Welcome to the City of Sin, where casino families reign, gangs infest the streets...and secrets hide in every shadow

Enne Salta was raised as a proper young lady, and no lady would willingly visit New Reynes, the so-called City of Sin. But when her mother goes missing, Enne must leave her finishing school—and her reputation—behind to follow her mother’s trail to the city where no one survives uncorrupted.

Frightened and alone, Enne has only one lead: the name Levi Glaisyer. Unfortunately, Levi is not the gentleman she expected—he’s a street lord and con man. Levi is also only one payment away from cleaning up a rapidly unraveling investment scam, so he doesn’t have time to investigate a woman leading a dangerous double life. Enne’s offer of compensation, however, could be the solution to all his problems.

Their search for clues leads them through glamorous casinos, illicit cabarets and into the clutches of a ruthless Mafia donna. As Enne unearths an impossible secret about her past, Levi’s enemies catch up to them, ensnaring him in a vicious execution game where the players always lose. To save him, Enne will need to surrender herself to the city...

And she’ll need to play.

Also available from Amanda Foody and HQYA

Daughter of the Burning City

Ace of Shades

Amanda Foody

Copyright

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2018

Copyright © Amanda Foody 2018

Amanda Foody asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © April 2018 ISBN: 9781474055529

Version: 2018-08-31

Praise for Amanda Foody and

Daughter of the Burning City

‘Wow! A dark and dangerous tale, a world like no other, and heroism of the weirdest kind!’

—#1 New York Times bestselling author Tamora Pierce

‘A fantastic, magical setting, a seedy mix of titillation and sin... Readers who enjoyed their whirl in Garber’s Caraval will want to get in line for entry.’

—The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

‘Amanda Foody’s stunning debut is full of velvety language, intricate worldbuilding, and a story that treads the fine line of horror and fantasy. This is the kind of read that makes your spine shiver, and your heart beat faster.’

—Roshani Chokshi, New York Times bestselling author of The Star-Touched Queen

‘The world...is astoundingly vivid and complex, the smells, sounds and sights of the smouldering city/travelling carnival near tangible. Amanda Foody’s deliciously dark and magical whodunit has world-building so rich, the reader...is likely to leave with a hangover.’

—Shelf Awareness

‘Utterly original. Amanda Foody has a wicked imagination. If you enjoy your fantasy on the darker side, then you will love Gomorrah!’

—Stephanie Garber, New York Times bestselling author of Caraval

‘Foody’s colourful setting is vast—filled with magic, political intrigue, and the potential to grow’.

—Publishers Weekly

‘I love the vivid, sumptuous world Amanda Foody has created: Sorina’s magic, her illusionary family and the Gomorrah Festival make for a wildly inventive mystery I won’t soon forget.’

—Virginia Boecker, author of The Witch Hunter series

To Mom-Mom

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Praise

Dedication

DAY ONE

ENNE

LEVI

LEVI

ENNE

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

ENNE

DAY TWO

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY THREE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY FOUR

LEVI

ENNE

DAY FIVE

ENNE

DAY SIX

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

DAY SEVEN

ENNE

DAY EIGHT

ENNE

LEVI

DAY NINE

ENNE

LEVI

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY TEN

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

EPILOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Extract

About the Publisher

DAY ONE

“To be frank, reader, you’d be better off not visiting the city at all.”

—The City of Sin, a Guidebook: Where To Go and Where Not To

ENNE

If I’m not home in two months, I’m dead.

Her mother’s warning haunted her as Enne Salta lugged her leather trunk down the bridge leading off the ship, filling her with an inescapable sense of dread.

If I’m not home in two months, I’m dead.

It’d been four.

For the first time in fifteen days, Enne stepped onto dry land. Her balance veered from side to side as if she expected the gray cobblestones to tilt like the sea, and she white-knuckled the pier’s railing to compose herself. If the ground weren’t so littered with cigar butts and grime, she might’ve kissed it. Two weeks battling seasickness on a floating monstrosity could do that to a lady.

A woman shoved past her, not noticing Enne’s petite frame. The force of it nearly knocked Enne over. She glared at the woman’s ostentatiously feathered hat as it disappeared into the crowds.

Hmph, she thought. A lady shouldn’t rush. Barely five seconds in the so-called City of Sin and already people were rude.

As more passengers disembarked from the ship, the crowds around the customs tables swelled with hundreds of people, hollering and waving passports and jostling each other in an effort to reach the front of the lines. Most were young men, probably visiting New Reynes to sample its famous casinos and nightlife—but the number of families present surprised her. This city was no place for children.

And, she reminded herself, staring up at the sinister, smog-stained sky, it was no place for her, either.

As Enne joined the queues, she dug through her belongings for her tourist documents. Her purse was stuffed: her passport, a handful of gingersnap cookies leftover from last night’s dinner and a copy of The City of Sin, a Guidebook: Where To Go and Where Not To. As she fished out her papers, something fell and clinked when it hit the ground. Her token.

She scooped it up and clutched it to her chest. Her mother, Lourdes, had given her this token. It was two inches long and gilded, with an old Faith symbol of an eye etched on one side and a cameo of a past queen on the other. The Mizer kings had used these tokens as party invitations. It was probably illegal to own it—any remnants from before the Revolution twenty-five years ago had been destroyed, just like the Mizers themselves. But Enne couldn’t bring herself to throw away something so rare and precious. She tucked it safely back into her pocket.

With nothing to do but wait, Enne pulled out her guidebook and compared its cover to the city in front of her. The photograph of Luckluster Casino matched the stories of New Reynes: red lights that flashed without flame, women of loose morals dancing on street corners in sparkling, skin-tight corsets, gambling den owners beckoning passersby with seedy smiles and the allure of fast fortune.

But neither the stories nor the cover bore any resemblance to the city before her. From what she could see, New Reynes was a wasteland of metal and white stone. The factories in the distance glinted as if coated in liquid steel, and the clouds were so black she swore the rain would fall dark as coal.

Panic seized her as she examined the skyline—white and jagged as teeth.

All you know are stories, Enne told herself. And not all stories are true.

“Next!” called the man at the customs table, and Enne hurried to his desk. He snatched the papers from her hands. “Erienne Abacus Salta.”

She cringed at the sound of her full name. No one called her that but her teachers.

The man wore round spectacles rimmed in faux gold, making his eyes appear magnified as they traveled from her face and slithered down her body. “A Salta, eh? Then you’re a dancer.” By the way he said “dancer,” drawing out the s sound and licking his lips, Enne knew he wasn’t picturing her ballet at finishing school.

Her cheeks reddened. City of Sin, indeed. She was not that kind of dancer. She. Was. A. Lady.

He glanced back at her paperwork. “From Bellamy. Seventeen years old. You know, you hardly look seventeen.”

She flushed deeper and counted backward from ten, lest she say something indecent and break one of Lourdes’s sacred rules.

Ladies should never reveal their emotions. That was the first rule.

The man checked the birth date on her passport, shrugged and returned to her travel documents. “Blood talent is dancing, of course. What is the Abacus family talent?”

“Arithmetic,” she answered. Every person possessed two talents, one inherited from each parent. The stronger one was known as the blood talent, and the weaker was called the split talent. Enne’s Abacus split talent was so weak it might as well have been nonexistent, as if all her ability had gone to pliés and pirouettes rather than to simple math.

The man scribbled her talents and family names into a grease-stained booklet. “How long is your stay?”

“The summer,” Enne said, trying to make her voice sound strong. School began again in September, and this was Enne’s final year before graduation, before her debut into society. All her life she had perfected her fouettés, memorized her table settings and obsessed over every salon invitation...all to graduate and earn the title of lady. She wanted it more than she wanted anything. It was all she’d cared about...

Until Lourdes went missing.

No matter how scared or how alone she felt, Enne swore to remain in this disgusting city until she found her mother. For however long it took. But secretly, selfishly, she hoped she’d find Lourdes before September. Without her debut, she wasn’t sure who she was supposed to become.

The man tapped his ballpoint pen at the bottom of the document. “Sign your name here. If you can’t write, just put an X. And if you can read, go ’head and verify everything.”

The document was a horror of fine print. At the top of the page was a check box for those with Talents of Mysteries. During the reigns of the Mizers, the various kingdoms had required every citizen to be classified into one of two categories based on their talents: Talents of Aptitude and Talents of Mysteries. Both Enne’s blood and split talent were considered Talents of Aptitude; anyone could develop a skill in dancing or arithmetic, even if they would never compare to those born with a family talent.

Talents of Mysteries, however, couldn’t be learned. Crudely put, they were magic—and even the Mizer kings, who’d had powerful Talents of Mysteries of their own, had considered them to be a threat. Before the Revolution, there had been harsh restrictions on where people could live and who they could marry based on their talents. It was one of the many reasons the Mizers were overthrown. And so Enne was shocked to find such a classification in an official document in New Reynes, the Republic’s capital, the home of the Revolution. It was archaic. Distasteful.

She signed her name in her best calligraphic script, ready to move on.

With a dreadful thud, the man pounded her passport with a wooden stamp bearing the Republic’s insignia, a circle with a bolt of lightning inside, meant to resemble an orb full of volts. The signature of Chancellor Malcolm Semper—the “Father of the Revolution,” and still the Republic’s leader twenty-five years later—was engraved over it.

Handing her the papers, the customs man said, “Enjoy New Reynes.”

As if she could enjoy herself when her mother was lost in this rotten city.

Enne shoved her way out of the crowd and stared blankly at the vast New Reynes skyline. At the unfamiliar fashions of the people around her. At the bleakness of the city’s polluted sky. She had no idea where to begin. As she crossed the street, the people waiting to be reunited with their families looked straight through her, as though she didn’t exist.

On her tiptoes, Enne scanned the crowd for Lourdes, for her pale blond hair or signature crimson scarf. She was nowhere.

With the passing of each day beyond Lourdes’s deadline, Enne had begun to crack. As weeks lapsed, then months, the cracks had deepened and spread. Now, as she held her breath and desperately searched the faces of the strangers around her, she felt that she was more broken than not. One exhale, one sob, and all her pieces would shatter.

Lourdes is alive, she assured herself, just as she had done every day for months. The repetition of the words steadied her more than the words themselves.

Lourdes was alive. She was in this city. And Enne would find her.

She repeated the mantra several times, like twisting the key in a porcelain doll, winding herself back together.

Never allow yourself to be lost, Enne recited in her head. That was Lourdes’s second rule.

But she wasn’t lost. She was terrified, and that was worse to admit.

She was terrified that—no matter how many times she recited Lourdes’s rules, or how many times she wound herself back together—she’d made a dangerous mistake in thinking she could brave the City of Sin. If the stories were true, she was a schoolgirl who had just wandered into the city of the wolves.

She was terrified that Lourdes was dead, just as she had warned.

Lastly, she was terrified of finding her. For all of Enne’s life, it had been only her and Lourdes and no one else. Lourdes was her home, but that home had many locked doors. Her mother had rooms full of secrets Enne had been forbidden to see, secrets Enne had pretended didn’t exist.

Once she found Lourdes, it was past time Enne opened those doors.

Hands shaking, Enne pulled Where To Go and Where Not To from her pocket and turned the pages to the city map. The Brint River split New Reynes into two halves: the North and the South. She was currently in the harbor, the smallest district of the notorious North Side.

If a storm were to further delay my return or another unforeseen circumstance occurs, you can speak to Mr. Levi Glaisyer, a friend of mine who lives in New Reynes. He will be glad to help you.

That was from the mysterious letter Lourdes had sent Enne a month after she had left home. Enne had never heard of this Mr. Levi Glaisyer, nor had she the least idea how to find him. On the map, she scanned the various neighborhoods of the much more refined South Side: the Senate District, the Park District, the Student District...he could live anywhere.

Two police officers slumped against the wall of a warehouse, talking to a boy roughly Enne’s age. The officers wore tarnished white boots and jackets buttoned from hips to throat, the threads frayed, the pits stained, the collars scuffed.

The boy speaking to them had a harsh face, like someone had carved his features with a razor so that they sharpened as he scowled. His shoulder bones, hip bones and wrist bones all jutted out uncomfortably, stretching his skin taut, and he wore an oversize collared shirt that only extenuated his gaunt frame. His brown hair was wildly disheveled.

While the officers’ uncleanliness was off-putting, the authorities were probably a good place to start her search. Enne pocketed her guidebook and approached.

“Show us your hands,” the first officer ordered the boy. He was tall with teeth like a shark—one of them gold.

The boy held up his palms. “Happy? No scars.”

“How about rolling up your sleeves, then?” Shark asked slyly. The second officer nodded, a cigar dangling from his mouth. Enne fought the urge to cover her nose. The stench of it.

The boy reached for his sleeves, then stopped. Although Enne had little notion what they were discussing, she could sense the tension in their words. The boy seemed to be in some kind of trouble.

“What?” Shark said, an ugly smile playing at his lips. “Got tattoos you don’t want us to see?”

Enne jumped forward at the boy’s hesitation, both to save him from whatever unpleasant conversation was unfolding, and because she didn’t have the time to wait. Who knew how long it would take her to find Lourdes?

“Excuse me,” Enne interrupted. She flashed her best, practiced smile. All three of them ran their eyes over her plainly tailored suit and high-necked blouse. Amid the flashier haute couture of the women around her, she knew she stuck out as a tourist.

Enne cleared her throat nervously. “I’m looking for someone. I was hoping you’d be kind enough to assist me.”

“Sure, missy,” Shark said as he elbowed Cigar suggestively. “We’d be glad to help ya. But we have to deal with him, first.”

“You can’t arrest me,” the boy growled. “I ain’t done anything.”

“Then show us your arms and prove you’re not an Iron.”

The boy didn’t move, only glared at the officers.

“Please,” Enne interrupted again. “I’m looking for a woman named Lourdes Alfero. She’s been missing since February.” Enne drew the letter from Lourdes out of her pocket and unfolded it. “She gave me the name of a Mr. Levi Glais—”

“Alfero?” Shark repeated. “Why you lookin’ for her?” He shoved the boy aside and advanced on Enne. He was two heads taller than her, and twice as wide. Enne was swallowed beneath his shadow.

“Um...” Enne stammered, the words dying on her tongue.

The other man dropped his cigar and ground it into the dirt with his heel. “There’s probably a mistake. Ain’t that right, missy?” Enne glanced toward the boy, but he’d taken advantage of the distraction she’d provided and fled.

Her stomach knotted. Did they know something about Lourdes? Enne thought back to another line from Lourdes’s letter: I encountered a little trouble that has delayed my return...

“Who’s Lourdes Alfero to you?” Shark’s fingers twitched as he reached for something at his side. A gun.

“No one,” Enne said hurriedly, doing her best not to stutter. Never let anyone see your fear. Another one of Lourdes’s rules—one Enne was certainly breaking. Her chest tightened as Cigar stepped closer, close enough to grab her. “My apologies. I believe there’s been a mistake. Thank you very much for your time.”

Enne dragged her trunk back into the crowd before they could stop her. Her mind raced as she attempted to conjure some sort of explanation for the officers’ reactions. Surely, they must’ve confused her mother’s name with someone else’s.

An uneasiness settled into her stomach—maybe there’d been no mistake. She was in the center of the harbor landing, but all around her were locked doors, locked doors.

Someone tapped Enne’s shoulder. She shrieked and whipped around.

“Scare much?” The boy smirked.

“You know, it’s rude to startle people, and—” And she needed to get out of here.

“Look over my shoulder.” He leaned down like he was whispering in her ear, allowing her to see beyond him.

The two police officers pushed through the crowd in their direction. Enne’s hands began to sweat inside her lace gloves.

“Who are you?” he asked. “First you’re looking for Levi Glaisyer, and now you got the whiteboots tailing you.”

“You know Mr. Glaisyer?” How could a boy like this know a gentleman? He smelled like he slept in a sewer, and there was something about his face that unnerved her—not so much his crooked frown as his crooked smile. He looked like a warning from her guidebook.

He rolled up his left sleeve to reveal a black tattoo of a club on the underside of his arm, like the card suit. It was small, halfway between his wrist and elbow. “I’m an Iron.”

“I’m afraid I’m not familiar with...the terminology.” Though, even as she said it, Enne realized it did sound familiar. Something she had read in the section about the North Side. Admittedly, she’d skipped most of those parts. The North Side’s reputation was so dirty, even its chapters in her guidebook looked a little bit stained.

The boy leaned down a second time. The whiteboots watched them from the end of the block, and Shark kept one hand on his gun. “You’re lost, missy. And walking straight into some muck. So take my advice: ditch your trunk, and scram. Playing nice is the same as losing in this city.” Before she could adequately digest what he’d said, he whispered, “Three, two, one.”

He took off.

Behind her, Shark and Cigar shoved their way toward her, cursing and knocking travelers aside. Enne whimpered, terrified, yet loath to abandon all her possessions.

But the decision took only a moment. She was lost, and the boy knew Mr. Glaisyer, Enne’s only connection to finding Lourdes. Maybe Mr. Glaisyer could explain the misunderstanding between the whiteboots and her mother. Maybe he possessed the key to those locked doors. And besides, possessions could be replaced.

She dropped her trunk, yanked up the hem of her skirt, and sprinted after the boy.

He ran two blocks past the end of the harbor before turning down an alley. Wheezing, she forced her legs to move faster. Her heels clicked loudly with each step, and sweat dampened her forehead and undersleeves. Enne couldn’t remember the last time she’d run. This behavior must’ve breached every one of Lourdes’s rules.

The boy slipped down another alley up ahead, while Enne trailed fifty paces behind. What if she lost him? For every step she made, he’d already made three. He clearly had some sort of speed talent, which explained why his features were so angular—like he’d been made to be aerodynamic. She passed a pawnshop and an outdoor grocer, but no one looked twice at her, as if a girl fleeing from the authorities was a common morning occurrence in New Reynes. Maybe it was.

The next alley had no streetlights, and thanks to the black clouds and towering buildings, she could hardly see where her feet landed. Soon the noises of the main street—the motorcars, the shouting, the traffic whistles—disappeared, and it became eerily quiet. Only their footsteps remained. Enne’s heart pounded so hard, she felt the beats in her back.

The buildings here looked different, too. In the harbor, the shipping houses were made of a weathered white stone—the kind her guidebook described as characteristic of the city. But the architecture around her now was gothic and black, full of spires and archways and wrought iron. Everything was sharp, a place designed to cut. To draw blood. It was the kind of dark where shadows didn’t exist. Wherever she was...she shouldn’t be here.

She turned a corner and found the boy waiting for her. He stood at the doorway of a house with boarded windows and shriveled ivy crawling up its gutters. He grabbed her by her blazer and jerked her inside. She crashed to the wooden floor.

They were in a dusty, unused kitchen. Two panels on the ceiling flickered with murky light.

The boy bent over her. “So, why are you looking for Pup?”

Enne scrambled to her feet and smoothed out her dress, hyperaware of how inappropriate their situation was. They were alone in goodness knows where. She didn’t know his name. She didn’t even know what he wanted.

What had she done?

No emotions, no fear, she thought. She smiled and adjusted her posture, but that couldn’t have made much of an impression, panting and sweating as she was.

“Well, I’m actually looking for my mother, Lourdes Alfero,” Enne explained. “She mentioned Mr. Glaisyer to me in a letter. She said he’d be glad to help.”

“I never knew Pup to be glad to help anyone,” he said darkly. “Sure you got the right man?”

Dread blossomed in her like black ink soaking through paper. Could there have been some other mistake? “I believe so,” she replied meekly. “How are you acquainted with him?”

“Acquainted?” he echoed. With his thick New Reynes accent, he didn’t pronounce the t. It reminded Enne that she was awfully far away from home.

“How do you know Mr. Glaisyer?” she asked.

“Everyone does,” he answered. “He’s the lord.”

Footsteps thudded down a staircase, and two others entered the kitchen. The first was another boy, also about Enne’s age. He had a soldier’s look to him: broad shoulders, a shirt too tight for his muscular build and an expression like he was never much surprised about anything—that, or he didn’t care. Black-and-white tattoos covered his arms, some disappearing into his sleeve, snaking up his neck. Among them were two small ones, the only ones with color: a red J on one arm, and a diamond on the next, in the same places as the first boy’s. He wore his trousers cuffed and his blond hair slicked back underneath a newsboy cap.

Like a gangster, she thought. She took a step closer to the door.

The other person was a girl, maybe thirteen years old. She had golden skin and thick black hair, which was cut bobbed and jagged. She wore men’s clothes that were several sizes too large and a pair of ruby earrings that Enne imagined she’d stolen. On the underside of her forearms, just like the boys, she had two tattoos: a black spade on the left, a five on the right.

The boys met each other’s eyes sternly. “Where’ve you been, Chez?” the soldier one demanded. “And where—” his eyes wandered over to Enne “—did you find a missy like this?”

“Near Tropps Street. She was wandering around...an easy target, really—”

“You’re a bad liar,” the soldier one said. “You’ve been pickpocketing near the harbor again. You know Levi has business with the whiteboot captain. Business worth a lot more than a few volts in some tourist’s pocket.”

Enne perked up at the mention of Levi. So they both knew him.

“Then where’s my paycheck, Jac?” Chez growled. “Where’s her paycheck?” He gestured toward the girl. When the soldier boy—Jac—didn’t respond, Chez added, “I found this missy asking the whiteboots about Pup—I mean, about Levi. Levi and some other person. Then they started tailing her.” Chez took a switchblade out of his pocket and flipped it between his knuckles—deftly, expertly. Enne’s mouth dried, and she hugged her purse to her side. “She’s kinda thick.”

Jac tugged at his cap and nodded at Enne, who tried not to appear nervous. From his build, Enne guessed he had a strength talent. If he grabbed her, she wouldn’t be able to escape. And if she ran, Chez would catch her.

They all knew Levi Glaisyer, but something was wrong. Without knowing why, she felt trapped. Fifty minutes in the city, and she’d already made a dangerous mistake.

Jac stepped closer to Enne and stared at her with such intensity that, if not for years of etiquette training, would’ve made her drop her gaze to the floor. Lost or not, strength and speed talents or not, she refused to let them know they intimidated her.

“What’s your name?” he asked, arms crossed.

“Enne,” she said, clearly, loudly, as if answering roll call rather than speaking to a potential delinquent.

Don’t speak about yourself unless asked. Never show fear. Never allow yourself to be lost. No emotions. Don’t trust anyone unless you must.

Lourdes had drilled dozens of rules into Enne in the hope that they would become second nature. Usually, they were. Sometimes Enne could hear her mother’s voice in her head, whispering about etiquette and precautions. But right now, all she could focus on was Chez’s knife twirling around his index finger and the seriousness in Jac’s gray eyes. Even the girl looked threatening, and she was younger than Enne.

Enne held her breath, but even so, she felt herself cracking...shattering.

“Enne? That’s a letter, ain’t it?” Jac asked.

“Yes.” She didn’t hide her astonishment well, but the boy didn’t seem to notice.

“You from around here?”

“I’m from Bellamy.”

“Quite a journey.” He smiled, and she relaxed a bit when she noticed his dimples and the way his ears stuck out. “When did you get here?”

“An hour ago.” A wave of nausea crashed over her when she remembered that she’d left her trunk with all her belongings near the harbor. Someone would’ve stolen them since then. Now her only means of paying for her stay in New Reynes and her ticket home were the thousand volts she was carrying, meant to last an entire summer. She hadn’t anticipated buying new clothes or other necessities while in the city.

She was lost, surrounded by strangers, and all she had were the contents of her purse. And it was—mostly—her own fault.

When she caught Chez and the girl both staring hungrily at her bag, she hugged it closer.

Fear. Lost. Emotions. Trusting... Were there rules for when she was breaking every rule?

“I don’t know why you wanna see Levi,” Jac said, shaking her trembling hand, “but anyone who outruns two whiteboots on their first day here seems trustworthy in my book.”

Even if he trusted her, Enne knew better than to trust him. She knew better than to trust anyone in New Reynes. Except, hopefully, this Levi Glaisyer.

“Levi will be here in an hour,” he said, and those were the only words that held her together. “He’s busy, and I can’t make promises, but I’ll make sure he talks to you.” He took her arm and led her to the sitting room, his smile a little too wide, his grip a little too tight. “I’m Jac Mardlin. Allow me to be your official welcome to the City of Sin.”

LEVI

Muck. Of all the gambling taverns in the city, why had the whiteboot captain chosen Grady’s? Levi Glaisyer hadn’t set foot in there since he’d handed Grady his resignation four years ago. He paced back and forth in the alley outside the tavern, dropping the copy of The Crimes & the Times he’d been carrying. On the front page, a photograph of Malcolm Semper, the oh-so-respected Chancellor of the Republic, soaked up the muddy rainwater.

After a few more moments of cursing, Levi gathered his nerve, straightened his felt homburg hat and strode to the door.

The inside of the tavern hadn’t changed at all. It still reeked of tobacco and burnt food, and the patrons were loud, even now, early in the morning. A group of men seated at the main card table—what was once Levi’s card table—were dressed in clothes with more patches than original fabric. A woman in fishnet stockings giggled and toppled into one of their laps.

The dealer at the table did a double take once he noticed Levi. Most gamblers considered Levi to be the best dealer in the city, and he didn’t normally show his face in establishments as small-time as this one.

But he hadn’t come to gamble. He’d come for business.

Levi searched the room for Jamison Hector, the captain of the city’s whiteboots. The two of them were supposed to meet here at ten o’clock sharp, and Levi had been on edge about it for days. He wasn’t usually the sort to rendezvous with authority—if only on principle—but lately, Levi had done a lot of things he’d never thought he would.

He locked eyes with the captain at a table in the back corner but made it only halfway to him before Grady slapped his shoulder, hard enough for him to wince.

“Levi, never thought I’d see you again,” Grady said with a laugh. His enormous gut tremored. “How you doing?”

As if Grady didn’t know how Levi was doing, what he’d become since his stint here as an amateur card dealer. Reputation aside, he was easily recognizable with his dark brown skin, his calculating gaze and his signature coarse curls—bronze at the roots, but black at the ends, like a burnt-out match. Levi had a look like he was trying to sell you something, and a smile that made you want to buy it.

“I’ve been busy,” Levi answered. “How’s business?”

“Just hired another new dealer and had some rotten luck. He barely makes ten percent profit. Ten percent.”

Levi whistled with feigned concern.

“It was better when you were dealing for me. No, don’t bother apologizing. St. Morse must shell out three times what I paid you. At least.”

Try ten times, Levi thought. But that doesn’t come without strings attached.

“I could get you an Iron,” Levi offered, always the businessman. He made a show of adjusting his sleeves to brandish his tattoos: the ace on one arm, the spade on the other. They marked him as the Iron Lord. “I found this new kid who deals pretty well—”

“I would, but I can’t. The whiteboots keep paying me visits lately, and I don’t want any trouble.” Before Levi could point out that technically speaking, the Irons were the only gang that didn’t break the law, Grady continued, “They think I’m smuggling.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Of course.” He laughed again. “I’ll get you a drink, on the house. Anything for my best dealer—and youngest, I might add. A Snake Eyes—that still your favorite?”

“Sure is,” Levi said politely, though he’d never had a taste for the drink. It was also barely ten in the morning. “Thanks.”

“You should stop by more often. Teach the new fellow how it’s done.”

“Maybe I will,” Levi lied. He had no intention of revealing his tricks to anyone, especially a no-name dealer who wasn’t an Iron.

When Grady walked away, Levi approached the whiteboot captain. The captain wasn’t dressed in his usual uniform, but Levi never forgot a face—and the captain had an interesting one. His nose had been broken so many times that it was bent decidedly to the left, and an ugly scar traced across his jawline to the place where his right ear had once been.

“Not every day I have a drink with the Iron Lord,” the captain said. He had a grandfatherly voice—all condescension, but with an added hint of malice. He looked Levi over more closely. “But you must be barely old enough to drink. Isn’t that right?”

Levi tilted his head to the side and cracked his neck, a nervous habit of his. He hated the way people talked to him in this city—like he was nothing. No, like he was worse than nothing. Like he was a joke.

Levi reached into his pocket and pulled out a silk pouch filled with seven orbs. He set it on the table in front of the captain.

The man raised his eyebrows and opened it. He pulled out the first orb. It was a clear glass sphere, about the size of a billiard ball. White sparks, called volts, sizzled within the glass.

The captain held it up to the lamplight and examined it. “This is good quality.”

“Only the best for my clients,” Levi said smoothly.

“You make it?”

“No. I’m not in the orb-making business.” Not anymore.

“Yes, we’re all aware what kind of business you’re in,” the captain said drily. He pulled out a mechanical volt reader, flipped open the orb’s metal cap and slipped the antenna inside. The meter read 180 volts. He did this with the other six orbs, even though it was widely known that Levi would never cheat a client. They were all there. Every volt he owed him.

Dealing in orbs was a very official way of doing business—it made Levi look more legitimate. As a currency, volts could be traded in two ways. Glass orbs, like the ones Levi had given the captain, were the traditional method. Alternatively, you could carry volts in your skin. This was the hardest to track, the most difficult to steal and the favorite method of the city’s gangsters.

The captain slipped the last orb into the pouch. “It’s a pity. The Glaisyer orb-making talent is the best of them all.” He shook his head. “I don’t want to know how you got these.”

Levi’s eyebrows furrowed. “The investment was a success. You’re lucky you paid in when you did. The venture—”

“Was a scam, boy. Don’t lie to me.”

Levi’s sense of alarm never crossed his expression—he had too skilled a poker face for that. But what exactly was the old man suggesting? He couldn’t know. That wasn’t possible.

“I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” he answered coolly.

The captain leaned forward. “I’ve got it all worked out. You promise an investment with outrageous returns. One man invests, then another, then another. Then when their deadlines roll around, you pay them back with the volts from the newest investor and pocket a bit yourself. Not a bad scam. It just keeps going and going, all until you run out of investors and have no ways of paying people back.”

No. No. No. Levi had covered every trace, tied up every loose end. After two years of running the scheme, he was nearly done with it. He had only two people left to pay back, and the captain was one of them. He was so close. He wasn’t about to go down now.

He fingered the pistol at his side, even as he tried to think of a clever way out. He always did. Levi the card dealer. Levi the con man. There was no player he couldn’t outplay. But he’d rarely been so easily backed into a corner.

Damn it, Vianca, he thought. I could hang for this. And it would be your fault.

As if his employer gave a muck about what happened to him.

“What do you want?” Levi growled.

“I don’t want anything,” the captain said. He was obviously lying. Everyone wanted something.

Grady set Levi’s Snake Eyes on the table, bubbling in its champagne glass. “Anything else I can get you, Levi?”

“Nah, thanks, Grady,” he muttered, forcing a smile. He still had one hand on his gun.

“What about you, um...sir?” Grady eyed the captain hesitantly. Grady was a good man, but he wasn’t a respectable one. Whiteboots always made him tense. “What can I get for you?”

“Nothing for me.”

Grady returned to the bar, where he yelled at an old man on a stool trying to order his fifth glass of absinthe.

“You know him?” the captain asked curiously, as if he still expected Levi to be capable of small talk at a time like this. Levi had a grim suspicion he was about to be blackmailed. Or worse.

“He’s an old friend,” Levi said curtly.

“That’s why you’re not like the others. The other lords don’t have friends,” the captain said matter-of-factly. “They have victims.”

Levi was mucking tired of hearing how he wasn’t like the other street lords. Tired of hearing each and every way they were better than him.

“How old are you?” the captain asked.

“Eighteen this October,” Levi said stiffly, even though that was four months away. Better to seem older than be treated like a child.

“If you live to October. Have you ever considered that you might be in over your head?”

Levi clenched his fist beneath the table. He thought about it every night, during the hours when he should’ve been sleeping but couldn’t. He didn’t choose to start this scam. He didn’t choose to involve the most dangerous people in the city. Ever since he started working for Vianca, he hadn’t had many choices at all.

“Who else knows?” Levi murmured, the quietness of his voice betraying his fear.

The captain rubbed the scruff on his scarred chin. “I’m not the smartest man. So tell me, if I figured it out, who else might’ve, too?”

Levi caught his breath. He was referring to Sedric Torren, the twisted, perverted don of the Torren casino Family. The kind of man who could clear a room with the snap of a finger. The kind of man who could ensnare his prey with only a smile. The kind of man Levi didn’t want as an enemy.

Sedric Torren was Levi’s final investor. Once Levi paid Sedric back, he’d be done. Clean. Safe. But it’d taken Levi weeks to scrape up the nine hundred volts for the captain, and he owed Sedric ten thousand.

If Sedric did figure out the scam, would he wait for Levi to pay him back, or would he kill him to make a point? Conning a Torren was flirting with destruction.

The captain stood. “I’d prefer not to keep hearing your name.” Then he nodded at Levi and left the tavern. No blackmail, no coercion. Just a warning.

Levi let out a breath of relief. He supposed he was lucky—he could’ve been arrested, or worse. But he didn’t feel lucky. The whiteboot captain didn’t bother arresting criminals he considered dead men walking.

I’m almost done. I’m almost safe, he reminded himself. The only person I have left to pay is Sedric, then I can finally focus on the Irons.

With all the time he’d been spending on Vianca’s scam, his gang was slowly crumbling. Their income was tight, their clients were irritated and Levi hardly recognized some of his own kids. But Levi refused to fall with this scheme. He had a destiny to forge and an empire to build.

Levi stood to leave. As he made his way out the door, he tried not to notice Grady’s face fall at the full drink he’d left behind on the table.

Levi headed to the newest abandoned house Chez and some of the other Irons had made their own. As he put more distance between himself and Grady’s tavern, his shoulders relaxed, and the tightness in his chest loosened. Walking always cleared his head.

Around him, the white stone shopfronts and gambling dens gave way to the signature black scenery of Olde Town, the most historic neighborhood of New Reynes. With the buildings so tall and the alleys so narrow, there was little light here, which was why Levi had claimed it when he founded the Irons five years ago. It was nearly abandoned—nicknamed the “stain of the city,” it was the sort of place you didn’t want to find yourself, no matter the time of day. There was an art to navigating its maze of alleys, of slipping oneself into its endless shadows. Here, it was always night. And sleights of hand were easiest in the dark.

When he reached the Irons’ hideout, Levi paused, running his hand across the wrought iron bars bolted over the windows. He knew every inch of Olde Town. Because you own it, he told himself, convinced himself. But did he really own it anymore?

Levi cracked his neck, mustered up some bravado and knocked on the door. Chez unlocked it.

“There’s a missy here to see you,” Chez said, crossing his heart, as gangsters always did for their lord. As Chez usually did for him, though his sign of respect was often forgotten lately.

“What? Who?” Levi hadn’t scheduled any meetings today.

“A real prissy one. From one of the territories.”

Before Levi could ask if he was joking, Chez skulked off to the living room. Levi followed, ripping his arms out of his jacket. He didn’t have time for this. He needed to figure out how to deliver ten thousand volts to Sedric Torren before Sedric Torren delivered him.

In the living room, Levi found Jac leaning against a quilted armchair, his aura drifting lightly in the stale air. Levi had inherited his split talent of sensing auras from the Canes, his mother’s family. He couldn’t sense everyone’s auras—his split talent wasn’t strong enough for that—but those of the people he knew well were often discernable to him.

His best friend’s aura flowed toward him in waves and smelled like linen and the color gray.

Mansi perched at the end table, practicing a card trick Levi had taught her yesterday. She crossed her heart and beamed at him, just as she always did. Mansi was one of the best up-and-coming dealers in the Irons. Some called her Levi’s protégée, though Levi hadn’t made that decision yet. Still, her unwavering loyalty held appeal—there wasn’t enough of that to go around, these days.

The missy in question sat on the couch, her back straight as a billiard rod, her legs resting to the side with one ankle tucked delicately behind the other. She was tiny, only about five feet tall, with fair skin and brown hair falling out of a tight ballerina bun. She was real pretty in a second-glance kind of way, though she looked like she was on the wrong side of the city—a strand of rose pearls caught on one of Olde Town’s serrated spires.

She stood when Levi entered, like he was some dinner guest. “You must be Mr. Glaisyer.” He cringed at the sound of his father’s name. The others snickered.

“What’s going on here, Jac?” he asked, keeping his gaze fixed on her. It wasn’t every day such pretty or strange girls showed up asking for him.

“She said you could help her contact someone. And before you say no—” Levi snapped his mouth shut, and Jac continued “—she outran two whiteboots this morning after just arriving. Not bad, eh?”

Not bad? By the looks of her, Levi would say unbelievable. What could she have done to anger the whiteboots? Curtsy the wrong way?

“Who is she?” he asked.

“I’m right here,” she said haughtily. “You might as well ask me.”

“Exactly,” Levi snapped. “But I didn’t. Which means I didn’t want to.”

That shut her up.

“She’s from Bellamy,” Jac explained. Bellamy was one of the Republic’s territories, a mostly self-regulated island that paid taxes to the wigheads. It had a reputation for being twenty years backward, which explained her conservative clothes. “Bit of a snob, really.”

She cleared her throat with a sharp ahem.

The only person Levi knew from Bellamy was Lourdes Alfero, but he hadn’t thought about her in years. She was one of those “anonymous” journalists who wrote for the monarchist papers. Though the Mizers were all dead, the monarchists kept lobbying for a reinstatement of the old kingdoms and the crowning of new families to rule them. The monarchists were the only ones in opposition to the First Party, the core political party of the Republic.

Levi owed Lourdes Alfero a big favor, but that was from four years ago. He’d always assumed she’d gotten herself killed—all the monarchists did eventually.

“Are you quite certain this is Mr. Glaisyer?” the missy asked Jac.

“Think carefully,” Levi said, winking at him. “Better be sure.”

Jac plopped on the couch, and the girl tried to subtly scoot away from him. He made a show of throwing his hands up in the air. “You meant the other Levi Glaisyer. Terribly sorry, missy. But dont’cha worry, the other Levi Glaisyer is a real nice fellow. Nothing like this guy.”

Levi tossed his jacket and hat on the coffee table. “He’s a bank teller. Three kids. Nice house on the South Side. Not even a splotch on his criminal record. Instead, you’ve got me. Best card dealer in the city. The Iron Lord.” Chez rolled his eyes. “Though I like to call myself a businessman more than, well, a con man.” He claimed the seat on her other side.

“There’s no other Levi Glaisyer,” she whispered, her lip quivering.

“Jac, you didn’t tell me she was a smart one.”

“Then...there must be some mistake,” she stammered. To her credit, she managed to keep her chin snobbishly high. Maybe Levi wasn’t the only one here with some bravado.

“Why else would such a fine Bellamy lady like yourself be looking for someone like me in the City of Sin, if not by mistake?” By her large purse, well-made clothing and leather pointed-toe heels, Levi bet she carried some decent voltage. “How about you give us your purse and we forget this ever happened? Maybe I’m not the other Levi Glaisyer, but I’m still a generous man.”

“No,” she said. Her voice cracked, and he couldn’t tell if the word was a plea or a refusal.

“Might want to repeat that,” Levi warned. “I don’t think I heard you right.” Chez walked up beside him, flipping his knife between his hands so fast the blade was a blur of silver.

She shrank away and choked a bit, like she was trying to keep from crying, holding her hand over her mouth and shaking all over. Muck. He hated when missies cried.

Unmoved, Chez ripped her purse from her hands and threw it to Mansi, who caught it as nimbly as in one of her card tricks. Half the contents fell out—a passport, a few loose buttons, several cookies and a folded piece of paper. Smirking at the mess, Levi picked up the last item. It was a letter with fancy, precise handwriting:

Dearest,

I hate to think of the worry I’ve caused you. I am well and missing you. Although I have encountered a little trouble that has delayed my return, I plan to leave in a few days. By the time this letter reaches you, I’ll be eagerly sailing home.

If a storm were to further delay my return or another unforeseen circumstance occurs, you can speak to Mr. Levi Glaisyer, a friend of mine who lives in New Reynes. He will be glad to help you.

With much love,

Lourdes

Levi’s stomach knotted. Lourdes. He knew that name.

Chez peered over Levi’s shoulder blankly. “What’s it say?”

Levi didn’t respond. The girl watched him with wide, puffy brown eyes, hugging her arms to herself.

He pointed to the letter. “By ‘Lourdes,’ I’m guessing this is...”

She shook her head indignantly and reached to snatch the letter from him. He moved it away from her reach.

“Relax, missy. It’s just a question. Do you know Lourdes Alfero or not?”

She took a deep breath to compose herself and wiped away the tearstains on her cheek. “I do. That’s why I’m here.”

Jac stiffened with recognition and met Levi’s eyes. His expression seemed to prod, This changes things, right?

Levi looked away. Of course it changed things. His best friend had a low opinion of Levi’s conscience. Levi owed a debt to Lourdes—at the very least, he’d hear the missy out.

“Would you three leave me and Miss...” He paused and looked at her.

“Miss Salta. But you may call me Enne.” Despite still tearing up, her voice remained controlled and steady. She spoke more formally than the managers at St. Morse did when addressing their rich patrons, but her jaw was locked, her fists clenched. She wouldn’t forgive him so easily for trying to cheat her—not that Levi cared what she thought of him. He wasn’t trying to be a gentleman; he was trying to pay his debts.

“Could you leave me and Enne alone for a few minutes? Leave her purse.”

Chez’s jaw dropped, but Jac put his hand on his shoulder and steered him away. Mansi tossed the purse on the table before they all left through the back door.

When Levi was certain they were alone, he asked, “How do you know Alfero?”

“Lourdes is my mother. I traveled here because I need you to find her.”

I take it, after writing this letter, Levi thought, Alfero never did make it home. He was liking this day less and less, and it was barely eleven in the morning. “You came a long way, and this place isn’t much like Bellamy.”

“No, it’s not,” she said flatly. “But the reputation of New Reynes is the least of my worries.”

That was her first mistake.

If she’d known anything about her mother, she wouldn’t have gone within a hundred feet of whiteboots, much less actually approach them.

Which meant Levi had the unfortunate job of telling her that her mother was almost certainly dead.

He studied her. If she didn’t share Alfero’s blood name, she must’ve been her split daughter, with a blood talent inherited from her father. Enne Alfero Salta. From what he remembered of Alfero—a devoted journalist, a staunch progressive and a profound political mind—Levi couldn’t picture her walking out with someone with a dancing talent. She’d seemed too serious for that. Nor did he recall her being particularly interested in men. It’d been four years ago, but Levi still remembered the determined fury in her eyes. The Republic had wronged her in a way she could never forgive.

Whatever her cause had been, Levi wondered, was it worth dying for? Worth leaving behind a daughter for?

He doubted it. Nothing was worth that price.

She cleared her throat. “Tell me, Mr. Glaisyer—”

“Call me Levi.”

“Tell me, Levi, why would the whiteboots be so interested in my mother?” She slipped her hand into her pocket and pulled out a bronze coin, which she squeezed the way gamblers squeezed dice before they tossed them. Like a prayer.

Levi hesitated, not wanting to deliver the bad news so fast. She’d only just she stopped crying. Instead, he said, “You don’t look much like her.” The Lourdes Alfero he remembered was tall, nearly as tall as him, and with blond hair much lighter than Enne’s brown. She’d dressed fluidly—some days as a woman, sometimes as neither male nor female—and her angled features lent themselves easily to her identity. She preferred to be addressed as “she” and “her.”

He didn’t see any of Lourdes’s face in Enne’s.

“Lourdes is my adopted mother,” Enne explained. “But I can tell you’re stalling. Why were the whiteboots so interested in her?”

Levi sighed. She might not know much about New Reynes, but she wasn’t thick. “She’s a Mizer sympathizer. A famous one, at that.”

“What?” Her voice came out in a screech. Maybe she wasn’t as controlled as Levi had first thought.

He supposed he couldn’t blame her slip. Even if the way Chancellor Malcolm Semper governed the Republic was wildly unpopular, the Mizers had been tyrants. In New Reynes, where the Revolution began, men, women and children had cheered in Liberty Square as the royal family was beheaded. Most viewed the monarchists as radicals.

“Ever since the Revolution—especially during the Great Street War, which occurred seven or so years after—there’s been a group of journalists writing for monarchist newspapers. They use code names to expose stories the wigheads try to keep quiet, and they work in secret. They call themselves the Pseudonyms. Lourdes is one of them.” The most famous of them all, even. “The whiteboots have been searching for her for a long time.” And, sometime in the past four months, they’d probably found her.

Levi paused, gauging Enne’s reaction. “Did you really have no idea?”

She bit her lip. “I knew Lourdes had her secrets, but no, I never would’ve guessed this.”

Levi held his breath as he watched the gravity of her mother’s situation dawn on her. He didn’t need to tell her that Alfero was dead. She could probably guess it herself now.

“Do you know where Lourdes might be?” Enne asked, still using present tense. Levi sighed inwardly.

“I haven’t spoken to her in years,” he told her.

“What?” She frowned. “Then why would she recommend you?”

“I’ve got no idea. About four years ago, I got myself into a lot of trouble with a con gone wrong.” And apparently, he thought, I haven’t learned my lesson. “Lourdes paid my way out of it and got me a steady job at St. Morse.”

“St. Morse?”

“The casino. You must’ve heard of it. It’s one of the two largest in the city.”

She pulled a book out of her pocket, and Levi snorted. A tourist guide. “I think I’ve heard of it,” she said, skimming through the pages until she found the passage she was looking for. “Oh. It says not to go there.”

He glanced at the title. The City of Sin, a Guidebook: Where To Go and Where Not To. If she’d paid more attention to her guidebook, then she’d never have followed Chez into Olde Town, the heart of Iron territory. She would’ve left the harbor and gone straight to the South Side, where she clearly belonged.

Levi stood up and reached for his hat on the table.

“Where are you going?” Enne asked.

“Out. There are volts to make and people to cheat.” He flashed her a smile. She was lucky he hadn’t cheated her. He was feeling sentimental today.

“But you didn’t finish your story,” she blurted.

“That is the story. Lourdes helped me out, she got me a job and then she disappeared. I haven’t spoken to her since.”

Enne stood up, her shoulders square and her expression a challenge. He wondered if she really felt that brave, or if she was a breath away from tears again. “But you must help me. I have to find her.”

“I must help you?” he said, taking a step closer. She wasn’t very intimidating, small as she was. Not many spoke to him the way she did. “Why should I? I don’t know you. I barely know your mother.”

“Because...” Her voice wavered. “Because I’ll pay you.”

“You lost your luggage. How many volts could you possibly have on you right now?” His eyes traveled from her purse to her pockets. He doubted she had more than a few hundred.

But...that was a few hundred closer to his ten thousand. Maybe he was feeling a bit altruistic after all.

“Lourdes has a bank account,” Enne said, with the kind of seriousness that made Levi think she wasn’t lying. He searched her face for a tell—everyone always had a tell, a break in their poker face. But he found none.

“It has more volts than you could want,” she continued. “If you help me find her, I’ll pay you.”

“How much?” he asked.

“Five thousand volts,” she said unflinchingly.

He stilled. Did she really have that kind of voltage? She did look like she came from money, as Lourdes always had, too.

Maybe she had five thousand volts. Maybe she had more.

“Sorry,” he said, faking disinterest. “I don’t have time for this. I’m not the sort of guy who helps damsels in distress.”

“Ten thousand volts,” she declared.

Gotcha.

He narrowed his eyes, as if considering. He let a few moments pass, and as he waited, the boldness in her dark eyes never faded. A few minutes ago, she’d been in tears, but she wasn’t broken.

But would she be, once she realized her mother was probably dead?

Maybe Alfero is still alive, Levi thought. After all, she’d survived this long. That alone was impressive.

But unlikely. And a good player knew better than to bet against those kind of odds.

“I’m listening,” he said. “But I’m going to need some incentive up front. Who knows how long it could take to find her?”

“I’ll give you one thousand volts,” she offered, “but not until the end of the day. You said yourself that you barely know Lourdes. I want to make sure you can help me at all.”

If he pressed her for more, she’d probably relent. After all, she could play at being brave all she wanted, but Levi knew better. She’d left her belongings behind to follow Chez straight into the heart of the North Side—she was desperate.

But he didn’t haggle. He didn’t want to scare her away and lose the possibility—even if it was slim—for ten thousand volts, for a chance to save himself. After all, he was desperate, too.

If the day ended without a lead, then Levi would take his one thousand volts tonight and leave her in the dust. Even if ten thousand would cover his entire debt to Sedric, he still doubted that Lourdes Alfero was even alive. He couldn’t afford to waste time on a pointless search.

“We’ll start with a friend of mine,” Levi said. “He can answer our questions.”

Enne’s shoulders relaxed, and she let out the breath she’d been holding.

“Is your friend an...Iron?” she asked.

He smirked. “What? Don’t like my friends much?” Jac might look threatening, but he had all the aggression of a baby rabbit. Mansi was practically Levi’s younger sister. And Chez... Well, Chez and Levi weren’t on the best of terms as of late, but when Chez wanted to, he could be tolerable. Sometimes, when the stars aligned, even pleasant.

“No, my friend’s not an Iron,” he said. But Levi got the feeling Enne would be missing Olde Town’s charm within the hour.

“Good,” she huffed.

He opened the door for her. “After you, missy.”

“But what about the whiteboots?” she asked. “They could still be searching for me.”

“You think I’d go someplace with whiteboots? Please, I know better than that. You should learn to trust me.” His smile was filthy with insincerity.

“I’ll work with you because I have to, but I’m not going to trust you until I find Lourdes.”

She lifted her head and marched outside.

“One thousand volts,” Levi grumbled to himself. If he could tolerate her for a single day, then he would wake one thousand volts richer tomorrow.

Besides, Enne Salta wouldn’t last more than a night in the City of Sin.

LEVI

Levi and Enne emerged from the edge of Olde Town, squinting into the light. Not the sunlight—the New Reynes sky was overcast, the smog leaving foul smudges against the clouds. No, they were squinting at the flashing lights of Tropps Street, the center of the Casino District, and—as far as anyone on the North Side was concerned—the center of the city. Everything shone on Tropps Street: the glint of costume jewelry, the golden teeth of the bouncers’ smiles, the waxy sheen of faux leather and, of course, the neon reflections in the puddles of rainwater, piss and emptied liquor cups along the sidewalks.

There was nothing like the Casino District. From the moment Levi had arrived in New Reynes, he’d made it his home. Then he’d made it his territory. One day, he would make it his kingdom.

To the right, a man played an accordion along the curb. He sang about the woes of unrequited love, but it wasn’t clear if he was referring to a sweetheart or the bottle of absinthe at his feet. Enne cringed each time the singer cursed.

“You seem nervous,” Levi said.

She hugged her arms to her chest and darted an anxious glance over her shoulder. “This street is so crowded, but it’s not even noon. Don’t these people work?”

He snorted. “Crowded? You should see this street at night.”

Half a block ahead, a man in a trench coat stared at them from beneath a dull and flickering yellow sign. Rusted chains dangled from it like metal streamers. The man’s face was sallow and sunken, and he reached a shaking hand forward like a prisoner trapped behind bars, begging for food or volts.

Enne stiffened and knocked into Levi’s shoulder, piquing his annoyance. “Why is he watching us?” Enne whispered.

“He’s a street slave. Don’t worry—he can’t follow us.”

“What does that mean? What’s stopping him?” She ducked to his other side so that Levi was between her and the man.

“He’s trapped on that street,” Levi explained. “The families there have a talent that binds people in debt to them within a certain area. That street is like a jail cell.”

She shivered. “What are they in debt for?”

“Drugs. Mostly Rapture, Mistress and Lullaby—all from Torren and Augustine suppliers. Try to avoid Chain Street.”

She nodded fearfully and fiddled with something in her pocket. If Levi didn’t know better, he’d guess she was an antsy runner carrying an expensive package. The farther west they walked down Tropps Street, the closer they came to Scarhand territory. Even if it wasn’t peak hours, there were probably still a few gangsters roaming the alleys, hunting for orb pouches or—for the particularly skilled—grazing trace volts off unlucky passersby’s skin. Enne was marking herself as a target.

Then, to Levi’s ever-increasing aggravation, Enne removed her coin from her pocket and began fiddling with it as she walked. He glanced at the cameo of the queen on the front. If it was from before the Revolution, it was probably worth more than sentimental value. All the more reason to avoid wandering eyes.

“Put the coin back,” he snapped. “That looks like gold from far away.” This missy was bound to be more trouble than she was worth. He didn’t have the time or patience to teach her the rules of New Reynes.

Enne bit her lip and slipped it back into her pocket. At least she listened to what he said.

“What’s the coin from, anyway?” he asked.

“It’s an old token. Lourdes gave it to me.”

She’s alone and agitated, Levi reminded himself. Of course she was acting jumpy. What she needed was a distraction.

“So just how different is New Reynes from Bellamy?” he asked, even though he already knew the answer: completely.

“Well, to start with, it’s a lot dirtier,” she said, her nose crinkled. Levi was beginning to think that was her signature look. “And it smells foul.”

“What? This city?” He inhaled deeply through his nose. “That’s the smell of opportunity. And maybe a little piss.”

“Yes, well, I suppose you might be fonder of it if you were born here.”

“You can’t tell from looking at me, but I wasn’t born a Sinner,” he said. “But yes, I am rather fond of the eau de New Reynes. Maybe you will be, too, after a while.”

She crinkled her nose again. Pretty or not, Levi wondered if he had ever met such a delicate, unpleasant creature. “Where are you from, then?” she asked.

“My family lives in Elta.” The word felt like a shard of ice on his tongue. It was a city a few hours east, on the opposite coast. “Before that, my parents came from Caroko.”

Caroko was once a great capital of one of the seven Mizer kingdoms. During the Revolution, like many orb-maker families who’d been loyal to the Mizers, the Glaisyers were forced to relocate near the ever-suspicious eyes of New Reynes, the capital of the Republic. His mother, who’d been a bit of a world traveler in her youth, hadn’t resented the move. His father, however, had mourned the loss of his home and the king he’d once served. Rather than teach Levi about Caroko, his father had refused to discuss it, as if the city itself was gone, left in an unspeakable state of grief. He considered himself a martyr.

“How long have you lived in New Reynes?” Enne asked, bringing Levi’s focus back to the present.

“Since I was twelve.” Levi had fled the brutality of his home seeking the brutality of somewhere else—a place where, this time, he could fight back.

Frowning, he shook away the unpleasant memories. In less than a minute, she’d managed to steer the conversation entirely away from herself. He didn’t like it when people didn’t talk about themselves. In his experience, that usually meant they had something to hide.

“You’re full of questions, aren’t you?” he commented.

“You’re a stranger leading me through an unsightly area in an unseemly city. Of course I’m full of questions.” He supposed that was a reasonable response, though he’d hardly call his own territory “unsightly.”

Someone cooed to their right.

“Welcome to Sweetie Street,” he said, not bothering to hide his grin. He could think of no place better to watch Enne squirm.

Swarms of people stumbled down the alley, all flushed and in some degree of hungover stupor. The women dressed in dark skirts with lacy tulles, lipstick every shade of red, faces white or pink with powder. The men wore black-and-white-striped suits, with jewel-studded pipes resting suggestively between their lips. At night, the dancing silhouettes in the windows beckoned customers from all across the city with promises of warm beds and warmer embraces.

“Whatever you do,” he whispered in Enne’s ear, “don’t look anyone in the eyes.”

“Why not?” she asked, jerking her gaze from the window displays to the ground, which was covered with broken glass and sparkly confetti.

“Their talent is seduction.” He swore he saw goose bumps prickle against her skin, and he fought to contain his laughter. “You can’t let them get too close, either. One touch—” he squeezed her shoulder “—and even you would be discarding your skirts and stockings. One kiss, and you’d be overcome by an almost primal sort of lust.”

Enne narrowed her eyes like she’d realized he was mucking with her, but then a woman giggled to their right, and Enne jolted as if she’d heard a gunshot. The woman swayed back and forth, wearing only a ruby corset covered in black lace, her glitter-covered chest spilling out the front. The number ten was written across her cleavage in violet lipstick.

“Oh goodness,” Enne gasped, her gaze darting wildly between the cobblestones and the woman’s breasts. “What does the number mean?”

“Price.”

The whimper that escaped her lips was enough to send Levi into hysterics. He laughed so hard he needed to clutch his abdomen to steady himself.

“Oh, I’m glad you find my decency so amusing,” she snapped. “So is Sweetie Street frequented by everyone in the City of Sin? Is this where you come every night after...whatever illegal things you do?”

“Me? I don’t need to come here,” he said, only somewhat in earnest, but mostly because he couldn’t help himself. His cockiness earned him a disgusted but embarrassed look from Enne. “Think of it this way,” he said. “When you go back to Bellamy, you’ll be able to scandalize all your uppity friends.”

Enne laughed hollowly. “As if I need them thinking any less of me.”

“Less of you? Are you not snobbish enough for their preferences?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m a Salta. There are much better, richer families at my finishing school with more impressive dancing talents. No one notices me. Most of the time, they hardly acknowledge I’m there.”

Must’ve hit a nerve, Levi thought. That was the most she’d said about herself yet. It also struck him as rather unbelievable. Her doll-like features, her determined dark eyes—how could anyone not notice her?

“Then why go back there?” he asked.

“Because I have only a year left of school before my debut. It’s why...I’d really love to be able to return before the start of term.” If Levi didn’t find the thought of a “debut” so ridiculous, he might’ve felt sorry for the longing in her voice. She was sacrificing a lot to find Alfero, assuming Alfero could even be found.

“And if you don’t find Lourdes before the summer ends?” Levi asked Enne quietly. “You’re willing to risk that?”

“Of course I am. She’s my mother.”

Levi’s stomach tightened, and—to his own surprise—he was about to say something consoling, but then she bit her lip. Maybe dealing cards made him hyperaware of bluffing, but that was a straight-from-the-book tell. He wondered if she was hiding something after all, but he didn’t press her on it.

For now.

“We’re here,” he announced as they crossed the border from Iron territory into Scar Land.

Tents, stands and carts lined the sidewalks, and people crowded around them, waving merchandise in the air to tempt customers or yelling at the kids trying to steal food and trinkets. Several paperboys approached him and Enne, advertising this week’s copy of the South Side’s Guillory Street Gossip or the North Side’s version, The Kiss and Tell. Levi grabbed Enne’s shoulders and pushed her ahead. If she spent too long gawking at everything, a pickpocket would nab her in a blink.

“This is Scrap Market,” he said. “It changes location every day, and it’s in only one place for a few hours at a time before it disappears.”

She broke away from his grasp and glared at him with annoyance. “Are all your markets like this? How disorienting.”

“No, just this one. People here don’t pay in volts—they don’t really have them. Instead, they trade. It changes time and place to make it harder for the whiteboots to find them. The goods here aren’t all legal, and it’s all under the table.”

They passed a food stand, and Levi’s stomach rumbled at the smell of sausages and sizzling bacon. He’d forgotten to eat breakfast. Enne must’ve been hungry as well, judging by the longing look she cast at the doughnut cart.

“Illegal? Then why are we here?” she asked nervously.

“The Scarhands live under Scrap Market.”

“The Scarhands?”

“One of the gangs.”

She halted in the middle of the street. “You said your friend wasn’t in a gang.”

Levi hauled her along, this time not letting her shrug him off. She was going to lose her purse.

“No, I said he wasn’t an Iron,” he grunted. Besides, Reymond Kitamura was a good place for them to start. Not only had Reymond introduced Levi to Lourdes, but he was the Scar Lord, and all secrets of New Reynes flushed down to him eventually.

“Let go of me. It’s terribly impolite—not to mention improper—”

“I’m trying to keep you from getting your purse stolen. You’ve already lost your luggage. Wanna lose your volts, too?” Levi refused to suffer through this entire morning only for Enne to lose his reward.

She stopped struggling, and he led her into a ramshackle building with a sign reading Cheep Orbs and Metalwork. They slid between a couple examining a box of empty glass orbs.

“Those are real shoddy quality,” Levi muttered. “Probably can’t hold over twenty volts without shattering.” He could make better blindfolded...not that he’d made orbs in years. His blood and split talents didn’t mix together well, so he’d decided a long time ago to avoid orb-making altogether.

Enne stared at a crate full of knives, each with a little rust on the handle or cracks in the blade. “How many street gangs are there?”

Levi cleared his throat. Really, there was no person better suited for introducing Enne to New Reynes than himself. “There are three: the Irons, the Scarhands and the Doves. They all live on the North Side.” There were also the two casino Families, the Augustines and the Torrens, but Levi didn’t want to overwhelm her. Besides, he’d rather not think about the Families right now. It was a mistake involving himself with either of them.

“Why do you call yourselves the Irons?” Enne asked.

“It’s a nickname. We didn’t have a name at first—the dens just called us ‘mechanics.’ People who fix games.” He shook his head. “Of course, our clients didn’t actually like to call us that—bad for business. Somehow the name Irons caught on.”

“So you cheat,” she said, the contempt obvious in her voice.

“We make a business out of winning.”

Levi took her to a door in the back of the shop. A rusted lock dangled from the knob.

Although Levi never used his blood talent anymore for its actual purpose—making orbs—he often relied on his skill for fire. Levi could do a few tricks: light a match with the snap of his fingers, walk through open flame without being burned, craft a glass ornament with only his bare hands. Nothing powerful, but his talent was often useful.

Levi grabbed the lock and concentrated on heat. After a few moments, it glowed red and hissed with steam.

“How are you doing that?” she asked.

“It’s my blood talent.” He tugged it, and it snapped. He would’ve thought that obvious, given the orb-maker colors in his hair.

“Which is—”

“Someone will hear you.” He didn’t need the Scar Lord blaming him for giving away today’s location to all of Scrap Market. Reymond liked to lie low.

Levi slipped inside the crack of the door into a dark, narrow staircase. When Enne closed it behind them, everything went black.

“You’d better leave. We’re not seeing anyone today,” someone growled. Enne made a sound somewhere between clearing her throat and a squeak.

“It’s me,” Levi said.

“Pup?”

He hated that nickname. People assumed that Canes smelled auras like bloodhounds, even though they read them with all their senses. The nickname was, in Levi’s opinion, the embodiment of everything he needed to change about his reputation. Once upon a time, the Irons had been the richest gang in the city. Even if he was young, Levi deserved to be taken seriously.

“Nice to see you again, Jonas,” Levi lied.

Jonas Maccabees, the Scarhands’ second-in-command, sneered, “You should stick to Olde Town where you belong.”

“That’s a shame, because I came here to see you. It’s hard to resist that smile of yours.”

Jonas turned on a light, and Levi squinted as his eyes adjusted. The room had concrete walls and a mess of exposed, leaking pipes. It smelled faintly of cigarettes.

“Reymond isn’t seeing anyone today,” Jonas grunted. A scar ran from his left eye down his cheek, disappearing beneath his shoulder-length black hair. More scars crisscrossed his palms, and his skin had a gray tint to it. Like a corpse. Beside Levi, Enne stiffened.

“But he’ll see me,” Levi challenged.

Jonas glared because he knew Levi was right, then mumbled something under his breath and turned to a door at the other end of the room. The undeniable stench of rotting bodies trailed after him.

“Is Reymond their boss?” Enne whispered.

“He’s the Scar Lord.”

“You failed to mention that.”

“Does it matter? I’m the Iron Lord, aren’t I?” Apparently his lordly title didn’t warrant the same concern.

“Maybe this was a bad—”

“Do you want to find Alfero or not?”

She quieted.

Jonas opened the door and ushered them into an office. Reymond perched on the desk. He was short and slender to the point of looking starved, with black hair and brown, hooded eyes. He wore a shiny gold vest and a crimson jacket, a belt of reptile scales and huge rings on every finger, which made eight rings in total—both his middle fingers were stumps.

“He brought a missy,” Jonas said.

“Yes,” Reymond answered, scanning Enne up and down with interest. Levi didn’t usually introduce missies to his friends. “I can see that.”

Levi pulled up a seat at the desk and nodded for Enne to do so, as well. As he sat, he got a whiff of Reymond’s cheap cologne and nearly gagged.

“We won’t take long,” Reymond said, dismissing Jonas, who closed the door as he left. Then he held out his hand to Enne. “I’m Reymond Kitamura,” he said.

She shook it and gave a winning smile to rival Levi’s own. All of her apprehension from before was concealed. “It’s a pleasure. My name is Enne Salta.”

“You don’t dress like any Salta I’ve ever met,” he remarked, which made Enne lift her chin indignantly. Levi snorted, picturing Enne in a burlesque costume. Well...it wasn’t so terrible a picture, if he was being honest with himself. “Or any of Levi’s boys or missies, for that matter,” Reymond added, smirking at Levi.

He shrugged in response. Levi had a long romantic history of scattered affairs—a few girls and many boys—that had become the subject of teasing from his friends. They claimed he had a hopeless habit of kissing and telling.

“I’m not his missy,” Enne said hurriedly.

“Good. Glad to hear you got taste,” Reymond joked.

Aside from the dons of the casino Families, Reymond Kitamura was arguably the most powerful person in the North Side, a reputation he enjoyed flaunting in Levi’s face at every opportunity. When Levi had first arrived in New Reynes—twelve years old, scrappy and eager—Reymond had taken him in. The two were like brothers, though, as Jac had pointed out on more than one occasion, they fought more often than they got along.

Two Octobers ago, when Vianca Augustine had dumped the investment scheme on him, Levi had turned to Reymond as a business partner. Since then, Levi had tried to keep their working relationship under wraps, but Chez had discovered it several months ago. His third considered it a betrayal. Officially, the Irons and the Scarhands were far from friends, and the gangs took their rivalries seriously. So Levi visited Reymond only when it was absolutely necessary these days, even if he sometimes missed their squabbles.

Reymond pulled a cigar out of his pocket. He pointed it at Levi, almost like he was offering it to him, except he wasn’t. Levi snapped his fingers, igniting a small flame at his fingertips and lit the end. Reymond cupped it and took a deep inhale. The smoke billowed out his nostrils, and Enne crinkled her nose.

“We’re still late on the Torren payment,” Reymond reminded him, as if Levi needed reminding. “Two weeks or so.”

“Let’s talk about this another time,” Levi muttered. Enne already knew he ran a gang; he didn’t want her knowing about the scam, too. He couldn’t have her running off on him...at least not until she paid him tonight. And if Reymond did have any leads on Alfero, then it was in Levi’s best interests to stick with Enne. He couldn’t lose the potential for a ten-thousand-volt reward for finding her mother, even if the chances were slim.

“Now seems fine to me.” Reymond blew out a cloud of smoke, and Levi seriously considered the repercussions of wringing his skinny neck. Clearly, he’d caught his friend in a bad mood. “And the whiteboot captain?”

Levi debated with himself for a moment, then decided that, after being chased just this morning, Enne was unlikely to talk to anyone about this conversation. She didn’t know anyone in this city except for him. Still, they needed to be discreet.

“I paid the captain this morning,” Levi answered begrudgingly. “But he knew. He knew about the scam.”

Reymond’s eyes widened. “Did he tell anyone?”

“I don’t think so, but he said some things about Sedric Torren that have me concerned.”

Reymond anxiously tapped the soot off his cigar. “You talk to Vianca yet?” Powerful as Reymond was, the only person who could truly protect Levi from Sedric was Vianca, the donna of the Augustine family, the owner of St. Morse Casino, and—as far as Levi was concerned—the foulest woman in New Reynes.

“Not yet. I’m not sure what she’ll do to help.” St. Morse was a sinking ship. Vianca’s radical political beliefs made her unpopular on the South Side, where many of her patrons lived. Meanwhile, the Torren Family had the wigheads in their pockets.

“You’re Vianca’s favorite. She’d do anything for you,” Reymond said, blowing out another exhale of smoke. “You’re her bitch.”

Levi’s fury simmered as Reymond smirked. “We’re not here to talk about this,” Levi snapped.

He wanted to add that Enne and Alfero’s volts might’ve been the solution to their problem, but he couldn’t think of a way to say that without Enne picking up on it. He’d have to discuss that with Reymond another time.

But he already knew what Reymond would say. Alfero is dead, Levi. Of course she’s dead. You’re too easily persuaded by a pretty missy.

“But I wanna talk about business,” Reymond insisted. “Ever since Vianca lost our thousands of safety volts, this is starting to sound a lot more dangerous. I have skin in this game, too.”

“If you wanna pitch in more, partner—”

“No can do. Fifteen percent was the deal.” Reymond flicked his ashes in a porcelain bowl that was broken on one side. “No can do.”

“Are you both quite done?” Enne snapped. “It’s very inconsiderate to talk business in front of a stranger.”

Reymond snorted and picked at his well-manicured cuticles. He took precise care of the fingers he had left and never liked to get his hands dirty. “She’s a real charmer, Pup.”

“I’m afraid I didn’t come here to charm you,” she snapped. “I came here in search of information on Lourdes Alfero.”

Reymond paused. “Did you, now?”

Despite Enne’s numerous flaws—namely that she was mucking annoying—she knew how to weasel in and out of a conversation. Levi respected that.

“Have you heard anything about Alfero lately?” Levi asked Reymond, more than eager to steer the discussion away from their failing con.

“She comes and goes,” he answered. “The usual spots. But I haven’t heard anything noteworthy recently. What do you need to know?”

Enne’s face lit brighter than a neon sign outside of Luckluster Casino. “I need to find her. She’s missing.”

“How do you know her? You don’t look like the type to read monarchist papers.”

“You can tell this just from looking at me?”

The Scarhands worked in the business of counterfeiting, arms dealing and information, and Reymond had sacrificed ten years, dozens of men and two fingers to carve out his gang’s place in the North Side. Reymond credited his power to his blood talent: he could see through any lie. But he probably didn’t need it to guess that the dare in Enne’s words was empty.

“Most of the Pseudonyms are dead,” Reymond said flatly. “Lourdes Alfero is smart. She survived this long. If she’s missing, though...”

“Please, where was she last seen?” Enne’s voice quivered.

“She frequented the Sauterelle. It’s a cabaret a few blocks off Sweetie Street. There, they’d probably know her as Séance, her pen name.”

Enne paled at the mention of Sweetie Street. “Are you sure—”

“Levi and I both have friends there. We can get you in.”

Levi nodded. Mansi worked at the Sauterelle. “My shift is this evening. But tomorrow we’ll pay a visit,” he said. This was perfect. With the promise of a lead tomorrow, Enne would need to stay with Levi and pay him tonight. He doubted she would attempt to brave Sweetie Street by herself. And if he could promise her this night, then the next, then the next, maybe they really could find Lourdes. Maybe she was the answer to all of his problems.

He just needed Lourdes to be alive. And he needed Enne to stay.

“What’s wrong?” Reymond smirked, seeing Enne crinkle her nose. “Got a problem with variety shows, doll face?”

Enne shook her head.

“No...” Reymond tilted his head to the side. “That’s not it. It’s that you’re afraid Lourdes is probably dead.” Reymond had many good qualities, but no one would call him considerate. He didn’t hold back any blows. “You know, you still never mentioned how you knew Alfero.” Reymond was already using past tense.

Enne’s face was pale as she rose from her seat in a rush. “Thank you, but I need some air.” She nearly tripped on her dash to the door. Levi stood hurriedly and followed her. He didn’t like Enne much, but even he admitted that Reymond’s words were harsh, considering the morning she’d already had.

Enne pushed through the back room and up the stairwell. By the time they exited the orb shop, tears glinted in her brown eyes.

Outside, the wind had picked up, and the clouds—black from factory smoke and an oncoming storm—cast a shadow over the city. The tents were gone. Carts, gone. Stands, gone. Scrap Market had picked up and left, and Enne and Levi were the only ones standing on the empty street.

“Is she really dead?” Enne asked, her voice high and broken in a way that stirred his own memories.

For a moment, Levi was eleven years old again, kneeling at his mother’s sickbed. He swallowed.

“Don’t,” he warned.

She didn’t listen. She let out a gasp, then a sob.

Levi stepped back from her, unsure what to do or how to comfort. Tears pooled down her cheeks, and she blotted them away with the back of her hand.

“I don’t know if she’s alive,” he said truthfully but gently.

“But I’d feel it. I’d know if she was dead.”

If Jac were here, he would’ve agreed with Enne. Jac was sentimental like that. Levi was usually too cynical to indulge such hopes, but, this one time, he needed to believe. He needed Enne’s reward.

I need her to stay.

But it was also something more than that. He recognized his own ghosts in Enne’s eyes.

He put a hand on Enne’s shoulder and bent down to her level. “Look at me. We can’t talk here, in the middle of the street for the whole world to hear. You know that, and you know why, don’t you?”

Enne nodded, her hand fiddling in her coat pocket. Even with her limited knowledge of New Reynes, she understood why the monarchists were a dangerous subject.

“I have a shift tonight at St. Morse Casino, so I’m going to take you there now.” Levi swallowed hard, hoping he wouldn’t regret his next words. “But I promise, I’ll help you find your mother, no matter what.”

ENNE

Levi and Enne passed through the revolving doors of St. Morse Casino. Enne had never set foot in a casino before, but she’d glimpsed some of the smaller establishments on Tropps Street, and none of them came close to resembling St. Morse’s old-world glamour. A crystal chandelier stretched across the entire ceiling. Emerald green carpeting trailed up the stairs, matching the velvet curtains draped over the windows and the uniforms of the concierges. Metallic silver archways led into rooms labeled Tropps Room, Theatre and Ballroom with sapphire-blue calligraphy. Everything smelled of fine leather and whiskey, and each patron donned the Republic’s most famous designers: Gershton, Ulani Maxirello, Regallière.

It was, without a doubt, the gaudiest place to ever affront Enne’s senses.

At least fifty guests mingled in the lobby, champagne glasses in hand. They wore elegant tea gowns with pleated skirts, feathered hats and long strands of black pearls. In her tailored suit and scuffed heels, Enne felt exposed in more ways than one.

She’d lied to Levi about the volts.

At first, she hadn’t felt guilty in the least. Levi was a criminal after all. He probably cheated tourists like her every day. But that didn’t make it right. And after what he’d said to her earlier, like he had more at stake in this than his wallet, it didn’t make her feel good, either.

It hadn’t been a total lie. The volts did exist. Last summer, when Enne had sneaked into Lourdes’s private office for the first and only time, she’d seen the bank slips. She and her mother certainly didn’t live like they had millions of volts, but Enne had read the documents herself. It was...wealth beyond imagination. And Lourdes had kept it from her.

So the volts did exist, and paying Levi would hardly put a dent in their fortune. But Enne had no idea where the bank account was. Or where the volts came from.

It didn’t matter. Once she found Lourdes, she’d have her answers. Once she found Lourdes, Levi would have his volts. It wasn’t a lie. It just wasn’t the truth.

She and Levi walked into a hallway lined with portraits of men, women and occasionally whole families, each with blazing purple eyes. Mizers, Enne thought with a chill. She wondered whether or not it was dangerous for the casino to have portraits of the royal families on display, as if they were people to be revered. Most people alive today had witnessed the Revolution, and, however corrupt the Republic might’ve been, it was nothing compared to the tyranny of the Mizers.

The deeper they ventured into St. Morse, the more Enne felt like she was walking into a castle out of a history book. The mahogany woodwork. The blue and green, everywhere. The white stone walls. A hotel casino, Levi had called it. Really, it was more of a fortress. In the nighttime, it might even resemble a mausoleum.

They stopped in front of an elevator, where Levi pulled a lever that illuminated an up arrow above the doors.

“How many volts did you bring?” Levi asked. “Enough to last until you leave?”

“No, not with all of my belongings gone.” A jolt of panic shot through her. She had no clothes. No toiletries. And not enough volts to replace them and still purchase her ticket home, after paying Levi tonight.

“That’s what I thought,” he said. The elevator doors opened, and they stepped onto a shaky metal platform. The black iron gates creaked closed as the operator turned a crank. “How are you with heights? This is the tallest building on the North Side.”

“I’m all right,” she lied. The floor shifted beneath her feet, almost like the deck of the ship she’d traveled on to New Reynes—but then, she hadn’t been terrified of falling to her death. Enne held her breath and squeezed the railing.

Levi watched her with amusement, much as he had all morning. At first, when Levi had tried to steal from her, Enne had considered him a crook. But after they left Scrap Market, there had been an unmistakable sincerity in his voice. It had improved her opinion of him, if only slightly. Still, he was terribly rude. She reminded herself that she needed to tolerate him only until they found her mother.

“Never ridden in an elevator before?” he asked.

“Not one quite so in need of maintenance.”

The operator grunted.

The doors opened to a hallway with emerald wallpaper and silver trim. It looked opulent and grand, but beneath, Enne could see that it was royal only in the cheapest, most obscene manner possible. Every metallic finish was paint; every bit of crystal was actually glass.

“The top floor is only for Vianca Augustine’s favorites,” Levi said, except with more disgust than pride. “This includes the highest-paying guests, close friends of the Augustines, Vianca herself and, of course, me.”

“You mentioned Vianca earlier. Who is she?” Enne asked.

He scowled like he had a bad taste in his mouth. “You should pay better attention to that guidebook. Vianca is the donna of the Augustine crime Family, and she owns St. Morse Casino.”

As Enne digested his words, Levi led her to a room labeled 2018 and unlocked the door. He held it open for her, but she couldn’t tell whether his politeness was meant to mock. It was impossible to differentiate between his smirk and his smile.

The apartment was unnaturally clean. Levi took a seat on the stiff armchair in the living room while Enne examined the shine of his counters and the strange black oven that looked out of place in his cramped kitchen. Bookshelves covered every wall, filled with volumes and papers arranged by height, and a glass conch shell glittered on the coffee table.

Enne took a seat on the couch.

“What?” Levi asked, studying her face. “Missies always expect that I live in a gutter,” he muttered. Then, as though he were actually going to play host, he offered her a green candy from the bowl on his table. “Tiggy’s Saltwater Taffy. Absinthe-flavored. It’s the signature New Reynes treat.”

Enne shook her head, certain anything signature to this city would prove repulsive. “Why are we here?” She’d never been alone in a young man’s home before, and she hoped he couldn’t see her cheeks redden, couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Surely there must’ve been other places in St. Morse to talk in private besides his apartment. The whole ordeal of Sweetie Street and the unfamiliarity with New Reynes didn’t ease Enne’s mind, nor did the pleasing slopes and angles of Levi’s jawline.

“I’m gonna get you a job,” he declared.

She startled. “A job? Here?”

“What? Too below you to earn an income?”

She doubted her teachers at finishing school would have approved of a lady working at a casino. Or a lady working at all, for that matter. “What kind of job do you have in mind?” she asked coolly, refusing to rise to his provocation.

“You’re a dancer. We’ve got several groups of performers—”

“I’m not that type of dancer.”

“And St. Morse isn’t that type of establishment.” He stood and turned into a narrow hallway, motioning for her to follow. By the time she got up, he’d disappeared into the room at the end, and she realized with no small amount of horror that it must have been his bedroom.

“What are you doing?” Enne called from the doorway, unable to even peek inside.

“Finding you something to wear. Your clothes belong in an antique shop.”

Enne sniffed in indignation. Her outfit was considered fashionable in Bellamy, where women had a sense of modesty.

“What do you expect me to wear?” she asked. “Trousers?” Or worse, one of those fishnet numbers she’d seen all over Tropps Street?

He emerged with a dress and an easy smile. “What? Don’t you trust me?”

“Hardly.” And certainly not with that gleam in his eyes. Or with the not-entirely-unpleasant smell of his citrus cologne.

She allowed herself to admit that Levi Glaisyer was very good-looking—at least, in an up-to-no-good way that she supposed some people found attractive. He was of fairly average height, but his build was slender and trim. Of all his noteworthy features—his smooth brown skin, the sharp slopes of his cheekbones—the most identifiable was his hair. It started bronze at the roots, but the tight curls gradually turned to black at the ends, as if singed.

Sometimes talents, especially Talents of Mysteries, carried a particular physical characteristic with them—like the purple eyes of the Mizers. She remembered Levi melting the lock earlier and lighting Reymond’s cigar. He might have had a fire-making talent, but the fire-makers she’d met in the past were different—they smelled of smoke and depleted the oxygen from the air around them, suffocating anyone in close contact. He didn’t smell like...

Levi smirked, and Enne realized with a start that she’d been staring.

To avoid his gaze, she spent several moments examining the dress. It was floor-length, with a gold ribbon trim lining the silky, sage-colored fabric. It was actually rather nice. “Where did you get this?” she asked as she daringly entered his room and took it from his hands.

“I’ve got a collection of lost things.”

Lost things? Oh. He meant left behind. She lifted the dress up to hide her mortified expression.

“You get dressed,” he said. “I’ll be out here.”

“Levi,” she protested as he walked away. “This is ridiculous and unnecessary. My clothes are perfectly fine.” Although, as she looked down, she noticed that her hemline was rather filthy.

“Look, missy,” Levi said flatly. “You can call as much attention to yourself as you want, but I prefer to keep my head down. Time to fit into our society.” He closed the door but kept talking, his voice diminishing. “Now get changed. I’ve things to do and only time for half of them.”

Hmph. Though her attire did stand out in this city, it was for the right reasons. But the dress he’d chosen didn’t appear too outrageous, and the color would suit her nicely.

As she changed, she realized how low the neckline was cut. Goodness, she thought, it would be almost like strutting around topless. She turned to his wardrobe and rooted around for a new outfit. Nudged between another blouse and several pairs of men’s undershirts in various sizes—this was quite the collection—she selected a red dress with a more conservative front.

When Enne returned to the sitting room, she found Levi in the armchair turning the glass conch shell over like an archaeologist examining a fossil. He raised his eyebrows upon seeing her in a different dress.

“Where did you buy it?” she asked, referring to the conch. “It’s beautiful.”

“I made it. There was a shell like this in my house when I was young, so I tried to replicate it.”

“You have a glassmaking talent?”

“No, an orb-making talent. But I don’t use it much.” He talked with a kind of bitterness, as if admitting to something shameful. The orb-making talent certainly explained his hair and his affinity for fire; she’d never met an orb-maker, but she should’ve guessed it before. They had nearly as much lore surrounding them as the Mizers did. Most of them were even executed alongside the Mizers, so there weren’t many families left.

“Then why be a card dealer and a...” She didn’t say criminal, in case she might offend him, though Levi seemed to take pride in his particular line of work. “Orb-makers could make a very fair living.”

“You mean, why be poor when I could be rich?” He laughed hollowly. “For plenty of reasons. For one, most people assume orb-makers are Mizer sympathizers, and I’d rather not associate myself with that muck. The only reason my family survived was because we haven’t called attention to ourselves.”

Enne flinched at Mizer sympathizers and survived. She didn’t like how, in only one morning, New Reynes had drawn a heavy, black line connecting those two phrases to her mother, followed by a bloodred question mark.

For the second time that day, Enne wondered how she would face it if she never learned the truth about Lourdes’s other life. The newspapers...the monarchists...the Mizer sympathizers...it was so far from what she knew about Lourdes.

But what did she know about her mother?

Lourdes had taught her how to analyze people meticulously. She had a method to this, and a set of rules that she observed with an almost religious reverence. Enne could replicate her skills in a heartbeat.

But they never worked on Lourdes.

It began with a person’s air. Lourdes was tall with features full of right angles and fair colors. She dressed fluidly—a practice uncommon but not unheard of in Bellamy, where reputation depended on social circles and income and nothing else. Her Protector talents—her blood and split talents were the same, making her exceptionally powerful—made her every word sound consoling, soothing, no matter how sharp her tone. She followed each code of societal etiquette, but did so with such precision that it always seemed as if she were poking fun.

Next was what you could’ve gathered from pleasant small talk. Lourdes claimed she was thirty-seven years old, but she looked no more than thirty. Her family—now all dead, as far as Enne knew—had vacationed in Bellamy when she was young, but she hadn’t moved there until she’d adopted Enne, and no one in Bellamy knew her from her childhood.

Last were the more intimate details. Within the privacy of their home, Lourdes cursed. She read New Reynes newspapers. She sang loudly and terribly. Enne had seen strange scars shaped like perfect circles on the inside of her elbows. She’d heard her laugh too hard or yell in a way that made the beads on their chandelier quiver, but she’d never seen Lourdes shed a tear. She’d seen Lourdes walk into her office each morning with a cup of coffee and lock the door behind her, and Enne, for years, had been too nervous to follow her inside.

Enne loved her, but she didn’t understand her. No one in Bellamy did. It was why their names rarely graced the guest lists of balls and salons, why no one ever paid attention to Enne.

Now Enne wanted to understand, and she regretted, more than anything, avoiding these questions before.

“I want to hear everything,” Enne told Levi seriously. “Everything you know about the monarchists, the Mizer sympathizers, this world. Lourdes never shared any of this with me, and I need to—”

“Have you ever considered that your mother purposely kept you in the dark?” he asked—not unkindly, but not gently, either.

Yes, she thought.

Instead she answered, “Why would she do that?”

“No idea, but before we chat with Vianca Augustine about hiring you, it’s very important that we’re on the same page. If you haven’t noticed by the decor of this casino, Vianca has a fetish for all things Mizer. She certainly knows who Lourdes is, but—” he said loudly as Enne began to interrupt “—under no circumstances should you ask Vianca about Lourdes. Under no circumstances should you ask Vianca anything.”

The way Levi spat out Vianca’s name, Enne wondered what exactly he’d asked of Vianca. Or what she’d asked of him.

“Mizers created volts, that was their talent,” he began.

“I know that—”

He shushed her. “Being an orb-maker, I was taught a lot about Mizers—I’m sure I know more than you. We’re different from the metalsmiths or glassmaker families. As you might know, Mizers don’t technically make volts—they make energy. Orb-makers filter that energy into volts, sort of like a by-product. Without orb-makers, no one would’ve ever started using volts as money. Without orb-makers, holding that energy in your skin would be unbearably painful.”

Enne was tempted to interrupt and remind him that very few people stored volts in their skin. In Bellamy, it was considered too lowbrow not to use orbs—they weren’t that expensive. And in New Reynes, she imagined such a method could prove risky. With enough practice, someone could steal your volts with only a graze of your skin. Forgoing orbs was impractical.

“The Mizers were all systematically murdered during the Revolution. Adults and children alike,” Levi said gravely. “There were protests, of course, but the Phoenix Club didn’t much care. Twenty-five years ago sounds like a long time, but not for the North Side. Mizers are still a political topic, but we don’t need them anymore, now that volts can be manufactured artificially. Still, the monarchists have been slowly gaining momentum to fight against corruption.”

“Do you agree with the monarchists?” Enne asked quietly. Levi almost made it sound like the monarchists were in the right, when all Enne had ever associated them with was extremism and violence.

He smiled in a way that wasn’t much of a smile at all. “I don’t involve myself in politics.”

Seeking reassurance, Enne took her token out of her pocket. It’d always seemed like a unique trinket, something pretty Lourdes had thought Enne might like. Now Enne saw the woman in the cameo as a Mizer queen. She saw the Revolution. The queen’s execution. The murder of every Mizer and their sympathizers. She couldn’t decide which was more horrific: that Lourdes had gifted her an object with such a blood-soaked history, or that Enne had treated it as a trinket.

“I still...” She squeezed the token, and it felt warm and steady in her palm. It was her only comfort away from home, alone in this city. “I still can’t picture Lourdes being involved with monarchists.”

“She was more than involved. She was Séance, practically the face of the Mizer sympathizers’ crusade.” He gazed at Enne fiercely, the judgment clear in his dark eyes. What exactly did Levi Glaisyer think of her—that she was desperate? Foolish? Childish? She wondered why she cared. “Why did you think she came to New Reynes so often?”

“She said she was visiting friends,” Enne answered.

“She never thought to bring you to meet those friends?”

“It was more important I stay in school.”

“You never questioned that?”

She squeezed the token in her fist. Was this some kind of interrogation?

“She’s my mother. Why should I have questioned her?” Although Enne had certainly had her suspicions, she’d ignored them. Admittedly, there had once been a time when Enne resented Lourdes for her secrets, for her strange behavior, for the way she alienated Enne from any chance of society’s approval.

But now, with Lourdes’s whereabouts and even survival unknown, she hated herself for those thoughts.

“It’s easy for Protectors to keep secrets,” Levi prodded. “They never seem as if they’re lying. It never occurred to you—”

“No. It didn’t.” Enne’s voice rose, marking the dozenth time she’d broken the show no emotion rule. She didn’t appreciate what Levi was suggesting, that Lourdes would use her talents to purposefully keep Enne in the dark. If a Protector officially swore their powers to someone, they were forever bound to act in that person’s best interest, no matter the implications for themselves. Lourdes had never sworn to anyone, thank goodness. The practice was barbaric and unused since the Revolution. Levi was suggesting Lourdes was protecting someone—probably someone in New Reynes—and, by extension, that Enne hadn’t even noticed that her mother’s life was barely her own.

“I trust her,” Enne snapped. What did he want her to say? That yes, it had occurred to her that Lourdes had purposefully kept information from her? Of course it had. Enne knew Lourdes kept secrets, but he made it sound as if their entire relationship was a lie, and Enne would never believe that. “I trust her. Maybe trust is a foreign concept to you.”

She realized, once she said it, that the words had come out rather harsh. This whole time, Levi had kept a remarkably cool expression. She was the one working herself up. For a moment, she considered apologizing. Then...

“Maybe naïveté is a foreign concept to you,” he said drily.

That thought vanished.

“How dare—”

“If you’re so jumpy answering my questions, how are you going to last one night on the North Side? How are you going to face Vianca Augustine?” He shook his head, and Enne couldn’t decide if she felt ashamed or aggravated. He wasn’t being fair. “I’m just trying to keep you from getting yourself killed.”

“What do you mean?” she asked. It wasn’t as though she was in any real danger. At least, as long as she didn’t speak to any whiteboots again.

He leaned forward and steepled his fingers, his expression grim. “Have you ever heard of the Phoenix Club?”

“Only now, when you just mentioned it,” she answered.

“They’re the most powerful and dangerous people in the Republic. Businessmen, wigheads, scholars...all with a talent for immortality. They’re the ones who orchestrated the Mizer executions. The whole Revolution, even.”

She searched his expression for one of his telltale smirks, but found none.

“There’s no talent for immortality,” she said. “That’s impossible.”

He sighed, cracked his neck and checked his watch. Enne’s nostrils flared. If anyone had a right to feel impatient, it was she. “Chancellor Semper himself is part of the Phoenix Club. He’s their leader.”

She barked out a laugh. “You expect me to believe that?”

Levi stood. “Fine, missy. I was trying to prepare you. But if you’re so sure of yourself, you’re obviously ready for Vianca.”

He walked to his front door and motioned for her to follow. Enne hesitated, wanting to challenge him. But if she kept arguing, she might start crying again. The urge to do so throbbed in her chest, and if she even used enough breath to say fine, it would explode. She’d already cried twice this morning. She didn’t know how she had enough tears left for a third.

They were silent until the elevator reached the bottom floor, where she followed Levi through another hallway lined with portraits of Mizer monarchs with amethyst eyes.

“You should address Vianca as Madame,” he said, more like a warning than a suggestion. “She likes that.”

“I’m more than comfortable addressing superiors.” Her voice sounded steady and precise. The streets might’ve been Levi’s arena, but etiquette was hers. After everything she’d faced so far this day, an interview with Vianca Augustine hardly intimidated her.

Enne held her head up high, smoothed down her hair and focused. She repeated Lourdes’s rules in the back of her mind.

His eyes trailed over her—almost enough to ruin that focus. “I take it you didn’t like my choice of dress for you.”

“It was inappropriate. Particularly for an interview.”

“Maybe that’s why I liked it.”

He smiled, and no, no, she wouldn’t let that smile break her resolve to be aggravated with him. She stared in the direction of her pointed-toe heels, hidden underneath the hem of the dress, and hoped with every fiber of her being she wasn’t giving him the satisfaction of blushing like a Bellamy schoolgirl.

“Though I will admit, this dress is a bit long,” she commented, trying to remain aloof.

“Yeah, you should grow some.”

She couldn’t think of a snappy enough retort, so, left with no other options, she let out a hmph.

He snorted, but then his smirk receded. “I’m sorry, Enne. I haven’t been trying to upset you. But this city...it’s rotten, down to its very core. And you need to be prepared for what you might face. Or learn.” He looked away and stared at his oxfords. “I’m trying to help you.”

He was attempting to soothe her, but his honesty made Enne only feel worse. Maybe she was no match for this city. Maybe the North Side would take everything she had and spit her out into the harbor. Maybe the streets where Lourdes walked freely would spell ruin for her daughter.

They walked into a waiting room with several marble busts lining the walls. A pale, fragile-looking woman hunched over a desk in the corner. She startled at the sight of them.

“Levi,” she exclaimed, standing as he approached and even giving a slight bow of her head. She had a pinched nose and a collar so tiny it was a wonder she could breathe. She drank in the sight of him, never once glancing at Enne. “I wasn’t aware you had an appointment.”

“I don’t. Is Vianca available right now?”

“Yes.” She hesitated before adding, “I can announce you if you wish—”

“We’ll announce ourselves.” He grabbed Enne’s wrist and tugged her to the door on the far side of the room. “Here we go.”

He knocked.

“Come in,” a woman’s voice invited.

Before opening the door, Levi bent down, his lips inches from her ear. “Whatever you do, don’t let her see you squirm.”

ENNE

Enne and Levi stepped inside a dark office with emerald velvet curtains and matching chairs. Behind Vianca’s desk hung a mural of another Mizer family: two parents, two daughters and an infant on the mother’s lap—the last royal family of Reynes, executed twenty-five years ago during the Revolution. Mahogany bookcases lined the side walls, filled with more vases, marble busts and antiques than books.

Amid the darkness of the room, Vianca Augustine was fair. Her white hair and ivory, sallow skin made her appear ghostlike, and there was certainly something haunting about the emptiness of her gaze. Soulless. She looked to be in her sixties, and her age was exaggerated by the powdery makeup caked within the creases of her face. Despite her ornate dress and overwhelming amount of jewelry, nothing about her was elegant. She had clearly never been beautiful, and—judging from the severe frown lines and pruned wrinkles around her pursed lips—she had never been kind, either.

“Levi,” Vianca said. She spoke his name slowly, as if savoring its taste. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“I owe this girl a favor. She needs work, and with all I need to juggle at the moment—” He smiled, a bit too widely. “It would put my mind at ease knowing she gets settled.”

Vianca raised her pencil-drawn eyebrows and shifted her gaze to Enne. “What’s your name, girl?”

Grace, Enne told herself. I am grace and ease.

“Erienne Abacus Salta, Madame.”

“A dancer? I already have more dancers than I need. And usually my dancers come with a vocal or instrumental split talent. What use do I have for a dancer who can count?”

Enne wasn’t sure how to respond, especially as, truth be told, she wasn’t much of a counter at all.

“She’s a gymnast, as well,” Levi added quickly. “I heard there’s a spot open for a new acrobat.”

Enne struggled to contain her alarm. She hadn’t bargained for that. She didn’t know the first thing about gymnastics.

“Is she, now?” Vianca asked, not looking at Enne so much as through her. “You may go, Levi. I’ll speak to Miss Salta in private.”

He blinked in surprise, then nodded. After giving Enne a final weary look, he slipped out the door. Enne tried not to let his apparent nervousness bother her. She had faced worse interviews for admission to her finishing school.

Vianca beckoned her forward, and Enne moved to stand in front of one of the chairs before the donna’s desk.

“Do you plan on taking a seat, Miss Salta?” she asked.

“Not unless you ask me, Madame.”

Vianca’s green, lizard-like eyes inspected every foot, inch and hair of Enne’s body. Her lips curled, and Enne couldn’t help but notice her uneven red lipstick. “Sit.” Once Enne had taken a seat, Vianca asked, “Where are you from?”

“Bellamy, Madame.”

“That’s quite a journey. How long have you lived here?”

“About half a day, Madame.”

That made Vianca smile. For a moment. Enne hadn’t been trying to be humorous.

“Is Levi trying to court you? He serves a number of roles for me, and I require him to have a clear head. If his belle is living within St. Morse, it will distract him.”

Enne would never walk out with a card dealer, not if she planned on keeping the last shreds of her reputation intact. And if the card dealer in question was Levi, she’d also need to salvage what remained of her dignity. Even if he was attractive, she had no patience for his jokes and smirking. “No, Madame. Nothing like that.”

“Then why is he so interested in your well-being?”

Enne uttered the first lie she could think of: “He owes a favor to my father.”

“I should’ve guessed Levi would be in debt to a counter. How good are your counting abilities?”

Enne could barely add or subtract without the use of her fingers. “Quite good, Madame.”

“Are you literate?” With each new question, Vianca leaned closer to Enne over her desk, almost close enough to grab her.

“Yes, Madame.”

“How well you can read?”

“I read very well, Madame,” she answered, barely able to hide the bite in her voice.

“Who taught you?”

“I went to finishing school. The Bellamy Finishing School of Fine Arts.”

“Did you really? They don’t accept just anyone. You must be the only Salta in your class.”

Enne kept her hands folded calmly in her lap, despite the fury shooting through her like an electric current. The Saltas might’ve been the lowest and most common dancing family, but she wasn’t ashamed of her name. It didn’t matter that her talents didn’t compare to her classmates. She’d worked for her place at that school, for her future.

“I was, Madame.”

Vianca was now bent so close to Enne that Enne could smell her musky perfume. “And you must be quite intelligent to have passed the entrance exams.”

It wasn’t a question, so Enne stayed quiet.

“Is there anything else I should know about you, Miss Salta? Anything else that could be useful to me?”

“No, Madame.”

“Pity.” At last, Vianca leaned back in her seat and drummed her fingers against a stack of papers. Each of her rings—there were almost a dozen—shimmered. Unlike Reymond’s, these appeared to contain real jewels. “How old are you, Miss Salta? You must be at least fourteen to work here, and I don’t make exceptions.”

Enne cringed inwardly. This interview had already been the best test of her etiquette skills she’d ever experienced, and it had been only a few minutes.

“I turned seventeen in February, Madame,” she said.

“You look quite young. Oh, he would like you,” she murmured, more to herself than to Enne. Enne didn’t ask what or whom she meant. “I’m glad to hear you have a background in gymnastics. Levi was quite right; we are looking for some acrobats.”

If Levi’s smile looked like a smirk, then Vianca’s looked like a sneer.

“But I think I’ve found an additional use for you,” Vianca purred.

Enne nodded and pretended like she was following along, though the unsettling satisfaction on Vianca’s face sent an uneasy feeling through her stomach. This interview was highly unlike any that she had experience before.

“This casino has been in my family for generations,” Vianca told her. “But New Reynes isn’t the city it was when St. Morse was first built. Have you ever heard of my family, Miss Salta?”

“No, Madame.”

“So you don’t know what kind of business we run?”

“A...casino, Madame?”

Vianca stood and turned her back to Enne, facing the Mizer family portrait. “There are people in these halls who can unhinge your mind with a kiss. Who can distill poisons and narcotics from a single flower fallen from a bouquet. Who deal in tricks, deceit and even death. And they are all under my employ.”

Sweat broke out along Enne’s neck. Donna of the Augustine crime Family, Levi had told her. This must’ve been what he’d meant.

But what would that have to do with Enne? She was a simple performer. If Vianca truly had those kind of people within St. Morse, then what use could she have for her?

Vianca turned to face her. Her green eyes looked nearly black. “Among my friends, I keep a few favorites who perform a little extra for me. There are enemies everywhere in this city—even within this casino—who seek to destroy me. I need to know their plans. I need listeners. And I can no longer afford to be short on ears.”

Before Enne could process Vianca’s words, the donna ushered Enne out of her seat and to the center of the room. She made a twirling gesture, and Enne, confused, obliged. Enne kept her shoulders back to make them appear larger, stronger—the right build for an acrobat. Whatever this was, it felt like a test.

“You’re young. No one ever notices the young,” Vianca commented wistfully. She grabbed Enne’s cheeks and brought her face closer, then absentmindedly ran a bony finger down Enne’s Cupid’s bow to her chin. Her fingers tasted foul, like rancid perfume.

Enne resisted the urge to free herself from Vianca’s grasp and ignored the sickening feeling in her stomach. She needed a job. She needed to survive in this city long enough to find Lourdes.

“But you’re a performer,” Vianca continued, unaware of or unbothered by Enne’s unease. “You can be noticed if you want. You’re smart and can move in higher society, but you also know Levi—and I’m sure, if you ask nicely, he’d be willing to show you a thing or two about the streets. You’ve only just arrived—this city hasn’t corrupted you. Yet.” She relaxed her grip on Enne’s face, and Enne backed away, her cheeks sore. “And I could use a girl.”

Whatever Levi had told her about Vianca Augustine, she hadn’t been prepared for this. The way Vianca looked at her, touched her...like she was a possession. This meeting felt more like an appraisal than an interview. Under different circumstances, Enne would have fled the room and the donna’s frightful presence.

“I’m going to do you a favor, Miss Salta. I’m going to give you this job.”

“Thank you, Ma—”

“But I need a favor in return. I need you to do another job for me.”

I will find Lourdes, Enne recited, winding herself back up. I will find her and bring her home. No matter what it takes.

“Of course, Madame,” she responded swifly, despite her nervousness.

“I need you to deliver messages to my enemies. Can I trust you to do this for me?”

Enne swallowed, staring into the woman’s predatory gaze and vicious smile, and wondered who would be reckless—or dangerous—enough to make an enemy of someone like her.

No matter what it takes.

“Yes, Madame.”

“Hold out your hand,” Vianca instructed. When Enne obeyed, she clasped both of her wrinkled hands around Enne’s. She whispered something that Enne couldn’t hear, and a cold tingling shot up Enne’s arm. Enne gasped, but when she tried to yank her arm back, Vianca held it in place. The tingling accumulated in Enne’s chest, and her lungs shook and hardened as if surrounded by a shell. No air would release. She couldn’t breathe. Her balance swayed, but Vianca just gripped her hand tighter, her face unconcerned.

Her nails dug deep into Enne’s skin, and Enne choked for breath. Nothing. Nothing. There was no panic like the panic of suffocating, and she stared wildly at Vianca’s apathetic green eyes, pleading for aid.

Help, she mouthed, but no air came out.

Just as her vision began to darken, the feeling released. Air rushed down her throat, and Enne coughed as her lungs stretched like cramped muscles. She collapsed on the floor, tears welled in her eyes.

“That was my omerta,” Vianca said, looming above her. “It’s not an oath I bestow often. But now you are mine.”

Enne grasped for Lourdes’s rules, for something to tell her how she should react, how she should behave, when confronted with the worst. Words to recite. Words to wind herself back up.

Don’t let her see you squirm, Levi had said.

Never show them your fear, Lourdes had warned.

But the loudest word, the only word, was Vianca’s.

Mine.

Mine.

Mine.

Enne stared at Vianca in horror. The woman had strangled her without touching her. Though Enne’s lungs had returned to normal, a phantom soreness lingered, and panic still clawed up her throat. For several moments, she’d thought she would really die, that Vianca would kill her in this dreadful office, while her secretary and Levi waited outside. She could’ve died. And no one had heard a thing.

Enne felt small. She felt ill. What had Vianca done?

“You may sit now,” Vianca told her, a smile playing on her lips.

Enne sat down slowly, carefully, and she watched the old woman with growing alarm. She needed to run. To be alone. To bathe. She needed comfort, and there was none to be found in Vianca’s domineering expression, in the stiffness of the desk chair or the uncomfortable heat of the office.

Vianca called it an omerta, but Enne had never heard of such a thing. What had she done to her? And Levi...had he known she could do this? Why hadn’t he warned her?

“Sedric Torren will be paying St. Morse a visit tonight,” Vianca said, already returning to business. “Your first assignment will be to bring a message to him in the Tropps Room at ten o’clock.”

The name sounded familiar for some reason, but Enne was too traumatized to place it, picking at a scab along her thumb to focus on anything other than the woman before her. By the way Vianca spoke the name, it sounded as if everyone should know him.

Her scab popped off, and blood trickled down her palm.

“Look at me while I’m talking to you,” Vianca snapped, and Enne’s head jolted toward Vianca of its own accord. Enne’s heart thundered. This woman could control her like a puppet, force her own body to betray her. She was trapped within her own skin.

“What is the message, Madame?” She wasn’t sure if she had spoken those words on her own, or if Vianca had made her.

Vianca pulled a vial of clear liquid out of her drawer and handed it to her. “This is your message. See that he receives it. I’m tired of young Mr. Torren playing with my things.” Once again, Vianca leaned closer, and this time, Enne winced and put as much distance between the two of them as possible. She knew her terror must have been plain on her face. “This won’t kill him, but it will incapacitate him for several days. That should send him a message, don’t you agree?”

“Y-yes, Madame.”

Enne’s conscience twisted when she realized what she’d agreed to do, even if Sedric Torren was a stranger. Surely, he didn’t deserve to be poisoned, and she couldn’t possibly be the one to do it. She was a schoolgirl, for goodness’ sake, not some kind of assassin.

But Vianca’s menacing glare rooted Enne to her seat.

This was her chance to refuse. To run. But the more she considered it, the more air was sucked out of her. Her breath thinned until she was gasping again. Each inhale was weaker than the next. While Vianca thoughfully twisted an emerald ring around her finger, Enne gripped the edges of her seat, her lungs aching as they demanded oxygen.

Then Vianca’s lips coiled into a smile, and Enne’s chest expanded in relief. She took large, gulping breaths and blinked the tears away from her eyes.

Somehow, the omerta knew what Enne was thinking. It knew Enne didn’t want to do this. And it was playing with her, punishing her.

This woman could murder her at any moment she wished.

Enne bit her lip to hold back the helplessness squirming in her throat. Breathe. Sedric was a stranger. Someone who meant nothing to her. Breathe. This wasn’t permanent. She was leaving this monstrous city the moment she found Lourdes.

“We’ve come to an agreement, then,” Vianca said. Clearly, Enne’s silence was what she’d wanted to hear. “The acrobats are in the middle of a show. Tonight is their last performance, so you can begin rehearsing a new act with them tomorrow. I’ll be sure to send you something special to wear tonight for your date with Mr. Torren. Time to abandon your Bellamy values.”

Enne didn’t need to worry about the city corrupting her. Vianca Augustine seemed confident in achieving that all on her own.

Vianca retrieved a bronze key out from a filing cabinet. “As part of your newfound employment, you will live here in St. Morse. Your apartment, room 1812.” She handed the key to her, and Enne mumbled a thank you, sliding it into her pocket beside the vial and her token. “Welcome to the greatest casino in New Reynes, Miss Salta.”

Enne stood so fast her knees cracked. She needed to get out of here. Away from her. She needed to get out of this city.

This had all been a terrible mistake.

“I’ll contact you again when I have a new task for you,” Vianca promised, her eyes flinty. “Or if you disappoint.” The threat in her words was clear.

As Enne stumbled on her near-run to the door, Vianca didn’t even look at her. She returned to her papers. No smile. No nod. Not even enough acknowledgment to call it indifference. And that was what terrified Enne most of all.

Levi stood in the waiting room, repeatedly checking his watch. He looked up as Enne closed the door. “Well?” he asked impatiently.

Enne hesitated a few moments, waiting for Levi to add something else. Anything else. Had he known this would happen? Surely he wouldn’t have brought her here if he knew about the omerta. He would’ve warned her. He wouldn’t have let her anywhere near St. Morse Casino. She’d only just met Levi, but criminal or not, she had heard true sincerity in his voice when he promised to help her. Unless everything in this city was a lie.

She opened her mouth to tell him the truth, but her chest constricted. It was a simple word, omerta, but when she tried to form it, no sound would come out. Enne realized that, whatever Vianca had done to her, Enne couldn’t talk about it. So she smiled to hide her panic, as she had always been taught to do.

Wasn’t that one of Lourdes’s sayings about being a lady? Smile widest when you are about to cry. Enne had already broken rule after rule, and she needed this one. She needed to do something right. She needed to feel in control.

More than anything, she needed to be alone.

“I got the job,” Enne managed, though she didn’t sound excited. Everything felt numb. Tonight she was going to...going to...

“You got the job?” Levi echoed, and Enne hated that he looked impressed. Hated that she’d wanted that minutes ago, when now she felt so shaken.

“I’ll walk you to your new room, then.” He opened the door to the hallway, and Enne avoided staring at the Mizer portraits, suddenly all too aware that these faces belonged to the dead. When she stared into their purple eyes, she felt Vianca’s green ones gazing back.

“How kind of you,” she muttered, wishing he would instead leave her to herself. As intent as she was on finding her mother, she didn’t know if she could do anything else today, with all the questions and stress of this morning and tonight’s assignment weighing on her shoulders.

“Ever the gentleman,” he said cheerily as they stepped inside the elevator.

The pulleys above them spun, and the platform jerked as they ascended. Enne held the railing in a steel grip.

“What did you say that impressed Vianca so much?” Levi asked. Everything about his tone was pleasant and friendly. It made her want to scream.

“She appreciated my etiquette skills,” Enne snapped. That was another broken rule—she couldn’t pinpoint which one. Not in this death trap. Not with the curse Vianca had cast on her. Not when she kept picturing Lourdes in a similar metal cage, only one that was descending and descending, never to reach a bottom.

She was still smiling, though. Her teachers would’ve been proud.

“Ah, there’s that attitude again,” Levi said.

“Are you quite finished?”

For some reason, that made him smile. He didn’t hear the panic in her voice. Didn’t realize he’d just introduced her to a monster.

“Why do I have the feeling I need to watch out for you?” he asked.

Goodness, he’s exhausting. “I’m not helpless, you know.”

“That’s not what I meant. I meant that maybe I should watch out for you, because you seem like the kind of person someone might underestimate.”

Enne blinked in surprise. “What gave you such an idea?”

“I don’t spend my mornings helping out just any pretty missy, you know.”

Was Levi Glaisyer flirting with her? The boys in Bellamy never flirted with her unless they hoped she’d introduce them to her richer classmates. Few people paid attention to someone as common as a Salta.

He must’ve been making fun of her again. She was emotionally wrung dry, and she didn’t have the patience to watch Levi fling one smirk after another. He’d sat unaware while, in the next room, Vianca had assaulted Enne in the most terrifying way. He’d mocked her at every opportunity. He might’ve been helping her find Lourdes, but only because Enne would pay him that night.

“I’m flattered,” she sneered, her voice vicious. “Truly.”

He stiffened, wilted. “Excellent,” he said drily. “Wouldn’t want to get off on the wrong foot with a new coworker.”

The word coworker sounded stranger the more Enne let it sink in. Her teachers—and probably Lourdes, for that matter—never would have let her within fifty feet of a casino, and probably not within one hundred feet of Levi and the collection of lost things in his closet.

But the Lourdes Enne knew and the Lourdes Levi remembered seemed to be completely different people. To think that Lourdes spent so much time in this wretched city boggled Enne—disturbed her, even. Maybe Lourdes knew how to survive in New Reynes. Maybe the reason Lourdes never told her the truth was in case Enne might have been foolish enough to believe that she could survive here, too.

Her mother had been right to keep her daughter in the dark, because each hour spent in New Reynes formed a new crack, and there was no way Enne was going to emerge from this city unbroken.

LEVI

Levi’s poker face didn’t waver as he studied his hand: a four-card straight and the kings of clubs and spades. Clearly luck was on his side. The player to his left eyed him warily and threw in five green chips. Two hundred and fifty volts.

From beside him, Sedric Torren also slapped five green ones in the pot.

Levi equaled their wagers on behalf of the house. Normally with the betting so high, he’d fold. But tonight was different. He hadn’t expected Sedric Torren himself to visit St. Morse. He could’ve been there for only one reason, and that was Levi.

Which meant that Levi couldn’t afford to look weak—not even for a moment.

When the hand ended, Levi had managed to earn a 27 percent profit. At this rate, he’d have thirty in the next hour, which was the highest he’d ever made in one shift. Unlike poker or blackjack, where the dealer was little more than a moderator in the game, Tropps treated the dealer like a player who represented the house. The game placed a heavy emphasis on strategy and bluffing, and it was so well-known across the city that the main street of the Casino District was named after it. Dealers like Levi were famous for their skill, and Levi was one of the best of them all.

The other players grumbled and stomped their way to the next table, their pockets significantly lighter. Levi took a break to collect the cards, as well as his bearings.

The only player who didn’t leave was Sedric Torren.

“’Lo, Pup,” he murmured. His brown hair was slicked to the side and shiny with grease, and his smile was wolf-like. He switched to the seat beside Levi.

“Sedric,” Levi gritted, concealing the ugly feeling of dread in his stomach. The Tropps Room around them was loud with jazz and the chatter of guests, all gussied up in designer gowns and carrying cigarettes in long jewel-encrusted holders. Surely Sedric wouldn’t try anything in public. Even the don of the Torren Family wouldn’t do something that reckless. “What can I do for you?”

Sedric turned to one of the waiters carrying a tray of champagne. “Two glasses.” He set one in front of Levi, who didn’t bother to reach for it. Drinking with a Torren—least of all the don—sounded like asking for trouble, and Levi needed all his concentration to survive this encounter unscathed. “Should we make a toast?” Sedric suggested.

“To what?” Levi asked, keeping his voice steady as he shuffled the Tropps decks. Sedric Torren had a reputation for playing with his prey before he killed it, and Levi needed to make it clear to Sedric that he wasn’t afraid. As far as Sedric should have been concerned, Levi had no reason to fear his family. If anything, this should be an exchange between two businessmen, a celebration of an advantageous trade.

Sedric raised his glass. “We toast to your continued good health. You’ve managed to push back the date for our investment return not just once or twice, but three times.”

Levi’s skin went clammy. This was no celebration—this was a threat.

“Cheers, Pup.” Sedric clinked Levi’s glass before taking a swig. “So where are my promised returns?”

Levi swallowed. “They’re coming.”

Sedric leaned closer. He had a sickly sweet smell to him, like toffee. “I’m not a thickhead, you know,” Sedric said. “Just tell me what you’ve really been doing this whole time.”

He suspects, Levi thought with panic. Or he knows. And he’s forcing me to lie.

The truth meant death.

“You’ll get the volts soon,” Levi rasped, shifting away from him.

Sedric laughed, then adjusted his suit jacket. A silver knife gleamed from an inside pocket, a ruby winking at Levi from its hilt. Only a Torren would carry a weapon that flashy.

Levi reminded himself that he couldn’t look vulnerable. He searched around the Tropps Room for some of Sedric’s cronies, and sure enough, he spotted several men lurking near the door in crisp suits with black-and-red-striped ties—Luckluster colors. He fought to maintain his poker face. He was surrounded.

“You gonna kill me in St. Morse?” Levi dared, mustering up the appearance of confidence. “Doesn’t seem you’d get your volts back, then. And Vianca would never forgive you.”

“I’m not here to kill you. I’m here to warn you.” But despite his words, Sedric removed the knife from his jacket. With only an arm’s length of space between them, it would take Sedric only a heartbeat to stab the knife through Levi’s neck.

Any rational man would run, but Levi was frozen. Maybe that was a good thing. It made him appear bold, even when he was terrified.

Sedric ran his finger along the blade, then inspected the red droplet on his fingertip, as if assuring Levi the knife was sharp. He licked away the blood. The sight of it made Levi shudder.

“Whatever scheme you’ve been running,” Sedric murmured, “it’s over. Maybe you will be, too.”

Sedric flipped over the top card on the deck.

“Ten of hearts. You got lucky, Pup. We’ll give you ten days. With reminders.” He stood, slid his knife back into its sheath and drained the rest of his glass. “A present from my family.” He tossed a silver card face down in front of Levi. Sedric whistled and walked to a different table.

Levi’s heart hammered, both from Sedric’s threat and the gift he left behind. He recognized the card instantly—its metallic back was signature to the Shadow Game, the rumored execution game of the Phoenix Club. It was a North Side legend, as notorious as the Great Street War or the original lords. To Levi, it was an object plucked out from a story, from a nightmare.

It can’t be real, Levi thought, hoped. But even his cynicism couldn’t rationalize away the card’s plain existence right in front of him.

The tales claimed the cards had magical properties once you touched them. Even though Levi didn’t believe in those shatz superstitions like Jac did, he flipped it over with a morbid curiosity, seeking some assurance that the legends weren’t true.

The moment he touched it, the lights of the Tropps Room faded, and silence pierced through the music.

* * *

Levi stared down a long hallway that stretched endlessly in both directions. The impressively tall doors alternated black and white, each parallel to the other. The walls and ceiling were marble, clean enough to glint off the hallway’s collection of mirrors and crystal. The floor was tiled in black and white, as well. Like a chessboard.

Vaguely, he got the sense he was dreaming. But if he was, he couldn’t seem to wake up.

He reached for a black door, but it was locked. He tried the white one next to it, and it clicked open. The air that rushed past felt like a sigh against his skin.

Once he crossed the threshold, he found himself dressed in a smart suit, far nicer than his St. Morse uniform. The mud squished beneath his oxfords, and it smelled of earth. He was in a graveyard. The sky was gray, as the sky in New Reynes tended to be. The City of Sin followed him wherever he went, even in his dreams.

Levi moved to return to the hallway—graveyards unnerved him, as cliché as that was—and tripped over one of the headstones. It was painted metallic silver.

Levi Canes Glaisyer, it read.

Levi scampered to his feet and backed around it. On its other side was a face: the Fool, one of the Shadow Cards, the invitation to the Shadow Game. The bells on the Fool’s hat chimed, high-pitched and eerie in the silent graveyard. The diamonds and triangles painted on his face spun like pinwheels, and he strutted toward the cliff in front of him. Levi reflexively took a step back, as though he could also fall.

The Fool laughed. And laughed and laughed and laughed.

It’s not real, Levi assured himself. It’s only a nightmare.

But it didn’t feel like one. The earth sticky under his shoes, the cold sweat dripping down his neck, the Fool winking from his headstone—how could this all be in his head?

He whipped around and faced a new row of fresh, unfilled graves. He peered into the first hole, above which the headstone said Jac Dorner Mardlin. Jac’s coffin was lidless. Soot coated his blond hair and cap, and his eyes were wide-open, his mouth twisted into an unnatural scream.

Levi jolted back with horror and nearly stumbled into the next grave. It was Chez’s, and beside him, Mansi’s, and dozens of other Irons from around the city. Levi bit back a wave of nausea looking at Mansi’s gray-toned skin and lifeless eyes, matching the bodies of the other kids around her. Even if the investment scheme had gotten in the way of most of Levi’s responsibilities as lord, he still cared. They were his kids. His to protect.

This was all Levi’s fault.

He ran back to the hallway. The moment he crossed the threshold, his shoulders relaxed, his guilt and fear fading along with the nightmare.

There were hundreds of doors, but none of them was the right one.

Suddenly, a white door blasted open. Fire spewed out, reaching into the hallway, reaching for him. Levi raced out of its path. His back pressed against one of the black doors, the heat licking his cheek. Ghost-like faces flickered within the flames, their eyes an eerie, glowing purple, watching him.

All at once, they screamed.

* * *

Levi gasped and woke in the Tropps Room at St. Morse. His suit and vest were wet from his spilled glass of champagne. A few people at neighboring tables pointed at him as he dried off his pants with a handkerchief, his fingers trembling.

A dream, he told himself, shaking his head to clear it. A nightmare. But he could still hear the Fool’s laugh. He could still picture Jac’s contorted scream.

On the face of the Shadow Card, a metal tower stretched toward the night sky, disappearing amid clouds and stars. Several men climbed its spiral staircase, and one fell from it to the ice below.

The Tower. In the Shadow Game, it represented chaos and ruin.

He shoved it in his pocket as nausea stormed in his stomach. The Phoenix Club’s private execution game was a myth, and Levi had always taken the North Side’s legends with a grain of salt. There was no house of horrors hidden within the city. There was no wandering devil bargaining for your soul. And there was no game you couldn’t win.

But there could be no mistake—the Game did exist. The card and the visions proved it.

Have you ever considered that you might be in over your head? the whiteboot captain had asked him this morning, and the words made Levi sick. He’d always known Vianca’s scam was dangerous, but he was the Iron Lord. He was cunning. He was clever.

If he didn’t collect Sedric’s volts in time, he was dead.

Levi’s break ended, and a new group of players sat down. Every card he drew was lousy: a single queen and the lowest of every other suit. The house’s pile of chips shrank, and his profits slumped to 20 percent.

A man in a bowler hat took his eighth pot. Levi tried to focus on his game to see if he was counting cards, but he was panicked. He was sloppy. And his mind kept straying back to Sedric Torren.

If the Torren Family wanted him dead, why would they use the Shadow Game instead of one of their own men? Sedric’s cousins—the brutal, notorious siblings, Charles and Delia—never turned down an opportunity to kill. Levi had heard rumors that Charles was experimenting to see how many times he could shoot someone before they bled out, and that Delia had a knife collection made from the bones of each of her victims.

If Sedric wanted Levi dead, he didn’t need the Shadow Game to do it.

Which meant Sedric was showing off his friendship with the Phoenix Club. Sedric had inherited his position as don less than a year ago, after his father’s death. Since then, in an effort to squash his rival, Vianca Augustine, he’d befriended the wigheads, begun a campaign for office and declared himself an honorary South Sider.

He would make a spectacle of Levi, just to show he could.

After another round, the players headed to the poker and roulette tables. Levi’s profits plummeted to a meager 18 percent, a good percentage for a mediocre player. Not for him.

Even if he played his best at St. Morse, ten days wasn’t enough time to come up with ten thousand volts.

He traced his finger along the edge of the Shadow Card in his pocket. In the stories, receiving one meant only one thing: a warning. Make the Phoenix Club happy, or go buy a cemetery plot.

Lourdes Alfero has to be alive, he thought. Because if she’s not...

Ten days.

Ten days to figure out how to beat his enemies at their own game.

ENNE

Enne found a mention of Sedric Torren in her guidebook, buried within a chapter called “A History of Organized Crime on the North Side.”

He was the don of the Torren Family.

He owned a narcotics and gambling empire.

He was one of the most powerful men in New Reynes.

And Enne was going to poison him.

A knock at her door summoned her from her bed. She’d fallen asleep, but she hadn’t truly rested. In her dreams, she was running through the city’s streets, reaching for her mother’s slender shadow as it disappeared down alley after alley. She’d been paying too much attention to the diminishing sound of Lourdes’s footsteps to notice the second shadow lurking behind her. It tore the jacket from Enne’s arms and ripped the purse out of her hands. She’d woken just before it had plunged a knife into her back.

Enne opened the door.

A woman stood in the hallway with a grim expression, holding a dress. “From Madame Augustine,” she said.

Enne’s hands shook as she took it and held it up to her small frame. It was pink as peonies, with a crescent moon collar and a ribbon tied around the waist, its skirt a mess of tulle and bows. It was a dress meant for a doll.

“What is this for?” Enne asked.

“For tonight,” the woman answered, already turning to leave.

“She can’t be serious.”

“It’s nonnegotiable.”

Enne had always enjoyed dressing up, especially for a performance. In a way, the outfit reminded her of a ballet costume, so as she slipped it on, she tried to convince herself she was preparing for an elaborate show rather than her potential demise. Her makeup calmed her, even if her hands were shaking. Some powder around her nose. Some rouge on her cheeks. Some tint on her lips. Whatever it took to persuade herself that she was another person, that this was not her life, this was not her end.

She repeated Lourdes’s rules to herself in the mirror.

Do not reveal your emotions, especially your fear.

Never allow yourself to be lost.

Trust is a last resort.

The words didn’t mean much now—after all, those rules couldn’t save her. She tucked the clear vial into her pocket and, on her way out the door, left one thousand volts in an orb for Levi on her table—nearly everything she had—in case he came looking when she didn’t return.

She’d never felt so alone.

* * *

If St. Morse were a palace, then the Tropps Room was the throne room, and greed was king. The stained glass windows, the iron candelabras, the glimmering marble floors and white tables—the room was decorated as though for royalty. The throne itself was in the center of the room, raised above the rest of the floor. There Levi sat, collecting and shuffling a deck of midnight blue cards. He was speaking to a man with slicked brown hair, fair skin and an expensive suit.

Of course Levi was at the throne. Reymond had said he was Vianca’s favorite.

Levi wore a three-piece blue suit and a green tie that matched St. Morse’s signature colors. For a brief moment, Enne allowed herself to see what the other girls and boys had seen—the girls and boys whose clothing now filled half of Levi’s wardrobe. He cleaned up nicely, and Enne had a soft spot for men in suits. She appreciated the way the jacket made him look broader, and the way his dark suit and features contrasted with the copper roots in his hair...

She stopped herself. She needed to focus.

Levi watched the man next to him while shuffling a deck of cards. He half smiled, then he adjusted his tie, the muscles in his jaw clenching as he—

Focus. What would her teachers have said? Levi was...hardly someone to admire. And even if his appearance was nice, his character left quite a lot to be desired. She didn’t feel like herself, not in this dress, not with the vial in her pocket, not so far from home.

More problematic than Levi’s dashing appearance was the fact that he was so prominently seated above everyone else in the room. She would be easy to spot, looking like a walking piece of cotton candy. But Vianca had claimed Sedric would be here, in the Tropps Room. Thankfully, Levi wasn’t directly facing her. Maybe he wouldn’t see her at all. He did look rather preoccupied with the man beside him.

If only she was wearing something less conspicuous. She was small enough that, with some luck, she could have slipped the poison into Sedric’s glass from behind him and he’d have been none the wiser. But the dress made this impossible. Enne had spent her entire life being overlooked, but tonight, Vianca had dressed her to be noticed.

A man in a green St. Morse uniform stood by the door, the pallor of his face nearly matching the white busts lining Vianca’s hallways.

“Excuse me?” Enne asked.

“What can I do for you, miss?”

“I’m looking for Sedric Torren. He promised to meet me here.” The gravity of the evening felt much more real now that she’d spoken his name out loud.

“He’s there.” The employee pointed to Levi’s table. Just as he did, the man with the slicked hair drained his glass and strode away with a swagger to his step. Enne paled. What was Sedric doing talking to Levi? “He just left.”

“Thank you—”

“Miss?” the employee called, his voice heavy and weary.

Enne turned around. “Yes?”

“Are you, um, here alone?”

This dress, Enne grumbled internally. As if I don’t look young enough already.

Seeing her annoyed expression, the man looked down at the floor, flustered. “Never mind. Please, forget I said anything.”

Enne took a deep breath and repeated Lourdes’s rules to herself. She followed Sedric to another card table and, before she could talk herself out of it, slid into the chair beside him. It was conveniently behind Levi, so he wouldn’t spot her unless he turned around. She almost wished he would—maybe he could help her; maybe he could save her. But the omerta was a secret. She hadn’t been able to tell Levi before, and even if she found a loophole, the memory of suffocating made her stomach turn. She couldn’t risk that again, even if it meant acting alone.

She didn’t look at Sedric for several moments. Her heart pounded. He was the don of a casino Family, just like Vianca, and if he was anything like her, then Enne was right to be afraid. She should be petrified. She should run.

But that wasn’t an option. She might need to poison him for Vianca, but she would survive this night for Lourdes.

At last, she turned to him.

He was already smiling at her.

He was attractive. Not in a beautiful or even a handsome way, but in how he carried himself. As if he had power over everyone, and he knew how to use it. But the more Enne stared at him, the more she noticed the heavy grease in his hair and the outrageous, gaudy details of his suit—as if anyone really needed a diamond-studded necktie.

Yet as attractive as he was, it wasn’t a good-looking smile. It was threatening, like a wolf who had just spotted his prey.

“I don’t believe we’ve met,” he said smoothly. His age was difficult to discern—his receding hairline didn’t match the few lines on his face. She guessed about thirty years old. “Are your parents here?”

“What? No, no,” she said, her voice distressed. She was breaking the first rule. He could see her fear. She needed to do better than that if she was going to live through the night.

A knife winked at her from his pocket. She almost whimpered.

“And are you a fan of Tropps, miss?” Sedric asked.

She didn’t have any chips. She didn’t know how to play. Her lie was unraveling before she could even spin it.

Forget you noticed me, she pleaded. She wanted to go home. She wanted to be invisible again, so long as she was safe.

But she was trapped under Sedric’s snare of a smile and the other players’ bewildered looks. She was in the spotlight. For once, she had people’s attention.

So she did the only thing she knew. She smiled innocently and lied. “Yes. I play all the time.”

She could tell from his expression that he didn’t believe her. But there was no suspicion in his eyes—only amusement. She was simply a silly girl to him.

She relaxed—barely. Young, innocent...she could keep up that charade. She was a Bellamy schoolgirl lost in the City of Sin. She knew this role well.

Sedric slid her a stack of ten green chips. “Compliments to a pretty young lady.”

“Thank you.” She placed one of the chips in the center, and the dealer handed her three cards. She mimicked how the other players held them and moved some cards around here and there for good measure.

Each round, the players placed their bets, and the dealer passed them a new card. This continued for a few turns, until each of them was asked to reveal three cards from their hand. Enne flipped over the ace of spades, then the queen and ten of hearts. The others watched with raised eyebrows. Perhaps she’d made the wrong move.

One of the players folded, and so did she. With four chips left, she waited for the game to finish, the hairs on her neck rose on end. She felt the heated gazes of the whole table. She looked obviously lost. If this continued, Sedric might grow suspicious.

When the game finally ended and the dealer collected the pot of chips, Sedric turned to her. “I take it you’re not a regular. Are you sure you’ve played before?”

“Was I that obvious?” she asked, trying to appear sheepish. She wiped her sweaty hands on her tulle skirt.

He smirked at her as if, yes, she was. “Waiting on someone? You can’t be here by yourself.”

“I’m here alone,” she replied cautiously. “I thought I’d watch the dancers.”

“Then you’re a little lost. The theater is across the hall.” He scanned at her up and down, and she resisted the urge to look away from his dark eyes. She was supposedly playing the role of the assailant, yet his gaze was the one growing more and more predatory. Her skin prickled with unease. “Would you like me to accompany you? I wouldn’t want you to get lost again.”

“That would be lovely...”

“Sedric.”

“Sedric,” she echoed nervously.

“And your name, miss?” He took her arm and led her around the tables. She peeked at Levi, who was—thankfully—still too focused on his game to notice her.

“En... Emma. It’s Emma.”

“A pleasure, Emma.”

In the lobby, the air reeked of floral perfumes, cigarette smoke and the perpetual stink of Tropps Street. Groups in ruffled gowns and tuxedos shuffled between the restaurant and the casino rooms, but they all parted for Sedric as he approached. Enne couldn’t tell if it was out of respect or fear—in New Reynes, they both seemed like the same thing. She tried to avoid their wary gazes in her direction to keep herself from trembling.

“The performance doesn’t start for a half hour,” Sedric said. “Do you like dancing as much as you like watching it?”

In order to poison him, she’d need to stay with him until he bought himself a drink. But the way he held her, his arm linked so tightly with her own, her side pressed against him, she felt the urge to flee. It was nothing he had said, but the way he looked at her. It made her feel...wrong.

“I love dancing, but only if I have a good partner,” she said, swallowing down her longing for escape. She had lasted this long. She could do this.

She had to.

He smiled. His teeth were alabaster white. “I promise you will find me more than acceptable.”

He steered her to the dance floor of a grand ballroom of twinkling lights and waxy floors. The other couples danced chest-to-chest, and Sedric pulled her close. His breath warmed her forehead, and she wished she was tall enough to look him in the eyes, or at least anywhere above his neck.

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