I found the parts of Battle Ground that I enjoyed the most were the early chapters where Harry and the various supernatural leaders were together on the top of Marcone’s castle. In these chapters, I think we see the long-term planning by Mab, coming to fruition with the help of a judicious amount of real time manipulation of Harry. Both Odin and the Erlking contribute to Mab’s efforts.
Up on that roof, Harry and Ebenezer have at least three separate conversations. In one of them, Eb warns Harry that Mab is a long-term planner and she will soon start “putting the nails in.” I think to some degree Mab is already there. I’m sure Mab has some other scheme in mind to better control Harry; perhaps making him into an immortal is part of that. However, I think Mab has already done a great deal of work to get Harry where she wanted him.
This next paragraph is highly speculative. I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out that River Shoulders was also recruited as a part of this scheme. I don’t mean the sasquatch became a coconspirator in the manipulation of Harry. Instead, I think someone might have told River Shoulders that Mab’s Knight was impetuous, and suggested that it might be a good thing if one of his friends watched out for him should Harry do anything foolish. You know, like jump off the top of a castle and run into a battle without knowing what he might be facing.
So, when and what was the long-term planning that Mab put in on Harry? On Marcone’s roof, Mab told Harry, “From the first time I laid eyes on you, I saw a being who had the potential for true greatness.” So, when was that, exactly? We can’t be 100% certain, but it may have been during the events in Grave Peril. In Summer Knight, Mab tells Harry, "Such anger. Such fire. Yes. I watched you stalemate your godmother the Leanansidhe autumn last. (When Harry poisoned himself to get out of Lea’s clutches, or more accurately Lea’s kennel.) Few mortals ever have done as much. Bold. Impertinent. I admire that kind of strength, wizard. I need that kind of strength." I think when Harry outmaneuvered Lea, that is when Mab realized that here was a mortal who could be molded into her weapon. She had to test Harry to be sure, and to set him on the right path, and that occurred in Summer Knight.
In Battle Ground, it wasn’t enough for Mab to get Harry in the right position, she needed him in the right frame of mind as well. In other words, Mab saw Harry in Battle Ground like the guitar amplifier in Spinal Tap, she wanted him turned up to 11. For Mab, the correct frame of mind for Harry would be for him to fully open himself to the influence of the Winter Knight’s mantle. When Ebenezer told Harry that he needed to hold back, Mab told both Eb and Harry that that wasn’t going to happen. Mab was almost openly telling Eb and Harry that she had set things up so she (or outside events Mab could forsee) would push Harry in the direction she wanted him to go.
I think Mab deliberately provoked Harry into taking his first positive action when she told the Red Cap to send out the malks. Seriously, how were a bunch of psychotic oversized cats going to stop the flying squid assassins? The malks couldn’t have been anything more than a retaliation against King Korb, and that wasn’t what Mab needed at that time, and I’m pretty sure she knew it. The alternative is that Mab was so annoyed by Korb sending out those flying squid things that she lost her ability to reason clearly. I’m not buying that. Mab is all about reason. That’s why the Eye of Balor couldn’t hurt her. This doesn’t mean Mab wasn’t angered when Harry suggested she was acting irrationally. Mab does get annoyed by Harry’s less than respectful language and behavior, but I think that was price the Queen of Air and Darkness was willing to pay in order to goad her Knight into using a more appropriate asset to fight the flying squid things. In this way, Mab started ramping Harry up to get into the fight.
Another indication of the preplanning that went into the events of Battle Ground is Odin’s magic powered tactical map of Chicago. When Harry makes a comment about the effort needed to make such a magical object, Odin replies that he has had more time than most and been to more places than most. That sounds reasonable as Odin has been around at least as long as Mab, but there’s one of distinguishing feature about that map, it has streets on it, which means it’s fairly modern by Odin’s standards. I don’t know if Millennium Park is shown on Odin’s map, but it seems likely that it was, seeing as Mab’s stash of shotguns and ammo were stored within the Bean sculpture which is in Millennium park. Construction of Millennium Park began in the late 1990’s and was first opened to the public in 2004. The construction on the Bean, or Cloud Gate; began in 2004 and it was completed in 2006. Jim has stated in a recent interview that Mab placed that cache of weapons, and has many others, but this cache couldn’t have placed earlier than 2004.
If you look at the Dresden Files official timeline, you will see that Storm Front happened around the year 2000, or within one or two years in either direction, so sometime between 1998-2002. Harry meets Mab in Summer Knight which occurs two years after the events in Storm Front; so that’s between 2000 and 2004. Millennium Park is finished in 2004, that’s zero to four years after SF, and the Bean another two years after that. So, I think that shortly after Mab identified Harry as her future weapon, it was about that time; or within a couple of years, when Odin’s map was created and Mab set up her Chicago weapons cache.
Finally, we have the way Odin, Marcone and the Erlking behave when the Fomor scouts are spotted. All of them behave with cold blooded precision. They ignore the obvious death and destruction that’s happening within earshot. (I’m not saying that Marcone is one of the people manipulating Harry. Just that his cold-blooded nature could be counted on to be part of what would set Harry off.) Finally, Harry does exactly what Mab has wanted him to do, he lets Winter have free reign over his emotions and actions and jumps into the battle.
