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“The Syndicate’s here?” Maggie asked, glancing nervously at North.
“Who do y’all think was in charge of that raid today?” Cordelia frowned like this was something they should have already known. “They’ve been gathering up people suspected of illegal magic ever since what happened in St. Louis. All the Brotherhoods have.”
“Do you two have experience with this Syndicate?” Esta asked. It was clear the Syndicate was another of the Brotherhoods, but that didn’t account for the severity of Maggie’s and North’s reaction.
“They helped run me out of Texas a couple of years back,” North said, apparently not wanting to tell the entire story. He was still looking at Maggie. “I didn’t want to worry you before, but…” His mouth pressed into a hard line before he spoke again. “I saw Jot Gunter back in Texas.”
At this news, the color drained from Maggie’s face. “You’re sure?”
North rubbed at the back of his neck. “He was with the men at the oil fields.”
They traded a meaningful glance, and Esta understood that there was some bigger story there—something that they were not saying.
“How do y’all know Jot Gunter?” Cordelia asked, her thick brows bunching. “He’s one of the Syndicate’s highest-ranking members.”
“We go way back,” North said darkly. “But I’d rather not run into him again anytime soon if I can help it.”
“Jericho, they’re definitely going to realize that my explosions today were the same as the ones I set off in Texas, and when they do…” Maggie raised her hand to cover her mouth, as though she could hold back the truth of what she’d done.
“It doesn’t matter,” Esta told them. Jot Gunter or the Syndicate or whoever was in her way—none of it mattered. She didn’t know why time had wavered around her, but the warning had been clear enough: Her time was running out. “We have to go back. Bill Pickett has the dagger, and I’m not leaving until I get it.”
A TRUTH TOO TERRIBLE
1904—Denver
Maggie hadn’t missed the way Esta had said “I” rather than “we,” and she wondered, not for the first time, if Esta would leave them as Ben had, empty-handed and without explanation. True, Esta had taken the Quellant, but Maggie had seen her in action over the past couple of weeks, and she didn’t believe that something as simple as a missing affinity would stop the Thief if she set her mind to something.
And yet… Esta didn’t look quite right. For all the confidence in her voice, she looked almost green and her hands were trembling. Maybe the emptiness of the box had shaken her badly, or maybe Esta had been shocked by the news about the Syndicate being in Denver. Whatever the case, Maggie couldn’t worry too much about Esta’s state. Not when they still didn’t have an artifact in their possession.
When Esta had told them about the dagger, Maggie had thought that maybe fate had given her a way to correct the mistakes she’d made. Maybe the necklace was gone, but with the possibility of collecting the Pharaoh’s Heart, she still had hope. Now she wasn’t so sure. The dagger hadn’t been in the box, and they were still empty-handed.
“Esta’s right,” Maggie told the others. “Bill Pickett’s the only lead we have. Even if the Syndicate is here, we need to put all of our focus into figuring out whether Pickett still has the dagger, and if he doesn’t, we need to find out if he knows where it is.”
Jericho clearly didn’t feel the same. “I don’t know, Mags—”
“We need the Pharaoh’s Heart, Jericho,” Maggie said, cutting him off before he could give her all the good reasons they shouldn’t. They’d lost everything else. They couldn’t lose this, too. Especially not with the Antistasi sharpshooter looking at them with suspicion.
Jericho didn’t respond at first, and Maggie could see in his expression that he still wasn’t sure. For a moment she worried that he might refuse.
“You promised,” she reminded him gently. “When we left St. Louis, you told me you understood how important this was. You told me I could depend on you.”
He let out a ragged, frustrated breath. “You can. You know that.”
Somehow, though, Jericho’s reluctant acceptance didn’t feel like the victory it should have been.
“I’ve never seen Pickett with anything that could be mistaken for a lost artifact,” Cordelia said.
“That doesn’t necessarily mean Pickett doesn’t have it,” Esta said. “If he’s smart, he wouldn’t have shown it off.”
“A piece that valuable? I’d expect he’d keep it somewhere safer than his tent,” Cordelia said. “Might could be that he left it back with his family in Texas.”
“I’m not going back to Texas,” Jericho said with a frown. “I just managed to get out of that state alive for the second time. I’m not interested in trying for a third.”
“Not unless we have to,” Maggie promised. Then she glanced at Esta. “The first thing we need to figure out is whether Pickett has the dagger with him here in Denver. Then we can go from there.” She turned to Cordelia. Maggie was still unsettled about Cordelia implying she hadn’t been faithful to the Antistasi’s cause, but she figured the best way to neutralize the threat Cordelia might pose was to include her. “Cordelia, you know your way around the show.… How well do you know Bill Pickett?”
“Not well enough to go asking about some priceless lost artifact,” Cordelia said, arching a single brow. “Besides, even if Pickett is sympathetic to our cause, I can’t imagine he’d tell me a thing, not with the marshals prowling around today.”
Cordelia was right. With all that had happened, and with how quickly the news had spread about the theft of the Djinni’s Star and the attack on the world’s fair, it wasn’t likely that Bill Pickett would admit that he was in possession of one of the Order’s other lost artifacts. Not willingly.
