“He is dead?” Igor asked.
“What is dead, my friend? Dead is sometimes the repeating of time, and not being able to walk out of it. You don’t have to blow out your breath to be dead. The haunted forest is not haunted by ghosts alone. It is a vortex of time and space where devils come through as if it were a door. Not even nature goes there. Everything is upside down, inside out, and the people caught in the net of its evil will never come out,” he warned. “Petr took the wicked deck of cards into Hoia Baciu to hide it from the Nazis, those bastards who chased him for it, and…poof…he was swallowed by the forest.”
The party sat dumbstruck. Each had their own thoughts, fears and theories. But Mihail the Eye was not done yet.
“Now Petr Costita is caught, walking the same time over and over. But with the evil cards he is trying to change fate. A demon dealer. From the mouth of ob…ob-livion…” he sought the right word, “…he is constantly arranging the tarot to change events, hoping he will come out again. But you cannot fight the devil with his own works.”
“Sam,” Nina said almost inaudibly, “caught in time, living it over and over?”
“Aye? What about it?” he asked.
“I have been having this insane déjà vu driving me crazy, remember?” she said with her eyes wide and terrified.
“You too?” Igor asked her. “I have been having it too. Every time it happens, I know what is going to happen, but I can’t stop it.”
By Petra’s reaction is was clear that they had all been suffering from those unusual déjà vu experiences. They were all caught in someone else’s repetitive nightmare.
“That is why the Black Sun is after the Black Tarot,” Nina sighed. “With the deck they can alter world events to their favor. But they need all the cards and they need the Dealer!”
“Oh my god, that means they could already be here,” Petra gasped.
Igor put his hand on her shoulder and rubbed her arm in consolation.
“There is trouble everywhere, Professor,” Stefan said. “We just have to know where to look. Sometimes it is right in front of you, so take care where you tread, hey?”
“You’re not helping, Stefan,” Nina snapped at the grinning guide.
“I’m just making some light-hearted comment, Dr. Gould. It is just so far-fetched, all this. I cannot help but make a little fun at it.” He shook his head and lit a cigarette.
“Mihail,” Petra suddenly said, “how much would you charge to come with us? Name your price.”
“Where to, Professor?” he asked, surprised.
“Hoia Baciu,” she said firmly.
“Fuck no,” he smiled. It was a smile of uncertainty and terror that played on his lips, but he considered it for the money.
“Mihail, that Czech man who was here was my brother. He is dead now, killed by members of the Black Sun, I think. Please come with us. I need you to see for me, to see what happened when he was here,” she pleaded.
“Professor, with all due respect, you are out of your mind,” he replied seriously.
“I’ll pay you well. Better than you can imagine,” she insisted.
“It is not worth my soul!” he retorted.
“You are a superstitious fool,” Stefan taunted him quietly. “I’m going.”
“Then you can stay there forever…with your friends!” Mihail barked at him. Inside the house the baby started crying. It was an ominous wail that announced things to come.
Chapter 23 — The Reluctant Chosen
Heinz had left early to consult on a military base now used as a training academy for young troops to improve their physical and artillery training. He had been giving lectures on the advantages of discipline and knowledge, especially aimed at troubled teens and inmates at juvenile facilities. It had become a real problem with the stigma of Nazism, to maintain a balance between factions of young people perpetuating right-wing ideals while others were tipping the boat with their constant demonizing of all things in their heritage because of an education system that imposed guilt on modern generations for what happened in the Second World War. Heinz-Karl Heller would do everything in his power to correct this imbalance and he was only too happy to attend these seminars.
Greta made herself a cup of coffee, a strong one with lots of sugar, something she would never have done before. Since her collapse a few nights ago and her subsequent two day recuperation she had adjusted her habits somewhat to accommodate her new state of mind. In hindsight she sensed that the breakdown had been necessary for her to realize what was actually important and what her priorities really were. Starting with too much sugar in her coffee, she marched down the corridor to attend to her biggest concern right now.
No more was she going to kill herself for others. Yes, it was a good way to obtain much needed funding, but there were far bigger things going on that needed attention. Radu was first and foremost, but it was not because of Greta’s good nature or intentions. From the beginning he had never been her charge, regardless of all the trouble she went through to adopt him. Greta was happy that Heinz and Radu got along so well and perhaps that was one of the good things that came from her initial plan.
Holding her hand firmly on her abdomen, dressed in a long flowing dress instead of her usual suits or designer pants and shirts, Greta woke Radu for his day’s tutoring.
“Are you feeling better, Frau Heller?” he asked when he saw her sitting on his bed.
She caressed his forehead with her pale hands and smiled, “Yes, thank you, Radu. Now, hurry up and have breakfast so that we can begin, you hear?”
After his breakfast of toast and scrambled eggs prepared by the housekeeper, prescribed by Radu as being ‘the way Herr Heller makes it’, Radu made his way to Greta’s study.
She sat like a statue, looking straight ahead as he came in. Without looking at him she said, “Close the door, Liebchen.”
She did nothing to make him falter in his steps, but there was something amiss with her and Radu felt just a little afraid of his German mother. Never before has he had reason to feel this way, but on the streets of Cluj he had learned to trust his instincts.
“Sit. Arrange.”
Her voice was soft, but it didn’t sound warm, he found. She sounded soft in a weak and cold way, as if she was not entirely present, yet knew what she wanted. In front of him she had placed not one row of cue cards, but three, one above the other.
“How would you like me to arrange them, Frau Heller? From side to side or top to bottom?” he asked carefully and she picked up on his reluctance.
“Both, Radu. Make me an extraordinary story that would work in both ways,” she ordered, a frown forming between her eyes. Her left hand was on her stomach and the other was massaging the bridge of her nose. He proceeded to place the cards in different positions. There were pictures he had never seen before. No longer did he work with cars, balls and trees. Now the depictions were more sinister. There was a group of uniformed men in a row, each with his dress sword stuck in the next man’s chest. Another card boasted a green circle with bones strewn over the entire radius of it. Horses with red eyes quartering a king; an upturned plough in a field of dead crops and a card with a black circle and lightning bolts around it. The latter looked disturbingly familiar to the young boy. He remembered his own card, the one he stole from Greta Heller the first time he saw her. It depicted a similar black circle with tentacle-like tongues emanating from it.
A terrible feeling of iniquity crawled over Radu’s scalp. His little heart started pounding as he moved the bad cards into positions that would foretell a terrible fate, a tale of despicable events in sequence. By each placing the ominous oppression escalated, as if every card he laid out set something hideous in action somewhere in the world. Before he laid the final card his voice quivered, “Frau Heller, can I be excused for a moment?”