“That’s what you meant about the wasted dead,” Eureka said.
Solon nodded. “Your tears have already killed many. In order for their souls not to rot and waste away, Atlantis must rise in the next seven days. All ghosts must flow into the machines. Your mission will be to find some method of release.”
“Release into what?” Eureka asked.
“A better fate than eternal enslavement by the Evil One.”
As the features on the robot’s face fixed into place, Eureka began to sweat. Solon didn’t have to tell her who the other ghost was inside Ovid. She recognized Seyma, the woman she had murdered, wrinkling the robot’s skin.
“Filiz!” Seyma’s ghost began her death message in a language Eureka was surprised to understand. “Do not let the Tearline girl deceive you. She is the world’s worst dream come true.” The old woman’s voice softened. “A blind man could see how much I love you, Filiz. Why you never saw it, I don’t know.”
Then the robot closed its orichalcum eyes. Seyma was gone.
“Ovid is programmed with some sort of translation device,” Solon said. “It knows what the listener will understand.”
“My father’s ghost and the ghost of the woman who murdered him are together inside this machine? How does that work?”
“The mind boggles,” Solon said. “An unfathomable number of ghosts can populate Ovid’s body, propelling its thoughts and deeds like the atoms of a wave. They will make Ovid brilliant, and immortal—and conflicted, I assume. World wars could rage inside a single orichalcum body … if some clever ghost were to organize a resistance.” Solon paused and drummed fingers against his chin. “Actually, that sounds like fun.”
“How many ghosts are in it now?” Eureka touched her yellow ribbon. “There was a girl we passed on the way to the Bitter Cloud. I wanted to bury her.…”
“So far it seems only two ghosts are imprinted. Ovid’s acquiring radius is quite small at the beginning, but will grow with each ghost that fills the machine. It will be a grand rite of passage when Ovid acquires its third ghost. Then this miraculous trinary robot will be fully operational, ready for the world, such as it is.”
“That’s when I go to the Marais,” Eureka realized.
“In good time. Remember, someone else still has to die before Ovid is ready to guide you. Before that grisly occurrence, I suggest you go upstairs and get some rest.” Solon smiled into the waterfall. “I wonder who the lucky bastard will be.”
17
TRYSTS
Cat was gone.
Eureka returned upstairs to find a pallet of empty blankets where she’d last seen her friend. She checked the kitchen, all six candlelit alcoves in Solon’s salon, the tiny bathroom off the staircase. Cat had fled the Bitter Cloud.
Eureka had known Cat long enough to guess where she had gone. The Poet had pointed out his rooftop from Solon’s veranda the night they arrived. It was just across the Tearline pond. For the first time, Eureka regretted not telling the others she’d seen Atlas the night before. Now Cat had crossed the witches’ glaze without knowing he was near. If Atlas found her, he would look like Brooks to her. Cat had no idea how much there was to fear.
Eureka snatched her purple bag. She considered taking the witches’ torch, but it would make her too visible in the dark. At the doorway of the guest room she paused to watch the twins and Ander sleep. William whimpered, nestling closer to Claire, who swatted him, then changed her dream-mind and embraced him.
Part of Eureka would feel safer if Ander went with her, but after Seyma’s death, Eureka no longer knew how to be around him. And she didn’t want the twins to wake up alone. Besides, if she did encounter Brooks and Atlas tonight, she couldn’t risk Ander’s trying to kill them.
She aimed to be back before sunrise, before any of them woke up.