The Count of the Living Death (The Chronicles of Hildigrim Blackbeard) (9 page)

Blackbeard shook his head with a foreboding laugh. Yes, why not invite a troupe of soldiers to join the party! They were about to ask why he found this even slightly amusing when Ivan appeared at his side.

“
You
!” What’s he doing here?” she asked.

“Unfortunately, that’s why I’m here,” Blackbeard said. “The spell didn’t work. Your death…”

They immediately understood.

“But the box…it’s still locked, right?” Mary asked, breathlessly.

The look on Blackbeard’s face left nothing in doubt: the box was open, his Death was out.

Mary slumped against the wall, utterly broken. They could run away from her father, from the armies of the earth…but from death? And unlike her father it knew exactly where he was. She looked at Leopold, saw him dying all over again from Ivan’s hand. But this time he wouldn’t come back. She had fooled herself into thinking that love alone had saved him. Love, of course, meant nothing to death. It was implacable and unfeeling; it consumed life and nothing more. And now it was here…roaming the palace hallways. Slinking like a cat in the shadows, its eyes shining, seeking him out.

“Why didn’t it take him?” Leopold asked.

“Your Death wasn’t so easily fooled,” the sorcerer said. “Other Deaths, perhaps…but yours has a mind, a will, of its own.”

“But you said it would work! You
promised
!” Mary said.

“I said it
should
have worked—I thought I could make it work!” he snapped. “Your Death, it’s changed, grown beyond all comprehension. I don’t even know what to call it!”

“I don’t understand any of this! All these deaths and boxes and ridiculous spells!” she shouted. “You can’t let it take him—I can’t be here without him! Why can’t you understand that?”

“You may not have to,” he sighed.

Now the Count perked up, sensing a threat to Mary herself. Blackbeard took her hand (despite her reluctance) and tried to explain and apologize at once.

“My dear, I’ve failed you both, just as I failed his father so many years ago. He came to me with an impossible request. Any other magician would have denied him. But I looked into his eyes and identified with his pain…little understanding the terrible consequences of saying ‘yes.’ I never asked myself what would happen to a Death torn away from its host, a death removed from the cycle of living. If Death is not
death
, what is it?”

“So it’s not0">“So n“ ">

“Not exactly. Without you it grew into something dark, a creature that thinks and hates and desires. It still needs you…but it wants others, too.”

“But you said it didn’t want Ivan,” the Count said.

“It shouldn’t want anyone—it only needs you! And yet it asked—demanded—you and one other.”

“Who? Someone in my family?”

“Me,” Mary said, reading his eyes. “It wants me, too.”

Blackbeard dropped his head in silent agreement. The Count gasped, suddenly aware of the tragic consequences of his actions. Each key, each lock, seemed to spell someone’s doom. By turning the second lock he had erased her future, though the voice promised they would be together. And they would be—just not how he imagined. A moment’s curiosity had killed the love of his life.

“Blackbeard, please, there has to be something…she can’t die for my mistake. I’ll do anything.”

“It’s beyond my powers to play with death,” he said, gesturing weakly. “There are no spells for this kind of opponent.”

“It doesn’t matter, I live or die with you,” Mary said. “Let it take us…at least I won’t have to go back. At least it’s with you.”

“No, I can’t accept—"

“We’ll always be together,” she said. “I’m not afraid.”

 She kissed him and he allowed himself to give in, to believe that a death with her would be like a life together. Surely he couldn’t find her now only to lose her for eternity, the two of them swallowed up in some cosmic abyss and then spit back wherever? It had to be fate.

“But Blackbeard, wait!” he exclaimed. “This doesn’t make sense…how can my Death kill her? What about
her
Death? It’s not locked away in some box, is it? Can’t it defend her?”

“Normally, yes, this would be true…but we’re not talking about a normal Death. Your Death is its own creature, a force that exists in this world, able to kill anyone it likes. You may as well consider it a person.”

Leopold sank back, defeated. So that was that. Yet the answer that crushed him made Ivan perk up, inspired with a profound—but possibly foolish—thought.

“But if that’s true, can’t his Death
die
? If it’s not dead, so to speak? Couldn’t we just go in and kill it?”

“No, not with swords or axes or anything you can find in the palace,” he responded. “Alive it may be, but it’s still something
other
, something I can’t understand. t rofound”

“Then why doesn’t it climb out of the box? After all, what’s stopping it? Can’t it just reach out and kill us?”

Blackbeard opened his mouth to respond, to shoo his comments away—and faltered. He had examined the problem from every angle except the one Ivan so casually introduced. Yes, why
didn’t
it leave the box? The locks had tumbled off one by one. It had power beyond reckoning. So what stopped it from taking what it wanted? There was only one explanation: fear. It feared leaving the walls of its box. After all, it was born there, like a perverse womb. No child willingly left the comfort of its mother; even the pangs of hunger and the tortures of revenge were balanced by the fear of the unknown, of setting forth on its own two feet.

“Ivan may be right,” Blackbeard mused, aloud. “Whatever its power, it’s reluctant to leave the box. We can use that…but we need to know more.”

“Then let me help you. Killing is all I’m good at, apparently,” Ivan said, unsheathing the Count’s sword. “At least let me kill someone that matters.”

He offered it back to Leopold as an act of atonement. The Count took it, almost apologetically, before responding.

“I don’t want to make my father’s mistakes. Whatever happened, you’re still my brother. I hope you believe that.”

Ivan lowered his head, nodding. Leopold stole a look at Mary, who still didn’t believe it. They would never be related in her mind; his father was right to reject him, seeing this twisted imitation instead of his son. But for Leopold’s sake she bit her tongue, though swore Ivan would be forced to pay for his crimes. She would never forget the image of him standing over Leopold, sword in hand, intoxicated smile on his lips. One day that smile would be hers.

Ivan returned alone to the room. As the door closed, he felt a thousand whispers scurry up the walls. The entire room seemed vibrantly alive, every stone and curtain quivering with life—or death, as the case may be. Only the box remained silent, the three locks lying conspicuously on the floor like slain opponents. Ivan approached and cleared his throat.
It’s alive, and everything living has fear
, he told himself, quoting Blackbeard. Yes, it could fear him…if he didn’t run out of the room screaming first.

The lid creaked open, just enough for a red eye to flash out. Ivan struggled to stand his ground. A tentacle peered out of a corner of the box, but just as quickly pulled back. The eyes blinked and focused on him, less fierce and interested as before.

“I’ve come to offer myself in the girl’s place,” Ivan said.

The box made no reply to this offer. Ivan pursed his lips, realizing he had to push harder.

“She’s dead. You left her no choice—she killed herself. So I come in her place.”

The eye flashed, stirring the box.

“Blackbeard will honor his promise and give you the Count…on one condition.”

A tentacle slipped out of the box, slapping lazily against the floor. In a shrill, echoing voice, the creature said there were no conditions, only demands to be met. It wanted the Count and the girl. Not him.

“But she’s gone…even you can’t have her now. We ojum2. As theffer you the Count and his brother. Me.”

The death withdrew its tentacle, flashing both eyes at Ivan. Without anger, but in a terrible voice nonetheless, it stated that the Count had no brother. It wanted the girl and the Count within the hour.

“But I…I’m the Count’s brother. We have the same blood,” he protested.

No, you do not. You are not, it replied.

Ivan lost heart and almost gasped for breath. Was this a trick? Blackbeard warned him that it would say anything to shake his resolve. It was clever, cunning, and whatever else the moment required. But this…how could it know?

“I tell you the girl is dead,” he persisted, though unnerved. “You’ll have to accept me in her place. Then you can have us both…again, on one condition.”

The creature slipped another tentacle out of the box, either with interest or irritation. It said he was in no position to state conditions, though it would humor his request. Perhaps it would also consider the substitution…if, as he said, the girl had truly destroyed herself. But time was pressing.

“The condition is this: he wants you to leave the box. You can have us both, but not in this room. Outside.”

The tentacle whipped in the air and smashed against the box. Both eyes fixed him in a deadly stare.

Unacceptable, it replied in a ghastly hiss. The Count will be delivered here along with the girl. Otherwise terrible things would happen. And the sorcerer alone would be responsible.

“Thank you, I will tell him,” Ivan said, retreating.

A quarter of an hour has passed, it rasped. Your time is almost spent.

Ivan walked backwards toward the door, watching the eyes watch him. The lid slammed shut just as he closed the door. Once outside, his legs wobbled and almost collapsed as she caught himself. The sound of his heart throbbed in his ears. If that was death…may he find the secret of eternity and live forever!

“Wonderful,” Blackbeard said, emerging from the shadows. “A perfect performance.”

“Perfect? You mean pointless!” he gasped. “Unless I missed something in there, it’s definitely not scared of us.”

“On the contrary, it’s terrified. Because now we know it’s secret.”

“It’s secret?”

“Yes, it’s not just fear—it’s something more. It
can’t
leave the box,” the sorcerer grinned, shaking his hands in a posture of prayer. “Locks or no locks, it’s trapped. We now have the advantage.”

“We do?” Ivan said, replaying the events in his head. “So now what?”

“We wait. Let the hour drift past.”

“And then?”

“And then we kill it.”

Leopold sent his most trusted advisor to speak with the soldiers at the gates. Tell them anything, promise them the moon; get them to leave if possible. But the soldiers were implacable: they came for Lady Mary and would not retire until she appeared. Otherwise, they would tear down the palace walls. From a window the Count judged they could make good on their promise, especially since he had no trained soldiers to speak of. His guards were a motley assortment, cobbled together from this and that province and paid a pitiful salary. They wouldn’t put up much of a fight. Still, the soldiers might never find them. They could hide, play cat and mouse all night if need be. He would never surrender.

“I’m afraid we don’t have time for that,” Blackbeard cautioned. “If we are to fight it, we must strike now, without distractions. Surely you understand—”

“She can’t go back! They would never let us marry!”

“And that’s your greatest concern—her parents’ consent?” the sorcerer exclaimed. “With all due respect...if you survive this confrontation the displeasure of her parents and all the soldiers in the world will seem like child’s play. For the present, we need to keep you alive; otherwise there will be no marriage or anything that follows.”

“Perhaps it is for the best…” Mary said, weakly.

“But they don’t even know if she’s here! How long could they look?” he said. “Wait, say we fled to the mountains—yes, tell them we simply ran off. Send them on a wild goose chase!”

“I understand the pain and uncertainty of parting,” the sorcerer said. “So imagine parting eternally without her. This is your only chance.”

The words found their mark. The Count winced, struck the walls and muttered something unprintable about fate. He knew what he had to do. But he didn’t care to do it.

“Please, I’ll go…this won’t be the end,” she said, leaning against him.

He only nodded, unconvinced.

“But you’ll come for me? You’ll find me, wherever I am, even if they ship me to the Northern Provinces and marry me off to a pagan Laplander?”

“I…yes, though I don’t even know what a Laplander is,” he said. “But there’s no place on the map I won’t go. Even to…where do Laplanders live?”

“Have Blackbeard show you,” she smiled, kissing him. “I remember the first time I saw you…at the Vysotsky’s for my coming-out. You were dressed in that ceremonial outfit—”