The Dark Volume

“Oskar?” Her voice was gentle. He swallowed, his face suddenly clouded by fear. The Contessa sank so her face was at his level.

“You are alive again, Oskar… it is not the airship. On the airship you were killed… but you have been restored. You have been restored by one of your own marvelous books, Oskar. Do not be afraid. You have come back to us… back from where no man has ever returned.”

Vandaariff swung his head awkwardly, straining to make sense of her words, of the different room and so many people—so different from the ones he had last seen. He lurched forward. Fochtma

“Is it truly him?” whispered Mrs. Trapping.

“Of course it is,” said the Contessa easily. “He knows me.”

“Did not Robert Vandaariff know you too?” asked Leveret. He peered suspiciously into Vandaariff's face, like a farmer inspecting a pig at auction.

“Monsieur le Compte—if you are the Compte—my name is Leveret—”

“Tell him we need proof,” Mrs. Trapping called over Leveret's shoulder. “Something only he could know—some snip of alchemical whatsit.”

Mr. Fochtma

“Give him room, sir—the physical costs of the infusion are prodigious. Robert Vandaariff has undergone this after the Process, nor had he a young man's vitality to begin with.”

“The problem is not his body,” said Doctor Svenson, studying Vandaariff with pained disapproval, “but his mind. The Comte was snatched from the arms of death.”

“I'd expect him to be grateful,” muttered Mrs. Trapping.

The Contessa sighed with irritation and shifted closer.

“Oskar… try to remember… on the airship. The last minutes. You were very angry—angry at me. I had behaved very badly. I had killed Lydia—”

Vandaariff's eyes flared at her words. The Contessa nodded as if to encourage his memory, as if his rage were entirely natural. “I had ruined all of your great plans. You came at me… you thought to kill me… but then you were stabbed. Do you remember? Everything had gone wrong. We were betrayed. The airship was sinking. You were dying. Francis came to you with a book… an empty book, Oskar. Francis captured your soul.”

Robert Vandaariff swallowed, listening intently, watching her mouth. His lips trembled.

Once more Leveret thrust his face forward.

“This is the Xonck Armament Works in Parchfeldt Park, monsieur. I am Mr. Leveret. You are—” He grimaced with distaste and then muttered to the room at large, “I feel a fool saying this at all—we have no certainty that anything of the sort has occurred…”

“Go on, Alfred,” said Mrs. Trapping. Leveret sighed, then snapped his fingers in front of Vandaariff, whose gaze had gone back to the Contessa.

“The contents of that book have been infused into the body of Robert Vandaariff. If you are indeed the Comte d'Orkancz, we require you to give out some sign—some assurance—that this is true. We require it now.”

Vandaariff blinked, returning Leveret's stare. Miss Temple could see the man's expression had sharpened, enough for his true thoughts to be veiled behind it—though this might bespeak no more intelligence than a cat's wary reaction to a curious child. She swallowed with a wince, like the others unable to look away from his scarred face, but unlike them, dreading an echo of the corruption she had already allowed to stain too much of her own mind. But Robert Vandaariff remained mute.

“Why don't we simply make him answer?” Charlotte Trapping addressed Mr. Fochtma

“He may not be unwilling,” began Fochtma

“Nonsense. Alfred?”

Leveret stood tall and cleared his throat. “Indigo Pilate iris sunset Parchfeldt! Are you the Comte d'Orkancz?”

No one spoke. Instead of answering, Vandaariff attempted to stand. Fochtma

“He will not answer,” hissed Leveret. “Look at him! He does not even acknowledge the phrase!”

“That is impossible,” said Mrs. Trapping. “At least… it ought to be…”

Leveret's face darkened with rage. “Is this trickery? Does he presume to trifle?”

“For God's sake!” cried Fochtma

Miss Temple was startled by the halting clicking steps—the glass woman was advancing with great care, the little girl in tow. Vandaariff thrust Fochtma

Then his mouth slackened and his eyes went under a cloud. The glass woman was quite obviously probing Robert Vandaariff's new-fashioned soul.

“What do you see?” whispered Fochtma

“Tell us!” hissed Mrs. Trapping.

The glass woman began to glow with the same cerulean sparks Miss Temple had seen that morning in the Duke of Stäelmaere's study, and her gleaming fingers tightened around the vacant girl's arm.

“Look at this marvel!” Fochtma

Francesca's eyelids flickered like a dreaming animal's. Miss Temple looked back to Vandaariff… with alarm she realized that Francesca's face was now flinching and twitching exactly in time with his. Through the conduit of the glass woman's hand, the child was being completely exposed to Vandaariff's mind. Did no one else see?

Mrs. Marchmoor's words curled into Miss Temple's mind like a serpent encircling a sleeping bird.

“It is done. The Comte d'Orkancz has been saved.”

FRANCESCA TRAPPING suddenly coughed, choked, and then sprayed out a mouthful of blackened spit. Her mother screamed. As if realizing too late what had happened, Mrs. Marchmoor thrust the child toward Colonel Aspiche, breaking the co

“Francesca!” shrieked Mrs. Trapping.

The girl looked up, eyes wide, as if she were seeing the room for the very first time. Mrs. Trapping rushed toward her, but was caught about the waist by Leveret.

“What has happened?” shrieked Charlotte Trapping. “What has she done to my child?”

“Charlotte—no, wait—”

“Do not!” cried the Colonel. He held tight to Francesca's shoulder and pointed to Mrs. Marchmoor. “Margaret—Margaret, what in heaven…”

Her remaining glass hand had been sprayed with black bile. Mrs. Marchmoor convulsively licked her lower lip as she stared down at the stain, as if she could taste the nauseating substance through her surface. The surprise in the glass woman's voice pierced Miss Temple's mind like a pin.

“He… he is… unclean…”

The bright slug of her blue tongue spurred another spasm in Miss Temple's stomach. The glass woman had never found the corruption, even when probing Vandaariff's mind outright, having wrongly assumed that with the change in bodies the Comte's prohibition no longer held force. Only when the taint had passed to the child could the glass woman sense it. Mrs. Marchmoor retreated from Vandaariff, her blue lips drawn back.

“Unclean?” Leveret shook his head angrily, still holding Mrs. Trapping. “What does that mean?”

“It means nothing!” shouted Fochtma

“It is not,” Aspiche shouted. “Look at the child!”

Francesca trembled, held at arm's length by the Colonel. Her lips and chin were black, and her small mouth dark as a wound.