The most frightening terror in the world was not ghosts, or monsters, not vampires, or any of that nonsense. The most terrifying creature in the world is a madman.
In her dream her husband shook her, saying, Don’t you remember? Don’t you remember?
She started crying because she didn’t know what she was supposed to remember. And the kind man who had never said a harsh word to her when he was alive had seized her shoulders in her dream, making her head rock.
A far-off scream carried in on a gust of wind, and then was swallowed in the silence of the castle.
Chapter 50
HOFBURG PALACE
VIENNA
DECEMBER 23, 1610
The cold winds of December roared through Vienna, tearing slate shingles from the roofs, smashing them on the ice-glistened cobblestones.
King Matthias strode the halls of the Hofburg Palace, a caged lion. The click of his boots ricocheted off the vaulted ceilings and the stone walls lined with portraits of the King’s Habsburg an cestors.
Matthias had received a letter from Cluj, seat of the Diet of Transylvania.
“Your Majesty, I beg leave to speak,” said Bishop Melchior Klesl, entering the hall.
“Speak!”
“Your people should see you in church worshipping during the advent season,” the bishop pleaded.
“Which people? The blood-thirsty Catholics or the rebelling Protestants?”
Melchior Klesl sighed. “Habsburgs have always been Catholic, your Majesty. The Mother Church holds the Crown in great esteem as defender of the Faith.”
“My father refused last rites from the Catholic Church. I think I shall do the same,” said the King bitterly. “Most of my subjects are Protestants in the Hungarian Lands.”
Melchior Klesl looked at the scroll of vellum in King Matthias’s hand.
“Bad news, Your Majesty?”
Matthias exhaled noisily, flapping the letter in the air.
“The swine Gabor Bathory is plotting against me with the Sultan. He has invaded Wallachia, expanding his kingdom. Fool!”
“Wallachia! What claim could he possibly have to those lands?”
“Bathory claims Wallachia is part of Transylvania and under the ancient Order of the Dragon,” spat the King. “Groundless nonsense. Treason! He claims Vlad Tepes as a distant cousin.”
“Vlad Tepes! The order of Dracula?” Melchior Klesl shook his head, as a draft blew in through the leaded glass. He drew his robes tighter around him. “The Bathorys have spawned a viper’s nest of villains and cold-blooded murderers. It is easy to imagine Gabor is actually proud of his ancestry, rather than ashamed of it.”
“Bah!” said the King. “The Ottomans will play with Gabor like a cat enjoys a mouse’s scurrying. Then they will strike him down, installing an infidel of their choice as Voivode. They will knock once more on the gates of Vienna.”
“Your Majesty, surely Gabor doesn’t think he can hold Wallachia?”
Matthias swept up the parchment letter from Transylvania. He flapped it in the air with a vengeance.
“Gabor has executed his general, Boldizsár Kornis, in the public square to show his absolute power. My sources tell me there was a plot to assassinate Bathory in his bed, but the assassin lost heart.”
“General Kornis’s plan?”
King Matthias raised his chin, affirming. Tense ropes of muscle stood out in his neck.
“Bathory took the general’s wife to his bed, as he had done with any number of other loyal officers’ wives, making cuckolds of his loyal men. Komis had had enough of the despotic fool.”
Melchior Klesl scowled.
“Barbaric Transylvanian, who gives his own sister bastards.”
“His rutting does not concern me nearly as much as his political ambition,” said Matthias. “He means to rule all Europe, under the Bathory banner. The man who penned this letter tells me that Gabor sent a delegation to Constantinople to confer with the Sultan. He is planning on invading Poland, to secure it for the Ottomans. The scurrilous swine!”
The bishop scowled, twisting the jeweled rings on his big-knuckled hands. “In hopes that the Sultan will name him Voivode of all the Eastern lands?”
“Of course. And he has assured the Calvinists that their religion shall be propagated throughout the Eastern empire.”
The bishop balked. “Surely your report must be mistaken. The Bathorys wouldn’t risk their fortunes for religion!”
“Domination is Gabor’s religion. The whole cursed family is mad with power. Power and lust. Even the Sultan calls Gabor the ‘Deli,’ the madman.” King Matthias clenched his hand in a fist. “Gabor Bathory means to unite Moldavia, Wallachia, Poland, and Transylvania in opposition to the Habsburg Crown.”