Such Wicked Intent

by Kenneth Oppel

  I looked back at Ernest, eager to recapture his attention. “But watch what happens when we attach the double joint,” I told him. “Now, I’ll need your help here. It’s a bit tricky…”

  It took us some time to fix the double joint to the main pivot, but Ernest proved to be a very focused apprentice, as long as I let him hold a tool or occasionally twist a screw. When we were finished, we tied on the star-shaped pendulum weight once more.

  “Now watch this,” I said. “There are two pivots, each at ninety degrees to each other.”

  I pulled back the weight and let go. With each swing the weight careened in a new direction, completely unpredictably, as though it were doing some strange dance.

  Ernest laughed, delighted. “It’s like it knows!”

  I glanced at him sharply. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, like it knows what it wants to do,” he said.

  I smiled. There was indeed something eerily alive about the motion of the thing.

  Elizabeth came back over and watched with interest as the pendulum flailed about.

  “It goes and goes,” Ernest said.

  “It will slow down eventually,” I replied.

  I looked at my younger brother, pleased by his delight. “So, what do you say, Ernest? Is that a good toy?”

  “Yes,” he said, stopping the pendulum and then setting it going in a different direction.

  “It’s oddly hypnotic,” said Mother, “like looking at the flames of the fire—never the same from moment to moment.”

  I wished Father had not gone off so quickly. I would have liked to feel his hand clap me on the shoulder.

  I worried that he blamed me. It was never spoken; it didn’t need to be, but I felt it as an invisible barrier between us. During the quest to make the elixir I had deceived him, and kept secrets from him, and he’d ordered us to abandon the search. But I’d ignored him.

  I wanted things mended between us. Konrad’s death felt like a great fissure through my being, and another blow would crack me apart entirely.

  And yet here I was, about to deceive Father again.

  * * *

  As we were finishing dinner, Justine, our nursemaid, came to tell me that William, my littlest brother, had been calling for me from his crib.

  I quickly finished my torte and left the table. In the dim nursery I saw William in his crib, still awake, lying on his stomach, with his arms circled around his favorite two toys, a knit elephant and a soft flannel horse. He was not quite one yet, and at the sight of me his legs wriggled against the sheets in excitement, and he beamed. A more blissful face I don’t think I’d ever seen.

  “Tor,” he called me.

  “What are you doing, wide-awake?” I placed a hand on his back, his warm head. He pushed up, and I leaned down to kiss him. “I love you, Willy. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Yeah,” he said, and dropped back down, hugging his animals closer to his face.

  For a moment my resolve melted. My apparatus was finished and waiting in my bedchamber for my midnight business. I could take it apart. I could put it away. I could sink the metal book in the lake. But I knew I wouldn’t. Once an idea had set its course in my head and I’d fixed my destination on the horizon, I’d never been able to tear my gaze away.

  I embraced William once more. How I envied him—the world was such a simple, good place. All he needed was a soft bed, two toys, and a kiss on the head.

  * * *

  After midnight, by candlelight, I spread upon the floor the spirit board I’d fashioned. It was a large piece of leather on which I had written the letters of the alphabet, well spaced, around the edges, in the particular manner described in the instructions. Rising from the center of the board was the wooden tripod that held the pendulum.

  I placed more candles around the periphery of the board so I could see properly. I had a sheaf of paper, two inkwells, and an extra quill nearby for good measure.

  I skimmed over the instructions once more. Rain pattered against my window, and when I glanced up, I had the fleeting sensation that someone was looking in at me. I went to close the curtains, then returned to the spirit board. I crouched beside the pendulum and deliberately, in accordance with the instructions, pricked my finger upon one of the weight’s points. I felt its purposeful vibration and quickly stood. I picked up a piece of paper, dipped my quill into the well, and cleared my throat.

  “I invite you to speak,” I said to the empty room.

  No sudden draft chilled my flesh; no candles guttered.

  “I invite you to come,” I whispered.

  My door opened, and every hair on my neck bristled as a shadow darted into the room. Almost at once the flickering candlelight showed me the face of Elizabeth, and my terror was replaced with indignation.

  “What’re you doing here?” I demanded.

  “What is it you’re doing?” she countered, staring at the board, and then my pendulum. “I knew that machine of yours was no mere toy.”

  I made no reply.

  “What does it do?” she persisted.

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “What is it meant to do?”

  “Allow me to talk with Konrad.”

  Her face was waxen. “Is this some invention of yours?”

  I shook my head. “In the bonfire there was a book that wouldn’t burn. Well, it wasn’t really a book but a metal box, and in it were instructions for conversing with the dead. It claims that their spirits remain a time on the earth, unseen by us, weak and powerless to communicate unless we help them.”

  “And who was the author of this book?”

  I shrugged. “Some magician or necromancer. What does it matter?”

  “But you don’t even believe in such things!”

  I chuckled mirthlessly. “I don’t know what I believe anymore. My faith in all things is shaken. Modern science failed me. Alchemy failed. I trust nothing but am ready to try anything.”

  She looked horrified. “The occult? I actually believe in a world beyond ours, Victor. I haven’t seen them, but there may truly be ghosts—and devils, too—and I think it very unwise to try to summon them.”

  “All I know is that I want to talk to Konrad.”

  From the corner of my eye I saw the pendulum twitch.

  “Look!” I whispered, pointing.

  “It’s a draft,” she breathed.

  “I feel no draft.” The pendulum weight flinched once more and quivered slightly, as though waiting.

  “How do you make it move?” she demanded, her voice tinged with both anger and fear.

  “I’m doing nothing!” I held out some paper and my extra quill and inkwell. “Curious? Sit across from me and write down any letters the pendulum points to!”

  “I don’t like this, Victor!”

  “Leave, then! Get thee to a nunnery!”

  She looked at me, hesitated for only a split second, and took the paper and quill. I couldn’t help smiling. Elizabeth was never one to back down from a challenge.

  “I part the veil between our worlds,” I whispered. “I invite the spirit of my brother Konrad to join us. I invite you to speak, Konrad.”

  The pendulum quivered again.

  “I beg you, speak.”

  Elizabeth gasped as the weight jerked, and my eyes locked on to its long tip, watching the letters it pointed to as it swung. Hurriedly I began writing.

  “Copy them down,” I panted. My entire body felt suddenly sheathed in ice. Back and forth, side to side, the star-shaped weight jerked swiftly.

  “They’re not forming words!” Elizabeth said.

  “Don’t worry about that now!” I said, for the pendulum’s movements were becoming faster still. It flailed about the spirit board, and I could scarcely keep up with its spastic motions. I was scribbling madly, the ink smearing in my haste.

  The pendulum’s frenzy thrilled me—and terrified me too, for it was like a bird trapped in a room. I lost track of time and was only aware of filling page aft
er page until, with a final violent spasm, the star-shaped pendulum broke its tether, flew across the room, and hit the wall. I realized I was holding my breath and let it out, feeling as though it had been my body, and not the pendulum, lashing about.

  I looked at Elizabeth, then down at my pages of desperate letters.

  “This isn’t some trick, Victor?”

  “You saw it moving!”

  She moved around the board toward me, and for a moment I thought that she was going to embrace me, but her arms caressed only the air in front of me, hands brushing back and forth.

  “What’re you doing?” I demanded.

  “Checking for strings. You might’ve made it move yourself.”

  “Why would I do such a thing?” I retorted, furious.

  She was trembling, and I suddenly realized how frightened she was. I too felt a watery weakness in my joints. Quickly I pulled a blanket from the end of my bed and draped it around her shoulders.

  “Some force animated the pendulum,” I said quietly.

  “And you truly think it was Konrad?”

  “There might be a message.” I was almost afraid to examine the pages I held, but I forced myself.

  lksjdflkjlskdjflkjcomelsjdflksjldkfjlk

  draiseioureyjnmnsmeoeriytoiskldf

  qweqwemlksjdflkjlskdjflkjcomelsjdflksjldkfjlksdraiseio

  ureyjnmnsmeoeriytoiskldfmnkjjkhoiulksjdflkjlskdjflkj

  comelsjdflksjldkfjlksdraiseioureyjnmnsmeoeriytoiskldfi

  ucvzxsjkhklksjdflkjlskdjflkjcomelsjdflksjldkfjlksdraiseio

  ureyjnmnsmeoeriytoiskldfioubvwtygflksjdflkjlskdjflkjcome

  lsjdflksjldkfjlksdraiseioureyjnmnsmeoeriytoiskldf…

  “It’s all gibberish,” Elizabeth said, looking up from her own papers. “Nothing.”

  I shook my head in dismay.

  “I’m disgusted with myself,” she said vehemently, and then turned on me. “Isn’t there enough misery in this house already, without you inviting more?”

  I let the papers slip from my ink-stained hands and sank to the floor.

  “You’re not the only one who suffers, Victor,” she said. “Everyone in this family is suffering. I’ve seen my entire future change.”

  “I lost my twin,” I growled.

  “And I lost my future husband.”

  I said nothing, the word “husband” clattering painfully inside my mind.

  “But what if it was Konrad?” I asked. “Trying to talk to us?”

  Her eyes closed for a moment. “I should’ve walked out on this. You’ll only torture yourself—and me too.”

  My eyes settled on the pendulum. “There is a definite power in it,” I persisted. “I felt it.”

  “If there is,” she retorted, “it’s not one we’re meant to harness.”

  “Where is that written?” I said defiantly. “By whose law?”

  “You didn’t need to build this device, Victor,” she said. “You had a choice. But I can see you’re intent on dwelling only on the darkest things.”

  I watched as the door closed behind her, and with a sigh I bent to gather my papers from the floor. Blinking to clear my tired eyes, I suddenly saw, among the garble of letters, a word.

  I stared, then snatched up my quill and circled it. My eyes roved across the lines, and I circled another word, then another and another. The same three words repeating again and again.

  Heat and ice squalled across my flesh. Could it be coincidence? Or my own mind, knowingly forcing my hand to write the words, so desperate was I for a message from my twin?

  Outside the window rain pelted the glass. I hurriedly gathered Elizabeth’s discarded papers, and my gaze flew over them. There. And there! And there!

  Come raise me.

  Come raise me.

  Come raise me.

  CHAPTER 2

  A KEYHOLE IN THE SKY

  IT SEEMS BEYOND DISPUTE,” SAID OUR FRIEND HENRY CLERVAL, running a hand through his wispy blond hair as he looked between the two sets of pages. “You’ve both recorded the same letters—and words.”

  I looked over triumphantly at Elizabeth.

  “I never doubted they were the same,” she said. “But it doesn’t mean they came from Konrad.”

  On a table in the music room I had spread out our transcripts from the previous night, as well as the red metal book and its contents. We had the château to ourselves. After our morning lessons, presided over as usual by Father, both my parents had left for Geneva, Father to attend to his magistrate’s duties, and Mother to help ready the city house for our return in October.

  Before Konrad’s funeral, their pace had been frenetic. They’d received visitors offering condolences from near and far; there had always been preparations and meals to oversee. Our house had always seemed full. And even then my parents seemed intent on keeping to their usual schedules—if anything, more vigorously than ever. Father resumed our morning lessons with Elizabeth, Henry, and me, and afterward he carried on with his own work. Mother threw herself into her duties about the house, carving out time to begin another pamphlet on the rights of women.

  Henry fluttered his fingers, giving his characteristic impression of an agitated bird. “And you truly think Konrad spoke to you from beyond the grave?”

  “Why would it be anyone else?” I countered.

  There was an uncomfortable silence before Elizabeth replied. “I was taught that the dead who need to atone for their sins are sent to purgatory, and sometimes they wander the earth in the hopes of somehow making amends—and that they may try to communicate with the living.”

  “Very well, then,” I said. “By your way of thinking, Konrad is communicating to us from purgatory.”

  “But,” Elizabeth continued, “the Church also believes there are devils whose only aim is to beguile us and lead us into temptation.”

  Henry was nodding emphatically. “Remember that play of Marlowe’s, Doctor Faustus? The doctor foolishly makes a deal with the devil, and in the end he’s dragged down to hell. I’d never felt such horror—not in the theater, anyway.” He paused. “With you two I’ve felt far greater horror, of course.”

  Despite myself I laughed. “Why, thank you, Henry. I’m flattered.”

  “What is it exactly you think you can achieve?” he asked me, removing his spectacles to polish them. I was surprised by the steadiness—the hint of challenge, even—in his blue-eyed gaze.

  I took a breath. My own thoughts were far from clear. “I don’t know. To see him again, I suppose. To help him.”

  “Admit it, Victor,” said Elizabeth. “You’d make your own deal with the devil if you could play God.”

  “Don’t listen to her,” I told Henry dismissively. “She plans to join a convent.”

  Bewildered, Henry looked from me to Elizabeth. “Is this true?”

  Elizabeth glared at me. “Why did you say that?”

  I shrugged. “Why keep it secret?”

  Henry looked truly distressed. “You really mean to become a… a nun?”

  “Why does everyone seem to find this idea so incredible?” she asked.

  “Well, it’s just…” Henry cleared his throat. “You’re very, um, young to make such a drastic decision—and have you thought about the family? They’ve just lost a son. If you entered a convent, it would be like losing a daughter, too. They’d be devastated.”

  “Of course I’ve thought of that! Which is why I wasn’t planning on doing it right away.”

  “Well, that’s some comfort,” murmured Henry. “Still, it would just be such a terrible loss to, well, everyone.”

  “She has no intention of becoming a nun,” I said impatiently. “Anyway, she wouldn’t last two days.”

  “I resent that very much!” Elizabeth said.

  I held up two fingers. “Two days before the mother superior throws herself from the bell tower.”

  Elizabeth bit at her lips, and by the light in her eyes, I knew she was suppressing a giggle.

  But now Henry leveled his gaze at me. �
��You, Victor, are just trying to change the subject. What exactly are you planning? You used to joke about being a god. But this is taking things too far, don’t you think?”

  I rubbed at my temples, impatient. “I tell you, I want to see my twin again!”

  “But how?” Henry demanded.

  I sighed. “I’ve no idea, not yet. Here’s all I know: that the world is uncontrollable. Chaos reigns. That anything and everything might be possible. I won’t subscribe to any rational system again. Nothing will bind me.”

  “That is the way to madness,” said Elizabeth.

  “If it makes me mad, so be it. But leave me to my method, because without it I’ll fall into a despair so deep, I’ll never claw my way back out. I’ll see him, damn it! As far as I’m concerned, he asked for my help. ‘Come raise me.’ Over and over he said it. Wherever he is, he’s not happy.”

  “Stop,” Elizabeth said.

  “He’s suffering,” I persisted.

  “Stop it, Victor!” Her eyes were wet.

  “Victor, you’re upsetting her,” Henry said, softly but firmly.

  “You two don’t need to have any part of this. I’ve bullied you enough—you especially, Henry.”

  I was startled to see anger animate his face. “I’m not quite so easily bullied, Victor. I may not be the bravest of men, but I’m not the weakling you suggest.”

  “I wasn’t suggesting any such—”

  “I was with you when Polidori amputated your fingers and tried to kill us all. I fought then, and I fought that wretched lynx alongside the rest of you.”

  “Absolutely you did, Henry, and—”

  But he was no longer listening to my reassurances. His eyes had strayed to the red metal book.

  “I’ve seen that before,” he said.

  “Possibly in the Dark Library,” I told him. “We spent enough time looking through the shelves—”

  “No. Not there.”

  Purposefully he walked past me, opened the door, and left the music room. Elizabeth and I looked at each other in puzzlement, then followed. We found him in the great hallway, standing before the huge portrait of Wilhelm Frankenstein, our notorious ancestor who’d built this château some three hundred years before.

  His face was handsome and pale, unblemished except for a mole on his left cheek. His full mouth was well-molded, almost feminine. His eyes were a piercing blue, with a curious speck of brown in the lower part of each iris. Eerily he stared out at me, meeting my gaze directly, his right eyebrow lifted slightly, conveying a hint of mockery.