Summer Knight recap

Months after Bianca's ball, Harry is a guilt-wrecked recluse hunting a cure for Susan's half-vampire curse while the White Council debates surrendering him to the Red Court to end the war he started. Mab, Queen of the Winter Court, buys his debt from his faerie godmother and offers freedom for three tasks, the first: prove she did not murder the Summer Knight, whose stolen power has unbalanced Faerie and pushed the Courts toward a war that could wreck the mortal world. Harry finally tells Murphy the whole truth and gains her open-eyed partnership, and finds his first love Elaine alive and working for Summer. The killer is Aurora, the Summer Lady, who means to sacrifice the changeling Lily on the Stone Table to destroy the Courts' balance forever. In the midsummer battle Harry's side prevails: Aurora is killed by Toot-toot's iron-armed faerie swarm, Meryl dies, Fix becomes Summer Knight, Lily becomes Summer Lady, Mab is cleared, and the Council keeps Harry - still at war, still owing Mab two tasks.

Previously: Harry Dresden, Chicago's professional wizard, destroyed the Red Court vampire Bianca after her elaborate revenge - a masquerade-ball trap in which Harry's girlfriend Susan Rodriguez was bitten and left half-turned, fighting a constant thirst. Susan left the city rather than risk the people around her, and Harry's massacre of Bianca's court ignited an open war between the wizards' White Council and the Red Court. Harry fought beside Michael Carpenter, a Knight of the Cross, and escaped his faerie godmother the Leanansidhe, who holds an old claim on him. His allies include Detective Karrin Murphy of Special Investigations - who still does not know his whole story - the Alphas werewolf pack, and Bob, the spirit in the skull. The White Council blames Harry for the war.

Harry has spent months as a shut-in, obsessively hunting a cure for Susan's condition while his life falls apart; Billy and the Alphas drag him out of his spiral. Two summonses land at once. The Winter Queen Mab reveals she has bought Harry's debt from his godmother and offers to release him in exchange for three tasks, beginning with one: the Summer Knight, the mortal champion of the rival Summer Court, has been murdered - thrown from a rooftop - and his power stolen, and Summer blames Mab. Harry must clear her name or Faerie's two Courts will go to war, with the mortal world as their battlefield. Meanwhile the White Council convenes over the vampire war, and a faction proposes buying peace by handing Harry to the Red Court; taking Mab's case, vouched for by his old mentor Ebenezar McCoy, becomes the price of the Council's protection.

Harry investigates the death of Ronald Reuel, the Summer Knight, with Murphy's help - and finally tells her everything: the Council, the war, the whole hidden world he had kept from her. She takes it standing up and commits to the fight beside him. The trail leads through the dead Knight's circle of changelings - Meryl, Fix, Ace, and the missing Lily - who are being hunted as the Courts mobilize. Harry is stunned to find the Summer Court's emissary is Elaine, his first love, whom he had believed dead since the fire that ended their apprenticeship; she is alive, bound to Summer, and carrying secrets. Agents of both Courts shadow and test Harry as he works, and an assassin's attacks make clear someone wants the truth buried.

Harry questions the queens of both Courts: Maeve, the cruel and capricious Winter Lady, and Aurora, the gentle Summer Lady, as well as the elder queens' agents. Each audience deepens the puzzle - the Summer Knight's stolen mantle of power has not passed where it should, and the balance between the Courts is tipping toward a war that neither Mab nor Titania can stop once it begins. The changeling Lily remains missing, Ace's loyalties prove treacherous, and an attack leaves Elaine's role looking more compromised than Harry wants to believe. As midsummer approaches, the Courts summon their hosts to battle in the Nevernever, and Harry runs out of time to name the true killer.

The killer is Aurora, the Summer Lady. Behind her warmth is a fanatic's resolve to end Faerie's eternal cycle of war by destroying its balance: she arranged the Summer Knight's murder, hid his stolen mantle in the changeling Lily, and means to sacrifice Lily on the Stone Table at the height of the Courts' battle, unmaking the order of Summer and Winter forever. Harry, with Murphy, the Alphas, and the changelings Meryl and Fix, fights through the battle of the Courts to the Table. Aurora is stopped and killed - brought down by Toot-toot and a swarm of small faeries armed with cold iron - though Meryl gives her life in the fight. Lily becomes the new Summer Lady and Fix the new Summer Knight, restoring the balance. Mab is cleared, the first of Harry's three tasks is done, and the White Council keeps him - the vampire war unresolved, Mab's claim on him very much alive.

The killer proves to be Aurora, the Summer Lady herself: she murdered the Summer Knight, Ronald Reuel, and arranged for the stolen power to pass into the changeling Lily, meaning to sacrifice her at the Courts' battle and unmake the balance between Summer and Winter - a fanatic's plan to end the Courts' eternal war by destroying the cycle itself. In the battle on the Stone Table at midsummer, Harry, aided by Murphy, the Alphas, and the changelings Meryl and Fix, breaks Aurora's plan; Aurora dies at the hands of Toot-toot and his swarm of tiny faeries wielding cold iron, and Meryl gives her life in the fight. The Summer Knight's mantle passes to Fix, and Lily becomes the new Summer Lady. Mab's name is cleared, discharging the first of Harry's three tasks - two remain, and Mab makes clear she is not finished with him. The White Council, having seen the case through, declines to trade Harry to the Red Court; he remains a wizard in bad odor but under the Council's protection, with Ebenezar McCoy's support publicly declared. Murphy now knows everything, Elaine survives and departs still bound to her own path, and the vampire war goes on.