The sun was just beginning to set as they headed back across the river toward the hotel. Mouse told Angelo no more stories, and he asked no more questions, even when she turned them west, away from the Red Lion Hotel and up steep Petrin Hill. There was one last place Mouse needed to show Angelo, perhaps the most important given the choices he had to make. Near the summit, twin crosses lifted above the tree line. Strahov Monastery. Some things never changed.
Even now the Premonstratensian Brothers were at prayer in the ancient halls. In Mouse’s day they called themselves Norbertines. Father Lucas had trained at this monastery. Mouse grit her teeth at the sudden wave of rage as she thought again about the torture done to him because of the secrets he kept. Her secrets. The secrets Angelo was so determined to uncover. Watching him weave himself into her life, she couldn’t help but think of the cost Father Lucas had paid for doing the same. By bringing Angelo to this holy place, shrouded in nine hundred years of solace and worship and still sheltering monks in God’s service, Mouse was giving God another chance to pluck his servant from the jaws of an almost certain death. If Angelo was worth a miracle at the Thames, surely Mouse had not tainted him yet.
“Why here?” he asked as they neared the doors.
“No reason,” she said quietly. “I’ve just always wanted to see inside.”
“Why don’t you go on in? I want to take a look at all the statuary before the light’s gone.”
She nodded and pulled open the doors that had always been closed to her. Mouse went to the place she had always dreamed of going with Father Lucas—the library. At the abbey in Teplá, where she grew up, she and Father Lucas had broken all the rules, and she had been allowed to go anywhere she wanted, cloistered space or not. She had spent her childhood hunched over ancient texts with Father Lucas, both of them laughing with the joy of hunting for something new to learn and trilling with the anticipation of discovery. But at the Strahov Monastery, a girl, even one as educated as Mouse, was not allowed.
As she finally broached the forbidden space, she sighed, disappointed. The Brothers still managed to keep her locked out—all of the books were kept safe behind glass cases where no one could touch them.
Mouse arched her neck to look up at the library’s ceiling fresco, which was almost garish in its relative newness, painted in the late 18th century. It was an artist’s rendering of humanity’s quest for Truth framed by saints and scientists—a mirror to Bishop Sebastian’s vision of the world with religion and science as two sides of the same coin, both dictating order and rule and absolutes.
Mouse suddenly threw her hands out as she lost her balance, dizzied by the feeling that she was falling into the picture above her, disoriented again by the jolt of being in such a familiar place but surrounded by the unknown. This was her home, yet she did not belong here anymore.
Angelo found her sitting on a bench in the courtyard, lost in thought, shivering a little at the growing chill.
“Where are you?” he asked as he sat close to her, and she leaned into the warmth of his body.
“Trying to understand the nature of . . . humanity, I suppose.”
Angelo groaned.
“What?” Mouse laughed softly.
“I can’t tell you how many of those late-night conversations I’ve had over cold pasta and stale beer. That’s what seminary is—one long string of bloated discussions on the nature of humanity, of God, of good and evil, of the universe, of Heaven and Hell. And trust me, it’s all hell.”
Mouse sighed and looked up at the darkening sky.
“But I’ve probably got one more in me. For you,” he said. “Anyone in particular you were contemplating? Kant? Spinoza? Nietzsche?”
“Simpler,” she said. “Judaism, Islam, Christianity—Protestant and Catholic. For all their differences, they all look at the world the same way. In dualities, I guess. You know, divine or human. Heaven or Hell. It’s either/or, black-and-white, good versus evil. All of it polarized. So tell me, Priest, do you think God sees the world that way?”
“No.” The answer came quickly and with his own sigh. “I argue with the Bishop about this all the time. We’ve created this battle between us and them, whoever that may be, but God . . . I don’t know, I think God wanted something else. Cohesion, compassion, understanding, harmony, I suppose.”
Mouse leaned against the old stone at her back. “That’s not the God I knew.”
“Knew?”
But she couldn’t think of an easy way to explain that her understanding of God was about as old as the building behind them. “I haven’t had enough sleep,” she said instead, rubbing her eyes.
“Let’s head back to the hotel then. We can settle God’s plan for the world another day.”
The door closed behind them, and Mouse and Angelo stood staring at the bed that filled the tiny room. For days they had shared the space in Angelo’s flat and even his bed, but somehow this felt different—another unfamiliar place, a no-man’s-land where there seemed to be no rules. The intimacy of the day clung to them, charging the air with desire.
In the bathroom, Mouse changed into a T-shirt she’d borrowed from him. She’d brought nothing from Nashville to sleep in; she hadn’t thought she’d need it.
Angelo was standing awkwardly by the bed when she came out.
“Do you prefer a side?” he asked.
Mouse shook her head, overly conscious of how high the shirt rested on her thigh and wondering how see-through the thin cotton might be in the lamplight.
“I guess this is me then.” He gestured at the side of the bed where he sat. He stood up and pulled the covers back as Mouse walked to the other side, the one with the table. The one with the lamp. Angelo glanced up as she leaned over to pull back the covers, the light behind her, but he lowered his eyes quickly.
They lay looking up at the beautifully painted Renaissance ceiling beams for a moment before Mouse reached over and turned out the light.
“You’re different here.” He whispered it like a boy afraid of being caught awake after hours.
“What do you mean?” She was instantly on guard for more complicated questions, but she was whispering, too.
“You sound different. I can hear the Czech in your voice.”
“Bohemian.”
“What?”
“This part of the country is called Bohemia. I’m from Bohemia.”
“You crossed yourself when we left St. George’s today. Did you realize?”
“No.” But she had; it had been a slip, a habit formed from the hundreds of times she passed in and out of the basilica. Angelo was right. The longer she stayed here with him, the more she felt her old self emerging. It felt good and alive but frightening, too.
“Good night,” she said to the dark.
He lay still for a moment, and then, in the silence, Mouse heard the wetness of his lips as they opened. “And I’m not a priest. You called me a priest at Strahov, but I haven’t taken vows yet.”
Mouse lay very still.
Angelo got up suddenly and pulled on the shirt he had worn that day. He grabbed his bag with his laptop.
“Where are you going?” She still had not moved.
“For a walk. I need some air.”
“Don’t.” She sat up, looking at his silhouette in the doorway.
“Mouse, I am just going for a walk.” But he wouldn’t turn around. “I can’t sleep.” He laid his hand against the doorframe and leaned into it.
The sounds of a car horn from the street below broke the silence.
“I’ll get another room.” She rested her elbows against her knees and lowered her head into her hands. She heard the scratching of his shoes as he crossed the rug. Angelo put his hand on top of her head and let his fingers sink into her hair.
“Hey, look at me.” He tugged gently at her head until she turned her face to him. “This is nothing. There’s no need to get another room. It’s not you. It’s me. I’m keyed up and need some air. All right?”
“Sure.”
“Mouse, I’ll be back soon. Go to sleep.”
“Sure.”
After he left, Mouse walked to the window and watched the lights flicker around the castle. A storm was moving over the city. She waited.
And then she turned sharply away from the window and headed to the bathroom. As the water filled the small tub, she pulled her shirt over her head and looked at her body in the mirror as if she were seeing it for the first time in years. In her centuries of routine and ritual, Mouse had stopped looking at her body—it either served a painful reminder of her timelessness or evoked a deep, pointless, longing. But now, she ran her hands along her lower abdomen against the smooth skin. This body could tempt a man, could give him pleasure. Mouse found herself wondering about the pleasure she might feel, too. The one time she had been with a man, with Ottakar, it had been anything but pleasurable—hurried and rough, a last desperate chance to be together rather than an act of making love. She had learned since how it could be—she’d worked in brothels, tended sick and dying women who wanted to remember happier times. Mouse wanted to know what that kind of love felt like. Her body was a body like any other woman’s body, she thought.
Then she noticed that the bruises around her ribs were gone. She twisted to see her back and ran her hand along her injured shoulder where the black had faded to greenish-yellow. She was healed. Too soon for a normal woman.
The steam fogged the mirror and tendrils of wet mist closed in around her reflection like wispy fingers. Mouse stepped into the warm water and lifted the showerhead from its rack, holding it over her head so the water rained down on her face. But tonight she could not make herself feel clean again.
The steam carried the unfamiliar smells of the hotel’s soap into the room with her as she went back to the window. Lavender. It was raining.
Mouse slipped back under the covers. Angelo came in shortly after. The mattress shifted with his weight and Mouse felt the warmth of his body through the dip in the sheets that separated them. He smelled like rain.
“So how old are you?” he asked softly.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Mouse jumped out of the bed and into the corner of the room, away from Angelo, her back against the wall. Her leg bounced uncontrollably where her foot propped against the baseboard. She was ready to run.
“What?” she asked. “How? I mean—” It was all she could get out, but what Mouse really meant to ask was how much of her story Angelo had figured out.
“Marchfeld. That’s what you called the field we went to. But the monument just called it the battle between Rudolf and Ottakar. You talked about it as if you’d been there. I took the names and dates—a quick internet search gave me the rest of the story. But I . . . honestly, I thought you were probably just sick, maybe something had happened to you out in that field, and you had twisted that old story with your own somehow.” He moved to the end of the bed closer to her; she squeezed herself farther into the corner.
Rain slapped on the windowpane. Mouse watched the drops plunge against each other in a quick ride down the glass before rolling off the sill and into the dark beyond. She tapped her fingers against the wall in a rhythm with the rain.
“And then today you gave me the other pieces. You know you did.”
Mouse was shaking. She felt raw, like he was peeling her, layer by layer, and she needed to stop it before he learned the most damning truth of all—that there was nothing inside, nothing at the heart of all those lies and secrets.
“I couldn’t tell you.” She tried to make it sound casual, but she looked at the floor as she spoke.
“Nicholas was your son. I had to check that last piece tonight when I left. He became the Duke of something, right?”
“Troppau.” Her throat felt tight like someone was twisting a garrote around her neck.
“And today when you took me around the city. They were all old places, but you talked about them like you’d always known them. Your voice was different. The words you used. Even the way you held yourself as you walked. It was all . . . wrong.”
“That’s me. All wrong.” She leaned her head back against the wall and tried to breathe.
“What are you?”
She jerked her head up to look at him. She could see that bright curiosity in his eyes again, but there was something else, too. Fear? Mouse slid to her knees.
“Nothing,” she said. “I’m nothing.”
He nodded as he watched her and waited for a real answer.
“You can’t just be accepting this, Angelo. That’s not . . . normal.”
“I already told you I believe in the not-normal, Mouse.” He lowered himself to the floor in front of her. “What are you?” He put his hand on hers, but she snatched it back.
“Don’t.”
“You’re immortal?” He leaned toward her.
The space closed in around her, and there wasn’t enough air. There was no way out and the panic twisted and squirmed in her chest.
“It’s okay, Mouse. I’m sorry. Just breathe.” He moved back to the corner of the bed and watched her as she pulled in slow breaths through her nose. “Better?”
She nodded.
“Mouse, please. I know already. I just want the details. I need them.”
She bowed her head, wet strands of hair sticking to her cheeks and smelling of lavender. After hundreds of years of keeping her secret, of hiding her nature, explaining what she was now was impossible. Especially since she didn’t even fully know herself.
“How old are you?”
She heard his need to know the truth, and so, as much as it hurt, she gave it to him.
“I was born in Avignon in 1236.” It sounded ridiculous to her as she said it out loud. Angelo moved to sit beside her but was careful not to touch her.
“What are you?” His voice was filled with wonder, and Mouse hated it.
“God, will you stop asking me that! I don’t know what the hell I am.”
Carefully, he slid his arm around her shoulders. “Relax, Mouse. What do you think is going to happen?” He pulled her to him, laid his face against the top of her head. “This doesn’t scare me. I’m not going anywhere. I want to help you.”
The joy Mouse heard in his voice stilled her with a sudden, horrible realization. “Angelo, I’m not what you think I am.”
“You’re not an—” It was his throat that tightened now around a truth he couldn’t name. “You’re not what pulled me from the river?” The hope in his voice broke her heart.
“Oh, Angelo.” Mouse covered her face. His hope explained everything—why he brought her home from the church that night, why he stayed with her, why he wasn’t frightened. “When I was a little girl, someone called me his andílek, his little angel. I thought I was special like that. I wanted to be something like that.” The truth of her confession burned her throat, but then she lifted her head and brushed away her tears. “But I’m not, Angelo. I didn’t save you. I’m sorry.”
Angelo was quiet for a long time.
“I should have known better,” he said finally. Mouse heard his disappointment and the forced casualness as he started asking questions again. “What are—I mean, you’re obviously old. Doesn’t that mean you’re immortal?”
“I don’t know.” She said it as a sigh. “Maybe. I can get hurt, but I always heal.” Images of her failed suicides after Marchfeld filled her mind. “I never get sick. I don’t age. But I think there’s at least one way I can die.”
“How?”
Answering that question would turn the conversation to her father, and Mouse wasn’t ready for that. She looked over at Angelo. “I really don’t want to—”
“It’s okay.” He could see the fear in her eyes. “Any other gifts?” he asked instead.
Mouse cringed. Father Lucas had called her abilities gifts, too. “My mind works differently than a normal person’s. I use more of it, or all the buttons are switched on or something. I can read a book, play chess, and recite Shakespeare all at the same tim
e.”
“The people in Monster Park?” Angelo asked.
She nodded. “I see the details. All of them. Twitches of an eye, a pulse in the throat, frayed fabric, everything. I heard their conversations, accents, inflections. I put it all together like some massive jigsaw puzzle. It lets me know what’s likely to happen before it happens. And I never forget . . . anything.” The breath hissed through her teeth.
“How can you find space for yourself in all that?” He picked up her hand and traced his fingers over her knuckles and followed the lines of her tendons.
“I’m alone most of the time.” The skin on her hand tingled as he played with it.
“Anything else?”
“I see better, hear better. I can pick up subtleties of smell.” She closed her eyes, inhaled, and isolated what she had come to think of as Angelo’s scent, a mix of rich museum air, linen, a hint of coffee, and the sweetness of olive oil. It made her smile.
When she opened her eyes, Angelo was smiling, too. “Superstrength?”
She had to laugh at the playfulness in his voice. She had always looked at her abilities like they were a cursed birthright—something to be afraid of or to hide. She liked seeing herself through Angelo’s eyes much better.
“You’ve watched me wrestle with my bag, so what do you think? But I can control my body better—my heartbeat, my breathing. I can anticipate how someone else will act or move several steps before they do. In a fight, I know how my opponent will balance himself, which direction he’ll feint and when.”
“That might be better than superstrength.” He sounded like a kid, almost giddy with discovery and possibility.
“And I can . . . compel someone to do what I want.” She looked steadily at him, wanting him to ask the follow-up.
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