This Dark endeavor taovf-1

by Kenneth Oppel

  “It has been lost!”

  “We found one. Surely you cannot have read every single book in the Dark Library!”

  This was a gamble, I knew. I saw my father bristle, but then he reigned in his temper.

  “Victor, you have no idea the danger these elixirs pose. They are not proper cures!”

  “Like Dr. Murnau’s?” I blurted.

  He looked at me, silent.

  “Konrad told me,” I said. “We have no secrets. But you’re keeping one from Mother. His illness might return.”

  Father seemed weary suddenly. “There is a small chance.”

  “And next time it might kill him! How can you sit back and do nothing? How can you trust Dr. Murnau’s guesswork, and no one else’s? Why not Agrippa’s? There are accounts of its successes-”

  “Don’t be absurd,” said Father. “Dr. Murnau’s methods are informed by centuries of proper scientific learning.”

  At that moment we were interrupted as the door to the study opened, and Elizabeth and Konrad, warmly robed, were ushered in by my mother.

  “They wanted to see how you were,” Mother said to me.

  “The patient will survive,” Father said.

  Konrad was studying me, no doubt wondering how much of our adventure I’d revealed. I felt ashamed. I’d crumpled under Father’s interrogation. I’d not told him everything-but too much.

  “It seems,” Father said to our mother, “that the children have been trying to gather the ingredients for an alchemical potion. An elixir of life, no less.”

  The look of sheer surprise on Mother’s face told me that Konrad and Elizabeth had confessed very little.

  “You said you’d gotten lost exploring the caves!” she exclaimed, seeming genuinely hurt. “How long has this been going on?”

  “Since Konrad got ill,” Elizabeth murmured. “We wanted to cure him.”

  Mother frowned. “But why would you persist with this even after Dr. Murnau cured him?”

  From the corner of my eye I saw my father and brother exchange a glance, as if reminding each other of the secret they kept.

  “An elixir of life would be a glorious thing to have,” Konrad said smoothly. “I confess I couldn’t resist the sheer adventure of it.”

  “You must abandon this dark endeavor,” my father said firmly. “It is finished. Is that clear?”

  “Yes,” Konrad and Elizabeth said.

  “Victor, I don’t believe I heard you.”

  “Yes,” I muttered.

  “You’ve put your lives in peril. You might easily have been killed in those caves. And you should know this as well. Not only is the practice of alchemy fruitless, it is also illegal in our republic. You were unaware of this, no doubt.”

  I nodded, truly surprised. I remembered Polidori telling us he’d personally been forbidden from the alchemical arts, but I hadn’t realized it was considered a crime.

  “Some years ago,” Father went on, “we tried an alchemist who had been administering a certain miraculous elixir. People paid for it eagerly and willingly drank it. Some of them were made sicker; one died. To prevent further tragedies, the other magistrates and I decided to pass a law making it illegal to profit from, or administer, alchemical medicines.”

  “We did not know that,” murmured Elizabeth contritely.

  “I cannot have my own children daring the laws of the land,” he said.

  “No, Father,” said Konrad.

  “And while I admire the selflessness and love that inspired your actions,” said Father, “I’m very disappointed by how you’ve deceived your mother and me.”

  I looked at him coldly, and thought he was a hypocrite. Was not he being dishonest with Mother, by not telling her the truth about Konrad’s illness?

  “I’m placing you three under house arrest for the next two weeks. No riding. No boating. Your footsteps will not tread beyond the inner yard. You will receive no visitors.”

  “Not even Henry?” I cried.

  “Especially not Henry,” Father snapped. “He was one of your accomplices!”

  “He didn’t really do much,” I muttered, and Konrad could not suppress a laugh.

  “He was very good at staying behind,” said Elizabeth, biting back a smile, “on account of his acute imagination.”

  And then the three of us fell into a violent fit of giggling, despite our exhaustion-and the prospect of being imprisoned for the next two weeks.

  “We must somehow get a message to Polidori,” I said quietly.

  We had slept deep into the morning and after a late breakfast the three of us had met in the ballroom, where we could stand outside on the balcony and see the glorious summer, forbidden us for two weeks.

  “We need to make sure he got the coelacanth head from Henry-and that he knows we won’t be visiting for a fortnight.”

  I was very worried what Henry might have told the alchemist; I didn’t want Polidori to think we’d exposed him, or given up on our plan.

  Konrad exhaled. “Victor, we promised to end our adventure.”

  I looked at him in surprise. “Yes, but we were lying.”

  He glanced at Elizabeth, as though they’d already discussed this without me.

  “Perhaps ending it is for the best,” she said.

  “How is it for the best?” I demanded.

  “We might have died, Victor,” she said in astonishment.

  “Yes, I know. I was very nearly inhaled by a fish. But we can’t give up now. We have only a single ingredient left to find! Konrad, it was you who wanted to continue.”

  “I regret it now. I’m of Father’s opinion. We are chasing a mirage. There is no proof these alchemical cures work.”

  Elizabeth nodded, and I stared at her in astonishment. “You saw that book move; you smelled its blood!”

  “I don’t know what I saw or smelled anymore.”

  “Did you not say the room was bathed in red lamplight?” Konrad asked her. “That might have created the effect of-”

  “You were not there,” I reminded him pointedly. “If you had been, you would’ve felt the power of the book, and Polidori-like Elizabeth and me.”

  “I find it curious,” said Elizabeth, turning to me, “that you can’t believe in God but are more than willing to believe in alchemical wonders.”

  “The vision of the wolf. The flameless fire. They may be wonders, but they’re real. It is just science by another name.”

  Konrad sniffed. “Father doesn’t think so.”

  “Right now,” said Elizabeth, “I am extremely grateful to be alive. And I think we should put the whole matter in God’s hands.”

  Konrad gave a little nod.

  “Has she converted you, then?” I asked. “You never believed in God.”

  “She is very persuasive,” Konrad said, smiling, and Elizabeth flushed as they looked at each other fondly.

  “And he’s converted you, too,” I said to her, disguising my jealous pain with anger. “You were so brave on our adventures, and now you cowardly want to surrender.”

  She would not meet my eye. “We see things differently, Victor.”

  “Well,” I said, “I prefer to take some action. But if you wish to lie about and hope for miracles, go ahead.”

  “Victor, you have already risked your life for me,” said Konrad kindly. “I cannot imagine a greater show of brotherly love. I’ll never forget this. But I am asking you now to stop.”

  “But-,” I began, only to have him interrupt me.

  “Surely my say should count the more,” he said. “It’s my life. And I say stop. Truly, let’s leave this behind us.”

  I did not know how to reply.

  I woke the following morning to an unexpected feeling of well-being.

  When I parted the curtains, warm sunlight doused me. I opened the window to the trill of birdsong and an intoxicatingly warm breeze. The lake sparkled. It seemed the whole world was before me, and it was truly beautiful, and beckoning me to return to it. I was alive.
r />   I took a deep breath. These past weeks, during Konrad’s illness, my mind-awake and dreaming-had been filled with dread and cobwebs and darkness. I wanted the sun to burn them all away.

  And I could not but wonder…

  Maybe Konrad and Elizabeth were right, and it was best to abandon our dangerous and uncertain quest.

  As far as prisons went, the chateau was a pleasant and roomy one, but it was still a prison. The lake and meadows we’d taken for granted all our lives now seemed to beckon from the windows and balconies with excruciating intensity.

  Father was not a sadistic jailer. Though he refused to shorten our sentence (despite my best arguments), over the next five days he did try to distract us with entertaining stories about far-flung countries, and the bloody histories of famous battles that he knew Konrad and I had always craved when younger. He shared with us the news he received from abroad, where France heaved with revolution. A whole new world was being forged beyond the mountains, but within the walls of Chateau Frankenstein, nothing changed.

  He’d done something to the library’s secret door so it would not open. Clearly he no longer trusted our promises.

  Mother was very happy. She thought Konrad healed, and she had all her children under her roof day and night.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  KEEPER OF SECRETS

  A few nights later I woke from a dream so terrible that it shimmered darkly before me, even as I sat up in bed, panting.

  Konrad was dead and laid out in his coffin, the hue of bodily corruption already on his flesh. I stood at his head, peering down at him. Behind me I could hear the weeping of my family. A huge fury stirred inside me.

  And suddenly the coffin was no longer a coffin but a laboratory table.

  Over Konrad’s body I spoke words of power, and applied unguents and strange machines to his limbs, his chest, his skull.

  And then I gave a great cry, and energy erupted from within me and arced like lightning from my body to his.

  His hand twitched. His head stirred. His eyes opened and looked at me.

  I lit a candle and paced my room. Sleep was impossible after such a vision. What was its meaning? I did not believe in augury, but the dream’s urgency was hard to ignore. Would Konrad sicken and die unless

  … unless we took action once more? Was it within my power to save him?

  Restlessly I went to my desk and from a hidden cupboard drew out Eisenstein’s slim green volume. Father thought all alchemy nonsense, yet at least some of it worked. It had given me the vision of the wolf, and a flameless fire to escape the depths. It had helped Polidori resurrect text from a burned tome, and make Krake preternaturally intelligent.

  Why couldn’t this same well of knowledge produce an elixir of life?

  Idly I paged through the book, looking at the headings. They did not seem so unlike the natural sciences Father taught us at our lessons I stopped.

  Upon the page was written “Transmutation of base metals to gold.” It was not the luster of this promise that caught my attention, but the handwriting in the book’s margins. It was distinctive and unmistakable-for it was my father’s.

  I gripped the book closer, my eyes flying over my father’s calculations, his detailed annotations on performing the procedure.

  Liar.

  The man I had admired all my life, whose every word I had trusted, was a liar. The secret he kept from Mother was one thing-a small deceit done to protect her from worry. But this was altogether different. He had barred us from the Dark Library, told us that alchemy was nothing but nonsense. And all the time he himself knew its power.

  He had turned lead into gold!

  So why had he forbidden us from making the Elixir of Life even though it might one day save the life of his own son? I didn’t understand.

  I forced myself to take a breath, and as my pulse slowed, I knew my course of action. I wouldn’t allow myself to be distracted any longer.

  Just one ingredient left.

  Just one more, and the elixir would be mine.

  After breakfast I went downstairs to the servants’ quarters and found Maria in her office, going through the accounts.

  “How are you today, Victor?” she asked, looking up.

  “I am thoroughly enjoying my imprisonment, thank you, Maria.”

  The news of our adventuring was common knowledge among the servants, although Father had been most careful not to make any mention of alchemy. Even among the most loyal of staff, rumors could easily escape the chateau and sully our family’s glorious reputation.

  “Can I be of some service to you?” Maria asked-a touch warily, I thought.

  “Today is your day in town, is it not?” She usually made the trip into Geneva with a maid to supervise the purchase of provisions we could not get locally in Bellerive.

  “It is indeed.”

  “Would you be willing to take a message for me?”

  “Of course. To Henry Clerval, I assume.”

  I closed the office door behind me. “No,” I said. “To Julius Polidori.”

  She was silent for a moment. “You found him, then,” she said, for she and I hadn’t spoken of the matter since she’d given me his name many weeks before.

  I nodded. “With his help we’ve been assembling the ingredients for the Elixir of Life.”

  Her eyes widened. “But surely your father-”

  “Knows nothing of Polidori’s involvement, no. And mustn’t. But we are very close to creating the elixir, and I must get word to Mr. Polidori of our predicament.”

  “Victor,” she said, and paused as someone passed the door, “surely there’s no need, now that Konrad is healed.”

  “It may only be a temporary cure,” I said. “Father does not want that known, even by Mother.”

  “I see,” she said. I did not like divulging this information, but I needed all the ammunition at my disposal.

  “Will you deliver my note?” I asked.

  “I am loathe to do it,” she said bluntly. “When I heard of your adventuring in the caves… It’s a miracle you did not all perish.”

  “But, Maria, you helped set us on this path,” I reminded her.

  The fingers of her left hand rubbed nervously against her arm-rest. “I know, and it was wrong of me, I think.”

  “It’s but a small matter of delivering a letter to his house-and awaiting his reply.”

  “Your Father would be furious if he found out.”

  “But he will not find out,” I said. “Just as he never found out it was you who told us about Julius Polidori in the first place.”

  She looked at me carefully. “I did it only for Konrad’s sake.”

  “I know,” I said. “I know. But we must keep each other’s secrets, mustn’t we?”

  I daresay she thought I was threatening her. I would never have done anything to get her in trouble-but perhaps it was best to let her imagine I might.

  “Very well,” she said with heavy reluctance. “Give me the address. I will be your messenger.”

  I passed her the note, already written and sealed with wax.

  “And one last thing, Maria. Do not tell him who you are, or for whom you work.”

  In the evening I slid downstairs and found Maria again. She scarcely looked at me as she handed me a sealed letter. And then she gave a shiver, as though relieved to be rid of the thing. Instantly I slipped it into my pocket.

  “To be in that shop of his gave me grave doubts,” she whispered. “And the fellow himself… and that cat of his!”

  I kissed Maria on the cheek, as I used to do when little.

  “Thank you,” I said. “You have done a great service.”

  “I hope it is the last.” She looked at me, and I thought I saw a flicker of fear on her face.

  I went upstairs to my bedchamber, closed and locked the door, and opened the letter. Dear Sir, Thank you for your letter. Please rest assured that I did indeed receive the coelacanth head from your friend and that it yielded oils ample for the pu
rpose.

  I now understand that you are temporarily detained, and I am most relieved that our venture remains secret-as it must. If I do not hear otherwise from you, I will assume you wish me to continue my work. The translation is cumbersome, but proceeds apace, and I have no doubt I will soon know the third and final ingredient. When I have succeeded, I will leave a message for you, as per your instructions, by the Gallimard crypt in the Bellerive graveyard. Until then, I remain,

  Your humble servant,

  Julius Polidori

  For the moment I had done all I could. Now I had to wait.

  I became a keeper of secrets.

  I did not tell Konrad or Elizabeth of Father’s alchemy. I did not tell them of my resolve to pursue our adventure. What good would it do? It wouldn’t change their minds. They were too busy being in love. If Konrad did not have the sense to obtain the elixir, I would have to do it for him.

  If he were to get sick again, I would have his cure. I would have the power to bring him back from the dead.

  And what else might I have the power to do?

  That night, sleep would not come to me, and by candlelight I once more opened the slim green volume, the last remnant of the forbidden Dark Library.

  The love potion was so childishly simple that I almost doubted it: A drop of fish oil. Sugar to mask the fish oil. A drop of clover honey to sweeten it further. A pinch of thyme. The juice of three crushed rose petals. A small measure of pure glacier water. Two pinches of rosemary. A strand of the maker’s hair, cut and ground as finely as possible. A drop of blood from your heart’s desire.

  These items would be easy to come by. Only the last worried me-until I remembered my handkerchief. I had kept it hidden away in my chest of drawers. I did not want it laundered, for upon it was a spot of Elizabeth’s blood, from her sweet lips.

  I could cut out the spot and drop the bit of linen into my mixture.

  The recipe called for the liquid to sit for a day and night, and then be drunk by my heart’s desire.

  That would not be so hard. During our fencing practice we often had a refreshing cordial. I would pour a goblet for Elizabeth and deftly add the sweet potion to her glass.

  She would love me. The tincture would make her love me.