Back to the comments regarding how Thorned provided more power to Marcone than Lashiel did to Ascher. It was my understanding that Lashiel was only bonded with Ascher for only a couple of weeks tops. Wasn't Thorned with Marcone for at least a year, closer to 2+ if I remember my timeline correctly before we saw the results of that partnership? I don't think we can have a proper comparison between which of the two fallen would have powered Dresden up more based on the two examples we have.

I think there is some underestimation on the White Courts security during the full reign of Lord Raith. Sure there wasn't a lot of free thinking when he was fully in charge but one good thing about the security detail during that era was there would have been no loose lips. I got the impression that Lord Raith moved around a lot as part of his security precautions. Even Lara, who even before she took full reign, did a lot of the administration aspect of running the White Court and didn't always know where dear ole daddy was. The whole nuke a location option doesn't work too well when you don't know where your target is at any given time. Setting up an object from orbit or a new volcano or earthquake to hit needs some serious set up time to pull off. So with those options off the table, Eb would have to be less than subtle in his attempt to kill him and as Raith was always surrounded by his thralls and could always GTFO before Eb could even come close. I don't think he would have been as easy to kill as some seem to think.