The Dresden Files/Codex Alera is copyright Jim Butcher. This story is licensed under the Creative Commons as derivative, noncommercial fiction.

Susan opened the door on the first knock. She looked tired, frustrated, worn out in the darkness of the room. It stank, and the lumps of whatever it was in the bathroom festered and moldered in the warmth of the heater she'd set too high.

Mab stood beside me, resplendent in a remarkable maroon jacket over navy top and skirt. She was going to buck the 'rules;' my apprentice. She had styled her hair in a layered pageboy with burgundy highlights. Maal had looked quite upset when she poofed an hour earlier but had important things to attend to.

Susan hadn't even attempted to reassemble the flesh mask, opening the door with a towel over her head.

"God, Harry, it's good to see you." It hugged me, the creature, with its batlike wings. I could feel the fetid odor of its breath as it spoke in ragged tones. "I don't think I can take this anymore."

I cringed a little but hugged it back, briefly, then released it, shivering a bit at the horror of the way it felt against me. "You know, Mab?"

"Greetings, Unseelie Queen," Susan said, dipping that nightmare head a little.

"Greetings, child." We stepped into the room.

Susan shuffled back away from us, giving us space to enter.

"How are you doing with the atonement?" I said.

The creature gave a wan smile with fanged jaws. "Not well."

"Tell me," I said, and snapped on a light. Susan cringed away from it, cowering, moaning in pain.

"Sorry," I said, and turned it back off.

"I can't seem to wear the skin mask for more than a few hours. I'm so desperately hungry for something other than beef, I could scream."

She went to the sofa and crouched down on it. Apparently, the body was not conformed to sitting. It drew the legs up and wrapped the wings around, with only the head peering above. The glowing red eyes darted left and right.

I swallowed sighing. I'd been so busy; I'd neglected what was happening with her.

"Tell me how far you've gotten?"

It shrugged. "I've only visited five from the list."

"Jesus, Susan. You have ten more to go. And only three more days to do it."

"Don't you think I know that?" she said. "But without feeding on something…human, I don't think I can take another step outside the hotel. I can barely make it to the edge of the woods before my flesh mask falls. I've been waiting until after midnight to go out."

"The email thing didn't work?" I nodded at the Macbook pro I'd purchased for her.

She looked down at her hooked talons. "A little hard to type, and when I try to dictate, it doesn't recognize my voice."

"I can type for you," Mab said.

"That would be wonderful, uh, my Queen, but I couldn't possibly trouble you with such a trivial—"

"Nonsense, what's your password?" Mab opened the laptop and touched the trackpad.

Susan told her.

Mab logged on and pulled up a browser with her email account.

"Okay, let's go through your list," I said, pulling out the sheaf of papers Thomas had left.

We spent the next few hours researching the rest of her list, finding their places of work, and sending emails to their last known address. After the afternoon and evening of sending emails, we heard the chime three times, indicating we'd at least narrowed the list down to seven.

"And we did discover one thing at the salon," I said. "James Martin's mother comes in for treatments. She has an appointment tomorrow afternoon."

"Oh my god," Susan said.

"I think that one will take more than an email."

"Yes, but if I show up there like this?"

I sighed. "I'm starving, too, if you know what I mean."

"I faced this when I was half-turned, but this is so much worse."

"I can at least dip in and out without creating new vampires. If you leave someone half-drained, they'll become the second of the Red Court. We can't allow it to be resurrected, not now after all this time."

"Don't you think I know that?" She unfolded and stood up. "I think it's time to face the fact you're going to need to just kill me. You've already done it once."

I sighed. "No, we can do this."

"I don't see how." It moved to the curtained window, and I could see the wet nose on the tip of its snout quivering. "I can smell them out there."

Mab stood up. "Are you able to move about in daylight?"

"Not very well. At first, I could, but now…well, even having the lamp on in here burns my eyes."

"So, we either overcome our sense of what is right and wrong and feed you or the time ticks down, and you stay as you are and you feed. The way I see it, at least if you feed now, you have a chance of regaining your humanity. The other way…" Mab wiggled her fingers in a delightfully Molly way of thinking.

"You'd be forced to kill me, or allow me to create a new Red Court."

"Exactly. When all options suck, take the least suckiest of options." Mab giggled.

The creature laughed a wheezing cough.

"You get some rest," I said. "Let us think about this."

"You'll be here when I wake up?"

"Yes, I just need to figure out how we can kill someone without it turning us all into monsters."

"Okay."

She walked into the bathroom, and I heard the sound of flapping, then her feet clasping onto the shower rod. I shivered at the thought of her in there, hanging upside down.

I sat down on the couch next to Mab, and our hands found each other.

"And how are you doing in there?"

She looked at me. Her face didn't have the cast of youth that Maal's had. She had wrinkles and loose skin around her eyes, neck, and mouth. I knew Mab could fashion herself, or geas herself to look like anyone, so I thought it interesting she chose to stay as Mab.

"I feel good, actually. Better." She smiled. "There's a whole bunch of feelings I haven't touched yet, but I feel more me than I have in months if that makes any sense."

"It does. And you do. It's eerie, though, you are definitely Mab on just about every level I can perceive. Aura, spirit, taste, smell, all of it. But when you speak, I know it's really you."

"It had to be that way. There's too much of the supernatural that exists on the spirit levels for me just to be in her body. People would know instantly, otherwise, as Mab has gone on walkabouts at times through other vessels. No, we had to make this very deep indeed."

"I'm surprised you haven't cast a geas to appear as Molly again."

"So…that's the thing. Mab has infinite cosmic power in some areas and not in others."

"Wow, really? You're saying that…"

"Yep, this is all me. I mean, I can magic my hair and clothes because those are physical objects. And obvs, my body is thousands of years old, but much like you, I have to go through a rather intensive regeneration every few decades to erase the effects of time."

"So, you could switch spirits around but not perform transmutation magic?"

"Oh, no, I can transmute, and spirit switch. I just can't cast illusions."

"So, you could potentially turn me back into Harry?"

She stared at me, hard. I could see she was opening her third eye, and probably a fourth and fifth that I didn't even know about."

"There's definitely things we could do, for sure. I don't think I could turn you completely back into Harry, however. I could fashion your body into something sidhe as I said before, or I could possibly cast your spirit again since we've changed your true name. But then we're left with where to cast you, and who to cast you into. Harold is now deffo not you anymore, Lara."

I remembered the previous night when he'd basically become an Orc hulk. "Yeah, I get that."

"Want me to try?"

I sighed. "No, we need to figure out this shit with Susan first. I've had enough of all the transformations and body-switching for a lifetime. We can look at it afterward."

"Okay, babe."

"So, how to kill someone and not feel guilty afterward." Mab sat back down at the laptop and started typing.

I put a pen between my teeth and paced back and forth. "Vampires aren't inherently evil creatures; they're predators. It would be like calling a great white shark evil, or a pack of wolves. They need to feed to survive."

"As a human race and the top of the food chain, we'd come to the conclusion that killing another human, with intent, was wrong. But what if that was just an expression of the Circle of Life? With Vampires, humans are not the apex predator anymore. And hell, humans could get eaten by anything; great whites, packs of wolves, it happens all the time," Mab said. "In fact, I don't think they're in the top ten when you consider the supernatural races."

"So why would Vampires be any different?"

I didn't know if I should be bothered by this internal ethical conflict or not. It was something I needed to think about, after all, wasn't I 'dipping' and taking the life force from people, even Karrie? Wasn't that just as bad to take soul force, instead of life force in the form of blood?

I sighed. "We're trying to rationalize the killing of a human being."

"It's the first step into becoming a monster," Mab replied. "And I get it. But I think I might know an answer."

"Oh?" I walked over to her and sat down at the little table.

"This." She spun the laptop, so I could see the screen.

And I realized…she might just be right.