Poison Fruit (27 page)

In the park outside my window, the Christmas lights on the big spruce continued to sparkle through the falling snow. I gazed at them for a while, absently petting Mogwai, before turning out my own lights and going to bed.

I slept well. Tonight, the shadow of my nightmare kept its distance, and I was at peace with the world.

And then in the morning, Stefan called, shattering that peace.

Twenty-six

I
was making coffee when the call came.

“Daisy.” Stefan’s voice sounded grave when I answered, and I got a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. Whatever dire favor he’d been hinting at, it was going to be asked of me.

“Hey,” I said with a lightness I didn’t feel, trying to fend off the inevitable. “Are you back in Pemkowet?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Is everything okay in, um . . . ?” I couldn’t for the life of me remember the name of the town in Poland where he’d been for the past weeks.

“Wieliczka,” Stefan supplied. “Yes, thank you. Would you happen to be free anytime today? There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

I poured a carafe of water into the coffeemaker. “Does this have to do with that favor you mentioned?”

“Yes,” he said. “I’m afraid it does.”

Great. I switched on the coffeemaker. “I don’t suppose you’d care to cut the cryptic eldritch crap and enlighten me, would you?”

“No.” There was a trace of humor in his voice, but it didn’t alleviate the gravity. “As I have said, this is something that must be done in person, Daisy.”

I sighed. “Yeah, I figured. I have to go into the station for a few hours this morning, but I’m free in the afternoon. Will that work?”

“Yes,” Stefan said. “Would you be able to come to my condominium at two o’clock?”

The word
condominium
sounded funny in his Eastern European accent; or maybe it was just the idea of a ghoul—my bad, one of the
Outcast—living in a condominium. Immortality and homeowner’s leases didn’t seem like two things that went hand in hand. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll be there.”

“Thank you.”

So much for peace.

All morning long, a fog of apprehension clung to me. What, exactly, constituted a dire favor for one of the Outcast? Maybe Stefan had suffered some kind of injury doing whatever the hell he was doing in Poland and wanted to feed on my super-size emotions to restore his strength. That would explain why he had to make the request in person . . . sort of. But I’d seen Stefan’s method of dealing with a serious injury last summer. When that psychopath Jerry Dunham had shot out his knees, Stefan had freaking
impaled
himself on his sword, dying and reincarnating in a heartbeat, as good as new.

Besides, Stefan had mentioned the possibility of a favor before he even left for Poland . . . right before he kissed me.

Oh, I hadn’t forgotten about that kiss. As far as kisses went, it was fair to say that one had rocked my world.

By noon, I gave up trying to guess. I logged my hours on my time card, went home and made myself a tuna salad sandwich, watched an old
Law & Order
episode—ever notice that there’s always a
Law & Order
episode on somewhere?—and spent the remaining time practicing my psychic shield drill, just in case Stefan tested me to make sure I’d been diligent. Last night’s encounter with Bethany was a good reminder that I needed to keep my skills honed.

At two o’clock, I presented myself at Stefan’s condominium.

“Daisy.” Stefan greeted me at the door. He gave me one of his courtly little bows and smiled at me, and my heart lurched absurdly in my chest. “It is good to see you. Please, come in.”

“It’s good to see you, too,” I said in the small foyer. It was, although he looked tired. I wondered if it was due to jet lag, the draining effect of being away from a functioning underworld while traveling, or the ominous favor.

“Let me take your coat,” he said, helping me out of my leather jacket.
Yes, it was freezing outside, and no, I hadn’t worn the Michelin Man coat. “Come inside. I’d like to introduce you to a dear friend.”

Aside from an impressive array of edged weapons hung on one wall and a museum-quality fourteenth-century Bohemian parade shield on display in a Plexiglas case, Stefan’s condo featured sleek, minimalist furnishings, high ceilings, polished wood floors, and a big picture window with a great view of the river.

Today, there was a wheelchair parked in front of the window. The man sitting in it gazed at me with dark, luminous eyes, an indecipherable yearning in his expression.

“Daisy, this is Janek Król,” Stefan said. “Janek, this is Daisy Johanssen, who serves as liaison to the goddess Hel in Pemkowet.”

“It is a pleasure,” Janek Król said in slurred, softly accented English. Reaching for a pair of forearm crutches, he began struggling to rise.

“Oh, please!” I said quickly. “There’s no need to get up!”

“Please.” He gave his head a dismissive shake. “Sometimes manners are all that stand between us and the end of civilization.”

So I waited while Janek Król completed the arduous task of levering himself upright and taking a step away from his wheelchair, his feet dragging reluctantly. At least it gave me time to study him. He had a thick crop of bushy gray hair and a gaunt, lined face, those dark, expressive eyes set in deep sockets. It was hard to place his age; he looked to be in his mid-sixties, but I had a feeling he was younger. I realized with a shock that he was one of the Outcast. It shouldn’t have been a shock—after all, he was a friend of Stefan’s—but I’d never considered the fact that an Outcast could be disabled.

“There.” With a lopsided smile, Janek extended one hand. His ring and pinky fingers remained folded back against his palm, unable to straighten. “It is not a
good
handshake, but it is a handshake. A proper greeting for a beautiful American girl.”

I shook his hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Król.”

“And you, Miss Johanssen.” His pupils waxed briefly as he drew a sharp breath, but they steadied just as fast. His body might have been compromised, but it was obvious that his willpower and discipline
were strong—as strong as Stefan’s or maybe even stronger. “Please, call me Janek.”

“Daisy,” I said in turn. “How can I, um, help you?”

Janek glanced at Stefan, who gestured to a table in the dining space. A tray sitting on it contained a clear glass bottle of amber liqueur and three shot glasses. “I procured a bottle of
nalewka
for the occasion,” Stefan said. “Traditional Polish spirits. Let us sit together and drink while Janek tells you his story.”

Janek nodded in agreement. “Then you may decide if you are willing to help me, young Daisy.”

My tail twitched reflexively. “Okay.”

With another prodigious effort, Janek returned to his wheelchair. He set the forearm crutches aside and allowed Stefan to maneuver him to a seat at the head of the table where a chair had been cleared. I took the chair to his left, and Stefan sat opposite me. It all felt very formal, which didn’t help settle my nerves. My thoughts skittered all over the place. I found myself wondering if it was a regular thing for Stefan to hold councils at his dinner table. Somehow, I didn’t think so. Hell, I didn’t even know if he ever used his dinner table—the Outcast can eat and drink, but a lot of them don’t bother, since they can’t take any sustenance from it.

Then I tried to recall if I’d ever seen Stefan eat or drink anything other than a parsimonious sip of water, and finally remembered that yes, we’d had coffee together at Callahan’s after Thad Vanderhei’s funeral, which didn’t seem like a particularly good omen. Stefan had commented that it was dreadful—the coffee, that is, which was true, but it was cheap and refills were free. Although Thad Vanderhei’s funeral was pretty dreadful, too. That was where I’d been on the verge of
totally
losing my temper and causing a major scene—as well as possible structural damage—and had voluntarily consented to let Stefan drain my fury, which had averted the crisis but forged the bond between us.

And thinking about
that
made me wonder how many other people Stefan was bonded to—if the bond was as powerful, or if that was a dubious side effect of my super-size emotions—and why I hadn’t seriously wondered about it before.

Yeah, those are the thoughts that flashed through my mind in the time it took Stefan to fill three shot glasses with traditional Polish spirits and distribute them. Did I mention that I was nervous?

Janek Król raised his glass, holding it carefully in his crabbed hand.
“Na zdrowie!”
he said. “To your health.”

Unsure whether to sip it or slam it, I watched and waited. Sip, apparently. It tasted sweet and faintly herbaceous, a bit like cough syrup. Not that I’d ever had a cough—I never got sick—but Jen and I had dared each other to drink a bottle when we were teenagers in search of a legal buzz.

“You will be wondering about my condition.” Janek set the glass down. “In English it is called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.” He pronounced the foreign words with care, struggling not to slur. “I believe in America you call it after a famous player of baseball, Lou Gehrig.”

I nodded. “Lou Gehrig’s disease.”

“It is a
bitch
of a disease.” He spat the word. “And I have endured it for almost three-quarters of a century.”

“I’m sorry,” I murmured. Stefan sipped his liqueur without comment.

“It is not your fault.” Janek waved his hand. “It is no one’s fault. But it is a bitch of a disease.”

He told me his story.

Before that afternoon, I hadn’t known much about Lou Gehrig’s disease. I hadn’t known much about the history of Poland under German occupation during World War II, either. I mean, I knew about the Holocaust and the concentration camps and the general course of
events, but it had all seemed very distant. Well, except for that time I watched
Saving Private Ryan
, which obviously doesn’t count.

Listening to Janek Król tell his story, it felt very immediate, very real, and very, very horrifying.

He told it in a matter-of-fact manner without belaboring the details.
He had been a teacher, a man of profound Christian faith, and a childless widower. He had been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease after experiencing symptoms far milder than he did today shortly before the Nazi German invasion in 1939.

Oh, and for the record, the disease is incurable, inexorably debilitating, and inevitably fatal. It really is a bitch.

I hadn’t known about the Nazis’ efforts to eradicate ethnic Poles, the thousands sent to the concentration camps or killed outright, and I hadn’t known there was a Polish government in exile, coordinating resistance efforts including an organization dedicated to providing shelter, food, and false documents to Jews across the country.

“Oh, yes,” Janek said in a dry voice. “It is estimated that it took ten Poles to save the life of one Jew.”

In the ongoing cultural genocide during the occupation, in which a lot of academic institutions were destroyed, surviving Polish children were forbidden to receive an education beyond the elementary level, the theory being that it would prevent a new generation of leaders from arising. Even as his condition continued to deteriorate, Janek’s role in the resistance had been as a teacher, part of an underground campaign to educate those very children.

“An important role,” he acknowledged. “Not a
vital
role. But I knew people who performed such roles, providing military intelligence to the government in exile. In 1941, the Gestapo began to suspect such a man of my acquaintance, an asset of great value.” He shrugged. “I took his place.”

“How?” I asked softly.

Stefan refilled our shot glasses with liqueur. Janek took an effortful sip and coughed. “How is not important,” he said. “Nowadays, such details do not matter, only to historians. It is enough to say it was done. The suspicions of the Gestapo were diverted, and they took me instead
of him.” A spasm convulsed his right shoulder and ran down his arm, and the shot glass slipped from his hand, falling onto the table. Janek swore in Polish.

“It’s okay,” I said while Stefan rose to fetch a dishcloth. “You really don’t have to tell me this.”

Janek fixed me with his intense gaze. The hunger in his eyes was palpable, and I fought the urge to kindle a shield. “Yes,” he said. “I do.” He waited until Stefan had mopped up the spill and refilled his glass before continuing. “I knew I would never return from this mission and I was at peace with it. Already, I was a dead man walking. I told myself it was not a form of suicide, that there was no sin intended, and that God would forgive me for the sacrifice I made. But I lied to myself. I knew what I was doing and why. And so did God.”

There wasn’t a whole lot one could say in response to that, so I didn’t say anything.

Wrapping his two fingers and thumb around the shot glass, Janek lifted it to his lips, sipped and grimaced. “The Gestapo questioned me for many days. You will have read about such techniques, for your own government used them not so very long ago. It was only the knowledge that I was giving my life to save another’s, to serve my country, that gave me the strength to endure.” He stared into the distance. “To this day, I do not know how it is that I failed.”

An involuntary sound escaped me.

“Oh, yes.” Janek’s gaze shifted back to me. “Just before he killed me, my tormentor made certain I knew.
You let a few things slip
,
Mr. Król
, he said to me.
You’re not who you’re pretending to be. But that’s all right. We’ve got the right fellow now
.” His crippled hand tightened around the glass. “To prove it, he recited my acquaintance’s name and address, the names of his wife and children. I was filled with a rage and despair such as I have never known. Seeing this, my tormentor laughed. And then he said they had no further use for me, and shot me.”

Across the table, Stefan’s pupils waxed in silent fury.

“So.” Janek relinquished his grip on the shot glass. “I died; and I returned. The first of many times. That is how I discovered that God
did not forgive my sin.” His mouth tightened. “Of what happened next, I will not speak to such a beautiful young woman.”