Three Emperors (9780062194138) (17 page)

Did he glance my way once more?

I realized I was wet. I looked down. My torso was soaked from a blot of blood that had browned as it clotted. I'd been shot, I reminded myself, my breathing labored. I felt nauseated. The battlefield began to whirl.

“We must get away from that man,” Gideon muttered of Napoleon.

And then all went dark.

Chapter 19

Astiza

I
n medieval times, the silver mines of Kutná Hora made Bohemia one of the richest provinces of the Holy Roman Empire. Sixty miles of tunnels wormed through veins of ore, and thousands of miners with picks and shovels crouched and crawled to their stations like doomed troglodytes. The mines have since played out and been abandoned. The city of Kutná Hora remains, half-forgotten, making it a discreet hideaway for occult alchemical experiments. Horus and I were bound by ropes in Prague and transported by sealed wagon. My muscles cramped and my son was feverish, moaning from burns to his hands. He'd been thrashed, starved, and threatened. I'd been told that only my abject cooperation could save him from worse. I'd fallen in with monsters, and waited to be raped. Yet Fulcanelli—no, Richter—was so mutilated and in such pain that he'd lost any immediate interest in possessing me. Auric painted him with ointment and swathed his lower head with bandages. While the dwarf drove, Richter would open a shutter from the driver's bench and peer at us with dark, sharklike eyes, betraying no feeling at all. He didn't speak on the journey.

We traveled many hours—I lost all sense of time—and after an eternity stopped in the old mining town, none but ghosts awake. There were growling hounds at the wagon wheels to discourage escape, and Harry shrank against me, whimpering. I wept with him, furious at my own folly in trusting a “bishop” who was clearly not. Then we were carried into a tower tied to the old mines below. We were pushed down winding stairs hewn from solid rock. At the bottom we passed cells with iron bars and were shoved into a windowless underground apartment used for magical experiments.

It was dim as a dungeon in our new prison. Richter took a seat on a stool in the alchemical laboratory, caped and bandaged, a rapier at his side. Despite his disfigurement, he posed erect as if sitting for a painting, watching us as we looked around. The primary chamber had stoves, distilleries, bookshelves, flasks, bowls, and crucibles. Beyond was a tiny cave for sleeping, with more books. There was a crude chimney, and the stink of fumes. The baron took some satisfaction from our sense of doom. Unless we escaped or were rescued, my son and I would eventually face far ghastlier pain than he had. The only question was when.

My tongue was thick with thirst—we'd had no food or drink for a full day and night at least—but I managed a croak. “Where are we?”

“The place where you will rejoin your husband.”

Like a fool, I actually looked about. Ethan here? Or his body? But that wasn't what Richter meant. Still, the words gave me wild hope. My heart stuttered.

“You've dissolved my face, but not our partnership,” Richter said, his teeth clenched from pain. “In fact, your hellion has sealed our alchemical wedding. You've been enlisted in the Invisible College, madame—that mystic fraternity that follows the secrets of the rose. Congratulations, witch.”

“But with me as master, and you as a slave,” hissed Auric.

“Yes, as our slave, my little friend.” He stared hard at me. “You will obey my dwarf in all things. If you don't, your boy will become supper.”

My gaze darted. Two candles guttered in a chamber fifteen feet wide and thirty long. The door was made of stout and ancient wood. There were cauldrons, hanging hooks of iron, buckets, and vials. “So you are cannibals.” My guilt at trapping my son ground at me like a millstone, and the only thing that assuaged it was fury. How I longed to kill our two tormentors! But I needed a plan, not an impulse.

“I don't share my assistant's peculiar tastes, which are for pleasure, not nutrition.”

“I'll do what I must to protect my son.” At this point I'd sacrifice my body. It is, after all, a temporary husk.

“Trust me, I've lost any attraction I once had for you,” Richter said.

“It's me you have to placate.” Auric licked his lips again, enjoying my reaction. He cackled and jigged, dancing from foot to foot. What strategy to use on the insane?

And then my son spoke up, in a brave little voice honed by far too many hardships. “If you touch Mama, I will burn you, too.”

Auric was startled, and actually recoiled. “Goblin,” he hissed. But he was afraid.

“You are a bad man like the other bad man, and I don't like you and I don't like it here.” Harry put on his best scowl, as if about to throw a tantrum. I moved closer to him and we grasped hands, our courage growing from it. To be defended by a child! My own strength and determination soared. I'd bring down these men. I'd destroy them, and their nest, and their ambitions.

The dwarf had the confused look of all bullies faced with defiance.

The baron interrupted. “You will touch neither of them unless I expressly allow it,” Richter mildly commanded the dwarf, in a manner that showed he expected total obedience. “We want answers, not screams.”

“Then let us go,” I begged hopelessly. “Our meeting was a colossal mistake for both of us.”

“On the contrary. You've studied in Egypt, home of great magic. You learned the African arts amid the slaves of the Caribbean. You've studied in the greatest libraries, and by some rumors have read the Book of Thoth itself.”

I was shaking my head. “No, no, you give me too much credit. I exaggerated, to impress you. I led you on. I'm little more than a gypsy reader of the tarot.”

“You seek the Brazen Head.”

“As an amusement for my husband.”

“Whom I will enlist as well. Then I will bend all of you to our will.”

Would these monsters really reunite us? With Ethan, escape seemed truly possible. Or would I suck him down into hell as well? My mind hopped like a bird, pecking at flitting hope. “You'll find him?”

“Perhaps. I believe you speculated he might come through Venice. I'll seek him there. Meanwhile, do you wish for reunification?”

“Of course.”

“Then you must earn it. And pay me back for my face.”

“It was an accident. You were threatening me. My son was frightened.”

“First, your husband is going to learn of your imprisonment.”

Hope again. “How?”

“News will be sent to Spain, where he is some kind of courier between the navies. You will be reported to be in dire peril. That should encourage him to come, and together we will find the Brazen Head. But without the French.”

“We can't lead you from down here.” I shuddered, looking at Auric. “Instead you brought us to this midget monster. Why, Baron—or Bishop—or whatever you are? Why this dwarf? Why bring us here?”

“So you can serve the Invisible College while we wait for clues your husband will unwittingly bring. You will seek the Philosopher's Stone by refining gold from base metals.”

“No one has ever found the stone that provides immortality and salvation.”

“Haven't they? The Comte de Saint-Germain said he had lived for centuries. Other alchemists and magicians have made the same claims, going back to Merlin, Enoch, and Hermes Trismegistus. You will be my chemist, Astiza, and discover and deliver to me the transformation men have sought for ten thousand years.”

“I can't. Not in a hole like this. Where am I?”

“The silver mines of Kutná Hora, sorceress,” Auric piped up. “A labyrinth of half-drowned tunnels no person has ever fully mapped. A kingdom of darkness. The pit of the underworld. The portal to Satan. The abyss of despair.”

“A laboratory,” Richter corrected. “And you
will
succeed, because your whelp's life is at stake. Isn't that right, Auric?”

“Boy soup. You promised, master. Should she not produce gold . . .”

“You will succeed, or watch your son boiled and eaten before your very eyes.”

I shut them. “Succeed at alchemy?”

“Succeed at magic.”

“By threatening me with your little demon?”

“This demon will be your assistant and overseer. Auric knows the dark arts as you know the light. He won't hurt you if you do as I say.”

My mind was frantic as a rabbit, darting this way and that. I'd no doubt their intention was to lure Ethan, use him, kill him, and then use me. But I was their prisoner, ransom for my husband. I'd promise to do what can't be done.

“How can I believe you? You said Ethan might be dead. Now you said you'll get word of my imprisonment to him. Which is it?”

“He's a duplicitous agent for both France and England, I've been informed, serving as go-between among great men. If the navies have clashed, he may well be dead. But if he survives, I'll find him.”

“How? You're not French.”

“The Invisible College is vast and interconnected. France uses us as agents at times, but has no idea that we use France. We must find the Brazen Head before men like Talleyrand do. We must keep it from their conspirators.”

“Which conspirator?”

“An agent you may remember. The Comtesse Catherine Marceau.”

Chapter 20

Y
our assassin treated you remarkably well, monsieur,” someone said to me through a haze of misery and confusion. “Or he was a remarkably poor shot. What did you say, Gideon? A dozen paces?”

“If that.”

“And yet the murderer missed every vital organ. You say this Digeon fellow here is good at cards?”

“He's good at cheating with them. Somehow he cut a deck to let me display the high card and keep a cloak. Which I shared with him.”

“Skill and luck. Digeon should be a gambler.” At which time the speaker probed my left shoulder and gave me a lightning bolt of pain, reminding me I had a new tunnel through my body from a musket ball fat as a grape. Then he poured what felt like liquid fire into the orifice and I flashed fully awake, roaring any number of oaths and thrashing to get out of some kind of enclosure. By the gunpowder deviltry of Francis Bacon, it hurts to get shot! Strong hands held me down.

“These Christians pretend to great piety and then take their messiah's name in vain,” my torturer said, commenting on my foul language. “It seems hypocritical.”

“To be human is to be a hypocrite, Father,” Gideon said.

“Gage!” I gasped.

“Ah, we truly woke him. What was that he said?”

I summoned breath, the mere inflation of my lungs a slog through purgatory. “My name is Gage.” It was a croak.

“He's delirious,” Gideon assessed.

I shook my head in frustration. If I died, I wanted someone to know who I truly was so word could someday reach my wife, should she live. “I'm not Digeon. My real name is Ethan Gage.”

There was silence for a moment. “He must be a deserter,” the sadist in charge finally said. “This Digeon is a fraud as well as a cheat.”

“He deserts to the front lines?” Gideon objected. “Then this Digeon is a lunatic.”

It was time to go all in, given that I was weak as a foundling and desperate for help. My fate was in Jewish hands. “I'm an American savant, a Franklin man,” I rasped. “You must hide me from Napoleon. He keeps detaining me from finding my wife.”

“I will allow,” Gideon allowed, “that he is very odd. No one befriends a Jew. He took my side in a quarrel he had no part in and risked the scorn of the others. Mysterious about his past, too.”

“Perhaps he's a Jew himself?”

“I suspect he's not much of anything.”

No, I wasn't a Jew. But I've spent time with savage Red Indians, black ex-slaves, Egyptian wizards, Arab adventurers, and the Jew Haim Farhi in Jerusalem, and decided that religion, color, and label didn't make a whit of difference in their performance as human beings. There's good and bad in all persuasions, is my experience. The other thing we share is that we're all a bit peculiar, me especially, but far from unique. I didn't care if this pair were Jewish or Eskimos, if they could help me. I'd have stated this ecumenical philosophy, but instead passed out again.

I awoke once more to the torment of a wagon jouncing on winter's frozen ruts, metal pots banging, axles creaking, and light filtering through cracks in a brown canvas roof. I was lying on a straw tick mattress, my chest and shoulder swathed in bandages, my boots off but the old sword hilt still tucked at my back. I wasn't bound, but since each jolt left me half-paralyzed with pain, I wasn't about to run away, either.

I listened. Armies give a great noise of clanking equipment, tramping boots, rumbling wheels, thudding horses, shouts, complaints, laughs, songs, and the other sounds that tens of thousands of people make when moving as a herd. All of this was absent. Gideon had brought me to a rolling refuge far beyond Bonaparte's forces, and thank Yahweh for that. I'd had my fill of soldiering.

I fell asleep again. And woke.

My feet were close enough to the wagon seat to kick its bottom. “Gideon! I'm thirsty.”

My saviors reined up and parted the canvas to let in gray light. Both turned to look at me. I saw an older version of my soldier friend, with the same handsome long jaw, heavy brows, intelligent eyes, and thick curly hair, the elder's tinted silver. Unlike his son, he had a beard and sidelocks, making him easy to identify as a Jewish merchant.

Gideon's father was a peddler to the army, and successful enough to afford a wagon. Many peddlers carry their wares on their backs, but dangling around me were all the things sutlers use to cater to soldiers. There were hides of leather, bolts of cloth, string, rope, buttons, nails, kegs of brandy and wine, tobacco, handkerchiefs, paper, fruit, smoked meats, pickles, sauerkraut, and sugar. There was also a rack with two pistols, a musket, and a fowling gun to protect this hoard and shoot the occasional meal. I saw furs, pawned watches, pewter plates, and iron pots.

“Drink this.” I was handed a wine sack. “We're in a hurry.” I sucked like an infant, puckering at the sour edge.

Night soon descended, as it must in December. We stopped, my chauffeurs jumped from the teamster seat, and then the rear flap opened and Gideon crawled inside. I slurred something.

“You're not just alive, but a little intoxicated,” he observed.

“Not drunk enough. Being assassinated is like being struck by lightning.”

“Here, have a taste of this.”

It was fiery brandy. I coughed and had some more.

“And this.” It was bread softened in beer.

This stew kept me dizzy, but I sipped enough to unclench my throat and roil my empty stomach. I felt feverish and feared sepsis, but at least I wasn't permanently delirious. “You saved my life,” I said. “Saved it twice, if we're getting away from Napoleon's army. I was hiding in the ranks from my enemies.”

“All we've done is plug your bullet hole. But I killed Cheval. You're lucky he was as bad a shot as he was stupid.”

“My own clumsiness, I suspect. I tripped on a furrow just as he fired.”

“Then my father was right. You're lucky.”

“I'm sorry you had to play executioner.”

“I'm not. I would have been his next victim.”

“Gideon, listen. I'm having the wretched luck of Odysseus trying to get back to my wife. I'm hoping she's in Prague. Could your father drop me that way?”

The older version loomed into view. “That's already our destination. My son has deserted, too, and will hide in the ghetto until the war ends.”

“The Jews will shelter you,” I asked, “Monsieur . . . ?”

“Aaron Dray, sutler and financier to His Emperor's troops. Thousands are missing after what's being called the Battle of Austerlitz, and I don't think they'll be particularly anxious to get their Jew back. And by my son's account, no friends will be looking for you, either. Nonetheless, you should consider declaring yourself dead, Monsieur Digeon, or Mister Gage, or whoever it is you are. Unless you're anxious to stand again in line of battle.”

“I'm actually very good at being dead,” I said. “I'm getting a great deal of practice. Though I hope I'm not actually dying.”

“It's a pretty poke through your shoulder, but keep it clean and it will close soon enough. Move too soon and you'll open it to poisons.”

I nodded weakly. “Where are we?”

“West of Brunn.”

“And the armies?”

“Napoleon has gone northeast in pursuit of Alexander and Francis, though the rumor is that the Austrians are suing for peace. The Allies weren't just defeated; they were destroyed. Europe is in shock. Bonaparte is master.”

I collected my thoughts. I was alive, likely to recover, and away from Pasques and Catherine Marceau. If they had followed the army to seek reunion with me, it was either to take revenge for my escape or to get the Brazen Head for themselves. I must not lead them to Astiza. Now we were near Prague. Perhaps the wound had been a blessing. “I owe my life to both of you. Cheval would have finished me with his bayonet. I've some money left to pay you for your kindness.”

“Men pay enough for possessions,” the elder Dray said. “Kindness should be free. As should life.”

“Doesn't cost a penny to come out of the womb,” Gideon added. “It's only the grave that is expensive.”

“You can use your money to board with a farm family while you recover,” Aaron suggested. “Spend the winter sitting by the fire. Lie low until the war is over, American. Then get on with your life, if you have one.”

Accustomed as I was to being chased, tortured, imprisoned, and shot at, the charity astonished me. Aaron Dray seemed generous and sensible; he proved that people are capable of surprise, which I suppose is one of mankind's rare redeeming features.

Yet lounging by a farm fire was the last thing I should do, even if I could afford it. I'd been badly sidetracked in my quest for wife and son. Could these new saviors be partners? My mind was spinning from more than alcohol. “That's damned Christian of you,” I began, before catching myself. “I mean Jewish. What I mean to say is that I'm grateful, and am going to propose another alternative, a business venture, that offers great challenge and great reward.”

“You are in no condition for adventure, Monsieur whoever-you-are.”

“I'm a diplomat, a savant, and a Franklin man, and I've been caught up in Napoleon's schemes while working desperately to escape them. I've served Bonaparte before, and was on my way to rescue my wife and son when I was conscripted again into his service. Old enemies from Paris—a comtesse named Catherine Marceau and a rogue policeman named Pasques—came to the army in pursuit of me. So I slipped away to hide in the front ranks.”

Gideon laughed. “Like hiding from the jailer by stepping in front of a firing squad!”

“It was a risk, but I thought Soult would be held in reserve. And it was ironic to be shot in the back, no? But I've had stranger things happen. In any event, I'm searching not just for my family but for a medieval relic that a lot of important people seem to want—including Catherine Marceau and Napoleon. Talleyrand, his foreign minister, enlisted me to find it and to give it to him first.”

Aaron looked skeptical. “Talleyrand? A medieval relic?”

“The story is that there may be an artificial man that can foretell the future. It's worth a great deal of money when we find it.” I'm a bit of a salesman, and substituting
when
for
if
is the kind of thing I've learned to do. I didn't tell them that the Brazen Head might have been destroyed centuries ago.

Gideon looked at his father. “A golem?”

This Jewish legend was a well-known tale in Europe. The golem was some kind of mud man, animated by magic, who protected the Jewish ghetto in Prague. It ran out of control, according to my informants in Paris. “Precisely, except completely different,” I said. “This is an automaton built by Albertus Magnus. One legend says it was smuggled east from Paris to Bohemia and awaits rediscovery. My wife, who is astoundingly clever, might have figured out where it is. My boy is a better version of his papa, and brave as Hector. My proposal is that you get me to Prague, we look for Astiza and Harry together, find the machine, and share whatever we sell it for.”

“We could take him to the ghetto,” Gideon said to his father. “The French would never find him there.” He turned to me. “Is this Marceau, and this Pasques, likely to pursue?”

“Yes. I hope they'll believe me dead or deserted, but I doubt they'll give up their own hunt for the Brazen Head. The two are as pestiferous as Corporal Cheval, and considerably craftier. So recovering in the Jewish ghetto would be greatly preferable to being abandoned at a Bohemian farmhouse.” I gave the brightest smile I could, given my prone position and barely stanched wound. “I've been to the Holy Land and have the utmost respect for your customs and religion. I'm something of a scholar when not shooting people.”

“You don't seem religious at all. A bit of a rogue, we soldiers judged.”

“Ecumenical,” I amended. “Pagan on my wife's side. It's all a little fuzzy, so we like to think of ourselves as open-minded. I'm sure mankind will sort these creeds out someday.” I actually thought nothing of the sort.

“Not ecumenical,” Aaron said. “You'll be as baffled on your deathbed as the day you were born. No matter. We're offering shelter, not conversion, and you're offering opportunity. A machine that could predict the next Christian riot would be very useful indeed.”

“Ask it anything you like. When we find it.”

“But how to divide the proceeds, should we sell it?” he went on. “This is assuming we do find your golem, of course, with you wounded and bringing a history of enemies into our new partnership.”

I was impressed with his negotiating skills. Most of us don't think our greed through. “My family has been looking for a full year,” I bargained. “Perhaps three-quarters for us and one-quarter for you?”

Gideon laughed. “He's asking to be dumped in a farmyard!”

“Actually, there are two of us and one of you,” Aaron added. “I've yet to see this wife of yours. So two-thirds for us, and a third for you.”

“You're a negotiator as sly as Talleyrand. Divided down the middle, then. That's always simplest.” It seemed a little presumptuous to haggle before we'd taken a step to find the thing, but it's simpler to divide the abstract than an actual pile of coins. “I care much more about finding my family than this android, or golem, or whatever we care to call it. So I propose an equal partnership: half to the Gage family and half to the family of Dray.”

“Done. And how do you propose we begin this search, Ethan Gage?'

“Get me to your ghetto, a good doctor, and a wise rabbi, and help me make inquiries. I'll show a clue I haven't shared yet.”