Chapter 25 Kane #2
Several steps ahead of them, Zaria also halted, shooting them an inquisitive look. And that was the exact moment Kane heard it: the word exhibition.
Fletcher heard it, too; he swung around to look at Kane, his expression alarmed. “You don’t think—?”
“Yeah, I do,” Kane said, suddenly forgetting the pain in his torso. He raised his voice to be heard above the clamor. “Zaria? We’re taking the next right. There’s someplace I want to stop.”
She nodded, a knowing look in her dark gaze.
The Exhibition was just as busy as it had been earlier that week.
Kane handed over their shillings with a smile, pushed through the turnstile, and led the way to India’s exhibits once more.
Or at least he attempted to: The crowd around the south entrance was dense in a way that surpassed even the grand opening.
He resisted the urge to pull Zaria closer to him, instead stepping around to her other side, positioning her between him and Fletcher, the way he had last time.
Although Zaria never complained, Kane could tell she was uncomfortable in a crowd like this.
Her eyes were large and wary, her lips pinched, and she seemed to recoil each time the noise swelled.
As Kane watched, she gave her hands a little shake.
He had the sudden strange, overwhelming urge to bellow at everyone to shut the hell up.
Officer presence, too, had increased, and Fletcher made a point of bowing his head as a trio of uniformed men shoved past. Like last time, much of the hubbub was congregated around India, though now people engulfed both parts of their display, which was large enough that it took up both sides of the building near the crystal fountain.
“The second device must be there,” Fletcher said loudly in Kane’s ear, pointing. “One on the north side and one on the south.”
“Why are they both among India’s exhibits?” said Zaria, somehow managing to overhear. “Do you think that means something?”
Fletcher automatically looked back to Kane, who could only shrug.
“I don’t know what it could mean. But look—there are even more patrons over by China.
” He hadn’t been able to see at first, but now he was certain more people were moving in that direction.
“I bet that’s what everyone was talking about in Trafalgar Square. There must be a third device there.”
Indeed, the Chinese display had drawn such a crowd that even the nearby crystal fountain seemed to have become a mere obstacle, with people circumventing it to approach from a more advantageous angle. Zaria followed Kane’s gaze, rising up onto her tiptoes. “We need to split up.”
“No,” he said before she could elaborate. “We’ll never find one another again.”
“Then we’ll meet outside after,” Zaria insisted. “Look, it’s going to take ages to fight our way through the crowd. We’ll get out of here faster if we each go look at one of the devices. Not to mention it’ll look far less suspicious, should any of these coppers happen to recognize us.”
As much as he was loath to admit it, Kane saw the logic in that plan. “Fine. Fletch, head back to the device we looked at last time—see if anything’s changed. Zaria, go to the one across from it. I’ll find out what’s going on in China.”
“And where should we meet afterward?” said Fletcher.
“Outside the westernmost exit,” Kane decided, “near the steam room.”
He didn’t like it, watching Zaria disappear into the fray. Not only because he worried about losing her, but because he knew she wasn’t comfortable here.
Kane let the crowd carry him along, setting his teeth against the press of unfamiliar bodies.
God, but other people were so irritating, with their incessant babble and shrill laughter.
Here for the thrill of it all, he supposed, the majority of them with nary a clue about magic.
They didn’t even realize what they were looking at.
And yet they had come nonetheless, pushing toward the newest alchemological device like livestock corralled into a pen.
One man had even hefted his son onto his shoulders to give the young boy a better look.
Tensed against the pain, Kane shoved past them, glancing at the lanterns dangling overhead.
He had to admit that China’s display was lovely, with its ornamental vases and intricate porcelain tiles.
A couple of representatives in lavish red outfits that could only be Chinese national dress stood off to the side, muttering to one another in obvious irritation.
Kane couldn’t blame them—they hadn’t traveled all this way for their exhibits to play second fiddle to magic, of all things.
Yet here he was, come to see the device like everyone else.
As he had the thought, the crowd finally parted, affording him an unimpeded view of the device.
It looked… well, precisely like the first one.
Kane was far from an expert in such things, but he couldn’t see a single difference in the design.
For some reason, that fact rattled him. Why bother going to the trouble of sneaking something into the Exhibition thrice, only to deliver the same object each time?
It was hardly as impressive once it had already been done.
Any criminal worth their salt would have moved on to something larger.
Something more interesting, more difficult to smuggle in.
If it was about the challenge—which had been Kane’s initial suspicion—then this didn’t make any sense.
He didn’t know why he’d bothered coming here at all.
As he turned away, however, a realization hit him.
He whipped his head back around, frowning at the device.
At the opalescent light emanating from within.
Last time he’d come here, standing in the shadow of a taxidermied elephant, he recalled seeing the barest flicker of luminescence from the orb-like protrusion.
It was weak enough that he’d nearly missed it altogether.
This one, though, burned brighter. More vigorously.
Almost as if it had gained something the first device didn’t have.
Heart slamming against the base of his throat, Kane went back the way he’d come, the sound of the crystal fountain crashing in his ears.
Impatience was a relentless thing that drove his pulse ever higher.
He twisted and slipped between bodies without a care for propriety, gaze trained on that abominable elephant.
More than a few protests sounded in his wake, but he ignored those, too.
Although he’d assigned Fletcher to reexamine the first device, Kane needed to see it again for himself.
He needed to know if his suspicions were correct.
When at last he reached it, he skidded to a halt. A woman’s shrill laugh sounded far too close to his ear, but he scarcely registered the sound.
The first device was brighter, too. Far brighter than it had been the other day.
“What the hell,” Kane muttered under his breath, squinting as if that might alter what he was seeing. He could be remembering things wrong, he reasoned, but knew that wasn’t the case. He was certain of what he’d seen. The device had definitely changed.
The question was: Why?
Objectively, it wasn’t that big of a deal. So what if the device was glowing brighter than it had before? They didn’t even know what it was. Still, Kane couldn’t help feeling a bone-deep sense of foreboding. As if the device were slowly but surely coming to life.
He tucked his chin and backed away from the gawking onlookers, melting into the rest of the crowd again. Thoughts turned over and over in his head as he made for the exit, the Crystal Palace’s grandeur already lost on him.
That was when he noticed someone familiar standing just inside the doors. Someone who was deep in conversation with two other coppers, agitation obvious in his stance as his gaze lifted to meet Kane’s.
Son of a bitch.
Richard Price Senior was here.