Written in the Blood Read online

  Across the street a graphite Rolls-Royce Phantom, like an armoured rhinoceros, idled against the kerb.

  Leah stared at the vehicle: at the enormous flat-fronted grille; the headlights like narrowed eyes; the winged Spirit of Ecstasy, poised for flight, perched on the bonnet.

  Its windows were black, reflecting the night.

  Don’t let them see your fear.

  Blowing air from her cheeks, Leah crossed the street, threw open the Phantom’s rear door and slid into a world of mahogany and cream leather. She pulled the door shut behind her, a heavy-sounding clunk. Immediately, as if a switch had been flicked, the noise of the street traffic ceased.

  No one occupied the seat beside her. In front, a man sat behind the steering wheel. She could see curls of black hair, a strong and tanned neck.

  He turned in his seat, and when he saw her sitting there he flashed white teeth. His irises were feathered with violet, a shade she had never before seen in the eyes of a hosszú élet. Leah thought she caught something else lurking in that expression too: something that froze her blood a little. She recalled the line from the note:

  Again, that frisson of expectation, stirring the hairs on the nape of her neck.

  ‘Leah Wilde,’ the man said.

  She nodded. ‘Who are you?’

  He ignored her question. ‘Lean forward for me. Before we go any further, I need to take a look at those pretty eyes.’

  She slid to the edge of her seat, bringing her face to within a foot of his own. His eyes really were extraordinary: striations of passion fruit and lavender; unworldly, cold and, this close, unsettlingly intense. She watched as the streaks of violet intensified and began to bleed towards the edges of his irises, like dye leaching into a vat of ink. Leah gripped the leather seat with her fingertips, feeling her own eyes respond in kind. There followed a curious unspooling of fear and longing.

  Her mother’s rules, voiced so often in times past, echoed in her head: Trust no one. Verify everyone. If in doubt, run.

  The seraphic beauty she saw dancing in this stranger’s eyes verified that he was, at least, hosszú élet. Yet whether he wore his own face tonight or that of another’s, she could not say. Leah knew that her inability to discern the difference placed her at a disadvantage.

  Those eyes, though. She could not remember how long it had been since she had met another of her kind for the first time. Her heart quickened in her chest; she felt its pulse in her ears. The scent of his cologne washed over her.

  Flinching away, the man stared through the windscreen at the cars passing on the street. Then he twisted back around. ‘How old are you, Leah?’

  She held his gaze. ‘Twenty-four.’

  The moment seemed to lengthen, stretch out between them. His nostrils flared.

  ‘So it’s true,’ he said.

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘And we’re to believe that you came here, all on your own: a single girl, into the lion’s den, without any protection whatsoever.’

  ‘You can believe anything you want,’ she replied. ‘But I’m here alone. Just as I promised.’

  He stared at her, his expression hardening. Abruptly he turned away. Putting the Phantom into gear, he flicked on an indicator and pulled into traffic.

  They drove south out of Interlaken, following a twisting road that threaded its way through dark pine forest as it rose towards the peaks. Theirs were the only lights on the road. ‘We’re leaving town?’

  He found her eyes in the rear-view mirror. ‘You wanted to meet A Kutya Herceg.’

  ‘I thought he lived nearby.’

  ‘He doesn’t.’

  Leah clutched the purse on her lap, feeling the hard angles of the Ruger through its sequinned fabric. ‘Is it far?’

  ‘A while yet.’

  The Rolls-Royce accelerated, powering them up the road’s gradient and around its curves towards the starlit peaks above them. As Leah settled into the seat’s leather embrace, she tried to avoid glancing too frequently at her driver. Every so often she sensed him lifting his eyes from the road to study her.

  Are you sure about this? Are you absolutely sure?

  Yes. It was the right thing to do: the only thing. She knew she wouldn’t be thanked, knew that her actions tonight would sow even more division among the few hosszú életek that remained. But if someone didn’t do something soon – something radical – then all that her mother and Gabriel had worked for in the years since her father’s death would be undone.

  Even so, by coming here alone, with no one aware of her destination, she placed herself in extraordinary danger. Her driver had taunted her about walking into the lion’s den, but Leah knew that was exactly what this involved. She had heard the stories. Some of them sickened her.

  They wound up through black ranks of fir and pine, moonlight glimmering on frost-rimed needles. The air at this altitude looked sharp enough to cut her skin. All around them, the Bernese Alps presented dizzying faces.

  Finally the Phantom slowed, turning onto a private single-lane road that took a sharp ascent through the trees. A minute later they left the forest behind and emerged onto a rising strip of tarmac. When it swept around to the right, Leah gasped.

  An enormous chalet complex rose up ahead: four curving levels of wood and glass, topped with multiple gabled roofs. The building glowed with a golden light, an architectural bauble clinging to the face of the mountain. The windows of its middle floors reached from floor to ceiling, at least four metres in height, served by crescent-shaped balconies that curved their entire width. Somewhere inside she could see the flickering reflections cast from a swimming pool.

  To the left of the building a five-car garage had been chiselled directly out of the rock. Strip lights blazed inside. Below the house, a wide lawn receded into darkness. Across the valley, in full view of the huge viewing windows, rose the rocky monolith of the Jungfrau. Snow sparkled on its summit. On its north-eastern shoulder loomed the Mönch and the Eiger.

  Her driver brought the Phantom to a halt on the tarmac. He glanced at her embroidered lace dress, then up at her scuffed motorcycle jacket. ‘It’s minus ten outside. You’re not exactly dressed for mountain weather.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Wait here.’ He climbed out and went to the boot. Moments later he appeared at her window, holding a calf-length fur; it shimmered silver in the moonlight. He opened her door and held out the coat to her. The air that raced inside the car made her eyes sting at its bite. ‘Put this on.’

  Leah swivelled her legs and stood, feeling her skin burn with cold. Slipping her arms into the fur, she wrapped it around her body and followed him across the tarmac to the ground-floor entrance. The front door was a rounded slab of oak hung within a curving transom decorated with stained-glass panels. Its fittings were brass, polished to a liquid shine. Scorched into the centre of the wood she saw the same woven motif from her dinner invite.

  Her driver stepped into the entrance hall and beckoned her to follow. Feeling a flutter of nerves in her belly, knowing that whatever reservations she’d entertained about tonight’s encounter it was now too late to change her mind, Leah crossed the threshold.

  When the door closed behind her, she heard the clunk of several mortices engaging simultaneously, sealing her inside.

  CHAPTER 2

  Calw, Germany

  Hannah Wilde listened to the scream echo through the building and clenched her teeth at the sound. The agony in that cry dragged claws down her spine and sank teeth into her belly. Wincing, she flicked open the hinged lid of her wristwatch and felt for the position of its hands: twenty past three in the afternoon.

  It had started around six o’clock the night before. Twenty-one hours now: a long labour by anyone’s standards.

  Rising from her stool at the makeshift kitchen’s breakfast counter, Hannah placed her coffee mug on the drainer and walked across the tiled floor of the room. When her bare feet touched carpet, she turned right and moved into the hall.

  She
smelled Gabriel before she heard his breathing – that familiar combination of maltiness and astringency, which, for some strange reason, always reminded her of cider. A draught touched her skin. She sensed him turn to face her. ‘How’s Flóra?’ she asked. How’s she doing?’

  ‘I don’t know how the poor mite can have any strength left.’

  ‘Is she bleeding still?’

  ‘They think they’ve stemmed it. But if this baby doesn’t come soon . . .’

  Hannah nodded, curling her hand around Gabriel’s arm as another scream rattled along the corridor. He didn’t need to finish his sentence; the consequence of sacrificing yet another life to this project of theirs was too wretched to consider. ‘We can’t lose her to this. We just can’t.’

  ‘They’re doing everything they can.’

  ‘It’s not enough.’

  ‘Han, they—’

  ‘Oh, I don’t mean them,’ she replied. ‘I mean all of this. We’ve been bashing our heads against a wall for fifteen years, Gabe.’

  ‘I know. But what else would you have us do?’

  ‘You know what else,’ she said. And knew that he did. Since discovering her true ancestry years earlier, Hannah had committed herself to restoring the hosszú életek’s dwindling numbers; but she’d never expected her greatest obstacles to come from within the very society she sought to preserve. A miracle to some, an abomination to others, her mixed blood had provided an opportunity, however controversial, to reverse what the genocide centuries earlier had begun and nature had perpetuated since.

  Through the closed door of the delivery suite she heard a moan of pain followed by a shriek. A crash as something turned over.

  Someone shouted. Tanja Komáromy’s voice, their senior midwife. Gabriel moved to the door, threw it open. ‘What’s happening? What can I do?’

  Tanya’s voice was elevated but controlled. ‘She’s having a baby, that’s what. Flóra, kedves, you’re doing great. Just great. Gabe, help me and move that trolley out of the way.’

  Another scream, piercing and drawn out, as if winched from the woman’s lungs by hook and line.

  ‘Shall I give her more pethidine?’ Rose Doyle, now. Their usually calm Irish nurse sounded exhausted.

  ‘No time. This baby wants to say hello. That’s it, Flóra, fantastic. Short breaths. And when the next contraction hits, I need you to push.’

  Sobbing, from the bed. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Yes. Yes, you can. You’re doing brilliantly. This baby’s coming and you’re going to fall in love the moment you see it, so I need you to gather your thoughts together and push.’

  Intuiting the position of the room’s occupants from the sound of their voices, Hannah navigated through darkness towards the bed. ‘Flóra, take my hand.’ Sweat-soaked fingers found hers.

  Lowering her face to the pregnant woman’s, Hannah spoke softly. ‘This is it, Flóra. How amazing, eh? What you dreamed about for so long. One last push and that’s it: a baby. All yours. A new life in your arms.’

  ‘It hurts so much.’

  ‘I know. It’s not easy, this. It never has been.’

  ‘I’m scared. It shouldn’t be this bad, should it? Oh God, I can feel it coming . . .’

  ‘Don’t be scared, don’t be. Your baby’s almost here.’

  ‘No, I can’t, please. I can’t.’

  ‘Yes, you can. You’re strong. So strong, and—’

  ‘Oh, don’t, Han. Help me, please. I want it to stop, it’s . . . it’s—’

  The woman’s words flowed into another scream, ripping loose from somewhere deep.

  ‘That’s it! I can see the head!’ Tanja Komáromy again, shouting now. ‘One more push. One more!’

  Body arching upwards, Flóra bellowed. Hannah heard a slippery sucking sound and smelled the sweet, biscuity scent of birth fluids.

  ‘You did it!’ Rose shouted, jubilant.

  Hannah listened for the first sounds of a baby’s cries, telling herself not to tense when she heard nothing in the first few seconds. She didn’t want Flóra to sense her concern.

  ‘You have a son,’ Tanya said. ‘A beautiful boy.’ Then: ‘Rose, turn him over. Quickly.’

  She could hear the two women working urgently at the foot of the bed.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Flóra whispered. ‘Is he breathing?’

  ‘We need to clear his airways,’ Tanya said. ‘The ventilation mask, please.’

  Flóra squeezed Hannah’s fingers. ‘Tell me. Tell me he’s going to be all right.’

  ‘Of course. Of course he is.’

  Why on earth did you just promise her that?

  She heard the shlep-shlep-shlep of a hand pump. Counted sixty compressions. A minute’s worth.

  ‘Rose, watch for any bleeding.’

  Shlep-shlep-shlep.

  The pump stopped.

  Silence.

  ‘Hannah?’

  She was about to answer when she heard it: a tiny mewling cry, as delicate as a dewdrop. Her heart swelled. She sensed a presence by her side, and knew that Tanja was lowering the newborn onto Flóra’s chest.

  ‘Oh,’ Flóra whispered. ‘Oh, oh. He’s perfect. Just a perfect little man.’

  When Hannah felt the woman’s fingers slip from her own, she moved backwards, wanting to grant Flóra the space to welcome her baby into the world.

  But it was not just that. Sometimes she found this part difficult. Knowing that the newborn was part of her – had been created from one of her own eggs – made these births a curiously bitter-sweet experience.

  ‘Tanja,’ Rose murmured. Far from sounding relaxed now that the baby had started to breathe, the nurse’s voice radiated alarm. ‘Look.’

  The senior midwife hissed, and for a moment the silence held. Then: ‘OK, Flóra, you’re bleeding, quite a lot, and we’re going to have to stop it. I want to put an oxygen mask on you, OK? Just breathe, nice and slow, that’s it. Rose, what can you see?’

  ‘I can’t tell. I’m sorry, I need you to take over.’

  ‘That’s fine. Set up an IV. And get the mask on her.’

  Hannah heard Tanja curse, suddenly knew it was bad. This had happened before: two months earlier, to Annaliese Mayr, and four times before that. On all five occasions the women had died, bleeding to death in the delivery suite with their newborn crying in a cot beside the bed. Even hosszú élet intervention had not helped. As quickly as they’d laid on hands and pumped their blood into the women it had spilled out, draining onto the delivery room floor along with all their hopes of salvation.

  It’s happening again. We’re going to lose her.

  She had known Flóra for four years. When the woman heard about their programme, and their attempt to reverse the hosszú életek’s decline, she came to see Hannah and Gabriel, pleading with them to become one of their volunteers. At first they were wary: Flóra was well past the age they had set as their notional upper limit. But Flóra had worn them down, methodically dismantling their objections and pointing out that their limits were just that: notional; arbitrary; based not on science – there was no science here to guide them – but on a hunch, a best guess.

  As Flóra broke down their arguments and told them the story of her entire tragic past, they began to love the hosszú élet woman who had sought them out, and decided to abandon the limits they had set.

  We can’t lose her.

  Hannah could smell the blood now. A hard scent; all angles and points. Sharp in her nose. Like wire.

  And then she heard something, far worse than the smell. Something she had

  plik

  heard on five occasions before, in this very room: the steady patter of a mother’s blood as it dripped off the hospital bed and hit the rubber-coated floor of the delivery suite.

  plik plik plik

  None of them understood what caused this, or why it happened so abnormally often in these assisted pregnancies. It was why, Hannah knew, she was reviled as a bringer of death among the hosszú életek almost as often as she w
as revered as a giver of life.

  Not for anything would she be turned away from this. But it made the agony of losing someone no easier to bear.

  ‘Rose, is the placenta intact?’ Tanja asked.

  ‘Yes, I think so.’

  ‘I need you to be sure.’

  ‘Wait. Yes, I’m sure.’

  ‘Good. OK, Flóra, I’m going to need you to be brave again. We have to stop this bleeding. I want you to clear your head and focus your mind inside your body. Can you feel the source of the bleeding?’

  plik plik plik plik plik plik

  ‘I can’t feel anything down there. It’s just . . . numb.’ Her voice sounded odd. Thick.

  ‘Listen. I know you’re tired. You’ve earned a rest, and as soon as we’ve fixed this you can sleep, I promise you. But focus for me, OK? You’ve a baby that needs you. We have to fix this.’

  Hannah stepped towards the bed. ‘Stay awake, now,’ she urged. ‘Listen to Tanja.’

  Flóra sighed. ‘I can’t feel anything.’

  plikplikplikplikplikplikplikplikplik

  Tanja’s voice again, raised now, all attempts to disguise her concern abandoned. ‘Flóra, Rose is going to put your son in the crib while we do this. He’ll be right next to the bed. Take him, please. Hannah, you might want to hold her hand again.’

  She heard a tiny snuffle of protest as the baby was lifted away. Flóra moaned.

  ‘Right, we need to work quickly. Gabriel, top of the bed, please. Rose, you’re going to have to help me here. I need heart rate and pressure. Regular calls. Somebody sound the alarm. We need everyone in this building outside that door, ready to lay on hands and donate blood.’

  ‘Hannah?’ Flóra’s voice again. Barely a whisper.

  She bent closer, took the woman’s fingers. ‘Yes, darling?’

  ‘I’m not going to make it.’

  ‘Don’t say that. Come on, squeeze my hand. Deep breaths. Listen to what Tanja tells you.’

  Throughout the building, a gentle two-toned alarm began to sound. Hannah could hear doors opening, footsteps running. They’d installed the device after Jennifer Kedzierski had died. On hearing it, everyone knew to make their way to the delivery suite, in case their blood was required to save a life.