The soldier took a step back, baffled. Now the other guards were coming nearer, swords drawn. Lukas’s friends, who had been hanging back with Elsa, rushed to help Lukas.
“Well, this won’t get us into the palace, but at least there’ll be a proper fight,” Paulus muttered, swinging his broadsword. Giovanni and Jerome positioned themselves back to back, rapiers in hand.
“One for all and all for one!” Jerome cried. “En voilà un, en voilà un deuxième, et terminé!” Resolutely, he deflected blows from two soldiers and then disarmed a third with an elegant twist.
Paulus, meanwhile, kicked a barrel over from one corner of the forecourt and rolled it at the guards, who stumbled over it and fell flat on their faces. Lukas found himself fighting two men at once. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw to his horror that more guards were running out through the gate. Several of them were holding crossbows.
Damn my pride! Lukas berated himself inwardly. How could I be so stupid? We’ll never win this fight!
As he parried the next blow, he turned briefly toward Elsa, who was cowering on the ground, clutching the Grimorium, looking exhausted. He remembered how that buck had suddenly collapsed, that morning in the woods—could that magic work on people as well?
Elsa, help us! Lukas thought, but his sister still looked like she might pass out at any moment.
One of the soldiers took advantage of Lukas’s distraction, aiming the point of his sword at Lukas’s neck. Lukas dodged it, but the blade caught his upper arm. The stinging pain caused his rage to flare up all over again. He’d let himself be duped by a simple lunge—merely because he’d put his faith in Elsa’s magic instead of his own abilities!
“Together against death and the Devil!” he shouted, preparing for a quick lunge of his own. Feint, riposte, counter, attack. Just as Lukas was about to put his blade at the astonished soldier’s throat, a powerful voice thundered across the square.
“Upon my soul! Who dares abuse the battle cries of the Black Musketeers! You scum deserve the gallows a hundred times over for that alone!”
Lukas glanced up and saw a tall, broad-shouldered figure directly above the gate. He was dressed all in black, except for a red feather in his cap. His knee-high jackboots were waxed until they gleamed, and he was carrying a broad-handled bastard sword with a serrated edge.
Lukas was so alarmed that his rapier nearly fell out of his hand. He knew this man, and he would never have dared raise a hand against him, not for all the money in the world.
The man before them was none other than Zoltan, the commander of the Black Musketeers.
V
Zoltan appeared just as astonished at the encounter as Lukas and his friends were. When he recognized Lukas, he gave a visible start. But after a moment, he collected himself again and gave the watchmen a sign. “These boys are mine!” he barked. “Lower your weapons; I’ll handle them.”
“But sir—” one of the soldiers protested.
“Weapons down, I said,” Zoltan broke in, silencing the soldier with an imperious gesture. “Now!”
The guards obeyed, and Zoltan strode menacingly toward the four companions. The expression on his face was dark and inscrutable. “Surrender! We have a deep hole here to help upstarts like you remember their place. Or should I have you all hanged right here?”
“Monsieur le commandant . . .” Jerome whispered. “If we had known . . .”
Zoltan put a finger to his lips and gave the boys a penetrating stare. “Surrender, I said!” he continued in a loud voice. “Or all of you are dead where you stand!”
Meekly, they all lowered their weapons, and Zoltan led them and Elsa through the gate into the palace’s hedge-framed interior courtyard. As soon as the watchmen were out of view, the commander hissed, “Lord, have you all lost your minds completely? Follow me, but keep your eyes down!”
He turned to the right. They hurried past the hedges and through a low, narrow gate leading back out into a small side street. From there, they made their way through a confusion of cramped alleys, past other stately palaces, until they finally arrived in a poorer quarter upriver. The houses here were small and plain. The streets stank of human waste and the putrid water around a nearby pier. Lukas gritted his teeth. The wound on his arm was hurting worse with every passing moment—perhaps it was deeper than he’d originally thought.
Zoltan stopped in front of a tavern door with a metal sign showing a black boar dangling above it. He knocked three times short and twice long, and then the door opened a crack. A strawberry-blond giant with a wild beard stared down at the boys suspiciously. The massive sword he was holding was nearly as long as Lukas was tall.
“I do not think anyone followed us,” Zoltan said quietly. “You can let us in, Bernhard.”
The giant nodded and held the door open for them. Together, they stepped into a tavern that was empty except for one man at the door and two at the bar. All three were armed. One, a short, sinewy young man, was playing with a long knife. He had a patch over one eye, and he squinted at the boys sullenly, almost hatefully, with the other. The man beside him had a much friendlier look about him. Dozens of pearls and other glittery things were knotted into his long black hair. Leaning against the table beside him was an enormous crossbow with a strange wooden box over the groove. The man nodded to Lukas as he bit into an apple with relish.
“Bernhard, Jurek, and Matthias,” Zoltan said, gesturing to each of the men in turn. “My best mercenaries. I selected them myself from my regiment. So behave, or they’ll eat you alive.”
“From your regiment?” Jerome whistled through his teeth. “Mon dieu, that means they’re—”
“Black Musketeers, just like you,” Zoltan interrupted. “These men, however, are quite a bit stronger, better skilled, and more experienced. They’ve spent the past several years serving as Wallenstein’s personal guards and out on various missions. Unlike some,” he added darkly, “they actually came back as expected from those missions.”
Lukas looked at the floor in shame. He and his friends had fought tirelessly alongside the Black Musketeers. They had started as drummers, but soon they’d joined the ranks of the legendary warriors. In the end, they’d fled back to Lukas’s home after they successfully found and rescued Elsa. Zoltan had never quite forgiven them for going to the Lohenfels residence rather than returning to duty.
“Senno summoned us to Prague to assist you in a delicate matter,” Zoltan continued with a sigh. “Not that I trust that charlatan, but he does have Wallenstein’s ear, so we obeyed. We were told you would show up here in Prague with him and then report to us at the tavern.” He eyed the boys sharply. “So where is Senno? What happened?”
“We’d like to know that, too,” Lukas replied. Hesitantly, he told Zoltan about their magical journey and the events that had followed.
“So you all thought you’d just march on over to Wallenstein’s palace and assault the watchmen there, is that it?” the commander mused after listening. “You’re very lucky I happened to have business at the palace, otherwise you’d already be swinging from the gallows.” The commander cursed and kicked a chair, sending it flying into the corner.
Lukas flinched. When Zoltan got angry, there was usually no stopping him. People feared his violent temper nearly as much as his fighting skill.
“Do the words ‘secret mission’ not mean anything to you?” the commander shouted. “We already can’t be certain whether or not Schönborn knows something is going on. Now half of Prague knows that four urchins and a little girl are looking for Wallenstein’s court astrologer!”
“I’m sorry,” Lukas said ruefully. “It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have done that.”
Zoltan waved dismissively. He took a deep breath, which seemed to help him get control of himself again. “Water under the bridge. Now our only concern is finding these three articles of Imperial Regalia before Schönborn returns to Prague and uses them for something wicked. As far as we know, he is still in Rome.” Zoltan shrugge
d. “I would rather have had my men do all this alone, but supposedly this girl here”—his gaze flitted to Elsa, who was still leaning heavily on Lukas for support—“has magic that we will need in the fight against the powers of evil.”
Zoltan shook his head. “Until very recently, I never would have believed in such superstitious nonsense. But the battle near Hamelin and the death of my old comrade-at-arms Leopold von Torgau forced me to admit I was wrong. Black magic! Dead soldiers that return as invincible war machines. What sort of age are we living in?” He regarded Elsa skeptically. “To be honest, this little brat doesn’t look anything like how I’d imagined a witch would look. Does she at least have this book Senno was talking about?”
Lukas nodded. “Without it, we would never have made it to Prague. But the spell that brought us here weakened my sister a great deal.”
“And you seem to have taken a lick or two fighting the palace guards,” the friendly man with the pearls in his hair—Matthias—remarked, gesturing to Lukas’s bleeding arm. “Let me take a look. I’m something of a feldsher for the Black Musketeers, an army surgeon.”
“A goddamn quack is what he is, that’s all,” strawberry-blond Bernhard broke in, laughing. “But he can probably manage a little wasp sting like that,” he added with a grin, leaning against his long broadsword.
Matthias examined Lukas’s arm, cleaned the wound, and dressed it with a few scraps of cloth. In the meantime, the one-eyed man Zoltan had called Jurek put bread, barley soup, and a jug of small beer out onto the table.
Paulus lunged for it hungrily. “Nice inn you have here,” he said with his mouth full. “Cook seems a bit grouchy, though.” He gestured to Jurek, who was back to playing with his knife.
Jurek regarded Paulus with a disdainful sneer, but Zoltan waved him off. “The inn actually belongs to a cousin of Jurek’s,” the commander said. “He’s marching in the imperial army, so this place is empty for the moment. We’re using it as a meeting point—less conspicuous than Wallenstein’s palace.” Zoltan chuckled. “The neighbors avoid the place; they think we’re all smugglers and assassins.”
The soot-smeared walls were decorated with bearskins and threadbare tapestries; the beer-stained tables were scratched and weathered. By all appearances, the straw covering the floor hadn’t been changed since before the war. A moth-eaten boar’s head, the tavern’s namesake, hung above the counter.
It’s true, Lukas thought. Nobody would ever suspect that an elite troop of Wallenstein’s men was in here.
“So do you all know where we can find the Imperial Regalia?” Jerome asked, picking a few slices of dried apple from a bowl and chewing them appreciatively. “Senno said Schönborn had hidden them somewhere in Prague. Not exactly precise.”
“All of the pieces—the scepter, crown, and sword—are all supposedly hidden in different places,” Zoltan said, counting them off on his fingers as he spoke. “We do have a clue regarding the scepter, at least.” Grinning, he pulled a crumpled note out from his doublet. It was written on the finest handmade paper, the type only the well-to-do used for their correspondence. “We received this message just three days ago—it was pushed under the door. According to this, the scepter is located within Marquis de LaSalle’s palace.”
“And who would that be?” Lukas asked.
“The French ambassador in Prague, and a good friend of Waldemar von Schönborn. He lives in a manor beside the Vltava River. I have no idea how our mysterious friend acquired this information, nor why he passed it to us, but it seems to be authentic.
“Hmm.” Giovanni tilted his head from side to side uncertainly. “A secret helper? I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” Matthias said as he polished his large crossbow. “But it’s our only lead so far, so we should definitely pursue it.”
“With five children?” Jurek spat on the floor contemptuously. “I thought we’d at least have Senno on our side. But now?”
“We aren’t children,” Paulus retorted angrily. “I’d be happy to prove it if you like, One Eye.”
“Sure, Fat Boy, if you’re that desperate to lose an ear.” Jurek reached for his knife, but Zoltan held him back.
“No fighting within the troop, or I’ll throw you in the cellar. Is that clear?” The commander banged his fist on the table. “We don’t know where Senno is. Perhaps the spell simply blew him to the other side of the Vltava and he’ll join us tomorrow. Or perhaps he’s halfway around the world. Maybe he’s dead. We don’t have time to find out. We need to act now.”
“Elsa is still very weak,” Lukas pointed out, giving his sister a look of concern. He pushed her a cup of milk that Matthias had given him. “Maybe we should wait a bit.”
“Zoltan is right,” Elsa broke in haltingly. “We don’t have time. I sense that something terrible will happen soon—very soon—unless we retrieve the Regalia.” She was now clutching the Grimorium, which she had been hiding beneath her cloak. “The book gives me the strength I need. At least for the moment.” She turned to Zoltan. “So, what’s your plan?”
“The marquis hosts a large event every year—a masked ball,” Zoltan replied. “That will be our chance to walk around his palace unnoticed and search for the scepter. But they will be checking each guest thoroughly at the entrance. Can you all swim?”
The young comrades nodded.
“We will need to strike from the other side, from the Vltava,” Zoltan continued. “There’s a small riverside pier on his property used for receiving goods, and a door beside it that leads into the palace. If we can just distract the pier guards for a moment, we should be able to make it inside.”
Elsa looked thoughtful and shrugged. “My powers should still suffice for a little distraction. When is this masked ball?”
“This very evening.” Zoltan grinned, pulling a handful of masks and some colorful clothing from beneath the counter. “You have just enough time to pick out your costumes.”
VI
They waited until nightfall.
Zoltan walked in front, carrying a lantern to guide them through the labyrinth of deserted alleys. Lukas was just happy that the wound on his upper arm hardly hurt at all anymore. Matthias, it seemed, was a better doctor than Bernhard the bearded giant had suggested.
Now, at the height of summer, it was warm and humid even after sundown. Lukas’s clothing was soon clinging to his skin. The heat also amplified the terrible stench of trash and human excrement hanging in the air. He had pictured this fairy-tale city from his mother’s stories somewhat differently—certainly with fewer of these disgusting piles in the middle of the street.
Lukas could still scarcely believe that they were actually in Prague. Until now, most of the magic he’d seen Elsa do had been little conjuring tricks: the wet wood in the fireplace suddenly bursting into flame, a gust of wind that blew the leaves from a tree, the red pustules on the maid’s face. This magical journey was something else entirely. Lukas wondered what else the book made Elsa capable of.
And will it be enough against a black magician as powerful as Waldemar von Schönborn? he wondered.
Zoltan turned another corner, and the rotten stench of the Vltava hit Lukas once more. Each of them was carrying a small bundle wrapped in waxed cloth. The bundles contained their costumes and masks, and the waxed cloth would keep them from getting wet in the river. Lukas hoped no one would see through their disguises at the ball or try to engage them in conversation—especially in Bohemian, like the angry barkeep. To make matters more uneasy, they were only able to arm themselves with knives and small cudgels.
The river shimmered before them between the buildings, black as night. The large bridge was just a stone’s throw away.
“The marquis’s palace.” Zoltan pointed to a magnificent two-story building right on the bank of the river, separated from the rest of the city beyond it by a small stream. Light shone out through the windows, and the soft sounds of flutes and shawms floated over to them on the breeze. “Looks like the ball is well unde
r way,” he added quietly. “Not a sound from any of you, starting now!”
Together, they crept toward a flight of stone steps, slick with algae, leading down to the river. Lukas stared, shivering, at the black swells splashing softly against the quay. When he’d told Zoltan he could swim, he hadn’t known how deep and sinister the river would seem at night.
As dark as hell, Lukas thought.
Bernhard and Matthias disappeared into the water with their waxed-cloth bundles. Zoltan gave the others a sign and then dove down as well. Now, of the four grown men, only Jurek was left on the shore.
“Aw, are the little babies scared of the cold water?” he sneered. “I hear there are whales the size of boats in the Vltava, and small children are their favorite food.”
“But they like one-eyed windbags even better,” Paulus replied. “I’ll let them know you’re coming.” Without another word, he leapt into the water from the top step with a huge splash.
“Damn it, not so loud!” Jurek hissed. “All right, now the rest of you.” He signaled to the other boys and Elsa. “I’ll take the rear guard.” He clamped his long knife between his teeth and sat down on the steps.
Lukas glanced over at him suspiciously. He didn’t like Jurek at all. He could only hope that Zoltan’s trust in his people wasn’t misplaced. Lukas shut his eyes for a moment and then slid into the dark water with Elsa. It was surprisingly cold, and the current tore at his legs. The palace was about a hundred paces away upstream. Suddenly, Lukas was grateful to his father for having taught them both to swim in the Neckar, even if he—unlike Elsa—wasn’t much of a water rat.
He held his breath and dove beneath the surface. The bundle on his back hindered him as he swam, so his progress was slow. He tried to avoid looking down into the water. Dark as it was, he thought he could make out a shadow here and there, and once something soft and slimy brushed his leg. He could only pray that it was some kind of climbing plant, rather than a huge fish.