She pretended interest, hiding her disgust beneath a placid expression. No honor among thieves, and no solidarity among the downtrodden, apparently. Maybe she didn’t know this Caleb Lipscomb, but she knew those like him and felt some of the guilt she’d been carrying about what she was supposed to do lift from her.
He would do the same to me, she thought as she pressed even closer to the platform. He would do worse.
When someone bumped into her, Esta let the sheet of paper the girl had given her drop to the floor. She waited until it landed at her feet before she stooped to retrieve it, and in a subtle movement perfected during her years of training, she placed the parcel on the floor and held on to the edge of the loose sheet within it. Then she slid the notebook forward, until the loose sheet came free and the device was directly under the platform.
The Antistasi had explained that she had less than five minutes once she removed the fuse, but when she got back up to her feet, she realized that she was penned in, trapped by the crowd that was on its feet, shouting with the fervor of true converts. There was no opening, so Esta made one, throwing an elbow sharply into the stomach of the man behind her. The man groaned and tumbled backward into the people behind him, and the crowd, already whipped into an excited frenzy, responded by pushing him back. In a matter of seconds, someone threw a punch, and the room erupted into chaos.
Esta ducked, keeping herself low as she shoved her way to the edges of the madness, and when she reached the other side, she pulled time around her and ran.
She didn’t let go of time until she was outside the building and at the carriage where North was waiting. The sounds of the night returned as she opened the door and climbed in.
“Go!” she told him, looking back out the window.
He didn’t look up from picking at his fingernails with the blade of a knife.
“Go!” she said again. “We need to get out of here.”
“Let’s just give it a minute or two to be sure.”
He’s insane.
Her breathing was still ragged from running out of the building and down the block, and her heart felt as though it would pound its way straight out of her chest. When you did a job, you didn’t just wait around to get caught. “We need to get out of here before the police come.”
“We have time,” he said again, putting the knife away in his back pocket. He took out the pocket watch from inside his vest and considered it. “I’d say we got at least two more minutes to go.”
Because she’d used her affinity to escape, it took nearly four.
North had just picked up the revolver when they heard the echo of a small explosion.
Esta’s stomach dropped. “You said it wasn’t a bomb,” she told him, her mouth dry as she thought of all the people who had been in that room—workers, laborers, all who had come to listen because they needed hope. She’d been so angered by Lipscomb’s words that she hadn’t considered the other people when she set the device for him.
“No,” he said, meeting her eyes. “I said nobody was going to die, and they won’t. The explosives in that package won’t do more than take a leg or an arm—just enough to put Lipscomb into the hospital and keep him out of our way.” He twisted the knob on the side of his watch as the first of the people began to pour from the doorway of the building. With them came a dense, cloudlike fog, and even from more than a block away, Esta could feel the strange, icy-hot magic in the air.
“What did you do to them?” she asked.
“It’s not what we did to them,” he told her, glancing up from the watch. “It’s what you did for them.”
He clicked the watch closed, and Esta didn’t have time to contemplate the meaning of his words before she felt her veins turn to ice and the world went white.
THE LAKE
1902—New York
Viola felt as though she couldn’t breathe. “What do you mean, it was done with magic?” she asked Ruby. The girl’s skin had gone from the palest cream to a high pink as she spoke, moved by the furor of her convictions. It didn’t make her any less attractive.
“Jack was clear. The train didn’t just derail. There wasn’t a bomb. The two of them—Harte Darrigan, who was supposed to have died on the Brooklyn Bridge the day before the accident, and this Esta Filosik—used magic to destroy the train.” Ruby leaned forward. “They used magic beyond the Brink.”
“That isn’t possible,” she told Ruby. Not unless Darrigan had the Book. And for Esta to be with him? No.
“If it wasn’t true, why would the Order go to such lengths to stop me from telling people?” Ruby asked.
But all Viola could do was shake her head numbly.
“The very fact that they were willing to hire your brother to kill me shows just how true it is. There are Mageus outside the city, and there’s more,” Ruby added. “Jack told me what really happened at Khafre Hall the night it burned.”
Viola’s stomach suddenly felt like it was filled with molten lead. “He did?” she said, trying to keep her voice steady, even as she wondered how deep the water around her might be. Had this all been a trap?
“They were robbed,” Ruby told her, satisfaction shining in her eyes. “A group of Mageus walked into their headquarters and took all their precious treasures.”
“Oh?” Viola’s voice sounded weak, even to herself.
Ruby nodded, her midnight eyes shining. “Yes, but the Order is still trying to cover it up. No one has let anything slip about who the thieves were or what they stole. As long as the people in this city believe that the Order is all powerful, they’ll keep supporting them. That’s why I need you. I need to know what happened in Khafre Hall.”
“I don’t know anything about what you’re talking about,” Viola said, forgetting where she was for a second. She almost lurched to her feet, but the rocking of the boat reminded her. “Take me back,” she told Theo. “I’m done with this. With all of this.”
“What is it?” Ruby asked, legitimately confused. “If you’re worried about being attacked, we can protect you.”
“You?” Viola laughed at the ridiculousness of the girl’s statement. “You are going to protect me?”
“We can make sure you’re safe from Paul Kelly when the story comes out—”
“Paul?” Viola asked, surprised.
“Don’t you see?” Ruby said, lowering her voice. “It all makes sense. Kelly has Torrio—a Mageus—working for him at the same time that Khafre Hall is robbed? Paul Kelly, who is already known to be a notorious criminal—no offense,” she added, her cheeks going pinker still.
Viola waved away her apology. “You think my brother is the one who broke into Khafre Hall?” she asked, astounded. It was better than Ruby knowing about Viola’s own involvement, but not much better.
“I don’t know for sure, but that’s how you could help me. If we could prove that he did it, we could take down a crime boss and the Order all at once. Tammany would have to turn against Kelly, because they’re interested in the Order’s favor, and everyone would know that the Order is weak and pointless. And if we can find out what Kelly’s guys took from them, maybe we could even track the objects down and make sure they don’t fall into the wrong hands.”