City of Lost Dreams (26 page)

THIRTY-ONE

S
arah gasped as she plunged through Gottfried’s energy field, zapped by a sharp electrical current. She staggered for a moment, and when she regained her footing she turned back. Gottfried had been replaced by two young boys. One of them, the leaner one, carried a crossbow that was nearly as big as he was. The leaner boy’s energy was . . . strange. It was pulsing and clicking, almost like a clock, or a bomb. The two ran down the steps and Sarah, pulled by some magnetic force she couldn’t name, followed them into the garden.

“Gottfried,” the plumper boy said. This must be Heinrich. She could see his sullen expression in this child. He pointed. “Look. Mama’s cat.”

But the boy Gottfried had fallen to the ground; the pulsing energy of his body had exploded and he was convulsing, his young body twisting and turning in unnatural ways, his eyes rolling back until they were all whites. Sarah looked at Heinrich to see what he would do.

He picked up the crossbow, took aim, and shot the cat.

The two boys vanished, only to be replaced by versions of themselves, seated at a chessboard in the garden. Their bodies flickered. They were little boys, wiry teens, young boys again, then in their twenties. Always playing chess, always facing each other across the board. Always the same hot rivalry, the same crackling tension.

“Heinrich,” said Gottfried. “Your move.”

The boys were intense, and the men more so. Gottfried was confident, but unhappy. Heinrich was angry. Angry and jealous.

“This may be our last game here,” said Gottfried. He looked exactly like himself now. This had to be recent.

“Not necessarily,” said Heinrich.

Gottfried made a move on the chessboard. Heinrich smiled and moved his own piece.

“I have beaten you at last, brother,” he said.

“Your skills have improved.” Gottfried leaned back in his chair. “I did not expect such a bold move from you.”

“It’s called the ‘shower of gold.’”

Sarah’s mind raced—where had she just heard about this chess move? From Nico. The move he claimed someone made on Herr Dorfmeister’s chessboard.

“There is a woman named Bettina Müller,” Heinrich was saying now, “a scientist. She works at the university. I’ve made friends with her assistant. This woman—Frau Doktor Müller—is involved in very important medical research. My company does not say what this is, but they are willing to pay a great deal to make sure she does not sell this research to foreign investors. This research will help our company, help Austria. This woman must be stopped. I need your help.”

So it was Gottfried
,
Sarah thought with a chill. Gottfried, loden-wearing Austrian patriot horseman, not to mention sexual maestro, who had stolen Bettina’s laptop?

Shower of gold. Shower of gold? Surely it wasn’t Gottfried who had—

She needed to get out of here. Before Gottfried returned.

Sarah shut her eyes. Philippine. She had to find Philippine.

“Come to the grotto. Come see what Philippine has made.”

Sarah opened her eyes. It was Ferdinand and Philippine again, surrounded by guests. A party. Musicians. They were drunk, laughing. It was nighttime and the guests held candles. They waved them around, making circles of light, and hooting. Sarah followed the crowd to the grotto, where a young man, elegantly dressed, sat manacled in a chair. The straps were made of leather and attached to metal locks. The man was laughing and struggling and the guests circled him, some taunting, some encouraging.

“It is a riddle!” Ferdinand cried. “Solve it and the chair will set you free!”

“You have to break the glass,” Philippine said. “But the glass is inside the locks.”

“I cannot . . .” the man gasped, and he rocked the chair.

“What is the riddle?” asked one of the guests.

“What can the blind man not do?” Philippine smiled. Sarah took a step back. Philippine seemed to be looking straight at her.

“The blind man can’t see!” the young man in the chair cried. But nothing happened. The guests began calling out suggestions. Sarah took a step toward Philippine.

Help me,
she whispered.
I don’t have much time.

 • • • 

“P
hilippine?”

It was Ferdinand. Standing next to her, looking straight at her. Her body felt . . . strange. Filled with energy but somehow unfamiliar, as if she . . .

Ferdinand took her hand. She could see him take it; she could see her arm rising; but she could only feel a slight electrical charge, a faint warmth.

She was holding the hand of Archduke Ferdinand, sovereign of Further Austria, who died in 1595.

Ferdinand led her toward the building that housed his collection of curiosities. Sarah could see her own jeans-clad legs and short leather boots, but she could also see, overlapping her present-day self, another self, someone wearing a fine dress of embroidered silk.

She hadn’t just found Philippine. She
was
Philippine.

“I have something to show you, my princess,” said Ferdinand.

It was the strangest sensation. They had overlapped, somehow. Like magnets.

“I’m no princess,” said Philippine. Sarah had said these words, too, almost five hundred years in the future. She had said them to Pols.

“You gave up much when you married me,” Sarah found herself saying now, as Philippine. “You endured your father’s wrath and the scorn of your friends, and you missed the chance for an alliance which would have brought you even more power.”

“I do not seek power.”

“I am glad to hear it.”

Ferdinand held Sarah’s gaze for a moment, and Sarah could feel how strong the bond was between him and Philippine. The things they had both given up for love and the differences between them—where they came from, what they wanted—only served to intensify their connection.

Ferdinand led her up the stairs and into the long hallway of the
Kunstkammer
. Gottfried had been right, it was nearly the same in his time as it had been in Ferdinand’s. No rug, no lights, fewer things on display. It seemed the oliphant hadn’t been acquired yet; perhaps the elephant was still alive. Ferdinand led Philippine (and Sarah with her) over to a small table. On it was an alabaster and marble toy castle, checkered and cantilevered like an Escher painting.

“It is a safe place, my darling. Watch.”

His hands moved over the castle, pressing first one thing and then another. At last, the drawbridge of the castle opened, revealing an empty compartment.

“An amusing contraption, to hold such a serious thing,” said Philippine gravely. “This is not a cure for the rash. This is different. This is . . .”

“Immortality,” said Ferdinand.

Philippine reached into her pocket and removed a small vial.

“This is why the Fleece must be hidden,” she said sharply to Ferdinand. “Do you understand what immortality means? Do you? Eternal life. Do you understand the temptation and the curse?”

“I do.”

“You think you can withstand it? You think immortality can be hidden in a box? I tell you it cannot. I would rather these stones be immortal.”

Philippine raised the vial and smashed it against the floor.

Ferdinand’s face was white. But he took Philippine’s hand and kissed it.

“You are right,” he said. “Thank you.”

Philippine withdrew a second vial.

“This is the antidote,” she said. “I will put this in your castle within a castle. But I will not practice from that book anymore. You must take the Fleece away from here. You must bury it deep. It must be hidden until the end of time.”

Time, thought Sarah. She didn’t have much time. Gottfried would be coming back. Sarah could feel herself inside Philippine, feel the woman’s blood all around her. And then, Philippine’s voice inside her head.

“What do you seek here?”

Philippine’s voice was infinitely gentle.

“I seek a cure for someone I love,” Sarah answered.

“The need is great?”

“Yes.”

“The need is always great.”

“This is different.”

“It always is.”

“Please help me.”

“We will help each other. You must go now. He is coming.”

 • • • 

S
arah was standing in the same place, the same room, but she was completely alone. All the phantoms had disappeared, and she could feel that she was firmly back in the present, and the present alone. The drug had worn off, abruptly this time. The lights of the gallery had gone out. The clicking had stopped. The objects in the room were barely visible in the fading light coming in from a high row of small windows. She looked down.

She was holding a small vial.

She was holding the antidote to eternal life.

THIRTY-TWO

“M
ax. Max, wake up.”

“Is it morning?”

“It is almost evening,” said the little man. “You slept all day. We have work to do. Wake up.”

“The folio?” Max muttered.

“Fascinating. In Ferdinand’s own hand, with later notations by Edward Kelley.”

“Kelley?”

“Kelley had access to all of Rudolf’s manuscripts. How it came to end up in your family library is another story.”

“So what’s it all about?”

“The notations are instructions. And in some cases, spells. To be used in one location only, the Star Summer Palace.”

“To do what?”

“Precisely. It has always been a mysterious building. No one was ever clear precisely what went on there. Or why Ferdinand designed it the way he did. They thought he was building a folly, or a love nest. But now I think the entire structure was designed for a specific purpose.”

“Well?”

Before Nico could answer, Jose came barreling through the door, hair wild.

“It’s Pollina,” he said. “She send me text not to disturb her so I don’t but finally I worried and—” A strangled cry came from his throat. “She’s gone.”

THIRTY-THREE

“S
arah?” Gottfried. It was Gottfried walking down the hallway. Present-day Gottfried. The Gottfried who had stolen Bettina’s laptop. The Gottfried who . . .

Sarah shoved the vial deep into her pocket. She needed to think about why Philippine had given this to her, instead of something that would help Pols, but right now she needed to get out of being in a secluded sixteenth-century castle with a potentially homicidal maniac. Where was her purse? Not that a Swiss Army knife would be much help if Gottfried was intent on killing her. She looked out the window, and judged the distance to the ground.

“I’m so sorry I was delayed,” said Gottfried. “And I have bad news for you, I’m afraid. I was finally able to find the key to the library, but when I went in to get the book from its case, I found this.” He showed her a card.

Removed for curatorial purposes.

“Heinrich must have lent it to some museum,” he said. “I am surprised. Usually we let nothing out of our sight. Ah, well, but we will have a nice dinner anyway.”

“Thank you for looking.” Sarah’s mind was racing. “I really do appreciate it. But while you were gone, I had a phone call. A work crisis. I need to get back to . . . to Boston. As soon as possible. I’m afraid I can’t stay the night.”

“Very well.” Gottfried took her arm. “I will drive you to the airport and you can explain to me what a crisis in musicology consists of.” He reached into his pocket.

A harsh blast of hot, white light hit Sarah’s face like a bomb going off. It strobed as she closed her eyes and threw her arm across her face. She heard a thud, and a grunt, and then she was grabbed around the neck and forced into something—onto it—and she was shouting but she was
blind
, and someone was binding her, gripping her, and she could hear more grunting and thrashing and her wrists were locked into place and she felt metal across her waist and legs. She was manacled to a chair.

She could see spots. She could see black spots, and then colored whorls, and then she could dimly make out Gottfried on the ground in front of her. He was having a seizure, shuddering and convulsing. And standing over him was another man.

Heinrich.

She was strapped to a chair. Bound. She tried to kick her legs as hard as she could, but the straps held. Straps that fitted into metal locks.

“It’s very effective, isn’t it?” said Heinrich. “Ferdinand’s little party game. He would make his guests sit in it, then lock them down and not let them loose until they had answered a riddle.”

“What the fuck?” Sarah said. “Look at your brother! Help him!”

“I am well aware that my brother is having an epileptic fit. There are many causes of epilepsy, but they say in his case it is a defect on chromosome 20. The telomeres bind to themselves and form a ring. So his number 20 is an O, not an I. An old Hapsburg gene that has resurfaced. The price of all that inbreeding to keep the family close.”

“Fascinating,” snapped Sarah. “To repeat my earlier question: what the fuck?”

“Oh.” Heinrich pursed his lips as Gottfried’s convulsions ceased and he lay still, apparently unconscious. “I am afraid that you know too much for me to let you go. But thank you for the rat.”

Thank God,
Sarah thought.
Thank God we switched the rats
. “Bettina Müller is working on a cure for defects in chromosome 20,” Sarah said. “Is that why you want the rat, to cure your brother? Because maybe I can help.”

Heinrich laughed a small, tight laugh. “My brother’s epilepsy has been useful. I see no need to cure it, especially since only an hour ago he threatened me. Told me to leave you alone. Gottfried’s seizures are very easy to trigger these days, you know. All it takes is a burst of light. Sets off an electrical storm in the brain. Isn’t it interesting, how it really does all come down to energy imbalances? Soon all scientists will sound like New Age hippies.”

Sarah began carefully testing the strength of the metal and wood that held her fast. It was five hundred years old, this chair—it must have a weak point.

“He does not remember what happens during the attacks. So I have to tell him. Sadly, he is often violent. He will awaken to discover that he has hurt you, I’m afraid.”

Heinrich slipped a noose over Sarah’s head. A noose made of piano wire.

“Like the cat?” she asked quickly. “Did you make him think that he had shot the cat with the crossbow?”

Heinrich paused, staring at her, frowning. “How do you know that?” he asked. “Gottfried would not have told you.”

“I know you killed Herr Dorfmeister, too,” said Sarah, trying to twist around. She had to keep him talking until she found a weakness in the chair. “How did you pull that one off?”

“Gottfried went to see if he had missed anything in the apartment. He had a seizure. The old man called me. Gottfried wears a bracelet with my number on it. I took care of Herr Dorfmeister. But don’t worry. For him, a nice old Austrian gentleman, I used a drug that causes a painless death. But I’m afraid you have no one but yourself to blame for Nina.”

Sarah froze. “You killed Nina? And Gerhard Schmitt?”

“How pleasant it is to speak of such things openly. I could not share this even with my brother, you see, because he thinks I am weak, and it is better that way. It was only supposed to be her. I saw you together, going into the lab. I followed her, only to ask what you had talked about. She grew suspicious of my questions, began to accuse me of things, and that was when that blond fop showed up.”

“Gerhard?”

“The little witch would sleep with him, but not with
me
? They accused me of spying, threatened to go to the police. I had no choice, you see.”

It was no use. The chair was solid.

“My brother suspected, I think,” Heinrich continued. “That’s why he warned me to stay away from you. He is loyal, but I fear that eventually he would have cracked. His strange ideas about honor have become inconvenient. Perhaps it was fate that saved you both in the stables. If you had died then, I would never have gotten the rat.”

“You set the fire in the stable,” said Sarah. “You tried to kill us both.”

Heinrich shrugged. “Among other things, I hate horses.”

He began to tighten the garrote, then leaned over and whispered, “The tourists come to Vienna, and they enjoy the opera, and the Sacher torte, and they buy a souvenir hat and they think what a lovely civilized place Austria is. A little fussy, perhaps, but safe as houses. They forget the past. They forget what is in our stars.” Sarah could feel the wire cutting into her throat. The room began to go black. The wire was cutting off the flow of blood to her brain.

“I will kill him, too. I will be the heir. My sons will be the sons to inherit. Gottfried cannot be trusted. If he told some American bitch he barely knows about Herr Dorfmeister . . .”

“No. I saw,” Sarah whispered. “You won the chess game. In the garden. You beat Gottfried. It was the shower of gold. It was your move.”

Heinrich stopped tightening the noose. “How did you know that?” The garrote loosened slightly.

“I saw you.”

“That is a lie.”

She had seen them. She had seen. The garden. The game. The chair. She had seen the chair she was sitting in before. In the garden. Philippine. Ferdinand. A riddle. What can’t the blind man do?
The blind man can’t see.

You have to break the glass,
Philippine said
. But the glass is inside the locks. What can the blind man not do?

“You must be a witch,” said Heinrich, tightening the noose again. “We burn witches here at the
Schloss
. You wouldn’t be the first.”

The blind man can’t see.
C.
A note. A musical note.

As Heinrich’s noose started to cut off her air again, Sarah began to scream. She wasn’t normally the screaming type. But this was a very particular scream.

A scream in C. Every piece of glass has a natural resonance. Every material on earth has it. A frequency. Match the pitch and the molecules will vibrate. Do it loud enough . . . Sarah did not attempt a high C, but her pitch was perfect, and she could sing very loud.

As she did, she felt something vibrate and then shatter inside the metal locks as they released. Sarah’s now free hands shot up and she lurched forward, grabbing Heinrich’s throat and kneeing him in the balls as hard as she could.

Heinrich’s scream came pretty close to a high C. Sarah shoved him roughly and he stumbled backward into a glass case, which shattered. A solid alabaster skull with ruby eyes rolled off one of the shelves and hit Heinrich on the head. He fell to the floor.

Sarah removed the piano wire from her throat, choking still. She could feel blood, but the cut wasn’t deep enough, thank God.

Thank the past.

Gottfried was coming to. She sank to the floor next to him.

“Gottfried,” she croaked through the burning in her throat.

“Heinrich,” he whispered. “Heinrich, what have I done now?”

“Gottfried, it’s not you. It’s your brother. It’s Heinrich who does these terrible things. It’s not you. Heinrich is the murderer.”