Arthur kept his feelings shoved as deep as he could as he watched Pavel take a small vial out of the box. Pavel closed his eyes, and a moment later the potion was roiling in its vial.
“The compass,” Sasha said softly.
Arthur swallowed and passed it over to her. She put it on the top of the stepstool, and Pavel crouched down and poured the potion over it, the liquid disappearing into the metal like water absorbed by a sponge.
Arthur held his breath as the needle slowly began to spin. Sasha grabbed his wrist. He kept his breath held, heart beginning to lift—
Then the compass needle sped up, round and round without slowing.
Arthur’s heart plummeted. “Why isn’t it stopping?” he whispered, watching the needle spin in useless circles. “It should be pointing to Rory, right? Why is it just spinning?”
“Lost.” Pavel’s rough, deep voice cut through the storeroom.
Sasha furrowed her brow. “He means his magic can’t find Rory. Something is confusing it.”
Arthur’s stomach plummeted. “There’s a man with Rory. I don’t know exactly what his power is, but he disrupts magic like a boulder in a river.”
Sasha glanced at Pavel. “We’ve never encountered something like this before.”
Arthur raced for some kind of idea. “Can we make Pavel’s magic stronger? Go to Rory’s boardinghouse, get something more of his—before we also had a note, maybe I can find another—”
But Pavel was shaking his head.
“It wouldn’t be enough this time, not to overcome an interfering magic.” Sasha’s voice was reedy and pained. “You can make alchemy very strong, but you need more than a possession.”
“Then what?” Arthur said desperately. “Whatever the cost, I’ll get it—”
“You cannot pay for this.” She swallowed. “This is something Pavel does not like. But to make his alchemy its strongest takes blood.”
Arthur’s eyes widened. “Blood magic.”
“Very little is stronger than magic made with blood. Pavel does not like it, but he would do it, to find Rory. But we need Rory’s blood, because we need Rory’s magic.”
Rory’s blood, with Rory nowhere to be found. Arthur clenched his teeth. “There must be something we can do.”
Pavel looked at him. “Sorry,” he whispered, in gravelly, accented English.
No.No, there had to be an answer, Arthur wouldn’t give up—“What about me?”
The words burst out of Arthur. Both of the Ivanovs stared at him as Arthur put a hand over his heart. “I’m Rory’s anchor,” he said, blurting out the secret and praying they wouldn’t think too hard about why he and Rory would be so close, that they wouldn’t throw him out or call the cops. “He made me his lifeline to the present by linking his magic to my aura.” He took a breath. “I have Rory’s magic in me. Can Pavel usemyblood?”
Sasha and Pavel looked at each other. Sasha said something in Russian. Pavel pursed his lips, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a small folding knife.
“Give him your hand,” said Sasha. “Left hand.”
Arthur swallowed but held his hand out, palm up.
Pavel acted quickly, drawing the knife so fast across his lifeline that Arthur flinched in surprise pain. Blood welled in the cut almost immediately, scarlet under the pharmacy lights.
“If Rory’s magic is in your aura, it may be in your blood.” Sasha’s gold-brown eyes were glued to the compass. “And now we hope it’s strong enough to find him. Pick up the compass.”
Arthur sent a silent prayer to the complicated religion Rory still had faith in and grabbed the compass.
The instant his bloody palm touched the metal, a shock shot up his arm like he’d touched a live wire. He gritted his teeth as his skin began to burn—
But as suddenly as the pain had started, it was gone.
“No more pain?”
