The Shadows of God - J. Gregory Keyes [57]
“I was invited to dinner. I thought it best not to go. I will attend tonight, however. The king wishes me to see his demonstration.”
“You are friendly with the king?”
“Why not be blunt, Ben, as you seem bent on hurting me? I am not his mistress. He has two of those, both quite vicious. I have enemies enough here as it is.”
“Yes, and I have enough without acquiring yours.”
Finally, a small, vexed frown disturbed her composure. “I thought you wanted me to speak,” she said. “You said as much.”
“Speak, then.”
“It has to do with the dark engines.”
That caught his attention. It was the same phrase Euler had used. Of course, she might well have met with Euler in the last day, but either way, it was worth hearing more about this.
“Go on,” he said.
She smiled faintly. “Science has taken something of a different direction in Russia,” she explained. “An angelic direction, if you understand me. Almost all advances there have hinged on improving Sir Isaac's use of the animal spirit, on giving the malakim material bodies.”
“So far you aren't telling me anything I don't know.”
“Now I will, I think. We have gone beyond Newton, Ben. We have invented a way for the malakim to become manifest— more than manifest, near omnipotent—in the world of matter. No more taloi made of metal and alchemical muscle, no more clumsy airships, no more fighting battles through human allies. They will take a hand directly, themselves. Do you see?”
His mouth felt dry. “Then why all this?” he asked quietly. “Why the underwater ships, the Pretender, Sterne—why all this farce?”
“Because we didn't know we could do it, and because the malakim are divided. Some forbid the use of the dark engines; some don't even know about them. Battles can be fought in the aether, too. Those who wish to exterminate our race must pick their moment. They must pretend to have the matter in hand with their armies and cannon and intrigues in human kingdoms. But, Ben, it will all be for naught if we can't defeat the engines. All of it, I swear.”
And suddenly, in a cold light, he saw something on her face he understood perfectly. It was the face that looked out of the mirror at him when he remembered what he had done to the world, the face that knew itself responsible for millions of deaths.
And—the unfair part—she was weeping.
A weeping woman has a magnetism that few men even think to resist. Franklin was no better, and he found himself with a hand on her shoulder, gruffly trying to soothe.
The next moment, he found her in his arms.
It was a shock, how familiar it was. The scent of her hair was the same, the bones of her body, so delicate.
But he did not recognize this grip, this feeling of helplessness emanating from her. She had always been the confident one, the one in control. It had always been he who needed her. It felt good, this change in roles. It felt like such good revenge that he didn't even want revenge anymore. No, he wanted …
Despite what he wanted, he gently pushed her back.
“Come, Vasilisa. If what you say is true, I will help you. Of course I must. But if it is distraction—”
“It is not, I swear.”
“You said you had proof.”
“I have some of Swedenborg's notes on their making. From them we can create a countermeasure. We must! Together, I am certain we can.”
“Notes are not proof.”
“You look at them. You judge. I leave them with you.”
Where she produced them from—the folds of her skirt?— he wasn't sure, but she lay several bound sheaves of paper into his hand. Then she was gone.
He opened the first up. Latin, at least, and not Russian. He would be able to get through it passing well.
He sat down and began to read, scratching every now and then with pen and paper to check an equation.
The sun changed its slant through the windows and worked toward the red end of the spectrum until it settled on a brutish sort of brick orange.
A cool breeze swept in from seaward, easing through the open windows to replace the ferocious heat of the day. Despite that, Franklin kept sweating, for by that time he believed.