House of Bathory(130)
Merciful death had kissed them with peace, their tortured faces relaxed at last.
Janos forced himself to close his eyes to the girls long dead. He had to find Zuzana.
She was not here among the dead.
He followed the course of the river threading through the cavern. He picked his way along the frozen shore.
He held his torch high, the ceilings of the cavern now not a wolf’s mouth, but the smooth vaulted arches of a cathedral.
His lips moved in silent prayer, not daring to speak in the holy silence of the underground. Spirits—far more ancient than mankind—dwelled here, amid the rock, water, and ice.
As the cave descended less steeply, the river moved more and more slowly. The rush against the stone was muted, the water undecided whether to freeze and join with the icy shelf or to slice its course onward.
Janos walked on. His torch flickered once, twice. Then it was gone. He was plunged into darkness. He closed his eyes and followed the sound of the cold-blooded waters.
As time wore on, he heard the water change its heartbeat, moving more rapidly. He opened his eyes to see light playing off long white icicles, the savage teeth of the wolf guarding the way to a small opening—and, beyond that, the glint of the rising sun.
At last he fought his way through the opening and looked down to the river spilling out into a series of ponds. The branches of the weeping willows bowed low in reverence to winter’s reign.
It was there he found Zuzana, staring wide-eyed to the rosy dawn, her body lodged under a thick sheet of clear ice.
Chapter 121
BATHORY CASTLE
HIGH TATRA MOUNTAINS, SLOVAKIA
DECEMBER 30, 2010
Daisy stared at Betsy’s body, beneath the ice. She stood paralyzed at the sight.
“Daisy!” shouted a voice. “Grace!”
John hurried toward them, stumbling through the snow, fighting through the drifts.
Wide-eyed in horror, neither woman spoke as he reached them.
He looked down and saw Betsy and, without thinking, he lunged.
He crashed through the ice, embraced her freezing body, and pulled her from the pool. Her face had turned a pale blue, mottled in white.
What is the chance of surviving more than thirty minutes in icy water—what is the probability?
Probability. Chance, margin of error. Statistics—his identity, his life—all that was his enemy now, logic his foe.
She was dead. He knew it. Here was the proof, the blue-white flesh, the open eyes.
“No!” he roared, falling to his knees. “No!”
He bent over her, his open palm cradling her head. He placed his lips over her open mouth.
He breathed hard. Breath after warming breath.
He heard Daisy’s boots crunching next to him as she knelt in the snow.
She crossed her palms, pushing rhythmically against Betsy’s chest. Tears streamed down Daisy’s face, but she said nothing. Her anguished eyes sought John’s.
John and Daisy worked silently, blinking dumbly in the glow of sunrise.
Grace watched them.
She gazed out over the frozen pond, remembering her dream.
Detective Whitehall found the three Americans poised over the body. He led the ambulance medics to the scene.
As the Slovaks pulled the desperate man and girl away, Whitehall turned. He looked out over the pond, the icicles on the weeping willows splintering the glow of dawn.
The medics allowed John to accompany them in the ambulance. As a matter of protocol, they kept up the artificial respiration for the duration of the ride.
John held Betsy’s frozen hand, squeezing rhythmically it as if it were her heart.
“Live,” he whispered. “Live. Against all probability, damn it! Live.”
He cried silently into her frozen hand.
He felt a flicker, a slight curling of her finger.
“She moved her hand!” he shouted. “She moved!”
The medics looked at each other, and then to the face of the foreigner.
“No, she could not. She is—”
“No, listen to me! She did it again. Look!”
He cradled her hand like a bird in his cupped palms. Her fingers moved tentatively, searching for his.
One of the medics placed a stethoscope against her breast. He stared into the air, listening blindly.
His face lit up.
“Yes, yes, Very little. Heart.”
Chapter 122
ČACHTICE CASTLE
DECEMBER 30, 1610
Dozens of soldiers searched Čachtice Castle. They overturned mattresses, searched wells, dug up shallow graves.
Count Thurzo had every servant within the walls of the castle brought to him, one by one, in the great hall, to give testimony. He sat at a great oaken table along with his scribe, with Miklos Zrynyi and Emerich Megyery as witnesses.
A guard accompanied Janos Szilvasi to the door.
“Horsemaster Szilvasi,” said Count Thurzo. “Please enter.”