He pulled on a glove and began to examine Ayl. The skinny girl’s blonde hair was loose on her scalp. Where Rusk tugged, a clump threatened to come out entirely. He pried open her jaw. Fat, yellow maggots wriggled in froth that had once been saliva.
Lano turned toward the corner and retched. Rusk made a derisive noise; the mechanic had always indulged a disdain for those who gave in to fear or disgust.
“I have a pair of charms,” Rusk said. “Powerful ones. I got them in trade for an unpaid bill.”
He rapped his fingertip against Ayl’s nose, stretching the suspenseful moment.
Vare grimaced. “Out with it, then.”
Rusk lifted his hand and pulled off his glove. He examined his fingernails with mock fascination. The man would take his own damn time; he always did.
“The charm animates the body in lifelike animation. Moves it around. Like a marionette. They walk. They talk.” Slipping the glove back on, he paused to close Ayl’s right eye. “They flutter their lashes.”
“I don’t want to bring them back to life,” Vare protested.
“Lifelike imitation,” Rusk repeated. “Get them upright and send them back to Berrat. A dilemma for his holiness. Will the grieving father kill his daughters all over again? Or will he let them live as monsters?”
Lano broke in. “Will the charm do anything about the…” He gestured toward the girls’ decaying flesh.
Rusk shrugged. “Superficially.”
Vare considered. The girls’ decomposition had given him a great deal of pleasure, but the chance to revenge himself on Berrat all over again—this was what he’d been seeking, something vicious and rare.
“The best part is the question of what happens to their souls while their bodies are walking and talking. Does the soul get caught? Half here, half there? What will his holiness do about that?” Rusk snorted. “Make the gods-licker shove the church up his own ass, that’s what I say.”
Vare looked down at Ayl’s winking corpse.
“Yes,” he said. “It sounds just the thing.”
PART SIX: ACTIVE DECAY
They woke with bright, blank eyes.
It was strange seeing them restored to smoothness. Their cheeks remained pale, but the flesh was firm again, resolutely attached to the tissue below.
The housekeeper was sent out with instructions. When she returned, the girls were dressed in froths of white lace. Only the colors of their accessories set them apart: touches of green matched Ayl’s eyes, and touches of pink hinted at Delira’s nascent womanhood.
They sat, prim and proper, on the velvet loveseat, which still held the scent of Delira’s decay.
“There you go, girls.” Vare handed them a chased-silver hand mirror. “What do you think?”
Ayl gave herself barely a glance, but Delira looked lingeringly at how her curls swept under her hat and the way her bodice flattered her neckline.
“The gloves are too tight.” Ayl tugged at the mother-of-pearl clasps.
Delira swatted her lightly. “Be kind. Say thank you.” Delira set the mirror down on the table. Nodding toward Vare, she said, “Thank you.”
“Thank you, papa,” Vare corrected.
Ayl frowned, but Delira repeated, “Thank you, papa.”
Ayl had not capitulated, but this could be remedied later. Vare perched on the edge of the daybed and leaned toward the girls. “Do you remember yourselves?” he asked. “Anything from before?”
Delira paused. Her eyes clouded as if she were staring at a shape she couldn’t discern. “My name is Delira.”
“Yes, yes,” Vare said, “but do you remember anything?”
Delira’s tone was wistful. “No…”
“There was a shop,” Ayl said. “Then we came here.”
Vare gestured excitedly. Their amnesia was perfect. It made them moldable, perfectible. His girls.
He got to his feet and began pacing the room. His words came out in a rush. “There was a man, you see. Your father. Berrat. He kept you in his house. He tortured you.” Vare made a noise of disgust. “Terrible, terrible things. They don’t bear repeating. The important thing is I rescued you. Me, you understand? I snuck into your father’s house and pulled you out. No one else would have done it.”
Delira put her hand to her collarbone. “It certainly sounds like it required great fortitude.”
“So you see,” Vare continued, “You must stay with me. Your father is a bad man. A devil. You’re lucky to have me.”
“I should say so,” said Delira. Still distracted by her glove, Ayl fretted at the calfskin and said nothing.
Vare leaned in to kiss Delira’s cheek and then Ayl’s. As he did so, he realized he’d never send them back to Berrat. Not ever. “The Just” man didn’t deserve them, even dead. Wasn’t it crueler this way? To hold their souls hostage?
But Vare needed to look at them. To look at his girls. Just for a moment.
“Now hold still,” he told them. “This may be unpleasant, but it will be over in a moment.”
He reached into their mouths–in tandem so as not to scare them–and pulled the charms out from under their tongues.
There. There they were. Maggots in frenzy, beneath their skins, in their mouths, in their anuses. Flesh oozing strange fluids. His girls.
He slipped the charms back into their mouths and they were fleshed again. Ayl looked put out, bored as any child forced to sit in a parlor wearing scratchy clothes. Delira sat with her hands folded in her lap, demure as anything.
Vare patted Ayl’s shoulder. “Go upstairs. Go play. I’ll send the housekeeper with milk.”
PART SEVEN: LIQUEFACTION
By day, he took them strolling in the park with their parasols. Ayl wore a bathing gown and dangled her feet in the river. Delira sat politely on a blanket, attracting the gazes of young men. Vare enjoyed watching them watch her, imagining the expressions on their smug faces should they ever have the opportunity to kiss her sweet lips and pull out her charm with their tongues.
He took them to fancy dinners, one on each arm, and tucked them in at night with bedtime stories.
It had come to the point where even he could barely stand to be with them when he removed their charms. What had once been a trickle of strange liquids was now a veritable flood. Their stench was such that he could not inhale without feeling faint, the remnants of his last meal hot in his throat. He wore a scarf over his mouth and inhaled deeply before he pulled the charms free and often replaced them before he was forced to inhale again.
One morning, as Vare went out to hire a carriage to take the girls shopping, he was taken aback when he saw Lano and Rusk heading toward the manor house, expressions dour. He began a cordial greeting, but their scowls put him in a foul mood. Instead, he spoke abruptly. “What do you want?”
“We need to talk,” Rusk said.
Lano slipped his hands into his coat pockets and nodded.
Reluctantly, Vare admitted them to the parlor. He sent the girls upstairs and gestured for his guests to take the loveseat. Vare did not sit himself, but rather leaned against the mantel, enjoying the advantage of height.
Rusk leaned back against the cushions, opting for insouciance if he couldn’t manage intimidation. Lano, clearly more nervous, sat with his knees jammed up to his chest, too tall for the modestly proportioned furniture.
“You said you’d send them back to Berrat,” Lano blurted.
Vare feigned nonchalance. “I changed my mind.”
“You’re parading them around town! Everyone can see them. Someone will find out who they are eventually. They’ll trace them back here and then trace you back to us. I stayed the hells out of prison after they destroyed the magitorium. I’m not going now.”