Against a Rising Tide

by Alma T. C. Boykin

  “Because of this, and because of the storms and cold, I am staying here until after the New Year. My brother and family and the doctor all say it is better for me to remain in Krakow through Epiphany. Travel should be easier then, my lord, and you will have time to find a proper nursemaid to assist me with Wladislav.

  “How is Sophia doing with her school work? Mother Catherine sounded unhappy in her last letter. Remind our daughter that she is to continue working on her penmanship and embroidery during Christmas. Petr will likely need new uniforms, if he grows as quickly as Emrich Matthew did. And I found two families with sons who are interested in making acquaintance with Elizabeth. It is time and past that we consider introducing her to proper society. She has had her little fun. Now she needs to take up her duties as a woman grown.” The letter continued with Potoki family news and a little gossip, closing with, “God bless, your wife, Weronica.”

  What to do? I will get on a train, go to Krakow, and bring her home. She needs to be here, she and our son both need to be here, winter weather be damned. István started to get out of his chair to go to the telephone, then stopped himself as reason and common sense prevailed. No, if the doctor had told her not to travel, and the nursing sister concurred, then she needed to remain in Krakow. Especially after a hard delivery. And traveling with a newborn baby . . . well, he did not know much about babies, but something told István that the long journey would not help his son.

  Trust her, he told himself. She’s not a new bride anymore. She knows what she’s doing, and what she needs, and if she needs to stay a few more weeks for her health, then that is much better.

  István started then stopped twice before he found the right words for his return letter to her.

  “My dearest, beloved lady,” he began. “I am delighted to know that you and little Wladislav are well and recovering. I want you to come home so I can greet you and our new son, but please, my lady, listen to your doctor and stay as long as necessary. I love you, and I will pass the good news on to our circle in Budapest and Vienna.

  “You are correct. I am certain that Petr will need new uniforms. Growing is one thing all boys seem to do well. I will instruct Miss Jirina to watch Sophia, and I will have her answer some of our social correspondence. She needs to be learning how to respond to invitations. I believe Duchess Szecheny will know of a suitable nurse maid to assist you upon your return.” Should he mention Tadeas? Yes, but not exactly.

  “Tadeas has found employment with a family in Austria. They are distant relatives of her mother’s mother’s family and have a sterling reputation. Her parents were agreeable, as was Agmánd, and her departure has not caused any difficulties with the staff at Nagymatra. I sent her with excellent references.” All of which was true, and none of which should upset Weronica.

  With that he finished the letter, signed it, sealed it, and put it in the basket for Hans to take down to the post to Eger.

  The return to Budapest left both István and Attila Szombor, his valet, uncomfortable. Three young men kept passing through the first class car, looking at the passengers without speaking to anyone. The Conductor seemed unable or unwilling to stop them, and István wondered if they were plainclothes police looking for a criminal. Szombor seemed concerned as well, and insisted on sitting beside the door, watching the corridor. One of the men, a blond with a bent nose, reminded István of someone unpleasant, but he could not quite recall who it might be. Someone from his past . . . had it been a guard when he was in the Army? No, it was a more recent acquaintance, someone he’d crossed paths with in the past year or two. It wasn’t until the train reached Budapest, and he heard beak-nose saying to someone, “Just the usual profiteers and Jew-lovers, sir,” that he recognized the man. He’d been part of the mob that had chased Jenö into the office! István wanted to confront him, but stopped himself before he did more than think about it.

  If the man were part of the new secret police . . . the thought chilled István. At least Franz Josef’s police had been open about their activities. This new breed skulked and slunk. He and Szombor walked through the crowd in the train station, ears and eyes open. The mood in the great iron-and-glass hall felt strange, half-eager and half-wary, as if the crowd was waiting for something they did not quite want to happen. A sense of blessed relief swept over István when he saw Ivan and the car waiting, and Szombor made a happier sound as well, but it was not until they crossed the bridge into Buda that István truly relaxed.

  “Aye, my lord,” Dobroslov agreed when István mentioned his observations. The older HalfDragon shook his head. “It is—well, I don’t care to attribute malice where foolishness is to blame—but there is a taint in the air, my lord. Regent Horthy believes he can control the younger generation even as his men call for purifying the Magyar nation and unifying the people, making a ‘new way’ outside of politics and creed. The young men drink it in, my lord, and are as drunk on promises as a lover in spring.”

  István smiled at the description, but only a little. “Do you sense trouble before the New Year?”

  Dobroslov looked over at Ivan, who loomed in the corner by the stove. The younger man made a complicated gesture with his hands, then shrugged.

  “My lord, sir, if you are not a Jew or a Communist, all appears quiet. The street talk is just that, at least at the moment—all talk unless you are a Communist. But my lord, do not trust anyone outside the House.”

  The young man’s voice shifted, deepening, and his eyes lost focus. István and Dobroslov both went on point as Ivan continued., “Danger comes with the snows, danger black and sharp. Old ghosts walk at Christmas and Candlemas, dark and light, red light, flame light dances on the dark and a curtain sweeps—”

  Dobroslov managed to catch Ivan before he fell over, and with István’s help they lowered the young Russian to the floor.

  «I believe we have identified his other Gift,» István observed, smoothing the hair on the back of his neck with one hand.

  «Indeed, my lord, but is it true future sensing or something else?»

  A very good question, István knew. Future sensing appeared but rarely in the Houses, despite many claims to the contrary. Now-sensing, distance empathy, and object-reading appeared far more often, and even they turned up once in a generation, if at all. «We treat it as true future sense, I believe. It seems to confirm what we have already feared.»

  «Yes, my lord,» Dobroslov said, sounding relieved.

  They did not need an emergency, like a house fire, that afternoon. Ivan groaned and looked up.

  “What happened, Lord Stephen?” he asked in Russian.

  István answered in slow Bohemian and Russian.

  “You had a true vision. And now you have a headache.”

  Like everyone else in my country, the lowest servants excepted, perhaps.

  “Da.”

  István stayed out of the way as the servants prepared for Christmas. Office work kept him occupied as it was, since timber harvest started just before St. Miklos’s Day. Twice a week, Master Gellért sent a coded telegram down from the office reporting the cuts and any injuries. Thus far, all seemed to be going well, and they’d risked cutting a little on the leases on the Czech side, since the Germans had stopped exporting to Czechoslovakia. They need wood, but how much can people buy if they cannot sell except to Poland or by shipping through Austria and Croatia to the sea? Hungary remained open, as did Austria, but for how much longer, the way the Nazis were talking about “reunifying” all German-speaking peoples? István made a mark acknowledging the report and turned to a different book. The German-speaking peoples had not been unified except for two years, and that only by hatred of Napoleon.

  “Ah, my lord?” He looked up and found Miss Kiss standing in the doorway.

  “Yes?”

  “There are some gentlemen here to see you.”

  He could read nothing in her voice or posture, and the absence made him wary.

  István closed the book under his hand. “Send them in.”
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br />   Three broad-shouldered young men in dark coats pushed into the office.

  “Colonel Eszterházy. I am from the Forestry Bureau . . .”

  Half an hour later, after the men left, István stared at the map on the opposite wall and counted backward from a hundred in alternating Latin and Magyar.

  Such a generous invitation, indeed, he snarled well behind his mind’s walls. Pay half our earnings to the government in exchange for being permitted to do what we already have full legal rights to do on the House’s lands and leases. And that in addition to paying more taxes, not less, and helping the “widows and orphans of those injured in the struggle against the Communists.”

  He wondered what would happen if he told the government bandits to go swim in the Danube. Except he could well imagine the fate of the House’s business, based on what had become of the industrial Houses’ holdings. Zibulka z Kolovrat had lost how much? He tried to recall, and the number two-thirds drifted to him from memory.

  Georg Tisza’s face also drifted up, although not from memory. István rested one hand on his thigh, out of sight of anyone, and clenched his fist, imagining pounding it into Tisza’s face—because he was the one who had sent the toughs to “encourage” István’s compliance. István had risked reading the least-shielded of the trio and had caught flashes of Tisza giving them specific instructions. István was not their only target for the morning, and he wondered if he should call some of the others on the thugs’ list.

  No, because you will reveal what you know, and if they trace it back . . . with one exception. Him you do need to warn. He got up and used the telephone on Jenö’s desk.

  “Yes, Buda 103, please. Yes.”

  Duke Gabor’s secretary picked up the call. István wasted no time. “Good morning, this is Count Colonel Eszterházy. I apologize for the earliness of the call, but His Grace would be well to be prepared for visitors to his office today.”

  “Indeed, my lord?”

  “Yes. Gentlemen inquiring about new proposals and benevolence opportunities.”

  He did not want to be any more direct than that, given the likelihood of listeners. He heard scratching, and the secretary coughed. “Your pardon, my lord. Were these visitors inquiring in the spirit of the trikol’ka?”

  “Quite so. The spirit of the season indeed.”

  Good. The man had caught István’s hint, using the Old Drakonic word for the time of a change in leadership.

  “Thank you for the news, my lord. Ah, your pardon, but allow me to give you His Grace’s congratulations on the new addition to my lord’s family. Their Graces will be sending formal congratulations later.”

  Despite the events of the morning, István felt himself smiling.

  “Thank you, and thank His Grace.”

  István smiled even wider that afternoon when the car pulled into the gates of the town palace and he saw the greenery decorating the courtyard, where evergreens softened the stone pillars and columns. Inside, the first smells of Christmas and New Years baking filled the ground floor, and the usual decorative antiques had been removed from the parlor and replaced with the stable of the large crèche. István and Dobroslov, after consulting quietly with a few trusted associates, had decided that a Christmas tree would not be appropriate. They had come from the German tradition, not Hungarian, after all. The crèche, however, had been in the family since before Napoleon. Some wandering ancestor had brought the first pieces back from Italy in the 1700s, and it had grown over the centuries.

  Here lay safety. István picked up the empty manger, feeling the weight of the wood and tucking a small piece of straw back into place. It would remain empty until Christmas Eve and the arrival of the Christ Child. He thought back, remembering the shine in first Imre’s eyes, and then Erzsébet’s, then Petr and Sophia’s, as they laid the Baby into the bedding and moved the shepherds close to see the miracle. If he closed his eyes, their father could see those blessed nights, the candles and dim glow of the coals in the fireplace, the children still children, still innocent of the world and all its shadows, safe in the warm darkness like the Baby in the stable. He wanted to turn back the years, to hide all his children from danger. Did Anna Marie know that same safety, the love in the midnight? Of course she did, just not from him, and his heart stung for the deception. But she was happy and loved, and that mattered more than his own feelings did.

  He replaced the manger into the stable and went to change into something more suited to working at home. Erzsébet would be home that evening, then Imre, God willing, in two days, and Judit would escort the twins back from their schools. The Benedictines had done wonders for Imre, and Weronica had agreed that the younger children would benefit from the Brothers’ and Sisters’ firm but wise guidance.

  Now more than ever, he missed Weronica’s presence. As Szombor corrected István’s collar, as usual, István wondered if he should have gone to Poland and fetched her home. It was his legal right as her husband, after all.

  And if her brother balked? Prince Potoki’s claim probably carries more legal weight than does you being her husband, and even if not, his objection plus the doctors’ orders could lead to problems.

  He sighed but only to himself. When she returned, perhaps they should go to Lake Balaton, take the waters, and talk. But that would be during the carnival social season, and she would not want to miss another year’s events, even if István no longer ranked within the first tier of political nobility. He snorted as he shrugged on his coat. Now that Hungary stood on her own once more, he ranked higher among the Hungarian magnates than he ever had. But Weronica could not see that—or did she choose not to see? Or did she not recognize the differences between Imperial and royal, Hungarian and Polish? It mattered not, not until she returned from Krakow.

  On Christmas Eve, the four children and their father walked up to the Mátyás church within the palace complex for the first Christmas Eve Mass. After that, the younger children had a little supper and everyone napped before going to Midnight Mass at St. Imre, their parish church. Well, everyone was supposed to have napped, although István suspected Petr’s nap had consisted of playing with tin soldiers under the covers. Imre carried Petr home, and István let his jealousy pass. He’d done that for Imre once, but even the younger children were too heavy for him to lift now. The cold air and low clouds hurried their steps.

  “Pater, will there be snow?” Sophia asked, then yawned.

  He tightened his grip on her delicate gloved hand. “Perhaps. It is Christmas, after all.”

  And they would have Mass again that morning. They could hear the last of the bells ringing out the joyful news of the Savior’s birth. Before the war, more bells had sung from the towers, István recalled. At least they no longer melted them for cannon, as had happened in earlier wars.

  The feast following Christmas Morning Mass satisfied even Petr and Imre, both of whom seemed to be trying to eat their weight and then some.

  “If you grow any bigger in the shoulders, brother, we will have to borrow horse blankets for you to wear,” Erzsébet teased.

  “I take after grandfather, or so I am told,” he sniffed back, taking another cookie.

  István considered his son’s size. “Your grandmother’s brother, or no, Grandfather Rozemberk’s brother, that’s who you remind me of. He was just over two meters nose to tail-tip, but shoulders like an ox and the thickest tail I can recall seeing. His brother joked that when he was small, they’d just cut down trees and given him logs to play with in the nursery.”

  Michael Rozemberk had been the War Lord until his premature death. He’d died in his sleep one night at only one-hundred-twenty years of age. István pulled his thoughts back to the present. Petr blinked, and Sophia spoke up.

  “There are True-dragons in our family, Pater?”

  “Yes. Aunt Claudia, Cousin Wetzel, Cousin Duke Jindrich,” your older sister, “they are all family, although not close kin.”

  “Oh.”

  She grew quiet and he wondered why
. He learned later that afternoon, when the older children had gone visiting and Petr—at last!— napped. Sophia appeared in the doorway of the library holding a stuffed bear. István put down his book. Should he call Jirina? No, something about Sophia’s demeanor warned that he needed to take care of whatever bothered her.

  “Yes, little one?”

  She came one step closer, then another, then another, until she stood in front of him, holding the brown bear like a soldier’s shield between them.

  “There are True-dragons in the family.”

  “Yes.” He waited.

  “Charlotta Marie says True-dragons are evil and will all go to hell,” she informed him in a grave tone, brown eyes wide and deadly serious.

  This is not the time to growl. Instead he leaned forward.

  “Has Aunt Claudia ever been evil toward you or anyone you know?”

  She shook her head.

  “What about Agmánd?”

  Another head shake.

  “God made True-dragons just like he made HalfDragons and other people. And He says that they are good.”

  She came a little closer.

  “Then why are they hiding from the Regent if they are good?” she asked in a whisper.

  Oh shit, control yourself now.

  “Because sometimes people make mistakes and assume that the outside of a person is the same as the inside. Like Uncle Gellért. Is he evil?”

  She shook her head.

  “Is he ugly?”

  She nodded so hard he wondered if her ears would fall off. István held out an arm, and she climbed up onto the couch and sat in his lap, his arms around her. Weronica would fuss, but a little indulgence on Christmas, well, it wouldn’t hurt.

  “Sometimes, Sophia, adults make mistakes and think they know a person’s heart because of what his clothes are like, or what her face looks like, or what a person’s work is. It is easy to judge with the eyes and not with the heart.”

  “But the paintings show St. Georg and St. Michael killing a dragon.”