Before Ever After (27 page)

“Very well.” Gestrin knelt in front of Viktor. He tilted his chin up and looked directly into Viktor’s eyes.

Viktor tore his gaze away. But he was too late. Gestrin had seen what he was trying to hide.

“Wait …” Gestrin gasped. “You
do
believe me. I see it in your eyes. Why? Tell me!”

“What I believe is that you are mad and that you are a murderer.” Viktor tightened his grip on his sword. “I cannot let you live.”

“But I did not kill them!” Gestrin said. “I simply asked them to stay.”

Viktor remembered Pavel’s words. He brushed them away.

Gestrin rose to his feet. “Tell me, Viktor, is that too much to ask? Even gods grow tired of being alone. They should have been honored just to stand in my presence. I gave them a choice, the same choice I gave Pavel.”

Viktor’s sword weighed heavier in his hand. “What choice?”

“To die.” Gestrin took a step forward. “Or to live as a god by my side. Forever.”

Viktor backed away.

“I can make gods of the tiniest of men,” Gestrin said, “just as I became the god that I am now.”

“You are not a god.” Viktor flicked his sword and cut Gestrin’s arm. “You bleed, just like any man.”

“Wounds are fleeting.” Gestrin ran his finger over the flesh wound. “I am not. I was born before a grove grew here, at a time when the river was mightier. I had a family here. A wife. A child growing in her belly. One night a man my wife had spurned carved my son out of her womb. He bound me and forced me to watch, knocking me out in the end not as a mercy but to stain me with their death. I cried for justice and instead I was accused of his crime.” He smeared the blood from his wound across his lips.

“The river was our judge, receiving the innocent and shunning the guilty. My people bound my hands and feet and cast me into it. I tried to be calm, but I was a boy and I thrashed and cried for mercy, for reason.
But they did not listen. I heard their jeers as I sank. The water rushed into my nose and mouth.” Gestrin took another step toward Viktor.

Viktor backed into a rotting wall.

“If my judges were fair, as was our custom, they would have pulled me out of the river once my innocence was proven by the ordeal,” Gestrin said. “But they were not. My absolution became my execution. The rope that tethered me to the bank broke and the superstitious fools took it to mean that the river did not wish me to leave. They left me to die.

“But the river was more merciful. It invited me to lay my head on its soft bed. But I could not accept its invitation. I thought of my wife and the shreds of my son. I thought about the man who had killed them both, the man whose crime I was drowning for. I could not die. I would not.” Gestrin stared at the blood on his hand. “What happened next is a blur to me now, because it has been many lifetimes since it happened, but I do remember this: There was pain, there was darkness, and then there was nothing at all. I rose from the river a day later, a god. Whatever battle was waged in the river, I won.”

Viktor swallowed hard.

“My people feared me and worshipped at my feet—as they should.” Gestrin sneered. “I had beaten death and now I was its rightful master. It was mine to give as I pleased. I gave it freely to those who laughed at my trial and slowly to the man who had killed my family.” He smiled. The blood on his lips shimmered in the firelight. “Was I not a generous and patient god?”

Viktor’s sword trembled in his hand.

“Time passed. A grove grew. The river dwindled,” Gestrin said. “But I remained. Everything changed except for me. I did not know this new world and its new god. I did not want to be a part of it. I stayed away. I was alone. Always alone.”

“You sought …” Viktor tried to form the word without gagging. “A companion.”

“Someone worthy to stand by my side and speak my name.”

“But you tried to drown them …”

Gestrin shook his head. “No. No. I tried to give them life! But … 
they were all afraid. They were all weak. They flailed about, too terrified of the water to fight for their right to live. They surrendered to death. The river judged them undeserving of my gift.”

“And so you gave them poison.”

“I thought that it would be less frightening than the river. I thought that if they were not afraid, if their minds were clear, perhaps like me they would triumph over death.”

“But it did not work.” Viktor clenched his teeth.

“Many died on the floor, writhing in terrible pain, unable to think, much less fight for their life,” Gestrin said. “I had to make the poison less painful and … slower. It needed to bind their body but not their mind.”

Viktor’s hand tightened around his sword. “That was the poison you gave Pavel.”

“I did not give it to him, Viktor,” Gestrin said. “He stole it from me.”

“What?”

“I told you, I let him go. He was like you. He wasn’t afraid of me. He did not believe in monsters. He asked me if I took his father. I told him that his father had met the same fate as the others who would not remain by my side.” Gestrin sighed. “I told Pavel the same story I have just told you and asked him if he wished to stay. I asked him if he wanted to live forever.”

“What … was his answer?”

“He said yes.”

“Liar!”

“Pavel said he never wanted to leave his mother. He told me how sad she was when his father died. He wanted to be immortal so that she would never have to be alone,” Gestrin said sadly. “It was then that I knew I could not keep him. He was too young to truly understand the gift that I could give him. He would have left me, like all the others. So I cut his binds and told him to return to his mother. That’s when he stole the poison from me, to keep himself forever at his mother’s side. I chased after him, but he swallowed the poison and jumped into the river.”

“No …”

“I swam after him. I was in the water when you found him. I saw you
take the choice from his hands before he had a chance to make it,” Gestrin said. “I wonder if he will ever forgive you for that.”

“I have heard enough,” Viktor said with a heaviness in his voice. “Kneel.”

“But … I thought you believed …” Gestrin implored. “I let him go.”

“It does not matter either way. You are still alone. Tomorrow you will try to find someone else to be with you. Nothing has changed. I cannot let you go.”

“Then stay.” Gestrin held up a small silver flask. It glowed in the firelight. “It will not hurt.”

Viktor closed his eyes. “Neither will this.” He felt his blade slide between Gestrin’s ribs. “I’m … sorry.”

Gestrin clutched the sword sticking out of his chest. His fingers bled on its blade. He took a step forward, burying the sword deeper inside him. He reached out and gripped Viktor in a tight embrace. His lips curled and blood gurgled through his yellowed teeth. “I will find you.”

Viktor looked down at the grave. The man who believed he was immortal did not move or breathe. His silver hair was caked in blood. Viktor filled the ditch quickly, covering Gestrin’s half-smiling lips with loose ground. He didn’t have to do it. He threw more soil over the grave. He didn’t believe Gestrin. The man was dead. He had killed him. Still, he had bound Gestrin’s hands and feet, twice, and he dug a hole deeper than death. Just in case.

A young boy skipped stones across the river. Laughing children ran past him as they chased one another on the bank. The boy smiled up at his uncle.

His uncle smiled back, his sword ready at his side.

T
he tent’s tarpaulin door flapped in the wind. The wet smell of the marshes drifted through and hovered over the group like the words of Max’s story. Shelley felt their weight in the air. She leaned her elbows on the table.

“How sad,” she said. “I don’t see why Viktor had to kill Gestrin. He was clearly insane, but couldn’t they have just locked him up?”

“I don’t think things worked that way back then,” Dex said.

Simon nodded. “What Viktor did was the kindest thing that could have been done to the man. Gestrin was a murderer and what the villagers would have done to him would have been a thousand times worse.”

“But still …” Shelley said.

“You pity him?” Max asked.

“I do,” she said. “I don’t think he was evil.”

“He was a dangerous man, Shelley,” Max said.

“I’m with you, Max,” Brad said. “ ‘I’ll drown you so that you can live forever.’ I mean how twisted is that? Nut job or not, he had to be stopped.”

“So you don’t think Gestrin was telling the truth?” Shelley asked.

“Why?” Dex asked. “Do you?”

“Wouldn’t it be interesting if he had been?” Shelley said.

“Now that’s a scary thought,” Simon said.

“Why?” she asked.

“Well, for starters, while I do sympathize with his story, it doesn’t change the fact that he was a homicidal maniac,” Simon said. “Can you imagine how depraved he might be by now if he were still alive and desperately searching for a companion?”

“But what if he found one?” Shelley asked. “Wouldn’t that change how the rest of his story would be written?”

“That still wouldn’t make him less creepy,” Dex said. “What if he decided he wanted to add more members to his little group? It would be like, ‘Hey, would you like to join our poker club? You would? Great! We usually play out by the pool. It’s really deep. We should go for a swim sometime.’ ”

Marija smiled and stood up from the table. “That was a very interesting story, Max.”

“Thank you for all your assistance, Marija,” Max said. “Please give my regards to the professor when you see him.”

Shelley and Max made their way to the van. The rest of the group walked ahead of them.

“Shelley, wait.” Marija strode up to her. “I almost forgot to give you this.”

“What is it?” Shelley asked.

“A gift.” Marija handed her a small silver vial.

The muscles in Max’s neck tightened. “Where did you get this? Did you find it in the river?”

“No. It’s from a colleague of mine. He said he was an old friend of yours. He told me he met Shelley last night.” Marija winked at her. “I think he may have a little crush on you.”

“Mihael …” Shelley examined the vial.

Max grabbed the vial from Shelley and twisted its cap off. He poured it out. A dark liquid seeped into the mud. He handed the vial back to Marija.

Marjia knitted her brow. “What are you doing?”

“Making a donation to the museum,” Max said. “If you examine it, I believe you will find that it has some historical value.” He took Shelley’s hand and led her to the van. He turned around. “Oh, and please tell Mihael that if he insists on giving away such extravagant souvenirs, I shall have to look for him and thank him. Personally.”

W
hoa. Are you telling me that Gestrin … Mihael was immortal, too?” Paolo said. “And that he tried to poison you?”

“Frankly, I don’t know what to think anymore.” Shelley rubbed at her temples. “I may, however, be able to form a semblance of an opinion by raising my blood alcohol level up a few notches. What do you say? Do you think you inherited enough of Max’s charm to find us a few glasses of clarity on the rocks?”

“I guess we’ll find out,” Paolo said.

He flashed a grin so familiar to Shelley, it made her heart leap and break at the same time.

“Max, I mean, Paolo,” Shelley said, “scotch, if you can manage it, okay?”

“Sure.”

Shelley watched the man with her husband’s smile disappear behind the curtains of the airplane’s pantry. She wondered if she would ever see Max’s own wide grin again. If she did, it most certainly wouldn’t be when she showed up on his doorstep. Max had been less than thrilled when Gestrin had intruded into his “new” life. She imagined that she would be met with the same reception when she stumbled into his latest one.

Shelley remembered the first time she had made love with Max, the hours her body exorcised his demons on the night he had seen Gestrin. Was she now also a ghost to Max? Would he run from her as he had from
Gestrin and into the comfort of another woman’s arms—and legs … And where the hell was that drink?