He paused, looking at her blindfolded eyes, angry at her rebuke. But he bit back his retort. He could see over the crumbling wall the world beyond, steady in its slow turning.
“What you do, Mr. Ovid, what all the talents do, is a kind of … necromancy. It is the manipulation of dead tissue. No one can manipulate living tissue. And no one can work their talent on another’s flesh. Come. Walk with me, if you would.” She drifted again forward, her face averted, as if listening to something.
“There are five kinds of talent,” she continued, crisply. “Clinks, casters, turners, dustworkers, and glyphics. Do pay attention, Mr. Ovid, this is important. Firstly, the clinks. They can accentuate their own bodies. You, as a haelan, are of this order. As are strongs, like poor Mr. Coulton was, who make their flesh so compact and dense it can even stop a bullet. Secondly, there are the casters, who can animate mortal remains. Bone witches, who whistle up skeletons, are casters. And Mr. Czekowisz—your friend Oskar, with his flesh giant Lymenion—is a caster. Thirdly, there are the turners, who can alter the appearance of their own flesh—Miss Ribbon, as you know, can make herself translucent. Others can even shapeshift. Fourthly, there are the dustworkers, like Miss Onoe, who can control and manipulate their own dead cells that go into dust, and bond other particulates to it. Lastly, there are the glyphics. But they are a strange and unknowable breed; they grow into their talent like a tree grows into a hillside. They are solitary and powerful and you must go to them, to find them. It is their gift—or curse—to be able to see the webbing that connects us all and follow the threads through. They are immensely powerful.”
Charlie walked alongside her, trying to absorb everything. “Five talents,” he murmured.
“You will hear some of your fellow students talk of a sixth talent. But it does not exist. I advise you to listen only to the facts and to resist rumors here, Mr. Ovid. There are many rumors, here at Cairndale.”
He gave her a quick sharp look, furtively, but he couldn’t make out her meaning. It didn’t seem possible she could know about his suspicions, about his mother’s wedding ring with the Cairndale crest, or the dark carriage and its rider.
“There is a substance in you,” she continued, “which we here at Cairndale think of as ‘dust,’ though it is not dust, not in the ordinary sense of the word. It is this that animates your dead tissue, your dead cells. Why it is in you, and not another, I cannot say. There is much we do not know. But it is this ‘dust’ that makes your corporeal self … remarkable. It is in you and through you, and it leaves its traces wherever and whenever you use your talent. The body of a talent is a map of their dust, Mr. Ovid, and a glyphic can read it like a book.
“As a haelan,” she went on, “your flesh heals itself. It stitches itself back together. It repairs the dead cells and in so doing it appears to restore the blood that is lost. You cannot stay drowned, you cannot stay burned, you cannot stay strangled.” She paused, her long fingers reaching for his face, touching him quickly, gently. “Nothing comes from nothing. The talents are drawn from the lives of their users; the more they are used, the shorter those lives. You feel a terrible pain when your talent is at work? It is the same for all of us. That is the price being taken. Talents burn brightly, Mr. Ovid, but they burn out fast. All except you. When you come of age, around twenty or so, your body will slow down its aging process. You will outlive all of us.”
“You’re saying … I won’t die?”
“Everything dies, Mr. Ovid. Except God and the angels and the idea of freedom in the hearts of the pure.”
He furrowed his brow.
“A joke. No. You will live a long time. But nothing is forever; and your talent will weaken, eventually. And when it does, your body will begin to age. Slowly at first, then more swiftly. You will suddenly be old, and you will suddenly be dead. My great-great-grandfather was a strong man of thirty, two days before his death. When he died, he was paper-thin and frail.”
Charlie swallowed. “How long does it take?”
“Dying?”
“The living.”
“That depends on how powerful your talent is. They are not all equal. You will live at least one hundred and fifty years.”
He wasn’t sure he’d heard her right. He tried to do the numbers in his head. “That’s not something I want.”
“Then you are wiser than most. Nevertheless, it is something you are, Mr. Ovid; wanting has nothing to do with it. Now, there are limitations to your ability. Your limbs will grow back, should they be separated from your body, but severing your head will end your life rather swiftly. The greatest toll for you will be in your heart, and in your soul. It is a draining thing, outliving those you love. And watching the world change around you. But that is not something I can help you with.”