Hawk & Sparrow

Set in the fictional city of Basalton, a Victorian-era metropolis where sorcery coexists with industrial technology, the story follows Vesper Evans, a 19-year-old reporter for The Basalton Globe. Vesper lost her parents and younger sister Ethel in the Hillbrook Fire of 1887 when she was eight. After months on the streets, she was found sleeping on the Globe's stoop by Tom Chauncey, the paper's editor, who took her in. The newspaper has been her home and surrogate family ever since.

On a Friday evening, Vesper attends an exhibition at the Basalton Museum of Art, where she interviews Francis Gladwell, a charismatic inventor, and meets Ada Bickerton, a high society socialite her own age. Francis unveils the Gladwell Machine, a device that produces written incantations in Thaumaric, the ancient language of sorcery. The machine enables anyone to harness arcanic energy, the force powering all sorcery, without years of costly study. A young sorcerer Vesper met earlier at the dessert table is called onstage to assist, and she realizes he is Maximilian Kite, scion of one of Basalton's wealthiest families, who had concealed his identity. After the show, Vesper pursues Maximilian into the museum's hedge maze for an interview. He privately dismisses Francis as a "grifter" and argues that untrained people wielding Thaumaric is dangerous. His remark that "someone like you wouldn't understand" deeply wounds Vesper.

Lost deeper in the maze, Vesper discovers Francis convulsing on the ground. She notes signs of intoxication and a champagne bottle near him, then leaves to find help. Returning with Maximilian, they find Francis dead with blood pooling from a head wound and the champagne bottle gone. Police arrive, led by Chief Frederick Stettner, Vesper's mentor, who declares it a murder.

The next morning, Maximilian returns Vesper's missing notebook and proposes hiring her as his private investigator to clear his name. She refuses, but when Tom reveals the Globe owes nearly fifteen thousand gild, the local currency, and faces closure by December first, Vesper reverses course. She accepts Maximilian's offer at a fee of thirty thousand gild. He outfits her with a new wardrobe to blend into high society and proposes a fake courtship as their cover story.

Their investigation produces tangled leads. At Francis's ransacked hotel suite, they find a letter from Charles Belver, founder of Basalton Steel, offering to buy the machine's rights, and a golden honeybee hatpin left by a recent female visitor. At the public library, Vesper uses the Book of Vital Records, a magically enchanted text, and discovers that no one named Francis Gladwell exists in any official record. At a polo match, Ada reveals Francis had an affair with Elizabeth Duxley, known as Bess, the anxious young woman Vesper encountered in the maze on the night of the murder. During the match, a rogue horse charges at Vesper, and Maximilian saves her with sorcery. The two clash repeatedly over the machine's implications: He argues that power must be carefully guarded, while she insists it belongs to ordinary people.

Vesper infiltrates City Hall's patent archive and discovers Francis filed a patent for the machine the day before the exhibition but withdrew it on the day of his death. At the Belver family's aviary, after surviving an attack by a teratorn, a giant predatory bird whose enclosure was suspiciously opened, Vesper sneaks into Belver's office. She finds letters proving he is bankrupt, a journal of technical sketches related to the machine, and the stolen prototype itself. Before she can act, Belver is shot dead at a farmer's market, eliminating her primary suspect. Vesper entrusts Ada with the journal for analysis. Soon after, she receives an anonymous death threat: a clipping of her own article with her name circled in red and the words "YOU'RE NEXT."

Tracking down Stanley Dawson, Francis's older brother, Vesper learns the inventor's real name was Franklin "Frankie" and that he grew up impoverished in Shalescreek, Basalton's worst neighborhood. Stanley also saw Frankie with the Thally Rousers, the city's most notorious gang. Vesper and Maximilian infiltrate the Rousers' territory and meet their leader, Miss Thally, an elderly former heiress named Josephine Thalheimer who built a criminal empire after being disinherited. She reveals Francis sought investors but could not explain how the machine worked and was turned away.

That night, a factory fire erupts on Pierce Street with workers locked inside. Maximilian uses sorcery to douse the flames, severely weakening himself. Stranded at Kite Manor by a citywide lockdown, they share an intimate evening. Maximilian reveals his arcanic energy intolerance, a rare condition that causes illness whenever he channels sorcery, explaining his repeated collapses. Vesper tells him about her family's death, and they share a first kiss, though she pulls back when genuine feelings surface.

Ada reports she was attacked and the journal stolen. Chief Stettner then detains Maximilian after a rail yard worker named Nick Bartolucci confesses to murdering Francis on Maximilian's orders. Vesper infiltrates the police station and proves Nick is lying: His infant son has tuberculosis, and someone paid him for false testimony. Nick reveals Francis's true surname was Everett, not Dawson, as the brothers had different fathers, and that Frankie was rumored to be a wealthy man's illegitimate son. Using the Book of Vital Records, Vesper discovers Francis's father is John Everett Oelrich, making the inventor the secret stepson of Lara Oelrich, the Heritage Society president who oversaw the maze's restoration.

Vesper sets a trap at the opera house, arranging a fake announcement for "Franklin Everett." Mrs. Oelrich takes the bait and confesses that Francis had been blackmailing the Oelrichs for up to ten thousand gild monthly. She declares she is glad Francis is dead and tries to buy Vesper's silence. When Vesper refuses, Mrs. Oelrich attacks her, but Stettner and Tom, hidden nearby, intervene and arrest her.

At Maximilian's holiday ball, he presents Vesper with a handmade book containing every article she has written for the Globe. She kisses him, then panics and flees to the frozen lake behind the manor. Ada follows, and Vesper notices that Ada's golden honeybee charm bracelet matches the hatpin from Francis's hotel room. Confronted, Ada reveals the full truth: She designed the machine herself, calling it "the Illuminator," and recruited Francis as her proxy because no investor would fund a woman. When Francis filed the patent in his own name and partnered with Belver to cut her out, Ada killed them both. She also orchestrated the rogue horse, the teratorn attack, the stolen journal, and the death threat to frighten Vesper off the case. Ada draws a revolver, but as she advances onto the frozen lake, the ice cracks beneath them. Ada refuses to help Vesper from the water and flees. Maximilian finds Vesper clinging to broken ice and, despite his intolerance, uses sorcery to rescue her.

Ada disappears, and a million-gild reward is posted. On December first, Vesper learns the Globe's rent has been anonymously paid for five years. Maximilian arranges a meeting at Guillermo's Coffeehouse, where he presents her with gilded fountain pens and a raspberry tartlet he baked himself, without sorcery. He asks to court her for real. Vesper says yes, tells him she loves him, and they kiss as the first snow falls.