Ace of Shades (The Shadow Game #1)(34)

Levi pulled the Shadow Card out of his pocket. Jac paled, then snatched it from Levi’s hands and turned it over, running his thumb across the metallic silver back. “This is some serious muck. He didn’t...he didn’t invite you, did—”

“No. It’s a warning.” The invitation card was the Fool, not the Tower. And invitation was a misnomer: the Fool card warned you of your upcoming execution. Upcoming as in immediately.

“A warning about what?”

“The investments. He said I have ten days.” Nine days now.

“Ten days?” Jac croaked. “You... You’ll think of something. You always do.”

Jac had always had too much faith in Levi, starting from the first day they’d met. Levi had been twelve, crouched in an alley off Tropps Street. He’d worn all black and kept his face covered—as was the signature look of Veil, a legend of the North Side and Levi’s hero—and he’d dealt out a deck of cards, goading passersby with a game of fifty-fifty chances. But no one had stopped. They’d all recognized him and his cons by then.

“How would you like to make a hundred volts today?” Levi had asked Jac as he walked by. Even then, Jac was big. Not tall—he’d never been tall—but in his shoulders, in his build. The sort of strong that could’ve been concealed. He looked like a card Levi might want up his sleeve.

Jac tapped Levi’s near-empty orb jar with his boot. “That’s big talk.”

“I aimed low.”

They’d earned two hundred volts, and they’d spent them all in one night, feasting and drinking at a lousy cabaret. So they met up again the next day. Soon it was every day, a new place, new con, new spoils. It lasted for one year, until Levi met Vianca, and Jac met a drug called Lullaby.

“Did you get a...vision or something?” Jac whispered. “Ain’t the Shadow Cards supposed to be jinxed?”

“Nah, nothing like that,” Levi lied, because Jac was already pulling out his Creed, the necklace he wore that was a symbol of the old Faith. Not many believed anymore; the Mizers had perpetuated its stories for their own gain, and, after the Revolution, the wigheads had declared the Faith illegal. If Levi told Jac about the hallway and the graveyard, Jac wouldn’t sleep for a week, and he’d spend the next few days quoting Levi verses from some text Jac couldn’t even read himself.

Jac rubbed the Creed—which looked like an intricate knot in the shape of a diamond—between his fingers.

“Speaking of warnings, do we have anything to give to Chez?” Jac asked. “More than, you know, the usual?” Lately, the usual hadn’t been much. Levi could manage to give him and the other Irons only the minimum at the last few weekly meetings.

“We don’t collect from the dens for a few more days,” Levi reminded Jac. It was the only excuse he could offer.

Ever since the investment scam began to crumble, Levi hadn’t been able to run the Irons like he used to, and they were falling apart. The minimum wasn’t going to cut it much longer. It wasn’t enough. And it killed him.

Membership in a gang was more than a simple contract: it was an oath. Once you swore to a lord, they had power over you. Nothing unbreakable, like an omerta, but a power that carried orders down a chain of command and prevented the gang’s circle of trust from being violated. There was magic to an oath, and even if Levi didn’t understand it, he respected it. Everyone on the streets did.

They’d sworn Levi their loyalty, and he’d promised them more. If not greatness, if not wealth, then at least roofs over their heads and dinner in their stomachs.

Enne had given him one thousand volts last night, volts she thought were going to help the Irons. And Levi wished they were, but he needed them. They brought him one thousand volts closer to paying Sedric. He’d be no good to the Irons if he was dead.

Nine more days. All he needed was to survive the next nine days. Then the Irons would go back to being the richest gang in the city. Then Levi could finally give his kids what they deserved.

Levi checked his watch. “We need to get going.”

Jac walked beside him, his shoulders slumped with weariness. “You haven’t said anything about that missy you were with yesterday. N-something.”

Levi would rather not involve Jac in all that muck, not if he could help it. The monarchists were a dangerous lot. “I got her a job at St. Morse.”

Guilt simmered in his stomach as he remembered where exactly that job had led Enne. He had admittedly thought her a bit snobbish when they first met, but he wouldn’t wish Vianca’s omerta on anyone. Had he even suspected Vianca would take interest in Enne that way, he would never have brought her near St. Morse.

You were supposed to help me! she’d yelled at him. You told me to trust you!

Levi had failed her in the worst way. At the start, finding Alfero for her had been a way to save himself, and since Sedric had given him a Shadow Card, it meant salvation now more than ever. But since last night, it was also more than that—it was about Enne’s forgiveness. It was about making things right.

He’d originally thought Enne wouldn’t last more than a night in New Reynes, but he’d been wrong about her. Sedric had terrified Levi down to his very core, and Enne—Enne—had poisoned him, the wolf of the North Side, and she felt remorseless. No, she wasn’t what he’d expected at all.