Chapter 40: THE RIVER'S TEETH

The great hall of Prague erupted into chaos—cups clattering, women shrieking, men shouting over one another as the Bohemian knight stood dripping in the doorway, his breath clouding in the cold air that rushed past him. Ottokar's voice cut through the din like a blade.

"Silence!"

The king descended from the dais, his golden mantle sweeping behind him, and seized the knight by the shoulder. Konrad watched from the shadows of a pillar, Margarethe's fingers still hooked in his sleeve.

"Speak plainly," Ottokar said. "What has the river done?"

The knight's lips trembled. "The Vltava has burst its banks below the Judith Bridge, my lord. The ice jam broke at dusk. The water is taking the mills and the wharves, and there are men in the water—"

"Men?"

"Fishermen. A barge bearing grain for the castle kitchens. They were caught in the surge. We heard them crying out, and then—" The knight crossed himself. "The ice took them under."

Ottokar released him and turned to face the assembled court. His face had shifted from stone to something more terrible—calculation, not grief. "The river takes what it takes. We will mourn the dead at Mass. But the bridge—is the bridge standing?"

"The arches hold, my lord, though the water laps at the piers."

Ottokar nodded slowly, and then his eyes found Konrad across the hall. The look was brief, but it was enough. Konrad understood: this was not tragedy to Ottokar. It was opportunity. The river had become a weapon, and the Bohemian king was already turning it in his mind.

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Konrad slipped away before the feast could resume its drunken rhythm. He moved through the castle's winding corridors, the stone cold beneath his boots, following the sound of water—not the river, but the trickle of melting snow through gutters, the drip of ice from eaves. He needed to see the river himself.

The winter garden lay abandoned, its door ajar. Through the gap, he saw the sky over Prague, bruised purple and grey, and beyond the walls, the flash of churning water where the Vltava ran swollen and furious. He stepped out into the cold, and the wind struck him like a slap.

A figure stood at the garden's edge, cloaked in dark wool, watching the river.

Konrad's hand went to his dagger before he recognized the posture—the tilt of the head, the way she held her arms folded against her chest as if bracing for a blow.

"Lady Eliska."

Eliska von Kuenring turned to face him. Her face was pale in the dying light, her eyes red-rimmed. "Sir Konrad. I wondered when you would come."

"You left the door open."

"I left it open three nights ago. You did not come." She turned back to the river. "I thought perhaps you were a man of action. I see I was wrong."

Konrad came to stand beside her, close enough to see the fine tremor in her hands. "The river has taken men tonight."

"The river takes what it takes," she said, echoing Ottokar's words with bitter precision. "That is what he will say. He will say it at Mass tomorrow, and the priests will nod, and the widows will weep, and Ottokar will take the grain barges and the timber and the iron that were meant for the city and use them for his war."

"What war?"

Eliska laughed—a short, hollow sound. "You are a clever man, Sir Konrad. Do not play the fool with me." She turned to face him fully, and in the grey light he saw the anger burning beneath her grief. "Ottokar means to march against your uncle before the spring thaw. He has been stockpiling arms and horses for months. The river has just given him an excuse to strip the city bare."

Konrad's blood went cold. "He cannot march in winter."

"He will march at the first break of the ice. He means to strike before Rudolf can gather the princes of the Empire. If he takes Vienna before Easter—" She shook her head. "Your uncle's crown will be worth less than the paper it was written on."

Konrad stared at the river. The water had risen visibly even in the time they had stood there, lapping at the garden wall below. The Judith Bridge's arches strained against the surge, groaning like a wounded beast.

"Why are you telling me this?"

Eliska was silent for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice was barely audible above the water's roar. "Because the river took my brother tonight."

Konrad turned sharply. "Your brother was on the barge?"

"Jindřich was the youngest of us. He was seventeen. He had no part in Ottokar's schemes, no love for the war, no hunger for land or gold. He only wanted to see the grain reach the castle so that the kitchens would not go short through the winter." She pressed her knuckles to her mouth. "And Ottokar will use his death as an excuse to take more. He will say the river has shown him that God favors the strong. He will say that the city must sacrifice for the war."

Konrad said nothing. There was nothing to say.

"You asked me once why I watched you," Eliska continued. "I watched you because you are the only man in this castle who looks at Ottokar and does not see a king. You see what he is. What he will become."

"And what is that?"

"A tyrant." She met his eyes. "And tyrants must be stopped before they grow too strong to bleed."

The wind gusted, carrying the roar of the river and the distant cries of men working the banks. Konrad reached into his tunic and touched the ring Hedwig had given him—the wolf's head, cold against his skin.

"What do you want of me?"

Eliska stepped closer, close enough that he could smell the woodsmoke on her cloak, the winter herbs in her hair. "Ottokar keeps his war council in the tower above the great hall. There is a chamber beneath it where the messengers deliver their dispatches. One of those messengers is mine."

"Your spy."

"My brother was my spy," she said, her voice cracking. "Now he is at the bottom of the river. So I am asking you to take his place."

Konrad studied her face—the grief, the fury, the desperation. She was dangerous, he knew. But she was also the only ally he had in this den of lions.

"The dispatches," he said slowly. "What would you have me do with them?"

"Read them. And then decide whether you are the serpent's fang—or its master."

She pressed something into his hand. A key, cold and heavy.

"The chamber is locked. The guard changes at midnight. You have until the bells of St. Vitus to do what must be done."

She turned and walked away, leaving him alone at the garden's edge, the river roaring in the darkness below, the key burning in his palm like a brand.

Konrad looked down at the key. Then he looked at the river—the churning, hungry water that had taken Eliska's brother and would take so much more before the winter was done.

The river takes what it takes.

But so, he thought, closing his fist around the key, does the serpent.