Amalia awoke, the cold stone of the wharf numbing her cheek, her wet clothes weighting her in place. Her lungs still burned and she had the taste of the river on her lips. All of this was inconsequential, for her mind was a clear, bright hall of openness and light, and within its seemingly endless space she walked through time, each second encompassing lifetimes of purpose. All of it coalescing and swirling into something nameless and yet whole and complete. The space was hope. Meaning. Peace.
Amalia blinked, recognizing a ball of dust against the wall under Primrose's bed. A second ago, she had felt a blessed stillness, or so she thought. Now, though, it was as if smoke wafted through her mind, hiding the remains of some place that had once filled her with hope. She dreaded this moment, each day waking only to discover that place frustratingly out of reach.
Today she was to attend church.
Amalia dragged herself from the floor of the girls' room with the lethargy of someone hoping to never reach their destination. Sundays were usually her own, a time when she could hole up in her office or at the very least convince Lucy to scrap with her in the yard for a bit. Her Sundays were not devoted to the pious routine of church nor society, and she made her way reluctantly to her room, where the dress Lavinia sent awaited her in her wardrobe.
Her despair lightened when she found Penance still in her bed, the sheets bunched at her shoulders and her rather large feet sticking out at the end. Amalia smiled, edging a tickling finger on the bottom of Penance's foot before crawling atop the sheets to place a kiss at her temple.
Penance stirred, eyes foggy with sleep. "You know there is a reflex point on the foot that instigates a kick to the face."
"You're violent before you've had your science," Amalia said with a pleased grin. She eased down next to Penance, watching as her eyes drifted open, light and present, and then they shifted askance, as if a thought had pulled her away.
"We've got church today."
Amalia sighed onto her back. "I need you to temper your violent enthusiasm."
"I've got to get myself ready," Penance continued, rising with a yawn and ignoring her. She glanced around Amalia's room. "Did you not lay your dress out last night? It's going to be wrinkled."
"God doesn't care about the smoothness of my dress."
"But Lavinia does," Penance reminded her, pushing her lightly away before pulling her back in for a slow kiss, and then thinking better of it and pushing her away again. "Get dressed." Penance pounced gaily out of bed, the thought of a new dress putting a slight bounce in her step as she made her way back to her own room.
Amalia turned her attention to pulling out her own assigned attire, its skirt as wrinkled as a crumpled piece of parchment paper. Lavinia had slyly chosen a green and white pique set with silk, clearly attempting to lighten Amalia's look if not her mood. The jacket was quite smart at least, tailored at the waist with tapered lapels, although the puffed fabric of the shoulders was a bit much. Amalia fluffed the ruffle of her silk shirt and stopped into her office for a brandy, which seemed the appropriate thing to do before church.
Harriet poked her head in the door, only making Amalia drink faster. "Good morning, Harriet," she said with a faint smile.
"I hear you're going to church today."
"Yes, do I look pious enough?" She snuck a glance at her glass and set it back on the tray.
Harriet nodded. "For you, I guess." She held out a piece of paper. "I got you the names of the recent deed holders for that property." She assessed Amalia. "I'm guessing it's the same property where that deranged doctor tried to pull out your arms."
"Perhaps." Amalia offered no more and Harriet knew better than to ask. Instead she said, "Penance is already in the carriage. Can you have her back by early afternoon, preferably in one piece and at a panic threshold of three or below?" Harriet smiled. "She's putting on a magic show for the girls later today."
"I didn't know Penance was dabbling in magic."
Harriet gave her a cheerful shrug. "She does have a tendency to over-explain the optical illusions, but the girls find it fun nonetheless."
Amalia tucked the list into the pocket of her skirt, bypassing the dining table and heading for the back of the yard where the carriage was waiting. Penance was on the far side of it, her head visible as she tinkered with the coachman.
Penance noted her with a smile. "You look fine, Mrs. True."
"Do I think so?" Amalia asked thoughtfully, touching the bowed sleeves. "I seem to have bells for shoulders."
"Superfluous sleeves are in style." Penance latched her coachman's leg into the bottom of the carriage, stopping herself from asking Amalia about the strange snippets she'd mentioned the day before. Amalia wasn't one to pontificate and if she hadn't brought it up again, then it meant she didn't know enough to talk about it. Hypothesis and speculation were not her strong suit; she'd make a terrible scientist. That sparked a thought in Penance.
"I spoke with Mary this morning. She's fine with me recording her song." She paused, tilting her head. "Of course, I've still got to finish creating the machine in the first place, but I'm almost there. Just a few last revisions of the electromagnetic wave pulses and a bit more wax, and I'll have her song recorded for any Touched who ever wants to hear it." She gave a triumphant smile.
"Wax..." Amalia repeated, curious and yet not curious enough to inquire about it. "And it will record, even though we're the only ones who can hear it?"
"That's what I'm hoping. Thomas Edison may have all the glory, but he's got nothing on my ability to refine his diaphragm machine to such a sensitivity that it can capture even the faintest of frequencies."
"Yes, Mr. Edison missed out on the thriving market of indiscernible sound recordings." Amalia ignored Penance's petulant stare and pulled on her gloves. "You know I'm teasing you, I think you're the smartest-" she stopped as Penance rounded the front of the carriage in Lavinia's carefully chosen dress, nothing less striking than a Vermeer masterpiece. Floral patterns danced along the flowing pink taffeta, which billowed from a tapered French style waist, down her legs to a laced edge. A silver clip above one hear held her curls in place.
Amalia stared dumbly at her, all too aware of the limits of language. "You look beautiful." She swallowed. "And smart."
The church, although close to the city center, had the seclusion afforded the wealthy, and was set back far from the road along a grassy lane covered in arched oak trees. Its main cathedral was a vaulted rectangle, with a belfry tucked on its side, the bell inside its tower brassy and recently shined.
Amalia had tried to stall them in the carriage for as long as possible, asking one question after another about the process of isolating sound waves in an electromagnetic plane, but Penance quickly caught on to her and pulled her out by her wrist. They stood at the foot of the entry path to the church, Amalia hesitating. "I hate unruly crowds," she said thinly.
Penance glanced at the genteel crowd mingling amongst one another, all muted gray suits and pastels, moving with the unhurried pace of those unused to moving quickly for any reason that didn't involve leisure. "I wouldn't call it unruly."
Taking her hand again, she pulled Amalia along the lane. Augustus was perched behind his sister, who was bestowing a contented yet chilly smile upon an older couple standing in front of her. As they approached, Lavinia broke her attention and offered Penance and Amalia an approving smile, making a brief introduction. Amalia clenched her jaw, waiting for the inevitable, boring question: What is your turn?
Willfully letting Penance go first, she let her eyes and attention drift to the grounds of the church, assessing its layout and proximity to roads and trees, both helpful allies should one either need to flee or hide, then reminded herself she should have to do neither at a Sunday service. She tried to direct her attention to more worldly things: rose bushes lined the sides of the church and around the front of the bell tower, where they led to an overly wide ash tree, its limbs stretching over most of the side church yard. Its large roots were littered with a series of mismatched gravestones that stretched around the entirety of its girth, looking as if they'd been lined up for an eery game of dominoes. This, of course, caught Amalia's attention.
"What is that?" she asked, abandoning the tepid conversation and taking a few steps across the yard.
Penance stopped mid-smile and excused herself, following Amalia. She had heard tales of the bizarre tree and found it discomforting in its strange beauty, as if begging church patrons to notice the horrid along with the holy. Augustus, however, jumped in with the tale as he stepped quickly to catch up to them.
"It's a fascinating venture, actually," he began. "When they expanded the rail line nearby, it terminated at the station just beyond the church's cemetery. No one thought it the best of ideas to disembark at so dreary a sight, so the city exhumed all of the bodies."
"By all means, let's not force daily revelers to acknowledge the one and only common fate that unites us all in the end," Amalia replied. "What did they do with the exhumed?" For the first time, she was actually enjoying a conversation with Augustus.
"They reburied them elsewhere. But, they still had all of these tombstones just piled up."
"Why didn't they place them on the new graves?"
Augustus cleared his throat. "Oh, you see, therein lies the problem. They didn't do the greatest of jobs in logistics. No one had any idea whose parts belonged to who and at the end of it they were buried in one mass grave. Easier, I guess." He caught Penance's grimace and stuttered. "But the gravestones themselves were preserved, at the very least, and put here. A bit of a monument, if you will."
Several of the stones had been consumed by the roots of the tree, and Amalia thought it almost poetic, nature's ability to subsume all in its path, giving home and life again and again. "All because the rail line ended nearby?" she questioned. "That is one way to show respect for the dead. Forcing them to give up a serene resting place for one no better than a tenement house."
Augustus nodded, shrugging. "The price of progress. You would rather them to have been exhumed more carefully?"
"I don't care one way or another. They're dead. I find it amusing how humans find infinite ways to delude themselves into believing their course of action is the right one because it's the one they wish to pursue."
"By all means, let's have more pleasant talk," came Lavinia's voice, who had brought herself closer to them. She beckoned them back toward the stone path toward the church. "That all happened over fifty years ago." She looked up at Penance. "Any new inventions you're working on, dear?"
"As a matter of fact, yes. I'm working on a recorder to capture Mary's song."
"Oh, yes," she said, glancing up at Amalia. "The girl from the opera with the voice that only the Touched can hear."
"It is lovely," Augustus sighed pleasantly, then he frowned, clearing his throat with a quick glance down at his sister. "I imagine it is. Lovely. Or not. Could be horrid." He eked out a nervous laugh that ended in a resigned sigh.
"I don't see Lord Massen just yet," Lavinia said, eyeing those still mingling on the lawn. "But let's go inside, there's more time for conversation after the service." She looked over at Amalia. "You do look striking in that color. Try to keep it on this time."
"Nothing but the holy ghost will get me out of this one," Amalia promised, reluctantly following them inside.
The chapel was quaint in the sense that its plain but wide halls featured shining pews made of expensive cherry wood and stained glass windows featuring scenes of piousness that would rival heaven itself. All of it most assuredly paid for with immense funds from wealthy benefactors. Lavinia sat them near the front toward the altar, a location that made phantom fingers brush Amalia's neck, as if she could feel all the eyes and thoughts behind her. She preferred to gaze upon a room from the back or from near the door, preferably both. She positioned herself behind a woman in a large hat, the better to hide her face from the Bishop, who was slowly passing the lighted candles at the altar and taking his rightful place at the raised pulpit.
Hugo Swann swooped into the pew next to them just as the bell chimed, reaching his hand over in greeting. "Pleasure to meet your acquaintance again, ladies."
Amalia nodded at him. "Lord Swann. Nice not to see all of your parts again."
As the congregation bowed its head in prayer, Amalia took a look around the room, in so much as she could. The main cathedral was long and narrow with two separate sections of rowed off pews. To the right of the altar stretched a wide, short hallway that led to the belfry and the tower. Amalia chanced one look behind her, glancing at the wide double doors at the front of the chapel and the two narrow balconies at the top that held a monochrome robed choir.
A shadow materialized into existence at the far end of the balcony, so fleeting it could have been a floater in her peripheral vision. Amalia blinked, searching for it again, but it was gone. As the prayer ended, the gentleman immediately behind her raised his head and caught her gaze, giving her a reprimanding frown.
"These are confusing times," the Bishop began. "We open our Bibles and read of the miracles of God and Christ. We open are eyes and are confronted with progress that seems to rival these miracles. But, we must not allow progress to blind us to morality. A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls. In these modern times, we must discern progress from the profane. We must distinguish those you use their gifts for good and those who use their gifts for gain."
The air in the chapel felt stolid, stale. It was the air of mindlessness, a sterilized air that made Amalia recall the white, polished walls of the asylum. The sanitized smell was inescapable, and at times the only way she smelled anything different was when she and Maladie hunched on one of their beds with mint that they'd managed to pluck from their guarded time in the gardens, grinding it into their palms. Amalia closed her eyes and leaned closer to Penance, searching for her familiar, pleasant scent of lavender and amber.
"Are you okay?" Penance whispered. She reached into her purse and pulled out a wrapped piece of hard candy and handed it over to Amalia. She took it, grateful to have something to occupy her hands and her attention. The cellophane wrapper was loud, but she ignored the stares of those around her, namely Lavinia, and popped it into her mouth with a cool look back at her. After a few seconds its flavor registered and she gave Penance a surprised glance.
Penance grinned. "It's caramelized brandy," she said, putting a finger to her lips and giving Amalia's hand a squeeze. "Shh."
"Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners," the Bishop continued. "In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Acts that fall outside of God's intention shall be dealt with."
Amalia leaned closer to Penance, whispering under her breath, "Three guesses as to who among us are deemed the ones with the proper anatomy to determine God's intention."
"We know that as we await Jesus's return, there will be Satan's chief that seeks to reign over Earth. The Antichrist, this beast of the sea, is a parody and evil mirror of Christ."
Amalia let the words float by her. She was getting antsy, which meant she began to fidget, which meant people began to notice her which caused her to be antsy all over again. She glanced about her, the parishioners' wearing expressions of complete vacancy as they listened, enraptured, to the Bishop, or of irritation as they caught sight of Amalia's wandering eye. It recalled the common area at the asylum, and of knowing she was both apart from the others there and at the same time, part of their fate.
At the back of the church, perched on the last pew, she saw just the top of a shabby, unkempt hat, a wilted flower half-torn and hanging sloppily from a soiled ribbon. The face was hidden, but Amalia blinked and behind her eyes she saw Maladie's face, the shadowed dark band surrounding her yellow eyes. She blinked them open again, but there was only a dainty straw hat, piled atop with small flowers and ornaments, like an ice cream sundae atop a lady's head. Amalia rocked slightly in the pew, her fingers reaching to worry the fabric of her skirt, hoping to keep both images of the future and the past at bay long enough for her to make it out of the service and into fresh air. Penance seemed to intuit her agitation, and again clasped her hand, hiding their entwined fingers in the folds of their skirts.
"But make no mistake, the Son will return and expose this evil, this Antichrist, and all of his followers as impostors. This deluded Antichrist will be cast back from which he came. But we must be ready."
Amalia shifted again, fingers nervously rubbing against one another, but instead of a ripple, she felt an increasing strain at the sides of her head, the kind that came from trying to block untruths from seeping into her brain. The Bishop's voice continued to drone, and Amalia imagined herself standing on the pew, looking down at the vacant faces and using a turn she didn't have to melt unactivated brain matter until it leaked through their ears. Again, she blinked, almost wishing a ripple would come to her, as her sanity was having a hard time subsisting in the present. As the choir began a quiet hymn, she slipped past Penance and toward the door, launching herself back into the rightful colors of the world. She took a deep breath. A moment later Hugo joined her, his hands in his pockets, and she gave a belabored sigh to signal her annoyance.
"Sometimes I think listening to a stock ticker would be more exciting," he said. "And helpful."
"You don't strike me as the church-going type anymore than I am."
"Church is about appearances. I do have to keep them up from time to time." His constant inability to keep still irked Amalia, as if he were made of a lolling river, all slow movement and gesture. "Besides, I know many of these men."
"Yes, you men all seem to know one another." She looked up at him. "Do you know these men or do you terrify them?"
"Both." He smiled. "You strike the same sort of fear, I see. I've heard that Mary Brighton is now in your good care. If it's all the same to you, I thought I may swing by and pay her a visit one day."
"We're not allowing visitors," Amalia said, taking a step onto the grass toward the rosebush, but he followed her. She noted that despite the looming lunch hour, the moon was full and visible in the sky. Nature was toying with her today, too.
"You see, my club was a source of employment for her," Swann continued. "And I do still have a vacancy should she wish to resume her performances. Same goes for any of your girls that are of age. I provide steady wages and room and board."
Amalia turned to look up at him. "Mary is fine where she is. What is your club, that it requires the presence of the Touched? I have a colleague who can break things with her hands. Perhaps she'd be interested."
"It's exclusive."
"So you say, and yet I imagine every man with a half-life of a cock inside that church has been offered an invitation." Amalia pressed her finger to a thorn alongside a blooming rose, hoping it would puncture the ballooning animosity in her chest. "You are a sad boy, pulling at the skirt sleeves of power and yet you think yourself an emperor because you've figured out that people are enamored by and ashamed of their own desires." She pulled her finger away, glancing at the bead of blood at its tip. "Aren't you special." She rolled her eyes and left him, miffed that she was spending her sacred Sunday tottering between the pretentious pontiff and the pompous prick.
After the service, the congregation lingered both inside the church and out, the sermon's words still clinging to them like spores of pollen. A picnic table had been set up in the garden to lieu them back to more worldly concerns. A crystal bowl of lemonade and platters of finger sandwiches had been laid out on a white tablecloth, a dainty emulation of the last supper. As they stood just outside the church doors, Amalia, neither calm nor hungry, took the liberty to fish around in Penance's pocket for another brandy candy.
"Mrs. True, how did you find the sermon?" Lavinia asked, shading her eyes from the midday sun.
"Trivial."
"That is the incorrect answer."
"I thought you asked my opinion."
"It's church. There are no opinions."
"I found it inspiring," Penance tried, handing Amalia another piece of candy and brushing her exploring hand from her pocket. "Of course, the listening is only one part of it. The hard part is distilling it into one's everyday life, to use your talents for the good of others. That's the point, I imagine." She paused. "And avoiding the Antichrist, I guess?"
"What she said," Amalia pronounced, popping a candy into her mouth with a loud suck.
Lord Massen walked grimly up to them, austerity clouding his face like a veil. "Mrs. True and Miss Adair, it is nice to see you again and in one piece." His eye lingered on Amalia, but he turned his attention to Penance. "A scientist you are, right Miss Adair? Tell me, what are your thoughts on religion in tandem with all of our recent progress?"
Penance smiled, undeterred. "Oh, God is right in the middle of it. Science will never be able to unlock the holiest of mysteries, but that perseverance in spite of everything is the very definition of meaning, I think. Makes us human."
He nodded, impressed, as if she'd passed some sort of test. "And you, Mrs. True?"
Amalia met his eyes with an unbothered gaze, pushing the candy lozenge to her cheek. "I don't think God occupies herself with Earthly matters anymore than a fish or a bear occupies itself with the complexities of a city sewage system. Although it is very vain and human to think so. And if she did, then I would hope she would turn her attention to pressing a weighty and manicured nail to our imbalanced scales of justice."
"You think God a woman?"
"I find that no less plausible than thinking her a man. God is likely neither and we keep up this delusion because our brains couldn't possibly hold actual truths without slithering out through our ears." She took some pleasure in turning her imagined thought into reality, if a poor version of it.
"And you know this truth?"
"No, I don't. And I'm aware enough to know that I needn't know it. It doesn't take a holy epiphany or fear of the Antichrist to know enough to treat others with dignity."
Lord Massen looked at her with a gleam in his eye, like a man often searching for a challenge and never quite finding one worth his time. That is when Amalia knew she had misjudged him. For the very thing she thought might repel him only attracted him. Being adored was at times more cumbersome than being disliked. Lavinia seemed to notice the spark of his attention, touching Penance's arm and beckoning her toward a group of ladies, vacating a space that the Bishop quickly filled. He walked over and took Amalia's hand with a smile.
"I see you are familiar with Lord Massen, a gracious presence in our congregation."
Lord Massen demurred with a wave of his hand, which the Bishop took as all the more reason to continue with his idolatry. "Despite his own personal grief, he rises above it and ensures the posterity of our great nation. It is a service for which we are thankful. As the scripture says, 'Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.'" The Bishop offered a needy smile at Lord Massen and Amalia's stomach turned at the silent transaction that was occurring between them, one that would most likely lead to another pane of stained glass or a marble bust of St. Peter, all in exchange for Lord Massen's money and his name. The Bishop shook Lord Massen's hand and begged his leave, no doubt going down the line of tithers and greasing his church coffers.
"Do you read scripture?" Lord Massen asked her.
"I can."
"That verse is from the book of Peter," Lord Massen said.
"Yes, there are so many books to remember," Amalia breathed. "After awhile, you keep adding volumes and you're bound to contradict yourself."
"We are all but boundless contradictions."
"Yes," Amalia agreed. "For example, you claim to espouse a wish to preserve the integrity of our great nation at the peril of a third of its citizens." She saw no need to continue beating around the bush and stepped closer to him. "Do you know the extracurricular activities of your esteemed doctor, Edmund Hague?"
"I've read his studies."
"You've commissioned some of his research for your purposes. Some of his torture. Do you know how he comes about his test subjects? What he does to them?"
"I'm not a scientist, Mrs. True." He peered at her with the distance of someone watching a gladiator match play out from the emperor's box. Amalia felt suddenly small, her fists clenching at her sides although she knew they wouldn't help her with an adversary like Lord Massen.
"Mrs. True, you are a smart woman and as one entrusted with the care of the Touched by the good Ms. Bidlow, I'm sure you've put thought into how to ensure those with turns that could be a danger to others can best be cared for. That is my interest as well."
"I can understand that your feelings toward the Touched may be complex." Amalia treaded lightly. "I have not heard of any Touched succumbing after the event. What befell your daughter is a rare tragedy and I am sorry for your cruel loss."
Lord Massen bowed his head. "What you call a gift could be an affliction that one day could be treated as the anomalies that they are."
"I continue to take offense at your labeling it an affliction," Amalia said, particularly considering that she found her own turn frustratingly afflicting at times. It was that small uncertainty in herself, that if left unchecked, could blossom into shame. She saw that same uncertainty sometimes flicker as contrition in the eyes of the girls as they passed headlines espousing the dangers of the Touched. Society bent on convincing them that they were grotesque.
Amalia continued, undeterred. "Funds could be allocated to assist the Touched with special schooling, trusted places in their communities where they could learn to control their turns. Ms. Bidlow's gracious funds only go so far, and I don't see a reason why she should be the one savior of the Touched. Parliament could easily allocate resources to help its citizens."
As if sensing he had expired his good graces, Lord Massen changed course. "There is a committee being put together to ascertain this issue of the Touched. There is appetite to have one of the afflicted join as an ex-oficio member. Ms. Bidlow has tried to convince me that perhaps you should be that individual."
"You are putting together a committee of Untouched men to determine the fate of the Touched?" Amalia nodded, amused. "And you invite me the sole individual to represent all of them?"
Lord Massen chuckled. "What do you expect, there are no Touched in Parliament."
"Yes, and I know you'd like to keep it that way." Amalia spoke plainly. "You can attempt to fight the scourge of modernity all you want, but what you fail to realize is that you've wrongly defined what it is that is happening."
"And what is that?"
"The tipping of the balance of power."
He didn't respond, instead giving her a cordial smile. "A formal invitation will be forthcoming."
Amalia watched him leave, glad for the moment to stand alone. Penance was easy to find among the crowd, her heeled boots giving her height over the women standing near her, clearly enthralling them with the perks of a recent invention. Amalia wove her way through the parishioners, avoiding their glances as best she could, and retrieved two glasses of lemonade before joining Penance and handing her a glass.
"You see," Penance was saying, her eyes shimmering with excitement, "the rotating fan creates an abundance of pressure, creating a vacuum within the chamber. That allows the tube to siphon dirt from almost any surface."
"Are you regaling them with tale of your vacuum cleaner machine?" Amalia said with a smile.
Penance eyed her. "I'm still working on the name."
"How about dust sucker?" asked one of the ladies.
Amalia didn't hear Penance's response, because she was at that moment being sucked away from the group and into a ripple, suddenly overcome with a feeling of losing her balance. Her feet floundered on a wooden plank, and she was surrounded by wooden beams and long, thick ropes, the church bell directly in front of her, so close she could reach out and touch it. Before she could, she was siphoned back to the present, jarring both herself and her lemonade, sloshing some onto her glove. Penance took her hand, steadying her, but Amalia pulled it away, her focus on the bell tower up ahead. She took a step towards it, but then stopped, wondering at the freedom there may be in simply ignoring the tug of her ripple for once. Why must she always pursue things so heartily? If it was to come, then it would. She turned her attention back to the women and tacked a smile back on her face.
"Miss Adair, your inventions are meant to be a godsend, I do say," one of the women continued, a yellow ribbon dangling from her hat. "It is not lost on me that the inventions of the day seem to be catered to men. For example, they are excited about their motor cars, which merely make it easier for them to leave the home. They say that necessity is the mother of invention, but I do think piddling is the father of progress." She tittered and sighed. "Boys will be boys, indeed." The woman turned and motioned over a middle-aged man lurking near them, whose mousy brown hair fell in boyish curls over his forehead. "Deacon Burgess here is in charge of our program to help clothe the homeless. We've all donated some of our finest dresses to his efforts."
"Mrs. True," he said with a smile, "I have been waiting to catch you. Ms. Bidlow often tells me of the wonderful job you do at the orphanage. I am wondering at some of your methods in reaching out to those who may not be inclined to so readily accept help." He glanced at the women and took a step away from them, leading Amalia by the elbow. "For example, girls working in brothels and the like."
"Well, it strikes me that perhaps they're in less need of clothes." Amalia sucked her cheek to prevent from smiling, but Deacon Burgess caught on after a helpless moment and let out a relieved laugh.
"Something tells me that if I'm to really help people, I might employ a sense of humor as biting as yours." He blushed. "Or at the least perhaps take myself less seriously. But, I would like your advice, if you could spare it."
It took a moment for Amalia to realize he was serious. She couldn't recall the last time a man asked her a question and then waited for her to supply the answer. It was refreshing. "Well, the orphanage isn't framed as a handout, rather than a community. Left to our own devices, we'd toil away at our individual tasks and insecurities, but a shared goal always helps bring people together. But, if I may be frank, you may have a lot more success if you thought of your work less as charity and more as how to empower these women in a more permanent way. Offer them childcare if they need it or a safe place to gather, eat, and commune without any overbearing sense of judgment. And if needed, offer them dresses with sensible sleeves."
Penance stepped up, her mind whirring behind her eyes as she unintentionally interrupted them. "Dust dredger." She scrunched her nose. "Dirt annihilator." She glanced at Amalia for feedback, who offered only a silent but supportive grimace. Penance sighed. "I'll keep thinking." She thought. "Clean Machine?"
Amalia smiled, much preferring the lightness of this conversation than the dreary ones she'd had thus far, and she appreciated how Penance effortlessly made the rest of the world disappear. "Dirtless Delight?" she offered, then thought better of it. "Doesn't have the right ring to it."
"Speaking of ring, have you seen the renovated bell tower?" the Deacon asked.
Amalia's face fell, her ripple following her despite her best efforts. "No," she answered warily, already knowing what was coming next.
"Oh, it is quite grand. We spent a penny on it last year buttressing the stone and restoring the bell's varnish. Come, I'll show you."
Amalia watched, resigned, as the Deacon led Penance toward the bell tower. "Goddamn fate," she sighed, following them.
Penance did a much better job at faking her fascination with the belfry, which, as Amalia stood in the the center of the tower floor and glanced up, seemed just like any other bell tower, complete with ropes, pulleys, and a frightfully narrow circular stair winding its way to the top. Amalia squinted up at the bell, if only to feign enough interest not to have to actually engage in actual conversation. Unease trickled from the back of her neck and down her spine as she spied a pair of black boots, splayed open and dangling from one of the darkened ledges above the bell. That was all Amalia could see, the pair of mocking boots, until Maladie bent forward out of the shadows, black ribboned-eyes wide with silent joy.
Amalia gasped, then attempted to cover it with a yawn as the Deacon glanced apprehensively at her. "Well, I must get back to the congregation," he said, insecurity flashing across his face, and Amalia felt slightly bad for the yawn.
"I'm sorry," she said, "I'm still recovering from the sermon. Talk of the Antichrist makes me drowsy." She caught Penance's eye. "Why don't you accompany the Deacon back outside? I'd rather enjoy a reverent moment to myself."
Penance didn't think for a moment that Amalia wanted to slip to her knees and offer a prayer, but she did think that the tiresome chatter and the societal engagement was wearing on her, so she smiled and followed the Deacon back out of the cathedral. Amalia waited until the sound of their footsteps on the marble floor faded completely, the long squeak of the door signaling their exit, and then she resumed her place in the center of belfry, craning her neck. "What the hell are you doing here?" she called up, her voice echoing above her.
"Listening to the voice of God."
Amalia couldn't see Maladie any longer, and turned a three hundred and sixty degree turn, her neck beginning to ache. "I imagine me asking you to come down is pointless."
When she got no response, she sighed, eyeing the vary narrow set of stairs. As she started to climb, she realized they were more like a ladder, and she kept a paranoid eye out for Maladie, but the tower was quiet. Amalia reached the top of the ladder and carefully poked her head above the narrow wooden ledge that circled the bell, fully expecting, and most likely deserving, Maladie's boot to connect with her face. But she saw nothing but a fine layer of dust covering the bell.
"Is now a good time to apologize for kicking you in the face?" she asked, her voice hollow in the still chamber. She sighed, stepping gingerly onto the rickety ledge, which she saw was held up only by a series of thin wooden poles that connected it to the top of the tower. Amalia edged carefully around the ledge, which was no wider than the length of her foot, and caught sight of the black boots sticking out from under a tarp covering the wheel of a pulley.
Amalia came to a stop in front of the boots and crossed her arms. "I am sorry."
When Maladie didn't reply, Amalia began to lose her patience. Annoyed, she slammed her heel down on the toe of the black boot, taking some pleasure in the yelp that came with it.
Maladie threw back the tarp and her fist came flying outward, but Amalia was more than ready and veered her head to the side, catching herself on the thin rail. She waited a beat, ensuring Maladie's other fist wasn't going to fly at her, before asking, "What are you doing here?"
"Never took you as a religious one," Maladie said, avoiding the question. "How is our dear songbird Mary? Figure out how you're going to use her yet?"
"She's safe."
"I don't care," Maladie sung needlessly, stepping from her perch along the pulley wheel and loping around the ledge. Amalia watched her, bracing herself with her other hand as the ledge bounded with Maladie's movement. She was all too certain it wasn't meant to hold more than one person at a time, much less one with the energy of an excited meerkat.
"How did you know I would be here?" Amalia pressed. "Are you following me?"
"Do I seem the type to have that kind of attention span?" Maladie asked. She pulled a dangling rope and hoisted herself on top of the church bell, shimmying her hips to straddle the tiny shaft that connected it to the ceiling and allowing her stolen choir robe to peel open. "Have you heard what the doctors are calling what's between our legs now? Saying we've got teeth tucked inside us, ready to snap off a cock the moment it enters. Funny, you'd think that would make them less likely to poke around in there, but it don't. I think it's more like a bell, don't you? Wide and open and depending on where you strike it, you can make it sing."
Amalia was not amused. "Climb down from the bell."
"Afraid I'll fall?"
"I'm afraid I'll push you."
"You went after the doctor to get to me." Maladie smiled, as if Amalia had sent her a card and a bouquet of flowers. "Like old times. You used to be so protective." She reached out a hand to Amalia, waiting for her to take it. After a second, Amalia did, watching as Maladie slid off the bell and bumped into her, causing her to grip on the rail, which rattled beneath her hand. Heights didn't tend to bother Amalia, but that's because she never tended to look down, and her stomach roiled slightly at the sight of the marble floor beneath them.
"I went to the doctor's to get to Mary," Amalia corrected, regaining her stance as she straightened. "Not to you."
Maladie's fist darted out for the second time, clipping Amalia's ear violently and causing her hearing to blink out for a moment, forcing her to struggle to regain her balance all over again. She let go of the rail and inched to the side, leaning into the pulley.
"A kick to the face wasn't a very nice way of showing gratitude for me rescuing you, was it?" Maladie angled her head, taking on a mocking parental tone. "Was it?"
"Saving my life?" Amalia spat, her eyes darting up and taking in the scaffolding above the bell. "I was bleeding out."
"You wish," Maladie crooned, jumping in place on the ledge, and Amalia couldn't help but dart a nervous glance at the ceiling, where the poles clanked in their brackets.
"Is that why you're here? For an apology?" Amalia put a hand to her ear, her voice sounding far away. "I doubt that."
"I thought we could do some exploring in the doctor's tunnels."
"Why would we want to do that?"
Maladie gave a dazed look. "The doctor may not be the Adam he professes to be," she said, raising a finger. "He says he's dutiful to his God, but he has secrets." Maladie stomped closer, the ledge jostling beneath her heavy boots.
Amalia braced herself against the pulley, frowning at Maladie. "You couldn't have worn ballet flats?"
Maladie came close to her face as she breathed, "He has secrets. And he serves many Gods."
Amalia shook her head, not understanding. "And you've been in his tunnels, Sarah? Is that it? Why would I care about them?"
Maladie gave her an odd look, as if she'd sprung a second head. "Because he keeps secrets and serves many Gods," she repeated. She shook her head and exhaled a disappointed sigh. "If our fate is truly up to you, like you say it is, then we're royally fucked. You've been out on good behavior for what, two years? And what have you got to show for it? While he slithers his way under the water like an eel."
Amalia forced herself off the pulley and took a step closer to the stairwell as the back of her neck tightened. "I said that to you?" she asked. "Did I tell you that the Touched's fate was in my hands?"
Maladie closed in on her, wrapping a hand around her throat and pulling her back around the ledge. "Are you insane? Again?" Maladie looked carefully at her. "You pretending you don't remember us?"
Amalia swallowed, swiftly edging her arm underneath Maladie's and twisting it so that her fingers came loose from her neck. "No, I remember us. Tell me what's in the tunnels."
Maladie reacted at her impatience, a door sliding shut behind her eyes. Amalia had lost the moment. Maladie leaned back precariously over the rail, tipping her head to the ceiling. "Can I come live with you at the orphanage? It seems like a nice place. If you don't have a bed, then I can make room. Which girl is your most troublesome?" She straightened and slid a finger mockingly across her own throat.
"No." Amalia looked at her, saddened by the idea that she had no idea where Maladie would be best served, where her rightful place was after so much damage. "I do care about the doctor's secrets. I know he is working for members of Parliament. I think they mean to make the case to openly and freely harm the Touched. To lock us all away."
"Been there, done that, haven't we?" Maladie asked nostalgically. "It wasn't so bad in the beginning. You were a total nutcase, you remember? They tied you down and I'd sing those songs to you, the ones you taught me."
As she spoke, Amalia could see the song, more than hear it, as if she could see the waves of the melody. And yet, she had no idea what Maladie was talking about. "No. I don't remember. I'm sorry, but I don't."
"I don't want you saying that," Maladie hissed. "Especially since I know it ain't true, Mrs. True. I know you're not sorry. You're not sorry for anything. Why be sorry when you have a mission, ay?"
Amalia was losing her balance again and it wasn't due to the narrow landing beneath her feet, but rather an overwhelming sense of some revelation ready to strike. "Did I tell you that?" she asked again.
"Why do you keep playing at that?" Maladie took a step forward, wrapping an arm around Amalia's neck and pulling her eye to eye, examining her. "You trying to trick me? I know you are, I expect it and all, since I don't fucking trust you, but I wanted to have a nice chat before I sliced your face."
"You do trust me, you just hate yourself for it," Amalia replied. "Same with God. You hate their God, you hate what it did to you." Then something came to her, a knowing more than a memory and she spoke plainly: "Your God throws a veil across your eyes and yes, I think you should kill him."
They both looked at one another, startled as if they'd both heard a whisper from the past, and Maladie pushed her back. "Don't talk like that. That's the demon talk, that's what fucked it all up, Molly. You're a demon."
Amalia had a flash of their room, the dingy whiteness of the walls and the calm, trusting pool of Sarah's eyes. "I said that to you." This time, she didn't phrase it as a question. She was certain. "Sarah, what happens to you when your eyes glow? What happens during your turn?"
Maladie rolled her eyes, bored. "Like I haven't been asked that one before. Get a new pickup line, nurse."
"Do you hear thoughts?"
Maladie put her hands to her ears, frustration seeping into her eyes. "Get me worked up and I'll show you."
"I know that your gift sets you apart from the rest of us," Amalia tried again. "You remember the event, don't you?" She let go of the rail and walked closer, searching Maladie's face, the answer plainly there in her cracked expression. "And I remembered, too, didn't I? I told you everything."
Maladie rocked on her heel, swallowing, and wiping a hand across her nose. "You lied to me, is what. That's why you're a demon. I saw the insides of you with my mind and I saw it was real, but if it was real, you wouldn't have left me there." She shook her head, letting out a frustrated grunt. "I got my own mission now, anyhow."
Maladie took a step forward and pushed against the bell as hard as she could, watching as it moved and let out a resounding gong that pinched the insides of Amalia's ears. She chanced a glance out of the windowed grate, a couple of parishioners' heads turning curiously up toward the tower. "Don't do that."
"I think I'm going to look out for myself for a change."
"That would not be a change."
"Play a game with me."
"I don't like games."
"You'd like this one, the stakes are high." Maladie pushed into the bell and it rung out again. "You know a bell can sound out a whole chord at one time? It can relay any message, pain, grief, terror, sadness. All of those things are right in the belly of it, and it's just waiting to be hit, to let all of it out."
"Stop ringing the goddamned bell," Amalia warned her.
"But it's the voice of the angels. Oh wait, Mary is your angel, right? Our angel? That was it, wasn't it?"
"She will bring us together," Amalia replied. "You could be a part of that. A part of us."
Maladie's eyes shifted as if thoughts ran just underneath her forehead, like she was watching a film strip in her head. "No, her song is more than that." Finally, something came together for her and a light dawned in her shadowed eyes, a small smile playing at her lips. "You really don't remember?"
Amalia's blood ran cold. "I told you what she is," she whispered.
Maladie offered her a maniacal grin. "Guess you could say that I know you better than you know yourself. Ironic." She moved toward the bell again, but this time Amalia pushed her back against the window grate, catching her fists with her own and forcing them to her sides.
"The bell is part of the game, silly." She looked at Amalia as if trying to penetrate her. "You need me."
Amalia felt Maladie's pulse beat rapidly as she held her wrists. "Are the doctor's secrets in his tunnels? Where?"
Maladie ignored her and glanced through the slats, staring down at the churchgoers surrounding the picnic table. "Which of the men do you think I put the clue in?"
"What?" Amalia asked, letting up on her grip, dread settling inside her.
"A little scavenger hunt. Perfect for a Sunday church picnic, wouldn't you say?" Maladie raised her eyebrows. "How about we ring the bell and get it started? Third times a charm in a place like this. Holy trinity and all that shit."
She lunged toward the bell once more, but Amalia caught the tail end of her robe and pulled her back, causing Maladie to lose her footing and grab hold of one of the ropes running toward the ceiling. She scrambled up it, bare legs spidering out of her robe, and stepped onto another, narrower plank that ran over the top of the bell. She edged toward a small platform, where several sandbags anchored a tangle of ropes.
Amalia looked up, following Maladie's movement, and realized too late that one of the sandbags was falling towards her. She turned, but not in time, and it caught the edge of her shoulder, pummeling her downward with the force of a hammer. The right side of her body slid off the ledge, dangling unhelpfully, while her left hand shot out to catch the railing, which came loose in her hand. Amalia swallowed panic as her left leg screamed as she strained to hold it around the ledge just long enough for her right hand to find purchase on a rope, hissing as its burn cut into her palm. She swung her leg off the ledge to a wooden scaffold along the wall, her face nearly ramming into it. Taking a moment to curse and catch her breath, she looked up to see Maladie scrambling back down to the lower ledge.
Amalia leaned away from the scaffold and leapt back to the small platform, the poles jostling at the ceiling, a screw clanking loose. She surged forward and caught Maladie's arm, both of them locked in a one-armed stalemate, like two fighting elephants, as each tried to stay balanced while leveraging what strength they had left over to land a sloppy punch.
Amalia used their deadlock to brace herself, leaning into Maladie as she raised a leg and caught her in the kidney, doubling her over. Amalia wasted no time in pushing her towards the stairwell, thinking it the most expedient and safest way to get the hell off of the tower and away from the bell. Because while Amalia was distracted in the tower, Maladie's lackeys were most likely outside readying themselves for whatever life and death game they were all about to play.
Maladie, still hunched over clutching her stomach, rammed into Amalia with a forceful thrust of her head. Amalia grunted and lurched off the ledge, pulling Maladie with her, and she glanced down as her legs swung. Maladie caught herself, scrambling backwards onto the plank, and Amalia held on, giving her no choice but to pull her up as well.
Before Amalia could express misplaced gratitude at feeling of the platform beneath her again, she was flipped and pinned against its surface. She felt a rope winding around her neck, felt it pulling tighter, then felt Maladie's boot come down on the ledge, once, then twice, and the third time cracking the plank, sending Amalia sliding down just enough for the rope to catch at her neck. She half lay, half hung, only her back supported by the broken plank, watching Maladie pant above her, out of breath.
"Just give me a fucking second to ring the bell," Maladie hissed. "You're ruining the fun."
"What happens when you ring the bell?" Amalia wheezed, pulling at the rope with her fingers, her feet dangling from the plank. "I'll play your game, but no one can get hurt."
"Not interested."
Amalia eyed the knife glinting from inside Maladie's robe, latched against her thigh. Letting go of the rope, she gagged as it cut into her windpipe, but she needed both of her hands, one to reach for the knife and one to reach for Maladie. Feeling as if the rope would cut her neck in two, she yanked the knife free and slashed the rope above her head, feeling herself start to slide down the broken plank as she grabbed Maladie's leg with her other hand, counting on her not to fall. The slack rope still wound around her neck, Amalia used both arms to claw her way back to the ledge along Maladie's body. Maladie kicked her off and backed again towards the bell, attempting to distance herself from Amalia long enough to ring it.
But Amalia, tired, angry, and annoyed, ran at her, the platform rocking under her feet and the force of her body sending both of them slamming into the grated window. The wood cracked, and both of them locked eyes as Maladie fell backward and used her momentum to pull Amalia with her, fresh air rushing at them as they began a flight of angels all too certain to end with a fall from grace.
Penance was in the middle of nodding along at the Bishop's unique beliefs that unkempt facial hair could hide the Antichrist among men, when she caught sight of a large crow, or what she thought to be a crow, at the window of the bell tower above the Bishop's head. For the slightest of seconds, Penance thought perhaps his obsession with demons had led one to burst from the bald patch on the back of his head.
The grate from the bell tower window burst with a splitting crack and Penance's heart, if not her mind, absorbed the sight of fine green silk sailing out from the window. She barely had time to scream before the unfortunate bundle that could only be Amalia plunged into the bed of rosebushes, sending buds and blooms flying violently toward the picnic table. Penance didn't afford herself the luxury of shock and ran immediately toward the roses, even as others stood flummoxed around her.
Penance glimpsed boots sticking out from the bush, too many of them, and stopped short with a startled scream as Maladie's head popped up from the greenery, her nose bloodied and a halo of roses caught among her tangled hair.
"Hello, pretty."
Penance took a step back, Maladie halting whatever progress she had been intending to make toward Amalia, whose boots were still sticking out of the bush. A groan came from it, making the leaves shiver, and Amalia indelicately tumbled out, a deep, red scratch visible along her cheek.
"Just a couple of old friends having a catch-up," Maladie called, attempting to help Amalia up by the arm, a gesture that was violently shrugged off. Maladie gave a conspiratorial glance at Penance, one that felt like thorns pricking her skin. "This one always did get violent before chapel." She glanced admonishingly at Amalia. "Violence begets violence."
Penance took all of this in with the fright and bewilderment of someone on a time delay. She thought she heard Maladie's words and she thought she saw the familiarity with which she touched Amalia. But this was all happening in slow motion, and Penance was afraid of what might happen when her comprehension caught up to speed, afraid of what she was about to suddenly understand. She barely heard the Bishop as he called from behind her, "What the devil is that?"
Amalia was caught in the stop motion world, too, taking in Penance, the Bishop, and his shocked congregation, a fearful flock still in the process of determining whether to watch in horror or to flee. Maladie was beside her, leaning into her with a whisper. "Bet you can't guess which pocket holds the prize." She shrugged. "I don't know, either, that was all Bonfire Annie. But good luck, ay?" She cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled as if commanding an army of fallen angels: "HELLFIRE!"
Amalia moved even before she knew exactly where she was supposed to be headed. But then she caught sight of Bonfire Annie, who rounded two fireballs in her palms, firing each of them in separate directions. The balls exploded, igniting on the backs of two separate men, one of whom happened to be the Bishop.
Amalia rammed through the parishioners and toward closest of the two men, a gentleman in a gray suit, flames rising from the back of his jacket. She pulled the edge of the tablecloth from the picnic table, scattering dishes and plates of pickled sandwiches like a none to skilled magician. The bowl of lemonade cracked as it slid from the table, but Amalia was already leaping onto the man, wrapping the cloth around him and rolling him to the ground. In the blink of an eye, she was on her feet, heading for the flaming arms of the Bishop, knocking him down and using her skirt to pat out the flames across his chest. Smoke rose around them enveloping them in a terrible stench that made her cough and wheeze. The Bishop moaned underneath her, the sides of his hair slightly singed and standing upwards, giving him the look of a worn out devil, but he was no longer on fire. Amalia contemplated him, and then reached her hand into his pants pocket, uncaring of where her fingers were roaming, and brought out a small ball of metal and wires wrapped in parchment. She pulled out the sphere, turning it toward her and gasping as an artificial eye stared back at her. On the parchment was a crude map, its edges singed and its lines almost unreadable, and Amalia cursed Maladie under her breath for her calamitous planning.
The smoke wafted toward the branches of the ash tree, clearing the air around them and Amalia looked up at the crowd, their mouths pitched in horror as if they were looking through a window into hell itself. Amalia was still straddling the Bishop, her skirt singed and burnt through in places, but was too tired to care of any seeming impropriety, and she guessed the Bishop was too relieved to care. The abject faces peered at her as the crowd began its low murmuring, and Amalia felt that she had done something that needed to be done and that made sense to her, but that left her feared by those looking upon her. And one of those people currently looking at her was Penance. Amalia swallowed the ball in her throat and focused instead on the dependable, short fuse of anger always ready to ignite in her chest. She climbed slowly to her feet, exhaustion slumping her shoulders and her sleeves singed to nothing, the two men still prone on the ground and Maladie and Bonfire Annie long gone.
Amalia glanced accusingly at the congregation staring back at her. "Is someone going to ring the medics, then?"