Thieves' Quarry (The Thieftaker Chronicles) (7 page)

“Of course,
Senhora.
Forgive me.” Ethan heard little contrition in the man’s voice. “But you and I have more urgent business. We both stand to lose a good deal if the man we seek escapes us. That is where we should concentrate our energies.”

“Agreed,” Sephira said. “But if you’ve lost him—”

“I do not believe we have. You say that your information is correct and that he was on one of the ships. I take you at your word. In which case, I expect that he remains out there on the water even now, and will wait until the soldiers disembark before making his attempt.”

“You expect so, but you don’t know it for certain.”

“I know him,” Spectacles said. “He is not always the smartest of men, but he is cautious. Waiting is the safest way, and so he will wait.”

“There are hundreds of men on those ships,” Sephira said.

“Yes. You see my point.”

“He can hide among them, and escape when he’s ready.”

“Exactly. So rather than watching the ships, we should be looking for the items he has hidden. He will go to them eventually. He will not leave Boston without them. So if we can find them, we will find him.”

“But we’ve been through this,” Sephira said. “We don’t know where to look and we don’t know who else might be able to tell us. We have nothing.”

“I cannot help you in that regard. I know him. I do not know this city.”

“Right. So you should continue to watch the ships, and we will continue to search the city, just as I told you two days ago.”

Spectacles didn’t respond right away. Ethan thought he heard footsteps, and when next the man spoke, his voice seemed to come from right beside the window.

“Very well,
Senhora.
We will return to the waterfront.”

“Good. First though, I still want to know what your friend here was going to say.”

Another pause.

“I assure you, it was nothing. I felt a spell just a short time ago, as I told you. But I felt another pulse of conjuring power as well.”

Ethan leaned closer to the window, thinking that perhaps the man might reveal something about the powerful casting he had felt early that morning. He should have known better.

“When?” Sephira asked.

“Last night. Afton and I were in a tavern at the other end of your city, and I felt a spell, right there in the room.”

“What tavern?” Sephira demanded, biting off the words.

“I believe it was called the Dowsing Rod.”

“The Dowser,” Sephira said, her voice low. “You idiots! That’s Kaille’s tavern!”

“He owns it?”

“No, his woman does. But he’s there all the time. That was his witchery you felt. Damn it!” A pause, and then she asked, “Did you see him?”

“I would not know him if I had.”

“Well, he saw you. I’m sure of it. You felt witchcraft just a short while ago?”

“I have been telling you so.”

“Damn it!” she said again. “Nigel! Nap! Get in here!”

Boots scraped on the stone outside the entrance to the house, and the door opened.

Ethan had heard enough. Sephira was too smart not to put it all together. He hurried back across Summer Street and into the pasture. His conjuring still kept Sephira and the others—even Spectacles—from being able to see him, but he didn’t think he could rely on the spell for much longer.

He hadn’t gone far when Sephira’s voice reached him again. “… Him found!”

Ethan chanced a quick glance over his shoulder. Sephira stood at the entrance of her home, hands on her hips. Nigel, Nap, Gordon, Afton, and two other men had fanned out through her yard and the street in front of her house. Nap and Nigel carried pistols; the others held knives.

But Ethan was most interested in Spectacles. He stood with Sephira, but he had drawn his blade as well, and had it poised over his arm, looking like he was trying to decide what spell to cast. He would probably go with a finding spell first, followed by an attack of some sort. That was what Ethan would have done had he been in the other man’s position.

Ethan had little choice. He couldn’t make himself invisible to a finding spell—that level of craft was beyond him. Which meant that he needed to protect himself. Pulling his own knife from his belt, and still striding across the pasture, he cut his arm and whispered, “
Teqimen ex cruore evocatum.
” Warding, conjured from blood.

The ground pulsed, as he had known it would. Uncle Reg appeared beside him, ethereal in the bright sunlight. He had expected that, too. The thrum of the casting, and the shimmering appearance of Uncle Reg, would allow a conjurer to find him, even if he wasn’t visible to the naked eye. So he wasn’t at all surprised when he heard Spectacles—Mariz—shout, “There!”

The report of a pistol echoed across the pasture, and a bullet whistled overhead, a wild, blind shot.

Sephira shouted something that Ethan couldn’t hear. She sounded angry, though whether because the shot had been fired or because it had missed, Ethan couldn’t be sure.

He guessed that Nap had fired, although he didn’t look back to make certain. Nigel would know better than to make the attempt. Sephira’s toughs still couldn’t see him, and Uncle Reg was invisible to anyone who wasn’t a conjurer.

But an instant later, he felt power vibrate again in the ground, and he braced himself for Mariz’s assault. It reached him in mere seconds, like a sudden wave rolling over calm waters. A powerful spell, though one he didn’t recognize. It crashed into his legs, causing him to stumble momentarily. But his warding held; he felt the wave of power breaking, dissipating, retreating. Ethan kept his balance, and ran on.

Another conjuring rumbled through the earth. Ethan felt the spell approaching, and once more he tensed, wondering what Mariz had thrown at him this time. It caught up with him just a second or two later and fell over him like a cold mist. Once more he heard cries from behind him, not just from Spectacles, but from all of Sephira’s men.

Looking down at his body and limbs, Ethan realized that Mariz had found a way to overcome his concealment spell. Or rather, to outwit it. It looked like someone had poured tar over him. In the time it took him to take but a single stride, he had gone from being invisible to the men searching for him to standing out like a red-coated British soldier in a crowd of clergymen.

Ethan spat a curse and tried to run faster, despite the agony in his bad leg. He dodged to the right and headed for a pair of country estates. Another shot rang out, but even the newest pistols of the day were too unreliable over great distances. Again the bullet soared past harmlessly.

By now though, Nap would have had enough time to reload, and the men could track him. Ethan still held his knife and he cut himself once more without slowing. He hesitated, wondering what spell might remove Mariz’s conjuring.

“
Purqa, ex cruore evocatum.
” Clean, conjured from blood. Power made the ground beneath his feet vibrate, but nothing else happened. He was still covered with whatever it was Mariz had thrown at him, an ebon figure amid the pale grasses.

He cut himself again. “
Aufer carmen ex cruore evocatum.
” Remove spell, conjured from blood.

It was a more powerful spell. It hummed in the ground and in the marble of the homes he had reached. Ethan knew immediately that it had worked. Too well, in fact.

He no longer looked like he was covered in pitch, but he also could feel that he had removed his own concealment spell. Anyone could see him.

Dashing between the estates, Ethan turned on to Long Lane and made his way back toward Milk Street.

At that next corner, though, instead of turning east toward Henry’s cooperage, he went straight, again slipping between two houses into a small lot behind them. He soon reached Water Street. Here he turned west before heading north again onto Pudding Lane, where Diver lived. He was in the heart of Cornhill now, on a street crowded with working men, and people making their way from storefront to storefront. He slowed.

His leg screamed, and his breath came in great gasps, but he seemed to have lost Nigel and the others, at least for the moment. He had cast enough spells that Spectacles wouldn’t have much trouble locating him again; the man might not even have to resort to a finding spell.

Ethan had feared this day for years. Sephira Pryce had long been a formidable rival. Ruthless and clever, as deadly with her bare hands as she was with a blade or gun, she commanded a small army of men and had managed to ally herself with some of Boston’s most powerful leaders. Ethan had but one weapon at his disposal that she couldn’t match: spellmaking. The threat of a conjuring had stayed her hand in countless confrontations that might otherwise have ended in his death. And his ability to cast spells had allowed him to overcome her other advantages as they raced each other to find one stolen treasure or another. For so long, solely by dint of Ethan’s skills as a conjurer, they had battled each other to a stalemate.

But now she had access to the same powers he did. With Mariz working for her, she might well be too strong for him.

Ethan didn’t have much time to ponder this. The resonant pulse of another spell forced him into motion once more. He knew right away that this was a finding spell, and that it came from some distance, probably from back in d’Acosta’s Pasture. Still, once Spectacles found him again, it wouldn’t take Sephira’s men long to surround him.

He managed a few steps before the conjuring reached him, flowing through the cobblestones beneath his feet and twining about his legs like a vine climbing a tree. The casting lingered on him for a few seconds before fading, but Ethan had cast finding spells of his own and so knew that this was more than enough. Mariz had figured out where he was.

Ethan still held his knife, but here in the middle of a lane, he couldn’t cut himself and conjure, at least not without drawing far more attention to himself than he wanted. Instead, he bit down on the inside of his cheek, as he had the previous night in the Dowser. He hated drawing blood this way; it hurt far more than cutting his arm. But he needed to ward himself again, since he had likely removed his previous protection, along with Mariz’s spell and his own concealment conjuring. “
Teqimen ex cruore evocatum,
” he whispered under his breath. Warding, conjured from blood.

The hum of the casting in the ground would allow Mariz to fix his location with that much more certainty, which meant that Ethan had to keep moving. But the warding made him feel safer.

Uncle Reg still walked with him stride for stride, his expression grim, his glowing eyes flicking Ethan’s way every few seconds. They walked through the center of Cornhill and crossed through Dock Square past Faneuil Hall toward the North End. Ethan didn’t have a destination in mind. He intended to stay away from Cooper’s Alley and from the Dowsing Rod; those were the two places where Sephira knew to look for him.

Once past Faneuil Hall, he crossed over the Market Bridge and followed Mill Creek toward Ann Street. The lanes were less crowded here, and Ethan looked toward the ghost beside him.

“Is he more powerful than I am?” Ethan asked, knowing the shade would understand that he meant Spectacles.

Uncle Reg shook his head, but not before hesitating.

“But he’s no less powerful either, isn’t that right?”

The ghost nodded.

“Aye, I was afraid of that. The spell he tried to use on me, the one blocked by my warding, did you recognize it?”

Uncle Reg nodded again. He held out his hand and a flame appeared in the middle of his palm.

“A fire spell,” Ethan said.

The ghost allowed the flame to die away.

“Was it strong enough to kill me?”

Reg shook his head once more.

Well, that was something at least. Maybe Sephira didn’t want him dead … yet. Ethan slowed, finally halting altogether. If Sephira and her men were still tracking him, they knew by now that he was no longer in Cornhill. He waited for another finding spell, but none came. Had Sephira given up for the time being, knowing that with Mariz working for her she could find him anytime she wished? Had she gone to Henry’s shop or Kannice’s tavern? Or was she back at her home, drinking Madeira and laughing at Ethan, knowing that he still ran from her?

He almost gave in to the temptation to try a finding spell of his own. Knowing where Spectacles was might alert him to whatever Sephira planned to do next. But he didn’t want to give away his location again, nor did he wish to give Sephira the satisfaction of knowing just how alarmed he was by this new ally of hers.

“I can’t run from her forever,” he said aloud.

Uncle Reg smirked and faded from view. Ethan often wondered where the ghost went when Ethan didn’t need him. Reg often seemed eager to return there, and sometimes appeared to resent Ethan’s summonses. There was much about the ghost Ethan didn’t know, beginning with his name and his place on the Jerill side of Ethan’s family tree. But in all important respects he trusted Reg as much as he did his closest friends, despite the shade’s prickly personality.

Still protected by his warding, Ethan turned and started back toward Dall’s cooperage and his room. He kept his knife out, and remained watchful, scanning the streets as he walked, and looking behind him every so often.

He saw no sign of Sephira or her toughs and by the time he reached Cooper’s Alley he had allowed himself to relax. Still, he decided to stop into Henry’s shop to check in on the old man and let him know that he was back.

Henry’s shop was small and old. It had been built by the cooper’s grandfather and had been passed to Henry’s father, and then to Henry. Despite its age, though, it was sturdy. It had survived winds and storms and more than a few fires. Ethan’s room was plain but comfortable. It wasn’t the only place he had lived since his return from the plantation in Barbados on which he had labored as a prisoner, but it was the only one that had felt even remotely like a home.

Henry liked Ethan because he paid his rent on time. Ethan liked Henry because he didn’t ask too many questions about Ethan’s work as a thieftaker, and because he didn’t know that Ethan was a conjurer. As far as the old cooper was concerned, Ethan was just like any other tenant, except with a somewhat more interesting profession.