Contents
* * *
Title Page
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
1
2
Interlude
3
4
Interlude
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
Interlude
15
16
17
18
19
Interlude
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
Interlude
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
Interlude
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Connect with HMH
Copyright © 2021 by Nicole Glover
All rights reserved
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to [email protected] or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.
hmhbooks.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Glover, Nicole, author.
Title: The conductors / Nicole Glover.
Description: Boston : A John Joseph Adams Book, Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020009019 (print) | LCCN 2020009020 (ebook) | ISBN 9780358197058 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9780358181798 (ebook)
Subjects: GSAFD: Fantasy fiction. | Mystery fiction.
Classification: LCC PS3607.L687 C66 2020 (print) | LCC PS3607.L687 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020009019
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020009020
Illustrations adapted from constellation images by Iron Mary / Shutterstock
Cover design by Martha Kennedy
Cover illustration © Elizabeth Leggett
Author photograph © Exposed Moxie Photography
eISBN 978-0-358-18179-8
v1.0221
For my grandparents who taught me everything I know, and left me with questions I’m still answering.
REWARD FOR TWO FEMALE NEGRO RUNAWAYS
A pair of sisters fled the 18th night of November 1858.
ESTHER aged 14, fine looking with chestnut coloring and a birthmark on her right cheek. Bring back untouched and alive for $50.
The other, HENRIETTA, aged 15, with chestnut coloring. If examined will find raw ringed scars wrapped around the neck, three fingers wide. Approach with caution and bring shock collar to subdue any magical attack. Reward is $20 dead or alive.
WANTED!
Five Negro males fled the Lea Farm in Pond County with false passes. HARRIS, 42, missing right eye. JON, 20, mulatto with collar scars. LUKE, 22, also mulatto, tall and stout. OBIE, 35, with an R branded on left cheek. BEN, 16, able to read and write.
$125 reward for all five, $20 per head.
Posted: December 24, 1858
WANTED, $1000 DEAD OR ALIVE FOR STEALING SLAVES!
A Negro man and woman were spotted by the subscriber on the 15th of January in the company of persons belonging to Mrs. Edna Reynolds. The criminals are BENJAMIN, dark coloring with a muscular build. Speaks well and can read. Last seen posing as a blacksmith. With him is HENRIETTA, dark coloring, fine looking despite scars around her neck. Dangerous magic practitioner.
$500 for returned property, $1000 for either criminal dead or alive.
Posted: January 16, 1861
Article XIII
Amendment of 1866
To define the rights of Negroes in regards to spellcasting.
SECTION 1. All persons heretofore known as slaves and free persons of color shall have the right to perform acts of magic and other permitted forms of spellcasting.
SECTION 2. These acts of magic are permitted as long as they are performed within the constraints defined by local authorities.
SECTION 3. It is unlawful for any former slave or free person of color to possess or use a wand. Any person or persons so offending shall face imprisonment no less than one day or more than ten days in the discretion of the Court or jury before whom the trial is had.
—CONSTITUTION OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA
CROW
1
May 1871
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA
WHEN THE WAGON ROLLED into view, Hetty took another small step along the tree branch. Lookout was not a role she would have chosen, but Benjy had argued a trap was useless if it wasn’t sprung in the right moment. Someone needed to watch the road, or trouble would be the only thing they caught.
If the stars were so willing, Elle could have made a proper lookout. But at the sight of the wagon, the girl clutched her branch so tightly that it was a challenge to find where girl ended and tree started.
The younger girl was one of the dozen or so people who had gone missing over the course of two days, and so far was the only one to have escaped. Hetty and Benjy just thought the missing girl’s trail had gone cold when Elle stumbled out of the woods, frantic for help. Not realizing they had been looking for her, Elle told them everything without hesitation, confirming what they already knew. She had been approached by a kind face, led out of safety, and trapped before she even knew a trick was in play. But the only thing they didn’t know was carried in her breathless words. Details that changed their approach entirely.
After years of ferrying people to safety from white slave catchers, they assumed these kidnappers were cut from the same cloth.
They were wrong.
The men driving the wagon could have been one of their neighbors, someone they’d seen as they went on their business throughout town. Although Hetty did not know these particular men, not even their names, learning this detail stung like a friend smiling as they told your secrets to your worst enemy.
Below her, the bushes rustled as Benjy hurried to finish the last of his spells. Hetty silently urged him on as the wagon drew nearer.
If they had been working in tandem, the spells would be primed and ready.
But as this was not the first time they’d done this, Hetty knew that stopping the wagon was the least important part.
The driver’s head had just passed under her feet when Hetty let a crow’s caw escape her throat.
She projected her voice as if she had a crowd eagerly listening as she spun tales for their enjoyment. Trees some distance away stirred with confused crows, but farther along the road, the bushes stopped moving.
Benjy stepped to the side and slammed his hammer onto the sigil scratched into the dirt.
Light flashed from the strike and dust flew into the air. The trees across from Hetty’s hiding spot swayed until three of them dropped like dogs onto a bone.
Wheels squealed and the horse cried out in alarm. The wagon veered to the side, and the driver swore as he did his best to avoid the pile of trees.
The moment it shuddered to a stop, two men jumped out of the back of the wagon to yell at the driver.
As the dust settled, Benjy tucked the hammer away. But before he approached the trio, he reached up and tugged his left ear.
Hetty rolled her eyes.
Clearly he still remembered the last time they pulled a stunt like th
is. But she would have lingered on her perch a bit longer even without his warning.
Their plan had not accounted for three men being on the wagon. Nor did it consider the guns the men held in their hands.
The swearing stopped when Benjy drew near. One of the guns turned his way, but Benjy grinned and greeted the trio with a rolling drawl he brought out for these occasions. For some reason, it seemed to put people at ease. Hetty’s husband was imposing even when he tried not to be. He wore his past labors on broad shoulders and held his head high with full confidence as he made his way in the world.
“You fellas look to be in a spot of bad luck,” Benjy said. “Need some help getting those trees out of the way? Can’t move them, but my pappy taught me a good chopping spell to turn them into firewood.”
While Benjy held the trio’s attention with a rambling story Hetty had invented, she launched into the next stage of the plan. Hetty swung off the branch, soundlessly dropping from the tree to the ground.
The wagon’s doors were partially open when she reached it.
With care, Hetty nudged them a bit wider so she could slip inside. Beams of dying sunlight caught the eyes of the dozen men and women seated around a log. Like a fat spider in the middle of its web, ropes sprouted from the log to bind each person’s hands together so that not even the smallest of fingers could twitch.
This was not as terrible as she expected, but it came mighty close.
Hetty took another step into the wagon. Her appearance sent a shiver through the group.
When the man closest to her made to speak, Hetty raised one finger to her lips.
The only noise she heard was Benjy’s rambling, so she drew the Crow star sigil into the air.
A simple square with a short line extending from one corner, the sigil shimmered in the air for only a moment before Hetty gave life to the constellation. Suddenly, instead of lines and vertices, a crow hovered in the air, silently flapping its wings. Unlike a true crow, this one did not have ink-black feathers. The star sigil was a deep midnight blue from its beak to its tail feathers, speckled with starlight that twinkled even when it stood still.
The star sigil looped circles inside the wagon, slicing through bindings and unraveling the web of ropes.
As the crow did its work, Hetty held out a coin with the Dipper emblazoned on one side. Gesturing toward the open door, she pointed at the road back to town. Most blinked back at her, but an older woman stood up and took the coin from her. She gave Hetty a hearty wink and then held the coin toward the sky. The coin flashed at once.
Ursa Minor took form in front of the woman before shifting into a shower of pale purple light. At the sight, the reluctance in the group melted away. They might not have seen Hetty before, but they had heard the stories of people like her. They knew they were not the first people Hetty had freed.
The older woman held her hand toward the man closest to her. After Hetty urged him with a look, he took it. Others followed, grabbing each other’s hands. One by one, the magic of the coin vanished them from sight—like a veil of invisibility had been tossed over them.
When the last person disappeared into the woods, Hetty directed the crow upward. With a swish of her hand, she imploded the spell, letting loose the magic in a blazing light.
The men outside swore. There was a thump, and then a gunshot split the air.
The horse started at the sound, and its neighs added to the sudden chaos. But it was the second flash of light that got Hetty moving.
She ducked around the wagon, holding out a sharp hairpin.
A bullet struck tree bark inches from Benjy’s head. He ignored it and flicked his fingers into a series of star sigils, forming them so quickly that Hetty got only a faint impression of their shape. The spells shot from his hands and struck the man in front of him. Another man was already on the ground, moaning as he clutched a hand more in pieces than whole.
And the third . . .
The third man was frantically cramming bullets into a pistol.
Hetty jammed the hairpin into his arm. The man yelped, falling to his knees. Hetty jumped back. She ran a finger along the cotton band at her neck, calling on the Taurus star sigil she had sewn into the stitches.
Wrenching out the pin, the man stared at it and then at her. His mouth was still twisted over some crude word when Hetty’s spell sent him flying into a tree.
The man slipped to the ground, out like a snuffed candle.
“Too bad you can’t do that spell from a distance,” Benjy said, tossing the knocked-out men to join the third. The pair hit the tree trunk with a thud. None woke up.
“If I could do anything from a distance,” Hetty reminded him, “I would have pinned them with a sleeping spell from the start and we could have avoided all this trouble.”
Her husband snorted. “Certainly would have made things easier.”
A star-speckled wolf loped over, carrying in its mouth the binding ropes from the wagon. It stopped near the three men and shook itself briefly before vanishing. The ropes fell on the men and then knotted together, binding wrists and ankles with a precision as sure as if done by hand.
“Plan still worked,” Hetty said.
“We’ve done this before,” Benjy said, shrugging, “and this time we didn’t need to be as careful.” He cast a glance around the clearing. “Everyone on their way?”
Hetty pointed upward.
“Except for one.”
Up in the tree, Elle had a death grip on the branch, but a new wariness entered her eyes as Hetty approached.
“Who are you people?” Elle stammered. “You summon birds, walk into gunfire with little pause, and make people vanish into the air. I thought when I ran into you it was luck—”
“Hardly luck,” Benjy scoffed. “We were looking for you!”
The girl emitted a small squeak and pressed her face back into the tree bark.
“A friend of ours sent us looking for you,” Hetty called up to Elle. “Miss Penelope.”
The name did the trick.
Elle’s eyes opened and her grip relaxed so she merely held the tree instead of squeezing life from it.
“Who are you?” she repeated. Curiosity bloomed in her eyes, overshadowing the fear.
Hetty held out a hand to the girl, much as she’d done many times before, and said, “Someone here to help.”
* * *
When they brought the girl back home, Elle’s mother’s face shone wet with tears. Elle barely stepped through the door before her mother drew her into a crushing embrace.
Hetty stood aside watching the reunion as envy prickled her with each word and gesture.
“Thank you for bringing back my girl,” Elle’s mother said when she finally released her daughter. “Come inside—can’t have you out there after all you done.”
The room was tiny, surprisingly so, given how grand the boardinghouse appeared on the outside. This room must have been partitioned to create more rooms for renters. Hetty’s eyes fell to the paneled wood to her left. It was a shade lighter than the rest and allowed muffled noises to slip through from the next room. But these were small things. The family had a small window to let in the light, a hooked rug spread across the floor, and wilted flowers in a vase on a round table. It wasn’t much, but it was well cared for and filled with love.
“It was no trouble.” Hetty took a few token steps inside. “We were lucky. She escaped them on her own. I don’t think they expected her to have a talent in magic.”
“You taught her, didn’t you?” Benjy asked.
The mother nodded, pride filling the soft curves of her face. “First thing I did once freedom came. Didn’t dare teach any of my children back when we were slaves, but now times are different. Now they’ll have all the tools they can get.”
“She learned well.”
“Not well enough.” Giving Elle a stern look, she said to her daughter, “You should have known better.”
“Those men, they said they knew where Daniel was, said
they’d bring him here if I brought the money. I thought . . . I thought it wouldn’t hurt to try. It’s my fault he got sold and I just wanted to see my brother again!”
“We will,” her mother said, “but these things take time.”
“Sometimes too long,” Hetty murmured.
“How did you even know about this at all?” Elle’s mother asked. “I barely told anyone, and none that would know you.”
“Penelope Jones is a friend of mine,” Hetty explained. “She saw a few things that concerned her and got word to me.”
“The choir teacher? I’ll be sure to thank her. I’m in her debt. All your debts.”
Elle’s mother thanked Hetty again and, as they were attempting to leave, offered up payment in the form of an inky black candle. Reeking of herbs more mundane than magical, it was a candle of protection, although Hetty suspected the only protection it offered was from the darkness.
Not very much of that, either, Hetty thought as she turned it over in her hands. But they didn’t take up this work expecting payment.
Their first case, if you could call it that, started when they fished a body out of the Schuylkill River with a slit neck and a week’s wages in his wallet. It was disturbing, it was strange, and, above all, it was curious. But only to them. The police—who patrolled the streets looking for trouble to stir up—weren’t interested in the dead man. When Hetty and Benjy pressed too hard, suspicions fell on them. So instead of the police, they directed their questions to people who might actually come to their aid.
That dead man wasn’t the first to be murdered in this city, but he was the first that drew their attention. Hetty and Benjy realized similar deaths would keep occurring and no one would do anything about it.
It became their job. And it still was after five very interesting years.
Whether it was bodies found chopped up in a trunk, missing cauldrons, or cursed teakettles, they poked and prodded until they made sense of the senseless. They found nightmarish things tucked away in the quietest of homes. Revealed culprits and caught thieves. And they found lost loved ones.
The Conductors Page 1
