ONLY EMPTINESS
1904—St. Louis
Even as she ran, her lungs burning and her heart pumping, Esta could feel the heat from the power of the Book creeping along her skin where her hand was clasped in Harte’s. It felt as though it were testing her, a snakelike thing slithering alongside her own power, licking at her to probe for a weakness in her armor, for a way in. It was so much worse than back at the train station in New Jersey. Stronger. More dangerous—and also more enticing in a way it hadn’t been before.
But her mind was too full with the crushing disappointment of not getting the Djinni’s Star to really be tempted. The necklace wasn’t there. It was a trap. Which meant that someone knew they wanted it. Someone knew they would try to steal it. And if the Guard caught them now, they might never have another chance to find it.
Esta refused to let that happen.
Together, she and Harte ran past the transportation building and then cut deeper into the fair, where the paths were narrower and the landscaping provided more cover. They dodged a cluster of families watching a puppet show and then weaved through a group of young men who were taking in the sights. All the while, the Guard was gaining on them, but when she heard hoofbeats, she knew that they couldn’t outrun a horse.
Harte glanced back over his shoulder. “We need to get out of here,” he told her. “You need to get us out of here. We need time.”
He was right, but she was still reeling from a few minutes before when she’d gotten them out of the chamber. The darkness had been so immediate, so strong when she’d pulled the seconds apart to stop the gate from closing.
“I’ll control it,” he told her as though he understood her hesitation. “You have to—”
The riders were gaining on them. She could practically feel the thunderous pace of the horses telescoping each hoofbeat through the ground beneath her feet, like the earth had a heartbeat all its own. They rounded a bend and past the clock made of flowers that was the size of a carriage before they headed toward a smaller lagoon, but the horses were gaining on them. Their hoofbeats were like thunder, and she could practically smell the sweat of horseflesh and angry human.
“Now, Esta . . . Now!”
Never slowing, she clenched her jaw and found the spaces between the seconds, pushing her magic into them, pulling them apart so that the noise of the fair died away. They didn’t stop running as the birds in the trees went silent and everyone around them went still, suspended in the moment. She glanced over her shoulder to find the horses frozen in an impossible tableau, like the statues that dotted the fairgrounds. Their mouths were open, pulled back violently by the bits between their teeth, and their manes looked like fingertips grasping at the air. And above the whole scene, a darkness was seeping into the world like a trail of black ink splattered across the page of reality, following them.
Following her.
The power sliding against her skin went hot as a brand, and the darkness lurched, growing until it blotted out everything. For a moment there was only the darkness, only emptiness, and at the sight of it—the feel of it—she ripped her hand from Harte’s. The world slammed back into motion without warning, and the darkness that had threatened to obliterate everything just a second before faded, like a fog burned off by the sun.
“Esta?” Harte was reaching back for her, but his eyes lifted to something behind her, and from the fear in his expression, she felt suddenly wary.
She turned back, expecting to see the Guard, but instead she saw madness. A deep chasm had opened in the ground, like an enormous sinkhole. It almost looked as though the path they’d just come down had been ripped in two. The horses stopped short at the gaping wound in the earth, tossing the riders from their backs.
Esta let out a strangled sound and her feet started to slow, but Harte took her hand again and tugged her onward. She ran blindly, until she realized they’d stopped because they’d made it to the wall of the fair, where the exit she’d unlocked earlier waited. Her mind raced with the implications of what had just happened. It was the Book—there was no question of that. When Harte touched her, she could feel it as clear and true as she could feel the warmth of his skin. But what was it doing to her? To her affinity? The train and the elevator at the hotel, and now this gaping hole she’d—they’d—somehow created here at the fair . . . Her affinity was for time, not for the inert, so why was the Book having such an effect?
She was dazed from the reality of what had happened as she stumbled through the doorway, so she didn’t see the people waiting on the other side until it was too late. Harte came through a moment later, and at the sight of them, his eyes met hers, and she thought she saw the colors flash in them.
The cowboy from before stepped out of the shadow of a waiting wagon and pushed his broad-brimmed hat back a bit as he came toward them. He had a gun in one hand, and the click of its hammer was clear as the peal of a bell, even over the distant noise of the fair.
Together Esta and Harte lifted their hands in surrender. If it had just been her, she could have pulled time still and ran, but Harte and the number of their opponents complicated things.
“Well, well . . . We meet at last,” the cowboy said with a self-satisfied expression. “The Devil’s Thief, in the flesh.”
He knew. “Who are you?” Esta asked, lifting her chin as though she had cornered them and not the other way around.
“You can think of us as the cavalry,” the cowboy said, touching the brim of his hat. “Unless you’d rather take your chances with the Guard.”
Esta exchanged a silent, questioning look with Harte, but he only gave a small shake of his head.
“What do you want with us?” Harte asked.
“Me? I personally don’t want anything at all,” the cowboy said. “But there’s someone who does want to make your acquaintance, and it’s my job to make that happen. We can do this the easy way or the hard way, but either way, it’s gonna happen. So what will it be?”
“You’re not exactly giving us much of a choice,” Harte said.
“There’s always a choice to make,” the cowboy drawled. “There’s always a side to take. At the moment we’re taking yours.” He shrugged. “We could have just as easily not have. Give us a reason, and we’re liable to change our mind.”
Esta glanced at Harte, whose expression had gone flinty, but whose skin still had an unhealthy-looking pallor from whatever had happened in the Nile. Behind them the noise of the fair was growing closer. They had to get out of there. Now.
When she looked back to the cowboy, she straightened her spine and cocked her head to one side, making a show of confidence. “I suppose we could use a ride if you’re offering.”
“That’s what I thought.” The cowboy’s mouth twitched as he lowered the gun and stepped aside to open the back of the wagon. As she approached to climb in, he held out a limp burlap sack. “I’m sure you’ll understand that we need to take certain precautions?”
“I thought you were taking our side,” Harte challenged. “We’re not a threat to you.”
“With all due respect, I have a hole in my pocket from one of your smoke devices that says otherwise,” the cowboy told him. “If you’re not a threat, then you shouldn’t mind proving it.”
They were wasting time. Without waiting for Harte’s reply, Esta took the sack from the cowboy and shot Harte a determined look before she put it over her own head. A moment later her hands were being secured, and she felt herself being lifted as strong hands tossed her into the wagon. Not long after she heard Harte land next to her—he gave a small groan as the air went out of him—and then the door slammed shut.
The wagon lurched, and they were moving.
“Are you okay?” Harte asked, the hood over his head muffling his voice. She could hear him moving, probably already maneuvering his wrists and working at the ropes like this situation wasn’t anything more than one of his magic tricks.
“I think so,” she said, relieved that he’d made the choice to follow her without a fight.
“I’ll be out of this in a second,” Harte told her as the wagon lurched around a bend. “I can’t imagine what you were thinking.”
“I was thinking we needed a quick getaway, and they were offering. They’re Antistasi,” she added, as though that wasn’t painfully obvious.
“Clearly. And they knew who you were,” he said, his voice a combination of frustration and smugness.
“I know. I figured we can use that to our advantage,” she said, hoping that she was right.
“They’ve certainly used you enough,” he muttered. She could hear Harte still struggling against his own restraints. “Almost got it . . .”
Suddenly she heard the pop and the hiss of something close by.
“What was that?” Harte asked just as she began to smell something musty and sweet.
Esta didn’t even have time to answer him before everything went dark.