It turns out, when you want to learn something that the Fae do without thinking, it's next to impossible. I'd gone through the books in my tiny library. For the hell of it, I even tried my mother's gem to see if there were any paths she'd taken. Her voice told me how to get to the edge of the Dreamlands, but it seemed that her travels were little more than that. There were mentions of a few realms she had visited, including one comprised entirely of shrimp. I suppose if this whole Winter Knight slash Wizard slash Warden (Jesus, the titles were starting to pile up) didn't work out, I could always go trawling for the fish market. Hey, don't give me that crap – there's good money in shrimping.

Not a word about Whisperwalking, though.

I asked Bonnie if she'd known anything about it, and come up bupkus. She did, however, have more info on Remnant. As it turns out, Remnant was one of several hundred dream worlds spawned by a pair of cursed Persian twins. I'd asked how she knew that, and her reply was shocking.

"Mom knew about it." Whoa. I knew that Bonnie knew everything that I did up until I'd spawned her – I refuse to call it giving birth. I hadn't realized that Lasciel's shadow would pass on knowledge as well. She was gone, burned out of my brain. It was important information, but we had more pressing concerns.

"What about these twins? What happened to them?" I knew it probably wasn't going to be helpful, but I was curious.

"They were spirited away by parties unknown. They were dangerous." Bonnie had stopped leafing through her comic book and was staring at me keenly.

"How so?" This was fascinating. It might be a waste of time, but for the moment I couldn't figure out the next step. Hopefully Karrin and Yang were having better luck.

"Their curse was eternal slumber. The power of it gave rise to the realms in the Dreamlands." She paused for dramatic effect. "The reason they were dangerous was because they could pull people seemingly at random into those dreams or nightmares." That made my blood run cold; sure, for someone like me that could be less of a problem, but for your average person? Yikes.

"When were they around?" Again, not really helpful, but it might be later. Lack of knowledge can kill.

"The last recorded mention of Urr-šunatu and Mu-šuttu was near the last century of the Sassanid Empire, 500-ish A.D." The green eyelights flickered to the left before returning to meet my gaze. "Couldn't Molly teach you how to 'Whisper walk'?" I knew that look.

"Maybe so, but Molly works on her own schedule. She knows I need to talk to her." I really didn't want to summon her, like, ever. We weren't in full panic mode yet. That sort of thing was like lighting a big stick of dynamite. It was also rude as hell, former apprentice or not. "Interesting as the history lesson was, I don't think we're getting anywhere with that." Something about it was bothering me, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I mulled it over in silence for a few minutes and gave it up as unnecessary information.

I decided maybe it was a good time to check my answering service. I doubted there would be anything – I hadn't had calls for cases since my office building had burned (thank you oh so much for that, Red Court dweebs), but I hadn't exactly been hurting for or needed much money since raiding Hades' vault. I dialed the number for the answering service and sat on hold waiting for an operator. Tim was quite happy to put me through. There were two messages.

The first, surprising enough, was from Fix. He left a terse few sentences about having found Remnant to be a Dreamland full of ignorant Changelings. Aha! New news on how it was that Yang was so easy to soulgaze. They were human, after all – albeit weird and powerful. Proto-human, maybe? Nah, that sounded terrible. He apologized for not being able to find more and ended the message.

The second call was hair-raising. The voice sounded like nails on chalkboard, and yet it attempted to sound affable.

"Oh Harry Dresden, my, my, what a fine mess Blondie has made. We really should talk, face to face. Grab a pen, oh wizard. Go on, I'll wait right here." The way he spoke my chosen profession grated like nothing I'd ever heard before, causing me to jerk the receiver away from my ear. Still, I grabbed the pen and pad sitting next to the phone. He – it? It rattled off an address in an abandoned industrial park. "Tell Blondie I said hello, and leave Little Red at home." The message ended with a short beep and I hung up the phone a little harder than I needed to.

It wasn't the first time bad guys had called me out, but this rated almost as high as the message the Naagloshi had left when it took Thomas. I stared hard at the address for several minutes. I gave myself a shake and stumped back over to the work table. By the time I crossed the fifteen or twenty feet, frost had started to form on my hands. I had been drawing on the Mantle without even realizing it from the moment I started listening to the message. I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, making a concentrated effort to calm down and let it go.

"Are you alright?" Bonnie asked. When I didn't answer, she said, "Dad?" I took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly.

"Yeah, Bonnie, I'm just… rattled. I need to leave you here for now..." She moaned at that. "Hey, look, that call was from the new big bad. I get the feeling that we're about to meet up with Mister Sinister, and I don't want you in the line of fire."

"Oh. Right. Well, uhm… Be careful, okay? Mister Sinister is no joke." I chuckled and took out some fresh writing pads and ball point pens.

"I need you to do me a favor while I'm gone, though, okay?"

I did my best not to push the gas pedal all the way down to the floor as I drove through downtown Chicago. The engine would occasionally sputter and shimmy, but otherwise it held up. I had a pretty good idea of who the anonymous caller had been, but I wanted Yang to hear it for herself. No way was I going anywhere near that place on my own.

It took me less than half an hour to get to the site of my former boarding house. I had mixed feelings about the place. On the one hand, it felt like my friends had done it to honor my 'memory'. The gesture was somewhat soured by the fact that Johnny Marcone had footed the bill. Technically it was his place, now – even if he used it only very occasionally.

Gravel crunched under the tires as I pulled into the empty space next to Murphy's car. Good, they were still here. I hope they had better news than I had come up with. If not, it was going to be a very long day. I stepped up to the door and rapped on it with my staff. A moment later, Sven answered and gave me a nod as he pulled the door all the way open.

"Dresden," he greeted me the same as he always had. Usually I tried to make conversation with the man. Granted, it was like trying to have dialogue with a mountain, but he usually had something to rumble out. I opted out this time.

"Where are they?" I asked. He hooked a thumb at the stairway and closed the door behind us.

"They're up in the training room. Her new friend is spunky." Call me crazy, but he actually sounded disappointed that he wasn't up there. I took the stairs two at a time and all but sprinted down the hallway. I barreled through the double doors just in time to watch Karrin take a flying leap at Yang. I barely had time to register joy at seeing her back to fighting form before realizing how big that jump was.

The arc was at least thirty feet – almost the whole length of the room. It wasn't a straight shot either; she was most of the way to the ceiling, twenty five or thirty feet up. My head tracked her through the air. She had one of those bamboo practice swords leveled at Yang, who stood in a defensive posture. They met with a loud thwack, sword impacting on one of Yang's bracers. Murphy hung in the air, held up by the sword and seemingly defying gravity. Yang yelled, "Now, push!" Murphy grunted and bunched up her left shoulder. I heard the crackling and snapping of the bamboo reeds as the practice sword glowed briefly before snapping like a twig. Both women went tumbling and rolling across the floor.

Yang recovered instantly, pushing down with both hands and cartwheeling into a ready position. Karrin, on the other hand, did not. She looked a little dazed as she came to a stop on her side. The bottom half of the sword was still clutched in her hands as she fumbled her way to a sitting position. "That's great, Murphy!" Yang dropped her stance and walked over to where Karrin was still sitting, trying to shake off the shock of impact. "It's too bad your training equipment isn't more durable. Otherwise I think you've got the jump down." She offered Karrin a hand up. "I'm sure if you had a weapon that could handle aura, your push would be a good start."

They hadn't noticed me yet. It was around three in the afternoon when I left Molly's apartment. They'd only been here seven hours maybe. That was one hell of a turnaround time. I golf-clapped as Karrin got her feet under her and stood with Yang's help. They both turned to face me as one.

"Harry!" Yang exclaimed. "How long have you been standing there?" They crossed the intervening space between us. While they walked, I noticed that several Einherjaren had been watching from one end of the room.

"Long enough to see Karrin re-create my favorite Kung Fu movie scene," Karrin grinned despite herself. "How's it feel to get back on the horse?" I was thrilled for her and didn't want to spoil the mood. The big bad could damned well wait for a few minutes. Murphy tilted her head back and inhaled deeply.

"It's amazing, Harry. I used to wonder what it must be like, for you, with the magic. Now I don't think I have to imagine anymore." I knew just where she was coming from. For all the gritty parts of my life – especially of late – it was as much a part of what kept me going as the people in my life. Murphy frowned down at the broken practice sword. "Yang is right though. This thing felt like a toothpick the whole time." Yang shook her head ruefully.

"I tried to tell you it wouldn't take much. You should have just used the real thing." It was Murphy's turn to shake her head.

"No way, Yang. You might think you're invincible, but I'm just learning how to do this stuff. You're a good trainer, but I'd rather play it safe." Yang shook her hands in front of her chest.

"I'm just doing for you what dad did for me. Besides, we probably don't have time for safe." She looked up at me. "Your daughter is a real sweet kid, Harry." I looked back and forth between the two blondes. It didn't take long to put it together.

"Molly," I said. Karrin dipped her head and pointed a finger at my chest.

"Yeah, she's taking Maggie to see a Disney movie." I had completely forgotten about that. Nervous as I sometimes was about having all things Sidhe anywhere near my daughter, I trusted Molly to keep her safe. "Mouse likes Yang – he may have peeled a layer of skin off her hand." Well there you go. If ever there was a sound endorsement of a person, it was Mouse slobber. Yang grinned.

"That's not a dog, Murphy, that's a bear in disguise." Murphy shrugged, I laughed. If only Yang knew the truth about Mouse. Hell's bells, maybe she did. "So Molly," Yang said, giving me a serious look. "She's sort-of your boss, but used to be your apprentice? She had some… interesting things to say." She didn't quite suppress a shiver. "I'm really sorry, Harry." Murphy lightly smacked Yang on the arm with the back of her hand.

"Hey, it's not your fault. You didn't know." I may not have the missing conversation, but I had a pretty good idea. Still, you'd think they would let me in on it. Women; always assuming the guy knows what's going on.

"Esplainy?" I asked. Murphy turned to hand the broken practice sword to Skaldi, who had fetched the other half and moved to join us. He took it from her and gave her a fist bump before rejoining he fellows.

"The Grimm, how did she put it? Spawn in response to Aura." Oh. So that was what the spirit had meant. I cringed internally, but Karrin was right. Yang opened her mouth to speak, but I held up a finger.

"Yang, if you apologize again, I'm going to box your ears." She closed her mouth with an audible click of teeth. "Karrin is right: You – we had no idea that would happen. We'll deal with it." She didn't look convinced. I made a loose fist and bounced it off her shoulder a couple of times. "Don't worry, Sparky. The trade-off is worth it as long as we stay on top of things. You gave us back one of our best fighters." Murphy's cheeks reddened. I pretended not to see.

"Ulsharavas had some to say, and while she wasn't as direct as Molly-" which was a breath of fresh air for once "that was something she alluded to. What's more, it affects what's going on here and back on Remnant." I looked around for a moment. The Einherjar were good men, but they were being paid for with Marcone's money. "Let's go to a room with a phone. You need to hear something."

"Oh?" they both asked in unison.

"Yeah, the game has changed. You're not gonna like it."