bluffs cassius

When Father Vincent answered my knock, I kicked the door into his face as hard as I could. He fell back with a grunt of surprise. I came into the room with Father Forthill's Louisville Slugger in my hands, and jabbed the broad end of the bat into Vincent's throat.
The old priest made a sick croaking sound and clutched at his neck on the way to the floor.
I didn't let it stop there. I kicked him in the ribs twice, and when he rolled over, trying to get away from me, I stomped down on the back of his neck, drew my gun, and shoved it against his skull.
"Dio," Vincent whimpered, panting. "Dio, wait! Please, don't hurt me!"
"I don't have time to play pretend," I said. "Drop the act."
"Please, Mister Dresden, I don't know what you mean." He coughed, panting, and I saw droplets of scarlet dripping onto the carpet. I'd bloodied his nose, or maybe his lip. He turned his head a tiny bit, eyes wide with panic. "Please, don't do anything to me. I don't know what you want, but I'm sure that we can talk about it."
I drew back the hammer on the revolver and said, "I'm sure that we can't."
His face went white. "No, wait!"
"I'm getting tired of playing pretend. Three."
"But I don't know-" He choked, and I heard him trying not to retch. "You have to tell me-"
"Two," I said. "I'm not going to elaborate about the other number."
"You can't! You can't!"
"One," I said, and pulled the trigger.
In the instant between the word and the deed, Vincent changed. A sheath of green scales appeared over his skin, and his legs twined together into a serpent's long and sinuous body. The eyes went last, changing to vertically slit yellow orbs while a second set of glowing green eyes opened above the first.
The trigger came down on an empty chamber. Click.
The snake twisted to bite me, but I was already getting out of the way. Michael came through the door, his unshaven face set in grim determination, Amoracchius blazing with its own white light. The snakeman whirled to face Michael with a hiss. Michael tried for a clean horizontal cut, but the snakeman ducked under it and went for the door in a streak of gleaming green scales.
When the snakeman went out the door, Sanya brought a four-foot length of two-by-six down on its head. The blow drove the snakeman's chin flat to the ground. It twitched a couple of times and then lay still.
"You were right," Michael noted. He slipped the sword away into its sheath.
"Better get him back inside before some maid sees him," I said.


Death Masks Chapter 28, Page 244-245