The Watchmage of Old New York (The Watchmage Chronicles Book 1) Read Free

crowded. I wove through a pretzel of people and horses. Pushcarts, carriages, and hacks choked both sides of the street in six crooked columns.  Often, one hack would see an opening in another lane, cut across, and upset everyone’s applecart.  You can learn a peck about people by how they handle their carts.  The Upper Ten-thousand in their fancy carriages run the smaller hacks off the road, and the omnibus drivers take pleasure in driving through mud holes.  Mama and Pop raised me an upperten, but I prefer boots to shoes and wool to silk.
    The street mongers on the sidewalks called out their wares in song: Oysters! Oysters! Fresh from the sea! A dime for a dozen, I’ll shuck ‘em for free , or the clothes peddler shouting Ol’ clo’! Ol’ clo’! In an accent I couldn’t place.  Was it German? Russian? Someplace I’ve never heard of? Who knows, they all end up here.
    On Thirty-Second Street, a drunk squared to water a saloon wall.  I rapped my daystick on the sidewalk and glared at him.  He looked up, saw the uniform, badge and club, and scampered away.  Some people.  It’s not difficult to find an outhouse.
    I bought some hot corn from a little g’hal on Twenty-Eighth to eat in the saddle, like they do out west. 
    “You be careful,” I said.  The girl was no more than four and a half feet.  “You get inside soon, or you won’t be walking home with those coins tonight.”
    She sneered.  “If they try it, I’ll chalk ‘em.”  She showed me the rusty razor in her sleeve.  I nodded and filled my mouth with corn.  It’d been boiling for too long, but I smiled and chewed.
    By the time I got to my flat, the night deepened enough that the b’hoys came out to sport: the midnight gangs and pickpockets, the orphaned street arabs, and the bare-knuckled boxers.  I wish that I could sport with them; their lives were where the adventure was.  I suppose that as a Muni, I did get to play—but not the way that I wanted.
    I stabled Tumbler and tossed the groomsman a couple of pennies.  I live on Thirteenth near Third, on the outskirts of Little Germany.  It’s mostly clerks and craftsmen on my block, with uppertens to the west and immigrants to the east.  I stopped at the grocer on the corner, bought a bucket of beer, and then climbed the stairs to my apartment.
    As far as homes went, it isn’t a bad one.  It’s a French flat, the owner of the building rents each floor to a different person. A Yankee family lives below me, three kids, a fat woman, and a man with beaten eyes and hunched shoulders.  His name’s Jim Appleton, and he writes for the Tribune.  We drink together sometimes, and the man pours out his troubles like wine. Still, he likes a laugh, and doesn’t mind helping me home if I get laddered.
    I closed the door behind me and found a lamp.  I lit it and then the stove for some heat.  I shed my Muni blues on the floor and dipped a mug in the beer.
    This is all I have, twenty-two years behind me, a nice flat, and complete boredom. This kidnapping was the first real excitement I’d felt as a Muni.  I wasn’t used to being stumped, and I sure as Sodom wasn’t used to asking Pop for help. 
    I heard a fire bell in the distance and saw the flames maybe a mile south, toward the Bowery.  One fire bell, two fire bells.  I pictured the scene.  Two different firewagons’ll show up at the same time.  They’ll start fighting, and the building’ll turn to ash while they dust coats.  It’s happened before and it’ll happen again.  I’d go, but I’d never get there in time.  Besides, one man can’t do nothing.
    Tomorrow I’ll call on the nursemaid at the hospital.  For now, I have a beer, Black Billy, and bed.

Nathaniel
     
    If you’ll pardon the pun, magic is tricky.  It’s rather like weaving cloth.  A wizard spins the different threads of magic from the elements: Air, Water, Earth, Fire, and Aether.  He joins the threads with Chaos energy and weaves them into a