Kenneth Oppel - Such Wicked Intent

“The Dark Library is ash now,” said Henry.

This stopped me for a moment, and then I realized something.

“Only in our world,” I said with a grin. “In the spirit world it’s still there. Every book that ever came into this house will still be there, unburned, unblemished.”

“Books,” said Henry wearily. “Our last adventure was filled with books, and-”

“It ended with failure, yes. Alchemy and science, primitive and modern, they failed us. But clearly the occult holds more wisdom than I gave it credit for. There will be a great many books to read…” I looked over at Henry. “For someone as clever as you, it would not be nearly so great a chore.”

“Your flattery’s shameless,” Elizabeth said. “Henry’s too sane to help you with such a mad plan.”

I sighed, nodding. “It’s too bad, though, Henry. Inside the spirit world there’s such total… vitality. Elizabeth felt it too. Somehow it makes us more of what we are. It gave me my fingers back. What might it give you?”

I saw him chew at his lip.

“It’s remarkable.” I watched his face, trying to gauge if I were swaying him. “You’ll find what’s best about you, what’s most powerful. It allows you to be the self you always wanted to be but kept hidden, or thwarted. I felt I could do anything-”

Henry laughed sarcastically. “That’s nothing new!”

I chuckled. “No, maybe not. But inside it just might be true.”

“I’ve had enough of this blasphemous talk,” said Elizabeth. “Good night, both of you.”

“Don’t forget your prayers,” I said before she shut the door.

“That was a bit sharp,” said Henry.

“But funny,” I replied, and we both laughed.

Henry looked at me, intent. “What else?”

“Inside it’s simpler, truer.” I thought of Elizabeth, how our feelings for each other had been raw and uncomplicated, animal in their urgency. “There’s nothing stopping you from doing anything you might like.”

He looked away, as though afraid of betraying some secret. “Truly?”

“Truly.”

He blinked and pushed his wispy blond hair back from his forehead. “When you next go, I’ll come with you.”

I woke early the next morning, dressed, and waited in the music room for Elizabeth to pass by on her way to breakfast. When I heard her footfalls in the hallway, I trilled a few notes on the piano-the same melody that Konrad had played the night before-and heard her stop. Hesitantly she entered the room.

I improvised a tune on the keys and quietly sang, “I don’t think someone’s quite ready for the convent yet.”

“Shhh!” she hissed, closing the door and coming closer.

“Were you planning on pretending it never happened?” I asked. “That bit at the end?”

For a moment she said nothing, and I wondered if she would refuse to speak of it altogether.

“Thank you for not writing it down in your account,” she said finally, then cleared her throat. “It would seem that our behavior in the spirit world is… uncensored. All our base impulses are given free rein-”

“ Base impulses,” I said. “You make it sound like they’re evil.”

“Just because one has feelings doesn’t mean one has to act on them.”

“What a prig you are! Why’s it so hard for you to admit your feelings for me? You had no trouble showing them last night.”

“Do you know what distinguishes us from animals, Victor?”

“Yes, but I think you’d like to do the explaining-”

“They know only instinct. No knowledge of right or wrong. They have no self-control. Humans do. And we’re meant to exercise that control.”

“So is this the real reason you won’t go back inside?” I asked her. “Because you’re worried you might be overcome with passion for me again?”

“I won’t go back inside because it’s a wicked endeavor, and if you were smarter, you wouldn’t go back either.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I’ll be blunt, Victor. I am not in love with you.”

This stung, but I pressed on. “You’re just angry because I was the one to end the kiss.”

Her cheeks reddened. “Rubbish.”

“You would’ve had us kiss until our bodies died. Hah! You feel rejected by me!”

“If you must know the cruel truth, Victor, I kissed you only because I couldn’t kiss Konrad.”

And she turned and left me there, wondering whether it was true.

Mother was not at breakfast again, and our morning lessons were subdued. Father seemed dispirited, and dismissed us early. I needed to be alone with my thoughts, and went for a long walk into the foothills.

The clouds that had oppressed us the past week were thinning, and by the time I paused to catch my breath, the sun had broken through. I took off my jacket and looked back across the lake, glad to see some color returned to it. My gaze lifted to the mountain peak where the Frankenstein family crypt was carved into the glacial rock. Inside lay Konrad in his icy sarcophagus.

In that sunlit moment it seemed madness to try to bring him back, no more possible than stopping the turning of the earth. What if… What if I were to let life simply take its course? Surely it was a form of madness, what I had in mind.

But I couldn’t stop my thoughts from straying back to the spirit world, its lustrous colors and textures, the surge of life in my veins, my healed, painless hand. I’d opened a door, and it had revealed all kinds of possibilities, all manner of power.

And perhaps it would allow me to keep the promise I’d made to myself, to unlock every secret law of this earth, to bring Konrad back.

A jolt of pain in my missing fingers made me curse. I turned from the mountain, looking back at our chateau poised on the lake’s edge like a powerful and brooding sentinel. I imagined myself a malign spirit, whirling about the house, trying to get in.

There was a second promise I’d made not so long ago-to stop coveting what was my brother’s. If I brought him back, would I have to surrender any chance of winning Elizabeth?

Hadn’t I sacrificed enough already for Konrad? I’d given my fingers, dared to enter the spirit world, and might face even greater trials to give him back his life.

In the spirit world Elizabeth had kissed me and pushed herself against me with a passion that seemed impossible. Surely some part of her had to love me. She denied it, but I didn’t believe her, and if I could get her to spend more time with me in the spirit world, maybe that ardor would grow even stronger and I’d be able to unlock it in the real world. How could such a pursuit be deceitful if she herself wanted the same thing as me?

I will bring my brother back, I thought.

But I’d keep Elizabeth for myself.

As I made my way back home, I saw a fine carriage I didn’t recognize near our stables. Inside the chateau I found my father’s manservant, Schultz, and asked him who our visitor was.

“Professor Neumeyer from the university,” he told me. “He came to examine the caves.”

“Is he there now?” I asked, eager to have another chance to explore.

“No. He’s speaking with your father. I believe they’re in the west sitting room.”

“Thank you, Schultz,” I said, vaulting up the stairs.

I found them on the balcony, Elizabeth and Henry, too, standing against the balustrade, the professor pointing at something along the shoreline. He was not at all my idea of a professor. I’d expected someone bespectacled and papery, but this fellow was built like a bear. He wore clothes that looked better suited to hunting than studying, had a bearded ruddy face, and hands that could break bones with ease.

“As you see,” he was saying, “the site of your chateau is most desirable. Access to fresh drinking water and easy transport routes across the lake. It commands a view in all directions and is backed by the mountains, both strategic advantages. You’re by no means the first people to have lived here. The Allobroges Celts had settlements as far back as five hundred years before Christ.”