By the time he reached her street he was exhausted and weak. The houses here were as dark as they had been on Cooper’s Alley. All except Elli’s. She would be panicked, unable to sleep or eat, unsure of whether to wait there with Clara or venture into the dark streets in search of her son. Even from down the lane, Ethan could see that candles shone in her windows, so that pale shafts of light cut across the street, making the rain sparkle. He saw her peer out into the night from the nearer of the two.
She must have seen him coming. In the next moment, her door flew open and she ran down the steps, heedless of the rain.
“What’s happened to him?” she asked, her voice high and strained. “Is he hurt?”
“I don’t know,” Ethan told her, breathing hard, his leg aching.
He stepped past her, entered her house, and went immediately to the sitting room, where a fire blazed. He laid Holin on a sofa and began pulling off the boy’s wet clothes.
“He looks half dead!” Elli said, hovering at Ethan’s shoulder. “How did this happen? What mischief did you get him into now?”
He whirled on her so quickly that she fell back several steps. Grief and guilt and the memory of pain flared in his chest like conjured fire. But though a thousand angry replies leaped to mind, he bit them all back. There were tears in Elli’s eyes, and her cheeks were every bit as ashen as her son’s.
“I didn’t do this,” he said, struggling to keep his voice level. He could feel Pitch’s wet fur under his fingertips. His chest burned with guilt, with grief, with the remembered pain of the conjurer’s relentless attacks. “And I just… did something to save him-to save both of us-that I’ll regret for the rest of my days.”
She said nothing, but nodded.
Ethan turned his attention back to the boy’s soaked clothes. “Get blankets, as many as you can find. And throw another log on that fire.”
“Of course.”
She hurried from the room, and Ethan finished undressing the boy. He moved the sofa so that it faced the hearth, and when Elli entered the room with an armful of blankets, he took several from her and together they laid them over the boy.
“Some soup or tea would help him,” Ethan said.
“All right.” She started to leave. “For you, too?”
He glanced back at her, their eyes meeting briefly. “Thank you.”
Once more she left the room. Ethan knelt beside the sofa and studied Holin’s face, head, and neck. He saw nothing to indicate that the boy had been injured, which meant that this stupor had been induced by a spell. Elli would kill him if she learned that he had conjured in her home, even if he cast the spell for Holin’s benefit. So quickly, while she remained occupied in the kitchen, he pulled out a single mullein leaf.
“ Suscitatio ex verbasco evocata. ” Awaken, conjured from mullein.
At first nothing happened. Ethan considered trying the spell again with more leaves. But then the boy’s eyelids fluttered, and he let out a low groan.
Instantly, Elli was by Ethan’s side. “I thought I heard him.”
“You did,” Ethan said. “He should be awake before long.”
Holin moaned again, opened his eyes and then closed them. A moment later, he shifted beneath the blankets, looking and sounding far more like a sleeping boy than like a child caught in the thrall of a conjurer.
“The Lord be praised,” Elli said. Tears flowed freely down her face, and for once she made no effort to hide them from Ethan.
“He looks like he’ll be all right now,” Ethan said. He climbed to his feet, feeling old and sore and wearier than he would have thought possible. His clothes were as soaked as Holin’s had been, and he realized that he was shivering. “I should go.”
“The tea is almost ready,” Elli said. “And there are some clothes in the back room that belonged to John. They should fit you. Get yourself changed. I want to know what happened tonight.”
Ethan knew better than to argue. He limped to the back room and found an old chest filled with men’s clothes, all of them far nicer-and no doubt far more expensive-than anything he owned. He rummaged through the chest until he found what had to be the oldest, most threadbare shirt and breeches John Harper had owned. He stripped off his wet clothes and put these on. The breeches were too long for him, though they fit around his middle, and he had to roll back the shirtsleeves. But putting on the dry clothes made him feel far better. He returned to the sitting room, arranged his damp clothes before the hearth, and took a seat beside the fire. Soon, he had stopped shivering.
Elli had already settled into a chair by the hearth. She held a cup of steaming tea in one hand and was stroking Holin’s wheat-colored hair with the other. As Ethan sat, she straightened a bit in her chair. A second cup of tea sat on a small table beside him. Elli pointed to it.
“Thank you,” he said, picking up the cup and holding it under his nose. It smelled of apple and mint, and warmed his hands.
“Can you tell me what happened?” Elli asked. He could hear the effort she was making to keep any hint of accusation from seeping into the question. “Do you know why this was done to my boy?”
He hadn’t even considered the question of why. He had seen Holin lying there in the lane, and had focused every subsequent thought on finding a way to save the boy’s life. But as soon as Elli asked him, the answer became obvious. Sephira Pryce.
Sephira’s men killed Daniel Folter, and Anna tried to convince Ethan that Daniel had killed Jennifer. Holin had seen Nigel and Ethan in the street, and now the conjurer had taken Holin and tried to use him for another killing spell. Sephira and this man were working together. But to what end?
“Ethan?”
His eyes snapped up to hers. “I’m sorry. I was… The short answer to your question is that Holin was taken because of me. Because someone saw us together yesterday, when I walked him home.”
“Who?” she asked, as if intent on killing whoever it was herself.
“I shouldn’t-”
“Who, Ethan?”
“Sephira Pryce,” he said.
Elli blinked once, but offered no other response.
“You remember the conjurer I mentioned yesterday?”
She nodded, growing pale once more.
“He’s the one who had Holin. But I think he and Sephira are working together. I think that’s how he knew to go after Holin in the first place.”
“Was he going to-?” She broke off, seeing the look on Ethan’s face. “Holin could have died, just like those others.”
“He’s fine now. We were fortunate.”
She stared at him for a long time, until at last Ethan looked away and sipped his tea.
“You weren’t fortunate,” she said. “You saved him. You told me you did something that you’ll regret.”
“Let it go, Elli.” He said it softly, but he knew she wouldn’t argue.
“Well, thank you,” she said at length. “For whatever you did.”
“Don’t let him go to work tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry,” she answered, falling into the stern tone he had heard her use with Holin and Clara. “What about the next day?”
“It’ll be over by then.” Speaking the words, he knew it was true. He could scarcely believe that his confrontation with Nigel had been only yesterday, that he had spoken with Janna this very morning. Tomorrow night was still a lifetime away, in more ways than one.
“You think you can defeat this conjurer so soon?”
Ethan shrugged, staring fixedly at the fire.
“Ethan?”
“If it takes longer than a day, and I think Holin is still in danger, I’ll let you know.”
He glanced Elli’s way and found her watching him, her green eyes seeing right through the placid expression he had imposed on his features.
“That’s not what you meant, is it?”
