"Wow, seriously, PT?" Butters asked. "How long?"

"Eleven weeks."

"Yeah, that really leans things toward 'coma' for me."

"And all the angels and ghost stuff," I said. "Which way does that make them lean? In your medical opinion?"

Butters pressed his lips together and said, "No one likes a smart-ass, Harry."

"I never liked him anyway," Thomas confided to him.

"Why don't you do something useful?" I said. "Go outside; see if anyone is lurking out there, waiting to kill us the second we walk out."

"Because Molly has to go with me each and every time or they won't let me back in, and she's out dealing with your scouts," Thomas said. "You worried about that faerie crew using your blood to track you?"

"Not sure. Using it is trickier than most people think," I said. "You've got to keep it from drying out, and you've got to get it undiluted. It was raining, so if someone wanted my blood, they'd have had to get to it pretty quick-and it looked like Sith was keeping them busy."

"Sith?" Butters asked.

"Not what you're thinking," I said.

"Oh," he said, clearly disappointed.

"Besides," I said to Thomas, "I'm less worried about them using it to follow me than using it to make my heart stop beating. Or you know . . . explode out of my chest."

Thomas blinked. "They can do that?"

"Oh, my God," Butters said, blinking. "Is that what that was?"

"Yes, they can do that, and probably, if you mean all those murders around the Three-Eye drug ring bust," I answered them. "Butters, what's the story here? You done yet?"

"Empty night," Thomas said, his manner suddenly serious. "Harry . . . shouldn't we be putting up circles or something?"

"No point," I said. "If they've got your blood, they've got you, period. Maybe if I ran and hid somewhere in the Nevernever, but even then it isn't certain."

"How much blood do they need?" Butters asked.

"Depends," I said. "Depends on how efficient their magic is-their skill level. Depends on how fresh the blood is. Depends on the day of the week and the phase of the moon, for all I know. It isn't something I've experimented with. The more energy they're sending your way, the more blood they need."

"Meaning what?" Butters asked. "Sit up so I can dress these."

I sat up and lifted my arms out of the way as I explained. "A tracking spell is hardly anything, in terms of energy input," I said. "They wouldn't need much at all for that."

Butters wound a strip of linen bandage around my midsection several times. "But if they want to make your head explode, it takes a lotmore?"

"Depends how good they are," I said. "They don't have to crush your head into paste, sledgehammer style. Maybe they put an ice pick up your nose. Less force but concentrated into a smaller area, see?" I shuddered a little. "If they've got my blood and can use it, I'm f**ked and that's that. But until that happens, I'm going to assume that I still have a chance and proceed as if I do."

There was a silence then, and I realized that both Butters and Thomas were just staring at me.

"What? Magic is dangerous stuff, guys," I said.

"Yeah, for all of us," Butters said, "but, Harry, you're . . ."

"What? Bulletproof?" I shook my head. "Magic is like the rest of life. It doesn't matter how much a guy can bench-press, or if he can break trees with his hands. You put a bullet through his brain, he dies. I'm pretty good at figuring out where to stand so as to avoid that bullet, and I can shoot back a lot better than most people-but I'm just as vulnerable as everybody else."

I frowned at that thought. As vulnerable as everybody else. Something nagged at me from beneath the surface of my conscious calculations, but I couldn't poke it into visibility. Yet.

"Point is," I said, "if they were going to try to kill me with it, they've had time to do that already."

"Unless they're saving it for the future," Butters said.

I made sure not to growl out loud. "Yes. Thank you. Are you finished yet?"

Butters tore off a final piece of medical tape, stuck the end of the bandage down with it, and sighed. "Yeah. Just try not to . . . well, move, or jump around, or do anything active, or touch anything dirty, or otherwise do anything else that I know you're going to do anyway in the next twenty-four hours."

"Twelve hours," I said, swinging my legs down from the table.

"Oy." Butters sighed.

"Where's my shirt?" I asked, standing.

Thomas shrugged. "Burned it. You want mine?"

"After you got your guts all over it?" I asked. "Ew."

Butters blinked and looked at Thomas. "My God," he said. "You've been shot."

Thomas hooked a thumb at Butters. "Check out Dr. Marcus Welby, MD, here."

"I'd have gone with Doogie Howser, maybe," I said.

"Split the difference at McCoy?" Thomas asked.

"Perfect."

"You've been shot!" Butters repeated, exasperated.

Thomas shrugged. "Well. A little."

Butters let out an enormous sigh. Then he picked up the bottle of disinfectant and a roll of paper towels and started cleaning off the table. "God, I hate this Frankenstein-slash-Civil War medicine crap. Give me a second. Then lie down."