Chapter 72 Chapter 71

Helen and I gasped when we saw the icon held by Baba Yanka. After a while, Baba Yanka turned away and returned the icon to the two boys, who immediately covered it. The priest blessed the two old women, and Brother Ivan took them aside and gave them water to drink.I looked at her feet as she walked by, and the overworked bare feet looked undamaged, as did the other's. "The dragon," Helen whispered to me as we watched them. "Yes," I said, "we need to find out where they keep the icon and how old it is. Come on, the priest promised to show us the church."

"What about Ranov?" Helen didn't look around. "We can only hope he doesn't plan to follow us," I said. "I don't think he saw the icon." The priest was walking back to the church, and we followed him slowly to find that he had put the icon of Sveti Peko back on the foreground, and that the other icon had disappeared. I nodded to him in thanks, then pointed to the church and raised my eyebrows, "Can we visit?" "Visit?" He changed into his usual black coat and carefully led us into each shrine, pointing out 'ikoni', 'Hristos' and other things we didn't quite understand.

Finally, I asked him where the other icons were, and he pointed to the gaping black hole in an annexed chapel that I had noticed earlier.Apparently the icons have returned to the crypt where they were kept.He eagerly fetched the lamp and led us down. The stone steps were steep, and after a while we saw dimly that it was not an altar, but an exquisite brass reliquary, on which were two holy images in silver frames, the Virgin and—I Step forward - the dragon and the knight. "Sveti Peko," said the priest cheerfully, touching the coffin. I pointed to another icon. "Sveti Georgi," he said, referring to the knight.He pointed at the dragon. "Dracula."

"It could just be the dragon," Helen reminded me. I nodded, "How do we ask him how old he thinks this is?" "Star? Staro?" Helen looked for that word. The priest shook his head in agreement, "Mnogo star," he said solemnly. We stared at him, and I held up my hand, counting my fingers.three?Four?Fives?he laughed.is five.Five fingers - about five hundred years. "He thinks it's the fifteenth century," said Helen. "Before that, he doesn't know." He turned around with a smile, and we were going to follow him and his lamp up the steep steps again, and we were about to leave this place forever with utter despair, but at this moment, the heel of Helen's high-heeled moccasins was crushed by two stones under our feet Stuck, she gasped in exasperation—I knew she had only one pair of shoes with her—and I crouched down to help her.

We were almost out of sight of the priest, but the candles near the reliquary gave me enough light to see the profile of the last step.The steps were right at Helen's feet, and there was a carved pattern on them.It was a small dragon, with rough lines, but it must have been exactly like the dragon in my book, absolutely! "God," she said, "what kind of place is this?" "Sveti Georgi," I said slowly, "this must be Sveti Georgi." She stared at me in the dim light, "but this church was built in the eighteenth century," she protested, and then she brightened, "you think that—"

"Many churches have very old foundations," I murmur excitedly, "and now this church may be rebuilt decades or centuries later, bearing the names of the martyrs they remember." Helen turned around in horror, staring at the copper reliquary behind us, "Do you also feel—" "I don't know," I said slowly, "I don't think it's very likely that they confused one relic with another, but when do you think they've opened it recently?" "It seems It's not big enough," she seemed to stop talking. "Yes," I agreed, "but we have to try. At least I have to. Helen, I want you out of here."

She gave me a mocking look, as if she couldn't understand why I should even think of sending her away. "It is a grave sin to break into a church and desecrate a saint's tomb." "I know," I said, "but what if this isn't the tomb of a saint?" The place was cold and dark, smelling of yellow wax and earth, and there were two names neither of us dared to say, no matter how hard we tried.One of them is Rossi. "Right now? Ranov will be looking for us," Helen said. When we emerged from the church, Ranov was looking for us impatiently.Brother Ivan stood by.

"Are you resting well?" Helen asked politely. "It's time for us to go back to Bachkovo," Ranov's voice became simple and rough again. I think he felt disappointed that we didn't find anything here. "We're going to Sofia in the morning. I'm going to run errands there. I hope you're satisfied with your research work." "Probably," I said, "I'd like to see Baba Yanka again and thank her for her help." "Very good," Ranov said angrily, but he still led us back to the village. Brother Ivan followed us silently.

Baba Yanka was delighted to see us. "How could you not be burning?" Helen asked her. "Oh, it's the power of God," she said softly. "I can't remember what happened afterwards. My feet felt hot sometimes, but I never got burned. For me, this is the time of the year. Best day, but I don't remember much. I'll be as calm as a lake for months." She took an unbranded bottle from a cupboard and poured us a clear brown liquid.There were long grasses floating in the bottle, which Ranov explained were herbal, flavored.Brother Ivan declined, but Ranov accepted a glass.After taking a few sips, he began to ask Brother Ivan some things in a friendly tone that made him uncomfortable.

We sat and listened for a while, and I interrupted them to ask Ranov to ask Baba Yanka if I could use her bathroom. Baba Yanka smiled and pointed to the back door.Helen said she was coming with me and she was going to the bathroom too. The outhouse in Baba Yanka's backyard was more dilapidated than her hut, but it was big enough that we could sneak through the trees, the beehives, and the back door.We saw no one, but when we were on the road we walked, slipped into the bushes, and hurried up the hill.Fortunately, there was no one around the church, and the church was already submerged in heavy shadows.The fire pit under the tree was slightly reddened.

We're not going to go through the front door so we can be seen from the road.We hurried to the back door, where there was a low window with purple curtains on the inward side. "There leads to the sanctuary," said Helen. Inside, I found that Helen was right, we were behind the iconostasis screen. The room behind the iconostasis is occupied by a raised platform.It took me a while to find a box of matches on the shelf.The basement is the darkest place I have ever been to. I lit the extinguished candle with the candle I brought, and the candle light flickered. Helen gently removed the two holy images, and then removed the heavy covering. The reliquary was revealed. Here it comes, we look down, trembling. On the top cover is a beautiful bronze relief - a long-haired saint, with one hand raised to bless us, possibly a martyr, whose relic may be in the box.The top of the reliquary appears to have been nailed or bolted.I can't open it anyway. While looking for an opening, we knocked on the box.Something was moving inside, as if knocking on the inside of the box, and we were startled. The box was indeed too small for a child's body, or some odd thing, but it was heavy.For a moment, I thought with horror that maybe there was only Vlad's head in there after all, and I started to sweat. I was about to start to act when Helen called softly, "Paul, look!" Turning quickly, I saw that the marble on which the reliquary rested was dusty, but not solid.As we strained to remove the reliquary, the marble shifted slightly.I believe I stopped breathing, but neither of us said a word, and together we moved the marble slab. The stone slab is not thick, but it is very heavy.By the time we put the slab against the back wall, we were out of breath. Below is a long stone slab, the stone is the same as the floor and the wall, and the same length as the human body, the pattern on it is very rough, directly chiseled on the hard stone surface - that is not the face of a saint, but a face A real face--a brutal face, trying to look cheerful and confident despite its rough outlines. "Helen," I began softly, but said nothing else. I picked up the short sword, and Helene put a hand inside her dress—I never saw where—and took out a small pistol, which she placed within reach on the edge of the wall. Then we reached under the tombstone and lifted it up. Half of the beautifully carved stone cover was removed.We were trembling all over, and we could barely hold on to the stone. After the stone was removed, we looked down at the human body inside: closed eyes, sallow skin, unnaturally red lips, silent, shallow breathing. It's Professor Rossi!