Page 72 of Harnessed in Gold

“It’s gotta be somewhere on this campus,” Aaron surmises. “Or in town.”

“I hope so,” I say. “I hope it’s wherever that candlestick was made, or where it was used, because it doesn’t look like it belongs in a church.”

Avery pockets her drawing. “I agree with Betts. The candlestick’s too plain and too old.”

“How old?” Rime asks.

“Hmmm, pre-colonial?”

What if it belonged to Browne?

“Browne was originally a goldsmith,” Leo says, apparently thinking along the same lines. “I’m guessing that’s why he came with the Roanoke expedition. He had a shop in London, in Cheapside,but not on Goldsmiths’ Row. He probably couldn’t compete and thought coming here and owning land would raise his station.”

Avery peers over her shoulder at the altar. “Yeah, but I’m pretty sure that candlestick is brass, not gold.”

Leo shrugs. “He would’ve been able to work in any metal he could find.”

We don’t have to be asked; we all go up to take a closer look.

I reach for the candlestick first, grunting as I pick it up. “Heavy,” I declare, setting it clumsily back onto the table. It’s also crude and lumpy, not smooth and polished like one would expect brass or gold to be.

“I think it’s iron underneath,” Avery says.

“Here,” Leo holds out a hand. “Let me have it.”

He doesn’t have to inspect it long to agree with Avery. “It’s definitely not gold.”

“I thought iron was supposed to make faeries sick,” she jokes. Or maybe she’s serious; it’s always hard to tell with her.

Topaz rolls her eyes. “If that were the case, we wouldn’t be able to survive more than about an hour in the Subworld.”

True. Iron and steel are everywhere. They wouldn’t even be able to use forks.

Rime chuckles. “And we’d be poisoned by our own blood.”

Aaron snorts. “Iron? It’s the twenty-first century. Everyone knows the real poison is gluten.”

I burst into a laugh and fist bump him.

Leo sets the candlestick back on the table with a thunk. “You can’t mold iron without a forge.”

We all stop snickering to look at him.

“A haunted forge?” Aaron asks.

Leo nods. “Where there’s centuries-old iron, there’s a centuries-old forge. And where there’s that forge, there’s strange phenomena. And where there’s strange phenomena?—”

Aaron finishes, “There’s the macguffin.”

I frown. “There’re more holes in that logic thanSwiss cheese.”

Leo doesn’t try to argue with me. “It’s a starting point.”

“Then let’s go.” Topaz is already halfway to the door.

The rest of us zip up our jackets and follow.

I blink the cold drizzle out of my eyelashes as Leo, Aaron, and I round the right side of the chapel, and the others disappear around the left. Unfortunately, someone decided to plant thick evergreen bushes all along this side. Good thing we have a plant weaver in our midst. We glance over our shoulders and around the corners of the building. Thanks to the crappy weather, no one’s out strolling around the area.