by Allie Therin
“Was that—Italian?” Gwen cocked her head. “Rory is an Irish name.”
Rory ignored that. “I wanna hear you say you’ll let Ace go.”
“Frankly I’d prefer to. He was a friend once and he’s never done me or Ellis wrong.” She held up the box under the moonlight. “When this is mine, he’s all yours.”
A man on a high cliff watches with cold eyes as the tidal wave sweeps forward, toward the walls of a castle perched on the coast—
Rory shoved away the memories of the amulet’s history and hugged himself tightly. “What’re you gonna do when it’s unlocked?”
“See Ellis’s face instead of his magic,” Gwen said, and Rory’s chest ached in sympathy for thirty entire seconds until she tilted her head and added, “And then use the sea to drown a baron.”
Rory stared at her. “Wait—wait, you don’t know what’ll happen if you mess with the sea—”
She grabbed his hand in her own, and that was all the warning he had before the knife sliced over his palm. He hissed and yanked his hand away, clenching his fist against the sting. Ellis and Gwen had Arthur, but all those people.
“I’m not gonna help you drown New York,” he said, scrambling backward.
His back hit the barrel of a gun. “You’re gonna do whatever she wants,” said the henchman, as Gwen calmly drew the small silver blade over her own palm without flinching. “Her head’s screwed on wrong anyway. Doesn’t mean a word.”
“Are you stupid?” Rory barked. “Of course she means it. Haven’t you seen Ellis’s knife?”
But the other henchman grabbed Rory’s wrist and forced his hand out, toward Gwen. His blood was welling in the cut, between his clenched fingers, and she clapped her own bloody palm over his fist.
He sucked in a breath as their blood met. Magic. For a second, he was paralyzed, seeing only a halo of light around her, a flash of her aura.
Then her hand was gone, and so was her aura, as she seized the amulet in her bloody fist and plunged it into an oncoming wave.
The wave stopped.
Time seemed to slow as the wave didn’t return to the ocean but lingered at full press on the beach, frozen like a picture. Rory’s skin broke into goose bumps as the air grew thick and magic poured into the amulet.
“Jesus Christ,” whispered one of the mobsters.
Gwen smiled. She yanked the amulet out of the ocean and held it high. “Can you feel it, Rory?” Her eyes were closed as she slipped it over her head. “Can you feel its power?” She held a hand out in front of her, palm facing the horizon, and the wave retreated into the ocean—but slower than it should have, too slow to be natural.
Both mobsters took several steps back. The bigger one pointed to the water. “The ocean ain’t supposed to move like that!”
Gwen pulled her hand in, like she was pulling a door shut, and the ocean wave returned, bigger and stronger than before, sweeping the beach with ice-cold water up to Rory’s knees.
The mobsters swore loudly, their panic nearly palpable. Gwen turned to Rory, and her eyes were focused and clear. “I see you.” Her eyes widened and a brilliant smile lit her face. “Not your magic. You.”
“I see you too,” Rory said, through clenched teeth. “I see you’re nuts. Leave the ocean alone!”
She only smiled, brilliant and true. Then, with a sweeping motion, she sent the wave back into the sea, too fast and too far out, leaving too much beach behind. Rory’s heart leapt to his throat. “Be careful—”
“Careful?” She laughed. “I’m going to be a goddess of the sea. I’m going to drown Baron Zeppler. And I’m going to see Ellis without his magic choking me.” She raised both hands in front of her and curled her fingers, beckoning.
The wave began its return to her, unnaturally slow. The henchmen turned tail, kicking up sand as they sprinted toward the boardwalk. Rory took measured breaths and prayed that he hadn’t made an enormous mistake.
The wave paused an inch in front of her toes and stayed, like a hunting dog tensed and waiting for an order from its master. Gwen’s expression was soft, almost serene.
And then she frowned.
“What’s happening?” Her outstretched hands began to shake. “What’s going on?”
Rory looked up at the sky. “I left something out.”
At her feet, the ocean began to simmer, like water coming to a boil. Her eyes grew wide. “I’m not doing that.” She whipped her head toward Rory. “What didn’t you tell me?”
Rory pointed up to the stars and the bright light. “Full moon.”
* * *
Mrs. Brodigan had a hairpin up her sleeve. “Bless you, you wonderful woman,” Arthur said under his breath, fingers closing around the metal. He kept his body still as, behind his back, he worked the pin open.
Eyes on the pacing Ellis, he’d just maneuvered the end of the pin into the keyhole of his handcuffs when he heard the shouts.
“What the hell—” Ellis began.
But Arthur could hear it too, the pounding of boots on the boardwalk, the sound of terrified men running for their lives.
Arthur hurriedly twisted the pin in the keyhole as Ellis sprinted to the edge of the platform. “Where are you going?” Ellis shouted down, as the boots thundered past the Wonder Wheel.
“She’s got the goddamn ocean on a string!”
“Run for your lives, we’re all gonna drown!”
The mobsters on the platform didn’t need to hear it twice. They abandoned Jade, scrambling across the platform and off the edge. Ellis ran after them. “Get back here—”
But the men were gone. Ellis whirled toward Arthur in a rage, and Arthur froze, handcuff almost sprung—
A woman’s cry came from the beach. Not triumph. Fury.
“Gwen!” Ellis didn’t give Arthur a second look as he leapt from the platform in the direction of the boardwalk. “Gwen, I’m coming!”
“Hang it all. He really loves her.” Arthur moved the pin and the handcuff opened like a dream. He pushed up on shaky legs, lingeringly weak in the aftermath of Gwen’s handiwork on his aura.
“Arthur, dear.” Mrs. Brodigan gestured with her chin to her heavy winter coat. “My pocket.”
Confused, Arthur crouched with some difficulty and fished into the large pocket in the front of her brown coat. He closed his hand around something small and too heavy. “Oh, you are full of surprises,” he said in delight, as he withdrew the ring box. “I could kiss you.”
“I think Rory might have something to say about that.” And before Arthur could find words through his surprise, she said, “Now go save my nephew.”
Arthur forced himself to his feet, stumbling as fast as he could move on pins and needles toward Jade. “Do you need—”
“Give me the damn pin and I’ll get myself and Mrs. Brodigan out.” Jade made a face. “These cuffs feel like needles. I can’t even tell if my magic’s returned.”
Arthur pressed the pin into her hand. “Rory said the ring controls the wind.” His grip tightened on the box. “Can you use it?”
She shook her head. “Someone has to see how to unlock it.”
Their eyes met. And then Ace was sprinting for the boardwalk and the ocean.
* * *
The ocean at Gwen’s feet broke the simmer and began to roil at a full boil despite its icy cold. The air pricked at Rory’s skin, charged like static electricity.
“What have you done?” Gwen demanded.
“Moon controls the tide and it’s pouring power into the amulet.” Rory clenched his still bleeding fist. “Too much power.”
Gwen’s hands were shaking. Around her neck, the amulet’s gem was glowing blue.
“You know I can see history. I saw the amulet’s last owner die ’cause he tried to use it on a full moon.” Rory fought back a shudder. He could still see the castle and the man on the jagg
ed cliff, the man’s face frozen in terror as the magic tidal wave surged higher than the cliff. He could still hear the choked-off scream as the wave crashed down, sweeping the man off the cliff to break on the rocks below. “Take it off, or it’s gonna kill you too.”
Gwen’s jaw tightened.
“Gwen!” Ellis launched himself down the boardwalk stairs to the beach, striking the sand and kicking it up as he ran their way. “Gwen, take it off, don’t let it kill you—”
“Ellis.” Gwen’s eyes widened. Her hands lowered. “Oh, Ellis, look at you—”
“Take it off. Please, Gwen. Do what the kid says. I can’t lose you—”
Rory flung out his arm. “Don’t come any closer, Ellis!” he ordered. “We got too much magic on the beach already—can’t you feel the air?”
Ellis growled, but he did stop. “You lied to Gwen.” He glared at Rory from only feet away. “Give me a reason not to slice you to paralyzed ribbons.”
“How’d that work out for you when you stabbed your pal Philippe?” Rory said, with narrowed eyes. “’Cause I heard he set everything and everyone on fire. But go ahead and see what my magic does when your dagger lights it up like dynamite. Hope you like history.”
Ellis bared his teeth, but his hand hovered without landing over the holster of his dagger.
On the beach, the ocean continued its strange, cold boil. Rory stretched his other arm toward Gwen. “Just put it down,” he said. “Put the amulet on the sand and no one’ll get hurt.”
“So you say. But do you know?” Gwen’s gaze stayed on Ellis. “Or are you fumbling in the dark, same as us, unable to promise that if I set my relic down, we’ll all be safe from the sea?”
Rory set his jaw and didn’t answer.
“I’m gonna kill him,” Ellis started. “He’s good as killed us all—”
“No need, love.” Gwen’s eyes finally left Ellis’s face for the briefest second, flicking down to the pocket of his coat. “As long as we’re together, we’re going to be just fine.”
Ellis blinked. Then his hand moved from the holster to rest on his pocket, and a tiny smile curled one corner of his lips. “You and me against the world, darling.”
Rory’s stomach began to roil like the sea. “Take the relic off, Gwen.”
Never taking her eyes off Ellis, Gwen clutched the amulet around her neck and lifted it over her head.
“Set it on the sand,” Rory said desperately. “Stop touching it and no one’s gonna die.”
Gwen suddenly turned her gaze on Rory. “Care to bet?” And with a powerful jerk of her arm, she flung the amulet into the sea.
The wave followed the amulet—too fast, too far. Much too far, until there was nothing to see but sand as the wave disappeared like a slingshot being set.
Ellis let out a bark of laughter and dove for Gwen, sweeping her into his arms like a bride. As he held her up, Rory saw the vial in his hand, the flash of orange.
Pavel’s last potion.
“Best of luck,” Gwen said to Rory, arms around Ellis’s neck as he yanked the cork out of the vial with his teeth.
There was an explosion of orange smoke—
And then Ellis and Gwen were gone.
“No!” Rory lunged forward, but there was nothing but empty space. Ellis and Gwen had vanished and the ocean was still in retreat, far enough he couldn’t see the water’s edge anymore. His stomach dropped into his shoes. “Tidal wave,” he whispered.
“Teddy!”
Rory ripped his gaze away from the water and looked up.
Arthur was sprinting over the boardwalk. “Catch!” He launched something into the air. It soared over the railing, over the sand, and smacked Rory right in the chest.
The ring box.
Without thought Rory opened it and slid the ring on his finger. Magic coursed like a lightning strike through his blood, and he called on the power, on his visions.
Show me how to unlock it. Show me how to make it work.
He closed his eyes.
* * *
The woman holds the ring out to the pale man in the blue coat and white cravat, her hands still coated with the blood of her victim. “I’ve made it ready to cage your magic,” she says, and smiles darkly. “El viento. It will be a tempest in a ring.”
The man matches her smile. He takes the ring and holds it to his mouth in cupped hands, then closes his eyes—and exhales.
* * *
Wind. Blood and breath.
And with Gwen’s blood still coating his own bleeding hand, Rory held the ring to his lips and blew.
* * *
Arthur stood frozen on the boardwalk. Beyond the too-big beach, he could see the wave building in place, unnatural as sin, magic stacking it higher and higher, stronger and stronger. It gave off a strange roar that vibrated the beach, like a dragon about to lose its fire. Rory had put on the ring, but there was no running from a tidal wave—
Jade’s and Mrs. Brodigan’s footsteps thundered on the boardwalk behind him, but it was too late; the wave was as tall as a building and it was starting to curl, nothing between the three-story tidal wave and Brooklyn except the tiny figure of Rory on the beach.
Rory suddenly swept his hands out in front of him.
The air went still.
Then, in the distance, there was a high-pitched whistle.
Arthur’s eyes went wide. “Get down!” He leapt for Mrs. Brodigan, flattening her to the boardwalk just as a gale force wind swept across Coney Island.
Jade hit the wooden planks next to him. “The lamppost—I’ll cover us!”
She seized Mrs. Brodigan’s hand and together they pulled her to the iron lamppost on the boardwalk’s edge. Arthur clung to the post and did his best to shelter both women with his bigger body, his shirt flapping like a sail on his back as the wind cut above their heads. The torn fabric of the booths’ bright roofs sailed overhead as storefronts splintered and the Wonder Wheel creaked and groaned. He squinted up into the sky in time to see a giant wooden duck from the shooting gallery spiraling through the air straight toward them—
Jade curled her fingers and the duck careened off to the left. “Magic’s back?” he yelled into the wind.
“Zhang is too!” She threw up a hand and a sign for honey-roasted peanuts changed course right before it collided with their lamppost. “Look at Rory!”
Arthur managed a look back at the beach, eyes watering from sand and wind. The magic wave was churning but restrained, kept at bay by the magic wind. Two forces of nature at war, and between them was Rory.
Arthur held his breath.
Rory abruptly threw his arms out to either side and the wave surrendered. It poured itself straight down, like water tipped from an upside-down cup. It spread in a thin layer as it ran over the sand all the way up to the three of them huddled at the boardwalk’s edge.
Not a tidal wave, just a too-high tide.
Then Rory toppled over.
“Rory!” Arthur scrambled to his feet. The receding wave splashed over his dress shoes as he sprinted to the unmoving figure on the beach.
He dropped to his knees in the sand. Rory’s eyes were closed and he wasn’t moving. Arthur ran his hands over him frantically, finding clothes soaked through and his skin ice-cold to the touch.
“Open your eyes.” Arthur grabbed his shoulders. “Come on, Teddy.”
Rory didn’t respond.
Arthur put his fingers to Rory’s neck, felt the weak pulse. He pushed down his surge of panic and bent over Rory’s unmoving body.
“You’re in my bloody aura, Theodore,” he said, his whisper choked. “So you can damn well find your way home.”
And as he’d done in Mansfield’s mansion, he pressed his lips tightly to Rory’s.
For a moment, there was nothing.
Then Rory gasped. “Arthur.” His eyes were
too wide, his breaths too fast as he clawed at Arthur’s shoulders and clutched at him like a drowning man with a life preserver. “Ace. Arthur. I thought I was lost. Don’t let me go.”
“Never,” Arthur promised, and held Rory as tight as he could as the waves rolled harmlessly over them.
Chapter Thirty-Three
They were a bedraggled group as they made their way through the wind-wrecked amusement park to Arthur’s Cadillac: Mrs. Brodigan’s and Jade’s hats long lost to the wind; Arthur’s tuxedo ruined by sand and sea; Rory soaked to the bone and stumbling as Arthur supported him around the waist. But the relief was heady, their smiles shared, even when Arthur’s poor car turned out to be missing its canvas roof.
Mrs. Brodigan withdrew Arthur’s keys from her pocket and held them out. “Here you are, dear.”
“You drive,” Arthur said. “I’ll be in the back seat, making sure Rory stays in 1925 all the way to a doctor.”
Rory stiffened. “Nah, Ace, I can’t see a doc.”
“You must, you’re freezing—”
“You were chained up and you don’t even got a coat—”
“I wasn’t half-drowned by the ice-cold ocean. You saved Brooklyn. The least we can do is keep you out of shock.”
“What if I fall back in a vision?” Huge brown eyes beseeched Arthur in the glow of the streetlamps. “What if the docs want to lock me up again?”
“Over my dead body,” Arthur started.
“Don’t say that!” Rory burst out, sharp and angry. “Just—don’t say that.” He swallowed hard. “Dry clothes are enough.”
Of course dry clothes weren’t enough. Arthur would have argued, but Rory’s fist was clenched where it held Arthur’s shirt and he was shaking, maybe not just from the cold.
“Fine,” Arthur said, crumpling like the Sunday Times. “But dry clothes at my place, without argument.” He gave in to the urge to pull Rory’s shivering body closer. “If you could drive us to my home?” he said to Mrs. Brodigan, over Rory’s head. “I’ll pay for everyone’s cabs from there. Except Zhang; I assume he’s around here somewhere and doesn’t need a ride.”