CHAPTER 1
Beatrix pulled into an empty space on Cathedral Street and stared at the ornate apartment building across the road, a rush of adrenaline making it shimmer for an instant like a Gothic mirage.
Ella—friend, confidante, co-conspirator—shifted in the seat beside her. “Ready?”
If they were caught in the midst of what they came here to do, they’d be thrown in prison. If they’d miscalculated about the woman waiting for them in that building, prison. If this went well but a later step tripped them up—prison.
She would never be ready. But she had to do this. Assuming, of course, that the magically binding Vows she’d taken didn’t stop her.
“Let’s go,” she said.
She jumped out of her car, the old door groaning with complaint, and held up her skirt as she walked through theslush on the street, focusing on her intentions so there would be no mistake. As Ella caught up with her, Beatrix waited for the warning signs—for the taste of pomegranate in her throat, for her body to stop obeying her.
Peter’s words came back to her, charged with anger and distress:You can’t do it. You Vowed to cause me no harm. You Vowed to cause your sister no harm.
What she now planned was far more daring than what he’d been arguing against. But she made it through the revolving door without incident. She pushed the elevator button and rode with Ella to the tenth floor, nothing forcing her to retreat.
This was the right thing to do. This could save her sister’s life.
Or go terribly wrong. She paused on the welcome mat at Apartment 1012, heart racing.
“You’re certain?” she said.
Ella gave one of her irrepressible grins. “Absolutely.”
Beatrix wished she had Ella’s confidence. She thought of her sister and knocked on the door.
“Once more unto the breach,” she murmured.
The lock turned and the door opened, revealing Joan Hamilton, president of the Women’s League for the Prohibition of Magic, Baltimore chapter. Tall, fashionable, razor-sharp valedictorian of her class at Hazelhurst College.
“Hello,” she said, pressing an errant pin into deep-brown hair. “Oh—I thought Lydia was coming, too.”
Lydia, Beatrix’s sister, had no idea what they were doing. Lydia and strategist Rosemarie Dane were meeting withSchoen’s Sugar union leaders downtown to convince them to bring the rank-and-file to her planned march on Washington in June—she wanted both sexes there in substantial numbers. After that, they had two meetings in walking distance with Baltimore legislators in preparation for the impending session. Beatrix wasn’t on the hook to pick them up for hours.
How her sister would react if shedidknow what they were up to was a question Beatrix tried not to dwell on.
“She couldn’t make it,” Ella said breezily.
Joan’s lips twitched. “Well—I’m sure the three of us can manage. Come on in. Tea?”
Beatrix sat on Joan’s couch—a Béfort like the one in her own sitting room, except new and immaculate—and wished there were a spell for reading minds.
Joanseemedan ideal first choice for their underground effort. She was one of the few local leaders in the organization who lived absolutely alone—not with parents, not with a husband, not in a boarding house or on campus. She had none of the financial problems that pressed their treasurer to turn spy. She’d helped Lydia from the very beginning, when Lydia was just a freshman at Hazelhurst. And something about her wry smile implied she wasn’t easily shocked.
But none of that guaranteed she wouldn’t be horrified by what they wanted to do.
“Were you able to get January fifteenth off?” Ella asked.
That was the day the General Assembly convened. Lydia wanted to meet with legislators—again.
Joan let out a sigh that fully communicated her answer before she gave it. “No. I’m sorry—I did try. ‘Oh, no, Miss Hamilton, I couldn’tpossiblydo without you. Who would take my notes and fetch my coffee?’”
Ella tsked.
Beatrix licked dry lips. “What about the promotion? Have you heard anything new?”
“An outside hire got the job. No college degree, six months less experience than I have. And yes,” Joan said, a sardonic edge creeping in, “a man. Imagine that.”
