“He’s gone to find her!” My throat tightens around the words.
“ ‘Her’?” Her voice lowers. “You mean . . .”
“The Historian!”
“How?”
But I don’t dare say it out loud here. I trip my way down the stairs of the plane. Run across the tarmac toward the nearest hangar.
“How can he find her? Audra! What’s happening?”
I run into a repair shop of some kind. Persuade the mechanic who comes to yell at me to turn on his heel and walk away.
“His mother,” I pant.
“What about her?”
“The Historian is his mother!”
“What? He kept this from us all this time? What has he been telling her—what information has he been feeding her?”
“No! He met her, vicariously, through me—through my memories when I drowned. He’s going to confront her. I don’t know where. But he’s alone and I don’t trust her! She’s already had him kidnapped and beaten. Even put a hunter—Rolan—on him when we were in Maine!”
I can hear Jester reeling on the other end. Claudia in the background, alarmed, asking what’s wrong.
“All right,” she says, more flustered than I’ve ever heard her. “All right. Let me—merde. Let me think.”
“You have to trace him. Follow him. Serge can’t know.”
“Audra . . . Serge has been following you for months. Following Luka for months. There’s a whole marker here on you.”
Those words make my skin crawl.
“He’s left France, I’m almost certain. I promise you, he’s taking more interest in this than he appears.”
“That’s— No. For all he knows we had a fight. Some lovers’ quarrel.”
“He’s too smart for that. He knows what Luka is. If you know what family Luka’s from, he does, too.”
“Then why have me find the Historian, if he knows?”
“He hasn’t made the final connection. As soon as he does, you’re both expendable.”
I grimace. “And I asked Serge to find Luka!”
“Do you have any idea where his mother might be?”
“No. None,” I say. “She left his dad when he was a teenager. Family name Novak. His grandpa had some kind of farm . . .”
“I’ll log in to Serge’s network and see what I can find on both of them. I can do quite a few things thanks to the fingerprint you brought me. Let me do some looking, I’ll call you back.”
The minute we hang up, I don’t know what to do with myself. I have no direction. No idea where Luka’s gone.
I try him again. This time, the phone doesn’t even ring but goes through to an automatic message in another language.
I jog back out and across the tarmac to the sleek private plane with Bruno waiting like some lone Secret Service guy at the bottom of the stairs.
“Stay,” I say and run up into the plane. I retrieve my first phone, the one known to Serge, and dial him.
He answers on the second ring.
“Serge,” I say.
“Audra, did you land?” he says.
Some kind of sound in the background, of a vehicle or something. He isn’t at the château.
I play along.
“I did. I’m in Bratislava. But I don’t know where to go from here. I can’t find him. He’s gone.”
“Yeah, we’ve also had a tough time.”
“What about the other number Jester gave you?”
“We’re still waiting.”
“Serge, you have to give me something here.”
“I’m sorry, Audra, it isn’t magic. I’m willing to help you as a sign of goodwill, but you know that I have far larger concerns. Unless this has something to do with our mutual purpose . . .”
“It does.”
“I’m listening.
“It does in that I’m not going anywhere, finding anyone, or doing anything until I locate Luka!”
“I’m sorry, but that wasn’t our agreement. You promised me the Historian. I gave you the names and faces of the current hunters so you could warn your kind. I’ve given you resources, access to the GenameBase database. But what have you brought me?”
“Did you think I’d just find you someone you’ve been looking for all this while—in a few days? You said yourself it’s not magic.”
“I’m afraid we need to renegotiate. Because I’m not here to help you chase your husband across Europe. I’m a businessman.”
“Oh, I know all about your business,” I say. “And I’d be glad to share it with the world if I think for one minute that you’re not giving me your best self, Serge.”
“Be careful with idle threats,” he says softly.
“There’s nothing idle about it. I can push the button on you any time.”
“I don’t believe you will.”
“Try me.”
He sighs. “Audra, I wasn’t completely truthful with you, I’m afraid. All that I said about finding myself at cross-purposes with the Historian is true. What I did not say is that we only recently parted ways. Because that is the way to throw off your enemies—by holding them close until you are ready to betray them. You’re young. You’ll learn. I tracked you and Rolan to Košljun, where I believe you found your useful information, as I hoped you would. And that’s when I realized that I had no desire to hand over your locations, though I did give the Historian that of Brother Daniel once he reached Pristava. So be grateful that I wanted you to live. To escape. To do exactly as you have, and use what you found against her.”
I go very still.
He called the Historian “her.”
“As far as finding her, however, I’m afraid Luka has proven more useful than you. Which isn’t to say we cannot renegotiate.”
“I have nothing to negotiate with you,” I say quietly.
“Are you sure? I never told you that my doctors found something interesting about you during their initial examination. It seems at some point—in the last year, even—you had a child.”
I don’t even breathe.
“I would like very much for her to stay alive. Though I’m afraid it will cost you Jester.”
44
* * *
The call ends before I can even attempt a response.
I drop the phone.
It takes a moment for me to realize that the second phone is ringing on the table.
Jester.
I answer wordlessly.
“From what I can tell, Serge’s people got a location on that number for the Historian’s lackey as early as a half hour after you gave it to him,” she says. “Some Vladimir Kysely.”
Souls writhe along the burl wood edge in front of me.
Jester and Eva. One life for another . . . What kind of hell have I just fallen into?
“Audra. Did you hear what I said?”
I swallow, glance out the plane window.
“Jester?” I say softly.
“What?”
“Remember that thing I told you?”
A pause, and then, “Oui.”
“Can you look?”
“Yes, I will. Of course.”
“Can you soon? As soon as we find Luka.”
I tell myself that for Serge to threaten Eva means that she’s alive.
She’s alive.
And right now so is Jester.
“I promise,” she says.
“Where’s the number coming from?”
“Nové Mesto, Slovakia.”
“Where’s that?”
“East of you. Near Cachtice.”
Cachtice. One of the ancestral holdings of Elizabeth Bathory—most famous for being the place where she was walled up in her castle the last years of her life and where she died. Of course the guy with the creepy voice would have to be from there.
“Okay,” I say slowly, trying to process. Forcing Eva and Jester both to the edge of my mind. Just for now.
Because Luka is out there somewhere. And right now he’s in the most immediate danger.
“Small area in the White Carpathians.”
“I know. I’ve been there.” I can now recall driving there and back in my previous life—in the search for the cache I eventually found in Košljun.
“You sure that’s the Historian’s lackey?” she says.
“Yeah.”
“Here’s the other thing: One of Serge’s planes left Paris around six this morning. You’ll never guess where he’s going.”
“Nové Mesto?”
“Well, technically they don’t have an airport. But there’s one in Trencin nearby. If you can call it that. It’s just a regional strip mostly used for skydiving.”
“So who’s Serge following—Luka, or the Historian’s lackey?” I say. But it’s hard to think when you’ve just been dealt a blow.
“My guess is both.”
“When’s Serge supposed to land?”
“In a half hour. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t already have guys on the way.”
I stride to the cockpit, peer in at the pilot.
“I need to get to Trencin,” I say. “Now.”
To Jester I say: “What about her?”
“If the lackey’s there, I’d bet money the Historian’s nearby. It’s Cachtice,” she says.
And I admit, there is a certain morbid poetry there.
“Audra, are you okay?”
“I’m on my way.”
45
* * *
Except that I’m not.
“What’s the problem?” I demand, standing outside the cockpit.
“Trencin is saying they have higher traffic than usual,” the pilot says.
“What, two planes in one day?”
“We have wheels up in fifteen minutes.”
“It’s only going to take twenty to get there!”
I claw at my hair and then take out my new phone, text Luka, and pray he’ll receive it:
Serge knows. He’s coming.
I turn my gaze toward the cockpit.
Get us in the air. Now.
The plane’s engine rises to a smooth whir a moment later. After a beat, I switch to my old phone. Dial a number I know far too well.
It rings twice before the inevitable answer.
“Da.”
“It’s me,” I say.
“Well, hallo, Audra.” He even sounds pleased.
“Serge’s coming for your mistress.”
A pause.
“And you know this how?” he says.
“Because I’ve been working with him.”
“You’ll understand if I don’t believe you.”
“Then she’s going to die.”
“She is prepared for that eventuality. Her successor is already appointed.”
“Yeah, and how’s that happen? Who informs the new Historian—you?” I say, as the plane begins to taxi.
“I may have the papers of succession, if that should happen.”
“Well, I guess that explains why he’s coming for you first.”
“Rest assured he doesn’t know where to find me.”
“Doesn’t know where specifically in Nové Mesto, you mean?”
Another pause.
“Put me in contact with her, Vladimir,” I say.
A sharp rap sounds somewhere on the other end, followed by rapid footsteps.
“Put me in contact with—”
The call clicks off as we pull onto the runway.
46
* * *
Jester calls as we touch down. Craning against the window, I can see another private aircraft already on the lawn.
“Please tell me you know where Luka’s gone and that it’s somewhere close,” I say.
“There is a piece of property under the family name Nowak—”
“That’s it,” I say. I grab my other phone as Bruno opens the exit, lowers the stairs.
“It’s just south of Visnove, right by Cachtice.”
I shudder, all too familiar with the area’s rolling fields dominated by Cachtice castle. Can remember peering through the stone window of that ruin—one of the few left standing in what has been reduced, in other areas of the stronghold, to rubble. Recall walking through the remains of the room where Elizabeth Bathory spent her last days peering down, perhaps, on the village as I did that March afternoon. I wonder how many of the Scions’ original twelve labored in the shadow of Cachtice castle, emerging finally in their slow march of power throughout Europe.
“Stay here. Stay ready,” I say to the crew, leaving Bruno behind.
And then I’m running toward the air club, throwing out a plea as I go and wondering if it’ll carry far enough. We’re practically in the middle of nowhere.
Just as I reach the building, a man comes out through the hangar and hands me a set of keys. He points to an old Zafira.
I get in, dial Jester, and thirty seconds later, I’m peeling out from the airstrip. Not.
But I’m winding full-speed to the highway.
“Got you,” Jester says from the phone speaker. “Silver Zafira, no? This system’s amazing.”
“Where am I going?”
“Hold on . . . It seems Luka was sighted twenty minutes ago in Cachtice proper.”
“What about Serge?”
“He’s ahead of you, but he’s made a stop in Nové Mesto.”
“I kind of thought so.”
I focus on the road. My heart is pounding and I’m not sure why—at the prospect of coming face-to-face with the Historian or with my mother-in-law?
Of saving or of killing her?
I speed south on the 61, send three cars into the other lane as the Zafira teeters on the edge of 120 kilometers per hour. A low whistle in the background. Piotrek.
“We’re all here, Audra,” Jester says. “We’re all here with you.”
The simple statement and the image of their faces makes my vision blur. I swipe at my eyes and nod, though I know they can’t see me.
“I know,” I whisper.
I drive in their silent companionship for several minutes until a sharp gasp sounds on the other end of the phone.
Jester shouts a curse, and something slams on the table, rattling the speaker.
“What is it?” I say, not sure my heart can take much more.
“The system just shut me out!”
47
* * *
Cachtice is a tiny town east of the castle by the same name. You have to take a winding road through the forested hills to reach the stronghold where Elizabeth Bathory spent her last years, imprisoned in its walls.
Unlike Visnova, where the Bathory name is still held in contempt, Cachtice profits from its association. From the sallow wooden statue of the countess in the town square—a ghostly girl emerging from her gown—to the Bathory pizza parlor complete with portraits of the countess and bottles of Bathory wine for sale.
It is the culmination of Elizabeth’s life and the birthplace of her bloodiest legacy. The most obvious and therefore least likely place for a Progeny or Scion ever to return.
I remember the first time I came here, in March two years ago. When I gaped at the statue’s dour, masklike face and empty eyes . . . and then went and ate the pizza. Claudia and Katia had a lively discussion about whether the countess would find any of this amusing. Katia thought she might be vain enough to be insulted by the statue, but good-humored enough to appreciate the café. Claudia disagreed, calling both horrendous.
Today as I drive into the town presided over by the clock tower with its copper-green onion top and quaint yellow houses, I have to agree.
With Serge only minutes behind me, I careen to a stop on the side of the road. Not bothering to lock the Zafira, I strike out to the center of the town square, hand raised to shield my eyes against the sun overhead. I glance from the church to the statue of the countess to the Alpine-style guesthouse. Last of all, the pizza parlor with the narrow awning and delivery sign posted out front.
“Luka!” I shout. I can’t imagine the Historian actually sittin
g in there, but then again, there’s a lot I can’t imagine about my life at this moment. The place is full of the lunch crowd—as much of a crowd as this place can conjure between summer’s scant tourists and the ski season. Three tables are filled inside. None of them with my husband or a woman with any of his features.
I hurry past a small shop. Run over to peer into the window of the guesthouse office. The two chairs in the foyer are empty, and the dining room appears to be closed.
“Luka!” I shout again, casting a wide-burst suggestion for help. An image of Luka, a mental missing person poster.
Pain. My hands go to my head as I whirl around, glance toward the church, in the direction of the museum.
Where would a Historian of the Bathory legacy meet her son, the would-be Scion? A museum means history, doesn’t it? But it also connotes antiquity, no longer relevant today. A church? Serge called the Historian a zealot. God knows her father, Luka’s grandfather, raised him to wage holy terror against the Progeny.
I glance at the eyes of those I pass. No recognition. They haven’t seen him.
I stride up the street toward the coffee shop. But coffee is the Progeny drink of choice. Of the frenetic young. Not of the head of nouveau-riche leaders clinging to their champagne, the puppet master behind the powers that crown and sever heads.
And then I know.
There is no place for the Historian but the best hotel in town. With its crystal chandelier and iron banisters—the finest place Claudia said she had ever been. Where she gasped over the china in the stately old dining room and slipped a silver fork into her pocket.
But more than that, because of its name: Palatin. It was the palatine himself, Gregory Thurzo, who arrested Elizabeth, investigated her atrocities, and collected the testimonies of more than three hundred witnesses. Who made the case for her life, which ended with her getting walled up in the castle a kilometer away from here, her name struck from society as if she never existed.
I race down Malinovského Street toward the Palatin. Shove through the heavy front door, past the foyer, and into the small dining room.
And there, at a table covered in a pink tablecloth, sits Luka with a woman whose back is toward me.