The Lights of Prague

by Nicole Jarvis

  Hackett drove her alone across the river, and she waited outside of the Provisional Theater, adjusting her white silk gloves. The massive building was a study in classic lines, with a pointed roof and two tiers of columns lining the front. The small plaza before the theater had a clear view of the castle on the hill, lit with candles in the many windows. The rain last night brought a crispness to the air, reminding the city that winter hadn’t quite loosened its claws.

  “Lady Fischerová!”

  Ah, yes. There was another reason Ora had wanted to avoid the opera tonight. As she spent more of her time in society at literary salons and lectures than at galas, the opera was one of the few places she ran into the more overbearing ladies. Most days, she could make conversation with anyone, but tonight she had little patience. “Lady Enge,” she greeted, turning to the other woman, who had dragged Lord Enge along with her.

  They were new money, accumulated from an empire of coal mining that neither had ever touched. Lady Enge had been cold to Ora when she had first arrived back in Prague ten years ago, excluding the brash newcomer. Over the years, as Ora had become a settled figure and other, more vulnerable new people had arrived, Lady Enge had changed her tune.

  “You look as radiant as ever,” Lady Enge said, not giving her husband time to add his own greeting. “I swear you haven’t aged a day since I met you. What is your secret?”

  “I used to drink virgin blood, but that was unsustainable,” she said coolly.

  Lord Enge laughed. “Now, if that were true, we could bottle it and make millions!”

  “It only works when taken straight from the vein,” said a new voice.

  Ora whirled to find that in the overwhelming mix of scents from the surrounding crowd, Darina Belanova had snuck up on her. She was wearing the same serviceable gown from Czernin’s palace earlier and a vicious smile.

  “I don’t believe we’ve met,” Lady Enge said, looking between Ora and Darina.

  “We haven’t,” Darina said. “Ora—we need to talk.”

  Ora gave the Enges a tight smile and then grabbed Darina’s elbow. “What are you doing here?” she hissed, leading her away from the press of the crowd toward the edge of the river.

  “Is this what you’ve been doing? Going to the opera and letting grubby mortals treat you like you’re one of them?” Darina asked. “You should be running this city. Instead, they’ll be laughing at you as soon as they have the chance.” She glanced back toward Lady Enge. “Have you ever thought that if Czernin were a woman, he could never have sat in that palace for so long? A line of identical male heirs doesn’t draw attention, but a line of ladies inheriting a palace would have the villagers loading their rifles. You must have to move every few years to stop people from catching on to you.”

  “Did you follow me?”

  “No, I had a sudden horrible hankering for droning orchestral music,” Darina drawled. “Czernin sent me. He wanted me to keep an eye on you. I was supposed to follow you around the city without you noticing.”

  “Well, you’re doing an excellent job,” Ora said.

  Darina shrugged. “Czernin is not here.”

  “He’d kill you if he found out you were working against him,” Ora said. She brushed her unburnt hand over one of her shoulders, feeling the healing claw wounds under her dress.

  “He may kill me anyway. He doesn’t know what he wants. You saw him, what he’s become. I’m not such a fool as to follow his orders blindly anymore.”

  “Then leave Prague,” Ora said. “You helped me earlier, but that doesn’t mean you’re welcome in my city. The people here have done nothing to deserve you or Czernin.”

  Ora tilted her head when she caught a familiar scent on the air. It was warm and metal-bright, laced with charred chemicals, honey, and the promising smell of a storm boiling on a horizon. It was an intoxicating mix that stood out as authentic in a crowd of men and women doused in pomades, cologne, and the heavy must of burnt tobacco. She turned to follow the trail.

  Domek Myska was walking through the crowd toward her. Though he was broader than any other man there, he didn’t use his bulk to push people aside. Instead, he slipped and wove his way through, like a bird flitting among the steeples of the city.

  “We’ll talk later,” Darina murmured. Ora turned back to her, but she was already slipping away. She wanted to call her back, demand more answers, but this was a poor place for a confrontation.

  Domek stopped in front of her and bowed. He was nearly an entire head taller than her with broad shoulders and a trim waist that came from manual work. His dark hair curled over his collar, slightly longer than was fashionable. Though his pants were of his usual work-hewn variety, an expensive, modern overcoat was wrapped around his shoulders. It was tight on him, but it did give her a fantastic view of his chest and arms. She wished she were in the mood to appreciate it. “Evening, Lady Fischerová. I hope you weren’t waiting long.”

  “Mister Myska,” she said, forcing herself to smile. It felt unnatural on her lips, the grimace of a skull. “I was worried you wouldn’t show up.”

  “I said I would,” he said, as though it were as simple as that. Perhaps to someone like him, it was.

  Domek was solid, dependable. Ora, as much as she’d tried, wasn’t. Her husband used to tease her for it. In many ways—most ways—he and Domek were opposites. Franz had been slender and delicate, prone to sickness. Part of Bohemian nobility, he had been privileged all of his life. Their horses had been his only brush with physical labor, and even that he managed mostly through the force of his gentling personality. One look from him and a horse would want to be better. Ora had felt the same way.

  Ora looked past the mechanic. The Provisional Theater was set at the back of the land purchased for the city’s new National Theater, which was being designed by Prague’s greatest architects after the last had burned down. The location had a perfect view of the castle on the hill, with the spires of the eternally half-finished St. Vitus stretching into the sky, and the river that cut between them. At night, the river was visible more for its absence than its presence, a dark line in a city that was more and more brightly lit.

  Was Domek’s steady personality part of what had attracted Ora in the first place? Though he had more physical strength, and his background could not have been more contrary, Domek had the same soothing nature as Franz. Perhaps she had been searching for someone with the same stability as her lost love unaware. Maybe Lord Czernin was right. No one could escape the mistakes of their pasts. Even Ora, by convincing herself that going to his estate was the best way forward, was falling back into her own bitter patterns.

  “Are you all right?” Domek asked.

  Ora turned back from the river. “Fine,” she said with a bright smile.

  He didn’t match her expression. “You seem distracted.” He glanced down at his borrowed overcoat skeptically. “You’re sure you’d like to go inside? We could leave.”

  She sighed. “Mister Myska,” she said, taking his arm and dragging him toward the opera’s entrance. “Does it ever seem pointless to you? The uphill battles people seem to constantly be fighting? You don’t suppose Sisyphus ever just…let the boulder fall? Look at this theater. It’s an entire structure that’s simply a stopgap to the next. Who’s to say the next building won’t simply burn down again once it’s built, starting the entire process over?”

  He gave the question solemn consideration. “I’ve never been the type to stop trying,” he said finally. “Some challenges are more difficult than others. Sometimes, sleeping would be the easiest option. But if you don’t keep pushing forward, what’s the point of…anything?”

  “Exactly,” Ora said.

  “That is the point,” he said. “Hopeless or not, life keeps moving. I don’t intend to let it move on past me.”

  “Seize the moment and hope everything works out in the future?” Ora prompted.

  “Something like that,” he said. “There are days when it seems like no matter what ha
ppens, everything stays the same. Maybe on a grand scale, it does. That doesn’t mean that every minute in someone’s life can’t be important too.”

  Ora looked up at him, swaying closer. “That was practically romantic,” she said. She was ready to move past this serious conversation and into her distraction for the night. “I didn’t peg you as a romantic type. Broody, thoughtful,” a tad awkward, “and quiet, yes, but not romantic. Do you read poetry, Mister Myska?”

  “Rarely,” he said stiffly, taking a step back. If they had been somewhere more private pressed so closely together, it would have been entirely inappropriate. Even in a lobby full of people all pushing their way toward their seats, a charged intimacy sparked between them.

  “That’s more than most. I hope you’re as strong as you look. I may swoon.”

  “You’re teasing me,” he said.

  She couldn’t tell whether or not he was pleased by that realization. “I only tease people I like,” she assured him. “Thanks for escorting me to this show. Not many would have been up to the task.”

  “It’s not a hardship to listen to music,” he said.

  “I’m being serious. I’m not the most traditional of women. There are men who would have run screaming at the thought of an evening alone with me.”

  “I like that you’re not traditional,” Domek said. “If you were traditional, you wouldn’t be speaking with me at all.”

  Ora wanted to argue, but knew it was true. “That would be my loss,” she told him. “You’re a delightful conversationalist, you let ladies lure you to operas, and you’re good with your hands. What’s not to like?”

  Ora led him up to their seats on the balcony, which pressed close to the railing. Since she’d only bought the tickets yesterday evening, they had ended up in seats tucked in the middle of a row, leaving them crammed in by the murmuring crush of humanity on either side. Still, she knew it was likely better seats than he’d ever sat in before. With worker’s wages, he would have been in the standing room section below, if he’d come at all.

  Disgust for herself and those surrounding them washed over Ora. Domek was a good man—solid and shy. What made these people, most of whom inherited their wealth, better than him? Ora had been a peasant in her first life, and it had been the judging looks from the wealthy which had sent her careening into Czernin’s grasp. She had longed for power, for respect. How could Domek seem so unaffected?

  A woman looked twice at the secondhand overcoat stretching over Domek’s shoulders, and Ora sneered at her before considering it may have been an appreciative glance instead of condescending.

  “Have you been to the opera before?” Ora asked, if only to get out of her own thoughts for a moment.

  Domek shook his head. “I enjoy music, but haven’t been here,” he said.

  “You’ll like this,” Ora decided. She leaned closer to him. His honey and metal scent helped drown out the river of perfume surrounding them. “I wish the National Theater would be finished more quickly. It’s on track to be the most beautiful building in the city. Did you know that they plan to fold this design into the final structure? I presume the architect was feeling fussy about putting effort into something so blatantly called the Provisional Theater.”

  “I can’t blame him,” Domek said. “It’s difficult to believe this is simply a placeholder. It’s magnificent.”

  “Music is for the ear, but opera is a full sensory production. The scenery is as important as the singers. Tonight, we’re seeing The Bartered Bride, which was written by the principal conductor. This theater was actually opened with one of his operas, but they didn’t give him the job conducting until four years later. Politics. You’d think you’d get to avoid them in the arts, but they’re worse there than anywhere. This show is supposed to be very German, but should still be enjoyable.”

  The orchestra began to tune their instruments, adding a layer of cacophony on top of the muttering, shuffling crowd. Ora was tempted to cover her ears to try to muffle some of it, but knew that would barely help—and would worry her companion for the evening. As charming as Domek was, Ora was sure coming tonight had been a mistake. She was able to distract herself while teasing him, but sitting silent among the crowd threatened to shatter her composure. She felt like a spring being pressed and pressed until her energy threatened to defy suppression.

  When the first song faded and the soprano stepped forward for her first aria, the sensation grew worse.

  Music was pleasant, but Ora’s tastes had always leaned toward physical art and academia. Her thoughts worked too quickly for a single mode of engagement. She needed conversation to supplement her enjoyment, or a story to compel her. In opera, the story was done in broad, predictable strokes, making it accessible to all languages and intellects. There was nothing to distract from her fear and shame. How was Alena coping with the horrible revelation Ora had thrown at her? What was Darina doing in her city? Would Lina forgive her for her temper?

  She needed to get out of there. She couldn’t sit through an entire opera tonight, not even with the delectable Domek Myska for company. This was a night for running along the Vltava, finding a disposable book and shredding it to pieces with her hands, for trying to find something in her house that could break her skin and—

  She turned to Domek, ready to tell him that they were going to leave.

  He was enraptured by the performance. Leaning forward slightly, he stared down at the stage with a slight, awed smile on his lips. As the soprano soared to a new height, his chest lifted with it, as though his soul were trying to escape his body. The music had cast a spell upon him, transporting him from their cramped conditions and sending him somewhere Ora couldn’t follow.

  He noticed her gaze and, carefully, reached over to clasp her hand in his. She leaned back, closed her eyes, and focused her attention on the gorgeous music. Not the singing on the stage below, but the steady pulse of his heartbeat.

  At the first intermission, the normally stoic man chattered like a schoolboy about the show. It was charming—more charming than a man of his bulk should have been. Ora was grateful to be there with him for this experience. She wasn’t arrogant enough to give herself credit for it, but it warmed her to know that when he thought back to this night, she’d be there in his memories alongside the singers on stage.

  Using his breathing as a regulator, Ora made it through another act before she finally caved to the instinct to flee. She leaned over to Domek at the next break, enjoying the excuse to whisper in his ear. There was a near imperceptible tremor that ran through him when her breath hit his skin. “It’s getting late. I should head home. Would you care to escort me? If you don’t mind leaving the show slightly early.”

  He cleared his throat and turned to her. “You don’t have a carriage?”

  “There’s a carriage. I live halfway across the city, and my slippers wouldn’t be able to handle the cobblestones for so long without shredding. It’s a long way to the door, though, and then the footman has to retrieve the carriage. I’d be lonely without company.”

  Domek nodded. “I believe I’ve had enough of the opera for the night.” She took his arm and they slipped out of their seats and retreated toward the exit. There were a few other people milling about in the main lobby, getting drinks and stretching their legs. The opera could last more than four hours. Half of the building’s business came from selling the fuel to get the audience through to the final bows.

  “They really did put quite a bit of money into a building designed to become redundant, didn’t they?” Ora commented, brushing a hand along the intricate gold filigree lining the threshold as they walked. “Do you think the gilding is spreading? Like a fungus?”

  “Careful,” Domek said. “If it is, you don’t want to touch it. You might end up covered.”

  Ora laughed, delighted that he was joking with her. “And then you by way of me,” she said. “Your chivalry leading me out of this place would be your downfall. I’ll avoid any more brushes. I’m not sure
gold is the right metal for your complexion.”

  “Much appreciated,” Domek said.

  She paid one of the loitering footmen a krejcar to fetch her carriage—her driver, Hackett, would be parked down the street to avoid the crush at the entrance of the theater—and then she and Domek stood on the steps in front of the theater to wait. They were the only ones outside.

  Overhead, the night sky was cloudy, but free of rain. It felt like a sign, an opportunity.

  Checking that the footman was still gone and the door behind them was closed, she moved in closer. Now that she had fresh air in her lungs, she felt sharper, more alive. His scent was almost overwhelming. She could hear the steady pulse of his heartbeat. “Why don’t you escort me all the way home?” she asked. “The carriage ride will be so lonely by myself.”

  His eyes grew wide and he faltered, so she took the opportunity to strike. Ora was a predator at heart. She knew when to press an advantage.

  Standing up on her tiptoes, she pressed her lips against his. Placing a hand on the side of his face, she kissed him as beguilingly as she knew how. Over the centuries, Ora had kissed many people. Men, women, pijavice, humans—she had learned the taste and touch of them all. There was an art to kissing, and after she had left Czernin’s estate, she had found a vicious thrill in using her mouth for pleasure rather than pain. If she had her way, Domek would not be able to stand in the wake of her onslaught. Domek tasted the same way he smelled, honey-sweet and strong. His lips were soft against hers, even as his beard scratched her skin.

  After a moment of hesitation where Ora coaxed and pleaded silently, he kissed her back. One of his hands landed on her waist and the other cradled the base of her skull. His hands were broad, spreading wide over her smaller frame. She felt encircled, safe as a bird in a nest. He kissed with the same methodical, contained focus with which he spoke, tempting her with what could come next. He was learning her with careful movements, testing and prying to unravel her secrets the way he had once fixed her pocket watch.