“She was sweet,” Esta said, feeling suddenly defensive.
“She is. But what life does she have to look forward to? She’ll live out her days in those rooms, or other rooms like them, without any chance for something more. All because she can make a silken flower bloom. If she’s lucky, the Order will never touch her directly, never let her building burn down around her or cart off her father or husband for crimes they didn’t commit. She probably won’t be lucky. Few are. Marta wasn’t so lucky. Her husband disappeared a little over a week ago. She has no other family here. If I didn’t step in, what would become of her and her children without him?”
“And that’s it?” she asked, still trying to figure out what made this man tick. If everyone had a weakness, everyone also had an angle. She didn’t believe that Dolph Saunders was any different. “You just help them, with no expectation of reward? No conditions?”
He considered her question for a moment before he spoke, and when he finally did, his words were measured. “I’m no saint, Esta. I’m a businessman with multiple properties, with employees who depend on me, with people in this neighborhood whose respect I’ve earned. I’d like to continue being that man. I’ve always been ambitious, maybe too ambitious for the life I was born into. If the Order falls, that’s good for me, for my businesses. For my future prospects in this city. If I’m the one to bring the Order down, people will be grateful and I will reap the benefits. There’s no doubt of that, and I’d be lying not to admit it.
“But I also know what it means to starve. I’ve slept on the streets and I learned how to escape from those who would hunt me. I know the strength of will it takes to fight back from the bottom, and I know that not everyone has that strength. So, yes, I have my own interests, but I’m not completely without a heart, whatever the rumors about me say.”
Esta studied him for some sign of the lie in his words. Professor Lachlan had taught her everything he could, had trained her to bring down the Order that pressed them into narrow lives. But he’d never concerned himself with the world beyond their small crew. To free themselves was enough. But here was Dolph Saunders, a man who had every reason to be out for himself, for the power he could grab, telling her something different. “And you trust them? You trust all the people you help not to give you up to the Order?”
“What choice do I have?” he asked wryly. “No one can survive on their own. Not even me.
“Do you have any other questions?” he asked, but in his tone was a clear indication that he was done answering them.
She shook her head. She already had too much to think about.
“You handled yourself well last night. Jianyu probably owes you his life.”
“I did my job.”
“So humble?” Dolph’s mouth curved slightly. “I think you have depths you’re still hiding from me, Esta Filosik. I’m not sure I like that about you.”
She frowned, worried by the sureness in his voice. “I would never do anything to hurt you or anyone you protect.” It was a lie, but she managed to choke it out with admirable ease. She’d been trained well, after all.
Yet all her training couldn’t stop the twist of guilt she felt now that she knew Dolph and the rest. ?There was no way to do what Professor Lachlan had asked her without hurting them all in the end. And if she hurt Dolph, she was hurting every person he helped in turn.
“But how far would you go for them?”
Esta didn’t answer at first. She understood he was appraising every move she made, every word she spoke. Agreeing too readily would mark her as a fool, or worse. When she finally answered, she spoke only the truth: “If it was to stop the Order? I’d risk everything.”
“So would I,” he told her. He hesitated briefly before he spoke again. “I have plans for the Order,” he explained. “Perhaps you could help me with those plans. Nibs seems to think you might be able to.”
Licking her lips, Esta considered her next words carefully. “I . . . I’m not sure if Nibs is right, but I’d be willing to do whatever I can.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” he said, though his expression didn’t soften. “Then I have a job for you. We can call it a test to see how serious you are and how much I can depend upon you. My plans depend on someone joining us. Someone who has been quite reluctant to do so.”
“Harte Darrigan,” she said, putting the pieces together.
“He saw you at the museum, and he knows you work for me. That makes him a liability.”
“I’ll make sure he’s not,” she promised. She’d put to rights whatever she’d done and put Harte Darrigan back in his place.
Dolph chuckled. “If I wanted him dead, I’d send Viola,” he joked. “My plan depends upon Darrigan’s help. I want you to get him for me.”
SPARKS OF POWER
The Docks
The old fool was never going to finish with his tinkering. Jack paced the dirt floor of the warehouse as the sound of metal on metal and the blast of the welding torch grated at his raw nerves. Ever since the robbery at the museum, he’d paid the old man double to work around the clock to finish the machine. It should have been done by now.
Finally, the old man backed away from the machine and gave it one more look. “That should do it.”
“Have you made the adjustments I sent you?” Jack asked, holding up the roughly cut diamond. There would be hell to pay when his father found out how much he’d spent on the stone, but if this worked, it wouldn’t matter. If this worked, they would thank him. He’d be a goddamn hero.
He didn’t know why he hadn’t thought of it before, but something had clicked when he’d learned that his aunt had lost a family heirloom at the museum—a priceless necklace filled with rare emeralds and diamonds. They were singular, irreplaceable . . . and they had given him an idea.
Of course he couldn’t simply generate power with a machine, no matter how complex and modern it might be. He needed an object for the power to be focused into.
Didn’t the Order depend on their artifacts to keep the protections secure in the Mysterium? He’d never seen them himself, but he’d heard about them—five gemstones that one of the most powerful alchemists to have ever lived had collected from five ancient civilizations steeped in magic. That alchemist had found a way to imbue the artifacts with power through complex rituals, power that the Order could draw on still. True, only the Inner Circle understood the secrets of the artifacts, but Jack was no idiot. He’d spent the last year learning everything he could—everything his uncle and the others would permit him to. If those stones could hold magical power, why couldn’t this one?