Oana made a humming noise. “Not your only ally. You have other family besides your father.”
“Mircea is dead, too. And none of the boyars are more closely related to the Dracul line than to the Danesti or Basarab.”
“Not that side. Your mother. Last I heard, she was alive in Moldavia. And she is still royalty there.”
Lada turned her head to the side and spat. “She is nothing to me.”
“Be that as it may, you might not be nothing to her. Blood calls to blood. You could yet find your path to the throne through the support of her family. If nothing else, it is a place to rest and regroup. You need some rest.”
Groaning, Lada rubbed her forehead. “I do not want to see her.” There was a reason appealing to her Moldavian relatives had never crossed her mind. Her mother had ceased existing for her years ago. The idea of welcoming that woman back into her life, even if it got her the throne …
Oana leaned closer. “It cannot cost you more than whatever happened with the sultan.”
“God’s wounds, woman, very well.” Lada ignored Oana’s pleased smile as she turned her horse around. “New plan,” she said when she rejoined her men.
“New plan?” Petru asked.
“Where are we off to now?” Nicolae asked.
“Moldavia.”
“Moldavia?” Petru said.
“Is there an echo here?” Lada glared at Petru.
Though he ducked his head and blushed, excitement animated his voice. “Are we burning Moldavian cities? Like we did in Transylvania?”
Lada had not forgotten Matei and the waste of his death, traitor or not. She would not lose men to petty vengeance again. Only to vengeance worth taking. She shook her head.
“What, then?” Nicolae asked.
“We go to appeal to my blood. We go to see my—” She paused, feeling the edges of the next word sticking in her throat, threatening to choke her. “My mother.”
“She is so beautiful,” Petru whispered, peering through the hedge they hid behind. “You look nothing like her.”
Nicolae cringed. “And that, Petru, is why your line will die with you.”
Lada did not—could not—answer as her mother rode elegantly toward them down the dirt path of her country manor.
The only clear memory Lada had of the woman was one of lank hair hanging over her face, sharp shoulder blades, bowed back. Crawling. Weeping. She had expected to come here and find the same broken creature. She had not been able to picture her mother standing, much less riding.
This woman was small and fine-boned like a bird. Her hair, pinned elaborately beneath her hat, shone black with hints of silver threaded through. Her back was straight, her chin lifted, a veil of lace over her face.
Lada had been apprehensive about trying to leverage her connection to her mother to get help from the Moldavian king, her grandfather. But it had been easier to think of her mother that way, as a stepping-stone. Someone to climb over.
Here her mother was not on the ground. She was higher than Lada.
“We should leave,” she said. “This was a bad idea.”
“We should at least talk to her,” Nicolae said.
“I do not even know if that is her. I have not seen her since I was three. Perhaps we were misdirected. My mother might be dead.”
Bogdan pushed Petru aside, taking over his vantage point. “That is her.”
“How do you know?”
He shrugged. “I was older than you when she left.”
“By a year!”
He blinked at Lada, expression intractable. “I remember everything about our childhood.” He said the word our with uncharacteristic tenderness. It made Lada feel unsettled, even more than she already was.
Lada crossed her arms over her chest. “Well, what are we supposed to do? Jump out of the hedge and scream, ‘Hello, Mother!’”
Nicolae shook his head. “Of course not. She is not our mother. Only yours.”
“She is barely even that. She will not recognize me.” Lada would have to prove her identity to the woman who had fled when she was a child. She had no way of doing that.
“We could bring my mother,” Bogdan said. “She was your mother’s companion for many years.”
They had left Oana at camp with the rest of the men, hidden along the mountain pass where they had crept into Moldavia. The whole journey Lada had longed to turn around, to flee, to go back home. But she could not. She needed help.
She hated needing.
“Fine.” Lada stood and pushed through the hedge. She struggled out from it right as her mother’s horse passed.
“God’s wounds!” Vasilissa shouted, using Lada’s father’s favorite curse. “Where did you—” She stopped, her fingers going to her mouth, pressing at the veil.
“You should travel with guards.” Lada wore her anger as armor against this woman. “We could have been anyone.”
Vasilissa moved her trembling hand to her heart.
“We are not going to rob you.” Lada sighed. “We are here to speak with you.”
“Ladislav,” Vasilissa whispered. “My little girl.”
Lada had been prepared to be humiliated by introducing herself. She had not thought about what she would do if her mother knew her. She stepped back as though struck, her vision narrowing to a tunnel. Every muscle tensed, waiting for attack.
Vasilissa leaned down as far as she could from her horse. Her voice was barely discernable over the rush of blood in Lada’s ears.
“Ladislav.” She reached one tiny, gloved hand toward Lada’s hair. Then she cleared her throat, looking Lada up and down in a way that made her feel naked. “Come. We will get you a bath and some new clothes.” Her mother turned the horse back toward the manor and set off at a brisk pace.
“I have men with me!” Lada shouted, finally regaining her voice.
“No,” Vasilissa said, not turning around. “Only you. No men.”
At a loss, Lada gestured to Petru, Nicolae, and Bogdan, who watched her from the cover of the hedge. “Just … stay, for now. I will come back for you.”
“Are you certain you will come to no harm?” Bogdan asked, narrowed eyes tracking Vasilissa’s hasty exit.
Lada was certain of the opposite. But she did not expect the type of harm Bogdan feared. “Wait here.”
When she got to the manor, the front door was closed. Barren ivy climbed over every surface, its tangled brown masses swallowing the angles and shape of the house. In the summer it would be green and lovely, but not now.
The least her mother could have done was wait for her. Lada laughed bitterly. No, her mother was skilled at doing far less than the least she could do for her daughter. Of course she would make Lada knock. Lada pounded her gloved fist against the door. It opened with such speed, the maid behind it must have been waiting there.
The girl curtsied awkwardly. She wore a shapeless brown dress and an ill-fitting black cap. “Welcome, mistress. My lady has prepared a room for you.”
Lada frowned. Who else was her mother expecting? “I only met her just now on the road.”
The girl cleared her throat, keeping her eyes on the floor. “My lady has prepared a room for you. Please come with me.”
“Where is my moth—where is Vasilissa?”
“If you will come with me, I will show you your room and draw a bath for you. Her ladyship receives visitors after supper.”
“But she already knows I am here. And I have my men waiting outside.”
The maid finally looked up. Her eyes pointed in slightly different directions, one drifting to the left. She whispered, “Please, mistress, do not speak of the men to her. We do as she wishes. It is for the best. Allow me to take you to your room, and she will see you after supper.”
Exasperated, Lada flung a hand out. “Fine. Take me to my room.”
The girl flashed a quick, grateful smile, and led Lada into the house. The deeper they got, the more Lada’s stomach clenched in fear.
There was something very wrong here.
25
Early April
CHRIST STARED MOURNFULLY down at Radu. No matter how Radu shifted or where he looked, the round eyes of Jesus followed him.