THE DJINNI’S STAR
1904—St. Louis
The oarsman was still talking, but all Esta could think about was how close Harte was and how he was pretending to ignore her.
His silence grated on her. She hadn’t slept all night because she’d been thinking about what had happened between them. He hadn’t returned until it was almost morning, and by then she’d been too angry and frustrated—with him and with herself—to talk, so she’d turned away and pretended to be asleep.
But even once they’d gotten the message from Julien to meet at the Exposition, Harte had been sullen and silent. Since she wasn’t the one who had stormed off, she wasn’t about to be the first to offer an olive branch.
She could almost still feel him on her lips. She would probably always remember the weight of his body as it pressed her into the mattress. How could he sit there acting as though nothing had happened between them?
Unless it really was only the power of the Book that wanted her and not Harte. Which meant that she’d made a fool of herself over him for no reason at all.
Esta shoved those thoughts aside and turned farther away from Harte, pretending to concentrate on the ride. Each room the boat passed through was elaborately decorated to simulate some scene in ancient Egypt—or at least what people in the early twentieth century imagined ancient Egypt might look like—but Esta barely saw them. Her focus was constantly being drawn back to Harte—the stiff set of his spine and the way he smelled clean, like soap and linen, despite the heat of the day.
“Finally, we come to the House of Books,” the oarsman said as they came to a chamber lined with shelves, each filled with different tablets and piles of rolled parchments. “Here the god Thoth, master of the Library of Life, invented the art of writing and gave it to the people.”
Harte had held himself away from her, still and watchful for the entire ride, but when the oarsman spoke about Thoth, something changed. It felt like the moment before it rains, when the air has a specific quality that feels like a storm is coming. When Esta glanced over at Harte, he had the strangest look on his face.
“Is that what they say?” Harte asked, his words dripping with a scorn that seemed out of proportion to the moment. “Thoth, the master of the Library?” A dark laugh bubbled up from his chest.
He was acting so strangely that Esta forgot her irritation for a moment. “Harte?” She reached out to touch him, and the moment their skin met, he whipped his head around to face her. His hand snaked up to latch on to her wrist, and she felt a burst of heat that had nothing to do with Harte’s magic. Still, she couldn’t pull away, not without causing the boat to rock or tip.
“Thoth didn’t invent anything,” Harte told her. But his voice sounded off, and his eyes were all wrong. Like the night before, he was looking at her without seeing her, but now his pupils were enormous, dilated enough to obscure the color of his irises. Something peered out from within him, a darkness that reminded her of the inky blackness that had seeped into her vision at the train station and the hotel.
“Harte,” she said softly, trying to call him back to himself. “What are you talking about?”
“Thoth was nothing but a thief.” Harte practically spit the word with disgust. “He took knowledge that wasn’t his, and when that didn’t satisfy him, he took more.” Again came that strange, deep, mirthless laugh, which had Julien sending a questioning look in Esta’s direction.
She shook her head just slightly, to indicate that she didn’t know what Harte was up to. “Shhh,” she hissed, when his laughter didn’t stop.
Before Esta could say anything more, the oarsman started up again, explaining how the ancients believed that whatever was written in the library in Cairo would be transcribed and made real in the world of the gods. “Thoth was one of the ancient civilization’s most important gods. He gave the world not only writing, but science and magic,” the oarsman continued. “He carved order from the chaos of the cosmos through the creation of the written word, and through the inscription of spells, he eliminated the wild danger of magic and made its power safe.”
“Lies,” Harte muttered. “All lies . . .”
“What is wrong with you?” Esta whispered, jabbing at him with her elbow.
Harte blinked. “What?” Frowning, he pulled back from her. His eyes were still wrong, but she could see the gray halo around the black returning. Maybe he’d been wrong to kiss her the night before. Maybe she’d been wrong in wanting him to. But looking at his strange, half-dazed expression, some of her anger cooled.
The oarsman was still going on and on with his sonorous narration. “Because he was a benevolent god, Thoth contained the cosmic dangers of that chaos within a book. He buried the Book of Thoth in the Nile, protected by serpents, and those who attempted to retrieve it paid a steep price, for the knowledge of the gods was never meant for mere mortals.”
The Book of Thoth? Esta glanced at Harte. Whatever had come over him a moment before seemed to have passed. He was still tense, but he was listening to the oarsman now. Or if he wasn’t, he was focused on something, since his expression was one of concentration rather than disgust.
They passed out of the library chamber and made their way into a brilliantly blue room that contained a large diorama. On a hill far off in the distance stood a white temple, shining under an artificial sun.
“As time passed and civilizations transformed into new empires,” the oarsman explained, “Thoth became known as Hermes, but he continued in his quest for knowledge and his commitment to man. Myth tells us he stole knowledge from Olympus for humans, and so he became the patron of thieves. Later, he would become Hermes Trismegistus, inventor of the Emerald Tablets, which held the secrets of the philosopher’s stone, the very foundation of alchemy.
“Through the secrets of the Emerald Tablets, the power to transform the very essence of the world was revealed to man,” the oarsman told them as he navigated past what was obviously supposed to be Mount Olympus. “Through the careful study of the hermetical arts, we have learned to control the power that once posed a danger. And through alchemy and the occult arts, those who perfect themselves, like the Veiled Prophet himself, can stand against the wild dangers of uncontrolled power.”
They glided into the darkness of another tunnel in silence, and on the other side, they found the end of the ride.
“And now,” the oarsman said, “if you’ll proceed along the Path of Righteousness to the Temple of Khorassan, the Veiled Prophet offers a view of one of his most prized treasures, a collar forged in the ancient world that contains a stone rumored to have been created by Thoth himself.”
The hairs on the back of Esta’s neck rose at his words. From the look on Harte’s face, he’d shaken off whatever had happened back in the House of Books. But his expression didn’t hold the same anticipation she felt. His eyes were still glassy and distant, his jaw was tight, and there was a sheen of sweat on his temples. It was like he hadn’t even heard the oarsman.
The path was painted to look like it was paved in silver, but it was as fake as everything else on the Pike. As they walked along it with the other, completely oblivious tourists, the music changed to a softly driving melody that sounded vaguely Eastern. The path emptied into a smaller chamber that was already filled with people. In the center of the room, blocked from view, a glass case was illuminated from above.
Esta didn’t need to see the case to know that it would contain the Djinni’s Star. She could feel it calling to her, just as it had called to her in a posh Upper East Side jewelry store not long after the turn of the millennium—the last time she stole it.
If she could just slow time, perhaps she’d be able to take it here and now, but the closer she got to the case in the center of the room, the more she knew that using her affinity would be impossible. It wasn’t only that they’d walked past a pair of Jefferson Guards to enter the chamber but also that there was something sickly sweet scenting the air.
“Opium,” Harte whispered to her, his expression still distant, but more serious now as well.
“It’s just a bit of fragrance,” Julien told him, brushing aside Harte’s concerns. “They wanted to give the whole sensory experience.”
But Esta didn’t doubt that Harte was right. She’d smelled that scent before and had experienced the numbing effects of the drug as it took her ability to pull time slow when she’d been captured at the Haymarket, back when she’d first arrived in Old New York. Even now her magic felt dulled, softened by the drug. It wasn’t enough to harm anyone, but it was enough to make an affinity weaker.
Soon the three of them were standing in front of the glass case, and there, laid against midnight velvet, was the Djinni’s Star. Set into the platinum collar, the stone was polished to a brilliant shine, and within its depths, it looked as though it contained galaxies.
“I hope you can see how impossible getting your necklace back is going to be,” Julien said, leaning in close so no one else would hear. “The Streets of Cairo is the Veiled Prophet Society’s offering at the fair, and that necklace is the centerpiece. They’re never going to sell it back to you.”
They hadn’t exactly been planning to pay for it.
“Then I suppose we’ll have to take it,” Esta said with a shrug.
“Take it?” Julien’s mouth fell open. He looked to Harte, who was staring at the stone with a thoughtful expression. “From the Society? You’re completely mad.”
“No,” she whispered, giving Julien a smug smile. “I’m a thief.”