Vodník

by Bryce Moore

  “The only place it could be,” he said, and pointed at the well. “Down there. Where I live.”

  I stared at the well, a sinking feeling in my stomach adding to my confusion. Last time I’d gone down there, it hadn’t exactly been peaches and cream. This time, I was dizzy, depressed, and afraid. Could it get any worse? It was almost enough to make me forget about my headache. “I’ve been down there. Nothing’s there but dead water.”

  The vodník scoffed and adjusted his collar. “You didn’t really think I stay there all day? Where would I keep my cups? No. That’s just the doorstep. Kind of grimy, but necessary. Convenient.” He snapped his fingers, and water squirted up from the well and onto the lock holding the grate closed. With a click, the lock opened. “Shall we?”

  I swallowed and looked back at Katka. “Stay here.”

  “What?” she said. “You can’t go down there alone.”

  “I don’t have a choice. Didn’t you see the cup? This is our last option, and he’s got a point about why you shouldn’t go down. It’s not like I can drown down there.” I licked my lips, then asked the vodník. “How long will this take?”

  He sighed. “You humans are all so obsessed about time. It’s like some sort of impulse. It won’t take long, but if you want me to break it down to you in seconds, or minutes, or hours or something, I can’t do that. Not long. Short. Very brief. You’ll be back before she can miss you.”

  “Fine. Katka, if I’m not back in fifteen minutes, call your dad.”

  She shook her head. “I’m not letting you go down there without someone other than him.”

  The vodník groaned. “Sheesh. Where’s the trust in the world? You want a friend with him? How about Lesana? I suppose I could dredge her up somewhere on the way down. Vodník’s word of honor. Does that work?”

  She nodded.

  “Let’s go,” the vodník said.

  I peered over the edge of the well to see the water had risen to the top. That was a lot of liquid. It was one thing to know you couldn’t drown, but water still freaked me out. “How do we get down?”

  He hopped onto the well wall and stepped into the water. It held him up as if it were solid.

  When I tried, the water held me too. It started to sink like an elevator going down. I gave Katka one last forced smile before she and the rest of the world disappeared, replaced by darkness.

  The vodník clapped, and the sides of the well flared to life in long vertical strips of blue light, casting everything in a rippling glow. “Better?” he asked.

  I grunted.

  He sighed. “For a sixteen-year-old, your vocabulary hasn’t advanced much from when you were five, you know.”

  The rippling light pattern intensified, and part of the water surged into the form of a woman standing next to us. Lesana.

  “See, Tomas?” the vodník said. “A replacement for Katka. Feel better?”

  Lesana frowned at him. “Why did you have me trapped?”

  The vodník cleared his throat. “Trapped? Me? I’d never dream of such a thing. It was a mistake, I swear.”

  She tried to respond, but all she got out was “But you—” before her voice disappeared. Her mouth kept moving, but no sound came out. She stomped her foot in apparent frustration, then came to stand on my right side and glare at the vodník.

  “What was that?” the vodník said. “I can’t quite hear you.” The water stopped moving down, and the vodník grinned. “Here we are.”

  In front of us, the blue lights formed a circular pattern on the wall, sort of like a cross between a spiral and a bull’s eye, with some Celtic ornamentation thrown in for good measure. A door.

  The vodník said, “Turn around.”

  “What?”

  He sighed. “There’s a trick to opening my front door, and it’s one I haven’t let anyone find out for hundreds of years. I’m not about to change that now. Crime’s awful these days, and you can’t be too careful. So turn around, and no peeking.”

  Whatever. But he stared at me until I did as he asked. I tried to watch what he was doing in the reflection cast from Lesana, but she was too ripply to make anything out. After a moment, there was a hiss, and a blast of frigid air escaped into the summer heat. “I like to keep things cool,” the vodník said. “Chilly is so much nicer, don’t you think?”

  I turned to see the open door leading to a tunnel lit by torches that burned with more of the eerie blue light.

  “I’m not going in there with you,” I said. “I don’t trust you.”

  The vodník rolled his eyes. “And I suppose you trust that fire witch, instead? Whatever. I can see when I’m not wanted. Besides, I’ve got places to go, people to preserve. Just go down this tunnel, and head straight. The spring is at the end. And no drinking! Just get some water in your vial, and that’s it. Lesana, watch him.” He jumped backward out the door and into the well, leaving me staring at Lesana. Why had the vodník been so willing to run away like that? The whole thing screamed “setup.”

  It must have been even colder than I’d thought. Lesana was becoming ice again—fast. Maybe mystical water creatures froze quicker than normal. I watched as ice crystals crept over her body like ivy, spreading and connecting until, within seconds, she was a living, breathing ice statue, with the ice moving and flowing from one shape to another without cracking or shattering. Liquid ice, almost.

  “Don’t go in, Tomas,” she said. “It must be a trap.”

  “I don’t have any other choice. If I don’t do this, then my cousin dies. Come on.” I didn’t mention the fact that if I didn’t have some of that virgin spring water soon, I’d be as watery as Lesana. My head was spinning and felt like it was about to explode. I started walking down the corridor.

  Lesana followed. At first we walked in silence, then she said, “He wants to kill you. He told me so himself—that he wants your soul for his collection. You let creatures like him have more power over the physical world somehow. He wants to be able to control that, and he’ll kill you to do it. Steal your soul. The only thing stopping him is that he’s not certain if you’ll still be able to do it without your body. Whatever he’s told you doesn’t change what he wants.”

  I glanced over at her from the corner of my eye. Her forehead was crinkled in worry and fear, little wrinkles in the ice. Pretty cute, really. If only she wasn’t just a water spirit. Focus, Tomas. It was nice that she was concerned for me, but I didn’t trust myself to respond on that topic. I was in a foul mood, and I’d probably say something I’d regret. The tunnel appeared to be some sort of modified cave, like someone had taken a naturally-occurring cavern and evened out the floor, shaved the stalactites off the ceiling, yet left the walls rippled and rough. Torch sconces lined the walls every twenty feet or so, giving some light, but not enough to make you comfortable. About fifty feet in, there was an offshoot of the tunnel that led to the right, and soon after that, another one going left. Both were blocked off—the two tunnels were flooded, the water held back by an invisible, impassable wall.

  The blue torches in the tunnel continued, though—even down the flooded passageways—and I could see glimpses of ornate furniture in the offshoots. This was much more like what I thought the vodník’s home would be like. Comfort, not misery. Dracula’s castle meets Atlantis.

  I wondered if down one of those tunnels, the grave of Matúš Čak waited, entombed in water. The original owner of the castle, submerged forever with his treasure. Certainly down one of the tunnels was a collection of teacups, each one filled with a human soul.

  We kept walking.

  “So where’s your grave?” I asked. We’d need to know that eventually to know where to pour the potion and release her soul.

  She shook her head. “I can’t remember.”

  “Can’t remember?”

  “No. It’s been too long. The vodník likely knows. Ask him.”

  Weird. How could you not know where you were buried? It seemed like something a ghost would obsess over. “Have you be
en down here before?” I asked. The tunnel seemed like it wasn’t going to end. We weren’t walking quickly—this didn’t have the feel of a place where you’re comfortable just striding in anywhere—but we’d been walking for at least a quarter of a mile. The tunnel kept curving to the left, leading deeper and deeper under the castle.

  “Of course,” Lesana said. “This is my prison, usually. When he hasn’t sent me off on some errand.”

  “How well do you know him?”

  “You’d think I’d know him better after all these years. For the first few decades, he tried to befriend me, but I don’t approve of his hobby. Those teacups.” She shuddered, and small chips of ice went flying from her body and sprinkling to the floor. “Until you came, we hadn’t been talking much anymore. He orders, and I must obey.”

  A few yards farther down, I stopped. “Do you smell that?”

  Lesana sniffed a few times, her seemingly frail ice nostrils moving with the effort. She shook her head. “Ice isn’t good for smelling. What is it?”

  “Smells like . . . a fish market.” I hated fish, and I was an expert when it came to telling a restaurant that served it. This had the same aroma, only without the cooking.

  “Oh,” Lesana said. “That’s Ajax.”

  “Ajax?”

  “He’s too hard to explain. Just keep walking. You’ll see him soon enough.”

  Soon the tunnel turned and widened into an actual cavern, the ceiling at least thirty feet tall, and the chamber itself as big as a small concert hall, filled with a light mist. An enormous chandelier hung in the middle of the room, the light from a thousand blue-flamed candles casting flickering shadows in the corners. The floor was covered in about an inch of water, but we could walk on it just like the vodník had let me stand on the water when we went down the well. Even more curious, this water seemed arranged in a pattern. In the castle, they had parquet floors, different shades of hardwood floors arranged in a pattern that makes the floor look like a wooden patchwork quilt. In this room, the pattern was made out of different shades of blue, some of it the clear blue of natural water, some the white shade of pure ice, and others in between.

  At the other end of the room sat an incredible fountain. When I was twelve, my parents had taken me to Disney World. At EPCOT, there was this system of leapfrogging fountains that shot water into the air over your heads and into other fountains across the way. This fountain was like the grown-up version of that, except that the fountain itself was made of water, in the same way the floor was. Everywhere I looked, water was jumping and shooting from one spot to another, never staying still.

  And in the middle of the fountain hunched the source of the fishy smell—a sea monster.

  15.2.93—Of course, everyone makes mistakes. It even happens to the Grim Reaper, though I wouldn’t ask him about that. Just remember: don’t panic. Should the soul not arrive at its intended destination and you must resort to the options outlined in 15.1, please fill out form 872i in triplicate and submit copies to your immediate supervisor (white copy) and to Records (blue), keeping one copy for yourself (goldenrod).

  The monster was a cross between an eel, a shark, a stingray, and a dragon: lots of body (blue on the backside, white on the belly), a strong tail, thick winglike things, four stocky legs, and a snout with plenty of teeth. It was contorted into one of those Chinese dragon poses, with its legs splayed out and its long body twisted into a series of curves. The water jets were shooting every which way around it and on it, creating a mist that had spread through the whole room.

  “Is that Ajax?” I asked.

  Lesana nodded. “The vodník’s pet. He should do what I tell him to, though. Unless the vodník’s told him otherwise of late.” She faced the beast and shouted. “Ajax?”

  Ajax blinked an eye and cocked his head at us.

  “Stay,” Lesana said.

  The beast grunted, then turned his face toward the wall.

  “He’s very obedient,” Lesana said. “Just don’t make any sudden movements, and do not make eye contact with him. Oh—and if he starts to attack, stay still. He can only see things when they move.”

  Right. Easy. I couldn’t help thinking the vodník had decided to try killing me by monster, since drowning hadn’t worked. “Let’s just do this and get out of here,” I said. We approached the fountain together. It had to be the virgin spring, even if it was different from anything I’d pictured. This was the end of the tunnel, for one thing, and for even more proof, the water vapor was . . . different, like ocean air, but more invigorating.

  My whole body tingled with each breath I took, my limbs stronger and my thoughts clearer. I could feel my emotions more fully—the fear and the excitement. My senses grew sharper too. I felt the water and the touch of my clothing on my skin, felt the cold more keenly. I heard the ice crackle softly next to me whenever Lesana moved, and under everything was the noise of Ajax breathing. And it made the dizzy feeling subside.

  I kept my eyes on the beast the whole time. Just because he hadn’t moved yet didn’t mean he couldn’t, although what I’d do if he did was beyond me. Standing still didn’t seem like a great idea. Closer, he was even bigger—the top of his back was at least three times as tall as me, and his head reared up to scrape at the ceiling thirty feet above. His eyes still followed us, but he hadn’t done anything but breathe yet.

  “Where do you think we’re supposed to get the water from?” I asked.

  Lesana shook her head. “I’m uncertain, but I think we should find the source—the place where the first water emerges from the rock.”

  I stared at the whole fountain, with all the leapfrogging spurts of water. It was a lot of the wet stuff, but nowhere deep enough for even me to be worried about drowning. And anyway—I was drown-proof now. “How do we tell?”

  “Look and see,” she said.

  The two of us spent the next fifteen minutes inspecting the fountain. After a bit, I could tell that the water was going in a pattern, with one spout accepting a burst of water and then passing it on to the next. So it became a task of trying to trace back the spouts to the original one. It was simple to study one and note the pattern, but when we started trying to follow individual bursts of water, it was difficult to keep track of them, with all the crisscrossing and confusion and time delays in the chain. Not to mention the uneven light that blue-flamed chandelier gave us. It was like trying to find a missing bulb on a strand of Christmas tree lights, only with a time limit and the constant threat of impending death.

  The longer I was around the monster, the harder it became to ignore his gleaming gaze. He didn’t attack, though, and I remembered Lesana’s admonition to not make eye contact. Ajax seemed hungry for a Tomas sandwich.

  Finally, we discovered the source of the water—a small round spring cut into the rock directly beneath a coil of the monster’s tail. Water came from there, but even after watching for a minute or two, we couldn’t see it entering from any direction.

  “So what?” I said. “Are we supposed to walk under there and get some water?”

  Lesana nodded.

  Right. Just waltz under Ajax and scoop it up. He wouldn’t even have to try to kill me—he’d just have to shift his weight. Then again, if I didn’t do it, I’d lose Katka for sure, and I’d probably become a water spirit, like Lesana, if Starenka was telling the truth. What was my world coming to, when I couldn’t even be sure I could trust little old ladies?

  Even being as terrified as I was, I was almost eager to try. The drips of spring water I’d gotten into my mouth were better than tasting the mist had been, and the closer we had gotten in our search for the source, the more powerful the effect had become. My headache had almost completely disappeared, for one thing. At this point, both my hands were tingling with some sort of energy. I didn’t know what it was, but I really wanted to feel more of it.

  I checked the monster again. True, Ajax could have swallowed me without having to chew, but he hadn’t moved. He wasn’t going to. I stepped clos
er to it, put out my hand, and touched him.

  His skin wasn’t oily like a fish’s. It was smooth and rippled and solid as rock, like a snake. I had worried Ajax would whirl around and snap at me, but the beast didn’t even twitch when I made contact. I turned back to Lesana. “Come on.” I said. “Let’s do this.”

  The water dragon’s body arched above us as we examined the source. The actual device that shot out the water was different from the other ones we had seen. Like them, it was made out of the same solid water as the floor (it rippled in a way glass didn’t), but I could see through this one. Beneath it was a hole leading down into the ground. The spurts of water coming from it were intermittent—only one every minute or so—but long. In the times when it wasn’t spouting water, I tried to pry off the cover, but it wasn’t moving.

  “Oh well,” I said. “This is probably close enough.”

  Before Lesana could respond, a black piece of paper appeared next to the spout. Written on it in white ink was one sentence:

  It isn’t.

  —A.

  I felt a wave of relief wash over me. This was the first I’d heard from Morena in what seemed like forever. If she was replying to my efforts again, it had to mean I was on to something. Yes, she seemed to be ill-tempered and big on pranks, but I didn’t think she’d lie about this. To have her tell me I had to get the actual spring water—not what was coming from the spout above it—validated our plan even more than Starenka’s assurances. I grabbed the piece of paper, looked up at Lesana and smiled. “This is going to work!”

  She grinned and nodded encouragingly.

  Of course, it would only work if I got the actual spring water. I tried twisting, pulling, scraping—everything I could think of, with no luck. I sat back and sighed. “Do you have any ideas?” I asked.

  Lesana frowned. “I could try something, but I don’t know what the vodník would do about it. He made this fountain. If he wanted us to be able to get water from the actual spring, he would have let us. If I break his construction, he’ll know right away, and he’ll be angry.”