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- (00:00) - Intro
- (02:35) - The Opening of Summer Knight
- (06:03) - Ch. 1 - "They're sending kids after me. Hell's bells."
- (23:51) - Ch. 2 - "You may call me Mab. Queen of Air and Darkness."
- (51:58) - Ch. 3 - LOCAL ARTIST DIES IN MIDNIGHT ACCIDENT.
- (01:03:07) - QfB: Does Indirect Magic Violate the 1st Law?
Episode Art by Nick Strom; you can find his work here: https://mrnickstrom.com/
Creators and Guests
Host
Adam Ruzzo
Adam has been producing and hosting podcasts for over 20 years. Such podcasts include Tales of Heroes, Tales of Tyria, and Tales of Citizens. Spread throughout this is various video and streaming projects on his youtube channel. The most recent production is Recorded Neutral Territory, which examines the Dresden Files book series in a chapter-by-chapter re-read.
What is Recorded Neutral Territory - A Dresden Files Podcast?
Recorded Neutral Territory is a chapter-by-chapter re-read podcast for The Dresden Files book series. Each episode, we one to four chapters with a deep dive on the writing, characters, and worldbuilding within this fantastic series. These episodes contain spoilers for all DF related material released at the time of recording.
New episodes drop on Fridays (~3 per month).
Brian (00:00)
And this is cool in the context of the story that we get to see that Billy is, you know, really taken this level in badass. But can you imagine if you're the huntress in this moment and you've executed this like really careful, yeah, we're gonna have, you know, ⁓ he looks left and then I go right and boom, shoot him right in the back. Perfect, taken care of. And you've never even heard of the alphas.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (00:13)
Hate?
Brian (00:25)
You have no idea there's werewolves in Chicago. Like you're just taking out this one wizard, and this random kid next to him turns into an attack dog and just goes to I mean, I the thing that caught me the first time I reread this was she's supposed to be some kind of like big shot assassin. Like, how does she not get a shot on Billy? You know, he's just basically a a ⁓ normal physical creature. And then I realized it's because she's
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (00:33)
He's
Mid leap, mid leap he does.
Mm-hmm.
Brian (00:54)
Absolutely gobsmacked, and it takes even a world-class assassin a moment to recover from surprise werewolf.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (00:57)
Yeah.
Welcome one, welcome all, welcome to recorded neutral territory where the spoilers go all the way through twelve months. I'm Adam, and joining me as always, it's a herpetologist about to break into the big time. It's Brian O'Reilly.
Brian (01:24)
What's that? Raining Toads? By the hundreds? By God, this could make the cover of the Journal of Herpetology! This is just what I need to finally wipe the smug smile off Dr. Gillette's face. And then Chrissy will like me.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (01:39)
⁓ let's not get ahead of ourselves. All right, ladies and gentlemen, we finally stepping foot into summer night. This is one of my favorite books, and I'm so excited to get started here, Brian. We are on chapter one, where Harry and Billy are about to investigate a reign of toads.
Brian (01:57)
it rain toads the day the White Council came to town. That is ⁓ a classic of the genre.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (02:04)
I yeah, it's really good. And I wanted to sort of compare it to the other ones that we've seen so far. So I went back and honestly, if I were to rank them, I think they ascend in quality until we get to number four. So on Stormfront, you say you have I heard the mailman approach my office door half an hour earlier than usual. That's okay. Interesting. And we did spend like 10 minutes talking about it. And it's it's okay for a noir opening, but
Brian (02:25)
It's fine for Noir. Yeah. Yeah.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (02:30)
To get that classic Dresden like hook in you right away, not much.
Brian (02:34)
Right. No.
And then at full moon we have. I never used to keep close track of the phases of the moon.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (02:41)
that's a great one. The implication being I do now. Like why is he doing that? So
Brian (02:45)
Right. Yes,
that's of the Dresden opening line type without being a really, you know, hooky example of it. But Grave Peril, I feel like, kind of goes the other direction.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (02:51)
Yes.
Yeah. It's it's a good joke because it starts with There are reasons I hate to drive fast. And the like the first example is like, Cause my car doesn't drive fast. So that's like a good answer to that question. And and it works really well. But then like you said, we get it rained toads the day the White Council came to town. And that is so much more evocative and interesting. And it it sets up this book really.
Brian (03:09)
Right. Yes.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (03:26)
Really well because we are about to drastically expand the world of the Dresden Files. We're gonna blow open the doors not only to the White Council as a political entity and a huge number of important characters therein, but the Fey and the Fey courts and a whole huge c host of characters there. Harry's about to meet characters, many, like a dozen characters that are orders of magnitude more powerful than him.
and we've only met a handful of those, including for example, Mavra and Feravax in Grave Peril, and arguably Leah as well, of course.
Brian (04:02)
Right. I mean, in the first books, we have Bianca's party. That is the moment where Harry meets supernatural entities that are of a higher weight class than him. At every other place in all of the other books, I'd argue even McFinn, right? It's only once a month that he's the Luguru. So Grave Peril is the only time in one place where we really come face to face with things that are just out of Harry's league. Until summer night. And then it's
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (04:27)
Yeah. Yeah.
Brian (04:30)
Every three chapters, here's a new group of people who are completely out of Harry's league.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (04:34)
Yeah, absolutely. And yet he still has to navigate this. That's what I think makes it really interesting. And what's more is
Most of the characters that are out of his league in this book are not hostile to him. Instead, he has to negotiate or talk and investigate things that are going on. So that allows him to meet all of these massively huge characters, and it still doesn't feel like, ⁓ he's just somehow surviving by the seat of his pants like he did in other books. Because if these were all hostile entities, if the mothers were hostile, he doesn't even come close to surviving this.
Brian (05:08)
Yeah, and I think we're gonna talk about some of the themes that we'll see in Summer Night after we get through these first two episodes, which really load the plot canon in a way that Jim sort of has never done before in a Dresden Files book. We've got to get through all of this, so we've got to save it for later. But one of the themes that I think Jim plays with here, and I don't know, maybe it's not a theme, maybe it's just a world-building element, is in this expansion of the world.
Jim is really careful to give you a reason to believe this guy can survive, even though he already knows that he's got to let the power ratchet up very gradually, or he'll lose you. So the difference in Dresden from Grave Peril to Summer Night isn't that big, even though he's in a whole other league. And Jim has to be
Really clever to navigate that. And he absolutely nails it, as we'll talk about in in many moments in this book, including in this first chapter, or in this first set of chapters, where it is eventually Dresden's cleverness that sets him on the path to his destiny.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (06:22)
Yes, absolutely. But his cleverness fails him a little bit in this first chapter because Jim immediately would give sharp-eyed readers an important clue. We have this description of
Other people in the park, including an old lady with a shopping cart and a long coat tottering around the park. It wasn't yet noon, and my sweats and t shirt were too hot for the weather. Now Brian, why is she wearing a heavy long coat when it's that hot outside? That's an obvious tell, but Harry doesn't spot it. I think it's probably because he's a little distracted.
Brian (06:56)
It's definitely because he's a little distracted. And we get a lot of information about that before we even see that old lady. But really good job of Jim showing us a couple things. First, that Harry is distracted and you know he's not noticing his surroundings the way that we would hope this guy who walks crime scenes and listens and is sort of, you know, the wise would. But looking back on it, man.
Can you imagine Harry after a few years of being at war with the Red Court? Like, he an old lady wearing a long coat, I mean, he's shaking down a 70-year-old to see if she's got a shotgun up her sleeve, right? we get to see that harsh juxtaposition, but we also get to see that harsh juxta juxtaposition in how Harry is treating Billy in the first place. And I
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (07:29)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Brian (07:48)
I think an interesting question is why does Dresden even take the call to go meet him here when he has been avoiding everyone for months?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (07:59)
I think it has to be what he tells Billy later in this chapter that a reign of toads could mean serious badness. Like it means there's something's really messed up. And he knows the white council's coming to town and he needs more information. So he comes here hoping to find out that this is some weird illusion and that these are never never toads and they're gonna turn into ectoplasm. And when he finds out that they're real, cause one crapped in his hand.
He he has to tell Billy like stuff's getting real bad then. So I think that's the reason that he comes out here. I think almost very few other reasons would have gotten him to come all the way out here. But one thing I do think is a little unusual is that neither he nor Billy notice this old woman. And I think it's because they're in the middle of this fight. He's really focused on trying to get Harry to open up and and, you know, recognize
in the kind of state that he's in. Harry's running on very little sleep. I like to think if they even this version of them, if they were just a little more put together, if they weren't butting heads at this moment having this argument, one of them would've noticed that old lady and been like, something's wrong here.
Brian (09:03)
And you kind of get the impression, or at least I do, that Billy might be under orders here, in the sense that his, future wife said, Billy, you know, Harry is really displaying some classic symptoms of, I exactly. And that's why when Dresden snaps at him, just ⁓ I mean, Dresden is behaving like a real jerk.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (09:17)
'cause she's a psychologist psychology major.
Brian (09:28)
For the entire beginning of their conversation. He's bossing him around, like pick up these toads for me. But then also when Billy's trying to ask questions about what's happening, my temper flared. I don't have the time or inclination to teach a class today. Shut the hell up. And that doesn't get a rise out of Billy. And that's the kind of thing that I think would maybe set him off if Georgia hasn't told him, hey, you gotta treat him with kid gloves. Because what does he do after that?
He invites Harry to play not Dungeons and Dragons.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (10:00)
Yes, Arcanos. Brian, do you think Arcanos is just a legally distinct name that Jim has given to the D of the Dresdenverse? Or does DD actually exist in the Dresdenverse and this is like a lesser known, more niche version of an RPG? Like is this the the like white wolf type publishing, like like Vampire the Masquerade?
Or some other indie RPG like or maybe a Paizo like Pathfinder sty thing. Or is this like the thing that everybody plays? What kind of nerds are the alphas?
Brian (10:33)
So these are these are my two options for you. One, it is in universe DD because that totally fits. That's exactly the kind of thing that Jim would do, right? Harry's status is a DD character. Harry plays a barbarian in the campaign. You know, that's a very DD class. I could totally see this being a a D, you know, analog. But here's the one that I think is a little bit more fun. This isn't D D. This is, the White Wolf game.
Mage the Awakening. It's literally called Arcanos, which makes the fact that Harry plays a barbarian in it just even more ridiculous, you know?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (11:02)
Hmm.
Yeah.
Absolutely. Okay. So another thing that happens in this conversation when Harry's talking to Billy, and I think it's really important that you point out that Billy doesn't ta take the bait, doesn't get super defensive when Harry tells him to shut the hell up. I think you're right. I think he's prepared for this. He knows going into it, you know, Harry's gonna be have a short temper. I need to be very careful on how I respond to him. I can't take it personally, right? So Billy then reveals.
That he's really leveled up in the knowledge of the supernatural world because he reveals that he knows that the Red Court of Vampires has declared war on the other wizards after Bianca's place. He knows that they've tried to kill Harry a couple of times. Like, how is he learning this stuff? He's obviously interfacing with the supernatural community who passes these rumors around. And then Harry even tries to say,
What white council? They don't exist. What are you talking about? And Billy's like, Yeah, please. ⁓ we know what the White Council is. You can't pretend it doesn't exist. So obviously, this is Harry learning for the first time how clued in Billy is these days in comparison to what Harry last remembers him as.
Brian (12:21)
I know this whole vampire war thing has you jumpy. What vampire war?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (12:21)
Yes, perfect.
Brian (12:25)
Word gets around, Harry. I even know that the Wizard's White Council is coming to town. What White Council? forget about what vampire were, which is something that he should actually expect might be something of a secret. But what white council? You know, Harry's acting like Billy is just a total square. And Billy not only knows something that, yeah, probably most people at Max
know that there is a white council. He knows there's a war on. He's doing the equivalent of reading the news.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (12:56)
Yeah, it reminds me of like a father pretending that his daughter shouldn't know what sex is or something like that when she's fifteen. Like you don't know what that is. That's nothing. You're never supposed to know that. You know, this is like that that that's what it feels like. He's obviously knows what it is, Harry. You don't have to pretend anymore. The the game is up. So we get that, and then we get a what is a very important, I think, lesson of this book that
everyone needs help sometimes. That's literally Billy says that word for word and
That's the lesson that Harry ha one of the lessons that Harry has to learn during this book. He needs to let the alphas help him, he needs to let Murphy help him, and he needs to let Elaine help him at an improper opportune times. And he needs to let the the the the Fey, the sh the little people help him in the very end, and Meryl and and Fix and and all those people have to help him too. So without them, he doesn't make it through this book.
So by the end, he does accept that lesson, and we see him walking into the Arcanos game at the very end of this book. So I think it's important that it's stated right up front, hey, Harry is people and trying to shut them out of his life, and this is the lesson he has to learn. And it put it and Jim puts it right in Billy's mouth.
Brian (14:12)
Right. And Harry, I mean, it is poetry that Jim does it. I jabbed a finger into his chest. No, Billy, I don't need more help. I don't need to be babysitting a bunch of kids who think that because they've learned one trick, they're ready to be the lone ranger with fangs and a tail. I reached down and snatched up a toad, jerking the cloth bag from Billy's hands on the way back up. I don't need you. Naturally, the hit went down right then. And that is Jim.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (14:39)
Yeah.
Brian (14:41)
I feel like telling you Dresden here is wrong. I want you to know that Dresden is wrong. This is him being irrational. It's a reaction, of course, to losing Susan at the end of Grave Peril. I don't want any to be close to anyone so I don't lose them. I don't want to feel like it's my fault that anyone's hurt by the supernatural. I don't need anyone. I'm supposed to help people, not get people hurt. And this is him reacting angrily against that, right?
But Jim is immediately telling us: not only is that wrong, everybody needs help sometimes, but also Harry isn't even getting people out of harm's way with this attitude because he can't interact with no one. And if this is how he's gonna be, then every time he does interact with somebody, it's going to be dangerous for them.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (15:32)
Yeah, that's really what it comes down to. He he needs to interact with people, so he might as well make them allies and bring them onto his team, because that's the best way to keep them safe is to arm them with the knowledge they need. And that's of course one of the lessons that he's slowly been learning over the last couple of books, and he'll put that to to use in this book when he brings Murphy on to help him right away at the beginning of this. So one of the other things that happens here, Brian, is that Billy
reveals that he dropped by Harry's office, checked his messages, and a Miss Somerset was trying to reach him. And Billy takes the initiative and sets up an appointment for Harry. And Harry's response is, quote, I felt my temper rising again. You did what? Unquote. So to me that suggests this is probably the first time Billy's done something like this. Why has Billy chosen this moment to
help get Harry hooked up with a client who turns out to be Mab. If Billy doesn't do this, Harry never gets the client, and so he never has this adventure. Did Mab put the her finger on the scales somehow and convince him to go and help Harry? Well, how does that work?
Brian (16:44)
So let me play devil's advocate here. Mab has nothing to do with it. It's just happenstance because, and this is why Billy is walking on eggshells right now. The gang has finally decided they need to do something about Harry. Right? The school semester is probably like just ended or something. I think they're still in school. I don't remember.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (17:01)
Hm.
Brian (17:06)
it's it's the summertime. You know, he's not going out anywhere, they're not seeing him anywhere. He hasn't been to Max in months, and they're just starting to feel like they have to do something. And that's why Billy has kind of gotten cliff notes on how to talk to Harry. That's why they're trying to get him on a case. That's the whole Rain of Toads thing. Let's bring him in.
Right? Billy doesn't know intrinsically that a reign of toads is something you need to contact Dresden about. Okay, but if that doesn't work, you know what? Check his messages. I don't think he's taking any clients. I haven't seen him in his office in two months. And Billy thinks he has a golden opportunity and steps on it.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (17:43)
Yeah, I think that probably is correct. I don't know that Mab would have the ability to interfere subtly and make Billy do something with magic. Like she's not normally allowed to affect mortals that way unless obligated themselves to her somehow. So I think it is just a giant coincidence, but the Reign of Toads thing gets Harry out, combined with exactly what you said, Billy and the gang take this opportunity, and that's because of the Reign of Toads thing.
is directly connected to the reason Mab's coming to look for him. So all of those things make it possible.
Brian (18:15)
Right. Now Mab could be really subtle about it.
At one point she imitates Molly's voice to get Thomas to come out to the water beetle where she knows Harry's gonna go in cold days. maybe Billy or Georgia thinks that Andy or Marcy called them to say something about seeing Dresden and he's really out of it.
But that begs the question of why would Mab even be so invested at this point? Now we'll talk a little bit about that later, but I think you're probably right, Adam. Mm Mab doesn't have a strong enough reason to care right now to necessarily be paying that much attention to the situation.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (18:34)
Hm.
Yes, exactly. So, with that having been said, we then have the hit go down right then, the assassination attempt. What we see is a pickup truck with some kids riding in the back that have submachine guns or something that start trying to shoot at him. He puts up a shield, and then ⁓ Billy tries to get Harry's attention because at the same moment the
suspicious lady with the long coat is pulling out a shotgun, and Harry now has two gunmen on both sides of him. But it's okay. Billy's saving the day because he immediately flips to wolf form, another obvious example of his ability to level up, not just in knowledge, like we talked about, but in physical ability. He's now ready for the climax of the end of this book. and so he helps Harry avoid
Harry grabs the shotgun and shoots the ghoul as it turns out to be, and then all the bad guys get away, and Harry accepts Billy's help having a sort moment where he kind of reevaluates his priorities and perspective almost having died there.
then they drive away under intense toad rain, and that's the end of that chapter. Now, one of the other things that happens in this chapter, Brian, that I wanted to talk about. Billy says, quote, The Vampires are offering their groupies full vampirehood if one of them brings you down, unquote. Now, I wanna ask you, why have the Reds
failed so spectacularly to kill Harry since the party. If at this point what Billy says is true, and the assassination attempt seems to suggest that they're upping their game, why have they failed to kill Harry? Is it because they're only having the groupies do it? And if so, why? What's going on here?
Brian (20:30)
So I think there's two potential answers to this. And one of them is something we get a little bit of a hint towards, which is that people have been keeping a bit of an eye on Harry. Maybe Morgan is lurking around in the background to a certain extent. Obviously, he's got a lot of other duties, but we're in a bit of a Cold War period in the war itself, so I don't think that would be completely ridiculous. And of course, Ebenezer McCoy are.
Almost certainly is taking some steps to, help Dresden say stay safe, even if Dresden doesn't know about them. But I think it's a really compelling suggestion that the main reason this is pretty much the first halfway competent hit on Dresden is because they're not trying very hard to kill him.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (21:19)
Yeah, you would think if the upper echelons of the Red Court actually wanted him dead, they'd just send the Ebes with the ick, and it would be done. Like this version of Dresden probably would not have been able to survive a high-level Red Court hit squad, not least of which because he's all alone.
He has no allies to call on, and he's not leveled up like he will be when we get to changes. So I think it has to be exactly what you're saying. This major international organization that's, probably hundreds of thousands of vampires strong can't take out one lonely wizard because the vast majority of the people in important places don't want to. They want to use him as the excuse.
Brian (22:00)
And I bet that there's a little bit of a sort of risk-reward calculation going on where Dresden has shown he can kill a red court vampire. Bianca wasn't a nobody. She was going to be elevated within the court. So Dresden clearly can take out a lot of the people who they'd send after him. So the question is: okay, do we either commit
A significant resource like the Eebs and like actually, bring like a heavy hitter to this situation, like they'll do in a couple books. Or we maybe see if we can get something kind of for free? And we'll try to take him out with some, low life swear. If they kill him, it's even more of a propaganda coup because it's look how weak.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (22:40)
Hm.
Brian (22:49)
These wizards are. this one thought he could start a war with us and he got gunned down by some punk, right? Or he gets to stick around. And the thing is, I bet both the war party and the anti-war party are okay with that. Because I think the anti-war party believes that the ultimatum they've laid at the feet of the White Council, which we'll talk about next time, is going to work. Because as we saw,
In the last book, when Bianca makes that offer to Harry, most Red Court vampires don't think about the offers they're making to bring people into the Red Court or for them to give up one of their own the way a human who hasn't been tainted would.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (23:32)
Yeah, they're definitely have a hard time sort of putting them in the headspace. Now, of course, there's one other explanation for why they failed so sp so spectacularly so far, and that's Harry has basically become a hermit hiding behind his wards like ninety-eight percent of the time. Which really speaks to where he is at in these books. Which brings us to chapter two, Brian, because at the beginning of chapter two, after dropping Billy off, he sits in his car.
In sort of a grief spiral for hours.
Brian (24:04)
Yeah. I mean it's great. I think it really works. And it didn't surprise me, but I didn't really realize that he's planning on effectively trying to get out in front of this thing Billy's roped him into. And he just ends up being unable to move. And not only unable to move, but I tried not to cry.
I willed myself not to, with all of my years of training and experience and self discipline, it would accomplish nothing. It wouldn't put me anywhere closer to finding a cure for Susan. I was so damn tired.
I left my face in my hands.
I didn't want someone walking by to see me bawling. my God. He literally is weeping uncontrollably in public. That's I mean, obviously, you know, this is for a book. Jim is showing and not telling and trying to like condense the this emotional crises in a way that lets us, see the depth of it. But
If we take that at face value, that is is a lot.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (25:10)
Yeah, and presumably he's been feeling things like this for the last several months, because I don't think this is the first time he's fell into this particular spiral. But what's really impressive is that Jim uses this to a remind the readers what happened in previous books, because maybe it's been a year or two since the last book came out and you need a refresher.
And also for anybody who hasn't read the previous books, he's giving them the backstory about what happened to Susan and what why that. But then third, he's actually showing how much that has affected him since the last book. So he's also giving us new information about how it's affecting him. And that is important for this book. And he's also setting him up so that he doesn't have time to go home before he goes to see Miss Somerset.
Because he sits here for hours. Right after that part that you mentioned, he says, it took a long time to get myself back under control. I'm not sure how long it was, but the shadows had changed, and I was baking in the car, even with the windows down. Unquote. So shadows changed means that he's been there for at least an hour, if not two. He no longer has time to go home. And now he has to go see Miss Somerset, still looking like crap. Like he hasn't had a shower or a haircut in weeks.
Brian (26:28)
So something that I want to flag is that, yes, Harry thinks of Susan and and that's what makes him cry and and lose the time and and be, upset. But before that, I mopped at my face with my shaking hands that the days and nights had been blurring lately.
I don't think that Dresden is just upset because he's thinking about Susan. I think it's also because he is now in a place where when something like a hit happens to him.
He gets hit with PTSD. He's he's kind of shell-shocked because he had such a horrible time of it in grave peril that he doesn't want to be in a situation where the monsters can get him again.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (27:07)
Ooh wow.
That's a really good insight.
That brings me to my next question, Brian. We get a little bit of his situation in the first chapter. We get a little bit more of it here. How long has he been this much of a wreck? How long has he looked this bad? How long has it been since his last case?
I can imagine a situation where right after Grave Peril, he doesn't spiral this badly because he's convinced himself, he's determined, I'm gonna fix this, I'm gonna find a solution for Susan, right? It's not I'm gonna reverse all the bad things, I'm gonna save the day. But as the weeks and eventually months go by, he loses that hope.
And that determination when it seems like everything is impossible. He's exhausted all his best leads for how he might help Susan. And now for the last few weeks is when he's really started sliding into a depression over it. He was buoyed for a while because he had to believe he could fix it. But now he's lost that hope. So I think he was probably taking just enough cases.
to keep his the lights on as it at his office and to prevent himself from getting kicked out of his boarding house. But now we get from Billy like they filed an eviction notice for his office just recently and he's like behind on the rent at his home. So I think it's only been a couple of weeks where it's been this bad and it's because the last few weeks is when he's really lost hope.
Brian (28:52)
And I think that that's also because it's not that he has gotten worse in the sense of he is, you know, feeling more badly than he did at the beginning. But it is that slowly the good things, the good habits are crumbling. Right? So in the beginning, Harry is a guy who
Who works really hard and he's diligent and he's gonna fix this and he's gonna take cases because he needs to fund his ability to buy the things that he needs to do to keep doing the research. And, as he starts to let one thing go, okay, well, I'm not gonna take that case tomorrow. I'm gonna stay up and I'm gonna try to work this out. And okay, well, you know, I guess that this potion has to be brewed at night. So it's okay if, you know, this week my hours change and I don't get a lot of work.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (29:20)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (29:40)
And well, you know, I'm not really gonna go outside today, so I don't really need to take a shower. It's the little sort of moments of permission he's giving himself to slide deeper into it that metastasize into the state that he's in. So Harry isn't necessarily feeling worse, but he is worse, and he has gotten to this point where in the past couple weeks it's gotten really dire because.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (29:46)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (30:07)
He's been in a slow deterioration since Grave Power.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (30:11)
Yeah, and I think the other way to look at that is that after Grave Peril, he was basically in denial. Bob tries to tell him, like, you can't solve this. Like, all these things you're trying, they're not working. I think that there's definitely a little conversation that happens like that at the end of Grave Peril. And I think part of this is as tragic and and despondent as it seems, a little bit of a healing process as well, because he's slowly coming out of his denial.
And finally starting to accept reality that he can't reverse what happened to Susan, and that acceptance is the first step towards healing. He's not really started to heal yet, but he can't start to heal until he leaves that level of denial that he was under. So that's kind of what brings us.
to the meeting with Miss Somerset and his eyes are like have bags under them, his hair is a mess, he hasn't had a haircut, he hasn't had a shower, he hasn't had a shave in forever, and he's going to meet this prospective client, probably just because he really is desperate for the work.
Brian (31:14)
Let
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (31:15)
So he's gonna go to his office, he's gonna meet Miss Somerset, who's already waiting in his office with the door locked, and that is gonna be one of his first tip-offs that something's a little unusual here. But my question for you here, Brian, why is Mab
appearing in this guise as Miss Somerset. Is this some sort of a test for Harry?
Brian (31:35)
I mean, it has to be a test. Mab obviously can't just, go around in full queen of air and darkness and get up walking through the streets of Chicago, but she doesn't need to. She could basically be outside Dresden's office building the moment he appears and say, come with me or you're gonna be in trouble. Because as we will later see, she has a sufficient hold on Dresden to basically make him do.
She wants. So appearing in disguise has to be a test. But I think the more interesting thing to figure out is exactly what is Mab testing? Because I think, Adam, if we just think she's testing, is he clever enough? She seems to make it a little bit too easy.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (32:23)
Yeah, let's look at let's list down all the clues that she provides for Harry. Number one, she's got snow white hair. How many normal mortals do you meet with snow white hair?
Very unusual. Beauty that makes men murder friends. So already he's aware that this is a supernatural beauty that is around her, which of course, glamour fairies, that that's clearly a connection in his head. then you've got she wasn't old and she wasn't young. Again, a fay or even a she trait. She's appearing inside his office through a locked door. That's not something normal mortals do. And
She asks to soul gaze him. If nothing else worked as part of this test, she knows that she wouldn't have a soul gaze with him, right? Because she's a supernatural creature. She's not a human. She doesn't have a soul, quote unquote. So he wouldn't be able to soul gaze her. That would be the final tip off that like something's not right here. And so if he's so far gone that he doesn't notice any of these others, then that has to be the one that clues him in. But maybe he fails the test if that's the one that is required.
Brian (33:27)
And she dropped Harry a hint before they even met. What does she announce herself as? Miss Somerset. Now there's an obvious reading of that name. Summers set the end of summer. it's she's the the queen of winter. She's the thing that, you know, comes when summer has set. But also, Somerset.
Is a place. Specifically, Somerset 1M is a county in Cornwall in England. And it is essentially right next door to the places where most of the King Arthur mythos takes place, right? King Arthur is conceived in, you know, the the very ⁓ southwestern tip of Cornwall and the Kingdom of Domnonia, which is the one that
is very often attached to Arthur in lore, is based around Somerset. Merlin is supposed to be from, you know, Somerset. the Mount Baden is in the area. There are all these Arthurian things related to that county in England. So she's signaling with the name that she is something that is of winter, Somerset, and also that she is something on the scale of Arthurian lore.
Like Mab might actually in real life be Miss Somerset because her actual name might be whatever her first name is of Somerset or of whatever the, you know, the name for the county was in her time. It's where she's from.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (35:03)
Hmm.
Brian (35:05)
So the sort of depth of the clues that ⁓ Mab is laying out here is completely incompatible with Harry not noticing. Especially, I don't think we can mention it enough, Adam. You're completely right. The hair, Jim specifies not white not platinum. And then he says, don't know how her skin managed to look pale beside that hair, but it did.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (35:31)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (35:32)
That is a level of sort of stark coloration that is completely unknown even in human die jobs.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (35:42)
Yeah, and we know that the Fay, specifically the she, can absolutely pull off the glamour needed to look like a normal human. Molly does it when she goes home for the first time, right? She makes herself look like she's thirty or whatever, a little bit of ⁓ older, a little bit of wrinkles when she goes to meet her parents. of course Mab could do that too if she wanted to. She's screaming that she's
Fey, and probably also that she's at least a member of the she ⁓ to Harry. And of course, he does see through it, and his response is probably what the test was about. Not just when will he figure it out? How many clues do I need to feed him, but what will he do when he does figure it out?
Brian (36:25)
And she must love. I'm testing a theory, I said. I kept the gun and my eyes on her and opened another drawer. See lately I've been getting nasty visitors. So it's made me do some thinking about what kind of trouble to expect. And I think I've got you pegged. And that's when he rolls a plain iron nail at the Queen of Air and Darkness.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (36:51)
Yeah, of course, he doesn't know that she's the Queen of Air and Darkness. He thinks he's got the cards because he's saying, Listen, I made a bargain with my godmother. She's not allowed to come at me until next October or whatever. I've got several months going. And so he thinks he's he's in the right here that whoever this is
That if they're trying to come collect on Leah's bargain or something, or if this is Leah in disguise or something, that he can tell them to go pound sand because they're not allowed to mess with him. Not realizing that the debt has been purchased by ⁓ arguably the most powerful and scary person in the entire Fey court, as far as he knows at this point. So, yeah, and I love that turn where
You see him coming into this meeting disheveled, absolutely depressed, and just not looking very competent, right? He's offering her coffee from a thing that's obviously had burnt coffee sitting in it for days or whatever. And he just looks like a moron, and yet he turns around in an instant and proves that he actually is really confident, really competent, and he knows what's going on.
That is the kind of Harry that I love to see and so
In those earlier books, he's on the back foot so much more often. In this book, this one chapter, right away, early on, he turns it around. A, in the first chapter, he gets an attacked by assassins and he's able to hold them off, and he doesn't do it by sheer luck. He does it by holding a shield, by using his ring, by turning around when Billy gives him the opening and taking advantage of it. Like he does it through guile and smarts and his abilities. And then here.
Again, he his investigative, his, his, his mental abilities are being tested, and he clearly proves that he's worthy at this moment.
Brian (38:45)
Yeah. One thing that I think must be sort of a saving grace for Mab is that she doesn't know when he figured it out. Because clearly his goal is to try to get the drop on whatever she is. So the thing that interests her, the thing that makes her say, clever, is that he thought not one but two steps ahead.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (38:55)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Brian (39:11)
Not just, ⁓ this could be a fairy, but how am I gonna get this fairy to stay here long enough for me to draw a gun on it? And that is, I think, is what makes Mab actually interested. Because when she drops the act,
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (39:21)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (39:31)
her voice sounded just as beautiful as it had been before, but it was empty, quiet, haunting, clever. Like that switch when it's flipped, is Mab needing to sort of actually stop performing for a second so she can realize all the steps that he took. So I think
She really was going to walk out the door on Dresden. And he so thoroughly changes her opinion that even when he pisses her off, she's not willing to completely give up on it.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (40:06)
Yeah, in fact, the fact that he's impertinent has ⁓ and like willing to stand up to her is one of the qualities she actually likes in him. It's one of the reasons she wants him as her knight throughout like half the series. But at this moment, I think exactly what you said, his performance here about not just the fact that he noticed who and what she was, but also how he responded to it is what makes her decide to.
Gamble upon him, as it were. But at this moment, when she says, I have chosen you to be my emissary, my agent, we get this line: quote, I laughed at her. That made something else come into those perfect pale features. Anger. Anger cold and terrible flashed in her eyes, And all but froze the laugh in my throat, unquote. That I think is the moment.
She decides, in order to prove who I am and that I have the power over him, I'm gonna make it painful. He laughed at me.
Brian (41:10)
Yes, and that's something that she would later not necessarily respect, but at least expect out of Harry in a way that, like you said, you know, she approves of that level of defiance. But here, with the way he looks right now, she feels like you need to know when to be courteous, buddy. you don't know what you're messing with, and you're a little too cocky, and I need to take you.
Down a peg. And that
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (41:37)
Exactly right. To be fair though,
if Harry did know who she was, I don't think he would have dared laugh at her in this moment.
Brian (41:44)
Well, that might also be a point he lost because, yes, of course this is a fairy, but you know, get three steps ahead, Dresden. If this is one of the she who's come to visit you and has made it obvious enough for you to figure it out, do you really think they're that afraid of you?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (41:55)
Ha ha ha.
Brian (42:04)
But Adam, that doesn't explain why she went to Dresden in the first place.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (42:08)
Yeah, no, that's a really interesting question. Why is Mab choosing to go to Harry, presumably as her first option, right? Ronald Rule was killed fairly recently. I doubt she went through a string of other people and he's like her her C or D choice. I think she came straight to him. And I was trying to ask myself, well, what does she know about him at this point? And as I built that list, Brian.
It became really obvious why she might go to see him. Well, she knows everything Leah knows, which means she knows that he defeated a walker from the outside. He's defeated an outsider already. He defeated
Brian (42:45)
Well, okay,
okay, maybe defeated, maybe got away from.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (42:48)
would call him defeated. But anyway, he he at very least survived a walker, which has to be an important impressive achievement, especially for having done it so young. He defeated Justin, who was probably we we assume at this point connected with the Black Council, maybe with Nemesis. He defeated Victor Cells, which we know on retrospect was also connected to the Black Council slash nemesis. He defeated the FBI Wolfpack, which we also know was somehow connected to the Black Council slash nemesis.
and from her own mouth, quote, ⁓ she watched him quote stalemate his godmother autumn last, unquote. So she knows all of that as well as the fact that he d defeated Bianca, who again, someone that we know that is tied to either the Black Council and or Nemesis. So he has already been fighting her enemies without even necessarily knowing it,
And she may not know all of these things. Maybe she doesn't know that Victor Cells was influenced by it. Maybe she didn't know about the FBI. But I'm thinking she probably knows about at least some of them. Certainly The Walker. And maybe that's enough to make him interesting to her.
Brian (43:55)
And I think that's a lot of really good points, but it led me to sort of ponder something else. Yeah, sure. If you're going to choose a 29-year-old wizard to be your emissary, Dresden is clearly the pick. I can't imagine there is anybody else in the White Council who is his age or younger who has a list half that cool. But ⁓ you know. Morgan? McCoy? Like.
Is there no other wizard who could help? Or that I mean, Mab has to have leverage on somebody, right?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (44:28)
Yeah, but remember how the wizards are taught, like specifically how Harry is taught by Ebenezer, and we know for a fact that Harry's mother was a huge outlier for how often she spent time in the Fay Courts. I have to imagine there's not that many that are as capable potentially as Harry is, and also they have a she has a perfect handle, a perfect leverage to use on them. But also remember that it's not just about
Magical capabilities. She needs an investigator. And as we see later in Turncoat, the wizards are not all great investigators. Harry arrives at the crime scene and is like, okay, did you take photos? Did you run DNA? Did you do all this stuff? And they're like looking at him blankly, like, we ran some divination magic. And he's like, Well, there's other ways of pursuing this, right? So he is a trained investigator.
and he's adapted his magic to work with all the mortal techniques of investigation. And that is what makes him uniquely suited, in addition to all the other things that we said, for this specific task, because it is in the end a murder mystery.
Brian (45:39)
And I think it's also the case that it's not just that Mab has a strong handle over him. And of course, the handle Mab has on Harry in this moment is probably stronger than the handle anyone, could have on Harry. And is as strong as the handle she'd have on any other wizard. But she also knows that the council is about to put his nuts in the vice, which means that Mab knows she can.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (46:01)
Yes.
Brian (46:06)
maximally manipulate the situation. So yes, there are more powerful wizards, but this one is an investigator, and we've really got them. Plus, is she already angling for a new winter night?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (46:21)
I think she might be. We know for a fact that she has plans within plans to replace like for example, Sarissa was supposed to be the backup for one thing and Molly was a second backup. So she has these plans within plans. She always wants to plan for okay, what if Slate dies? I need to be prepared for that. And so this is certainly one of her plans, I think, at this point. But the real question is, Brian, does she already know that he's a starborn?
Brian (46:49)
yeah, we built a good case with all these questions. But if Mab just thinks, well, yeah, he got away from the outsider somehow, and he's had some adventures, and sure he is probably a better investigator than most wizards, Mab could put so many more resources into figuring this out than just Harry Dresden. And she doesn't.
And I think the only way that makes sense, right? Not selecting Harry as the winter emissary. That might be a logical choice. But making this a test of Harry alone, I think that only makes sense if Mab is looking ahead and trying to figure out: okay, is this gonna be the starborn horse I back?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (47:34)
Yeah, that makes sense too. she calls it a gamble, and it really is a big gamble. Cause look what almost happens at the end of this book. I mean, the winter and summer courts are going to war. If Aurora succeeds in sacrificing the summer mantle to winter, then she's completely unbalancing the courts. Like it would it would be absolute chaos. So she needs to pick an emissary that is going to get.
things done, and maybe she doesn't know how deep the treachery goes on both sides of this. Maybe she suspects it's gonna be fairly easy to figure out and it turns out to be harder, but I'm guessing she really does know this is a serious situation and I think this is my best bet.
Brian (48:19)
And you brought up an interesting point in the pre-show, Adam. Maybe she knows that because somebody told her so. The gatekeeper, we can be pretty sure, has a better understanding of the vague direction the future is headed in than almost every other wizard. He seems to have a really good handle on time as we find out and proven guilty. Maybe let Mab know.
That she needs to test Harry as a starborn with this in this moment, because maybe it is a gamble. Maybe we can't be sure it's gonna work. But if we don't test him here, won't get key information we need. Things won't go as well as they could. Right. Maybe it's the case that even if Harry fails, yes, it's terrible, but it's not something that's gonna
end with the world being conquered by the outsiders. It's just going to be awful. And maybe that's a worthwhile gamble for Mab and the Gatekeeper and everybody who's invested in the coming Starborn cycle to kind of winnow out one of their best bets. Because we know, right? Like Listen's a starborn, but he ain't no wizard. We know that Harry would be unique.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (49:18)
Hmm.
Brian (49:39)
uniquely interesting to the people on team reality due to the circumstances of his birth and the talent he inherited from his mother.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (49:49)
Yeah, and I think more evidence that Rashid and Mab are like colluding in the background of this is just how often he pops up. Like he pops up outside the mother's cottage when Harry's stuck in that tree later. So and the other the other time that they're that seems like they're working together when the White Council's emissary or diplomat that was supposed to go to Mab and ask to use the ways
Brian (50:00)
Seriously.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (50:12)
He comes back half frozen or whatever at exactly the right time in the middle of the council meeting with the message that like Mab's testing you and and is if and so Rashid is like takes that opportunity is like, Yes, let's let Harry solve this test or whatever. Like, it seems like the timing there is so coincidental that I think they have to be working together because why what other reason does Mab have to like
ice this person but still let get back with that answer at exactly the right time. I think it's clear that they're working together.
Brian (50:44)
Yeah, and the question is not if they're working together. The question is, are they working together on this? We're gonna find out in cold days that the gatekeeper is the outer gatekeeper. And that's Mab's job too, right? So they're definitely working together. We know they're in cahoots. I mean, yes, the gatekeeper comes to the mother's cottage, but what's gonna happen in 10 years? Harry's gonna go.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (50:55)
Yes.
Brian (51:09)
From the mother's cottage to the gatekeeper. So we know that that is a well-traveled path. It's just interesting that both Mab and Rashid take a personal interest in Harry in this matter at the same time, suggesting that they're not just working together in a broader sense. But when Harry negotiates the deal with Mab, after, okay, he she's kind of.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (51:11)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (51:36)
Got me, you know, I I I can't totally get out of this. I think it's interesting that even after she's got him completely on the back foot, literally stabbing himself, like he's bleeding the whole conversation they're having after this. He's still able to kind of take a level up in Fey bargaining from everything we saw in Grave Peril.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (51:58)
Yeah, definitely. And that brings us to the negotiation that he has with Mab, which takes place during chapter three, when he first takes the moment to process what it means for Mab to be in your office. And the fact is he he immediately kind of refuses her offer. he doesn't know what she's asked yet, but he's Whatever you want, I don't want it. If you want if you're threatening to kill me, just kill me now. And he it's actually a really smart move because A ⁓
He already knows if you get in deeper with the fairies, it just gets worse. So it's like I'd rather die than get even more over a barrel. Like I still don't know what I'm gonna do about Leah in the first place, so this is it. But the other thing is he's in a much stronger bargaining position than he knows. He he can get more out of this. She's desperate enough to offer him a really what is a pretty good deal. Now, she of course
Is the queen of the winter fee. She's going to find a way to slip a loophole in there, and Harry's not gonna notice it, and that's exactly what happens, but it's still a very good position for him to be in. Now, Brian, one of the lines she says here is really telling, and it just show goes to show how much Jim has thought this through, even all the way back in book four, where ⁓ Harry, you know, says something about freedom, and Mab says, I adore freedom. Anyone who doesn't have it wants it.
unquote. And that just speaks to his whole concept within this entire ⁓ universe that the more power you have, the more limited you are in your use of it. And Nab is more limited than most.
Brian (53:33)
Yeah. One thing that I love here, because I think it's ha working on two levels, is right at the beginning, where Harry realizes what it means to have Mab in the office, and she says, Yes, wise enough to be afraid. How does it feel to know what you know, child? And Harry's answer Sort of like Tokyo when Godzilla comes up on the beach, that's a like maybe best lines thing. But Mab's being very thin.
Theatrical there. She's really playing into how scared he needs to be. Mab doesn't need to do this. This is like what we talked about at the end of 12 months when Mab is very theatrically, I'm gonna stab her. I'm gonna stab her, you know, for like five minutes. Because Mab is trying to sew these emotions in Dresden to get him to agree by hook or by crook, because she.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (54:05)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Brian (54:27)
Acting in the steed of his godmother to do what is ultimately best for Harry. So I think she has to offer him what is ultimately a sweetheart deal without him knowing how sweethearted is, and still get him to take it, which is why part of this is so elaborate on her end.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (54:46)
Yeah, I'm not sure if she's acting in the stead of his godmother. At this point, his godmother is still out and about. When his godmother is frozen, in in Arctus Tour, that's when Mab has to take up Leah's duties. But I don't think that's the case here. I think she's just trying to make this as tempting as possible for Harry.
While leaving a big loophole. Let's look at what the actual negotiation comes down to, right? These are the concessions that Harry manages to wheedle out, or even the concessions that she offers ⁓ and accepts. So she says, You do me three favors and we're done, your clear obligation over. And Harry says, A, I get to decide whether I take the task or not, and she agrees. No from you or your lackeys because I refuse a task.
and no selling my debt onto another party so that they can then do something worse to me. This is the only deal that exists. Now that sounds like a good set of conditions. It sounds like he could just refuse every task from now on, and there's nothing she can do about it. Of course, the loophole that she uses in both this book and for his second favor in the book Small Favor is basically the same loophole, which is she names him emissary and
Because she grants him that title, she's not reprising against him for anything. It's just a title and a job, and being in that job forces him to deal with the situation she wants him to deal with. So she's actually giving him something and it's a burden. Here you go. Congratulations, it's a burden.
But then that does raise the question, why does Mab provide so little information to Harry? Because Harry asks, Who took Marcone in small favor? and Mab answers, I don't know. So she gives him a straight answer there,
But here, when Harry asks what was taken, she's like, You'll know it. She can't she knows that it's the summer mantle that's missing. She could just say it's the summer mantle. What's going on here?
Brian (56:49)
Yeah, I mean, all she tells him is that it wasn't an accident, like the papers say, and that Harry will meet his summer counterpart. She doesn't even tell him who that is. So Mab definitely holds out here. And one answer is just because she doesn't trust Harry yet. And, you know, the default of fairies when you ask them a question isn't, you know, simple yes-no answers.
But it might go beyond that. Because later we're gonna find out that Mab can't even talk to Harry when she knows that the favor she's asking him about is about her daughter. Slate is involved in this caper. What if Mab already fears Maive is the one responsible?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (57:28)
Mm.
Yeah, that is certainly I mean, of the various people who could have done this, she probably doesn't suspect Aurora Cause I don't think she's acting particularly unusual.
in the last six months since she's got infected by nemesis, but who else could it be? Well, we already know that Maeve shirks her duties and hires really bad knights. so it could be her. It's probably not the mothers. Who else could it be, Brian? It's a the summer night isn't somebody you can just knock over like a convenience store.
Brian (58:08)
You know, I can't imagine that there are a lot of really good reasons to take the summer night's mantle. So I think that if she's contemplated Maeve being involved, perhaps she does believe it's to sacrifice the mantle sort of on the stone table in a way that brings its power to winter. That sounds like the kind of short-sighted thing Maeve would do, thinking that, you know, she's a master strategist. But
It could be for other reasons. Maybe the point is to take the summer mantle off the board to let Slate kind of have a free hand, or to create sort of ⁓ a situation where the unsealy c accords fall apart because summer is no longer effectively checking winter. There could be some greater sort of political reasons you would want to just trap the mantle.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (58:57)
Hm.
Brian (59:03)
That Mab could be considering also. And the reason why we're mentioning all of this is obviously if Mab just knew it was Aurora, there's no reason she has to let it get so close to disaster, even though we know it's not technically Mab's job to save the mortal world from you know climate change.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (59:23)
Yeah, that's true. But she also doesn't have a lot of power in this, right? in this dispute between the two courts, she's not really allowed to act. That's why they pick emissaries to act on their behalf in this particular case. But if she did have a really strong inkling of what was going on, maybe she would have told Harry unless she feared the answer and she didn't want to say it out loud.
Brian (59:37)
Yeah, I mean
Yeah, and and I wonder if that suggests that maybe she does know who killed Rule. I mean, the winter night killing the summer night doesn't even seem like that would be, you know, that much of a cause for alarm. And that's why she might suspect, ⁓ it might be my daughter who is wrapped up in this. you know, that we have no idea, and if we ever get Jim back on the show, we might just have to ask him.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:00:01)
Right.
Brian (1:00:14)
But I wonder, do you think Mab knows that Slate is the killer already?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:00:20)
I don't know. I think she could easily suspect that. I mean that his counterpart in winter seems but I don't think she knows it. And the other thing to consider, Harry specifically is told like s the summer knight isn't somebody you can just push down a set of stairs and kill. I there has to have been a specific thing. They're very tough. And the who are who could do this? And he's told like, well, it could have been one of the six queens, and that's why he goes and investigates the six queens and talks to them, right? But
Brian (1:00:23)
Sure, yeah.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:00:49)
Couldn't it been somebody outside of Fairy? Could it have been an outsider that somehow got summoned into the world? Could it have been one of the Denarians or some other major supernatural entity? Could it have been the red court did something weird to get him killed? It feels like they never really consider that possibility. And I think it's probably because of the way the summer night's mantle just disappears after his death.
I think there's no way someone outside of the fairy queens in the courts could have done that, which really narrows the suspect pool, which is what makes this so thorny for her in the first place.
Brian (1:01:27)
And you bring up a really good point, Adam, because okay, Mab, let's say, doesn't know who it is, and it's gotta be somebody with, you know, a a lot of knowledge of the courts, but couldn't that be certain wizards under the influence of Nemesis? Because the one thing that Mab almost certainly does know at this point is that he who walks beside is ramping up his activity level. So that
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:01:44)
Mm.
Mm-hmm.
Brian (1:01:56)
might be the thing causes Mab to really believe she needs a good investigator. Because there's a lot of probabilities that she could believe, but Mab doesn't make assumptions. Mab knows, you know, rationality and knowledge, that's what she's all about. If she doesn't feel like she has enough information to be sure, she might not, feel comfortable
Putting a more specific plan into action, that's why she has to, in her own words, gamble.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:02:30)
Yeah. And she might not even be able to allow to tell the emissary any more details than what she's already told him. That might be some important rule about disputes between the courts. The emissaries have to figure it out. You put your finger on the scale. You have too much power to do that. So anyway, I think that we have gone on far enough about speculating on what we can't possibly know with regards to Mab's internal monologue here, but
Brian (1:02:35)
Mm.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:02:57)
The next episode
we're gonna do chapters four, five, and six, which is the entire White Council meeting sequence. Very exciting stuff happening there. But before we do that, we have our question for Bob.
Brian (1:03:12)
If like Billy kills a human in wolf form, does that break the first law of magic?
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:03:18)
Yeah, Bob would be great for this question, but ⁓ he sent us a message saying he's trying to sneak into a white council meeting, I guess to spy for Harry. I I don't know what the deal is there.
Brian (1:03:28)
I feel like he's
listening to the podcast. That's literally what we're covering next.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:03:31)
Yeah,
maybe that's it. All right. So the most suggested answer when we asked this question on the subreddit was quote, obviously no, unquote. And I think they're probably right. That's where I was leaning at the beginning of this because it seems like if there's no active magic involved, like the transformation process happens, there's magic involved in that. But after there's no active magic sustaining them as wolves, they are now just physically wolves.
Then probably it wouldn't break the first law. But I wanna play a little bit of Devil's Advocate here because I think there's a couple of things that made me ask this question in the first place. For example, Harry believes that he indirectly killed those kids in grave peril, right? He set off the fire. No question. But after he set that fire off with magic.
It then just became normal fire and started burning the house down. And a lot of the kids were theoretically killed by asphyxiation, not burned to death necessarily. So that means they were indirectly killed by magic, and yet he's still convinced that it was w something he did with his magic. Now, you could chalk that up to him being extra sensitive about killing kids. Obviously, that's a tragedy.
Whether or not it's a first law violation, but he does seem genuinely concerned that he's gonna be executed if the council ever finds out about what he did there. Now, the other reason that I think this enlightening raven on the Reddit brings up this point as well, how is it different than what Denton and the Hexen Wolfen did?
They seem to be corrupted by their kills. So if Billy or Georgia kills a human while in wolf form, does that corrupt them in the same way? What do you think, Brian?
Brian (1:05:23)
Yeah, I think there's an obvious retort, which is that the Hex and Wolf belts are inherently corruptive, and feeding on lifeblood just accelerates, you know, how the rage spirit is twisting, you know, the person who wears the belt. But I think that on a symbolic logic sort of level, and and magic works on a symbolic logic level, you're right, there isn't necessarily an inherent difference there. And we see
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:05:45)
Mm-hmm.
Brian (1:05:51)
Other areas in the you know Dresden files where it doesn't seem to be the case that your intentions have to sort of one-to-one match up with I'm trying to do this thing that isn't like obviously and inherently against the law. Molly very clearly invades the mind of another ⁓ in the run-up to proven guilty, but it's also
Probably okay to go, you know, sort of try to heal someone's mind by doing effectively the same thing. Arguably that's what she was doing, and her intents were only sort of corrupted by some unconscious emotions she doesn't know she was feeling. Now, almost certainly this is why Molly's not horribly corrupted by it, but they're still gonna take her head off.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:06:42)
Yeah, absolutely. Now, the other argument that could be made is maybe the Hexen Wolf belts are active magic, right? When you're wearing them, you are channeling that bestial spirit, and therefore what you do while you're converted by a belt is magically done, which is why it can be so corruptive. and that also raises the question of like.
Brian (1:06:52)
Mm.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:07:09)
The Kinetomancer in Ghost Story, if he speeds up his body and uses it to like break someone's neck, does that count as killing with magic? Or did the magic simply enhance his muscles? And so tac it's indirect. Technically he didn't do it. Again, if we just go by the laws, Brian, I think maybe the answer is no. But my guess is
Regardless of whether it is a violation, it seems like the council would prefer to just better safe than sorry.
Brian (1:07:41)
Yeah, it's interesting because Aristaites, the leader of, you know, sort of Fix's ⁓ gang, I suppose, in Ghost Story, seems to maybe in part be using Kinetomancy because he could get away with killing somebody with it. But don't know if he's necessarily right about that. It seems like the Wardens would absolutely stamp out somebody like that.
Using that as an excuse if they thought they had to. So maybe.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:08:10)
Yeah, no economics
puts it thusly, they are more inclined to behead first and ask questions later.
Brian (1:08:16)
Yeah, so maybe it is a little bit more about, you know, sort of what's convenient for law enforcement. when a warden kills a warlock in the lines of duty, mean even if they use their sword, that's enchanted.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:08:31)
Yeah, but the s the enchantment isn't what kills them, which is I I think why I think it's why they all use swords, right? I or guns in the case of Wild Bill, because if you can murder somebody with a mundane means, then you aren't corrupted. You haven't broken the first law. In fact, Intracovert Crew brings the receipts to that particular discussion because he found a word of Jim where
the question was referring to Kemmler, how all the wardens got together to murder Kemler like multiple times, but then it eventually took. And the question was, well, those wardens, they murdered with magic. They broke the laws. Aren't they all tainted? And Jim's response was quote, technically, they didn't actually kill him with magic. They rendered him
helpless with magic, and then found other ways to execute him. Swords are the usual. For Kemler, they also use guns, axes, shovels, ropes, a flamethrower, and a number of other extremes. It's a semantic difference in some ways, but an important technical distinction in others. Unquote. So there, Jim seems to be splitting the hair between direct and indirect magic, suggesting that indirect magic, like potentially Kinitomancy, and prop more probably,
Billy killing in werewolf form wouldn't be tainted and wouldn't necessarily be an official first law violation, no matter how the council actually treats it.
Brian (1:09:51)
and we know actually from day off when Kirby and Andy get, psychic mites from the never never, that the alphas are augmenting their mass with ectoplasmic matter from the never never, which suggests that when they are actually killing
They're doing so with a magical construct. That makes it sound like it might be direct magic.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:10:14)
Yeah, that could easily be the case too. Which is why it's a good reason they haven't killed humans while in wolf form. In fact, they try very hard not to kill anyone, because that's the kind of people they are. but i that we just thought it would be a fun hypothetical question. And it was really inspired by what Billy does to the ghoul in the first chapter of this book.
Where I asked myself, okay, what if to try to defend Harry he winds up killing this person and it wasn't a ghoul? What happens? And it led me off this this this whole spiral. So ultimately I this is one I'd love to ask Jim to see if he has an answer to.
Brian (1:10:48)
Yeah, and I think Lightning Raven makes a really good point, which is there's lots of good arguments here against this being magical killing that would work if the White Council was a normal governing body with well-defined and sensible rules. And I think this is an important question to ask because it might be the case that even if this is not corrupting and it's not really breaking the first law.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:11:02)
Yeah.
Brian (1:11:14)
This still might be something that on a technicality the White Council could come after you for, which actually creates, and this thought exercise is a good example of it. It creates the kind of you know space we need to ask questions like, well, okay, if the servitors are n are, you know, human enough for Harry killing them to get him kicked out of the council, why isn't that corrupting him? Well, maybe because.
The laws are not really interpreted within their spirit. They're interpreted by the wardens, who are people with, you know, what we call in ⁓ in the in law, legal realists. They want the case to turn out the way they want it to turn out. And that ultimately governs a lot of things, including stuff like the laws against necromancy, the laws against messing with other people's minds.
That really there is more play in the joints than the wardens allow there to be, but they constantly err on the side of caution, which gives us an overly restrictive understanding of the laws.
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:12:18)
Yeah, so I think that's about as far as we can go here without getting a direct answer from Jim But our question for next week, what would your excuse be for not showing up to the White Council's meeting? Cause we get a couple of really good bangers in the next set of chapters.
Brian (1:12:17)
Mm-hmm.
Yes, we're going to talk about that research trip to the Yucatan in particular, but I want to know if you guys can come up with something even
Adam "Bridger" Ruzzo (1:12:42)
Yeah. I don't want to go to the council meeting. I need a good excuse. Pyramid sitting. Yeah, sorry, I can't do it. I'm pyramid sitting or living under the polar ice cap. What is your excuse? Send us an email Mac at rnt.fm or reply to our thread on Reddit.
We'll see you next week.