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“Go.” His mouth was drawn, pained, but his words made it clear he knew she was there. That he was still there. “She wants to destroy you.”
“I don’t have any plans to die today, Harte.” She wanted to move closer and reassure him, but the air around him was charged and unsettled. “And you’d better not, either.”
The City Hall subway station had been closed for nearly forty years. They’d shut it down in the forties, when the subway cars had grown too long and too large to fit into the curved station without creating an unsafe gap between the train and the curve of the platform. It had been empty and abandoned since then, and it wasn’t exactly legal to visit it, so there was no one around. No vagrants sleeping in the corners, no junkies dealing on the stairwell, and no graffiti marring the shining ceramic tiles on the walls. Trapped in time, the station platform was silent and lonely. And almost clean. In short, it was exactly what they needed.
“This is where the very first subway train ever departed,” she told him, speaking out loud because she had to prove to herself that her voice wouldn’t shake.
Professor Lachlan had shown her this secret place when she was a girl. It had been a crisp fall day, and they’d ridden the 6 until the end of the line. They’d remained on the train as it made the loop in the station to turn around and head north, and she’d peered through the scratched windows to see this place, dimly lit but still shining like new. He’d wanted her to know everything about the city. Every nook and every secret.
An unpleasant thought occurred to her: Could he have known she would need this place one day?
She wasn’t sure how to feel about that—the idea that even with the tangled knot of time, so much of her training could have been intended to lead her there, right where Professor Lachlan wanted her. Was it possible that despite everything, despite all they’d changed and all she’d thought they’d been able to do to avoid his grasp, he had known all along that this was where she would end up? How was she ever supposed to beat him if, in both the past and the future, he could still move her around like a pawn on a board? Despite the passing of time—despite the changing of history?
Harte had curled tightly into a ball, trying to protect himself against Seshat’s fury and anger.
Esta looked around, considering her options—their options. She wasn’t sure how long Harte could last like this, and without the Quellant… They needed the missing part of the Book. She needed to stop Seshat from destroying Harte.
“I have to get the key,” she said, more to herself than to Harte. But this time he seemed to hear her.
“Esta, no.” When he opened his eyes, he looked almost lucid… almost like himself. “You know Nibsy’s waiting for you. He wants you to come for it, and I can’t—” A groan tore from his throat that made her ache.
Without hesitating, she pulled time still, and the world went silent. “You’re right, Harte,” she said softly, her throat tight with emotion. “You can’t.”
The station had already been quiet, but now the far-off sounds of trains traveling along the tracks and the creaking of the pipes drained away into complete silence.
Esta took one last look at Harte and hoped that Seshat’s powers couldn’t harm him while he was held in the grip of her affinity’s net. Or at least she hoped he wouldn’t be aware and wouldn’t remember the minutes that passed until she returned. She wished she could touch him just once before she left him, but she didn’t dare. She couldn’t risk it.
She’d been a fool for trusting Seshat to keep her word.
Esta had killed a man to keep her promise. She’d destroyed Thoth, eliminated the threat he posed, and this was how the bitch of a goddess repaid her? By driving Harte to nearly end everything by throwing himself from the train?
No. Esta wasn’t going to sit there and hope that Seshat came to her senses. She wouldn’t allow Seshat to destroy Harte or to hurt anyone or anything else. Not ever again. She’d get the key to Newton’s cipher from Professor Lachlan, and then she would take care of Seshat herself. Even if it was the last thing she did.
Esta took the Book from the satchel and considered her options. She might be able to steal time, but she couldn’t put off the inevitable. She was going back to Orchard Street.
Considering her options, Esta placed the Book on the floor and gave it a small push, sliding it closer to Harte. She lifted the satchel from her shoulder and slid it toward him as well. It could be a mistake to leave the Book and the artifacts, but it would be a worse mistake to let them fall into Nibsy’s hands. The last thing she wanted to do was deliver the Ars Arcana directly to him. Then she took one more look at Harte—his too-sharp cheekbones, his rumpled dark hair. But when she reached his eyes, she saw the hold Seshat had on him.
She hated the blackness there, the dark power already overwhelming him. And she would do anything to destroy it. As she turned away and headed toward the tunnel that led up to the emergency exit, she vowed she’d see his eyes flash storm-gray at her once more.
UNEXPECTED ANSWERS
1902—The Bowery
Jianyu and Viola had barely made it around the corner before the police wagon tore down the street they had just been on. Hanging from its sides were uniformed men, off to round up whatever the disturbance in the distance happened to be.
Jianyu exchanged a look with Viola, and in silent agreement, they began to move faster.
It was not only Josef Salzer’s unconscious body that weighed on Jianyu as they worked to get the boy to safety. Viola’s words worried him as well.
What if there are no answers?
It had been months since that day on the bridge when Harte and Esta had left him to defend the ring and hold everything together. Months of chaos. Months of failure. He had lost the Delphi’s Tear and any chance to reclaim a place in the Devil’s Own along with it. And with each day that passed, he could not help but wonder what would become of them if Harte and Esta never returned. But Jianyu forced himself to push aside his worries for the future. They would still be there once Josef was safely in his family’s keeping.
Finally they arrived at the side street where Cela waited with the wagon they had borrowed from Mr. Fortune and his newspaper the New York Age.
Cela was in the driver’s perch behind a single mangy-looking nag. She was dressed in the rough-spun clothes of a common working man, trousers and a jacket that she had tailored to hide her true form. A man’s broad-brimmed hat was pulled down low over her brow, shielding her face, but Jianyu did not miss the tightness of her fingers around the worn leather of the reins.
When they neared, he let out a low, soft whistle, the signal that they had arrived.
