Absent. All absent, replaced with a fevered look as he slit Elodie’s nightgown open down the front.
And then he split her chest in two.
Elodie was weak but alive. She was fighting, thrashing, screaming, and Jane felt tears upon her cheeks as she stared up at the plinth in horror, so close that she could feel the chill radiating from the stone, feel blood spattering across her brow. Her hands spasmed and she jerked forward, but she could not rise from her knees. Stop! Stop! You’ll kill her! she tried to scream, but the words would not leave her throat. She could hear nothing but her own heartbeat, the crack of bone, and Elodie’s convulsing limbs sliding weakly over the stone.
Augustine plunged his hands into the wound. Blood coated him, coated Elodie and the white stone below her, and it was all Jane could smell. His hands were inside her chest, and he was sobbing. He was laughing. There was none of his calm control during surgery, none of his procedure, his confidence, his solemnity. He looked wild.
Jane screamed. She had to stop him. She had to stop him!
What has he done?
Hands gripped her, and Jane wailed, thrashing. The veil slid from her face, and then the cool, musty air of the library flooded her nose.
She couldn’t smell blood anymore, and when she blinked, the vision was gone. She was being held fast by Hunt and Vingh, and all around her the doctors murmured to one another in their playacting robes. Tremors rocked her as she looked between the gathered faces.
“Mrs. Lawrence?” Hunt asked. “Are you back with us?”
“I saw—” She gasped, then fell to shaking once more, confused, in pain. Augustine had lied to her, had hidden Elodie from her, had left her unable to trust her own memory, but she had not thought him a monster. Had never feared him to be a brute. The Augustine of her vision refused to coalesce, not only with the man she wished him to be, but with the man she had observed. His outline did not match the wretched horror she had seen.
And Hunt, Vingh, Nizamiev—they’d all been clear. Elodie had been dead when Augustine arrived. Whatever ritual Dr. Nizamiev claimed he had worked, it had been after her death. Not—not whatever it was that she’d just conjured, on the scaffolding of Hunt’s pageant.
And yet it had felt so real. And yet she could not explain it. She remembered the words of Reese’s incantation: By the flowing of this water, we align ourselves to the forces at work and begin to see their origin, their path, their conclusion. They had tried to summon up Augustine’s affections and draw him back, and instead, they had revealed to her …
What?
She was helped to her feet, then down the stairs. Hunt settled her in the sitting room and pressed more brandy into her hand. Behind her, Jane could hear muttering, make out only isolated words: sensitive, perceptive, a true medium.
“I am sorry,” Hunt said, touching her shoulder.
“Leave me,” she mumbled.
“Drink your brandy.”
Jane took an obedient sip, the liquid sloshing from the shaking of her hands. She stared at it, and then beyond it, to the darkened window. Her reflection stared back at her. She willed her features to be transformed, for her gray eyes to weep red. She willed Elodie to appear before her, to offer some explanation, some condemnation, anything.
She could hear, distantly, Hunt’s voice. Discussing diagnoses and treatments with one of the other doctors. They would take her apart to find what was wrong with her. The thought filled her with revulsion.
“Give Mrs. Lawrence some space,” Dr. Nizamiev said, moving in front of her, the fabric of her skirt obscuring the window. Jane looked up. Dr. Nizamiev looked back, impassive. Hunt left without argument.
Dr. Nizamiev was, after all, an expert in madness.
All the other voices faded, retreating out to the hall. The foyer. Perhaps they would leave, and at that thought, Jane started forward. No, no, I cannot be left here alone for the night. But Dr. Nizamiev caught her shoulder and eased her back, then sat down beside her on the small couch, not looking away. Jane turned to face her mechanically.
“You saw something,” Dr. Nizamiev said.
I saw horror.
“I don’t understand,” Jane mumbled, gripping her glass tightly. “I don’t understand what I saw.”
“The ritual can be affecting,” Dr. Nizamiev said. “The power of suggestion, a type of hypnosis.”
“No.” Jane seized Dr. Nizamiev’s hands with one of her own. “I need you to tell me what Augustine did. I need you to tell me about magic.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“YOU MUST PROMISE me one thing, before I continue.”