The gravediggers pulled off their sweat-stained caps, loose dirt tumbling to the ground.
“So you see the graves—thirty-two in all. Graves of girls who had ‘accidents’ at the castle,” said the pastor, his tone acid. “When the ground freezes too hard in the winter months, we stack the bodies in a root cellar to bury in the spring.”
He led Count Thurzo through the graveyard to a row of fresh mounds of dirt.
“This one. Albina Holub. Born here in Čachtice. A knife slipped and cut her wrist when she was slicing vegetables. Cut it so badly that she bled to death. Clumsy girl, it seems. Serves her right, they said, for mishandling the Countess’s fine cutlery.”
Thurzo tightened his lips, pale as slivers of cheese.
“And this one, Barbora Mokry. It seems she slipped and knocked her head against the well, only a week after Albina had her mishap with the knife. An unfortunate coincidence. Gashed her head so badly that she bled to death. Nothing, it seems, could be done.
“And over here is the first maiden who brought me fresh bread and butter when I arrived at the parish. She called me Sir, and bowed as if I were a king. She was devoted to the scriptures, and would sit in rapt attention in Mass. Of course the poor girl could not read, but God’s holy word resonated in her soul.”
“What happened to her?” asked Thurzo.
“It seems that she attended to the Countess’s bath when her regular attendant was ill with a fever. The water was too cool, sending the Countess into a rage. The Countess screamed at the girl, and beat her about the head and shoulders until she bled.”
“And then what?”
“We do not know. There was a cut on her neck where the Countess scratched her in fury. And a savage bite, ripping the flesh from her breast. She—” the pastor’s voice cracked. He clenched his eyes shut, his face pinched with emotion.
Then he looked into the Count’s eyes. “The Countess simply wrote she bled to death.”
Chapter 30
HOFBURG PALACE, VIENNA
DECEMBER 20, 1610
Winter seized Vienna on the eve of the solstice. Hard frosts choked the earth. Brittle leaves clung to branches coated in ice.
King Matthias II, ruler of Hungary, Austria, and Moravia complained first of the unseasonable cold and then the oppressive heat from the colossal ceramic furnace of the Hofburg Palace.
His peevish humor was aggravated by thwarted ambition. The summer had seen his army’s bloody advance on Prague. The Brother’s War, it was called, as Matthias’s forces marched toward the Hrad, to wrest power from his brother Emperor Rudolf II.
Matthias had won control of the lower kingdoms, leaving Rudolf with little more than Bohemia, a scrap of his former empire, a flimsy mantle of dignity to wrap around the once all-powerful ruler of the Holy Roman Empire.
Then Matthias had felt the surge of power, like young blood flowing in his veins. Now as he cast an eye beyond the frosted glass windows, the dead, frozen gardens and winter silence gnawed at his heart.
The tributes to the new king were not sufficient to finance his struggle against the Ottomans, who waged ever-encroaching war on the Hungarian and Austrian fronts. If they took Vienna, all of Christendom could fall to the infidels.
For years, Matthias had served as commander-in-chief of the Royal Habsburg Troops, serving his brother and his kingdom. Rudolf II had squandered the riches of the empire on alchemy, astrology, art, and costly curiosities, while the troops had survived with meager wages and scant rations. The soldiers looted whenever possible in victories against the Turks, but those victories were too few as the Habsburg armies saw their lands conquered by the enemy. The fall of Estergom, ancient seat of Hungary, still haunted Matthias. The old Hungarian capital had been lost under his watch, for he had not the troops to match the Ottomans.
Now, he held another petition from the Countess Bathory. She demanded repayment of a debt—a debt he could not begin to pay—that had financed years of war against the Infidels.
Matthias flung the letter to ground. A bowing servant scuttled by, plucking the velum missive from the carpeted floor. “As if I even possessed the gold to repay the Bathory bitch. She owns more land than I!”
“Yes,” said his trusted confessor Melchior Klesl, nodding. “And more castles.”
King Matthias scowled, looking out the window at his frozen kingdom. “Send in Count Thurzo.”
Melchior Klesl motioned to the sentries to admit the visitor.
Count Thurzo—who had been waiting for hours for an audience with the King—bowed deeply to Matthias.
“What news do you bring?”
Thurzo cast a glance around the room. “Might I ask for a private audience with Your Majesty?”