Death Masks

The counterspell worked. The serpents writhed and thrashed around for a second, and then imploded, vanishing, leaving behind nothing but a coating of clear, glistening slime in their place.

Susan scrambled away, still gasping, still bleeding. Her skin shone, wet and slick with the residue of the conjured serpents. Rivulets of blood laced her arms and one leg, and thick black bruises banded the skin of one arm, one leg, her throat, and one side of her face.

I stared for a second. The darkness on her skin wasn’t bruising. It gained shape, as I watched, resolving itself from vague discoloration to the dark, sharp lines of a tattoo. I watched the tattoo come into being over her skin, all curves and points, Maori-style. It began on her cheek under one eye and wound down around her face, around the back of her neck, and on down over one collarbone and into the neckline of her evening gown. It emerged again winding down along her left arm and left leg, finishing at the back of her hand and over the bridge of her left foot. She hauled herself to her feet, panting and shaking, the swirling designs lending a savage aspect to her appearance. She stared at me for a moment, her eyes dark and enlarged, the irises too big to be human. They filled with tears that didn’t fall, and she looked away.

The snakeman recovered enough to slither his way vertical again, looking around. He focused yellow snake eyes on Susan and let out a surprised wheeze. "Fellowship," he rasped, the word a hiss. "Fellowship here." The Denarian looked around and spotted the courier’s tube still hanging by its strap from my shoulder. Its tail lashed about and the Denarian darted toward me.

I slipped to one side, keeping a table between us, and shouted, "Susan!"

The snakeman struck the table with one arm and broke it in half. Then he came at me over the pieces-until Susan ripped a dryer out of the wall and threw it at his head.

The Denarian saw it coming and dodged at the last second, but the dryer clipped him and sent him sprawling. He hissed again, and slithered away from both of us, shooting into the air shaft and out of sight.

I panted and watched the vent for a second, but he didn’t reappear. Then I hauled the still-stunned Valmont toward the door and asked Susan, "Fellowship?"

Her lips pressed together, and she averted her too-large eyes. "Not now."

I ground my teeth in frustration and worry, but she was right. The smoke was getting thicker, and we had no way of knowing if tall, green, and scaly would be reappearing. I pulled Valmont along with me, made sure I still had the Shroud, and followed Susan out the door. She ran along barefoot without breaking stride, and between the pain in my lungs and the blond thief’s torpor, I could barely keep up with her.

We went up a flight of stairs and Susan opened a door on a pair of gorillas in red security blazers. They tried to stop us. Susan threw a right and a left cross, and we walked over them on our way out. I kind of felt bad for them. Getting punched out by a dame was not going to pad their goon resumes.

We left the building through a side door, and the dark limo was waiting, Martin standing beside it. I could hear sirens, people shouting, the blaring horns of fire vehicles trying to get to the hotel.

Martin took one look at Susan and stiffened. Then he hurried over to us.

"Take her," I rasped. Martin picked up Valmont and carried her to the limo like a sleepy child. I followed him. Martin put the blond thief in and got behind the wheel. Susan slipped in after her, and I slung the tube off my shoulder to get in behind her.

Something grabbed me from behind, wrapping around my waist like a soft, squishy rope. I slapped at the car door, but I managed only to slam it shut as I was hauled back off my feet. I landed on the ground near the fire door.

"Harry!" Susan shouted.

"Go!" I gasped. I looked at Martin, behind the wheel of the limo. I grabbed the Shroud and tried to throw it at the car, but something pinned my arm down before I could. "Get out! Get help!"

"No!" Susan screamed, and tried for the door.

Martin was faster. I heard locks click shut on the limo. Then the engine roared, and the car screamed into the street and away.

I tried to run. Something tangled my feet and I couldn’t even get off the ground. I turned to find Nicodemus standing over me, the hangman’s noose the only thing he wore that wasn’t soaked with blood. His shadow, his freaking shadow was wrapped around my waist, my legs, my hands, and it moved and wriggled like something alive. I reached for my magic, but the grasping shadow-coils grew suddenly cold, colder than ice or frosted steel, and my power crumbled to frozen powder beneath it.

One of the shadow-coils took the courier’s tube from my numbed hands, curling through the air to hand it to Nicodemus. "Excellent," he said. "I have the Shroud. And I have you, Harry Dresden."

"What do you want?" I rasped.

"Just to talk," Nicodemus assured me. "I want to have a polite conversation with you."

"Blow me."

His eyes darkened with cold anger, and he drew out the heavy revolver.

Great, Harry, I thought. That’s what you get for trying to be a hero. You get to eat a six-pack of nine-millimeter bon-bons.

But Nicodemus didn’t shoot me.

He clubbed me over the head with the butt of the gun.

Light flashed in my eyes, and I started to fall. I was out before my cheek hit the ground.

Chapter Twenty-one

The cold woke me.

I came to my senses in complete darkness, under a stream of freezing water. My head hurt enough to make the wound on my leg feel pleasant by comparison. My wrists and shoulders hurt even more. My neck felt stiff, and it took me a second to realize that I was vertical, my hands bound together over my head. My feet were tied too. My muscles started jumping and twitching under the cold water and I tried to get out from under it. The ropes prevented me. The cold started cutting into me. It hurt a lot.

I tried to get loose, working my limbs methodically, testing the ropes, trying to free my hands. I couldn’t tell if I was making any progress. Thanks to the cold, I couldn’t even feel my wrists, and it was too dark to see.

I got more scared by the moment. If I couldn’t work my hands free, I might have to risk using magic to scorch the ropes. Hell, I was cold enough that the thought of burning myself had a certain appeal. But when I started trying to reach out for the power to manage it, it slithered away from me. Then I understood. Running water. Running water grounds magical energies, and every time I tried to get something together the water washed it away.

The cold grew more intense, more painful. I couldn’t escape it. I panicked, thrashing wildly, dull pain flaring in my bound limbs, and fading away into numbness under the cold. I screamed a few times, I think. I remember choking on water while I tried.