by P. W. Child
HEED WELL, reader!
It has to be reduced to ashes! Do not hold on to any of the items in the chest. Do not attempt to put these things into action, for I fear they are sources of a much darker realm, enforced by those who should never be given power over others.
Please do not speak of this and do not ever share the information I have shared. All I can do is hope and pray that whoever reads this letter will be of sound mind and true heart, someone who will have the integrity to rid the world of this slumbering evil. I can only pray that the contents of
Nina looked up from the letter she had translated from German for Petra to understand the contents. It was one of the main documents left to her by her brother. Petra’s hands were shaking as she stared dead ahead. Igor quickly poured her a glass of wine which she chugged before looking at Nina again.
“My brother had this since he helped excavate the well here in 1999!” she said with a quiver in her voice. “Why did he never tell me?”
Nina placed her consoling hand on the sobbing professor’s while Sam looked at the document.
“Is anyone else noticing what I am noticing?” he asked suddenly, pushing aside all the other glasses and papers on the desk.
“What is it?” Nina frowned. She knew Sam had a very sharp eye for detail. Being a photographer was one thing, but his entire accomplished career ran on his talent for connecting the dots. She knew he would be invaluable to this assignment.
“That letter is written in the same scribbled handwriting this one is. The sentence continues here…” he said with a self-righteous cough as he held out the other, “…on this one where the Black Sun sigil is drawn. I think we know what that means. It carries on; I can only pray that the contents of this trunk and its devilish games within will be utterly destroyed. The society sent to stash the relics here was not the Thule, but their secret affiliate. Psycho Satanics Anonymous and Friends.”
Nina had to snigger, her head sunk so that her hair could cover her face. She felt bad for Petra being in such a sorrowful moment and Sam’s jokes thrashing right through the meaning of it.
“So why did he not want you to know about it until now?” Sam asked Petra. At first she looked at him in befuddlement, but then she remembered that he was not aware of the situation.
“He died recently, Sam. This stuff was allocated to me by means of his Last Will and Testament,” she answered politely.
“Oh shit, I’m so sorry,” he said quickly.
“Don’t apologize. You didn’t know,” she smiled and had more wine. “I got the news about three weeks ago, that they had discovered his body in a car in Germany. They…” she stopped to catch her breath, “…they think he killed himself. My brother would never have shot himself. Ever! He was a bibliophile with a love for the good life, goddammit.”
“Sounds like you were close,” Nina said in her best comforting tone.
“We were not. Not for a long time…we saw each other in 2003 last at a relative’s funeral, funny enough. He was my parents’ eldest, you see, and I was born almost fifteen years after him, so he was out and about in the world already when I was in primary school. Nevertheless, I knew him. Of the times we did spend together on birthdays or Christmas with our folks the country, we got along great and found that we both had a penchant for cultures and languages,” she continued to explain, clutching her glass while she reminisced. “He did not commit suicide. He was murdered.”
“So maybe he hoped he would find the mystery trunk first and that is why he probably did not tell anyone about it while he was alive,” Sam debated.
“Could be. You see, as Nina explained to me a while back, the SS occupied this castle specifically for one purpose – to intercept worldwide radio signals during the war, something they found by accident while repairing vehicles here,” Petra said.
“That’s correct. Because the hill consists of chert rock and jasper and the Wehrmacht noticed it had amplification properties.”
“Maybe the planting of the explosives had something to do with the sound properties of the rock? Who knows?” Igor chimed in as he placed his empty glass next to Nina’s. “But that does not make it easier for us to find it.”
“So you are looking to open this trunk, Petra?” Sam asked, slightly worried. “And then?”
“Sam, I cannot let precious antiques wither away in obscurity like that, especially those of my culture and of historical significance. You heard what that man in the letter said – it was stolen from the kingdom of Bohemia. It must be given back to the land, put in museums to commemorate the hell our country went through at the hand of the Third Reich, don’t you agree?” Petra asked Sam. She folded her dainty hands under her chin and leaned with her elbows on the table.
“I agree, Professor,” Igor said firmly. “Art of such age and skillful excellence should not be left under the earth because of some long dead failed regime. I move we approach the SCSA Security Company, responsible for the excavation to see if they maybe recovered such a chest.”
The others all agreed and Petra sent Igor to get the ball rolling. He was to make an appointment with the archeologist who headed the excavation while she would invite the owner of Chateau Zbiroh to dinner to get some information about the already recovered items. She was aware of the weapons, Nazi documents and artifacts they had found, but the terms were very general and she thought it would be better to get a more detailed inventory of what had been pulled out, so that she could have a guess what was still lying under the false bottom and the explosive traps.
Sam and Nina looked at each other, while Petra went looking for the owner of the estate, somewhere in its hive of rooms and halls.
“What are you thinking?” Nina asked.
“Do you still have my camera?” he asked her under his breath.
“Of course. It’s in my locked vanity case,” she assured him.
“You have a vanity case?” Sam sank back and widened his eyes playfully at her.
“Oh fuck off, Sam,” she laughed. “You can come and get tonight after dinner.”
“Cool.” He played with his fingers and gathered the courage to talk. “Hey, Nina, I just wanna say thank you.”
“For what? The new clothes and cell phone I paid for in the expensive travel bags I bought you?” she teased about the shopping spree she took her injured friend on the day before to replenish his lost wardrobe.
“No, silly wench…for saving my life,” Sam said sincerely. Nina felt guilty about that more than she was proud of helping Sam escape from the killers. She was late because she got into a tiff with a man and his son about parking her in, instead of asking him to just move his car. Typically of her, she had to be cocky and started with a sarcastic remark the man did not take well to from the start, so it took her a while to defuse the situation and get him to let her out. Had it not been for that, Sam, who had already been in physical distress, would never have been assaulted so brutally. But she decided to keep that to herself.
“Oh Sam, what would I do without you? You are my wingman every time I get into stupid shit,” she smiled shyly. He was surprised to see her like that, vulnerable and sweet.
God, you’re beautiful, he thought as he looked at her marble skin, her high cheekbones and her wide and beautiful smile. Even the scar on her arm was beautiful. He made a mental note to ask her about the treatment she had been undergoing, but she looked healthy enough to leave it at that for now.
For a moment he recalled his despair at her rapidly declining condition when she was poisoned at first, how frail and pale she had been, hardly able to walk as it got worse. He realized just how grateful he was to have his Nina back and he did not even think twice before reaching out to her with his good arm and embracing her. He breathed her scent as she fell against him with a sigh. She smelled so good that he reminisced about the night in Purdue’s house.
“Do you have travelling papers, Sam?” Petra asked loudly in the doorway. “I have a VISA arranged for Nina for the next few weeks because of our agreement, but s
ince I did not expect you, we could not afford you the same facility.” She was pleased to see the two parting at the sound of her voice.
“Aye. I have my papers. Ready to go,” he smiled and she returned his grin, very pleased that he would come with them.
Fortunately he had the common sense to leave his passport, press credential and driver’s license in a locked box at the station in Berlin where he first met with his late excursion colleagues. Sam never took identification with him when he went undercover or embarked on dangerous assignments. They retrieved his documents and managed to leave Germany before his hunters could find him again.
“Oh, um, by the way,” Nina frowned curiously, “where are...we…going?”
“We will be going to Romania. Thanks to this record I obtained from the owner,” Petra flashed a police report from the office files of Chateau Zbiroh like a trophy.
“Do tell,” Nina exclaimed.
“I shall, I shall,” the professor jested. “I told Igor to cancel the appointment with the security company who handled the excavation, because, according to this report, the content of that chest was stolen in 2002 by a contract worker who helped with the exploration of the well and the cataloguing of the items retrieved.”
She continued as Sam poured more wine for the three of them.
“According to this, a chest was brought up, but to this day it had never been opened to see what was missing. Nobody can open it. Yet, a mysterious deck of cards vanished from the catalogue list of items and shortly after, so did…” she scrutinized the names on the form, “… one Mr. Petr Costita. So, it is the general consensus that he was the thief, because he disappeared around the same time as the cards.”
Sam was absent from the conversation. His scowl proved that he was calculating countless facts in his mind. He remembered the tarot card with the personality. He remembered the young boy’s name and his obsession with the card that had seemed nothing short of evil. He remembered that the child was Romanian.
Sam’s dark eyes opened wide at the coincidences that were just too uncanny, but he felt reluctant to share his conclusion just yet, because it was still unclear what Petra wanted with this wild goose chase after a stolen deck of cards, especially now that he knew that it was of an occult nature.
“Sam,” Nina snapped him out of his pondering. “Did you hear the story about this man?”
“Nope,” he answered, and quite frankly he couldn’t care less.
“Petulka, come tell us about the theft a few years back, please,” Petra asked the housekeeper.
The plump woman who had brought Petra her fresh tea earlier entered the chamber with Igor behind her. He smiled and passed her, taking his place next to the object of his fixation who was sitting at the table waiting to hear the story.
“Well, when everybody was still busy with exploring of the well, the divers from the police came and there were people here all the time, helping with the excavation. Now, the staff, we talk amongst ourselves as you can imagine, just like other people do at work,” Petulka narrated with enthusiasm while the other sat frozen, listening. “There was this one man…good looking man…but he was restless. Like restless in the soul makes people mean,” she tried to explain in her terms, and Nina nodded to encourage her. “His name was Petr and soon we all realized there was something wrong with him. At night he would tell tales of his homeland and the village where he lived, near the Baciu forest. When he told us it was in Transylvania and that the place was known for being a place where other dimensions crossed into ours, we knew he was crazy…” she paused for dramatic effect, “…or a vampire.”
They all laughed and Petulka reveled in her delighted audience before she continued.
“He would tell us about Hoia Baciu…”
“Gesundheit!” Sam jested, evoking chuckling again.
“Hoya Batchoo, Mr. Cleave,” she grinned.
“Ah! Got it,” Sam nodded.
“Anyway, he told us that it is the most haunted forest in the world, where people walk in and never come out. Where strange lights float through the trees at night. Energy comes up from the ground and turn mild men into animals, and turn women into witches while brutes become peaceful,” she whispered loudly to give them the same show Petr used to give the Zbiroh staff.
Nina felt a thrill she had not known since childhood, listening to tales of mystery and intrigue. Sam sat frozen, but his mind was racing over little Radu while he entertained the storytelling with the occasional nod.
Petulka carried on with her story.
“One night he told us of his family, who lived near the forest, just on the edge and he said to us that they knew what the cards represented. The past, present and future…”
“So…tarot cards,” Sam interjected. He had known all along what they were, thanks to the young boy in his hospital room.
“…of the world,” she finished her sentence. “Tarot is normally used to predict a person’s future, but this unholy deck, Petr told us, could predict the fate of the world. He called it ‘The Black Tarot’.
Cha pter 17 – The First Game
Radu ate himself into a stupor. At the hospital he had already wolfed down the bland food of mass prepared trays, but this meal was absolute ecstasy. Even at the hospital he looked forward to meals, having lived from hand to mouth for so long, so he felt like a king when the Hellers sat down to dinner with roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, creamed spinach and sweet carrots. There even was a side salad and pudding as well. Radu could not eat fast enough until his ribs felt like concrete slabs pressing against a swollen tummy.
“What is this?” he asked Greta Heller, holding up a forkful of spinach.
“Just eat it, Radu,” she said through her own chewing and she hastily swallowed to add, “and don’t wave your food around like that. It is very rude and only children with bad manners do that.”
He obeyed, eyeing the floppy dark green strands hanging limply over the silverware, dripping with thick white sauce. Whatever it was, it looked horrifying. Why could they not just give him a loaf of bread – food he recognized – with his chicken?
“What is it, then, Herr Heinz?” the young boy tried his luck with the grouchy alpha male in his best attempt at addressing him with a German title.
Heinz-Karl Heller had to admit that he was somewhat impressed at the child’s willingness to adapt, and even more so at his ability to figure out and make an effort in using linguistic details. Above that, the big old man secretly liked that the boy asked him what Greta would not tell him.
When Greta called Gabi, her housekeeper, to ask for some wine, Heinz shifted in his chair to whisper, “It is spinach. Very good for your health. Eat it.”
“I don’ like it,” Radu admitted whispering as well, and so the big German cast a glance to his wife with her back turned to them, and quickly scooped up the apparently repulsive vegetable from Radu’s plate onto his. Radu smiled, revealing a mouthful of slightly discolored teeth, while he quickly pushed his carrots over the smear left by Heinz’s abduction of the spinach.
Heinz gathered it all up in his fork and shoved it into his mouth just as Greta returned to the table. The two males chewed heartily as she sat down, only rapidly locking amused gazes with one another.
“Have you ever been to school, Radu?” Greta asked as she drank a sip of wine.
“No, Frau Heller. I don’t need school. I know everything there is to know about surviving,” he nodded assuredly.
“Oh, you think so?” she asked. “You know how to survive on the streets, yes, but do you know how to survive in the world you are living in now? This is a different world, with different rules and…” she looked at herself in the wall-mounted mirror behind the child, “…different villains.”
“Yes, if you cannot read or write, you can never learn anything new about places and things you encounter in this world you live in now,” Heinz mentioned, his tone far more amicable than it had been thus far.
“I can read and write. My mother taug
ht me with books before she died,” Radu boasted.
The Hellers looked at each other. Greta, in particular, was concerned about this. She had hoped the boy’s illiteracy would give her a reason to feign his basic tuition, so that she could employ his arcane skills without anyone noticing. But with him knowing what he was writing or reading, the feat proved more complex.
“How much?” Heinz asked. Even he was surprised that he showed interest.
“Enough to sound out words and to write my name,” Radu said, and loaded his tongue with pudding.
“Well, I am going to give you some lessons myself,” Greta smiled.
Her husband stopped eating and frowned with his head tilted to one side. His wife, the socialite, philanthropist, busy business woman…was going to teach a disadvantaged street child to read and write?
“Just some, until he is ready to join others his age in school,” she smiled at Heinz, her tone light and reassuring.
“You want to put him in a public school?” Heinz asked.
“I don’t need school,” Radu said under his breath.
“Why not?” Greta asked.
Her husband tried not to voice his real concern in front of the child, but he spoke through his teeth, “Roma people…”
She knew full well that Roma people in general were shunned by most cultures, and even in Germany he would have a hard time in a public school. But Greta was merely keeping up the ruse she needed to get what she needed from Radu. She had no intention of enrolling him in school. His part in her end game was far too important.
“Radu, we start tomorrow, my dear,” Greta winked. “You will like it, I promise. Just me and you. No other children or stupid recitations. We will begin with picture cards, alright? How would you like that?”
The boy nodded indifferently. He would be willing to appease his new keeper as long as she kept feeding him the delicious yellow cream pudding they called custard. Radu had no intention of staying long, certainly not indefinitely. Much as they spoiled him, much as he enjoyed not having to suffer the cold or struggle for food, it was simply not in his nature to be domesticated like a puppy. He was a wolf. Always, since he was a little boy, he likened himself to a wolf, a wild and free creature that would rather suffer the elements and roam where he wanted, than to be kept as a pet and have no choice in his own fate.
