It was late afternoon, and the light of the long northern days shone down on the two, bringing out the radiance in Vasya’s hair and fading the rusalka to a greenish, woman-shaped ghost. The water-spirit was old as the lake itself, and sometimes she looked wonderingly on Vasya, the brash child of a newer world.
They had become friends under strange circumstances. The rusalka had stolen a village boy. Vasya, seeing the youth vanish, gurgling, and the flash of green fingers, had dived into the lake after him. Child though she was, she blazed with the strength of her own mortality and was a match for any rusalka. She seized the boy and dragged him back into daylight. They made it safe to shore, the boy bruised and spitting water, staring at Vasya with equal parts gratitude and terror. He tore away from her and ran for the village as soon as he felt the earth under his feet.
Vasya had shrugged and followed, wringing the water from her braid. She wanted her soup. But late in the long spring twilight, when each leaf and blade of grass stood out black against the blue-tinged air, Vasya had returned to the lake. She sat down on the verge, toes in the water.
“Did you wish to eat him?” she asked the water conversationally. “Can you not find other meat?”
There was a small leaf-filled silence.
Then—“No,” said a rippling voice. Vasya sprang to her feet, eyes flicking through the foliage. It was luck more than anything else that her glance lit on the sinuous outlines of a naked woman. The rusalka crouched on a limb, a glimmering white thing clutched in one hand.
“Not meat,” the creature had said with a shudder, hair scudding like wavelets over her skin. “Fear—and desire—not that you know anything of either. It flavors the water and nourishes me. Dying, they know me for who I am. Otherwise I’d be no more than lake and tree and waterweed.”
“But you kill them!” said Vasya.
“Everything dies.”
“I will not let you slay my people.”
“Then I will disappear,” replied the rusalka, without inflection.
Vasya thought for a moment. “I know you’re here. I can see you. I am not dying, and I am not afraid—but—I can see you. I could be your friend. Is that enough?”
The rusalka was looking at her curiously. “Perhaps.”
And true to her word, Vasya would come looking for the water-spirit, and in spring she threw flowers into the lake, and the rusalka did not die.
In return, the rusalka taught Vasya to swim as very few could, and to climb trees like a cat, and so it was that the two found themselves together, lounging on a limb overlooking the road, as Father Konstantin approached Lesnaya Zemlya.
The rusalka saw the priest first. Her eyes gleamed. “Here comes one who would be good eating.”
Vasya peered down the road and saw a man with dusty golden hair and the dark robes of a priest. “Why?”
“He is full of desire. Desire and fear. He does not know what he desires, and he does not admit his fear. But he feels both, strong enough to strangle.” The man was coming closer. It was indeed a hungry face. High, protruding cheekbones cast gray shadows over his hollow cheeks; he had deep-set blue eyes and soft, full lips, though set sternly as though to hide the softness. One of her father’s men rode beside him, and both horses were dusty and tired.
Vasya’s face lit. “I’m going home,” she said. “If he is come from Moscow, he will have news of my brother and sister.”
The rusalka was not looking at her, but down the path the man had taken, a hungry light in her eyes.
“You promised you wouldn’t,” said Vasya sharply.
The rusalka smiled, sharp teeth gleaming between greenish lips. “Perhaps he desires death,” she said. “If so—I can help him.”
THE DOORYARD BEFORE THE HOUSE churned like an ant pile, washed in gold by the afternoon light. A man was unsaddling the weary horses, but the priest was nowhere to be seen. Vasya ran for the kitchen door. Dunya, who met her at the threshold, hissed at the twigs in her hair and the stains on her cut-down dress. “Vasya, where—?” she said, then, “Never mind. Come on, hurry.” She hustled the girl off to have her hair combed and her dirty clothes exchanged for a blouse and embroidered sarafan.
Flushed and smarting, but more or less presentable, Vasya emerged from the room she shared with Irina. Alyosha was waiting for her. He grinned at her appearance. “Maybe they will manage to marry you off after all, Vasochka.”
“Anna Ivanovna says not,” Vasya replied composedly. “Too tall, skinny as a weasel, feet and face like a frog.” She clasped her hands and raised her eyes. “Alas, only princes in fairy tales take frog-wives. And they can do magic and become beautiful on command. I fear I will have no prince, Lyoshka.”
Alyosha snorted. “I’d pity the prince. But do not take Anna Ivanovna to heart; she does not want you to be beautiful.”
Vasya said nothing, and a quick shadow darkened her face.
“Well, so there is a new priest,” Alyosha added hastily. “Curious, are you, little sister?”
The two slipped outside and circled the house.
The look she gave him was limpid as a child’s. “Aren’t you?” she said. “He is come from Moscow; perhaps he will have news.”
PYOTR AND THE PRIEST sat together on the cool summer grass drinking kvas. Pyotr turned when he heard his children approach, and his eyes narrowed when he saw his second daughter.
She is nearly a woman, he thought. It is too long since I looked at her truly. She is so like and so unlike her mother.
In truth, Vasya was still awkward, but she had begun growing into her face. The bones were still rough-hewn and overlarge, her mouth still too wide and full-lipped for the rest of her. But she was compelling: the moods passed like clouds over the clear green water of her gaze, and something about her movements, the line of her neck and braided hair, caught the eye and held it. When the light struck her black hair it did not gleam bronze as Marina’s had, but dark red, like garnets caught in the silky strands.
Father Konstantin was regarding Vasya with raised eyebrows and a slight frown. And no wonder, Pyotr thought. There was something feral about her, for all her neat gown and properly braided hair. She looked like a wild thing new-caught and just barely groomed into submission.
“My son,” Pyotr said hastily, “Aleksei Petrovich. And this is my daughter, Vasilisa Petrovna.”
Alyosha bowed, both to the priest and to his father. Vasya was looking at Konstantin with transparent eagerness. Alyosha elbowed her, hard.
“Oh!” said Vasya. “You are welcome here, Batyushka.” And then she added, all in a rush, “Have you news of our brother and sister? My brother rode away seven years ago to take his vows at the Trinity Lavra. And my sister is the Princess of Serpukhov. Tell me you have seen them!”
Her mother should take her in hand, Konstantin thought darkly. A soft voice and a bent head were more fitting when a woman addressed a priest. This girl stared him brazenly in the face with fey green eyes.
“Enough, Vasya,” said Pyotr, stern. “He has had a long journey.”
Konstantin was spared any reply. There came a rustle of feet in the summer grass. Anna Ivanovna swept breathlessly into view, dressed in her finest. Her small daughter, Irina, followed her, spotless as always and pretty as a doll. Anna bowed. Irina sucked her finger and stared round-eyed at the newcomer. “Batyushka,” said Anna. “You are most welcome.”
The priest nodded back. At least these two were proper women. The mother had a scarf wrapped round her hair, and the little girl was neat and small and reverent. But, despite himself, Konstantin’s glance slid sideways and caught the other daughter’s interested stare.
“COLORS?” SAID PYOTR, FROWNING.
“Colors, Pyotr Vladimirovich,” said Father Konstantin, trying not to betray his eagerness.
Pyotr was not sure he’d heard the priest aright.
Dinner in the summer kitchen was a raucous affair. The forest was kind, in the golden months, and the kitchen garden overflowed. Dunya outdid herself with d
elicate stews. “And then we ran like hares,” said Alyosha, from the other side of the hearth. Beside him, Vasya blushed and covered her face. The kitchen rang with laughter.
“Dyes, you mean?” said Pyotr to the priest, his face clearing. “Well, you need have no fear on that score; the women will dye whatever you like.” He grinned, feeling benevolent. Pyotr was content with life. His crops grew tall and green beneath a clear, fair sun. His wife wept and shrieked and hid less since this fair-haired priest had come.
“We can,” Anna interjected breathlessly. She was neglecting her stew. “Anything you like. Are you still hungry, Batyushka?”
“Colors,” said Konstantin. “Not for dyes. I wish to make paints.”
Pyotr was offended. The house was painted under the eaves, scarlet and blue. But the paintwork was bright and well-kept, and if this man thought he needed to meddle…
Konstantin pointed to the icon corner opposite the door. “For the painting of icons,” he said very distinctly. “For the glory of God. I know what I need. But I do not know where to find it, here in your forest.”
For the painting of icons. Pyotr eyed Konstantin with renewed respect.
“Like ours?” he said. He squinted at the smoke-dimmed, indifferently painted Virgin in her corner, with the candle-stub set before her. He had brought the family icons from Moscow, but he’d never seen an icon-painter. Monks painted icons.
Konstantin opened his mouth, closed it, smoothed his features, and said, “Yes. A little like them. But I must have paints. Colors. Some I brought with me, but…”
Icons were holy. Men would honor his house when they knew he harbored a painter of icons. “Of course, Batyushka,” said Pyotr. “Icons—the painting of icons—well, we’ll get you your paints.” Pyotr raised his voice. “Vasya!”
On the other side of the hearth, Alyosha said something and laughed. Vasya was laughing, too. The sunlight shone through her hair and lit the freckles adorning the bridge of her nose.
Gawky, Konstantin thought. Clumsy, half-grown. But half the house watches to see what she will do next. “Vasya!” Pyotr called again, more sharply.
She left off whispering and came toward them. She wore a green dress. Her hair had loosened at the temples and curled a little about her brows, beneath her red and yellow kerchief. She is ugly, thought Konstantin, and then wondered at himself. What was it to him if a girl was ugly?
“Father?” said Vasya.
“Father Konstantin wishes to go into the wood,” said Pyotr. “He is looking for colors. You will go with him. You will show him where the dye-plants grow.”
The look she threw the priest was not the simper or shy glance of a maiden; it was transparent as sunlight, bright and curious. “Yes, Father,” she said. And, to Konstantin: “At dawn tomorrow, I think, Batyushka. It is best to harvest before full light.”
Anna Ivanovna took the moment to ladle more stew into Konstantin’s bowl. “By your leave,” she said.
He did not take his eyes off Vasya. Why couldn’t some man of the village help him find his pigments? Why the green-eyed witch? Abruptly he realized he was glaring. The brightness had faded from the girl’s face. Konstantin recalled himself. “My thanks, devushka.” He sketched the sign of the cross in the air between them.
Vasya smiled suddenly. “Tomorrow, then,” she said.
“Run along, Vasya,” said Anna, a little shrill. “The holy father can have no more need of you.”
THERE WAS A MIST on the ground the next morning. The light of the rising sun turned it to fire and smoke, striped with the shadows of trees. The girl greeted Konstantin with a wary, glowing face. She was like a spirit in the haze.
The forest of Lesnaya Zemlya was not like the forest around Moscow. It was wilder and crueler and fairer. The vast trees whispered together overhead, and all around, Konstantin seemed to feel eyes. Eyes…nonsense.
“I know where the wild mint grows,” said Vasya as they followed a thin dirt track. The trees made a cathedral-arch above their heads. The girl’s bare feet were delicate in the dust. She had a skin bag slung across her back. “And there will be elderberries if we are fortunate, and blackberries. Alder for yellow. But that is not enough for the face of a saint. You will paint us icons, Batyushka?”
“I have the red earth, the powdered stones, the black metal. I even have the lapis-dust to make the Virgin’s veil. But I have no green or yellow or violet,” said Konstantin. Belatedly he heard the eagerness in his own voice.
“Those we can find,” said Vasya. She skipped like a child. “I have never seen an icon painted. Neither has anyone else. We will all come and beg you for prayers, that we might stare as you work.”
He had known folk to do just that. In Moscow, they thronged about his icons…
“You are human after all,” said Vasya, watching the thoughts cross his face. “I wondered. You are like an icon yourself sometimes.”
He did not know what she’d seen on his face and was angry at himself. “You wonder too much, Vasilisa Petrovna. Better to stay quiet at home with your little sister.”
“You are not the first to tell me that,” said Vasya without rancor. “But if I did, who would go with you at dawn to find bits of leaves? Here—”
They stopped for birch, and again for wild mustard. The girl was deft with her small knife. The sun rose higher, burning away the mist.
“I asked you a question yesterday when I should not,” said Vasya, when the lacy mustard-greens were tucked in her bag. “But I will ask again today, and you will please forgive a girl’s eagerness, Batyushka. I love my brother and my sister. It is long since we have had news of either. My brother is called Brother Aleksandr now.”
The priest’s mouth narrowed. “I know of him,” he said, after a brief hesitation. “There was a scandal when he took his vows under the name of his birth.”
Vasya half-smiled. “Our mother chose that name for him, and my brother was always stubborn.”
Rumors of Brother Aleksandr’s impious intransigence on the matter had spread throughout Muscovy. But, Konstantin reminded himself, monastic vows were not a subject for maidens. The girl had fastened her great eyes on his face. Konstantin began to feel uncomfortable. “Brother Aleksandr came to Moscow for the coronation of Dmitrii Ivanovich. It is said he has gained a certain renown for his ministry in the villages,” the priest added stiffly.
“And my sister?” said Vasya.
“The Princess of Serpukhov is honored for her piety and for her strong children,” Konstantin said, wishing an end to the conversation.
Vasya spun around with a little whoop of satisfaction. “I worry for them,” she said. “Father does, too, though he pretends not. Thank you, Batyushka.” And she turned on him a face all lit from within, so that Konstantin was startled and unwillingly fascinated. His expression grew colder. There was a small silence. The path widened and they walked abreast.
“My father said you have been to the ends of the earth,” said Vasya. “To Tsargrad, and the palace of a thousand kings. To the Church of Holy Wisdom.”
“Yes,” said Konstantin.
“Will you tell me of it?” she said. “Father says that at dusk the angels sing. And that the Tsar rules all men of God, as though he were God himself. That he has roomfuls of gems and a thousand servants.”
Her question took him aback. “Not angels,” Konstantin said slowly. “Men only, but men with voices that would not shame angels. At nightfall they light a hundred thousand candles, and everywhere there is gold and music…”
He stopped abruptly.
“It must be like heaven,” Vasya said.
“Yes,” said Konstantin. Memory had him by the throat: gold and silver, music, learned men and freedom. The forest seemed to choke him. “It is not a fit subject for girls,” he added.
Vasya lifted a brow. They came upon a blackberry bush. Vasya plucked a handful. “You did not want to come here, did you?” she said, around the blackberries. “We have no music or lights, and precious few pe
ople. Can you not go away again?”
“I go where God sends me,” Konstantin said, coldly. “If my work is here, then I will stay here.”
“And what is your work, Batyushka?” said Vasya. She had stopped eating blackberries. For an instant, her glance darted to the trees overhead.
Konstantin followed her eyes, but there was nothing there. An odd feeling crept up his spine. “To save souls,” he said. He could count the freckles on her nose. If ever a girl needed saving, it was this one. The blackberries had stained her lips and her hands.
Vasya half-smiled. “Are you going to save us, then?”
“If God gives me strength, I will save you.”
“I am only a country girl,” said Vasya. She reached again into the blackberry bush, wary of thorns. “I have never seen Tsargrad, or angels, or heard the voice of God. But I think you should be careful, Batyushka, that God does not speak in the voice of your own wishing. We have never needed saving before.”
Konstantin stared at her. She only smiled at him, more child than woman, tall and thin and stained with blackberry juice. “Hurry,” she said. “It will be full light soon.”
THAT NIGHT, FATHER KONSTANTIN lay on his narrow cot and shivered and could not sleep. In the north, the wind had teeth that bit after sunset, even in summer.
He had placed his icons, as was right, in the corner opposite the door. The Mother of God hung in the central place, with the Trinity just below. At nightfall, the lady of the house, shy and officious, had given him a fat beeswax candle to set before the icons. Konstantin lit it at dusk and enjoyed the golden light. But in the moonlight, the candle cast sinister shadows over the Virgin’s face and set strange figures dancing wildly among the three parts of the Almighty. There was something hostile about the nighttime house. Almost, it seemed to breathe…
The Bear and the Nightingale Page 10