"I was just going to ask you the same thing," Marcone said.
Nicodemus smiled and said, "Bravo, sir. I understand. I'm obliged to kill you, but I understand."
I traded a look with Marcone. I flicked my eyes at the upcoming bridge. He took a deep breath and nodded.
Nicodemus lifted the gun and aimed for my head. His shadow suddenly swept forward, under and around my shield, seizing my left hand. It ripped at my arm hard, pulling me off balance.
Marcone was ready. He let one of his empty guns fall and produced a knife from somewhere on his person. He flicked it at Nicodemus's face.
I went for his gun hand when he flinched. The gun went off. My senses exploded with a flash of light, and I lost the feeling in my left arm. But I trapped his gun arm between my body and my right arm and pried at his fingers.
Marcone went for him with another knife. It swept past my face, missing me. But it hit the Shroud. Marcone cut through it cleanly, seized it, and pulled it off Nicodemus entirely.
I felt the release of energy as the Shroud was removed, a wave of fever-hot magic that swept over me in a sudden, potent surge. When it was gone, my chills and my aching joints were gone with it. The curse had been broken.
"No!" Nicodemus shouted. "Kill him!"
Deirdre leapt at Marcone. Marcone turned and jumped off the train just as it rolled out over the river. He hit the water feet first, still clutching the Shroud, and was lost in the darkness.
I pried the gun from Nicodemus's fingers. He caught me by the hair, jerked my head back, and got his arm around my throat. He started choking me, hissing, "It's going to take days to kill you, Dresden."
He's afraid of you, said Shiro's voice in my mind.
In my memories, I watched Nicodemus edge away from Shiro as the old man entered the room.
The noose made him invulnerable to any lasting harm.
But in a flash of insight, I was willing to bet that the one thing the noose wouldn't protect him against was itself.
I reached back, fumbling until I felt the noose. I pulled on it as hard as I could, and then twisted it, pressing my knuckles hard into Nicodemus's throat.
Nicodemus reacted in sudden and obvious panic, releasing my throat and struggling to get away. I held on for dear life and dragged him off balance. I tried to throw him off the train, letting go of the noose at the last moment. He went over the edge but Deirdre let out a shriek and leapt forward, her tendrils writhing around one of his arms and holding him.
"Kill him," Nicodemus choked. "Kill him now!"
Coughing and wheezing, I picked up Michael's still form as best I could and leapt off the train.
We hit the water together. Michael sank. I wouldn't let go of him. I sank too. I tried to get us out, but I couldn't, and things started to become confusing and black.
I had almost given up trying when I felt something near me in the water. I thought it was a rope and I grabbed it. I was still holding on to Michael as whoever had thrown the rope started pulling me out.
I gasped for breath when my head broke water, and someone helped me drag Michael's body over to the shallows at the side of the river.
It was Marcone. And he hadn't thrown me a rope.
He'd hauled me out with the Shroud.
Chapter Thirty-three
I woke up in the back of Michael's pickup staring up at the stars and the moon and in considerable pain. Sanya sat at the back of the truck, facing me. Michael lay still and unmoving beside me.
"He's awake," Sanya said when he saw me moving.
Murphy's voice came from the front of the truck. "Harry, be still, okay? We don't know how badly you've been shot."
"Okay," I said. "Hi, Murph. It should have torn."
"What?" Murphy asked.
"Shroud. It should have torn like wet tissue. That just makes sense, right?"
"Shhhhh, Harry. Be still and don't talk."
That sounded fine to me. The next time I opened my eyes, I was in the morgue.
This, all by itself, is enough to really ruin your day.
I was lying on the examining table, and Butters, complete with his surgical gown and his tray of autopsy instruments, stood over me.
"I'm not dead!" I sputtered. "I'm not dead!"
Murphy appeared in my field of vision, her hand on my chest. "We know that, Harry. Easy. We've got to get the bullet out of you. We can't take you to the emergency room. They have to report any gunshot wounds."
"I don't know," Butters said. "This X ray is all screwed up. I'm not sure it's showing me where the bullet is. If I don't do this right, I could make things worse."
"You can do it," Murphy said. "The technical stuff always messes up around him."
Things spun around.
Michael stood over me at one point, his hand on my head. "Easy, Harry. It's almost done."
And I thought, Great. I'm going to require an armed escort to make sure I get to hell.
When I woke up again, I was in a small bedroom. Stacks and boxes and shelves of fabric filled the place nearly to the ceiling, and I smiled, recognizing it. The Carpenters' guest room.
On the floor next to the bed was Michael's breastplate. There were four neat holes in it where the bullets had gone through. I sat up. My shoulder screamed at me, and I found it covered in bandaging.
There was a sound by the door. A small pair of eyes peeked around the corner, and little Harry Carpenter stared at me with big blue-grey eyes.
"Hi," I said to him.
He dutifully lifted his pudgy fingers and waved them at me.
"I'm Harry," I said.
He frowned thoughtfully and then said, "Hawwy."
"Good enough, kid."
He ran off. A minute later he came back, reaching way up over his head to hold on to his daddy's fingers. Michael came in the room and smiled at me. He was wearing jeans, a clean white T-shirt, and bandages over one arm. The cut on his face was healing, and he looked rested and relaxed. "Good afternoon," he said.
I smiled tiredly at him. "Your faith protects you, eh?"
Michael reached down and turned the breastplate around. There was a cream-colored material lining in the inside of the breastplate, with several deep dents in it. He peeled it back to show me layers and layers of bulletproof fabric backing ceramic strike plates set against the front of the breastplate. "My faith protects me. My Kevlar helps."
I laughed a little. "Charity made you put it in?"
Michael picked up little Harry and put him on his shoulders. "She did it herself. Said she wasn't going to spend all that trouble making the breastplate and then have me get killed with a gun."
"She made the breastplate?" I asked.