Cold Days (The Dresden Files #14) - Jim Butcher Page 0,169

watched her for a second longer. Then I sprinted for the Munstermobile as the haunting cry of the Wild Hunt’s horn grew nearer. I jammed my key into the door lock and . . .

And it wouldn’t fit.

I tried it again. No joy. Half-panicked, I ran to each of the others, but every single one of the locks was out of commission. I was going to bust out a window, but I checked the car’s ignition through it first. It had been packed with what looked like chewing gum. The Munstermobile had . . .

Had been sabotaged. With gum and superglue. It was a trick I’d had Toot and company play on others more than once. And now what I had done unto others had been done unto me at the damnedest moment imaginable.

“Aggggh!” I screamed. “I hate ironic reversal!”

The Za Lord’s Guard had been escorting us along the way, but I hadn’t said anything about staying on the job once we reached our destination. Given the distance I’d had them covering today, they’d probably dropped down exhausted the second I’d set the parking brake.

The thunder rolled closer, my unthinking panic rose, and my wounded leg felt like it might burst into flames.

My leg.

My eyes widened with horror of my own. The Redcap had killed me at that ambush, and I was only now realizing it. The trickle of blood flowing steadily from that tiny wound would leave a powerful olfactory and psychic trail behind me. Tracking me would be easier than whistling.

I could run, but I couldn’t hide.

Thunder roared, and I saw a cluster of dim forms descend from the cloud cover overhead and into the city light of Chicago. I could run, but the Hunt was moving at highway speeds. I wouldn’t even be able to significantly delay the inevitable. Shadowy hounds rushed down at me from the north, along the shoreline, and behind them came a blurry cluster of dark figures on horseback, carrying bows and spears and long blades of every description.

I couldn’t beat the Hunt. Not even with Mab’s ’roids in my system.

But maybe . . .

Then there was another roar—this time not of thunder, but of a hundred and forty horses, American-made.

Karrin Murphy’s motorcycle slid to a stop close enough to me to throw gravel over my shoes, and I turned to find her revving the engine.

“Karrin! What the hell are you doing?”

“Get on the bike, bitch!” she called over the next horn blast. “Let’s make them work for it!”

She smiled, a fierce, bright smile, and I found my own face following her example.

“Fuck, yeah,” I said, and threw myself onto the back of the Harley as darkness, death, and fire closed in around my city.

Chapter

Forty-one

I dropped the cartridge belt for the Winchester over one shoulder and hurried to rake in the tail of my new duster before the motorcycle’s rear wheel snagged it and killed me. I damn near fell off as Karrin accelerated, but managed to cling to her waist with the arm holding the rifle.

Karrin scowled at me, grabbed the rifle from my hand, and slipped it down into a little section on the side of the Harley that fit the short rifle suspiciously well. I held on to her with a free hand, and with the other made sure my coat wouldn’t get me killed.

“Which way?” she shouted back at me.

“South! Fast as you can!”

She stomped one of her feet onto something, twisted a wrist, and the Harley, which had been doing around fifty, leapt forward as if it hadn’t been moving at all.

I shot a quick glance over my shoulder, and saw the nearest elements of the Hunt begin to slowly fade back. I guess maybe the Wild Hunt hadn’t ever heard about Harley-Davidson.

But she couldn’t maintain the speed, not even on a wide Chicago street in chilly, rainy weather. There were just too many other people around, forcing her to weave between traffic, and she had to slow down to keep from splattering us all over some family’s sedan. Indignant car horns began to blare as she slipped in and out of lanes, adding an abrasive harmony to the horns of the Wild Hunt.

“How we doing?” she called.

I looked back. The Wild Hunt was less than a hundred yards away—and they didn’t have to contend with traffic. The jerks were racing along fifty feet off the freaking ground, up in the dark and the rain, unseen by the vast majority of people going about their everyday business. “They’re