“Where will they sleep? What will they wear? Do we keep them forever, or do they go home again?” She shrank under her brother’s poisonous glare. “One of us has to think of the future.”
“You live your life almost exclusively in daydreams about the future. We are doing this right now, in wild new territory. There are no rules that I can explain to you, because I do not know.” Victor’s composure faltered, revealing a rare glimpse of self-doubt. “You are probably worrying for nothing. I haven’t succeeded before.” He crossed to the completed man and looked down at him. “I’ve never tried harder than this, knowing how much you want him, Jelly. You deserve somebody to love you.”
Her throat felt tight, and she returned with equal vulnerability, “Thanks, Vic. But I don’t expect him to love me. He probably won’t even like me. But if he stays, and convalesces here, maybe he will . . . get to know me.”
Victor was uncomfortably earnest now, with his hand on the man’s shoulder. “He will learn that you’re stubborn, and ridiculously extravagant, and that you spend more money than humanly possible.”
“Now say something nice.”
Victor patted her creation. “He will see your world-famous beauty—”
“Stop,” Angelika protested, smiling. “Keep going.”
“And after he knows you, he will see your heart of gold. You surely have an expensive heart, just as he now has the strongest heart I’ve ever handled. Nothing spared,” Victor said to the man. “Everything is of the best quality. She made sure of it.”
Angelika felt her brother deserved some encouragement in return. “When you succeed, and the news travels the world, Lizzie’s father will be boasting about his son-in-law. And yes, it pains me to admit it, but she will love your muscles.”
“Oh, I know she will,” Victor replied, before becoming so invigorated by joyful energy that he completed another set of chin-ups. He now lived like he’d learned a secret, and Angelika yearned to know it, too. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be in love?
She covered her sudden melancholy with a tease. “If she won’t have you, Belladonna waits patiently in the wings.”
“Belladonna is the one female I should never have encouraged.” Victor snorted with laughter, dropping back to the floor and wiping his hands on his trousers. “When Lizzie arrives, there may be a murder at Blackthorne Manor. Rested enough?”
It was very late at night when Angelika laid down her needle and thread.
“It’s time,” Victor said, and he was right.
It was time.
*
Angelika’s work was done, and she was not overly interested in the reanimation process. Victor directed. She sewed. He dealt with obtaining the afterbirth, the weather forecast, and the wire cabling attached to the spire on the roof. She took off her soiled apron while her brother dashed about, aligning the bodies in their individual chambers.
Rinsing her arms and hands, she said to Victor, “Something about tonight feels different. I should go and put on a nice dress.” And a little cheek rouge, perfume, and a hairpin. Whilst she could not find anything overly objectionable in her reflection, and she had indeed been described many times as a beauty, there was something about her personality that was untenable. Unnatural. Unlovable.
“What if he convulses and burns like the last one? That’s what you should focus on, not your appearance. Besides, you always wear trousers at home. He’ll have to get used to it.”
Victor poured the barrel of afterbirth into the first chamber, submerging his creation. Their sheep-herding neighbors no longer asked what they used it for, and laughingly referred to it as liquid gold. With a grunt of exertion, Victor diverted the barrel to Angelika’s creation, and she watched as the translucent, smelly substance began to coat him. Then the flow weakened to drips. Victor banged the side. This triggered a new splattering, but not much.
“I thought there was more,” he began defensively, but Angelika was beside the chamber in a blink.
“It barely reaches an inch up his side, and yours is completely covered.” Her tone was plain: It’s unfair. “How is mine to have an even chance?”
Victor pondered this. “We’ll animate mine first, then put yours in. Don’t fret, it will work out.” Above, a rumble of thunder caught his attention. “The storm’s almost here. We must hurry.”
Maybe it would be for the best. Victor’s creation could fail, he could adjust the technique, and hers would succeed. Everyone would be happy, and these months of late nights would be over. She dropped herself heavily into a nearby armchair to wait.