I forced myself to keep from looking at Evaline. What was taking her so long? If she didn’t act, I’d run out of things to say—and I’d find myself attached to the statue.
Keeping my attention on my adversary, acutely aware of the proximity of my personal guard and his gun, I replied, “The fact that the crown you’re holding looks nothing like any of the drawings doesn’t lead you to question your certainty? A woman like you wouldn’t want to take the chance of being wrong. After all your plans. If you were wrong . . . they’d all come to naught. And you would have lost your chance.”
Silence reigned for a long moment. What was Evaline waiting for?
“And I happen to be the only one who knows where the real diadem is,” I said.
Miss Stoker
Out of the Frying Pan
At Miss Holmes’s announcement, I did three things at once: surged to my feet, discharged the Steam- Stream gun, and yanked on a string I’d looped around the leg of the Ankh’s table.
The guard who’d been halfheartedly watching me howled when I slammed into his chin with the top of my head. The table shifted and fell off the dais. Its contents tumbled everywhere. And the blast of steam from my gun seared into the guard next to Miss Holmes.
I met her eyes. “Go!”
She darted toward the double doors as I whirled to blast the gun at the Ankh. He ducked, reaching for a weapon in his pocket as I discharged the gun again. This time it caught Bastet, and the woman screamed as the steam burned through her tunic and into her arm.
Boom! Something had fallen off the preparation table and combined with an element it shouldn’t have. Flames erupted, catching on the edge of a tablecloth, and jumped quickly to an upholstered chair. Soon the space would be engulfed.
I ran toward the door in Miss Holmes’s wake, flinging a heavy table behind me. The guard whose jaw I broke wasn’t fast enough, and the table caught him in the torso. He stumbled back and fell into the man I’d Steam-Streamed. In the midst of the chaos, someone’s pistol discharged with a loud crack.
The flames spread near the front of the chamber, and as I turned back to blast one more wide stream of steam around the room, I heard a loud mechanical grinding. But I didn’t wait to find out what it was; I shot steam at my pursuers and burst through the double doors into the opium room.
To my relief, the chamber was empty except for Miss Holmes, who’d paused at the opposite side. Why was she waiting for me?
“Go!” I couldn’t stop, I couldn’t allow myself to think. If I did, everything would catch up to me: the pain, the loss of blood, my cowardice.
I should have stopped them. I should have saved her.
My partner went through the double doors, and I was only seconds behind her. We bolted down the corridor, and just as we rounded the corner, a figure appeared.
Miss Holmes hesitated, but I recognized him. “Keep going!” I pushed her between the shoulder blades as I met Pix’s eyes. “There’s a fire!”
My partner was panting, not used to the sort of physical activity that came naturally to me. Pix seemed to understand, for he grabbed her arm and helped me tow her along. She didn’t argue, but she was probably so out of breath she simply couldn’t. When she stumbled again, he slung her over his shoulder just as he’d done with Lilly Corteville. And he continued to run, outpacing even me.
We were coming out onto the street when I remembered Amunet. Tied up and hidden in the side hall where I’d left her.
“Oh no,” I said, taking one deep breath of cool night air. “She’s trapped!”
It was one thing to leave the Ankh and his guards in the chamber to find their way out. But Amunet was helpless and no one knew she was there.
No one but me.
I dashed back into the building. I had time. The building was made from brick. It wasn’t as if it was going to burn to the ground. But the smoke, and the flames . . . they would eat anything wooden or cloth.
Or human.
Using my small illuminator for light, I retraced our steps. Despite the growing pain from my wound and the renewed flow of blood, I managed to find my way back . . . back to the opium room, now filling with a different sort of smoke . . . back through the side door, where Pix had stolen that kiss from me right against that wall . . . into the side hallway, tinged with smoke. A dull, grating roar filled my ears.
Beaming my light, I ran up the narrow corridor to where I had left Amunet. The smoke had begun to filter through, but it wasn’t as thick as I’d expected. Light flickered from . . . the open door.
Amunet was gone.
But I wasn’t alone.
I looked up to find a gun pointed at me.
“Welcome back, Miss Stoker.”
Miss Holmes
An Unfortunate Miscalculation
I could hardly catch my breath, but the cool night air helped. Whoever the individual was who’d been carrying me dumped me unceremoniously onto my feet.
I looked around and didn’t immediately see Evaline, although I’d watched her run out onto the street behind us. However, just a short distance away was a cluster of very confused, frightened young women. The Society of Sekhmet had been evacuated. She was probably in the midst of the girls. Just then, the sound of sirens screeching filled the air. The police or firemen.
The young man who’d carried me out, whose torso was bared by the vest that identified him as one of the opium servers, spun to look behind him. “Bloody ’ell! I’m gone.” Before I could thank him for his assistance, he took himself off.
I stood there for a moment, still panting, and looked up. The fire in the upper floors would devastate, but the building wouldn’t come down. It was brick. Surely someone as clever as the Ankh would find an escape.
Which meant that this wasn’t over.
The sky-anchors swayed high above, large dark balloons bumping against each other in the breeze. As I watched, one of them detached itself from the others. It happened occasionally that one of the moorings loosened, and streetwatchers would announce it with cries of “Cut loose! It’s cut loose!” and there would be wagers on how long it would be buffeted about in the sky and where it would land.
Then comprehension dawned. The stage, the entire stage in the opium den, had been a sort of airship. The steps, in all four directions, had actually been folded sides, collapsed onto the floor. Now they’d been raised and the entire stage lifted . . . and was being piloted up and out of the open roof. I watched with a combination of admiration and annoyance that I hadn’t observed this earlier.
“Miss Holmes!”
A familiar peremptory voice had me spinning around.
“This is becoming quite a habit, is it not? Encountering you in the thick of criminal activity.” Inspector Grayling stood there, radiating exasperation. “You promised not to come here tonight.”
“I didn’t promise any such thing,” I told him. “I merely said—wait!” I cried, struck by a realization. “I must get to Cosgrove Terrace.” This was my chance to catch Lady Cosgrove-Pitt in the act—or, more accurately, not to. She wouldn’t be there. She couldn’t be. “Quickly!”
“What is it?” he asked, his pique easing in the face of my desperate entreaty.
“It’s—it’s a matter of life and death,” I said. I couldn’t explain it to him; he wouldn’t believe me. He wouldn’t
