I hired a fiacre to take me to the Duna and crossed the pontoon bridge into Buda after paying a small toll. Normally, Luminate did not have to pay the toll, but with my torn dress and lopsided skirts, no one would believe I was noble. The boats beneath the planks rocked as I crossed on unsteady feet. Buda Castle hovered above me on the hillside, the banners of the Hapsburgs flying briskly over the ramparts. The hills around the castle were transmuting into a rainbow of gold, ocher, crimson, and umber.
On the far side of the river, I stopped to ask directions of a middle-aged woman. She eyed me askance, but pointed obligingly.
Tabán, as I approached it, was not as I’d expected. I’d pictured a collection of narrow streets full of squalid buildings. But though the streets were indeed narrow and largely unpaved, the single-story houses lining the roads were for the most part clean, their walls scrubbed and freshly whitewashed.
The streets were empty, dry leaves scuttling across the packed earth, though I sensed eyes on me through the occasional cracked door or narrow window. Shouts rang out ahead of me, and I followed the sound, my heart thumping against my breastbone. The noise brought back the horrible afternoon when Noémi and I had been barred from the Romani camp. My steps slowed, but I forced myself onward.
As the noise grew louder, I clung to the whitewashed buildings, at last finding a narrow alleyway to slip through. It opened onto a larger, unpaved street, which in turn gave way to an open space that might be called a square, were it more properly formed. I proceeded cautiously down the street and positioned myself behind a wall of bystanders.
The square was full of people: Romanies, Circle members, onlookers. The handful of Luminate were easy to identify by their fine clothes. There was not much to choose from between the Romanies and the bystanders, most of whom wore plain, patched clothing. But the darker-skinned Romanies were being herded to the far side of the square, and their faces bore tracks of tears and tight-twisted mouths. Some invisible spell seemed to hold them in place. The onlookers reminded me of nothing so much as crows gathered around carrion. Were I an Elementalist, I’d have cast a Wind spell to knock all of them onto their rears in a fine patch of mud.
Two rough-looking men emerged from a nearby street with a thin Romani girl in tow. Desperate, she bit one of the men and kicked the other in the shins. They released her with matching howls of pain, but when she turned to run, the man nearest her hauled her back by her hair.
My breath caught. Izidóra.
At a gesture from a tall Luminate woman, the men shoved Izidóra toward the mass of Romanies. I scanned them, but there were too many. I could not see Gábor, though that meant nothing. If his family was here, no doubt he was nearby.
My heart sank. I was too late. Yet I felt compelled to watch, to witness whatever might be happening for Gábor’s sake, for his sister’s. They were my friends.
A second Luminate woman wove through the captive Romanies, collecting their talismans in an enormous sack: rings, brooches, necklaces, and bracelets. I rubbed at my wrist, at the phantom memory of the bracelet Gábor had given me.
In the center of the square, two Luminate men stood, setting the grounding for a spell. Herr Steinberg was one, his glasses flashing in the low light. The other crouched down, placed a coil of rope on the ground in a precise circle, then straightened. His light-eyed gaze swept the crowd, as though looking for something. I started.
Pál did not see me, or whatever he searched for. He closed his eyes and sniffed the air. I pressed back against the nearest building, slouching down so I was hidden from view by the people in front of me. Pál’s eyes snapped open.
His voice carried across the square, even over the muttering noise around me. “There’s a Gypsy woman nearby hiding her newborn. Bring them here.”
A dozen eager citizens peeled away from the crowd, disappearing into side streets. My stomach cramped. I knew how sacred the Romanies held the privacy of the newborn. To thrust both mother and child into the dirty public square would be the worst kind of violation. I wondered if Pál knew as much. I hoped he did not: I hoped he was only ignorant, not malicious.
The crowd stirred restlessly. I ignored my neighbors, concentrating instead on the Romanies. Still no sign of Gábor. I hoped he had escaped. I hoped he was far away. But my heart hurt for those who remained, the young mothers with terrified children clinging to their skirts, the older men and women wearing looks of stoic resignation. Izidóra gripped her mother’s hand. A woman near them dropped to the ground, wailing, pounding her hands fruitlessly against the dust. A young boy who looked much like Gábor’s brother darted, toward a gap between the Romanies and the Luminate, only to recoil hard against an invisible barrier.
At last a young woman was pushed forward into the square, her hair hanging wild around her face, free from the kerchief every Romani woman wore in public. It was not Gábor’s sister with the baby I had cursed—but I ached for her anyway. She held her baby against her breast and keened: a high, horrible sound as if her heart were being turned inside out.
Herr Steinberg took the baby from her with gentle hands. The tall Luminate woman put an arm around the girl and led her to the other Romanies. But their very gentleness made their actions the more abominable—they knew they were doing a terrible thing and wished to lessen the horror of it.
Herr Steinberg spread a bit of cloth on the ground before Uncle Pál and laid the baby upon it. The infant thrashed tiny limbs and wailed a high, thin note, nearly lost in the growing murmur around me. The crowd was uneasy, disliking this new turn when they had hoped for blood. An innocent provided poor sport.
I closed my eyes briefly, praying for courage, and then shoved my way through the crowd. I did not know precisely what Pál and Herr Steinberg planned, but a tight certainty in my gut told me they must be stopped. The two men looked up in surprise as I emerged in front of them. I waved my hand at the child and the bound Romanies. “Don’t do this! These people are no real threat to you. Let them go.”
Herr Steinberg readjusted his spectacles. His brows pinched together. “As distasteful as this may seem to you, civilized society must be governed by rules. And rules demand consequences. The Gypsies have been using magic reserved for the Luminate, a practice punishable by law.”
He nodded at Pál to continue. My eyes flickered from the baby, whose lips and fingers were already blue with cold, to the young mother who threw herself repeatedly against the Holding spell.
“Please stop.” I brought my icy hands together in supplication. Did Lady Berri know the Circle had planned this? Then I remembered—she was in hiding. Of course she couldn’t know. She was not like these men.
“Be silent, or I will silence you.” The look Pál cast me was chillingly indifferent. “The spell is begun.” He crouched beside the baby and touched its forehead with a finger. The baby stopped wailing. Pál pulled a small, wicked-looking knife from a pocket in his coat, and I cried out.