Uncle Guido and Aunt Heide were still downstairs. Lenka inched open the bedroom door and peered down the corridor to their bedroom. Every board in this house creaked. How to get there without being heard?
She took a deep breath, deciding to trust that all would be well, and stepped out onto the landing. It was a chilly evening, and the wind gusted around the house, rafters groaning, the sound of Aunt Heide clattering plates in the kitchen below. Where was he, though? Smoking a pipe in the study? Yes, that was where he was.
She took another step. Then another and another. This had to be quick. To be caught in their bedroom, or even outside the door, would without doubt elicit severe punishment. Aunt Heide would do nothing to save her, either. The woman was weak. It was imperative to be cunning, to anticipate every move, every outcome.
Stealthily she pushed open their bedroom door and peered inside. Pearly moonlight streaked across a brass bed covered with starch-white sheets exactly as pictured. A dark oak dresser and chest of drawers stood against the far wall by an inset closet. Her glance flicked to the dressing table. Aunt Heide’s hairbrush lay on a silver tray along with a pot of cream and a tortoiseshell hand mirror, but there was nothing of his. What about a robe or coat? Ah, of course – darting over to the bed, she pulled back the top sheet. His nightcap! And inside it were several gingery hairs. At the sound of a voice, she curled them into her palm and exited as swiftly as she’d entered, scooting back across the landing without a single board making a creak.
Back in her own room, she rooted for a piece of writing paper and sat at the small desk with the excuse of writing home should she be disturbed. Conscious now of a dual life, of a silky, cunning presence streaming through her veins, she found herself waiting for a response, pen poised.
Show me! Show me!
Nothing came but a vague and hazy notion that words of intent should be scrawled onto the paper and then burned. But what could she say to make this work?
She frowned, waiting, trying hard to think of the right words. But they would not come. Frowning, she dipped the nib into the inkwell and began to doodle… As before when the floorboards were bound to creak, she had trusted and they had not. She must trust again and let the one inside channel through. Doodle after doodle… until her thoughts began to blur at the edges… and her hand, as if it were no longer her own, picked up a fresh sheet of paper and began to wrap the hairs from Guido’s nightcap into its folds.
Then, and only then, did the pen begin to scrawl. And as she inscribed her uncle’s name on the packet of hairs, his image burned brightly, searing onto her mind. Every working of his jaw as he chewed and chewed, every flick of his tongue over those wet red lips, and every lascivious gaze falling onto the cherubic body of an innocent child ramped up the loathing.
Words in a tongue not her own fell from her lips: “Nema Olam a son arebil des menoitatnet ni sacundi son en te. Sirtson subiotibed sumittimid son te tucis, artson atibed sibon ettimid te. Eidoh sibon…”
Onto the small envelope, under his name she drew a circle, filled it with an inverted pentagram, and painted in the very centre a black sun with rays around it, all the while picturing him in great detail, seeing the demons gathering around him, imagining the shudders as he sat downstairs in the study, smoking his pipe, aware now of a cold breeze on the back of his neck. With the package now complete, she took a hairpin and repeatedly stabbed it, picturing Guido doubling over with pain. Every stick of the pin was dealt with conviction and intent. “As this hair so receives blows and pain, so may its master receive blows and pain.”
When the working was done, she held it to the flame. “This is my Will!”
Within seconds of finishing, footsteps creaked rapidly along the floorboards on the landing. A rap came at the door, and Guido walked straight in without asking. He sniffed the air. “Something is burning?”
Smiling inside, Lenka languidly glanced over her shoulder. “Forgive me, Uncle, I was working so hard on a letter to my parents, I had not noticed. I must have scorched my sleeve on the candle.”
“You should be more careful, Lenka. How can we trust you if you are careless in such matters? It is time for you to put out your light and go to sleep.”
“Yes, goodnight, Uncle.”
He closed the door. “Goodnight.”
He had been checking on her. He had some inkling she was not as pious and demure as he would like. No, there was something rebellious and dangerous about his niece, and it unsettled him. She smiled more widely now, feeling well – tingling, in fact, with good health.
So now we will see, she thought, if I really am a sorceress.
Chapter Twenty
The following evening, Aunt Heide walked Lenka to the university, not ten minutes from where they lived. It had gained a reputation of considerable standing, and rumour had it great personages attended. She had heard royalty at one time.
“I do not understand how your mother acquired this place for you,” Aunt Heide went on. “It is for the most elite, and here are you – just a village girl.”
Lenka shrugged. She did not know either.
“Your parents, they must have put together good money for their only child – money that should have been used for a wedding. I do not know what they are thinking.”
“Yes, Aunt Heide. I do not know either, I must say.”
On arriving at the gates, Heide kissed her on one cheek in an uncharacteristic display of affection. “Nevertheless, I wish you good luck in your studies. Perhaps your mother wishes you to become a teacher in the village?”
“I think so,” Lenka nodded, keeping her eyes averted. “I am sure you are right.”
“Well, then. I shall expect you home by nine o’clock. Have someone walk you to the door. You should not be out alone.”
Aunt Heide watched until Lenka had walked all the way down the drive to the university building, her footsteps echoing dully on the rain-spattered stones. Ahead, an arched doorway had been left ajar, and seized by a flutter of excitement, she stepped eagerly over the threshold, forgetting to turn and wave.
The corridor, lit by an oil lamp on a small hall table, was oak panelled and lined with portraits of alumni. From a room at the back came a murmur of voices, and tentatively now, she headed in that direction. Expecting it to be full of students, she peered shyly around the door. In fact, there were only two people in there: a tall dark-haired man, slightly stooped, who had his back to her, and a younger man with whom he was engaged in avid conversation. She caught the gist of it in the few seconds before the dark-haired man swung around and saw her.
“Yes, yes, the Kriyasakh has produced external, perceptible, and phenomenal results by its inherent energy—”
“Any idea will manifest itself externally if one’s attention and will is deeply concentrated upon it—”
“Ah!”
Their eyes met. And the first thought that struck her, with considerable impact, was how startlingly handsome Herr Blum was. The second, that he was the same man who had infiltrated her mind.
She stood paralysed with shock.
He bowed. “Fräulein Heller? Good evening, I am Herr Blum, your tutor.”
His golden-brown eyes danced, the jet hair and pointed fox-like features alive with mischief. He was quite old, she thought, at least thirty. And experienced… Instantly she received a vision of them both with limbs entwined. He was holding back her hair, pushing into her… A rush of heat suffused her cheeks.
“How do you do, Herr Blum? Thank you for accepting me as a pupil.”
“My absolute pleasure, Fräulein Heller.”