by Alex Archer
The girl started to reach for the poultice.
Erene captured her young patient's hands. "No. You mustn't touch the medicine. Okay?"
The girl nodded, but already her eyelids were growing heavy as her skin absorbed the narcotic and flushed her carotid arteries with it. Erene knew she didn't have to worry about the air passageways getting swollen. One of the herb's effects was to facilitate breathing.
When she judged the girl was sedated enough, Erene removed the medicine and put it aside. Later she would bury them so no animal would be tempted to eat them. Consuming the leaves could prove lethal.
Glassy-eyed, the girl lay back on the table, suspended between life and death.
"Is she all right?" the mother asked.
"She's asleep," Erene said.
"Those plants are dangerous. We are taught to be careful around them because they can cause death."
"They can. But they can also be used to take pain away. Don't you know what they're called?"
The woman shook her head. Turning her head and catching the candlelight as she did revealed the old bruise under her left eye.
"They're called yellow monkshood." Erene couldn't believe how little the people in the village knew about the natural world around them. Most struggled to save enough money to buy American jeans and music from the Russian and Chinese black marketers in Riga.
"But she's all right?"
"She's going to be fine. I'm going to let her sleep for a little longer, to make sure the herbs do what they're supposed to."
"The hedge witch taught you this?"
"My grandmother taught me this," Erene corrected. She hadn't realized how much her grandmother had taught her until she got out in the world that existed beyond the village. When she'd lived with her grandmother, she just accepted that her grandmother knew so much just because she did.
It wasn't until she was teaching herself her second vocation – the one that had allowed her to live if not in luxury then at least well in many of the cities she'd lived in – that she realized how much training her grandmother had given her. Erene had adapted easily and learned quickly, impressing the people she worked with.
"I meant no disrespect," the woman said.
"She took care of this village all her life."
"I know. We miss her."
But not enough to see that her grave is kept clean, Erene thought. She pushed away her anger. She was in a bad mood, about to do something that wasn't easy, and she wanted to take it out on someone.
"How was your daughter's arm broken?"
The woman hesitated.
Erene knew the woman was choosing her lie and was disgusted.
"She fell," the woman said. "It was most unfortunate."
"Fell?" Erene put as much disbelief into that one word as she could muster.
The woman nodded but wouldn't meet Erene's eyes. "She was caring for the goats. There was ice." She shrugged.
Erene caught the woman's chin in her hand and turned her head to better observe the black eye. "I suppose you slipped, too."
"Please," the woman whispered. Gently, she pulled free of Erene's grip. "I don't want any more trouble. My daughter and I have enough trouble in our lives."
"Your husband did this," Erene stated.
"Please treat my daughter."
Erene took a deep breath. "I don't want to heal her just to have her hurt again. Do you understand?" She spoke in Latvian now, and didn't even notice until she'd asked the question.
"He has a lot of anger in him," the woman said. "Things are not easy for him."
"Things aren't easy for anybody. There's no excuse for this."
The woman stroked her sleeping daughter's head. She wiped the tears from her face with her shirtsleeve.
"Where is your husband?" Erene asked.
Shaking her head, the woman made no reply.
"My grandmother," Erene said, knowing she spoke the truth, "wouldn't tolerate something like this."
"I know," the woman said. "She would threaten to put a curse on my husband. But she isn't here now, and he doesn't believe in things the way most of us do." She paused. "Not everyone believed in the hedge – in your grandmother."
The words cut into Erene. Not just the narrowly avoided slight against her grandmother, but the reminder that she, too, had abandoned her grandmother's ways.
"My husband," the woman went on, "is from Russia. When he first got here, I thought he was just a soldier who had seen too much fighting."
Erene knew that those men still wandered into the countryside. There were fewer now that Russia had adopted Western ways, but it still happened.
"Now I think he is just a criminal who wanted a place to hide." The woman shrugged sadly. "All the pretty words he gave me are gone these days. He works when he wishes to, but my daughter and I never see any of the money. If my friends didn't give us food to eat, we would starve."
Erene cursed, and the harsh words caused the woman to flinch.
When her grandmother had lived in the village, nothing like this would have happened. Her grandmother had involved herself with the lives of the villagers. They had respected and, in part, feared her.
"You can't have one without the other, Erene," the old woman would tell her. "Respect and fear almost always go together."
And the hedge witch's healing powers are nothing without the ability to punish, Erene thought. She focused on the woman again.
"I will heal your daughter, but I don't want her hurt again," she told the woman. "Do you understand?"
The woman nodded.
"Then you will tell me where he is when we are finished here."
Slowly, uncertainly, the woman nodded.
Taking a deep breath, Erene turned back to the child. Then she reached over and calmly rebroke the sleeping girl's arm.
Chapter 24
"I don't think I've ever seen a woman pack faster," Stanley commented at Annja's hotel. He stood looking down at the new suitcase she'd purchased only that morning. "My mother takes at least ten suitcases every time we go somewhere."
"That's because I don't live here. I came here to stay out of harm's way." Annja worked as quickly as she could. She'd gotten permission from Bart to go home to relax for a bit, then he wanted to meet with her and get a written statement. She turned her attention to the mosaic Mario had sent her.
Stanley approached the table and peered over the tops of his glasses at the mosaic lying there. "This is some puzzle."
"Yes. It was." Annja scooped the tessera into a reinforced mailing package she'd picked up at a convenience store on her way to her hotel.
"You solved it?"
"I did."
"Want to explain what it means?"
"Not exactly." Annja sealed the envelope and addressed it to herself care of Mailboxes & Stuff. She planned to leave it with the concierge to have it couriered over. Dieter's men were all in custody, but there might have been a few left.
"This is why you want to go to Venice?"
Feeling a little guilty, Annja turned to him. "Stanley, I have to tell you something."
He looked nervous. "Sure."
"I had a friend named Mario Fellini. Those men who attempted to kidnap us at Sherlock's were probably the ones that killed him."
"Wow."
"There's more," Annja said. "This puzzle is part of the reason Mario was killed and why they were looking for me."
Stanley nodded.
"Mario left a message for me in the puzzle. I'm going to Venice to find out how all this started."
"You're looking for whatever he thought he found."
"I am. But what you need to know is that these people are dangerous. Dieter and his buddies are mercenaries. Professional killers for hire."
"I know what mercenaries are. I wrote a book about corporate mercenaries just last year."
Terrific, Annja thought. "I appreciate you flying me to Venice. I really do. But you need to know that if you go with me, your life is going to be in danger."
Annja shook her head. "Not cool. You'd be better off dropping me at Venice."
"That wouldn't be very gallant."
"Gallantry has killed a lot of people," Annja said. "But I'm truly sincere when I tell you that if someone shoots you between the eyes, you're going to be dead."
Stanley paled a little at that. "It'll be okay. I've done missions with the CIA, the Army Rangers, and SWAT teams in Philadelphia. Those carried a lot of danger, too."
"There's a difference between me and those units," Annja said. "When they got into trouble, they had people they could call. I don't."
"It'll be okay. I can handle myself. I've had self-defense and gun classes."
And that's why you attacked an armed man with your notebook computer?
"If you want the jet," Stanley said, "I'm the only game in town."
Annja sighed, then grabbed her suitcase and headed out with Stanley Younts, intrepid writer, at her heels.
****
Stanley's private limousine waited in front of the hotel. The driver took Annja's suitcase and stowed it in the trunk. She kept her backpack with her as she crawled into the backseat. She slid over to the other side of the car.
Snow followed Stanley in as he took his seat. He took out a BlackBerry and attached a small keyboard. "Do you need anything for the trip?"
"Like what?"
"Supplies. Weapons."
"You can have them delivered to the jet before we take off?"
"I think so. We can ask and see."
"How can you get weapons here in Manhattan?"
"I did a book involving the arms industry and the private-security sector. You wouldn't believe how much firepower those guys can move when the price is right."
"No," Annja replied. "But thanks anyway." She slipped her computer out of her backpack and opened it up to rest on her knees.
Stanley reached out and pressed a section on the seat. The seat cushion flopped out and revealed a table with Internet hookups.
"It's all wired into the limo's onboard satellite system," Stanley explained.
In disbelief, Annja tugged on the Ethernet cable and it spooled out easily. She plugged it into the back of her computer and saw the Internet accessibility icon come up at once.
"Writing books got you all of this?" Annja asked.
"When you get lucky or do it right, being an author is quite lucrative. My agent and publishers tell me I've done both."
****
Annja checked the message boards, then started cruising the Internet. She referenced Mjolnir and followed the web of information that spun out of that. Even though she didn't know what she was looking for, she'd always found research to be a good investment. It was better to search wider and deeper than a topic suggested. Connections were made up of what she knew, so in order to better connect, she had to know more.
Her cell phone buzzed for attention while the limo driver slid quietly and quickly through the Manhattan night. The number was listed. Annja recognized it as coming from France. Although she knew a few people in Paris through her archaeological connections, she only knew of one person who would call this late at night without a prior arrangement.
"Hello," Annja answered.
"Hello, Annja. This is Roux. How are you?" He sounded upbeat and jovial, which wasn't normal.
"This is unusual," she said.
"What?" Some of the snide snarkiness she knew him capable of returned.
"You calling me. Usually I have to initiate contact, then you point out – subtly, of course – that all I'm offering is an unwanted interruption."
"That's not what – "
"And I'll go ahead and take this time to point out that your subtlety rivals that of an agitated porcupine."
"I didn't call to be subjected to insults," Roux said.
Annja sighed. She was upset and she knew it. Viewing Mario's savaged body yesterday had been hard. The last thing she needed was Roux calling her to tell her that there was something he needed help with.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm in a bad mood."
"Well, I certainly didn't have anything to do with it."
Not this time, Annja thought. "Why did you call?"
"I was just thinking about you."
"You'll have to excuse me. I was unprepared. I'm going to need to roll my pant legs up if we're going to get deep in horse manure that quickly." Annja was aware that Stanley was watching her but she ignored it.
"I could be thinking about you."
Annja glanced at the time in the lower right corner of her computer screen. She did the time conversion, adding six hours. "It's almost three o'clock in the morning there. Want to try again?"
Roux sighed. "Dealings with you are fraught with disenchantment, do you know that?"
"Thank you. The feeling is mostly mutual." Annja scanned the available Web pages and knew that if she couldn't narrow down her search it was going to be like searching for a needle in an incredibly huge haystack.
"What are you currently working on?"
Annja sat up a little straighter. Roux wasn't just snooping around for casual information. He was deliberately searching for something.
"The Calusa Indians," she replied. "The indigenous tribes that lived along Florida's western coast and inland waterways."
"I know who they are," Roux snapped irritably. "I was there with Ponce de León when he was looking for the Fountain of Youth."
The announcement stunned Annja. Although she hadn't known him for long, and only as intimately as he would allow because he was a very private person and didn't intend to be turned into a history lesson for her, it was easy to forget that he had lived through so much history.
More than five hundred years, she reminded herself. Roux had never given any clue as to how long he'd actually lived.
"You never mentioned that before," she said.
"It's not something that's likely to come up in casual conversation, now, is it?"
Growing a little angry at his abrupt treatment of her, Annja said, "I'm busy. Either get to the point or I'm getting off the phone. I've got things I'm doing."
Roux grumbled. "What do you know about Mjolnir?"
Startled again, Annja looked down at the computer screen. The Web page was all about Norse legends, featuring Thor.
"Mjolnir who?" Annja stalled. Even as she said it, she realized how weak her response was.
Roux cursed. "I've talked to asses that weren't as dense as you pretend to be. If you persist – "
Annja broke the connection, took a deep breath and placed the phone on the seat beside her. Outside the tinted windows, Manhattan was cloaked in unnatural whiteness that battled the night. Fat flakes swirled through the air in front of the lighted signs that marked the way to LaGuardia. The windshield wipers moved like metronomes, but she couldn't hear them in the soundproofed compartment.
****
"Is everything all right?" Stanley asked after a few minutes had passed.
"Everything's fine." Annja took a deep breath and let it out.
Stanley hesitated, then obviously couldn't let the situation go. "I don't mean to pry, but it sounds like you're a little stressed."
"Maybe a little," Annja said.
"Is it the detective? Because if it is, I have a very good attorney who could – "
"No, it's not the detective. It's just someone I know."
"Oh."
The phone rang again.
Annja glanced at Caller ID and saw that it was from Roux again. She let the phone ring twice more, tempted to let the answering service deal with it, before she punched the Talk button. The last thing she needed to do was deal with the riddle wrapped in a conundrum and covered by guile that Roux represented.
"What?" she demanded.
"We got disconnected," Roux said warily. "I've never trusted these electronic inconveniences. They drop signals at all the wrong – "
"It wasn't a dropped signal," Annja interrupted. "I hung up on you."
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"What?" Roux thundered.
Annja hung up on him again and focused on the computer screen.
****
Despite her best attempts, Annja couldn't focus on the computer or the Web pages she accessed and downloaded as image documents for later review.
Stanley looked at her sympathetically. "It's not going well, is it?"
Exasperated, Annja wanted to tell Stanley that the problem wasn't anything to worry about. Instead, all the tension of the past two days, the anger and sadness over Mario's death and the unknown nature of what might be waiting for her in Venice made her emotions come boiling to the surface.
There was something about Stanley Younts's calm demeanor and honest brown eyes behind his glasses that drew her frustration out.
She said, "He never listens to me. He always thinks he knows best, and that he knows more than I do. He's unwilling to give me credit for being able to think for myself." She let out a long breath. "What he doesn't get is that I would like to just sit down and talk to him. I'm well aware that he knows more than I do. About a lot of things. Instead, he's got to be all mysterious about things. Like not telling me why he's calling tonight."
"Maybe," Stanley suggested, "he just cares about you."
"I'm not even sure about that," Annja said. "I mean, sometimes I think he does, but other times I'm just as sure that the only reason he even acknowledges that I'm alive is because he feels like he owes me something."
Stanley nodded. "I know the feeling. Fathers are tough."
"Fathers?" Annja looked at him.
"That's who you were talking to, right?"
Annja tried to answer but Stanley cut her off.
"Take my dad, for instance," Stanley said. "He was a corporate guy. One of the youngest CEOs ever in the entertainment community. A real mover and shaker in Hollywood. He was a guy that got things done."
"But I'm not – "
Stanley seemed lost in thought. "It was hard growing up and meeting his expectations. I sucked at baseball. I mean, look at me. I was too short and small. But did that keep him from hiring personal trainers who worked me every day till I thought I was going to die? No. He just kept on – "
"Stanley," Annja said loud enough to get his attention.