“What … is she?” whispered Komako.
“Glyph-twisted,” said Mrs. Ficke. “That is what she is. An a horrible thing it is, too.” There was a small sewn doll in the corner and the old woman retrieved it and slid it into the unmoving crook of Deirdre’s arm. “This is all what’s left of her, poor creature. Didn’t seem right, letting Henry dispose of her. Any of them. So we done what we could, we brung them here to take care of them. They’re just sad and confused, mostly. I don’t know what’s left of them on the inside. But on the outside there’s no part of them is harmful at all.”
“You … care for them?” said Ribs slowly.
Mrs. Ficke pulled the girl’s hair gently behind one ear, revealing a pale heart-shaped face, its eyes closed. “No one else done it,” she said.
“What is glyph-twisted?” said Komako.
Now the old woman’s face hardened. “Oh, these are just exiles, like me. Except when they lost their talents, Henry gave these little ones a choice. He told them about Mr. Thorpe, an his sickness, an what all’s like to happen to the institute when the glyphic dies, an the orsine rips open. An he said what if they could help. He said what if they could keep their friends safe. An in return, he’d give them their talent back. These here are the ones what agreed to try.”
“To try what?” whispered Komako. But she already knew the answer.
“To be made a new glyphic. In his image, like. To take over for Mr. Thorpe when he dies, an control the orsine an the wards an such. Oh, it’s never worked, of course. A glyphic don’t get made like this. But Henry had his notion that the key to everything were us exiles. Except now”—the old woman ran her palm tenderly along the girl’s cheek, her voice tired—“now he’s out of time.”
“What do you mean?” said Oskar.
“The glyphic’s dying, child. The drughr’s coming. An then the dead will pour through. The orsine needs to be closed for good, like, to be sealed, an there’s only the one way of doing that.”
“What way is that?”
“Carve out the glyphic’s heart, an sink it into the orsine.”
“Nope,” said Ribs quickly. “I’m out.”
Komako glared. “That’s disgusting.”
Mrs. Ficke allowed a grim smile. “The world’s an ugly place, loves. Unfortunately, I weren’t consulted when it were being made. But here’s the truth: Henry Berghast can’t allow the orsine to be closed. How else is he to bring the drughr to him, if not through the orsine?”
“Through the orsine?” whispered Ribs, turning. “Did she just say through the orsine?”
Komako wasn’t sure she’d heard right, either. “He wants to bring the drughr into Cairndale? Why would he do that?”
Mrs. Ficke’s voice was soft. “The drughr is the difference between horror and fear, my pet. It’s the kind of fear what fills you with revulsion, what makes you prefer … obliteration. This,” she murmured, stroking the girl’s hair, “is preferable to the drughr’s bite. And yet, even so—it’s Henry Berghast what you ought to fear more.”
Ribs, for her part, just scowled. “Maybe luring the drughr into Cairndale’s the best bloody way to destroy it.”
“You aren’t listening,” said the old woman, shaking her head. “Henry Berghast’s been hunting the drughr since before you were born. The drughr’s power has never been measured. If it could be harnessed, if it could be absorbed…”
Komako raised her face in shock. “Absorbed—？”
Mrs. Ficke gestured with her hooked claw. Daylight filled her eyes, sad and bright. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Henry don’t mean to destroy the drughr, pet,” she whispered. “He means to become it.”
37
THE STRANGE MACHINERY OF FATE
Something was coming, something awful.
In a second-class carriage north of Doncaster, Alice Quicke sat with her face turned to the window, brooding out at the early light. She could feel it approaching, a kind of dread, racing toward her over the spine of the world. In a basket at her feet lay the keywrasse, purring; in the pocket of her greatcoat lay the old revolver, its chambers loaded. She gripped it fast. They would not reach Princes Street Station in Edinburgh until evening.
Margaret Harrogate, in the seat across from her, did not permit herself to brood, not about her crushed spine, not about how she’d never walk again, not about the bad feeling that was in her. The wheeled chair Miss Quicke had built, wedged in a corner, bumped softly against the paneled door. Across the fields the white sky filled with light, darkened again.