Ink, Iron, and Glass (Ink, Iron, and Glass #1)(69)
Leo’s hand flashed out and snatched ahold of Aris’s sleeve, demanding his brother’s full attention. “Aris—” His voice came out hoarse and urgent. “Where’s Pasca?”
Ricciotti started to say, “Now is hardly the time to—”
“He’s dead,” Aris interrupted, staring intently back into Leo’s eyes. Leo seemed pinned beneath his gaze. “Pasca was supposed to be at fencing lessons with you. Signora Rosalinda was supposed to get both of you out. By the time we knew he was unaccounted for, it was much too late.”
Leo’s eyes went wide, and all the color drained from his face. He looked as if he might be sick. Elsa couldn’t begin to guess what he was thinking in that moment—but, apparently, his brother could.
Aris cupped Leo’s face in his hands. Unlike with Ricciotti, Leo made no move to stop him, and this more than anything else chilled Elsa. “Oh, little brother,” Aris said, “you couldn’t have known. Pasca was always sneaking off, skipping lessons. It isn’t your fault.”
“Of course it’s not his fault,” Elsa said, her temper finally snapping like a brittle twig. “He’s not the one who set fire to the house!”
The brothers both looked at her, Aris with a trace of annoyance, Leo as if he were trying to focus on her through a thick fog.
Elsa turned her wrath on Garibaldi. “We’re not here for a reunion,” she said through gritted teeth. “Why did you take Jumi? Where is she?”
Garibaldi clasped his hands behind his back. “As to the second matter, Jumi is alive, she is under my care, and I will remand her to you in exchange for a favor.”
Fury flashed through her veins, but Elsa lifted her chin and tried to channel the brazen calm with which Porzia might have this same conversation, were their positions reversed. “And as to the first matter?”
“Therein lies the rub,” he replied, the corner of his mouth lifting ruefully. “My men had instructions to gain access to Veldana with Montaigne’s assistance, then acquire your mother along with a scriptology book she created.”
Elsa felt an absurd sense of triumph at hearing Montaigne’s betrayal confirmed. And the scriptological weapon they’d heard rumors of—it must be inside the worldbook that had gone missing from the cottage along with Jumi.
“Unfortunately,” Garibaldi continued, “the mission went awry. A third party killed Montaigne, set fire to the house, and in the ensuing confusion made off with the book.”
Elsa said, “So where is this book now? Who has it?”
“I know not. A double agent for the true Carbonari, some vindictive Veldanese, a spy for Sicilia or Veneto or the Papal States…” He took a breath, and for a second he almost seemed rattled before regaining his smug superiority. “I’ve had agents searching for it, unsuccessfully so far. But now I think this is no longer my problem to solve.”
“You’re proposing a trade. You want me to find it for you.”
“Who better to find the book than the daughter of its creator?”
Elsa kept silent for a moment, watching him. The creator herself would surely be better than the creator’s daughter, and this thought sent a spike of fear through Elsa. “I’ll see my mother now. I want proof she’s alive before agreeing to anything.”
Garibaldi gestured to another door at the far end of the room. “Signorina, if you’ll accompany me, I’ll take you to her.”
This seemed to sober Leo enough for him to regain control. “She’s not going anywhere with you—”
Elsa rested a hand on his arm to quiet him. “It’s all right. I’ll be all right.”
She followed Garibaldi despite Leo’s protestations and found herself traversing a narrow, windowless hall, and doubting whether it was wise to be alone with him in a confined space. If anything, Garibaldi seemed amused by her stiff reluctance.
“Think what you will of me, but everything I do is for the good of the people. To put an end to foreign rule and crushing taxation, an end to religious laws strangling the progress of science. To unite my countrymen for a better future.”
Elsa glared at him. “You have a funny way of showing it, abducting an innocent woman from her home.”
“Innocent!” Garibaldi let out a surprised laugh. “Your mother is hardly innocent. She scribed the single most dangerous book in the history of mankind.”
“But has she ever actually used it?” Elsa countered with a show of confidence. In truth she felt queasy at the thought of her mother using a worldbook to manufacture weapons—corrupting the beautiful, pure scientific discipline of scriptology. She did not want to believe her mother capable of such perversion, but at the same time she knew Jumi would do anything to protect Veldana.
Garibaldi led her into a smaller room, and what she saw there drove those thoughts from her mind. Her mother lay prone, unmoving, inside a glass coffin nested within a large machine. Elsa’s breath caught in her throat.
“What have you done?”
“Everything I could.”
“What is that supposed to—” She stopped midsentence as she got a better look at the machine. A mask with a thick tube trailing from it covered her mother’s nose and mouth. A sound almost like hydraulics—hiss and suck, in rhythm with the rise and fall of Jumi’s chest. A needle oscillated across a ribbon of paper, drawing a peak for each slow beat of Jumi’s heart. It was medical equipment.