Blood Rites (The Dresden Files #6) - Jim Butcher Page 0,65

him on at least one other occasion. Who had given up her life for him last night. The sheer, vicious passion of my anger surprised me. And then I had another intuition.

He hadn't meant it to happen. Thomas may have hurt or killed the woman he loved, but the anger I felt wasn't solely a reaction to what he'd done. I was standing on the outside this time, but I'd seen this situation before, when the Red Court had destroyed Susan's life. I would never have wished harm on Susan, not in a thousand years, but the fact remained that if she hadn't been going out with me, she probably would still be in Chicago, writing her column for the Midwest Arcane. And she would still be human.

That's why I felt such anger and shame when I looked at Thomas. I was staring into a mirror, and I didn't like what I saw there.

I'd all but destroyed myself in the wake of Susan's transformation. For all I knew, right now Thomas was worse off than I'd been. At least I'd saved Susan's life. I'd lost her as a lover, but she was still a vital, strong-willed woman determined to forge a life for herself—just not with me. Thomas would not have even that much consolation. He'd been the one to pull the trigger, so to speak, and his remorse was tearing him apart.

I shouldn't have tried to hurt him more. I shouldn't have started chucking stones from within my own glass domicile.

"She knew what she was doing," I said into the silence. "She knew the risk. She wanted to help you."

Thomas's mouth twisted into a bitter smile. "Yeah."

"It wasn't your decision at that point, Thomas."

"I was the only one there. If it wasn't my call then whose was it?"

"Your dad and Lara knew Justine was important to you?"

He nodded.

"They set her up," I said. "They could have handed you anyone. But they knew Justine was here. Your father gave Lara specific instructions to take you to your room. And from what Lara said on the way here in the car, she knew what he was going to do."

Thomas lifted his eyes. He stared at his door for a moment and then said, "I see." He clenched a hand into a fist. "But it hardly matters now."

I couldn't refute that. "What I said was out of line."

He shook his head. "No. You were right."

"Right isn't the same thing as cruel. I'm sorry."

Thomas shrugged and we said nothing more on the matter.

"I've got places to go," I said, heading down the hall. "If you want to talk, walk me out."

"Not that way," Thomas said quietly. He stared at me for a minute and then nodded, some of the tension leaving him. "Come on. I'll take you around the guards and monitors. If my father sees you leaving, he might try to kill you again."

I turned around and fell into step beside Thomas. The puppy whimpered and I scratched him behind the ears. "What do you mean, again?"

He spoke quietly, his eyes flat. "Inari. He sent her to you when he saw that you left my chambers."

"If he wanted me dead, why didn't he just come and do it?"

"It isn't how the White Court fights, Harry. We use misdirection, seduction, manipulation. We use others as instruments."

"So your dad used Inari."

Thomas nodded. "He intended her to have you as her first."

"Um. First what?"

"First lover," Thomas said. "First kill."

I swallowed. "I don't think she knew what she was doing," I said.

"She didn't. In my family, we start off life like any other kid. Just… people. No Hunger. No feeding. No vampire stuff at all."

"I didn't know that."

"Not many do. But it comes on you eventually, and she's about the right age. The panic and the trauma must have acted like a catalyst on her Hunger." He stopped by a panel in the wall and nudged it with his hip. It slid open, revealing a dim corridor between interior walls. He went down it. "Between that, the painkillers, and the exhaustion, she didn't know what was going on."

"Let me guess," I said. "The first feeding is lethal."

"Always," Thomas said.

"But she's young and could be forgiven a loss of control under the circumstances. So I end up dead and it's a believable accident. Raith is clear of any blame."

"Yeah."

"Why the hell hasn't anyone told her, Thomas? What she is? What the world is really like?"

"We're not allowed," Thomas said quietly. "We have to keep it from her.