Free Changes by Jim Butcher Page A

sliding to one side, revealing a doorway hidden behind it. The door swung open soundlessly, and a wizard who was the solemn, movie-poster version of old Merlin himself came into the Worry Room.
    Arthur Langtry was one of the oldest and the single most powerful wizard on the White Council. His hair and beard were long, all snowy white with threads of silver, and perfectly groomed. His eyes were winter sky blue and alert, his features long, solemn, and noble.
    The Merlin of the White Council was dressed in simple white robes. What I could think of only as a gunslinger’s belt of white leather hung at his hips. It looked like it had been designed after tactical gear made for Special Forces operators, but in an insignificant flash of insight I realized that, if anything, the opposite was likely to be true. Multiple vials, probably potions, rode in individual leather cases. The leather-wrapped handle of an anemic rod or a stubby wand poked out of a holster. Several pouches were fastened closed, and looked as though they would contain bits and pieces of the standard wizarding gear I habitually carried with me when I was working. He also bore a long, white staff, a simple wooden pole made of an unfamiliar wood.
    I stared at him for a moment. Then I said, “The peace talks are over?”
    “Of course not,” the Merlin said. “Goodness, Dresden. We aren’t going to allow the entire Senior Council to stand on a stage within reach of a vampire’s claws. Are you mad?”
    I blinked at him.
    “Wizard McCoy was the only actual Senior Council member on the stage,” he said, and then grimaced. “Aside from Cristos, of course, who is unaware of the security measure. The envoy might well be an assassin.”
    I worked my jaw a few times and said, “So. You left him up there by himself while you played it safe.”
    The Merlin shrugged. “One of us had to be there to handle any questions. It was McCoy’s idea, Dresden. He is an irritating, arrogant, and formidable man.”
    I scowled and mentally flogged my brain for slacking, forcing myself to see past my emotionally driven hostile response. “You don’t trust the vampires,” I said slowly. “You aren’t drinking the Kool-Aid on this peace conference.”
    Langtry looked at me patiently. Then he looked at Luccio.
    “Jonestown,” she provided. “The mass suicide last century.”
    He frowned at that and then nodded. “Ah, I see the metaphor. No, Dresden, we are not willing to simply accept them at their word—but a great many people on the Council do not concur. Cristos has garnered an enormous number of supporters who very much want to embrace the terms of peace.”
    “If you don’t want to call off the war,” I said, “then why the hell did you stop me, Captain Luccio? I could have fixed it for you right there.”
    “You wouldn’t have,” Langtry said calmly. “You would have been knocked senseless and thrown in a hole.” A faint smile touched his lips as he spoke the words. “Granted, a pleasant notion, but not a practical one.”
    Next to me, Molly put her elbows on the table and propped up her chin in her hands, staring at the Merlin thoughtfully.
    My brain kept chugging. I think I can, I think I can. When it got to the top of the hill, my eyes widened. “You aren’t planning to smoke the peace pipe. You’re expecting an attack.”
    He looked at me blandly, and rested one hand on the hilt of his combat wand as if by pure coincidence. “Egad. What gave it away, Dresden?”
    I started to say something hot in reply, Merlin or no Merlin, but Anastasia put a hand on my wrist. “Our sources,” she said, overriding my incipient insult, “have reported a great deal of activity in the Red Court camp. They’re mobilizing.”
    I looked back and forth between them. “You figure they’re trying a Trojan horse?”
    “Or some variant thereof,” Langtry replied.
    “So we’re getting ready for it,” Anastasia said. “As well as preparing the heaviest counterattack