The inventor would emerge from these long sessions with a red face and dripping brow, and she would go to him and hold him and thank him for all of his efforts on her behalf. She could see how tired he was, but also how driven. She rarely saw him at all during those strange, wild days and nights. Yet he appeared to appreciate these moments of kindness and affection, reminding her that whatever happened, whatever he had to sacrifice, he would not give up on his daughter.
And so when the attacks came with increasing regularity she tried her best to be strong, and not to think of those fork-tongued demons awaiting her with their tridents and lascivious eyes.
* * *
Almost two months passed. The girl became weaker still, and took to her bed, no longer able to manage even the small activities of daily life. The stairs were now a mountain to her, the walk to the privy a mile-long excursion.
That was when the inventor finally emerged, triumphant, from his study. He burst into her room unannounced, his eyes wild with success. She remembered feeling not joy, but fear at his wild, frenetic manner. He was trembling as he took her hand, squeezed it, and told her how he had finally found the answer to their prayers. He would mend her broken heart, and she would never have to leave him.
Her relief was palpable. She thanked him profusely for everything he had done and told him that, had he not come to the orphanage that day over ten years earlier and whisked her away from that dreadful place, she would already be dead. He had given her life simply by offering her a place in the world.
He wept tears of relief. Then, anxious not to risk even a moment longer to the vagaries of the damaged organ in her breast, he scooped her up and carried her down the stairs to his study.
She remembered how the smoke stung her eyes, how the marble slab was cold and harsh beneath her shoulders as he laid her out before him. Books were propped open on wooden lecterns all around him, and a gleaming object, forged from brass, rested upon his workbench.
She told him she was scared. He smiled warmly and assured her that she need not fear anything. The procedure would take some time. In the meantime, he would help her sleep. That way, her pretty face would not have to be blemished by any pain she might suffer as he carried out his operation.
She trusted him without question, so she willingly acceded to his wishes, deeply inhaling the fumes of the foul-smelling chemical he presented to her on a rag. Her mind swirled, and soon the dizziness overcame her, sending her spiralling into a deep slumber.
She dreamed of devils and demons, of searing flames and eternal damnation. It was five days before she woke.
She recalled how she struggled to sit up in her bed, the curious sense that her body felt somehow different, awkward and ungainly. She felt the weight of something pressing on her left shoulder. In the darkened room, she imagined it to be a bandage strapped tightly across her chest.
Whatever her father had done for her had worked. She could sense her body was already stronger, flushed with vibrancy and life. He had fulfilled his promises and saved her from the demons that were slowly eroding her heart.
Hesitantly, she swung her legs out over the side of the bed and climbed unsteadily to her feet. She fumbled for a candle and lit it from the dying embers of the fire that still glowed faintly in the grate. She carried the candle to the looking glass so that she might examine his work; see how the colour had returned to her cheeks.
At first the sight of the stranger that confronted her baffled her. Had she been confused and inadvertently gone to the window instead? Who was this demonic woman who glowered at her in confusion?
Then realisation had dawned on her and she screamed. The sound that erupted from her throat was like none she had heard before. What had he done?
The woman staring back at her from the looking glass was covered in the same elaborate symbols as the walls in the inventor’s study: circles and whorls, pentagrams and stars, runes and words. They covered her entirely from head to toe. Not an inch of her still-pale flesh remained untouched.
She tried rubbing at the strange marks, wiping them away, but they refused to be scrubbed clean. They were etched deep into her flesh, as much a part of her now as the tiny blemishes and imperfections that she’d noted as a child. Furthermore, nestled amongst the ink-black tattoos were traceries of precious metals: silver, platinum, and gold. They shimmered in the reflected candlelight, highlighting particular symbols or runes like accents on particular words.
Worst of all, the tightness she had felt across her shoulder was not, as she had thought, a tightly bound bandage, but the brass instrument she had seen on the workbench in the inventor’s study. It was a brace that fit over her shoulder like a sword guard. She could feel the mechanisms inside it slowly turning, hear the gurgling rush of fluid as her blood passed through the metal chambers inside. A tiny key jutted from a hole in its surface-a winding mechanism, she realised, with which to operate it. This was her new heart, the clockwork engine that would beat in place of her own.
On the front of the device, filling the space where her left breast had once been, was a glass panel like the porthole on a ship. Inside she could see the shrivelled remains of her own damaged organ, now black and necrotic and fused to her new, unnatural components.
She wanted to turn and run from her horrific image, to pretend that she was still dreaming, that the living hell she had glimpsed in the mirror was just another trial, another imaginary torment placed before her by the demons and the old woman. But she now knew the true nature of her damnation. She had been saved from the clutches of the devil by the ministrations of the inventor, but the devil had found a means to punish her regardless: The fallen one had worked through her father, imbuing him with dark intent and the occult powers with which to afflict her.
Something broke inside of her, then. A cold numbness seemed to spread outwards from the void in her chest until it utterly engulfed her. She had lost her heart, and from that day onwards, she would never feel anything again.
CHAPTER 15
“Are you sure this is where Sir Charles suggested we meet?” said Veronica, shielding her eyes from the dazzling afternoon sun.
“Do you doubt me?” asked Newbury, chuckling.
“No. But I do know you,” she said, playfully.
Newbury smiled impishly. “I protest! I am quite innocent, Miss Hobbes. I understand from Charles that Professor Angelchrist proposed the location of our little get-together. Although, I admit, I have been rather anxious to pay a visit since the exhibition opened last week.”
“Yes, I thought you might be,” said Veronica, grinning. “Well, come along, then. Let’s take a look.” She hooked her arm through his and led him across the lawn towards the entrance.