She had the ruffians drag him over to the firepit, where they leaned him close enough to the flames to make him flinch. Edwina attempted to jerk free from her captor, but the grip on her arms only tightened. Tears flooded her eyes, not only for Ian but for her sister’s spiral into depravity.
“Now, I believe this is how it works.” Mary put her hand under Ian’s chin and made him look into the fire. “Call your imp to you.”
“What?” Ian unscrewed his face from the pain long enough to look into Mary’s eyes.
“Call that repulsive thing to your side.” She nudged her chin at the ring of stones. “This cauldron would be the nearest open portal, would it not? So call him. Into the fire.”
Nick’s mortal nonchalance reached its limit. “What’s this about an imp?”
“It’s his hairy servant. It knows everything he knows. That thing has to be dealt with too.”
Edwina shook her head, pleading with her eyes for her sister to see sense.
“He’s nae but a wee elf,” Ian said. “He’ll be gone up north by now. Dinna fash yourself over him.”
“I don’t believe you.” Mary released his chin and stood back, holding up the orb containing his memories. “And I rather suspect he knows you’re here already, so summon that creature of yours. Or I toss all these precious memories of your family and lovers into the fire.”
The thug with the crooked teeth tightened the grip on his arm when Ian took too long to answer. “I’ll do it. I just . . . I have a wee spell I use to call him to me.”
Mary nodded, and they pulled him back from the fire a fraction and waited without easing the tension on his arm. Edwina struggled and screamed through her gag, but Ian cleared his throat and stared into the flames.
“Ashes denote that fire was,” he began. “Revere the grayest pile, for the departed creature’s sake, that hovered there awhile.” The flames sputtered, dying out as though his words encouraged them to dampen. Edwina held her breath. “Fire exists the first in light, and then consolidates.” He lifted his eyes to Mary’s. “Only the chemist can disclose, into what carbonates.”
“He’s gone all nutter again,” the thief in the top hat said, laughing.
“Mad as a hatter, he is,” said another.
But Mary knew better. “What spell was that?” She looked from the dying flames to Ian in alarm. “What did you do?”
“I did the summoning, as you asked,” he deadpanned.
Mary grew agitated. She circled the firepit, watching the flames shrink. “No, no, that was—”
At once the flames burst in the firepit, shooting up as high as the rooftops. Mary covered her face and backed away as fireworks detonated out of the center and exploded in the darkened sky above their heads in a shower of sparks for all the borough to see. Edwina rejoiced behind her gag at Ian’s fiery, rebellious words.
The gang stood with their mouths agape and their weapons momentarily forgotten at their sides. Ian used the distraction to free his arm and twist away, even as Mary berated them for being awestruck fools. He lashed out swiftly with a hurling spell meant to disarm, no longer bothering to disguise his conjuring in the open. The lad with the police truncheon had his arm slung backward by the magic until the weapon vaulted out of his hand and across the courtyard, splintering into a dozen pieces. His mate suffered the same, though he hadn’t let go of his club and was thrown into the wall. The third lad, who brandished the stick, had his weapon yanked loose only to soar into the blazing fire to become more kindling.
Like Ian, Edwina attempted to twist free, but the thug with the ghost eyes, quick as lightning, drew the bowie knife to her throat. Her mouth and magic remained gagged, so she stilled herself, hoping he had a steady hand. Then Ian’s magic found his knife too. The blade slid past her throat, cutting a thin line deep enough to draw a trace of blood, before embedding itself in the nearest door with a thud. Crossing himself, the lad ran off before the sting from the knife rose to the surface of her skin.
Free of him, Edwina removed the rag from her mouth. Sparks from the fireworks rained down from above, landing on the shingle roof of the tenement building. She sucked in a breath and tenderly checked the cut on her neck. Only a trace of blood came away. Shaken, she retreated to the door of the flat on her right.
Somehow unaffected by the disarming spell, Nick circled the firepit with his folding knife in hand, his eyes tracking Ian. But where was Mary? Edwina searched the shadows in the courtyard before spotting her strutting up the final steps to lean on the railing of the upper landing. She was too confident. Too smug. What had she done? Edwina studied Nick’s foul appearance. He was being protected, but how? Then she spotted it. The mother-of-pearl buttons gleamed with an iridescence infused with swirling magic. “Ian, watch out! He’s using a protection charm.”