Aether Spirit (10 page)

“I…” She looked from one to the other. “I got disoriented and found it. The padlock came off, so I brought it inside while trying to figure out how to alert you. Then I saw that.” She gestured to the Eros Element.

“Under its sheet?” Patrick asked.

“It wasn’t covered.” She looked from under her lashes at him. “I couldn’t resist a little peek. Then that soldier came in, and I hid, and…” She spread her hands, indicating the mess around her.

The little cuss wasn’t repentant at all, and he knew she wouldn’t be unless someone or something had gotten hurt, either physically or emotionally, which would bother her for days. But what effect might the Eros Element have had on her damaged psyche if she hadn’t been stopped from, well, whatever she’d been doing? Concern welled up and twisted into anger.

“This is a military base,” Chad told her. “I know you think you know your way around, but you could stumble into more trouble than you could ever imagine.”

She rubbed her wrist and winced. “Well, perhaps you should let me see some patients, and then I wouldn’t have to entertain myself.”

“She has a point,” Patrick mumbled. He repacked the straw in the boxes and stacked them.

“Fine, you can come to the hospital tomorrow, but at the first sign of distress to you, I’m sending you back to the General’s House and telling Mrs. Soper to lock you in.”

Claire grinned, and Chad groaned inwardly. He’d given her exactly what she wanted, and she still wouldn’t be punished for trespassing. Not for the first time, he didn’t envy Allen and Melanie McPhee their headstrong daughter. Still, they’d done the best they could under the circumstances.

“Now what’s that thing?” She walked to the glass sphere and peered in. “How does it work? What is the fuel source? Where did you get it? What are you going to do with it?”

Patrick held up his hands. “One at a time, please, Doctor. The answer to most of your questions is that we don’t know.”

“What?” She turned. “Then why have it if you don’t know what you’re going to do with it? And what do you know about it?”

“Put on some tea, Patrick,” Chad said. “This could take a while.”

Now Claire stood with a gloved hand on the glass, and golden light poured from her fingertips into the element.

“Patrick,” Chad said. He wanted to knock her hand away, but fear paralyzed him.

O’Connell gently lifted Claire’s hand from the glass. “Now tell me, lass, what did you feel when you were touching it?”

Chapter Ten

Fort Daniels, 24 February 1871

Claire wasn’t sure what to tell O’Connell. She snatched her hand from him and flicked away the thoughts that no man would want to touch her hands if he could see her scars. She’d felt a warmth under her fingertips, but more than that, she’d felt the glowing sphere’s amusement at what had happened. But how? She was enough of a scientist to not want to present what she’d found unless she had a good explanation. And then she’d have to explain herself and what she could do, which she also couldn’t do logically. No, she’d stick with simple description for now.

“It’s warm,” she said with a shrug. “It feels good tonight. Is that what it’s supposed to be? A new heat source?”

O’Connell and Radcliffe exchanged glances. They’d obviously been friends for a long time to be able to communicate like that. Somehow she felt she already knew they had a long relationship, even beyond what she observed. It was another frustrating example of how she sometimes knew things even beyond her talent. It had been a boon to find out she had some knowledge of tinkering. Everything was a tantalizing clue to the past her mind and her family hid from her. Would it be possible for her to figure out who she was without having to face the memories of the accident?

“In a sense, yes,” Radcliffe said. “A new power source.”

Claire nodded as bits and pieces of overheard conversations floated through her brain. Were they from before she left Boston or on the continent? The content said Boston. “They talked about the coal shortage in the north, even with limiting what we export to England. You still haven’t told me exactly what it is.”

Patrick walked to a desk on the other side of the room and lit a lamp. Now golden light diffused through the laboratory—it was too wondrous to be a mere workshop—and made it all seem friendlier. The sounds of him making tea added a level of familiarity to it. Now she knew without specific memory that her father had been a tinkerer, and he had made tea when he and she worked together. She only wished she could know what they’d worked on.

“I’m not sure how to explain it,” Radcliffe said. He moved some boxes off of a low bench and gestured for her to sit. “Now let me see your hand, please. You’ve been rubbing it. Did one of the crates catch it?”

“Yes, but I’m all right.” She cradled her left hand in her right one. It did ache, but she didn’t want him to see the ropes of white and dark pink that had turned her once beautiful hands into a horrifying mess.

“If you’re not comfortable taking your gloves off, I can feel the bones through the kid. I’ll be gentle.”

Had O’Connell mentioned her hands to Radcliffe? The light smoldered in his gray eyes, and he emanated relief, probably that he wouldn’t have to touch her scarred skin. She didn’t blame him, but he was an army doctor. Hadn’t he seen worse? She almost wanted to take her gloves off to shock him, but she wanted him to tell her about the glowing orb that had its own feelings, and she wouldn’t allow him to distract her from her questions. She held out her hand. He felt it and turned it this way and that, asking if his manipulations hurt. She murmured yes when they did.

“Probably just a bruise,” he told her. He released her hand, and she placed it with the other one on her lap.

“Good. Now that you’ve confirmed I’m not injured, would you please tell me what that thing is? Just explain as best you can.”

“Well, you’re familiar with aetherics, right?” O’Connell asked. He handed her a mug of tea. “Here, this will settle your nerves from your accident.”

“Thank you.” She blew over the top of it. The heat she felt through her gloves was of the stinging kind, not the tingling warmth of the thing in the glass sphere. “And aetherics is a branch of physics, is it not?”

“Yes, that’s correct. And aether has posed some challenges to those who work with it like stability.”

Claire set the mug on the bench between her and Radcliffe. “You mean to tell me that’s a stable aether mass? How is that possible?”

“The music of the spheres,” O’Connell replied. He pulled a chair up to join them but didn’t block Claire’s view of the glass sphere and its contents. “A talented aetherist found the right combination of frequencies to make it stabilize. We’ve been experimenting with its light properties, but so far, no one’s had any luck with turning it into power. You’re the first who’s felt anything temperature-wise.”

Claire shrank back and picked up the mug, holding it to her chest. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Or did you?” O’Connell frowned, and the indirect light gave his expression fearful shadows.

“That’s not true,” Radcliffe said. “Amelie Lafitte said she felt warmth during her treatments with it.”

Claire sipped her now adequately cooled tea so she wouldn’t blurt out “Who is Amelie Lafitte?” She recalled how the hysterics at Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris had been treated like favored pets by Charcot and his ilk, but she didn’t want to think that Radcliffe had seen his patients the same way.

She also wondered at the stab of jealousy that pricked her heart.

“You didn’t tell me that,” O’Connell said.

“You weren’t interested in that application of aether,” Radcliffe pointed out. “And there was nothing I could tell you about my method that you hadn’t already tried.”

“What application are you trying?” Claire asked. She’d find more about Amelie Lafitte later.

“I want to concentrate its glow into a weapon.” Now O’Connell’s face did appear frightening. “This war has gone on long enough, and they’re talking about negotiating. You know as well as I that slavery can’t continue, so we need a weapon that will end this war in the Union’s favor.”

Claire tried to imagine concentrated aether light as a weapon. What horror would that bring to those who witnessed its work on the battlefield, not to mention those in its path? Would it cook its victims where they stood? Make it impossible for families to identify bodies like in large train crashes or fires?

The emotions she’d felt from the stabilized aether seemed similar to those of a mischievous child happy for any attention it got. She couldn’t say it was alive—how could it be?—but she also couldn’t allow its innocence to be sullied by being put to a bloodthirsty use.

And what about its effect on the person who wielded the weapon? The psychic injury would be unimaginable.

“That’s a horrible idea!” She stood and shoved the mug at O’Connell. “You must stop your work at once, and the stabilized aether must be destroyed.”

Radcliffe drew her back to the bench with a hand on her shoulder. “It’s not all bad. In fact, it may help with what you’re trying to do with the soldiers.”

Claire’s shoulder trembled under Chad’s touch. He didn’t know what stories she’d heard from the soldiers she’d treated, but she’d always had a vivid imagination. No doubt she pictured the worst possible scenarios for the Eros Element’s use. He removed his hand as soon as he was sure she wouldn’t bolt upright again. He and Patrick had slipped back into their old patterns of including and trusting her in their schemes, not considering the new Claire and the experiences she’d had during and since the accident. Now they had to correct the mistake before she went to the general and insisted the work with the Eros Element be stopped. Or worse—talked about it with the soldiers.

“What do you mean?” Claire asked. “And who else knows about this?”

“I did an experiment on a young lady in Paris who’d had some sort of psychic injury caused by a cult,” Radcliffe told her. “I still don’t know how it worked, only that it was the best course of action at the time. As for who is aware of our experiments, General Morley and Major Longchamp are the only two.”

“What happened to the young woman? Is that the Amelie Lafitte you were talking about?”

“Yes,” Chad said. “And we’re not sure. Her memories were garbled, but she saw many young people killed. Or thought she did.”

“So she had hallucinations?” Claire wrinkled her nose. “That’s not the same as what happened to the soldiers.”

“True, but what I did is similar to what the English have been doing with electricity in the treatment of severe melancholia. A current, or in this case, a frequency applied to a certain part of the skull as the skin is exposed to the aether as it flows through a rubber tube can potentially change the brain and heal whatever lesion is causing the symptoms. You could be on the cutting edge of a new treatment.”

“Wait, earlier today you were saying you didn’t want me to use my methods on the soldiers because they’re too risky, but this seems even more so than talking to them and helping them visualize pleasant things. Even minor hypnosis.”

Dammit, she had a point. Chad reminded himself to not fall into the trap of hoping the Eros Element could help her, if she was willing to try.

“Then I’ll let you try your method first,” he conceded. “And if it doesn’t help, we may have to do something else. The United States is in danger of splitting into two countries if we don’t have a decisive victory soon, and that means millions will be doomed to stay slaves.”

“Slavery is a horrible thing,” Claire agreed. “But so is having thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of young men and boys mowed down on the battlefield with a single weapon wielded by one person. And then what happens beyond this war, assuming the weapon works and you win? You know it won’t stop here. American allies will get hold of it, and then they’ll inevitably turn on each other as they jockey for power, and then soon there will be no one left but women, old men, and children. Or worse, it will be turned on civilians.”

Chad tried to keep the exasperation from his tone. “And for that vague possibility, it’s worth it to you for millions of people to remain enslaved? If the Confederacy is allowed to continue, so will the slave trade. You’re advocating for a different kind of hell.” He stopped short of reminding her that should Fort Daniels be captured and he be taken prisoner, he would likely end up enslaved on some plantation after having been sold for a very high price. She didn’t care for him to that extent anymore.

“There has to be another way,” she said, but she didn’t argue his point.

Chad took one of her hands and pressed it in his to stop its trembling. The poor girl would have nightmares, but he had to do something to make her see reason. He wasn’t thrilled with the idea of Patrick’s aether weapon, either, but he didn’t know how else they could end the war. He hoped her treatment method would work in restoring the soldiers with battle hysteria to their full capabilities. If not…

“Let’s do a little experiment,” he said. “Come with me tomorrow to the contraband camp.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Why? Isn’t it frowned upon to do studies on disadvantaged people?”

“Because it will make the plight of these poor people real to you.”

She snatched her hand back and stood. “You’re accusing me of insensitivity. That’s not fair. I do feel that slavery is bad.”

“But it’s not real to you. Think of it as having all the information before you form your opinion.”

“Very well.” She walked to the door. “Now, er, would one of you walk me back to the general’s house, please?”

Chad stood to follow her, but Patrick put a heavy hand on his shoulder before he could step forward.

“You’ve said enough,” Patrick told him. “I’ll take her.”

Chapter Eleven

Fort Daniels, 24 February 1871

Claire and Patrick didn’t converse as he walked her back to the general’s house. He only said a quick goodbye and remained outside as she used her key to go in the front door. She said goodnight and slipped inside, where savory odors of onion, beef, and rosemary drew her into the kitchen. A loaf of bread sat on the table, and Mrs. Soper stood at the stove and stirred something in a large pot. Claire braced herself, not sure what, if any, trouble she’d be in for coming in so late to dinner. Her mother and aunt had kept to a strict “kitchen closed after seven” policy.