The Last Magician

by Lisa Maxwell

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he called, letting his voice boom over the theater as he settled into the persona he’d perfected for the stage. “I have traveled far and wide to learn the occult arts, the hermetical sciences. Today I bring you evidence that we mere humans might converse with the divine.  And that the divine,” he said, flourishing his hand to ignite the flare palmed there, “might converse with us in turn.”

  The ball of fire burst from his palm, hovered for a second in the air, and then vanished. It was a simple enough trick, but it did its job. An interested murmuring rustled through the house as a stagehand rolled out a table filled with props.

  “Do not be alarmed,” he said, taking up a pair of steel hoops large enough to fit over his head. “This is not the magic of old, wild and untamed, capable of seduction and destruction. There is no danger here,” he called, manipulating the rings so that they locked together, came apart. “For my powers come not from the accident of birth, but from careful scientific study and practiced skill. Because I have devoted myself to the mastery of the occult sciences, the powers I demonstrate have no command over me.” With a flourish, the hoops seemed to vanish. “Instead, I bend them to my will,” he finished, plucking a hoop out of thin air, making it materialize before the audience’s very eyes.

  The house was silent now, all eyes watching and waiting for what he would do next. Rich or poor, every audience was the same. Some might dismiss tales of the old magic as nothing more than legend. Some might fear its existence still. Most had been taught to hate the people with affinities for it. But like the Order, they all desperately wanted magic to be real.  They wanted to believe that something was out there bigger than they were—as long as that something could be controlled by the right sort of people.

  He wasn’t sorry for using their fears and their hopes, their prejudices and their sense of righteousness against them. For distracting them from the truth. He was simply surviving in a world that hated what he was.

  Once the audience was on his side, he felt himself relax into his act. He stripped off his jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves to show nothing was hidden beneath them before he ran through a series of his usual, seemingly impossible card manipulations and sleight-of-hand tricks. All the while, he drew the audience in with tales of his travels. He told them how he had been a guest in a maharaja’s court as he swallowed a dozen single needles and thread, and insisted it was the court’s sorcerer who’d taught him to bring the needles back up, threaded neatly at even intervals along the silken string. He’d studied the mysteries of science and alchemy under the most learned men in Europe, and discovered many secrets of the universe in the shadow of the great pyramids.

  All lies, of course. He’d never stepped foot off the island of Manhattan, had never even dreamed it was possible until Dolph Saunders had put the idea into his head.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Harte said, drawing the moment out dramatically before he launched into his final effect. “Now I will demonstrate my sovereignty over the forces of life and death. In this, my most daring demonstration, I will require a volunteer. Someone with the strength of will to withstand the lure of the Otherworld and the courage to face what lies beyond the veil of our understanding.”

  He stepped downstage so that he could see beyond the glare of the footlights, searching for a mark. Usually, he liked to find a man for this effect, preferably a large one who was clearly doubtful or scowling. Someone the audience would believe to be uncertain, skeptical. But as he screened the crowd, he found someone else in the audience—the girl from the Haymarket.

  At first he thought she’d come for him. His gut went tight and his whole body felt warm, and for a moment he couldn’t move. He could only stare at her, like she was some strange apparition he’d imagined into being.

  Then he saw she was sitting next to Nibsy Lorcan, and every last bit of his anticipation went cold.

  It couldn’t be a coincidence that they were both in the theater, that they had both accosted him the night before. But any of Dolph’s people should have known how stupid it was to use magic in the Haymarket. Had the whole thing been some sort of setup? Another way for Dolph to entangle him?

  He’d see about that.

  Harte made his way down the short flight of steps to the audience, pretending to still be searching for a suitable volunteer. By the time he’d made it to their row, the girl had found something interesting to examine in the stitching of her gloves. Her jaw was tight, and her cheeks were flushed.

  Good, Harte thought. Let her be nervous. His tongue still throbbed, but damn if the pain didn’t also remind him of how it had felt to have her mouth against his. How for a moment—when she had seemed willing to return the kiss—he’d felt a kind of dizzying freedom that part of him itched to have again.

  Which just went to show how dangerous she was.

  “Miss?” he said, offering her his ungloved hand. “If you would be so kind?”

  She glanced up, fear warring with the violence in those strange tawny eyes. “Oh, I’m never kind.” She waved him off.

  He offered his hand again, but even as she started to refuse, Nibsy was already pushing her to her feet.

  “She’d love to,” he told Harte. There was a spark of something like anticipation in the boy’s eyes.

  Seeing Nibsy excited should have put him on guard, but Harte couldn’t bring himself to care.

  “Don’t make a fuss,” he murmured when she tried to pull away. Harte was already firmly tucking her arm under his. “You’ll only look like a fool.” He tightened his arm over hers, pinning her in place at his side.

  “I suppose you would know best about that”—she gave him a smile that was all teeth—“seeing how you’ve made an art of it.” Her expression was murderous, but for some insane reason that only made him more curious about her.

  Because of his success, girls had been only too happy to smile and fawn on him, but none of them really wanted the person beneath the name. They wanted the polished magician, the showman who could wine and dine them and fulfill their dreams of being onstage themselves. This girl didn’t want any of that. She didn’t want him at all, at least not that she would admit.

  He liked that about her.

  Maybe his mother had been right after all—there was clearly something wrong with him.

  “Why are you here?” he whispered, focusing on what was important as he led her down the aisle to the stage.

  “I was told there’d be entertainment,” she said, not caring who heard. Then she leaned in, as though to tell him a secret, but spoke loudly enough for the front rows to hear. “I think my escort might have overpromised.”

  Harte swallowed his amusement and schooled his features as the audience tittered. “I see,” he said, handing her up the first of the steps to the stage. He followed close behind, and when he got to the top step, he leaned forward and whispered in her ear, “And last night, is that the kind of . . . entertainment you prefer?”

  She whipped around, outrage sparking in those honey-colored eyes of hers, but he only gave her a wink before addressing the audience.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, this lovely creature has been so kind as to grace us with her beauty and courage this fine evening. What is your name, miss?”

  The girl scowled at him silently until he cocked an expectant brow. “Esta,” she said, apparently realizing that the fastest way off the stage was to cooperate.

  “Dear Esta—named for the stars—has graciously volunteered to assist me in one of the most perilous demonstrations of my connection to the powers of the Otherworld.” He ignored the girl’s snort and motioned to a stagehand, who rolled out a large wooden crate that had been painted to look like an ornate wardrobe.

  “If you would examine this wardrobe for any inconsistencies, any false backs . . .” He gestured to the crate. When Esta didn’t immediately move, he urged her again. “Please, do remove your gloves and give it a thorough examination.” He held out his hands, as though to take her glove
s.

  The girl gave him another tart look, but she removed her gloves and handed them over to him. The leather was smooth as a petal, and he wondered again where she’d come from and who she was to have such finely made gloves when she was clearly taking orders from Nibsy.

  She began inspecting the box, her pert mouth still scowling, and Harte had the sudden, unwelcome memory of the night before, of how her lips had gone soft and almost welcoming for—

  “She’s a ringer!” a drunken voice called out from the audience, a welcome interruption from the direction his thoughts had taken.

  “No, I’m not,” the girl called. Then, before he could stop her, she shouted, “You should come up here, too, and see for yourself.” She batted her eyes at Harte. “He can come, can’t he? You don’t have anything to hide . . . do you?”

  The audience tittered with laughter.

  “Well?” she asked, all mock innocence.

  She had him in a corner. Fine. He’d deal with it, and then he’d deal with her. He pasted on his most charming smile, as though he were in on the joke, and turned back to the audience. “Of course not.”

  The heckler turned out to be a large man whose coat was pulled tight across his stomach. While he checked over the cabinet, a nervous and excited energy ran through the audience. But Harte Darrigan didn’t make mistakes. Not anymore, and not on his stage, where he felt most at home and most in control. No girl was going to change that, no matter how much the sight of her full mouth twisting in amusement reminded him of the night before and how her lips had felt against his. He pressed his still-sore tongue against the sharp point of one of his teeth, to remind himself of what had happened the last time he lost his head over her.

  When they both were done, he held out his bare hand to help her into the box, bracing himself for the warmth of her fingers. “If you’re satisfied?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. . . .”  There was a vicious gleam in her eyes. “I’m not sure that you have the skills to satisfy,” she said loud enough for the audience to hear.

  The audience rustled again with more laughter, and someone in the back whistled.

  He leaned very close, until he could feel the warmth of her and detect the light, sweet scent from her hair. “No one’s ever complained before,” he said, offering his bare hand to her again. “Unless you’re afraid?”

  To the audience, her momentary reluctance probably appeared to be more of her toying with him, but Harte was close enough to see the reason she hesitated before taking his hand. He saw in her golden eyes the inner battle the girl was waging with herself between the choice to meet his challenge or to admit she was nervous.  And he saw the moment her pride won.

  She gave the audience another dazzling smile, goading them on as she made him wait a moment longer. When she finally slid her long, slender fingers into the palm of his hand, the shock of her warmth was almost enough to distract him from his relief. If he’d had his wits about him, maybe he would have found a way to take better advantage of that moment. But at first he could only look at their two hands joined in the glare of the spotlights—hers soft and surprisingly small against his.

  “Well?” she asked, glancing again at the audience she now held in the palm of her hand. “You did promise . . . satisfaction, did you not?”

  The heckler, who was still onstage with them, let out a loud, braying laugh, and the audience rustled again, but this time, he fed on their amusement, used it for what came next.

  He lifted her hand, presenting her to his public. “The lady will now put herself at my mercy. At the mercy of the powers of the universe around us . . . powers that I control,” he said dramatically, as he led her toward the open cabinet. “On my command, she will disappear from this world and travel to the Otherworld beyond until I call her back.”

  He looked at the girl then, and her tawny eyes were still laughing at him. But when he squeezed her hand gently, pushing his own power through himself, through the fine softness of her skin, those eyes went wide.

  She looked down at their joined hands and whispered a single word. It was the kind of curse that most well-bred ladies had never even heard, much less used.

  “Maybe later,” he whispered as he squeezed her hand again and sent another pulse of energy through his fingertips. He helped her up into the cabinet, relishing the way her brow furrowed in confusion. “Enjoy your trip,” he whispered, so the audience couldn’t hear.

  Harte had to work to keep his face fixed in the serious mask he’d perfected for the stage as he closed the door in her face and latched it securely. He’d enjoyed sparring with her . . . too much. But he didn’t have time for her, not on his stage and not in his life. He took the corner of the cabinet and pushed, rotating it like a top. It moved faster and faster, spinning of its own volition, until it was floating inches and then feet off the stage. The audience went silent watching.

  Lifting his hands in a dramatic gesture, he made the revolving cabinet stop. Then, all at once, the sides flapped down, so all that remained was a steel-framed box, empty and open. The audience could clearly see the curtain behind it.

  A few people in the audience gave some halfhearted applause, but most of the faces remained bored. Unimpressed.

  “Perhaps you think this is a matter of mirrors or optical tricks?” He pulled a small, snub-nosed pistol from his jacket, and the audience grew attentive, suddenly interested in what would come next.

  “Perhaps you could help me again, sir?” He gestured to his heckler to come forward, then handed him the pistol and a single bullet.

  “If you would do the honors of loading this gun?” He turned to his audience. “To guarantee that this is no trick of mirrors, that the girl has well and truly disappeared, I will fire the bullet into that target,” he said, gesturing to a large padded mat behind the empty frame of the cabinet.

  Harte found Nibsy in the audience and met the boy’s eyes. Nibsy’s expression was impassive, apparently unconcerned with the girl’s safety.

  When the man was done with the pistol, Harte took it from him, leveled his arm, and took aim. A drumroll began, low and ominous.

  “No!” a female voice called out from the audience.

  Harte didn’t react. His finger tightened, and the bullet exploded out of the gun, through the empty box, and into the padded target behind.

  Scattered applause grew, but the audience was still quiet, waiting. Just the way he liked them. It was never enough to make the volunteer disappear. The real trick was bringing her back.

  “Never fear,” he said, letting his voice carry over the crowd. “Though the fair Esta is no longer in our world, I will summon her to return. Behold—”  With another wave of his hand, the walls of the cabinet began to rise, like a flower closing, and the cabinet began spinning again, more slowly now as it sank back down to the stage floor.

  He approached it and gave it one more spin, making sure the front door was facing the audience, and then opened it with a triumphant flourish.

  The audience went completely silent, and then after a moment, laughter began to erupt.

  Harte turned to see the cabinet, empty. The girl wasn’t there.

  He cursed under his breath and tried not to look as frantic as he felt. He turned back to the audience. “Ladies and gentlemen, if you allow me to—”

  “Are you looking for me?” a now-familiar voice called.

  His skin felt suddenly hot. He could hear his own heartbeat in his ears, as his entire career flashed before his eyes. The audience shuffled, turning and craning their necks to see the source of the voice.

  The girl stood and waved. “I’m over here,” she called from one of the center rows of the theater.

  The people around her startled. She might as well have been a ghost the way she’d appeared in their midst. Their mouths hung open as she excused herself, climbing past two people who sat gaping as she moved toward the center aisle.

  At first the audience was too shocked to do anything more than stare, and a deafening
silence filled the cavernous house. Even Harte couldn’t do much more than stare. She’d managed to seat herself in the middle of a row without anyone noticing her.  As he gaped, dumbfounded at how she’d outmaneuvered him again, the applause started slowly and then grew until the audience began coming to their feet, whistling and calling for more.

  The girl was already half gone before he came to his senses and realized he needed to go after her. She blew him a kiss and gave a wave from the back of the theater before ducking through the doors to the lobby. Harte found Nibs sitting in the middle of the standing ovation. He gave Harte a smirking salute, then got up and started pushing his way through the frenzied crowd, following the girl.

  MASTER OF THE OTHERWORLD

  Esta let her feet carry her out of the theater—and far, far away from Harte Darrigan. She barely noticed that night had already fallen over the city; the icy chill in the air didn’t even touch her. She couldn’t feel anything but the shock of finding herself no longer inside the cabinet onstage but out in the audience.

  Pushing her way through the crowd gathered on the sidewalk outside the box office, she didn’t bother to apologize or slow her steps, not even when she careened into a large man helping a woman out of their carriage. She had to get away.

  She had to figure out what the hell had just happened.

  She remembered getting into the cabinet, remembered feeling the sizzling heat of his magic against her palm and knowing he’d done something to her. She remembered the wink he’d given her—the one that promised trouble—before he locked her into the wardrobe. But after that . . .

  Nothing.

  Nothing at all until she found herself watching Harte Darrigan from the audience again. Not until the audience’s laughter at seeing the cabinet empty shook her from her stupor.

  She didn’t know how she’d come to find herself in the middle of the theater—much less in the middle of the row—but she could guess. From his clear agitation when he realized he was alone on an empty stage, Esta understood that she was still supposed to have been inside that cabinet. She must have decided to leave, to use her own magic and get herself into the audience without any of them realizing. But she couldn’t remember actually doing it.