Thorn made no comment. Ophelia had hoped to ease the strained atmosphere with her joke, but it had been a total failure. This reunion was a total failure. It wasn’t supposed to go like this at all, she really must say something more intelligent. Finally find the right words. Now.
“Click-click!”
It was the fob watch. Ophelia pinched her fingers trying to extricate it from her pocket. “Here’s a witness above all suspicion who should convince you that I’m not God.”
Ophelia felt ashamed of her shaky voice. From the moment she’d entered this room, she’d behaved like a scared little girl. Back when she didn’t know Thorn, and had every reason to fear him, she hadn’t felt half the apprehension that was now tying her in knots. This man had breached something within her that made her unbearably vulnerable.
And he was doing nothing to put her at her ease.
He stood up. This movement of bones unbent his endless spine and triggered a grating of steel from his leg. Ophelia preferred him sitting down. She felt intimidated enough like that; she really didn’t need to feel crushed by his size.
Thorn took back his watch without taking a single step toward her—from a distance and with his fingertips.
“It’s not telling the right time,” Ophelia apologized. “It spent all its time looking for you. I’m no expert in watch psychology, but it’s sure to return to its senses, now it has found you.”
The watch snapped its cover, again and again. Thorn looked at it suspiciously, as if he doubted ever having owned such a noisy object.
If Ophelia had hoped to move him with that, it had failed.
“How is my aunt doing?”
“Oh . . . in fact, I haven’t seen Berenilde since the Doyennes made me return to Anima. But I did receive some news. You can count on her to hold strong. And to await your return,” she thought it best to specify, with an awkward smile.
Ophelia refrained from making any allusion to the Compass Rose episode. Doing so would have meant having to mention Archibald, and the last thing she wanted was to put Thorn into a bad mood. One couldn’t say he was overflowing with enthusiasm right now.
“My return?” he repeated.
“Things have changed in the Pole. Farouk has changed. I’m sure that, one day, you will be able to return home with head held high, and at last make your case.” Ophelia had stated that with conviction, hoping that those words at least would reach Thorn’s heart. He merely closed his fist around his watch to make the incessant click-clicking stop.
“Did you come to Babel alone?”
“Er . . . yes.” Ophelia did her utmost not to think of the scarf right then.
“Is there no risk of the Doyennes discovering that you are here?”
“I think not.”
“Is the ‘Apprentice Eulalia’ cover watertight?”
“I have papers.” Her reply was drowned out by an awful grinding of steel. Thorn had wanted to change position, but the mechanism serving as an exoskeleton to his leg had jammed, mid-movement. He gripped the console of the Coordinator just in time to avoid losing his balance.
“I can manage on my own,” he said, noticing Ophelia make a move. His tone was final. As he leant to unblock the mechanism behind his knee, Ophelia took the chance to look at him more closely. She suddenly noticed all sorts of details that she would have spotted earlier had she not been so obsessed with her own nervousness. Thorn, too, had changed. The deep furrow between his eyebrows had grown even deeper. His hair had receded, making his forehead even broader than before. His face was so pale, his scars barely showed. And there was that strong smell of surgical spirit he gave off, as if he religiously disinfected every inch of skin, clothing, and metal.
And yet his entire body seemed to be electrified by a powerful energy, a determination so fierce, it was almost palpable.
Thorn unblocked the mechanism of his caliper with a ghastly grating sound, and stood up to his full height. “It’s your turn, if you have any questions. Not about my leg, preferably.”
Ophelia tensed. Of course she had some! In fact, she had so many she didn’t know where to start. She couldn’t stop herself from glancing at the sun emblem pinned on Thorn’s shirt.
“I make use of LUX as much as LUX makes use of me,” he said, preempting her. “I was unable to measure up to God by attacking him from the outside. Consequently, I reconsidered my whole strategy.”
“By becoming a Lord yourself? Are they all God’s accomplices, then?”
“Just as your Doyennes on Anima are, and my mother’s clan in the Pole were. Somewhat more than that, even. LUX possesses considerable influence and means. These Lords are Guardians par excellence: they keep a tight rein on their family spirit, and have made the city of Babel the model that God would like to enforce on every ark.”
Ophelia swallowed hard. A world where one always has to watch what one says and what one does was no place for klutzes like her.
“It must have been some feat, joining their ranks,” she muttered. “Like everything you’ve achieved since your escape, in fact.”
Thorn glanced at his watch and, since its hands were all pointing at him, turned to the numerous clocks in the room, as if wanting to time how long they spoke. “It’s a long story. You should at least know this: I came to Babel due to the pointers you gave me in prison, and I became Sir Henry thanks to the Genealogists.”
“The Genealogists?” Ophelia asked, surprised. “You spoke of them last time, with Lady Septima, and didn’t particularly want to have dealings with them.”
A quiver shot across Thorn’s jaw. It was the first sign of emotion he’d shown since the start of their conversation. It was a sign Ophelia knew how to interpret. She had noticed it so often in the past, whenever Thorn was trying to protect her from his own secrets, that she was relieved to see it once again. This man would return to being the gruff bear she’d come to know. He would order her to return to Anima, to stop meddling in his affairs, to leave him to confront the danger alone.
As for her, she firmly intended to impose herself on him. “Thorn, I will remain in Babel, whether you want me to or not. Whatever Lady Septima says, there are some things going on here . . . really disturbing things. I don’t yet understand what you’re up to, but before you oppose my decision, know that I have . . . ”
“I won’t oppose it.”
The response had been so swift, Ophelia mis-swallowed, and her fine speech degenerated into a coughing fit.
“I agree with you,” Thorn went further. “There are things going on here. I need some eyes outside the Secretarium, and you need some eyes inside. We will both gain from collaboration. Does that suit you?”
Ophelia nodded her head stiffly. She should have been delighted, but Thorn’s detachment, his way of ridding their conversation of all sentimentality, made her feel increasingly hollow inside.
On the Coordinator console, the radio headphones emitted a murmur, indicating that someone was trying to reestablish communication. The voice was Lady Septima’s.
“The microphone is switched off,” Thorn said, seeing Ophelia draw back. “She can’t hear us.”
“Does she know who you really are?”
“No one knows that, apart from the Genealogists. I don’t know whether Lady Septima knows of God’s actual existence, but she is convinced that she’s serving a noble and worthy cause. Only the Genealogists are aware of the whole truth. They are the most powerful Lords of Lux. So powerful, indeed, that they can no longer bear the thought of having to explain themselves to God. That’s the only common denominator I share with them,” he added, with a distaste he couldn’t conceal, “but it enabled me to join their ranks. They created a new identity for me, from scratch, making me a respectable citizen of Babel, and then put me in charge of the Secretarium. God is, of course, unaware of my presence here. We must be vigilant, you and I, and never betray our past in fron
t of the others. Including the Genealogists. They are my allies only because I can be useful to them. They wouldn’t take kindly to you interfering in their little affairs.”
“But why did they entrust the Secretarium to you?” Ophelia insisted. “What have the catalogue database and the reading groups got to do with their ‘little affairs’?”
“They have everything to do with them. The Genealogists have asked me to find a very particular document.”
“The manuscript Mediana was translating?”
“That will be for you to confirm to me. I will say no more to you so I don’t distort your judgment. I need a fresh approach.”
Lady Septima’s voice became louder through the headphones, insistently repeating “hello!” Thorn returned to his stool with mechanical rigidity, but didn’t switch the microphone on yet. He opened a drawer, and out of it unfurled a stream of punched tape, which cascaded down to the floor. “Let’s not waste any more time,” he said, handing it energetically to Ophelia. “Here is a list of bibliographical references. I suggest you consult all these books, without exception, as soon as possible. They will prove useful for your evaluation.”
Then, ignoring how Ophelia’s face had fallen, Thorn returned to sorting out the Coordinator’s tangle of cables with obsessive care. He might seem uneasy on his legs, but his hands had the precision of arrows.
“You should go to the cold room without further delay,” he advised. “The manuscript awaits you and Lady Septima would deem it unacceptable if you hadn’t already started your work. Be prepared for her to be on your back. We will consider meeting alone when her vigilance has abated. Then, and only then, I will give you further information.”
Thorn had spoken with the speed of a typewriter, not noticing the effect his words had on Ophelia. On her glasses, in particular. They had turned completely yellow.
“The thing is . . . I was considering leaving the Good Family.”
Thorn now swiveled his stool slowly around to her. Nothing in his countenance expressed disapproval, and yet Ophelia suddenly felt chilled to the bone.
“It will be easier for me to assist you that way,” she assured, twisting the punched tape. “The conservatoire is very restrictive and allows me little freedom of movement. It was mainly a pretext for accessing the Secretarium, but since you are here, you can . . . get me in secretly. No?”
Thorn’s eyes, steady and piercing as an eagle’s, made Ophelia lose any remaining composure.
“No. There’s much more to be gained from your position within the company of the Forerunners. And that will be even more the case when you become an aspiring virtuoso.”
Ophelia was flabbergasted. He spoke of this as if it were a mere formality! For a moment, she was tempted to mention the threats, the blackmail, and the shards of glass, but she abandoned the idea. She didn’t want to appear weak in front of Thorn. For a reason she didn’t yet understand, a gulf had opened up between them, and she wouldn’t allow it to widen.
“That’s fine,” she said, putting the tape into her uniform pocket. “I’ll continue with my apprenticeship at the conservatoire, and I will evaluate that manuscript.”
Much to Ophelia’s annoyance, Thorn betrayed no sign of satisfaction. “You will submit a written report of your progress to me, just as Apprentice Mediana used to before you. Don’t forget to pick up all this before you go.”
He indicated the translation notes that had remained scattered on the floor, and returned to his connecting and disconnecting of cables, as if the conversation was over.
“Is that it?” Ophelia murmured. “You have nothing more to say to me?”
“I have, actually,” Thorn muttered, not stopping all his connecting. “From now on, until we find out what really happened to Mademoiselle Silence and Apprentice Mediana, avoid isolating yourself. Always stay close to your fellow students; their company will be your best protection.”
Ophelia stifled a nervous laugh. She kneeled down, trying her best to ignore the pain under her bandages, which returned with her every movement. When she had finished collecting the pages, she noticed that Thorn wasn’t moving anymore. Hunched on his stool, he was holding his radio headphones, undecided about putting them on. His metal gauntlets gleamed in the light from the Coordinator’s bulbs.
“And you?” he finally asked, in turn. “You have nothing more to say to me?”
Ophelia had thousands of things she could have said to him. Not one of them passed her lips. Talking to Thorn’s back was even harder than talking to him to his face.
As she didn’t reply, he put his headphones over his ears. “You will close the door after you.”
Once out of the Coordinator room, Ophelia stood still in the middle of the din of the cylinders. She bit her glove with all her might, stifling the sob that threatened to explode between her ribs.
“By the way, I love you.” Where had they gone, those six awkward words Thorn had whispered into her ear just before disappearing from her life? Had absence sufficed to erase them, like chalk?
Resolutely, Ophelia wiped her eyes. No. The most important thing was having found him. The rest would be a matter of time, for him as for her.
“To work!” she muttered, heading for the cold room.
THE CARETAKER
Sultry showers gave way to dusty winds. The Babelian summer was nearly over, but the air was barely less hot.
Ophelia didn’t notice the change of season. To do so, she would have needed the time to tilt her glasses up at the sky. She woke before dawn for the pre-morning chores, did her obligatory circuits of the stadium, ran from the amphitheater to the laboratory, gobbled up her bowl of rice while revising her notes for the side, and wasn’t allowed to go to bed before completing her evening chores. The slightest delay had repercussions for the whole week. On top of all that, Lady Septima had almost doubled the hours for the Memorial reading groups. She had instigated a ruthless grading system based on individual productivity; the higher the apprentice’s grade, the greater his or her chance of obtaining the rank of aspiring virtuoso.
The grade-awarding ceremony was imminent.
Every minute counted when working at such a furious pace, and that much the Seers had fully grasped. Since Ophelia had refused to withdraw from the competition, they targeted the most precious thing she possessed at the conservatoire. Her time. They slipped sleeping pills into her bedside carafe of water; bunged up the toilets when it was her turn to clean them; stitched one leg of her trousers to the other; blocked the mechanism of her bed—they would stop at nothing to slow her down.
At first, Ophelia saw her position plummet in the ranking system. Replacing Mediana was a poisoned chalice, and not just because it had riled her classmates. The extra hours Ophelia spent in the Secretarium’s cold room came on top of a timetable that was full to bursting.
And it had to be said: the manuscript she had to evaluate for Thorn was no piece of cake. It was a thick caretaking register kept during the last decade before the Rupture. It was written in an ancient regional dialect of Babel, with an alphabet not used for centuries: complete gibberish to Ophelia. Mediana’s start at translating it had only brought to light merchandise accounts, equipment lists, fixtures inventories, health and security instructions. Nothing that appeared worthy of interest.
Ophelia had gotten ahold of the books Thorn had recommended to her, but they were so erudite, she was unable to make use of them.
She could rely only on her hands.
Unfortunately, the edges of the pages in the register had been worn away by time, and they were the parts most likely to have been fingered. In other words, she was deprived of the part most favorable to a reading with hands. Moreover, she had to follow the scientific procedure imposed by Lady Septima. This methodology was more taxing than anything she’d ever had to do at her little museum: progressing from one page to the next took an inordinate amount of time. Op
helia examined every tiny bit of paper meticulously, and when a vision finally came to her, she hastened to record it in her report.
Little by little, she built up a basic profile of the author. The caretaker was a man. He suffered from a severe nervous condition, but didn’t lose his cool, for all that. Despite his mistrust, which permeated the register, he was keen to do his work conscientiously. Great rigor, an acute sense of discipline, traumatic aftereffects: a soldier who has returned to civilian life. Ophelia felt great discomfort in her jaw whenever she came across an imprint. The caretaker was probably a severely disabled ex-serviceman.
Putting all this in writing demanded the utmost precaution. Since the Index forbade the use of the words “soldier” and “war,” Ophelia had to resort to endless circumlocutions, such as “individual who served in a large unit for the preservation of the nation,” or “situation of conflict between several countries using equipment that is harmful in the extreme.”
Ophelia was both hoping for and dreading the moment she would meet again with Thorn to give him her report. As he had predicted, they no longer had a single opportunity to meet in private: Lady Septima ensured that she was present for every meeting, so she could judge for herself how her pupil was performing. Elizabeth was also often present, coming and going between the reading cubicles and the Secretarium, reviewing the coding or bringing endless improvements to the Coordinator.
So Ophelia had to remain forever on her guard, call Thorn monsieur, and keep her eyes lowered. It was painful every day, knowing that he was so close, and yet so inaccessible. Ophelia felt as if she hadn’t really found him again. She was so afraid of not living up to his expectations that she took the mission he had assigned her very seriously; so afraid of increasing the distance between them that she maintained the discretion he had demanded of her religiously. Every time she dared to glance surreptitiously at him, she was struck by the cold determination that spurred him on. Thorn had already set himself the objective of thwarting God back when he had sought to read Farouk’s Book, but from the start he had accepted the possibility of failure. Ophelia had watched him gradually exhausting himself, becoming stooped as the weeks went by, crushed by the weight of a burden that was too much for him.
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