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| Photo by David Gabrić on Unsplash |
Ghosts press in around him, so numerous, and so powerful with the barriers all wibbly, that they physically impede his progress. He pulls out his pentacle, wills light to it, and holds it up in front of him "like Diogenes's lamp". I had to look that up. Apparently Diogenes would carry a lamp during the day, and claimed when asked about it that he was looking for "a man". For reasons I don't fully understand, this is often rendered in English as "looking for an honest man", and considering the number of common misconceptions that are either uncritically reproduced or fictionally true in this series (e.g. "We only use 10% of our brains"), the "honest man" version seems more likely to have been intended here, though I'm not entirely sure what to make of it. There's also a statue of Diogenes in his birthplace of Sinop, Turkey, apparently well known since it's the main picture on the Wikipedia page about him, which portrays him with both the lamp and a dog, so there's a case to be made that this is foreshadowing for Harry's next visit here, in Dead Beat, when he has Mouse with him.
The Light's dimmer than usual, and Harry wonders if that's a reflection of his weakened magic, or if the destructive, violent, sometimes chaotic use to which he's put over the past few years has weakened his faith in the principles of controlled power, used constructively, that the pentacle represents.
He calls Charity's name, and she responds, although something cuts her off, giving him a better sense of her exact location in the giant graveyard. When he finds her, she's lying on a bier in a fake temple thing, with the Nightmare standing over her, one hand near her belly, the other near her throat. When Harry addresses it as "demon", it asks "Is that what I am?" and says it wasn't sure, another indicator that the "ghost of a demon" theory is inaccurate, although Harry's got enough distractions that it's pretty reasonable for him to miss it. As much fun as it's having tormenting Charity, the Nightmare's primary beef is with Harry, so it throws a fuego fireball at him. Harry blocks it with a shield spell, and thinks that he wouldn't have tried that kind of fire magic in torrential rain. Charity seizes the everyloving shit out of the moment and kicks the Nightmare in the chest with both feet. She sends it flying, but also knocks herself off the bier and falls badly. Harry tells her to run, and then uses his staff to pole vault? Over the bier? And kick the Nightmare in the face? Butcher is normally a very clear action writer, but I listened to this part three times and read it with my eyes twice, and I'm still only mostly sure I get what happened here. Harry lands on top of the Nightmare, and tries to scramble away, although I'm not sure if it was physically or magically, spins him around in the air, and throws him into a marble column.
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| Photo by Salomé Guruli on Unsplash |
Harry hits head first, naturally, so that's concussion number three. He makes a concerted effort to stand, and gets as far as sitting with his back against the column. That's more than anyone could reasonably have expected of him, but it's not anything like enough to save Charity and defeat the Nightmare. Lea appears out of nowhere, and observes that there's a lot of water around here, a lot of things flowing. This is actually pretty straightforward, but under the circumstances I think Harry can be forgiven for not getting the hint. She offers her help, if Harry will renew their bargain and come with her tonight, as soon as Charity's out of danger. She also tastes Harry's blood, because, y'know, Leanansidhe. Harry has basically two choices here. Take the deal, or sit there and hope Michael turns up and saves the day before the Nightmare finishes killing Harry and destroying Charity's mind. And given that Michael doesn't necessarily even know where they are, that second thing doesn't look like a good bet. So he agrees. Lea blocks most of his pain, restores his energy and clarity of thought, and tells him the answer is all around him.
Harry confronts the Nightmare again, drawing its attention, although he's not really better equipped to fight it now than he was at the outset. It approaches at a casual walk, knowing that there's very little Harry can do about it. That is, until Michael appears behind him. Michael gives Harry a crucifix and tells him to get Charity, then engages the Nightmare, making a considerably better showing with his glowy magic sword than Harry did with his, uh, pole vaulting.
Harry gets to Charity, and gives her the crucifix, but of course she's going into labor now, and can't walk, and even if he were in good condition, he wouldn't have been able to pick up and carry a heavily muscled, 6 foot tall pregnant woman. The Nightmare gets away from Michael and telekinetically picks up a headstone, preparing to squish Harry and Charity. Harry gets between Charity and the Big Rock, which isn't gonna do much to protect her, but it's a nice gesture. The Nightmare tells Michael to put down the sword, or it'll squish them. Harry says not to do it, that it will just kill them anyway. The Nightmare tells him to shut up. This is the real purpose of the scene where Michael threatened the grocery clerk, is to establish that Michael is thoroughly irrational where the safety of his family is concerned, so that it feels plausible when he misses this blazingly obvious indication that Harry has the right of it. He puts the sword down. Naturally, the Nightmare does carry right on trying to kill them. Charity brandishes the crucifix, hurting and startling it enough that it drops the headstone, and Harry finally makes sense of the hint about the water.
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| Photo by Radek Homola on Unsplash |
the downpour, where it dissolves, its energy dissipated by the running water. This was perhaps not as well foreshadowed as it could have been. The last reference to the use of running water was two books ago, in the fight with the toad demon, and that wasn't a ghost. Also? I'm having a little bit of a geography issue. Graceland cemetery is a real place. There's even a real grocery store a couple blocks away, although it's currently a Jewel-Osco, not a Walsham's. (As far as I can tell, there isn't a Walsham's grocery store). That Greek temple mausoleum is also real - it's called the Palmer Mausoleum, and that picture up there is a real picture of it, although in daylight and springtime, not an autumn night. And as you may notice, it's not up very much of a hill, and what's directly downhill from it is a pond. Going by google maps, it might technically be a small artificial lake. In any event, as far as I can tell, there's nowhere downhill from the Palmer Mausoleum for a temporary stream to form, and it's frustrating because this scene is otherwise so close to geographically accurate.This also feels like a missed opportunity, because falling into an artificial pond while physically wresting a ghost and coming up with gross algae water in his mouth is exactly Harry's energy at this point in the series.
Michael picks up Charity, Harry picks up the sword, and they make to get out of there. Unfortunately, Lea hasn't forgotten about Harry that quickly, and she intends to collect her due. Harry tries to argue with her, tries to negotiate for time to finish defeating the Nightmare. She's not having it. When one of her hellhounds attacks, Harry tries to defend himself with Amoracchius. Thing is, you uh, you can't use a sword powered by faith magic to get out of your promises. It turns in his hand, falls from his grasp. And Lea picks it up. Apparently, her game here wasn't really about getting an extra handle on Harry, which she didn't really need. It was about breaking the sword's protection, getting Harry to betray its purpose so she could take it.
33 minute chapter and it still contrives to end on a cliffhanger. Next post might be another one of these, or it might be the Season 2 review post. Until then, be Gay, do Crimes, and read All The Things!
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