The Countess and I had this much in common at least. In Vienna, I had grown accustomed to rising late; without the pressure of chores and other duties to perform around the inn, the luxury of lying abed when I could had been too sweet to resist.
We sat in silence with our coffees for a while, me sipping gingerly, the Count gulping his down. I wasn’t much for breakfast either, but felt I had to eat for courtesy’s sake. I set my cup down and walked to the sideboard to fill a plate with a few small, cookie-sized pastries topped with a sweet poppy seed paste. The room in which we sat was one of the few better-maintained parts of the house, the furniture sturdy if shabby, the rug of high quality if threadbare. Two sets of windowed doors framed the fireplace, opening onto a terrace that overlooked wildly overgrown lands. Like the dining room, a painting or a mirror was hung above the sideboard, and as with the rest of the framed objects in the house, it was covered with a sheet.
“If you don’t mind me asking,” I said, pointing to the framed object, “may I ask what it is you keep covered under there?”
The Count coughed, choking a bit on his coffee. “Now, now,” he said, face reddening. “Mustn’t touch.”
Another voice from another time returned to me, whispering the same words. No, no, mustn’t touch. I thought of the mirror in my chamber Underground, my enchanted window to the world above.
After a few more minutes of coughing and clearing his throat, the Count continued. “It’s not a painting or a portrait, my dear,” he said. “It’s a mirror.”
I was surprised. “A mirror?”
“You may consider it a silly old superstition,” he said sheepishly, “but around these parts, it is ill luck to keep mirrors uncovered in empty rooms and while the house is sleeping.”
“Why?”
He gave a nervous laugh. “Oh, it’s an old wives’ tale, but they say that if the mirrors aren’t covered, a dreamer’s soul may accidentally wander through them to the shadow world and become trapped.” The Count gave the one hanging above the mantel a sidelong glance. “One never knows where one’s soul might end up. The realm behind the reflection may or may not be true, and they say the fey and the spirits of the restless dead travel through the shadow-world paths created by mirrors.”
I shivered, thinking of how I had spied upon my brother and sister through the enchanted mirror in my chamber Underground. Suddenly, I understood the why of it. One never knew just who was staring back as you gazed into your reflection.
“Are you frightening our guests, Otto?” The Countess emerged from the hall, limping into the room on Konrad’s arm. “Don’t believe everything he tells you,” she said. “Otto does love a good story.”
He gave his wife a tender smile. “Especially ones with happy endings.”
The Countess rolled her eyes. “My husband is a sentimental fool, I’m afraid,” she said, but she could not keep the smile from her voice. “I myself prefer the old tales. Wouldn’t you agree, mademoiselle?” Konrad helped the Countess to her seat while her husband rose to his feet and made his wife a cup of coffee.
“I would prefer it if we dispensed with the storytelling and went straight to truth seeking, if you don’t mind,” I said tartly. “What are we doing here? Why? How?”
She sighed and set down her cup after a sip. “I had hoped to get settled in before all that.”
“Get you acquainted with Snovin,” the Count added. “You are our guest, so please make yourself comfortable and at home here.”
I lifted my brows. “And how long will my stay be?”
“Until the danger to you is passed,” the Countess said. “And in order to make sure you’re safe, we need your help, Elisabeth. You are far more precious to us than you know.”
“Precious?” I laughed incredulously. “To you? Why?”
“Because of what you are,” she said seriously. “And what I am.”
“What I am,” I repeated. “The Goblin Queen.”
The Countess nodded. “There is kinship between us.”
“Kinship?” I was surprised. “Who are you?”
She glanced at the Count, who met her gaze briefly, then returned his eyes back to his plate. “I presume you do not mean to ask about the illustrious house of Procházka und zu Snovin, of which my husband is the nineteenth count and I, his wife.”
I crossed my arms. The Countess sighed again.
“We are—I am,” she began, “the last of a line no less old or illustrious than my husband’s, if not quite so noble. The Procházkas have ever kept watch over the in-between places and thresholds of the world, but my family have been the keeper of its secrets. We keep the old laws and we safeguard them, maintaining the balance between our world and the Underground.”
I frowned. “How?”
“I told you that those of us touched by Der Erlk?nig can reach across the barrier.” She held her hands apart. “We can find the windows and”—she clapped her hands shut—“close them. You can do this, Elisabeth,” she said, nodding toward me. “As can I.”
“You?” She nodded again. I narrowed my eyes. “What are you?”
The Countess and her husband exchanged another glance. This time, he held her gaze and gave her the slightest of nods. She turned back to me, those eyes of hers large, luminous, and an impossibly bright green. “I am of his blood,” she said in a low voice. “My foremother was the first of his brides. A brave maiden, who gave her life for the world, then doomed that very same world to bring Der Erlk?nig back from death.”
a voice from the deep places of the world called his name and Josef awoke. The sun was streaming in through windows and past curtains he had forgotten to close the night before, long past morning but not yet noon. For a moment, he thought he was back home at the inn, for the air held the faint, crisp freshness of pine and dirt and snow.
And then he remembered.
The weight of his argument with Liesl pressed heavily on his chest, pushing him back into his bed linens, a suffocating pressure that made it hard to breathe and to get out of bed.
During their entire flight from Vienna, Josef had sensed his sister’s unease, her anxiety, her manic restlessness at the uncertainty of their futures. He had sensed it, and tried to care. But he didn’t. Couldn’t. He knew that he ought to be worried, he ought to have been frightened, for the revelations the Procházkas had bestowed upon them were alarming and unbelievable. Yet at the same time, the effort it took him to muster anything beyond vague concern was exhausting, and Josef had been tired for a long, long time.
He contemplated staying in bed all day. There were no places to go, no people to see, no auditions to prepare for. There were, he realized, no expectations set upon him. He waited for happiness, for excitement, or even relief, but there was nothing but the same dull indifference that had plagued him since he left Bavaria. Since he left home.