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Patrick pictured those great copper drums waiting within the Coal Works. All that gas in the bellies of a hundred boilers. How big would the blast’s radius be if it were all to combust?

Patrick became seized by something far greater than bravery, or any sense of responsibility.

He was gripped by fear. By the thought of losing his home completely. Every scrap of it blasted into oblivion.

“STOP!” he shouted madly, foolishly. They were three men on a road facing a group of twenty, thirty, and Patrick forgot himself, raised his gun.

Patrick heard the clack of many rifles lifted onto shoulders. Heard the blast of a barrel before he felt the bullet.

Pain shattered his left shoulder as he was thrown backward. The back of his head hit the cobbles, gun clattering beside him. Donny was suddenly over him, eyes ahead. His gun raised to defend them both.

But Theodore advanced. “Wait!” he shouted. “Don’t shoot! I’m not Union!”

Patrick blinked up at him, tried to see and hear around the bursts of agony pulsing along his collarbone. He could see the underside of Theo’s face, see the terror in his eyes.

“I’m an Artisan!” Theodore was saying now, shouting it. His hands were raised in surrender, the mark of Idia on his arm visible. “I’m an Artisan!”

“Theodore?” came a distant reply, a woman’s voice. “Theodore Shop?”

Patrick rolled onto his side, a hiss of pain escaping him at the pull from his shoulder, but he squinted his eyes to see the brigade of fire Charmersand soldiers approaching them. Now a mere twenty feet away. At its head was a woman with tawny hair. “Is that you?”

“Tell me when to shoot, Pat,” Donny murmured.

Another Charmer scoffed. This one was young, reedy. He cocked his chin with an air of importance. “Lord Shop’s boy?” he said. “The disgraced son? Spare me.”

“No, it’s him, I’m quite sure,” said the woman. “A water Charmer.”

Theodore’s eyes bounced between them, between all those guns. “I can prove it.”

“And what would a water Charmer be doing all the way out here?” said the third fire Charmer, an older man. “Defected, have you?”

“No,” said the woman. “Tanner sent him.”

Something in Patrick fractured.

“An informant?” asked the young fire Charmer.

“One of them,” said the woman, and that hole in Patrick ripped deeper. “Where is the earth Charmer, Mr. Shop? I was told explicitly to find her. That she would be here alongside you on this assignment.”

Patrick turned his head in time to see Theodore’s face. He waited for a frown, some display of confusion.

But Theodore nodded. His eyes flickered to Patrick for only a moment. “Yes,” he said. “Though the earth Charmer is long gone. You won’t find her.”

Patrick didn’t comprehend it. Refused to.

And yet there was that yawning abyss inside him, threatening to swallow him whole.

The woman grimaced. “Never mind. We have soldiers in every surrounding province. We’ll round her up.”

“What do you want with her?” Theodore asked, his eyes darting between them.

Pieces of Patrick broke away from the rest. He began to recall snippets of Nina’s questions, her curiosity, the tunnel.

The woman frowned. “Lord Tanner will want to reward you both for your success.”

Theodore hesitated. “Success?”

The woman frowned, suspicion dawning. “We received word from Polly Prescott that Domelius Becker was dead,” she said carefully. “We’ve been ordered to find a man named Patrick Colson and bring him back to Belavere City.”