The White Council emerged last, Ebenezar, Listens-to-Wind, and Cristos backed up by Ramirez and his squad, all in grey cloaks now, staves in hand, weapons strapped, ready for action. The old man headed straight for me and I rose to meet them.

“Okay, Hoss,” he said. “Remember we’ve got three positions between here and the lake?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Well, we’re heading for the opening between the northernmost two,” he said. “And Etri and his people, along with the Summer Lady and the rest of her gang, are heading for the gap on the south side. The idea is to force the Fomor to a stop so that they have to bring up their heavy troops if they want to advance.”

I frowned. “I thought the idea was to wait until Ethniu revealed herself.”

The old man grimaced. “If we don’t stop the advance,” he said, “the battle won’t get that far. It won’t need to. She’ll have won already.” He shook his head. “We have to force her to use the Eye to get through us.”

“If they’ve got that many troops,” I said, “why should she? She can just grind us away.”

“She doesn’t have time,” the old man said, his eyes glinting. “Mortal emergency response systems are already in motion. The National Guard is already mobilizing and on its way. They’ve got to bring up heavy equipment to clear the roads so they can get through, but they’ll be here by dawn. Maybe sooner.”

“So,” I clarified, finding myself grinning irrationally, “we’re going to charge into the meat grinder as fast as we can to force her to hit us as hard as she can, and then hope that we can punch her lights out before the army gets here and starts killing everybody in sight.”

“We . . .” Ebenezar sighed. “Aye, fair enough.”

“Yippee,” I said. “That sounds like fun.”

“Heh,” rumbled River Shoulders. “Heh, heh, heh.”

The White Council suddenly looked very cautious to be standing in the proximity of the Sasquatch’s rumbling laugh.

“Well,” I said to River Shoulders. “Shall we?”

My grandfather lifted his eyebrows.

“Sure,” River Shoulders said, and climbed to his feet, lightly for all his enormity. “Be good fun. Bigfoot versus octokongs.”

“What?” asked Cristos, his handsome face confused.

“You heard him,” I said. “Let’s go.”

Chapter

Eleven

   So we moved out, into the smoke and the dark and the chaos, and the enemy did what the enemy always does. They showed up without calling ahead and screwed with our nice plan.

We’d marched down to Montrose and turned east, heading down the streets at a trot. I found myself moving next to Ramirez, who grimaced and clenched his jaw and kept the pace with silent, pained determination until we got to Welles Park. The darkened buildings and looming shadows of the park could hold hundreds of enemies. We pulled up to wait for a moment while Lara’s people swept the place.

Ramirez found a bench and eased onto it, gasping. I knelt next to him. We watched as people fleeing the chaos between here and the lake paced silently past us, eyes wide and haunted. They crossed to the other side of the street as they approached and realized that we were a large, armed group. I didn’t blame them. There was a goddamned Bigfoot standing on the corner, apparently examining a crosswalk pedestrian button in fascination.

Chandler, Wild Bill, and Yoshimo joined us as a factor of natural gravity, and I watched Ramirez will the pain and weariness away before he addressed them.

“So,” Ramirez said, without pausing, “the enemy’s northern arm came ashore at Montrose Beach. Lara’s mercenaries are to the north of us in Uptown. They were holding the line at Lake Shore Drive but they got pushed back to Sheridan. Marcone’s people are down south of us and they’re dug in around Wrigley. They’re holding. That’s funneling the enemy right into the space in the middle as they try to get around them. McCoy and the Senior Council are going to go stop them from doing that, and we’re going to swat any flies that bother them while they do.”

“How’s your leg there, boss?” Wild Bill asked casually.

“I can’t feel it,” Ramirez lied. “It’ll last the night.”

“You are hurt,” Yoshimo said. That she had spoken at all was remarkable. Her Latin was flawless, her English only so-so, and she wasn’t the chatty type. “It is not appropriate for you to be entering battle.”

“It is not ideal,” Ramirez agreed, still struggling to control his breathing. “But we need every hand on this one.”

“If this don’t go so good and we have to skedaddle,” Wild Bill said, “you’re gonna be a little slow, Pancho. It could get dicey.”

That was putting it mildly. Come time to run from a battle, the slow and wounded die. That’s just how it works.

Ramirez just looked at Wild Bill, and said, with weary amusement, “I’m Spanish, not Mexican. You damned Texan.”

Wild Bill put a hand on Ramirez’s shoulder and flashed him a wolfish grin.

River Shoulders came over and dropped to his haunches next to me. That put him on an eye level with Chandler, standing. The dapper Brit eyed the Sasquatch with a bland expression and did not flinch. Much.

“How do you do?” rumbled River Shoulders.

“Well, thank you,” said Chandler, with the flawless, reflexive courtesy you only get from a finishing school. “I understand you and Harry have worked together before?”

“Nah,” River Shoulders said. “He come and bailed me out a few times when I needed help.” He grinned. His teeth were very white. They stood out against the spatters of dark blood still on his fur. “But we did some good work tonight.”

Chandler was too refined to take an intimidated step back. But he leaned.

I had just retied one of my shoes when the order came back down the line from Ebenezar, who seemed to have de facto command of the group. Time to move ahead. I had just gotten moving again when there was a flash of violet light that streaked down the road, swept high over the group’s line, and plunged down toward me.

“My lord!” piped Major General Toot-Toot. The little fae came to a wavering hover in the air before me and saluted, grinning fiercely at me. “There is knavery afoot!”

“Talk to me, Major General,” I said, even as I broke into a jog to keep pace.

“We didn’t see them until they got there! The foe has sneakily snucked a sneak attack behind our lines, like a sneaky sneak!”