“Please,” was all Yeva could think of to say. She had no argument against it—even years after the last time they had been hunting together, she still longed for the dark, cold cathedral of the wood.
He shook his head. “I won’t be persuaded on this, Yeva.” She still flinched to hear the use of her proper name from her father. “Besides, if you come with me, Doe-Eyes will try to follow, and you know she can’t weather this cold.”
And so he left her behind, traveling deeper and deeper into the forest each time with Pelei at his side. Sometimes he was gone two or three days, leaving Yeva and her sisters, and Albe, alone in the house. Yeva kept to her bed by the fireplace. Doe-Eyes would have whined and cried all night, unable to climb the ladder to the loft, had Yeva taken over her father’s room in his absence.
It was during one of her father’s excursions that they received their first visitor to the cabin, on an afternoon full of pale, cold sunlight. Yeva and Lena were blocking up the gaps in the timbers of the floor and the walls with clay, while Asenka sat by the hearth, mending one of their father’s shirts. Doe-Eyes was executing a circuit around the house, as she did every hour or so, alert for Pelei’s return. But instead of the perk of her ears and frantic lash of her tail that heralded his arrival, she went rigid, nose pointed toward the door and tail unmoving.
Yeva paused, her eyes on the dog. “Albe, is someone outside?”
The servant’s head peeked out from the edge of the loft, where he was tidying. “I don’t hear anyone, miss.”
Yeva put a hand on Doe-Eyes’s shoulder and found the muscles there solid as rock. “Could you please check?”
Albe slid down the ladder to land with a solid thunk on the floor. He opened the door a crack, peering out across the gleaming snow. “There is someone coming, miss,” he said, surprised.
Lena dropped her bowl of mud, sloshing some of it on the floor. “Radak,” she whispered, glancing first at Yeva and then over at Asenka, who had stopped mending and was staring back at her sister. “It has to be. Oh, what if he’s come to break our engagement?”
“He hasn’t,” said Yeva firmly. “He wouldn’t. And if that was his intention, he would hardly travel three days for it, he would just never come at all.”
“It isn’t your young man, miss,” said Albe. Yeva regretted having spoken—now each day that Radak didn’t come, Lena would be more convinced he never would.
Albe stepped into the gap of the door, straightening his shoulders. “Welcome, sir. May I help you?” He spoke to someone Yeva couldn’t see, his form silhouetted by the blinding light off the snow behind him.
“Is this Tvertko’s new house?” asked the visitor. “I’ve come to see him—and his daughter.”
Albe stepped back, allowing the man inside. As soon as the door closed behind him and shut out the daylight, his features became clear. It was a young man, perhaps five or six years Yeva’s senior, with dark hair and an easy smile. He had friendly hazel eyes that cast over the room, going first to Asenka at the fireplace and then to Lena by the wall, and then to Yeva. And there his eyes stayed. There was a gasp from the hearth, and Yeva turned to see that Asenka had gone white, staring at the man in the doorway.
It was Solmir.
BEAST
Something comes.
A man and a beast, moving slowly, scanning the ground. We watch from only a few feet away—we know how to disguise our scent from the canine. The man is surefooted and strong, if old for his kind, and we watch with interest. Something about him is familiar; we have encountered him before.
Yes, we know him. He would not have been the first hunter we turned to our purposes but he was the most promising. We were so certain he would be our salvation, until one day he vanished and never returned to the wood. It was years ago—or weeks? Perhaps generations. His hair has changed and his face has grown lines, but he walks with the same knowledge of the lifeblood of the wood.
We growl, the sound blending with the wind and the groaning of the trees under their weight of snow. We are patient. We still remember our plan.
As the man makes his way through the forest, the dog blowing steam at his side, we move on silent paws to follow.
THREE
YEVA STOOD ROOTED TO the spot, staring at Asenka as she stared at Solmir. Yeva was closest to the door, and knew she ought to greet him properly, but she felt that if she looked at him everything would unravel.
Finally Lena stepped forward, smoothing down her skirts as if they were made from fine silk, and not mud-spattered wool. “Welcome, sir!” she said, brushing past Yeva and holding her arms out for Solmir’s heavy cloak. “Please forgive us, you’re the first visitor we’ve had since we moved.”
Solmir let her remove his cloak with a murmur of thanks, glancing at her briefly before shifting his gaze back to Yeva. “I apologize for not sending word, but by the time a messenger arrived and returned, it would be a week gone at least. I have a room at the inn some leagues back—I can return another time if I’m inconveniencing you.”
“Of course not,” said Lena. “You must be cold. Please, sit here by the fire.” She pulled one of the chairs from the table over to the hearth, placing it nearer to Asenka’s than was necessary. Asenka, whose white face had gone red as she twisted her hands together in her lap, flashed Yeva a look of alarm.
Solmir shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Actually, I don’t have much time. Your father is not at home?”
Lena shook her head. “He is hunting,” she explained, one hand still on the back of the chair, as if hoping to usher him there by willpower alone.
His face fell a little. “Well, I will have to come back another time to speak with him—but that wasn’t my sole purpose.” Solmir had dropped his gaze to the floor, as if he might find his next words written there.
“Yes?” said Lena expectantly, the hand on the back of the chair creeping over to rest on Asenka’s shoulder.
“I—had hoped to be able to speak with Yeva.” His eyes flicked up, meeting Yeva’s before she looked away, startled. “Alone.”
Heart straining against her rib cage, Yeva could not help but look at her sisters. Lena’s face was blank, confused . . . but Asenka understood. Her lips parted, but no sound emerged; the flush of nervous excitement warming her face fled; her hands went still in her lap. She caught Yeva’s eye, and after a long, heavy second, the corners of her mouth turned up in a smile.
Unable to stand it any longer, Yeva darted forward, fumbling for the latch of the door. “As you can see,” she said harshly, “we have only the one room aside from the bedrooms. I will speak with you outside, if you please.”
She stumbled out into the snow without waiting to see if Solmir would follow. Why, she thought furiously, could it not have been Radak? In her haste she’d left her cloak behind. For now, hot humiliation and distress coursed through her, immunizing her against the cold.
Solmir’s horse stood obediently by the snow-covered trail, snorting steam into the air. Well trained, that it required no hobbling or tying. A voice cut through her thoughts. “Yeva?” Solmir was closing the door behind him, having grabbed his cloak back from the hook on which Lena had placed it.
“What are you doing here?” Yeva turned abruptly enough to send up a spray of snow.
Solmir’s mouth opened in surprise, his brows furrowed. “I—why are you so angry?”
Yeva had not known her emotions were so obvious. She closed her eyes, sucking in a frigid breath of air that burned the insides of her nose. “I am sorry, you came at an awkward time. Please, sir—why have you come?”
“Solmir,” he corrected her. “I hate it when people call me sir. I came—” He paused, brows lowering further as he peered at her in the winter sunlight. “You really don’t know?”
The fury ebbed, leaving her with only confusion and dread creeping through her as quickly and surely as the cold. “No.” She shivered.
“Here.” Solmir stepped forward and draped his cloak over her shoulders bef
ore she could protest. Taking a step back, restoring a respectful distance between them, he leveled his scrutiny at her again. His eyes were friendly, warm—it was unsurprising that they were what Yeva remembered most about him from the dinners they spent together.
“I apologize. I thought you had understood.” Though he spoke softly, he spoke with confidence. “I know we haven’t spent much time together but of everyone at those dinners, you were the only one I wished to speak to. The other ladies spoke of weather and fashion, and of the baronessa’s silver. You explained the proper way to skin a leopard so as not to mar its fur.”
Yeva felt the bottom falling out of her stomach. “I—never—”
“Not to me,” he said, with a smile. “To one of the huntsmen in the baron’s service. I overheard you. I tried in vain to talk about hunting with you but I think the baronessa had you too well trained. Never before have I so envied a mere huntsman.”
Now that he spoke, Yeva remembered more clearly the evenings they had both attended dinner. He had always sat at her elbow, always spoke of the huntsmen and asked if she knew any of them. She had thought he was engaging in some form of gossip, and had deflected the questions as best she could. Yeva closed her eyes again. How had she been so blind?
“Please,” said Solmir. Yeva heard a soft footfall, knew he had taken a step toward her. “When I got the news of your father’s caravan, your family was already gone and I had missed my chance. And now I’ve come all this way, instead. I will have to come back and speak with your father but everyone knows how he loves you. If you want something, he won’t refuse you. Please, Yeva. Consider my offer. I would like to take you back with me—as my wife.” He had run out of breath, forced to gulp down another before his last words.
Yeva felt as though the weight of his cloak on her shoulders might drive her to her knees. She forced herself to meet his eyes and immediately wished she hadn’t. He was too earnest, gazing at her with such feeling. How had she never noticed?
“I can’t marry you,” she mumbled, shivering again despite the warmth of his cloak. “I’m sorry.”
“Why not?” He looked merely puzzled, not comprehending what she was saying.
“I can’t marry anyone.” As the words came out, Yeva realized how much truth they held. Of all the men in the world who might ask for her hand, she could not hope to find someone more suited for her than this one—and yet the thought of marriage made her want to startle like a wood thrush and fly away into the forest. “I’m not—I’m not a wife. You should marry my sister, Asenka, she’s kind and good and—”
Solmir shook his head, moving forward and reaching for her hands. Yeva, too dumbfounded to protest, stared as he enclosed them in his. “It’s not your sister I want, Yeva.”
She looked up, caught by the longing in his voice. The depth of it left her speechless.
He met her eyes and the corners of his mouth drew up in the tiniest of smiles. “Yeva,” he repeated softly.
“I can’t.” She pulled away, dragging the cloak from her shoulders and presenting it to him at arm’s length. “I’d offer you refreshment but we’ve only just moved and we aren’t ready to receive company. Please, go.” If she weren’t so thrown, she’d be shocked at her own behavior. She was being unforgivably rude.
But Solmir only gathered up his cloak, hugging it to his chest. He kept hold of her outstretched arm with one hand, his fingers encircling her wrist. He was watching her as though wishing it was she, and not the cloak, pressed against him, but he made no attempt to draw her nearer. “I must come back to speak with your father. A fortnight, perhaps. That will give him time to return. Please, only think about it until I come again. We can hunt together, travel together, until the baron names me his heir. Then you will be my baronessa, and no one will dare tell us what we should do.”
Yeva could say nothing, breath stuck in her throat, heart thrashing against her rib cage.
Solmir bowed over her captive arm, and Yeva expected him to kiss her hand the way a gentleman would kiss a lady’s. But then fingers as dexterous as a weaver’s turned her wrist over, and he bent her hand back gently so that her fingers opened like a flower. Then he placed a kiss in her palm. Yeva shivered again—and this time not from the cold.
“Please give my regards to your sisters,” he said, releasing her hand. “And tell them I’m sorry I can’t stay longer to speak with them.” Then, pulling his cloak over his shoulders, he made his way back to his horse and mounted with practiced ease. He sat like someone born to the saddle, which was plain and unadorned—worn with use and care. Solmir saw her looking and smiled.
Yeva dropped her gaze to the snow, but felt his eyes on her for long moments before he turned his horse and disappeared back into the forest.
She longed to remain where she was, neither returning to the house nor going after Solmir, but cold inevitably drove her indoors. She opened the door as quietly as she could, slipping inside, but stealth was useless. They were all waiting for her.
Her eyes went immediately to the figure standing in the house’s center, one hand steadying herself on the table. Asenka smiled, and Yeva could see no hint of anything but pleasure in her sister’s face.
“I’m so happy for you, Beauty,” said Asenka, raising her arms. Yeva went to her, ducking her head against her shoulder, and felt her sister’s arms wrap tightly around her. “He’s a good man.”
Late that night, as Doe-Eyes dreamed of fat rabbits and twitched at her side, Yeva heard a sound from the back bedroom. Whispers, barely audible over the wind and leaves—and then a sob, low and quickly muffled. Just once, a single cry in the quiet. Yeva spent the rest of the night awake, arms wrapped around Doe-Eyes, the palm of her hand burning in the darkness.
Yeva rose before dawn, dressing in the dark and wrapping herself up well against the chill. She took a slice of day-old bread and slipped it into her pocket, then made for the door. Doe-Eyes scrambled up from her nest by the fire and trotted after her, toenails clicking on the wood, but Yeva held out a hand and the dog dropped to her haunches. “Mind the house, Doe-Eyes,” she whispered. Doe-Eyes cocked her head, trembling with the desire to accompany her mistress, but when Yeva slipped out, the dog remained obediently still.
The sky was beginning to lighten in the east as she crossed the snow-covered yard toward the run-down shed that butted up against the edge of the property. Albe had taken the borrowed horse back to town, but the wagon was theirs, and some of what they had brought had yet to be unpacked. Yeva hoisted herself up into the back of the wagon and threw aside the heavy canvas that covered its contents, tossing up wayward snow as she did so.
There—a long wooden chest, one of the few things of value that her father had not parted with. It was carven with intricate depictions of ash and oak, rowan and hickory. Amid the tangle of leaves and branches there were eyes peeking out, a flash of a tail there, a glimpse of a paw. Yeva ran a hand along the box and then opened it.
Her father had taken his heavy bow with him and his ax, but the lighter bow was there, unstrung, and a quiver of fine goose-feathered arrows. These were hers, had been since she was young. Her father’s bow had always been much too heavy for Yeva to draw, and anyway, she’d never needed the power the strong bow offered. He was a large-game hunter, while Yeva was quick and resourceful, with good aim and well-hidden traps.
Yeva pulled out the bow, testing the wood with her thumb. She had neglected it these past years. When was the last time she had oiled the wood? And yet it was smooth to the touch, and when she bent it across her shin it curved gracefully. Someone had been caring for the bow. And who other than her father would know what it needed?
She strung the bow with some difficulty, bracing the wood against her leg and discovering that the muscles she’d had when she was twelve had atrophied over the years. Her arms shook as she slipped the string into its groove at the bow’s tip. After retrieving her knife and her spool of wire from the bottom of the chest and tucking them into the band of her skirt, she h
opped down from the wagon. She slung the bow and the quiver of arrows over her shoulder and slipped back out of the shed, shutting the door behind her.
Yeva glanced to the east, where the rosy violet sky over the trees had grown several shades lighter. Albe would be rising soon, and he would find the hearth cold and the kettle empty. But if Albe woke to find her there, she would be drawn into the daily life of the cabin, and she could not bear to face her sisters, not yet.
And her father had not forbidden her to hunt—only to accompany him.
She set off through the silent, snowy forest, blood coursing past her ears. Though she’d slept little, energy flowed through her and drove her onward. She stopped now and then to set a wire snare in the snow. Her fingers fumbled with the task at first, but they soon remembered the trick of it, growing more sure as she went. Her skirt hampered her more than she’d expected; she would have to make herself a pair of trousers out of one of her dresses, if she was to do this regularly. And now that she’d tasted again the fresh air, felt the snow-covered world enclose her, smelled the crisp brightness of the ice underlain with spicy fir, she knew she would do it every day she could.
She saw little sign of anything nearby in the forest, coming across only old tracks: deer and fox, and occasionally the strange hopping troughs in the snow that told of rabbits. The day passed quickly, the morning turning to noon almost without her noticing. Just after noon she stopped to rest, wishing she’d been thinking clearly enough to bring food for lunch.
She would have to turn back soon, retracing her route to see if any of her snares had borne fruit. And at the end of her trail: the house, with Albe and Lena—and Asenka.
Yeva breathed deep, despite the way the cold air stung her nose and lungs. She thought of Asenka, the tiny sting of a smile on her face when Yeva had reentered the cabin after Solmir left. Her voice, without recrimination, as she congratulated her little sister on a match well made. That same voice, lost in a single sob in the darkness.
Hunted Page 4