Written in the Blood (33 page)

C
HAPTER
34

Budapest, Hungary

I
van Tóth sat at the oval table in the debate chamber of the
tanács
town house, elbows resting on its surface, fingers steepled. A display of white lilies stood in the centre of the table. Their symbolism was not lost on him: white for remembrance, lilies to signify a passing. Their presence, he knew, was coincidental, but they bothered him nonetheless.

He felt watched;
was
watched. From the ceiling fresco above, the painted eyes of the gods seemed to regard him with looks no less disinterested than those around the table.

Although most of the chairs were filled, two remained vacant. One belonged to Anton Golias. The other, at the head of the table, belonged to the
Örökös Főnök
. Although he refused to look at it, he saw the eyes of those around him cast their eyes towards it every now and then. In the silence its emptiness seemed to scream.

Tóth stared at each
tanács
member in turn, refusing to move on until he had met their eyes. In some he saw anger; in others, fear.

Good. He would focus their anger. Manipulate their fear.

Satisfied that he had the room’s attention, he placed his hands palms down in front of him and grimaced. ‘I’ve lost count of the times I’ve sat at this table over the years, listening, debating, offering counsel. We’ve made decisions in this chamber affecting the lives of everyone we represent. Not all of those decisions have been the right ones, I’ll admit. We’ve made mistakes, haven’t we, in our time together? But at least we can say that our decisions have always been made for the good of our people, and with the intention of maintaining the purity of our race.’

In front of him, he saw Oliver Lebeau flinch at his choice of words.

‘Yes, I’ll say it again: the
purity
of our race. Since when did we begin to shrink from that word? Since when did we begin to shrink from that
task
?’

He waited, silent. The man did not reply.

‘We’ve made difficult decisions, and while we haven’t always been unified in our thinking, we’ve always been unified in our actions. We’ve never kept secrets around this table, never indulged in brinksmanship. None of us has ever acted unilaterally.

‘When our forebears were murdered during the
Éjszakai Sikolyok
, we inherited an unenviable task. Our future looked bleak. To some, it looked as if we
had
no future. We inherited the leadership of a crippled society, a scattered and terrified people.

‘But we didn’t flinch from our commission. We worked hard. We spread our population far and wide. We rebuilt. And through it all we remained true to our laws and true to our history.

‘I know some of you continue to worry about the future, but I tell you there is no need for fear. We continue to hold a
végzet
. And while for years, admittedly, the numbers were in decline, in our most recent season we saw the greatest attendance for eight years.’

Again, he glanced around the table. ‘When you’re part of a minority – even one which, on the surface at least, seems to enjoy such advantages as our own – the actions of a few can have far-reaching consequences. We only need to examine the legacy of the
kirekesztett
to see proof of that. You’ll never hear me lay blame for the
Éjszakai Sikolyok
at anyone’s door other than the Eleni’s. But we can still ask ourselves whether the Crown would have sanctioned their actions if we’d punished more severely the crimes of our own kind. Only sixteen years ago we lost our
Örökös Főnök
Éva Maria-Magdalena Szöllösi due to the actions of our most infamous
kirekesztett
son. And let’s not shy away from the reality: her replacement has been less than satisfactory.’

The silence was charged now, primed for the spark that would ignite it. ‘But even through her missteps,’ Tóth continued, ‘even though she’s divided us more than any
Főnök
who’s gone before, we’ve remained loyal. She’s made contentious decisions and we’ve supported her, even when we’ve disagreed.

‘You all know of my personal opposition to some of those decisions. Still, like you, I recognised her ultimate authority, and I have always respected the right of our leader to cast the deciding vote in areas where we’ve failed to reach consensus. But I’ll ask you this: it is the role of our
Főnök
, is it not, to
forge
consensus? And it is also our
Főnök
’s responsibility to keep her
tanács
informed in all areas of our governance. How else can we fulfil our role effectively?

‘For over ten years I’ve held my tongue. I counselled against the founding of this fertility programme, counselled against the principle of introducing
kirekesztett
and
simavér
blood to the line. I was shouted down by some of you, ridiculed even. As a result, that programme has operated cloaked in a secrecy impenetrable even to those of us who sit around this table,
at the specific orders of our own leader
.’

Lajos Horváth, sitting opposite, cleared his throat. ‘We all know the reasons for that. Besides, we imposed strict conditions—’

Tóth laughed. ‘Ah, yes, the
conditions
. Let’s examine those conditions, shall we? First, we would endanger no lives. Remember that one? Yet I hear that during the last year we’ve lost perhaps half a dozen of the very women we were elected to protect.

‘As troubling as that discovery may be, over the last few days I’ve learned of something so reprehensible it’s given me no choice but to summon you all here and demand that we act.

‘It’s always been clear to me that this scientific
meddling
is a heresy. While the success of our
végzet
continues to grow, the work of Hannah Wilde, and her supporters, has produced nothing except the deaths of those volunteers naive enough to support her, and the birth of a handful of children who are little more than
kirekesztett
-spawned bastards themselves.’

He saw bristling now, from all around the table. He wanted to rile them, wanted to inflame them. ‘Whatever your view on that – and I know mine is not without controversy – at least we’d put controls in place. At least, one could argue, the influence of
kirekesztett
blood could be diluted over the coming generations: a distasteful but necessary evil.

‘Over the last few days, however, I’ve learned that one of our most sacrosanct conditions has been breached. With the express approval of our
Főnök
,
kirekesztett
volunteers have been recruited into their ranks.’

Outraged gasps. Tóth was careful to keep his smile at bay.

Only Horváth now, and perhaps I can accomplish this without spilling too much blood.

‘You’ve learned this how?’ the man asked.

‘The
kirekesztett
women are receiving treatment both at the original centre and also at Villa del Osservatore. I have eyes inside the
Belső
Ő
r
who have confirmed it. Gentlemen, we’ve been duped, and history will judge us on the actions we take today. We have allowed ourselves, however unwittingly, to become accessories to the greatest threat facing us since the Night of Screams over a hundred years ago. Right now, even as I speak, Hannah Wilde’s programme, in collusion with the
Főnök
, is impregnating
kirekesztett
women with
kirekesztett
life, in direct contravention of the laws laid down within the pages of our
Vének Könyve
. I spoke earlier of the purity of our race, and I tell you I am here to defend it. I already have the majority I need to force a change of leadership, but what I want is consensus.’

‘What you
want
,’ Horváth said, ‘is a coup.’

‘I’ll tell you what I want,’ he replied, straining to keep his voice calm. ‘Let me lay it before you as clearly as I can. I want us to act before it’s too late. I want us to disband this programme. I want us to end the senseless deaths of the very women we’ve sworn to protect. I want us to unite behind a leader who respects the counsel we offer. And I want us to prevent the inevitable decline into depravity that will result if we sanction the creation of an entirely new generation of
kirekesztett
.’

He looked around the room. ‘Shall we vote?’

Only Horváth met his eye. ‘What of Hannah Wilde? What are you proposing we do about her?’

‘She’s a Balázs, by inheritance if not by name. You know as well as I what needs to be done.’

‘Then say it.’

‘Hannah Wilde is a threat. We eliminate threats, or they eliminate us.’

‘And her daughter? Do you intend to eliminate her too?’

‘That’s for us all to decide.’

‘You think, if you kill her mother, you won’t create an even stronger adversary in Leah Wilde?’

‘Are you frightened of a young girl?’

The man stared. ‘Why is Anton not present?’

‘Anton made his choice.’

‘Not what I asked. Where is he?’

Tóth didn’t blink. ‘He’s dead.’

He waited for that news to sink in. Then, in a softer voice, he added, ‘Anton died trying to warn the
F
ő
nök
that we’d discovered her duplicity. I grieve his loss, and I hope his death won’t be in vain – that it can avoid greater bloodshed.’

Horváth’s mouth dropped open. ‘This is how you build consensus, is it?’

Sitting back in his seat, Tóth glanced across at Joó. The man barked a command and the chamber’s double doors banged open. Twelve black-clad
tanács
guards swept into the room, taking up positions behind the table’s occupants.

‘The
Főnök
can no longer be trusted,’ Tóth said. ‘I intend to remove her from office, and I offer to rule temporarily until a replacement is chosen. Do I hear objections?’

Horváth’s face had drained of colour. He stared around the room at the assembled guards. ‘You call this a choice?’

‘Do you object?’

‘God forgive me.’ He paused. ‘No.’

Tóth turned to Joó and nodded.

The man raised a phone to his ear. ‘Do it,’ he said.

C
HAPTER
35

Villa del Osservatore, Italy

L
eah Wilde was standing with Luca’s sister Soraya by the tall windows of the villa’s first-floor map room when she noticed the two vessels approaching the dock at the base of the peninsula.

For five months of the last twelve she had made Villa del Osservatore her home; but however long she stayed here, she knew she would never grow tired of this view.

The landscape seemed to evolve every hour, the sun, clouds and sky conspiring to mix an artist’s palette of colours on the water’s surface. This afternoon, a thick mist had unfurled across the lake and rolled up its shores, the moisture-laden air bleaching the shouldering mountains to grey. It seemed reluctant to release the two vessels that slipped from its clutches, chasing them with ghost-like tendrils as the craft approached the dock.

They came from different directions, as silent as basking sharks; the first appeared from the north, its twin emerging from the south.

Leah watched them drift closer. The moment they bumped against the landing stage, their crew leaped out and began to tie up.

Hands cradled around her swollen belly, Soraya moved to the window. ‘Do you recognise them?’

Leah shook her head. ‘Not from here.’

‘Were we expecting anyone?’

She didn’t know the answer to that. When the
Főnök
was in residence at the villa, as she was now, the woman received a steady stream of visitors, and while most of them arrived by road, many chose to enjoy the drama of the lakeside approach.

At the dock, the crewmen finished tying up. Now the two vessels disgorged further arrivals. Even from here, Leah could tell that they were, all of them,
hosszú életek
.

They seemed in no hurry to climb the staircase to the gates of the lower terrace. Instead, they gazed up at the villa.

She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Maybe.’

‘Strange for them to appear at once like that, from different directions.’

‘Yeah.’

Leah moved closer to the window. Below, on the lawn outside the music room, she could see seven-year-old Emánuel and his brother Levi playing an improvised game of croquet with little Pia and her younger brother Alex.

Leah’s heart began to beat a fraction faster. She glanced across at Soraya, saw the frown creasing the woman’s forehead. Her friend had always been petite, but her pregnancy seemed to accentuate it tenfold. Face as pale as the mist that languished on Lake Como’s waters, feet bound in her favourite Chinese slippers, she seemed as delicate as a lily petal. Leah didn’t want to worry her unduly. Still . . .

‘Not sure I like this,’ she said.

Flecks of copper had appeared in Soraya’s eyes. ‘What shall we do?’

‘Those boats won’t have gone unnoticed. Stay here. I’ll be back.’

The first-floor hall served rooms that for the past year had become living spaces for many of Calw’s volunteers, partners and children. Leah darted along it, taking a left-hand fork to the building’s west wing. Her blood was pumping faster now, and she felt her stomach shrinking away. Something about this felt wrong; badly wrong.

At the end of the hall she crossed the landing of a grand staircase, threw open a door and burst into the room beyond. Its only window faced west, offering a view back across the peninsula to Villa del Osservatore’s roadside entrance.

A stone-built wall contained the grounds of the western border, culminating in a dramatic gatehouse. Usually, even during the day, its gates were closed. Now they gaped open. A dark-clad group stood on the roadside beside them.

With Jakab gone these last sixteen years, Leah’s fear of being hunted had slowly faded. But the
memory
of it never had. Now it leaped at her, jubilant, clawing the air from her lungs and squeezing her chest tight.

Light-headed, she reached out a hand to steady herself. Who were they? Not
tolvajok
, surely. Too many of them for that.

Have you caused this? Is this happening because of you?

Nausea rolled in her. She thought of all the people in the villa to whom she owed a debt. The four children playing on the lawn. The others still inside the house; their mothers.

Go. Now. They’re depending on you.

But the wrong decision, made in haste, might lead them further into danger. Did she go first to her room, to collect her gun? What about Soraya? Could she risk leaving the woman alone?

As clearly as if Hannah had been standing beside her, Leah heard her mother’s voice. One word:
Act
.

Grimacing, teeth clenched against the return of that fear she’d thought she’d long since escaped, she bolted across the room and into the corridor outside.

Catharina Maria-Magdalena Szöllösi,
Örökös Főnök
to the
hosszú életek
, sat at the reading table inside Villa del Osservatore’s library and listened as Ányos Szilágyi, most senior of her
Belső
Ő
r
, gave his report. Ányos stood by the window, hands clasped behind his back, feet restless, looking like he wanted to pace the floor.

Except for Gabriel, she’d known him longer than anyone alive – knew, especially, how much he hated to be indoors, even during weather such as this. Despite his seniority he remained a cloistered man, presenting the latest intelligence succinctly, yet reluctant to offer his counsel unless asked.

Also around the table, Ferenc Werkner, Ányos’s lieutenant, and his aide. Standing by the library’s door, another of her
Bels
ő
Ő
r
.

A silver tray of crushed ice sat between them, upon which lay a spiral of oysters, their inner shells iridescent. Ányos knew they were her favourite delicacy, and he’d arrived back from England with a sack of them.

Unfortunately, the news he brought hardly whetted her appetite. ‘So the trail is cold, then,’ she said. ‘We don’t even know if the group hunting Leah is still in Wales.’

Ányos shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not.’

Catharina turned to Ferenc Werkner. ‘What’s the latest from America?’

‘Our biggest challenge,’ the man replied, ‘has been separating what might be incidents of
tolvajok
activity from the more regular – if you’ll excuse the term – instances of abduction. Luckily for us, group abductions are relatively rare, which helps somewhat. We have the two families from Oregon that went missing last year, somewhere between Yosemite and Vegas. The mother’s body was discovered a few months later, but none of the others was ever found; it certainly looks like the work of a
tolvaj.
Before that, we had the Swedish exchange students snatched from Lake Tahoe. Then there were those hockey players in Utah; again, never found. Two more groups disappeared not long after. First the ranchers in Colorado. And you’ve heard the Renata Hernandez story from Kansas: a young mother put her and her neighbours’ kids in the car one morning for the school run and was never seen again. The police there are treating it as an abduction-suicide. We think differently.

‘A few other things we can surmise. First, obviously, they’re surviving on
simavér
hosts, which is why these disappearances are so frequent. Second, the frequency is increasing, which indicates they’re not in the best shape. Third, the fact they’re snatching whole groups rather than individuals suggests a certain amount of desperation.’

She nodded. ‘And they’ve been heading east.’

‘Over time, yes. It looks like this started on the West Coast. Those incidents follow a steady line through the centre of the country. Latest news is this: two days ago, an Atlanta parking attendant discovered five incredibly old men and women locked inside a van. Two of them died on the way to hospital, and the other three aren’t communicating. The government agency there is holding it back, but they ran DNA tests and came up with matches to five teenagers snatched only a few days earlier.’

‘A few
days
?’ Ányos asked.

‘That’s what I heard.’

‘If they’re deteriorating that fast, they really will be desperate,’ the man replied. ‘Which makes them even more dangerous. Where exactly did they find this van?’

Werkner’s face was grim. ‘About seven miles south of the business district. Right outside Hartsfield-Jackson. It’s one of the busiest international airports in the world.’

Quietly, Catherina said, ‘They’re coming.’

The room fell silent. And then, from somewhere, a soft trilling. She glanced up, irritated. ‘I thought we had a rule about phones in here.’

Reddening, Werkner pulled a handset from his pocket and examined the screen. ‘Not me,’ he said.

‘Sorry, Cat.’ From the window, Ányos took out his phone and held it to his ear. He listened in silence, switched it off, and turned to face the room.

‘Well?’ she asked.

He nodded.

It happened so quickly. The
Belső
Ő
r
by the door walked up behind Ferenc Werkner. Simultaneously, Werkner’s aide rose to his feet. He was holding a knife. With the deftest of movements, he opened a wound in Werkner’s throat so deep that the man had no hope of closing it on his own.

Werkner’s eyes bulged and he tried to stand, but the two men grabbed his arms. Bright blood fountained from his neck. Droplets splashed into the oyster shells.

Catharina watched from her chair, rigid. She knew she was about to die in this room. Strange, how for a moment that image of Werkner’s blood falling into the oyster shells mesmerised her with its terrible beauty.

She thought about all the things she’d failed to achieve, all the things she’d hoped to make right. When an image came to her of the children playing in the villa’s ground-floor rooms, her throat grew tight.

A red tide cascaded down Werkner’s chest. He kicked his legs, trying to throw off his assailants, but they held him firm. ‘Don’t fight it,’ his aide whispered. ‘There’s nothing personal in this. Die well.’

Either the words themselves finished the man, or he had already lost too much blood. His struggles weakened and he slumped, head lolling forward, chest still.

Werkner’s killers eased him out of the chair and laid him on the library floor.

Catharina glanced up at Ányos, and when she saw his expression she felt a hollowness in her chest. He moved towards her.

‘Whose order?’ she asked tonelessly.

‘Tóth initiated it. But the
tanács
voted. It was unanimous in the end.’

She nodded. ‘Then I join an exclusive club.’

In their entire history, only two previous
Örökös Főnöks
had been unseated.

He edged closer and she saw that he held a blade of his own. ‘Let’s do this gracefully,’ he said, and when she caught the anguish in his voice it angered her.

‘You’d presume to make the cut?’ she asked, with ice in her tone. ‘I think not, Ányos. There is a historical precedent for this, is there not?’

He hesitated. Then he retreated and his face relaxed. ‘I had hoped you would remember that.’

‘As if I could forget.’

When Csontváry Kisfaludi István had been usurped in Budapest, back in the fifteenth century, he had chosen to take his own life rather than die at the hands of his guards. Irinyi Gábor, a few hundred years later, had followed his predecessor’s example.

Catharina went to a table beside the fireplace. On its surface rested an intricately carved box. Lifting the lid, she looked down at what it contained: an ancient
déjnin
blade. She removed it, feeling its cold weight, feeling the press of history in its metal. Drawing her thumb along its blade, she saw the scarlet line it scored. Still sharp, after all these years: the same knife Csontváry Kisfaludi István had used to take his life.

She turned back to face Ányos.

‘I’m sorry, Cat,’ he told her. ‘I never wanted this. But what’s happening here. It can’t be allowed.’

‘I take it you’re not referring to my death.’

‘You know what I mean. No one wishes you any malice. You made some mistakes, that’s all. Everyone wants this to be as bloodless as possible. I wish we could include you in that. But you know it would complicate things. We need a fresh start.’

He dropped his eyes to the
déjnin
blade in her hand, and his chest swelled. ‘I knew you’d choose the old-fashioned way. I’ll make sure it’s recorded. You have my word on that.’

Catharina turned her wrist upwards. Studied, with quiet contemplation, the raised blue veins just below her skin.

‘Do you want to sit?’ he asked.

‘I prefer to stand.’

He nodded. ‘Very well.’

Catharina lifted the blade. And then she threw it.

Realising how badly he’d misread her, Ányos began to move. But already it was too late. The
déjnin
knife, flashing like sun on water, whipped through the air and into Ányos’s mouth, puncturing him with a sound like a bitten apple.

He staggered backwards. Biting down reflexively on the handle, his front teeth shattered. He dropped his own knife, lifting his hands to the one buried inside his mouth.

‘I never liked the old-fashioned ways,’ she said. ‘And I can’t abide traitors.’

Ányos fell to one knee. Sat down heavily.

Catharina dismissed him with her eyes, turning to his two conspirators. They closed on her, eyes wary, knives drawn.

No way she could defeat them both. At the other end of the room she saw a bust of her mother. Thankfully, the woman’s eyes were cast towards the window. Bizarrely, it made the prospect of dying here a little easier to face.