Bloodwalker

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

Sylvie

Budapest, Hungary

When arriving at the deceased’s house,

always leave your shoes outside. No sense

ruining good shoes with corpse stains.

~ The Bloodwalker’s Book

Sylvie gathered her long skirt in one hand, her suitcase in the other, and wobbled down the steep train steps after her mother. She made it to the platform without tumbling on her face but then ruined any semblance of propriety when her mouth dropped open, and she gawked at Hungary’s Keleti railway station.

Her entire Romanian village could have fit inside the immense building. It dwarfed the trains. Its ceiling floated a hundred feet above. Without pillars to support it. It hung as if magically suspended from the clouds.

By the time her gaze fell earthward again, her mother had vanished in the crowd.

Sylvie sprang onto tiptoe, searching for her mother’s black dress and white crocheted cap. So many people. Too many. Heads bobbed. Bodies swerved. Colors blurred from the Hungarians’ garish clothes. Tracksuits. T-shirts and jeans. Women in pants. A few teen girls wore shorts—right out in the open, in front of everyone.

Sylvie turned on the spot, her bulky shoes stepping all over each other in her panic, and prayed for a glimpse of her mother’s cap. Thinking she’d spotted it, she pushed through the crowd, only to find a man wearing a white baseball hat.

“No, no,” she whispered, swallowing the acid suddenly climbing her throat. She couldn’t be lost. Not on the most important day of her life.

People streamed by, jarring her shoulders, clipping her elbows. A dark-haired man gazing down at his phone banged into her, almost knocking her down. Instead of apologizing, he continued on as if nothing happened.

Other commuters dodged her, but then turned to look back with raised brows, ogling her from top to bottom.

Sylvie shrank from their gazes and examined her floor-length dress. It was clean. No stains, no dirt. Even her cuffs and long apron shone as white and pristine as when she’d left home that morning.

Was her outfit really so strange?

Or had they guessed what she was?

She clutched her suitcase to her chest, trying to avoid the prying glances and the impacts of passengers brushing past. Cowering simply produced more stares. But she felt safer behind her makeshift shield. At least it was light, although it contained all her belongings. A tiny box for a tiny life.

A hand gripped her elbow, and she gave a startled yelp.

“Where were you? You’re slipperier than goose grease!” The words lashed out, and Sylvie cringed. Her mother impatiently swept a lock of flaxen hair off Sylvie’s face and tucked it back under her cap. “There’s no reason to be nervous. Everything will be fine.”

“Of course it will,” Sylvie murmured.

Her mother’s eyebrows arched in the familiar I-know-you’re-lying look. “Sylvie, listen to me. Your wedding will go as planned.”

Though almost forty, her mother still had the rawboned look of a teenager. All Skomori women had high cheekbones and sharp chins, but on her mother, the features seemed too sharp, too pale, as if her white skin was carved from ice. She drew herself erect, and Sylvie could almost hear every chiseled vertebrae snapping into place.

In a gruff voice, her mother decreed, “I have seen it, so it will come to pass.”

Whenever her mother used that authoritative tone to make predictions, Sylvie’s skin prickled, but this time, the reassuring words didn’t help.

Her wedding day should have been her happiest moment—yet her nerves were strung tighter than the twine she used to sew corpse’s eyes shut.

“Come along, Sylvie, we’re late already. Let’s hope the others haven’t left.” Her mother took Sylvie’s elbow, steered her toward the end of the platform, and then up the stairs.

Sunlight from tall windows flooded a vast foyer and bounced blindingly off its marble floor. Sylvie spotted the other two brides waiting for them by the exit doors. At their sides, their mothers fidgeted in their long black dresses, dark as grave pits, the emblem of married women.

Across the foyer, dozens of passengers flowed in and out, frowning, pushing, rushing for their trains. Their footsteps reverberated off the ceiling and walls. The sound filled the space with a loud patter as if trapped birds were throwing themselves at the windows, lured by blue sky and the promise of freedom.

Sylvie’s feet dragged and then stopped altogether. The other four bloodwalkers hadn’t seen her yet. She still had time to turn and run away.

“Don’t let them spook you.” Her mother tightened her fingers on Sylvie’s arm. “They know nothing about your past. If you keep your mind clear and draw no attention to yourself, they won’t notice a thing.”

“But there are four of them.” Sylvie’s breath came in short hiccups. “One is bound to sense I’m not…like them.”

“Then you’ll have to convince them you are like them! Eighteen years of bloodwalker rules and rituals aren’t good enough?” Without waiting for a reply, her mother continued. “The people back home may know, but that doesn’t mean anyone else has to. You must be careful. Very careful.”

“I’ll try, but—” Sylvie clacked her teeth shut, locking her words inside. Across the way, the bloodwalker mothers looked around impatiently, all sharp angles and hard eyes. The dam inside her burst. “I hate this! I don’t want to be here. Can’t you fix it so I can go back home?” As soon she saw her mother’s appalled expression, Sylvie wished she could take it back. This disaster wasn’t her mother’s fault. She was a real bloodwalker—saw souls, heard the dead’s voices, and gave messages to their families. Sylvie couldn’t, no matter how hard she tried. Even when all she had to do was prepare a body…somehow, things just went wrong.

Sylvie wiped a sweaty palm on her dress. If word got back to the Skomori elders about all her mistakes, the bungled rituals, and worse, that she couldn’t bloodwalk, they’d cast her out. Ban her from every clan and town. Without home, friends, or money, she’d never survive. “I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.”

“No...” Her mother’s stony façade cracked, her features weighted down by sadness. “I should have quieted the complaints and gossip. But the talk hasn’t reached the elders yet. In your new home, no one will know you. It’ll be a fresh start. Just get through today without letting them suspect you.” She smiled and squeezed Sylvie’s hand. “Okay?”

Sylvie nodded though her heart still told her to run.

“Keep your wits about you, and everything will be all right.” Her mother led the way through the mass of travelers, Sylvie trailing behind.

The other two mothers gave them curt greetings and passed judgment on their lateness with the Gaze-of-Condemnation, a staple in any Skomori woman’s repertoire. Sylvie had seen it often enough in her home town.

“Liana and I left the Carpathian mountains before dawn to make it here on time,” said the mother of a tall, blond bride who chewed a wad of bubblegum.

“Lowlanders.” Liana stared at them and popped her gum with a loud smack.

Sylvie’s eyes devoured the girl’s long purple gown with its sheer sleeves and lilac ruffles at wrists and collar. Every tiny seam perfect. Store bought for sure. Sylvie fingered her hand-sewn cuffs and winced at the threads hanging from the edges.

“Don’t they have clocks in whatever tiny village you’re from?” The other bride’s mother gave a petulant huff. “We’re all here now. Go on, Ada…Ada!” She elbowed her mousy-haired daughter.

The girl, who looked about sixteen, stopped counting travelers with umbrellas and mumbling about bad omens. Pink flared in her cheeks. She dug two flowers from a pocket of her apron and handed one to Sylvie and the other to Liana. “Crocus,” she said with a shy smile. “I picked them this morning.”

“Thank you.” Sylvie accepted the bedraggled white bloom that symbolized auspicious beginnings.

Liana made a face. “I hope our futures fare better than this did.” She dropped the flower in her purse and retrieved two salt shakers. “Bees’ wings and powdered ash bark, in a silver shaker.” She handed one to each girl. “Sprinkle this in your bread dough and your husband’s business will always prosper!”

Real silver? Sylvie cradled the gift, the metal warming in her palm. She’d never owned anything so expensive.

After the oo-ing and ah-ing from the daughters and mothers alike, it was Sylvie’s turn. She knelt and opened her suitcase. Her stomach squeezed tight as she reached for the sachet packets. It had taken three months to collect the ingredients for the bloodwalkers’ strongest charm. But what if the sachets weren’t good enough? What if the girls didn’t like them, or suspected they wouldn’t work? She handed a bag to each bride and forced the ritual words past the lump in her throat.

“In the blackest of plagues, we lit the way,

From town to town, behind the dray,

Collecting the dead, from gutter and hearth,

To bury them deep, in cold, cold earth.

But when souls speak, to soothe their kin,

We open death’s door, and let them in.”

“For we are bloodwalkers,” the others finished the recitation in a hushed tone.

“Is this really a Farmece Arkana?” Liana frowned at her packet. “You want us to believe you found capuci centipedes, at midnight, during a new moon?”

“Yes.” It had taken weeks for Sylvie to locate them under a rotten log and then wait for the next new moon to collect the squirming six-inch creatures.

“And chicken beaks, bearberries, and bladderwort?”

Sylvie nodded. The bladderwort plant had been the hardest to find. It floated in water and ate insects and small animals. She’d found a field mouse in hers, partially digested.

“Okay. But tell me how you got a bone of a real bloodwalker from the Black Plague. That’s more than five hundred years ago.”

“It’s from Kutna Hora, in the Czech Republic. Mama’s cousin is the caretaker of the bone church.” At Liana’s skeptical expression, a pleading note crept into Sylvie’s voice. “I did everything right. This is the Farmece Arkana. It will make us into great bloodwalkers. Perfect ones. I swear…” Words dried up as her confidence deserted her. Although she’d followed the recipe exactly and desperately wished it would work, she was certain it wouldn’t. Nothing ever did.

“Pull in your claws, Liana,” the girl’s mother scolded. “Thank the girl.”

“Yes, indeed.” Ada’s mother beamed. “It’s such a glorious gift!”

As the others complimented Sylvie, delight warmed her cheeks, and she dropped her gaze to the marble tiles.

A rubber ball rolled under the hem of her skirt and bumped her foot. She squatted to pick it up and found a toddler careening across the floor, a grin on his face, his arms outstretched. With a smile, she placed the ball into his grasping fingers.

A shadow slid over them. A gray-haired woman bent down and slapped the ball away. She hissed Hungarian words Sylvie didn’t understand.

“I-I’m sorry,” Sylvie began in Romanian, but the old woman switched to badly accented Romanian and cut her off.

“Don’t touch him, you filthy girl.” Her eyes shrank to slits in her weathered skin, and she scooped up the boy. “Bad enough you put your unclean hands on his toy. I know what you are—Skomori ghoul!” She spat in Sylvie’s face.

Sylvie reeled back and fell on her rump.

The old lady stabbed a finger at the others. “Crawl back into the disgusting graves you came from. Your kind’s not welcome here!” She whirled and stalked off, the little boy peering back over her shoulder, his eyes misting, one hand outstretched toward the ball.

Sylvie struggled to her feet. The other women glanced about, fear bleaching their faces. Even Liana appeared uncertain.

“This is a terrible omen!” Ada’s eyes glittered with tears.

Her mother shushed her, and the whole group barreled out of the building like criminals. Commuters dodged out of their way. On a clear patch of sidewalk away from the entrance, the woman stopped and huddled together.

Taking a handkerchief from her pocket, Sylvie’s mother wiped the spittle off her face.

“I’m so sorry,” Sylvie whispered. “If I hadn’t touched the ball, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“It’s not your fault,” her mother said. “Some of the Baran are more wicked and stupid than others.”

“Mongrels!” Ada’s mother said. “Marrying anyone instead of keeping their line pure. That’s how they end up so stupid and frail.”

“May their blood become vinegar and their hair fall out!” Liana’s mother spat in her hand and rubbed her fist in it, sealing the curse.

“But my groom has a shop in Miskolc,” Sylvie said. “He deals with the Baran...” She halted beneath cutting looks.

“How do you know that?” Liana’s mother snapped. “The elders chose him. You shouldn’t know anything except his name.”

“I told her,” Sylvie’s mother raised her chin. “My late husband’s Aunt Cosmina, the elder who will perform the ceremony today, naturally made sure Sylvie’s groom had a good livelihood.”

The others’ faces soured like pickles, but they held their tongues. Favoritism was rife in the Skomori clans, all depending on how closely one was related to Zora, the oldest living elder who could trace her lineage back to Ratmir of Novgorod. Zora was a bloodwalker, a powerful one. Legend had it she was born with a foot in both worlds, the living and the dead.

Ada’s mother dried her daughter’s tears while Liana and her mother stared daggers at Sylvie.

From across the parking lot, a silver-haired woman in a long black dress limped toward them, leaning heavily on a cane.

Sylvie’s mother ran out to embrace her while the other two brides’ mothers bent their heads together.

“Look,” Liana’s mother whispered. “The bloodwalker’s curse is upon her.”

“Heaven protect us from that horror!” Ada’s mother crossed herself.

Sylvie’s brow wrinkled. She knew every Skomori superstition and rule by heart but had never heard of a bloodwalker’s curse.

As Aunt Cosmina drew closer, Sylvie straightened up and tried to clear her mind of all doubt and fear. Considering the woman was an elder, she might be as prescient as Sylvie’s mother. In their village, grieving families and neighbors came all the time for advice and remarked on how her mother knew things no one could and how her predictions always came true.

The nearer the elder got, the more Sylvie’s heart fluttered. If only she could make it through this one day. Her mother had promised that her groom was from a faraway city where no other Skomori lived. A man said to be modern minded. One who might not care if Sylvie forgot things, like scattering owl droppings on the hearth every month, adding spider eggs to the porridge, or hanging a rat skeleton over the bed to ensure marital harmony.

All things that the elders swore kept the Skomori strong and healthy. No Skomori ever got so much as a cold.

“Hello!” Aunt Cosmina smiled as she reached the sidewalk. “Don’t you girls look lovely!” With twinkling eyes, flushed cheeks, and the smell of cherry pie wafting from her, she wasn’t at all what Sylvie expected. Maybe it wouldn’t be so hard to keep her weaknesses hidden after all.

“The sun pales beside your shining face, Oma,” Sylvie and the brides recited in unison and curtsied.

After allowing the mothers to kiss her on both cheeks, Aunt Cosmina said, “A fine crop of youngsters you’ve brought me. Their new husbands will be well pleased.”

“We are honored our girls have been chosen and are most grateful someone of your status will be performing the ceremony.” Liana’s mother kept nodding and bowing like an old pump handle.

“Indeed,” Ada’s mother chirped. “I can hardly believe our good fortune that you’re doing the ritual!”

Aunt Cosmina’s grin stretched wider. “Then you’ll be even more pleased when I tell you we’re going to Obudai Island, and someone far more important than I will perform the wedding.”

The women stared at her blankly.

A chill of foreboding ran down Sylvie’s back.

“We are lucky enough to have the Zorka Cyrka in town, and you know what that means…”

“No!” Liana’s mother’s eyes lit up, and she bounced on the balls of her feet.

“Yes!” Aunt Cosmina crowed. “The services will be performed by none other than Zora herself!”

Hoots of elation sounded, and the girls and their mothers hugged. Sylvie barely clung to her smile as vomit burned the back of her throat.

She could possibly fool Aunt Cosmina long enough to make it through the ritual, but her hopes shattered at the name of the Skomori woman who’d officiate the marriage.

Zora. The most powerful bloodwalker alive. The one who could uncover the lies and secrets concealed in every heart.