Witch in the White City: A Dark Historical Fantasy/Mystery (Neva Freeman Book 1) by Nick Wisseman (popular books to read .TXT) 📗

at the Fair,” she said as they turned onto the station’s street. “About the shells forming the sign of a ‘bad vodun.’ I think they’re more aloof than that. But they’re certainly more than just a necklace. They make me more. More flexible, more able to use my talent. And they seem to do it for anyone who puts them on, anyone with—”

“Neva.” Derek reinforced the warning in his tone by thrusting his arm in front of her. “Look.”

The station was on fire.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

NEVA GRIPPED DEREK’S arm, squeezing hard to suppress memories of blazes at the Fair: the Casino... the Peristyle... the Cold Storage Building. The rail station wasn’t fully alight yet, but smoke puffed out its windows in telltale ways, a precursor she’d seen too many times in the last year.

“Help!” someone cried beyond the smoke. A terrific crash sounded from the same area.

“Come on,” Neva murmured to Derek, ducking under his arm and sprinting toward the station. He called her back, but she kept running—if someone needed help, she was going to give it to them.

This time, she was going to be fast enough.

As she drew closer, it became clear that her eyes had deceived her initially. The station wasn’t on fire, but two overturned railcars on the tracks were, and several Negro men were busy lighting a third car. The smoke from the overturned cars was what she’d seen blowing through the station’s windows, swept in one side and out the other by a gust of wind.

Neva stopped a few feet short of the platform, watching as some of the men broke off from firing the third car to detach a fourth from the larger train. Several of the arsonists carried ropes.

“Pullman cars,” Derek said when he caught up to her. “The four they’re targeting; I recognize the models. They’ve left the others untouched.”

“There don’t seem to be any passengers. I hope they asked everyone to get off first.”

“Help!” someone called again, from further down the platform.

Neva spun and saw a white engineer waving his arms in furious protest.

“Do something!” he said to Derek.

But her brother just tapped the white ribbon affixed to his chest, the same type of fabric Brin had given Neva to express solidarity with the workers. A few of the Negro men wore ribbons as well.

“Damn you, then!” the engineer snarled. “That’s private property they’re destroying!”

Derek shrugged and turned back to observe the men on the tracks. Two of them had secured their ropes to the top of the fourth car, and when one of them whistled, the rest of their companions came running, positioning themselves on either side. Those on the south side took hold of the ropes and pulled; those on the north side leaned against the car and pushed.

“Damn you all!” the engineer yelled again.

But the men on the tracks paid him no mind, and they had the car tipping within moments. Once it had toppled, the men streamed back to the third car, now burning merrily, and lit torches, rags, and whatever else was at hand. Then they returned to the fourth car to light it too.

“There!” the engineer shrieked. His tone was different, inflected with notes of vengeful glee. “On the tracks!” he shouted. “They’re on the tracks!”

Neva whirled around in time to see a row of boots thrust past the engineer, as if he’d suddenly grown twenty new legs and stepped with them all at once. But the boots belonged to a unit of soldiers, and they marched onto the tracks in near-perfect unison.

Had there not been four fires roaring next to each other, someone would have heard the troops’ approach. But as it was, they were lowering their rifles before the Negro men could find a scrap of cover.

So when the soldiers loosed their first volley, the results were devastating.

“Run!” yelled Derek as more than a third of the Negro men fell to the ground, some screaming, some silent, all bleeding. He tried to pull Neva back to the street, but she bent her way out of his grasp and ran to the near side of the station.

“Hurry!” she hissed, motioning for him to follow. “We have to help them.”

To his credit, Derek didn’t hesitate. But his face crinkled with anger as he sprinted behind her and crouched down. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

Neva pointed at the surviving Negro men—some had managed to run off, but the rest were making themselves as small as possible behind the cars they hadn’t tipped. “The soldiers aren’t firing at us. We need to help the protestors escape.”

Another hail of bullets pocked the yard. One man yelped in pain, then gurgled, then fell quiet.

Derek winced and glanced back at the street.

She gripped his shoulder. “Your movement is integrating on its own—whether Pullman Town and the American Railway Union want it to or not. Help those men get away.”

He refocused on the tracks. Then he cocked his head as if an idea had struck him. Risking a quick stand, he peered through one of the station’s windows. “The soldiers are still on the tracks,” he muttered as he crouched down again. “Give me the cowry shells.”

Neva bit her lip—that wasn’t what she’d meant.

“You said they make you stronger,” Derek whispered fiercely. “Well, I need to be stronger. Please, just give them to me. Quickly.”

She studied him a moment longer, but another shot—and the ensuing cry—convinced her. “Here.” She produced the necklace from her pocket and pressed it into his hand. “What do you want me to do?”

“Don’t get shot. And don’t let me get shot.” Before she could respond, he donned the necklace and darted around her, out from behind the station and onto the tracks.

“Derek!” she yelled as he stumbled, sparks starting to spit from his fingers, his elbows, his eyes—oh God, his eyes! The necklace would kill him. It only made her limber, but him, it would fry. Why had she given it to him?

Yet he knelt gracefully enough, dead-center on the tracks, his shins resting