The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (literature books to read txt) 📗

when she saw something else in the corner of her vision. A shadow lurked there, and the darkness had her drawing back and releasing her hold on time.

She’d seen darkness like that before. It had happened the first time, weeks ago, on the train out of New Jersey, and then again in St. Louis. Each time, destruction had followed. But every time it had happened before, Esta had been touching Harte; their connection had allowed Seshat’s power to amplify her own. That couldn’t be what was happening, though. Harte was gone, and Seshat’s power with him.

Wasn’t it?

Esta shook off the unease that had turned the warm summer wind suddenly cold against her skin. She took a deep breath to center herself, letting the rhythm of the train steady her, but before she could reach for her affinity again, she noticed that a small puff of smoke had appeared on the horizon. It was enough to make her pause.

Not smoke, Esta realized. It was a cloud of dust thrown up by a group of horses galloping toward the train. Even from that distance, she could tell they carried riders.

Esta took an instinctive step back from the railing, pulling herself out of sight. She didn’t know who the riders were, but her instincts were screaming that their appearance was no coincidence.

The Order had found her.

A WHISPERING CERTAINTY

1904—St. Louis

It was not yet six in the morning—an ungodly hour, to Jack Grew’s thinking—when he found himself walking through the empty midway of the world’s fair. Dark clouds hung heavy above, mirroring the mood of the whole city. As far as Jack was concerned, the gloom of the early morning suited him. His overcoat warded off the dampness of the day, and within a hidden inner pocket, the weight of the Book was a comfort, a ballast stone to keep him steady on his course. Within his mind, a new consciousness was taking form, a whispering certainty that he would prevail.

The grounds of the Exposition would not be open to the public today, not after the embarrassment at the ball that had happened the night before. The highest-ranking members of the Veiled Prophet Society—and consequently, all of St. Louis—had retreated to their individual mansions and boardrooms to lick their wounds and hide their fear, leaving the people of the city to fend for themselves.

Jack wasn’t exactly surprised. The men who held power in the Society weren’t any different from those who led the Order. Who could the men of the Veiled Prophet Society ever hope to be if they would not even reveal their faces?

Nothing. No one.

Luckily, Roosevelt was fine. The president had been removed from the Festival Hall moments before the attack, right before everything had erupted. Before leaving town late last night, Roosevelt had commended Jack on his bravery, thanked him for his assistance and his loyalty, and given him a new position.

So, yes, perhaps Harte Darrigan and the girl had managed to slip through Jack’s fingers, but the chaos they’d unleashed had worked in Jack’s favor. Because of their actions, Jack had more authority than ever before. Because of their recklessness, the entire country understood exactly how dangerous feral magic was. The yellow journalists would sensationalize the events to sell their tawdry rags, and the fear and hate that was already spreading like a wildfire through the land would become the forge that could bring Jack’s ultimate goals to fruition.

At the sound of steadily approaching footsteps, Jack turned to find Hendricks—one of the Jefferson Guard who had helped him in the previous weeks—approaching. Right on time.

Jack didn’t bother calling out a greeting or lifting a hand in welcome. Instead, he kept his hands tucked into his jacket pockets, where his fingers brushed against the artifact he carried.

He’d found the piece years before, but after the events of the Conclave, he’d used the pages of the Ars Arcana to secret it away. To protect it. For the last two years, however, the Book had refused to return the artifact, stripping Jack of the power he might have otherwise wielded… until the night before. Now the familiar coolness of the stone in the artifact sent a thrill of anticipation through his blood, and the same whispering certainty rose within him again.

Hendricks’ gaze shifted restlessly, as though he expected an attack. “Sir,” he said in greeting. “Everything is ready. Just as you’ve required.”

“Good,” Jack said, ignoring the outstretched hand and withholding the praise he knew Hendricks craved. “Let’s be on with it, then.”

The two men made their way past the enormous sepulchral buildings, all quiet in the morning’s gloom, until they came to a tower at least twenty stories high, as tall as the skyscrapers that were already starting to transform the skyline of Manhattan. The building at the base of the tower housed a mixture of working machinery and displays about the wonders of wireless telegraphy. Jack had already seen the exhibit—and the one in the Palace of Electricity, where the ever-present crackle of high-voltage electricity had signaled that the De Forest wireless machine was at work. He’d already watched the operators send messages to and from this very tower, through the air—as if by magic.

Jack wasn’t as ignorant as the people whose eyes had goggled in wonder, though. He knew that it wasn’t magic but science that accomplished the task, and he also knew that scientific thinking applied to the occult arts could reap great rewards.

Years before, Jack had worked in secret to create a machine that could cleanse the world of dangerous, feral magic. He had hoped to reveal his masterpiece at the Conclave. He had imagined his machine in the Wardenclyffe Tower, the wireless installation that J. P. Morgan had been financing for Tesla out on Long Island. Jack had planned to use the machine to lead the Order into the future. Now he had bigger dreams.

Here was evidence that Tesla’s project had not been a waste of resources, as J. P. Morgan had