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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Butcher, Jim, 1971– editor. | Hughes, Kerrie, editor.

Title: Shadowed souls/edited by Jim Butcher, Kerrie L. Hughes.

Description: New York, New York: Roc, 2016.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016025491 (print) | LCCN 2016033135 (ebook) | ISBN 9780451474995 (paperback) | ISBN 9780698192607 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Fantasy fiction, American. | Science fiction, American. |

Classification: LCC PS648. F3 S49 2016 (print) | LCC PS648. F3 (ebook) | DDC 813/. 0876608—dc23

LC record available at https: //lccn. loc. gov/2016025491

First Edition: November 2016

Cover illustration by Chris McGrath

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Version_1

CONTENTS

Praise

Title Page

Introduction | by Kerrie L. Hughes

Foreword | by Jim Butcher

COLD CASE | by Jim Butcher

SLEEPOVER | by Seanan McGuire

IF WISHES WERE | by Tanya Huff

SOLUS | by Anton Strout

PEACOCK IN HELL | by Kat Richardson

EYE OF NEWT | by Kevin J. Anderson

WHAT DWELLS WITHIN | by Lucy A. Snyder

HUNTER, HEALER | by Jim C. Hines

BAGGAGE | by Erik Scott de Bie

SALES. FORCE. | by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

IMPOSSIBLE MONSTERS | by Rob Thurman

About the Authors

About the Editors

INTRODUCTION

I love Harry Dresden. Seriously. He’s the perfect guy: deep, dark, somewhat handsome but with a geeky streak. He knows all kinds of magick and he stands up for his friends and family. He also has really awesome pets. Mind you, there’s always the possibility of becoming collateral damage.

My love for Harry isn’t just a crush; I respect his journey in life. He started off as an orphan, learned to fight off bullies, and then became a force to be reckoned with. I also respect that he hasn’t become a monster along the way.

Harry might argue, though, that he is a monster. Mainly because of that collateral-damage thing, but what he has slowly come to realize is that many of the people who pretend to be good are not, and the ones who do bad things are often the ones protecting everyone, and that’s where the heart of Shadowed Souls lies.

I invited the authors to write a story based on the idea that good and evil are just two aspects of a complicated and very human story. I wanted the plots to play with the concept and invite the reader to explore the edges of their own darkness. I wasn’t disappointed.

The stories get dark—some of them get really dark—and a few of the protagonists are truly monsters. I’d still invite them to tea, though, maybe not in my home, but definitely someplace safe—perhaps at Mac’s for a beer; I hear he brews some really good stuff.

Welcome to Shadowed Souls, and remember something Jim told me: Good isn’t always light, and evil isn’t always dark.

—Kerrie L. Hughes

FOREWORD

A pack of coyotes circled my house last night.

My little dog is old and sick. His time could be close, and I imagine that they could smell that on the scents he left around the yard. They circled the house, yipping and barking, territorial-challenge barks that were supposed to make him want to come out and defend his territory. Coyote sounds, but maybe an octave deeper than I was used to from coyotes.

It worked. Poor little guy was frantic, pacing back and forth around the house, desperate to do his duty as he had his whole life and go to bark at them and defend the home territory.

Well. I heard three different animals, which probably meant there were more like five of them—some making noise, while others slipped around all sneaky-like. Coyotes are smart like that. But even if there were only three of them—three of the new, larger coyote-dog-wolf hybrids that seem to be emerging, maybe—it seemed an awful lot to ask of a twenty-pound bichon frise. My dog thinks he’s darned near a wolf, but I’ve never had the heart to tell him that he’s a bichon.

So I went out to confront them instead. I yelled at them, let them know that this was my territory and their presence was not desired.

They yelled back at me. Louder. Got more excited, enough that I could hear them breathing as they ran in the dark and the woods outside. I’d approached the source of the first sounds boldly and with confidence, the way you’re supposed to confront potential predators, to let them know that you’re not weak and not afraid of them.

But as I stood there facing the woods, I heard sounds of movement in the woods to my right. And more sounds over in the woods to my left. And I realized that the coyotes were moving into position all around me. I’d seen one of them a few days before—it had approached to within twenty feet of me, golden eyes and a black nose at the edge of the forest. It was big. German shepherd–sized, maybe seventy or eighty pounds. I’d seen a young adult just wandering around my yard a few days before that, definitely a wild creature, but maybe fifty pounds of canine.

And I realized that if I continued acting the way I was, I was in potential danger.

So I fell back to the house while the coyotes continued yelling and barking and trying to taunt my sick old little warrior out to be a meal.

So instead of yelling and screaming, I turned out all the lights in the house. And I slipped outside, very quietly, with a loaded rifle.

And in seconds, all the noise from the coyotes stopped.

Yeah.

That’s what I thought.

Within a minute of my coming back inside, the dog had relaxed. He went to sleep and almost immediately had dreams where he was barking and growling very bravely, from the sound of it.

At the time, I was coldly furious with the creatures who were trying to hurt my little buddy. But, looking back on it, I can’t really think that I was justified in feeling that way.

Coyotes aren’t evil. They’re predators, and they’re awfully intelligent and very, very good at their jobs. They’ve thrived even in the face of expanding human civilization. But they aren’t monsters. It’s their place in the natural world to prey upon the old and weak. It keeps prey species strong, helps prevent the spread of disease, and grants a swift end to creatures that might otherwise linger in pain for days or weeks or months.

As frightened as I was on behalf of my little fuzzy buddy and, for a few seconds, for myself, those creatures weren’t monsters. They have a place in the world and a job to do, and they were doing that job faithfully.

In turn, I was doing my job as a protector of my dog, and the moment I let them know that I was serious about my position, they honored it and left. They made their intentions clear, and I made mine clear in terms they could respect.

And yet, for a while, I had to be concerned about maybe getting eaten. If you haven’t ever had that concern confront you in such a primal and visceral fashion, I highly recommend it. It gives you a whole new perspective on the world.

We all like to think that we’d be the people to fight off the coyotes when they come for ones too weak to defend themselves, but in thinking that, we often miss an important point: Coyotes aren’t monsters.

But they are made of shadow.

They live in a part of the world that we don’t like to think about or look at—even though the world needs them there, doing that job.

A lot of the people in these stories you’re about to read are made of shadow, too. They aren’t good. But they aren’t necessarily evil, either. They need to be where they are, doing what they do. So come along and take some time to consider the darkness, and those who spend their lives moving in and out of it.

—Jim Butcher

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