The Keep. Part 18

The darkness on the far side of the little table began to recede. A shape took form out of the black. Cuza immediately recognized the face and the eyes from last night, and then the rest of the figure became visible. A giant of a man stood before him, at least six and a half feet tall, broad shouldered, standing proudly, defiantly, legs spread, hands on hips. A floor-length cloak, as black as his hair and eyes, was fastened about his neck with a clasp of jeweled gold. Beneath that Cuza could see a loose red blouse, possibly silk, loose black breeches that looked like jodhpurs, and high boots of rough brown leather.

It was all there-power, decadence, ruthlessness.

"How do you come to know the old tongue?" said the voice.

Cuza heard himself stammer. "I-I've studied it for years. Many years." He found his mind had gone numb, frozen. All the things he had wanted to say, the questions he had planned all afternoon to ask, all fled, all gone. Desperately, he verbalized the first thought that came into his head.

"I had almost expected you to be wearing evening clothes."

The thick eyebrows, growing so near to each other, touched as the visitor's brow furrowed. "I do not understand 'evening clothes.' "

Cuza gave himself a mental kick-amazing how a single novel, written half a century ago by an Englishman, could so alter one's perceptions of what was an essentially Romanian myth. He leaned forward in his wheelchair. "Who are you?"

"I am the Viscount Radu Molasar. This region of Wallachia was once mine."

He was saying that he was a feudal lord of his time. "A boyar?"

"Yes. One of the few who stayed with Vlad-the one they called Tepes, Tepes, the Impaler-until his end outside Bucharest." the Impaler-until his end outside Bucharest."

Even though he had expected such an answer, Cuza was still aghast. "That was in 1476! Almost five centuries ago! Are you that old?"

"I was there."

"But where have you been since the fifteenth century?"

"Here."

"But why?" Cuza's fear was vaporizing as he spoke, replaced by an intense excitement that sent his mind racing. He wanted to know everything-now!

"I was being pursued."

"By Turks?"

Molasar's eyes narrowed, leaving only the endless black of his pupils showing. "No. By ... others ... madmen who would pursue me across the world to destroy me. I knew I could not outrun them forever"-he smiled here, revealing long, tapered, slightly yellowed teeth, none of them particularly sharp, but all strong- strong-looking-"so I decided to outwait them. I built this keep, arranged for its maintenance, and hid myself away."

"Are you..." There was a question Cuza had been burning to ask from the start but had dared not; now he could contain himself no longer. "Are you of the undead?"

Again the smile, cold, almost mocking. "Undead? Nosferatu? Moroi? Moroi? Perhaps." Perhaps."

"But how did you-"

Molasar slashed a hand through the air. "Enough! "Enough! Enough of your bothersome questions! I care not for your idle curiosity. I care not for you but that you are a countryman of mine and there are invaders in the land. Why are you with them? Do you betray Wallachia?" Enough of your bothersome questions! I care not for your idle curiosity. I care not for you but that you are a countryman of mine and there are invaders in the land. Why are you with them? Do you betray Wallachia?"

"No!" Cuza felt the fear that had been washed away in the excitement of contact creep back into him as he saw Molasar's expression grow fierce. "They brought me here against my will!"

"Why?" The word was a jabbing knife. The word was a jabbing knife.

"They thought I could find out what was killing the soldiers. And I guess I have... haven't I?"

"Yes. You have." Molasar underwent another mercurial shift of mood, smiling again. "I need them to restore my strength after my long repose. I will need them all before I am again at the peak of my powers."

"But you mustn't!" Cuza blurted without thinking.

Molasar flared again. "Never "Never say to me what I must or must not do in my home! And never when invaders have taken it over! I saw to it that no Turk ever set foot in this pa.s.s while I was about, and now I am awakened to find my keep overrun with Germans!" say to me what I must or must not do in my home! And never when invaders have taken it over! I saw to it that no Turk ever set foot in this pa.s.s while I was about, and now I am awakened to find my keep overrun with Germans!"

He was in a foaming rage, walking back and forth, swinging his fists wildly about to punctuate his words.

Cuza took the opportunity to lift the top off the box to his right and remove the fragment of broken mirror Magda had given him earlier in the day. As Molasar stormed about, lost in a rage, Cuza held up the mirror and tried to catch Molasar's reflection in it. He could glance to his left and see Molasar by the stack of books on the corner of the table, but when he looked in the mirror he could see only the books.

Molasar cast no reflection!

Suddenly, the mirror was s.n.a.t.c.hed from Cuza's hand.

"Still curious?" He held up the mirror and looked into it. "Yes. The tales are true-I cast no reflection. Long ago I did." His eyes clouded for an instant. "But no more. What else have you in that box?"

"Garlic." Cuza reached under the cover and pulled out a clove. "It is said to ward away the undead."

Molasar held out his palm. There was hair growing at its center. "Give it to me." When Cuza complied, Molasar put the clove up to his mouth and took a bite, then tossed the rest into a corner. "I love garlic."

"And silver?" He pulled out a silver locket that Magda had left him.

Molasar did not hesitate to take it and rub it between his palms. "I could not very well have been a boyar if I had feared silver!" He seemed to be enjoying himself now.

"And this," Cuza said, reaching for the last item in the box, "is supposed to be the most potent of vampire banes." He pulled out the cross Captain Woermann had lent Magda.

With a sound that was part gasp and part growl, Molasar stepped away and averted his eyes. "Put it away!"

"It affects you?" Cuza was stunned. A heaviness grew in his chest as he watched Molasar cringe. "But why should it? How-"

"PUT IT AWAY!".

Cuza did so immediately, bulging the sides of the cardboard box as he pressed the lid down as tightly as he could over the offending object.

Molasar all but leaped upon him, baring his teeth and hissing his words through them. "I thought I might find an ally in you against the outlanders, but I see you are no different!"

"I want to see them gone, too!" Cuza said, terrified, pressing himself back into the meager cushioning of his wheelchair. "More than you!"

"If that were true, you would never have brought that abomination into this room! And you would never have exposed it to me!"

"But I didn't know! It could have been another false folk tale like the garlic and the silver!" He had to convince him!

Molasar paused. "Perhaps." He whirled and stalked toward the darkness, his anger cooled, but minimally. "But I have doubts about you, Crippled One."

"Don't go! Please!"

Molasar stepped into the waiting dark and turned toward Cuza as it enveloped him. He said nothing.

"I'm on your side, Molasar!" Cuza cried. He couldn't leave now-not when there were so many unanswered questions! "Please believe me!"

Only pinpoint glints of light off the surfaces of Molasar's eyes remained. The rest of him had been swallowed up. Suddenly, a hand jabbed out of the blackness, pointing a finger at Cuza.

"I will watch you, Crippled One. And if I see you are to be trusted, I will speak with you another time. But if you betray our people, I shall end your days."

The hand disappeared. Then the eyes. But the words remained, hanging in the air. The darkness gradually receded, seeping back into the walls. Soon all was as it had been. The partially eaten clove of garlic that lay on the floor in the corner was the only evidence of Molasar's visit.

For a long while, Cuza did not move. Then he noticed how thick his tongue was in his mouth, and drier than usual. He picked up the cup of water and sipped from it; a mechanical exercise requiring no conscious thought. He swallowed with the usual difficulty, then reached for the box to his right. His hand rested on the lid awhile before lifting it. His numbed mind balked at facing what was within, but he knew he eventually must. Compressing his strictured mouth into a short, grim line, he lifted the lid, removed the cross, and laid it before him on the tabletop.

Such a little thing. Silver. Some ornate work at the ends of the upright and the crosspiece. No corpse affixed to it. Just a cross. If nothing else, a symbol of man's inhumanity to man.

From the millennia-old traditions and learning of his own faith that was so much a part of his daily life and culture, Cuza had always looked upon the wearing of crosses as a rather barbaric custom, a sure sign of immaturity in a religion. But then, Christianity was a relatively young offshoot of Judaism. It needed time. What had Molasar called the cross? An "abomination." No, it was not that; at least not to Cuza. Grotesque, yes, but never an abomination.

But now it took on new meaning, as did so many other things. The walls seemed to press in on him as he stared at the little cross, allowing it to become the focus of his attention. Crosses were so like the banes used by primitives to ward off evil spirits. Eastern Europeans, especially the Gypsies among them, had countless banes, from garlic to icons. He had lumped the cross in with the rest, seeing no reason why it should deserve more consideration than the rest.

Yet Molasar had been repulsed by the cross ... could not even bear to look at it. Tradition gave it power over demons and vampires because it was supposedly the symbol of the ultimate triumph of good over evil. Cuza had always told himself that if the undead did exist, and the cross did have power over them, it was because of the innate faith of the person holding the object, not the object itself.

Yet he had just proved himself wrong.

Molasar was evil. That was given: Any ent.i.ty that leaves a trail of corpses in order to continue its own existence is inherently evil. And when Cuza had held up the cross, Molasar had shrunk away. Cuza had no belief in the power of the cross, yet it had power over Molasar.

So it must be the cross itself which had the power, not its bearer.

His hands shook. He felt dizzy and lightheaded as his mind ran over all the implications. They were shattering.

NINETEEN.

THE KEEP.

Thursday, 1 May 0640 hours

Two nights in a row without a death. Woermann found his mood edging into a sort of cautious jubilance as he buckled on his belt. He had actually slept last night, soundly and long, and was so much the better for it this morning.

The keep was no brighter or cheerier. There was still that indefinable sense of a malignant presence. No, it was he who had changed. For some reason he now felt there might be a real chance of his getting back to his home in Rathenow alive. For a while he had seriously come to doubt the possibility. But with the hearty breakfast he had eaten in his room perking through his intestines, and the knowledge that the men under his command numbered the same this morning as they had last night, all things seemed possible-perhaps even the departure of Erich Kaempffer and his uniformed hoodlums.

Even the painting failed to bother him this morning. The shadow to the left of the window still looked like a gibbeted corpse, but it no longer disturbed him as it had when Kaempffer had first pointed it out.

He descended the watchtower stairs and reached the first level in time to find Kaempffer approaching the professor's rooms from the courtyard, looking more supremely confident than usual, and with as little reason as ever.

"Good morning, dear Major!" Woermann called heartily, feeling he could forgo any overt venting of spleen this morning, considering the imminence of Kaempffer's departure. But a veiled jab was always in order. "I see we have the same idea: You've come to express your deepest thanks to Professor Cuza for the German lives he has saved again!"

"There's no evidence of his having done a d.a.m.ned thing!" Kaempffer said, his jauntiness disappearing in a snarl. "Even he he makes no claim!" makes no claim!"

"But the timing of the end of the murders with his arrival is rather suggestive of some cause-effect relationship, don't you think?"

"Coincidence! Nothing more!"

"Then why are you here?"

Kaempffer faltered for an instant. "To interrogate the Jew about what he has learned from the books, of course."

"Of course."

They entered the outer room, Kaempffer first. They found Cuza kneeling on the floor on his spread-out bedroll. He was not praying. He was trying to hoist himself back into the wheelchair. After the briefest glance in their direction as they walked in, he returned his full concentration to the task.

Woermann's initial impulse was to help the man-Cuza's hands appeared useless for gripping and his muscles seemed too weak to pull him up even if he could manage a firm grip. But he had asked for no aid, either with his eyes or with his voice. It was obviously a matter of pride for him to pull himself up into the chair una.s.sisted. Woermann realized that beyond his daughter, the crippled man had little left in which to take any pride. He would not rob him of this small accomplishment.

Cuza seemed to know what he was doing. As Woermann watched from Kaempffer's side-he was sure the major was enjoying the spectacle-he could see that Cuza had braced the back of the wheelchair against the wall beside the fireplace, could see the pain on his face as he strained his weakened muscles to pull himself up, forcing his frozen joints to bend. Finally, with a groan that broke out beads of perspiration on his face, Cuza slid up onto the seat and slumped on his side, hanging over the armrest, panting and sweating. He still had to slide up a little farther and turn over fully onto his b.u.t.tocks before he was completely in the chair, but the worst part was over.

"What do you want of me?" he said when he had caught his breath. Gone was that staid, overly polite manner that had typified his behavior since his arrival in the keep; gone, too, was the constant referral to them as "gentlemen." At the moment there appeared to be too much pain, too much exhaustion to cope with to allow him the luxury of sarcasm.

"What did you learn last night, Jew?" Kaempffer said.

Cuza heaved himself over onto his b.u.t.tocks and leaned wearily against the back of the chair. He closed his eyes a moment, then reopened them, squinting at Kaempffer. He appeared to be almost blind without his gla.s.ses.

"Not much more. But there is evidence that the keep was built by a fifteenth-century boyar who was a contemporary of Vlad Tepes."

"Is that all? Two days of study and that is all?"

"One day, Major," the professor said, and Woermann sensed some of the old spark edging into the reply. "One day and two nights. That's not a long time when the reference materials are not in one's native tongue." day, Major," the professor said, and Woermann sensed some of the old spark edging into the reply. "One day and two nights. That's not a long time when the reference materials are not in one's native tongue."

"I did not ask for excuses, Jew! I want results!"

"And have you got them?" The answer seemed important to Cuza.

Kaempffer straightened his shoulders and pulled himself up to his full height as he replied. "There have been two consecutive nights without a death, but I don't believe you have had anything to do with that." He rotated the upper half of his body and gave Woermann a haughty look. "It seems I have accomplished my mission here. But just for good measure, I'll stay one more night before continuing on my way."

"Ah! Another night of your company!" Woermann said, feeling his spirits soar. "Our cup runneth over!" He could put up with anything for one more night-even Kaempffer.

"I see no need for you to remain here even that long, Herr Major," Cuza said, visibly brightening. "I'm sure other countries have much greater need of your services."

Kaempffer's upper Up curled into a smile. "I shan't be leaving your beloved country, Jew. I go to Ploiesti from here."

"Ploiesti? Why Ploiesti?"

"You'll learn soon enough." He turned to Woermann. "I shall be ready to leave first thing tomorrow morning."

"I shall personally hold the gate open for you."

Kaempffer shot him an angry look, then strode from the room. Woermann watched him go. He sensed that nothing had been solved, that the killings had stopped of their own accord, and that they could begin again tonight, tomorrow night, or the next. It was only a brief hiatus they were enjoying, a moratorium; they had learned nothing, accomplished nothing. But he had not voiced his doubts to Kaempffer. He wanted the major out of the keep as much as the major wanted to be out. He would say nothing that might delay his departure.

"What did he mean about Ploiesti?" Cuza asked from behind him.

"You don't want to know." He looked from Cuza's ravaged, troubled face to the table. The silver cross his daughter had borrowed yesterday lay there next to the professor's spectacles.