Thieves' Quarry (The Thieftaker Chronicles)

by Jackson, D. B.

  Someone snickered. Yellow-hair probably, or maybe Nap.

  Ethan opened his eyes again, and though the world around him still spun, he managed to force himself up onto an elbow. He was lying on grass, and his first thought was that they had taken him to the Common again, as they had once before when intending to kill him. In the next instant he realized that if Sephira had wanted him dead, he would never have awakened. Surveying his surroundings, Ethan saw that he was on a lawn behind Sephira’s house. Yellow-hair, Nap, and Gordon stood nearby. Yellow-hair—Nigel—had a bucket in his hand and a mocking grin on his face.

  Mariz stood apart from them. He had his sleeve rolled up and he had already cut himself. A small trickle of blood ran down his forearm toward his wrist. It was like having a loaded pistol pointed at Ethan’s head. Feeling the way he did, there was no way Ethan could conjure quickly enough to best the man.

  “Those were good spells,” Ethan said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Detection?”

  Mariz smiled and nodded, his spectacles flashing white for an instant as they reflected the glare.

  “And a sleep spell?”

  “Basically,” he said, his accent thickening the word.

  “I have access to witchcraft now,” Sephira purred, looking far too pleased with herself. Her hair was down, black curls shining. She wore her usual clothes: black breeches, a matching waistcoat fitted snugly around her curves, a silk shirt cut low. As always, she looked stunning. “And I have my men as well. There’s nothing you can do to hurt me, and no way you can leave here without my consent. So you’re going to answer some questions for me, and after we’re done I’ll decide whether or not to kill you.”

  Ethan answered with a short, breathless laugh. “That sounds fair. But can we do this over supper? I haven’t eaten all day.”

  Sephira stared at him, then gave a laugh of her own. “All right.” She turned on her heel and started toward the house. “Bring him.”

  The three toughs closed on him, but to Ethan’s surprise, Nap offered a hand and pulled him to his feet. They arrayed themselves around him, with Mariz following a few paces behind, and escorted him into the house.

  Sephira had seated herself at the head of a long table in her dining room. Not for the first time, Ethan admired the tasteful artwork and tapestries that adorned her walls. She indicated with an open hand the seat to her right.

  “Sit,” she said. “The food will be out momentarily.”

  Ethan took his seat. The others remained standing nearby.

  “You were eavesdropping yesterday.”

  He saw no sense in denying it. “Aye. Rude of me, I know.”

  “Why?” she asked, ignoring him. “What did you hope to learn?”

  “I wanted to know more about Spectacles here,” he said, lifting his chin toward Mariz. “I overheard him in the Dowsing Rod the night before, and I saw that he sensed my spell.”

  “It seems that too often you listen to other people’s conversations,” Mariz said. “This could get you killed.”

  “Why did you eavesdrop on him in the tavern?” Sephira asked, drawing Ethan’s gaze again. “What is it you’re after?”

  “I’m not after anything. I recognized Spectacles when he walked in. I’d seen him with Tanner, and since you had just robbed me of my earnings from that job, I was interested in hearing what he had to say.”

  Before Sephira could ask him more, a servant entered the room carrying a platter of cheeses, fresh bread, apples, and pears. The man laid the food before them and retreated into the kitchen.

  “Help yourself,” Sephira said.

  Normally, Ethan would have hesitated to eat any food Sephira offered him that she didn’t eat herself. He didn’t think she was above poisoning a rival. But on this day he was so hungry that he didn’t even hesitate. He took cheese and bread and began to gorge himself. Sephira watched him, appearing amused. After a few moments she stood, retrieved two glasses and a flask of wine, and returned to the table. She poured a glass for Ethan and put it in front of him.

  “Drink this, before you choke yourself,” she said.

  Ethan swallowed what was in his mouth and took a long sip of wine.

  “Thank you.”

  “Where have you been that you haven’t eaten?” she asked.

  “Who says I’ve been anywhere?”

  “I do,” Mariz answered. “The detection spell by your home was not the only one. I placed one around that tavern as well. You did not go to either location until this midday.”

  “Where were you, Ethan?” Sephira asked again.

  Sometimes Ethan refused to answer Sephira’s questions simply on principle. Too often she treated him like he was another one of her lackeys. He resented it, and went out of his way to defy her. But on this occasion it occurred to him that he might learn something of value by telling her at least part of the truth.

  “I was at Castle William.”

  Her eyebrows went up. “Castle William,” she repeated. “Why?”

  “Representatives of the Crown requested that I inquire into an assault on one of their ships. The Graystone.”

  He paused, allowing the vessel’s name to sink in. Sephira’s expression remained unchanged, but Mariz cast a quick look in her direction, and Nigel and Nap, who were leaning against the far wall of the dining room, exchanged glances.

  “It seems someone used a conjuring against the ship,” Ethan went on. “Every man on board was killed.”

  Even Sephira couldn’t mask her response to that.

  “Every man?” she repeated, leaning forward. Her eyes flicked in Mariz’s direction before fixing on Ethan again. “You’re sure of this?”

  “I’m sure. Every man on the ship was killed. Nearly a hundred in all.” He turned to look at Spectacles. “Whoever cast a spell that powerful would have had to take a life for the conjuring, don’t you agree?”

  Mariz didn’t flinch from Ethan’s gaze. “Sim, eu concordo. I agree.”

  “I noticed the other day that you and your friend—Afton, I believe—were keeping a close eye on the British fleet. Was it the Graystone you were watching?”

  “You are what my people would call an intrometido,” Spectacles said, his voice low and menacing. “You meddle in the affairs of others when you should not.”

  “Yes, Ethan has always been too inquisitive for his own good,” Sephira said, sounding far less concerned about his transgression than had Mariz. “I’ll admit, it’s not one of his more endearing traits.” She sipped her wine. “Our interest in the fleet is no different from that of any other person in the city. This business of the impending occupation has all of us on edge.”

  “So, Mariz here is just another concerned citizen,” Ethan said.

  A dazzling smile lit her face. “Exactly.”

  Ethan considered bringing up Simon Gant, but there were limits to what Sephira would tolerate, and he wasn’t sure he was ready to reveal just how much he knew. Keeping silent, he reached for an apple and bit into it.

  “What is it these representatives of the Crown have asked you to do?” Sephira asked.

  Ethan swallowed before answering. “They want me to find the conjurer who killed their men.” He eyed Mariz again. “What were you doing just after dawn yesterday morning?”

  “Sleeping.”

  “Alone?”

  Mariz laughed. “Sadly, yes.”

  “Do you think that Mariz here is the one who killed those soldiers?” Sephira asked. She laughed as well. “Is that what all this is about? Is that why you’ve been following him and listening to our conversations?”

  The only thing worse than being intimidated and beaten by Sephira and her men was being ridiculed by her. Ethan knew this, because she ridiculed him a lot.

  “There aren’t many conjurers in Boston capable of casting a spell that powerful,” Ethan said. “And since Mariz is new to the city, I thought it a possibility.”

  Sephira shook her head, still chuckling. “Go home. There’s nothing more for yo
u to learn here. It wasn’t Mariz. I assure you it wasn’t.”

  “Pardon me for saying so, Sephira, but your assurances don’t carry much weight with me.”

  The smile vanished from her face, leaving her expression stony. “Well, they should. And you ought to watch yourself. I’ve said you can go. I’d suggest you leave now, before I change my mind.”

  Ethan took another bite of his apple and looked around the room. Nap and Nigel had straightened and were regarding Ethan the way hunting dogs would a fox. At a word from their master, they would attack. Mariz held his knife loosely in his right hand; his left sleeve was still pushed up.

  Ethan stood and nodded to Sephira. “My thanks for the food.”

  He backed out of the room, watching her men, expecting Sephira to sic them on him.

  “How much are they paying you?” Sephira called after him.

  “Enough to keep my interest,” Ethan said. “But probably not enough to draw yours.”

  She laughed at that and raised her cup of wine in salute.

  Ethan let himself out of the house, stepping past Gordon, who stood guard outside the front entrance. The big man didn’t try to stop him, but he did enter the house, no doubt to make certain that Ethan had left with Sephira’s permission. Ethan took one last bite of his apple and tossed what remained onto Sephira’s lawn.

  He was confident that he had bought himself some time, but he knew that it came at great risk. Without lying to Sephira and the others, he had given them the impression that Simon Gant was dead, murdered with every other man aboard the Graystone. He knew Sephira well enough to understand that she wouldn’t leave anything to chance; if she had been intent on finding Gant, she would now be just as intent on confirming his death. And eventually, when she learned that he had gotten away before the spell that killed his shipmates was cast, she would be furious with Ethan. It wouldn’t make any difference to her that he hadn’t actually lied. But Ethan would deal with her when the time came. In the meantime, he assumed that he had a day or two in which to find Gant and figure out why Sephira was so interested in his return to Boston.

  Ethan headed back to Henry’s shop, still intent on washing up and putting on a change of clothes. Mariz’s sleep spell had left him unsure of the time, and with the sky still clouded over, he couldn’t fix the position of the sun. But as he neared the streets that lay closest to Boston’s southern wharves, he saw that there were still plenty of people abroad in the city. It couldn’t have been too late in the afternoon.

  He cut through the heart of the South End and soon turned the corner onto Cooper’s Alley. As he did, he spotted a lone figure lurking in the byway next to Dall’s cooperage. Even from a distance, Ethan recognized the man. He was slight and young, with the face of a lad half his age, but he wore the long black vestments and stiff white cravat of a minister. Trevor Pell.

  Ethan slowed, looking around for Henry Caner, the rector of King’s Chapel, or perhaps Sheriff Greenleaf. Pell had proven himself a friend on more than one occasion, but he would have come to Ethan’s home only in the most dire of circumstances.

  “I’m alone,” Pell said. “Except for this girl.” He squatted down and Shelly emerged from the byway, her tail wagging. “She’s been keeping an eye on me. She working for you?”

  “Aye, she works for me,” Ethan said, grinning as he walked to where the minister waited for him. “Unless someone else gives her food. Then she’ll work for him.”

  “Ah.” Pell gave the dog’s head one last scratch before standing. “Sounds like a thieftaker to me.”

  Ethan grinned. “I suppose it does.” He looked around again. An old woman hobbled toward them carrying a basket of bread, and Shelly trotted off after her. “Are you just out for a walk?” Ethan asked. “Or did you come for a reason?”

  “As it happens,” Pell said, his voice dropping, “I came looking for you yesterday, but couldn’t find you. I … I need to ask you some questions.”

  Ethan nodded, understanding far more than Pell knew. “Aye, but not here on the street. Come upstairs.”

  They went up to Ethan’s room. Once they were inside, Ethan retrieved a small pouch of mullein from the table by his bed. Mullein was one of the most powerful of all conjuring herbs, and it worked especially well for warding spells. After barely surviving the attacks of a powerful conjurer several summers before, he had made sure that he always had a supply on hand. Taking three leaves from the pouch, he said, “Teqimen ex verbasco evocatum.” Warding, conjured from mullein.

  Pell jumped at the pulse of power, and started a second time when he spotted Uncle Reg leering at him from the corner of the room. The minister was not a conjurer; he had never learned to cast spells. But he had conjuring blood in his veins, and so could feel spells when they were cast, and could see spectral guides like Reg. And yet, for all the times he had been present when Ethan cast, he never seemed to get used to the thrum of power or the appearance of Ethan’s ghost.

  “What kind of conjuring was that?” the minister asked, in a tremulous voice, still eyeing Reg.

  “A warding spell. There’s a new conjurer in the city, and he works for Sephira Pryce.”

  Pell faced Ethan. “Well, that may be the answer to the question I came here to ask. Yesterday—”

  “You woke to the pulse of a powerful spell.”

  “Yes,” the minister said. “You felt it, too.”

  “I expect every conjurer in Boston felt it.”

  “My first thought was that you had cast it,” Pell told him. “But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it felt too…” The minister trailed off, shaking his head.

  “Strong?” Ethan suggested

  Pell looked up. “Dark.”

  “You have good instincts,” Ethan said. He told Pell what had happened to the Graystone and about his time at Castle William. Senhouse had asked for his discretion, and yet having been back in Boston for but a short while, he had already told Sephira and Pell of the Graystone’s fate. But he knew that Sephira would keep his secret out of her own self-interest, and Pell would keep it because he was naturally discreet.

  “Dear God,” the minister said, his face ashen. “Every one of them. How powerful would a conjurer have to be to do that?” He faltered, but then added, “Could you do it?”

  Ethan pondered the question. “I don’t think the casting itself would have been that difficult,” he said, choosing his words with care. “But whoever cast it would have had to source the conjuring in a life.”

  “You mean the sorcerer killed someone when he conjured? Like with the Jennifer Berson murder a few years ago?”

  “Yes,” Ethan answered, although he was thinking not of the Berson girl, but of a kindly dog: Pitch, Shelly’s constant companion. Ethan had cast a spell sourced in the life of the poor creature in order to fight off the conjurer who murdered Jennifer Berson and thus save his own life. The memory of that casting had haunted him ever since. Aside from Kannice, he had told no one of what he had done that night. “He would have killed someone, or something,” he said. “It could have been an animal rather than a person and it still would have been a powerful casting.”

  “But dark.”

  “Aye. Very dark.”

  “Do you think that this new conjurer did it?”

  “I think it’s possible. He and Sephira have seemed unusually interested in the fleet, and it turns out that a former associate of Sephira’s came to Boston aboard the Graystone, but managed to get off before the spell was cast.”

  “I see,” Pell said. “Well, tell me how I can help.”

  Ethan kept his amusement to himself. Between Diver and Pell one might have thought that Ethan was putting together his own thieftaking empire, one to rival Sephira’s. He understood, of course. Both men were young and saw in Ethan’s work the excitement and adventure that they couldn’t find working the wharves or tending to the souls of the King’s Chapel congregation. As it happened, though, there was something Pell could do for him.


  “I’m glad you asked, Mister Pell,” he told the young minister, drawing an eager smile from the man. “Within the next day or two, officers of the fleet or the occupying army will have to deal with the dead, and when they do they’ll need to inform the families of those soldiers who live here in Boston. I’d like you to get the names of any men whose families belong to your congregation.”

  Pell’s face fell. “That’s all?”

  Ethan considered this. “Well, if you think you can get the names of men who attended other churches that would be very helpful.”

  “But even that…” He shook head, frowning once more. “Surely there’s something more that I can do. I mean, yes, of course I’ll do as you ask. But … Where are you going now?”

  “First, I’m going to wash off and change into clothes that don’t smell of sweat and dead men. After that … well, I believe Henry Caner would say it’s best that you don’t know. He still thinks that my conjurings will lead you to Satan.”

  “Ethan—”

  “How many times has Mister Caner threatened to have me arrested, tried, and hanged as a witch?”

  Pell looked down at the floor. “Several,” he muttered.

  “And do you wish to see him follow through on that threat?”

  “Sometimes. It depends on the day.”

  Ethan chuckled. A reluctant smile crept across the minister’s face.

  Pell crossed to the door. “I’ll leave you to wash,” he said. “If I may offer some advice, use plenty of soap.”

  “Very funny.”

  “Perfumed soap, if you have any.”

  Ethan scowled. “Get out.”

  “I’ll let you know what I can learn about the dead soldiers.”

  “Thank you,” Ethan said. He watched the young minister leave.

  Once Pell was gone, Ethan retrieved a pitcher from the basin in his room, took it down to the street and filled it with water from the pump near Henry’s shop. He didn’t wish to take the time necessary to heat it in his hearth, nor did he wish to invite more attention from Mariz and Sephira by casting. So upon returning to his room he stripped off his stale clothes and washed himself with water so cold it made his skin tingle. After drying himself, he put on clean breeches and a fresh shirt, waistcoat, and coat. He strapped on his blade, and as an afterthought tucked the pouch of mullein in his pocket. Satisfied that he was prepared for Mariz or whoever else he might meet, he left his room.