My Swordhand is Singing Read online

  “Look,” Sofia said again.

  Peter didn’t need telling. He remembered what Sofia had told him about the things you could bury with a hostage to stop them from walking. Charcoal. That was the one. Charcoal.

  Peter stared at the inside of the coffin they had uncovered. Every inch of wood was covered in writing, in charcoal. It was scrawled, as if written in a fury, or a great hurry, but nevertheless it was legible. And with every word that Peter read his heart grew colder and his hair became a little whiter.

  “What does it say?” Sofia asked. “I can’t read. What does it say?”

  Peter shook his head. He wished Tomas had never taught him to read, because then he wouldn’t have had to read what was written on the inside of the coffin. Words of such anger, and malevolence, and hatred. Toward the living. Descriptions. Statements of intent. Jealous rantings. All the disgusting horror to be perpetrated on those still above ground.

  “If I tell you,” Peter said, “you’ll wish I never had.”

  Sofia looked away from the writing, and then they both heard something slither behind them.

  They turned, and Sofia screamed. Sultan bolted, and this time nothing was going to keep him in the graveyard. It was all Peter could do to keep from screaming. They watched with a deep and mortal fear as snow slid from the top of graves on every side.

  Sofia whirled around.

  “Peter!”

  He followed her movement and saw the same thing happening behind them. What they saw next was even more terrible. All around them, squares of snow lifted bizarrely into the air. The graves were opening. Snow slipped from the squares to reveal coffin lids being pushed upright, being pushed aside.

  Then came a hand, grasping for something to hold on to. Desperately Peter and Sofia looked around. Sultan was long gone, and every glance showed them something worse than the last.

  They came out.

  In front, behind, to the left and right, they came out, and it was clear they knew Peter and Sofia were there.

  “This can’t be happening!” Peter cried. “It’s daylight!”

  “I know,” Sofia shouted.

  “Run!”

  They ran, heading for the side of the church, aiming for a gap between the hostages. But there were dozens of them now, all running for them, all with a simple, deadly intent.

  “Quickly!” Peter shouted, and pulled Sofia onward.

  But she stumbled in the snow, and fell awkwardly against a gravestone. Peter reached to help her, but got only halfway when one last grave opened before him. The lid flew off as if blown apart by gunpowder. Snow fountained into the air, then settled, and Peter gasped.

  Not one, but two figures rose from the grave hole. The first was Stefan, and with him was a girl. Agnes.

  37

  The Sword

  Peter and Sofia backed away from the menace on all sides. Radu was there, and Willem, who had made Radu a hostage. Stefan and Agnes joined the others. Agnes’s mourning dress wafted around her, making her look like a black ghost against the snow.

  Instinctively perhaps, Peter and Sofia had edged backward to the church until they found themselves pressed up against its northern wall, and they were trapped.

  Peter knew what would happen next. He had heard enough stories in his time. His father had told him that those stories were nonsense, but now he knew they were not. Very soon they would become hostages too, and would rage against those still living like a murderous pestilence.

  He felt Sofia beside him, and could hear her breath coming in short, stifled gasps. He put his hand out to his side and found hers, squeezing it tightly.

  “If we’re going to go, we may as well fight,” he whispered. “I don’t care what the song says.”

  In another two paces, dozens of pairs of hands would be on them.

  He leapt forward with a roar, hitting out with his fists, kicking with his feet, but it was no good. Their strength was beyond human strength, and they brought him to the ground with ease. He heard Sofia scream; he knew they had got her too. Hands held him fast on all sides. Hands with swollen, blotched fingers and long, yellowing fingernails. The skin was bruised, blue-black and dry, like the faces that harried him. Peter saw the face nearest to his own. This had been a man, once, but from the dried blood crusting its mouth, he was sure there was nothing human left in it.

  “Go on, then!” he cried, shutting his eyes.

  But nothing happened. He flailed some more, then opened his eyes, and found he was being lifted to his feet.

  No killer blow came. No clawlike hand. No savage bite.

  He twisted furiously in his captor’s grip and saw that Sofia was nearby, likewise held, but unharmed.

  “What is it?” he called to her. “What are they doing?”

  “I don’t know!” she cried. “They shouldn’t be able to do this. It’s still daylight!”

  It was true. It was a weak, miserable, gray afternoon, with no sun in sight, but it was still daylight.

  Something occurred to Peter.

  “Is it the Shadow Queen?”

  Sofia didn’t answer, but she didn’t need to. As Peter mentioned the name of the Shadow Queen, the hostages all around seemed to shiver, and some began to wail, wordlessly.

  It was true, then. It was her power that was changing things.

  The hostages gripped Peter and Sofia more tightly and forced them to walk. They made their way out of the graveyard.

  Peter had been sure they would head for the forest, but he was wrong. In full daylight, they walked into the village square, heedless that they might be seen.

  And now they had been seen. An old woman, venturing out to her woodshed, saw the unholy procession. Screaming, she crossed herself, and fled back indoors.

  At this other doors and windows opened, and Peter watched aghast as other people saw them, then flung their doors and windows shut, leaving them to their fate.

  They were forced on, faster and faster, through the village.

  “Where are they taking us?” Sofia called to Peter. “What do they want?”

  It was slowly dawning on Peter what was happening, but he didn’t dare voice his fear. They were moving, almost at a running pace, and the edge of the village came in sight.

  They moved on, and now Peter was sure. They were being taken to his very own house, and he knew why.

  As they passed the village gate, many of the hostages hung back, letting Peter and Sofia be taken by eight, four of them holding each. Stefan was among those holding Peter, and Peter saw Agnes pushing Sofia along. He tried to pull free once more, but the hostages’ strength was far too great, and their speed increased still further.

  The hostages began to run, and Peter and Sofia found their feet lifted from the ground. They skimmed along, inches above the snow.

  There.

  The hut came into view.

  “Father!” Peter called out, trying to warn Tomas, but it was useless.

  They had arrived.

  Peter knew why they had come. The hostages had taken some hostages of their own. There was only one thing they feared, and they had come to barter for it. Peter and Sofia would be held against the surrender of the sword.

  Before, when Radu had chased them from Agnes’s hut, the river water was enough to stop him from crossing to the island. Peter wondered if, under the Shadow Queen’s power, they could now cross the bridge, but then he realized they wouldn’t need to.

  They would draw Tomas out.

  “Father!” Peter cried, and before the words had reached the hut, he found himself held high in the air by his throat. Stefan had not been a strong young man when alive, but now he could have snapped Peter’s neck in an instant.

  One of the other hostages, an older man with a swollen belly and bloodied eyes, stepped forward. His hair was long and filthy, uncut for years. He raised a hand and pointed at the hut.

  “Come out!”

  Peter shuddered at the sound of the man’s voice. He fought to breathe in Stefan’s grip, tr
ying to lift himself on Stefan’s arm, to find some air.

  “Come out!” The voice was quiet, but commanding. It was indeed dead, but it carried across the safety of the water to the hut.

  Sickeningly, Peter heard the door on the far side of the hut, hidden from view. There was an awful pause, during which Peter fought to see.

  Tomas appeared, and Peter’s heart sank.

  Tomas was drunk.

  He staggered uneasily, swaying from one foot to the other, stopping to try to balance every now and again. In one hand he held a stone bottle of rakia, in the other, the sword, naked and dangerous.

  “No!”

  Peter tried to cry out to his father, but the warning was crushed by Stefan’s grip.

  Tomas came toward the bridge. He waved the sword around, holding it loosely, heedless of the risk of cutting himself. The bottle he held much more tightly, and pushing it to his lips, he tilted his head back for a long swig.

  At the sight of the sword, the hostages murmured restlessly. It was this they had come for.

  “The sword. For your boy.”

  That was it. Peter had guessed right. He and Sofia were the trade-off for the sword, and as if to prove the point, Stefan squeezed Peter’s throat, choking him, taking his air completely. Peter kicked and struggled, but Stefan might as well have been made of rock.

  He knew he didn’t have long left, but in his heart he still prayed that his father would stay on his side of the water, perhaps safe. Perhaps.

  Tomas stepped forward and put his foot on the bridge. He staggered over the water, and somehow managed not to fall in. As he reached the other side the hostages began to wail with delight, while their leader withdrew a little, pointing at Peter, warning Tomas to come no nearer.

  “The sword.”

  Tomas tried to focus. He turned his head one way and the other, as if utterly failing to comprehend what was happening. But it was clear he knew what was expected of him.

  He took another half step away from the safety of the bridge, and then, turning the sword around, threw it onto the snowy ground, just in front of the leader’s feet.

  There was a shriek of ecstasy from the hostages, and their leader moved to pick up the sword.

  Peter had almost passed out, but he had enough life in him yet to be amazed.

  And then, Tomas changed.

  “Now!” he shouted.

  There was a rustle in the sky, and a dozen Gypsies dropped from the trees onto the hostages’ backs. The surprise was enough to make Stefan let Peter fall to the ground. Peter rolled away, in time to see his father fly forward, beating the hostage to the sword where it lay. In a single motion, Tomas rolled on his back, picked up the sword, and slid it into the man’s chest.

  Once the initial surprise was over, the Gypsies were no match for the strength of the hostages. They were thrown to the ground. All seemed lost, but Tomas had left his first victim in the snow. He walked steadily into the heart of the fight, and the sword swung around him so fast that Peter could barely see it moving.

  Now Peter saw the power of the sword. All it took was a single cut from its blade. Hostage after hostage fell, unmoving. Only three remained, Agnes and two men.

  Peter scrambled over to where Sofia lay in the snow, to see if she was all right.

  Sofia cried out and Peter turned to see Agnes right behind them, reaching ice-cold hands toward his throat.

  Behind her, Tomas made a mistake. The final two hostages closed on him at the same time, and he hesitated, trying to decide which to attack first. One of them punched him in the stomach, so hard that he was sent spinning to the ground.

  In that endless second he recovered himself. With a single sweep of the sword he made an inch-deep cut in two necks. The hostages fell to the ground, at rest once more.

  Tomas squirmed in the snow, the pain in his stomach enough to prevent him from standing.

  Seven. There had been a girl, too, and craning his neck he saw her, with her hands on Peter’s throat.

  In desperation he threw the sword at her, but it missed, landing short in the snow.

  Sofia grabbed Agnes’s arms, trying to break her grip, unaware that the sword lay just behind her, but her efforts were meaningless; the hostage was stronger than love, stronger than hate.

  Sofia let go of Agnes’s arms.

  She took a step back.

  Then she began to speak. To call it singing would be a lie. She mouthed the words at first, and seeing Agnes look away from Peter for a second, she felt hope rise in her.

  She gave the silent words a voice, still not singing, but whispering.

  Agnes’s hands dropped to her sides, and Peter gasped air back into his lungs. He stared at Sofia, in wonder at what he was seeing.

  But now Sofia was singing.

  She sang the Miorita, and finally Peter understood the meaning of the song.

  He tried to join in, but at first his damaged throat would give no voice.

  Sofia sang louder, and Agnes backed away from her, floundering through the snow, yet somehow transfixed by the song. And at last Peter found his voice.

  Together they sang the Miorita, and as they reached the end of the song, Agnes lay down in the snow, as still as all those who had been touched by the sword. Sofia fetched Tomas’s sword from the snow and handed it to Peter.

  He hesitated, but Sofia held his hand.

  “A single cut?” he asked, and Sofia nodded.

  He moved the tip toward Agnes, surprised by the sword’s weight, then made a mark so small on her neck that it might have been a pinprick.

  “Sorry,” he whispered, so faintly that even Sofia, a step behind him, didn’t hear.

  He gazed at the girl he had once thought he loved lying in the snow, dead.

  38

  The Song of the Miorita

  Peter scrambled to his feet and rushed to Tomas, who had managed to sit up.

  “How did you do that?” Peter cried. “You were so drunk!”

  Tomas smiled.

  “Haven’t touched a drop all afternoon,” he said, “but it worked.”

  Sofia came over. Her uncle was with her.

  “Tomas,” Milosh said. “Are you hurt?”

  Tomas chose not to answer this.

  “How are your people?” he asked.

  “Some are hurt. Some badly. But all are alive. Thanks to you. I am glad you came to your senses at last.”

  “I didn’t come willingly,” Tomas said.

  “What happened?” Peter asked. He turned to Milosh. “You came to take the sword by force?”

  “Yes,” said Milosh, “but when we got here we found Tomas waiting for us. It seems something had changed his mind. Someone.”

  Peter glanced at his father, then looked away at the ground, his heart pounding.

  “We knew they would come for the sword, so we waited. We didn’t expect them to bring you, but it played into our hands.”

  Sofia looked at Peter, smiling, but Peter was looking at his father on the ground.

  “Are you hurt? What happened?”

  Milosh knelt down beside Tomas, feeling for the wound.

  “One of them got a blow in. Here.”

  Tomas winced as Milosh pressed his stomach. Pulling back Tomas’s clothes, they could see a huge discolored swelling already forming.

  “You’re bleeding. We must get you inside.”

  “No,” said Tomas.

  “No?” said Milosh.

  “Peter. What did you see in the village? There are others from the graveyard, aren’t there?”

  Peter nodded.

  “Dozens,” he said.

  “That’s not possible!” Milosh cried.

  “It’s true, Uncle. I saw them,” Sofia said. “And they won’t stop now.”

  Tomas sat up straighter. “We have to act. We have learned a lot today. We have seen hostages walk in daylight. It seems Agnes was among them. There may be others. I have never heard of that before. So the Shadow Queen’s power is growing. Some of them
may even have been living among us, biding their time. And the hostages have learned about the sword, and they want it. Well, they will get it, but we have learned something else too.”

  Tomas turned to Sofia.

  “What you did…How did you know?”

  “I…I didn’t,” Sofia said slowly. “I just believed.”

  “There!” Tomas said. “And what did you believe?”

  “I’m not sure…”

  She shook her head, puzzled, and Peter laughed.

  “I know!” he said. “I believe it too. I understand the song.”

  “And what does the song teach us?” Tomas said. “Does it teach us to go to our deaths, without fighting? To accept our fate?”

  “No,” said Peter. “No. It teaches us to embrace death while we live, to understand it, so that when we do finally come to die, we may accept it without fear. And that way we can live free of fear, believing in ourselves.”

  “That is it,” said Milosh. “That is it. Death is part of life. They are inseparable. You cannot have one without the other. The song teaches us that if we accept a wedding with death, we can go to our graves content. It is people’s failure to understand this that makes them prey to the Shadow Queen.”

  “How?” asked Peter.

  “She can feel the discontent of the dead, those who were not content, those who had not understood the Miorita. These people are open to her power, and so she brings them back from the grave.”

  “And now we have another weapon!” Peter cried. “A song!”

  Peter could feel this faith within him, as a presence that he had failed to see until now. Belief in the song, and true understanding of its message, that was it. Enough to give power, enough to lay the hostages to rest.

  “Yes,” said Tomas. “And a great confrontation is upon us. Help me to my feet.”

  “No, Father!” Peter cried. “You must rest. Let someone else take the sword.”

  “Your son is right,” Milosh said. “Give the sword to me. I am not as skilled as you, but I will do my best. You are hurt.”