“I know you wouldn't walk into my lair to lie to me, Charmant. You know what I can do.”
“And I know what you cannot do as well.”
She sighed in disgust. “Come in and have a cuppa then, you smarmy bastard.”
Charmant smothered his mad snicker as he stepped into her lair, not so unlike his own. She had no door, and she had predator skulls instead of carousel horses, but it was the same jumble of meaningful talismans, amusing diversions, and serious ingredients for the most powerful spells. The witch sat close to a glowing hole in the floor where a smokeless orange fire smoldered. Her shoulders were humped like a vulture, her face wrinkled and sagging with age. But her eyes were sharp behind the smoke curling from her pipe, and it didn't escape him that the raven perched on her chair could pop out his eyes as easily as a child shooting marbles.
Her head tilted like an ugly rock eroding. “If you think you can make this mug beautiful, Charmant, I can't wait to hear how. I've tried every spell, every cream, every snake oil. I'll be trapped this way for at least two hundred miserable years, and I can only hope to take down as many smug, pretty people as I can.” She took a long draw on her pipe and held it, waiting.
“Madame, has it escaped your purview that you are, in fact, an idiot?”
The witch spluttered smoke, but a snap of Charmant's fingertips sealed her lips.
“You keep trying to make yourself beautiful, but that's impossible. You can, however, make yourself younger.” He snapped again, and her mouth opened with a cough, billowing white smoke.
“Years ain't free, last I checked, daimon.”
“Then steal them.” Charmant pulled a small bag from his jacket pocket and dangled it just out of the crone's reach, minimal as it was. “I'll give you a year of my own to prove my solution.”
“Name your price.”
He licked green lips, twirled his mustache. “I wish to take possession of a soul.”
The witch's head fell forward, showing gray hair marching down her back. Her cackle built from a burble to a mad cawing, and she threw back her head, showing old, ivory teeth in between shining white fangs.
“So you wish to trade impossibilities. I accept.”
She held out her hand, and he stretched out his, and acid yellow met dead white over the cherry-red fire.
“But there's a catch,” the witch said, eyes dancing. Charmant squeezed her age-spotted hand with skin gone red with fury, and she squeezed back with bones of iron.
Too late. The deal was done.
* * * * *
The exchange happened quickly, each magician anxious to steal away to savor their new toy in solitude. Charmant shook the black dragon scales from his bag and bound them to the witch's right hand with whispered, slurry words. They sank into her withered skin, invisible.
“Grasp my hand and focus on my life force, on drawing it away like a handful of water. I promised you one year. Take a single moment more, and you'll suffer for it.” He held out his bare hand, and his tail rose up over his shoulder, the barbed end aiming for where the witch's heart ought to be.
Erzabet's corpse-lips curled up as she reached for him. He braced himself for the jolt of panic he knew was coming. After focusing for a moment, he felt it—one year and one day, gone.
As his tail reared back to strike, the witch cackled and stumbled out of reach. “It was a leap year, Charmant. And damned if it didn't taste fine.” Withered fingers traced the cracks around her eyes. “A few more handshakes, and you won't even recognize me.”
The magician swallowed down his growl and held his other palm out flat, wiggling his fingers.
“You mentioned a catch.”
He would have bet any amount that the witch's smile couldn't have been wider, but now it stretched wider still.
“You can possess a soul, but once it's out of the body, it can't be put back. Flesh rejects its wrongness.”
“What the hell sort of bloody good does that do me? I'm not making a terrarium!” His skin shivered over with tiger stripes, his regrown mustache uncurling.
“Not my problem. You said only that you wished to possess a soul. You didn't say anything about what you wanted done with it. And you'll possess it. There's just not much you can do with a soul, sadly.”
Charmant threw his hat into her fire and watched it burn, cursing the clever words he'd practiced in his head on his way down to the cavern. He should've known better and gone for detail instead of beautiful, succinct phrasing. Witches had no appreciation of poetry. But perhaps something could be salvaged.
“I can't possess it while the creature in question lives?”
“The creature will live, but soulless, a lump of breathing meat. You'll enjoy that, I'm sure. The soul's not yours until you yank it out. But it will belong to you, know you, be unable to raise a hand against you.”
“And it can't be placed into another body?”
“Sadly, no. Flesh will reject a foreign soul.”
Charmant's head shot up. “Flesh will reject it. But other materials won't?”
Erzabet's rheumy eyes twinkled. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
The daimon's fingers wiggled again. “Then hand over the charm and free me to pursue this puzzle, witch.”
She hobbled to a shelf hacked into the cave wall, rummaged in a dainty box, and returned with a spool of invisible thread. Dropping it into his hand, she gestured to a tiny knot winking in the firelight. “Get her to swallow that. Feed the thread to her. When it goes no further, reel it back. The glowing bit of fuzz that pops out will be her soul.”
Charmant's eyes slid sideways. “How do you know it's a she?”
Erzabet laughed and waved him away. “Because everyone knows a man's soul is worthless.”
* * * * *
Back in his own underground lair, Charmant lovingly folded his striped jacket and draped it over a chair. With a grim smile, he removed his cufflinks and rolled up his sleeves. His lab coat slid over his shoulders, perfectly tailored and charmed to never show the years of layered stains painted by blood, oil, and ink. Glancing in the mirror, he grinned at the dapper murderer he almost always found there. His mustache was flawless, and soon his spell would be, too.
He'd already dragged in another table, the pitted wood pre-fit with shackles. In the corner waited a stack of abandoned, run-down, or stolen clockworks, smooth faces and long limbs and rusted hooves jumbled together. Carousel horse legs, a dancing bear, a comical orangutan, a robot butler, a cluster of curves pulled from a burned-down bordello: they formed a tangle of steel, brass, and copper. But Charmant didn't see a mess. He saw a potpourri of possibilities. A few uncharred automaton dancers were mixed in, and he had already selected the base from which he would build his masterpiece.
Plucking a gas-powered saw from the perfectly arranged table of instruments and opening a fresh jar of silver solder, he flipped down his goggles and set the blade to a slender metal neck. The fluid that spilled out was close enough to blood to make him smile.
* * * * *
It took nearly a week of sleepless slaving to construct a vessel worthy of his Coco. With complete freedom over form, he fed his deepest desires into polished metal. Her legs tapered daintily, her hips swelled like a violin, her neck was more swanlike than a normal spine could allow. She was better than anatomically correct in every way. The face took the longest, as he had only sketches of his beloved and a poster stolen from the cabaret's wall to go on. He made her lips just a little poutier and curved up, her eyes wider and her eyelashes longer and hard as springs. With stroke after stroke, his sandpaper smoothed the metal and solder down to the softness of a girl's cheek, and soon the once disparate parts were unified with the perfect coat of lavender. The lust he felt while painting her nipples a rosy pink on mountains of shaded purple spoke plainly of satisfaction at a job well done. The automaton was, in a word, flawless.
Dressing her was a joy. Years of trade had amassed a collection of dresses and fripperies that would've made any real girl envious. With
his usual impeccable taste, Charmant selected a celadon green gown, daringly low cut and trimmed with gold. Once slipped over the metal girl's head and over her still but pliant arms, it required loving tailoring with needle and thread. He giggled as he took in the waist, amused that his perfect woman required no corset and would never grow fat or old. The powerful limbs would never raise against him, never turn him away. A clever bit of spellcasting, that.
Finally, finally he stood back to take in her full form. All she lacked was hair, and he would stop by the wiggist later to fetch the most beautiful curls money and treachery could buy. He took off his lab coat, unrolled his sleeves, slipped on his jacket, and checked the mirror. The man he found there burned with an unnatural fever, his skin unconsciously matching the celadon gown and his mustache drooping and overlong. Whipping off his goggles and straightening his cravat, he twitched away his concerns and slid a hand under the automaton's back, his other hand under her neck. Lifting her for the first time, he shuddered. The daimon magician of Darkside Paris had held dragon eggs, unicorn horns, and once, a beating human heart. But until this moment, he had never known true awe. Clutching her to his chest and giggling madly, he danced a waltz, just a few turns around the cavern.
It would be even better when she fought against him as much as the spell would allow, tiny hands pushing him away but unable to bruise.
As if she could escape.
After planting a chaste kiss on her firm, red lips, he tucked the automaton into an armoire he'd fitted with hooks and manacles, just so. Closing the door on her stupid, beautiful face, he shivered to himself and made his final preparations. Tonight, his Coco would belong to him.
Forever.
* * * * *
“Do I know you, monsieur le duc?” Coco's smile was more of a smirk, her legs crossing and uncrossing in irritation as he slid the champagne flute across the table.
“This is my first time at the cabaret, ma chere. And I find myself mesmerized.”
He stroked his full beard contemplatively and glanced around the room as if hunting for a better toy. The courtesan's eyes shot to the duke's crest on his ring and the diamond pin in his cravat.
“You seem bored, my lord.”
The man's dark eyes flicked to her, his blond eyebrows shooting up. “And you seem to be rejecting the finest vintage of champagne Paris can offer.”
The girl looked taken aback but quickly recovered, swigging down the champagne as if her life depended on it. Glancing back, the man noticed the cabaret's Madame glaring daggers at poor Coco as she slopped the champagne down her front. He allowed himself a small smile. Couldn't let a human duke go, could they? Especially when he'd already paid.
Coco spluttered and giggled. “It's delicious, monsieur.”
His hand cupped hers around the flute. “Then have some more. I have another bottle in my apartments, if you'd care to join me.”
Coco's eyes shot over his shoulder as she obediently drank.
“It would seem I have no choice, monsieur. I'd be glad to accompany you.”
He rose and smoothed his tailcoat. Tipping his tall hat and gathering his cane and the champagne bottle, he held out his arm to her.
“Please join me, then, mademoiselle. For I so very much wish to know you better.”
* * * * *
She strutted out of the cabaret, slunk out the door, and hopped into the waiting hansom as if being chased. Once he'd climbed in beside her, she wedged herself into the corner and glared at him.
“I don't like doing this,” she all but spat. “This is not a life I chose. So use me if you must, but know that I'll hate you for it.” His fingers twitched against the velvet, and she sneered and added, “But you'll pay me first.”
In answer, he held out the champagne flute, again full.
“I've already paid your mistress. But after a few sips, my dear, you might not mind as much.”
She grasped the crystal as if it were a viper. “I will always mind.”
“I admire your ferocity.”
“Overpowering me, I suppose, will make it all the sweeter for you.”
He smiled, lips just a bit green beneath the peach-colored powder.
“Perhaps it will. They do say hunger is the best sauce.”
* * * * *
She kept up her hissing cat act right up until the coach stopped at the yawning mouth of a dark alley.
“These . . . are not fashionable apartments, then, my duke?”
“Surely you didn't expect to be entertained at the palace, ma cherie?”
He disembarked and reached a hand for her, and she stepped onto the slick cobbles. Before her fear could still her limbs, he dragged her down the alley and toward the arching gates of Darkside.
“Monsieur, I don't think—”
“Good. Don't think. Just follow.”
His hand clamped painfully down on her arm as he propelled her into the twisting streets of his domain. She tried to break away from him once, but he caught her around her neck and waist and carried her with more strength than his slight body should have possessed. “I beg you to struggle, darling. But cry out and it will be your last.”
She bucked against him, and he drank in the delicious beauty of a terrified mind and body fighting for dignity and safety. But her fine lips remained pinned, and he couldn't help himself. He brushed his nose down the trail of her neck, drinking in her fear with eyes rolled back in ecstasy. And this was simply the amuse-bouche.
The familiar black door opened at a whispered word, and she fought for real as she understood, finally, where he was taking her. The high whimper escaped past closed lips as she faced the shoppe's carousel horses, the bloodletter's chair, the jars of glaring eyeballs. This was where he'd first seen her and known he had to possess her, and this was where she had given up the last part of herself she'd owned in exchange for the locket shimmering on her neck. Thanks to the curse, it had been worse than nothing to her. And now she knew she'd gained nothing.
When he scooped her up to carry her down the stairs, she struggled and writhed, but she was no match for his arms, his lust, his magic. Her duke tossed her onto the scarred wooden table and clasped manacles around her slender wrists. And that's when she let out her first scream.
“You monster!”
Charmant turned to his mirror, digging too-sharp nails into his cheeks. The peach peeled away to reveal acid-yellow skin lit with desire. The beard fell to the ground with one good tug, and he tossed the blond wig into the fire, where it stank of wet wool and burned meat.
“It's just like the fairy tales, then, my love. You be my beauty, and I will gladly be your beast.” He twirled the tips of his mustache in the mirror and turned back to her, love shining in his eyes like a wrecked train's headlights sinking deep into a loch.
“I am not yours,” Coco spat.
“Oh, but you will be.”
Charmant snaked fingers into his waistcoat pocket and pulled out a spool. When he gave it an experimental tug, Coco's shoulders jerked up, a look of terror and disgust twisting her fine features.
“What . . . what is that? What is in my throat?”
“Merely a bit of fishing line, my love. A consequence of fine champagne. Relax as I reel in my prize.”
The thread was invisible between his fingertips as he rewound it around the cylinder. Coco's body convulsed as if she might vomit but couldn't find her own throat. Ragged retching started deep within her, and her eyes rolled back to show all whites broken with angry red veins. With one final, happy pull, Charmant tugged past the last bastion of resistance, and Coco's body bowed up from the table with a high, gargling scream.
The tiny bit of glowing fuzz that floated on the end of the invisible string resembled a firefly's light, and Charmant caught it deftly between thumb and middle finger. Coco's body flattened onto the table, mouth open and eyes blank. With his other hand, Charmant stroked the pale lilac wrist, checking for the pulse. Warm, alive. But mindless. So sweet.
Holding the soul-ligh
t carefully, the magician used every lens on his complicated artificer's goggles. Even at the highest magnification, he could discern no body, no form, no composition, which confirmed several things he had always assumed about what composed a soul: namely, that it was a useless bit of fluff.
He'd kept the armoire closed to avoid frightening Coco, although, in hindsight, it didn't really matter. Now he unclasped the door and threw it open to reveal the beautiful automaton waiting within.
But . . .
There was something wrong. His construct: she had fallen apart completely.
One of her arms had sloughed off. Her face had running holes for eyes, the rust eating farther and farther into softly painted cheeks. Stains the color of old blood seeped through her celadon dress, and the wig had fallen to the ground in an acid-etched heap of fur.
Every muscle in Charmant's body clenched—except those two fingers that held Coco's soul.
It had to be the solder. That brand new jar he'd opened, just for her. Every place he'd melted silver powder into the metal, every seam—they were all broken. Where had he bought it? Who had dared to sell bad solder to the most powerful alchemist in Paris?
He would find out later. And end them.
But for now, he held a soul. And its glow was weakening.
He tried shoving it back into Coco's fine mouth, but the blasted thing stubbornly floated back out, just as the witch had gleefully promised. Next, he tried to tuck it into a jar, and then a wooden box, and then a clay pot. But outside of his own fingers, the thing could not be contained and gently floated about as if gravity was merely an amusing idea. Charmant's goat eyes dashed around the room, frantic for some way to capture the soul until he could craft another flawless, timeless body that he alone could control.
And then he remembered the automaton's heart. It was iron and hand-hammered and didn't include solder. Perhaps it, alone, had survived. And iron was prized for its immunity to magic.
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