The other characters in his head, murderers and madmen, too strong for him to control. “I know about your brother,” I said softly. “I’ve read V-Day. ”
He blinked and switched back to English, his entire mannerism changing in an instant. “Really? What did you think? I wasn’t happy with the middle, and the whole thing needed at least one more good rewrite, but I had deadlines, you know?”
Watching one mind after another wrest control of Charles Hubert gave me chills that felt as if they came from the very marrow of my bones. “It was good.”
He preened, and then his expression shifted yet again. “My brothers…” His voice was gruffer now, with a faint hint of a drawl. “It was the same with my unit. They hid the truth. They kept magic from us, denied us the weapons that could have saved my buddies, could have stopped the Nazi monsters who wanted to slaughter everyone and everything I loved.”
“Jakob?” At his hesitant nod, I pressed harder. “You were a good man, Jakob Hoffman. You saved lives. You protected innocent people.”
“I failed,” he said. “We lost. They’re still here. Infecting everyone, turning this world into a nightmare. I couldn’t save Mikey. Couldn’t save myself. I know what I’m becoming, and I’ll burn this world to the ground before I let them win!”
“You didn’t fail,” I said, but it was no use. This wasn’t his world, and it never would be. “Where’s Gutenberg, Jakob?”
He giggled, a sound that transformed into a sob. “In here.” He tapped the scar on his head. “Whispering. Screaming. Begging.”
Lena plucked the cage from my hip and walked over to join him. For the first time since her birth, she was free of any lover, enslaved instead by the magic of Hubert’s cross. I wondered briefly how much of a difference it truly made.
Hubert opened the cage and extended a hand. Smudge crawled up his arm and onto his shoulder. Just like that, I was alone. I raised my chin, trying not to show how much it hurt to see him standing there with Lena and Smudge. I swallowed, then reached into my pocket. Lena readied Excalibur, but I wasn’t trying to use magic. Not this time.
“It’s over, Jakob.” I gripped the tracking module I had used to find this place.
“Oh, Isaac.” He was speaking German again. “Your magic isn’t strong enough to overpower my automatons.”
“Really?” I smiled and jabbed the detonation button. To my right, an automaton’s head exploded into splinters. I tried not to let my relief show. “I’ll destroy them all if I have to,” I bluffed.
“Not bad,” Hubert said, in English. The mechanical man who had once been Johann Fust toppled forward.
“You’ve lost. Let us help you.”
The other automatons advanced. “You will help me, Isaac. You will show me how you repaired the broken automaton I left at my cabin. You and Lena will help me to prepare more.”
“You’re dying,” I said bluntly. “Even if I helped you, you won’t live long enough to raise your mechanical army.”
He straightened, his voice taking on a stern British accent. “My end was inevitable from the moment I set foot upon this path. Yours could have been avoided.”
The intonation was familiar. We had come full circle, and I was speaking once again with Professor Moriarty.
“If you will not assist me in this endeavor, then you are of no further use.” He raised the silver cross. “Lena, my dear, it’s time for you to kill Isaac Vainio.”
Lena strode toward me. She wouldn’t meet my eyes, which I took to be a good sign. He might have control of her actions, but she wasn’t happy about it.
Hubert, on the other hand, was practically drooling. He had brought his fists to his chin, and his eyes were wide. He appeared to be talking to himself.
“Even now the dead spread terror through the streets,” he mumbled. “We will burn them from their homes, and the world will unite to eradicate them all.”
I ran, dodging between the automatons and making my way toward the open garage door. I heard the heavy clomp of feet behind me. Wooden fingers clamped around my arm. It was the same arm I had dislocated at the cabin, and the shoulder throbbed with pain. The automaton spun me around to face Lena, who had raised both Excalibur and her bokken, preparing to strike.
I grabbed the automaton’s wrist. “I lied. I did have a backup plan. I didn’t tell you about it, because it’s somewhere between insane and suicidal. Sorry.”
The automaton hauled me into the air like a pinata. I could feel the warmth of its metal armor, the spells flowing through those blocks, turning it into an animated spellbook.
I twisted and slapped my hand against the automaton’s chest. I had read these spells at the cabin. I knew the text imprinted into the wood. I could see the letters in my mind. It was all magic. My books, the automatons, Lena’s connection to her tree… everything came back to energy, belief, and willpower.
My fingers sank into the automaton’s metal skin, exactly like the pages of a book. Until that moment, I hadn’t been certain this would work. I still wasn’t. Reaching into the automaton’s magic was one thing. Doing something with that magic was the real trick.
Lena didn’t give me the chance. I saw her lunge, and tried to twist out of the way.
I wasn’t fast enough.
My heartbeat grew louder, overpowering everything else. I stared down at the wooden blade protruding from my side. It felt like someone had punched me just beneath the ribs. There was less pain than I would have expected, but-
Oh, wait, there was the pain. It felt like the blade was burning inside me, growing hotter with every passing second. I tasted blood, and it was hard to breathe, as if someone were squeezing my lungs like a damp sponge. The burning grew more intense, spreading through my entire side.
I reached deeper into the automaton. It was a book, nothing more. Just another book. Praying to whatever deity might be listening, I pulled myself fully into the automaton’s body.
Pain gave way to numbness. My physical form dissolved, joining the magical energy contained in this wood and metal form, like an enormous mechanical battery. I had always wondered what happened to my physical hand when I reached into a book. Now I knew. It became nothing.
When I was six years old, I had gone wading at Lake Superior. I followed a school of minnows deeper and deeper until the sand dropped out from beneath me and I sank below the water.
My brother had come after me and hauled me back within seconds, but I never forgot that sense of panic, gasping for breath as I bobbed up and down, my body flailing instinctively as I tried to stay afloat. I couldn’t control my own limbs. I couldn’t scream.
This was worse. Magical energy dragged me in all directions. I couldn’t see, couldn’t move, and nobody was going to reach in to seize me by the hair and pull me to safety.
Who are you?
The words were in German. I clung to that other presence, tried to call out for help. In return, it tried to smother me.
That attack saved both my life and my sanity. Burning lines of text flared to life: Gutenberg’s spells, embossed into our wooden skin. My skin. I focused on the magic, orienting myself within this form. And having called his twelve disciples together, he gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out.
The automaton saw me as a spirit to be excised. Our body staggered, and my awareness began to fade. The mind trapped here had five hundred years of experience in this form, and I hadn’t even figured out how to walk.
Another verse flared to life. And a fire was kindled in their congregation: the flame burned the wicked. I had spent enough time with Smudge to recognize magical fire as it spread through me.
“I’m not here to hurt you!” I might have spoken the words out loud. There was no way of knowing.
Get out!
Pain worked its way inward, surrounding me. I pushed back, but it was like trying to stop the tide with my bare hands. The magic surged past my efforts. I felt the metal keys growing hotter, searing the wooden skin. The automaton would destroy itself before it let another mind take control.