It was only a matter of time before Vok came to her, stone sober and in the light of day. Nicholas had been laughing as he walked the perimeter of the table, his hands holding the edge for balance, but he stopped at the sight of Vok’s unfamiliar face, dropped to the floor and crawled as quickly as he could to Mouse. She picked him up, and he planted his face against her shoulder and played with her hair.
“Send him away. I want you,” Vok said.
“Gitta, will you—” Mouse leaned toward her, letting Nicholas’s weight help pull him free, but he grabbed a handful of her hair and a fistful of her tunic and let out a high, panicked wail.
Mouse pulled him close again and he quieted. “Nicholas, you and Gitta are going for a walk in the woods. I will come find you.”
He shook his head, the curls, bleached nearly white from the summer sun, falling into his face. “No, no, no,” he said as his lip quivered. He put his hand in the little dip at her collarbone.
“Would you like some berries? You and Gitta can go to the kitchen for them and bring them right back.”
“No, no, no—”
Vok grabbed Nicholas from behind. “Get rid of him, I said!”
The baby screamed. Mouse reached for him, but Vok spun.
“Be quiet!” he yelled as he shook him.
Frozen in fear, Mouse saw in her mind how it would all play out so that as it actually happened, everything seemed too slow, hazy as if she were watching through wavy glass. Nicholas’s head snapped back; she could see the shock on his face, heard him suck in air, stifling his cries.
“Stop, Vok,” she said as he moved to shake the baby again, but the power that had slept in her for nearly a year did not wake. And then her fear transformed into a mother’s fury.
“Stop, Vok!” The voice was not her own, deeper and laced with an animal-like growl.
Vok froze, a silent Nicholas dangling from his outstretched arms.
“Hand me the baby.”
He lowered Nicholas into her arms; the baby wasn’t breathing, but as he took in his mother’s face, he breathed out, crying.
“Shhh, shhh,” she whispered as she laid Nicholas against her chest, and he quieted. Mouse bit her lip.
She chose her words carefully. “Vok, you want to go hunting. This afternoon with your men. Go.” And then she pulled the power back into herself. Vok left without a word.
Mouse sank to the floor, weak, the power roiling in her until she vomited. Nicholas would not leave her arms, and they were both covered in spit and bile. She rocked the baby until finally he slept.
“Gather what we need, Gitta. It is time.” Her voice shook, but Mouse had planned for this.
And so they slipped through the woods and along the riverbank until they saw the boats where the Romany clan had set their watery camp. Back in the spring, the gypsies had wandered down from the Sumava Mountains that towered to the west of the Rozemberk lands. But the village would not have them so they had moved down the river, taken some trees, and crafted barges. They poled goods for trade up and down the Vltava, but mostly they kept to themselves—until two of the children caught the fever, and the Romany remedies failed. When the patriarch had raced to the village in the night, pleading for help, the priest had sent them to Mouse.
“Hanzi, are you there?” Mouse called out as she and Gitta and Nicholas stood by the river.
“Ah, my Lady, you are well this day?” A man, thick as a barrel, stepped out of a tent on one of the barges, dark hair hanging and slapping against his back as he jumped to the shore and embraced Mouse.
“I wish I could say yes.”
“Ah.” He let his hands rest on her shoulders, but his eyes ran back along the riverbank. “The trouble we spoke of has come?”
She nodded.
“Then tonight we move on.”
“The trouble might follow us. Are you sure you want to take the risk?” She looked at his wife standing with two little girls just outside the tent.
He put his finger on her lips. “You gave me back the life of my children. For you, I would face any trouble.”
Hanzi lifted Mouse onto the boat as she held tightly to Nicholas. Gitta followed.
As they walked unsteadily toward the tent, Hanzi tugged at the rope tying them to the bank. “Avree! Avree!” he hollered, and two teenage boys came running from the woods and jumped onto the other tethered barge. “Away!” he said to them; one pulled loose the rope and the other took up a long pole, spearing it hard into the river and pushing. Hanzi did the same until the current took both barges and sent them on a quickening jog down the Vltava.
THIRTY
The spires of the castle loomed in the distance as they reached the faster waters of the Devil’s Stream and Hanzi pushed the boat toward the shore. Mouse stepped out of the tent, the early morning air cool against her skin, but she could not make herself step onto the gravelly bank. She was back in Prague. But this was not her home any longer.
“You come with me,” Hanzi said to Mouse as he stood beside her, arm draped over her shoulders. “Be my family.”
“Oh, Hanzi, I would.” She wiped a tear from her eye. “But I have already put you and the family in danger. If Lord Rozemberk discovers that I left with you, he will hunt you. And if I go with you now, he will never stop hunting. It is best that you move on as we talked about.”
“As you say. But we will stay here for a little while in case you need us.”
Mouse hugged him and let him help her off the boat. She took Nicholas in her arms and headed up the path with Gitta behind her.
As they walked, Mouse saw the towers at the castle take shape, dark against the lightening sky, like four fingers of a hand with its thumb still hidden under the trees. She worried that once she stood in its grasp, those fingers of the castle would curl down on her and she would be crushed.
The guards knew her and let her pass after playing a little with Nicholas, who was both fascinated and frightened by their armor and their swords. Mouse walked alone with the baby toward St. George’s; she sent Gitta with a note into the keep.
Mouse waited as the first of the sunlight scattered like colored spears through the stained glass window. Saint Ludmila’s painted eyes watched Mouse sway in the light, rocking the baby on her hip. His hands tugged at the strings of pearls dangling on her bodice. She would not lift her eyes from the baby’s face, his curls, his blue eyes, his round mouth where a second tooth was just beginning to break through. When she heard the clack of boots against the stone staircase, she tightened her grip on her son.
“Mouse.”
She felt like a stranger in what had once been home, but as he said her name, she felt a flicker of belonging. No one called her by her name anymore. She was “my Lady” or odder still, “Lady Rozemberk.” But to Ottakar, she was still Mouse, and some part of him was still hers. She could hear it in his voice, feel it as he laid his hand on her back, see it in his eyes as she turned, finally, to greet him.
As much as she loved him, she also hated him for what she had to do. But it was her fault, not his.
“You are well?” she asked, looking away.
“Always looking after my health, you are.” He smiled. “Well enough. And you?”
She shrugged. She did not smile.
“What is it?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Ottakar, I want—”
He sighed. “I have missed that. Even my wife calls me ‘my Lord King.’” His eyes darkened for a moment and then he held his arms out. “May I hold your son?”
She nodded, unable to speak; she could never undo what she was about to do, and the weight of it crushed her.
Nicholas went to him willingly but turned quickly to be sure Mouse stayed where she was. Ottakar laughed as the baby tugged on his beard and put the edge of it in his mouth, made a face as it pricked and tickled, and then started giggling. Mouse found the courage she needed.
“Ottakar, this is Nicholas—your son.” Quick and sharp the words came, like the thrust of a
sword.
“Mine?” Behind the confusion, Mouse heard the hope and joy.
“He cannot—” She tried to make herself breathe. “He cannot stay at Rozemberk. Vok knows that Nicholas is yours.” Her heart withered at what she had done. But she would not watch her husband strangle her son in some drunken fit of jealousy.
“How does he know?” he asked. “How do you know?”
Her face reddened as if he had slapped her. “I know. Vok knows. There can be no doubt.”
He studied her for a moment, and then he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her to him. “Mouse.”
“Stop.” She pushed away from him. “Will you take him? I have brought Gitta to stay and care for him. She . . . she loves him, too.” Her voice pitched high with tethered emotion. “And there are people, friends, down at the Devil’s Stream. Vok may be looking for them. They could be of use to you at Hluboka. Could you—”
“Stay with me,” Ottakar said. “I can send you and Nicholas to Hluboka, too. Come visit you there.”
“And Vok?”
“I am his king.”
“And Margaret?”
“She is sick. She is not . . . a proper wife.” He laid his hand on Mouse’s shoulder. “We can ride horses in the summer and picnic at the lake like we did before. We can raise our son together. He will rule after me. There could be other children.” He talked quickly, nearly breathless with wishing.
For a moment, Mouse shared his dream, but she knew the truth. Vok would not care that Ottakar was his king. Ottakar had added much land and wealth to Vok’s estate and given him power second only to the crown; Vok would prove a dangerous enemy, though she doubted she could ever convince Ottakar of that. So Mouse gave Ottakar another truth instead, a truth he would understand and believe.
“And what would be thought of me?” she asked. “I would be seen as a whore waiting for you to come to me at your pleasure. You could do nothing for Nicholas then. You would anger Margaret’s nephew in Germany. The Church would not allow it. You would lose your crown. This pope is like the Innocent before him. He thinks himself your master, does he not?”
“They always do.” He sounded tired.
Nicholas started to whimper; he reached out to Mouse and she took him. Sleepy from a restless night on the boat, he laid his head against her chest and ran his hand along the skin at her collarbone. Mouse swayed and hummed the little lullaby.
“You sang that for me once,” Ottakar said.
She buried her face in her son’s soft hair and breathed in his smell.
“Are you sure, Mouse?”
She could not speak, so she nodded. She could see no other way to keep her son safe.
Ottakar reached for her hand. “I will take care of him. I will love him. I will tell him about you.”
Mouse reached into the bag at her waist and pulled out a wooden figure she’d worked on during the spring and summer when she knew what must happen. Whenever Nicholas slept, Mouse stayed awake carving the figure. She shed her tears on the wood, rubbed them into the careful notches she made, smoothed the grain with them.
“Will you give him that?” The words came out deep, heavy with her loss. The figure was of her nursing Nicholas, his hand on her face, her mouth open in song. Along the bottom, she had carved the words of the lullaby.
Ottakar kissed the top of her head. He took the figure and then a sleeping Nicholas from her arms.
Mouse dropped to her knees as the weight of her son left her. Ottakar turned and stepped into the nave.
Nicholas woke. “Ma-ma,” he called, wanting and then panicked. “Ma-ma!”
The sound of his screams pierced her. She dug her fingers into the grooves of the stone floor to keep from running after him. Her wails tore her throat before they traveled up into the vaulted ceiling and fell down on her again. She lay prostrate at the foot of the crucifix, her face buried in hands that still smelled like her son.
THIRTY-ONE
Mouse slipped from the horse’s back and landed in the hay. Her legs were numb from riding—three days from Prague in the rain back to Rozemberk Keep. She had not eaten. She had not stopped to sleep, but sleep had claimed her, and she’d lain across the horse’s neck until the dreams woke her. She was calling out for Nicholas, and then she remembered. Nicholas was gone.
Not long after Ottakar had taken the baby, Gitta had found Mouse and taken her to her old room in the castle and put her to bed. She didn’t know how long she had slept, and she didn’t care.
When she woke, Gitta tried to make her eat. “My Lord the King will be back in the morning, and he will be angry if you are still not well.”
“No.” Mouse’s tone was dead, like she felt, but her mind was clear again. She was certain that she had done what was right for her son—and also certain that she could not be here when Ottakar returned. “Bring me clothes,” she said. “A man’s clothes.”
“Please, my Lady—”
“I am not your Lady. Bring me clothes or I will find them myself.”
Gitta had done as she was told, and Mouse had left Prague within the hour dressed as a man to ride alone back to Rozemberk. She’d had to show herself to one of Vok’s guards at the gate of the castle. He had watched her pass with wide eyes, shocked by the masculine clothing and the wild look in her eyes.
She now untangled the sleeve of the rough gardcorps as she grabbed at the stirrup to pull herself up from the ground. She threw her arm across the horse’s back to support her weight and give the blood a chance to return some feeling to her legs. Mouse laid her head against his wet coat and let the smell of sweat and rain draw her back to the world.
The stables were empty. Mouse assumed everyone was in bed until she heard the footfall behind her.
“Where have you been, wife?”
Mouse jerked her head around. “Vok—”
He stumbled into her, pinning her against the horse. “Off whoring with gypsies, I hear. Just like your mother, you are, like a rutting animal.”
“You are drunk. I will not talk to you this way. I am tired and—”
Even though she saw it coming, Mouse did nothing to avoid his backhanded blow. The horse whinnied and shifted, but Mouse was silent.
“Where is your bastard?” he asked, eyes darting around the stables as he grabbed her chin roughly.
“Gone. That is all that should matter to you.” She saw the surprise dilate his eyes.
“You went to the King?”
“Yes.”
He shoved her hard to his left. Her head slammed into the cold dirt floor of the stables before she could break her fall; the horse shied and Mouse quickly pushed herself away to avoid the heavy hooves slapping the ground.
“He sent you away, then? Of course he did. Now that he is king, you are nothing to him.” He spit the words, wet with drunken slaver. “He has had you already. He has many other women to fill his bed. Women better than you. And now he’s left me burdened with his leavings.”
As she tried to raise herself from the ground, he put his foot on her back and pressed her down. Her tunic shifted, revealing a sliver of skin above the top of the tight-fitting braies. He yanked it up, exposing her back, and hissed.
“I marked you, wife. Where is the scar?” He pinched the smooth skin at the base of her back where he had branded her with the Rozemberk rose. Her power had healed her as always. There was a small scar, hardly visible even to Mouse, but her keen senses could detect the bit of waxy flesh as she ran her hand along the skin. She would not give him the satisfaction of admitting it.
“I have never been yours. You do not have the power to leave a lasting mark.” She meant to bait him, her misery driving away care.
In the year of their marriage, even when he was hard with longing and came to her bed, his manhood had left him. He was sure it was her doing, but now his desire throbbed in him, refusing to be denied. “Your witchcraft might magic away a scar, but there is a way I can make you mine. I will get what I want. Make your belly grow with a s
on of my own.” He slid his boot to the ground and shoved his knee into her back as he ran his hands up the inside of her thighs.
Mouse pushed up hard against him, her mouth dry with panic. But he was too heavy, too strong. Bits of straw and the smell of wet hay rushed up her nose as he shoved her face back into the stable floor. As he dug at her leggings, she spat the dirt from her mouth.
When Vok leaned back to loosen his belt. Mouse saw her chance. She moved her arms under her again, lifting herself and turning this time, throwing him back and off balance. She smiled at the shock in his face.
She knew exactly how he would move, and she was ready. When he lunged, she did, too, and brought her knee up into his face. He spun toward her again, blood dripping from his chin. The horse reared, distracting Mouse as she moved back, and giving Vok the chance to swing around to her side. He threw his weight into her. As she caught herself against the stable wall, his weight and hers bent her hand back onto her forearm, and she heard her wrist snap where he had broken it before.
Instinctively, she hunched, grabbing at her wrist, and Vok folded over her. It gave Mouse an unexpected advantage. She bent at the knees and threw herself back against him, slamming her head into his already broken nose. He let go, grabbing his face as he screamed, and stumbled backward toward the horse, which was pulling frantically against its tether.
Mouse saw what would happen.
She did nothing to stop it.
She watched the horse throw its weight onto its front legs, kicking backward in defense. The hoof hit Vok in the side of the head. Bone shards jutted up out of his scalp and through his hair with a gush of blood. He was dead by the time he landed on his back in the already scarlet hay.
Mouse watched the horse’s tail swish through the red as it mixed with horse urine and a puddle of rainwater in the middle of the stable floor; it looked like an artist swirling his brush in the water to clean away the paint.
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