The Girl from the Mountains by Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger

Author:Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger [Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bookouture

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The sound of a baby’s cry brought tears of relief. Magda left Aleš and paní Eva behind as she ran the last few feet to the mountain hut. Renata waited outside with an infant in her arms. Magda scooped up the bundle from her, tears streaming down her face as she kissed Samuel’s cheek. She remembered how much he had weighed in her arms the last time she’d held him, the day Koenig and Walter had come. Now he was bigger, with chubby cheeks and Frau Tauber’s blue eyes.

Renata crossed her arms. “Are you pleased with yourself then?”

Magda took Samuel’s right hand in hers and shoved the cuff of his sleeve up with her thumb. There it was, the brown birthmark on his wrist. She looked up from the baby, and Samuel began to fuss. It had been too long. He no longer knew who she was.

“It was a terrible risk,” Renata continued. “Terrible, Magda.”

Magda could say nothing to this. She had never been so tired in her life.

When Aleš and Paní Eva caught up, Magda followed them inside. It was a simple woodsman’s hut, a single room with few furnishings: one bed, a table with two long benches on either side, a small cast-iron stove. They sat. Renata pushed a plate of bread and a glass of water towards Magda.

“How did you manage to get to Samuel in time?” Magda dipped a piece of bread into the water and held it to the child’s mouth. He tasted it and sucked it, his beautiful eyes straining to focus on her.

Renata said, “Davide drove. Father Gabriel did the talking. The Nazis were right behind us. I don’t think it was more than a minute after we drove away that we saw the first Wehrmacht headlights pulling into the convent behind us. We left through the service road with the lights off.”

She made it sound so easy, but Magda knew better. She kissed the top of Samuel’s head, fed him another piece of bread. “Then I got to you just in time.”

“When you said you needed the opium, Magda, I thought it was for getting yourself and Jana out. If you had told me what you were planning…” Renata shook her head.

Magda shriveled beneath her glare. “I wasn’t even certain myself. I had no plan.”

“No plan? You’re incredible, you know that?”

“Yes,” Aleš interjected. “And now we need to decide what we’re going to do with Magda’s newfound courage.”

Renata and he took turns reprimanding her and Eva. The three of them—Magda, Eva, and Samuel—were in grave danger. Samuel because of Koenig’s orders to eradicate every Jew and the people who were hiding them, and Eva and Magda for their rash crime. But getting them out of the district altogether—especially Magda with her recognizable features—was not without great risks. They needed travel permits, and with Koenig’s manhunt, it would be extra challenging.

Magda listened with half an ear, distancing herself by keeping Samuel busy. Outside, birds sang in the surrounding woods, and the trickle of a nearby creek came through the door.

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