THE DROP
1904—St. Louis
The carriage rattled onward through the night, carrying Esta toward some unknown destination. On the bench across from her, sprawled with a lazy confidence, North took up too much room. He had a revolver in his hand, a clear threat that she shouldn’t try anything.
“Best not jostle that too much,” he said, when she shifted the notebook that was resting on her lap. It looked like an average-size leather-bound notebook that anyone might carry with them, but it weighed more than an ordinary book should. Whatever was between the pages was dense and heavy—and dangerous. “We don’t want it going off before you deliver it.”
His warning made her sit a little straighter. “Where are we going, anyway?”
“You’ll see,” North said.
“I think I have a right to know who I’m going to kill,” she told him, trying to affect a bored indifference. In reality, her hands were damp with nervous sweat as she tried to keep the book as still as she could while the carriage bumped along. Considering the roughness of the roads that led from the edges of town, where the brewery was, into the center of St. Louis, it had been a challenge.
“Who said anything about killing anyone?” North asked. His eyes were shadowed by the brim of his hat, but his thin mouth hitched up in the moonlight that shone through the carriage’s window.
“It’s a bomb, isn’t it?” she asked, not yet allowing herself to feel any relief.
North’s lips flattened, a thin scar at the edge of them flashing white with his annoyance. “Bombs are for Sundren. They’re messy and sloppy. Nobody’s gonna die tonight,” he told her. “Except maybe you, if that package doesn’t get to where it needs to be. And definitely your friend, back at Mother Ruth’s, if you do anything to cause a problem.”
Esta frowned, ignoring his bluster. If the Antistasi wanted her and Harte dead, they would have already tried to kill them. “If it’s not a bomb, what is it?”
“It’s a gift,” he told her. Then he turned to watch out the window, signaling the end of the conversation.
A gift? Like hell.
The woman she’d heard the others call Mother Ruth had made it clear that whatever was in the parcel was dangerous. None of the Antistasi wanted to be anywhere near it when she handed it over to Esta with the warning not to open it until she was ready to make the drop. Ruth’s instructions had been simple: Don’t leave it anywhere but the center of the building, as close to the target as she could. And don’t do anything to betray the mission, or Harte will die.
If Esta got caught? Well, that wasn’t Ruth’s problem. The people she was delivering the book to wouldn’t take kindly to an intruder. Esta would be on her own and at their mercy, but no one had told her who the target was.
“At least tell me who I’m up against,” she said, trying to draw North’s attention back to her. The open road had given way to the stacked buildings of the outskirts of town, the factories and warehouses that lined the river.
“Does it matter?” he asked with a mocking smile. “You’re the Devil’s Thief, aren’t you?”
“I like to be prepared,” she said with a shrug in her tone. “And I like to be the one who decides whether the risk to my life is really worth the cost of theirs.”
North looked at her, his odd, uneven-colored eyes piercing her unease. “Who are you to make that judgment?” he said softly. “This isn’t the first deed done in your name, and it certainly won’t be the last. Now’s not exactly the time to be getting all high and mighty about things.”
His words rattled something inside of her. He was right. The Antistasi had used her name who knew how many times before. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t been the one to perpetrate any of the attacks; a choice she had made had set all of this into motion.
“That’s what I thought.” North turned to the window, scratching at the scruff on his jawline as he watched the passing city. Eventually, the carriage rumbled to a stop and North checked the window to see where they were. “We’re here.” He pushed his hat back so he could look her dead in the eye. “Unless you’ve changed your mind?”
Esta considered the options before her. She didn’t doubt that the notebook she was carrying, whatever North said, was something dangerous. She could still say no. She could drop the notebook here, pull time around her, and run.
But then what?
Mother Ruth and the rest of the Antistasi back at the brewery still had Harte. They’d taken him away not long after he’d opened his big mouth, and Esta had no idea where they’d put him. By the time she figured it out, he might already be dead—she couldn’t hold on to time that long, especially lately.
And even if she found Harte before they hurt him, she had no idea what they’d done with Ishtar’s Key. She hadn’t asked, because she didn’t want to alert them to its importance if they hadn’t already realized. But if they had already realized what kind of power the stone had . . .
She couldn’t worry about that. For now she had a job to do. And if her choice was between Harte and the person this delivery was set for, there wasn’t really a choice. Dakari, Dolph . . . Esta had lost too many people to lose another.
But there was one other thing, a point that kept niggling at her like an itch she couldn’t reach. She knew she was being used. Esta’s name had been thrown around for nearly two years now without her ever knowing, and if Ruth had her way, the Antistasi would continue to use it. But she’d had enough of being a pawn in someone else’s game. She’d been led like a marionette on a string her entire life by Professor Lachlan. She wasn’t about to allow Ruth the same power over her now.
No, Esta had seen the mood in the building when Ruth talked, and she’d heard the fear in Frank’s voice when Ruth accused him of cowardice. The Antistasi might follow Ruth, but that didn’t mean that they liked her or trusted her. Which gave Esta an opening. But to gain their trust, she had to start by proving that she was one of them—beginning with North. Which meant that she had to go through with this.
“I’m not going to change my mind,” she told North. “Who’s my mark?”
He studied her for a second or two, as if trying to figure out whether this was just another trick. “Just remember, you’re not the only one who can pull a disappearing act. If you try anything, your friend dies.”
“I’m aware.” She gave him a bored look. “Are we going to sit here all night,” she asked when he continued to stare at her, “or are you going to tell me who this package is meant for?”
“Just making sure we’re clear,” he said. “You’re looking for Caleb Lipscomb. You can find him at number four thirty-two. It’s just down this row of warehouses and then to the right. Once you’re inside, go up to the second floor.”
Caleb Lipscomb. She’d never heard of him, but that didn’t necessarily mean much. “How will I find him?”
North’s strange eyes flashed with amusement. “You’ll know him when you see him. He likes to be in the center of things. Off you go now,” he said, unlatching the door.
Outside the carriage, the air was cooler, but it carried the scent of the river, a muddy, earthy smell layered over with the heaviness of machine oil and coal from the factories that lined its banks. Esta readjusted the parcel under her arm, making sure to keep it steady and the pages tightly closed. They’d told her that the fuse inside would activate when she pulled a loose sheet out of the center, and she didn’t need that happening before she found the person it was intended for.
Her chest felt tight. She didn’t believe North’s claim that it wasn’t a bomb, and even as she walked toward her destination, she had her doubts about whether she could go through with it. It was one thing in theory, but it was another when her feet were steadily moving her toward the moment she’d have to decide.
True, she’s been ready to kill Jack back at the station. She’d had the gun in her hands and the resolve to end him—because he’d deserved it. Because she knew that he would hurt countless people if she’d let him live. And she’d been right. From what she’d learned, Jack had been one of the proponents of the Act. He was the reason that magic was now illegal and that Mageus could be hunted openly, oppressed legally. But this felt different somehow. Esta didn’t know this Caleb Lipscomb, whoever he was. He was a faceless name, an unknown who had done nothing to her.
Still, she couldn’t see a way out of the situation, not unless she wanted the Antistasi as another enemy. And not unless she was willing to risk Harte’s life.
The building labeled 432 was a long warehouse that ran the length of a block—a factory or machine shop of some sort. A single dull yellow bulb lit the door. Everything about it felt like a trap. She looked back, considering her options, and saw that North was still watching her.
He gave a nod. Go on, the motion seemed to say, and she took the final steps into the sallow light of the bulb. Opening the door of the building as silently as she could, she stepped inside.