Revelle

My magic sputtered as I reached inward, dragging my nails along the walls of my empty inkwell, pain crackling through my chest like cursed lightning. But nothing happened.

“Dewey!” I ran after him, not daring to look back again and see the hurt written all over Jamison’s face. How selfish I’d been, telling him how I felt, no matter the consequences.

There were always consequences.

“Wait!” I stumbled over the curb, acrid smoke assaulting me. We’d lost everything. Our home. Our business. Everything we owned.

We couldn’t lose Dewey, too.

With my hands on my knees, I tore into myself, searching deeper, deeper, for my magic. Pain oozed from my head, my spine, as hot as those flames, spreading through my chest—

There. Mere drops. I had to make them count.

My rib cage felt ready to burst open under the strain. Night gathered around me, threatening to pull me under, but the lightstrings blinked into existence. Dewey’s was a tempest, but I didn’t have time to sort through his feelings, instead homing in on his jealousy.

Jamison is nothing to me.

“Please!” My voice broke from pain, from exhaustion, from the kiss that almost was. Dewey turned on his heels, his expression as hard as stone.

“I know what that looked like—”

“Do you?” He stalked toward me. “The last thing I remember is being drugged by an Effigen. I wake up to the Big Tent nearly falling on top of me. When I finally have the strength to move, I take off in search of you, to ensure your safety. And where were you? In his arms. He isn’t even wearing a shirt!”

“He got you out of the tent—”

“I’ve given you thousands of dollars’ worth of liquor. I’ve given you the nicest theater in Charmant. I’ve given you my heart.” His voice broke on the last words. “What has he given you?”

“Nothing. I just—”

“Exactly: nothing.” An insidious darkness poisoned his lightstring. “Has he told you who his parents are?”

“His . . . parents?”

“James and Evelyn Jones. Those names ring a bell, don’t they?”

I blinked, those hateful names surprisingly painful, even after seven years.

“I see he failed to mention them.” He coughed again, a deep rattling that wouldn’t cease.

Jamison’s parents were the Joneses? The ones who’d drowned my mother and aunts?

Another one of Dewey’s tricks—it had to be.

“Pocket,” Dewey wheezed, patting his coat. I slipped my hand into the pocket, removing a wad of newspaper clippings.

CHARMANT COUPLE CHARGED IN TRIPLE HOMICIDE

EDWARDIANS CONFIRM CHARMANT COUPLE DROWNED REVELLE DARLINGS

JAMES AND EVELYN JONES, 30 AND 28, FIRST CHARMANT EXECUTIONS BY ELECTRIC CHAIR

I shoved the clippings into his hand. “I don’t need to see these.”

He shoved them back. “Look closer.”

My throat burned with a sickening taste as I unfolded the smallest article—and stopped.

In the center was a photo of a couple standing on the beach. Identical to Jamison’s photo, from the carved dock to the brooch the woman wore. Jamison’s brooch.

Jamison’s parents.

The Joneses with their infant daughter in 1905, the caption read, weeks before they reported her missing. Not pictured is their son, Jamison, whom neighbors say hasn’t been seen in years.

“He lied to you, Luxe. You see that now, don’t you?”

The article shook in my soot-stained hands. Jamison was a Jones? The magic-haters who’d killed my mother, my aunts?

The photos matched. There was no other explanation.

“He’s trouble. I won’t have him get between us.” Dewey stepped closer. “Do you understand me?”

He was telling me this while my home still burned, right behind us. Even if it was true, it was unfathomably cruel.

A person showed their true colors under duress, Nana liked to say. Dewey was a goddamn Chronos, through and through, trying to manipulate me when he thought me weak. If it were just me, I’d spit on his fancy suit and curse the day I ever agreed to our arrangement.

But the Big Tent was gone. The Fun House, too. No shows. No customers. No home.

Dewey was my family’s only hope, especially if his family wasn’t done with us.

I dug deeper into my inkwell, that strange pressure in my chest threatening to snap my spine like a wishbone. Now, more than ever, I needed a jewel to supplement my magic. And if it had to be an engagement ring, so be it.

You trust me. You don’t want to lose me. You feel how much I love you, and you love me.

I let him see my desperation as I took his hands. “I feel bad for him. He has no money, no family, no prospects in life. I was kind to him, and he latched on to me. When the Big Tent collapsed, he comforted me, but it meant nothing, I swear.”

The dimmest spark of relief blossomed in Dewey’s lightstring, and I clung to it. “So the two of you never . . . ?”

“Of course not.” You trust me. I’m completely in love with you. “I’ll swear in front of Trevor, if it’d help you feel better. I just pity him, that’s all.”

The hateful words slid off my tongue like spoiled milk, and Dewey lapped them up. He tugged on his lapels. “I have friends, you know. They’ll make him disappear, if I say the word.”

Disappear, like the other bootleggers. “He’s Trys and Roger’s best friend. Let me find a way to let him down gently.”

Dewey’s lightstring darkened, the allure of violence too tempting. I tried to temper it with whatever drops of magic I had left, the taste of iron sharp on my tongue.

“He needs to be gone,” he finally said. “And if he refuses, we’re doing it my way.”

I wouldn’t let it come to that; couldn’t let it come to that. “Thank you, Dewey.” You feel loved by me. You’re happy with me.

He raised my hands to his mouth, kissing my knuckles. “Move in with me.”

“What?”

“Your home is gone. Forget about propriety. I can pay a priest to wed us now, if you’d like. But I need you safe.”

I racked my mind for any alternative, anything that prevented me from spending the night there. Not just tonight, but always. There was no going back.

What choice did I have?

You want me to be with my family tonight. But his lightstring hardly moved in my grasp.

Blades sliced through my chest as I dug deeper for any wisps of power remaining. There had to be more in there somewhere, but the pressure in my head swelled as I dug deeper, my empty inkwell ready to burst.

“You’re bleeding.” He leaned closer, pressing his handkerchief to my nose. “Let’s get you to a Strattori.”

I eased my grip on his lightstring. My magic needed time. I needed time.

More than that, I needed a big, fat jewel.

“I’m okay.” I took his handkerchief and dabbed at my nose. “Too much smoke.”

“Come home. I’ll have a Strattori meet us there.”

“What about my family?” Even if we could afford the hotels, they were full for tomorrow’s election festivities. My family had nowhere to go.

“I’ll have blankets brought to the winter theater. They can stay there for the time being. My queen, however, deserves a castle.” He laid a soft hand on my cheek.

I glanced around. Flames still ravaged the heaping pile of destruction that was the Big Tent. Revelles still wept in the street, and Jamison—well, Jamison deserved an explanation. “I don’t even know if everyone made it out. Let me check on my family first.”

Pitch-black anger burst from his lightstring. As I soothed it, the world tilted.

“Two hours.” He gripped my shoulders and pressed his mouth to mine. Hard. “Send the boy packing, check on your family, and return home. Trevor won’t leave your side until then. Understood?”

Jamison. Gone.

I lifted my chin. “Understood.”