Small Favor

"Harry," Michael said quietly, "that was Captain Luccio, was it not?"

"Yeah," I said.

"You never told us that Mab threatened to go back on her bargain."

"Well, no."

Michael watched me with troubled eyes. "Because she didn’t. You just lied to Luccio."

"Yeah," I said shortly. "Because I need the Council’s say-so to set up the meeting. Because I’ve got to set up the meeting so that the gang of murdering bastards who tortured Shiro to death will have a chance to prove to you that they’ve still got it coming."

"Harry, if the Council learns that you’ve misled them-"

"They’ll probably charge me with treason," I said.

Michael rose from his seat. "But-"

I stabbed a finger at him. "The longer we delay, the longer those creeps stay in town, the longer Summer’s hit men keep coming after me, and the more likely it is that innocent people are going to get hurt in the cross fire. I’ve got to move fast, and the best way to get the Council to move is to let it think its own ass is about to fall into the fire."

"Harry-" Michael began.

"Don’t," I said. "Don’t give me the speech about redemption and mercy and how everyone deserves a second chance. I’m all for doing the right thing, Michael. You know that. But this isn’t the time."

"Then what is right changes because we’re in a hurry?" he asked gently.

"Even your Book says that there’s a time for all things," I said. "A time to heal-and a time to kill."

Michael looked from me to the corner by the back door, where the broadsword Amoracchius rested in its humble leather scabbard, its plain, crusader-style hilt bound in wire. "It isn’t that, Harry. I’ve seen more of what they’ve done than you have. I have no qualms with fighting them, if it comes to that."

"They’ve already blown up a building, tried to murder me, and set off a situation that nearly got your own children burned down in the cross fire. In what way has it not come to that?"

Instead of answering, Michael shook his head, took up Amoracchius, and walked further into the house.

I scowled after him for a minute and muttered darkly under my breath.

"You confused him," Sanya rumbled.

I glanced at the dark-skinned Knight. "What?"

"You confused him," Sanya repeated. "Because of what you did."

"What? Lying to the Council? I don’t see that I had much choice."

"But you did," Sanya said placidly. He reached into the gym bag on the floor next to him and drew out a long saber, an old cavalry weapon-Esperacchius. A nail worked into the hilt declared it a brother of Michael’s sword. He started inspecting the blade. "You could have simply moved to attack them."

"By myself? I’m bad, but I’m not that bad."

"He’s your friend. He would have come with you. You know that."

I shook my head. "He’s my friend. Period. You don’t do that to your friends."

"Precisely," Sanya said. "So instead you have placed your own life in jeopardy in order to protect his beliefs. You risk your body to preserve his heart." He brought out a smooth sharpening stone and began stropping the saber’s blade. "I suppose he considers it a particularly messianic act."

"That’s not why I did it," I said.

"Of course it isn’t. He knows that. It isn’t easy for him. Usually he’s the one protecting another, willing to pay the price if he must."

I exhaled and glanced after Michael. "I don’t know what else I could have done."

"Da," Sanya agreed. "But he is still afraid for you." He fell quiet for a moment, while his stone slid along the sword’s blade.

"Mind if I ask you something?" I said.

The big man kept sharpening the sword with a steady hand. "Not at all."

"You looked a little tense when Tessa’s name came up," I said.

Sanya glanced up at me for a second, his eyes shadowed and unreadable. He shrugged a shoulder and went back to his work.

"She do you wrong?"

"Barely ever noticed me. Or spoke to me," Sanya said. "To her I was just an employee. One more face. She did not care who I was."

"This second of hers, though. The one who recruited you."

The muscles along his jawline twitched. "Her name is Rosanna."

"And she done you wrong," I said.

"Why do you say that?"

"’Cause when you talk about her, your face says that you been done wrong."

He gave me a brief smile. "Do you know how many black men live in Russia, Dresden?"

"No. I mean, I figure they’re kind of a minority."

Sanya stopped in midstrop and glanced at me for a pregnant moment, one eyebrow arched. "Yes," he said, his tone dry. "Kind of."

"More so than in the States, I guess."

He grunted. "For Moscow I was very, very odd. If I went out to any smaller towns when I was growing up, I had to be careful about walking down busy streets. I could cause car accidents when drivers took their eyes off the road to stare at me. Literally. Many people in that part of the world had never seen a black person with their own eyes. That is changing slowly, but growing up I was a minority the way Bigfoot is a minority. A freak."

I started putting things together. "That’s the kind of thing that is bound to make a young man a little resentful."

He went back to sharpening the sword. "Oh, yes."

"So when you say that Tessa prefers to take recruits she knows will be eager to accept a coin…"

"I speak from experience," Sanya said, nodding. "Rosanna was everything that angry, poor, desperate young man could dream of. Pretty. Strong. Sensual. And she truly did not care about the color of my skin." Sanya shook his head. "I was sixteen."

I winced. "Yeah. Good age for making really bad decisions. I speak from experience, too."

"She offered me the coin," Sanya said. "I took it. And for five years the creature known as Magog and I traveled the world with Rosanna, indulged in every vice a young man could possibly imagine, and…obeyed Tessa’s commands." He shook his head and glanced up at me. "By the end of that time, Dresden, I wasn’t much more than a beast who walked upright. Oh, I had thoughts and feelings, but they were all slaves to my baser desires. I did many things of which I am not-" He broke off and turned his face away from me. "I did many things."

"She was your handler," I said quietly. "Rosanna. She was the one getting you to try the drugs, to do the deeds. One little step at a time. Corrupting you and letting the Fallen take control."