Chapter 1: Old Rain in Baden

Rain ran down the slick cobblestones of old Baden, swirling into the cast-iron gutters with a dull, gurgling roar. The autumn of 1927 had arrived with a vicious, early punch, the wind packed with the taste of coal smoke that clamped down on your throat. I stood on the other side of the National Archives' massive oak doors, my fingertips closing around the cold brass handle.

Seven years earlier, I’d left Baden over that unsolved disappearance, trailing mud and blood that had never quite dried. Today, I was back in a sharply tailored charcoal wool coat, not a speck of dust on the hem. The pipes inside hissed softly, like some dying old beast growling in the dark.

The air here was stale and dry, a jumble of insect repellent and old pulp paper, the distinct smell of time compressed into a room. I took a deep breath, and the knot of frustration I’d been living with for eight years finally, slightly, loosened in my chest.

I was here for the 1919 artifacts inventory ledger that had been quietly removed from the books. It held the final, dark secrets of the empire’s collapse, and it held the proof that my father had been killed for being in the wrong place.

The main hall was empty, save for one old archivist in round-rimmed glasses, dozing in his chair. He looked up, recognized me, and a flash of wariness crossed his face before he dipped his head back down to the pages of a battered, dog-eared copy of the Archives Retrieval Manual.

“Ms. Unterberger,” his voice was rough, like sandpaper dragged across a desk. “You’re not on the list. Today’s access is reserved for the foundation’s people.”

I straightened my gloves and didn’t argue. Instead, I pulled a neatly folded note from my bag; it bore the seal of the Austrian Debate Association.

“I’m here on behalf of the association, helping to organize the post-war documentation,” I said, keeping my voice level. “If that’s too much trouble, you can call Mr. Stefan Pichler. He signed off on it yesterday.”

When he heard the name, I saw the old man’s shoulders visibly flinch. He hesitated for a moment, then dragged a spare key from his drawer and tossed it into my palm. The motion was as stiff as throwing a red-hot coal at someone.

I headed toward the section where iron cabinets held pre-1919 records. The light down there was dim, and the bare bulb overhead hummed with a low electrical buzz that made my eyes swim. I worked through the drawers by memory, section by section. The wooden tracks were rusted, each pull making a screeching, abrasive screech.

My fingers skimmed across rows of manila folders, all rough, fibrous paper. Then my hand stopped in front of a drawer labeled 1919-Baden-Lost. It should have been empty. According to the telegram Stefan had sent last week, he claimed that entire cabinet had been damaged during the 1923 flood renovations of the archives room and had been destroyed long ago.

But there, sitting under my nose, was an iron box sealed with a layer of grey cloth. It was covered in rust, with a small brass lock still hanging on it. A tiny key was already in the lock. The key’s teeth looked fresh, but the lock itself was worn. I pulled the key out, and the click of the lock turning was deafening in the silent room. It opened.

Inside there were no files. Just one thick register book, its gold-stamped title on the cover faded to illegibility. I opened the first page. The paper was brittle and yellow, the edges curled. The last recorded date was November 4, 1919. A corner of that page had been torn out, the edges clean and deliberate, like it had been cut with scissors.

“You’re quick, Anna.”

The voice came from the shadows, smooth and elegant, with a kind of composure that made my skin crawl. I snapped the register shut and turned around. Karl Wagner was standing in the corner between two bookshelves, holding a black notebook, a pencil tucked between his fingers. He was wearing a perfectly cut dark blue suit, the cufflinks catching the dim light.

“I assumed you would have gone to see Stefan first,” he said slowly. “He’s not in a good mood today. The office is locked tight. His butler says he is seeing no one.”

I studied his eyes. There was no smile in them, only the cold, appraising calm of a man assessing a commodity.

“What are you doing here, Karl?” I asked. “This is an archive, not one of your auctions.”

Karl took a few steps closer. His shoes made almost no sound on the floor.

“I’m here to stop someone from misreading history,” he said, patting my shoulder. The gesture looked affectionate but was actually a condescending, silencing touch. “That register is important, but it’s also dangerous. Many records from 1919 were deliberately altered. If you just start pulling threads, you’ll hit a dead end and waste your time.”

He looked down at the iron box in my hands, his brow furrowing. “Also, the key’s teeth are fresh, but the lock’s interior is worn. That means someone opened this lock at least ten times in the last three days.”

A chill spiked down my spine. My fingers tightened on the edge of the box. Ten times? Stefan had claimed the files were destroyed, which was a blatant lie. I lifted my chin, my eyes hardening. “Who? Adelaide Kirschner?”

Karl smiled, and the expression was glacial on his face. “Adelaide is a coward. She trembles just reading an old newspaper.” He paused, tore a page out of his notebook, and handed it to me. “But I can tell you that the person who has been accessing this file recently is not her.”

“Look at this.” He pointed the tip of his pencil at the back of the paper, where a faint pencil mark was barely visible, though it became clear under the side-lighting. “This mark corresponds to page thirteen of the register. And page thirteen records the original destination of that missing batch of bronzes.”

I took the paper and studied the mark closely. It was blunt, likely left in a hurry or deliberately used to obscure something. My mind raced, remembering the content of page thirteen. The bronzes had originally been destined for Schönbrunn Palace, but they had vanished en route, with the official record claiming a shipwreck. The mark suggested someone had recently paged through it and had specifically flagged that page. I looked up at him sharply. “Is this your mark?”

Karl tucked the notebook away, his tone still calm. “It’s a professional habit, Anna. I’m an auction consultant; my job is to verify authenticity. But what I’m more interested in is how you plan to explain your illegal entry into a restricted zone.

Stefan is looking for a reason to purge the entire archive. If he finds out you are here, you will become the first obstacle to be removed.”

He stepped closer, his shadow falling over my face. “Put the register down and walk out that door. I will help you scrub those illegal access marks, just like I handle a hundred other ‘accidental’ pieces of black-market goods.”

I felt a wave of cold creeping up my spine. Karl was threatening me, but he was doing it under the guise of “help.” He held my weakness, and I held the lead. This was an unequal game. I took a deep breath, forcing my voice to stay steady. “I am not leaving.

The register can stay here, but you have to tell me why Stefan signed for me yesterday and now has me locked out.”

Karl was silent for a moment. The air seemed to freeze, save for the ticking of a distant clock.

“Because Stefan doesn’t want you to see what comes after page thirteen,” he whispered. “There’s a name recorded there. A name both of you want to forget. He’s using the panic of the coming depression to buy these ‘missing’ artifacts at a steal and then wash them on the black market.

He is the shield, I am the cleaner, and you,” he pointed at me, “are the thorn.”

At that moment, the sound of quick footsteps echoed through the hall. Adelaide Kirschner came rushing over, clutching a stack of archive boxes, her face pale, a fine sheen of sweat on her forehead. She saw Karl, and her whole body shuddered violently. The boxes slipped from her hands, scattering with a rustle on the floor. Papers flew everywhere, like a flock of startled white birds.

“Please… don’t move,” she stammered, her voice barely a whisper. “Mr. Karl, please… go. There’s nothing here you’re looking for.”

Karl sighed, straightened his tie, and turned to leave, the click of his shoes fading into the distance. Adelaide crumpled to the floor, her eyes wide with terror, looking at me as if I were a monster. “Anna…” she finally managed, “They’re… they’re going to silence me. Stefan says that the more you know, the faster you die. I don’t… I don’t dare speak.”

I knelt and picked up one of the scattered papers. It read: November 5, 1919, received overnight, reference B-114, responsible party: Pichler. The date was the day after the register had been closed. I looked at her. “Why Stefan? He is the foundation’s chairman; he should be protecting the archives, not destroying them.”

Adelaide bit her lip, her nails digging into her palms until blood welled up.

“Because those artifacts… those bronzes, they weren’t antiques,” her voice trembled. “They were… they were the evidence used to cover up the corruption years ago. They’re engraved with… with the names of the donors. And those names are current Vienna politicians. Stefan… he’s helping them launder the evidence.

If this stuff leaks out, the whole foundation collapses. He’ll destroy everything, including us.”

I stood up, brushing the dust off my coat, and carefully folded the paper into my inner pocket. Stefan’s hypocrisy was a thick layer of grease over a rotten core. He was using the loopholes in the system to legitimize crime. And I, with the logic of a debater and the rigor of an archivist, was picking at that membrane, one thread at a time.

I looked at Adelaide, my tone calm and firm. “Get up, Adelaide. Call Clara Pichler. Tell her that tonight at seven, at the cafe behind St. Peter’s Church. Bring every copy you have.”

Adelaide looked up, a flicker of hesitation in her eyes, the tug-of-war between fear and conscience playing out in her face. “Clara… she’s dangerous,” she whispered. “The last time she investigated, she almost got detained by Stefan’s men. And besides, she has no idea how heavy these names are.”

“The heavier they are, the louder they crash when they fall,” I said coldly. “Let her know. If she doesn’t come, we die with no proof. If she does, we have leverage. Stefan is shutting his office to visitors today because he’s preparing a press conference tomorrow to claim the archives were damaged by ‘natural wear and tear.’ We need to nail the truth down before he can spin it.”

I left the archives. The rain outside had grown heavier, the cold water stinging my face. At the corner of the street, a red dial spun in a phone booth, the dim light casting long shadows. I stepped inside, picked up the receiver, and listened for the line to connect.

At the same time, I noticed someone had drawn a simple circle in chalk on the phone booth glass, circling the number 114. Was it Karl’s mark, or Stefan’s warning? In the downpour, a black sedan rolled slowly past, its windows closed tight, the faces inside hidden.

It didn’t stop; it just hovered in my line of sight for half a second before vanishing into the deep, rainy night. I gripped the receiver, my knuckles white, as the dial tone hummed in my ear, one pulse after another, like a countdown.

I dialed Clara Pichler’s private number. Click, click, click. The line was answered, but all I could hear from the other end was rapid breathing and the rustle of paper. “Anna? Who is this?” The voice was muffled, laced with wariness.

I hung up and stepped out of the booth. The rain plastered my bangs to my forehead. I unzipped my coat to check the paper in my inner pocket. B-114, Stefan Pichler, November 5, 1919. Every single clue pointed to the same bottomless pit.

I looked up at the high spire of the archives against a sky choked with black clouds, the sound of thunder rolling low and threatening. I knew that by the end of tonight, Baden’s quiet surface would be shattered. The edge of Stefan’s mask had been pulled back, the thread of Karl’s black-market chain had been exposed, and I had finally stepped out of my seven-year self-exile and into the muddy heart of the battle.

The rain kept falling, washing the dead leaves off the streets, but it couldn’t wash away the evidence carved into paper. I pulled my coat tighter around myself and disappeared around the end of the alley, my steps quickening as if I were chasing something that was about to slip away. Behind me, the massive doors of the archives stayed tight and silent, like a witness who refuses to speak, quietly waiting for the next interrogation.