The Hidden Goddess

by M. K. Hobson

  Stanton smiled. “You always do, Miss Edwards.”

  “And why do you keep calling me that?” Emily said. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten my name already?”

  “I’ll never forget your name,” Stanton said. “But I wasn’t sure you wanted me to call you that anymore. I wasn’t sure if we were still engaged.”

  “After everything we’ve been through? After true love conquered all?” Emily shook her head. “Being dead has done nothing to alleviate your obtuseness, Mr. Stanton.”

  “Being dead allowed me to learn the heart’s deepest secret,” he said. “That sometimes love—even true love—isn’t enough.”

  “But it’s a start,” Emily said. And then she reached up and pulled him down to her, and began kissing him, and they might both have learned a great deal more had not a voice from the door startled them apart.

  “Mr. Stanton!” Rose peeked in, and her cheeks flushed with excitement. She looked at Emily, and the meanness and spite had gone from them, replaced with her customary brown-eyed eagerness.

  “Oh, Miss Emily. Miss Emily’s awake! Dreadnought Stanton saves the day again! Oh, how wonderful!”

  “What is it, Rose?” Stanton said with mild annoyance, quickly buttoning his shirt.

  “Well, I’m so sorry to bother you, but the Sini Mira men have been here for hours waiting for you, and you really must speak to them …”

  Stanton twisted in his chair and looked at the girl with astonishment.

  “Rose, my fiancée has just stirred from what I feared was her deathbed. She’s just saved the world from the depravities of a Black Glass Goddess who wanted to transform it into a nightmare of filth and despair. And you want me to come talk to the Sini Mira?”

  “Well, I know, it’s very inconvenient, but—”

  “Go on.” Emily laid a hand on the jacket of his coat, gave him a little push. He turned his green eyes down to her.

  “No,” he said.

  “Yes,” she said. “You’ve got an Institute to run.” She wiggled her new fingers with glee. “I can’t believe they’re back! I’ll never take them for granted again. I’ll sign up for piano lessons immediately!”

  He bent down and kissed her new fingers softly, his love thrilling through their sensitive tips.

  “I’ll be back soon,” he promised.

  He didn’t come back at all that afternoon, which didn’t surprise Emily in the least. But she had another visitor to keep her company, who came in carrying a great bouquet of fragrant peonies and began to arrange these in a crystal vase by Emily’s bed without speaking a word.

  “Miss Jesczenka,” Emily said. She looked at the wide white bandaging around the woman’s throat. She only half remembered the night in the conservatory, when Utisz had kidnapped her; she had seen Miss Jesczenka’s body lying motionless on the gravel pathway, the front of her dress soaked with blood. “Are you all right?”

  “The Institute is running wonderfully,” Miss Jesczenka said. “Enrollments are up, and Mystic Truth sales have never been higher. Fortissimus is a broken man. He has retired from professional life and will be recuperating indefinitely in an asylum in the Adirondacks. We have completed negotiations for the purchase of the Fortissimus Agency. It will be renamed the Stanton Agency, and we will use it to branch out into the field of presentment arranging. It should be quite a profitable sideline, if what I’ve seen in Fortissimus’ accounting books is any indication.” She paused, arranging another bloom. “Mr. Stanton has asked me to run the Agency for him.”

  Emily was silent for a while, looking at the woman. “That’s not what I meant,” she said.

  Miss Jesczenka’s elegant hands stilled. She drew a deep breath. “Sophos Stanton has graciously forgiven my transgressions, involuntary as they were.” She was silent for a long time before adding, “And for some reason, my son did not cut my throat deeply enough to kill me. He spared my life.”

  Emily said nothing as she watched the woman position a stalk in elegant counterpoint to its mates. She gave the flowers a freshening fluff and adjusted the vase slightly. Then she sat down by Emily’s bed, her brown eyes lowered.

  “He began by sending me letters. He said that someone at the orphanage had told him about me. He said that he wanted to meet me, to learn about me. And then he just … showed up, the night before the Investment. He was falling-down drunk, loud, angry. He said he would wake the whole Institute and tell them what kind of a whore I was. I had to quiet him down. I brought him into my rooms. I allowed him into the Institute. All I could think of was my reputation, my position, all that I had made for myself. I was so ashamed. I was so ashamed of him.”

  She paused, eyes turned inward with thought.

  “Shame is such a powerful emotion,” she mused. “Almost as powerful as love. How clever of him to have used both against me.”

  “I saw you with him,” Emily said softly. “The morning before the Investment. I thought … I thought he was a student. And I thought he was your lover.”

  Miss Jesczenka looked up at her in shock. Then her face softened into a small smile.

  “I have always maintained a great deal of magic around myself to keep men from thinking of me in that way,” she said. “It is nice that there’s one person in the world who sees through it.”

  Then Miss Jesczenka lowered her head. “They used my child, Emily. They used my shame. What kind of monster does that make me? Why didn’t I use the power of my faith to make a better life for him, instead of for myself?”

  Once again, Miss Jesczenka’s eyes searched Emily’s face for an answer that wasn’t there. With a shaking finger, Miss Jesczenka dashed a tear from the corner of her eye.

  Emily laid her hand across Miss Jesczenka’s. Through the exquisitely sensitive flesh of her new fingers, she could feel the weight of the woman’s terrible guilt. But more than feel these things, the hand Ososolyeh had given her could soothe them. It could not take them away, but it could blunt them, make them like a storm seen from a distant ridgeline. When Miss Jesczenka opened her eyes, they were clear and calm, and when she spoke again, it was as if she hadn’t spoken at all before then.

  “By the way, Miss Edwards,” she said. “I have something for you. A letter from your friend Miss Pendennis.”

  Emily’s eyes widened in surprise as Miss Jesczenka withdrew a fat envelope from her pocket. As she handed it to Emily, Emily noted the abundance of exotic stamps decorating its face.

  “My goodness, she sent this from Portugal,” Emily said. She looked up at Miss Jesczenka. “She’s on a lecture tour, you see. Do you mind?”

  Miss Jesczenka inclined her head obligingly.

  Emily slid a finger behind the flap and opened the envelope, drawing out its contents. Inside the envelope was a fat folded letter, as well as another envelope. Emily looked at the second envelope; it seemed to contain some kind of congratulatory card. She laid it on the bedside table as she unfolded Penelope’s letter. It started off with fond regards and her hope that Stanton’s Investment went off without a hitch. Emily chuckled. She continued to scan the letter, which detailed Penelope’s adventures at lecture stops from Senegal to Sumatra to …

  San Francisco?

  Stopped in San Francisco for a few days on the way back from Alaska, and took the opportunity to hop up to Lost Pine. Called on your pap. He’s in fine fettle, got that lovely old woman to look out for him, and all those cats! Oh, and I met that lumberman of yours. What a topping fellow. He’s everything that will ever make this country great. I told him I’d like to study him some more, if he’d let me. He said that any friend of yours was a friend of his.

  Emily let out a breath and smiled.

  I’ve sent along a card he wanted me to give you, and a couple of wedding presents, too. I’ve sent all the paperwork along to the Institute. I’m sure they can see that the shipment arrives safely …

  It went on from there, but Emily didn’t read more. She reached quickly for the second envelope and opened it.

  It
was a prettily printed card of congratulations with hearts and flowers on the front.

  Best wishes from the Hansen Timber Company, someone with fine penmanship had written inside. Beneath the fine writing was Dag’s friendly, blocky scribble: Good luck to you both.

  She brushed her new fingers over the writing, feeling it sing up to her. He would have a daughter, Emily suddenly knew, and she would be very pretty. Emily knew that she would meet her someday, and would like her very much.

  Emily pulled her hand away from the card, waved it as if burned.

  “My goodness!” she said, blowing on her fingers. “This is quite a hand!”

  Miss Jesczenka inclined her head. “You’ve bonded completely with the great consciousness of the earth—body, blood, and soul. I suppose that makes you kind of a goddess.”

  “Oh, hogwash,” Emily snorted. “I’m just Emily Edwards from Lost Pine, California. And what’s this Penelope writes about wedding presents?” she asked, snatching up the letter again to reread it more closely. Miss Jesczenka smiled, touched a finger to her nose.

  “I’ve seen to it all,” she said.

  After Miss Jesczenka left, Emily decided she’d had just about all she could stand of her near-deathbed, so she got up and tested her legs. They seemed to work just fine. Pulling on a dress, she buttoned it up with delightful alacrity, new fingers flying. She regarded her face in the mirror. Her own pert reflection stared back at her, same as it ever was.

  Goddess, she thought, wrinkling her nose at herself. Hogwash.

  She went to the door and tested it. It was unlocked. How nice to be in a world with unlocked doors again.

  She walked through the halls, noting with satisfaction the air of hope and excitement that filled the mansion’s white marble walls. Students chatted in eager clusters, stopping to watch as she passed. She waved cheerfully to them, but did not stop. She was going outside, to a place where things grew. She was going to the conservatory.

  She walked along the gravel paths under the great arching roof of glass, brushing a trickle of sweat from her brow. Always so humid in here. She remembered roots and calling birds and sunlight streaming down through a broken and sundered aperture.

  She came to a stop before the Dragon’s Eye orchid and placed her hands on the thick woody vine. She closed her eyes.

  The memory of Zeno greeted her. Oh, hello there. It’s you. What was your name again?

  Ososolyeh, Emily said.

  Emily spent the rest of the afternoon sitting cross-legged before the Dragon’s Eye orchid, searching for the bits of Zeno’s memories that had been scattered like dandelion fluff all across the country. It was a pleasant pastime. She wandered through root and leaf and branch, from one shining ocean to the other, looking for pieces of his mind. It was a fresh pleasure every time she found another bit—a memory in the root of an elm in Chicago, a fleeting thought in the petal of a fireweed in New Jersey. She brought these memories to him like pinecones in her hands, proudly.

  In the jungles above the ruins of the Temple, held in the broad heart of the tree Zeno had escaped into—the first one that had been his savior—they found the memory of a boy with white-blond hair. He was working in a field of wheat, calling to Zeno bad-temperedly to come and help. Zeno respired pleasantly through his leaves.

  Ah, Nikolai, he said. There you are! How I’ve missed you.

  Emily smiled, remembering with Zeno for a moment before giving the memory back to him.

  A warm hand touched her shoulder. She flinched slightly, the pleasant memory of the wheatfield and the white-blond boy scattering with the jump of her heart. She remembered Utisz’ hand, remembered a slashing black knife.

  “It’s all right,” Stanton murmured gently. “It’s only me.”

  Emily opened her eyes, smiled up at him. She looked past Stanton and saw that Perun was standing behind him, hat in hand, white-blond hair shining in the sunlight.

  “We’ve come to ask for your direction, mat’ syra zemliya,” Perun said, head low. “Goddess of the Earth.”

  Emily sat in the dirt with the Dragon’s Eye orchid rising at her back, and Perun and Stanton sat before her, their legs crossed, hands resting on their knees.

  “Dmitri Alekseivitch,” she called. “I know you’re back there.”

  Dmitri, who’d been hiding unsuccessfully behind a large stand of palms, came out. He would not look at her, but he came to sit behind Stanton and Perun, at a respectful distance.

  “Emilia Vladimirovna,” he said, with great formality.

  “You were speaking with Emeritus Zeno.” Perun’s eyes traveled to the Dragon’s Eye orchid, and there was sadness in them. “How is he?”

  “Your brother is dead, Nikolai Illarionovich Zeno,” Emily said, looking back at him. “Other than that, he’ll be fine.”

  Perun smiled to himself, shaking his head as he looked down at his lap. Stanton twisted himself to look at Perun.

  “Emeritus Zeno was your brother?” His eyes were astonished. “But he was over a hundred and seventy years old. He kept himself alive with magic. How could you …”

  Perun lifted his cigarette.

  “I keep myself alive with science,” he said. “A preservative drug I inhale almost constantly.” He looked at the cigarette smoking between his fingers. “Though now that the great work of my life is finished, perhaps I’ll give the stinking things up.” He ground it out in the dirt beside him, swept some gravel over the butt to cover it. As he dusted off his hands, he looked at Emily.

  “We have completed our diggings in the ruins of the Temple,” Perun said. “You might be surprised at what we have found.”

  He reached into his pocket and withdrew the hair sticks—battered and bent. He handed them to Emily, and she took them in trembling hands. She’d never expected to see them again.

  “Now, it must be decided what is to be done with them.”

  “We’re going to decide?” Emily said.

  “No, Goddess,” Perun said. “Not we. You.”

  Emily looked down at them, feeling sudden weight press down on her shoulders.

  “We have deciphered them,” Perun said. “It turns out they contain one more secret that we never guessed at. They do indeed contain the formula for Volos’ Anodyne—a very powerful poison that would make magic unpracticeable for humans. Morozovich completed it before your father ever left Russia.”

  “But that was in 1851!” Emily said. “If Morozovich completed the poison twenty-five years ago, why was it never implemented?”

  “Your father was bringing the poison to the Sini Mira when he met Catherine Kendall. Met her and fell in love with her. Your mother was cursed.” Perun cast a sidelong glance at Stanton. “Just like the burned, the cursed cannot control the magic that runs through their veins. Your father knew that if Volos’ Anodyne was administered, she would die.”

  “As would many others,” Emily said. “There are many people in the world who are cursed … or burned.” Her voice caught on the last word. “Implementing the poison would be like sentencing them all to death.”

  “But My Divine,” Perun said, flashing her a smile. “I haven’t told you what else the hair sticks had on them.”

  “There was something else?”

  “Another formula—a formula that your father developed independently of Morozovich. A compound that I believe we should call Lyakhov’s Anodyne, in his honor.”

  “Why two?” Emily said, but understanding was already stirring in her—understanding that was far beyond her own human ken.

  “Lyakhov’s Anodyne is not a poison. It is very different. It is a readjustment of the very structure of the Mantic Anastomosis.” Perun paused for a moment, choosing his words carefully. “Its effect is similar, in some ways, to the ability Mr. Stanton’s body possesses. Mr. Stanton’s burned blood gives his liver the ability to filter and purify Exunge, as you saw. That ability, on an infinitesimally small scale, will be woven into all living creatures born after the Anodyne’s implementation. They
will be able to assist the Mantic Anastomosis in processing Black Exunge. As this ability spreads over generations, the power to process Black Exunge will become widely distributed enough that Exunge will never again be able to build up in any quantity.”

  Emily didn’t really understand the words, but she understood the idea in her gut, in her sensitive fingers. Lyakhov’s Anodyne would not kill those who were burned or cursed. It would not kill Stanton. That was all she needed to understand, really.

  “It is why he didn’t contact us for so long,” Perun said. “Why he didn’t deliver the poison to us immediately. If we had known it was complete, we would have demanded it from him. We would have stopped at nothing to get it from him if he refused. And once we had it, we would have implemented it without a moment of hesitation.” Perun looked a little ashamed. “He knew this. He spent the last years of his life looking for a way to save your mother from our impetuousness.”

  There was a long silence. Finally, slowly, Perun climbed to his knees. He bowed down before Emily, his forehead pressed against the soft fragrant earth of the conservatory. Emily’s eyes found Stanton, widened questioningly, but Stanton put up both hands. The duties of a goddess, his upraised hands suggested, were not his to comment upon.

  “We have come for your direction, mat’ syra zemliya, Goddess of the Earth.” Perun’s voice was muffled from beneath his outstretched arms. “How shall we proceed?”

  The silence hung for quite a long time as Emily tried to figure out exactly what kind of goddessing she was supposed to provide. Finally, sighing, she pressed her hands flat against the earth and closed her eyes.

  Lyakhov’s Anodyne, Emily said simply, her voice making all the leaves in the conservatory rustle.

  Perun straightened and nodded. He brushed dirt from his trousers as he rose. Reflexively, he reached into his pocket for his cigarette case, then, thinking better of it, tucked it back down. But then he remembered something. Reaching inside his coat, he pulled out a golden ball.

  “I almost forgot,” he said, handing Komé’s rooting ball down to Emily. “I believe you will want to get her into the ground soon. She’s growing more quickly than anyone expected.”