Grimm's School for the Erratically Gifted: Chapter 18

Little is known about what exactly happened during the time that Edmund spent with Victrola and Professor Whiskfield. The only available evidence comes from two sources: the events that occurred afterwards, and a small note in the margins of one of Edmund’s surviving notebooks:

I have done it! After much study, experimentation, and inspiration, I have concluded that it is possible to perform a post-encardiocephelographic revivification on a corpse of indeterminate duration of death, by adjusting a few ingredients and procedures involved in the creation of my ancestor’s Mechanus Vitae.
I have discovered a truly marvelous recipe for this, which this margin is too narrow to contain.

Scholars and medical professionals have struggled for years to discern exactly what this recipe is, to no avail. Many have used this lack of success to posit that Edmund was a bit of a prankster at this young age, while others suggest that, at its simplest, Edmund decided it was safer that no one knew the recipe apart from himself.

For those who are unfamiliar with the social mores of the time, it is here that some historical context will be useful:

In the dark years of the late 1400s, King Hubart VII was slain in battle. This news was warmly received by his son and heir, Prince-now-King Leonerd IV, who accepted both the crown and the fealty of the King’s army.

While this could easily have been the end of it, the scientific sages of the age included one Samsuel Gotard, who had sworn allegiance to King Hubart years before. A born Frenchman, the mad alchemist toiled for years on a means of insuring his liege’s continued reign. This means was the first documented post-encardiocephelographic revivification.

The morning after one suitably dark and stormy night, King Hubart strode up to his palace’s gates and demanded the return of his crown, which had only passed to his son due to an unfortunate infirmity of the body¹ which had since passed. The rightful king was now prepared to resume his duties.

A large portion of the new king’s army saw their duty to deny this claim, as the previous king had died, and that had always been the traditional method of acquiring a new king. After all, if old kings could simply pop back up again and demand their throne back, where would it all end?

The opposition to this line of reasoning — which was embraced by the remainder of the army, along with a large portion of the family lineage — was that really, the new King Leonerd was a bit of a twat.

What followed was twenty years of near constant warfare, with numerous kings, heirs, and offspring of previously deposed familial blood-lines rising, dying, being reanimated into varying states of decay and coherency, amassing new armies, and dying again, with every death merely increasing the number of claimants to the crown.

This might have continued forever, had not the twenty-seventh heir in line for the crown been a woman. After the horrific and bloody Battle of Kingslane, the last surviving² heir stood atop the Castle at Cranesvalley and proclaimed that the throne was hers, and so began the reign of Queen Rachela, the first Queen of Britannia.

So great was the slaughter and dismemberment at the Battle of Kingslane, Queen Rachela was able to rule for at least a year without serious contention to her claim. This short reign was marked by peace, justice, great technological and philosophical advancement, and the signing of several social reforms whose influence can still be felt to this day.

Because of this, it should come as no surprise that once she had birthed a suitable heir, she succumbed quite unexpectedly³ to heart failure.⁴

After the newborn crown prince had claimed the throne via proxy, the inevitably reborn Queen arrived to reclaim her rightful place. The Church of Britannia, however, was devout in their practice as well as their preaching, and had decided that one year of a female in power was quite enough. Not three days after her animation, agents of the Church backed by their own holy army stole into her battle-tent, pulled her from her revitalizing bath, and burned her at the stake atop Cranesvalley Castle’s battlements.

After throwing the charred bones into the moat, they made it quite clear to the assembled masses with passionate sermons and eloquent spears that the atrocity of a ruling female monarch could never happen again,⁵ and they would gladly set anyone to the torch who threatened its recurrence.

This was the birth of the Order of the Holy Torch, a sect of the Church of Britannia devoted to the burning of heretics who dared enact unholy and socially-destabilizing practices such as post-encardiocephelographic revivification, vaccination, or similar. While their numbers and devotees dwindled in the following years, their power within the Church was wielded with a deft and harsh hand, and the burning of heretical scientists is still not unknown in rural townships.

Did Edmund know this history when he decided to work with Victrola and Professor Whiskfield, toiling away in the laboratory, brewing his twisted concoction? It is a point hotly debated among the academics of Edmund’s life.

What is not debated in the slightest is this: if Edmund knew the history of the Church or the dangers involved in what he was doing, he did not care.

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There is no telling how long it took for Edmund to create his magnum opus, his revolution in medical science. Estimates range from several hours to three weeks of Edmund pouring ingredients, stirring concoctions, and simmering elixirs until he had created a Mechanus Vitae adapted to work on living creatures.⁶ Finally, he held in his hand a vial of his very own Hominus Vitae, a revivifying elixir that would, if he had brewed it properly, bring a dead body back to life.

Now, he needed the body.

The Mothburn graveyard was, Edmund had to admit, suitably attired for the event. The shadows quivered at the corners of his vision as he pushed open the graveyard gates. A thick fog blanketed the ground, and the shadows were long and plentiful. It was a beautiful sight, the very air itself quivered in anticipation of Edmund’s next move.

He gripped the vial of greenish liquid in his hands. It glowed faintly with destiny, or perhaps science. Or was it just a trick of the moonlight?

He had forced Victrola to show him a secret exit from Grimm’s that would take him closest to the graveyard, an act she was surprisingly reluctant to take. Neither she nor Professor Whiskfield seemed particularly willing to follow Edmund after they had successfully brewed his Hominus Vitae. They were far more interested in hiding.

It was such a simple plan, upon reflection, Edmund was ashamed he hadn’t thought of it before bothering with the Mothburn Mayor. Edmund was immune from scandal, protected from the wiles of the upper-class by his own lofty perch. So was Lord Dashington, to an extent, but not nearly as protected as Edmund.

After all, if Lord Dashington couldn’t be accused without an eye-witness, then Edmund could provide one.

It would be the trial of the century! Newspapers, journals, the entire world would hang on baited breath while the newly risen Professor Babbages recounted the tale of his unseemly demise at the hands of the great Lord Dashington of the Cliffside Dashingtons. Scandal would rock the foundation of Mothburn, Cliffside, and aristocracy all across the Empire. And there, at the witnesses side, would stand Edmund Moulde, the boy genius who invented a method for raising the dead without even so much as a rubric!

He would change the medical world, and be forever known as Edmund Moulde, the boy who revolutionized death itself!

“Edmund?”

Distractions!

“Hello Leeta,” Edmund said, without bothering to turn around. Of course, why stop with Babbages? The Ripper had slain over twenty women, and there was no telling who had seen how much. With a cursory shake of the vial, Edmund estimated how many full doses he had. Two, maybe three?

Part of him wanted to simply pick a random corpse and tip the whole vial into its mouth. After all, his concoction was strong enough it should be able to work on any dead tissue; but he was a scientist, and he was not about to let any unforeseen variable ruin his plans. As a professor, the courts would have to listen to Babbages. Then the supplementary witnesses could corroborate his statement.

“Oi! I asked what are you doing here?”

In answer Edmund flashed the vial before clutching it again to his chest.

“Oh, and I know what that is, do I?”

“I’m experimenting.” It was all the breath he was prepared to spare.

“On what? Gravestones?”

Edmund pulled up short. “Do you have the key to the Carver crypt?”

“Right here.”

“Good. I need it.”

“You can’t have it.”

That made Edmund stop. He turned to see Leeta, dressed in her leather coat, standing like an avian sentinel. She gripped her shovel like a spear as she stared at Edmund from behind her mask’s goggles.

“What’s in that vial?” She asked.

“Hominus Vitae,” Edmund said. “I discovered it. It’s mine.”

“What is it?”

“I don’t have time to explain,” Edmund muttered. Yes, he was Edmund Moulde, and that meant he knew things that others didn’t, but honestly, sometimes it felt like he was the only person who was doing anything.

“Then I don’t have time to let you walk around my graveyard with a vial of science in your mitts.”

Edmund had never considered the possibility that he might one day need to challenge Leeta, that she could ever be an obstacle to his success.

What could he say that would make her let him pass?

“I need to save my family.”

“Save them? Well aren’t you special? And what makes you think you’ve got all the answers? Why is it up to you to save anyone?”

It would take too long. It would waste time. Edmund couldn’t explain everything to Leeta. He needed the body of Babbages, and he needed it quickly. “Because I can,” was all he said.

“And you’re going to do it with that little vial?”

It is unclear what made Edmund reach into his pocket and shove the crinkled papers of his formula into Leeta’s hand. Perhaps he thought words insufficient to describe his discovery. Perhaps a part of him trusted her. Perhaps another part didn’t trust himself.

Leeta stared at the pages. “Let’s see…some of this looks — machine oil? This going to power an engine of some kind?”

“Of a kind, yes.” Edmund’s heart ached with regret at what might have been. She really was brilliant; she had captured the fundamentals of his theory already. If she had not been so drawn to —

Her finger traced a small picture at the bottom, where Edmund had diagrammed proper vial placement on the cadaver. “I’m no doctor,” Leeta’s voice was low, “but this looks like Church business.”

“Does it?” Edmund had generally left the Church to mind its own business, much as he minded his own. He had never suspected the Church might be involved in science in addition to theology.

“You are mad!” Leeta spat, dropping the paper on the ground.

“Would you like to help?” It was the gentlemanly thing to do; offer her a chance at apology and redemption.

“I’m no fool,” Leeta shook her head. “The Church is angry enough at me already. Do you know how careful I have to be? The only reason I’m still alive is I’m quick, sneaky, and I’d got the locals thinking I’m a ghost who haunts the cemetery. I’m not going to do anything, or let you do anything that might bring the Church down on my head!”

Edmund watched as Leeta brought the shovel-blade up to eye-level. Her unspoken promise was clear — she would stop him from doing what he needed to do.

Edmund was floored. How could she do this to him? How could someone so remarkably intelligent completely overlook how important this was for him? The world would learn of Dashington’s evil. The Founding Families would see Edmund meet their high expectations. Matron would see Edmund triumphant. He was worthy of the Moulde Family Heirship, and deserving of attention, respect, and wary caution. He could even write to the Dilettante Trust, and from there word would spread. Edmund Moulde, boy genius!

And from there…

“I’m doing it for us,” Edmund said.

“What us?” Leeta protested, her shovel unwavering. “I only met you a few months ago!”

“Not you and me,” Edmund lied quickly, “all of us. Don’t you understand? Grimm’s. Mothburn. My family. Brackenburg. The Britannian Empire. Everyone and everything all together. Society is just one big machine, and this is the start. If I do this, I can fix everything!”

“I’m not broken.” She was standing, posed so confidently with her hands on her hips. She wasn’t looking at him with the eyes of someone protesting, or demanding, she was simply telling him the truth.

It reminded him of Matron, really.

Edmund looked back at the vial in his hand. Lady Tinbottom had been able to convince him of so much, simply by talking. No, it wasn’t Lady Tinbottom who had done so; all she had to do was say what she thought, and Edmund convinced himself she was correct. With Leeta, he wouldn’t allow himself to make the same mistake.

“I need to do this,” he protested.

“And then what?” Leeta was relentless. “You’ll have your own little dead body following you around. Then you’ll make more? Get an army? Show your success to the world and they’ll all smile and nod and clap and say ‘by Jove I’ll take three?’ Is that what will happen?”

How did she not understand? Everything was depending this. Depending on him! If he could finally prove once and for all how much of a genius he really was, how intelligent, capable, and powerful he was…

Then…then she would — that is — they would…he’d be…

He’d show them all.

It is an established sociological fact that genius always regrets throwing the switch, drinking the potion, or adding that one final drop of glycerin. This regret inevitably arrives after the first patches of hair begin to grow, bones begin to liquefy, the laboratory gets destroyed, or in extreme cases, once the pitchfork and torch wielding mob knocks on the door in the hope of having a frank exchange of views regarding proper behavior for a scientist.

It is perhaps emblematic of Edmund’s virtues, strength of character, and above all, imagination, that this is the only documented occurrence of a genius regretting making a monster before actually making it, and foregoing the ensuing chaos, destruction, and general inconvenience.

Edmund closed his eyes. He had been wrong so many times. What was it about Leeta that confused his thoughts so completely? It must be madness.

He stared at the vial in his hand. He had let his humours get away with him. His choleric melancholy, his phlegmatic sanguinity…He had names for so many emotions, but the naming was not enough. He had never felt what he had felt with Leeta. He knew its name, but if he had learned anything from her, it was that books were nothing compared to practical experience.

“It’s not important,” he muttered, as he slipped his Hominus Vitae back into his pocket.

Leeta relaxed, her shovel dipping back to the earth.

“You want to tell me what this is all about?” she asked.

“A waste of time, I suspect, my dear.”

At first, Edmund was curious at his choice of words. Then, he realized the words had not been spoken by him, but by a third person who had joined their conversation.

The sound of soft oiled metal unsheathing from a cane slid across the hillside. Edmund and Leeta turned just as Lord Dashington stepped from the shadows, a thin blade glittering in the moonlight.

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As this was only the third time in his life that Edmund had ever been accosted by a shadowy figure wielding a blade, he had not yet developed the martial instincts that would save his life during the Battle of Harmingsdown. Thankfully, Leeta’s instincts were far more practiced.

The world jerked to the side as Leeta pounced on Edmund, carrying him out of reach of Lord Dashington’s silvery blade. The whisper of metal cut above Edmund’s head, hardly noticeable over Leeta’s grunts as they collided with the ground.

Edmund barely had time to catch his breath before he felt Leeta’s feet on his back, shoving hard. He rolled into a gravestone as Lord Dashington’s sword buried itself in the ground where Leeta and Edmund had been moments before.

“Slippery little rats!” Lord Dashington spat as he wrenched the blade from the ground, spinning it around to point at Edmund’s nose. “I’ll be glad to be rid of you!”

“But we’re friends!” Edmund gasped, twisting to the side as Lord Dashington thrust the point forward, scraping on the granite stone. “The Teapot Coterie! I’m a member!”

“So you are,” Lord Dashington sneered, lunging after Edmund as he crawled away. “Such a shame. Lady Tinbottom does so despise a scandal.”

“Oi, shit-face!”

A clod of earth struck Lord Dashington in the face as he turned, giving Edmund enough time to scramble to his feet. With a roar of anger, Lord Dashington spun about, his hand crashing into Leeta’s head, sending her to the ground.

If Edmund knew anything, he knew how to hide. He ducked through the gravestones, twisting and turning until he heard Lord Dashington grunt with frustration.

“Come now, Master Moulde! Let us end this quickly. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“That’s a lie,” Edmund said.

“True,” Lord Dashington’s sneer curdled the air. “I’ve had enough of you rats! Killing Professor Babbages was supposed to be the end of it! No more Grimm’s, no more medical discoveries, no more autopsies and learning how to track a murderer from the dirt they tracked in on the floor! I could have kept going forever if you miserable little pests had just stayed ignorant.”

Edmund gasped as Lord Dashington’s hand came from nowhere, gripping his shirt and hauling him upright. “A bit of money, and I get what I want! That’s how things are supposed to work! Then you rats start ruining everything!”

With the instinctual flail of a captured cat, Edmund swung with his fist, striking a lucky blow on Lord Dashington’s stomach. With a grunt, Edmund managed to twist out of Lord Dashington’s grasp, avoiding another sword-thrust. He hit the ground running as Lord Dashington continued to curse.

Edmund ran until the narrative necessity of the situation overcame his survival instincts, and a thick shard of crumbled headstone tripped him up. He fell to the ground as Dashington’s joyful cry drew closer. Scraping at the grave-dirt, he pulled himself behind a nearby headstone, and pulled himself into as tight a ball as he could manage.

Edmund was not a fighter. He was not a killer. He had never held a weapon in anger, much less in self-defense. He had felt pain before, and he dearly wanted to avoid it, but he had always assumed staying away from conflict was the best way to do so. It wasn’t until now that he realized conflict was constantly trying to find him.

Luckily, Leeta was a fighter.

Her sudden battle-cry echoed over the sound of metal striking metal. Edmund peeked out from behind his gravestone to see Leeta, bleeding from her forehead and swinging her shovel like an axe, driving Lord Dashington back.

“Get the hell away, shit-face!” Sparks flew into the air with every parry. “Murderer!”

“Ha!” Lord Dashington leapt onto a sarcophagus, pointing his sword down at Leeta’s flushed face. “Murderer? Not at all! I am Lord Dashington, member of the Teapot Coterie, Baron of Glowestcher and Locklenshire! There’s not a judge in the Empire who would dare convict me! Nature abhors a scandal!”

Edmund peeked out from his hiding place. He may not have been good at wielding shovels or blades, but he was confident in his skill at wielding words. Let’s see…rhythm, meter, duelist structure, no need to rhyme…

“A choice word, abhor,” he called out over the headstones. “A fine word indeed. It pairs well with Syphilis, and both pair with you!”

Lord Dashington spun around, eyes flashing at Edmund’s distraction. The pause was all Leeta needed to slip her shovel blade behind his knees and pull.

With a snarl, the Lord went sprawling back, tumbling to the ground from his lofty perch. Leeta ran around the sarcophagus, shovel raised, only to be turned aside by Lord Dashington’s blade. He hopped up again, face burning with rage.

“Never! Never!” Lord Dashington swished his sword through the air, a hot hum in the dark fog. “Do you know what would happen if such news were to become commonplace? I’d never bed another woman! They’d flee from me. Me! I would never be invited to Lord Grouffs summer orgies. Dratted Parlor maids would resist my advances! Me!”

Edmund listened, fascinated. This must be what madness was; to want something so desperately, to crave it so strongly, that you couldn’t see the harm you were doing to yourself. How you were inadvertently pushing your goal further and further away.

“I’d imagine you’d be used to it,” Edmund shouted a carefully crafted line. “I’m amazed there are any young women left if murder is your rebuttal of choice.”

“Do you know the pleasures of the flesh?” Lord Dashington shrieked, his blade like quicksilver, pushing Leeta back through the graveyard. “Have you yet bedded man or woman, in your scrawny pre-pubescent lives? If you did, you would never dream of taking the carnal delights away from me!”

“Oh, I’ll take something from you, mate!” Leeta shouted, her shovel swinging through the air.

“Such spirit!” Lord Dashington’s laugh was strained and frantic as he parried. “Do you know what I do when I’ve cut you down to size? I’ll introduce you to some friends of mine! They’re always on the look out for a fresh pair of thin hands and strong arms to work their factory in Princebri —”

A roar from Leeta drowned out the rest of Lord Dashington’s words.

Edmund ducked his head down. He didn’t want to watch.

He heard metal on metal, the light swish of Lord Dashington’s cane-sword cutting through the air, and the heavier swoosh of the shovel answering in kind. He couldn’t tell if it lasted seconds, or minutes, or even hours. All he knew was it ended after the sound of metal snapping, a wet slap, a gurgle, and then a loud thud as something heavy hit the ground.

When he was certain it was over, he stood from his hiding place. Leeta was leaning heavily on her shovel, staring at the prone form of Lord Dashington, a thick pool of blood growing under his throat.

It was the freshest corpse Edmund had ever seen. He knew he should be horrified at having witnessed a death, but somehow all he could manage was faintly detached interest and mild alarm.

“Stay back,” Leeta said. “You don’t want to get near his blood.” With that, she flipped her shovel onto her shoulder and walked away.

“Where are you going?”

“Away,” Leeta called over her shoulder. “I’m getting my things and getting out of here.”

“You can’t do that,” Edmund protested. “The Downstreeters are out there! If they see you, they’ll —”

“They’ll be busy with Grimm’s,” Leeta pulled her plague-mask back over her head. “They won’t care about me. Or if they do, I can handle them. I need to leave.”

“You can’t leave!” Edmund protested.

“Or what?” Leeta shot back. “You’ll chain me up? Feed me water and bread until I can’t stand and rake a whip across my back and tell me that’s what love is? Is that what you’ll do?”

Edmund thought for a moment before he realized she wasn’t really talking to him, per se. He didn’t know who she was talking to, but it certainly wasn’t him.

For a moment they stared at each other. Then, Leeta heaved a shuddering sob and took off her mask. Her face was wracked with an odd amalgamation of fear and sorrow. Edmund couldn’t think of the name of what she must have been feeling. Perhaps it was an emotion without a name.

“I’m sorry.” Apologizing went against everything he had ever been taught about being a gentlemen. At best, gentlemen admitted “things were said,” and agreed to “best say no more about it.” In effect, the proper gentlemanly thing to do was pretend mistakes never happened. To apologize was to concede both responsibility and inadequacy; two things no Moulde would ever do.

“What are you sorry for?” Leeta stuck her shovel in the ground, staring at Lord Dashington’s corpse.

“I wanted to fix everything,” Edmund admitted. “I wanted us to work together and discover amazing things that no one had ever discovered before.”

“Tough luck, then,” Leeta took a deep breath. “Well, I suppose I should do what I’m good at.”

Edmund took a step back as Leeta stepped around Dashington’s corpse and began to dig a hole in the path between the gravestones.

“Well?” she said, after the hole was ankle deep. “Aren’t you going to do your little experiment?”

Edmund sighed, pulling the vial out of his pocket and staring at it. “No. It wouldn’t have worked.”

“Oh, fishing for an ego-boost, eh?” Leeta’s twisted frown struggled to smirk.

“No,” Edmund said. “I mean it. It’s not important. I thought it was, but it really isn’t.” He took the ever-wound watch out of his pocket, and looked at it. It was such a beautiful design. He had ached to take it apart and study it, learn how it kept time so perfectly, without ever needing to be wound. Somehow, this miraculous watch was ticking away the centuries without a care in the world.

And as special as that was, what made it even more special, somehow, was that no one knew Edmund had it.

Fame was a tricky thing, and he knew he’d have no idea what to do with it. Even in his time at Grimm’s, the recognition of his peers had been…unsettling.

“Oi, I said what’s not important?” Leeta nudged Edmund with a sharp elbow.

“Me,” he shook his head. “It’s my own fault, really. I thought being seen was important. It was everything I ever wanted when I was younger, and everything I thought I needed when I got older, but now…I think I’m realizing it’s not that important.”

“Oh really? What’s more important, then?”

“Everything else.”

Leeta stared at him for a moment before shaking her head and returning to her work.

“What I mean is,” he tried again, “I thought if I did the right thing, I would be who I wanted to be. But I can only be me.”

“Oh? And who’s that?”

“Edmund Moulde.”

“Ah.”

She didn’t understand. How could she, when Edmund barely understood it himself? He had wanted to make the Moulde Family strong again, not just say it was strong. He had wanted to invent things, and discover breakthroughs, and read, and learn, and be proud of himself, as proud as he was of his adopted heritage.

Seeming a genius, being a genius, acting a genius…he had foolishly thought they were all the same.

He wanted to stop pretending.

It wasn’t something Edmund had never thought of before. Deciding that his diploma was more important than actually learning anything had been a decision full of uncertainty and speculation. In the end, it was the Founding Families that made the decision for him. They operated in a world of perception and presentation, a theatrical pantomime that demanded its players follow the script. It didn’t matter much if you were a good actor or not, all they cared about was that the lines were said, the props moved, and the set dressed.

And through it all, Leeta kept working. She dug, she looked, she buried, and dug again. She held herself to a higher standard of professionalism than Edmund had ever known, and she expected the same from everyone else.

Edmund stared out over the graveyard. Some of the headstones were large statues of angels or reapers, others giant crosses. Some of the stones were flat and unassuming, barely larger than a paving-stone. All of them did the job, and an increasing number were doing it without even a decomposing body underneath them. Maybe, just maybe, graveyards weren’t a place to keep bodies while they decomposed. Maybe the importance of the graveyard came from the headstones.

Which would mean…

“Leeta,” Edmund turned to his companion, “could you convince the others?”

“I…what?” Leeta faltered, looking up from her digging.

“You said before, the last time I asked you to come to Grimm’s, you said you don’t fit anywhere; that you need to carve a place out of this world for yourself. Could you convince others of that?”

“What do you mean?” Leeta shook her head. “It’s true.”

Edmund licked his lips. He truly wished he knew better how to communicate. “Could you make others believe it’s true? If I could get a group of important people in a room together, do you think you could tell them what you told me?”

“I’m not going to beg anyone for pity.”

“No,” Edmund pointed at the hole, “but you could take back your pride.”

Leeta blinked, confused for a moment before a glint of steel reflected in her eye.

“Can I bring my shovel?”

“Probably not.”

Leeta cocked her head to the side. “I guess I could still convince a few, yeah.”

“Good,” Edmund turned back to the beautifully Gothic evening. “Because I think it’s time I got out of everyone’s way.”

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