Winter War Awakening (Blood Rose Rebellion, Book 3)

by Rosalyn Eves

  Görgey nodded at me and seemed more amused than irritated by our interruption. General Guyon did not seem to recognize us, but Gábor, sitting beside him, smiled. The others appeared variously mystified, annoyed, or outright angry at our appearance.

  Dembiński bristled. “What the devil do you mean by this, sir?”

  Hadúr, copper armor clinking around him and glowing with curious intensity in the dim light, strode to the center of the room. “I mean, sir, to put an end to this foolishness. You are destroying this army quite as effectively as the Austrians might wish.”

  “Who says so?”

  “I say so. And before you question my authority again, let me remind you that I am Hadúr, the Hadak Ura, Hungarian god of war.”

  There were a few raised eyebrows at that, but not as many as I’d expected. Hadúr in full glory was quite convincing.

  “Starting now, I am commanding this war.”

  Dembiński began, “But Kossuth—”

  “Kossuth has no more notion how to run a war than have you. A good leader knows better than to disrupt a successful operation, and I might have been content to merely take orders if you’d given orders worth following. But you have not.”

  Dembiński finished his thought with more firmness. “Kossuth appointed me, and I will not step down until I hear the order from him.”

  The man had courage, I’d grant him that.

  Hadúr looked around the room, his eyes settling on each general and staff member in turn. Most of them quailed before his gaze. Gábor, I noticed, did not; nor did General Görgey. “Which man among you is going to tell Kossuth that the god of war offered to lead your armies and you turned him down?”

  No one answered.

  Hadúr smiled and settled atop a table. “I thought not. Our first task is to break free of the Austrian armies surrounding us and regroup.”

  In rather grim terms, he laid out the current situation of the war: we were surrounded by Austrians and the Russians were on the march. At best, we might delay our surrender a few weeks. We needed reinforcements. Kossuth’s emissaries to France and England had failed: France was embroiled in her own war, and English armies were occupied with putting down praetherian insurrection in the countryside.

  Hadúr looked at me. “I want you to take messages to General Perczel and General Bem. Have Perczel bring his army up behind the Austrians in the northeast. Have Bem bring his troops up from Transylvania to meet us.”

  He made no mention of the praetherian threat, and I wondered at the omission. Did he have some larger plan to address that, or was he at present concerned only with the survival of Hungary? He was the god of war. But like the Lady and other demigods who had been trapped in the Binding, he was technically praetherian. Which loyalty goaded him here? His loyalty to Hungary—or to the praetheria?

  * * *

  It took me all night to reach General Perczel, flying as a great horned owl and carrying the letters in my talons. I arrived just as dawn broke, shifted in the woods beyond their camp, and stole a coat and trousers that had been left on a line to dry. Görgey’s seal on the letter from Hadúr was enough to buy me entrance to the general’s tent, but Perczel looked harried, so I made my report brief and handed over the letter. I snagged some breakfast from a nearby pot, returned the purloined clothes, and set off again, a crow for the daylight hours, the remaining letters in my beak.

  General Bem was harder to find in the mountains of Transylvania, but I tracked his troops down at midmorning on the following day. Unfortunately for me, I ran afoul of a pair of scouts just outside the camp as I was shifting.

  They stared, open-mouthed, at me in all my naked glory. Flushing a little, I turned so I was presenting my backside.

  “Luminate!” said one, raising his gun.

  “Don’t be daft,” his fellow said, knocking the gun aside. “There’s magicians on our side too. Find out what he wants before you shoot him.”

  “I’ve messages for the general,” I said, waving the letters in the air above me.

  At this, they both looked perplexed. Finally, the second soldier said, “Best find you some clothes, then.” The first soldier disappeared, and the second kept me company, his eyes carefully averted. I began to feel amused, and by the time the first soldier had returned with some clothes, I was downright cheerful.

  General Bem, another borrowed Polish commander, was not quite what I had expected. His round face shone at me beneath a receding hairline, like Mikulás arriving with toys for children, but his eyes were keen. “My soldiers say they found you naked in our woods, and yet you’ve come bearing letters from Görgey?” His Hungarian was faintly accented.

  “Yes, sir,” I said. The letter was from Hadúr, but I didn’t correct Bem: there was a second letter from Görgey explaining the change in leadership. “I shapeshift, but, alas, my clothes do not make the transition with me.”

  “How very enterprising. A useful skill, that, in wartime.”

  “Not always so useful for fighting, sir,” I said.

  “There are many ways of fighting,” Bem said. “Not all of them involve weapons. You serve no one by belittling yourself. Do you fly, then?”

  I let my grin surface at the longing note in his voice. “Yes, sir. Would you like to try it?”

  And that is how I came to shift a decorated general in the Hungarian army and spent the better part of an hour teaching him to fly as a crow does, riding the air currents and tumbling through the sky. When I released him at last, his eyes sparkled above rosy cheeks.

  “That was splendid— I’m afraid I don’t know your name.”

  “Mátyás,” I said.

  Bem’s aide-de-camp was waiting for us when we returned, and as soon as the general walked into range, he began castigating me for taking the general away so long—until he got a good look at me.

  “Eszterházy Mátyás, on my life! I heard you were dead.”

  Petőfi Sándor, the militant poet who had driven us to revolution and rallied the people to storm Buda Castle, stood before me. He was no friend of Kossuth’s, but he was, as ever, a patriot. He’d lost his neat appearance—neither his mustache nor his clothes were as well kept as I remembered—but his eyes blazed as brightly as ever.

  “I was,” I admitted. “A goddess brought me back.”

  “Now, that’s a story I should like to hear sometime,” Petőfi said. “But how did you come here?”

  “He brought me a message,” General Bem said. “And then he taught me to fly.”

  “Of course he did,” Petőfi said, laughing.

  “Have you ever been a crow?” General Bem asked. “Marvelous. Simply marvelous.”

  Bem sent an adjutant to fetch us some food. As the shifting had begun to take its toll, I did justice to the food, to the adjutant’s awe and Petőfi’s amusement. Petőfi plied me with questions about my life since the Binding, and I told him about becoming the King of Crows.

  “Well, naturally,” the poet said. “Once one has lived and died a revolutionary, what is left but banditry? I shall write a poem for you.”

  I laughed. “My exploits need no poems, thank you very much.”

  As I rose to leave, General Bem said, “Fly safe, young man. You’ve a position in my army anytime you choose.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “And should you die in battle, I’ll write a rousing epitaph for you,” Petőfi declared. “ ‘One thought torments me, that I might die in a pillowed bed….Isten, do not give me such a death!’ ”

  There was something in his recitation of his own poem, a ferocity that made the bright day suddenly dark. I shivered, touched by a premonition I scarcely understood, and launched into the air.

  * * *

  When I arrived back at camp, the battle was still raging. I fought off exhaustion to join the others, and when the fighting slowed enough f
or me to stumble back to my bedroll, I did not so much fall asleep as cannon into it.

  When I dreamed, it was of the battle: of bodies rising from the ground to continue fighting, of spells whistling through the air that I could not dodge. It was a relief when I remembered I did not have to stay inside the nightmare. I let myself drift outside the dream, to the grey realm of dreamers.

  I watched the haze of sleepers as they coalesced and thinned, then took shape again. A particularly bright mist caught my attention: something about the red and gold swirling in its depths seemed familiar.

  My fingers closed around the mist, and I slid inside the dream almost at once.

  There was no battlefield here but a ballroom filled with glittering chandeliers and gleaming gold leaf on the walls. The edges of the room fuzzed away into nothingness. Couples whirled around me, mostly with indistinct faces, but a few I recognized: a pair of students from Café Pilvax in Buda-Pest, my uncle János, the soldier girl I had helped rescue.

  At the center of the room, Anna twirled in Gábor’s arms.

  I drifted through the crowd as orchestral music swelled. When Anna lifted her face to receive a kiss, I tapped Gábor, who dissolved, and stepped into his place.

  “Is this what you dream about?” I grinned at her. “I’m flattered.”

  Anna drew back in alarm. “I wasn’t dreaming about—”

  I took pity on her blushing confusion. “I’ve been looking for you and Noémi for weeks. Hadúr has taught me how to walk through dreams.”

  “So this is real? Not part of my dream?”

  “Not unless you want it to be.”

  She ignored my comment. “Are you safe? Where are you?”

  “Somewhere near Eger. Technically, we’re on a battlefield, so ‘safe’ might be relative, but I’m well enough at the moment. Where are you?”

  “In the mountains somewhere, in a cave.”

  “And Noémi?”

  “I don’t know. We tried to escape and were caught. I haven’t seen her since then. Is Gábor with you?”

  “Not with me, but I’ve seen him.”

  “You must tell him that my letters were stolen, that he can’t write to me.” Anna stopped, head cocked, as though she was listening to something I could not hear. “I’ve got to go. Find me again, please.”

  “I will,” I promised, and her dream disintegrated around us.

  My visitor came unannounced, heralded only by a growing globe of light against the darkness.

  It had been a week, maybe more, since our attempted escape—it was hard to gauge the passage of time in the new cell where I was kept. The space was smaller than the room I’d shared with Noémi, the walls rougher and colder. Instead of a bed, I had a blanket. I was always cold. Meals were brought and cleared away in silence at odd intervals by unfamiliar praetheria. I spent the rest of the time in darkness, filling the space around me with terrified imaginings: that the others had been killed, that the praetheria already marched on the Hungarian armies. I had tried, more than once, to recapture the same Breaking spell that had plunged me through rock after Chernobog had entombed me, but either the cell was spelled to prevent such an escape or I was not sufficiently in possession of myself.

  Even Vasilisa had not come to gloat.

  It was Hunger who came, walking easily down the uneven stone corridor leading to my cell. I gripped the bars fronting the entrance to my alcove.

  “Where have you been?” I asked, my voice rusty from disuse. It was not what I meant to say.

  “Occupied,” Hunger said, gold eyes gleaming. He sat down on the floor outside my cell and surveyed me. “Are you all right?”

  I didn’t answer him: he could see that I was well enough. “Where is Noémi? Emilija? The lidérc? What has been done to them?”

  “Noémi is secured elsewhere. The others escaped.”

  I released a slow breath. Thank God. “Noémi is well?”

  A broad yearning stole into his face, before Hunger wiped it away. “She’s unharmed.”

  “You should let her go.”

  Again, that flash of longing. “I cannot.”

  “Cannot or will not?”

  He did not answer. He rubbed his hands across his eyes, a very human gesture of exhaustion. But I would not feel sorry for him. “You were meant to be a guest, to be encouraged to help us of your own free will.”

  I snorted. Not ladylike, but there was no book of manners for behavior in a prison cell. “Your idea of persuasion is a funny thing. What was supposed to win me over: Watching a soldier be buried alive? Seeing the samodiva queen die? Being entombed by Chernobog? I confess, it’s hard to choose amongst so much charm.”

  “At least you retain your spirit. Hold that. You will need it.”

  I peered at him. Beneath the gold sheen of his skin, there were circles under his eyes, a chalky pallor that had not been there before. “You cannot approve of what is being done here—you cannot have meant for someone like Chernobog to take the samodiva’s place.”

  “What has happened is done. There is no going back from it.”

  I could not quite read his flat tone. Did he regret what had happened? “No—but you might choose a different way forward. It’s not too late to stop this war. Please, let us go. We can help you—”

  He cut me off, standing in a fluid movement. “You cannot stop this. It is too late.”

  The silence falling behind his retreating footsteps was a living thing: heavy, feral…and lonely.

  * * *

  I was dreaming of Mátyás spinning me through a ballroom when footsteps sounded outside my cell, tugging at my consciousness. I told Mátyás to find me again and was already swimming out of the dream when a guard yanked the bars open and hauled me upright.

  Just beyond the guard, Vasilisa stood in a frilly white gown, as though she were attending a society fête. Beside her, Pál nodded. “Bring her.”

  The guard dragged me through the corridors and chambers of the cavern. When my sleep stupor wore off, I tried to ask what was happening, but Pál waved his hand at me. “Hush,” he said, and I could not speak.

  We reached the entrance of the cave, and the guard pulled me through.

  Noémi waited in the fading light outdoors, Hunger beside her. After the initial rush of joy at seeing her alive and unharmed, I was swamped with dread. The praetheria had not brought us here to set us free.

  Hunger shifted, his dragon form stretching long and sinuous in the gathering dark. We were each bound, and Pál shoved me into a saddle fastened to Hunger’s back and tied my hands to the pommel.

  When Pál stepped back, Vasilisa wrapped her arms around him, and they rose into the air. Hunger’s great wings fluttered, and he lifted as well, his powerful claws closing gently around Noémi. I winced. I had flown in Hunger’s claws before, and it was not comfortable. Not that being bound to his back was a great improvement.

  Even in my fear, I could not help relishing the feel of wind against my skin, seeing the stars emerge overhead like so many diamonds, the nearly full moon gleaming like a pearl. I had missed this sight.

  The air at this height was frigid, much colder than the cool temperatures of the cave. I shivered, wishing I’d worn something warmer. (A ridiculous wish: I had nothing warmer.)

  We did not fly far. After only a few minutes, we began to descend. Hunger settled slowly, releasing Noémi before landing firmly on the ground. She stumbled a little, and Vasilisa drew her away while Pál helped me down. Hunger shifted back to human form, his suit so well fitted it had to have been glamoured.

  A short distance away, a troop of soldiers sat on their horses, unnaturally quiet save for the soft whuffling of their mounts. The soldiers wore the high shako hats of Hungarian hussars, and for a moment, my heart bounded.

  We might be saved.

  But only for a moment, unt
il my searching eyes took in the horned figure of Chernobog standing near the horsemen. Peering more closely at the soldiers, I saw some were too attenuated and oddly jointed for humans. These were praetheria, dressed as Hungarian soldiers.

  Chernobog stalked toward us. “There is a small unit of Austrian soldiers not far from here, mostly new recruits sent to join the main body of the army. We strike at midnight—hard, fast, without mercy.”

  My skin crawled. Was this it? The beginning of the end?

  I sidled closer to Noémi, and no one stopped me. Her very human warmth was comforting, though she smelled—as I’m sure I did—of sweat and unwashed flesh. But why had they brought us here?

  We waited for some time, silent and uneasy. Above us, clouds crawled across the sky, blotting out the moon and stars.

  Chernobog gave the order, and the soldiers rode out, the underworld god following them like a plague. A pair of horses were brought forward for us to mount: Noémi and Hunger on one, Pál and me on the other. I tried not to cringe when Pál put his arms around my waist; it would only amuse him to know how unsettling I found him.

  The battle was fully engaged when we arrived, if a bit lopsided—Austrian foot soldiers trying valiantly to fight back against praetheria on horseback. Most were not even in uniform, untucked shirts and missing trousers suggesting they’d been roused from their sleep. A few fled, running pell-mell toward the uncertain shelter of trees in the distance.

  I tried not to watch the battle, though Pál kept our horse turned that direction. It was enough—too much—to hear the clang of metal on metal, the bursts of gunfire, the gurgling cries of the dead and dying. I swallowed bile in my throat.

  At length, a white flag of surrender was raised, and the Austrians threw down their weapons. The praetherian soldiers in Hungarian uniform circled around them.