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  “No, of course not.”

  Both of them were lying. Parental issues indeed.

  “How’s that boy you’d taken up with? Irving.”

  “Irwin,” Connie said in a poisonously pleasant tone. “He’s great. Maybe even better than that.”

  He frowned at that, and said, “I see. But he’s not here?”

  “He had homework tonight,” Connie lied.

  That drew a small, sly smile out of the man. “I see. Who’s your friend?” he asked pleasantly, without actually looking at me.

  “Oh,” Connie said. “Harry, this is my father, Charles Barrowill. Daddy, this is Harry Dresden.”

  “Hi,” I said brightly.

  Barrowill’s eyes narrowed to sudden slits, and he took a short, hard breath as he looked at me. He then flicked his eyes left and right around him, as if looking for a good place to dive or maybe a hostage to seize.

  “What a pleasure, Mr. Dresden,” he said, his voice suddenly tight. “What brings you out to Oklahoma?”

  “I heard it was a nice place for perambulating,” I said. Behind Barrowill, his guards had picked up on the tension. Both of them had become very still. Barrowill was quiet for a moment, as if trying to parse some kind of meaning from my words. Heavy seconds ticked by, like the quiet before a shootout in an old Western.

  A tumbleweed went rolling by in the street. I’m not even kidding. An actual, literal tumbleweed. Man, Oklahoma.

  Then Barrowill took a slow breath and said to Connie, “Darling, I’d like to speak to you for a few moments, if you have time.”

  “Actually…” Connie began.

  “Now, please,” Barrowill said. There was something ugly under the surface of his pleasant tone. “The car. I’ll give you a ride back to the dorms.”

  Connie folded her arms and scowled. “I’m entertaining someone from out of town, Daddy. I can’t just leave him here.”

  One of the guard’s hands twitched.

  “Don’t be difficult, Connie,” Barrowill said. “I don’t want to make a scene.”

  His eyes never left me as he spoke, and I got his message loud and clear. He was taking the girl with him, and he was willing to make things get messy if I tried to stop him.

  “It’s okay, Connie,” I said. “I’ve been to Norman before. I can find my way to a hotel easily enough.”

  “You’re sure?” Connie asked.

  “Definitely.”

  “Herman,” Barrowill said.

  The driver opened the passenger door again and stood next to it attentively. He kept his eyes on me, and one hand dangled, clearly ready to go for his gun.

  Connie looked back and forth between me and her father for a moment, then sighed audibly and walked over to the car. She slid in, and Herman closed the door behind her.

  “I recognize you,” I said pleasantly to Barrowill. “You were at the Raith Deeps when Skavis and Malvora tried to pull off their coup. Front row, all the way on one end in the Raith cheering section.”

  “You have an excellent memory,” Barrowill said.

  “Got out in one piece, did you?”

  The vampire smiled without humor. “What are you doing with my daughter?”

  “Taking a walk,” I said. “Talking.”

  “You have nothing to say to her. In the interests of peace between the Court and the Council, I’m willing to ignore this intrusion into my territory. Go in peace. Right now.”

  “You never told her, did you?” I asked. “Never told her what she was.”

  One of his jaw muscles twitched. “It is not our way.”

  “Nah,” I said. “You wait until the first time they get twitterpated, experiment with sex, and kill whoever it is they’re with. Little harsh on the kids, isn’t it?”

  “Connie is not some mortal cow. She is a vampire. The initiation builds character she will need to survive and prosper.”

  “If it was good enough for you, it’s good enough for her?”

  “Mortal,” Barrowill said, “you simply cannot understand. I am her father. It is my obligation to prepare her for her life. The initiation is something she needs.”

  I lifted my eyebrows. “Holy … that’s what happened, isn’t it? You sent her off to school to boink some poor kid to death. Hell, I’d bet you had the punch spiked at that party. Except the kid didn’t die—so now you’re in town to figure out what the hell went wrong.”

  Barrowill’s eyes darkened, and he shook his head. “This is no business of yours. Leave.”

  “See, that’s the thing,” I said. “It is my business. My client is worried about his kid.”

  Barrowill narrowed his eyes again. “Irving.”

  “Irwin,” I corrected him.

  “Go back to Chicago, wizard,” he said. “You’re in my territory now.”

  “This isn’t a smart move for you,” I said. “The kid’s connected. If anything bad happens to him, you’re in for trouble.”

  “Is that a threat?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “Chuck, I’ve got no objection to working things out peaceably. And I’ve got no objection to doing it the other way. If you know my reputation, then you know what a sincere guy I am.”

  “Perhaps I should kill you now.”

  “Here, in public?” I asked. “All these witnesses? You aren’t going to do that.”

  “No?”

  “No. Even if you win, you lose. You’re just hoping to scare me off.” I nodded toward his goons. “Ghouls, right? It’s going to take more than two, Chuck. Hell, I like fighting ghouls. No matter what I do to them, I never feel bad about it afterward.”

  Barrowill missed the reference, like the monsters usually do. He looked at me, then at his Rolex. “I’ll give you until midnight to leave the state. After that, you’re gone. One way or another.”

  “Hang on,” I said, “I’m terrified. Let me catch my breath.”

  Barrowill’s eyes shifted color slightly, from a deep green to a much paler, angrier shade of green-gold. “I react poorly to those who threaten my family’s well-being, Dresden.”

  “Yeah. You’re a regular Ozzie Nelson. John Walton. Ben Cartwright.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Mr. Drummond? Charles … in Charge? No?”

  “What are you blabbering about?”

  “Hell’s bells, man. Don’t any of you White Court bozos ever watch television? I’m giving you pop reference gold, here. Gold.”

  Barrowill stared at me with opaque, reptilian eyes. Then he said, simply, “Midnight.” He took two steps back before he turned his back on me and got into his car. His goons both gave me hard looks before they, too, got into the car and pulled away.

  I watched the car roll out. Despite the attitude I’d given Barrowill, I knew better than to take him lightly. Any vampire is a dangerous foe—and one of them with holdings and resources and his own personal brute squad was more so. Not only that but … from his point of view, I was messing around with his little girl’s best interests. The vampires of the White Court were, to a degree, as dangerous as they were because they were partly human. They had human emotions, human motivations, human reactions. Barrowill could be as irrationally protective of his family as anyone else.

  Except that they were also inhuman. All of those human drives were intertwined with a parasitic spirit they called a Hunger, where all the power and hunger of their vampire parts came from.

  Take one part human faults and insecurities and add it to one part inhuman power and motivation. What do you get?

  Trouble.

  * * *

  “Barrowill?” Officer Dean asked me. “The oil guy? He keeps a stable. Of congressmen.”

  “Yeah, probably the same guy,” I said. “All vampires like having money and status. It makes their lives easier.”

  Dean snorted. “Every vampire. And every nonvampire.”

  “Heh,” I said. “Point.”

  “You were in a fix,” he said. “Tell the girl, you might wreck her. Don’t tell her, and you might wr
eck her and Kid Bigfoot both. Either way, somebody’s dad has a bone to pick with you.”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Seems to me a smart guy would have washed his hands of the whole mess and left town.”

  I shrugged. “Yeah. But I was the only guy there.”

  * * *

  Forest isn’t exactly the dominant terrain in Norman, but there are a few trees, here and there. The point where I’d agreed to meet with River Shoulders was in the center of the Oliver Wildlife Preserve, which was a stand of woods that had been donated to the university for research purposes. As I hiked out into the little wood, it occurred to me that meeting River Shoulders there was like rendezvousing with Jaws in a kiddy wading pool—but he’d picked the spot, so whatever floated the big guy’s boat.

  It was dark out, and I drew my silver pentacle amulet off my neck to use for light. A whisper of will and a muttered word, and the little symbol glowed with a dim blue light that would let me walk without bumping into a tree. It took me maybe five minutes to get to approximately the right area, and River Shoulders’s soft murmur of greeting came to me out of the dark.

  We sat down together on a fallen tree, and I told him what I’d learned.

  He sat in silence for maybe two minutes after I finished. Then he said, “My son has joined himself to a parasite.”

  I felt a flash of mild outrage. “You could think of it that way,” I said.

  “What other way is there?”

  “That he’s joined himself to a girl. The parasite just came along for the ride.”

  River Shoulders exhaled a huge breath. It sounded like those pneumatic machines they use to elevate cars at the repair shop. “I see. In your view, the girl is not dangerous. She is innocent.”

  “She’s both,” I said. “She can’t help being born what she is, any more than you or I.”

  River Shoulders grunted.

  “Have your people encountered the White Court before?”

  He grunted again.

  “Because the last time I helped Irwin out … I remember being struck by the power of his aura when he was only fourteen. A long-term draining spell that should have killed him only left him sleepy.” I eyed him. “But I don’t feel anything around you. Stands to reason, your aura would be an order of magnitude greater than your kid’s. That’s why you’ve been careful never to touch me. You’re keeping your power hidden from me, aren’t you?”

  “Maybe.”

  I snorted. “Just the kind of answer I’d expect from a wizard.”

  “It is not something we care for outsiders to know,” he said. “And we are not wizards. We see things differently than mortals. You people are dangerous.”

  “Heh,” I said, and glanced up at his massive form beside mine. “Between the two of us, I’m the dangerous one.”

  “Like a child waving around his father’s gun,” River Shoulders said. Something in his voice became gentler. “Though some of you are better than others about it, I admit.”

  “My point is,” I said, “the kid’s got a life force like few I’ve seen. When Connie’s Hunger awakened, she fed on him without any kind of restraint, and he wound up with nothing worse than a hangover. Could be that he could handle a life with her just fine.”

  River Shoulders nodded slowly. His expression might have been thoughtful. It was too dark, and his features too blunt and chiseled to be sure.

  “The girl seems genuinely fond of him. And he of her. I mean, I’m not an expert in these things, but they seem to like each other, and even when they have a difference of opinions, they fight fair. That’s a good sign.” I squinted at him. “Do you really think he’s in danger?”

  “Yes,” River Shoulders said. “They have to kill him now.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “This … creature. This Barrowill.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It sent its child to this place with the intention that she meet a young man and feed upon him and unknowingly kill him.”

  “Yeah.”

  River Shoulders shook his huge head sadly. “What kind of monster does that to its children?”

  “Vampires,” I said. “It isn’t uncommon, from what I hear.”

  “Because they hurt,” River Shoulders said. “Barrowill remembers his own first lover. He remembers being with her. He remembers her death. And his wendigo has had its hand on his heart ever since. It shaped his life.”

  “Wendigo?”

  River Shoulders waved a hand. “General term. Spirit of hunger. Can’t ever be sated.”

  “Ah, gotcha.”

  “Now, Barrowill. He had his father tell him that this was how it had to be. That it had to be that way to make him a good vampire. So this thing that turned him into a murdering monster is actually a good thing. He spends his whole life trying to convince himself of that.” River nodded slowly. “What happens when his child does something differently?”

  I felt like a moron. “It means that what his father told him was a lie. It means that maybe he didn’t have to be like he is. It means that he’s been lying to himself. About everything.”

  River Shoulders spread his hands, palm up, as if presenting the fact. “That kind of father has to make his children in his own image. He has to make the lie true.”

  “He has to make sure Connie kills Irwin,” I said. “We’ve got to get him out of there. Maybe both of them.”

  “How?” River Shoulders said. “She doesn’t know. He only knows a little. Neither knows enough to be wise enough to run.”

  “They shouldn’t have to run,” I growled.

  “Avoiding a fight is always better than not avoiding one.”

  “Disagree,” I said. “Some fights should be sought out. And fought. And won.”

  River Shoulders shook his head. “Your father’s gun.” I sensed a deep current of resistance in River Shoulders on this subject—one that I would never be able to bridge, I suspected. River just wasn’t a fighter. “Would you agree it was wisest if they both fled?”

  “In this case … it might, yeah. But I think it would only delay the confrontation. Guys like Barrowill have long arms. If he obsesses over it, he’ll find them sooner or later.”

  “I have no right to take his child from him,” River Shoulders said. “I am only interested in Irwin.”

  “Well, I’m not going to be able to separate them,” I said. “Irwin nearly started swinging at me when I went anywhere close to that subject.” I paused, then added, “But he might listen to you.”

  River Shoulders shook his head. “He’s right. I got no right to walk in and smash his life to splinters after being so far away so long. He’d never listen to me. He’s got a lot of anger in him. Maybe for good reasons.”

  “You’re his father,” I said. “That might carry more weight than you think.”

  “I should not have involved you in this,” he said. “I apologize for that, wizard. You should go. Let me sort this out on my own.”

  I eyed River Shoulders.

  The big guy was powerful, sure, but he was also slow. He took his time making decisions. He played things out with enormous patience. He was clearly ambivalent over what kind of involvement he should have with his son. It might take him months of observation and cogitation to make a choice.

  Most of us don’t live that way. I was sure Barrowill didn’t. If the vampire was moving, he might be moving now. Like, right now.

  “In this particular instance, River Shoulders, you are not thinking clearly,” I said. “Action must be taken soon. Preferably tonight.”

  “I will be what I am,” River said firmly.

  I stood up from the log and nodded. “Okay,” I said. “Me too.”

  * * *

  I put in a call to my fellow Warden, “Wild Bill” Meyers, in Dallas, but got an answering service. I left a message that I was in Norman and needed his help, but I had little faith that he’d show up in time. The real downside to being a wizard is that we void the warrantees of anything technological every
time we sneeze. Cell phones are worse than useless in our hands, and it makes communications a challenge at times though that was far from the only possible obstacle. If Bill was in, he’d have picked up his phone. He had a big area for his beat and likely had problems of his own—but since Dallas was only three hours away (assuming his car didn’t break down), I could hold out hope that he might roll in by morning.

  So I got in my busted-up old Volkswagen, picked up a prop, and drove up to the campus alone. I parked somewhere where I would probably get a ticket. I planned to ignore it. Anarchists have a much easier time finding parking spots.

  I got out and walked toward one of the smaller dorm buildings on campus. I didn’t have my wizard’s staff with me, on account of how weird it looked to walk around with one, but my blasting rod was hanging from its tie inside my leather duster. I doubted I would need it, but better to have it and not need it than the other way around. I got my prop and trudged across a short bit of turquoise-tinted grass to the honors dorms, where Irwin lived. They were tiny, for that campus, maybe five stories, with the building laid out in four right-angled halls, like a plus sign. The door was locked. There’s always that kind of security in a dorm building, these days.

  I rapped on the glass with my knuckles until a passing student noticed. I held up a cardboard box from the local Pizza ’Spress, and tried to look like I needed a break. I needn’t have tried so hard. The kid’s eyes were bloodshot and glassy. He was baked on something. He opened the door for me without blinking.

  “Thanks.”

  “No problem,” he said.

  “He was supposed to meet me at the doors,” I said. “You see a guy named, uh…” I checked the receipt that was taped to the box. “Irwin Pounder?”

  “Pounder, hah,” the kid said. “He’ll be in his room. Fourth floor, south hall, third door on the left. Just listen for the noise.”

  “Music?”

  He tittered. “Not exactly.”

  I thanked him and ambled up the stairs, which were getting to be a lot harder on my knees than they used to be. Maybe I needed orthopedic shoes or something.

  I got to the second floor before I felt it. There was a tension in the air, something that made my heart speed up and my skin feel hot. A few steps farther, and I started breathing faster and louder. It wasn’t until I got to the third floor that I remembered that the most dangerous aspect of a psychic assault is that the victim almost never realizes that it’s actually happening.