This story occurs between Small Favor and Turn Coat The first thing I thought, looking at the roomful of baby Wardens, was They all look so darned young. The close second was, My God, am I getting old?

“Okay, children,” I said, closing the door behind me. I had rented an alleged conference center in a little Chicago hotel not too far from the airport, which amounted to a couple of rooms big enough for twenty or thirty people-if they were friendly-plus several dozen chairs, and a few rickety old folding tables.

They didn’t even provide a cooler of water-just directions to their vending machines.

After me and my fellow Warden-Commander in the United States, Warden Ramirez, had gotten done learning the little Warden-kind up on their mayhem, for the sake of getting them killed in a war as quickly as possible, we thought it might be nice to give them a little instruction in other things, too. Ramirez was going to cover the course on relations with mortal authorities, which made sense-Ramirez got on just fine with the cops in LA, and hadn’t been shot by nearly as many law enforcement personnel as I had.

The kids had all come to Chicago to learn about independent investigation of supernatural threats from me-which also made sense, because I’d done more of that, relative to my tender years, than any other wizard on the planet.

“Okay, okay,” I said to the room. The young Wardens became silent and attentive at once. No shock, there-the disruptive ones who didn’t pay attention during lessons had mostly been killed and maimed in the war with the Red Court. Darwin always thought that it paid to be a quick learner. The war had simply made the penalty for not learning quite a bit steeper.

“You’re here,” I said, “to learn about investigating supernatural threats on your own. You’ll learn about finding and hunting Warlocks from Captain Luccio, whenever the Reds give us enough time for it. Warlocks, our own kind gone bad, aren’t the most common opponent you’ll find yourself facing. Far more often, you’re going to run up against other threats.”