Revenant Eve

  The cathedral bells began the call to Vespers, echoed within seconds by the bells of the Orthodox church. The sound, the fading light, called to mind Rachmaninoff’s Vespers; so beautiful, so profoundly evocative of a passing world.

  Then we were borne away, the bells fading behind us as the last of the day faded. The animals perked up, smelling the stable, warmth, comfort, and food.

  We’d reached the royal palace, gone through its massive gates.

  They rode directly to the front entrance, and Jaska, Mord, Aurélie, and Margit dismounted, Jaska covertly observing Aurélie with a revealing glance of worry.

  Guards and servants swarmed at a respectful distance, everyone wanting to get a look at the royal prodigal, back after so many years.

  The palace was the same architecturally, but so much of the statuary, even the fountains, had been removed or destroyed before I had ever seen it. The elaborate coat of arms over the entry, set in a glory of baroque flourishes, was totally gone in modern times, replaced by a modest, vaguely Greek pediment, reminding me of those scarred buildings back in post-revolutionary Paris.

  Immediately outside the carved doors waited a stout, apple-cheeked fellow with a bushy beard and a round furry hat. His face appeared so young the beard seemed incongruous, but as Aurélie got closer, I recognized the adult in that steady gaze. He wore the eighteenth century frock coat that we soon discovered was still the fashion here. I spotted in the beautiful embroidery along facings and cuffs Kabbalistic signs mixed with amaranth and acanthus.

  Jaska exclaimed, “Shmuel!”

  “I give thanks, Jaska, that you are safely returned!”

  Jaska grabbed Shmuel by the shoulders and said in Dobreni, “I give thanks to you for holding things together. Hippolyte told me when I was in Vienna. We will talk as soon as I see my mother.” He turned his head. “This is Mordechai ben Aaron Zusya. Will you put him up?”

  “You need not ask. It would be my honor. Domnu Zusya will wish to make his bow to her majesty, then bring him to me.”

  “What exactly is this language?” Aurélie whispered to me. “I hear bits of Latin, but altered, and bits of German.”

  “It’s called Dobreni.” I braced for more questions, but she was distracted by Jaska, who led them up the shallow marble stairs. It appeared to be enough that I knew the language: I was a resource, not an object of interest. She had enough to focus on now, with the expectation of meeting Jaska’s mother—and a queen.

  The plain white plaster walls of the twenty-first century were paneled with beautiful rococo paintings of religious and mythological symbols, in gorgeous pastels, the framing either of white and gold or else magnificent woodworked patterns.

  The ground floor was the marble checkerboard so common in palaces of that day. Up the stairs to the state rooms, and here was the lovely furniture that would completely vanish in World War II: shield-backed chairs with embroidered cushions in forest green and gold, drake-footed cabriole legs. Carved cabinetry and more statuary, enormous murals, and tapestries. I only recognized bits here and there—sometimes no more than a brass candle sconce on a wall, which would later be wired to hold a candle-shaped electric light.

  Liveried footmen opened doors, and we passed into a woman’s world, with rounded rococo furnishings of dusty blue, rose, and gold in a white setting. And there, seated in a pillow-festooned recliner, was a very old lady whose light brown eyes were familiar. Queen Sofia!

  “Mother,” Jaska said. He bowed, then leaned down to kiss her forehead and blue-veined hands. “I trust you got my messages.”

  “These are the ones I received,” the queen said, laying her hand over a carved box on her little side table. “Since you apparently never stayed long enough in one place for me to answer, I could not discover if one might have gone astray.”

  “I sent everything through Hippolyte,” Jaska said.

  The queen smiled. “You were clever to do so. I will venture to promise that anything he received most certainly reached me. I am troubled by what I am hearing out of Vienna.”

  “It’s going to get worse before it gets better,” Jaska said, and stepped back so that Margit could salute her mother. “We will talk about it when you wish.”

  “The morning will be sufficient,” the queen said and smiled at her daughter. “Dearest. So you could not wait to meet your brother, but must ride out willy-nilly to meet him?”

  “As you perceive, Mother. Jaska, shall you perform the introductions, or shall I?”

  But the queen forestalled them both. “You must be Mordechai ben Aaron? Domnu Zusya, I wish I could rise to properly thank the preserver of my son’s life. Some days are better than others. Today I am confounded, alas, but pray do not take that amiss.”

  Mord bowed awkwardly.

  Jaska said, “May I present Donna Aurélie de Mascarenhas?”

  Aurélie gave the court curtsey that Madame Campan had drilled into Josephine’s ladies.

  “Welcome among us, Donna Aurélie,” the queen said, and Aurélie dipped again. “Margit will see you comfortably established, as I gather her brother has requisitioned her aid.” A glance at the riding habit, which she obviously recognized.

  Aurélie colored.

  “We shall gather in the morning and discuss events once everyone has rested, shall we, my dears?”

  Two bows, two curtseys, and Jaska and Margit turned away, Mord following. Only Aurélie backed with little steps, head inclined, hands at her sides, the way she’d been taught. With her head lowered she couldn’t see the queen’s interested look, but I could.

  Margit took Aurélie to one of the wings that in the twentieth century would be used as Soviet head offices for the secret police; then, as the Soviet empire began breaking up, the desks emptied of agents one by one, to be stacked with boxes and broken Dictaphones and envelope steamers and PBX equipment, then locked up for a decade and a half. It was in the process of being transformed into a guest wing again when I vanished.

  The room Aurélie was given was charming, the cushions and curtains embroidered with roses, cherubs flying above puffy clouds in the ceiling paintings.

  Margit said, “Viorel will be here anon. I will have a seamstress up here in the morning, if that suits you.”

  Aurélie thanked her.

  “I will send a tray, if you like. I do not know when we will dine or if. My brother will probably be closeted with at least one minister all evening, once he and our mother have had a private interview. She retires early.” Margit held out her hands. “In short, we are not what you are used to in Paris, I suspect.”

  “That would be a fine thing,” Aurélie said. And added, “Though I admired Madame Bonaparte in many ways.”

  Margit gave that quick smile again, then inclined her head. “Have you any questions?”

  “Yes. What happened with this Duke Benedek Ysvorod of Domitrian? Was he going to attack us?”

  “No.” Margit flushed. “Perhaps he considered it. Perhaps he wanted us to believe he considered it.” She took a step toward the door, then turned around and said flatly, “Benedek was the heir until my brother and I were born. He was nearly ten, very much of an age to have been groomed to expectations. Then my mother, at the age of fifty-five, unexpectedly found herself with child. Twins. Including a boy, an heir.”

  “And so this duke would like to rid the world of Jaska. Do I understand that right?”

  Margit put her hand to the door, then once again turned back, as though she’d undergone internal struggle before answering. “I think he was testing Jaska. I will send someone directly.”

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  AURÉLIE WAS ABRUPTLY AWAKENED by a vast roar, as from the throats of a great crowd.

  She sat up, eyes wide, then shot out of bed and scrambled for her clothes. A crowd could only mean one thing to a person who had grown up on the detritus of crowd destruction: revolution, riot, chaos.

  Teenage Viorel entered while Aurélie was feverishly pulling on the nearest gown. The maid entered with
a brisk step and a shy smile, her hands filled with a heavy silver tray.

  “Is a mob attacking the palace?” Aurélie asked in French, and at Viorel’s uncomprehending look, repeated it in German, adding, “Where is my pistol?”

  Viorel gave her a glance of mild surprise. “Attack?” She set the tray on the sideboard and dropped a hasty curtsey. “It is only the city people gathered to welcome the prince. They have been outside the palace and all through the square, since dawn, so he has ridden out to greet them.”

  Aurélie sank into a chair.

  “Here is porridge, new-baked bread and cheese, and an apricot tartlet, as we won’t have fresh peaches or apricots for some weeks yet. I was told you do not wish for meat. Is that true, my lady, is there anything else I can bring?”

  “This is sufficient,” Aurélie said. “Thank you.”

  Viorel curtseyed again, and left.

  “Duppy Kim, I don’t know what to do next,” Aurélie said. “We talked about this. I trust Jaska, and I think he feels about me the way I do about him. But is that going to put him in a terrible position? If his family thinks the way my aunt does, which is common to many, then the knowledge of my background will force a difficult choice on him.”

  Wow. Talk about déjà vu! Recollecting my stupid decision to run in order to save Alec from difficult choices, I said, “I suggest you talk to him before going anywhere.”

  “Yes, I feel I owe him that.” She went on seriously, “But comes this thought: Besides trust, there is respect. If he were to see me the way my aunt does…oh, I do not want to lose my respect for him.”

  I said with all the power of She Who Made Stupid Choices For (she thought) The Best of Reasons: “I think you’ve already lost your respect for him if you think he’s going to fail you now.”

  Her scowl deepened, but I was fairly certain she wasn’t angry so much as conflicted. She turned her attention to her breakfast, and I shut up.

  She was just finishing when there came a knock at the door, and Margit entered.

  After her polite greeting, Margit said, “Jaska told us last night about the ghost you have following you.”

  “She’s not a ghost,” Aurélie said. “She’s a duppy.” And forestalling the She’s a what? that always followed, she added quickly, “Her body is alive somewhere.”

  “Ah,” Margit said, clearly with something else on her mind. “I would like you to speak to someone.”

  “Someone?” Aurélie repeated.

  “A seer.”

  Aurélie’s eyes widened. “Tell me about this seer, pray?”

  Margit said slowly, “Elisheva is five years younger than I, but in some ways, she has been old since she could talk. She used to spend more time with ghosts than with other children, they said. There is a fountain not far from the temple, where she insists that the children and animal ghosts play and dance.”

  Xanpia’s fountain! My focus sharpened.

  Margit was still talking. “I always liked the idea of child ghosts and animals playing, except not that they were dead. Anyway, her mother was my piano teacher, so Elisheva used to come to my lessons when their father was in shul, after her sister began singing lessons. Then, when she turned thirteen or so, she was tested for her abilities and…began training.”

  “I will speak to your seer, and gladly,” Aurélie said.

  Margit went to the door and opened it. In came a young woman with vivid coloring—flame-bright red hair above a high forehead, a thousand freckles, eyes the light blue of a summer morning. Her gown was made high to the neck and covered her to the wrists, its color a soft gray. The only ornamentation was the embroidery around the neck and wrists of Kabbalistic symbols twined with leaves of hawthorn, laurel, with amaranth blossoms. Fixed at the neck of her gown was a faceted crystal, catching the light with gleams and glitters, but it was scarcely brighter than her hair, which, though worn in a modest bun, did its best to escape in whorls and curls.

  “This is Elisheva Barta, Donna Aurélie,” Margit said. “I will teach you your first word in our language: Salfmatta. These are women who understand Vrajhus.”

  “Vrajhus?”

  “You could call it magic.”

  “Magic!” Aurélie exclaimed. And then, “Do you have a book? I will teach myself Dobreni while I learn Vrajhus.”

  Elisheva said, “You can learn our language, but you will find nothing about magic written down.” She pulled a prism from a pocket of her gown, and I thought, At last maybe some answers about the mysterious danger to Dobrenica?

  “Why is nothing written?” Aurélie asked.

  “The pursuit of Vrajhus is perilous,” Margit said. “Far too many people have been executed by fire, water, or rope—magicians good and bad but mostly ordinary folk who, at most, followed superstition and knew nothing of Vrajhus at all.”

  “Hundreds and hundreds in the last century alone,” Elisheva said. “But also, if nothing is written, then the teacher can test the student at each step along the path. No one with evil in her heart can steal a book not written. Or his heart, for there are also Salfpatras. Spirit?” She addressed me, though her attention was on the prism. She could see me, apparently.

  “My name is Kim,” I said in Dobreni.

  “You speak our language.”

  Elisheva looked from one of us to the other as Margit sighed and said, “I hear nothing and see nothing. But from your faces, it is not the same for you.”

  “Take my hand,” Aurélie said to Margit. “And look in yon mirror. Your brother was able to see Kim that way. At first, mirrors were the only way I could see her.”

  I said to Elisheva, “Is there a danger to Dobrenica besides the obvious threat from Napoleon? Does it have something to do with the Esplumoir?”

  Elisheva looked startled. “How do you know about the Esplumoir?”

  Margit said in Dobreni with a doubtful glance at Aurélie’s uncomprehending face, “We never talk about that.”

  “We are going to have to,” Elisheva retorted. “This spirit introduced it first. And the news that Domnu Zusya brought is deeply troubling to the Grandmothers and Grandfathers. But that must wait.” She peered down into her prism, turning it until she caught me again. “Kim-Spirit, I do not know yet if this danger you speak of is the threat that Domnu Zusya spoke of. Let me ask this: Did you become attached to Donna Aurélie by going through an Esplumoir?”

  “You say an. There are more than one?”

  “We are taught that there are three. One high in the mountains between the Far East and the Land of the Hindu, and another on the continent of the New World, in a place where the mountains once breathed fire. And ours. All are in mountains, and some of the stories insist that these mountains all breathed fire at one time.”

  Dobrenica, the Himalayas, and either Washington, Oregon, or Hawaii, I translated mentally.

  “All guarded by people of peace,” Elisheva said. She corrected conscientiously, “Or so we try to be.”

  Though Tony and I had closed one, we never understood what it was we’d found. “What exactly is an Esplumoir?” I asked.

  “That is the name given to the gate between worlds,” Elisheva said.

  “So, that is not the same as a portal?”

  “Portals take one to other portals, if you have sufficient Vrajhus, or from here into the Nasdrafus. I have never used one, nor has anyone else I know, but I was taught that once you are through a portal, you can use them to go from one place to another.”

  That tugged at my memory. Someone had mentioned something somewhere, sometime, but I could not remember.

  She went on. “Perhaps I ought to stop here. But as you are a spirit, I will tell you what we are told in our early training.” She looked around, spotted a pen sharpener on the escritoire, and tried to balance it on the point of her finger. “You see how the handle goes down and the blade goes up? Those are the places between heaven and earth, always shifting. If I were to put a pea on top of this sharpener, it could roll either way, depending upon h
ow the pen sharpener is moving. But this point underneath, here, where it touches my finger and does not move? That is the gate—the Esplumoir.”

  “And so the Nasdrafus is what?”

  “It is the path between portals. It is what you find beyond a portal.”

  “And what do you find beyond a gate? Nasdrafus, or…”

  “Nasdrafus and,” she corrected. “And, and, and. A plentitude of ands. The portal is simpler, but a gate reaches realms we know nothing of. All we know is that no one who stepped through the gates ever returned.”

  While she spoke, Aurélie had gone to the mirror and beckoned. Margit touched her fingertips to Aurélie’s hand and peered into the mirror. As soon as Elisheva finished speaking, Margit said, “I see the outline of something. I think. Or is it the light?”

  “Light is what my cousin saw,” Aurélie said.

  Margit let go of Aurélie’s hand and walked away. “Yet my brother can see. Is it because he is the heir? Yet Elisheva and the elders are not of royal blood.”

  “The ability will be in some families, but not everyone is the same,” Elisheva said. “You know that my sister Shoshanna does not see. She used to think I told untruths.”

  “She would,” Margit observed.

  Elisheva flashed a smile, which she quickly suppressed. “I will not harbor unkind thoughts in my heart about my sister,” she said quickly, as if by habit. Then she focused on me. “Spirit, I ask again, how did you become attached to Donna Aurélie? Was it through an Esplumoir?”

  “I was brought by a seer in Donna Aurélie’s land of origin. But before that, I was warned by a vision of Xanpia that there is danger to Dobrenica.”

  Both Elisheva and Margit stilled when I said Xanpia. It was good to be back in Dobrenica—it was a relief to be instantly believed—but the goodness and relief lasted about a nanosecond, because far stronger was their evident tension.