Page 209 of Alchemised
Helena turned, then gave a brittle laugh. “You know, I just realised, if I succeed, you’ll control Ferron the same way you use Luc to control me. It makes me feel rather sorry for him.”
Ilva didn’t look at her. “Well, he’ll deserve it more than you do.”
CHAPTER 42
Octobris 1786
WHEN HELENA ASKED SHISEO IF HE COULD test her resonance for a weapon alloy, he’d seemed surprised by the request.
“You don’t know?” he asked, looking up as he adjusted the temperature under an alembic.
“I never got around to it,” she said, trying to make the request seem casual. Shiseo was an excellent collaborator, but he was excruciatingly private. He never spoke of himself or the Eastern Empire except in ways specific to their work.
“It’s all right if you don’t have time,” she said. “It’s mostly curiosity.”
Shiseo blinked slowly. His expressions were even more unreadable than Kaine’s. “Remind me, what part are you from?”
Helena exhaled, fingers skittering across the medical textbook she was reading. She’d had an idea for an injected drug for emergency situations where a heart needed intense stimulation, but she was uncertain about the composition she’d developed.
“Etras. It’s south. Out in the sea. The crescent of islands between the two continents. Not many alchemists there, since there isn’t much metal, and no lumithium.”
“Is that why you came to Paladia?”
She nodded without looking up. “My father thought my repertoire was too special to be—wasted there.”
Shiseo gave a mysterious little hum and nodded. “I will bring my set to test you, but I would like to ask a favour, if I may.”
She straightened, and now she was looking at him curiously. “Of course.”
“The metals from that woman’s blood some months ago. I heard about them. May I try identifying them?”
Helena’s mouth went dry at this casual mention of Gettlich. She’d had no idea Shiseo was even aware of the event, much less knowledgeable enough to have picked up on the fact that there was anything unusual retrieved from the body. Several metallurgists had tried to identify all the trace metals and compounds found in the blood samples without success.
Shiseo’s expression had not changed; he wore the same mild look he always did. “I heard that some are not identified.”
“I’ll ask for a sample.”
When Shiseo returned to Helena’s lab, he brought a little case that was filled with glass vials, each with pure compounds and metals inside, labelled in a script that Helena couldn’t read.
He arranged them in rows. “These”—he pointed to the closest—“are common Paladian metals. These”—he pointed to the second and third rows of compounds—“are a little more rare. We will see.”
He removed them one by one, and Helena used her resonance to manipulate them into hollow spheres while he timed her. Then he used his own remarkably wide repertoire to slice them into quarters and examine the evenness of her distribution, the orderliness of the structure, grading each aspect on a chart.
If some were graded lower than others, there was a mathematical formula to calculate the level of lumithium emanations necessary to balance the potential alloy’s resonance to match the alchemist’s base level.
“You have an interesting repertoire,” he said in his quiet voice as they moved into the third row of vials. “Very unusual. Good attention to detail. I am surprised you are not a metallurgist.”
“I wasn’t sure what to do,” she said, handing another metal back for grading. “It felt like whatever I chose, someone was disappointed. Everyone—” She fluttered her fingers but, catching herself gesturing, folded them in her lap. “Everyone wanted a lot for me, and I’m not sure I ever knew what I wanted.” She shrugged. “Probably good that I didn’t, since it didn’t matter in the end.”
Shiseo didn’t reply. He was studying the notes he’d taken, then he looked at her, staring at her folded hands. “I don’t think a steel weapon would suit you.”
“What?” Her resonance for both steel and iron were excellent. There was no reason why she wouldn’t be perfectly suited for a steel alloy, it was what most metallurgists were specialised in. Almost all the weapons in Paladia were steel.
“You are exceptional with titanium. I met the titanium guildmaster once, and even his work was not so perfect.” Then he picked up a piece of her nickel work, studying it as well. “Have you ever tried nickel-titanium alloy?”
She shook her head.
“It would make a better weapon for you. Very light. You’d waste your strength with steel.”
