42

The Perfect Heart

THE LADY ELEANOR is gratified that the three children don’t seem to like the porridge.

Porridge is something Eleanor remembers well. She ate much at one time, when she was a girl—it was all they had. The very smell of it conjures a vision of her father’s fist, the pain of a swelling bruise on her cheek, the prison of her helplessness. Eleanor hates porridge even more than she hates her loveless father and heartless first lord.

Now Eleanor’s eye stops at Katherine. Katherine so reminds the Lady of her first lord’s new wife, the young wife he took after he drove Eleanor to the keep, the young wife who became mother to his only child by blood. Eleanor knows from seeing it last night that the girl has been given a hand, perfect, mechanical. Could it have been a gift from the magister? It horrifies her that Katherine Bateson might be the magister’s new pet, and her heart clutches.

And then she realizes—the magic she’s felt, the magic she doesn’t yet control, that magic is somehow linked to this girl. The pain in Eleanor’s chest becomes unbearable.

The Lady places her hand on her chest, her fingers gripping the beaded fabric, and she sucks in air with a wrenching gasp. The teachers look up in confusion. The children, too, lift their eyes to her and stare, some eyeing her fearfully, some surprised. She stands, the gears in her legs whirring to life; had she been still made of flesh she is sure her legs would tremble.

“Excuse me,” she says, and leaves the hall, fast but stately, her hand still clutching her chest. The hand, all steel and moving parts, that has the strength to rip her heart right out of her chest. The strength to rip out Katherine’s heart if need be.

The Lady is still able to shed tears, and one strays now from her right eye. She brushes it away, angry. Angry that Katherine should remind her of the past. Angry that she should see in Katherine the form of something—of someone—she hates. Angry that Katherine may have received the gift of a perfect hand from the magister and may have access to any kind of magic.

Katherine—and all the children—will give up their souls. Eleanor will hold power over men like her heartless lord and her cruel father, even over, she thinks, the magister.

She smiles grimly at this thought as she clutches at her heart. The rooks follow, circling, as she guides the wheel of her motorcar, this time leaving Hugo behind.

“All?” the magister repeats. His hut is exceedingly warm.

“Yes,” she says, seething with impatience. “All. And at once. I must be able to use the chatelaine as I see fit.” To control even you.

“You must not take them too quickly,” he says. “The magic—”

“Yes, yes. The magic will weaken.” She dismisses his caution. She is tired of the power of others, including the magister, tired of being told to move slowly.

“Giving all will require a complete sacrifice.” He does not face her; he is busy stoking his fire, an unnecessary gesture. When he turns and lifts his eyes they are birdlike, button-black. “You will no longer be human.”

She doesn’t like being human. It’s far too emotional, too messy, unpredictable, uncontrollable. Being human means wanting things like love. She’s been human for long enough. She clutches at her chest, and her words form a snarl. “You will take my heart as well?”

The magister grins; his teeth are sharpened to fine points, like the spikes on a saw blade. “Yes, my Lady. I will have your heart. And I have for it the most magical replacement.”

As he holds up the mechanical heart, the perfect shape of a heart even as it clicks and whirs with precision, gears and wheels turning on tiny pins, it beats with such a calm and steady clockwork regularity that Eleanor knows it will be glorious.