* * *

Nicodemus hadn’t warned his squires what to expect, and when Michael strode in at my side, Jordan and his brothers-in-arms produced a truly impressive number of weapons in what appeared to be a state of pure panic.

Michael just stood there with his thumbs hooked into his belt, Amoracchius hanging quietly at his side in its scabbard. “Son,” he said to Jordan, “don’t you have anything better to do than point that thing at me?”

“Lower your weapons,” I snarled in a voice loud enough to carry throughout the slaughterhouse. “Before I start downsizing your organization.”

They didn’t put their guns down, but my threat did make a lot of the squires eye me nervously. Go me.

“Hey, Nick,” I shouted. “Your boys are all jittery. You want to calm them down or should I do it?”

“Gentlemen,” Nicodemus called, a moment later, “I know who is with Dresden. Let them through.”

Jordan and the others lowered their weapons with manifest reluctance, but kept their hands on them, ready to bring them to bear again at any time. Michael didn’t move or take a threatening posture, but he swept his gaze from squire to squire, one by one.

They all dropped their eyes from his. Every one of them.

We started down to the conference table, and Michael said, “I feel sorry for these men.”

“The tongue thing?” I asked.

“Removing their tongues is one way to keep their loyalty,” Michael said.

“Yeah. I love people who mutilate my body parts.”

He frowned. “It’s designed to keep them isolated. Think what it does to them. They can’t talk—so how much more difficult is it for them to connect with other people? To form the kinds of bonds that might let them free themselves of this cult? They can’t taste their food, which precludes eating for pleasure—and eating together is one of the primary means of forming real relationships between human beings. Think how much more difficult it makes even the simplest of interactions with outsiders. And how the shared experience of that hardship means that one’s fellow squires will always be the only ones who truly understand his pain.” He shook his head. “It’s the last step of their indoctrination for a reason. Once it’s done, they no longer have a voice of their own.”

“It’s not the same as not having a choice,” I said. “These guys have made their call.”

“Indeed. After being manipulated by Nicodemus and Anduriel as unwise young men.” He shook his head. “Some men fall from grace. Some are pushed.”

“Once their fingers pull the trigger, does it matter?”

“Of course it matters,” Michael said, “but it doesn’t change what has to be done. I just wish they could find another way to fill the empty place insidethem.”

We’d reached the conference table by that time, where the crew was making final preparations. Anna Valmont, Hannah Ascher, and Binder were all there, dressed in close-fit, dark clothing, and each of them was wearing a shoulder holster. Valmont had a roll-up leather tool pouch laid out on the table and was going through various bits of equipment in it one by one. Ascher was sipping coffee, her bagel untouched on the plate in front of her. Binder was going over his gang’s Uzis one more time.

The loading doors at one end of the slaughterhouse rolled open, and a pair of large stepside vans rumbled into the place a moment later. Several squires set about getting them lined up and then rolling their rear doors open.

“Morning, Dresden,” Hannah Ascher said. “What happened to your girlfriend?”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said. “And she had a misunderstanding with Nicodemus.”

Anna Valmont’s eyes flicked up to me, hard.

“She’s alive,” I told her. “But she wasn’t in any shape to go to work today.”

“So you brought Captain Crusader instead?” Ascher asked. “He looks like a Renaissance fair.”

Binder abruptly stood up, his eyes widening. “Bloody hell, girl. That’s a Knight of the Sword.”

Ascher frowned. “I thought there were only, like, three of those guys in the whole world.”

“Two,” Michael said, “at the moment.”

Binder stared at Michael, and narrowed his eyes in calculation. “Aw, dammit. Dresden, this is what you do because Nicodemus gets in a tiff with your girlfriend?”

“She’s not my g—” I rubbed at the bridge of my nose. “Look, I want someone I know and trust watching my back. Murphy couldn’t do it, so he’s doing it instead.”

“What a load of tripe,” Binder said. “You think I don’t know what the Coins and the Swords are like with each other? You didn’t bring him to watch your back. You brought him to fight.”

“Let’s just say I don’t mind having a deterrent around,” I said. “If Nicodemus plays it straight and keeps his word, I will too and we’ll all get rich.”

Binder scowled and eyed Michael. “Is that right, Knight?”

“Harry’s generally a very honest man,” Michael said. “I really don’t care about the money, though.”

Binder and Ascher both tilted their heads to one side, like dogs that have just heard a new noise.

Anna Valmont smiled and shook her head slightly, going back to checking her tools.

“So what happened last night?” Ascher asked me. “Binder’s goons drew him a picture of a lion. The ones who came back, I mean.”