the town’s more famous landmarks, Chicago’s version of Notre Dame. The drive leading up to the delivery doors in the back of the church had been cleared, as had the little parking lot outside it. Michael’s truck was there. The ambient glow of winter night showed me his form and Sanya’s, standing outside the truck, both of them wearing long white cloaks emblazoned with scarlet crosses over similarly decorated white surcoats-the Sunday-go-to-meeting wear of the Knights of the Cross. They wore their swords at their hips. Michael wore an honest-to-God breastplate, while Sanya opted for more modern body armor. The big Russian, always the practical progressive, also carried a Kalashnikov assault rifle on a sling over his shoulder.

I wondered if Sanya realized that Michael’s antiquated-looking breastplate was lined with Kevlar and ballistic strike plates. The Russian’s gear wouldn’t do diddly to stop swords or claws.

I’d made some modification to my own gear as well. The thong that usually secured my blasting rod, on the inside of my duster, now held up my shotgun. I’d tied a similar strip of leather thong to either end of the simple wooden cane that held Fidelacchius , and now carried the holy blade slung over my shoulder.

Michael nodded to me and then glanced down at his watch. “You’re cutting it a little fine, aren’t you?”

“Punctuality is for people with nothing better to do,” I said.

“Or for those who have already taken care of the other details,” murmured a woman’s voice.

She stepped out of the shadows across the street, a tall and striking woman in motorcycle leathers. She had eyes that were the warm brown shade of hot chocolate, and her hair was dark and braided tightly against her head. She wore no makeup, but even without it she was a knockout. It was the expression on her face that tipped me off to who she was-sadness mingled with regret and steely resolve.

“Rosanna,” I said quietly.

“Wizard.” She strode toward us, somehow arrogant and reserved at the same time, her hips rolling as she walked. The jacket was open almost all the way to her belly button, and there was nothing but skin showing where it was parted. Her eyes, however, remained on the Knights. “These two were not a part of the arrangements.”