Meanwhile, the spiders chittered and hissed and leapt toward the nearest target, which happened to be me.

“Glah!” I shouted. In a very manly fashion.

Look, big bugs are like a thing. I mean, imagine you looked down the length of your underwear-only-clad body and saw giant Alaskan crabs charging up it, pincers waving. You’d have shouted in a manly fashion as well, to prepare yourself for battle.

There wasn’t much light, and even less time. I kicked frantically at one enormous spider and knocked it aside like a flabby kickball full of peanut butter. I shoved a second creature out of the air as it came at my face and then felt horrible puncture wounds happening as the other four bit into me. When teeth pierce your flesh, you don’t feel much for a second or two—until whatever bit you starts worrying you, thrashing back and forth while tearing. Then it’s like electricity flowing into you, lightning bolts of sharp silver sensation that surge up and down whatever limb is being bitten. Fangs pierced. Venom seared. My heart rate skyrocketed.

The other two widows rebounded from where I’d knocked them away and joined in.

And then, frantic breaths later, the forms of the spiders just wobbled and suddenly collapsed into translucent goo. One second, dozens of hard, tiny spider feet were poking into me everywhere while spider fangs sent pain scorching through me. The next, I was covered in ectoplasm and small wounds, having thoroughly slimed myself.

Goddamned conjuritis.

I would just have to hope that there weren’t any negative interactions with ectoplasm being injected into my bloodstream—because whatever the venom had been, it was definitely reduced to ectoplasm now.

I flopped like a landed fish, ectogoo making the floor more slippery than your average waterslide, eventually thrashing until I could see Lara again.

She still stood with her back to the Einherjar. They’d dropped the gun in the struggle, and the man had both hands on her throat now. Her face was bright pink, her lips an ugly greyish color. I couldn’t understand why she wasn’t fighting back until I saw her hands, behind her, at the small of her back.

She wasn’t trying to fight off his hold on her. She was going for the kill.

Lara arched, twisting and struggling, and the poor bastard hung on to her neck. He thought he was winning the fight.

Then his fatigue pants came loose. Lara’s lips twisted into a triumphant snarl. There was a surge of bodies, and then the Einherjar let out a startled huffing sound. His eyes went wide and unfocused.

The struggle stopped. A slow smile spread over Lara’s half-strangled face. She slid her hands up the Einherjar’s arms and tugged gently at his fingers. His hands came away at once, sliding down her shoulders to her breasts. She coughed once, then let out a low purring sound, and her hips began to move in slow rhythm.

The Einherjar staggered. He sank back against his desk, balance wavering. Lara stayed with him, and though the motion should have been awkward, Lara moved smoothly and nimbly to match him, somewhere between a dance partner, a lover, and a hungry spider wrapping up its prey for the feast.

She looked back at her victim, teeth showing, and then looked at me. Her eyes were liquid silver, like mirrors. Deep pink finger marks on her neck promised bruises to come, but even as I stared at her, they were fading—as the Einherjar’s breathing became heavier and more desperate.

“What the hell was that?” she demanded. Her voice was quiet and rough, as if she’d somehow spent ten years drinking whiskey. “Giant spiders? Dammit, Dresden.”

I found myself just staring for a second. She wasn’t putting out the same kind of aura she had before, but she was still one of the most erotic, terrifying sights I had looked upon. Her allure drew me, calling to my purely human hormones—and, needless to say, the Winter mantle was going absolutely insane with lust for her. It wanted nothing so much as to challenge the Einherjar, beat him to death, and then claim Lara as a prize of conquest.

But that wasn’t me. Not the real me. That was just the mantle and the meat, wanting what they wanted. I pushed back against them both with my mind, with my will, until I remembered my purpose.

Thomas.

Save my brother.

I came to my sock feet, soaked with ectoplasm though they might be, and padded forward squishily.

“Don’t kill him,” I hissed intently, trying not to look at her. “All of this trouble is for nothing if you kill him.”

“Don’t be long,” she countered, her voice throaty, sensual, a hint of a moan in every word. Her eyes had become almost completely white at this point, pupils like beads of black in their centers. Her eyes looked utterly inhuman—and exactly like those of the demon Hunger I’d observed with my wizard senses in my brother, years ago. “He’s stronger than he looks. Hurt me badly. I’m still healing.”

The Einherjar just remained locked where he was, his eyes blank, his expression one of a man in torment, moving only as needed to match Lara’s motion. She was a tiny thing compared to his sheer muscular mass—and he clearly didn’t have a chance in the world against her at this point. A man dedicated for centuries to his profession, and it meant nothing in the face of her power. There was no dignity to it.

Do we all look that goofy and clumsy during the act?

Yeah. Probably. Even when there wasn’t a succubus involved.

I pushed past the vampire and her victim and tried to figure out exactly when I’d started taking the field beside the things that go bump in the night instead of against them.

And then I pushed those thoughts away, grabbed an armload of towels, and went looking for my brother.

27

At the end of the hallway, I found a heavy trapdoor set in the floor.

I froze.

My heart started beating faster.

The door didn’t match the castle’s décor. It wasn’t lined up exactly right with the stones. It was old and made of heavy wood.

And there were scorch marks on it.

Because it was my door.

My door, mine, from my old apartment; the door to my subbasement lab. It still had the ring in it that I used to pull it up. And it had an additional bar on it that hadn’t been there before.

I shook myself out of the freeze and stretched out a shaking hand to slide back the bar and open the door. It came up easily; it even squeaked at the right spot and felt, dammit, exactly like it always had. My chest suddenly hurt and my eyes burned.

Hell’s bells, I wanted to feel like I was home again.

And instead, I was standing in Marcone’s house.

Something stirred in me, down deep. It wasn’t rage. It wasn’t anything as ephemeral and temporary as rage. It wasn’t predicated on my emotional pain. It felt older than that. Primordial. What was mine had been taken away.

It wasn’t right. And no one was going to do anything about it.

Unless it was me.

Something went click somewhere inside.

Ever since the Red Court had taken my daughter, I’d been reeling from one disaster to the next, surviving. This entire situation was just one more entropy barrage hitting my life, forcing me to scramble once again, maybe getting me killed. (Again. Technically.)

Things were different now. I was a part of Maggie’s life. And she might need me to walk her down an aisle one day.

Maybe it was time I started getting ahead of this stuff.