“Well, I’m not going out of my way to tell you when these things show up here, but I’ll make it clear to my fences that they’re not to buy any of Paxton’s stuff in my place.”
“That’s all I ask. My thanks, Dunc.” He raised the tankard to his lips but thought better of taking a sip. He set it on the bar. “You really should serve better ale.”
“I’ve told you before, coves don’t come here for the drink.”
“No, I don’t imagine they do.”
Dunc frowned. “Get out.”
Ethan pulled on his gloves and picked up his hat off the bar.
As he did, a spell trembled in the walls of the tavern. He looked sharply at Reg, who gave a single nod.
But nothing happened. None of the men in the tavern started arguing or fighting. None of them so much as glanced Ethan’s way. His warding had held. Or so he thought.
An instant later, a second spell shook the building, as puissant and clear as the pealing of a church bell. This time, Ethan felt the conjuring within his chest, as if the person who cast it had reached between his ribs and taken hold of his heart.
“Kaille? Are you all right?” Dunc asked, genuine concern on his narrow face.
“I don’t know.”
Chair legs scraped on the tavern’s wooden floor. Two men who had been sitting at the nearest of the tables were now standing, glaring at Ethan. Seeming to respond to some silent command, both men drew their blades as one and started toward the bar.
Dunc backed away from them. “What the devil are you two doing?”
Ethan slid his knife from its sheath.
“Kaille?”
“Stay back, Dunc.”
The men said not a word. Ethan didn’t think that they even shared a look. But they separated, one stepping to Ethan’s left, the other to his right. Both were tall, powerfully built. He had no doubt that they were skilled fighters.
Ethan still wore his greatcoat; he didn’t think he could take it off before they attacked, and he wasn’t sure he could fight them while wearing it. But he managed to pull off his left glove and cut the skin on the back of his hand.
“Discuti ambo ex cruore evocatum.” Shatter, both of them, conjured from blood.
Both men’s blades broke, shards of metal falling to the floor with a sound like the tinkling of breaking icicles.
“Lord save us,” Dunc whispered. Ethan kept his eyes on the men, who continued to stalk him. One of them lunged for him, moving faster than Ethan would have thought he could. He jumped back, acting on instinct. And a powerful forearm clamped down on his neck.
He struggled to get away, but the second man held him fast.
The first man reared back and hit him in the jaw, his fist like a brick. Ethan’s vision swam; he tasted blood.
“Discuti ex cruore evocatum,” he said, using another shatter spell.
This time he heard bone break and a grunt of pain from the man behind him. The man’s grip on his throat slackened. Ethan threw an elbow into his gut, drawing another grunt.
He grabbed the man’s broken arm and twisted out of his grasp. The man howled.
His friend swung at Ethan a second time, but Ethan ducked out of the way and took a step back, and then another. The man matched him step for step.
Fortunately for Ethan, the brute was as clumsy as he was large. He threw another punch. Ethan ducked again and the man’s fist whistled harmlessly over his head, leaving him off balance. Ethan planted his good leg and spun, using his bad leg as a club. His kick caught the brute in the kidney. The man collapsed to one knee. Ethan locked his hands together and hit him with every ounce of his strength, knocking him backward so that he sprawled unconscious on the floor, a trickle of blood flowing from his nose.
By this time, the other man was on his feet again. He held his broken arm cradled to his chest, but still he seemed determined to renew his assault on Ethan. He tried to hit Ethan with his good hand, but missed. Ethan threw a punch of his own, staggering the man. A second blow put him on the floor.
“Bloody hell!” Dunc said, staring at the men. “Do you know these two?”
Ethan was breathing hard, and his hands ached from the punches he had thrown. “I’ve never seen them before.”
“Then why did they go for you that way?” Dunc’s expression darkened. “And what was that you did to their knives?”
“I don’t know the answer to the first question,” Ethan said, flexing his right hand, “and you know perfectly well the answer to the second.” He picked up his hat and set it on his head, eager to leave the Crow’s Nest before another spell sent the rest of its patrons after him. “Remember what I told you about Paxton’s property.”
“Aye, I will.”
“See you later, Dunc.”
The Scotsman still stared at the two men. But as Ethan reached the door he said, “Hey, Kaille. Watch yourself.”
“Aye,” Ethan said. “I’m trying.”
Once on the street again, Ethan cast a dark look at Reg and started back toward Mill Creek and the South End. He knew it wasn’t the ghost’s fault that his warding had failed, but he felt betrayed by his conjuring power, and Reg was the embodiment of that power.
“It seems a simple warding isn’t enough,” he said, walking with his hands buried in his pockets. “But I don’t know what else to try.”
Usually when confronted with his own ignorance about magicking, Ethan went to the Fat Spider to ask questions of Janna. But at the moment he didn’t feel safe going anywhere: not to Janna’s tavern or Kannice’s. He even feared returning to his room on Cooper’s Alley. What if Henry was hurt as a result of one of these spells?
He knew, though, that he couldn’t remain in the streets; this was the most dangerous place, not only for him, but for any innocents who happened to cross his path. After some deliberation, he decided that his room was his safest refuge. He followed a serpentine path into the heart of the South End, taking the least crowded streets he could find, and adjusting his route whenever he encountered a crowd.
Any doubts he had harbored as to the identity of the conjurer who was harrying him had vanished with that last spell. Who else but Nate Ramsey was wicked enough to use conjurings in this way, and also strong enough to overcome Ethan’s warding with such ease? But this certainty came as little consolation. How could he fight the man when he didn’t even know where to find him?
He climbed the stairway to his room, locked and warded the door, and lit a fire in his stove to keep warm. Pulling out some of the herbs he carried, he then healed his bruised jaw. And as he did all of this, he cursed his inability to do more. Ramsey, he had little doubt, was laughing at him, mocking his ignorance and impotence, reveling in the success he had enjoyed thus far in this, their latest battle. Ethan realized as well that in the Crow’s Nest he had made himself an unwitting ally in Ramsey’s scheme. He had thought himself so clever using an illusion spell to scare Duncan. Instead, what he had done was tell Ramsey exactly where he was. He would need to be more careful in the future.
But of course Ramsey would want that as well. Slowly, one step at a time, Ramsey was weakening him, taking away every advantage Ethan might usually have enjoyed. Ethan had allies here in Boston, and so Ramsey sought to separate him from those on whom he relied. He was afraid now to set foot in the Dowser, or any other tavern, lest he cause another fray. Ethan and Ramsey were equals when it came to conjuring, but now Ethan was reluctant to conjure, lest he reveal his location to the captain.
Yet, even knowing this, Ethan was helpless to do anything about it. At least until he found Ramsey.
Though loath to go anywhere near Gray’s Rope Works and Green’s Barracks again, Ethan still had a job to complete, and he had promised Paxton that he would return the following morning so that he might question the commissioner’s servant.
He followed the same route to the Paxton estate that he had used when he left the previous day, thus keeping his distance from the barracks. But he couldn’t avoid the ropewalks; all he could do was approach the mansion as quickly as his leg and the ice-covered lane would allow and get off the street.