THE BOY WATCHED the dark-haired woman sitting on the steps without shoes, her coat not even buttoned, yet impervious to the cold. She wasn’t like the others, not with the proud carriage to her spine, the way she held her head high. Obviously not a rube. More like a lioness on the prowl. He should ignore her, concentrate on finding another mark before Natasha got angry that he wasn’t bringing in his fair share of the night’s bounty.
Rich people draped in fur dribbled out the museum doors and down the steps in pairs. They all studiously ignored the woman in the dark, flowing dress, her skin glowing like moonlight. Just as Vincent should have.
Natasha would have his hide for allowing so many potential targets pass by. But he couldn’t take his eyes off her. The woman was just another gaje; what made her so special anyway? She didn’t have any of the sparkling jewelry or soft furs of the other women who exited the gala. Plus, she was alone, which should have made her especially vulnerable.
Instead, her aloneness seemed to empower her, as if she possessed the strength to create her own reality and carry it with her, surround herself with herself, shutting out the ugly reality of the world beyond.
Vincent was irresistibly drawn to that power, wanted to learn it for himself. He took a step toward the woman, was half-way to her before he realized his mistake. His attraction had alerted the others. Suddenly, Natasha appeared before the woman as if conjured from the dark night.
Conjured forth from hell was more like it, the boy thought, trying to hurry without appearing concerned as the old woman took his lady’s hands into hers.
Natasha pulled his lady to her feet. His lady was short enough that even though she stood on a step higher than Natasha’s, they stood eye to eye.
Vincent arrived at her side, breathless with anticipation and fear as Natasha brought one of his lady’s hands to her heart, pulling his lady close as the others gathered silently behind her.
“Let me offer my services. I can glimpse into the shadows of your future,” Natasha crooned, swaying hypnotically, pulling his lady with her.
This was their cue and the others to begin to lightly race their fingers over the woman’s body, searching every nook and crevice of her clothing for valuables. Usually the mark had his eyes closed by now and felt the children’s light touch as palpable manifestations of Natasha’s psychic powers. Natasha’s banter was designed to encourage this as well.
“The spirits hover all around you,” she intoned, pulling the woman back and forth, the better to access inner pockets and purses.
To Vincent’s astonishment his lady—he knew she was no mark—merely laughed, shrugging off the searching hands.
“I don’t have anything,” she said, her voice clear and without anger. He’d never heard a gaje speak like that, especially not one who caught them in their act of larceny.
Natasha started, her face filling with anger, eyes blazing into his lady’s. His lady merely smiled, cementing forever her place in Vincent’s heart. No one could stand up to Natasha, at least no one that he knew. Not even Nickolai, the Royal, the leader of their little family.
The others stepped back into the shadows, the better to retreat and flee. But Vincent continued forward, circling to stand close by his lady, as if a twelve-year-old boy could offer her any protection from Natasha’s wrath.
His lady’s eyes gave her away—wide, dark eyes that looked into Natasha’s without flinching. The eyes of a Rom, deep, challenging, refusing to yield.
She shifted her weight slightly and he saw with amazement that it was she who now held Natasha’s hands. She lifted the witch’s left palm to her breast, resting it over her heart, pinning it there despite the older woman’s desperate squirming. Then she rotated Natasha’s right hand palm up.
“Perhaps I should read your future,” she suggested.
Natasha tried and failed to pull away. “Marhime gaje!” the curse emerged in a shrill, choked voice that was very much unlike Natasha’s usual barks of commands. “Who are you?” the witch snarled.
“My name isn’t important. My grandmother was Rosa Costello of the Kalderasha.”
Natasha froze. “That’s impossible.”
Vincent stared up at the two, mesmerized by the contest of wills. Sparks of power seemed to fill the night around them and he felt a chill settle over his body.
They’re just fireflies, he told himself. But fireflies had never scared him so much that his entire body trembled. And how to explain fireflies appearing in the midst of a Pittsburgh December?
Vincent wasn’t afraid of anything, he told himself, forcing his body to stand straight and tall. None of the family were.
Finally Natasha found her voice. “Rosa was killed. During the War. All of her kumpania as well.”
“Rosa’s family was betrayed. A Lowara told the Nazis about their campsite location in exchange for all their wagons and horses. Everyone knows the Lowara are thieves, only one step up from gaje.”
“I’m Lowara,” Natasha declared, her courage returning as she finally broke free of his lady’s grip. Or did Rosa’s granddaughter let her go? Vincent rather thought so, watching Natasha massage her sore wrists.
“I know.”
“Then you also know that Lowara are the best knife wielders alive. And we don’t take kindly to accusations from marhime!” Natasha spat at his lady.
Instead of distracting his lady and allowing Natasha to draw her knife, his lady ignored the spittle sliding down her cheek, and in a lightning move, twisted the knife free of Natasha’s hand as soon as it cleared her skirt pocket.
“The Rom turned their backs on my grandmother after she saved many of them from the Nazis. She was declared unclean, marhime. Many of the Lowara alive today owe their lives to my grandmother. Perhaps I will collect on the debt someday.”
“If you try, you’ll die,” Natasha hissed.
Vincent swelled with pride as his lady merely laughed and thrust her upturned palm into Natasha’s face. “Look again, old woman. Better than you have tried and failed.”
The lights from the museum glistened as they danced across a heaped-up scar shaped like a crescent moon that swirled around the base of her thumb. Her left arm, which held the knife in a deceptively casual fashion, also carried a scar, this one jagged like the tail of a serpent—or a dragon. A sudden gust of wind shivered through him.
Natasha looked down, drawn against her will, and Vincent heard her sharp intake of breath. Then she looked up into his lady’s eyes. Natasha dropped his lady’s hand as if it burnt her and clattered down the steps, running into the night.
His lady watched her go, idly twirling the knife in her hand. Then she turned her dark gaze on Vincent.
“Something I can do for you?” she asked. Her voice radiated through him like light spiraling through a crystal.
Vincent only nodded, taking her right hand and looking down into its depths himself. He saw nothing there but furrowed lines and the heaped skin of the scar. He knew he did not have the gift to read others like Natasha, but still, he was disappointed. He looked into his lady’s eyes and lifted her palm, caressing her scar with his lips.
She surprised him with a quick smile that lit the darkness around him, banishing all fear. He bowed over her hand. “I am Vincent,” he said, feeling much older than he was. “Please call upon me in your need, my lady.”
She nodded gravely, accepting his offer. “I’m Cassandra Hart. Do you know anything about what happened here tonight, Vincent? About the fire?”
He did. Just as he knew Natasha’s surprise at meeting Rosa Costello’s granddaughter had been an act. But he couldn’t betray his family—Nickolai would kill him if he said anything. Vincent bowed once more and then turned and ran, his legs pumping with nervous energy, skipping him down the steps two at a time. Cassandra Hart lifted her left hand in a small wave before turning and climbing the steps back to the marble halls of the gaje world.
That’s when Vincent realized her left hand was empty, but where was the knife? It wasn’t on the steps, he saw. He put his hands on his hips and felt the bone hilt. She’d slid it into his belt. Vincent drew it slowly, carefully. Natasha’s blade—now his. All that wonder, power—his.
His fingers closed over the hilt and he vowed to use the knife only to protect his lady from evil—like the revenge he was certain Natasha was already plotting.