The Devil's Thief

by Lisa Maxwell

  At hearing footsteps behind her, Esta turned to see Ruth darkening the doorway they’d just come through.

  “It seems our attack on Lipscomb struck an unexpected nerve,” Ruth said. “The Guard just raided Dutchtown, probably looking for whoever carried out the attack. One of ours brought the children here. They know Maggie has a soft spot for little ones.”

  “But why the raid?” Maggie said as she scooped the girl into her arms. “The meeting was for the SWP. The Society should have been glad to be rid of that lot.”

  “I’m not sure why they retaliated,” Ruth said, “but this is the effect.”

  “What happened to their parents?” Esta asked, adjusting the warm—maybe wet?—bundle in her arms. Definitely wet.

  “Arrested,” Ruth said. “They’ll be charged and probably found guilty, which means either jail or deportation.”

  “But they didn’t do anything,” Maggie said, rocking the girl until her cries died to whimpering.

  The one in Esta’s arms didn’t seem interested in being consoled.

  “When has that ever mattered?” Ruth asked.

  Esta looked around the room at the cheeks and red eyes of so many children. They should have been in the arms of their mothers or fathers, and she knew that they would always remember this moment, when the people who were supposed to protect them were torn away.

  She remembered the day Dolph had taken her around the tenements of the Bowery. There she’d seen children no older than these kept indoors and away from sight so their powers wouldn’t be exposed. He’d wanted to make a better life for them by destroying the Order and bringing down the Brink. He’d wanted a new future, and instead all he’d gotten was a bullet in the back. She wondered what had happened to the children he’d once protected in the two years since his death.

  One thing was clear: The Society was no better than the Order. They used their Jefferson Guard to rule the city, the same as the Order used their power. It didn’t matter that they were outside the Brink, on the far side of the Mississippi and on the edge of the West. Even away from the prison that was Manhattan, there wasn’t any freedom here, not for Mageus. Not when the very magic that ran in their veins—the magic that was an intrinsic part of who they were—was despised and feared and hunted. Nothing would change. Not until it was forced to.

  “North?” Ruth turned to him. “I want you to take some of our men and go round up the injured at the hospital.”

  “The socialists?” North asked, clearly surprised.

  “The Society’s retaliation was unexpected. I don’t trust the Guard to look after the injured. Better to have the newly woken on our side than to have them against us,” she said. Then she gave Harte and Esta appraising looks. “Take Ben with you. We’ll need to get them out before dawn, and he can help you with any who prove difficult.”

  Harte met Esta’s eyes from across the room, and she understood what he was thinking. This was exactly the type of danger he’d been worried about them getting caught up in, but standing there with an armful of squirming, screaming child, she felt even more strongly that she had to stay.

  She had seen the terrible thing that lived inside Harte, and she knew now, more than ever, that she would give up herself to keep that power from breaking free. If she didn’t make it, she needed to do whatever she could now to make a better future for him. She would help to ensure that neither the Order nor the Society could use the old magic against any Mageus ever again.

  FERRARA’S

  1902—New York

  It was late morning when Viola made her excuses and left New Brighton to head south, toward the streets of the Bowery she’d once called home. Already the sidewalks were teeming with vendors selling their carts full of wares and the shoppers who were haggling for the best price. Groups of children littered the streets, playing with whatever they could find and minding themselves, since most of their parents would be working at one of the factories or sweatshops in the neighborhood. Viola remembered those days, when she’d just arrived and the streets of the city seemed like a strange and dangerous new world. She’d learned her English on those street corners, and she’d learned how different she was as well.

  Putting those memories aside, Viola turned onto Grand Street, toward the gleaming glass windows and gilded sign of Ferrara’s. When she stepped through the swinging door, the toasted bitterness of coffee and the sweetness of anise tickled her nose as she was enveloped in the warmth of the bakery. It smelled like her mother’s kitchen at Christmas, when, even though her parents had hardly enough to pay for the roof over their heads, her mother would spend the days baking biscotti to gift to their neighbors. She’d picked this place because of the familiarity of it, because it was on her turf rather than theirs. But she’d forgotten what a powerful poison nostalgia could be. With a pang, it pulled her under and she was there again, a small girl with wild hair and a wilder heart, who had no idea how the world would try to press her small and demand things that she did not have to give.

  But she wasn’t that girl anymore. She understood too well now the dangers of the world, the hardness of hearts that learned early to hate.

  In the back of the bakery, Ruby and Theo were already waiting for her. Ruby was dressed in another frock that made her look like a rose about to bloom, but her eyes were wide as she took everything in. On the table in front of them, a plate of pastries and three small cups of espresso sat untouched.

  Viola was nearly to their table when Ruby finally saw her. Theo stood in greeting, but Viola waved him off as she slid into the seat. She was here on business, not pleasure.

  “This place is a marvel,” Ruby told Viola, giving her a stiff sort of smile that looked like she was trying too hard. “Thank you for sending the note,” she said, taking one of the sfogliatelle from the plate of pastries. “You have news?” She took a bite of the pastry as she waited for Viola’s answer.

  Viola had barely opened her mouth to get to business when her words left her at the sight of the sudden rapture on Ruby’s face as she ate the pastry. Her pink tongue darted out to catch the flakes of the delicate sfogliatella as she made a sound of pure satisfaction. And all Viola could do was watch, frozen with a strange combination of desire and hopelessness, as Ruby took another bite.

  “Well?” Ruby glanced up at Viola, and as their eyes met, Ruby’s widened just slightly and her cheeks turned a pink to outshine even the ridiculously feminine dress she was wearing.

  “I think what she means to say,” Theo interjected as he slid the plate closer to Viola, “is that you should try one, please, while you tell us your news.”

  “I know what they taste like,” Viola told him, her mouth too dry to eat anyway. She gave herself a mental shake and focused on Theo, who was easier to look at. “I can tell you what they stole from the Order,” she said, forging onward.

  Ruby set the pastry down and leaned forward. “You can?”

  Viola nodded. She still wasn’t completely sure that she should reveal everything, but giving Ruby this much would be evidence that the Order’s attempt to cover up the robbery was a lie. It would be one step closer in chipping away at their power. And it was that thought that spurred her into telling them about the Book and the five artifacts. “I don’t know what they were,” she lied, “but they were part of the Order’s power.”

  Ruby’s eyes shone. “Do you have proof?”

  Only my memories, she thought as she remembered the strange chamber, the bodies they’d found there, and Darrigan’s betrayal. “No, but I brought you some papers.” Taking the packet from the pocket of her skirts, she slid it across the table. Within the package was evidence that connected her brother to Nibsy and the Five Pointers to the Devil’s Own. “It’s not enough,” she told them. “But it’s a start.”

  She almost didn’t want to let the package go. It felt like the worst sort of betrayal of Dolph to point attention to the Devil’s Own and the Strega. But he wasn’t there anymore, she reminded herself, and if she could turn the Orde
r on Nibsy and her brother both, they could help with the work of destroying them.

  Ruby tucked the packet of papers away without so much as looking at them. “Thank you for this,” she told Viola, reaching across the table and taking her hand. Ruby’s cheeks went pink the moment that her gloved hand rested upon Viola’s bare one, and she pulled back.

  Viola glanced at Theo, and she saw him watching, his usually playful eyes serious. Which was a problem. That one, he looked like a puppy, but he saw too much, and Viola had been around long enough to know that she couldn’t underestimate him.

  “I think Paul has more,” she told them. “There’s something he’s planning, something big that he keeps sending people out of the city for. I think it’s connected to the Order and the items that were stolen.” She frowned. Family or not, she couldn’t imagine allowing her brother to ever have access to the power that the Order once had.

  At the front of the bakery someone had come in and was talking in excited tones, loudly enough that it drew Theo’s attention.

  Ruby, realizing that he was listening, put down her pastry. “What is it?” she asked. “What are they saying?”

  “Something about a fire,” Viola said, translating the Italian for them. “One of the engine companies seems to be burning.”

  “An engine company?” Theo asked, frowning. “That’s odd.”

  Viola listened again, following the conversation and understanding the fear in the voices. “Not so odd,” she told them. “Do you know how many buildings have burned in the last week alone, all while the firefighters do nothing at all?”

  “Why wouldn’t they stop the flames?” Ruby asked, frowning at her.

  “The Order has a point to make,” Viola said with a shrug. She hadn’t wanted to touch the offered food, because she didn’t need them to buy her a thing, but Ruby still had a dusting of sugar at the corner of her mouth and Viola had to do something to distract herself. So she took the tazza of espresso sitting on the table in front of her and downed it in a single swallow, letting the hot bitterness of it steel her against her own stupidity.

  “I don’t understand,” Theo said.

  “Tammany controls most of the police and fire departments in this part of town,” Viola explained. “The Order has been using Tammany’s influence in the Bowery for revenge against what they lost for almost two weeks now.”

  “They’re looking for the artifacts?” Ruby asked.

  “And sending a message.” Viola frowned as she listened to the man’s voice rise in volume.

  “Now what’s he saying?” Ruby asked, leaning forward.

  Viola wanted to reach across the table and brush the sugar from the corner of the other girl’s mouth, but she wrapped her fingers in her skirts and held herself back instead. “It seems that things are turning,” Viola said. Ruby was watching her again with those eyes the color of the ocean. They would pull her under if she wasn’t careful.

  “What do you mean?”

  She didn’t need to tell them any more. They didn’t have to know. But there was something about the way Ruby was looking at her, so earnestly—as though maybe she saw Viola as a friend, as an equal—and Viola spoke before she could stop herself. “According to those men, water isn’t even touching the fire,” she told them. “The flames are being fed by magic.”

  THE NEWLY WOKEN

  1904—St. Louis

  North didn’t really care what Maggie said about giving the new guy a chance, and he didn’t care that the Thief had managed to deliver the device like she was supposed to. He’d found them too late to hear much of what they’d been talking about. But he still didn’t trust either one of them, even if Ruth was starting to. Which was why he found himself sitting next to the one who called himself Ben as they drove the brewery’s wagon toward the hospital to collect their new brothers-in-arms before the Guard could get to them. After the rounding up of the Mageus over in Dutchtown, Mother Ruth wasn’t taking any chances. Considering that Ben looked like a born liar, North wasn’t taking any chances either.

  The hospital was on the north end of town, far from the excitement of the Exposition. It was still the dead of night, so they didn’t pass more than one or two other travelers on the road. Rescuing the newly awoken should be an easy enough job, considering that they had one of their own on the inside working as a night charge.

  He gave the horses another gentle flick of the reins to urge them on. Easy or not, the faster it was over with, the better. Next to him, Ben was silent, but North could feel the weight of his stare as he drove. After a couple of miles, he’d had about enough.

  “You have a problem?” he asked, glaring at Ben. “Something you want to say?”

  At first North didn’t think he would answer, but then he spoke.

  “Your tattoo . . . ,” Ben said, and there was something funny about his voice.

  North had heard enough about the mark he chose to wear on his arm in the years since he’d gotten it, which was why he usually kept the tattoo covered. But he hadn’t bothered to button the sleeves of the shirt he’d tossed on when he’d been woken about the kids, and as he’d driven the horses, his sleeves had fallen back to reveal the dark circle that ringed his left wrist.

  “What about it?” North asked, lifting his chin and daring him to say something.

  “I knew someone who had a tattoo something like that,” Ben said.

  “I doubt that.” He rotated his wrist to reveal the bracelet of ink formed by a skeletal snake eating its own tail. “Not unless he was Antistasi.”

  “It was something like that,” Ben said, frowning down at it. “Is that what the symbol is—the mark of the Antistasi?”

  “This symbol?” North said. “It’s an ouroboros, which goes back way before the Antistasi. But, yeah, the Antistasi adopted it, probably sometime during the Disenchantment. They used it as a sign so they could identify each other,” he said, pulling his sleeve back down. This time he fastened the cuff to hide the mark from view.

  “You had to accept it, then, to be part of Ruth’s organization?” Ben asked. North could tell he was trying to keep his tone light, but he was failing miserably.

  “I didn’t have to do anything,” North said. He’d had the tattoo since he was sixteen, a promise to himself and to the father he’d lost. It was sheer luck that he’d run into Mother Ruth and her people not long after that, and even better luck that she’d taken him in. “Nobody is forced to take the sign. It’s not the Middle Ages anymore.”

  “But you did take it.”

  “Because I liked what it stood for,” North explained, answering the implied question. “The snake eating its own tail is an ancient symbol for eternity. Infinity.” Rebirth. He’d been a different person before, and the serpent on his wrist reminded him he’d be a different person yet again someday.

  “The serpent separates the world from the chaos and disorder it was formed from,” Ben said, as if he knew something about it. “Life and death, two sides to the same coin, as my friend used to say. You can’t have one without the other.”

  North frowned, not sure what to make of Ben’s statement. He’d never thought of it like that, and he wasn’t sure he cared to. “The Antistasi use it because it represents magic itself. Because everything in the world—the sun and the stars and even time itself—it all begins and ends with magic.”

  “And if magic ends,” Ben said, his voice low and solemn, “so does the world.”

  North huffed out his disagreement. “Magic can’t end,” he said. “That’s what the symbol shows. Magic has no beginning and no end. Since the Disenchantment, they’ve tried to snuff us out and kill us off, but they haven’t been able to. We learn and bend, and then we change.”

  “You believe that?” Ben asked, looking at North with curious eyes.

  “You don’t?” North tossed back.

  But Ben didn’t answer, and it was too late anyway, because they’d arrived.

  North pulled the wagon around back, just like they’d agreed
to, and gave the signal—a couple of sharp whistles that were returned in kind. A few minutes later the back gates of the hospital opened and their work started in truth.

  There were about a dozen people to move. One had his hands wrapped in gauze, and they all had a sleepy, docile quality to them.

  “What’s wrong with them?” Ben asked. “Did the serum do this?”

  North shook his head. “This isn’t the serum. The hospital doped them up to make sure they can’t do anything. Morphine, probably.” He understood why the nurses had drugged them. The newly made Mageus had caused too many problems because they didn’t know how to control their powers.

  He’d understood what Ruth’s goal was in giving these people magic, but seeing it up close like this—it wasn’t what he’d expected. Ruth had talked about freeing something inside these people, but they didn’t look free. They looked worn and tired and like they’d been dragged through the mud and back. And they looked scared.

  The last one out was a young woman who couldn’t have been more than eighteen. Her blond hair hung limp around her face, and the smattering of freckles across her nose gave her the look of someone much younger. Like the rest, she had a stunned look to her, but unlike the others, she stopped to speak to North.

  “Who are you?” she asked. “Where are you taking us?”

  “We’re friends,” North assured her. “And we’re here to take you somewhere safe.”

  She frowned at him, her eyes still glassy from the drug. “The hospital isn’t safe?”

  North sighed, feeling every minute of the sleep he was missing. He didn’t have time to explain the reality of the girl’s new world to her. “What’s your name?” he asked instead.

  “Greta,” the girl said, frowning sleepily at him.

  “Do you know what’s happening to you, Greta?”

  She shook her head. Her eyes shone with unshed tears. “I don’t mean to do it, but I can’t stop it. . . .”