Written in the Blood (27 page)

C
HAPTER
26

Outskirts of Dawson City, Canada

1944

T
his close to spring, Izsák did not usually risk driving the fifteen miles from their cabin into town. The Yukon, frozen since October into a white slab of river ice, choppy with its crusts of snow, was finally beginning to thaw, and he did not like to test the truck’s weight on its surface, preferring instead to hitch his dogs to the sled.

In two days’ time it was Georgia’s seventh birthday, and he had driven into Dawson to visit the post office and pick up the parcel that had arrived from Winnipeg. He and Lucy had pored over the Eaton’s catalogue for three weeks before placing a mail order for the cherry-red bicycle with its bright silver bell.

They both knew there was nowhere near their cabin for Georgia to learn to ride. For more than half the year the area was covered with snow, and even after the thaw the ground was uneven and harsh. Izsák would worry about that later. The smile on Lucy’s face when she’d seen the catalogue illustration had warmed him like a baker’s oven. Buying Georgia the bike might not be practical, she had reasoned, but neither was raising their daughter in the frozen wilderness, with no electricity or running water. That hadn’t stopped them from doing it, so why should a lack of roads prevent them from purchasing the bike?

Izsák agreed; rarely, he had discovered, was anything strictly practical particularly fun. Despite its challenges, he had grown to love the Yukon’s savage wilderness almost as much as his wife and daughter. They’d built a perfect life here, full of wonder and peace; as free from the horrors of close-living humanity as they could possibly get. During the short Yukon summer they could sit out on the deck until midnight and still have enough light to read. Lucy’s vegetable garden produced a steady crop of potatoes, carrots and turnips, and Izsák fished for grayling along the river.

But it was the wintertime he liked best. The world froze and grew still. The windows of their cabin thickened with ice and the wood stove burned day and night. Izsák shot caribou, elk and moose, hanging the meat from nearby trees to foil the attentions of scavengers. They clothed themselves in the heavy garments Lucy knitted from the wool Izsák picked up in town, and during the long nights they watched the ropey green ghosts of the aurora borealis and listened to the howling of the wolves.

They’d left New York fifteen years earlier. Izsák and Lucy’s memories of the Ready Eat Lunch Wagon’s last days grew dimmer each season, but they kept Emil Otto alive through stories, and sometimes Lucy would sing to Georgia the old German songs with which he had entertained her as a child. A framed photograph of Emil hung on the wall beside the stove.

A few miles due east of the cabin, Izsák guided the truck off the Overland Trail connecting Dawson to White Horse, and navigated along the track that skirted the black spruce forest close to their home. It was slow going, the old Chevy bouncing over ruts and frozen clods of earth. A raven circled above, the only movement in a sky so intensely blue it seemed encased in crystal.

Around a final bend and he saw it waiting in the distance, their cabin: a rough home of sawn logs with a covered porch, which Izsák had built the year before Georgia arrived. Beside the cabin stood the dog barn, attached to which was the lean-to that sheltered his sled.

He’d give his Malamutes a run later. In truth he should probably have run the dogs to Dawson – one of their last excursions before the weather grew too warm – but the Chevy’s clutch had been playing up recently, and he hadn’t wanted to leave the vehicle as Lucy’s only means of transport should she need one. She was pregnant again, for the first time in seven years. He didn’t know how that could be; he’d heard such a thing was impossible. But Georgia had arrived with barely a wrinkle in the fabric of their lives; Izsák had delivered her himself one evening as a white moon turned the snowy landscape into a field of diamonds.

Ahead, smoke was feathering from the stovepipe jutting from the cabin’s roof. He frowned when he saw it. Even this close to the thaw, he could feel the crunch of ice crystals in his nose. Despite the effort he’d put into insulating the cabin the draughts still blew freely, and without a fierce steady heat from the stove the night ahead would see them shivering in their beds.

Nudging a little extra speed from the Chevy, he heard its snow chains crackle and pop. The cabin grew larger in his windshield and he noticed that its door was open, banging to and fro in the breeze.

If the sight of the thinning wood smoke had bothered him, the sight of the swinging door froze his blood. Now he spotted something else: a dark figure, sunk in a deep drift of snow, perhaps twenty yards from the door.

Izsák slammed on the truck’s brakes and the vehicle canted sideways, slithering to a stop. Grabbing his hunting rifle from the gun rack, he killed the engine.

Immediately he heard the yapping of his dogs, and that was when he knew something dreadful had happened. The noise the pack was making was no Malamute greeting at his return; they sounded crazy. Yet despite their agitation, none of them waited outside. Even Nero, his lead dog, had retreated to the darkness of the barn.

Throwing open the truck’s door, Izsák dropped into snow up to his knees. He waded towards the stricken figure, his breath pluming, the frigid air like a cold brick pressed against his face.

Lucy. It could only be her.

She wasn’t moving, and the thought of what that might mean nearly bent him double in despair. How long had he been gone? Four hours? Time enough for loved ones to die and life to change.

And where was Georgia? Unless Lucy had only just collapsed, surely his daughter would have noticed her mother’s disappearance and gone to find her.

The whispery tendrils of smoke trailing from the chimney suggested his wife had been out here a while.

Don’t panic. Panic and you lose them.

He reached Lucy’s side and sank down beside her in crunching snow. She faced away from him, as still as a doll. Izsák pulled off his gloves, reached out a hand. Only then did he realise that the woman lying in the snow was not his wife.

The hair poking out from under her knit cap was grey instead of blond, that was the most obvious thing. Likewise, she was too small, too bent. He did not recognise her clothing. Relieved it wasn’t Lucy, but heart knocking in his chest just as hard, Izsák pulled her onto her back and stared down into the ravaged face of an old woman.

The crone’s eyes were milky with cataracts. Her skin, pouched and baggy, reminded him of dried fruit. Beneath a hooked nose, colourless lips were lined with wrinkles. Her mouth hung open. From between toothless gums seeped a thin mist of breath.

When he shook her, her chest heaved and her eyelids flickered. She whispered up at him, the word rattling in her throat. ‘. . . 
Gonnne
.’

Releasing her, Izsák strained to his feet, trying to fend off the terrible memory that rushed at him. His breath came in shallow gasps. As he stumbled towards the cabin, he tripped, fell, and used the stock of his rifle to lever himself to his feet. He arrived at the front step, slipped on ice, sprawled onto his back.

Almost comical, he thought. How Lucy would laugh if she saw him.

With a jumble of half-formed prayers spilling from his lips he grasped the wooden rail, hauling himself up to the porch. Strange that his strength should leave him like this. Strange what terror could do to a man.

Izsák pushed open the door and staggered inside. When he saw the overturned table and the spilled soup, he sobbed.

The cabin had only two rooms, with a snug half-loft for Georgia. Right now he was in the big room where they lived during the day and cooked their meals. He crossed to the bedroom he shared with Lucy.

He found her inside, collapsed on the floor, hands cradling the swell of her belly. Blood mantled her.

Too shocked to cry out, Izsák dropped down beside her and took her hand.

Lucy opened her eyes. After a moment they focused, and she found his face. ‘Oh, ’Sak. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. It got inside me, eating me up. I tried, I really did. But it kept coming back into my head and I couldn’t think. Couldn’t do anything to stop it.’

‘What happened?’

‘It took her. It took Georgia.’

He stared at his wife. ‘What took her? Where’s Georgia, Lucy? What happened?’

‘They . . . came. Two of them. The older woman and . . . the man with the strange clothes. Go, Izsák. Find her. Before it’s too late.’

‘Lucy, let me—’

She shook her head. ‘No. Leave me. Find Georgia.’ She coughed, a dark clot of blood. Screwing up her face, she sucked in a breath and closed her seaweed-green eyes. ‘Love you, ’Sak.’

‘Don’t say that to me!’ he roared. He shook her arm, and when she didn’t respond he grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her far harder than he ought. ‘Don’t you say that, Lucy! Don’t you say that!’

It was pointless, and he knew it. The life had already left her.

Izsák screamed out his agony. The tears came, blinding him. He wanted to lay his head on Lucy’s chest, to bury himself in her smell. Instead he dragged himself to his feet. Somehow he managed to turn his back on her. Bumping into furniture, bouncing off the rough-hewn walls, he navigated his way out of the cabin.

Izsák staggered down the steps, slipping and sliding on ice. He noticed that he clutched his rifle, that he must have grabbed it from the floor when he’d left Lucy.

It was useless until he loaded it. Hands shaking, he drew back the bolt and waded towards the old woman lying in the snow.

Her eyes were closed but breath still trickled from her mouth. Izsák dropped to one knee. He raised the gun and swept the area beyond the trees.

Nothing.

The landscape was frozen and still. Even the raven had vanished from the sky.

Izsák slung the rifle over one shoulder, slipped his hands under the old woman’s armpits and dragged her back to the cabin. Her boots clattered against the steps as he pulled her up onto the porch.

Inside, Izsák rolled her onto the couch. He crammed three dry logs into the wood burner. From a jug he poured icy water into a tin mug.

At any other time he would have felt guilt for what he did next. He flung the water into her face.

The crone’s eyes snapped open. Arching her back, fingers clawing at the couch, she let out a screech.

‘Where have they gone?’ Izsák shouted. ‘
Think
. Where will they go?’

‘
Gone
 . . .’ the woman rasped.

‘Gone where? Who are you? What’s your name?’

‘
Anke . . . my name . . . Anke . . 
.’

‘How old are you?’

Her eyes fluttered and closed. He slapped her, drawing blood from her mouth.

‘I asked you a question! How
old
are you?’

She began to weep, an awful whimpering sound. ‘
I’m twelve
,’ she said, voice like a child’s. ‘
Please . . . d . . . don’t hurt me, sir. I’m twelve, twelve years old. I’m Anke . . . Anke.
’

Izsák sat down hard, his heart a boulder in his chest. He stared at her, at the lines of her face, her milky white eyes.

And he knew: knew what had happened to Georgia.

Jumping to his feet, he went to the bureau beside the cabin door. He ripped open a drawer and pulled out boxes of ammunition, throwing them into a satchel he found on a hook. He picked up his rifle.

‘I’m sorry. I have to leave you,’ he said, knowing what that meant for her. Turning his back, he walked out of the cabin, down the steps and through snow towards his truck. He did not look back.

How much of a head start they had on him he did not know, nor what he would do when he found them. Inside the Chevy the first thing he saw, wrapped in brown packing paper and tape, was the cherry-red bicycle that had arrived from Winnipeg. He hauled it off the seat. Climbed behind the wheel.

Izsák started the truck. In the rear-view mirror his eyes looked dead.

Swallowing his grief, he tramped down on the accelerator and the truck lurched out onto the trail.

C
HAPTER
27

Shropshire, England

O
n the outskirts of Shrewsbury they found a service station with a food court. Inside, at a quiet table beside the windows, Leah drank a coffee and listened as Tuomas told his story.

She could not rid herself of the chill that had enveloped her beside her father’s grave. The memory of the stag – the way it stared at her, the way its skull opened like a flower when Tuomas’s rifle round hit it – was too recent, too shocking.

Despite that, she found herself unable to look away from his solemn grey eyes as he told her the story of his life in the cabin outside Dawson City, so filled with laughter and love, and how it had ended. The more he talked, the less aware she became of the night pressing against the glass, and of the other patrons in the restaurant.

His tale was wrenchingly sad, and he told it so tonelessly, and with such resignation, that she wanted to reach across the table and touch his hand. But she was not used to contact like that – it would have felt awkward, wrong – and the table remained a gulf between them.

Tuomas paused, as if sensing that he’d lost her, and then he shrugged. Leah dropped her gaze to her coffee mug, glanced back up. ‘You never found her.’

‘Not yet, but I will. She’s out there. I know that.’

‘What will you do then?’

He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them she saw flecks of azurite floating in the grey. ‘I’ll kill them both. There’s never been a way to force a
tolvaj
to abandon a body against its will. Georgia was seven years old when she was taken. That thing’s been riding inside her most of her life. Even if I could figure out a way to get rid of it, I doubt there’s anything left of Georgia any more. She’s been a prisoner too long. All I can do now is to try and end her suffering.’

‘You could do that?’ She flinched, dismayed at how accusatory her question had sounded. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I just . . . if the time comes, could you really carry it out?’

‘I have to.’

Leah felt her shoulders dip with exhaustion. ‘You’ve been looking all this time. Before the one at the lake, have you encountered others?’

‘Several. For a while I was quite the expert at finding them. I’ve tracked maybe twenty, all told. Killed about a quarter of those. Not as much luck in recent years. They’re dying out. Just like us.’ Tuomas leaned forward in his seat. ‘Those hunting you back at the farmhouse. That was no coincidence, them finding you there. They must have picked up your trail a while ago. You need to work out how long they’ve been following you, and where’s safe for you to be from now on.’

‘I can’t just go to ground.’

‘You have no choice.’

‘You’re right, I don’t. I’ve made promises. To Etienne. Others.’

‘If you don’t take this seriously—’

‘Of course I take it seriously. I’m hardly going to forget that thing. But at least you killed it.’

‘No. I didn’t. Not even close. We should have taken care of it permanently, but there wasn’t time. It’ll be back. I guarantee it.’

She saw he was telling the truth, and shivered. ‘How do you kill them?’

‘Burn the bodies until there’s nothing left. Freeze them. Bury them in lime. There are ways.’

‘My God.’

For a while, neither of them spoke. Leah finished her coffee, feeling his eyes on her. She looked up from her empty mug. ‘What about your life before you moved to Dawson?’ she asked. ‘Before you met Lucy?’

‘My life started when I met Lucy. There
is
no before.’

‘You must have—’

Tuomas shook his head. ‘No. I won’t relive those memories. Not for you, not for anyone. I had a life in Canada, a wife and a daughter, and then I lost them. That’s all there is to tell.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be.’

‘I must ask one thing, because it does affect what I’m doing. Your history with Etienne. That came before, didn’t it?’

He hesitated, then nodded.

‘I won’t pry. I just needed to know.’

‘Etienne and I . . . we knew each other a long time ago. And then one day our paths just crossed again. We keep in touch, very loosely. Sometimes she asks my advice. She’s never had anyone else.’ Tuomas pulled out a pocket watch and flicked open its hunter case. ‘It’s getting late,’ he said. ‘We should move.’

Leah hardly heard his words. The blood drained from her face. Transfixed, she stared at the timepiece. Reaching over, she trapped his arm under her hand. ‘Show me that.’

Frowning, he pulled away, sliding the watch back into his pocket. ‘What’s wrong?’

With her eyes still on his, she lifted her hands to her neck and removed a chain from beneath her clothes. Swinging from it, a pocket watch of her own. Leah opened it and placed it down on the table. The gold case was dented and scratched. Inside, the numerals had burned away from its enamelled face.

It was the only thing they’d ever found in the smouldering wreckage of Le Moulin Bellerose, the only evidence of their victory over Jakab. No bones. No teeth. The fire had been far too hot. Leah turned the watch over. She did not need to look at the back plate to know the inscription it bore.

A pulse flickered in Tuomas’s throat. ‘Where . . .’ he began. ‘Where did you get this?’

‘Show me,’ she repeated.

His eyes pinioned her. After a moment’s pause he took out his own watch, flipped it over and laid it beside the first. A replica. Almost.

Feeling as if a serpent coiled around her chest, Leah pointed at the name. She didn’t want the answer, but she had to ask the question. ‘Are you him?’

He nodded.

The serpent tightened its grip, squeezing the breath from her lungs. ‘Jakab,’ she said. ‘Who was he to you?

Balázs Izsák’s chin was trembling, now. ‘I haven’t heard that name in over a hundred years. I never expected to hear it again. He sent my father to his death. Killed Jani, too.’ He bowed his head, stared at the watches lying side by side. ‘Jakab was my brother.’

Leah wanted to run, but the strength had drained from her. Her legs wouldn’t move. ‘No,’ she muttered. ‘No.’

When he raised his head, his eyes looked haunted. ‘Who was he to you?’