The Progeny (28 page)

Born Vojvodina 1981 mother: Serafina

father?

Belgrade: 1992–December 1994 (Bosnian war)

1995: lover—Marton ___?

. . .

Budapest 1997–1998 Prince: Attila

1996: Nyirbator

2001: Attila killed

2002–January 2003: Budapest Prince: Andrik

2005: Returned Budapest? Tamas killed?

2008: Zagreb Prince: Imre

2013: Bratislava 2x

2016: Croatia ___?

Died August? Body found near Csepel Island, Budapest

I blink, heart stuttering. I had been tracking someone.

My mother.

I scan back. Find the name Imre. Remember the caption the night of Ivan’s death, his name given on the television. Was Ivan once Prince of Zagreb?

The next two pages are a list of contacts at four European libraries, including the National Hungarian Archive, followed by what have to be nearly fifty pages of notes on Elizabeth Bathory, with portions boxed or circled:

Witnesses either did not actually witness Elizabeth in the act or unsure

Elizabeth not allowed to speak on own behalf

Respected nobles accused of procuring own relatives to serve E.’s household, turned blind eye OR willingly sacrificed girls for hope of conviction against her

(Did she do it or not??)

Elizabeth: Protestant (Calvinist), King: Catholic

Bathory/Nadasdy holdings: thousands of acres, 20 castles

E. husband Ferenc, national hero, BANKROLLED CROWN. Debt too large to pay back. Ferenc dies, E. begin litigation against debtors INCLUDING ROYAL TREASURY.

King can’t risk action against national hero—turn entire country against crown. But can against a widow

King calls witnesses from E.’s own holdings—nobles, court officials. E. made loans to servants, paymaster, castellan, squire, court master. THEY ALL OWED HER MONEY. ALL TESTIFIED AGAINST HER.

Palatine Thurzo (Protestant) charged to protect her before Ferenc dies. Move for no execution. (Keep E.’s property from ceding to Habsburg crown in full, prevent precedent of crown claiming Protestant property)

1611: E. walled up at Cachtice (Slovakia). CROWN’S FULL DEBT CANCELED, portion of lands cede to crown. All documents sealed. Treated as though E. “never existed.” Husband’s reputation as war hero intact

KING CROWNED HOLY ROMAN EMPEROR 1612.

Holy crap. I’m an ancient conspiracy theorist.

I thumb through several pages of names I don’t recognize and what look like hand-copied records. There are several more pages labeled “Budapest,” “Zagreb,” “Bratislava,” “Bucharest,” “Belgrade,” with names of what I assume to be court leaders or members.

Why would I do this—catalog their names like this? I think back to Jester’s story about the genealogies. This journal is dangerous to every person I’ve listed.

Is this what I had erased from memory—a record created in naiveté? A list that, once written, I could not unsee?

I pause on a page filled only with questions, such as:
Who was Ismeta’s sibling?
And then:
Imre = Tibor’s brother?—Yes. Goes now by “Ivan.”

My eye catches on two successive lines:

Ivan and Nikola falling out. Amerie sides with Nikola—WHY??

Amerie dies 16 months later

I scan ahead to several pages filled with names and death dates—and a seeming list of those who died in quick succession after their passing:

Tamas (April?) 2005

June: Zsolt

October: Attila II, Silus

December: Judit, Braco (suicide, memory unrecoverable)

But something happens after the last of those. About ten pages have been torn out.

And then this:

Audra,

It’s me. You.

The skin rises on my arms.

We can’t have this (journal) anymore. There is too much here, too much that you were not meant to find. Too much, too much. And you have too much—too much love, too many questions. Too much sorrow . . . and too much joy.

I tried to find her for us. She was gone by the time I got to Europe.

Ivan helped me find the journal (hers—what’s left of it). I’m keeping this all together. Were it up to me, I’d burn it all. I’ve already seen it—it will never leave my brain now. Which is the problem.

I think I know what I need to do. It’s pretty horrible. Dying would be easier, I think—for us, at least. But not for Luka. Not for the secret that does not go in this book, or any book. The one you’ll die for.

I’m rambling—you’ll think you were an idiot back in the day. I’m rushing, that’s the problem, because I’m leaving tomorrow for Bratislava and one last shot at the diary. Nyirbator, maybe, if I have time, but everything’s backward. The entire story is backward. Can’t write too much here while I’m still on the move—everything will end up with the Historian if I die now at any rate (big bonus day for that a-hole), but at least if these pages are taken by the Utod (you know who you are, traitors), they’ll have to figure part of it out for themselves. But then Luka will be free and all he’ll have to deal with is his grief.

I love that man. I love him, love, love him. The first time he told me he loved me, I didn’t hear it. And I waited so long to hear it, too. He waited to bring it up again for weeks because he thought he had upset me.

He’s patient and good and gentle. Don’t let it fool you: He’ll kill for you. Don’t let him. Kill for him, instead, if you have to. One of you has to live.

He’s buying us a ring if we (you and I) live through the next few months. I’d call that an incentive to stay alive.

I sit back hard, dumbfounded. Blink, grab the envelope, pull it open to peer inside, and then upend it.

It falls into my palm. A ring with a simple row of little diamonds.

I slide it onto my finger. A perfect fit.

We were engaged??

I flash back to Maine, recall the desperation I took then as him trying too hard. His manic will to rescue me from Rolan, get me safely to the underground . . .

His reluctance to let me come here alone.

I flip forward several pages, reading quickly.

Me again. You.

I couldn’t stay long enough in Bratislava. I’m running out of time so fast, the sun’s practically moving from west to east . . .

I don’t know how I’m going to bring it up to Luka. I know what I think I have to do. It isn’t selfish—it’s maybe the least selfish thing you’ll ever have done. And now that I think back, we were pretty selfish even just a year ago.

I’m so sad. I’m going to treasure these beautiful, beautiful hours. Do you know what Luka said to me before I left?

“I love you more every day. When you go to bed tonight, know that you’ll be even more loved tomorrow.”

The last night I was with him before I left, he sighed against my neck and said he loved the smell of me. And I understand what he means, because sometimes I wish I could inhale him, breathe him into my cells.

Now all of that is going away. I have never cried this hard.

I flip to the next page. It’s the last in the journal.

Audra,

So here we are. I’m at a crossroads, and you, reading this, are where I was months ago. Different date, same person . . . same impossibility.

Life is beautiful, Audra. I know it doesn’t seem like it, with everything. But it is. And it is new. Katia said something the last time I saw her that I will never forget (or I will, so I write it here): Heaven doesn’t come tomorrow. It’s here now. You don’t have to die to get there.

I hope I don’t lose that thought along with everything else. They say your life flashes before your eyes when you die . . . I really hope it does.

I’m writing another note after this one. It’s for you. It’ll be the first one you get from me. With hope, the only one. It’s short and sweet (miracle, isn’t it?). I can’t say everything I want to—haven’t even been able to here. And I’ve decided I won’t talk about Luka in it. You know why? Because I want you to have the joy of falling in love with him all over again. I think I could spend my whole life doing that.

Ask him what he has to tell you when it’s all over. But it has to be over. And if you’re reading these words now, it won’t be until you finish what I started. I’m so sorry. I tried.

The worst part is I can’t write it here. I can’t write it, and I can’t tell Ivan. It would be so simple if I could just tell Luka everything I need you to know . . . but I know what they’ll do to him once they think he knows anything. And while they can’t take his memory, they’ll make him wish they could.

Protect him. He’ll take a bullet for you without even blinking. Don’t let him. He is good. Proof of God, and a better person than I am. But maybe you are, too.

If you’re reading this, you know what happens next. It’s August and I swear I can hear the symphony playing at the Wolkenturm. I wish we could have a long, good chat, because I have so much to tell you. But more than that, I wish we all had more time.

I just heard last night that Katia is gone. It’s all coming down.

Go back to the beginning of our story. I’m giving you everything I dare. You know what you have to do.

Give my love to Luka.

Me (You)

P.S. Don’t trust Nikola. He’s in league with them.

I stare at the far wall, so many questions slicing through my mind at once they may actually mince it to pieces. About Nikola, about Luka and me, what I had hoped and failed to achieve in Bratislava. About the story I’m supposed to go back to.

But most of all, what I’m supposed to do with it all.

You know what you have to do . . .

But I don’t. And though there’s still a pile of loose pages I haven’t even looked at, I’ve had all the revelations I can take for the moment.

I glance at the clock in the corner. I’ve been here too long.

I tuck the baby picture inside the journal and start to put everything back in the envelope, but pause at the sight of a sheet folded multiple times. It’s worn and yellowed, but that’s not what’s caught my eye. It’s covered with names, some of them fuzzy where the ink has faded, some of the letters retraced more recently. One of them, in new black ink, is mine. Luka’s is written below it.

I carefully unfold the sheet, laying it over the biometric box and envelope; it’s the size of a newspaper centerfold and twice as fragile, crumbling at the corners.

Rows and rows of names are scrawled across the page in progressively faded ink. There, near the bottom, is mine and Luka’s. My mother’s is a row above mine, alongside an empty box. Above her: Serafina, paired with the name Petar Todorov. Some kind of family tree?

No.

I jerk back from the table the instant I realize what this is.

A kill map. Progeny and their known murderers.

So many names, each of them the tiniest representation of a life . . .

Ink has bled through in several places from the other side. Heart thudding, I turn the page over.

A chart in the vague shape of a Christmas tree occupies the bulk of the sheet. At the very top are twelve names I don’t recognize, faded with age, their letters redrawn. The next tier contains fourteen names, and the next level twenty. There are other notes beside some of them in what appears to be Hungarian that I can’t make out. But several of those lower down, I can: “Hungarian army,” “Red Army,” “Hungarian Social Democratic Party,” “Socialist Federal Republic, Yugoslavia,” and more recent labels including “media,” “police,” “tech,” and the names of several global banks, each accompanied by a city ranging as far west as the United Kingdom and as far east as Turkey.

A chill crawls down my spine as I realize I am staring at the evolution of the Scions . . .

The birth of a massive cabal.

There’s a single line down the right side of the page, separate from the rest, connecting a progression of circles. Some contain names I don’t recognize, many are blank, only a few with dates. The succession, I assume, of the office of the Historian.

The last circle is very new, in crisp black pen. It is empty except for a year.