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 Order 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.
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.”