Only a pyrokinetic mage could stand in the middle of an inferno and survive. “Was he a Prime?”
“You would think so, but no.” Professor Itou grinned. “His magic was classified as Notable later in his life.”
“That seems an awful lot of power for a pyrokinetic mage of Notable rank,” I said.
“Indeed.” Itou turned around, peered at the bookshelves, and pulled out a red book. “David Harrisson, one of Chicago’s twenty-six police lieutenants at the time, took a particular interest in this occurrence and in the causes of the fire. Nobody knows what he actually found, because the powers that be seemed to have suppressed his investigation, but years later he began publishing crime fiction under the pseudonym John F. Shepard.” Itou flipped the book open. “‘The Devil’s Fire.’ A short story about a young man who steals his father’s prized African artifact and uses it to burn down Boston.”
He showed me the page and snapped the book closed.
“There exists a deathbed confession by one Frederick Van Pelt, detailing how he and three other young men met with Edward Emmens, who had taken a magical object from his father and was going to show them wondrous things. They met up at a barn whose owners were known to call it an early night, and they paid a local man to keep watch. He claimed that after the fire, the magical object was broken into three pieces and each piece was hidden away.”
I put two and two together. “So let me make sure I got it. Rudyard Emmens brings home some sort of artifact with him from somewhere in Asia. Then years later, his son uses it to impress his friends, loses control, and burns down Chicago?”
Professor Itou looked at me for a long second and smiled. “Yes.”
“How did it go with the senior thesis?” Bern asked.
Professor Itou’s eyes got really big. He waved the book around. “Funny you should mention it. I got terribly excited. I had all my sources. I worked for weeks. I had written a paper that would’ve made angels weep. I was the last to present my thesis before a panel of professors. They listened to me, nodded, and offered me a full graduate scholarship. Guaranteed admission, BA to PhD track, all expenses paid. Just one small thing—my thesis couldn’t be published. It wasn’t in the public’s interest.”
“They bribed you,” I guessed.
He leaned forward and tapped the book on the table to underscore his point. “And I took it. Back then I took it because I was poor and had no choice. Now I would’ve taken it for a completely different reason. The existence of amplification artifacts has been debated for years. We know that some people develop magic powers without the serum, and we know that magical objects can be created, so there is a possibility that an item which makes your magic stronger does exist. If such an artifact could be found, only tragedy would come from it. If it could be controlled, it would be given to a Prime and turned into a devastating weapon. If it couldn’t be controlled, any attempt to do so would result in a natural disaster. It’s best for this theoretical artifact to stay hidden. It is a lesson for us and a legacy of Colonialism. Stealing another nation’s treasures never turns out well.”
Edward Emmens was a Notable, a third-tier mage, and he had burned down Chicago. Adam Pierce was a Prime. If he managed to get his hands on such an artifact, he would go nova. Cold worry squirmed through me. Would anything be left after he was done?
“Do you know what it was?” Bern asked. “The artifact?”
Professor Itou shook his head, his face mournful. “No. I’ve tried to find out over the years, but I’ve failed. We don’t even know where it came from. We know it was most likely of Far Eastern or possibly Middle Eastern origin, but the cultural heritage of both is so rich and varied. It’s like looking for a needle in the proverbial haystack.”
I pulled out my phone and showed him a picture of the jewelry. “Could it be something like this?”
“Possibly.” Itou frowned and spread his hands. “Remember, we’re talking about Orient, meaning ‘East,’ an outdated term by modern standards, which took on different meanings through the years. In the 1800s, this term came to mean mostly India, China, and the Far East, but we can’t discount the Middle East. The Orient Express, for example, went to Istanbul. I could probably tell you more if I could get my hands on the Emmens family documents, but the family’s descendants refuse to speak to me. It would take someone with a lot more clout than I can scrape together.” He exhaled and waved his arms. “I’ve let it go.”
“What does this jewelry look like to you?” I asked. It never hurt to ask . . .
“An old TV antenna?” Itou frowned. “I’m afraid I’m not much help.”
“Thank you so much for the information. One last question: is there anyone in your department we could talk to about the artifact?” I asked.
Professor Itou grinned. “Magdalene Sherbo would be the one. Unfortunately she is currently in India as part of her educational outreach. We could try emailing her, but her email access is sporadic, and she is notorious for not checking her account. You might get an answer in a month or so. I once sent her an invitation to my wife’s baby shower. Two months later, she replied that she would love to come just as I was sending pictures of the baby to everyone with an email account.” He chuckled.
“Could we have her email address just in case?” Bern asked.
Professor Itou jotted an email address on a yellow sticky pad and handed it to Bern.
“Thank you again,” I said.
“Is the artifact about to surface?” he asked.
“I believe so,” I said.
All humor drained from Professor Itou’s face. He took out his wallet and extracted a photograph. On it a woman of Asian descent, her dark hair loose, stood next to two boys against the backdrop of a massive tree. The boys looked a lot like Professor Itou, with the same smart, mischievous sparkle to their eyes.
“This is my wife and children.”
“Your family is beautiful,” I told him.
“We live here, in the city. If the artifact is uncovered and someone attempts to use it here, in Houston, people will die. The Great Chicago Fire left three hundred people dead. The population density within our city is many times that of Chicago on the cusp of the twentieth century. If this artifact falls into the wrong hands—and really there are no right hands for it—the casualties will be catastrophic.”
He slid the photograph toward me. “You have discovered something potentially devastating and you can’t just walk away now. You have a moral obligation to them, to me, and to your own family. By virtue of possessing this dangerous knowledge, you are now partially responsible for our survival. Please keep that in mind.”
We left his office and walked across the evening-sun-drenched parking lot to our car.
“Do we go to the authorities?” Bern asked.
“If we do, we’ll only get one shot at convincing them this is serious. If we’re right and Adam wants this artifact and somehow gets his hands on it, it could mean mass evacuation. They’re not going to do something like that without some serious evidence. Right now all we have is a theory from a never-published senior thesis and a picture of some sort of jeweled doohicky. I’m all for going for broke, but we have to have something to go with.”
“So what now?” Bern asked.
“We go home and do our research.” In the morning, if all else failed, I would ask Rogan to see about getting the documents from the Emmens family. Professor Itou was right. The family wouldn’t speak to him or me, but they would speak to Huracan.
I looked at my family gathered around the kitchen table. My two sisters, my two cousins, Mom and Grandma Frida. I’d just explained in broad terms the story of the Great Chicago Fire and the artifact that could be tied to it.
“I need your help searching for the artifact,” I said.