King Of Fools (The Shadow Game series, Book 2)

by Amanda Foody

  He thought about how he’d almost died. About the man whose name Jac now used as his own, and how cold he’d been when Jac had found him...only a few hours too late. Jac shivered, but it still wasn’t enough to let go.

  And so he thought about Levi. Who had dragged him unconscious to New Reynes North General. Who had trusted him. Who would blame himself.

  Jac dropped the syringe on the floor and shattered it beneath his boot.

  “Muck,” he choked out, running his hands through his hair. He took several deep, steady breaths, but he couldn’t stop himself from shaking.

  I didn’t do it, he thought. I crushed it.

  But another thought was louder. He hits where you are weakest, and he hits until you break.

  Vomit bubbled up his throat. His fears were all he could see. The North Side falling. Levi dying. Himself fading.

  And the worst part of it was that he knew the lull would take those fears away.

  Before he knew what he was doing, Jac stormed across the den and wrapped tape around his fists. He dropped an orb with forty volts into the bookie’s jar. “I’ll take next. Whoever you got.”

  I sold it all but my pride when I came to this town.

  Jac’s opponent was no bigger than he was. In fact, he looked like he’d already been in a number of fights that night, his lip swollen and his knuckles chafed. Jac didn’t mind. This just meant that he was faster. Each of his blows landed, one after the other. He would keep fighting with everything he had, and that was how he would win.

  He continued for several rounds. Until he stopped winning.

  His opponent’s fist knocked him square in the jaw, sending Jac reeling back. His thoughts funneled, and he braced himself on the chain-link fence surrounding the pit as he spit out a mouthful of blood. He wiped what remained of it on his sleeve and straightened, his fist raised.

  The next time he got hit, he landed on the floor. The air rushed out of him, and he groaned and rolled onto his back. His opponent stood over him, waiting for Jac to forfeit.

  But Jac didn’t want to give up. He wanted to win. He wanted to burn down a hundred more dens and smash a thousand more syringes. To hear the referee’s whistle rather than sirens. To become so strong he wouldn’t spiral the moment he caught a glimpse of Lullaby.

  He lost, of course. No sooner did he climb to his feet than he was knocked back to the ground again. He clutched his stomach at the pit’s edge, trying hard not to throw up.

  The referee whistled, calling the fight for Jac’s loss. Once his nausea passed, Jac limped to the exit and crashed in the nearest empty booth. He grabbed an abandoned glass on the table and fished out the ice to press to his lip.

  He sighed as he leaned his head back. Logic reminded him that he never would’ve won all night, and he’d taken four fights to lose. Was that how long it would take Charles to wear him down? Or would it be next time? Would it be never?

  Sophia appeared over him, her expression livid. “What was that about?” she demanded.

  “I was in the mood,” he grumbled.

  “To get your ass kicked? Exactly what sort of mood is that?” She brushed her thumb over the cut under his lip, making him wince—and shudder. “You might need stitches.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve had worse.”

  She let go of him, shoving him away as she did so. “What aren’t you telling me?” Jac didn’t know how she saw through him so easily, but she always did.

  “You were right about Charles. He did go for where we’re weakest.” He told her what the man had given him outside the bathroom, not quite meeting her eyes. “I shattered it.”

  Sophia reached into the pocket of her dress and removed a red envelope, identical to the one Jac had received. “You’re not the weakest part of this. I got one, too.”

  A surge of relief went through him, followed by curiosity. “What was in yours?”

  “An invitation...and a picture.” Sophia’s hand trembled slightly as she handed them to Jac. He traced his finger over the photograph first. It was clearly Sophia as a child, standing between two teenagers he realized were Charles and Delia. A family portrait.

  Jac opened his mouth to ask about it, but she snatched the picture back and slid him the invitation. It was printed on luxurious black card stock with embossed red font. Luckluster colors. “Charles wants to meet.”

  “I bet he does. I bet he’s thinking about bleeding us out on his carpet.” Charles wanted to run the Torren empire, and Sophia wanted to destroy it. There was no room for negotiation.

  “I think I should go,” she said quietly. “I think I need to face him.”

  “I don’t think we—”

  “You’re not going.”

  He frowned. “If you’re going, so am I.”

  “You told Levi you’d get out if it became dangerous, and it has. If Charles keeps sending you Lullaby—”

  “Don’t you trust me?” he snapped. “I told you I destroyed it.”

  She pushed his hair off his forehead, pressing tenderly on what he felt was a bruise beginning to form. “You ran from one destruction to the next. Don’t make me watch that.”

  His heart fell. That was the same as telling him no. She didn’t trust him. Nobody did.

  “Don’t make me leave,” he pleaded, even though he hated to beg. They were supposed to be partners. Equals. “You’re the only one who knows why I want this. It was my idea. And if you send me away, then I’ll keep hanging around here until you show up again. If you can hunt me down to where I live, then I can find you, too.”

  Her voice rose. “Just to prove something?”

  “Isn’t that what you’re doing by going to see Charles?” he countered. “You’re terrified of him. Even when you worked alone, you chose Delia over him—and she was every bit a monster. You know them, but they somehow no longer know you. How can I be your partner if I don’t know the whole truth?”

  She even looked pretty when she cringed. “You know me better than anyone else does. Isn’t that enough?”

  “No,” he rasped. “It’s not.”

  He pulled her down so she sat beside him. With the den loud with howls and whistles from the next fight, there was no one to overhear. She could either trust him, or she could at least be honest with him and tell him, flat out, that she didn’t.

  “I don’t know what you want from me,” she told him.

  “Do you even want me here? Do you want me to stay?”

  “Of course I do.” She dug her nails into both her knee and his.

  “Then tell me the truth. All of it.” He didn’t mean to growl, but he was angry—angry and frightened. Charles had murdered Delia. If they were going to face him together, then Jac needed to know what they were up against. Not the rumors—the truth.

  Her gaze fell to the cut across his lip. “I don’t want to.” She leaned toward him, close enough for him to smell the taffy on her breath. He realized she wasn’t actually looking at the cut. “I’m sorry, but—”

  “No,” he said, catching her hand midair as it drifted toward his waist. “You don’t get to play this game.” Because he was terrified that if they did, she would win. “The only game we’ll play tonight is all or nothing.”

  Sophia pulled her hand back. “I can’t make you leave. This is your war as much as mine. So we’ll accept Charles’s invitation together.” She slid back and stood up. “But no games.”

  Then she left Jac to ice his wounds alone.

  ENNE

  With the whiteboots trapped in the South Side, Scrap Market had taken up its first permanent residence in history. Gone were the days of varying hours, of packing up stalls and moving them at a moment’s warning. The Scarhands had used their stock market wealth to purchase an apartment building in the Factory District, and vendors had taken up shop in each room. Every floor offered a different category of wares. The higher you ascended, the less innocent they became.

  Enne climbed the stairwell to the topmost floor and entered a hallway filled with Scarhands
. The doors to each apartment were open, revealing weapons displayed on lounge furniture and photographs of for-sale identities covering everything like wallpaper.

  Though dressed primly for a South Side Party later that morning, the only attire Enne wore that mattered were her white gloves and silk mask. She paid no mind to the whispers and glances thrown her way as she walked past. Not until she came face-to-face with someone she recognized. Someone who, she immediately realized, was another loose end.

  The girl straightened and lifted her head as Enne approached the door. She had brown skin and bobbed hair. Like all the others, scars crisscrossed her palms.

  “Does Pup know you’re here?” Enne asked. She hoped, for Levi’s sake, that he didn’t. Even if the Irons had prospered under the North Side’s new regime, he wouldn’t take it well if he learned his old protégée now worked for Jonas.

  “No,” Mansi answered coolly.

  “What have you told Scavenger?” Enne asked, because of course Mansi would remember who she really was. Enne doubted the Irons received many visitors who burst into tears in their living room, as she had on her first day in New Reynes.

  “Everything.”

  Enne’s heart sank. That meant Jonas knew her name—and maybe more. She’d previously threatened him with Vianca, but how long would that threat retain its bite?

  “I have an appointment,” Enne told Mansi stiffly. The girl nodded and opened the door.

  Jonas sat cross-legged in his desk chair, his greasy hair pulled back from his face. Enne braced herself for his usual corpse-like stench, but the room actually smelled pleasant, due to whatever candle was burning on the end table.

  “Enne Salta,” Jonas said, grinning wickedly. Enne scowled at hearing her name and hastily shut the door behind her. “I’ve been looking forward to this appointment all night.” As she took a seat in front of him, he opened a folder and slid her a photograph across the desk. It was Enne’s last school portrait. “The Bellamy Finishing School of Fine Arts. Bottom of your class.”

  “I don’t want trouble, Jonas,” she said, since they were apparently on a first-name basis now.

  “Trouble?” He lifted his eyebrows. “Do you have other secrets I should know about?”

  “My associate called you yesterday about hiring someone who can alter memories. Do you have someone who could help us?” The sooner they disposed of Roy Pritchard, the better. She didn’t want a second handsome whiteboot to come looking for him. Or worse, for the Spirits to grow any more distracted. When he wouldn’t stop sneezing and they realized he was allergic to Marcy’s cats, every one of the girls had offered their rooms as a replacement.

  “Of course I do,” Jonas answered. “Maybe you’re unaware of what we offer here, but there’s nothing we can’t provide. Skin-stitchers, trackers, protectors. There’s no information in New Reynes that I don’t already know, or that I can’t find out.”

  Enne’s skin prickled at his last words. “Are you trying to sell me something, or are you trying to threaten me?”

  “What would I gain by threatening you? The Scarhands have never been richer, thanks to you.” He flashed her a too-wide smile. “My only ulterior motive is curiosity. I mean, why would a hopeless finishing school student want to become a street lord?”

  “Vianca doesn’t usually take one’s desires into consideration.”

  He stood up and perched at the edge of his desk, much like Reymond had when she’d first met them both. Even so, Jonas didn’t remind her of Reymond at all. Reymond had collected information by sniffing out lies and breaking bones, but Jonas’s office was cluttered and full in the way Reymond’s had been bare. File cabinets lined the walls, their drawers pulled out and stuffed with folders. Jonas might’ve had a report on every citizen of New Reynes tucked away in this room.

  “I have no doubt you’re doing this for Vianca,” Jonas murmured, “but that didn’t mean you had to excel at it. You want this.”

  Enne did excel at this, which was why she knew better than to be flattered. She gestured around the room. “I’ve made you rich, yes, but I don’t believe you when you say it’s about volts. You inherited this position from Eight Fingers, and it’s like you said—you didn’t have to excel at it.” She stood up and inspected the closest filing cabinet. The folders were meticulously organized in alphabetical order. “So is it knowledge just for the sake of it? Or something else?” Enne brushed her fingers across the folders, as though strumming an instrument. “Maybe you’re desperately trying to conceal your own secrets. Or trying to find a particular someone else’s.”

  He hopped off the desk and slid the drawer she perused closed. He had a playful gleam in his eyes. “I’ll tell you my truth if you tell me yours.”

  “Tempting,” she said, “but I’m more curious about other things.”

  Jonas laughed, as though even he acknowledged that he wasn’t the most interesting thing in this room. He had a strangely relaxed laugh.

  “What do you know about Harrison Augustine?” she asked.

  He stiffened. “Are you just trying to test my knowledge?”

  “My only ulterior motive is curiosity,” she told him simply, repeating his own words back at him.

  “You probably want to know why Harrison hates Vianca,” Jonas guessed. “I can’t tell you the answer to that, but I do know something. During the Great Street War, Veil kidnapped the children of several influential people and held them for ransom. Harrison was one of those children. Before that, he was every bit an Augustine prince. After, well...”

  Enne wondered what Levi would make of this connection between his favorite New Reynes legend and his secret ally.

  “That was a simple question,” Jonas told her. “I think you could ask a better one.”

  Enne had come here for business, but now her curiosity really was getting the better of her. Maybe Jonas wasn’t as slimy as she’d once thought.

  “Do you know who Vianca’s third...” Her voice died in her throat. She couldn’t say the word omerta, not without the omerta fighting back.

  Jonas pursed his lips. “That is a better one. I have no idea. But I would pay you for the information, should you happen to find out.”

  She could’ve stopped there, but already a third question—a far more dangerous question—came to mind. “Do you know the names of any members of the Phoenix Club?”

  She held her breath all through the Scar Lord’s silence, wondering if her curiosity had revealed too much.

  “Besides our newest chancellor? Only one.” Jonas brushed past her and opened one of the cabinets. He removed a file marked “Owain, Aldrich” and handed it to Enne.

  Her heart thundered as she flipped through the documents. A photograph was paper-clipped to the top, and Enne instantly recognized his face. She’d replayed the memory of that night so often in her mind that she would have recognized any of them. He looked old and frail, but his appearance was no indication of his true age, thanks to his immortality talent. According to the papers, he owned the media conglomerate that ran The Crimes & The Times and several famous radio networks.

  Enne finally had a name. This man had helped murder her mother—he had almost murdered her—and now Enne had his name.

  “That’s a dangerous look you have right now,” Jonas commented.

  Enne handed him back the papers before she squeezed them so hard they tore. “I should get going.” She fished an orb out of her purse and placed it on his desk. “For the memory fixer. Should I bring the client here tonight?”

  “Bring him whenever you’d like. My door is always open.” Jonas collapsed back into his chair and opened her own file, his eyes drifting between the documents and her. “You can tell me more about your plans for the Phoenix Club.”

  “And you can tell me more about that person you’re looking for.”

  At first, he frowned, and then he chuckled to himself. “You were wasted in finishing school.”

  * * *

  Two hours later, Enne danced the Skipstep w
ith a young man named Whitacker Blake. Whitacker wore a linen suit with white polka dots and a matching vanilla cravat. His blond hair was slicked to both sides, leaving a harsh part that accentuated his large forehead. Despite this, he wasn’t unattractive—if anything, he was far more interesting to look at than most of the other young men in the room, even those Poppy Prescott had so enthusiastically introduced her to.

  “So how long will you be staying on Guillory Street?” Whitacker asked Enne.

  “I’m not sure yet,” she answered.

  “It’s a terrible time to be here. The election is a dreadful business,” he said. “Especially, I’m sure, for a lady such as yourself.”

  She furrowed her eyebrows. “How so?”

  “Politics is entirely improper for women—they shouldn’t have to get their hands so dirty. I’m sure the campaigns are spoiling your summer vacation.” Enne squeezed his shoulder a bit harder—not enough to hurt him, but enough to prevent her from biting back.

  “Plus the campaigns have been all twisted by the North Side,” Whitacker continued, shaking his head. “The Chancellor’s death, Sedric Torren’s, this street war... Be very glad you’re south of the river.”

  “How could I not be glad?” she asked, tight-lipped. “When the South Side men are so charming?”

  His smile made it obvious he hadn’t understood her dig.

  “But this is Worner Prescott’s party—are you not here for political reasons?” she asked.

  “My father is,” he answered. “We’d normally never dream of voting against the First Party, but one North Side candidate replaced by another? It doesn’t matter that Harrison Augustine has been gone for so long—that North Side smell never really goes away.”

  “I know what you mean,” Enne said, nodding solemnly. “It smells acidic...like old wine.”

  He gave her an odd, unsteady look. “That’s very specific.”

  “And hardly to be masked by Regalliere cologne.” She slid her fingers beneath his collar, manicured nails grazing across skin. He stiffened as she exposed his collarbone, and on it, a telltale stain of red lipstick. “It’s terribly difficult to get a Sweetie Street mark out, isn’t it?” Enne said, pouting her lips. Then she quickly drew away. “I’d finish the dance, but I wouldn’t want to get my hands dirty.”