“He found me, Diver,” Ethan said. “He managed to use a sleep spell on me, and the next thing I knew I was at Sephira’s house.”
“Busy day.”
“Very.” Ethan sipped his ale. “Tell me this: Have you heard anything about Simon Gant coming back to Boston?”
“Gant?” Diver said, with a shake of his head. “Don’t even joke about something like that.”
“I’m not joking.”
Diver frowned. “I thought Gant was dead.”
“He’s not, although it seems possible that someone went to a good deal of trouble to try to kill him. I’m almost certain that he’s somewhere in the city, and that Sephira is looking for him.”
“Oh, I’m sure she is,” Diver said.
“Why?”
He shrugged. “You heard the same things I did. They had some kind of falling-out. And Sephira isn’t the sort to forgive and forget. If he’s alive, he’d be smart to get as far from here as he can.”
Ethan took one last spoonful of stew and set his bowl aside. Leaning in, he asked in a low voice, “Did you ever hear anything about Gant being a conjurer?”
Diver considered this. “Not that I recall. But didn’t you have dealings with him?”
“I did, but that happened a long time ago. He didn’t use any spells against me. He didn’t need to.”
Ethan sat back again and reached for his ale.
“There you are,” he heard from behind him.
He turned in his chair and smiled. Kannice was making her way to their table, a dishrag slung over her shoulder, candlelight shining in her auburn hair.
Reaching Ethan, she stooped and kissed his cheek. “I missed you last night,” she whispered in his ear.
“I missed you, too.”
Kannice straightened and cast a cold look Diver’s way. “So are you going to tell me where you were?” she asked, turning her gaze back to Ethan. “Or are you going to make me guess?”
“Diver didn’t believe me when I told him. I’m not sure you will either. I spent the night as a guest of the British army at Castle William.”
“You were arrested?” she asked, her voice rising.
Ethan frowned. “I was employed. But thank you for showing such faith in me.”
Diver grinned; Kannice merely scowled.
“You’re working for the Crown?” she said, arching an eyebrow.
Kannice had always shown far more sympathy than Ethan for those who opposed Parliament and His Majesty the King on everything from the Stamp Tax to the Townshend Duties. During the Quartering Act crisis in New York a couple of years before, Kannice had cheered efforts by the colonial assembly to deny troops access to publick houses and other private property. Now, with occupation imminent here in Boston, she feared that she and other tavern owners would be forced to provide housing and food for countless regulars.
She knew that Ethan had served in the royal navy, and she tolerated his Tory leanings, just as he did her Whiggish sympathies. Apparently, though, supporting the Crown was one thing; working for the king’s men was quite another.
“Aye,” Ethan answered, careful to keep his tone neutral. “And if I could tell you why, you’d understand.”
“I see.” She crossed her arms over her chest, her expression growing remote.
Kannice was as kind and generous a woman as Ethan had ever known, and she loved him deeply-more than he deserved, he sometimes felt. But when she wanted she could be as cold and hard as a New England winter.
“You’re going to have to trust me, Kannice,” he told her. “This isn’t about politics.”
“All right,” she said, sounding skeptical. “You boys enjoy your ale. I have work to do.” She turned on her heel and walked away.
Ethan glanced at Diver, who had the good sense to keep his eyes trained on his tankard.
After a few moments, Diver said, “Tell me more about Spectacles.”
He was probably more interested in breaking the silence than in hearing anything Ethan could tell him, but still Ethan was grateful for the distraction.
“Mariz? He’s an accomplished conjurer,” Ethan said, and drained his ale.
He raised a hand and caught Kelf’s eye. The barkeep nodded and began to fill another tankard.
“And,” Ethan added, “he’s not afraid to use his craft. He set up detection spells around Henry’s shop, so that he would know when I went home. He attacked me with that sleep spell. And just before I came here, he used a finding spell.”
“What did he want with you this time?”
Ethan tapped a finger to his lips, thinking. “That’s just it. I don’t think he was looking for me at all. He was disappointed when he realized that his casting had found me. He wouldn’t tell me who he had been trying to find, but I think it was Gant.”
“So,” Diver said, speaking softly, and looking around to be sure that no one was listening. “Do you think that Gant and this guy Mariz are fighting it out to see who gets to be Sephira’s speller?”
“No,” Ethan said, shaking his head. “There’s more going on here than that.”
“Well, did one of them have some connection with whatever it is you’re doing for the Crown?”
“I think so. But I don’t know-”
Ethan stopped and stared at Diver, his mind racing. How had this not occurred to him earlier?
Kelf brought him his ale and set it on the table with the usual “Thereyago, Ethan.” Ethan didn’t say a word.
Once the barman had left them, Diver asked, “Are you all right?”
“I’m an idiot.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
Ethan looked around, trying to decide how best to make up for his foolishness. A cheer went up from the men at the front of the tavern, and Kannice and Kelf came out of the kitchen bearing another tureen of steaming hot stew, which they placed on the bar.
“I’ll be back,” Ethan said, standing and stepping away from the table.
“Ethan, what’s going on?” Diver called after him.
Ethan didn’t answer. He needed someplace private, someplace where no one would see him, where he didn’t even have to worry about a chance encounter. He strode across the tavern, grabbed Kannice by the hand and started to drag her toward the stairway leading up to the second floor of the Dowser.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“Just come with me. Please.”
Her expression darkened, and she began to resist. “Ethan-”
“I need your help, Kannice,” he said, his voice low and tight. “And it can’t wait.”
Some of the men at the bar were laughing now.
“He’s a bold one, isn’t he?” one man said in a loud voice, drawing more guffaws from the others.
Ethan looked back at her and held her gaze for a moment. Seeing that he was in earnest, her expression softened and she followed him to the stairs.
When they reached the second-floor corridor, she asked in a whisper, “What is this-?”
He stopped her with a raised finger and shook his head. He pulled her on down a second hallway that led to the door to her private chamber, only stopping when they reached her threshold.
She regarded him for the span of a heartbeat, concern in her cornflower blue eyes. Drawing the key from within her bodice, she slipped past him and unlocked the door. He followed her inside and closed the door behind him.
Kannice had turned to face him. “Now, what’s this about?”
Ethan pushed up his sleeve and pulled his blade from the sheath on his belt.
“I need to cast a spell. I couldn’t chance doing it out on the street and I couldn’t wait until later.” He gave a quick shake of his head. “I mean, I could have, but it’s important and-”
“It’s all right,” she said. She took a step toward him and took his free hand in hers. “Tell me.”
“That spell I felt yesterday morning-do you remember?”
“The one that woke you,” she said.
“Yes. It was … it killed every man aboard one of the British ships out in the harbor. Ninety-seven in all. Soldiers, sailors, officers. Every one of them.”
“God save us. That’s why you’re working for the Crown.”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t-”
“It’s all right. The point is, I saw the color of the power that killed them. And all this time I’ve been thinking that the spell was cast by a man who’s now working for Sephira.”