"Curwen's?" she asks, knowing her son.

(She's been thinking on this, herself...)

Nod. 

She shows him where they're hidden in the library.

"Be careful, my son. There is a reason beyond reputation I haven't delved into this yet."

"I know. But she's dead, there isn't any other way to fix that." 

She nods. "I'll be able to help - it's perhaps safer, that way. Though I may suggest attempting the procedure with the originator first, for the latest notes that I have deciphered did not much fill me with confidence about the state of the raised."

She might have an ulterior motive for suggesting her son raise someone who had apparently cracked immortality and failed to write down how.

"--Yes. If there's more information to be had--if there's some risk of the process as reconstructed from his notes hurting her--" he swallows, clenches his fists a little tighter, and looks away. "Right now, she can't be hurt any worse than she already is." 

She nods, folding her hands. "She deserves a perfect return."

Deep breath. "Yes. Thank you." Slow exhalation. "Let's get to work."  He opens the book and starts poring over the notes, already annotated by generations previous.

She helps him locate the most recent, most relevant sections - it helps that the old necromancer's wife organized these rather wonderfully...

She hadn't paid as much attention to the necromancy, though, when she was looking for immortality as a frustrated teen.

Slowly, though, a picture of what's needed emerges - essential salts (distilled from the body), the whole body one underlined note in the margins says with a reference to older journals, certain incantations of which there's been much purely academic debate over the generations of which version was the most recent... Distillation wasn't fully documented, but some past antiquarian acquired a few other alchemists' notes at an unmentioned cost...

This won't be something they can do quickly nor carelessly.

When he thinks they have an idea of how to prepare the essential salts, he looks into where Hiram Curwen was buried. 

...It wasn't written down in the town records. For some reason. 

No, he knows why, most people don't have the tolerance Curwen's descendants do for the arts Curwen dabbled in. Now that he's looking, a lot of Curwen information seems to have been stricken from the town records. 

Knowing the reason helps less than he might have hoped. He starts obsessively tracking down every piece of material he can find that mentions Curwen, especially posthumously, in the hopes of finding hints to the location of his grave. Separately, he wanders the town's graveyards, carefully marking down the date of death on every headstone still legible, creating exhaustive maps of which areas were in use when. He cannot by this method narrow down the precise plot, and he very much hopes his researches into his ancestor bear fruit, but if he absolutely has to raise every single resident of Providence buried in the same handful of years in order to track down his ancestor, he will. 

She tells anyone who whispers negatively about him that he's started a project to restore headstones to forgotten graves. Isn't that sweet of him? It's such a needed thing; surely she'd hate if the ravages of time were to mean her family couldn't visit her grave...

Miracle of miracles, this gets them volunteers to help read through old newspapers and records, though none have Joseph's dedication. A proper little town project. Still, it's easier now to acquire said records with fewer questions, and they're able to narrow down (and make or repair headstones for) a number of non-Curwen graves from the list.

And family tradition has it that Amity Curwen was buried beside her husband. Emma pours through the old family matriach's journals, paying close attention to every mention of visiting that grave. A stone bench, a certain tree... 

A view upon leaving, which means they need to dig into old town plans, to figure out what yard would have had such a sight a hundred and fifty years hence.

He checks out records relating to the other abandoned graves, too, though he pores over them perfunctorily if at all, not that he lets the clerks and librarians who help him see that. His mother cares about reputation, and he loves his mother, and he won't make her job any harder than he has to in order to get Eliza back. 

They narrow it down to a single churchyard, and a single section of the churchyard, and then a single handful of graves, though the exact one depends on the location of a tree that was cut down sixty years ago. 

She runs 'attempting to find a distinguishing characteristic for which body' and 'locating the tree' in parallel.

She tracks down an eighty year old lady with a memory keen as diamonds, whose grandfather was buried in that same yard, and sits through a series of teas and long rambles about town and family history, and eventually extracts the tree's old location.

That evening, to her son: "Given this, we can say with some certainty that we know where the grave is. But now we must plan extracting the body, preferably without raising an alarm such that might trace back to us."

"Yes. --If someone finds out that there's been a grave robbed but doesn't catch the perpetrators we might be suspicious anyway, as much attention as we've paid it. But given our cover story--if we had a legitimate reason to be there, and a legitimate reason for the earth to be disturbed--we've identified enough unmarked graves in the process of ruling them out as Hiram's, we could have new stones made for them and install them all at once, cover the cemetery with workmen, scuff the ground excessively as things are moved around..."

"Clever. There are also legitimate reasons to move a grave or several, but that would take much longer to arrange."

"Additionally, Amity is supposed to be buried beside her husband - I believe we should acquire her body at the same time. Hiram Curwen might wish her returned, and two is not significantly more complicated than one, and certainly less complicated than twice."

"Yes, that would likely be wise." 

She nods.

Arranging for everything goes quickly afterwards, a shocking pace compared to what came before - the stones, the workmen, one of her nieces to distract the watchman that night (a teenager caught inciting trouble won't be that scandalous to the family. Fortunately, this particular watchman is inclined towards long lectures with extensive references to the Bible), loyal workers quietly paid off to dig up the graves and transfer the bodies and carefully rebury the coffins...

Still, these final hours seem to drag, to Emma's mind.

He prepares a laboratory in the cellar, with all the implements that might be necessary to reduce a corpse or a skeleton to that dust required to revive the body's previous occupant. He takes charge of the bodies, well disguised, at a pre-arranged drop off point that implies to the workmen that the bodies are wanted for reasons to do with a more mundane sort of science, then carefully smuggles them back to the house and into the basement. 

He triple-checks his notes on the distillation process. 

She aids him in the checking - a second eye, fresh from staring at the same pages because of how focused she's been on the other aspects, never hurts. 

She's given the newer, more nervous, and more gossipy servants - the majority of them really - a holiday tomorrow, since the distillation might involve perceptible fumes. For the rest, she prepares a soothing lie about certain medicinal formulas smelling quite noxious when experimented upon. She makes sure there's food and drink and opportunities for fresh air available during the process's many resting points.

He is careful. He is so, so careful, taking food and drink and fresh air at the relevant opportunities, but eating almost mechanically, mind racing over the steps of the process, ruminating on the notes and the procedures and making sure he made no errors. 

And at the end, the old bones are rendered into a soft powder, grey tinged the slightest bit blue. He sits down, and breathes. 

"We did it." 

"We did."

She has appropriate containers arranged for each set of salts, labeled in her short-hand. 

"The resurrection itself is next, I believe?"

He nods, takes another deep breath, and speaks. 

"Y'AI 'NG'NGAH,
YOG-SOTHOTH
H'EE—L'GEB
F'AI THRODOG
UAAAH"

The dust swirls. There's a heavy feeling in the air - 

And the dust forms a distinctly human shape, building and building and building upon itself, creating bones and bloodless sinew and coarse-woven flesh. It does not build clothes.

An almost exact double of Joseph Dexter Ward, plus a small scar over his eyebrow and on one cheek, opens his eyes.

"...Who are you?" he asks.

His voice is wrong, almost, hollow and sonorous, like someone struck a great chime at the bottom of a well and it emerged warped into human tones.

"My name is Joseph Dexter Ward. I am your descendant, through my mother, Emma Ward nee Arlington." He gestures to the woman beside him. 

He exams them both for a few long moments. "I thank you. How long has it been?"

"One hundred and fifty-seven years." 

"Longer than I would have expected."

"Most of the family was rather deterred by your murder."

He tilts his head. "Reasonable. And why weren't you?"

"My fiancée was murdered. And she had done nothing of the sort."

"Then we shall address that. You summoned me for my knowledge?"

"Precisely." 

"Have any advances in theory been made since my day?"

"Purely speculative, but yes. Your notes were compiled after your death by your wife and heavily annotated and expanded upon during the intervening generations." He collects the notes from the table where he was using them as a reference and hands them to his ancestor. 

He takes them, stroking one finger along the edge, but doesn't open them just yet. "I thank you. Come, let us retire elsewhere, and see to food and drink."

There's an odd thirst in the back of his throat. Annoying. He suspects this may be the driving sensation behind the vampirism, though it's low enough to be ignored for now.

He's also vaguely aware that he's still naked, so he glances around for any provisions of clothes.

It having been difficult to determine his size beforehand, a robe that should fit a variety of body types has been set out. 

That suffices.

He skims the notes quickly once settled, expressing interest in the supplemental texts people have found, but says: "Indeed it appears the problem of vampirism was not solved. I suspect that is the main obstacle between you and your beloved?"

"I was uncertain as to the completeness of the notes--I was unsure if that was the only problem remaining. If everything else seems to be satisfactory, then yes." 

"Some have expressed dissatisfaction with the sensation of being within the body. It is not fully like life; senses are duller, especially touch and taste. The body is not so spry, and heals more slowly from injury. The mind seems anchored poorly at times, though that problem is much reduced now."

"--That does seem troublesome. Can you quantify the extent to which the senses are dulled? Perhaps spectacles could mend the gap for eyesight...what does the mind seeming poorly anchored consist of?" 

He gives a few measurements; indeed, touch is for him so dulled that everything feels predominantly like a deep pressure, with no sharpness nor distinguishing of texture. His sense of taste is as dull as if he had a head cold, but not exceptionally so. His most recent resurrection attempts had reported less extreme differences, so it seems that his notes were not complete - indeed, he didn't have time to record many of his most recent changes before his death.

The mind being poorly anchored appears to involve a feeling of distance from oneself and a muffling of ones emotions and thoughts, as sometimes happens with extreme shock or grief, but more common or constant, and triggered by inane matters. Hiram presently isn't experiencing it - his theory is that the quality of the incantation determines the binding of the mind, whereas the distillation of the salts matters more to the creation of the body, but that an imperfect distillation can be compensated for through assorted processes, so long as the original body was whole.

Do they still have access to his old country house? Especially the catacombs? He had several subjects who had consented to repeated summonings, and who were quite good at providing feedback towards the refinement of the process. Of course, he himself does not mind being repeatedly dismissed and then summoned again, though you must take care that the dismissal not scatter the essential salts.

"The house is not presently in our possession, but nobody has reported finding the catacombs, and it might be possible to purchase it. Mother, do you know anything about it?"

"Somewhat; it hasn't been developed, being beside a town not disposed towards growth, and is rumored to be cursed besides. I do not know who the current owner may be, but that should be a matter of public record."

"I suppose it would be better if it could be obtained quietly. If it's undeveloped that should be easier." 

"Given the rumors around the property, yes - I will see about obscuring any mention of the sale, or even whether the records should point to us."

"For that matter, if it's completely ignored by its current owners, acquiring it might not be necessary to access the catacombs, at least not right away." 

"What was the original extent?" she asks Hiram.

He leans back, thinking. "Broad. The soil was not suited for delving deeply. They did not overrun the boundaries of my land, but such boundaries may have shifted, and certainly a new tunnel could be delved that way. But so too there were many secret entrances, and surely not all have fallen to time nor attack."

"I can obtain a map, if that would help. The town has probably encroached in the past century and a half." 

"It would. The river might have also shifted course, which could complicate access to a fair few points."

Joseph goes and fetches a map. 

The city has encroached; the river has not moved. 

He outlines the extent of the catacombs, and marks a few entrances, commenting briefly on each's stability.

"We should be able to access some of those without alerting the neighbors, but the town might note our presence; it depends, I suppose, on how secretive we wish to be - I don't imagine our presence in the area being known presenting a significant problem, especially if we don't linger to use the catacombs."

"Entering the catacombs takes less time than exhuming a grave; I imagine sneaking in under the cover of night could be done without a watchman or anyone else seeing anything noteworthy if we were careful." 

"The river paths might be more likely to be watched for bootleggers; still, this one here seems far from any prying eyes..." And she traces a door set in the woods. "But it's close enough to a road we might be able to retrieve more salts than we could in a single trip, packing them into the car."

Nod. To Hiram: "How are they stored? We may want to bring new containers if the current ones aren't secure enough to prevent spilling during transport." 

"Clay containers. Most are likely still intact, but they are not immune to being tipped over, no."

"I'll acquire some jars with lids that seal tightly." 

He nods. "Sensible."

"Another matter: while you resemble my son greatly, you do not act like him, and it is unreasonable to try and keep the two of you from ever being seen together."

"I have been acting differently since Eliza's death; I suspect further odd behavior could be written off. But the latter point I grant." 

"Do you have suggestions for how to resolve this?"

"Long-lost relative?"

"My sister spent a time acquiring every orphan she stumbled across. No one will question if they lost track of how many she has. Besides, presenting a child of her own blood will quell those horrible rumors of her barrenness. Of course, she never would have distinguished between her children, so has not mentioned it prior."

"Another cousin, perfect." 

"I would want some tales of her, some indication of my supposed upbringing, but, yes. I can be an antiquarian, of an out-dated mind, to explain my speech. Perhaps I have been ill, and educated solely upon books, to explain my lack of modern knowledge."

"She's not in town, now, but I will send her a letter. And stories aplenty can I provide."

"We would have had to tell her that the family traditions had become more practical than theoretical in any case." 

Emma nods. "She's I suspect suspicious of what we have been doing, but I have not confirmed it prior."

"Well. She's not who we're hiding it from." 

"Indeed. I suspect she'll want to meet her new 'child,' too."

"Acceptable. What is my name to be?"

"Hiram is antiquated but not too odd. Her surname is Sanders."

"Hiram Sanders, then."

Nod. "--We have your wife's body, as well. We didn't want to do anything irreversible until we had your expertise." 

"...Thank you. She would be a great help. I believe the procedure is enough for her for now - though I will need human blood for a few months' time, and it is perhaps true that two vampires will be a greater burden than one."

"How much are you going to need?" 

He does some calculations. "I suspect... Approximately a pint every two weeks at a minimum. Such is an amount a single adult human can afford to lose once a month, albeit with some anemia. The process for my wife would improve upon that number, but not, perhaps, significantly enough. If I drank more, I would recover from the blood-lust more rapidly, but that trades against secrecy."

"I'll give it. I've plenty of reason to be pale and odd."

"I will as well. I am in good health, and it is easy enough to arrange for foods that promote recovery from blood-loss."

"I can acquire supplies for blood draws from the medical school easily enough." 

"How long will that take?"

"Not long." 

"I can withstand this for another few days with moderate discomfort, and for another week through force of will."

"I can have it by tomorrow." 

"You have my gratitude."

Nod. "I will do whatever is necessary to see this through." 

"I don't doubt it."

Nod. "What do you think we did wrong in rendering the ashes?"

"There's a few possibilities, and I would need to carefully read through your full methodology for a conclusive decision. However..." And he lists common problems with distillation, especially that have the results he's observed.

He scrawls notes in a notebook of his own as his ancestor talks. 

Once they've gone over everything they can before Hiram reads the annotated notes, he leaves for the university to get started on obtaining the equipment needed. 

Emma leaves to write letters to the family members who will need to support Hiram's existence, to inform her niece currently in town, and to begin making arrangements to travel to the old Curwen residence.

And Hiram settles in to read and make further notes.

Joseph manages to arrange to pick up the equipment the next day without raising any eyebrows. On the way home he stops by the library to pick up more obfuscating historical documents. 

Hiram is a fast reader if nothing else; he's already gone through the new supplementary texts and notes, and started writing down everything missing, or that he didn't get a chance to record before his death.

Joseph returns to the house and waits for nightfall, so as to try the first hidden entrance to the catacombs. 

Hiram directs them, wrenching himself away from his fascination with their automobile.

Emma accompanies them, primarily as a driver, and brings the car as close to the entrance as possible.

When the hidden door is wrenched open, stale and malodorous air billows out. A set of stone steps are revealed, once one recovers enough from the fumes of long-decayed abruptly-interrupted chemistry experiments to face the opening again. Moss coats the stone of the passage, almost to the very end, where it opens out into a chamber with arched doorways leading away from the hidden entrance and into the labyrinthine depths of the catacombs. 

"Marvelous," Joseph murmurs. 

"I was very exacting in my engineering specifications, and my workers did well."

"I'm certainly glad it stood the test of time." 

He nods, and leads the way deeper. 

Joseph shines his electric torch ahead. Modern technology is so convenient for these kinds of things. 

Eventually they reach the store room where the powders of the dead are kept. 

The place is very dedicated to its grim aesthetic, and the years and the damp haven't been kind to the walls. Thick moss grows on them, and the place smells at once horrid and unsettling. They're the only ones making noise, for Hiram long ago put down his failed experiments.

The jars are intact, their labels faded but readable.

Joseph sets down the box of modern sealable jars he brought and starts unscrewing jar lids. 

The essential salts are all present. 

Hiram starts helping, but he takes careful pains to label every new jar before moving onto the next, and insists the other two do the same.

Extremely reasonable. 

Once all the jars are labelled, filled and sealed, Joseph closes the box again and hefts it, much more carefully this time, passing the flashlight to his ancestor. 

This is a fascinating bit of technology. He'll need to find time to read books on electricity.

In the meantime, he can direct them out.

Their route was chosen well; nobody catches them on the way back to the house. 

Emma had previously cleared a space and moved in new shelves into the basement; that'll be a suitable place, for now.

"Who are these people?" Joseph wonders idly. 

"Mostly old acquaintances of mine, before I discovered the key to immortality, or who couldn't make themselves immortal, or who died to violence. A number expressed that they would be willing test subjects. So, too, are there a few old sages and academics, whose knowledge I believed essential to my work, though I did not summon back any who wished to be left resting."

Nod. 

"We're going to need new subjects if we want to experiment with improvements to the distillation process, aren't we." 

"Yes. Humans; the process is different enough for animals to be useless at this stage of refinement."

"...Hm. I wonder if any of the intervening generations..." He flips through the notes for any annotations that imply consent for such a procedure. 

Their family is unsurprisingly full to the brim with people who would like to be immortal, who are curious about the future, or who are exceptionally dedicated to the scientific method.

"Let's not bring back my mother," Emma says, dryly, "Even if she did consent."

"I don't know, I'm half tempted to use Eliza's parents as test subjects and they're still alive." 

She snorts. "We have plenty of eager ancestors, I think, though if improvements are marginal we might run out. Since the vampirism problem will likely remain, I'm assuming we would dismiss them soon after summoning?"

"For the moment, at least. Is the vampirism permanent?"

"No. It seems to fill - perhaps an imperfection in the summoning process. It usually lasts between a month and six, depending on the quality of the distillation and incantation."

Nod. "Acceptable. One long-term vampire at a time, perhaps." 

"That'd be sensible, yes. Likely we will be able to loosely track the strength of the vampirism by the subject's reported cravings, without having to run longer term tests."

"And the dulling of sensation should be as easy to track in the short-term as the long. That one concerns me more, to be honest." 

He nods. "The vampirism is merely a transient bother."

"She spent her childhood sick, and died afraid. She should not come back to a world wrapped in muffling wool." 

"...Sensible."

He doesn't know the full history of his wife after his own death - but he suspects she, too, had a hard life.

He nods. 

"I'll fetch a map we can pin to the wall and mark with the locations of various graves." 

"Smart. I suppose I'll start planning how to cover up a rash of grave robbers..."

"For what reasons are bodies usually moved...? I wonder if we could fabricate something wrong with the cemetaries such that the bodies had to be exhumed and transferred..."

"That's one reason; if we were moving far away, and wished to take our family cemetery with us - that would be eccentric, since most who do that at all just move more immediate relatives, and costly, but not impossible. It is sometimes a practice with closing questions of how someone died, or if there was an argument over whether someone should be buried or cremated, or where someone should be buried... We could also claim that we wish to have our family grouped together properly."

"That would likely be complicated by the fact that the lineage is intermittently maternal. People would want to know why Curwen's descendants specifically. Perhaps something to do with planting flowers on or by the graves..."

"Landscaping would be a good excuse, yes - flowers, trees, paths..."

"It would be a logical accompaniment to the gravestone project..." 

She nods, smiling slightly. "And won't be too difficult to arrange; fortunately our family's well off enough for such a charitable donation."

"...The newer cemeteries too. I won't do anything irreversible to her body until we're certain she'll be alright, but I want her--I want it at hand, where time and insects and other grave robbers do not threaten it." 

She nods, puts her hand over his.

His head bows, his jaw clenched tight. 

"We'll get her back. I promise. And we'll make sure it's perfect."

Deep breath. "Yes." Slow exhale. "It will be easier once I can watch over--once her body is secure." 

She suspects watching his fiance decay might be its own torture.

All that's for that is to work quickly, though.

She nods and stands. "We should get to bed; I can hardly contact people in the middle of the night."

...Nod. "Alright," he agrees reluctantly, and heads to his own bed. 

Though they make arrangements with all seemly haste, he wants to scream at the torturous slowness of it. He does not, instead pouring his frustration into every productive and semi-productive activity he can think of, going over the notes and Curwen's new additions again and again, jotting down possible experiments to try, creating plans and backup plans in case of every disaster from hurricanes to being found out and met by a mob with torches and pitchforks. 

They manage to secure one of the entrances to the catacombs, and on the moonless nights when, camouflaged by the disturbed earth of the new gardens, they retrieve the bodies of their dead, they are ferried in secret to that ancient stone edifice rather than attempting to hide the charnel odors and stacked coffins in their own cellar where servants would inevitably stumble across them. 

And Emma, in between notes and books and letters and numerous meetings with church officials and landscapers and community leaders - 

Finds time to talk to Hiram about immortality.

"I want to know how you did it," she says, one night when the candles are burning low and it's just they two in the library. Hiram has long since been introduced to the town, her household's servants included, as her nephew.

"With great difficulty. It's something one must do themselves, else my wife would have not died so easy."

"I'm no stranger to the difficulties of life."

He regards her calmly. 

"It isn't free, not yet, but I suppose you care little." He shakes his head. "I will take you on as an apprentice, but you have much life in you yet. Returning the dead takes precedence."

Her chest boils with frustration, but Emma Ward has faced worse obstacles.

"I understand," she says, and turns herself back to the deep mysteries of necromancy.

Her son, meanwhile, has attention for little else. 

Eliza was well-embalmed. When her body is finally retrieved, decay has barely set in at all--she doesn't smell nice, but she still looks almost as though she could be sleeping, as long as one doesn't jostle the hair deftly arranged over her forehead to hide the bullet hole. 

He sits with her, occasionally, when there is absolutely nothing useful he could be doing at the moment, and strokes the back of her hand or presses careful kisses to her brow. 

Hiram's vampirism fades slightly faster than his estimate had been for, and they make enormous - but not conclusive - strides in the resurrection process.

He does, fortunately, have a process for halting decay, though it will fade from something Eliza's size after about a year with no maintenance. Useful for books, and for preserving corpses. Freshness matters somewhat; this will preserve their advantage, at least.

Good. 

They resurrect one ancestor after another, making tweaks to the distillation process each time. Some of them turn out better than Hiram; some turn out worse. Slowly, agonizingly slowly, they make improvements. 

The vampirism they can reduce quite a bit, but haven't gotten the trick of entirely eliminating. Joseph gives blood without complaint and makes thorough notes. 

The dulling of the senses they can chip away at, bit by bit, until it's reduced to a barely noticeable hint of numbness. 

Then the question, once Hiram recovers, becomes if they with to return Amity, as a fellow researcher to make further improvements, or Eliza. Amity won't mind the current state. Hiram's uncertain if Eliza would.

"I don't...think so. But gaining more information and skill first can only help." 

"And the vampirism should not last long, now."

"Yes." 

They make the preparations to raise Amity. 

She opens her eyes, takes a deep shuddering breath, and begins to weep.

Hiram steps up to embrace her.

Joseph casts his eyes in the direction of the door to where Eliza's body is kept. 

"What has come of the family since my death?"

Emma summarizes, mostly the recent affairs.

"Good. Good. I shall of course exercise all I may towards improvements. There were thoughts I had I dared not carry through upon, nor even commit to writing... And I came across much of assorted interest, in my time as a seminary professor." To Joseph: "I can say I hardly feel the distance from my body that had been so reported, and the blood-thirst is but a distant awareness for now."

"We worked very hard at improving that." 

"My thanks. I have certain insights I believe may help, regardless. If we may retire elsewhere?"

"Certainly." With Hiram's assistance, they actually have clothes that fit her-in-particular, even. 

Good.

One thing she had considered: the incantation seems to call upon a certain being, which some rumors of passed through her hands. She never pursued them in depth, deeming it wiser to not walk that path, but the rumors included that some people have a closer tie, and might be more adept at the incantation.

She also lived a long, academic life, and knows more languages by now than any of them - it is safer to read an instruction manual in the writer's native tongue - and knows of, though she never acquired, several more obscure alchemical texts they could pursue the acquisition of, which would likely aid in their understanding surrounding the distillation process.

"I'll inquire about those at the University library."

"I have some contacts I can pursue - I don't suppose anyone has ideas about finding someone affiliated with beings from the outer spheres? Especially friendly someones?"

"Listening to rumors and other social activities have always been your forte, Mother," he says affectionately. 

She smiles. "I suppose. I'll dig through what we have on the outer spheres and those touched by them, though I suspect 'unutterably strange' will be the extent of most rumors."

"I'll see if I can find out anything about who's been looking into certain books." 

"That would probably be the best use of the two of us; it won't be too strange, if your foreign cousin and his equally foreign newlywed wife wish to spend some significant amount of time secluded."

Nod. "It's going to be harder to explain Eliza." 

Amity makes a politely curious noise.

"Eliza is the woman we're wishing to return most," Emma explains. "She's Joseph's fiance."

"I understand. Could you move, to somewhere no one would know her face? Or if we master this so thoroughly, we might be able to reveal it as - a marvel of modern science, a work of god, whatever the mood of the period has turned to."

"Science would be more likely to be believed, I think, although claiming it to be science to other scientists might require explaining the entire procedure--difficult at best, dangerous at worst." 

"Scientists are a curious lot. Someone would look deeper, or try to translate the chant if we tried to spread this... Although plenty of business moguls refuse to explain anything at all about their processes, if we want to claim a more secret science."

"--If I had actually discovered a purely medical way to revive the recently deceased I would spread the knowledge as far and wide as I could and Eliza's death would not change that about me."

He nods. "It might be best to delay, however, a full resurrection campaign, until such a time as we can address questions of integration and where people would live. What excuse would people reach for, were their Eliza miraculously returned?"

"I don't know what they would naively reach for but we could sell the idea that she faked her death because she believed her mother was going to do something drastic to prevent the marriage if we revealed the fact that her mother had been poisoning her for her entire childhood in order to keep her closer." 

"She might have ideas of her own, besides, or a preference for a clean slate away from her family. However, should she wish to stay, that does seem like the excuse least likely to be questioned."

Nod. "--Staying in frequent communication with the rest of you and retaining access to the catacombs do seem likely to be a priority." 

"That seems likely, yes. And you're a valuable member of our team."

"I should hope so, as much money as you spent on my education." 

"You do take after me."

"And we're all better off for it. Nothing against Father, but," shrug. 

"A rather prosaic man, all things considered. Not a bad thing to be in and of itself, however..."

"Not very useful here and now." 

She nods. "Especially when his return would be rather more awkward than any other we have tried to explain."

"I do love him, but he'll keep." 

"My sentiment, effectively."

Though she's more 'vaguely fond' than 'love.'

Well, it's 1928. Not everyone can be fortunate enough to find a spouse they truly love, not when staying unmarried is such a non-option for young women. 

During the interval of Amity's vampirism, Joseph determines that while his University's library does not contain the volumes they seek, his professors are willing to write him letters of recommendation to the custodians of other libraries that do. He makes other, discreter inquiries into more straightforwardly occult and fabulously esoteric tomes, discovers which libraries have them, and begins fabricating excuses to inquire into those who have perused them. 

And when the day that Amity no longer requires his blood arrives, they can finally, finally bring her back. 

The procedure has been edited slightly from Amity's, his ancestress's own expertise having gone into the refinement of the distillation procedure. The powder produced at the end is a stunningly saturated ultramarine, and he feels lightheaded as he speaks the words that will restore his beloved to the world. 

There was a man with a gun. 

It had been late and she had ventured out of her room into the parlor only because her parents had left the house, and there was the sound of breaking glass and she turned around and there was a man with a gun who looked as surprised to see her as she was to see him and he had pointed it at her and she had screamed--

--the latter half of the scream escapes her as the world refocuses somehow, and she doesn't know what's going on but she hits the floor to be a harder target to hit but--this isn't the carpeted parlor floor, this is bare stone and she's naked, what--

He immediately falls to his knees at her side, wrapping her with the blanket he had procured for this purpose and holding her tight. "Eliza," he breathes. 

"--Joseph? What's going on?"

"You--you died." 

"I--oh." She thinks about the man with the gun, pointed right at her head, and shivers. Then-- "Joseph, if you killed yourself when you found out, I will be very cross." 

"No. No, my love, all is well, you're alright, I'm alright, everything's alright." 

"Good." She looks up, sees the other inhabitants of the room--recognizes Mrs. Ward immediately of course, makes some conjecture--

She wraps the blanket more tightly around herself and tucks a corner into the edge under her armpits, then takes Joseph's hand and leads him to a standing position and curtsies. "Hiram Curwen, I presume. And--I'm less confident, are you Amity?" 

"Yes. It is good to see you restored."

Hiram nods.

He also notably is facing partially away, and doesn't turn to face her until he's certain that she's covered.

She appreciates that. "It's good to meet you. I admit I never expected the honor; I just wish it hadn't required such dire circumstances." She leans against Joseph and takes his arm in hers. "Welcome to the twentieth century, if it's not too late to say." 

"Thank you. Welcome back."

"It's good to have you. But let's get the boys out of here - and you dressed, properly."

"Yes'm." She lets go of her fiance's arm with slight reluctance, then shoos him out of the room. Once he and Hiram have left she lets the blanket drop to the floor and starts pulling on the provided garments. While she's dressing, she says to Amity: 

"So--are you okay? It seems like it must have been unpleasant to have to live out the rest of a natural lifetime with all one's neighbors abhorring one's spouse." 

"I shoved myself into a little box, and they did not much mention that poor woman's unfortunate circumstance. Rumors, though, fade with time, and it seems boxes are at least somewhat larger in this time."

...Nod. "It's--easier when you have someone you can unbox yourself around," she murmurs. 

"Hiram was good for that, yes. I regret that my interest in him led to such an investigation, but... I do not regret the time he gave me. He looked at me, and saw my mind, not my station."

"And--well, ultimately what happened to the two of you wasn't permanent. Not that that means it didn't hurt, or that it doesn't matter that it hurt. But you get to get better. And the boxes will only get bigger from here." 

"It's the same, for you. This can be a fresh start, or a chance to change things here and now."

"Yes...for right now, though, I think I'm just very glad I'm not dead." 

"Understandable."

"Let's get you seated somewhere comfortable. I've dismissed the servants, so there won't be trouble with you wandering the house. And I suspect something warm to eat and drink would be comforting now."

Nod. "--I'm decent!" she calls out to Joseph and Hiram. 

Joseph comes back in immediately and hugs her. 

Hiram steps into the doorway more slowly.

She leans against Joseph and smiles at Hiram. "Thank you, by the way. If you hadn't done what you did, all those years ago, I imagine I would still be in a wooden box." 

"You're welcome. I'm glad I was able to help."

"Yeah." She sighs. "Something to eat and drink would be great right now, yes. Especially something to drink, my throat feels..." 

"Are you craving anything particular? Most have had a craving for blood, though we'd tried to reduce that..."

"--Well I wasn't thinking about blood but now--is it permanent?" 

"No, no, it'll be gone quickly." 

"Good, that would be inconvenient." 

"And even with Hiram, it wasn't so much we couldn't handle the amount."

"Where are you getting the blood?" 

"Mother and I have it drawn. Mostly me." 

"...Oh." 

She starts getting people moved into a drawing room.

(Does that seem a bad 'oh' or a good 'oh' or an ambivalent 'oh'...)

It's very much a there's-something-morbidly-romantic-about-drinking-my-True-Love's-lifeblood 'oh.'

She tugs Joseph down to sit on a loveseat with her and leans her head on his shoulder with a contented sigh. 

She's not going to touch the weird things kids these days find romantic.

"Do you want to talk about reintegration now? We had some thoughts, for getting you back into the world."

"Like what?" 

"We thought of two main options, though it's hardly an exhaustive list."

"We could set you both up somewhere far away enough no one would know your face. It would mean leaving behind everything familiar."

"We could also claim you faked your death - especially if you wish to come forward about your mother's crimes."

...Nod. 

"It'd be kind of inconvenient to keep working with the rest of you on the necromancy stuff if we left, wouldn't it." 

"It would, especially since I would prefer not to move myself. But arrangements could be made; I certainly do not mind traveling often."

"...I could wear a disguise? There are ways to use makeup to change the shape of one's face, and if people think the new fiance is noticeably similar to the old one, well, that's not necessarily a healthy choice but it's not suspicious." 

She hums. "I'd expect some to be able to recognize your voice, as well..."

"I don't have to talk much. And we could travel, when there's traveling to be done. I don't...care, honestly about the people we're trying to fool. I mean, I want people to be okay and not dead, but I don't really get anything out of interacting with people I have to hide myself from, one way or another." 

She nods.

"It might be best for you two to travel for a time in the first place, if that is our choice. Joseph goes off for a time, long enough for the memories of you to fade farther... And long enough to find another fiancee, as well as practice any lies about your background."

"I certainly pretended to be my own relative often enough. I can advise you in changing just enough about yourself."

Nod. "Thanks. I appreciate it." 

"We could go to look for people with connections to the Outer Spheres, or, for that matter, simply enough weirdness to bring in on things. Spreading the practice would be valuable if we can find trustworthy people." 

"As well as likely to net us more experience. Knowledge of the occult was scattered and varied in my time, and acquiring the remains of prior initiates of it was a slow process."

Nod. "There's a copy of the Necronomicon at Miskatonic University; it makes sense to start there." 

"The translation or parts of the original," he asks, voice somewhat wry. "The translations I have seen are mostly exercises in the translator's imagination."

"I don't think anyone's seen a copy of the original Arabic in years, but the Wormius version that the library has is spoken of in what I thought were suitably hushed whispers." 

"It's sometimes possible to trace parts of the original given enough varied translations, as well. Certainly that might not be a bad place to start."

"Besides, I'm less interested in the contents than in who's been looking at it." 

She nods. "I'll be less adroit at that part, but if we deem it important I can take a look."

"I can probably be all the charming young lady we need, you're fine." 

"It is good, to have multiple strengths in a team."

"When you grow up with the physical strength and endurance God gave a butterfly convincing people to do things for you is very useful." 

"We make our own way, as best we can."

"Yeah. And you and I are at least lucky in having decent assistance." 

"Our boys do make rather excellent accompaniments."

Giggle. "And pretty, too." 

"I do have a rather lovely face," Hiram agrees, dryly.

"I cannot deny it," she says, kissing Joseph on the cheek. 

She leans against her own love, smiling at him.

"It's been good, getting to work on this with you, though... Would you mind, dear, if I accompanied them? I should like to stretch my legs through this wide world, and I know travel is not always your heart's calling."

He leans back. "Of course. We may see each other often, still, and I suspect I will be of more use here. Find me a student, mayhap. It has been a long time since I have had someone to instruct."

"Certainly." And to Eliza and Joseph: "Would my company be acceptable to the two of you?"

"Certainly." 

Nod. 

"I will see about arranging money for the three of you, then," Emma says.

"Thank you." 

"Miskatonic... If you wish to stay the night in Boston on the way there, I might know someone with a vacant property. Boston might not also be a bad place to meet with people; it's nearby a decent number of places steeped in the occult, while being sufficiently large so as to be anonymous."

Thoughtful nod.

"Should you and I pretend to be related?" she asks Amity. "It might cut down on questions as to why the three of us were traveling together, and you don't currently look old enough to match my mental image of a paid chaperone." 

"We could pass as cousins perhaps, or even sisters, yes. Especially if you dyed your hair, which would assist in disguising your identity."

"You have a point. Even if I like my hair the way it is. Ah well, it'll grow out when it's safe." 

"Indeed. Do we wish to move soon? It might be best, to not have to dance around the servants here too long... And we can claim that I introduced Joseph to you, if you are to be my cousin, since I have been known in this area longer as his own cousin's wife."

"Yes...I don't mind hiding, much, but if it failed it would be rather inconvenient." 

"Though I expect my servants are enjoying all the vacation time," she says, wryly. "Certainly you should stay through tomorrow - tonight is too late to smuggle you out easily. But I'll contact my niece, Ruth. She was helpful with the first excavation, and can get you out of the city with none the wiser. Joseph and Amity might be better served leaving openly, in the day, to meet you elsewhere."

"Alright. I admit, the idea of travelling like this is rather exciting; I've never been able to before." 

"This world has many beautiful sights, as well. I always enjoyed traveling for my work. And I am equally excited to see how it has changed, since my death."

"At least when you died the Revolutionary War had already happened." 

"I didn't expect modern politics to be at all the same. And the war was not without its fore-warnings."

"Still, wow, what a way to put in perspective how long the two of you were gone for." 

He nods. "The Great War was more surprising, honestly, as is the entire concept of nationalism. It is hard to express, but - people related to the concept of king and country somewhat differently, in our time."

"The Great War was bad business all around." 

"It is something to work to avoid a repeat of, especially as people's opportunities to hurt one another grow."

"--Well. We have more ability to do that than we did five months ago." 

She nods. "And - given our abilities, our power at least in the shadows behind the curtain will grow."

Nod. "And if someone assassinates another Archduke maybe we can fix it before everything blows up." 

She smiles. "Though we'll need a better information network, to be sure of that."

"That shouldn't be too hard, should it? Even if it's not safe to reveal ourselves to the public, surely there are plenty of weeping husbands and wives and parents and children who'll be happy to keep mum about us and let us know where we're needed." 

"I can assist in that, too. I suspect we're already making subtle names for ourselves, given the direction of our researches, and it might be easier for me to receive consistent news, being in one place."

"The direction of--should I be concerned?"

"We have been mostly acquiring texts on necromancy and alchemy; nothing evil, but as we have kept an eye out for those who might have any knowledge, I suspect others are doing the same. People talk, even when we would wish they had not."

"I meant concerned about the attention, not concerned about the researches," she assures her mother-in-law-to-be.

She nods. "I'm not sure. I don't think occultists are often in the habit of moving against one another, out of caution if nothing else."

Hiram nods. "That was my experience, at least. Even those who disliked me did not try to reveal me."

"No, that happened when someone got mad at you over your wife. So our most likely enemy is...my mother. Grand." 

"Mobs are at least a bit less common, now. But you have me. It might be an interesting challenge, positioning myself to neutralize any of her whispers."

"Yeah. But if she was willing to stoop to poisoning her own daughter..." Sigh. "Maybe now that I'm legally dead she'll be less interested in how I would have left her." 

She nods. "For what it's worth, I suspect I'm willing to escalate faster than she is."

"And my father might hold her back. I don't know." 

"I'll look into recruiting allies, there. But that's my worry, not yours."

"Yes. They're not my problem anymore." 

"And they won't be again, if I have any say in it."

"Yeah." She snuggles a little closer to her fiance. "So--new identity, new hair, new face insofar as it can be managed--any thoughts on a new name? I should probably learn to start answering to something else as far in advance of having to as possible." 

"While your name is lovely, something very different would - at least allay rumors." She can list a few moderately distinct names.

"Hm...I like Helen, I think. Okay. Helen." 

"Welcome to the family, Helen," she says, somewhat teasingly. 

She snorts. "And I'll need a surname, I suppose, but that's less important since I'll be getting rid of it soon enough." 

"If you and Amity are to be cousins, you could perhaps share a maiden name. Though I do not think we have established one for her, yet."

Shrug. "Amity?" 

"...There was a woman at the seminal school whom I greatly admired, whose surname was Bolton. It would be good, I believe, to honor her."

"Helen Bolton," she says, rolling it over her tongue. "I could answer to that. Alright." 

"Amity Sanders nee Bolton has a certain ring, as well."

"That'll do, then. Helen." Slight headshake. "That's still going to take some getting used to." 

"It does tend to. Still, we can help."

"Yeah. I'll get used to it." Shrug. 

Emma nods.

In the morning, once it's a decent hour and they've all rested - her servants have today off as well - she sends a message down to Ruth. The girl was helpful enough earlier, and is honestly Emma's favorite of her nieces and nephews. A practical sort.

And, without too much ado, the trio can be on the road to Boston, no one else in their little town the wiser to Eliza's return.

"Cars must have been a surprise," she comments to Amity once they're well underway. 

"We had prototypes even in my husband's life, in fact. Quite fanciful, and nothing workable, but some found them exciting. And England had steam locomotives shortly after the turn of the century."

"...Oh. Sorry. I guess history isn't my forte." 

"I was perhaps more knowledgeable of the odd little inventions people pursued than most. I'm certain there's many ideas now that will revolutionize the world a hundred years hence..."

"Especially if we can keep the really promising inventors from getting taken off the field." 

Her grin widens. "I can certainly name several inventors of my time who would have a field day with today's science. Perhaps we should make a list, of all the minds the world should certainly not lose."

"Maybe we should be excavating more old graves. If the inhabitants react badly we can just dismiss them and be no worse off, and if they don't--I have no idea if anyone knows where, say, Archimedes was buried but if we could find him just imagine what he could do with modern science!" 

She laughs. "It'd take him a while to catch up! And - I imagine too, all the great minds who didn't get the chance. All the women whose minds burned so bright in their dark little boxes. But I don't know how we would find them to say, yes, this is who the world needed most."

"--Yes. There is that. I don't know if there is any way of finding them aside from simply resurrecting the entirety of humanity into a world where all the boxes are gone." 

"We'll do it, someday."

"Yeah." Sigh. "They've waited this long already. But I know I'll never look at a grave the same way again." 

She nods. "I never did, after meeting Hiram. It's - not just a life cut short. It's everything that life could yet be."

Nod. "And for myself, I feel--the phrase dodged a bullet shouldn't apply, I didn't dodge the bullet--" she shivers. 

(One of his hands comes off the steering wheel and laces its fingers with hers.) 

"There's enough of us, now, and we've written thorough instructions for the procedure. The knowledge won't be lost so easy - which means we'll have the chance, over and over, as many times as we need it."

It's a comfort.

Amity Curwen knows nothing if not how dangerous life is.

"Yes. Logically, I'm safer than I've ever been in my life. That's not nothing. I was expecting to be a doctor's wife, and now there's--forever. And that's a little frightening in its own right, I think. But in a good way, like stepping out of prison after having been given a life sentence." 

She smiles again. "And like being given the hammer with which to break the walls."

Giggle. "They can't stop us, they can't stop us--"

Amity has always been the quiet one, the teacher who can only hope to guide her students onto their best path - 

"I don't know that I'm the one to change the world. But change it must."

"And even if you don't change it, you'll still be here when it's changed." 

"Yes. I - always had a hope, that one of my students one day would shake the world to its roots. Certainly, many of them became influential women, but..."

"I can't help but dream."

"And now we're here." 

"Yes. We are."

And, to Joseph: "Speaking of arrivals, how long to Boston?"

"About three hours." 

"A far more pleasant trip than it used to be."

"What did it used to be like?"

"Longer, and highly subject to the weather, mostly. It was more comfortable if you were wealthy enough for a buggy. Some places you could get to by boat, which was usually faster, but a separate sort of unpleasant."

"Being seasick sounds no fun. I've no idea if I do or not."

"I always got my sea legs fairly fast, but very few people spend no time sea sick."

Nod. "What's traveling like? Besides the physical inconveniences." 

She launches into a narrative of her assorted - and multitudinous - adventures, which will pass quite some time.

She listens raptly. It's pretty clear that she's been cooped up her whole life and up till now has only been able to dream of things like this. 

Amity's a good story-teller, at least.

Good. 

When Amity's done, Helen asks, "How many books about the modern world have you read?" 

"It'd be hard to list them all, and they don't explain things in quite the manner I'd like. I've gotten as much information from talking to Emma, in fact... But I haven't learned as much as I should perhaps know."

"If you have any questions I'd be happy to answer." 

She has a few, mostly about things a bit more relevant to their generation, that Emma might not have known. Popular and recent media, fashions, persons of note...

Helen knows less about these things than if she hadn't been mostly shut inside her house most of her life but still more than Joseph or Emma. 

"I suspect that'll be enough, to cover being foreign... Speaking of, I haven't been specifying where I am from - do you have an origin you prefer?"

"Somewhere they speak English, I'm not good enough at any other languages to fake being a native speaker." 

"The British Isles would be best, then, I suspect?"

Nod. "English, probably. I know just enough about Ireland and Scotland and Wales to know how much I don't know." 

"I know some, but certainly more about England." She smiles a bit. "So we are charmingly foreign English ladies."

"Maybe we should go! We can see the sights, work on the accent..." 

"Certainly! There's a number of occult traditions there, as well."

"The English translation of the Necronomicon is supposed to have been done by John Dee." 

"...I wonder if we could find his grave."

"Ooooooooh." 

"Perhaps we can." 

"We'll have quite the motley lot by the time we're done," she says with a laugh.

"We should bring what's needed for the reduction with us, then--or source it there, but either way powders will be less suspicious to bring back with us than corpses." 

"Easier to transport as well, especially if we acquire multiple."

"I'm sure we could manage if that were the only consideration but yes." 

"We'll have to consider the ease of transporting the distillation supplies. Some of them are quite specialized..."

"I'll find someone in England that I have a loose acquaintanceship through the University or a friend in common with or something and write them saying I expect to visit and do they have any idea where I can find the following supplies for experiments while I'm there. Someone who's a complete medical layperson so they won't have any inkling what kind of 'experiments' I mean to do." 

"That seems a good place to start, yes. I can also investigate the creation of a more portable alchemical lab."

"Oh, excellent--and if that can be achieved, perhaps it can be disguised to look like a doctor's kit." 

"It'll be a good project, though I am unsure how quickly I can proceed..."