The Bloodletter's Daughter (32 page)

“Why—why are you crying?”

“I—I did not want this to happen. Not like this.”

“You untied me!”

“I thought—the lovemaking you promised.”

Don Julius rubbed her tears away with his fingertips.

“I am deeply and forever in love with you. Is that not enough?”

Marketa thought,
No! No, it is not enough.

This was the lovemaking he had in mind. Warm blood stained the sheets, a souvenir of his violence.

She stared at him.

“I came to tell you something,” she said. Blind fury surged up from a place deep inside her; she wanted to hurt him. Hurt him and pierce his heart, just as he had ravaged hers. She felt foolish. Beyond foolish. She had believed in love, that she was his angel. He had raped her.

“Tell me what?”

She spat the words in his face.

“I am leaving for Prague. I never want to see you again in my life! And I shall tell them what you have done to me!”

There was a great gulf of silence, a terrifying silence, as if a violent summer storm approached.

“What—
what
did you say?”

“I am going to Prague with Doctor Mingonius—”

He slapped her in the face hard with an open palm. The demon was returning; she could smell the sulfur growing stronger.

There was a blackness tinged in yellow and blue; she could see only fragments of the room around her, floating in the dark swirl of color. She could hear his voice rage.

“You would desert me now? You—the only one who can make the voices cease! I need you! I love you!”

She screamed for help.

“Silence!” He cupped his hand over her mouth. “You would betray me to my enemies?” He looked at the door. “Leave me at the mercy of the voices? You are not going anywhere with anyone! You have just made love with a Hapsburg, and now you are mine! You will never leave this room again without me. Do you hear me? Never!”

He pushed her away, and she stumbled across the room.

“I will not have a bathhouse whore make a fool out of me!” he said, coming after her again, his mouth flecked with spittle.

Marketa’s hands covered her face to protect her from more blows. She felt a violent movement and heard a heavy thud as one of the guards threw Don Julius to the floor.

“What happened!” the guard said, not comprehending. “Slecna Marketa, are you all right?”

“Look, Marketa! See what you have done!” cried Don Julius. “It was our secret.”

“Seize him,” said one guard.

Through the curtain of darkness, she could make out movement below her. Don Julius was searching frantically for something on the floor.

“The fleam!” she shouted as a form rose up behind the guard.

It was too late. Don Julius had sliced the guard’s ear with the fleam and seized Marketa again.

He looked into her eyes, searching desperately.

“Marketa! Do not leave me!”

She tried to struggle free. His eyes were wild, frantic, and he screamed again.

“Can you feel their wings brush your face, their claws at your breast? Do not let them enter your heart!”

Still holding her tightly, he slashed at the invisible demons. The blade caught just in front of her ear and sliced up across the top of her cheek and into her scalp.

“Away! Leave her in peace!” Don Julius ranted. “It is me you want, you devils!”

The tip of the flailing knife cut into her breast and she stumbled back, falling to the floor.

The second guard clubbed Don Julius with a cudgel, stunning him temporarily. He stumbled a few steps and knelt to the floor, the fleam still in his hand.

The guard helped the bleeding Marketa to her feet. “Are you all right,
slecna
?”

Don Julius jerked her away, sending her reeling toward the wall and the open window.

Don Julius roared, coming at her with the bloodletting knife.

“I will protect you! No demons shall touch my angel!”

“No, Julius! No!”

She backed up against the window, raising her hands, trying to protect her face.

“Cease, Don Julius!” shouted a voice. It was Doctor Mingonius. There was a quick scuffle and the smell of Don Julius’s wine-sour breath in her face. She jumped back and suddenly the night air flooded her senses, cold and dark, the wind rushing in her ears.

As Marketa fell, she screamed. It was not a loud scream. Only she could hear it. She had nothing left to say to the world.

A
FTER THE
F
ALL

A M
IDNIGHT
D
EPARTURE

“Marketa! Marketa!”

What voice was this? She knew she was dead. But then, how could she still feel pain? Every part of her body screamed in pain. She could not breathe. Her chest felt as if it had collapsed.

“Dear girl, Marketa. Speak to me!”

She opened her eyes and saw the face of Doctor Mingonius floating before her eyes.

Then a stench filled her nostrils, and what little air she had in her lungs was forced out in a burst of coughing. She felt something heavy and furry run over her leg.

“You have fallen on the rubbish heap,” said Mingonius. “Just lie still, try to breathe.”

Long minutes passed. Doctor Mingonius willed her to breathe, whispering encouragement in her ear as he knelt beside her in the stinking heap. He placed her hand over her chest so she could feel the rise and fall of each aching gasp.

Dazed, she looked at him, hovering just above her. Blood was still running down her face from the slash to her cheek and scalp.
When he at last helped her to her feet, she saw her new white blouse was soaked red from the cut on her breast.

“I tried to trust him,” she said and fell again to her hands and knees and began to sob. She could smell the spoiled food of the kitchen and the human waste of the castle, slimy and putrid under her hands. The stench assailed her as she tried desperately to breathe.

God had condemned her to hell before her spirit had even left the earth.

The doctor knelt beside her and drew her into his arms. She convulsed in sobs.

“You can never trust a madman,” he said. “Never. But I blame myself for this. I never should have let you treat him. I was worried about my reputation, my failure as a physician. And now look. All this sorrow is of my creation.”

“No, I wanted to cure him. I thought I had. I thought—”

“That your patient could love you. That is my fault, too. I have failed your family, and I have failed the king. But most of all, I have failed you, Marketa. Let’s get you up and take you back to the bathhouse where your mother can care for you—”

“No! I never want to see my mother again! This was her idea—she thought I could be his mistress and she would never have to work again.”

Mingonius didn’t say anything for a few minutes.

“Do you still want to leave with me, Marketa?” he said in the darkness.

She turned and lifted her face toward him as far as the pain would allow.

“I want nothing more in this world than to go to Prague.”

Doctor Mingonius looked up at the moon, blinking back tears as the first snowflakes of the winter hit his eyes.

“Marketa, I cannot take you to Prague. Especially now. We must find safe haven for you. You need care—you are badly hurt.”

“I—I must go to Prague! I need to escape him.”

“Shh! Shh!” said Mingonius, stroking her hair.

He looked up to the window, the torches still burning bright. He could hear the howls of Don Julius within the castle.

“Do not talk,
slecna
. Rest. We will talk later of Prague.”

They rested there in silence a while longer until, at last, Doctor Mingonius thought he could move her safely, and he pulled her gently to her knees and then to her feet. He was relieved to see that she could walk or, at least, limp with his help. Once they were back in the castle, in his apartments, he ordered Viera, the housekeeper, to bathe Marketa and clothe her in some of Viera’s own garments.

He spoke to the guards, swearing them to secrecy, lest the priest learn what had transpired during the night. For their part, they were terrified of being assigned the blame for what had happened to Marketa and eagerly swore an oath of secrecy.

“We must make him think she is dead,” said Doctor Mingonius. “And it is only by the grace of God she is not.”

It was two hours past midnight when the coach was brought round. The clatter of iron horseshoes on the cobblestone shattered the dark silence, striking sparks in the courtyard. The wildeyed horses, snorting great puffs of white vapor into the cold air, gave urgency to the departure. The trunks were hastily lashed to the back of the coach, and two guards carried Marketa out. Doctor Mingonius and the servant Viera helped settle the girl into the velvet seat.

The road was snowy and rutted. The carriage rocked and jumped, jostling the passengers like dice shaken in a gambler’s hand.

Marketa’s face throbbed from being battered by Don Julius. There were sharp, searing pains from the blade wounds. But for
the most part, the shock numbed her gashes and bruises. Soon she felt nothing but the deep aching pain in her head.

Doctor Mingonius had given her a potion to calm her, and despite the rough, jarring ride in the carriage, she found herself falling asleep.

When she opened her eyes again, sunlight was streaming in through the open curtains of the carriage. She saw the hard frozen ponds of the Rozmberks, where fat carp slumbered in the deep, cold water. Soon they would be harvested for Christmas dinners and sold throughout Bohemia, for what good Christian mortal would not feast on the white flesh of that fish in honor of the holy day?

Her eyes were heavy with sleep, and her face throbbed rhythmically like the beat of a drum. Doctor Mingonius, seeing that she was awake, steadied himself beside her in the rocking carriage. His fingers inspected the knife wounds that he had stitched up before they left Rozmberk Castle. They had already begun to pucker a bit and ooze, but the work had been done with a steady hand and he thought it would hold together, God willing, and heal.

He smiled gently at her.

“We will stop in Cesky Budejovice,” he said. “There is a good little inn, clean and simple. I’ve sent a rider ahead to notify the innkeeper of our coming. His wife is a good cook.”

He looked at her, worry etching his face. “You do like brook trout, Marketa? Fresh from the river?”

Marketa tried to smile, but when her skin stretched across her wound, she winced.

“It will take time to heal, Marketa. Viera will take good care of you.”

Viera smiled and reached over to clasp her hand gently.

“You have gone through too much in that wretched little village.”

Marketa wondered through her haze just how much Viera knew. She looked at her warily, but saw the woman’s kindness shining in her soft blue eyes.

“You will love Prague. There is no city like it in the world. You will see!” Viera squeezed her hand. “A world of reason, medicine, and science,” she said, stealing a quick look at Doctor Mingonius. “The finest artists, astronomers, and poets. You shall see. You will never want to return to Cesky Krumlov again!”

Doctor Mingonius put a finger to his lips.

“Enough,
slecna
. Marketa is too ill to go to Prague now. Budejovice will have to do.”

Slecna Viera looked crestfallen and stroked Marketa’s damp, blood-crusted hair.

Marketa closed her eyes against the pain. When she woke again the carriage had rolled to a stop in Cesky Budejovice and it was late afternoon, less than a day after she had walked through the heavy wooden door, into the madman’s chamber.