Blood Rites (The Dresden Files #6) - Jim Butcher Page 0,99

of one of their Renfields snapping and opening up on pedestrians with an assault rifle."

"Assault rifles," Murphy said. "And hostages. Jesus, Harry, people could die."

"No could about it. They're already dying," I replied. "At least three bodies already. And the Renfields are just a matter of time."

"What if you're wrong?" Murphy said. "Do you really expect me to charge in guns blazing against people who might or might not already be dead? I have an obligation to protect citizens, not to sacrifice them."

My teeth clacked together as the truck went over a heavy bump. "These are the Black Court. They kill, and they do it frequently. Not only that, but they can propagate their kind more rapidly than any other vampire. If we let a nest of them go unmolested, we could potentially have dozens of them in a few days. In two weeks there could be hundreds. Something has to be done, and now."

Murphy shook her head. "But it doesn't mean it needs to be vigilante work. Harry, give me three hours to establish probable cause and I'll have every cop and every SWAT team in two hundred miles ready to take on that nest."

"And you'll tell them what, exactly?" I said. " 'Basement full of vampires' is not going to cut it, and you know it. And if they go in with blinders on, cops will get killed."

"And if it's us?" Murphy asked. "What then? We kick down the door, shoot anything standing, and then make like we're the Flying Van Helsings? A direct assault on a wary target is one of the best ways in the world to get killed."

"So we figure something out," I said. "We get a plan."

Murphy shot me a look past Ebenezar, who evidently had decided to stay out of it. "This isn't like the Wal-Mart plan with the marbles, is it?"

"I'll tell you when I know. Let's get there and see if we can find out first. Maybe Kincaid will have something."

"Yeah," Murphy said without much hope. "Maybe. Here, this is where Kincaid is meeting us."

It wasn't a pleasant neighborhood. The city had been working on urban renewal projects for decades, but the lion's share of the money had gone to restore higher-profile, more infamous neighborhoods, such as Cabrini Green. In that time, many neighborhoods that had been borderline steadily eroded, and had usurped the infamous-neighborhood crown. The slum is dead. Long live the slum.

I'd seen worse, but not many. Tall buildings and narrow alleys choked out a lot of the sunshine. Most windows below the third or fourth floor had been boarded up. Ground level commercial properties were largely vacant. The storm drains were clogged with litter and other urban detritus, most of the streetlights were out, and graffiti and gang signs had been spray-painted everywhere. The air smelled like mildew, garbage, and exhaust. The residents of the neighborhood moved with brisk purpose, confidence, and flat eyes as they walked, doing everything they could to indicate by body language that they were not good targets for assault or robbery.

I spotted a drug house in the first ten seconds of looking around. The burned-out hulk of an abandoned car had been stripped for parts before it had been set on fire, and I had a notion that Murphy was the first cop to visit in the past several weeks.

But there was something missing.

Bums. Transients. Homeless folk. Winos. Bag ladies. Even in broad daylight there should have been someone collecting cans, panhandling change, or shambling along drinking from a bottle still covered with a paper bag.

But there wasn't. Everyone moving was getting from one place to another, not eking out a living from the environment.

"Look kind of quiet to you here?" Murphy asked, voice tight.

"Yeah," I said.

"They've been killing," she said, almost spitting the words.

"Maybe. Maybe not," Ebenezar said.

I nodded. "There's dark power at work here. People sense that, even if they don't know what it is. You're feeling it now."

"What do you mean?"

I shrugged. "The presence of dark magic. It makes you feel nervous and angry. If you forced yourself to calm down and tried to sense it, you could feel it. It leaves a kind of stain around it."

"Stinks," rumbled Ebenezar.

"What does that have to do with missing street people?" Murphy asked.

"You've been here about three minutes, and the power bothers you already. Imagine living in it. Getting a little more afraid every day. Angrier. More demoralized. People get rattled enough to leave, even if they don't understand why. Over the