Grave Peril (The Dresden Files #3) - Jim Butcher Page 0,138

raging back into me, filling me like silver lightning, a tingling, almost painful rush as I took back what was mine.

But I didn't stop there. My ghost fell away as I kept going. Kept tearing Kravos apart and gulping down the pieces. I got to his own power when I ate his heartred, livid power, vital and primitive and dangerous. Kravos's magic had been for nothing but causing harm.

I took it. I had plenty of harm to start causing.

By the time I'd finished tearing him to shreds, the pieces were vanishing like the remnants of any foul dream. I crouched on the dream-floor as they did, shaking with the rushing energy inside of me. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and looked up.

I must have looked feral. My ghost took a step back and lifted both hands. "Easy, easy," he said. "I think you got him."

"I got him," I said quietly.

"He was a ghost," my ghost said. "He wasn't really a person any more. And even as ghosts go, he was a bad egg. You don't have anything to regret."

"Easy for you to say," I said. "You don't have to live with me."

"True," my ghost answered. He glanced down at himself. His bruised limbs grew slowly translucent, and he began vanishing. "That's the only bad thing about this gig as a ghost. Once you accomplish whatever it was that caused you to get created, you're done. Kravosthe real Kravosis already gone. Just his shell stayed behind. And this would have happened to him, too, if he'd killed you."

"Do unto others before they do unto you," I said. "Thanks."

"It was your plan," my ghost said. "I feel like hell anyway."

"I know."

"I guess you do. Try not to get killed again, okay?"

"Working on it."

He waved one hand, and faded away.

I blinked open my eyes. Susan knelt over me, striking my face with her hand. I felt wretchedbut that wasn't all. My body almost buzzed with the energy I held, my skin tingling as though I hadn't used a whit of magic in weeks. She struck me twice more before I let out a strangled groan and lifted a hand to intercept hers.

"Harry?" she demanded. "Harry, are you awake?"

I blinked my eyes. "Yeah," I said. "Yeah. I'm up."

"Kravos?" she hissed.

"I pushed his buttons and he lost control. He got me," I said. "Then I got him. You did it just right."

Susan sat back on her heels, trembling. "God. When you stopped breathing, I almost screamed. If you hadn't told me to expect it, I don't know what I would have done."

"You did fine," I said. I rolled over and pushed myself to my feet, though my body groaned in protest. The pain felt like something happening very far away, to someone else. It wasn't relevant to me. The energy coursing through me that was relevant. I had to release some of it soon or I'd explode.

Susan started to help me, and then sat back, staring at me. "Harry? What happened?"

"I got something back," I said. "It's a high. I still hurt, but that doesn't seem to be important." I stretched my arms out over my head. Then I stalked over to the dirty laundry and found a pair of boxers that fit me, more or less. I gave Susan a self-conscious glance, and slipped into them. "Get something on Justine, and we're out of here."

"I tried. She won't come out from behind the washing machine."

I clenched my jaw, irritated, and snapped my fingers while saying, " Ventas servitas ."

There was an abrupt surge of moving air and Justine came tumbling out from behind the washing machine with a yelp. She lay there for a moment, naked and stunned, staring up at me with wide, dark eyes.

"Justine," I said. "We're leaving. I don't care how crazy you are. You're coming with me."

"Leaving?" Justine stammered. Susan helped her sit up, and wrapped the red cloak around her shoulders. It fell to mid-thigh on the girl, who rose, trembling like a deer before headlights. "But. We're going to die."

" Were ," I said. "Past tense." I turned back to the door and reached into all that energy glittering through me, pointed my finger and shouted, " Ventas servitas !" With another roar of wind, the door exploded outwards, into a large, empty room, splinters flying everywhere and shattering one of the two lightbulbs illuminating the room beyond.

I said, voice crackling with tension and anger, "Get behind me. Both of you. Don't get in front of