This Monstrous Thing(45)

“Geisler wants me to. Someone has to carry his luggage.”

“That’s good. I’m glad.”

She twisted her face up to mine. “Why are you glad?”

“Glad I don’t have to deal with Geisler on my own.”

“Oh.” She looked away and pressed her cheek to my shoulder again. She smelled like smoke and iron, that faint breath of metal that pushed Oliver into my mind without warning. I tried to shove him away and focus on what Clémence was saying, and after a while I managed to pry my thoughts away from my brother, and from Geisler, and the mess waiting for me on the other side of the dawn. As they departed, exhaustion filled their place, and I started to drift off. I could tell Clémence was fading too—she kept forgetting to finish her sentences, and we both seemed more frequently unable to find the word we were looking for, let alone string it properly with others.

My eyes were closed, sleep’s fingers curling around me, when Clémence’s voice floated up to me like steam from a teacup. “Can I tell you one more thing? Since we’ve said a lot already.”

“Go on,” I replied, though I already had one foot in dreams and was only picking up every few words.

“When I told you about the first boy I kissed—Marco in the theater troupe in Paris . . .”

She went quiet, and I said, “Yes?” so she knew I hadn’t fallen asleep.

“I lied.” There was a moment of trembling silence, then she laughed, soft as a breath against a windowpane. “I don’t know anyone called Marco, and my father would have murdered me if I had run around with actors. The first person I kissed wasn’t a boy at all.” Her body slid against mine until there wasn’t an inch of us apart, and I could feel her breath, her heartbeat, her crackling paper lungs. “Her name was Valentine.”




When I woke the next morning, the fire was ashes and Clémence’s side of the bed was cold. I sat up, covers falling off me, and tried my best to sort out what had actually happened last night and what I had merely dreamed.

Nothing, I realized with a sick lurch. I hadn’t dreamed any of it.

And now I was going to Geneva to fetch Oliver for Geisler’s mad research.

I climbed out of bed and changed into the clothes I had arrived in as I considered my choices, or rather choice, because backing out now was impossible. I had to go to Geneva—Geisler was tearing up bodies in his cellar, so who knew what he would do if I stood in the way of eating anything. After a few minutes, I heard his work?—but I didn’t have a clue what to do once we arrived. The last few days thinking Geisler would help me take care of Oliver had been glorious. The freest I had felt in years. Letting that go after coming so close made me want to climb straight back into bed and refuse to budge.

I stepped out of my bedroom and into the hallway. At the top of the stairs, a small window overlooked the front path leading to the road. Depace’s wagon was parked at the gate, stacked with twice as many coffins as there had been when I’d ridden in it. Depace was leaning against the wheel chatting with Geisler while Clémence, her gray coat thrown over her blue dress, stood on the driver’s seat tugging on the thick ropes that held the coffins in place. At first I thought they were unloading more bodies for Geisler’s laboratory, but it didn’t make sense for them to be doing it in broad daylight and just before Geisler was to leave for Geneva. That and the fact that Clémence seemed to be securing the coffins, not unloading them. I watched them until my stomach growled and I went in search of breakfast.

There were scones and coffee in the kitchen, and I took some into the sitting room and settled down to eat in front of the fire. The house seemed dead quiet. The constant ticking of the clocks had blended into the silence so I could hardly hear them apart.

I had less of an appetite than I thought, and I mostly picked currants out of the scones instead of actually eating anything. After a few minutes, I heard the front door creak; then Geisler stuck his head into the sitting room. He smiled when he saw me. I nearly threw up.

“Good, you’re awake,” he said. “I’d like to leave within the hour.”

“I’m ready,” I said, then added, “Are we traveling with Depace?”

Geisler laughed. “No, he was just doing me a favor. We’re traveling in a bit more style than that.”

“More style” turned out to be a compact sleigh painted forest green and powered by steam and clockwork. Geisler informed me that it would be faster than a carriage after the blizzard, and would allow us to go off the road if we needed to. In spite of how gloomy I was feeling, I couldn’t resist bending down to see the engine.

Clémence stepped over me as she did a lap around the sleigh to check that everything was stowed. “You look as though Christmas came early.”

I stood up, scrubbing my hands along my arms for warmth. “It’s amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“The doctor made it. It gets us where we need to be faster than a carriage. The only disadvantage is, it’s useless three of the four seasons.”

She tugged on one of the luggage straps, and I remembered her standing on the wagon full of coffins earlier. “What was Depace doing here?” I asked.

“Collecting something from Geisler.”

“Collecting? What’s Geisler got that he wants?”