The first example has been used as a plot device in murder mysteries.  So based on that, my thought is the bullet is the cause of death. Not magic.  If he bleeds to death, the cause of death is the attack, not the victims failure to take care of it. Had you not attacked there wouldn't have been any bleeding in the first place.  Both would probably taint you even if the wardens didn't behead you.

If you are being pursued by someone intending to harm you, you are not attacking them, you are defending yourself.  Your argument would have more merit if the pursuer is simply performing surveillance and has no (immediate) hostile intent. 

That's evil! LOL Has anyone ever made a chart of Butcher's average pages per chapter length and seen whether it has gone up or down?

If I did that someone would suggest that it wasn't good enough.  To be truly accurate we would need to compare the average number of words per chapter Jim has used over the past five or six books.  Plus, it wouldn't hurt to know the highest number of words in a chapter Jim has used per book and see if that number has changed significantly over time.  We could also do a character count per chapter, and divide that by the number of words per chapter to see if Jim's vocabulary for Harry and the other characters, plus the description of people, things, the environment, events and emotions have become more complex, meaning Jim is using bigger words, not just more of them.  Of course, some people might think that last suggestion is a bit too much, but aren't you a little bit curious to find out?     

Both Mab and Rashid can't be on the Grey Council because one of them has to be available at the Outer Gates when needed.  Seeing as Rashid is often unavailable for ordinary Council works he must spend a large amount of time there. 

Furthermore, Mab can't be a member of the Grey Council.  It's not that her magical strength would probably have allowed her to obliterate any of the Lords of Outer Night, making them rather pointless; though that might be a good argument from a writing perspective.  The real reason is Mab had to be available to defend her own realm.  In Changes Mab might have had a shiny new Knight in Harry, but while he was rescuing his daughter Winter effectively didn't have a Knight.  Mab also loaned out her most powerful vassal; Lea, to Harry, and Maeve being nemfected was at best worthless and at worst a threat to Winter in her own right.  Mab needed to keep an eye on her daughter and probably keep her from finding out what was going on.  This probably means that Rashid can't be member of the Grey Council either because if Mab is guarding Winter, that leaves Rashid on Gate duty.  It doesn't rule him out completely, but I think it makes the Gate Keeper something of a long shot. 

I used to believe that because it was stated the LTW became sick he couldn't be on the Grey Council.  However, I believe we may discover some of the information we learned from Chandler's letters to Harry is false.  (I'm not saying that Chandler is a liar, just some of the information he passed on to Harry was incomplete because Chandler wasn't fully clued-in to what was actually occurring.)  LTW may have seen others getting sick and decided it was a good time for him to disappear for a while.  There's no way to know this is the case, but it's a possibility I can't completely dismiss.

I won't be surprised if a few of the older Wardens; the ones that don't fully trust Harry, are on the Grey Council.  Harry called them hard cases.  They probably had a lot in common with Donald Morgan; but didn't have the personal connection to Arthur Langtry that Warden Morgan did.  They sure as hell wouldn't have trusted Cristos' peace plan with the vampires.  They would have joined the Grey Council because they trusted Eb, and were tired of seeing their numbers diminish with every battle against the Red Court.  Even though they didn't fully trust Harry, once Peabody was unmasked as a traitor, a few of the older Wardens may have been impressed with the lengths Harry went to, to exonerate Morgan, even though he didn't succeed.  The only older Warden we know by name; other than Captain Luccio, is Warden Thorsen, and he kept Harry from bleeding to death after his fight with Peabody. (That's right in the first sentence of Chapter 49 of Turn Coat.)  So I think Thorsen; and maybe one or two other older Wardens, will be on the Grey Council.

What I can't figure out are the "key allies" that Ebenezer mentioned, other than Vadderung of course. The Erl King likes to do his own thing, hunting.  There weren't any giant shadow hounds at Chicken Pizza, so that rules him out.  Eldest Gruff?  I suppose he has the ability, I'm just not seeing him being enough of a free agent to be a member, but maybe after the events of Small Favor he became concerned about the big picture and decided to become involved.  How Eldest Gruff would know Ebenezer is another question, Eb has been around long enough for them to have met sometime in the past.

In my opinion, Murphy's character and it's changes from 12 up to book 15 are quite explainable.

After Harry's presumed death in book 12, Murphy got hit hard. More importantly, in her opinion Harry is not dead because his body is not found. At that point Murphy is like a family of a soldier missing in action. Harry is missing, presumed dead but there is no body. There is no closure. She is hoping Harry is still alive, afraid he is truely dead and in denial. Unlik.All that plus all other external factors must have strain her badly. This would explain her hard line methods when Harry first appear in book 13. Murphy's condition is different from Molly. Molly knows what exactly happened to Harry. She knows Harry is dead because she help arrange it. Molly suffers from guilt. Murphy however, suffers from regret and uncertainty.

By the end of book 13, Murphy must have healled somewhat. By facing Harry's ghost and gaining the confirmation that Harry is truely dead, Murphy has gotten her closure. She is devastated, but she can now continue with her life. The end of GS, where Mortimer shielded Murphy while she is crying is the sign of her emotional recovery.

Just after Murphy accepted Harry's death and start to go on with her life, Harry returns from the dead. Molly has warning from Lea, Murphy get the full surprise package. From this alone, her innitial rather cold reception to Harry's return is understandable. It is hard enough for her to shift from believing Harry is still alive when Harry first died in book 12 into accepting that Harry is truely dead after she meet Harry's ghost in book 13. Now in book 14, she has to shift back from accepting Harry is dead to Harry is still alive again. It is a major emotional upheaval for her.

A shock though it was, it is after all a good news in the end. Once the shock is over, the fact that Harry is indeed not dead must be a major boon for Murphy emotionally which would explain why she gotten a lot better once book 15comes around.

In terms of character, all seems to be in order.

Your explanation is pretty good, except the part I highlighted.  The problem with your explanation isn't in book 13 (Ghost Story) and your explanation would be logical one except for what came later.  The problem is Jim's writing about Harry and Murphy's first meeting in book 14 (Cold Days).  First we have Butters having this conversation with Harry:

 "It's more of a roller coaster, lately, but a good mind is flexible," Butters said. "I'll deal with it; don't worry." He worked for a moment more before adding, in a low murmur, "Unlike some other people."

"Eh?" I asked him.

Butters just looked up across the large apartment and then went back to work.

I followed the direction of his gaze.

Karrin sat curled up in a chair beside the fireplace, on the far side of the big apartment, her arms wrapped around her knees, her head leaning against the chair's back. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was open a little. She was evidently asleep. The gentle snoring supported that theory.

"Oh," I said. "Uh. Yeah. She didn't seem to handle it real well when I was ghosting around. . . ."

"Understatement," Butters breathed. "She's been through a lot. And none of it made her a bit less prickly."

Thomas made a low sound of agreement.

"She's run most of her friends off," Butters said. "Never talks to cops anymore. Hasn't been speaking to her family. Just the Viking crew down at the BFS. I'm hanging in there. So is Molly. I guess maybe we both know that she's in a bad place."


So it's pretty clear that Murphy hasn't really healed at this point in time.  Then a page or two later Murphy guilt trips Harry into giving back Bob and acknowledging that Karrin would keep the swords.  While that conversation really annoyed some readers what I got out of it was this part:

"I'm not angry at you, Harry," she said. "I don't hate you. I don't think you've gone bad. A lot of people have fallen into the trap you did. People better than either of us."

"Uh," I said. "The evil-Queen-of-Faerie trap?"

"Christ, Harry," Murphy said quietly. "No one just starts giggling and wearing black and signs up to become a villainous monster. How the hell do you think it happens?" She shook her head, her eyes pained. "It happens to people. Just people. They make questionable choices, for what might be very good reasons. They make choice after choice, and none of them is slaughtering roomfuls of saints, or murdering hundreds of baby seals, or rubber-room irrational. But it adds up. And then one day they look around and realize that they're so far over the line that they can't remember where it was."

I really wondered when I read that if Murphy wasn't referring to herself in the part I highlighted.  She was in a pretty dark place emotionally in Ghost Story.  We know she terminated two sorcerers with extreme prejudice before ghost Harry showed up in that book.  I think there is more to Murphy's story that we haven't heard yet, and before we do it's difficult to know where her path may lead.

I find this conversation about the Paranet and whether Murphy could be considered one of its leaders and the differences between Elaine and Murphy to be a very interesting one with good points made on both sides.  However, I have problems trying to figure out either Murphy or Elaine's path going forward. 

Murphy's future is difficult to predict because her injuries left her in limbo at the end of Skin Game.  Long-term, she has enough inside supernatural knowledge and information sources to act as some kind of coordinator or possibly even a spymaster.  She may be associated with the paranet, but I see any future role Murphy might play going forward as being wider and perhaps more freelance. 

More importantly, I don't feel I have a solid grasp on Murphy's character like I did before Changes.  In Ghost Story Murphy was pretty hard core.  Without hesitation she was ready to kill people she saw as a threat.  Granted, Murphy thought Harry had been murdered and she was a leader of a faction fighting a nasty street war against the Fomor, but she had gone from upholder of the law to hardcore vigilante in a matter of months.  All of that seemed to change in Cold Days.  What, Harry being alive suddenly takes Murphy from being Tank Girl psycho back to being regular Murphy again?  I don't want to get into her actions in Skin Game.  Too much ink has already been spilled over whether Murphy made a mistake anyone could have been suckered into vs her own arrogance and self-importance led her to fall for Nicodemus' trap.  The point is, I think Jim has some "splainin to do" in regards to where Murphy is psychologically.  I think her personal issues have to be worked through before I could see her as as a leader, ambassador (No she's not ambassador material.  Throw that idea out the window now.) or consultant for the paranet or anyone else.  I got the impression that Murphy went through an arc that brought her back to sanity prior to Harry's return in Cold Days.  If that's the case I really think Jim needs to tell us about that so we can better understand this character.

The problem I have with Elaine is much simpler.  She not just hiding her abilities and history from the Ramirez and White Council.  She's hiding things from Harry.  This was clearly hinted at in White Night.  I'm not saying Elaine has gone full "Red lightsaber" because I don't have enough information to make that call yet, but it's a possibility that she was responsible for Nemfecting Aurora and has been lying to Harry about Justin and how she was enthralled by him since Summer Knight.

Those suspicions aside, Elaine is clearly in a better position than Murphy to be considered a leader or one of the key leaders of the paranet.  However, she is not in any position to openly meet with or negotiate with higher ups in the White Council.  I seriously doubt she would want to even meet with Luccio.

The paranet itself is not a centralized organization.  There's no HQ.  There's no hierarchy or clearly defined chain of command.  It's more like an underground resistance movement or even a loosely affiliated terrorist organization.  There are cells within different cities.  Different people may be seen as a leader to a particular cell or within a particular city.  At one time Murphy may have even been thought of as one of those leaders.  It's not like someone in Houston, Texas is going to know that Murphy is a vanilla mortal.  Another more likely possibility that when Murphy sends information to a member of the paranet in Houston, the recipient doesn't know the exact identity of the sender, they would just know if the information came from a trusted source.  So how could anyone hold Murphy's vanilla mortal status against her if they don't know exactly who was helping them?  Should the paranet ever become more formalized and structured, then Murphy being seen as a full member might become problematic, but she could still be some type of consultant.  However, I don't see how the paranet ever reaches that level of organization except in a time of peace and safety, in which case would Murphy even want to be involved with it?  There's no reliable way to answer that question.

P.S.  Now that I think about it, there really is no such thing as "a full member of the paranet."  There's no sign up sheet with rules and stated group objectives.  There's no tests to take to prove one is worthy to join.  Finally, there's no organization to judge a person's merit to join it.  Take the guy who sends Butters information that he claims help track supernatural activity through statistics he gathered on the internet.  Just because he's aware of supernatural activity doesn't mean he has anymore magical ability than Murphy does.  Some people may participate in the paranet as a matter of survival while others just want to help because they see it as the right thing to do.   

   

Seeing how powerful Cowl truly is in Deadbeat, it seems odd that he would be relegated to attendant duty at the party. Also, given that Mavra’s actions kick-off the plot of Deadbeat, it’s interesting that she & Cowl are at the party without interacting much or acting against each other/ in concert

The whole point of the party was to be able to conduct biz without alerting the White Council or other supernatural powers.  A party was a perfect excuse to meet on the down-low.  If Cowl starts throwing down power or even provide a noticeable presence, it destroys that subterfuge and probably alerts many powers that something weird/dangerous is happening and they better pay attention. 

   
It's possible that Cowl and Mavra were working together or communicated with one another during the events of Grave Peril.  It's also possible that Mavra was directly responsible for bringing in Cowl and Kumori to act as Bianca's flunkies; and I'll get to why I think that may be the case further down.

However, I think it is also possible that Cowl and Mavra have different long-term objectives.  Meaning they were only allies of convenience; like Kemmler's disciples, and at some point their interests might diverge from one another.     

The spat between Dresden and Bianca is clearly a PERSONAL conflict.  Bianca is doing this to get revenge on Harry ...

Yes to pretty much everything you said, even the parts I edited out.  Now here's something I've argued for years.  Bianca was a relatively minor power in her own right.  Even the promotion she was celebrating didn't make her powerful enough (IMO) that she'd be making deals with Outsiders to hand out Nemfected presents to her guests.  Her interests appeared to be local rather than global and her motivations against Harry were personal.  Think of the target that was painted on Bianca's back by handing out the tainted items.  Remember what Lea said about how she owed Bianca payback for giving her the tainted Athame.  I think Bianca was a patsy and either Cowl or both Cowl and Mavra were responsible for the Bianca's gifts being tainted.  They didn't plan on Harry knocking off Bianca, but when it happened it made things better for them.  Bianca wasn't around to deny that she was responsible for the tainted items.  (By the way, Bianca being set up as a patsy helps explain why Mavra didn't appear to be that powerful in the fight at Bianca's party.  She wasn't on Bianca's side, she was testing Michael without his sword and Harry without his full strength.  When she didn't get an easy victory she wasn't going to go all out just for Bianca's sake.)
   
It has been stated or suggested that Outsider magic is what animates the Black Court, or perhaps it was what first animated the Black Court into existence.  This would explain Mavra's willingness to help the Outsiders.  They are to her; and her kind, progenitors, parents of a sort.  However, it's more difficult to understand why Cowl or any wizard would make a deal with Outsiders, outside of being Nemfected themselves.  In Dead Beat both Cowl and Kumori spoke of a New Order arising, but knowing the Outsiders are making a move for power and deciding to throw in with them seems very questionable to me.  Jim has yet to explain why anyone would trust the Outsiders to keep any deals they may have made.

It's more easy to understand how Cowl and Mavra may have become allies.  In Dead Beat Bob explained how Kemmler had friends in most of the vampire courts and with other supernatural bad guys.  It's possible Kemmler introduced his students to some of his contacts.  From both Kemmler and Mavra, Cowl would have learned of the Outsider's plans.  What made him join their team is an open question.  Also, it's possible that the attempt to perform the Darkhallow wasn't simply aimed at the eliminating the Senior Council of the White Council, it was an attempt by Cowl to gain enough power so he wouldn't have to trust the Outsiders to keep their word.  He'd have been strong enough to demand that they keep their word.

I wonder what it would take to make Harry re-think the events of Bianca's party.  Once he does, he should be smart enough to realize that Lea would want to know who was really responsible for driving her so crazy Mab had to turn her into a Sidhecicle in order to cure her.  Now that I think about it, Mab might also want to know who was indirectly responsible for Nemfecting Maeve.  Harry has some juicy material to trade with Lea, and possibly with Mab, and he doesn't even realize it.

Assuming that Murphy doesn't die in Peace Talks, the problem in Mirror Mirror is Harry gets pulled into Alt-Harry's reality.  Alt-Harry starts going down the wrong path after a decision he makes in Grave Peril.  Remember the scene in Summer Knight when Harry finally let Murphy in on his world and gives her the inside dirt on how the White Council was trying to sell him out to the vampires?  That might never happen in the Alt-Harry universe.  We don't even know if Murphy fully comes back the psychic mauling she received in Grave Peril in Alt-Harry's reality.  It's possible that even if Murphy wasn't broken by that experience, the trust and friendship that started to be rebuilt in Summer Knight never happened at all.  In Alt-Harry land Murphy might still be working for the Chicago PD and she will probably think of Alt-Harry, and therefore our Harry, as a big time bad guy.  I won't be surprised if the first time Murphy sees Harry in Mirror Mirror she draws a gun on him.

I'm not sure what Harry could learn about Alt-Murphy that would help him with the Murphy he knows, though I suppose Jim might think of something.  More to the point, I doubt that whatever happens to Alt-Murphy in Mirror Mirror will be much of an indicator of where the main universe character will go in future books.

Seeing as Peace Talks takes place several months the events in Skin Game I expect Murphy will probably be doing a lot of PT in order to heal to the degree that she can.  I don't see her as being more than a sounding board for Harry in Peace Talks.  I assume Harry will talk to Murphy because it would be weird if he didn't, but we may not get a really good indicator of where her character will go in future books.  What might happen is we will hear Murphy wondering what her future role should be, perhaps hinting at a couple of possibilities.