Vodník

  I opened it to see copious notes all over the margins, all written in dense handwriting that was as close to indecipherable as you could get. The text itself was a standard legend book, similar to the ones I’d already seen around our house. I squinted at the notes, trying to make one out. It didn’t help that Slovak writing was illegible to begin with—they all were taught one way to write, and it was a cursive with a whole lot of loops and lines that looked like loops. It looked borderline psychotic.

  “What is this?” I said.

  “It’s my father’s. I found it when I was searching through his piles of junk for something about the virgin spring.”

  “And what’s it about?”

  Katka grabbed the book and flipped through it to find a particular passage: a legend about a vodník. “Read that. I want to see if you think it says what I think it says. Dad’s handwriting is awful.”

  It took me a minute, and it wasn’t until I figured out the two key words that the sentence made sense. Water and fire. It clicked in my head, and I read the phrases again.

  Ohen v suteréne—z tohoto? A čo voda?

  I froze, then swallowed and read it out loud. “The fire in the basement—maybe from this? But what about water?”

  “I think my father believes Babka was murdered by a mythical creature.”

  Just then, the door to the apartment opened and L’uboš came in, home from his trip. He was early and had a huge smile on his face. A smile that vanished when he saw the book I was holding. He rushed over and snatched it from my hands. “This is private,” he said. His face was red, and it wasn’t from blushing.

  I cleared my throat and wiped my palms on the couch. When had it gotten so much hotter in there? “We—uh—we—”

  “We were just looking for something to read,” Katka said. “Sorry.”

  L’uboš put the legend book behind his back, then nodded. “Ask next time. You can read any of those history books.”

  As soon as I had figured out what those handwritten notes were about, my first thought had been to ask L’uboš about Babka—this was the opening I had been waiting for. But now that he was looming over me in that small apartment, I wasn’t sure. He’d always seemed so friendly and harmless, but now he seemed wild. Dangerous. There was a reason he qualified for the night watchman job. Katka was staring at the floor and blushing too.

  “Uncle L’uboš?” I asked.

  “What?”

  My mouth felt like the Sahara. “You think your mother was killed by a vodník.”

  L’uboš checked behind him, almost as if he were afraid someone was going to come in. He faced us again. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “Why do you think that?” Katka said.

  L’uboš sighed. “I don’t think the vodník killed her. I think he saved her from the fire víla.”

  My jaw dropped. “What?”

  L’uboš folded his arms. “When you were little, Tomas, your mother found out I had been asking you for information about these mythological creatures. She blamed me that it got as bad as it did. After you were burned and almost drowned, I promised not to talk to you about them again. I felt too responsible. But you are old enough to make your own decisions now. You asked. You pestered me. So there you have it—my answer. From what I gathered from you when you were little, I believe the vodník saved my mother’s life when she was attacked by a woman made of fire.

  “I spent more than a decade of my life obsessed with it. Just look at those notes. I was losing my mind. I finally had to put it aside or go mad trying to find answers that wouldn’t help even if I found them. When you said you were seeing things . . . I still didn’t want to believe. Then, with Morena, I had to admit something was happening. But I can’t go back to that mystery. It would consume me. Now. Is there something you two aren’t telling me?”

  My uncle’s expression was solemn under that nest of a beard. I shrugged. “We were just looking up stuff about Morena and came across this. Sorry.”

  L’uboš nodded. “Well, stop causing trouble for yourselves. You should be practicing self defense, not digging up family secrets.” He left the room.

  I slammed my hand down on the table and frowned at Katka. I kept my voice to a whisper, but it was as furious as I could make it. “We should tell him.”

  She shook her head and whispered back. “No. He thinks he wants to know, but he doesn’t. You didn’t see him after Mom’s death. He tries to pretend he’s strong, but he isn’t. I don’t want to put him through that again.”

  “What’s up with this family?” I whispered fiercely, wishing I could shout. All this emotion made my head whirl more. “Do none of you talk about anything important?”

  Katka seemed taken aback. “Where is this coming from?”

  “You not letting me tell anyone about our deal with Death is some of it. My mom refusing to let anyone say anything about Babka is another.” I swallowed, unsure of whether or not I should say what I was thinking. I decided to go for it. “You know, if we fail, you’re going to die, and he’s going to go through it whether you want him to or not. Wouldn’t it be better if he at least was able to have a chance at helping save you?”

  “And if he fails then? It would be too much for him,” Katka said. “No. We don’t tell him.”

  “What about me? If we fail, I’m going to be left wondering what else I could have done just as much as he would be.”

  “Do we have to talk about this?” Katka’s eyes were brimming up, but I pressed forward.

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m sorry, but my life is on the line just as much as yours now. We need help for this, and not telling your father the whole truth makes no sense.” My head was still whirling, and I didn’t have the energy to fight this. “Tomorrow night. I’m going to tell him if you don’t. It’ll be better if it comes from you, though. Will you do it?”

  She hesitated, but nodded at last. “Okay. You’re right. I’m sorry, Tomas. I didn’t mean for you to have to risk your life. Thank you for all you’ve been doing.”

  Now she was crying in earnest. I felt like a jerk, but I was also relieved I’d gotten her to agree to telling L’uboš. I went and put my arm around her. “It’s going to be okay. You don’t have to apologize. I want to help. And anyway—I’ve got good news.”

  Katka wiped at her eyes and pushed away, back in control. “Right,” she said, sniffing one last time. Her eyes were puffy. “The virgin spring? You told me you found it.”

  “Sort of,” I said. “I know someone who knows where one is. We’re going to need salt. Lots of salt.”

  Huge, ill-tempered, but immensely loyal, sea monsters make some of the best pets a Death could want. True, the food bills do add up, but they can live on a diet of human flesh alone—something any Death can provide plenty of.

  It’s not your fault,” Katka said. It was the next day, and we were on the way up to the castle, ten one-kilo bags of salt in tow, along with the prepared vial we had retrieved from my apartment, for when we actually got to the virgin spring. Katka and I had each spent most of the day in bed resting. Our health wasn’t exactly the best right then. We’d gotten up around two and headed into town to get the salt. We might only have one shot at this—I hoped it worked out. We’d been careful to stay out of sight in case Draco and the gang were out. They weren’t, but we didn’t have the time—or the strength—to deal with them if they popped around the corner.

  “What were we supposed to do?” Katka asked, rehashing our conversation of the night before regarding Starenka’s appearance, “wait around and hope Starenka showed up? We couldn’t know if she would.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “We know what to do now, so let’s do it. If anybody deserves to get smacked about this, it’s that stupid vodník.” Too bad we had to involve the vodník at all, but our mission was clear: find the virgin spring, finish the potion, release Lesana, fulfill the pact with Morena, save Katka. It all started with getting that spongy freak show to tell us where the spring wa
s.

  Katka stumbled and fell to the ground.

  I stopped and offered her a hand up. “You okay?”

  She nodded, but she didn’t say anything, and I narrowed my eyes. “Why’d you trip?”

  “Just clumsy, I guess.” She tried to smile.

  “Are you close to having another seizure?” I asked. “We can go back home and do this later.”

  “No.” Her voice sounded much stronger. “We do this tonight. It’s four o’clock. The castle closes in two hours, and we can get this done. Didn’t Starenka say you had to do this today? We can’t wait any longer.”

  I hesitated, then said, “Fine. We’re almost there, anyway.” It wasn’t like I had a leg to stand on, anyway. The waves of dizziness had gotten worse since yesterday, although I’d managed to hide them from everyone so far.

  We huffed and puffed the rest of the way up, then headed into the break room to stash the salt and think things through until the castle grounds closed and we could pour salt into the well undisturbed. And we had plenty of things to think about. Regardless of what L’uboš believed, the vodník was up to something. Otherwise, why hadn’t he just told us where the virgin spring was to start with? If we could only figure out what it was, then we’d be able to turn the tables on him. But no amount of brainstorming helped.

  As we were sitting there, I began to get a headache. It started in my left eye, intense and with sort of an aching throb that accompanied it. Soon after, the room began spinning again. When I closed my eyes, it felt like I was on a slow merry-go-round. Katka wasn’t doing well, either. She was trying to act normal, but I could tell she wasn’t feeling well. Too pale, and she laughed too hard at my lame jokes, even the pop culture ones I knew she didn’t get.

  At last the castle started closing, and Katka and I helped—free of charge—herding the tourists down the hill and to the city below. We returned to the well and hung out until the tour guides started heading home too. Being the relatives of L’uboš, no one really questioned why we were there, and once the castle was closed, only one guard was left to worry about, and he headed off to do a final check of all the buildings, giving us plenty of time to salt the well.

  We went to get our bags. Tromping around the grounds hadn’t helped my head, and picking up a backpack o’ salt wasn’t something I was looking forward to. I gritted my teeth and lifted. The pain was intense enough to make me wince and put a hand up to my eye, and the merry-go-round in my head sped up. Katka didn’t notice; she was weaving her way over to the Well of Love, none too steady herself. I hurried to catch up to her, doing my best to stifle the pain lancing through my head and into my arm. It felt like the vodník was gnawing on my hand, and the dizziness was making me nauseous.

  I got to the well and raised an eyebrow at Katka, each of us with a bag ready to pour. “Ready?” I asked.

  She shrugged and nodded.

  Someone cleared his throat. The vodník had appeared behind me. “You could have asked, you know,” he said. “I’d hate to see what you do when you want to see someone at a hospital. Probably cut the power, or fill the place with toxic gas.”

  I glared at him. “You didn’t exactly leave a phone number.”

  “So write a note and drop it down the well. Don’t poison me. Sheesh. The two of you have a real interesting way of showing thanks. I’d love to see what you give people for Christmas.” He walked over to us, and I tensed. He laughed and gave another toothy smile. “I don’t bite. Well, not under normal circumstances. To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

  “We hear you know where a virgin spring is,” Katka said.

  The smile left his face. “Who told you that?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Do you?”

  “Maybe. It’s in the realm of possibility that I might know the whereabouts of such a thing.”

  “And you decided not to tell us about it?” I asked.

  “It’s called independence, and your generation should really look into it. Nothing but a bunch of pijavíc. And anyway, the only spring I know of is off limits. Totally out of the question.”

  “What about you being my ‘best friend’?”

  “So now I have to do things for you to prove friendship?” the vodník asked. “I already told you about the potion and Lesana. Don’t you understand how few virgin springs there are left in the world? Anytime one of you humans finds one, poof: one less.”

  “But we need the virgin spring to get the potion to work,” Katka said. She was ready to fall over, her face pasty and pale, her knees trembling.

  “If a human finds a virgin spring, doesn’t it cease to be virgin?” I asked.

  The vodník sighed. “Of course it does—to everyone but that human. You can sort of take its virginity, a metaphor I would really rather not explore with the two of you right now. That’s more of a go-ask-your-parents sort of a question, don’t you think? Or maybe they teach it in schools these days? In any case, I have an idea. You give me a container, and I’ll go get the virgin spring water right now. How’s that?”

  Katka had closed her eyes and hung her head, clearly in no condition to do much talking. I faced the little man. “I think I’m supposed to get the water myself.”

  “But then it wouldn’t be a virgin spring anymore,” the vodník said. “As soon as you see it, it’s not one. Rather paradoxical, wouldn’t you say?”

  I was just about to say that he had contradicted himself when another voice came from the direction of the vodník, this one muffled and hard to hear. “That’s part of the point of the spell. Sacrifice the properties of the spring and transfer them to the recipient.”

  The vodník jerked up straight in surprise, then clapped his hand against his right pants pocket and made a big show of coughing loudly.

  “What was that?” I asked.

  The vodník kept coughing.

  “Someone spoke from your pants,” I said.

  The vodník coughed even louder. He pointed at his mouth and kept hacking away, then shook his head, like he couldn’t talk, but his hand was still firmly attached to his pants.

  I forgot my fear of him and strode toward him, grabbed his hand, and jerked it away from his pants. As I did so, a jolt of pain seared up my arm—it was the hand that had been bitten by him before.

  The pants-voice came again. “Don’t try to hush me up. You asked for my advice, and you’re going to get it.”

  “Who’s that?” I tried again.

  The vodník stopped coughing and put on an angelic expression of ignorance. “I don’t hear anyone.”

  “Liar,” the voice said.

  “Shut up,” the vodník fake-coughed.

  I addressed his pants, feeling silly, but wanting answers. “Who are you?”

  “Don’t remember,” the voice came. “I knew once, but it’s been too long to pay attention to such trivialities.”

  The vodník glared at his pants. “You’ll be quiet if you know what’s good for you. Ungrateful little—”

  “Or else what?” the voice said. “I’m already in a teacup. It’s not like things can get much worse. I’m too valuable for you to let me go.”

  I froze. This was it: a teacup at last, right where I could break it. I cleared my throat. “Are you one of the spirits who came up with the potion?” I asked.

  “Of course I am. And you were right. Only the enchanter can harvest the virgin spring water, and the enchanter must be human. Of course, none of it’s any good unless the human can interact with the spring, and it has to be human, or old Soggybottoms here would have done this years ago. That’s why your . . . abilities are so useful in this case. A few centuries ago, this spell would have been easier. Now, hardly anyone is alive who could perform it.”

  The vodník reached inside his pocket and drew out a lidded teacup, sort of like one you might use to store sugar. He rattled the cup up and down and glared at it. “Enough. Teacups should be seen, not heard.” He grinned at me. “You’ll have to forgive my cups. They tend to prat
tle on. Normally I don’t take them out for walks, but I was talking to him right when I found out you were going to dump salt in my well, so I brought him with me in the rush to stop you.”

  “Could I see it?” I said.

  “See what?” The vodník was in the process of putting the teacup back in his pocket.

  “The teacup.”

  He smiled, showing all his teeth. “Oh, I get it. This is the part where you somehow trick me into letting you get your grubby paws on a cup, and then you stumble into something and accidentally drop it, shattering it into millions of pieces and oops!, you’ve released a soul and fulfilled your pact with Death at my expense. You’re so transparent, Tomas. Here. I’ll save you the trouble.” He took out the teacup again and threw it on the flagstone courtyard.

  It bounced.

  “See?” he said, then picked the cup back up and bounced it again before putting it away. It protested loudly—the voice complaining about the jostling—but the lid didn’t even fall off. There was nothing visible keeping it on. Magic. “What?” the vodnik asked. “You think I’d store my most precious possessions in something that’s fragile? These are the best teacups money can’t buy. Indestructible. So forget about it. Shall we go?”

  I was still staring at where the cup had fallen. It felt like someone had taken my heart and ripped it out through my mouth. Breaking a cup had been my ace in the hole—I’d been convinced it would work, and now it wouldn’t. “Fine,” I said at last, then turned to Katka. I had to shake her shoulder to get her attention, and when she looked up at me, her eyes took a moment to focus. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Go?” she asked.

  I nodded. So did the vodník. “Of course,” he said. “Tomas and I were just about to go down to the virgin spring.”

  Katka rubbed her temple again. “What about me?”

  The vodník laughed. “Well, we can’t have two humans go. If you see the spring first, then the spell could be ruined.”

  I supposed that made sense. It was hard to focus, when I was still feeling so let down. “Where is this spring?” I asked.