Sleeping Helena (12 page)

Thekla recalled the way in which Katza had run from the ballroom, following Louis. Thekla had watched them carry Katza in afterwards, soaked through with rain. Louis had never returned. As far as Thekla knew, none of them had seen him alive again after Katza’s party.

Thekla cringed. She must have been blind not to see it. Katza and Louis, as close as any lovers, must have fought at the party one hundred years ago. He ran out. She followed, fell and hit her head on the flagstones. Louis drowned and they found his body the next day. Thekla tapped her fingers on the table while Eva waited in silence.

Kitty was linked to their brother’s death. No wonder her sister was obsessed with changing the past. Thekla’s rage boiled over. It was Kitty’s black heart that had destroyed the family. There was only one way to stop her from doing it again.

“I will go. Make certain the front room is locked when the men are finished.”

Thekla wasted no time. She trampled the garden path and crossed the courtyard, never heeding the wood or the placid flowers or how the clouds crossed the sky. The door to Kitty’s house swung open before she reached it; she was not surprised. Thekla stopped on the step and smiled up at her sister.

“As you most likely know, we are celebrating Helena’s sixteenth birthday tomorrow. As it is also your birthday, I’d like to invite you to join us.”

Kitty puffed up, as though embracing the defiance evident in her sister. “I would be delighted, thank you.”

“The party begins at six o’clock sharp.” Thekla turned to leave. “Do try to be a bit early.”

“Oh, don’t worry.” Kitty said as she shut the door. “I will be.”

Thekla laughed on the step like a child. She had a present for both Helena and Kitty.

Neither of them would ever see it coming.

Kitty leaned her head against the hard wood of the door once Thekla passed out of sight. Everything was falling into place nicely
—
this time she would not fail.

She tasted the air; it was fresh and damp. She was blessed to have come from this land, she thought, this wonderful place of tall trees and castles in the sky. This time she would remember that.

She drew in her breath and climbed the stairs. She hadn’t been to a party in ages. Whatever would she wear? At her age, did such things even matter? She did want to go out in style. Kitty replayed the past one more time, for the last time. It hurt, but she had to do it. Tomorrow it would be gone.

The words her brother had spoken one hundred years ago had stunned her.

“Katza, he has asked for me. I must go to him.”

Katza had been furious. She had tolerated his little romance because she had no other option, but now—a meeting with the king was dangerous at any time, but on this, of all nights! It was insulting and it had wounded her deeply. Did Louis not understand? Had he been so blinded by Ludwig’s glory that he would turn away from
her
, his beloved sister? She had gritted her teeth to the point of breaking. Once upon a time, Louis had loved her. Only her. Now he would leave her for an unlikely meeting with the king.

“It is my birthday, Louis. You cannot just run off into the night. You must stay here. Besides, how do you even know it was really the king who sent the message?”

“It has his seal.”

Her hands had clenched so fiercely that her nails had pierced her flesh. She knew he wouldn’t have mentioned it, had she not gone into his coat pocket and found the letter herself. He had grabbed it from her hand before she had finished reading it, but she had seen enough. Louis had been ever impractical, but since the king’s visit he seemed to have lost his mind.

She had wondered if she should finally tell Papa of Louis’ infatuation. Mama and Papa were romantics at heart, like their son, and Katza had doubted it would do any good. She had ended up watching the hours roll past with a feeling of sick helplessness. She had made and discarded plans to follow her brother and had paced through the house like a wild thing caught in a cage.

She had tried to talk him out of it one last time.

“Louis, you must not do this. You cannot know the letter came from him.” She had been hysterical enough to grab his shirtfront. “Louis, you must come to my party!”

“I will be there for you,” he had said with a sigh, “but I cannot stay. This may be the only chance I have to see him. I love him—why can’t you accept that? Is it because he is a man? Katza, I can never be with him in truth. Let me have this one moment, please?”

Katza had faced defeat. There would be no reasoning with her brother.

She had hoped, even prayed, that Louis would put this mood behind him, but ever since he’d met the king he’d been obsessed with seeing him again.
No,
she had answered Louis silently.
It is not because he is a man. It is because you no longer love me.
She had seen then that Louis would follow this to its end, no matter what she said.

She had bowed her head. “Just remember, Louis, that I am the one who loves you.” There was nothing else she could have done to stop him, not then.

Louis had made his appearance at her party, as promised. His face had been drawn and he’d hovered in the corner against a backdrop of sweeping, blue curtains. Beautiful and tense, his shoulders had been hunched against the guests who swirled around him. They had seemed to know better than to attempt any conversation.

There had been entertainment and food and brightly dressed ladies pulling disgruntled men through the halls, children laughing and girls dancing and Katza had seen no one but Louis. He had watched her watch him, offered a wan smile, raised a glass, but Katza had been unmoved. She had glared at him, so much so that her mother had asked her if something was wrong.

“No, Mama. Everything is fine, it is a lovely party,” she had smiled sweetly.

Magdalena had gone off to greet a guest and Katza had been left with her anger.

She’d waited for Louis to leave. Five o’clock, six o’clock . . . she had glanced behind her and been caught for a moment by her reflection in a mirror on the far wall. When she’d turned around he’d been gone. She had run past a group of girls, by a maid with a tray of fruit, through the kitchens where the cook had been shouting, and out the door to the gardens. Rain had been pouring from the dark sky, clouds had clotted overhead, and her lungs had filled with moisture as she called out her brother’s name.

She had heard a horse and the sound of Louis’ voice commanding the beast to run.

She had chased after him; the ground had been wet and she’d slipped on the flagstones just in front of the stable. She had turned wildly and her hair, loosened from its usual braid for the celebration, had whipped across her eyes. She’d fallen and hit her head on the stones.

Katza’s family had found her in the courtyard, still crumpled on the stones. She’d woken hours later, in the middle of the night, in pain but mostly unharmed. Louis had been at her side.

“Is it you, Louis?” Katza had been disoriented until her brother’s features had settled into place.

“I am here, Katza. All is well.” He had smoothed the hair back from her brow. “I will tell Mama you are awake. Rest now.”

She never saw Louis again.

The next day, when the family had gathered for breakfast, Louis was absent. Katza had felt fine; no evidence remained of her fall. The familiar sound of Papa rattling the newspaper had drawn her to the table. As she had reached her seat, an attendant had rushed in and handed Papa a letter.

“My God,” Papa had suddenly shouted into the quiet morning.

Mama, Katza, and Thekla had turned towards him as the other children had giggled on in their corner, unconcerned by the look on Papa’s face.

“What is it?” Mama had asked, her hand on his arm.

“The king,” Papa had cried. “Ludwig was found in the lake last night. They say it might have been murder!”

No one had seen Louis enter the room and no one had seen him leave it, though he must have been there to hear Papa’s exclamation.

Later that day, in Louis’ room, Katza had rediscovered the king’s letter. By then they’d realized Louis was missing and the staff, with Papa, had been out in the forests searching for him. The letter must have fallen from Louis’ pocket in the night. She had read every word with horror.

Hide yourself well—I have many enemies. Two of them will be there, plotting against me. Kill them for me, Louis, and I will meet you after.

The king had been very precise in his description of the surrounding terrain. He had made it easy for Louis to find the perfect place to do the deed. The trees had been thick by the water, the castle had loomed in the distance, and two men must have walked the path, just as the king had described.

She had seen it then: Louis takes aim, his rifle at the ready. Clouds gather and cover the moon, but Louis can still see his targets in front of him. He waits until they enter the water, just as the king has instructed, where they are watching for a boat.

Louis is an excellent shot. He fires twice and, when Ludwig doesn’t appear, he goes home.

Katza had put her head in her hands and cried. The king had tricked Louis. That evening she had learned that Louis had returned to the lake and shot himself by the shore. This was the past that Katza had not prevented.

This was the past she was finally going to change.

The day of Helena’s party dawned clear and bright, though grey clouds hovered over the Alps in the distance. The lake was dark and a breeze shook the upper limbs of the trees that clustered around it. Kitty enjoyed a breakfast of sausage and eggs and then read a book to help pass the time. In mid-afternoon she washed with care, drew a fresh slip over her head and chose her finest stockings and garter. She combed out her hair, still thick and full, and slowly began to braid it.

It was a fine gift Kitty had been given, to be able to bend time backward or forward. She could make of it an acrobat touching the back of her hands to her ankles, one moment pressing upon one another until they merged, and back became front and front became back, twisting inside out and upright again.

When she was young her gift had seemed no more than a parlor trick, a way to tease Papa by moving his papers or books back to where they’d been a week before. This, her family tolerated.

When she had moved a stable hand two hours ahead, it was a different matter. The man had been trampled beneath a startled horse and had never walked again. As if that hadn’t been bad enough, Louis’ displeasure had almost killed her. She never wanted to see that look on his face again.

Kitty’s gift did have one safeguard. Her attempts to move herself in time all failed. If she was lucky, nothing at all would happen, but sometimes she ended with a headache that sent her to bed for three days. Her Sight was one thing, a bonus received in a fall. Her gift was another. If only she could get to the places she
Saw
.

For all the years after Papa died, she had pondered time and ways around the limits of her gift. She had a simple plan. She would return to the past and somehow save her brother. Katza had to accept, at last, that this was impossible. Her body simply could not be transported. Someone would have to return in her place and that had been absolutely unthinkable.

The question had then become one of
when
. Forget for a moment, she told herself, about physicality. If she could go back, what moment offered the best chance of success? When Louis had first told her he was in love, she had nothing to say that might change his mind. He would never believe she’d returned from the future to warn him away from the king. The night of the king’s visit the spell had been cast, but she could not again face the sight of Louis and Ludwig together. That had left the night of Katza’s sixteenth birthday party, before Louis had departed, and suddenly she’d had an answer.

Katza recalled the night she had seen the old hag, herself speaking to herself by way of a looking glass. And at her party, for just a moment, she’d been caught by her reflection again. It was exactly the moment she needed, but appearing in a mirror was simply not good enough. It left far too much to chance. She must, somehow, pass
through
the mirror. She must connect with herself—become herself—for only she, old and grey, knew what would happen after.

Finally, a possibility had come to her. Her body might be fixed, but the mind was another matter. She supposed her gift would not allow for that sort of travel either, and even if it did work, Kitty knew her mind could only be in one place at one time. She could not exist both now and then, but Kitty had refused to be daunted. No matter the cost, she could not let her brother commit murder. She had to find a way to trick her gift, to make it seem as though she meant it for someone else. Who would best serve her purpose? She had fretted and stewed for many long years, until finally the poppet had revealed herself.

Kitty smiled as she buttoned her favorite dress. When dealing with time, one must be precise. Helena, born one hundred years to the hour after Kitty’s own birth, was precisely what Kitty needed. Helena was the perfect mirror; she would reflect Kitty’s gift back onto Kitty and come to no harm herself. Helena only had to look into the glass; the gift would do the rest.

Kitty watched the future speed toward her. Had she not prophesied it herself those sixteen years ago? After all of this time, it was now only a matter of hours.

Helena woke late in the morning to the sound of birdsong coming from the open window. She leaned over the edge of her bed, picked up a shoe and threw it at the sparrow on the sill. Startled, it flew off. She stretched luxuriously, greedily, and gathered the linens under her chin and rolled in them.

Another birthday, the day her distant devotees gathered to make their offerings. Their pilgrimage ended on her doorstep and resulted in a great many presents. Helena enjoyed the annual ritual, but this year the usual assortment of clothing and books, jewelry and junk hardly mattered. All she could think of was Kitty’s gift and that she would finally have it. She wrapped a robe around her shoulders. Her appetite was huge.