A Carpathian Campaign: The Powers Book 1

by Alma Boykin

  His one concession to his father’s worries was to ride as far as the old quarry, four kilometers from the shrine. There István left Gepard, the old mountain horse, with the guard at the stone works, and began walking downhill. He took his time along the path, watching his footing and listening to the unfamiliar quiet. In normal times, the booms of explosions and the sound of drills and hammers had rolled through the forest as men broke the face of the mountain into manageable chunks. Now the men had been called to war, or to work elsewhere, leaving their chisels and detonators behind. Birds chirped sleepily, lulled by the heavy clouds that lingered in the pale sky. Maybe he’d see a deer, István mused, one of St. Hubert’s stags even. With a wrench he gathered his thoughts and pushed them onto the proper track, beginning a Pater Noster as he walked.

  It took him two hours by sun to reach the edge of the meadow around the old church. István stopped, set his stick down, left his sidearm and rucksack hidden under a wild rose bush, and knelt. He continued down the slope, around the north side of the Cistercian church and to the western door on his knees, saying an Ave after every ten “steps”. The grass soaked his breeches and he knew Barbara and Szombor both would scold him for ruining good clothes, but a promise was a promise. Only when he reached the stone threshold did he stop, bow, and get to his feet, opening the unlocked, weather-greyed door and stepping into the cool, silent shadows of the church.

  As the last echo of the closing door, and of his steps, faded into quiet, István bowed to the Presence, eased into one of the worn wooden pews, and knelt. The cold, gritty stones made his feet and lower legs ache. His knees creaked almost as much as the wooden kneeler, and his arm throbbed. A sweet scent touched the stillness of the ancient church, perhaps lingering from the flowers at special mass a week before, or simply embedded in the plain stone walls—the fragrance of half a thousand years of incense. As he’d promised, he took out his rosary and began to pray, praising the Lady and her greater Lord, to whom the Cistercian monks had dedicated the austere building 650 years before, and meditating on the Sorrowful Mysteries as he did.

  The sun had traveled well to the west by the time he reclaimed Gepard. A few low clouds in the west picked up the sun, still lingering in the south, as if hiding from the war to the north. István rode with care, his senses extended to touch the Power. It acknowledged him and he gave thanks again for the pain-free contact. He thought he heard something in the woods once or twice, and Gepard acted wary. István saw nothing larger than a hare, although he noticed fresh deer tracks by one of the streams. They’d probably have deer coming out of their ears the next year, since no one had been able to hunt that fall. He made a note to ask one of the foresters about the state of the browse. Well, they’d wrap up the war and he’d be hunting again next fall, he told himself. It felt very good to be in the saddle, even if his back hurt a little more than he was used to. He was likely just out of fighting trim, and needed exercise to rebuild the muscles on that side.

  A week later, István tried not to rustle as he waited with his father outside a heavily-carved wooden door inside the Habsburg residence at Szekesfehervar, the ancient coronation city on the Danube, at the edge of the Great Plain. He wore a new, clean uniform, complete with his hussar’s half-jacket and pelt. That much felt familiar. But the formalities of court seemed as strange as something from a different life. And he did not like leaving Barbara and Mátyás, even though he knew they’d be fine. I should be in Kassa, or on the way to take up my duties again. Not here, as far from the front as I could be and still be within the empire. His father coughed and the door groaned open before them.

  “Count Eszterházy Janos and Major Eszterházy István,” a man announced. István trailed two paces behind his father’s right shoulder. They walked into a quiet room. Embroideries and tapestries hung over the plain white walls, muting the sounds from inside and out. Elaborate, brightly colored floral designs twined across the ceiling beams and the wood over their heads, the legacy of the fad for medieval-style renovations, István guessed. Ahead of them sat a man at a desk flanked by two guards and two footmen clad in black and spotless white. The man looked up and smiled, rising to his feet as Janos and István stopped and bowed.

  “So this is House Szarkany’s gift to the empire,” a mild voice said in unaccented Latin. “You may rise. And come, be seated. I was pausing for na Jause,” Archduke Rudolph continued in Viennese-touched German.

  “You honor us, your grace,” Janos said. One of the footmen took his silk top hat and István’s cavalry hat, handing them to a lower servant before gesturing toward the coffee table with a formal bow. Janos walked to the table and chairs in the corner, under a window, and stood behind one of the lower, plainer seats. István did likewise. Only when the archduke had taken his place did they sit.

  “An interesting choice of words,” Rudolph replied. István studied the crown prince’s first cousin as Rudolph turned to summon yet another footman. The archduke wore his golden brown hair short and neatly trimmed. He was clean-shaven, showing strong cheekbones but a softer chin beneath average lips and a blunt nose. He had delicate hands—pale and soft seeming. A signet ring flashed on his left index finger, but no wedding ring on the right. Perhaps he’d not been given permission to marry yet, István speculated, trying to recall what he had once known about the relationships within the imperial family. Then Rudolph looked straight at him, and István seemed to fall into eyes that were suddenly wild and red-brown—eyes the color of dried blood.

  «You come early into your powers. Interesting.» The mind voice held a strange timbre that István hadn’t heard before, as if several voices spoke in chorus. He’d thought that his father overpowered him, but Rudolph’s Gifts were to Janos as the sun was to the evening star. «Not all gifts are blessings, little Stephen,» the triple voice warned before withdrawing. István almost shook his head, trying to shake the sensation out, before he recalled where he was and who sat—eyes now an odd pale brown, but human—smiling at him.

  “But I am being a poor host, as my mother has often reminded me,” Rudolph said. “Please,” he gestured to the table between them, now bearing sandwiches, cake, marzipan, and other treats, as well as a coffee service.

  “Thank you, Your Grace,” Janos murmured.

  “Ah, yes, thank you, Your Grace” István stammered, still shaken by the mental contact.

  His discomfort seemed to amuse Rudolph, who accepted a cup of coffee with a small splash of cream. “I fear I will never fit into Vienna society,” he sighed. “I prefer my coffee without socks.”

  Now completely confused, István looked to his father. Janos shook his head subtly, smiling a touch at the edges of his mouth. “With all due respect, Your Grace, the Viennese have no taste for coffee.”

  “Or for war, now that hunger is pinching the belly.” Rudolph’s hand gesture somehow acknowledged both the bounty on the table and the hardships of the year. “But that is for my House, not yours, to assuage.” He set down the cup and saucer and accepted a slice of the cream cake the footman offered. “Thank you. So, Count Eszterházy, I understand congratulations are in order?”

  “Yes, thank you, Your Grace. Mátyás Imre Dominic is doing well, as is his mother.”

  “Very good. Thanks be to God. The Houses are suffering, as you well know. Schwarzenberg lost the Heir last week in the south.”

  István and his father both crossed themselves. “Who will be named, Your Grace, do you know?”

  Rudolph ate some cake. “I have not heard yet. Nor have I pressed them, given the sensitivity of the situation with that House.”

  As he drank a little coffee, István tried to recall the Schwarzenberg situation, and after a moment it came to him: Joachim had been the only son, and his father’s surviving brother had no heirs. And was under a cloud because of accusations of being a sodomite who preyed on children. Accusations that had never been proved or even really substantiated, now that he thought about it. Unless something new had developed . . . no, but Florian
had no children and appeared unlikely to father any in the near future, given his age. A sensitive situation indeed, István mused.

  Janos and Rudolph discussed various Houses and their situations as István ate and tried to follow all the ins and outs of how this family and that related to the government of the empire. Many he remembered, but a few others were new.

  “And what of Drachenberg, Your Grace?” Janos inquired at last.

  Rudolph snorted. “As strange as ever. Their sigil should have been a boulder at the bottom of a hill rather than the winged mountain, as hard as it is to get them to emerge from their lands. But the Power of the Drachenburg is unusual.” He stared over István’s head. “Very unusual,” he repeated more quietly. Then the light brown eyes returned to István. “Your father said that you observed something else unusual Major—in Galicia?”

  István swallowed the last bite of cake with a gulp. “Yes, Your Grace, that is.” He licked his lips, uncomfortable. “I should begin by saying that I did not attempt to contact the Power, or even look for it, until I had been in the crownland for several weeks. We’d fallen back as far as Lemberg. I was outside any settlement, with my hand on the soil.” István thought back, feeling the chilly, wet almost-mud of the empty field on his fingertips again. “The Power did not acknowledge me, Your Grace. It had turned inward and felt afraid.”

  Rudolph leaned forward. “Afraid? How so?”

  István handed the empty plate to a footman and made a broad circle with his spread hands. “It felt like this, Your Grace, like a curled up animal trying to hide. Not, um, I’m not certain how to describe it exactly, Your Grace. It feared, and had turned all its attention inward. I do not recall a single link extending out, as if it had no connection to any House any longer.”

  The command István feared came. “Drop you shields and show me, Major.”

  The archduke’s touch flitted through the memory, and—much as had happened with his voice—it felt as if three minds brushed István’s instead of one. The sensation was disconcerting, to say the least. Rudolph sat back and pursed his lips, fingertips of his free hand rubbing, as if he were crumbling a bit of dirt. “That disturbs me.” His voice sounded strange as well, and István glanced at his father. Janos seemed unperturbed. Then Rudolph came back to himself. “I have read of something like that, from one of the few surviving Chronicles of the Mongol time. The sheer scale of death sickened a Power, and drove it far into itself, or so the writer guessed. She was not certain, because the Power would not ‘speak,’ and because no one native to the area remained alive to ask.” All three men crossed themselves.

  “Your Grace,” István ventured. “Have you read if warfare can change a Power?”

  “I have not so read, although such a thing might explain Logres and Pannonia, or not. Logres remains so far outside any House or Power’s ken that even Pannonia acts wary.”

  “Which makes my scales shiver, Your Grace,” Janos commented, playing with the lump of turquois hanging from his watch chain.

  “As well it should.” Rudolph shook all over, making the cup in his hand rattle against the saucer. He blinked several times before returning to what István guessed was his normal state. “The Powers remain outside—perhaps even above—the war, all over Europe, but not turned inward in the way that you have described that I know of.” He accepted more coffee from the footman and drank it so fast that István’s throat burned just to watch. “If the descriptions of the fighting in Flanders are close to the truth, that may change. The withdrawal, not joining the battle.”

  Talk turned to more mundane things. Even so, by the time Archduke Rudolph dismissed the men to go prepare for supper that evening, István’s head ached, and he felt as if he’d been dragged across the Alföld in mid-summer.

  “Your thoughts on His Grace?” Janos inquired as they rode back to their lodging.

  “I do not know what to think, Pater. He is . . . I have never sensed anything quite like him.” István sorted his thoughts. “He is not as rumor would have him to be.”

  “No, although the rumor about his acting as co-Guardian is true, or will be soon, I fear.”

  “Ah.” How can he stay sane with three Powers working through him? Or is he? István decided that he did not need to speculate about that. After all, there was madness and madness, and it could well be that Archduke Rudolph possessed a twist of mind that served him. “I did feel truly, Pater?”

  «If you mean His Grace’s triple touch, yes. I am told his powers came to him very early.»

  Which explained his grace’s comment about István’s own Gifts. «Thank you.»

  “So. Your plans for the rest of your leave?”

  István frowned and brushed his new mustache. The Army nurses had removed the old one for cleanliness, but now he felt a proper Magyar again. “I had planned to visit mother and Mátyás and Judit again, then return to Kassa and House and family matters. Assuming I am not called back, now that my arm and ribs are mended.”

  “You need to leave the army.”

  “No.”

  “You are the Heir. We’ve lost so many House heirs, and even Heads, that the empire cannot afford to lose more, including you.”

  “It has also lost a hundred thousand ordinary men—also fathers, sons, brothers, heads of families, and only sons, Pater. And I have a duty and vows to the empire and to my men.” Surely you remember that, form your own days of service?

  Apparently Janos did not, because he snapped, “You are not going back. I will see to it myself if I must, but you are needed intact and at home. Mátyás and I do not have time to deal with all the House matters ourselves.”

  “And the empire needs every man possible under arms if we are to throw the Russians out of Galicia and finish teaching the Serbs not to meddle. Especially not after the news this morning.”

  “What news?”

  Had his father not heard? “The Italians have broken their treaty and have allied with France and Russia against us. They have declared their intent to capture Dalmatia and the Tirol and Trieste.”

  Janos blanched until he seemed reduced to a ghost’s face hovering over his black coat against the dark brown of the carriage interior behind him. Then he flushed with anger. “How dare they?” He spat, “The perfidious, treacherous, lying . . .” Incoherent sputters followed as István sat back and fought to hide his smirk at having surprised his father, despite the seriousness of the situation.

  “I would guess that the French and British bought them. If they will stay bought, and if they can accomplish anything . . .” István shrugged. Although, as stretched as the imperial armies were at that moment, he suspected it would be a nasty fight once the Italian Army took to the field.

  “The House still needs you.”

  So did his wife and son. “If the counter attacks in the north go well, we will have the war ended by later this year, Pater, and I will be home, out of the army and reserves both, for as long as I am needed.”

  Janos glared at him, but the carriage slowed and stopped, precluding an answer. The father and his sons had an unspoken rule: never fight in front of staff or strangers. It had probably prevented a goodly amount of bloodshed over the course of the years, István decided, given the marks some of his associates bore from challenging their fathers and uncles.

  He climbed out of the carriage, missed the step, and bit his tongue as the force of his landing sent a jolt of pain up his right leg and into his back. He was probably just tense from the encounter with Archduke Rudolph, István decided, and had weak muscles from being injured. That was it. In fact, he felt more tired than he had in months, since he’d first started recovering from the shell blast. Well, I am sore out of practice with my Gift, as nervous about meeting the Archduke as a Franciscan nun with Turks in the district, and angry with Janos. No wonder I’m tired. He managed to stay on his feet long enough for Szambor to get him out of his hussar’s uniform, then collapsed and fell asleep in the chair.

  “. . . and he fell asleep a mom
ent later, my lord,” István’s valet told Janos half an hour later. Janos could hear the snore from the doorway, and debated having Szombor wake István for supper. No, this is not an official occasion and he is still healing. And after he slept, István might see reason.

  “I see. Supper will be sent up when he wakes.”

  “Very good, my lord.” Szombor sketched a bow.

  Janos turned and made his way down to the reserved table in the quiet corner of the restaurant. The chef worked wonders, even with the limitations of grain rationing, and Janos enjoyed a quiet meal and the peace of his own thoughts. He needed István back and that was all there was to it. Should he have a word with Prince Miklos and thence Archduke Tomas? No, not yet, Janos decided. He would wait, especially with the news of Italy’s treachery. He felt his mouth starting to curl into a snarl and caught himself before he scared a waiter or diner.

  István was young, after all. Young, headstrong, proud, and likely full of himself now that he had a son. Very much as his father had been at that age, Janos admitted as he sipped the last of his wine. And very tired, now that his father thought about it, which made all of Janos’s children defensive. Should he have warned István about the force of his grace’s personality? No. He’d never have believed me. Some things must be experienced first hand. István still learned best through collision, Janos mused, a little tired himself. And he had three weeks before István had to return to military duty. A few more days with his wife and son should persuade István to see reason.

  “I don’t want you to leave.” Barbara cradled Mátyás in her arms.

  “My lady, I have to. Orders are orders.” István did his best to sound soothing. He did not want to upset her more than necessary, lest she pass it on to Mátyás through her milk. She insisted on nursing him herself, scandalizing her mother and troubling the House, although not enough for István to mention.