Grinning, I put the phone away as my smoked eel arrived.
While I ate, I stared over the ledge, people watching those down on the street, and caught sight of a man in a black suit with a black shirt. On its face, that wasn’t too weird, except it was a hot summer day and he looked like an annoyingly familiar Renfield. He stood across the street, in the shade of an awning, sneering up at the patio where I sat. Why the hell were they following me? If he thought he was going to intimidate me or make me lose my appetite, he was going to be sorely disappointed.
After another amazing meal, I paid and left, resigned to dealing with the creep across the street, but he wasn’t there. I scanned the street in all directions but didn’t see him. Great. Was he going to ruin my afternoon of sightseeing by skulking around?
Whatever. I began to wander, touring parliament and nearby parks. Budapest was known for their thermal baths. The city sits on a geographical fault line. Buda Hills crash up against the Great Plain, causing more than one hundred thermal springs to erupt. Consequently, there are huge palaces of mineral baths all around the city, overflowing with people relaxing in the hot water.
As that really wasn’t my thing, I kept walking, enjoying the ease with which I could now move without the cast. Budapest was an amazing combination of awe-inspiring architectural masterpieces and plain, squat structures, depending on whether the building was designed while Habsburgs ruled or the Soviet Union.
Around the time I was wandering the Great Indoor Market Hall, tasting samples from a local butcher, I scented a wolf. Even over the chaotic scents of produce, meats, and spices, the wolf scent hit me hard and put me on edge. The hall was enormous and filled with people, so I couldn’t pinpoint the wolf at first. As no one had jumped me, I continued as though I hadn’t realized I’d gained another stalker.
After purchasing a substantial number of meat sticks from the nice butcher—don’t judge me!—I headed for the door and caught the scent of a wolf again. A woman in jeans and a tank top stood at a stall of peppers and spices, which was smart. It almost hid her scent. There weren’t many female werewolves in the world. As this one was following me, it only made sense that she was the one who spoke English on the phone last night.
I stepped up beside her and said, “Viktoria?” She had short reddish-brown hair and blue eyes that looked quite annoyed.
“I told him it was pointless to follow you,” she said, “but we had to try.”
“Understandable,” I said, opening my bag. “Do you want a meat stick?”
Sighing, she looked in the bag, pulled one out, and said, “Where are we going now?”
Nine
The Fisherman and the Mermaid
Viktoria turned out to be an excellent tour guide. “In 1896, Hungary had a celebration of our one thousandth anniversary,” she said, leading me around town. “At that time, Hungary was under Habsburg rule. The buildings and monuments were constructed to incorporate the number ninety-six. The opera house across the road has a grand stairway with ninety-six steps. Domes were built ninety-six meters high.”
“Have you lived in Budapest all your life?” I asked.
Viktoria shook her head.
I guessed we weren’t sharing private information about ourselves, which was fair. I wasn’t sure why I liked her. Perhaps it was only because I’d never been able to chat alone with another female wolf before.
We walked in companionable silence for a few blocks, though my stomach began to twist. Was it the eel at lunch? The meat sticks? It felt like the blood had drained from my head and I was about to pass out.
We stopped in front of a huge Moorish building. “This is the Great Synagogue,” Viktoria said. “And that over there is the Tree of Life memorial. It’s dedicated to the half a million Hungarian Jews who were killed in the Holocaust. They chose that spot because it sits on top of a mass grave.”
“Oh my God,” I murmured. No wonder I was getting light-headed, a necromancer at a mass grave. I did my best to breathe through the worst of it as my stomach cramped harder.
The tree was a weeping willow made of a silvery metal. She waved me forward, clearly impatient with the way I hung back. “Each of the metal leaves on the tree bears the name of a Jewish Hungarian killed by the Nazis. Come. Take a pebble, say a prayer, and add it to all the others in the base.”
I did, coiling my magic around the pebble, wishing that those who had had their lives stolen from them found peace on the other side, away from the hatred and bigotry, the sadism and indifference.
“The tree symbolizes the mourning of this nation,” she said.
Nodding, I considered taking a photo for Clive, as I had at the other spots we’d stopped, but I couldn’t. Some things were too important, too profoundly moving to take pictures of.
We wandered back the way we’d come, both lost in our own thoughts.
“Can I ask you something?” I finally said.
She shrugged one shoulder. “You can ask.”
“You don’t actually believe I need to be watched, do you? That I’m going to do something to hurt the people of this town?” I kept my eyes on her, but she was looking out over the Danube.
“Do you see that?” she asked.
I followed her gaze. “The island in the river?”
