“You’re talking about large-scale manipulation. Not of one person’s emotion, but of many people’s behavior.”
“In any number of ways, on every possible level,” he confirmed. “Through mechanisms that may never be acknowledged or discovered. All with a few strokes of brush or a quill, dipped in a specialized beyn.”
Every muscle in my body seemed to seize at once, freezing my breath in my lungs until I cracked them open with sheer willpower. The scope was almost inconceivable. The benefits…Theconsequences…And…
I sat straight, stuck with a sudden cold and paralyzing fear, at odds with the soothing pulse of ocean waves. “Can scrivening cause memory loss?”
“Yes.” Desmond shifted, and the boards beneath him creaked. “And I’ve given that hours of consideration, over the past three months. But I haven’t come up with anyone who would benefit from visiting such a calamity upon you, considering how much the scriveners—how mucheveryone—stood to gain from your work.”
But his eyes had that look again. He was leaving something out.
“Desmond…” I insisted. “Who would benefit?”
He sighed. “The Toolkeepers. They would benefit from keepinganystrong alchemist out of the scriveners’ ranks. But your father would never stand for your injury—”
“Unless he believed he was saving me fromgreaterinjury or corruption.”
“Precisely.” Desmond’s eyes fell closed, and when he opened them again—when he met mine frankly—I understood.
“That’s why you wrote to him.”
“No. I wrote to him before I knew you’d lost your memory. I wrote to tell him you were in danger as soon as I realized what the Alchemary was doing to you. How it would corrupt you.”
Thatwas how his correspondence had arrived so quickly. And why it hadn’t mentioned my amnesia…
“But I will admit that when your father arrived I studied his reaction, because I needed to be sure that he’d played no part in what had happened to you. And he seemed wholly and legitimately shocked to hear about the state of your memory, and truly concerned.”
“So if the Toolkeepers are responsible, my father played no part in it.”
“That is my conclusion, yes.”
“And you don’t think it was a scrivening?”
Desmond shook his head. “I can’t find any motive there.”
And yet the scriveners could do—and evidently had done—unspeakablethings.
He studied the horror evidently written across my expression. “Did youtrulythink it was all levitating carnival carriages and skin-tightening creams? That the Alchemary would ever be satisfied with such a small scale?”
“No. I thought alchemy was medicine and altruistic advances.” I paused, tears threatening to spill. “And things like Wilder’s elixirs.”
“He was very skilled. But Wilder could not be controlled, and that would eventually have made him a threat to the scriveners, which would’ve outweighed the benefit of his skill. Especially considering he’d begun to perfect his own versions of some very expensive elixirs scriveners reserve for their elite customers. And he was underpricing them.”
No wonder the board wouldn’t approve his research project.
“And I thought alchemy was pursuits like your effort to improve the human form.”
“Thesoldier’sform,” Desmond corrected. “I am tasked by the Alchemary with creating a stronger, faster soldier. A more efficient and deadly defender of the craft of alchemy in general, and the Alchemary in particular.”
“You…?”Shock rolled over me. I’d thought he wasstudyingsoldiers to understand the physical ideal. The peak of human health and ability. But…“You’re creating human weapons.”
He nodded. “Through alchemical advances. I am increasing the efficiency with which they utilize air when they breathe. Fuel, when they eat. I am strengthening muscles and increasing the speed of reflexes.”
“And armored flesh?”
Another nod. “What you saw at the carnival was a parlor trick. The real version of it is…well beyond.”
“But it’s for defense.” My voice felt soft and hollow. I couldn’t be sure whether I was stating or asking.
