Written in the Blood (46 page)

C
HAPTER
55

Interlaken, Switzerland

W
hen Jakab snagged her arm and held her back, Leah nearly shrugged him away, furious that he should choose to interfere, to mock her like this, so close to the end. And then she saw his eyes and she nearly cried out.

They blazed with a wild beauty.

On two velvet circlets of grey, gemstones twinkled; ferocious sparks of emerald, glinting sapphires, prismatic opals reflecting colours of every possible hue.

During the years he had pursued them, they had comforted themselves with the knowledge that while Jakab could control the contours of his face, he could not control his eyes.

Perhaps, she realised, he still couldn’t; perhaps he wasn’t even aware of the fireworks that danced there.

He handed her the gun, and she accepted it.

‘Don’t miss,’ he said, and she almost laughed. Perhaps it was what he wanted. But she couldn’t. Not at that.

Jakab looked into her eyes a moment longer, and then he turned away. Lifting his head, he walked towards her mother, arms outstretched.

Leah raised the gun.

Jakab closed in on Hannah, and then he enfolded her into his embrace.

Hannah stiffened as she felt him against her and they stood motionless, as if by some night magic his touch had turned them both to stone.

And then Jakab opened his arms and she slumped to the floor, and when he whipped around to face Leah he was Jakab no more, was something immeasurably more wicked.

His lips skinned back from his teeth when he saw her pistol, and he sprang across the floor, so fast it seemed as if some mythical beast charged towards her, one of Gabriel’s
C
ŵ
n Annwn
, perhaps.

Leah pulled the trigger. Felt the gun punch back in her hands. Saw its greedy lick of fire. Saw a bullet take Jakab in the heart. She shot him again. Again. Again. Again.

Bullets ripped though him. Chewed him open. Still he came, a half-dead monster with a blown-out chest and shattered head, and Leah almost stood her ground and let him come, until, with a jolt of horror, she realised what that would mean. Pushing off with her good leg, she dived to one side as Jakab – dead now, irrevocably so, even if the creature behind his eyes was not – sailed past her, out into that vault of darkness and down, down into its throat.

Leah sat up, and found that she was crying. She wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands.

A few yards away Hannah lay on her back, gasping. Leah dragged herself over. For a moment she had to press her forehead to her mother’s, and just be close like that.

‘You’re safe,’ she whispered. ‘You’re safe.’

Hannah’s face contorted.

‘Don’t speak. Don’t move. Not an inch, OK? There’s something I’ve got to do.’

She hoped there was still time.

C
HAPTER
56

Interlaken, Switzerland

H
e could do little else, but Izsák could still see. Flame-spawned shadows capered on the ceiling above him and he watched them, transfixed. He felt no pain. And even as his lungs filled with blood and his heart began to labour, even though he felt a curious wetness in the places where many of his organs should have been, the fear he had imagined might grip him at the end felt strangely absent.

He managed to move his head. Saw Leah Wilde bending over her mother. Angled his head a little further. Saw Georgia.

His daughter lay on her back, eyes closed. And it
was
Georgia now, he noticed, although exactly how he knew that he could not say.

The firelight dimmed, and now a larger shadow became a shadow not at all, but a face. Leah’s.

‘How do I look?’ he asked, and when he spoke he couldn’t contain a cough, and when it came it was followed by a gush of blood.

‘You look like shit,’ she told him. She tried to smile. Tears rolled down her cheeks.

His eyes swung over to the part of the room where Georgia lay. ‘I want to be with her.’

He saw that Leah was about to protest, was about to tell him that he was too weak, that he needed to conserve his strength. And then he saw her change her mind, and somehow, moments later, he was lying beside his daughter.

Izsák coughed again. However much blood he swallowed, there was always more. Georgia’s eyes were closed, but she was breathing, barely. Her face was contorted, a childlike expression of fear. It shattered him, to see that. But at least he was close. At least he was by her side.

Izsák snaked out his arm, amazed at the effort it caused him. His fingers found hers.

At his touch, her breath quickened.

‘You’re not alone,’ he whispered. ‘Georgia, you’re not alone.’

She took another breath, and then her chest stilled.

He wished he could have said more, could have told her he loved her, could have explained to her what had happened, where she’d gone, and where she went now. But perhaps – just perhaps – the few words he had managed were the ones she’d needed to hear most.

Izsák closed his eyes, felt his lungs deflating. How long he had travelled to get to this place.

Nineteen forty-four: that had been the year his wife had died on the floor of their cabin outside Dawson City; the year the
tolvaj
had visited and spirited away his child.

What year was it now? He couldn’t even say. But finally, the task to which he’d dedicated himself was done.

Peace.

That was what he felt. And then—

Opening his eyes, he saw Leah leaning over him. She had snaked her hands inside his shirt, and where her skin touched his, it burned.

Pale-faced, eyes wide and brimming with compassion, yet lacking any of the teaching that would give her the means to succeed, she attempted to heal him.

He coughed, another thick gout of blood, and shook his head. ‘No.’

She ignored him, and he saw her teeth clench, her chin tremble.

‘Leah, you don’t have the strength.’

‘Then hold on. I’ll get Soraya. My mother. Just hold on, OK? I’m not letting you go. I’m not.’

He reached up, encircling her wrists with his hands, and gently pulled them free. ‘I want this,’ he said.

‘But—’

‘I want this.’

A sob escaped her. She entwined her fingers in his. ‘Are you sure?’

Izsák smiled up at her. He closed his eyes. And died.

E
PILOGUE

Interlaken, Switzerland

T
hey made a strange procession down the mountain: an old Volkswagen bus, following the six-wheeled behemoth that was Luca’s Ford pick-up. A black sky above them released a billion white angels to mark their passage.

They’d used the winch on the truck to tow the camper out of the snowbank, and after a rolling start the VW’s engine had fired, surprising them all. If Leah ever managed to trace the man in Menaggio who’d donated it, she would thank him profusely before returning it to his care.

While Izsák had chosen to follow his daughter to that place where souls rest, Luca Sultés, as Leah had known he would, chose to fight. Hardly any life had remained inside him, but what was left stubbornly held on. It took the combined strength of all three of them to bring him back. Soraya shouted worried commands, which Leah and her mother followed as best they could. They nearly lost him twice before his heart regained enough strength to beat under its own rhythm.

They found Gabriel – half-dead – still locked in the back of Jakab’s van. Parked further down the slope they discovered an abandonned Lexus; inside, a driver’s licence containing Izsak’s photograph, and a childseat containing Elijah, Etienne’s son.

In the snow on the lawn below the chalet they found Etienne, still bleeding from the bullet she’d taken from Jakab’s gun, but alive. When Leah saw her renuited with her boy, she failed to hold back her tears. It took them five minutes before they could prise Elijah from Etienne’s arms so that they could begin to treat her wounds.

Wearing gloves, they pitched into the flames the carcasses of the dead ibex that lay on the chalet’s lawn. The likelihood that any of those remains hosted a
tolvaj
was remote, but they wouldn’t take the chance.

They found Flóra’s body in deep snow. With infinitely more care, they offered it, too, to the fire.

Leah drove the pick-up down the hill, her mother beside her. Gabriel slumped in the back, next to Etienne and her son. Behind them Soraya piloted the old VW bus, Luca hunched over on the passenger seat and the children crowded behind.

They could have stopped in Interlaken. But it seemed, to all of them, far too close. With snowflakes dancing in the headlights and chasing the wipers across the glass, they drove and they drove.

Leah did not know what the future held. Its mysteries were wound too tightly to unravel. But she wasn’t alone. And that was good.

Behind them, halfway up the mountain, flames leaped, fires burned and sparks, like the twinkling miracle of
hosszú életek
eyes, rose up into the heavens and, winking, disappeared into the night.

G
LOSSARY OF
T
ERMS

állj
–
wait
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

balfácán
–
idiot
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

Belső Ő
r
–
inner guard
(
Lit.
Hungarian) The
Örökös
Főnök
’s
personal guards.

capsich
–
blood-cuff
(hosszú életek)
A metal instrument used during public executions, in which a
hosszú élet’s
arteries were severed and held open, preventing the victim from healing and causing death by blood loss.

család
–
family
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

déjnin
–
déjnin
(
hosszú életek
) A ceremonial edged weapon. No direct translation.

elég
–
enough
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

Eleni
–
Eleni
(
Lit.
Hungarian) The organization, commissioned by the Hungarian Crown, responsible for the
hosszú életek
genocide of 1880.

Éjszakai Sikolyok
–
Night of Screams
(
Lit.
Hungarian)
hosszú életek
term for the Crown-sponsored genocide that occurred in nineteenth-century Hungary.

fiú
–
boy
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

Főnök/Örökös Főnök
–
leader/eternal leader
(
Lit.
Hungarian)
Hosszú életek
head of state. A lifetime position, although not always hereditary. With the exception of formal occasions, usually shortened to
Főnök.

gyermekrablók
–
child snatchers
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Little-used alternative name for the
lélek tolvajok
.

hosszú élet/életek
–
long life/lives
(
Lit.
Hungarian) A mythical race, mentioned in
Gesta Hungarorum
, one of Hungary’s oldest historical texts. Known for shape-shifting, extreme longevity and the ability to heal themselves and others.

jövendőmondás
–
fortune
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Hungarian tarot cards.

kedves
–
darling
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Term of endearment.

kicsikém
–
my little one
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Term of endearment.

kincsem
–
my love/sweet one
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Term of endearment.

kirekesztett
–
outcasts
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

1. Those banished from
hosszú életek
society as punishment for criminal acts.

2. Sentence of banishment passed down by the
tanács
.

kurva
–
slut
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Vulgar.

lélekfeltárás
–
soul-sharing
(
hosszú életek
)

1. A means of mutual identification through voluntary stimulation of the iris.

2. The most intimate act of
hosszú életek
lovers, performed by far more intense and prolonged stimulation.

Merénylő
–
assassin
(
Lit.
Hungarian) A formal position, in the exclusive service of the
Örökös F
ő
nök.

Örökös Főnök
–
See
Főnök
.

sertés
–
pig
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

simavér/simavérek
–
flat blood/flat bloods
(
hosszú életek
) Pejorative. A person of non-
hosszú életek
descent.

sorozat
–
inheritance
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Old
hosszú életek
law, extending the sentence of
kirekesztett
to an offender’s descendants. Abandoned early in the twentieth century.

szar
–
shit
(
Lit.
Hungarian) Vulgar
.

Szeretlek
–
I love you
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

tanács
–
council
(
Lit.
Hungarian) The eight elected governors of
hosszú élet
society. Advisors to the
Örökös Főnök.

te jó ég
–
my goodness
(
Lit.
Hungarian)

végzet
–
fate/fate night
(
Lit.
Hungarian) A series of four formal masked balls (
kezdet, második, harmadik
and
negyedik
) that mark the entrance of
hosszú életek
youth into adulthood and provide a venue for ritualised (and compulsory) courtship.

Vének Könyve
–
Book of Elders
(
hosszú életek
) The oldest
hosszú életek
text in existence, dating to
AD
748. Sets out the laws of governance strictly enforced by the
Örökös F
ő
nök
until the events of the
Aséjszakai Sikolyokor.
Viewed as outdated by some, its doctrines are the cause of a growing ideological split.

Food and Drink

halászlé
–
A river fish soup spiced with paprika.

kürtőskalács
–
A sweet chimney-shaped pastry, made by winding a sugared dough around a tapered spit and hanging above a fire.

paprikás krumpli
–
A simple potato and sausage stew, usually cooked with green peppers, onions and tomatoes.

pálinka
–
A brandy made from orchard fruits.

békési szilvapálinka
–
A plum pálinka from Békés.