The Lady Rogue

by Jenn Bennett

  Maybe what I felt for him was all one-sided. A mirage.

  A drunken mistake.

  After an hour or more passed, my brain grew tired of thinking and my heart was sick of hurting. I forced myself to push it all into the background and instead focused on basic survival worries. Because boy oh boy did I have them. My feet ached, and my shoes were caked with mud. My entire face was turning into an iceberg. We were still lost. What if we couldn’t find a way across the river? Or even the river! Scanning the desolate grassland, I wasn’t sure if we could find a house with indoor plumbing.

  The sun began falling after another hour passed. We still weren’t speaking. Huck just followed me in silence while we ran into little of anything resembling civilization. An abandoned farm. The occasional country home, with rounded roofs and clothes hanging out to dry, and several wide-faced peasants who retreated behind doors when I tried to beckon for assistance. But just when I was ready to wave a white flag and collapse into a muddy trench, I spotted something encouraging in the distance.

  Just ahead, inside a dark forest, was a golden, flickering light. Enough light that I could see it, and we were easily a mile away.

  “What’s that?” Huck asked over my shoulder. The first words he’d spoken in a couple of hours. He sounded exhausted. And crabby.

  “It’s people,” I said in a cool, even tone that I instinctually adopted after all our fights. And there had been many over the years. “Want to make a bet that the Danube is on the other side of that forest?”

  He grunted. “Looks like a fire. A camp, maybe.”

  “People building a fire that close to the river are bound to either want to cross or know how it might be done.”

  “Or they’re bandits who want to rob the coats off our backs,” he mumbled.

  “This isn’t eighteenth-century France,” I said. “Bandits are extinct.”

  “Oh, you’ll believe in magic and myth, but you won’t believe in bandits?”

  “I believe in thieves, but I don’t think they light campfires to lure unwary travelers. Anyway, if my guess is right, and if the Danube is on the other side of this wooded area, then once we find a way across, we’ll be in Romania—and only a few hours’ walk to Bucharest.”

  “Or we’ll be stripped of our belongings and drowned in the river.”

  “Either way, it’s better than trudging through mud.”

  Huck made a soft snorting sound. “You may be right about that.”

  The wind was getting colder and night was upon us, so we agreed to a compromise: to investigate the light in the forest from a safe distance. A good plan, I thought. And it was a relief to realize that even though things were still not okay between us, we could at least be civil.

  We began trekking in the fire’s direction and soon picked out a path made of wheel ruts leading straight to the light. Halfway there, we began to hear noise. A lot of it. Singing, cheering. Laughter.

  “Is it a fair?” I asked. “A festival of some sort?”

  “In the middle of Nowhere, Bulgaria?”

  It did seem far-fetched. We concentrated on listening to all the sounds. In fact, we listened so intently that we failed to hear the approaching cart until it was too late.

  JOURNAL OF RICHARD FOX

  June 22, 1937

  National Archives, București, Kingdom of România

  Wasted a perfectly sunny day stuck inside the archives building, looking through proclamations, letters, maps, and anything else I could find relating to Vlad III and his bone ring. Only two things I reviewed are worth mentioning.

  The first is a document related to the sale of a piece of Wallachian land. The steward here tells me it is the earliest written document that mentions Bucharest. Vlad wrote it in 1459 and signed it with a curse—basically, anyone who doesn’t honor this agreement will be cursed by God and die a horrible death. For the people of Wallachia, who believed in spells, witchcraft, and curses, I’m certain this was an effective way to make sure both parties stuck to the deal.

  The second document was only a fragment of a parchment letter, written in 1475 by a Catholic bishop to a Wallachian priest, presumably one who was ministering over Vlad’s wedding to his wife, Jusztina Szilágyi. It was a warning of sorts, a for-your-eyes-only piece of information. The bishop claimed that Vlad had a previous wife, the illegitimate daughter of John Hunyadi, a famous military leader and prince of Transylvania, whose son would take the throne of the Kingdom of Hungary.

  This isn’t the first time I’ve come across Vlad’s first wife, but that’s neither here nor there. The important thing I learned today is that this woman was reputed to dabble in astrology and the occult. She died under scandalous circumstances, but exactly how we’ll never know, because the letter was ripped in half, and only the top of it survived.

  However, this reminded me that some of the symbols on the bone ring look remarkably similar to grimoires of that time period (Hygromancy of Solomon, etc.), which provided demonic seals, magical spells, and esoteric methods for conjuring both angels and devils.

  Makes me more curious about exactly when (and why) the ring was made. . . .

  8

  HUCK PULLED ME OUT OF the cart’s path just in time. The driver jerked on the reins, and his horse whinnied before coming to an abrupt halt. A single lantern swung at the front of his wagon, illuminating a young man’s surprised face. He shouted something in a language weighted with Slavic tones—Bulgarian.

  When we didn’t respond, he switched to a Romance language, one I knew intimately. My mother’s tongue: Romanian. “Are you lost?” he asked, holding his horse steady.

  “Yes! We are very lost and very cold,” I answered in Romanian, utterly relieved to be conversing with someone who spoke it. Relieved to be speaking to anyone at all!

  The cart driver was perhaps a few years older than us, with a long, clean-shaven face. Dark, wavy hair spilled out of a floppy felt hat, and under a road-dusted coat, he wore a loose-sleeved tunic, a vest, and dark trousers.

  “You are Romanian?” he asked.

  “My mother was. She died seven years ago.”

  He placed a hand over his heart. “I am sorry. Is that why you are here? You are on your way to visit family in Romania?”

  “Yes. We’re here to . . . visit family in Bucharest.” Well, it was partly true, wasn’t it? “We’re American,” I said, gesturing toward Huck. “Irish American.”

  A handsome smile lifted the man’s face. “Oh, I speak English!” he said eagerly. “I speak it very good. My name is Valentin Krastev.”

  “What a relief it is to run into you—well met, brother,” Huck said, smiling back at him. “I’m Huck and this is Theo. We’re lost travelers.” He then quickly offered Valentin a bare-bones account of how we’d gotten here: We wandered away from the Orient Express and found ourselves lost, and then night fell.

  “One of my fellow travelers saw you earlier and wondered why you were out here, trying to wave him down. We’ve been robbed before, so he’s a little wary of strangers.”

  The rose oil cart. “I suppose we look a bit of a mess,” I confessed. “We’ve been walking since this afternoon. But we’re not bandits.”

  “We are very anti-bandit,” Huck assured him.

  He gave us a soft smile. “My wife told me to look for you, in case you needed help.”

  “We do. Can you tell us if the Danube River is close by?” I asked Valentin. “We need to find passage across. We’re headed to Bucharest.”

  “Ah, București. Like you, Romania is my mother’s birthplace, and I travel there several times a year,” Valentin said. “The river is just beyond this forest, but you will not cross tonight. No boats. Not until morning.”

  My heart sank.

  “Do not worry. You can stay with us tonight,” Valentin said generously, gesturing toward the campfire in the distance. “I’m traveling with several traders and merchants. We’re taking goods into Romania tomorrow—our last trip before winter—and have made a camp for the
night.”

  “In the woods?” I said, skeptical.

  “It’s very safe,” he promised me, then scratched his neck and added, “Usually.”

  “What about a hotel?” I asked. “You could maybe . . . take us to a telephone or a hotel?”

  Valentin laughed, but not unkindly. “Miles and miles away. We are in the countryside. There are no hotels here. I just rode for two hours to fetch bread from a farmer, and he doesn’t own a telephone.”

  Huck’s eyes flicked to mine, questioning.

  I hesitated. This was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Heading off into the woods with a complete stranger?

  “My wife would be angry with me if I left you alone out here. There is safety in numbers, and we have food, fire, and a place to lie down, yes?”

  I thought of my mother and wondered what she’d do in this situation. She always said to trust my intuition. And my intuition thought Valentin had an honest face. Besides, it was cold and muddy, and what else were we going to do?

  I nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”

  “Good! Come with me.” Valentin patted the wagon behind him, which was half filled with crates of supplies and what smelled like fresh bread.

  Huck seemed relieved. He took my satchel and chucked it onto the back of the wagon along with his pack. “You know what they say. Beggars can’t be chosen.”

  I ignored his offered hand and hoisted myself onto the back of the cart. “That sounds about right.”

  Valentin guided his horse forward toward the camp in the woods. The ride was slowgoing and bumpy, and halfway there I considered suggesting that we get out and walk to spare his poor nag the disservice of having to haul all of us. But the chatter ahead was getting louder, and the night darker, and it wasn’t long before our destination came into view: the traders’ camp.

  Just inside the forest, several canvas tents circled a large clearing where a dozen or so people were talking and drinking out of tin cups. Carts filled with crates and wooden barrels were lined up near horses that had been hitched to a line of rope tied between trees. And in the middle of all this, a brightly blazing bonfire sent a thick column of smoke up into the tops of the trees.

  Valentin stopped the cart near the line of horses and hopped off. A couple of older men were draping blankets over the horses’ backs, their breath visible in the chilly night air. I smelled fresh hay and the scent we’d caught an hour or so ago: rose oil. There was the little cart of clinking bottles beside us.

  “Come!” Valentin said. “Be welcome. We do not bite.” He gestured for us to follow him toward the center of camp, and we did, winding around people sitting on blankets spread over the ground, picnic-style. Curious faces, both pale and dark, looked up at us with blinking eyes. Mostly men of various ages, but a couple of women also, and at least two children. Valentin said something to one of the men in Bulgarian, and he relayed it to others around him as Huck and I lifted our hands in greeting.

  Woodsmoke and the scents of both alcohol and garlicky meat filled my nostrils as we walked around the bonfire. Near a couple of tents on our right, I noticed a barrel-shaped vardo wagon. It had a window with shutters on the side, decoratively carved eaves under the roof, and a door with pull-down steps at one end.

  “Are you travelers?” Huck asked, looking at the wagon.

  “Romany, he means,” I explained to Valentin.

  He shook his head. “This place here, in the woods, is an old Romany campsite. We trade with them sometimes. I come from a town called Razgrad, where my father is a Bulgarian carpenter. He made this wagon for a Romany couple who are getting married. I’m delivering it to their families before the wedding.”

  “It’s beautiful,” I said.

  He nodded. “It sleeps good too. Very solid,” he said, knocking on the wood. “My father makes several of these caravan wagons every year. The Romany have a tradition to give a new wagon to young couples, and also to burn the wagon with all belongings when someone dies so that a mullo does not return to claim them. So we are always busy making new caravans.”

  “What is a . . . mullo?” I asked.

  “Not dead. Not alive. When the spirit is angry or restless, or doesn’t receive proper burial rites, like burning the possessions, then it can come back. The Romanians call them—”

  “Strigoi,” I said in chorus with him. “A revenant, returned from the dead.”

  “You know about this,” he said with a smile.

  I nodded. “I’m fascinated with folklore and legends. I’ve never heard the Romany term though.”

  “Wait, are you talking about . . . a vampire?” Huck asked, doing an admirable Bela Lugosi impression with his face and hands.

  Valentin chuckled but shook his head. “That is fiction from your people, yes? Bram Stoker? Count Dracula? Your vampire is fiction, my friend, but many people in these lands believe that creatures like mullo and strigoi are very real, indeed.”

  “I certainly hope not,” Huck said.

  “Do not worry. There is safety in numbers. If they come for us, we will fight them, yes?” he said, elbowing Huck on his arm cheerfully. Then he looked up and spotted someone approaching and said, “Ah, here is my wife, Ana.”

  A plump, red-cheeked girl nearly as tall as Huck stepped to Valentin’s side. She wore a long skirt that fell around her ankles and black, laced boots. Dark waves peeked from beneath a knitted hat. Valentin said something to her in Bulgarian, a long explanation during which I was able to pick out a few words like “Orient Express” and “Amerikanski” and then our names. She smiled and nodded.

  “Ana says you are welcome and that she was right to make me look for you, which she is now gloating about,” he reported with a grin. “She understands a little Romanian but doesn’t speak English.”

  “Thank you for helping us,” I told her in Romanian.

  She smiled and nodded, and Huck and I smiled and nodded in return, and after a brisk back-and-forth between husband and wife—presumably about where we would sleep, as she gestured to the wagon and tents—Ana motioned for us to follow her toward a folding table near the bonfire. A makeshift outdoor kitchen had been set up there with a large pot.

  “I must help with a few chores,” Valentin told us. “But please eat and sit by the fire. Take a rest.”

  Before leaving, he helped Ana fill our hands with tin cups of plum brandy and bowls of hot polenta topped with a thick stew. The metal dishes were dinged and beaten, and I wasn’t entirely sure what kind of meat bits were in the stew. But when Ana guided us to an abandoned blanket to sit upon, and we were able to put down our luggage and warm ourselves near the fire, Huck and I both found the food to be satisfyingly good.

  Mostly, anyway. The plum brandy . . . took some getting used to. The first taste burned the back of my throat, and Huck laughed at me—which only made me more determined to drink it. After the second sip, it was more bracing than harsh, and the warmth it provided was pleasant. Much nicer than the Irish whiskey Father sipped after dinner.

  Several campers looked us over as we ate, and one friendly elderly man who spoke Romanian briefly stopped by our blanket—to opine that we’d gotten lost and reassure me that they’d take us over the Danube tomorrow. But mostly the campers just returned to their own conversations, unconcerned that we were there. We finished eating and watched as the two children I’d spotted earlier raced past the bonfire. A dark-haired girl and boy, maybe eight years old. They spotted us and stared, but their initial hesitant shyness fell away when Ana bent down to tell them about us and Huck held up a hand in greeting. Before long we were caught up in a tangle of arms and giggles.

  “Whoa!” Huck said, chuckling, as he held them at bay. The boy snatched Huck’s flat cap, and the girl laughed when Huck’s wild curls sprang to life. They were like ants on sugar, climbing on Huck until he tipped over backward, causing a duet of delighted screams—until a Bulgarian mother came to collect them and lead them away.

  “You’re smiling,” Huck said after the children were gone, retriev
ing his hat from the dirt to brush it off.

  “Am I?”

  “For the first time since we . . . left the train.”

  Since our fight, he meant but didn’t say.

  “That’s because I’m not shivering from the cold and miserable,” I said. Even the caked-on mud clinging to my shoes had dried in front of the fire—enough, at least, that I was able to kick and scrape quite a bit of it away.

  “You were right about following the rose oil cart,” he said. “This is turning out okay, yeah? Food. Kind people. It was the right thing to leave the train. Better here than with that man and his wolf dog.”

  For now at least.

  We sat in silence for a while, watching the people around us. Things felt unfinished and awkward between us. Or maybe I was just self-conscious about being a stranger in a strange camp. So I drank more of my plum brandy, and it not only warmed my stomach but also loosened my tongue. “Interesting what Valentin said about the vampiric folklore, don’t you think? Mullos and strigoi.”

  “That’s right up your alley, isn’t it?” he said. “People rising from the dead.”

  I flicked my eyes toward his, prepared to say something catty in response, but the look on his face wasn’t combative.

  “Plenty of folk in Northern Ireland believe superstitions like that too,” he said. “My mam always threatened ‘I will haunt you’ when I was a terror as a child.” He almost never spoke of his mother. I wondered if he still missed her like I missed mine. I wished she’d haunt me. I used to dream about her ghost visiting me in my bed. When I’d wake up alone in my room to find no ghost or spirit, not even a rustling curtain, it was the worst kind of disappointment.

  Huck rubbed his hands together for warmth. “My aunt says the dead must be buried at home, because if not their spirits will rise and haunt the family. But I think this is more an inconvenience than something to be feared. I mean, who wanted to hear poor, dead Cousin Eileen wailing outside the window because you were too cheap to ship her body home when she died abroad?”