"Let him go,” I told Hendrik. "He has nothing to do with this. This is between you and me."
"I’ll let him go,” Hendrik answered pleasantly, "if you do exactly as I say."
"Don’t do it, Adam," Vilmos called.
"Shut him up, Jan!” Hendrik said, and Jan pressed the tip of his shiv into Vilmos’s throat, drawing a thin trickle of blood.
"What do you want?” I asked Hendrik.
"A little payback. No more than you deserve. You humiliated me, and I can’t have that, so I’m gonna mark you. With this.” He brandished the shiv. “You're going to come over here and drop to your knees when I tell you to. Then I'm going to mark your face, so everyone will know what happens to someone who wrongs me. If you try anything, Jan will kill your friend, and I will kill you. If you behave, you’ll walk away with nothing but a few scars for a souvenir.”
He was lying. He wasn't going to let me live. The reason he’d set things up this way instead of ambushing me or attacking me at night was that he was scared of me. Twice he and I had come to blows, and twice I had bested him: the first time the night I had defended Cyuri; the second when I grabbed Hendrik by the throat and humiliated him in the block.
When he saw how weak Vilmos was, he realized he didn't need to attack me directly. He could go after Vilmos and use him to force my surrender.
If he let me live, I would seek vengeance. He couldn’t risk that. He wouldn't dare let me live. He was going to kill me, and Vilmos, too, probably.
I swore inwardly. I should have seen this coming. I should never have left Vilmos alone. Now, I was going to have to save both our lives. Somehow.
"All right,” I said. “But you have to promise to let Vilmos go.”
Hendrik grinned. “Oh, I promise. You behave and we won't lay another finger on him.”
"Don’t, Adam—" Vilmos began, but I raised a hand to shush him.
"It’s the only way, Vilmos. It’ll be all right. Stay hopeful." I put a little emphasis on the word hopeful and gave Vilmos a meaningful look. He couldn’t move his head to indicate that he’d understood me, but he blinked a long blink, which I took to mean that he had.
I took a step toward Hendrik. My pulse was beating frantically, and I could feel the blood rushing through my veins.
Another step.
Sweat was dripping down my back. Every sense was heightened. My fingers tingled with anticipation of what would soon happen.
A third step.
Against my belly, I felt the reassuring presence of Ludwig’s knife. My secret weapon. I could whip up my shirt and have it ready to slash in less than a second. I hoped I would be fast enough. Hope was all I had right now.
Another step.
Just two meters away from Hendrik. A couple of seconds to go. I rehearsed the movements in my head. Left hand grabbing the hem of my shirt and yanking it up. The right already moving toward the knife. My thumb pressing the button to release the blade. And then the slashing motion at Hendrik’s throat.
"Stop right there!" Hendrik’s voice cut through my mental preparation.
His head was notched to the left, and he was squinting at me. Dammit. He sensed something was amiss.
"Lift up your shirt," he said, and what little hope I’d been feeling shattered to bits.
There was no point in playing dumb. I obeyed.
"My, my," Hendrik chuckled. "Were you meaning to surprise me?”
I said nothing. An icy feeling of despair swamped my chest, making it difficult to breathe. It wasn't fair. I had escaped death by solving Franz’s murder, and now, just a day later, I was about to die. I had been foolish to hope.
I glanced apologetically at Vilmos. The blood from the cut on his throat had dripped to his shirt, painting a stitch of red down his collar.
"Very slowly, take out the knife and toss it to me," Hendrik said.
I did. He bent down and picked it up. He pressed the button that sprang the blade loose and grinned. “This will do even better. Now come on. Just a little closer.”
I let my shirt drop and rubbed both hands along the sides of my trousers. A couple of steps, and Hendrik commanded me to drop to my knees. I did, raising my hands, semi-closed, on either side of my head in a gesture of surrender.
Hendrik raised the knife. "This is gonna hurt quite badly." He sounded eager, ravenous, barbaric. He was aching to cut me open, to spill my blood and end my life. He moved around me, standing at my back. My entire body was rigid. My lungs strained to pull in air. My heart beat like cannon fire in my ears. Hendrik grabbed the back of my neck hard, immobilizing my head. Ahead of me, I saw Jan had loosened his hold on Vilmos, the tip of his shiv no longer pressed to Vilmos’s neck. There was a gap between Jan’s lips, and he looked entranced by what Hendrik was about to do.
As Hendrik’s hand rounded my neck, bringing the knife toward my throat, I gave Vilmos a wink. And simultaneously I grabbed Hendrik’s wrist with my left hand, and with my right jabbed the sewing needle I had liberated from the seam of my trousers into the soft part between his thumb and forefinger.
Hendrik yelled and tried to tear his arm away, but I held on tight, pushing the needle deeper into his flesh. At the same time, Vilmos drove the back of his head straight into Jan’s groin. Then he turned, pushing Jan away.
Hendrik screamed, smacking me on the back of my head again and again. Stars exploded all over my vision, but I maintained my hold on his arm, pushing the needle in all the way, so its tip broke the skin on his palm.
The knife dropped from his hand. I let go of him, seized the knife, and jumped to my feet, whirling around.
Blood was pouring down Hendrik’s hand. He gazed at it in shock. Then he saw me, and with his uninjured hand reached for the shiv he had stuck in his waistband. Before he could get it out, I pounced. The first swing gouged a deep line across his brow. The second sliced one cheek apart. His hands flailed blindly to stop me. He couldn’t see for the blood spilling into his eyes. His nails scratched my cheek, my nose, my chin. Half my face erupted in pain. I jabbed the knife once, twice, a third time—each thrust cutting his swirling arms, spattering my face with blood. Then, with a cry, I plunged the knife between his hands, finding his throat. The force of the thrust pushed him backward, ripping the knife from my grip. The blade jutted from his flesh. Hendrik dropped to the ground. For a second, his limbs twitched and jerked, not unlike the way Gyuri’s limbs had done the night he cried in our block. Then, with a gurgling inhalation, Hendrik let out a groan and was still.
I retrieved the knife and turned in time to see Jan and Vilmos fighting. Jan was on top of Vilmos, who was struggling to keep Jan from stabbing him with his shiv.
I watched Jan punch Vilmos in the face, then ram the shiv into Vilmos’s side.
"No!” The yell came from the deepest place within me, searing my vocal cords.
I sprinted forward, the knife dripping a trail of Hendrik’s blood.
Jan raised his shiv over his head for a second stab. I was too far away to stop him.
Then came a blur of motion from the side, and Jan was thrown off balance. It was Marco, the one who had declined to come to Hendrik’s aid the night I had humiliated him. He had pushed Jan off of Vilmos.
With a snarl, Jan leaped at Marco, driving him to the ground, spitting and cursing. He raised the shiv, but I was already there. I stuck the knife between Jan’s shoulder blades all the way to the hilt, then pulled downward as hard as I could, ripping a deep gash. Jan howled, twisting. I heard a snap as the blade broke free from the handle. Then Jan was on the ground, twitching. He did not twitch for long.