by May Dawney
A twinge of guilt worried her heart, but she breathed deeply and let it go. Mrs. Pietrzyk was a pawn in a game far beyond her level of comprehension. All Viktoria needed from her was information—had there been warning signs? Triggers, maybe? Had the Zaleska girl displayed any signs of magic? Perhaps most importantly, had there been a body? Those sorts of things. She wasn’t here to make her feel better.
Because she didn’t want to draw the priest’s attention to Tempest, she resisted the urge to look at him, but she would have liked to. Was he watching her? Doing his own investigation? Their friendship—partnership was perhaps a better word—was an odd one, but she’d come to rely on him a great deal over the years.
She shook off the thoughts as she reached the alcove Mrs. Pietrzyk had taken over. Just stepping close to a woman so entranced by her prayer felt sacrilegious. It didn’t surprise her that prior to Viktoria’s arrival, the alcove—which could have seated ten at least—had been empty except for Mrs. Pietrzyk herself.
Viktoria took one of the back seats and stared up into Maria’s soulful eyes. It was a high-quality rendition, an old one, with a golden sun behind her head and her hands up in prayer. She liked these better than the pietas.
Every few seconds, Viktoria caught a mumbled word. It was probably Polish, and it was close enough to Swiss and German for her to piece together The Lord’s Prayer.
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name, Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors; And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.” Then she circled back to the beginning. One bead for every prayer. Over and over.
Viktoria swallowed; the practice was all too familiar, and it brought back a slew of memories she’d much rather forget. Still, she got up and kneeled down on a pillow beside the grieving woman.
Mrs. Pietrzyk didn’t respond to her presence as she joined in, first in a very quiet mumble, then a little loader.
They fell in synch easily. The Polish and Swiss renditions blended together as if they were meant to be combined.
Viktoria followed Mrs. Pietrzyk’s pace and tapped her hand in lieu of prayer beads.
She wasn’t sure how much time passed, but she got through fifteen renditions of the verse before Mrs. Pietrzyk’s voice fell away.
Viktoria finished the prayer she’d started, then fell silent as well. Her insides were swirling with the aftermath of the memories she’d summoned up by falling into repetition of a practice established way back in her youth.
She took a deep, steadying breath, then lowered her hands to her lap and blinked her eyes open. When she drew her gaze up, Maria stared down at her. When she brought her gaze sideways, Mrs. Pietrzyk met it.
“Swiss?” She used the German translation.
Viktoria nodded. “I am.”
“Did you lose someone?” Mrs. Pietrzyk’s eyes were red-rimmed and tear-filled.
“I did.”
“So did I. Bless you.”
“Bless you.”
Viktoria steadied herself. “Ania was my niece.”
The words landed like a sledgehammer blow. Mrs. Pietrzyk gripped the rosary and mumbled something Viktoria didn’t catch.
“I haven’t—hadn’t seen her in a long time. I heard about the explosion and I…I had to see where she worked. What she did. I wanted memories of her. Memories I was stupid enough not to make when she was still alive.”
Mrs. Pietrzyk lost the fight against her tears and nodded. After a moment of hesitation, she reached over and took her hand.
Viktoria gave it a squeeze.
“She was good. A good girl. I thought she was a troublemaker when she first came, but she wasn’t. She took good care of the shop.” She pressed her lips together, then nodded. “And of me, when I let her. I have illness, you see?” She shook her head. “Pain in…” She seemed to lack the vocabulary to say what she meant, so she withdrew her hand and tapped her knuckles and knees. “Pain.”
“Arthritis?”
Mrs. Pietrzyk nodded. “Yes, that is like Polish. Heavy things I cannot carry. Ania helped me.” She shook her head. “She was a good girl. A good girl.”
Now it was Viktoria’s turn to reach out, and there was nothing played in her sympathy. She hadn’t known the Zaleska girl, but Mrs. Pietrzyk obviously had. “It was a terrible accident. What did the news say this morning? Gas explosion?”
Mrs. Pietrzyk’s hand tensed in her own. “Yes. Terrible accident.” Her tone was a lot more reserved.
Viktoria felt her heartbeat quicken but forced herself to remain calm. She furrowed her brow. “You don’t think that’s what happened?”
Mrs. Pietrzyk was silent for such a long time that Vitoria feared she wouldn’t answer the question at all. Then she looked up at the Virgin Mary and sighed. “I do not know. It is what the news says.”
“But you don’t think so? Please, if you think someone hurt her, then—”
“No. No, I do not think that, but she’s been sick. Terrible headaches all week. She wanted to come in. She is a good girl, you know?” Mrs. Pietrzyk’s looked at her, her gaze intense, as if trying to instill once more that the ‘niece’ she didn’t know was, indeed, a good girl.
“I know.” She squeezed her hand to reassure her and offered a small smile.
“Good.” Mrs. Pietrzyk took a deep breath, then released it. “Yesterday, she got sick. She fell on the ground, and she was…” She struggled for a word and frowned in concentration. “Afraid?”
Viktoria nodded to encourage her to go on.
“I took her home, in my car, and asked her if I should stay. She say no, so I leave.”
Another nod. Viktoria swallowed down a mixture of excitement and trepidation.
“Then—” Mrs. Pietrzyk mimicked the sound of an explosion. “And now she is dead.” She seemed to struggle getting the words out, but not because she didn’t know them. “It must be a, a....” She fell silent again.
“An accident?” Viktoria tried to catch her gaze.
Mrs. Pietrzyk held her gaze, searched her eyes. “Yes, I think? It must be an accident. It cannot be anything else.” She fell silent again and crossed herself.
“I understand.” Viktoria did—far better than Mrs. Pietrzyk knew. It pained her to see Mrs. Pietrzyk so conflicted, however. The guilt on her features was obvious and painful to behold. “It was a gas explosion. Maybe the headaches came from exposure to gas over the last few days. It made her sick.” Such an obvious lie, but when offering absolution…
Mrs. Pietrzyk’s eyes widened. “Yes. Yes, maybe that is what happened!” Her shoulders sagged just a bit. “Yes.” She looked up at the statue and tears filled her eyes again. “A terrible accident took her away.”
Viktoria nodded. “That’s what happened. A terrible accident. You couldn’t have known.”
Mrs. Pietrzyk met her gaze again and shook her head. “No. I could not have known. I took her home because she was sick. I didn’t know. Couldn’t know.” She inhaled and when she exhaled, the weight of the world seemed to fall off her. “Thank you.” Her voice trembled. “You are wise, like her.”
Viktoria shook her head before she could stop herself. The instinctual reaction to distance herself from her lie—or at least not take credit for her consolation—was too great. She needed to change the subject. “Thank you for talking with me. It’s good to see that she meant something to someone. That her life had an impact.”
“It did. And I will miss her.” She frowned, as if she’d just realized something. “Now I need to find a new girl.”
Viktoria couldn’t help but chuckle a bit at the indignation in her voice. “I’m sorry. I’m sure you will.”
Mrs. Pietrzyk huffed. “Not many good people. Not many at all.”
With a final press of her hand, Viktoria let go, crossed herself, and got up. “Perhaps I shall see you for the funeral. Do you know when the police will release her b
ody?” She tried to sound as casual as possible.
Mrs. Pietrzyk’s eyes widened. “You…you do not know?” She crossed herself, then got up as well. “The body is gone. It disappeared in the explosion. It’s terrible, terrible!” She kept her voice down, but the intensity in it made Viktoria shiver.
“No body?” She feigned surprise while fighting annoyance. Dammit. So, the body had disintegrated. Now she would have to rent all this equipment and spent hours in a place she wasn’t allowed to be in, just to get a drop or two of blood. This was not how she had hoped this trip would go.
“No, no body.” Mrs. Pietrzyk shook her head. “I asked the police officer who came to talk to me yesterday. They didn’t want to say, but I can make people say what I want to know even when they don’t want to.” She straightened out her back with a touch of pride. “He told me. It is terrible.” She shook her head. “Her poor parents.”
Viktoria’s mind was racing. Something nagged at her, a conclusion she was missing. A mental leap she wasn’t making. There was a possibility the Zaleska girl’s body had dissolved, but without a red coating of blood around the whole apartment, that sounded…dubious. So the logical conclusion was—
Anger flared up in her veins and her magic responded in kind. It rushed to her fingertips, eagerly awaiting release. She squeezed her hands to fists. “Thank you for your time.” She forced herself to smile while she seethed. “I hope to see you at the funeral.”
“Yes. I will come, if I am invited.” Mrs. Pietrzyk glanced down at Viktoria’s hands, but except for a slight raise of her eyebrow, she didn’t react.
“I’m sure you will be.” Viktoria placed the pillow back on the chair she’d taken it off and stepped back. “Goodbye.”
“Goodbye.” Mrs. Pietrzyk still looked at her oddly.
Viktoria didn’t care. She turned on her heel and cast a sweeping glance around the basilica.
Tempest either hadn’t moved from his spot, or he’d returned to it.
She marched over to him and grabbed his sleeve to drag him out.
“What happened?” He glanced at her with a look as close to bewilderment as he could get.
She didn’t pay him any heed. Her insides were boiling with rage. “The Society. They have the body. Somehow, they beat the police to it.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Before you act, think. Wisdom and a level head are the most potent tools of the hunter. Witches are slaves to the whims of their magic, but we know better. We are not ruled by emotion and blood thirst like they are. We are Godfearing men, and we keep our wits about us. Never give in to your emotions, because that’s when a witch will strike. Keep your head clear of doubts and your heart clear of emotions. The Inquisitio is life.
– Rudolf Wagner, ‘A Guide for the Death of Witches’
TEMPEST CAUGHT UP, so she let go of his sleeve. “What do you mean? I mean—” He stopped himself. “How do you know?”
She threw the door open and legged it down the steps without a destination in mind. She just had to walk, because her magic raged inside of her, in tune with her anger. Walking would help her cool down—she hoped. “There was no blood anywhere on the site. I should’ve seen it. If she blew up, bits of her should have been everywhere. There was nothing.” She stopped and whirled around to face him.
Tempest was forced to come to an abrupt stop or risk bowling her over. He ended up pressed against her body, with an arm around her waist to steady them both.
She allowed him; she was too angry to care. “The body was gone when the police arrived, because they got to it first.”
His dark eyes—usually too wide to pass as human—were squinted. “Slow down. Deep breath. What did the Pietrzyk woman say?”
Viktoria huffed, but then inhaled to the point where her chest expanded to its max. She let the air out slowly. “She told me that the Zaleska’s don’t have a body to bury because it was disintegrated in the explosion. Which is something I severely doubt happened, because there was no trace. No, someone got there before the police did. Someone who must have been close by, felt the blast same as we did, then hurried over and stole it.” She extracted herself from his hold. “It must be the Society.”
“It could have been and unaligned mage?” He followed her when she started walking again.
“They wouldn’t bother.”
“Why not?” He sounded puzzled. “It’s magic. They have magic. Why wouldn’t they be interested? Heck, they could think the Society—or Inquisitio, even—would pay for the body, or maybe they think wild mage bone powder is a stimulant.”
She snorted in disgust.
“Point is, you don’t know—we don’t know.”
“Then we need to find out.” She took a left, back toward the hotel.
“How?”
“I don’t know yet, but I’ll damn well find out.”
* * *
[(09:09) Wagner has entered the chat]
(09:09) Wagner: Who’s available?
(09:12) Reisch: I’m here.
(09:12) Joyce: Me.
(09:13) Messerli: Update?
(09:14) Wagner: Good. That’ll do. I’ve been to the house and visited with Pietrzyk. First, Steven: police files?
(09:15) Joyce: Any second now…
(09:15) Wagner: Send them through when you get them, but check one thing for me ASAP: do the police have the body?
(09:16) Reisch: What?
(09:16) Reisch: Explain!
(09:18) Wagner: Pietrzyk said that the police had told her that they haven’t recovered a body. I need that confirmed. If that’s true, the Society got to it before we did.
(09:19) Joyce: Or a free agent.
(09:19) Reisch: Steven, why are the police files taking so long to get?
(09:20) Joyce: Get off my back. Poland is a mess, but their computer systems are solid. Too much Russian espionage is my take. We’re almost there.
(09:21) Wagner: While we wait for those files, I need ideas. How do I track down that body?
(09:22) Messerli: Possibly, Steven, but it’s more likely the Society got their hands on it. Very few free agents would know what the blast was, and even fewer would know the value of the body. I agree with Viktoria, the most likely culprit is the Society, although they could have hired a free agent to get it. Poland doesn’t have a Society Charter, after all, but mages are everywhere.
(09:22) Reisch: I don’t know. We’ll flag incoming and outgoing traffic—trains, planes, buses—even more tightly than we have been doing, but that might not help if we’re talking about smuggling a body across borders. I wouldn’t do that with public transport, would you?
(09:23) Wagner: Thank you, Messerli.
(09:23) Wagner: No, probably not, Reisch. Dammit.
(09:24) Joyce: I need an eye roll emoticon. I need emoticons, period. Who wrote this backward platform? Even AOL had emoticons.
(09:25) Reisch: Do shut up, Steven. Get us those files.
(09:26) Joyce: Yes, Ma’am!
(09:27) Messerli: Focus, please. Viktoria, you’re going to need someone who can sniff out magic.
(09:28) Reisch: The hell she does.
(09:28) Wagner: Explain?
[(09:29) Anderson has entered the chat]
(09:29) Messerli: If the Society has the body, and we want to risk going to war (which is a topic I think we should discuss next), then you need someone who can sniff out magic, because the Society will have thrown every barrier up around that corpse that they have access to.
(09:30) Wagner: Makes sense.
(09:31) Anderson: Alternative suggestion?
(09:31) Reisch: Anderson, how good of you to show up, finally.
(09:32) Anderson: I’m neck deep in shit in Vienna. Lay off.
(09:33) Wagner: Hello, Hans. Another suggestion? I’m open.
(09:34) Anderson: Find a diviner, someone who can look into the past. Drag them to the house, watch what happened, try to track them. Won’t be easy, will cost you a fuckton, probably, being Inquisitio and all, but
it’ll work.
(09:35) Reisch: Anderson, proving why he was chosen to clean up Berlinger’s mess in Vienna. Bravo. Any progress on that situation, by the way?
(09:36) Anderson: If by progress you mean “every mage in the damn country went underground so my odds of completing the mission are boned,” then I am progressing splendidly, thank you very much.
(09:37) Wagner: Give it time. They’ll pop up.
(09:38) Joyce: Like roaches.
(09:39) Reisch: Do you have that report yet?
(09:39) Joyce: SHUT UP!
(09:40) Wagner: Children, quiet (or go off-channel). Messerli, what was that about going to war or not?
(09:44) Anderson: Another alternative suggestion: The mage is dead. As far as I know, dead mages are useless to the living. If the Society has the body, they have the body. What are they going to do with it that we want to risk your life, or our own, or even exposure, for it?
(09:47) Reisch: I respectfully disagree. It’s not that they can do something with it that we can’t, it’s that I want to dissect every bit of her to see why she’s special. I want her DNA, her brain, her tissue. I want to see what wild magic does to a person who is so directly exposed to it. If Wagner is to be believed, every mage on the planet felt the Zaleska girl come into her power and explode. That means that mages are all susceptible to something. If we can find out what that something is, we can use it to hit them all in one fell swoop.
(09:49) Joyce: Compelling points *inserts pointing up emotion, or even a gif* People, gifs?
(09:50) Reisch: Don’t make me fly back to Lucerne to hit you over the head.
(09:51) Joyce: You would too.
(09:52) Messerli: She would.
(09:53) Reisch: I would, yes.
(09:53) Wagner: Et tu, Masserli?
(09:54) Wagner: While everyone is enjoying themselves, there are actual decisions to be made, and those include the choice to go after the body (my preference) or to leave it in Society hands and pray necromancy is still beyond their skillset.