Bob, the spirit of intellect, an encyclopedia of knowledge, one of my first mentors and closest friends, had been stolen from me.

His skull isn't just some keepsake, or even just a fancy home. No, his skull is etched with dozens of runes of binding, and he is bound and beholden to the holder of his miniature prison. From what I understand, he accepts the situation because it's also a bomb shelter against the magical entities he's pissed off over the course of his extensive lifetime, spent learning things he wasn't supposed to know. I've said it before: if knowledge is power, then Bob is a magical heavyweight.

Check that.

Bob is, pound for intellectual pound, on par with any ten wizards in what he knows about how magic works, including about how it may change over time. It probably comes from having served wizards in their research since the dark ages, each living for potentially several hundred years, and several of them Dark enough to have managed to break each and every one of the Laws of Magic in some new and exciting way.

I'd inherited Bob's skull from my first mentor, and the man who had pulled me from the orphanage: Justin DuMorne. A man I'd murdered with magic in self defense when he'd sent an Outsider to kill me first because I refused to let him turn me into a thrall, a mental meat puppet.

All I had kept to remember that nightmare was Bob himself, who I'd pulled from the burning wreckage of Justin's house.

He was my second real friend since my dad died. I'd had him since I was 16.

And he was gone.

"Are you OK, sir?" the camera woman asked, and I pulled myself out of my daze long enough to look back at her, with her long blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail. "Do you need me to call you someone to help you back upstairs?"

I thought back to when I'd asked Bob where Justin had picked him up. Who Justin had gotten him from.

"Sir, you can't be down here while I'm working."

Justin had been a Warden of the White Council at the time. The entire Senior Council, the seven most powerful wizards in the world, had been roused to take down a single man, supposedly one of the most dangerous in history.

"Sir?"

It had been a man named Heinrich Kemmler. The man who literally wrote the books on Necromancy. The man who had kept Bob for forty years while he had unlocked all the secrets Death normally kept to itself. Bob never, ever forgets.

And now a Necromancer wannabe had him.

"No," I managed to say. "No, I'm not OK."

I looked over at her, and she smiled at me with just a hint of pity in her blue eyes. She had pulled down her facemask, the kind you see in hospitals that covers the mouth and nose. Her hands had those blue sterilized gloves all crime scene investigators are supposed to have when handling evidence, and she wore a white full body smock, down to the booties around her feet. Her face and hair masks she'd pulled down, and her curves were smooth wherever I could see them.

I could have sworn I'd met her before, but I couldn't remember when no matter how hard I tried.

"Is this your home?" she asked gently, holding her camera close to her chest.

I swallowed, blinking away some of the dust in my eyes. "Yeah. My little fortress, breached."

"Hey, don't be sad," she tried to cheer me up, then looked down and carefully stepped around the mess on the floor to get closer to me. "Even if today hasn't gone the way you thought it would, I'm sure things can always get better, can't they?"

I nodded, breathing deep. I took the room in a second time, just taking in all the destroyed ingredients I'd picked up over the years. It was going to be a long time before I could safely brew anything in this lab again.

"Did you lose anything important?" She asked, and I blinked, looking back up at her. She gestured around at the broken goods.

I followed her gesture, trying to see if anything was salvageable.

"You know…" she said slowly, looking at her camera. "I've been having trouble stepping around this mess. I might have to go back and take pictures of everything a second time, just to make sure I didn't miss anything. The first pictures aren't really that good…" she trailed off, and I looked at the bridge of her nose, just close enough to see her eyes without looking into them. "I wouldn't really notice if anything was missing. It hasn't been marked into evidence yet, after all."

I slowed my breathing, taking a moment to clear my head.

Yes, this sucked. Yes, things were bad. Yes, somebody was going to pay for coming into my house and breaking my things.

But that was only going to happen if I wasn't locked up in a cell.

There are a few things around my lab that aren't exactly legal. That is to say, I'd find myself locked up in questioning for a good long while if the police happened upon any of them, even if I could now lie and say that whoever had trashed the place had left them here. A few of those things I could already see were destroyed beyond all recognition, but one in particular still stood out.

My lead-lined box of depleted uranium.

I spotted it sitting near the top of a pile of sand from the Mojave desert, the jar it was in now just shards of glass among the other spell components. I stepped over the broken remains of my lab table to pick up the box.

It was sitting next to the edge of where I'd paid to have a circle installed into my cellar. I'd forgotten it, given the state of the rest of my house.

Under normal circumstances, I make absolutely sure that the circle is always clean, just in case I need to use it to protect myself from nasties that can somehow break through my wards and threshold. There's another reason I like to keep it clean, and that's what's buried in concrete underneath it.

I clenched the fingers of my left hand as best as I could. I could imagine the clean patch of flesh among the waxy, melted butter that my hand had been turned into when I'd gone toe to toe with a flamethrower. The little circle, about the size of a nickel, had a vaguely hourglass-shaped inscription in the middle, from where I'd touched the coin of a fallen angel.

The same coin I'd buried underneath that triple-band of silver in the corner of my lab.

"Did you need to take anything else?" the lab tech asked, and I fliched.

"No," I told her, quickly shoving the box into my pocket and standing up straight. "Nothing down here that isn't broken in some way."

If the feds were going to dig up my floor, then I had more problems than I could handle at this point. I had to assume the wrecking crews weren't going to go that far, and that if Death's Wannabes hadn't found it when they'd searched my place the first time, they weren't going to. I had to put the coin out of my mind.

"I haven't taken any pictures upstairs, so I wouldn't know what was missing there, either," she admitted with a small smile. "...I can understand losing everything like this. I'm sorry."

"Don't be," I said, stepping carefully over the piles. "'S'not your fault."

I stumbled over one of the broken legs of my lab table, and had to catch myself with my staff before I fell over her. She held her arms close and turned her head, and I found myself standing almost over her, close enough to smell a hint of peaches and strawberries in her hair.

"Be careful," she said softly, her breath hot on my face. "I don't want to see you get hurt."

I swallowed and carefully maneuvered around her side, back to the stairs back up to my apartment.

"Did you drop this?"

I turned back. She was holding up a book with red circles and golden lines across the cover, the title, "Die Lied der Erlking" plastered on the side, next to the writer's name: Samuel Peabody. A bookmark was set in it, halfway down the pages. It was one of the only things in the room that wasn't completely destroyed.

"Sorry, yeah, I must have," I told her, holding out my hand for it.

She turned it over in her blue gloved hands, frowning. "You know the title isn't supposed to be written this way, right?" She handed the book over to me.

I looked down at it. "How do you mean?"

"It's German. I think there's a fairy tale in there that all German children learn, about der Erlkönig. The title should read, Das Lied des Erlkönigs."

I put the book in my duster's large inner pocket, courtesy of being oversized, and thanked her. I gave her one last glance as she pulled her hood and mask back into place, and she winked at me as she noticed me looking at her. I hurried back up the stairs, and made a mental note to read it over later, given that it wasn't a book I actually owned.

Focus, Harry. She said it clearly: get the things you need, and get out of the police's way. Look at the clues you've been left when there's time.

I listed the things I needed to look for off in my mind as I searched:

My blasting rod, which I'd taken out of my coat along with my revolver when I'd taken it off to clean up and restitch my runes of protection.

My revolver, a copy of Dirty Harry's .44, snark about five shots or six not included. Ammo, too, or it wouldn't exactly matter that I had the gun.

My force ring, for those times I want to throw the Hulk's punch around at a moment's notice, but with a long recharge time before I can use it again.

A notebook with call signs in it.

A couple of rocks.

And any clothes that haven't been burned or destroyed, because I wouldn't put it past whoever did this to leave me anything clean to wear.

I forced myself to put my feelings about this mess aside long enough to search my apartment for my stuff. It didn't take long. I'm not going to list all the painful details of the destruction of my place. The gun had miraculously fallen under my bed, and the six spare bullets I'd left in my coat were all I had for it on me. The ring was under the shards of my Mickey Mouse alarm clock. My blasting rod had been broken in half. The notebook was ripped to shreds. The stones were in my closet, under what was left of my clothes; whoever had gone through here had made absolutely sure that all I had left were little strips of cloth.

It hadn't taken long to find it all. Two minutes, tops.

There was a policeman standing at the door waited patiently, the only other one in my home. He was dark skinned, blocky, maybe in his fifties, and his short, frosted grey beard contrasted against his complexion. I walked over to him, gave him a muttered thank you.

"Don't know what you're talking about," he drawled, leaning against the busted door frame. "You just got here a moment ago."

I gave him as best a smile as I could, given the circumstances. "If that's all, I need to find another place to sleep tonight. If it's not, then just tell me what needs to happen. Whoever did this is still out there, probably still after me, and I'd rather not find them waiting for me outside."

The man raised an eyebrow, then leaned out a bit and looked up the stairs. Rather than down at the lightly charred bodies, he looked up at the flashing lights and muffled shouted questions, probably from the reporters. He got up and crossed his arms. "Really? Through all that?"

"Yeah, through all that," I insisted. "These guys don't play by the rules. They're not from around here, and it won't cost them anything if there's a ton of collateral damage. Hell, they might even want that to happen. These are bad people," I checked his nametag, "Rawlins. If there was an orphanage they had to blow up to get at me, they wouldn't hesitate."

He looked around my apartment, nodding slowly. "You know, I've always sort of thought those kinds of things were real, even before the big reveal." He looked about as close to my eyes as he could. Apparently he'd listened when I'd told people not to look in Wizards' eyes. "...the bodies on the stairs. You booby-trapped your house?"

I swallowed, then nodded. "The only kinds of things that would set it off like that are those that aren't exactly coming over for afternoon tea. And if it helps, I'm pretty sure they were dead before they even tried to get in."

He shook his head, whispering some curse words I couldn't make out. Probably something that rhymed with duck or clam.

"Get out of here," he told me, not looking at me anymore. "Before somebody higher up decides it's your fault. Before this gets worse."

I barked out a quick laugh, taking one last look around my apartment. "I think they've probably already decided it's my fault, but thanks for the advice. I'll fix this. I will."

He didn't say anything else, just looked at me funny, like I'd completely misheard him, and I got moving.

I made it about five steps up the stairs before about a hundred voices started shouting at me. Flashlights blinded me, and I covered my eyes and had my left arm up and my shield working in an instant.

It took two hours to get the mess sorted.

As it turns out, a single cop does not speak with the authority of the entire force. In hindsight, that was really, really obvious.

The cop in charge was furious, and he was about five seconds away from having me held for 24 hours. I did my best not to sweat too hard, and thanked my lucky stars that the guys he asked to search me were less angry at the whole situation and were more like Rawlings, pitying me for being caught up in something for the thousandth time. If they hadn't been, I can guarantee they wouldn't have taken my words about the stuff I had on me at face value.

Legally speaking, they could search me because I'd barged into a crime scene and had a chance to mess with it. Also because I'm considered a dangerous individual. Since I'd been recognized as a wizard, I've been stopped and searched a few more times than I was used to just walking about, so I'd taken the time to finally get my concealed-carry license for my sidearm. Murphy had called me an idiot for taking so long, but looked secretly proud when she thought I wasn't looking.

If she's aware of the sawn-off shotgun or any of my half-brother's illegally-modified fully automatics, she hasn't been as vocal about it.

On the topic of being searched, I gave vague answers about the lead-lined box, but otherwise told the guys it wasn't a toy and that, as a wizard, I'm safest to keep it. They believed me, but still noted down that I had it. Part of me wanted to throw it away at that point, but the other part knew I wasn't going to get another chance to get such an important spell component any time soon. Plus, I needed it.

About a thousand questions later, during which I claimed to have no idea how the things on my staircase had fried themselves and gave my alibi about Mac's Bar and the Monsters' mansion, I was finally told not to leave town and they let me go with a warning. Part of that warning included, "don't you dare say a thing to those reporters, or we'll take you in here and now."

They'd moved the police lines past my car after I'd arrived, trapping it in, and I pointedly ignored the reporters shouting for me as we all approached my car. I'd had enough of their crap for the year, thank you very much, warnings aside.

Thomas joined me at my car with Mouse, and he got in the passenger side seat without a word. I opened the door for my dog, then got in.

"You know, I haven't been questioned by the police in quite some time," Thomas said conversationally as I turned the Blue Beetle's key.

"That right?" I asked, gently pumping the gas as the car turned over endlessly.

"Yeah. I suppose I had better protections before I left the family estate. I wonder how many more times I'll be interrogated before the week is out," he said, leaning back in his chair as best he could.

I grunted, turning the key back and forward again. The car stopped turning over completely, just buzzed quietly whenever the key was held forward.

I sighed, leaning my face into the wheel.

Wonderful. Just fucking wonderful.

"I take it calling some form of transport wouldn't be out of the question?" Thomas asked, tapping one of his pockets.

"That, and someplace to stay the night. Damn it. Your phone isn't dead, is it?"

He pointedly opened his door and stepped out of the car before trying it. Given my emotional state, I didn't blame him.

He leaned down and back into the car. "It can still make and receive calls. The screen is flickering, though."

I got out of the car and moved to sit on the hood. Thomas let Mouse back out and called us a taxi.

I was exhausted before we'd gotten to my little home, Monster food aside. Now? Now I was ready to pass out on the hood of my car.

"A taxi is on the way," Thomas told me, moving to sit down next to me.

A stray thought wormed its way into my mind as I looked back at the cops, now swarming into and out of my house. "Hey, you got searched too, right?" I muttered, not looking at him. "Were you still holding the shotgun?"

He snorted. "They had a female officer looking me over."

Which meant she'd taken one look at him and then promptly shut down all of her higher brain functions when his inner demon had come close to the surface. It wasn't against the Laws of Magic, especially because he wasn't technically a spellcaster, but it was as close to the grey zone as you could possibly get. If he'd been a wizard, I'd give him a coin flip on the Wardens knocking down his door.

I scowled, still looking around. "Must be nice, still standing on the less-known side of things. She'll be OK, won't she?"

Thomas must have nodded, because there was a pause before he quickly said, "Yeah. She'll be fine."

I sighed. After a few moments more, I asked, "What d'you think'll happen when the nastiest nasties finally get outed all the way? I mean, given that tossing mortals into a supernatural equation used to be more of a nuclear deterrent."

Thomas leaned back as Mouse finished walking a slow circle around the Beetle, then sat down next to me. I scratched his head.

"That is the million dollar question, isn't it?" Thomas said. "You know, Laura almost asked me to come home when those Monsters first rose from the depths." I looked at him, startled. He held up his thumb and forefinger up. "She was this close to saying it. She was worried I was going to get the rest of the White Court outed because I'm staying at your apartment. The White Court needs humanity on the whole left alone beyond our own needs, right? So we can quietly feed on their emotions in peace." He looked at me critically, but didn't finish his thought.

"Yeah," I nodded. "You guys're the lucky ones, aren't you?"

White Court Vampires feed on emotions, like Thomas said. Each house has an emotion they stick to, like lust, or fear, or even despair. One of the only weaknesses his kind has is a strong emotion opposite to their preferred lunch; Thomas will get serious burns if he touches somebody protected by an act of True Love. But that's it. He gets to walk around in the sunlight, worship as he pleases, and gets dashing good looks besides.

Well. Other than the inner demon, I mean. That'll still twist his mind and soul if he gives in to whatever it desires, or feeds like his old family does, sucking people down until they die.

He shook his head. "We may have the highest chance of staying integrated with society when our publicists spin the story, but we're still not human. I'm friends with you, but that doesn't mean I want to push my luck with anybody else."

I got it. I'm not the brightest bulb or the sharpest knife, but I got it.

"I don't know how it'll be handled, but I think outing those 'nastiest nasties' will still be considered the nuclear option. Even with Wizards and the new Monsters outed, humanity on the whole will still probably sit in the dark."

I agreed. If a person didn't know exactly what went bump in the night, then chances are he'd just upgrade the security in his house and go on his merry way. Out of sight, out of mind. People don't like to get involved if they can help it. It's just the way people are.

We shared a few minutes in silence, waiting for the cab.

An officer went out towards the reporters as we did, and I nudged Thomas so we could watch.

The cop raised his hand, and the roar of questions fell away. "Until our investigation is complete, we can't release any pertinent information. Our public information officer will issue a statement when all of the facts are known. Thank you."

Then he just turned and walked away, completely ignoring the outraged shouting as he went.

I think I could learn a thing or two from that guy.

The taxi arrived, and we headed out before the reporters could renew their focus on me.

We had a couple choices on places to stay for the evening.

Murphy was out of town, and I knew she wouldn't mind if I crashed at her place while she was out. I could water her plants if she hadn't asked somebody else to, and I knew the Murphy threshold, the intangible wall of "home" that surrounded her place, had been built up by three generations of police officers who had lived for and in this town. That feeling of home translates into a very real barrier against the supernatural, so much so that some beings can't enter at all without an invitation. Given that I wasn't sure if I had a standing invitation, her house wasn't as much of an option as I hoped it might be.

My second choice was Michael Carpenter's house. I'm pretty sure his threshold could be seen from space, and there wasn't a chance in the world he'd turn me away. The downside was, his threshold's power came from having a huge family he'd raised in a house he'd built himself, and there wasn't any way in hell I was putting them at risk just so I could get a decent night's sleep.

My last choice?

We pulled back up to the closed gate of the Monster Mansion.

My last choice was a fortified magical bunker staffed with the King and Queen of a species that was literally made of magic, and they'd already invited me to stay the night.

Sometimes it's nice to have friends.

I had to pay the cab driver something akin to a down payment on a new house, and waved to Asgore, still standing guard out front. He waved back, then turned around and went inside, probably to open the gate remotely.

I was proven right a moment later.

"Good evening Harry, Thomas, Mouse." Asgore said as we approached. "It is good to see you again. I must ask, however: what happened to your car?"

"It broke down," I told him, and we stopped as he raised one massive, gauntleted paw.

"I am terribly sorry, but we have already had an incident this week where one with the face of a friend tried to gain entry to our home. How can we be sure you are who you say you are?" He asked.

Out of all of us, it was Mouse who answered first.

"Bark, woof arf ruff," he said.

Asgore nodded, then stepped aside. "Welcome back. Make yourselves at home."

Thomas and I exchanged a glance, and I looked down at Mouse. He just let his tongue hang from his mouth as he panted.

"What the hell did he say?" I asked, bemused.

"He reminded me of how I reacted to finding that Frisk was unharmed," Asgore said simply, a sad smile on his face.

Well, then. I knew my dog was smarter than I was, but having it confirmed in that particular way was… interesting. Especially because I hadn't known that he could talk before that particular moment, even if I didn't understand the words.

"Uh, wonderful," I told him, still eyeing Mouse. "Where exactly were we staying tonight? I mean, if it's still OK."

Asgore furrowed his brow, then opened the door and pointed at the staircase. "Up those stairs, then to your right is a hallway. At the end of an open room, there are two doors. You may use those rooms for as long as you need them. Please, let me know if there is anything else we can do for you in the meantime."

"Sure," I told him, stepping inside. "Appreciate it."

Asgore shut the door behind us, still standing guard outside.

Given that the Monsters seemed to respond well to him, I had Mouse lead us down the long hallway on the second floor. We passed a bunch of doors until we came to an open one, a lounge with a big flat-screen TV taking up a huge chunk of one wall, and a bar on another, with two couches in front of the TV and a glass table with chairs over near the bar. I briefly wondered if it'd come with the house, or if the Monsters had installed it.

Past another staircase, this one circular, was another short hallway with two doors at the end.

"Looks like that's us," I said, and we crossed the last room. I suppose part of the reason we hadn't seen anyone must have been the hour. It was probably past midnight by then.

The rooms were nice, like four star hotel nice. Each was bigger than my own bedroom at home, with its own bathroom twice the size of mine. They probably had heated water, too, which was a luxury I didn't get to enjoy very often.

"Alright," I told the others, "I'm going to need a quiet place to myself for a little bit, but after that Mouse can decide which room he wants to stay in. Anything else we need to discuss tonight, or can we finally call it a day?"

Mouse chuffed, then turned back and settled himself halfway down the short hall between us and the lounge. Thomas shook his head, said goodnight, and took the room on the left.

"Good night, Mouse," I told my dog, and he wagged his tail.

It was good to see he didn't care one way or the other about the whole talking thing. I headed into the room on the right.

I took a few minutes to use the bathroom, have a drink of water, and to take stock of myself before I was ready to begin.

When I'd tried to take my notebook with the signs and countersigns, I'd meant to use it to call the White Council's home base in Edinburg to update them on the problems I was up against. We may not see eye to eye, but the last time a Necromancer had come to power, it had taken almost everything they had to bring him down. Now we had time travel in the mix to deal with, too, and while I was pretty sure the black hats were responsible, especially after that errant comment by the last one I'd squared off with, I couldn't be one hundred percent certain. If I'd had that book, I'd have been able to call them up on the phone to let them know what was going on. They actually had a switchboard that I think is about as old as can be, which helps mitigate the magic problems of calling the magic hub of the world. Call quality was still terrible, but you could expect them to be able to answer those phones.

There are other ways to contact the White Council. I had my little box of rocks for just that purpose, and I knew the "number" of a guy who could get their attention in a heartbeat. This member in particular, though, I would have been happier leaving out of the equation.

My mentor's name is Ebenezar McCoy, and he's the youngest member of the Senior Council. I used to call him Sir. While DuMorne was responsible for teaching me the basics of how to use magic, McCoy is the one who taught me the nuts and bolts of its mechanics alongside the responsibility of having it. He taught me to treat magic both as a source of energy, and as a byproduct of the many emotional and physical phenomena of the world. He wrote a book called Elementary Magic, and it's the first one most wizards give their apprentices to learn from. I'd say he knows about as much about the nuts and bolts of magic as anybody else in the world.

It's because of him that I believe that there's more magic in a baby's first laugh than in any spell that a wizard is capable of conjuring, because it's something whole, something pure. He taught me why the Laws of Magic exist, how and why black magic corrupts the user so seriously, why using it even once can taint you in ways it's hard to come back from.

Ebenezar McCoy is the man I grew up respecting more than I have anybody else in this world. He's about the closest thing in this world I have to a real father.

Last year, I got deep into trouble with the Red Court of vampires, deeper than I'd been even when I'd kickstarted the war between them and the White Council to save my girlfriend at the time. I'd panicked, and I'd called up my mentor in the hopes that he'd be able to help save me. McCoy had helped pull me out of that fire, but I'd learned something about him when he had.

When the Red Court vampire Duke Paolo Ortega had failed to kill me in a duel to recognize Chicago's protected status, having cheated and swarmed the place with vampires during the fight, he'd fled to Casaverde. My mentor had called to tell me to watch the news that evening. Sure enough, reports were coming in that the stronghold had been destroyed when an old Russian satellite had been pulled out of orbit. I didn't know it at the time, but there were plenty of mortal humans there alongside the hundreds of Red Court Knights. There were no survivors.

Ebenezar McCoy is the White Council's Blackstaff. It's a position that means he gets to ignore the laws of magic to do whatever job they tell him to do. Those same laws he taught me to respect, lest I fall into darkness? He breaks them wholesale. It's apparently part of his goddamn job to piss on the things he taught me to believe in.

I didn't want to talk to him. I didn't want to be on the same continent as the man, but right then, I didn't have much choice.

I forced myself to set all that aside while I drew a circle in chalk at the foot of the bed. I took a little box of rocks out of my pocket, then rooted around for the smooth piece of fire-rounded obsidian I kept hidden among the other less magical stones. I set it down in front of me, tossing the others back onto the bed, and slowly began to meditate.

Using the speaking stone is a delicate piece of magic, by my usual standards at least, so it took some time before I calmed myself down enough to try to use it.

It took another few minutes to push my anger at the old man aside after the first attempt completely failed, but I tried again anyway. If it wasn't to protect Chicago, I'd have tossed the damned rock out the first chance I had.

Slowly, carefully, I chanted Ebenezar McCoy's name, willing the magic to find him, to tell him I wanted to chat. Slowly, the room beyond my circle faded into an inky background, the lights dimming as the circle and speaking stone filled my senses.

Twenty minutes later, the bastard finally answered the call.

Ebenezar McCoy is an old man, having served on the Senior Council for a few years, and on the White Council for probably a hundred and fifty more. He's got a short, stocky build, a holdover from his youth (if he ever had one) in the Ozarks in Missouri. He's lived there for centuries, plural, but other than the white tufts of hair around his otherwise bald head and the short, white beard covering his face like an out of season Santa Claus, it wasn't always obvious just how old he was.

When he'd answered my call, his own speaking stone had appeared, translucent, over my own, making it seem thicker, denser.

His face was haggard, sweaty, red, and he hadn't completely caught his breath. He looked almost as angry as I felt, in the first moment. Then he realized who was calling.

"Hoss?" he asked. He was too confused, just for a moment, to be angry over whatever else was going on.

"McCoy," I said back, and he flinched. Whether it was my cold tone, the hatred I wasn't bothering to control, or failing to call him Sir like I normally did, I wasn't sure. Probably some combination of all three.

He took a deep, controlled breath, and nodded to himself. "It's good to see you, even with everything else going on."

"Chicago is under attack by Necromancers," I said evenly. He might have wanted to dance around pleasantries, to pretend things were fine between us, but I wasn't willing to.

His subdued gasp of confusion didn't last, and his unfocused eyes danced around the edges of the inky blackness as he put together some puzzle around what I'd said. His face went old, even more tired than he'd been when he answered my call, just for a moment, and then it hardened back into something furious. Finally, about four seconds after I'd told him, he nodded, then looked back at me more calmly.

"I'm officially requesting the help of any and all Wardens the White Council can send us. Even you," I spat.

I hadn't meant to add that, but it fit. He looked like he'd swallowed something foul, but he just shook his head, then sighed again, the anger fading back into something more manageable.

"Hoss, I think we've been had," he said.

I waited for him to explain.

"We're being hammered on all fronts," he continued. "And you're not the only one calling out to deal with threats like that one. How bad is it?"

"At least two, and as many as five Necromancers, and I'm still not completely sure why." I took up my notes. "A guy and girl wearing black robes, a guy wearing a duster like mine but less black and more khaki, a broken man with liver spots, and a girl with a ghoul backing her up. The girl with a ghoul ate a ton of the energy in the air around me, just swallowed it when I threw a blast of force at her, and she made me feel like I was asleep on my feet, barely able to move. I actually Saw the girl in the black robe. She had energies around her like you'd expect to see around restless spirits of the dead on el Dia de los Muertos." I dropped my notes and gave Ebenezar something that could charitably be called a smile.

He chuckled darkly. "Is that all?"

"No," I said flatly. "There was also an attack on my home; my front door looks like it went ten rounds with Mike Tyson, and they got through my wards by throwing what I think were walking corpses at them until they went down."

He looked me over more closely, squinting while he tried to see if I was injured anywhere.

"I'm fine," I kept my tone flat.

He rubbed a hand down his face, wiping away some of the sweat. "Sounds like you've got more to add to that."

"If my sources are to be believed, they're killing those Underground Monsters to take their power, kind of like how-"

I cut myself off.

I forced myself to finish the thought.

"Sort of like how some kinds of black magic can make you strong, killing these new Monsters wholesale apparently gives you strength at the cost of your soul."

He shook his head, then chuckled. It wasn't a happy chuckle, more an involuntary one. "You really can't keep out of the middle of things, can you, Hoss?"

"You'd know."

He looked at something in the distance, and waved whatever or whoever it was off with an angry glare. He looked back at me appraisingly, trying to gauge me. "Why'd you call me instead of Edinburg? Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but you haven't-"

"They trashed my house and I lost my book of signs and countersigns," I cut him off, biting down the feeling that he thought I'd called him because he was the Blackstaff. "I don't have any other contacts on the White Council, and when Morgan came by this morning he didn't exactly leave his calling card. It was either call you or try to handle it myself, and I'm sure as hell not going to do that. Not against Necromancers."

"Smart move," he told me, but his eyes had flashed when I'd been talking. "If that woman with the ghoul is who I think it is, you weren't ready to throw down with her head on."

I snorted. Yeah, no shit.

"If you end up against her again, split her focus," he told me hurriedly. "The more people hitting her from a distance, the better, especially with guns, but be careful when she 'dies,' especially if there's anyone near her. When did you speak with Morgan, exactly?"

I paused at the tone and change of subject. "Maybe eight or nine this morning? Ten at the latest."

"Hoss, Morgan was here at eight or nine this morning."

I inhaled deeply, making the mental leap as to why, then looked around the darkened room beyond my circle again. "Is there anybody who could, uh, intercept this call? Anybody at all?"

He raised an eyebrow, not bothering to look around. "Only if they're listening in on your end, Hoss."

I concentrated just a little harder on holding my circle, then cleared my throat. "If the Morgan who came by can be trusted at all, whoever it was, then the problem is related to time travel. I think I've been getting little bits of memories from the future. I think this necromancer with the ghoul knows about it, too."

He took a moment to process what I said, then looked so close to my eyes I wasn't sure how we managed to avoid a Soul Gaze. "If the Capiorcorpus is working with a time traveler, then I'll get something prepared to hold them down before I get there. Don't tell anybody else about this, Hoss, no matter who asks or why."

I guess the fake, or maybe real, Morgan I'd spoken with was right. I hoped I hadn't screwed something up telling Murphy about it, let alone Thomas.

"Nobody else. Got it," I told him, managing to keep my words even.

I did my best to control my breathing, but part of me was boiling inside. Internally, I was wondering if he knew how to stop time travelers because he'd done it himself at some point to kill somebody with magic. Whether it was another one of those things he'd do to 'get his job done, no matter what.'

"Is there anything else?" I asked him, clenching my fists. "Or will the entire White Council be visiting Chicago in the very near future?"

I've seen my old mentor a lot over the years, but rarely did I see him as tired as he looked when I asked that question. His face doesn't normally have a ton of wrinkles, doesn't sag, and he doesn't normally look his age. When he answered me, every one of his years was fighting to show itself on his face.

"That might be a problem, Hoss," He said slowly. "There's been a new development in the war."

"What could possibly-" I snapped, then took a deep breath. "What's more important than a bunch of probably-necromancers turning my city into their own personal clubhouse?!"

"Not a lot, Hoss," he told me. "But plenty enough for the soldiers we have left."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked him.

He took a deep breath of his own, then told me. "There was an attack in Palermo, Hoss. We held them off, at first, but then they called in Outsiders. Lots of them."

"Stars and Stones," I breathed, almost forgetting my anger at the news. "How bad was it?"

"I think we lost twenty three Wardens when they showed up, along with the others we lost in that fight overall," he said.

I shook my head. "That's terrible, but there are a few hundred Wardens worldwide. How many-"

"That was their opening attack," he cut me off. "The Wardens fled to a hospital in the Congo to recover. And the Red Court had been tipped off that they would."

My mind ground to a halt. Those kinds of secrets aren't exactly easy to ferret out. Not when only a few people in the whole world know them, and all are supposed to be the White Council's most trusted Lieutenants.

"They used nerve gas, Hoss," he told me, his face grim. "Thousands of civilians, people who had nothing to do with the war, just to make sure they got us. But they got us all right. Last count, we lost another hundred and forty Wardens. That's alongside all the other losses we've had in this war."

Hell's Bells. "How… how many Wardens are left?" I asked him.

He just shook his head. "Not enough for all the different attacks they've thrown at us since. You're not the only one calling for help, Hoss."

My head got kind of light, and I needed to lean on one of my hands to stop from falling over. The Red Court wasn't like us. They could throw away hundreds of vampires like cannon fodder, because other than the ones who had survived for thousands of years, they could always just turn more humans. Wizards were born, not made, and fewer still could handle combat. Last count we had less than four hundred Wardens at any given time, closer to three hundred than four. The best of the best, each capable of holding their own against some of the nastiest things in the world.

"Hoss?" he asked, voice low.

I took a deep breath, then pushed myself back up, shaking my head. "Did they get any of the seven Senior Council members?" I asked. I may not have liked half of them, but the big seven were worth two dozen Wardens each. Some of them twice that. If they were hurt...

He shook his head. "No, Hoss. We're taking the field wherever we can, holding down all the biggest threats here. But there are only seven of us. We can't be everywhere."

I nodded. I didn't know what else was out there, but if the Red Court was going to let Outsiders in, then I could understand why they were forced to wait on these necromancers getting bad before they could send more soldiers. I hated it, but I understood.

"Tell me you can send someone," I told him. I didn't, couldn't, phrase it as a question.

His tired face turned stony, and the fires lit up behind his eyes. "We will, Hoss. Count on it. I won't leave you flapping in the wind, no matter how bad it gets elsewhere. If it gets bad, I'll come there myself."

I glared at him. "Tell whoever's left to meet me at the Monster's Mansion on the Golden Coast," I told him, then gave him the address. "Keep safe."

He sighed, not bothering to ask why the Accorded Neutral Grounds at Mac's bar weren't the first place to meet. "You too, Hoss." Then he cut off the connection.

Great. Like there wasn't enough to worry about already.

The cavalry wasn't coming. Not the way it was supposed to. Necromancers, some of the more dangerous threats in the magical world given enough time? Apparently they didn't rank high on whatever totem pole the rest of the White Council was up against.

I chuckled in the darkness as the outsides of my circle slowly came back into focus, the call's energies passing away.

Like I'd told that kid. Some days, it's just me against the world.

Most days, feels like.

If I was going to face it, I was going to face it well rested, well fed, and as mentally prepared as I could be.

I cleaned up the chalk circle with a spell, then stood up to stretch my muscles. I stepped out into the hall, and Mouse raised his head to see me, wagging his tail. I leaned down, gave him as good a hug as I could, scratching him around his ears. Talking or not, he was still my dog. I worried about Mister, who I hoped was still OK wherever he was, whether he had Bob with him or not.

I went back into my room, warded my door, and collapsed into bed.

Tomorrow could wait for at least a few hours. I'd burn those bridges when I came to them.

I closed my eyes. Exhaustion did the rest.