Empire of Unreason (46 page)

again.

EMPIRE OF UNREASON

“No,” Emilie said, “this is exponentially greater than anything that
exists in nature. This creature has more substance than the
strongest wind of a tempest. If it were larger, or if its substance
were very hot or very cold…”

“Emilie sees the danger,” Adrienne replied. “And besides, he might
be able to achieve yet higher densities of matter than this. Even if
he can’t, this is very serious. I think this poor thing is only an
experiment, intentionally made innocuous. Its substance is mostly
gas and phlegm.”

“That in itself is proof that this represents innovation,” Linne
stated, excitement finally overcoming the revulsion that had been
coloring his voice. “No natural malakus contains more than one
substance.”

“True,” Adrienne said. “And further, as Emilie implied, there is no
particular reason why its substance could not be lux and gas, or lux
and damnatum, or some other volatile combination. It could even
be made unstable, like an alchemical lanthorn, reacting to unleash
the properties of the matter it contacts. It increases the power of
the malakim to meddle with matter more than tenfold, which is not
a good thing at all.”

“I wonder…” Lomonosov mused, tapping his finger on the table.

“Go ahead.”

“I have been speculating—Sir Isaac’s last publications concerning
matter. He had come to the conclusion that matter itself is rather
insubstantial, that even the densest matter is most porous, with
great space relative to the actual atoms. I have followed some of his
speculations—I did not bring it up earlier as it seemed of little
consequence. But now…” He paused a moment. “I think it can be
demonstrated that Newton did not go far enough—that matter is
not an arrangement of forces with bits of solid substance scattered
in it here and there, but that there is really no such thing as ‘matter’

at all. All of its properties can be explained by reference to the
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ferment itself. What we have called ‘atoms’ may be nothing more
than the intersections of forces, or perhaps the emanation points
for them, the places where affinities are born.”

“That’s preposterous,” Linne said.

“On the face of it, yes. And yet we know that gravity, which gives
things weight, is not a substance, not a solid thing, but an
immaterial force. Why then must we suppose that the things that it
acts upon are material?”

Linne pinched his arm. “This is real. It is tangible.”

“Is gravity unreal, then, since you cannot pinch it?”

“This is interesting speculation,” Adrienne said, “and I see how it
may be important to the subject at hand. It would suggest that the
difference between us and the malakim is less than we suspect.”

“It goes to what I said earlier,” Lomonosov said, a boyish
enthusiasm bubbling out with the words. “The malakim are
composed of different sorts of affinities than we—those nearer
God, those of the least-limited sort. I propose matter is also affinity

—of the
most
limited sort. You see? In which case, creating
something such as we see before us is not to do with mediating
between the realm of matter and the realm of spirit, but of
transforming up and down a scale that grades from those grossest
affinities we
perceive
as matter to those we
imagine
as spirit.

Think! Through philosophers’ mercury we transform the motions
of ‘matter’ into pulsations of ‘spirit.” Why should the
transformation be so simple if they are truly unlike things?“

Adrienne nodded, her attention fixed on her hand. “It would
explain much,” she murmured. “It might explain how a hand could
be manufactured from dream.”

“Mademoiselle?”

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She shook herself. It was time to consult Uriel again, to sort
through his science of lies for what he might know about the thing
on the table.

Before she could dismiss them, however, Hercule appeared in the
doorway. He was breathing heavily, and his cravat was spattered
scarlet.

“Hercule? What has happened? Are you well?”

“A scrape, nothing more. It’s Menshikov. Someone released him.

He has rallied a number of supporters, and more go to him each
moment.”

“How many?”

“His followers have seized one of the ships, the
Ivan.
None of your
guard has gone over, of course, but many from the attached
regiment have. They may have as many fighting men as we do.”

“But not as many ships.”

“No. But they have captured the statehouse, and, I believe,
liberated the governor and his staff.”

“What is this? How can Menshikov have been colluding with the
governor?”

“I don’t think he was. I think he saw a chance to seize power from
you and he took it. The governor’s men round out his numbers
nicely.”

“The idiot. What does he hope to accomplish?”

“You ask that of Menshikov?”

“Where is he?”

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“The statehouse, I believe.”

“Then he will have the governor’s magic mirror,” she said grimly.

“It is time, I think, for Prince Menshikov to learn a lesson in what
power actually is.”

Her fury carried her upward to the bridge as surely as the most
powerful affinity. How dare he, after all she had done for him? And
how dare her followers turn on her? It was unbelievable. How long
had it been since one of her followers disobeyed her, much less flew
against her?

Menshikov’s smug face was awaiting her when she reached the
magic mirror.

“Good afternoon, Empress of the Air,” he said.

“Menshikov, you have gone mad. I can crush you like an insect.”

“That will mean harming your followers, which I expect will make
those who still foolishly cling to the hem of your garment think
twice about whom they choose to serve.”

“Not so. I can be quite selective when I wish.”

“Indeed. But how selective? Selective enough to kill me and not the
tsarevna? I wonder.” He stepped back, to reveal Elizavet, her
clothing in disarray, one wrist bound to Menshikov’s and the other
tied behind her back. She looked angry and frightened.

“Menshikov, you have certainly sealed your fate. The tsar will
forgive you much, but for this you will die by the knout.”

“Peter is dead, you stupid bitch. If not, where is he? Not here, in
their prisons. Not in China. Not anywhere. Golitsyn and his traitors
have killed him. It is for us to pick up the pieces, to take Russia
back; and yet here you are, like a character is some silly fairy tale,
crossing seven mountains and seven seas in search of the firebird.

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No more, you hear? I will not go with you, and neither will those
who stand with me. Do what you will, you will not win them back.

They know you for the treacherous murderess you are.”

“The same murderess who saved you from the knout, Menshikov? I
wonder—did some follower of yours kill Irena, just so you might
contrive this occasion? It seems like you.”

“Does it? Then you do not know me well.” His voice changed a bit.

“Listen, Adrienne. We have the same enemies, you and I. The
Golitsyns, the Dolgurukys, the Old Believers. We should be working
together, not fighting like this. I have a plan I think will make us
both happy.”

“Menshikov, you are correct—we do have the same enemies. One of
them is
you.
You plot your own death, which makes you a doubly
stupid enemy. Any one of my people who wishes to stay here with
you may do so. But you will release Elizavet, and you will release
her now. I will say no other word to you until you do.”

“I will not. She is the only assurance I have that you will not
assassinate me.”

As promised, Adrienne did not speak to him again. She merely
smiled, the coldest, crudest smile she could twist her mouth to, and
waved the mirror off.

“I want her back, and I want a plan for retrieving her within the
next quarter of an hour.”

“And then what?”

“Then we push on, with whoever is loyal to us. We still have most of
the ships. I will not be deterred by this rebellion. If they want to
stay in this godforsaken place, they may. We get Elizavet, we go.”

Adrienne wrapped light and motion around them and made truce
with gravity, so that they came to earth more lightly than feathers.

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Menshikov’s guards saw nothing until it was far too late. It
confirmed what Adrienne thought: Menshikov had no alliance with
unseen powers. He was operating, not from a position of strength,
but from ignorance and arrogance.

Bullets turned and phlogiston licked about them. The molten-silver
spray of a Fahrenheit gun curled like spume meeting the prow of a
fast-moving ship. Menshikov’s soldiers, more than a dozen of them,
died in the ensuing retaliation, and they died without death cries.

Her djinni crowded the air, stifling the motions men know as
sound.

It was thus that they came upon Menshikov still oblivious—though
one of his bodyguards sensed something, looking up in time to see
the distortions approaching. He joined his companions in the other
life, as Menshikov gaped, thrust Elizavet in front of him like a
shield, and drew his
kraftpistole.

“Show yourselves, or I kill her. I will take a bride with me to the
grave.”

Adrienne allowed the forces obscuring them to dissipate.

Menshikov’s face twitched, but he otherwise maintained his
composure. He was no coward, Menshikov.

“I break my word,” Adrienne said. “I will speak to give you one
more warning. Release her and live. I can boil your blood without
harming her. I will do it.”

“You will do it anyway.”

“Then why haven’t I?”

“The hell with you,” he snapped and pulled the trigger. Elizavet
heard the sound and sucked in a breath. ,

But nothing happened. Adrienne smiled. “You should not have
chosen an alchemical weapon, Prince. A simple pistol would have
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been much more trouble for me.”

“I was just…joking, you know,” he said weakly. “I never meant to
hurt her.” He slumped, then, and the weapon fell from his hands.

“It was all a joke,” he muttered “Menshikov, the clown.”

“Hercule, go cut Elizavet free of this fool.”

Hercule stepped forward with knife and severed the rope.

Elizavet, sobbing at last, threw herself into his arms. He backed
away from Menshikov, who straightened his back and thrust his
chin up.

“Do what you will. Kill me if it pleases you.”

“That would be too easy for you. I have no wish to end your
suffering, Menshikov. Let the wives and children of those who died
defending you do your suffering for you. Let them wonder why, if I
am the evil one you make me out to be, you live when their loved
ones died.”

Menshikov’s hard eyes gleamed with a sudden hope. “You mean to
let me live?”

Adrienne could only laugh at that. She was still laughing as she took
Elizavet from Hercule, and they retraced their path to the ship,
boarding more conventionally by basket.

They were halfway up when Uriel spoke to her.

Something is coming
, he said.

What do you mean ?

Something I don’t understand. Space
—
distance and dimension
—

are difficult things for me. I have trouble evaluating them. But

something is near you, powerful and weird.

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Adrienne opened her otherworld eyes and gazed about at the night
sky. The gravity of the stars shone though the clouds, an infinitude
of vortices that made a Persian rug of the sky. The sea was mostly
sameness, with only subtle ripplings in its form. The air was
similar, though it was hatched with the forces that worked through
it.

And yet she did see something, near the horizon, where the
mountains ought to be. It was something strange and simple, a
blankness almost.

“By God!” Hercule choked.

She blinked, let her normal sight reassert itself, and followed
Hercule’s rare, terrified gaze.

Something came over the mountain, blacker than the night, but
with a heart like a furnace, twisting, a great drain in the sky with
fire pouring down it.

“By God, what is that?”

She, too, was frozen for the moment, then licked her dry lips and
replied. “It is what we spoke of earlier. It is one of Swedenborg’s
engines. You were right, Hercule, this was all merely a trap,
something to slow us until
that
could arrive.”