“Free who? Other Porters? Or do you mean the automatons? I know about the people Gutenberg trapped in those bodies. Johann Fust and the others.”

“Fust!” His face reddened, the lines of his mouth and eyes tightening with rage. He began to rant in German. “Johann Fust swindled from me my life’s work. He sought to steal my legacy. He stole Peter . . .” His anger broke. “Peter was a skilled scriptor and craftsman, and Fust gave his own daughter as a bribe to turn Peter against me!”

He wiped drool from his chin, his words becoming more manic. “We invented libriomancy! We know the dangers, the threats both true and phantom. We know the lies.”

“You murdered Ray Walker. You tortured him, and others.”

“I didn’t. We didn’t!” He cradled the silver cross in both hands. “I couldn’t stop them. If I held them in, they turned their rage against me. I needed to hide. I needed to know what the Porters knew. I needed the books.”

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.