"Bite me," I answered him. "Get your own book, Kemmlerite."
"I have nothing but disdain for the madman Kemmler," he spat. "Have a care what insults you offer. This need not involve you at all, Dresden."
That gave me a moment's pause, as they say. Taking on arrogant, powerful dark wizards is one thing. Taking on ones who have done their homework and who know who you are is something else entirely. It was my turn to be rattled.
The dark figure noted it. His not-human voice swayed into the night again in a low laugh.
"Touche, O dark master of evil bathrobes," I said. "But I'm still not giving you my copy of the book."
"I am called Cowl," he said. Was there amusement in his voice? Maybe. "And I am feeling patient this evening. Again I will ask it. Give me your copy of the book."
Die Lied der Erlking bumped against my leg through the pocket of my duster. "And again do I answer thee. Bite me."
"Thrice will I ask and done," said the figure, warning in its tone.
"Gee, let me think. How am I gonna answer this time," I said, planting my feet on the ground.
Cowl made a hissing sound, and spread its arms slightly, hands still low, by its hips. The cold wind off the lake began to blow harder.
"Thrice I ask and done," Cowl said, his voice low, hard, angry. "Give… me… the book."
Suddenly the second figure took a step forward and said, in a female version of Cowl's weird voice, "Please."
There was a second of shocked silence, and then Cowl snarled, "Kumori. Mind your tongue."
"There is no cost in being polite," said the smaller of the two, Kumori. The robes were too thick and shapeless to give any hint at her form, but there was something decidedly feminine in the gesture she made with one hand, a roll of her wrist. She faced me again and said,
"The knowledge in der Erlking is about to become dangerous, Dresden," she said. "You need not give us the book. Simply destroy it here. That will be sufficient. I ask it of you, please."
I looked between the two of them for a moment. Then I said, "I've seen you both before."
Neither of them moved.
"At Bianca's masquerade. You were there on the dais with her." As I spoke the words, I became increasingly convinced of them. The two figures I'd seen back then had never shown their faces, but there was something in the way that Cowl and Kumori moved that matched the two shadows back then precisely. "You were the ones who gave the Leanansidhe that athame."
"Perhaps," said Kumori, but there was an inclination to her head that ceded me the truth of my statement.
"That was such an amazingly screwed-up evening. It's been coming back to haunt me for years," I said.
"And will for years to come," said Cowl. "A great many things of significance happened that night. Most of which you are not yet aware."
"Hell's bells," I complained. "I'm a wizard myself, and I still get sick of that I-know-and-you-don't shtick. In fact, it pisses me off even faster than it used to."
Cowl and Kumori exchanged a long look, and then Kumori said, " Dresden, if you would spare yourself and others grief and pain, destroy the book."
"Is that what you're doing?" I asked. "Going around trashing copies?"
"There were fewer than a thousand printed," Kumori confirmed. "Time has taken most of them. Over the past month we have accounted for the rest, but for two here, in Chicago, in this store."
"Why?" I demanded.
Cowl moved his shoulders in the barest hint of a shrug. "Is it not enough that Kemmler's disciples could use this knowledge for great evil?"
"Are you with the Council?" I responded.
"Obviously not," Kumori replied from the depths of her hood.
"Uh- huh," I said. "Seems to me that if you were on the up-and-up you'd be working with the Council, rather than running around reinterpreting Fahrenheit 451 from a Ringwraith perspective."
"And it seems to me," Kumori answered smoothly, "that if you believed that their motives were as pure as they claim, you would already have notified them yourself."
Hello. Now that was a new tune, someone suggesting that the Council was bent and I was in the right. I wasn't sure what Kumori was trying to do, but it was smartest to play this out and see what she had to say. "Who says I haven't?"
"This is pointless," Cowl said.
Kumori said, "Let me tell him."
"Pointless."
"It costs nothing," Kumori said.
"It's going to if you keep dawdling," I said. "I'm going to start billing you for wasting my time."
She made a weird sound that I only just recognized as a sigh. "Can you believe, at least, that the contents of the book are dangerous?"
Grevane had seemed fond enough of his copy. But I wouldn't know for sure what the big stink was about until I had time to read the book myself. "For the sake of expediency, let's say that I do."
"If the knowledge inside the book is dangerous," Cowl said, "what makes you think that the Wardens or the Council would use it any more wisely than Kemmler's disciples?"
"Because while they are a bunch of enormous assholes, they always try to do the right thing," I said. "If one of the Wardens thought he might be about to practice black magic, he'd probably cut off his own head on pure reflex."
"All of them?" Kumori asked in a quiet voice. "Are you sure?"
I looked back and forth between them. "Are you telling me that someone on the Council is after Kemmler's power?"
"The Council is not what it was," said Cowl. "It has rotted from the inside, and many wizards who have chafed at its restrictions have seen the war with the Red Court reveal its weakness. It will fall. Soon. Perhaps before tomorrow night."
"Oh," I drawled. "Well, gee, why didn't you say so? I'll just hand you my copy of the book right now."
Kumori held up a hand. "This is no deception, Dresden. The world is changing. The Council's end is near, and those who wish to survive it must act now. Before it is too late."
I took a deep breath. "Normally I'm the first one to suggest we t.p. the Council's house," I said. "But you're talking about necromancy. Black magic. You aren't going to convince me that the Council and the Wardens have suddenly gotten a yen to trot down the left-hand path. They won't touch the stuff."
"Ideally," Cowl said. "You are young, Dresden. And you have much to learn."
"You know what young me has learned? Not to spend too much time listening to the advice of people who want to get something out of me," I said. "Which includes car salesmen, political candidates, and weirdos in black capes who mug me on the street in the middle of the night."
"Enough," Cowl said, anger making his voice almost unintelligible. "Give us the book."
"Bite my ass, Cowl."
Kumori's hood twitched back and forth between Cowl and me. She took three steps back.
"Just as well," Cowl murmured. "I have wanted to see for myself what has the Wardens so nervous about you."
The cold wind rose again, and the hairs on the back of my neck rose up stiffly. A flash of sensation flickered over me as Cowl drew in power. A lot of power.
"Don't," I said. I lifted my shield bracelet, weaving defensive energy before me with my thoughts. I solidified my hold on my own power, wrapping my fingers tight around my staff, and then slammed it down hard on the concrete. The cracking sound of it echoed back and forth from darkened buildings and the empty street. "Walk away. I'm not kidding."
"Dorosh," he snarled in reply, and extended his right hand.
He hit me with raw, invisible force-pure will, focused into a violent burst of kinetic energy. I knew it was coming, my shield was ready, and I braced myself against it in precisely the correct way. My defense was perfect.