Through the glass, Perun could see the form of a woman lying asleep. The reflection of the water through the glass cast a greenish glow over her pale, delicately-featured face, making her look as if she was sculpted from wax. Her dark hair, woven into long braids, ran down both sides of her face to her hands. Her clothing was also dark, but obscured by a thick, richly decorated cover that coiled around and under her, both mattress and blanket. 

Her eyes were closed. 

"She's not sleeping. She's dead," Perun whispered. He knew without being told. It was an instinct, a deep knowledge that had no specific origin. 

"No, just sleeping," the Collector back, his voice low and quiet. "Take a closer look."

Perun shook his head slowly, left to right and right to left, unable to take his eyes off the woman -- the corpse -- on the other side of the glass. That couldn't be right. She couldn't merely be asleep. That was  . . . childish wishing. And he wasn't a child. 

He wanted to turn to the Collector, laugh at him, mock him, tell him he was insane, him and all the other absurd, scaly horrors in the forge. They were in thrall to an illusion. Working night and day for nothing but a marshy mess of skin and bones that would dissolve at the slightest touch. A fantasy. A dream. They were idiots, fools, chumps. 

He wanted to laugh -- but found he couldn't.  He couldn't take his eyes off of her. He couldn't turn away.

The urge to press himself against the glass simply to be closer to her tingled his back and legs, but he remained where he was, caught between disbelief and longing. Then, without warning, the unfathomable desire to hear her voice took him over like a tidal wave and he put one hand on the glass . Her voice. He had to hear her voice. Say something! Speak, please!

Perun jerked back from the wall as if he'd been slugged.

"That's not her. That's not Libuše."

"It is. That's the once and future queen."  The Collector watched the waves of emotion wash over Perun's face in the lamplight, but made no attempt to convince him of anything.

"No, it isn't! That's a fake. A doll, a mannequin, or something. I don't know what, but it's not . . . it doesn't . . . she doesn't look . . . I've never seen her before. I've never seen that woman in there before. That's not her." 

That wasn't what he'd wanted to say, and Perun shook his head in annoyance at his own inability to express himself. Of course, he'd never seen a princess. Not a live one or a dead one. What was he talking about?  He was making no sense even to himself.  

Nevertheless, none of the words that welled up inside him, crowding each other to get out of his mouth, expressed the feeling that who he was looking at was wrong. It was the wrong woman. The wrong place. The wrong. . . he was being shown the wrong. . .   

Again Perun shook his head, his forehead furrowed in the struggle to find words. 

Finally, he was able to turn away from the dark creature on the other side of the glass and stare at the smooth face of the Collector. 

"Good," it said, with a satisfied nod. 

"Why did you bring me here? Why show me this. . .her?  She's dead, she . . . " 

The sound of a door slamming and the clopping of horses' hooves on cobblestone echoed through Perun's mind. 

The underwater chamber with its ghostly atmosphere vanished for a moment and was replaced in his mind's eye by the image of a room bright with sunlight. He saw his own hand reaching out and taking down a clock with a smooth wooden casing from an ornate mantlepiece.  Then, he saw that same hand smashing the timepiece repeatedly into the wall until it lay in pieces at his feet, splinters of wood, cogs, shards of glass and springs scattered over the floorboards, specks of his own blood decorating them. 

Rage, grief and disbelief swept over him in short waves, followed by a sharp pain that ripped through his chest. Perun winced. The image of the broken interior of the clock vanished and he found himself staring into the pupil-less eyes of the river monster who had drowned him under the lights of the castle. "She's dead and she's not coming back," he finally hissed, the words bringing another wave of pain so hard it felt as if he'd been hit with a length of lead pipe. "Princess Libuše's gone forever."

"You're starting to remember. And memories are painful," it said. "But necessary if you're to survive this night."

Perun massaged his chest right above his heart, attempting to ease out the pain. "Remember? Remember what? I have no idea what you're talking about," he snapped. "Could you stop speaking in riddles for just five minutes?" 

Even as the words came out, they sounded false and ridiculous. He had remembered something. A scene he couldn't place. He'd smashed a clock. And that room. He had no memory of ever having been in a room like that. From the slant of the sunbeams, it had been late afternoon. He was always asleep in the late afternoon, resting between his early morning and late night activities. What was an unaccounted for memory doing in his head? 

It's time to put the past aside, the voices of Veleček's messengers echoed in Perun's remembrance. 

I've got no past with Veleček, he heard himself reply.

Perun's legs felt as if they were filled with wet sand and he suddenly needed to sit down. His gaze wandered to the furniture in the room, falling onto a high-backed medieval chair that looked as if it had been stolen from a movie lot. The Collector followed his gaze. 

"Time to go. You've seen the Princess. The real Princess. Now you'll be able to tell them apart." 

"Tell who apart? What the hell are you talking about?" he protested weakly. 

The Collector retreated quickly from the glass wall, taking the bubbling lantern with him. The pale woman behind the glass fell more and more into shadow as the light moved away, and the monster glided towards a different dark, gaping hole in the rock than the one they'd entered through. 

Perun was forced to follow if he didn't want to be left sitting in total darkness. A thought as alluring as it was terrifying.

"Answer me one thing, will you? Why am I here? If I'm not supposed to be fodder for your ghost army, then what's all this about?" Sand swirled up around Perun's boots as he left the thick carpet behind, and followed the monster into the tunnel.

Again, no answer. The tunnel curved and snaked on, its rough hewn walls narrowing until they were only wide enough to pass through. An occasional startled fish passed over their heads, or attempted to swim through Perun's legs. The monster was little more than a shadow swimming a few paces ahead of him.

Perun's fists balled up as a strange, self-accusing anger over took him.  He was Perun Hammerfist, not some ignorant baker's boy who could be manipulated into believing he was seeing things, hearing things, that had nothing to do with reality. He was a force to be reckoned with! He owned the entire New Town. His lightning bolt was known far beyond the borders of the city. 

There was even a tree in a park in Žižkov, up on the bluff, prettily decorated with twenty-two pairs of shoes dangling from its limbs. The shoes of dead men. Of men he'd killed for getting in his way, for cheating him, for showing too much disrespect. 

Into the swirl of anger rushed intense exasperation. When The Hammerfist spoke, he was listened to. Always. Who did this eel think he was? 

"Hey! Where are we going?" Perun shouted, his voice reverberating like a snarl off the walls. A startled carp quickly turned and dove to the floor.  "Answer me! What's all this about, you cracked, ugly bastard? Who the hell is that woman, huh? Why show me that? Fair warning, you don't want to see me angry." 

The Collector whirled around, sending a breeze of colder, oilier-smelling water towards him. Perun stopped in his tracks and the two glared at each other. In the Collector's shiny, black eyes Perun saw nothing but cold malice. The polite, humanoid mask was gone, allowing the reptile underneath to surface within the blink of an eye. The exact same reptile who had grabbed him by the legs and drowned him without a second thought. A reptile no different than the two crocodile babies in their ornate terrarium. 

A reptile who would gladly kill him right there and then, but was holding back. Or being held back by something he didn't know about. 

Perun shivered and balled his fists, standing his ground. 

"You are here to begin your journey of remembering," the monster growled in a tone so low and beastly it made the water shake. "And you aren't the only one who demands respect, no matter your pedigree. If you want a fight with me, you'll get a fight. Just remember who won the last one, Wiedergänger."  

Perun and the monster stared at each other for a long moment, neither one of them moving, but with their muscles taunt, ready for attack. Then, the monster slowly receded and turned, continuing on his path as if nothing had transpired. 

The tunnel continued to twist its way through the rock, until finally the walls widened and they stepped out into a meadow of pale, waving water plants. The Collector dowsed the lantern, but its light was no longer needed. Perun could see the the glittering surface of the river only some fifteen meters over his head. He guessed there must have been a number of electrical lamps near the water, as light shone down to where they stood making the surroundings visible, if dimly so. 

A shadow fell over the meadow as a wide, dark shape passed by above. Beams of concentrated light shone down into the water on both sides. Perun stepped back, instinctively wanting to hide himself in the shadows. 

"Patrol boat," said the Collector, reverting back to a human tone. "They can't see us. The water is too muddy and we are still too deep at this point of the river." 

The shape continued its course, taking its ominous shadow with it. Perun shook his head, muttering curses at the National Axis and their need to patrol even the cracks in the pavement of the city.  

The monster seemed in no hurry. It floated calmly in the water breezes, watching the swaying of the plants as if it was a sunny, summer's day. Boards and human-made rubbish lay strewn about among the vegetation, adding unusual contours to the landscape. A car tyre, some unidentifiable rusting metal pieces. The water was different here, too. Heavier. Perun waved a hand back and forth, testing the feel. 

"Petrol," the monster said. "From the boats. Oil, rubber and waste. That's what you're smelling." He turned to look at Perun, the contours of his face blending in with the rock behind him. "The stink of modernity." 

"The stink of progressive civilisation."

"If you say so."  

The monster said nothing more. After a few minutes, impatience got the better of Perun and he squinted over at the Collector. "Well, what now? Got any other surprise corpses up your sleeve? Am I supposed to remember my dearly departed grandmother next?" 

The monster's shoulders jiggled a bit and its tail swished back and forth once, then once again. This time, Perun knew it was laughing. 

"No and no. I don't have a sleeve to hide anything in. You're the one wearing the shirt. Tattered as it is."

"Ha ha. Very funny.  If you were human and we were up there," Perun pointed towards the surface, "I'd have shot you by now, you do know that, right?"

"Fortunate for you that I'm not and we aren't," the monster replied.  

Perun considered for a moment and decided the monster just might be right. He could imagine how the alligator babies in their terrarium would react to being shot, especially if the bullet didn't kill them straight out. Not pleasant and certainly rather messy.

"Alright, fine. Are you going to tell me what we're waiting here for?" 

"Not what, who.  And as to what happens next, that has nothing to do with me. It all depends on you."