The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters by Gordon Dahlquist
“You have the advantage, Celeste,” muttered Chang hoarsely. “From the blood in the Doctor’s hair, I assume we both lack any knowledge of where we are, who guards us…even the damned time of day.”
“How long since we were taken?” asked Svenson.
Miss Temple sniffed again.
“Not long at all. But so much has happened since we spoke, since I left you—I am so sorry—I was childish and a fool—”
Svenson waved away her concerns.
“Celeste, I doubt there is time—nor does it matter—”
“It matters to me.”
“Celeste—” This was Chang, struggling to rise.
“Be quiet, the both of you,” she said, and stood up so she was taller than either of them. “I will be brief, but I must first apologize for leaving you at Plum Court. It was a foolish thing to do and one that nearly ended my life—and nearly finished both of yours as well.” She held up a hand to stop Doctor Svenson from speaking. “There are two Macklenburg soldiers outside the door, and down the corridor at least ten Dragoons with their officer and their Colonel. The door is locked, and—as you both can see—our room is without windows. I assume we have no weapons.”
Chang and Svenson patted their pockets somewhat absently, not finding a thing.
“We will acquire them, it does not signify,” she said quickly, not wanting to lose her place.
“If we get out the door,” said Svenson.
“Yes, of course—the important thing is stopping our enemies’ plan.”
“And what exact plan is that?” asked Chang.
“That is the issue—I only know a portion of it. But I trust you’ve each seen a portion of your own.”
Keeping her promise to be brief, Miss Temple breathlessly launched into her tale: the St. Royale, Miss Vandaariff’s potion, the painting in the Contessa’s room, her battle with the book, her battle—in a strictly abbreviated version—with the Comte and Contessa in the coach, her train ride to Harschmort, and her journey to the theatre. Both Chang and Svenson opened their mouths to add details but she hushed them and went on—the secret room, the Contessa and the Prince, the killing of Blenheim, Elöise’s discovery in the blue card, Trapping, Vandaariff, Lydia, Veilandt, the ballroom, and, finally, the vicious argument between the Contessa and her allies not ten minutes before. The entire narrative took perhaps two hurriedly whispered minutes.
When she was finished, Miss Temple took a deep breath, hoping she hadn’t forgotten anything vital, though of course she had—simply too much had happened.
“So…” The Doctor pushed himself up from the floor onto the settee.
“They have taken control of this government with the Duke—who I promise you was killed—and are on their way to taking over that of Macklenburg—”
“If it is not offensive to you, Doctor,” said Miss Temple, “I do not understand the to-do about one amongst so many German kingdoms.”
“Duchy, but yes—it is because our mountains hold more of this indigo clay than a hundred Tarr Manors put together. They have been acquiring the land for years…” His voice caught and again he shook his head. “In any case—if they journey tonight to Macklenburg—”
“We will need to travel—” muttered Chang. His words were followed by another wracking cough he did his best to ignore, digging into each side pocket of his coat. “I have carried these quite a way, for this exact moment…”
Miss Temple squeaked with happy surprise, blinking again at a new tickling of tears in each eye. Her green boots! She sat down on the floor without the slightest hesitation or thought of modesty and snatched them up, working her lost treasures joyfully onto each foot. She looked up at Chang, who was smiling—though still coughing—and set to tightening the laces.
“I cannot tell you what this means,” she said, “you will laugh at me—you’re laughing now—I know they are only shoes, and I have many shoes, and to be honest I should not have given a pin for these four days before, but now I would not lose them for the world.”
“Of course not,” said Svenson quietly.
“O!” Miss Temple said. “But there are things of yours—from your greatcoat, which we lost, but as I said, we took the card, and there was also a silver case, for your cigarettes! Well, now that I say it, I do not have it—Elöise does, but once we find her, you shall have it back.”
“Indeed…I…that is excellent—”
“It seemed as if it might be precious to you.”
The Doctor nodded, but then looked away, frowning, as if he did not want to say more. Chang coughed again, congestion echoing wetly in his chest.
“We must do something for you,” said Svenson, but Chang shook his head.
“It is my lungs—”
“Powdered glass,” said Miss Temple. “The Contessa explained how she’d killed you.”
“I am sorry to disappoint the Lady…” He smiled.
Svenson looked at Chang quite soberly. “The glass alone would be harmful to your lungs—that it bears such toxic properties as well, it is a marvel you have not succumbed to hypnotic visions.”
“I should prefer them to this coughing, I assure you.”
“Is there any way to get it out?” asked Miss Temple.
The Doctor frowned in thought. The Cardinal spat again, and began to speak.
“My story is simple. When we did not know where you went, we split up, the Doctor to Tarr Manor and I to the Ministry, neither of us guessing correctly. I met Bascombe and the Contessa, witnessed the Process in action, fought Xonck, nearly died, then tracked you—too late—to the St. Royale—thus the boots—and made the train for Harschmort. Once here I have seen the most powerful figures overborne, their minds drained into these books, and Robert Vandaariff, mindless as an ape, filling page after page with a narrative of his secrets. I was unable to prevent the transformation of the three women…” Chang paused for a moment—Miss Temple was becoming steadily aware of the degree to which each man had pressed the limit of not only his strength but also his heart, and her own went out to them utterly—and then cleared his throat. “Though I did kill your Major Blach. But the rest was capture and failure—except I also managed to kill the Contessa’s man, Mr. Gray—”
“O! They were arguing about it fiercely!” exclaimed Miss Temple.
“He was on some errand—secret from the others, I am sure. I do not know what it was.” He looked up at Miss Temple. “Did you say our guards were Dragoons?”
“Not directly outside the door, no—but in the corridor, yes—perhaps a dozen men with their officer, Captain Smythe, and their Colonel—”
“Smythe, you say!” Chang’s face visibly brightened.
“I met him,” said Svenson. “He saved my life!”
“He knows me too, somehow,” said Miss Temple. “It was actually rather unsettling…”
“If we can get rid of Aspiche then Smythe will come to our cause, I am sure of it,” said Chang.
Miss Temple glanced back at the door. “Well, if that is all we require, then we will soon be on our way. Doctor?”
“I can speak as we go—save to say that there is an airship on the roof—it is how we came from Tarr Manor. They may use it to reach a ship at the canal, or farther up the coast—”
“Or go all the way to Macklenburg,” said Chang. “These machines I have seen are prodigiously powerful.”
Svenson nodded. “You are right—it is ridiculous to undervalue their capacity in any way—but this too can wait. We must stop the marriage. We must stop the Duke.”
“And we must find Elöise,” exclaimed Miss Temple, “especially as she has the glass key!”
“What glass key?” rasped Chang.
“Did I not mention it? I believe it is the way to safely read the books. We got it from Blenheim’s pocket.”
“How did he have it?” asked Chang.
“Exactly!” Miss Temple beamed. “Now, both of you—back on the floor—or, all right, I’m sure it is fine if you are on a settee??
“Celeste, what are you doing?” asked Svenson.
“Managing our escape, naturally.”
She knocked on the door and called out as sweetly as she could to the guards on the other side. They did not answer, but Miss Temple kept knocking and although she was forced to switch several times from one hand to the other as her knuckles became tender, at last the lock was turned and the door cracked open a single suspicious inch, through which Miss Temple glimpsed the pale, cautious face of a young soldier from Macklenburg—younger than herself, she saw, which only increased the sweetness of her smile.
“I do beg your pardon, but it’s very important that I see the Colonel. I have information for the Contessa—the Contessa, you understand—that she will be most anxious to have.”
The trooper did not move. Did he even understand her? Miss Temple’s smile hardened as she leaned forward and spoke more loudly, with a sharp, unmistakable intent.
“I must see the Colonel! At once! Or you will be punished!”
The trooper looked to his comrade, out of view, clearly unsure of what he should do. Miss Temple barked past him at the top of her lungs.
“Colonel Aspiche! I have vital news for you! If the Contessa does not get it, she will cut off your ears!”
At her scream the guard slammed the door and fumbled for the lock, but Miss Temple could already hear the angry stride of heavy boots. In a moment the door was flung wide by Aspiche, face crimson with rage, cheroot in one hand and the other on the hilt of his saber, glaring down at her like a red-coated schoolmaster ready to deal out a whipping.
“Thank you so much,” said Miss Temple.
“What information are you screeching about?” he snarled. “Your manners are quite unbecoming—even more so if I find this is a lie.”
“Nonsense,” said Miss Temple, shivering for the Colonel’s benefit and slipping a theatrical quaver into her voice. “And you do not need to scare me so—the state of my allies and the Contessa’s power have left me helpless. I am only trying to save my own life.” She wiped her nose on her sleeve.
“What information?” repeated Aspiche.
Miss Temple glanced behind him at the guards, who were staring with undisguised curiosity, and then leaned forward with a whisper.
“It is actually rather sensitive…”
Aspiche leaned forward in turn with a tight, put-upon expression. Miss Temple brushed his ear with her lips.
“Blue…Caesar…blue…Regiment…ice…consumption…”
She looked up and saw the Colonel’s eyes did not move, gazing at a point just beyond her shoulder.
“Perhaps we ought to be alone,” she whispered.
Aspiche wheeled on the guards with fury.
“Leave me with the prisoners!” he barked. The guards stumbled back, as Aspiche reached out with both hands and slammed the door. He turned back to Miss Temple, his face without any expression at all.
“Cardinal,…Doctor,…you may rise…”
She kept to her whisper, not wanting the guards to hear. Chang and Svenson stood slowly, staring at the Colonel with morbid curiosity.
“Everyone who undergoes the Process is instilled with some sort of control phrase,” Miss Temple explained. “I overheard the Contessa use one on the Prince, and again when she attempted to use one on me—to prove I had not been converted. I wasn’t able to work it all out—it was a guess—”
“You risked this on a guess?” asked Svenson.
“As it was a good guess, yes. The phrase has several parts—the first is a color, and I deduced that the color was about where the Process was administered. You remember that the different boxes had different colors of felt packing—”
“Orange at Harschmort,” said Chang. “Blue at the Institute.”
“And seeing as he was converted before they moved the boxes from the Institute, the color for the Colonel was blue.”
“What was the rest of the phrase?” asked Svenson.
“The second word is about their role, using a Biblical metaphor—I’m sure it is all part of the Comte’s ostentation. For the Prince it was Joseph—for he will be the father to someone else’s child, as poor Lydia must be Mary—for me it would have been Magdalene, as for all of the white-robed initiates—and for the Colonel, as the representative of the state, I guessed correctly it would be ‘Caesar’…the rest follows the same way—‘Regiment’ instead of ‘Palace’ or ‘Royale’—”
“Is he understanding this?” asked Svenson.
“I think so, but he is also waiting for instructions.”
“Suppose he should cut his own throat?” suggested Chang, with a moist chuckle.
“Suppose he tells us if they’ve captured Elöise,” said Svenson, and he spoke slowly and clearly to Colonel Aspiche. “Do you know the whereabouts of Mrs. Dujong?”
“Shut your filthy hole before I shut it for you!” Aspiche roared.
Svenson darted back a step, his eyes wide with surprise.
“Ah,” Miss Temple said, “perhaps only the person who speaks the phrase can command.” She cleared her throat. “Colonel, do you know where we can find Mrs. Dujong?”
“Of course I don’t,” snapped Aspiche, sullenly.
“All right…when did you last see her?”
The Colonel’s lips curled into an unabashed and wicked smile. “Aboard the airship. Doctor Lorenz asked her questions, and when she did not answer Miss Poole and I took turns—”
Doctor Svenson’s fist landed like a hammer on the Colonel’s jaw, knocking him back into the door. Miss Temple turned to Svenson—hissing with pain and flexing his hand—and then to Aspiche, sputtering with rage and struggling to rise. Before he could, Chang’s arm shot forth and snatched the Colonel’s saber from its sheath, a wheeling bright scythe that had Miss Temple scampering clear with a squeak. When she looked back, the Cardinal had the blade hovering dangerously in front of the man’s chest. Aspiche did not move.
“Doctor?” she asked quietly.
“My apologies—”
“Not at all, the Colonel is a horrid beast. Your hand?”
“It will do fine.”
She stepped closer to Aspiche, her face harder than before. She had known Elöise endured her own set of trials, but Miss Temple thought back to her own irritation at how the woman, drugged and stumbling, had slowed their progress in escaping the theatre. She was more than happy to expend the sting of her guilt and regret on the villain before her.
“Colonel, you will open this door and take us into the hall. You will order both of these guards into this room and then lock the door behind them. If they protest, you will do your level best to kill them. Do you understand?”
Aspiche nodded, his eyes wavering between her own and the floating tip of the saber.
“Then do it. We are wasting time.”
The Germans gave them no trouble, so inured were they to following orders. It was only a matter of moments before they stood again in the open foyer where the members of the Cabal had argued with one another. The Dragoons lining the corridor were gone, along with their officer.
“Where’s Captain Smythe?” she asked Aspiche.
“Assisting Mr. Xonck and the Deputy Minister.”
Miss Temple frowned. “Then what were you doing here? Did you not have orders?”
“Of course—to execute the three of you.”
“But why were you waiting in the corridor?”
“I was finishing my cigar!” snapped Colonel Aspiche.
Chang scoffed behind her.
“Every man reveals his soul eventually,” he muttered.
Miss Temple crept to the ballroom doors. The enormous space was empty. She called back to her prisoner.
“Where is everyone?” He opened his mouth to answer but she cut him off. “Where are each of our enemies—the Contessa, the Comte, Deputy Minister Crabbé, Francis Xonck, the Prince and his bride, Lord Vandaariff, the Duke of Stäelmaere, Mrs. Stearne—”
“And Roger Bascombe,” said Doctor Svenson. She turned to him, and to Chang, and nodded sadly.
“And Roger Bascombe.” She sighed. “In an orderly manner, if you please.”
The Colonel had informed them—sullen twitches around his mouth evidence of a useless struggle against Miss Temple’s control—that their enemies had split into two groups. The first occupied themselves with a sweeping progress through the great house, gathering up their guests and collecting the stupefied luminaries whose minds had been drained into the glass books on the way, to send off the Duke of Stäelmaere with ceremony suitable to his imminent coup d’état. Accompanying the Duke’s progress would be the Contessa, the Deputy Minister, and Francis Xonck, as well as Lord Vandaariff, Bascombe, Mrs. Stearne, and the two glass women, Marchmoor and Poole. The second group, about which Aspiche could provide no information as to their errand, consisted of the Comte d’Orkancz, Prince Karl-Horst von Maasmärck, Lydia Vandaariff, Herr Flaüss, and the third glass woman.
“I did not recognize her,” said Miss Temple. “By all rights the third subject ought to have been Caroline.”
“It is Angelique, the Cardinal’s acquaintance,” replied Doctor Svenson, speaking delicately. “The woman we searched for in the greenhouse. You were right—she did not perish there.”
“Instead, the Comte kept her alive to use as a test subject,” rasped Chang. “If his transformation failed, then he need not sacrifice the others—if it worked and made moot the issue of her damaged body, then all the better. All in all you see, it is an admirable expression of economy.”
Neither Miss Temple nor the Doctor spoke, letting Chang’s bitterness and anger have their sway. Chang rubbed his eyes beneath his glasses and sighed.
“The question is what they are doing, and which group we ought to follow. If we agree that stopping the Duke and the Prince’s marriage are both vital, it is of course possible that we split up—”