Grasping for the Crowns (The Powers Book 2)

by Alma Boykin

  Mátyás made a sympathetic noise, and both men returned to their work. István finished looking over the books, signed what he needed to, made a few notes on things he had questions about, including repeating his concerns about Tisza Enterprises, then got ready to return to the town palace.

  Mátyás looked up from confirming an army order. “What do you think about requesting some war prisoners to work for us? Not in the main mill, but in the yard where we need strong backs?”

  István thought about it. “I’m not in favor, not really. I know the prisoners need to earn their keep, but they’re Slavs, Russian Slavs. Stubborn, sneaky, lazy unless their bellies are empty. I mean, they make good soldiers and farmers, but I’m not sure we’d gain much by trying to have them work in the yard or mill.”

  “Do many of them speak Hungarian or Bohemian? That you know of,” Mátyás asked.

  “I didn’t stop to ask, those times we got close to each other.” The memories began playing and István fought them back down. “Some of the officers might speak German or French.”

  His brother sniffed. “No help then, and I’m not going to ask our men to learn Russian. There’s no point to wasting the time on a language they’ll never use. I’ll tell Major Krupkii we have no place for them at the moment.”

  “Do that. I’m off then.”

  Mátyás started struggling to his feet and István waved him back. “Give my regards to your lady.”

  István nodded. “I will. We’ll see you come summer at Nagymatra?”

  “Perhaps. Unless the Army changes the train schedules again.” His eloquent sigh took in the difficulties of shipping, the fluctuating schedules, and the slowness of repairs.

  “Understood. God be with you.”

  “And with you.”

  “Thanks be to God!” Barbara’s happy cry met István as he walked into the library at Nagymatra.

  “What?”

  She held out one of the newspapers that had come earlier that day, while he’d been out speaking to Hans, the huntmaster, and Master Gellért about plans for the fall. István took the paper and read. “Amen.” He dropped the paper on the table as Barbara embraced him, holding him close and weeping onto his shoulder.

  “The war will end soon, won’t it? If the Russians won’t fight, the war has to end for the empire,” she sniffed into his ear.

  “May it please God, I hope so,” he said. István knew better in his heart, but he couldn’t bring himself to darken Barbara’s happiness. Through no fault of her own, that anyone could tell, her milk had dried up and they’d had to put Erzsébet on goat milk like her brother. Barbara had mourned the loss, certain that she’d failed as a mother, and Magda, the nurse, had been unable to convince her otherwise. István just held Barbara and made what he hoped were soothing noises. He felt a little guilty, since he’d wanted his daughter weaned so he could enjoy marital congress with his wife. Now he kept silent, holding Barbara and allowing himself to hope, just barely hope, that perhaps this might be the beginning of peace.

  “Weeeeeee!” He heard the patter of feet and felt something, or rather someone, hit the back of his legs with a firm thump. “Ma, Ma, mamamamamamamam no!” Little Imre bounced on pudgy legs, very fresh from a bath, judging by the damp trail leading out of the library and the damp patches on his father’s trouser leg—and his state of undress. “No, no, no!” He grinned up at his father.

  “Imre, come back, oh! I’m sorry my lord, my lady,” Magda said.

  Barbara wiped her eyes with one hand and grabbed Imre’s fist with the other. He babbled something, apparently very pleased with having escaped the nursery. “Imre, you are not to go running around without clothes on,” Barbara scolded, leading the toddler to Magda.

  “No! no, no, nonononono,” Imre flopped to the floor, or tried to, but his mother’s grip was too strong, and his nurse caught him before he could hurt anything. “Noooooo!”

  His wail of protest rang through the lodge and probably scared any deer still lingering south of Poland into flight, István thought as his ears rang. “I’m glad he’s no longer so quiet,” he ventured.

  The women gave him a look that suggested he might regret those words at some point. “The mountain air is good for children, my lord,” Magda said, resting an unhappy Imre on her hip and carrying him off to get dressed.

  Barbara wiped her hand dry on her skirt. “I’m glad Aunt Claudia is so good with children. And with Lady Marie.”

  “As am I.” There was no ill wind but blew a little good, and Claudia had been worth her weight in prime timber ever since she’d joined his household. She even ate less than most True-dragons, as far as István could tell. He walked over to the desk and picked up the mail, sorting through the letters. Barbara already had the newspapers in order for him to read. He preferred being at Nagymatra for many reasons, including the distance from bad news. By the time anything reached them, the urgency had already passed. He wondered again how his father could have tolerated living in Budapest for so long.

  “Dear,” Barbara interrupted his mental wandering. “Can . . . can we make peace without Germany? I mean the Americans are only at war with Germany, not with us. Could we . . .” Her words trailed off as István started to shake his head, then stopped.

  He took a deep breath. Then he set the mail down, walked over, and closed the door, checking outside for inadvertent listeners. “I do not know. I am not in the Foreign Ministry, and I do not know exactly what our agreement with Germany entails. I do know it would be dishonorable, but—”

  “But sinking ships from below without warning is also dishonorable, no matter what the German Navy says,” Barbara said. Anger snapped in her eyes. “And do not try to tell me that it is the same as hunting deer from behind bushes like my brother-in-law claims. Those are people in those ships.”

  Where is this coming from? Oh, Father Jozip I suspect. He’s a Franciscan at heart, as well as by Order. István preferred Fr. Martin as his confessor. Fr. Jozip’s penances tended to be more strenuous than seemed reasonable, at least the few times István had sought his council. “I won’t argue with you, my lady. But I suspect his Majesty and the Foreign Minister and Gen. Schwarzenberg have discussed the matter and will do what is best for the country as well as what is the most honorable.”

  “I hope you are right, my lord husband.”

  That night, when István approached Barbara, she did not refuse his attentions.

  The dawn twilight had just begun fading the stars when Agmánd and Aunt Claudia scratched on the bedroom door. «My lord?» István drew on a robe and tried to keep from waking Barbara, stepping out of the bedroom.

  «Yes?» He had a dreadful feeling that he knew the news.

  Aunt Claudia looked up at him. «My Lord, I regret to tell that you that Lady Marie has joined Lord Janos.»

  “Thanks be to God,” István whispered without realizing it.

  «She passed in her sleep,» Claudia said.

  Agmánd nodded. «Shall I inform the staff, my lord?»

  Through the partly open door, István heard Barbara make a sound. He said silently, «No, I’ll tell everyone. Stay quiet for now, and I’ll inform Lady Barbara, then the staff, those who do not already know.»

  The two True-dragons bowed. «Very good, my lord. Please accept my most sincere condolences,» Agmánd said.

  “Thank you. You may go.”

  István returned to the room and knelt beside the bed. Thank you, holy Lord. Thank you for your mercy. Thank you for easy passings. Please, holy Lord, may Mother’s sprit rest in peace. He prayed for several more minutes before waking Barbara.

  The next few days passed in a blur, much as had the days following Lord Janos’s death. The afternoon following Marie’s death, a doctor from Eger came up to the house and issued a death certificate. “I understand that she had been unwell for some time, my lord?”

  “Yes, Dr. Samsa. Her health began to decline after my father’s death last year, and she’s had several strokes.”

 
The physician made a sympathetic noise and signed the certificate. “The past year has been trying, especially for the very old and very young.” He gave István a shrewd look. “And for those more actively serving their nation.”

  István felt his temper starting to rise. “Indeed. And old injuries often return to plague even the otherwise young and fit-seeming, Dr. Samsa.” You do not want to see what my back looks like.

  “Indeed, my lord.” The narrow-eyed doctor took his fee, bowed, and departed. István watched his carriage disappear from sight. Then he sat in the chair behind his desk with a heavy thump, firmly enough to make his back protest. He closed his eyes and let his awareness drift to the House.

  He sensed sorrow, respect for Lady Marie, and consolation. As when his father had died, the Catholic members of the House would join and say a rosary later that evening for Lady Marie, while the Protestants prayed their own way. István felt numb.

  “István, what’s the matter?” his sister Judit asked two days later. She and her husband, Freiherr Walter Herald von Eschingen, had arrived a few hours before from Munich. They’d been on their way to Budapest to visit Mátyás, but had continued to Eger and Nagymarta once Mátyás told them the news. “Why aren’t you in mourning?”

  “I am.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t seem sad, or act as if you miss Mother. Not like you were when Father died, God grant him rest.”

  István crossed himself, as much from habit as from faith. “Father’s passing was a surprise, Judit. Mother . . .” The mother we knew disappeared six months ago. I’ve been mourning for half a year at least. But he couldn’t tell her that. She wouldn’t understand. “Mother started fading in January.”

  “But she was still here.”

  No, Judit, she wasn’t. “I’m sorry, Judit. You know that the rosary will be tonight?”

  “Yes.” She wiped her eyes with a handkerchief. “And the funeral will be tomorrow?”

  “No.” István turned, hands clasped behind his back, looking at the cold fireplace. “Two more days. There were some,” he considered his words. “Scheduling difficulties.” The priest at St. Barbara’s had balked at conducting the Mass because Lady Marie had died without having received extreme unction. Thanks be that Fr. Martin harbored no such qualms, and neither had Bishop Hovaks in Eger. Something else Judit didn’t need to worry about.

  “Oh?” Her question failed to draw an answer, and Judit gave her brother a cool look, then turned and left the library. He waited until her footsteps faded before settling into his favorite chair beside the cold fireplace. István leaned his head against the back of the seat and studied the pattern of stag heads and scrolls painted between the ceiling beams. He needed to speak with Fr. Martin about the funeral Mass. He needed to decide what to do about Clara and Jirina, now that Lady Marie no longer required their services. He needed to go to Kassa and give instructions to re-do part of the townhouse, and the same in Budapest. He needed to meet with representatives of the House’s families and start planning for winter. And he needed to at least pretend what he didn’t truly feel. He wondered when he would be able to do what he wanted to rather than what was necessary.

  The rosary that evening offered more comfort than István had imagined. He felt the support and faith of the House, as well as their respect and love for his mother. Lady Marie had been the softer half of the House leadership, giving and approachable, supporting his father and acting as a link between the Head and the weaker House members. István sensed the sincere grief for her passing, and it comforted him. At the same time, guilt and doubt gnawed his heart: how could he and Barbara live up to his parents’ example? Holy Lord, it is said that You never send trials stronger than we can bear. Please dear Lord, please may the war end soon and the hunger with it.

  After the official mourning was complete, István resumed his duties to the House and the empire. And he blessed the Lord for sending Barbara into his life. With Agmánd’s assistance and advice, and council from Aunt Claudia, she’d taken over running the household. Jirina remained to assist Magda with the children and to serve as Barbara’s secretary. To his surprise, Clara turned down an offer from Barbara’s Rozemberk cousins to attend to one of the family dowagers. “No, thank you, my lord. My brother’s manager needs workers at the munitions plant in Linz. They pay well, with better rations, and the shifts are only twelve hours, not twenty-four. Lady Marie, God rest her soul, was a good woman but with all respect, my lord, I want to do something else.”

  Nonplussed, all István could do was blink, write her an excellent reference, and send her with a travel bonus. Barbara had blinked as well. “She wants to do what?”

  “Work in the imperial armaments plant in Lantz.” He shook his head as he held one of Erszébet’s toys just out of her reach, playing with her in her cradle.

  “But she’s a proper woman, a lady.” Barbara started to say more, then caught herself.

  István guessed what she’d been about to say. “Mátyás and Cousin Imre informed me that the world has changed. Apparently it has changed even more than we could have guessed.” His daughter gurgled and smiled, and he shook her little rabbit again, lowering the soft toy so she could pull it from his hand and chew on one paw.

  Which raised an interesting question, István realized as he shaved the next morning. “Yes, that will be fine,” he told Szambor as the valet held up a shirt and collar for him. Clara had not been a member of the House. But what if Jirina or another House member wanted to leave the House’s lands and take work elsewhere. What responsibilities did they have to the House and vice versa? The men who left for seasonal work had always come home and had given part of their wages to the House as rent. The women rarely left unless they married out. István could not recall anything in the Chronicles that he’d read about a similar situation. Perhaps, he thought as Szombor finished arranging his collar and tie, he needed to go back to the years of the last major war and see what had been done.

  He also needed to check with the Power. He’d shunted that duty aside for the past few weeks, but István could delay it no longer. The next morning he left the house early, two hours before sunrise. He took the trail past the shrine to St. Hubert, climbing up the ridge behind Nagymatra. He smelled fall in the air, and as the day began to grow lighter, glimpsed hints of fog below the ridge, banking up against the southern slope of the mountains. He hiked up the old, old trail until he came to the remains of what had been a watch post, back in the days of endless war. Only a few stones remained of the foundation, and trees had crept into the centuries-old clearing. They needed to harvest the edges of the opening, István decided. The trees looked big enough, and straight, well shaped for timber. He took off his small rucksack, set his hiking staff down, and crouched, burying his fingertips in the summer-warm soil.

  The Power flashed into his mind. The now-familiar green-and-silver world appeared before his eyes, and he saw the Power’s lands, stretching over the Matra and into the plains to the north, brushing the mountains to the east as well. The land appeared healthy, like the House, although something felt just a bit off. Not wrong yet, and not bad or dangerous, but a little odd, like an instrument barely starting to go off key, or a single yellowing leaf on an otherwise healthy oak. István dropped the last of his defenses and let the Power take his mind with it. North and east, something lurked, watching. Galicia? No, Galicia remained null, twisted into itself, as if hiding. Something farther north, in the new Polish lands? No, the Matra said, and he glimpsed the northern Powers hissing toward Germany.

  Germany. István looked for House Hohenzollern, but could sense only the faintest, weakest of presences from Brandenburg. The junior branch of the House felt far stronger, but of King Wilhelm of Prussia István sensed barely a hint. In contrast, Emperor Josef Karl stood clear, bright as the day star where he stood in Karlstein, south of Prague. The greater Powers—Austria, Bohemia, Pannonia—appeared equally strong to the Matra’s awareness, suggesting that the Emperor and his buffer were doi
ng right by their people and lands. The Matra hinted to István that Josef Karl grew as Wilhelm Hohenzollern faded, drawing more energy and loyalty. István had never heard of such from the Powers, but then he’d never been Head and Guardian, and had never lived in times such as these before.

  Did the Matra require anything of the Guardian? István flinched from the sense of disappointment at his recent absence and acknowledged the warning contained in the message. But no, for now the Matra was content, although the trouble to the north and east made it restless and wary. István concurred with the creature’s sense of trouble. Something had to happen with Galicia: it must either return from its strange defensive retreat or fade away and cede the land to another Power. The Power of the Matra showed no interest in the lowlands, in fact it felt wary of even brushing the edge of Galicia’s territory with its own energies in case the “not right” might spread somehow. István assured the Power that the House had no desire to expand, even if asked. The Power released him.

  István came to himself facing north, sitting in the dew-soaked grass and watching the last morning star disappear into the pink and palest blue of dawn. Thank you, Lord, that His Majesty gets to deal with Bohemia and Galicia and I do not. His stomach growled, and he longed for coffee and a cigarette—and to sleep for the next few days. A handful of last-year’s nuts from the little bag in his rucksack assuaged his hunger for the moment, but István waited until he knew he’d fully returned to himself before trying to hike back to Nagymatra.

  He wished Janos were still alive, then felt guilty for not wanting his mother back as well. But she could not have helped him, not much, even in her prime. István longed to ask his father what he’d done during the war with Germany, how the House had coped, and what he remembered of his grandfather’s actions during the wars with Napoleon and in 1848. But Janos could not answer, and István recalled all too well the story of Saul trying to speak to Samuel’s spirit. And of the frauds and harm inflicted by the so-called spiritualists and Gypsy spirit speakers. No, he’d have to go on as he’d begun and hope that the Lord would send wisdom enough that he wouldn’t make any fatal mistakes.