The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [171]
“But why come all this way?” said Awa. “I understand Paracelsus wishes to study my methods, but you two have lives away from all this. Manuel’s family, and your brothel, and—”
“Well, the cleanest ’ores in Christendom didn’t stay quite so clean without your attentions,” Monique said sheepishly. “Sides, Manuel here needed your help in fulfillin a certain fantasy of ’is what relates ta those of the skeletal persuasion.”
“It’s not like that!” Manuel protested but he was smiling, too. “I’m an artist, damn it!”
“Yes, yes, of course you are,” said Paracelsus. “And of course Paracelsus will risk his life a dozen times over to study someone else’s methods, of course it’s all business for him, of course he has no fondness for anyone or anything but esoteric knowledge. It’s all just research for the magus, the only nourishment he requires.”
“Eat up,” said Awa, lifting another spoonful to Monique’s thick lips. “It’ll only help if you eat.”
Monique and Awa took the first watch together, catching one another up having taken some time and Paracelsus’s addition of laudanum to his schnapps making the day float by all the faster for the reunited friends. Monique waited until she was confident Paracelsus and Manuel were asleep before putting the problem to Awa directly: “So what now? If the ol’ wizardly cunt don’t know a way, an’ you don’t neither …”
“I don’t know,” said Awa. “I’ve got his book, but if it doesn’t know and my tutor doesn’t know and the Bastards of the Schwarzwald don’t know, then I certainly don’t, either.”
“What bout what he did, then? Couldn’t you do the same, nick out an’ take some other body fore he gets yours?”
“Even if I knew how, I wouldn’t. I couldn’t do that to somebody. I’m not like him.” Awa knew she was trying to assure herself as much as Monique.
“What if they was willin, like?”
“Willing? I don’t think most—” Awa saw the look on Monique’s face and shook her head vigorously, her heart twisting in a bittersweet contortion that is only possible on the rarest of occasions. “No. I … no. I can’t ask that of you, or anybody. The spirit … the spirit is destroyed, obliterated, or else trapped in his book, I think, oh hell, I really don’t know. But no.”
“Maybe we could share?” said Monique. “Like, if you wasn’t keen on, on pushin my soul about, maybe we could both set up shop. Room enough for two in ’ere. Rest of my family’s right dwarfs, maybe that’s the reason I come up so big?”
“I—I’ve never heard anything so generous.” Awa took her friend’s hand. “But like I said, even if I wanted to I don’t know how. I can talk to spirits, and make bargains with them, but I’m not so wise about controlling my own spirit, or who knows what else goes into what he does.”
“Whatta the, uh, the dead say on it, then?” said Monique.
“Which dead?”
“I ain’t the expert,” protested Monique. “Jus’ askin, right? You told of helpin out all them dead people fore meetin up with Manuel an’ me, thought you might’ve asked one of them dead or spirits or what bout how ta deal with dead wizards tryin to do stuff an’ all. What?”
“No.” Awa had sat up straighter, a sudden thought setting her teeth on edge. “I just … maybe … Monique, is there a war happening?”
“A war?”
“Yes, like the ones you were fighting when Manuel and I met?”
“Hell, there’s always a war goin down Lombardy-ways,” said Monique. “Emperor Charles ain’t just a fuckin Spaniard cunt but the king of the fuckin Spaniards from afore he got the ’oly Roman crown, so ya know he’ll be mixin it up with the cheese-eaters an’ the eye-ties even more than the old Emp. What’s war gotta do with it?”
“I … I …” Awa was getting excited, her thoughts swirling around something but unable to stick to it. She was on the edge of salvation, she felt it. “We need to go there, Mo, we need to go to war.”
“Might’s well ask Manuel if he’d like ta paint a pretty ’ore.” Monique grinned. “Them sally eggs ya gave me’s changed the whole fuckin game, Awa. Traded a smith some mink for time in ’is shop,