The Ruined Woman

The press conference was scheduled for 10 a.m. “After breakfast and before lunch,” Miss Jesczenka explained, “when the reporters will be at their peak of attentiveness.” But Emily and Miss Jesczenka began their preparations well before dawn. Dmitri and his men moved silently in the early-morning darkness, some leaving to take up secure positions around Twenty-third and Broadway where the Fifth Avenue Hotel stood, some preparing the nondescript carriage that would take them there, some loading and polishing what sounded like an arsenal of rifles. Dmitri himself carried a large trunk up to Miss Jesczenka’s room and set it down with a heavy thunk. The woman stood, going to the trunk quickly and throwing it open to make sure that nothing had been left out. She pawed through mounds of silk and lace, seemingly satisfied.

“Thank you, Dmitri,” she said. “You’ll have to leave us alone now. We must get her dressed.”

Instead of leaving, Dmitri went to Emily’s side. Emily didn’t look at him, but he would not be ignored. He seized Emily’s hand, the one of ivory, and held it for a moment, looking at it meaningfully. Then he bent over it with the stiff courtliness of a soldier.

“Think about what I told you,” he said. “There are always other choices, Emilia Vladimirovna.”

He straightened and walked from the room, closing the door behind him. There was the familiar scrape of a key in the lock.

When Emily turned, she saw that Miss Jesczenka was staring at her. Emily flushed and gritted her teeth.

“All right,” Miss Jesczenka said quickly, turning her eyes down to the trunk. “The press conference starts in less than two hours. I need you to listen closely while I brief you on one of the most important elements of this little drama we’re going to be staging.”

Emily was already removing her clothes in preparation for being put into what she expected would be another extremely formal gown, if the profusion of shimmering silk peeping from the top of the trunk was any indication.

“I’m listening,” Emily said, pulling her dress off over her head.

Miss Jesczenka reached into the trunk and produced a portfolio. She opened it, and nodded with satisfaction at the contents. Inside were letters. She handed the letters to Emily. It was a fat bundle; surely Miss Jesczenka couldn’t expect her to read them all right then? But she seemed to expect no such thing, and was ready instead with a precise summary.

“Remember I told you that the Institute had ammunition against Fortissimus? That’s the ammunition.”

Emily looked through the letters. They bore familiar addresses, in both the delivery and the return sections. The addresses were those of the Fortissimus Presentment Arranging Agency and Tammany Hall.

“Those letters provide irrefutable evidence that Fortissimus’ Agency extravagantly padded city contracts under the administration of Boss Tweed,” Miss Jesczenka said. “Shocking, of course, but hardly fatal given that just about everyone in New York was the recipient of Tweed’s graft. Without the leverage we’re going to bring to bear, such information would hardly dull Fortissimus’ shine. But it’s the way we’re going to give it to the reporters. We’re going to call upon a belief more ancient, more deeply held, and more fondly cherished, than even the American urge to root for the underdog.”

Emily laid the letters aside on the desk as she came to stand before Miss Jesczenka. “And what ancient, deeply held, and fondly cherished belief would that be?” she asked. Zeno’s powerful command, the one he had driven deep into the flesh of the thing in the pit, flashed through her mind. “Good shall triumph over evil?”

Miss Jesczenka looked at her like an elementary school student who’d just spouted the solution to a trigonometry problem.

“Why yes, that is a credomantic concept of exceptional power,” she said wonderingly. “Have you been reading Mr. Stanton’s textbooks?” She paused, then shook her head. “But no. That’s not the one we’re going to use. It is not specific enough for our purpose.”

“What is then?” Emily said.

“ ‘True love conquers all,’ ” Miss Jesczenka said, pulling a chemise down over Emily’s head with a jerk.

“The human belief in true love is perhaps the most powerful belief known to credomancy, next to the rather more general one you just quoted,” Miss Jesczenka said as she tied Emily’s corset strings and then left them to stretch, as she’d done before. She slid her arms along Emily’s firmly compressed sides, apparently satisfied that Emily’s waist was small enough, even without the benefit of a measuring tape. “Everyone wants to see two people who are truly and deeply in love come together in a happy union, regardless of the fact that the lovers must pass through trials of fire. It’s trials of fire that observers like the best, as a matter of fact. They serve as proof that the love is true, and powerful enough to survive whatever cruel fate throws in its path.”

Emily thought about cruel fate, and everything it had thrown in the path of her and Stanton. She pressed her lips together. Unlike a heroine in a romance story, she’d had her doubts. She had them still. Would her love be true enough?

Emily smiled wanly to herself. That last sentence certainly sounded enough like something out of Ladies’ Repository to fit the bill. But the smile did not last, as she followed the metaphor along its logical paths of association. Because in all those romantic stories, the hero never had murderous blood sorcery in his past. He would never leave the heroine to face brutal villains on her own because his work demanded him elsewhere. And heroes in stories were honest and forthright and decent.

Stanton was not honest. And he certainly wasn’t forthright. Well then, she could only pin her hopes on the last one. She had to pray that he was decent. And not decent the way the Stanton family defined decency. She could only hope after everything he’d done, after everything he’d been, there was an irreducible part of him that was the man she had fallen in love with. The man she imagined she saw in his green eyes when he looked at her.

That was all there was left for her to believe. Would it be enough? It would have to be.

“Hold your arms up,” Miss Jesczenka said.

Miss Jesczenka had arranged for an exquisite afternoon dress of a tender pinkish hue. It was light silk, and skimmed over Emily’s form with a delicate elegance. It suggested gardens, laughing hope, and swings decorated with flowers.

“Just the color,” Miss Jesczenka said with approval, smoothing the fabric down over Emily’s body. “Like a virgin’s blush.” At the word “virgin,” Miss Jesczenka’s eyes darted, ever so briefly, to the door through which Dmitri had exited.

“Then it will suit me perfectly,” Emily bit back, snatching the skirt away from the woman’s fussing hands. Without a word, Miss Jesczenka rose and began doing the dozens of tiny mother-of-pearl buttons that ran up the back.

“Mr. Stanton loves you very much,” she murmured as her nimble fingers made the buttons fast. “You know that, don’t you?”

“I wish I could hear it from him,” Emily said, dropping her head as Miss Jesczenka’s fingers moved to her nape. When the woman had finished the buttons, she took Emily by the arms and turned her. She looked into Emily’s eyes, her brown ones soft and imploring.

“You have to believe that he does.” She gave Emily a little shake. “You have to believe it in every bone of your body. If you could see what I’ve seen, if you could see how worried he’s been about you … you’d know. He’s not here to tell you himself, but he would want me to tell you. He loves you, and he never wanted any of this to happen.”

Emily looked into Miss Jesczenka’s eyes.

“A horse is tied to a ten-foot rope, and there’s hay twenty-five feet away,” Emily murmured thoughtfully. She was remembering another day, another dress, another life.

“Miss Edwards?” Her companion’s voice was puzzled.

“The simplest answer is that the horse can’t eat the hay. It’s impossible. Some things just aren’t meant to be.” She paused. “I don’t think that’s the answer he was looking for. It’s not the answer I was looking for. But maybe it’s the right one.” She looked at Miss Jesczenka, her eyes focusing. “You want me to be the heroine in a love story. But there’s one thing missing. A hero. You say he never wanted any of this to happen. But it did. And he couldn’t stop it.”

“No, he couldn’t.” Miss Jesczenka’s voice was firm. “Credomancy may seek to exploit the human desire for a tidy narrative where an unblemished romantic hero vanquishes all obstacles, but such ideals have very little to do with reality. Reality requires pragmatism and compromise. Men fail. Women fail. There are no heroes, only human beings who somehow find the strength to behave heroically, no matter how many times they have been unable to do so in the past. If you understand that, Miss Edwards—if you truly and deeply understand that, then you will understand the most powerful thing anyone with a heart can understand.”

“And what’s that?” Emily said softly.

“That love is not enough. But it’s a start.”

She released Emily’s arms slowly, stepped back to look at her.

“You look beautiful.” She smiled. “You’ll do just fine.”

At 9:30 a.m. precisely, Dmitri knocked softly on the door and told them that the carriage was ready. He led them downstairs to where a large black landau waited, harnessed horses stamping impatiently. Two men sat atop the carriage, behind the driver, and two sat on the carriage’s back railing. They all had rifles.

Emily settled into her seat, drawing a deep breath as Dmitri fastened the door behind them. She looked at the letters she held in her white gloved hand, then at Miss Jesczenka, who had settled across from her.

“Well, you’ve told me everything about true love,” Emily said as the carriage lurched and got under way. “But you haven’t told me what I’m supposed to do with these.”

“You are going to show them around to the reporters. Let them paw over them with their greasy hands and read enough to know that they want to read more. Whet their appetites, give them confidence that the letters are genuine. But make sure you get them back, and I’ll make sure that everyone gets copies afterward.”

Emily nodded, but the woman continued to look at her.

“But the letters aren’t the most important thing. The most important thing is for you to charm them, to make them believe that you love Mr. Stanton so much that you’re willing to throw yourself on their mercy for his sake. They’ll love having a pretty girl supplicating them, even if you’ll have them entirely at your advantage, as you will by the time you’re finished with them. A few discreet tears would be nice, but don’t overdo it. No one likes a sniveler. If things get really bad, faint.”

“You really think I can do this?” she asked, half to Miss Jesczenka and half to herself.

“You must,” Miss Jesczenka snapped. “You must, so that Mr. Stanton can be redeemed, the Institute saved, and Rex Fortissimus destroyed. Destroyed completely and utterly.” There was bitter delight in these last words, more bitter than Emily had ever heard from the woman, or from any woman, for that matter. She looked at Miss Jesczenka as the carriage rocked them softly from side to side.

“Perun said he knew something about you and Rex Fortissimus,” Emily said.

“He is trying to destroy everything I’ve ever worked for.” Miss Jesczenka spoke as if the words were rehearsed. “Of course I dislike him.”

“No, you don’t dislike him,” Emily said. “You hate him.”

Miss Jesczenka was silent for a long time, and Emily thought that the matter would end with her silence. The woman looked at the window, reaching up to brush aside the drawn curtains, then thinking better of it. She touched a finger to the corner of her eye. Finally, she spoke again.

“It is not a polite story for a virginal bride,” she said. “But since I’ve already told you about true love, I suppose I can tell you.” She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath.

“I was sixteen years old,” Miss Jesczenka said. “I had just come across from Poland. I didn’t know anything about New York. I barely spoke any English. And the Mirabilis Institute wasn’t taking women at the time.” She paused. “I went to Fortissimus’ Agency, knowing only that it was a place of powerful magic. I was looking for work, any kind of work that would help me learn magic—learn to have the kind of power the men I’d grown up around had … the rabbis, the wise old men of the minyan. They told me I could never study the mysteries of the cabala, that it was forbidden to women. They told me I should calm myself and learn to be a good, observant wife. That was power enough, they said. I did not agree. So I came to America. Because in America, anyone can do anything they want.”

She paused, chewing her lip—a strangely nervous gesture from the woman Emily was used to seeing so calm and composed.

“A slimy little weasel of a man hired me to do simple clerical work for Fortissimus’ Agency. I was overjoyed. I believed I could work my way up, learning as I went. Looking back, the fact that I was hired at all should have been a warning. I wasn’t anything like a promising prospect. Except in one very specific regard.”

She paused.

“I learned later that the slimy weasel of a man who hired me took presumptuous girls like myself off the street all the time. Girls who thought they wanted to learn something about the man’s world. It was a great joke between him and Fortissimus, teaching us.”

“Teaching you?”

“We would be directed to work late. And Rex Fortissimus would be there, waiting, in the dark offices with the heavy doors.”

Horror spread through Emily’s body.

“He … took advantage of you?”

“The word is rape,” Miss Jesczenka said. “And yes. That’s what he did.”

She was silent for a long moment, looking thoughtfully at the curtain that she seemed still to long to push back, to let the light in.

“It wasn’t just that he took my body. He took my ambitions. He made me a ruined woman.” She looked at Emily. “And I mean that in a very specific credomantic way, just as Fortissimus certainly meant it.”

“I don’t understand,” Emily said.

“Almost as powerful as the belief that true love conquers all is the belief that a ruined woman will never recover from her ruining. Fortissimus’ rape wasn’t simply a physical attack, though that was low and ugly enough all by itself. His attack was infinitely worse, because it mocked my desire to wield the kind of credomantic power that he was master of. By making me into a ruined woman, he attacked me with the force of belief. He made me into something that he believed I could never recover from being.” She paused, her voice going almost too soft for Emily to hear her next words: “And indeed, it has been very difficult.”

“But you did it,” Emily said.

Miss Jesczenka nodded, a small movement.

“At a cost. I must maintain the weeds of a spinster to avoid any hint of the past I have defeated. That is a very lonely road.” She looked at Emily, smiled sadly. “Everyone likes to believe that true love might one day find them, and I’m no exception. But in my case, I can’t let it. Not ever. I must be satisfied with lesser consolations.”

Emily thought of the young man she’d seen with Miss Jesczenka the night before the Investment. She watched the light play over the woman’s face. She wanted to reach out to her, but she felt that it was better not to.

“I left the Agency after that, of course. And of course, there was a child. The bitter fruits of ruination. I gave the baby to an orphanage. What else could I do?” She looked at Emily, as if wishing Emily had an answer she herself had never been able to find. When she saw no answer, she let her eyes fall back to her lap. “I do not know what became of him, and I will never know. I could not even give him a name, only a description in my own language. Utisz. Anonymous.”

“How did you do it?” Emily asked breathlessly, imagining Miss Jesczenka young and lost and alone. She herself had often felt young and lost and alone, but she couldn’t imagine how much worse it must have been for the woman who sat before her.

“I was hired by a flower shop that needed a quick-foot for deliveries. The flower shop specialized in orchids. My deliveries often took me to the Mirabilis Institute, to the conservatory. It was there that I met Benedictus Zeno. We became friends and I liked him very much. He was good to me, and he even spoke to me in Polish sometimes. After a while, I told him everything that had happened. I wouldn’t ever have told anyone, but I told him …”

A look of fresh puzzlement at the unexpectedness of her admission came over Miss Jesczenka’s face. How well Emily knew that puzzlement.

“He helped me gain admission to the Institute. Mirabilis didn’t want to have anything to do with me. He didn’t think I was a good risk, as he put it. But Zeno was kind. He understood. And I did everything I could to make him proud.”

“I’m sure he would be proud of you,” Emily said. A sudden question struck her. She wondered if she should speak, but curiosity overcame tact.

“But Fortissimus has seen you a hundred times since. How come he’s never recognized you?”

“Fortissimus sees positions, not people,” Miss Jesczenka said bitterly. “He would not recognize his own mother if she were dressed in the clothes of a beggar. And as I’ve told you, credomancers often have the weakness of believing their own press. He believed that girls he made ruined women would stay ruined women.” She paused, clenching her teeth. “More fool he.”

Then she rearranged her face brightly, and the note in her voice when she spoke next was as cheerful as if she’d just been talking to Emily about the bright morning sunshine, and how vexing it was that the heavy dark curtains must be drawn to keep it out.

“Now you know my darkest secret,” she said. “My sad tale of woe.”

Emily looked across the carriage at her. “It seems that you’ve done very well for yourself.”

Miss Jesczenka smiled at her. “Yes, I have, haven’t I?” Her note of cheerfulness became terrible, almost mad in its intensity. “I’ve come far enough to pay back Ogilvy Creagh Flannigan for what he did to me. I intend to repay him pound for ounce the humiliation and misery he caused me. Revenge is indeed a delicious dish, Miss Edwards, served hot or cold. I hope you never have cause to develop a taste for it.”

And hearing the bitter note of obsession in the woman’s voice, Emily found that she sincerely hoped so as well.

The Fifth Avenue Hotel occupied an entire block between Twenty-third and Twenty-fourth streets. Six stories of white marble, it faced onto the sweet-smelling gardens of Madison Square. The carriage came to a stop and Dmitri’s face appeared through a crack in the door.

“The men are in place. Come in quickly, Miss Edwards.”

Emily was ushered hastily into the luxurious grandeur of the hotel, Dmitri at her elbow, his eyes darting back and forth as they walked. Emily found that his nervousness was infectious; she found her eyes sweeping the beautifully dressed crowd for black suits and obsidian stickpins.

She was escorted into a box called a Perpendicular Railway—a little car with a liveried attendant who touched his hat to her as he slid the ornate grate closed. Emily felt her stomach fall to her feet as the box swept her swiftly up to the Imperial Suite on the sixth floor.

As they came down the hall, Emily glimpsed a beautiful large ballroom, in which the acoustics did indeed seem to be wondrous. Emily could hear every note of the reporters gabbling within, their loud voices carrying into the hall. But they didn’t go directly into the room where the reporters were. Instead they entered the suite through different doors, into a large withdrawing room with arched marble windows hung with gold brocade draperies. Miss Jesczenka threw her bag down and immediately began rummaging through it.

“We’re going to have to be even more aggressive than we were at the Investment.” From the bag she withdrew a silver case that Emily recognized as the same silver powder case she’d used at the Investment. She pulled out the same pink puff, dusted Emily’s face with it as she had before, but she didn’t just stop there; she proceeded to sprinkle Emily’s whole body, stopping just short of dumping the silver box’s contents over Emily’s head. Emily brushed away glittering dust, coughed chokingly at the overwhelming stink of lavender. “The glamour I applied to you for the Investment was subtle—I didn’t want random ambassadors to start dying of unrequited love for you. This time, however, the more heart-breakingly lovely you are, the better our purpose will be served.”

“It’s like a love spell?” Emily felt a faint echo of panic, remembering the love spell she’d put on Dag Hansen. The love spell that had cost her so much.

“Exactly so,” Miss Jesczenka said briskly. “You’re going to make those reporters fall head-over-heels in love with you. They’re going to find you so appealing and attractive that not only will they believe everything you say, they’ll be driven to hit the streets immediately in your defense.”

“But that’s not honest!” Emily said.

“Forget about being honest,” Miss Jesczenka said. “Worry about being convincing. Now, let’s get these in your ears.” She took out a pair of delicate pearl earrings and hung them in Emily’s ears. “These earrings will allow me to communicate with you. Listen for me, and for God’s sake, do exactly as I say.” Indeed, Emily did not see how she could fail to listen to Miss Jesczenka; once the earrings were in her ears, Miss Jesczenka’s voice became twice as loud.

“Won’t the reporters hear?” Emily winced, putting a hand to her ear.

“No, only you,” Miss Jesczenka said. “And don’t wince like that, it’s not maidenly at all. Now, one last thing.” Her hand dipped back into the bag and when she removed it, something blazed between her fingers. Emily stared dumbfounded at the diamond engagement ring she’d left back at Mrs. Stanton’s.

“How did you get it back?” Emily said.

“Much as it pains me to compliment Dmitri, I will allow that he’s got some highly skilled footpads in his employ,” Miss Jesczenka said. “Give me your hand.”

For some reason, Emily hesitated slightly. Miss Jesczenka’s brow knit.

“Is something wrong?” she asked.

“No, nothing,” Emily said, holding out her hand, hoping Miss Jesczenka didn’t see how much it trembled beneath its sheath of white satin.

When everything was ready, Miss Jesczenka positioned herself before the doors to the drawing room. She took a deep breath, and once again, she seemed to be gathering strength, marshaling force from deep within herself. Then she threw up her head, straightened her back, flung open the doors, and strode into the ballroom.

The room was large and high ceilinged. Dozens of reporters lounged on carved chairs that had been brought in for them; some of them had tipped the chairs back, some sat straddled over them, casually slouched forward. Emily’s eyes swept the room, noting the arrangements that had been made for them: platters of delicious-smelling food—already mostly devoured—carafes of ice water and juice and coffee, lots and lots of coffee. But what Emily noticed most, and what gave her the most comfort, were dozens of Russian men—Dmitri’s men. Gone were the loose peasant shifts; now they were all carefully suited, and they stood ranged around the walls, their bodies hiding the silver-loaded rifles behind them. Dmitri himself was standing by the door, staring stock-straight, his face impassive and watchful.

As she came into the room, the gabbling voices stilled. Dozens of eyes followed her as she walked. The reporters sat up straighter; some of the straddlers even swung their legs back over their chairs and hastened to sit in a more dignified fashion. Notebooks came out, pencils were pulled from above ears.

Emily came to sit demurely on a red velvet sofa as Miss Jesczenka took her place at a highly polished lectern. She lifted her chin, gathered the reporters within the compass of her velvet-brown gaze.

“Thank you all for coming,” Miss Jesczenka began. “I am Miss Tiza Jesczenka, and I have the great honor to hold a position as senior professor at the Stanton Institute of the Credomantic Arts, the foremost institution of credomantic education in the United States. I appear before you today as Miss Edwards’ representative. As you all know, she is engaged to be married to Mr. Dreadnought Stanton, the Sophos of the Institute. She has asked you here personally because it is her deep and heartfelt desire to defend her true love against the scurrilous accusations and ignoble attacks leveled against him by those who wish to see him damaged by such falsehood.”

Miss Jesczenka paused, looking out over the reporters. Their pencils hovered over their pads, but they did not write. They were too busy staring at Emily. Emily blushed. The glamour Miss Jesczenka had cast on her was certainly quite powerful. Lowering her eyelashes made the men breathe hard. Lifting a hand—which she did experimentally to touch a stray curl—made them watch as if they were imagining her using that hand to do something shocking.

We’re off to a fine start, Miss Jesczenka’s voice whispered in her ear, as the woman lifted a glass of water to her lips. She put the water down carefully, looked out over the reporters again.

“First, she prays that you all imagine the grief these accusations have caused her. The terrible, heartbreaking grief of an innocent, virginal bride-to-be, with all the fondly cherished hopes and dreams that a young girl nurtures in her chaste bedchamber. She has been very hurt by these accusations. Very deeply hurt.” Emily saw the agony her supposed pain caused the reporters. They looked at one another, concerned. She lowered her eyelashes again, and felt certain that one man in the front row was about to break into tears.

“Is it not unfair, gentlemen—is it not ignoble and unkind—that this beautiful child, who dreams only of true love and its appropriate sanction, should have to suffer the existence of such base and disgusting and utterly unfounded lies about the man she loves? The powerful, honest man who rescued her from dangers more terrible than should ever be imagined, the bold lover who brought this innocent girl from an innocent land to New York, with all its bright promise … where, instead of finding the welcome and adoration of its inhabitants, she was instead wounded—nearly fatally, perhaps—by their depravity, and cruelty, and sniggering prurience?”

The reporters looked among themselves, ashamed. They had all written stories about Dreadnought Stanton, Emily guessed. And they were all imagining themselves with beautiful, innocent fiancées reading them. Heads hung, feet shifted guiltily.

“Shame on you!” Miss Jesczenka cried suddenly, her voice trembling. “Shame on you all!” But at that moment, Emily rose softly and laid a gentle hand on the woman’s shoulder.

“No, Miss Jesczenka,” Emily said, keeping her voice very soft, as she had been instructed.

Don’t worry if they can’t hear you … they’ll just listen harder, Miss Jesczenka had said. It wasn’t hard to keep her voice soft, with her heart thudding in her throat as it was. Emily stepped before the lectern, putting herself, her lovely dress the shade of a shell’s lip, and her shimmering glamour on display before them. She crossed her hands before herself, lowered her head.

“Please, don’t be so hard on these poor men.” Emily put a lilt in her voice. “They were only doing their jobs. They didn’t know. They didn’t know that it was all lies … all lies …”

Emily let her lower lip tremble and lifted a handkerchief to her eyes to catch supposed tears. Several of the men moved forward, looking to be in the right position to catch her if she should faint.

“Gentlemen, I understand that each one of you has a very important job. Mr. Stanton often says that reporters are the most powerful men in New York, and for the first time, I truly understand that terrible power. I understand that you must write stories that are interesting and … titillating …” Emily took care to hit every “t” in the word with tantalizing precision. “But my fiancé—Dreadnought Stanton, the Sophos of the Stanton Institute of the Credomantic Arts, the foremost institution of credomantic education in the United States—is truly a great man. He is kind and noble, decent and strong. I know that he could never do anything ugly. He could never do anything base.”

“But he practiced sangrimancy, didn’t he, Miss Edwards?” Emily’s eyes came up quickly to a man in the back who spoke the words loudly. He was a very large man in a shiny gray waistcoat. He looked calm and pleased with himself. He wasn’t sitting, but was leaning against the back wall with his arms crossed. He didn’t have a notebook or a pencil; he was just watching Emily with cool appraising eyes. He was smiling, but not necessarily in a mean way.

Horace Armatrout! How did he get in here? Miss Jesczenka’s words hissed in Emily’s ears.

“There will be time for questions later, Mr. Armatrout,” Miss Jesczenka said crisply.

Don’t worry, he’s not one of Fortissimus’ men, but he’s honest. Too honest. He writes for The New York Times and he’s impossible to manipulate. The womanly wiles may work on the other simpletons, but not on him. Be careful.

“It’s all right, Miss Jesczenka,” Emily murmured, lifting a hand. The gesture made a cluster of reporters in the middle of the room fan themselves. But Emily paid them no attention. She looked at Horace Armatrout.

“Mr. Stanton did study sangrimancy,” Emily said. “But that was a mistake he made long ago. He has paid the price for it. He admits his error of judgment.” Not seeing any give in Armatrout’s cool eyes, Emily looked rather desperately around at the men she knew she had under her sway. “Haven’t any of you gentlemen ever made a mistake?”

“Oh, of course, of course …” Emily heard the men mutter among themselves. By that point, however, Emily was aware that she could have told them that they had all attended the Fifth Council of Reims and had gotten good copy out of it, and they would have agreed with her. All of them. All of them except the coolly smiling Mr. Armatrout.

“Short of a hangman’s noose, I wonder how exactly one goes about paying for the mistake of killing people and stealing their blood,” Armatrout said. But it was not a question, so Emily said nothing, just kept her lips pressed together tightly. “And speaking of errors in judgment, what about this ‘Mrs. Blackheart’?” Armatrout reached into his pocket, pulled out a red book, and held it before himself. “Just another one of his mistakes, Miss Edwards? To be honest, I find your apparent acceptance of your noble fiancé’s indiscretions kind of … puzzling.”

All right, Miss Jesczenka’s voice was clipped. I think it’s time we considered the fainting option. But Emily did not faint; she just lifted her chin and stared back at Horace Armatrout.

“I have met Mrs. Blotgate,” Emily said. “She was a guest at the Investment, in the company of her husband.” Emily had to clench her teeth to get the next words out, but she got them out all right, to her credit. “She seemed very nice. I don’t believe any of the things I read in that book, not about her or about my fiancé.”

“You read the book?” Armatrout sprung the trap, his voice rich with pretended astonishment. “You read The Blood-Soaked Crimes of Dreadnought Stanton? Hardly nice material for an innocent such as yourself.”

God no, you haven’t read it. Miss Jesczenka’s voice in her ears was horrified. You can’t even conceive of the kind of depravity described in that book.

“Oh, no … I couldn’t read it,” Emily stammered. “I couldn’t even concieve of the kind of depravity described in that book.”

“Then how do you know about ‘Mrs. Blackheart’?” Armatrout asked her. Then he shrugged. “Oh well, I’m sure you’ve been well prepared. Well briefed.” He encompassed Miss Jesczenka and Emily in one pointed glance.

“I … I have heard a little about it. But I felt quite ill when I saw it. I felt the evil in it. The horrible, horrible evil. I felt that it was an evil book, and it … it made me feel ill.”

Stop babbling, Miss Jesczenka’s voice was hard. Let him have the point. You’ve already lost it. Emily pressed her lips closed, clenching her teeth.

“As I said, Mr. Armatrout,” Miss Jesczenka quickly interjected, “there will be a time for questions later. At the moment, Miss Edwards has something to deliver. Something that will reveal the true author of these attacks, and the malicious intention behind them.”

Emily wasn’t listening as the woman continued to speak. She was watching Armatrout. He had apparently satisfied himself as to the idiocy of the proceedings and was lounging at the back of the room, using a pocketknife to pick his fingernails.

“Miss Edwards?” Miss Jesczenka’s voice prompted. But Emily was still watching Horace Armatrout.

Emily, the voice barked in her ear, making her startle. Bring out the letters. They’re ready for you. They’ll do anything you say now.

Emily’s hands dipped swiftly into her bag for the letters. She half pulled them out; the reporters leaned forward eagerly, like dogs waiting to be thrown a treat.

And then, Emily’s hand paused. She looked at Armatrout again. He was watching her without seeming to watch her. She did not pull the letters from her bag. Instead, she tucked them back down swiftly and strode across the room, her silk skirts rustling. Dozens of astonished eyes followed her.

What are you doing? Miss Jesczenka’s voice had a note of panic that Emily had never heard in it before. Show them the letters! Miss Edwards, please, you must! That’s what all this was for! You’ll never have a better chance …

Emily reached up, removed one pearl earring from her ear, then the other. She stepped carefully through the neck-craning crowd of men. She came to stand before Mr. Armatrout. He looked down at her, his face slightly amused. He folded the pocketknife and tucked it into his pocket.

“Wonderful show,” he said under his breath. “For someone who obviously doesn’t have much practice, that is.”

“Thank you,” she said softly. Her hand dipped into the bag for the letters. She handed them to him. He looked down at them.

“I’m supposed to show these around to everyone,” she said. “The Institute wants them widely disseminated. Once you read them, you’ll see why. They prove that Rex Fortissimus—his real name is Ogilvy Creagh Flannigan, I believe—embezzled millions while in the service of Boss Tweed. His Presentment Agency padded city contracts. These letters are the proof.”

Armatrout looked over the letters, his eyes appraising.

“Are they the real deal?”

Emily nodded. Armatrout snorted laughter.

“Well, you’d say that in any case.”

Emily looked at him. “The letters are real, and so is everything else. Mostly.” He looked at her, his face registering surprise at the modifier. She held his eyes calmly.

“I do love Mr. Stanton, very much,” she said softly. “He’s made terrible mistakes, yes. He’s made bad choices, yes. If I could stop loving him, maybe I would. But I don’t know how.”

Emily sighed, closing her eyes and opening them again. When she spoke, she did not look at Armatrout. It was as if she spoke the words to herself.

“Why should he be saved? Because I love him? No, love doesn’t make anything different. It doesn’t pay any debts. Should he be saved because he’s really tried to do his best? Because every choice he made seemed right at the time? That doesn’t make any difference either. Really, I don’t know why he should be saved. Maybe he shouldn’t be.”

She looked up, saw that Armatrout was staring at her. She gestured to the letters in his hands.

“That’s why I’m giving these to you. Because the truth does matter. And I think you serve the truth, the best you can find it. So serve it. Do what is right. I’m sure you can see what it is more clearly than I can. I only know that I love him. I do love him, despite everything. And that makes me blind. I don’t want my blindness to lead to more evil. True love shouldn’t do that.”

Armatrout turned the packet of letters over and over in his hands.

“I know you can see right through all the credomantic mumbo jumbo,” she murmured. “You think that this was all a show, and it was. But I wanted you to know it was more than that, too.”

Armatrout stared at her. For a moment, his smirk was gone, replaced with a look of wonderment.

“He’s a very lucky man,” Armatrout said finally.

“No, he isn’t particularly,” Emily said. “But I believe that he is decent. And that’s all I get.”

Armatrout tipped his hat to her. She turned away from him. As she did, newspapermen around her surged, knocking over chairs to get to him. They were snatching the letters out of his hands, passing them among themselves.

“Give, Armatrout!”

“You’re not keeping all the good stuff for yourself!”

Emily glided away from the scuffle like a beautiful, calm boat, closing her eyes. She thought of another credomantic precept that she could probably find in one of Stanton’s textbooks somewhere, if she ever had a chance to look.

The truth will set you free.

“Not exactly the way I planned it,” Miss Jesczenka said as Emily returned to stand by the lectern.

Together, they watched the pack of reporters grabbing at Armatrout. The big man was holding the letters high, protests roaring from his lips, but a dozen greasy hands had already reached up to snatch at them, and all around the room, reporters bent over their hard-won prizes, eyes scanning them greedily.

“Gentlemen!” Miss Jesczenka called to them loudly, over the din. “Gentlemen, I will see that you all get copies of the letters! Gentlemen, there really is no call for such dramatics …”

But then the dramatics really began.

There was the sound of kicked wood, and the doors at the back of the room, which had been closed for the conference, slammed open, banging back against the walls. Men strode in, a dozen men in gray uniforms bearing patches with the Institute’s crest. The Russians, already nervous from the reporters’ feeding frenzy, bristled and reached behind themselves for their rifles.

Leading the gang in gray was a tall, spare man in a black suit. It took Emily a moment to understand what her eyes were seeing. When she did, abrupt joy flooded through her.

“Mr. Stanton!” she cried, running across the room to him. She threw herself into his arms, and he folded her in them tightly. He pressed his lips against the top of her head, his hot breath stirring her hair.

“Goddamn you,” he whispered fiercely. “You’re not leaving me, Emily. I won’t let you.”

Emily ignored the words, ignored everything. She held him tight, squeezing her eyes shut, wishing everything else in the world would vanish. They stayed that way for longer than they should have, because when she opened her eyes, she saw that the reporters hadn’t vanished. Indeed, they’d all flipped their notebooks to new pages and were scribbling furiously. Reluctantly, she pulled away from Stanton, aware that just a bit more reticence might be in order. She noticed that Dmitri and his men had clustered close behind her, rifles drawn and leveled. They were grimly eyeing Stanton and the clot of Institute security that surrounded him. Emily had the sudden, terrible urge to laugh. A couple of true lovers with their security teams facing each other down.

Stanton, too, became more aware of the situation. Emily saw his face change as he looked around the group of reporters. His face became guarded and he frowned.

“Smile,” Emily whispered to him. But Stanton did not smile. In fact, if anything his scowl deepened. The reporters began barking in unison.

“Mr. Stanton! May we have a comment?”

“Mr. Stanton, do you feel confident in your ability to put these base and unfounded accusations behind you?”

“Mr. Stanton, are you terribly concerned by the anguish your fiancée has suffered?”

“If my fiancée has suffered from anguish, it’s because you and everyone like you has been bothering her with your ugliness and insinuation and disgusting filth!” he barked at the reporters, his green eyes shining with rage. “She shouldn’t be here, subjected to this kind of … pawing! You howling pack of wolves!”

Pencils scratched rapidly over page-turning pads. The story was getting better and better.

“Sophos, what are you doing here?” Miss Jesczenka’s quiet voice came at Emily’s elbow. “You know you shouldn’t be out of the Institute—”

“And you!” he barked, whirling on Miss Jesczenka. “What are you thinking, putting her through a press conference? Parading her before them? Are you insane?”

“Mr. Stanton.” Dmitri’s voice was a low throbbing insistence beneath Stanton’s keening fury. Stanton looked up, suddenly noticing the dozens of rifles that were trained on him. “I think it’s time you leave. Now.”

Stanton looked at him. He clenched his teeth. “Who the hell are you?”

“I represent the Sini Mira,” Dmitri said, his eyes coming up to Stanton’s, meeting them with hard brown determination. “We are here to protect her.”

“The Sini Mira? Protect Emily?” Stanton fairly spat the words. “Eradicationists who want to see magic and those who use it destroyed utterly?” He pulled Emily closer, his arm closing protectively around her.

Sudden inspiration lit Miss Jesczenka’s eyes. Stepping back, she drew a deep breath.

“Yes, indeed!” Her voice resonated through the room as her eyes turned on the Sini Mira men with a look of desperate terror revealed. “Oh, indeed! These are the very men who tried to kill her! The men who tried to murder her in Chicago! Gentlemen, we were not at liberty to disclose this fact, but we were forced to come here today against our will! These brutes forced us to come!” She leveled a trembling finger at Dmitri and his confused-looking comrades. “These men wish to murder Miss Edwards!”

“But they let her have a press conference first?” Emily heard Armatrout mutter, but no one seemed to pay any attention to him. The reporters were agape at the rifles, at the Institute security men who were already pressing forward, hands raised. Miss Jesczenka’s terror was filling the room like a palpable thing.

“Run, Sophos!” Miss Jesczenka said, her voice extravagantly pleading. “Take your true love and run!”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Emily heard Stanton mutter as he wrapped his arms around her. Flames flared up around them, flames that burned with extreme brightness but gave off no heat. In a moment they were gone, and in another moment they were tumbling heavily together onto the floor of the Sophos’ office in the Institute.

Inside the Institute, the air was still as a tomb. Emily sat up slowly, pressing a hand to her head. She felt slightly dizzy, as if she’d been drinking vodka again, but the feeling passed quickly.

The office was a shambles, Emily noticed first. Pieces of colored glass from the huge stained-glass window behind the desk littered the floor, showing glimpses of the blue sky beyond; curtains drooped from their rods, and everything was covered with a thin film of crumbled plaster dust. Emily looked down at Stanton, lying on the floor. His face was pale, skeletal, and bruised. She put an arm around his shoulders, helping him sit up.

He grinned wanly, his green eyes flat as marbles. “I can’t imagine how I did that. The Institute hasn’t an ounce of power left.”

“That wasn’t the power of the Institute.” Emily smiled, stroking his cheek. “That was true love conquering all.”

“Have you been reading my textbooks?” His eyes fluttered closed for a long moment before opening again and focusing slowly on her. She brushed a speck of plaster dust from his face.

“I was doing all right. The Sini Mira didn’t mean me any harm. Miss Jesczenka was just making the story better for the reporters. Please tell me you didn’t hurt yourself with that silly trick.”

“There is nothing else I can do, Emily,” he murmured. “I’ve lost the Institute.”

“Don’t say that.” She looked around the office, the despair in his voice making her imagine the roof crumbling to pieces on top of them. “Not here.”

“There’s not much more damage that can be done,” Stanton said, seeing the direction of her gaze. He was silent for a long time, and when he spoke again, his voice was soft. “I was so worried about you. Are you really all right?”

“I have nine lives, just like a cat,” Emily said.

“And you’re just as careless with them.” Stanton was silent for a long time before he spoke again. “I know you saw the book.”

She didn’t want to ask him about the hideous red book. Right now he was broken and tired, and all she wanted to do was soothe him and stroke the hair back from his broad hot forehead. But he did not want to be spared this, she knew. And sparing him this would be just like his mother … gliding over unpleasant things, encouraging his emptiness. Making him as empty as the Senator. She wouldn’t do that to him.

“You killed people,” Emily said softly. “You killed people when you were at the Erebus Academy, and you took their blood.”

“Yes.” There was no apology, at least.

“Were they good people?”

“I don’t know,” Stanton said. “We were never encouraged to ask.”

“How could you?” Emily said, her voice thin with pain. “How could you have done it?”

“I did it because they meant nothing to me. They were only objects to be used to achieve power.”

“But you’re not like that now,” she said. “I know you’re not.”

“I try not to be,” Stanton said. “I try very hard.”

He sank his head against her breast, breathing softly. She stroked his head.

“When I thought you’d left me, part of me was glad,” Stanton murmured, after her long silence made him realize she didn’t intend to speak. “I was glad you’d come to your senses.”

“Hush,” she said.

“I told you I wasn’t someone you should fall in love with. I told you I’d done terrible things. I’m sorry I didn’t let you go back to Lost Pine, where you could be happy.”

“I didn’t want to go back to Lost Pine,” Emily said. “And I’m happy with you.”

“Don’t lie,” he said. “That’s my job.”

“I’m not lying,” she said.

“How could you love me?” The question was desperate.

Emily searched for the right answer, but finally just shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said.

Stanton was silent for a long time.

“I’ve always grabbed for the things that I wanted,” he said at last, his voice low and sleepy. “The Erebus Academy, the Institute … but nothing is ever what you want it to be. The harder you grab for it, the more deeply it cuts. And it mocks you for being foolish enough to reach for it at all. You come to fear touching anything at all, because you know that if you do, it will become terrible.”

Emily said nothing.

“I didn’t want to touch you. There is no cruelty in you. There’s no deceit. I’ve never known anyone like you. How could I bring myself to ruin that? Why do you think I kept telling you to go marry the lumberman? He’d never have to lie to you. He’d never ask you to accept so much ugliness. You deserve someone like him.”

“Hush,” Emily said again.

“I wanted to believe that somehow you would be invulnerable to all this. That you’d be armored by that wondrous common sense of yours. But it was a foolish thing to believe. It will ruin you just as it’s ruined me.”

“You’re not going to ruin me,” Emily said. “Keep your chin up, Dreadnought Stanton. It’s always darkest before the dawn, right?”

“Now I know you’ve been reading my textbooks.” He smiled, closing his eyes and holding tight to the arms she held him with. Within a few minutes, he was asleep, breathing deeply.

“Oh, my poor love,” she said, pressing her lips to the top of his head. “My poor, martyred love.”