by Molly Tanzer
“Oh, I’m with you.” Graham, on the other hand, did have demonic insight. He knew to whom she spoke. “I just can’t help but think this won’t end well for us.”
Edith shrugged. “The more important thing,” she said, “is making sure it doesn’t end well for them.”
9
* * *
JANE HAD ALREADY DONE ENOUGH preliminary research on the subject of flight to know that every book that so much as touched on the matter seemed written to confuse rather than educate. Once she began to read in earnest, however, she came to truly hate the diabolists who had put quill to parchment only to waste a lot of both for no reason. For example, the one she’d selected one rainy afternoon had this to say on the subject of flying:
It might be that natural laws such as gravity may not be broken, being that they are both natural and law. Better and safer to manipulate changeable things, like the desires of man, or the weather of the world.
Jane was unimpressed by this eleventh-century Portuguese windbag, and she questioned his decision to title his treatise On Flying, given that it contained no information whatsoever about flying. Instead, he’d written about why it was “utterly impossible,” which felt to Jane like he’d tried until he was tired of failing, and then given up in a huff.
“What do you think, Smudge?” she whispered to the cat, who currently sat on her lap as she sprawled across the chaise lounge, perusing page after worthless page. “How would you do it?”
The cat declined to comment, but at the sound of his name, he did flick his tail from side to side. Jane went back to her book, but a moment later a volley of rain struck the farmhouse’s windows and drummed across the roof as the weather moved through the valley. Jane looked up, and so did her mother, who was knitting on a shawl the same color as the storm outside in a rare moment away from her desk of requests. Her hands did not pause as she surveyed the wet weather, and as her mother worked, Jane guiltily remembered her own neglected knitting project: a wine-colored hat she’d planned to give to Miriam for her birthday.
It had only been a week since Edith’s visit, but it felt more like a lifetime ago that Jane had had time to do such things as work with her hands to create something, rather than to have them be empty of much beyond books, pens, and paper.
Nancy chuckled. “I remember when a stormy afternoon filled me with dread—there never seemed to be enough to keep you girls occupied! These days you’re so deep in your researches, I can barely get a word out of either of you.”
Jane didn’t know what to say. She detected the sort of verbal trap that failing to navigate correctly would earn her a teasing remark for her troubles. If only it didn’t fall to her to reply . . . but of course Miriam was no help. She didn’t even lift her nose from her book.
“It behooves me to spend my time wisely now that I’ve passed my Test,” said Jane, appealing to responsibility—and the absolute legitimacy of her continued efforts. “My Practical won’t complete itself.”
“I see. Just remember, it’s easy to keep up with a good habit right after a success,” said Nancy. She sounded amused. “It gets harder as the days and weeks wear on.”
For the millionth time, Jane found herself wondering what in the world motivated her mother when she said things like that—those piercing remarks that were sharper than any knife, went deeper than any needle. This one was especially pointed, and still the question remained of why she would wish to hurt her daughter at all.
Some long-forgotten impulse claimed Jane then, and she looked to Miriam for support as she once would have done. In the past, Jane’s almost-sister and best friend would step in and do her best to distract Nancy from these sorts of situations. Today, however, Miriam remained silent—though her expression spoke volumes. She did not like this one bit. But that didn’t make her an ally.
Jane was on her own here.
“Of course you’re right, Mother,” said Jane, keeping her tone as bland as possible. Even so, it seemed as if her mother and her friend picked up on her skepticism just fine. Miriam even looked up from her book, which Jane chose to view as a triumph.
The mood in the room had indeed shifted. The fire in the wood burner no longer seemed as warm, and the rain made everything dreary, rather than cozy.
“Why, Jane!” exclaimed Nancy. “Don’t tell me you’re cross!”
Jane was all too pleased to respect her mother’s wishes. “Fine, I won’t,” she said, standing suddenly and sending Smudge leaping away with a reproachful mrowl and an indignant jingle of his collar bell. The cat stalked off with tail held high; Jane planned to quickly follow suit. “I needed a change of scene anyway!”
“Jane Blackwood! I’m surprised at you. The fact is, passing your Test is only one crucial step to achieving true Mastery. People fail at every stage of the process. I’m sorry if the truth annoys you, but I can’t pretend otherwise, even to spare my own daughter’s feelings.”
Jane went very red in the face as her cool slipped from her face like the mask it was. “If you think I’ll fail, Mother, then I’ll just have to prove you wrong.”
“I never said I thought you’d fail,” said Nancy, finally setting aside her knitting. “You mustn’t be so dramatic all the time.”
Miriam was almost squirming in her seat; she had turned back to her book, her eyes studiously on the page as Jane and her mother quarreled. On one hand, Jane understood the position Miriam was in; on the other, she could say something as Jane was forced to endure this assault.
Jane stuck her nose in the air, channeling her inner Katharine Hepburn. “Dramatic, is it?” she asked softly. “Is it dramatic to wish to be left alone while I’m working instead of being the subject of unfair and unprovoked attacks?”
“Unfair attacks! Is that what you consider a bit of mild teasing to be?” Nancy shook her head. “You mustn’t be so sensitive, Jane. The world won’t pet you for doing the right thing.”
“Don’t worry,” said Jane. “You’ve taught me that lesson very well.”
Nancy’s expression was priceless, but Jane knew the cost of seeing it would be very high.
“Please excuse me,” said Miriam, shutting her book and getting to her feet in one motion. “I need to get something from my room.” And then she dashed out the door.
Jane took advantage of the distraction, turning on her heel and following Miriam out into the hall.
She was furious. It wasn’t fair—none of it. She should have passed her Test—she was smart enough, capable enough to be a diabolist. She deserved it, after all her hard work—and what’s more, she wanted it. Shouldn’t her conscious will, her self-knowledge, matter more than some induced hallucination?
And it also wasn’t fair, the way her mother picked at her scabs and then faulted her for bleeding. Not for the first time did Jane wonder how different life would be had her father been a part of it. Would he have intervened? Would he have noticed his daughter’s discomfort and spoken to her mother about it, in private, during those brief precious hours parents had to speak to one another without their children present?
Jane’s gaze was suddenly, unconsciously upon the stairs to the Library. There, the answer to her questions awaited her. She just had to decide if she was going to take it.
“She was being unkind,” said Miriam.
Jane shrieked. She hadn’t seen Miriam standing a few steps up the big staircase, and she felt a mix of annoyance—over being startled—and guilt, as if Miriam might know she’d been thinking wicked thoughts.
“Sorry,” said Miriam, stepping awkwardly down and closer.
Jane recovered enough to pat her hair back into place with some dignity. “No need to apologize. I just didn’t see you.”
“Jane,” said Miriam, “back there, I wanted to say something. But I’m afraid.”
“Afraid of what? ” Jane wasn’t interested in any apologies from Miriam. “You’d have to fall a long way before you’d be even with me in my mother’s opinion.”
Miriam looked hurt,
which made Jane savage.
“I can’t wait to leave,” she said loftily.
“I don’t blame you.”
Jane was surprised. “I wish I understood what she wants! Before, she’d scold me for not sufficiently applying myself. Now I’m applying myself, and she’s cutting me down for trying.”
“You’ve been working very hard,” said Miriam.
So Miriam had noticed. Jane felt a bit better to have her diligence observed, and thawed enough to crack a joke. “Maybe she just knows how little progress I’ve made.”
“It’s been tough going for me too,” said Miriam, with a rueful smile. Hearing that was like a warm sunbeam hitting Jane’s shoulders on a cloudy afternoon. It wasn’t just her who was struggling! Jane smiled back, but the moment passed too quickly. “I just had a breakthrough though—at least, I think did. I might have solved something that’s been troubling me; at least, I hope I have. I just need to . . .” Miriam trailed off uneasily.
Miriam was always one step ahead of Jane, and always, it seemed, eager to remind Jane of that.
But Jane’s annoyance quickly turned to fear. Maybe that was because Miriam really was better at all this than she was.
Maybe she didn’t deserve to be a diabolist.
No—she couldn’t think like that. Not now that she knew the consequences of failure. She would be neither harvested by her greedy colleagues nor told she should smile while sweeping up after them.
“Please don’t let me keep you from your pursuits,” said Jane. “My own Practical puts many demands on my attention, of course.”
And with that, she headed for the stairs down to the Library.
She, too, had had a breakthrough. But it wasn’t about her project—it was about her situation.
There was no way she was going to be able to impress the Société enough to convince them she absolutely, unequivocally belonged there. Not on her own merits. Not without a leg up. Not without an edge.
It was time to contact her father.
10
* * *
MIRIAM HADN’T BEEN SPEAKING OF her Practical when she’d mentioned her breakthrough. In fact, she’d been surprised when Jane mentioned it. Her path to Mastery within the Société had been utterly absent from her mind since the night Edith had told her of her parents’ disgrace. More important was proving their innocence by finding them, or discovering what had happened to them.
They’d stayed in danger to fight. Miriam had left to live in safety. She hadn’t had a choice in the matter then; she did now. She would not let her brave parents disappear and become infamous. Even if all she could do for them was find out the truth, she’d do that—no matter what.
To that end, Miriam had researched how to see without being seen—to search without being present. There were quite a few ways for diabolists to do so, but Miriam’s specific needs narrowed the scope. She was, for instance, substantially limited by not being a Master; any solutions involving diabolic partnerships were therefore unworkable. She also suspected she would need some mobility to stage an investigation. The ability to interact with matter would also be a good thing.
Neither astral projection nor outright body-snatching would do, the former because her range would be limited as an apprentice, and the latter because not only was it frowned upon by the Société, but it was permanent, and it involved hollowing out one’s victim on a spiritual level in order to make enough room for the invader’s consciousness and will. None of that sounded right to Miriam.
Thankfully, there was a third option, in the form of a technique she discovered in, of all places, a tenth-century manuscript simply called Badgerskin; it was unclear if that was the title of the book or the author’s name. The best Miriam could translate the obscure Gaelic word for the technique was cleave,with its double meaning in English of both separating and sticking together; with it, a diabolist could temporarily ride along with another body. And while the book was angled at possession of animals, the author indicated the process could be used for humans, too.
Miriam was strongly reminded of a story her father had used to tell her of the dybbuk, a Jewish ghost that could possess the living by “sticking” to them. Sticking, clinging, cleaving—the association was powerful, and Miriam didn’t like it coming up in this context at all.
But now was not the time to be frightened by folktales—and, anyway, a dybbuk was a spirit of the dead who clung to the living. Miriam wasn’t dead.
As she read on, Miriam was surprised that she’d never heard of the practice of cleaving. It seemed so useful. One would think that someone among the Société’s ranks must have tried this technique in, oh, the past few hundred years. But then again, after she read all the warnings that misusing this technique, or even just using it too often, could cause a decline of her health—physical and spiritual—Miriam understood better. The author’s warning about the “intrusion of the shadow-soul,” an ill-defined possibility that might be a flowery way of saying catatonia or might not be, was substantially off-putting by itself, and that wasn’t the only thing that could go wrong.
The shadow-soul . . . it was either that, or the shadow cast by a soul, according to how she translated the Gaelic. She was intrigued by it regardless, given her fancy of having something similar within her.
The book was quite a find. The author, a self-professed “pagan follower of Christ,” seemed more honest than most ancient diabolists. While still vague at times, she—Miriam was convinced it was a she—was never deliberately misleading; in fact, she detailed the two main risks of what Miriam set out to do. In the days before the Société and other such organizations, diabolists would often be false in their instructions, caught in a bizarre fugue of wanting to document their accomplishments but wanting no one to be able to duplicate their results. Thus, Miriam felt grateful to this ancient diabolist for being so open as to note things like how, apparently, the flesh aged more quickly when separated from even a tiny piece of the spirit. That was really good to know.
There was no denying it was a risky technique. She was afraid—genuinely so. But Miriam knew her parents had likely felt the same about staying to fight in the war. They’d still done it, in the end, and she would too.
* * *
THE MATERIALS MIRIAM NEEDED to begin to learn to cleave were almost deceptively simple: a veil knife, general diabolic essence, and a way to separate her soul from her body.
The last was, interestingly enough, the easiest, as it required no subterfuge, just diablerie. There were plenty of recipes for something that would temporarily detach Miriam’s spirit from her physical body. She settled on an easy sublingual tablet.
A veil knife was just an iron blade infused with diabolic residue that gave it spiritual mass. This allowed it to be wielded both by a person of flesh and blood—or a soul freed from it. Nancy had one among the Library’s collection of tools. While she had never granted the girls permission to use it, neither had she ever explicitly said they couldn’t.
With the veil knife, Miriam could shave off a portion of her detached spirit and use it to cleave to another creature. But of course, her goal was not simply to experience life as a beetle or a bird. Miriam needed to be able to control them, too.
The ancient Gaelic diabolist but briefly touched upon the idea that one might master the will of another creature, but it was clear she didn’t approve of the idea. Still, she acknowledged that obviously many diabolists would wish to learn how to use animals for some purpose or another, thus it was better to reveal how to do so as safely as possible—for animal and human alike.
Basically, controlling a creature required sacrificing more of her soul each time. It also required more diabolic essence.
Diabolic essence was, essentially, the gasoline of all diablerie. It made the Art go. That’s why diabolic essence was such a closely guarded resource among all diabolists.
There were two types:
Specific diabolic essence came from those plants into which diabolists had summoned demons
. It could be turned into the food or tinctures diabolists consumed to keep themselves in touch with their demonic companion, or it could be processed into other components to power armamentaria. Specific essence could only be used in, well, specific ways, for specific armamentaria—which is why organizations such as the Société existed, at least in part. It made it much easier to share and share alike.
General diabolic essence was created from diabolists themselves. The process of communing with a demon infused the body with diabolic essence. Thus, a diabolist’s nail clippings, hair, lost teeth, or other byproducts could be collected and rendered down for what excess diabolic residue they still contained.
Long ago, diabolists had realized that diabolic essence was changed by the body. It was just raw power, and could thus be used to fuel any pills, potions, and powders that a diabolist might wish to create.
Nancy could afford to be generous with her stores of general diabolic essence. She really didn’t do too much diablerie—her interests were fulfilled by the more mundane aspects of the Art. Even so, there was a necessarily limited supply of it, so Miriam had to be careful not to take too much.
The day of Miriam’s second attempt, she woke up a bit early to dig through the compost heap before feeding the ducks and geese. Finding three worms, she put them in some earth in a jar, and then left it in the barn for after Nancy went down to the Library and Jane went off to do whatever Jane did with herself ever since Edith’s visit.
Out of sight of the house, Miriam studied the simple creatures in the shadowed late winter light behind the potting shed. Their bodies glistened as they squirmed.
Miriam knew what she had to do. Her first successful attempt had been on one of Nancy’s ducks—but while it had seemed like a simple beast, it had proven too complex for a novice. She’d managed to cleave to the bird, but she could only endure the experience for a moment before it became too overwhelming.