The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (read an ebook week .TXT) 📕

she would arrive in the city, and young as the boy seemed, Esta knew she might well be walking right into a trap.

The boy led her through the maze of the city, up roads that climbed so steeply that horses and wagons didn’t even bother and along trolley routes that cut through the wild tumble of streets. She almost didn’t realize that they were skirting Chinatown until she saw the signs painted with the Chinese characters hanging from the buildings beyond what looked like a barricade. But the boy didn’t try to enter through the checkpoints, which was fine with Esta. Especially since the men guarding the entrances all had medallions glinting on their lapels.

“What’s happening there?” she asked the boy.

“The Vigilance Committee.” He glanced up at her, his small brow furrowed with determination. “Don’t worry. We won’t go that way.”

He led her instead to a side street that turned into another alley. At the end of it, he opened a gate into a courtyard behind what appeared to be a restaurant. The bins of trash overflowed with rotten food that buzzed with flies and other vermin, but the boy didn’t seem fazed, even when a rat scurried almost directly over his foot. He continued to the back of the courtyard, where he pulled open one of the wooden doors of a coal cellar.

“I’m not going down there,” Esta told him, the darkness in the shaft below making her skin crawl. But the boy went first, disappearing into the shadows below, and Esta’s only choices were to lose him completely or follow.

She followed. He’d already taken a candle from his pocket by the time she reached the bottom, where he waited, and a few seconds later he had it lit. That single flame was the only illumination they had as they traversed a series of tunnels that seemed to have been carved from the earth below the city. It wasn’t long before Esta’s boots were completely soaked from the layer of muck they had to walk through. From the smell of the place—earthy and rank at the same time—she didn’t want to think too closely about what the mud might contain. She concerned herself instead with not slipping as she struggled to keep up with the sure-footed boy.

After a few minutes, though, Esta started to think she’d made a serious miscalculation. She’d been trying to memorize the twists and turns the boy had taken, but she soon lost track. Water trickled somewhere nearby, and the sounds of creatures scurrying and scratching followed them, but otherwise the tunnels were quiet. If this was a trap, if the tunnels opened into an ambush and she died here, it would be like she’d walked into her own grave. Still, despite the danger she might have been in, Esta felt stronger and steadier the farther she walked. Even in the darkened tunnel, her vision remained clear and focused. As far as she was concerned, that was even more confirmation that following the boy was the right decision.

Finally, the boy pushed aside a wooden board that exposed another branch of the tunnel. Once they were through, he replaced the board, then led her a little farther still, until they came to a short ladder. It didn’t look overly sturdy, but the boy scaled it easily and rapped a short, staccato rhythm on the wooden ceiling above. A moment later, a panel moved aside, and a woman’s face appeared. From the color of her hair and the shape of her nose, it was clear that she was the boy’s mother and that she’d been expecting them.

The boy scrambled up through the opening, and Esta followed. As her eyes adjusted to the brightness, she found herself in a storage room lined with shelves of dry goods and ceramic jars. The woman stepped back to allow Esta through, then secured the door to the tunnel behind her, barring it with a length of wood as she scolded her son sharply in German, clearly assuming Esta wouldn’t understand.

“I told you how dangerous it is for us now,” the woman told him. “I told you to stay in your room. Every day I tell you the same, why can’t you listen like a good boy would?”

The boy somehow looked even younger and smaller under his mother’s reprimands. “I tried to stay, but I couldn’t stop myself,” he complained, tears making his eyes look damp and glassy. “I had to go.”

“Lies on top of disobedience?”

“Not lies,” the boy said, suddenly looking more stubborn. “See! This is the lady I had to find. This is Miss Esta.”

The woman’s eyes cut in Esta’s direction. “You’re not a man,” she said in English.

“No,” Esta agreed. “I’m not. My name’s Esta. Esta Filosik.”

“I know who you are,” the woman said, but there was no heat and no fear in her voice.

“I’m looking for a friend of mine. Harte Darrigan. He’s here, isn’t he?”

The woman considered the question. Then she let out a long, tired-sounding breath. “I knew that one would be trouble.”

Relief flashed through Esta. “Then you do know him? Do you know where he is?”

The woman nodded before turning back to the boy and instructing her son to finish setting the locks and the alarms. Finally, she gestured for Esta to come with her and led the way into the apartment proper.

“I didn’t believe Sammie when he told me that he had to find someone—a lady from far away named Miss Esta,” the woman said. When she spoke, her voice was soft, and her English had the sharp accent of her native German. “Sammie is usually such a good boy, but for the last few days, he has driven me mad with his disobedience. He kept trying to tell me, but I didn’t believe that you could possibly exist, but now…” She closed her eyes, as though blinking would be enough to wake her from this awful dream, but when she finally opened them again, Esta could see the fear in her expression. “You