27

The Island

Peter stood, panting heavily. He began to shake and for a while was unaware of his father shouting.

Sofia was wet through with icy river water. She moved to Peter, who acknowledged her with a lifeless smile.

“What in God’s name?” Tomas said. He grabbed Peter by the scruff of his neck. “What are you playing at? Who’s that?”

Sofia stepped right up to Tomas, ignoring his rage.

“You know me, Tomas!” she declared. “I am Sofia, Caspar’s daughter.”

For a moment Peter thought he saw a glimmer in his father’s eyes, but then it was gone.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Tomas said, deliberately. “I don’t know anyone called Caspar.”

Sofia fell back suddenly, as though he had struck her.

“Liar,” she said.

Tomas lifted his hand in fury, but Peter stepped between them.

Tomas tried to push him aside, but Peter stood firm, though his legs shook.

“Father,” he said, “why are you angry? If this girl is nothing to you? Or do you know her?”

Tomas spun away.

“Get her off here!” he spat.

Peter pulled Tomas back and was surprised by how easy it was. He looked at his father’s face as if for the first time. Tomas’s face was ruddy and swollen from drinking, his nose pockmarked; broken veins showed in his cheeks. He stank of drink. He was old.

As they stood facing each other, Peter became aware that daybreak had come. A few low streaks of sunlight pushed weakly through the trees, gules dappling the roof of the hut here and there.

“Father,” he said again, more quietly this time, “Sofia says you knew her father, that you fought with him, for King Michael. Is that true?”

Tomas stared at his son.

“She says you were put in jail after the war,” Peter went on. “With her father. And she says that you have a sword. A sword that stops these people who have come back from their graves.”

Tomas blinked, then walked away, still mute.

Peter wouldn’t give up.

“What is it? What are these people, who won’t stay dead? Father?”

“Nonsense,” Tomas said over his shoulder. He moved toward the door. “All nonsense, and Gypsy tales.”

“No!” Sofia cried. “No. Look at me! I am soaked to the skin. We were chased by a dead man. He chased us here!”

“Nonsense,” Tomas said again.

“No!”

Sofia, seething, stepped toward Tomas, but now Peter stopped her, grabbing her soaking-wet sleeve firmly at the elbow.

“Sofia,” he said gently, “don’t.”

“What, Peter? You too? Do you think this is a Gypsy tale? Your father knows it’s true. Ask him! Ask him why he built a house on an island if it’s all nonsense!”

Peter’s hand dropped from her arm.

“What do you mean?”

“Do you need to ask? You saw the dead woodcutter stop at the water. You saw it with your own eyes. They cannot cross running water, which is why your father put himself on an island in a river. Ask him!”

Peter was cold and tired, shaking violently now, and yet his heart had just been chilled still further.

“Is that why you did it, Father?” he said. “Is that why you dug the channel?”

Nothing.

Then Tomas turned back from the doorway.

“Get her off here,” he said, almost too quietly to hear.

“Father, we can’t do that. She’s wet to the—”

“Get her away! Go!”

Thrown into a rage, Tomas spat the words, his eyes wild. Just as suddenly tears welled in the old man’s eyes, as he stood in the doorway, defeated.

Peter looked at his father and his shame was almost too much to endure.

He turned to Sofia.

“It’s all right,” she said, before he could speak. “I’ll go.”

“You can’t,” Peter said, but she was already crossing the bridge. “It’s not safe.” Peter lifted his hand to Sofia, but in friendship.

“It’s safe enough,” she said. “The sun is almost here. There can be no evil by daylight. I must go back to my people.”

“Wait!” Peter said. “You’ll freeze before you get there.”

He was weighing something in his mind.

“Take Sultan,” he said at last. “He’ll give you some warmth and you’ll be home quickly. I’ll come for him later.”

Sofia nodded.

“Thank you. You must not worry. I’ll look after him.”

Peter smiled and said, “When Father finds out…”

Sofia returned the smile.

They fetched Sultan from his stall. He seemed pleased to see Peter. He snorted steam into the cold morning air.

Sofia swung herself easily into the saddle.

“What will you do?” she asked.

“I’m going to look for Agnes. I must.”

“Peter, you should know—”

“Don’t say it,” Peter said, interrupting her. “I must try to find her. She…I…”

He hesitated. He couldn’t say what he was thinking, and anyway, he didn’t even know if it was true. Had there ever been anything between them?

“I understand,” Sofia said. “But be careful.” She leant down in the saddle and, taking Peter by surprise, planted a quick kiss on his cheek.

“For luck,” she explained, kicking Sultan into life. She laughed. “You should have let me do it before—we might have had an easier time of it!”

Peter watched her go, and then heard her begin to sing. She sang the Miorita, of course, and Peter smiled in spite of himself.


“Let it just be said I have gone to wed

A princess so great, at Heaven’s gate.”


Peter watched her go, and without even meaning to, raised a hand to his cheek, feeling the wetness of her lips with his fingertips.

As soon as she was out of sight Peter suddenly realized how bitterly cold he was. He went into the hut, and saw his father poking the fire, trying to coax it into life after its quiet slumber through the long night.

“Father,” Peter said.

Tomas lifted his head.

“Has she gone?” he asked, still shaking from his outburst, but Peter didn’t answer. Through his mind ran a series of pictures, each more evil than the last, culminating with the awful sight of Stefan’s eye staring from inside his grave.

“Son?”

Exhausted, freezing, and scared, Peter’s body gave up, and the world faded as he collapsed onto the floor.