Ravi picked that moment to return with a silver tray. Lucy sucked down a sigh, her bravery faltering.
He poured a pale, apple-green liquid into three porcelain teacups. The sterling-silver teapot, engraved with a pastoral scene, would have been right at home in Queen Victoria’s drawing room.
Ravi positioned himself next to Lucy on the sofa, extending a cup, which she accepted with trepidation. She avoided anything precious out of habit since her parents hadn’t trusted Lucy with breakable things growing up. Most of their dishes at home were still made from melamine.
Two pairs of eyes watched Lucy sip her tea.
“Heavenly, is it not?” Professor T mused, taking a sip from his own cup. “I have a friend at the souk in Marrakesh who couriers it to me.”
“Delicious,” she agreed.
The professor shifted back in his armchair, balancing the saucer on his knee. Something about his posture, even sinking against the leather, resembled a fighting stance. Ravi must take after him.
“What can you tell me about Archimedes?” Professor T asked her, bringing the cup to his lips, his eyes never leaving hers.
Talk about a non sequitur. Lucy’s mind raced, dredging up her father’s history lessons. “Archimedes was an ancient mathematician…” Think, Lucy. “He discovered that a floating object displaces its own volume in liquid.”
“Do you recall the story of his discovery?”
“Not entirely.”
Professor T set his cup on its saucer and the clink reverberated through the library.
“Archimedes was the chief scientist of Hieron II, king of Sicily,” he began. “King Hieron had commissioned a new golden crown but when it arrived, he suspected the smith had mixed silver into the gold. He tasked Archimedes with determining whether or not he had been swindled. Archimedes promptly went to the public baths to contemplate the problem, as you do.”
Professor T exchanged a conspiratorial smile with Ravi, who obviously knew how the story ended. “When Archimedes submerged himself, water sloshed over the sides. Eureka!” The professor jabbed a finger in the air. “Archimedes realized that he could test an equal weight of gold to see if it displaced more or less water than the crown. If it did, the crown was not pure gold.”
“And was it?” asked Lucy.
“No, indeed. That was the end of the goldsmith’s career. As well as his life.” Another laugh. “Archimedes also invented great war machines. The catapult, for instance. Once, he defended his homeland from invading Roman ships by arranging a series of mirrors on a cliff and harnessing the power of the sun to set them on fire.”
Lucy hadn’t known that. Goosebumps irritated the back of her neck.
“I suppose you’re wondering what Archimedes has to do with why you’re here,” said Professor T. “Ravi?” An arched brow was all the prompt he needed.
Ravi put down his teacup and turned toward her, a distant look in his eyes. Lucy chewed her lip. Way to drag out the tension.
He rolled up the sleeve of his shirt to reveal the eight-pointed star.
Then Professor T did the same.
“We belong to the Order of Archimedes,” Ravi said. He weighted each word, speaking reverently as he always did about the alchemists. “And like him, we believe that science should be used in the service of the state, or the people as a whole.”
Lucy flashed back to the crown on the columns outside. Hieron’s crown.
“Was Archimedes the founder?” That would make the Order thousands of years old.
Ravi shook his head. “We were founded by John Dee, an adviser to Queen Elizabeth the First. He was an alchemist, philosopher, mathematician. A true Renaissance man. He thought Archimedes a fitting tribute.”
“Right,” Lucy said, unsure where he was going with this. Apparently she hadn’t been totally wrong to think the teapot could have served the British royal family.
Five hundred years ago.
“The alchemists had reached a crisis point in the Middle Ages after being persecuted for generations,” Professor T explained.
Lucy kept her expression placid as he talked. She didn’t want to let on she’d already learned this from her mother.
“They were divided into two camps. Those who wanted to hide, squirrel their knowledge away. And those who wanted to find a way to work with the great rulers of Europe for the benefit of everyone.”
“I take it John Dee belonged to the latter camp.”
“Just so. He demonstrated to Queen Elizabeth that scientific progress was not something to be feared but rather essential to good governance.”
“Also maintaining power,” Lucy added. Immediately, she felt Professor T’s gaze land on her.
“John Dee laid the foundations for the Invisible Colleges and the Royal Society that followed.” There was a hint of defensiveness in his tone.
“Are you saying Sir Isaac Newton belonged to the Order of Archimedes?”
A rare smug smile from Ravi. “Him and many more. Edison. Roger Bacon.” The smile deepened. “Even your Volta.”
Disbelief washed over her. “Why haven’t I ever heard of you?”
It was Professor T who answered. “While we believe in sharing our knowledge, we do not like to advertise ourselves.”
“But you’ve told me.” She paused. “Are you going to kill me now?”
His laugh was meaty. “On the contrary, we believe you’d make an excellent recruit.”
The room seemed to spin. Was Lucy really being offered the opportunity to join a secret society to which all of her scientific heroes had belonged?
“Because of my lightning gene,” she inferred.
“Not only that. But yes, we believe it is the key to completing the research I had been conducting with Ravi’s parents.” Professor T regarded his godson with true fondness.
Lucy’s gaze returned to Ravi. She felt a prickle in her heart. As an aspiring researcher, she could think of nothing worse than leaving her work unfinished, her legacy uncertain. He must not have told her because he didn’t want her to feel obligated.
She inched her hand toward him on the sofa, then stopped herself. “How would I be able to help?” she asked.
“We believe that your mutation might provide answers to the cause of a variety of neurological conditions,” Ravi said, meeting her eyes.
“Like Alzheimer’s,” she said, thinking back to the article about the fire, and he nodded. “Then why am I in danger? Who could have an issue with curing disease? And what does it have to do with Tesla?”
“There are always those who fear progress,” Professor T answered.
Something worse than darkness shone from the professor’s eyes. Bleaker. Lucy was very, very glad he wanted to be her ally rather than her enemy.
“The other alchemists?”
“They’re called the Order of Sophia. They believe that the general public should be protected from technological advancement.” Lucy thought the professor might spit. “Craven zealots.”
His enraged response stunned her into silence.
More quietly, Ravi said, “The Sophists consider your genetic mutation to be dangerous.”
“To whom?” she demanded.
“Humanity.”
“Humanity? And that means what, exactly?”
“The ignorant seek to destroy that which they do not understand,” replied Professor T. “But we won’t let that happen.”
Destroy?
Lucy’s guts twisted.
“Lucinda.” The tenderness infusing Ravi’s voice pulled her from her spiraling thoughts. “We’ll protect you. I’ll protect you.”
Which was all well and good, but he wouldn’t always be around.
“I need to be able to protect myself.”
“Yes, you do,” Professor T agreed. “Come work with us. We will study your powers together, hone them. The Sophists will have much more to fear from you.”
Lucy didn’t think that sounded any better.
“There’s no way to get rid of my powers?” she asked with a trace of desperation.
He frowned. “Lucinda, they’re part of who you are. I’m sorry we didn’t find you sooner. That you have lived your life until this point believing you were damaged. Somehow less. You are far from damaged.” The compassion in his statement matched the ferociousness moments before.
How did he know that was how she’d felt? The way her parents treated her?
As if he hadn’t rocked her world enough, Professor T let slip, “We believe you are the next stage in evolution.”
Holy. Frak.
“If that’s the case, why aren’t there more people like me?” Lucy asked, a strange calm descending on her. Shock, she guessed. “Why are we so hard to find?”
Neither of them answered. The quiet became oppressive. It weighed on her chest. Ravi and Professor T exchanged a glance.
Of course. They weren’t responding because the answer was blindingly obvious.
“They’re dead, aren’t they?” she said in a hush.
Professor T slid to the edge of his seat. “The abilities caused by the genetic mutation can be unpredictable.”
“Unpredictable,” she repeated. “You mean maladaptive.” Lucy knew enough about biology and evolution to know that species with maladaptive traits went extinct. “The nervous system can’t withstand so much electricity.”
The human brain wasn’t built to cope with the amount of electricity she could produce. Eventually, her mental faculties would be compromised, and she might even stroke out.
Lucy looked from Professor T to Ravi. Ravi coughed.
“Tesla’s mutation is to blame for his increasingly erratic behavior, right?” she persisted. “Will the same thing happen to me?” Shock transformed into panic.
“We want to make sure it doesn’t,” Ravi told her firmly. She dropped her eyes to the floor.
Lucy’s thoughts whirled, searching for some kind of solution. “But, but … Tesla was in his eighties when he died. How did he survive so long?”
“We believe Tesla discovered a method to diminish and amplify his powers at will,” Professor T told her. “Perhaps even replicate them.”
Hope kindled inside her. “How?” she asked.
“We don’t know,” Ravi said apologetically.
Wait a minute. The Order of Archimedes might not know how Tesla had amplified his powers, but maybe Lucy did. An egg-shaped amplifier.
“Lamentably, Tesla was eliminated before he could share his findings with my predecessors.” Professor T released a sigh. “His research stolen.”
Lucy’s head snapped up. “Tesla’s death was an accident. He was hit by a taxi.”
“Right after he’d sent an ecstatic telegram to the Order saying he’d made a substantial breakthrough.” He spread his hands. “What are the chances?”
Another realization hit Lucy like a brick.
“Tesla was murdered. Because he was like me.”
She raised her chin, daring—wanting—them to contradict her.
“So, let me get this straight,” Lucy said. “These Sophists killed Tesla and stole his research—research that allows carriers of the lightning gene to live to a ripe old age.” The words gushed out of her, and she felt ill. “And you haven’t been able to replicate Tesla’s discovery. Whatever it was.”
Ravi grabbed her hand. “We’ve found you now,” he said, eyes blazing. “Everything will be okay.”
Everything was pretty damn far from okay. She was living on borrowed time.
“You can’t promise that.” Lucy turned to Professor T. “I should be getting home soon. My mother will start to worry.”
“Of course.” He glanced at Ravi. “Continue working together in Eaton until you graduate. Afterwards, I can offer you a summer internship at my company.”
“In England? My parents would never let me go.” Lucy didn’t even have a passport.
Professor T’s brow creased in a momentary scowl. “I can be quite convincing.”
She didn’t doubt it, but, “I—I need to think about it,” she told him.
A month ago an internship at Chrysopoeia Tech would have been her dream come true. But now … maybe Lucy didn’t want to know more. She’d come here for answers and they’d turned out to be more terrifying than she could have imagined.
“Naturally. I don’t want to pressure you,” the professor replied. “Just remember, you’re not in this alone. Not anymore.”
Lucy released Ravi’s hand and pushed to her feet.
“Thank you for inviting me to your home, Professor,” she said, remembering her manners.
“You’re always welcome here, Lucinda.” He smiled. “This place belongs to all Archimedeans. We take care of our own.”