Into Darkness

11

“I think the Grand Minister will be too busy sniffing out his prey to be worried about supper,” muttered Lu to the dough, irritated he’d burst in right when Liesel was getting to the best part of the story. She needed to know what happened to that boy. And who had been killed? “My schnitzengruben is legendary, woman!” shrieked Lars, pulling at his hair. “Of course he’ll want to stay for supper!”

Beside her, Liesel kept her eyes on her work, unaffected by Lars’s outburst. “You could make sauerbraten. Your recipe for that is legendary, too. And the meat’s been marinating long enough; it’ll be perfect.”

This was Liesel’s gentle way of deflecting attention from Lu. She’d done it a thousand times before. But today—maybe because of the shock of finding out Dieter wasn’t who she thought he was, or because she was just so, so tired of holding her tongue—Lu spoke up.

“How could it be anything but perfect? It’s from Lars.”

Liesel flashed a warning look in her direction as Lars narrowed his rodent eyes. Lu felt his inspection as a flush of heat on the nape of her neck. He was trying to decide if she was mocking him or not, but she figured ego would win out in the end.

It did. Lars sniffed and made a sound of agreement, lowering his hands to his hips. “You’re right. My sauerbraten is the best in the district.”

“Probably the entire Federation,” agreed Liesel, sending Lu a conspiratorial wink. Caught up in planning for the change, Lars didn’t notice. He clapped twice and began barking orders.

“Listen up! Finish the apfelstrudel, chop the cabbage, make the dumplings, get the spätzle ready—”

“And then we’ll set the tables with the good lace cloths and the Federation china while you put the finishing touches on the meat,” said Lu, turning to give Lars a wide, innocent look over her shoulder. “Don’t worry, herrchen, we’ll make sure everything is smooth as silk for the Grand Minister’s visit.”

Lars’s nose twitched in pleasure, reminding Lu of a happy ferret. He loved it when she called him “master,” never recognizing the sarcasm in her tone.

“You better.” He brushed past with an imperious lift of his chin. “Because I’ve heard that son of a b***h is as cold as a witch’s tit and twice as ugly. If anything goes wrong with the meal, I’m holding you responsible.” He swept from the room just as abruptly as he’d arrived. The scent of cheap cologne lingered behind him in a sour cloud.

Liesel muttered a curse in German. “All the responsibility and none of the benefits. Typical.”

“At least we won’t have to suffer through another of his ‘legendary’ batches of schnitzengruben today. Last time I thought I’d contracted dysentery.”

Liesel grunted.

“And what is that stupid saying, ‘cold as a witch’s tit’? What does that even mean?” Lu was growing more and more irritated, irked by her earlier premonition of doom inspired by Liesel’s story, her father’s fraught warning, and the pending visit from the goon squad.

Liesel sighed, and pushed back another flyaway strand of hair from her face. “I don’t know, and I don’t want to find out.”

Liesel began to flatten the kneaded dough into a thin layer with a wooden roller, and Lu followed her lead, realizing with a shiver that she didn’t want to find out, either.

Unfortunately, she had a dark, gnawing feeling that she would.

By the time the caravan of sleek black vehicles bearing the Grand Minister and his entourage pulled into the loading dock behind the Hospice on silent wheels, Lu’s nerves were as shredded as the red cabbage she’d prepared for the sauerbraten.

Like a nest of tumors, tension had been growing in her stomach for hours.

She’d dropped a tray of dumplings, burned her hand on one of the racks in the oven, and snapped at poor Mr. Kirchmann when he’d asked her to read to him during her rounds. She made it up to him by giving him a girly magazine—purloined from her nemesis Cushing’s extensive personal collection, which he’d compiled over years of searching the luggage of new arrivals—but she still felt guilty. It wasn’t his fault she couldn’t get her act together.

It wasn’t his fault she had a target on her back.

She wasn’t the only one suffering from nerves, though. The entire staff was on edge. To the Hospice guests, a visit from such an infamous character as the Grand Minister was a welcome distraction from their banal daily routine, but fear ran rampant through the kitchen, the laundry, and the administration offices. Fear that if an Aberrant was exposed within the ranks, everyone might be held accountable for harboring the enemy. Two fights had already broken out so far, minor skirmishes where one party accused the other of either being the culprit or having knowledge of who it actually was, and the feeling of hostile scrutiny increased to the point that Lu felt as if she were walking around under a giant, unblinking eye.

That feeling would pale in comparison to the first moment she locked gazes with the Grand Minister.