City of Dark Magic

by Magnus Flyte

  “Yeah, I heard something about that,” Sarah said carefully.

  “Jepp sat under the table at dinner,” Nicolas said. “And made many accurate predictions. He was clairvoyant, you see. Psychic. Or so people believed. He was also a fairly accomplished thief.”

  “Nicolas?”

  The little man made a small noise, in a minor key. He shook his head, as if to clear it. “I suppose we should take care of Bernard,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Sarah warmly, glad that Nico seemed to be focusing on twenty-first-century matters. What the hell had he been rambling about? He was talking as if . . . well, later. She’d think about it later. “The marchesa sent him, you know. To kill me.”

  “That does not surprise me. But I don’t think he would have actually pulled the trigger.”

  “You let him get awfully close. But thank you for saving my life. So . . . now we call the police?”

  <

  “Heavens no,” said Nico, unbuckling Bernard’s belt and pulling it out. “Turn him over again?”

  Sarah shoved Bernard back on his face and Nicolas pulled Bernard’s wrists together behind his back, securing them with the belt.

  “What now?” Sarah asked. “We can’t leave him here.”

  “Tycho Brahe,” Nicolas said, thoughtfully, retrieving Brahe’s diary from the desk and tucking it into his jacket pocket, “kept tame elk. His favorite one, Albrecht, died after getting drunk and falling down the stairs.”

  “Elks get drunk?”

  “It’s a problem,” Nicolas nodded. “With elks. Elk. Anyway, I suggest we stage a tumble down the stairs for our friend Bernard. A drunken slip. There will be the suggestion that poor Bernie, distraught at the loss of his dear friend Eleanor, and overwhelmed with the amount of Rococo bibelots he needed to categorize, quaffed rather more than was good for him and bumped his head.”

  “He’ll be taken to the hospital,” Sarah nodded. “And then . . .”

  “And then you can leave the rest to me.” The little man nodded. “Or, rather, my wife, Oksana. She is doing her internship at Na Františku Hospital. She will keep an eye on Bernie. I believe he will require a good bit of rest.”

  Sarah gestured at Bernard. “Grab his feet. I’ll get him under the armpits. How the hell are we going to get him through all those tunnels?”

  “I think you took the long way,” Nicolas said, smugly. “From this trapdoor to the one in your room is about thirty meters. And there’s a handcart here we can strap him to.”

  Which is what they did. They lowered Bernie into the tunnel, strapped him to the cart like a refrigerator, wheeled him through the tunnel, then pulled his unconscious bulk up into Sarah’s room. Nicolas stepped out into the hallway to check if the coast was clear. Sarah reflexively pulled out her phone and was surprised to see that though the screen was now cracked, it was working. Seven p.m. Her stomach growled. It was almost time for dinner. After a few minutes, Nico came back in, holding a laundry basket. Sarah recognized Bernard’s fisherman’s vest on top of a heap of clothes. Nico held Bernard’s cell phone in his hand.

  “Perfect,” said Sarah. You couldn’t help but admire the little man’s thoroughness. Together, they dragged the body outside to the foot of the stairs and arranged him face-up in a realistically sprawled position. Nicolas pulled a tiny flask from his jacket pocket.

  “Hold open his mouth,” he instructed.

  “You hold open his mouth.”

  Grimacing with distaste, Nicolas held apart Bernard’s slack jaws and Sarah poured the contents of the flask (Jägermeister by the smell of it) into Bernard’s mouth. This actually seemed to revive the man, who, for the first time, stirred and coughed. The alcohol spilled across his face.

  “Quick.” Nicolas pointed. “Make a noise like you’re falling down the stairs.”

  Sarah dashed up the steps and then banged down the steps, loudly. Nicolas upended the laundry basket and scattered clothes.othes.

  “Oh!” shouted Nicolas, in a muffled imitation of Bernard’s somewhat squeaky voice. “Arggh!”

  Sarah couldn’t help it. She started giggling.

  “Calm down,” Nicolas said. “And now we go upstairs and report this unfortunate accident. Quickly. I believe he’s waking up.”

  Nico paused at the top of the stairs to look down at the feebly stirring Bernard.

  “This is just how Albrecht went,” he said, sighing. “God, how I hated that stupid elk.”

  FORTY-ONE

  After Bernie had been trundled away in an ambulance, Sarah wanted to return to the secret library, but she didn’t dare. Nico had said he would lock it back up again, and that nothing should be touched until Max returned. “It is his right,” he said. Then he used Bernard’s phone to text the marchesa that Sarah was “taken care of.”

  “It is better,” he said, “that the marchesa believes all has gone according to plan. In her absence, we can continue to work more freely.”

  So, reluctantly, Sarah went back to the Music Room and tried to focus. The next couple of days passed relatively quietly. The researchers worked diligently, and the palace began to look more and more like a museum. Sarah, trying not to obsess about the Beethoven letters she had found, or Max’s continued absence with the woman who sent Bernard to kill her, or the strange and disturbing events in the library, sought refuge in mechanical details over the exhibition she was preparing.

  But it was hard not to wonder about Nico. When he was babbling strangely in the library, it almost sounded as if he believed that he—Nico—was the same person as Tycho’s own personal dwarf—the clairvoyant Jepp. Nico had always been odd, but that was just plain crazy. It would make him roughly four hundred years old. Which was absurd and defied all the laws of the universe.

  She thought of Alessandro, telling her: “Ninety-six percent of the universe is dark matter and dark energy. And in that ninety-six percent, it’s possible that none of the rules of science apply.”

  All of this made her suspicious and irritable.

  As did the fact that she had heard nothing from Max.

  • • •

  Since Eleanor’s death there had been much talk among the researchers over whether to cancel the costume ball. Eventually it was decided that it would be okay to go on, although the “ball” was now downgraded to a “party.” The group was unanimously in favor of retaining the “costume” part though. It was felt that Bernie’s work shouldn’t go to waste. Sarah was pretty sure Daphne had convinced Miles on this point. She was clearly dying to dress up as Polyxena.

  “Everyone remember it is just a party,” said Miles, who looked completely exhausted and wrung out. “Let’s not spend too much time on this. We all know we’re going8 to be working round the clock until the opening. I’m not canceling it only because I think we all need something to lift our spirits. But tomorrow back to work bright and early, with no hangovers. And don’t bring along the seventy-five expats you’ve met in the bar since arriving. If you don’t know the person’s last name, don’t invite them.”

  The group nodded. It was agreed that it was a shame that Bernie, who had been looking forward to this party all summer, might have to miss it because of his fall down the stairs. Sarah was a little astonished by how easily the lies had rolled off her tongue when they had “found” him.

  “Poor guy. I heard a crash and got there just in time to see him at the bottom of the stairs,” she said. “He must have slipped.” That was certainly a skill she had learned to perfect this summer: embroidering the truth until it was completely obscured.

  “Oh, and Max will be back this evening,” Miles had announced. “With his cousin, who will also be attending the party. So please try to not embarrass yourselves.”

  Sarah had managed to get herself deputized by the rest of the team to get the costumes from Bernie’s room.

  • • •

  Bernard may have been a spy and a potential (sniveling) assassin, but he was also a damn fine dressmaker, Sarah had to admit as she scanned the
rack of costumes and capes in his room. The fabrics, the colors, the embroidery, the buttons—everything was exquisite, and as close as humanly possible to the Polaroids of the actual oil portraits from the Lobkowicz Palace collection he had meticulously pinned to each outfit. The little white feather on Rudolf II’s cap, the jeweled buttons of Zdenek’s black tunic, Polyxena’s red sleeves, Vratislav’s furlined cape, Maria Manrique de Lara’s lace ruff, Vratislav Pernstein’s red velvet hat . . . There was even a spray-painted copper mask of the reliquary of St. Ursula. Amazing.

  Sarah reminded herself now that she was in Bernie’s room not just to collect brocade and damask but to look for hard evidence on the Marchesa Elisa.

  Sarah was nervous about whether Max was in danger from the marchesa, although Nico had reassured her that it was unlikely Elisa would try to do anything more for now. Sarah couldn’t even text him, in case the marchesa saw his phone.

  She had a brief vision of Max and Elisa toasting her death, then pushed it out of her mind. No. Max wasn’t involved with his cousin.

  Although he was definitely hiding something.

  Bernard’s room was on the fourth floor, under the rafters. Sarah wondered how many times he had bumped his head on the slanted ceiling and rough beams. It had probably been part of the servant’s quarters in earlier days.

  She began searching methodically through some neatly ironed and folded clothes in the dresser. She found a lot of books on Rococo and some fan magazines devoted to a teen vampire movie. She flipped open Bernard’s laptop and pondered the little box that asked her for his password. She tried “Rococo.” Nothing.

  She stopped herself for a moment. What was she doing here, trying to find evidence of a murderer? She was a gr.ad student in music, not a cop or a detective. She was in over her head, way over her head.

  Sarah stared at herself in the mirror on Bernard’s wall. She definitely looked haggard, hollow-eyed and exhausted. She should get the costumes and leave.

  Sarah pulled hangers from the closet and then bent down to move a box marked HATS AND PROPS! She pulled a few items out: a fan, a crucifix, and a stuffed dog.

  She fingered the costume Bernard had planned for himself. Maria Manrique de Lara, mother of Polyxena. It included a quite realistic papier-mâché mask and wig.

  The marchesa never missed a party.

  A plan began to form in Sarah’s head.

  FORTY-TWO

  No one was sure what the proper sound track was for a costume ball, so they settled on remixing the greatest hits of Beethoven, Mozart, Dvorák, and Handel. Douglas the nimble-fingered Croll expert had spent all day on his computer adding a hip-hop or rap beat to “Für Elise,” the New World Symphony, The Marriage of Figaro, and other masterpieces of classical music. Sarah expected to feel like she was hearing her heroes getting smacked around, but she had to admit he made it possible to actually rave to the Fifth Symphony, which was pretty rad. Moses wanted lute music, so Douglas had mixed it with some Afro-Cuban beats and it was now thumping through the seventeenth-century frescoed Balcony Room on the second floor. It was making Miles very nervous that they were holding glasses of cold pivo under the gaze not only of a skeptical camel frescoed on the ceiling, but also priceless oils of Vratislav III, the last Pernstein, in armor and red tights, and Caroline Schwarzenberg, whose pained look probably came from having had twelve children.

  Sarah turned and Vratislav himself was standing in front of her, in remarkably realistic armor and red tights. With the mask on his face, it took her a second to detect the scent of deer musk and realize it was Godfrey.

  “Bernie, I’m so glad you recovered!” he said, waving his arm at the gathering of academics, other staff, and friends who crowded the room. There were probably a hundred people there, all in costumes and masks. “Feels like we’ve stepped back in time. Wonderful costumes you made!”

  Sarah danced away, glad that her costume rendered her impenetrable. She wore the black dress with large flaring sleeves, a golden chain at her waist, and a white lace ruff at her neck. She clutched a white hankie in one gloved hand, and the Holy Infant of Prague in the other. A black and gold necklace with a cross hung at her neck. Platform boots she had found in Old Town at a clothing store called Quasimodo Vintage Fashion raised her to nearly six feet in height. But most important, the mask of Maria’s long-nosed, aristocratic gaze covered her face, and a large amount of padding made her seem much larger than she actually was.

  It was Bernard’s costume, the finest he had made, correct in every detail. It was making her sweat like a racehorse, but it seemed to be doing the trick.

  Daphne bounded up in her Polyxena costume.

  “Berfont>

  There were prizes to be given by Jana for the most historically accurate costume, most inventive, and silliest. Suzi was wearing a fake set of armor assembled from the pots and pans of the kitchen, although her sword looked suspiciously authentic. She was avidly pursuing Fiona, who had attractively painted herself in the Delft china pattern. Someone had hilariously come as the archives (brown box over head and papers glued everywhere with a clipboard on his back). Petr the valet made everyone scream when he came in with an actual horse, the spitting image of one in a life-sized portrait from the early 1700s. Miles made him take the horse outside immediately and tie it in the courtyard. The beer was flowing, as were the shots of slivovitz when Miles’s back was turned. Miles hit the breaking point and threatened to shut the whole party down when Douglas, cross-dressed as Anne of Austria, came in with a case of vodka and three giggling local girls.

  “That’s enough,” said Miles. “We must have some respect for the place.”

  People were dancing, large skirts gyrating and pantaloons swaying. The room was getting warm. Miles sighed and everyone cheered when he took the bottle of vodka Douglas offered him and downed a swig.

  “I’m probably dead anyway,” he muttered. Me too, thought Sarah.

  Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them, Sarah repeated to herself, for courage.

  She spotted Moses, dressed as one of the peasants from Brueghel’s Haymaking, the 1565 masterpiece that was one of the showpieces of the collection. It also contained one of art’s silliest jokes. Brueghel had painted one peasant with the basket on her head, another with the basket on his shoulder, and a third whose head had been replaced altogether by the basket. Ba-da-bum. Moses wore a rough gray tunic and his head was obscured by a giant basket of fruit. He pranced up to her.

  “Bernie, I lost my head!” he joked.

  Max and the marchesa had still not arrived, although Max’s wolfhound, Moritz, was circling the room looking hungrily at the tables of rabbits, pheasant, and wild boar that Godfrey had harvested for the occasion from the outlying family estates.

  “There hasn’t been much hunting in the last twenty years,” Godfrey told her, dancing up, his breath stinking of ale. “It was time for a bit of a killing spree anyway. C’mon, Bernie, you big queen. Let’s dance.”

  It felt good—and weird—to cut loose to a hip-hip version of “For Unto Us a Child Is Born” from Handel’s Messiah. The music was certainly beautiful, but Sarah had never quite felt like grinding her hips to it before.

  She was sweating profusely inside her costume. Sarah left Godfrey on the dance floor and moved to the window to cool down. She looked down at Malá Strana and out over Charles Bridge, which was now a necklace of lights against the dark river.

  She realized that this was the same window she had peered out of on her first day at the palace. The window Sherbatsky had fallen out of, convinced he was crossing a bridge. Tears sprang into her eyes. She could see him so clearly, and just as on that firs wit day she experienced a rush of vertigo. For a moment she thought she actually could see him—a filmy, phantom version of himself.

  “Luigi,” this ghost Sherbatsky whispered. “Luigi, wait for me.”

  “There you are,” said a voice behind her.

  Sarah, her heart in her throat, tu
rned to see the person behind her. This was no vision.

  Marchesa Elisa Lobkowicz DeBenedetti wore no costume. With her burnished skin, lioness mane of blond hair, and the Lobkowicz nose, she was striking enough. Inadvertently, Sarah took a step backward.

  “So,” said the marchesa, raising her glass of champagne. “We celebrate.”

  Sarah forced herself to move closer to the woman. She held the Infant of Prague doll tightly to her chest.

  “Did you get the girl’s cell phone?” Elisa asked, in a soft purr.

  Sarah made a gesture of assent.

  “And you sent an e-mail to Miles from her saying that she was tired and needed to get out of town for a few days?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Do not worry,” the marchesa went on. “I will take care of the rest. Tomorrow Max will get a text message from her telling him she was too afraid and went back home. Her mother will learn she died in a taxi crash on the way to the airport. Poverina.”

  Sarah made a gesture that she hoped signaled complicity and understanding.

  “Ottimo,” said the marchesa. “A little gift will be waiting for you back in Cambridge. Something lovely to reward your efforts and remind you of our special understanding. Ah, look at your little Bambino Gesu. So sweet. What a dreadful party. Peasants pretending to be nobles. Remember, if you breathe a word, I will release my little video to the police. Or slit your throat. Ciao.”

  As soon as the marchesa moved off into the crowd, Sarah slipped into the hallway and ran downstairs to her room. She threw off Bernard’s costume and retrieved her phone—set to record—out of the dress of the Infant of Prague. She replayed the conversation. Muffled, but it was all

  there.

  “Thanks, Jesus,” she whispered to the wax doll.