The Kingdom of Back(69)

“He runs after me,” Woferl said. He looked pensive now, and weary. “I cannot escape him. He lingers, now that I am alone.”

The cold prickled my skin. Hyacinth was here, in our home. What was he telling my brother?

“If you’re afraid,” I said to him, “you can come to me. I won’t tell anyone.”

He nodded once, but his expression looked pale and unsure. There was more to Woferl’s story, I could sense it—but he just kept writing, the light feverish in his eyes.

We wrote late into the night, until Woferl collapsed in exhaustion against the clavier stand. I helped clean his hands of ink stains, and then carried him to his room before retiring to my own. There, unable to sleep, hollow from the absence of my brother beside me, I lay awake and let my heart burn from what Hyacinth wanted with my brother.

Woferl was in danger. I could sense it now, the ice hanging in the air, waiting for him. Hyacinth was coming for him—somehow, someway. And I didn’t know how to protect him. I turned to my side and stared at where moonlight painted a silver square against the floor. Would he climb through my brother’s window in the night, while we slept? When would he do it? How?

The darkness in me, the someone else that I’d felt in my chest, stirred now. It painted for me a vision of Woferl whispering to Papa about where my compositions had been hidden. Have you already forgotten? the voice reminded me. Why do you protect him?

I tossed and turned, haunted by what the faery might do, until I finally heard my door creak quietly open to reveal Woferl stealing into my room. He hesitated by the door, not uttering a word.

How did he still look so small?

I stayed silent for a moment, unwilling to invite my brother inside. But then I pictured Woferl alone in his room, listening for Hyacinth to appear.

I waved him over. “Come here,” I said.

He crawled into my bed and snuggled beside me, just like he used to. His small body trembled. I brushed my fingers through his hair and let the voice in me slowly fade. There Woferl stayed, listening to my humming, until he finally drifted into a dreamless sleep.





THE RETURN TO VIENNA



We finished the archbishop’s oratorio in nine days, a day later than he requested. The time passed so quickly, I couldn’t remember the separation between one morning and the next. Everything blurred together into an endless string of feverish writing. We spoke little to each other, except to exchange ideas and notes about the composition. Every night, Woferl came to my room and huddled beside me in bed.

By the end of it, I could see the shadows clearly under my brother’s eyes. My own cheeks were pale, my eyes even darker against my white skin.

Papa looked at the oratorio once with a hurried eye, made several changes, and then delivered it to the archbishop so that he could receive his payment. The archbishop approved, pleased enough with the work to forgive our brief lateness.

A marvelous feat, he told my father.

He had not believed Woferl could do it at all. For a man as powerful as the archbishop, this was just a game to him. But my father did not complain, because soon after, he received a modest sum for our work and his salary was reinstated. We paid our rent.

Woferl had signed the oratorio with his name. I could not bear to watch while he did it. Instead I stared at my father, until Papa had to turn away from my searing gaze, grumbling over the extra time it took us to finish it.

“Perhaps next time he will give the children more than eight days,” Mama said at supper after Papa had told us about the archbishop’s payment. “How can a man toy with his subjects so?”

“Perhaps next time the children will write a piece worthy of more,” Papa replied.

“It was brilliant,” Woferl suddenly said to our father before I could utter something in our defense. The whole of his small body tensed, leaning forward like a stag protecting his herd, and a fierce light appeared in his eyes. “If the archbishop cannot appreciate it, he is wholly incompetent.”

Papa sucked in his breath at Woferl’s words, but I smiled for the first time that morning.



* * *





“You and Woferl did very well,” Mama said to me later that morning. We sat together in the music room for a moment’s reprieve, for the sun had decided to come out on this late winter’s day, and the room felt warm and lazy.

“I know,” I said to her before turning away to stare out the window. “But it is never enough, is it? We could work ourselves nearly to death, and Papa would still hand us the quill and ink.”

At that, Mama frowned. “Nannerl. Don’t speak about your father that way. He loves you, and he loves your brother. He fears for your health and your brother’s as much as his own. He just wants to ensure that our family—including you—is provided for.”

I looked back at her. “Yes,” I replied. “I know the lengths he’d go to in order to provide for us. So does Woferl.”

There was a brief silence. “You are still angry with your brother,” she said gently.

“No,” I replied. “What is the use of such anger?”

Mama sighed. “Woferl is like your father. They are stubborn men, and as the women in their lives, we must learn to voice our opinions without letting them realize it. It is the way of things.”

The way of things.