The Midnight Land: Part Two: The Gift (The Zemnian Trilogy Book 2)

by E. P. Clark

  “That hardly seems a noteworthy event,” said Slava’s sister, smiling even more patronizingly.

  “At which we became entangled with sorcery, and I ended up saving a leshaya and coming before the gods themselves, and then we carried on and came to Lesnograd,” said Slava quickly. She was finding it more and more difficult not to be openly rude to her sister, and decided the fight was not worth the effort. “And then we discovered that the old princess was gravely ill and everything was in disarray because of this, and I discovered that this was because of a curse she had attempted to cast on Krasnograd and our family, and then the gods revealed to me that I should conceive a child with Olga’s father, so I did, and then we came home.”

  “So you took a lover, did you?” said Slava’s sister, smiling even more widely. “Couldn’t you have found someone a little younger? He must have been—well, old enough to be your father, at any rate. Frankly, it seems unlikely that you actually managed to conceive a child with him—he must have been old and tired, and you’re no youth yourself anymore, you know. In fact, it seems to me to be highly unlikely. When did this take place? You’re certainly not showing yet.”

  “Shortly before we left Lesnograd,” said Slava. “It is early, yes, but still the possibility exists, so I thought it necessary to inform you immediately.”

  “And that would have been very proper, if you had been sure of it, but since it’s still so uncertain I’d rather not have known about your…connection,” Slava’s sister made a grimace of distaste, “with such an old man. Some things should be kept private, you know, and it is always unwise to speak of…such things too early.”

  “Well, we shall see,” said Slava. “Of more immediate concern is the curse…”

  “Oh, surely you’re not worried about that?” cried Slava’s sister, waving her hand dismissively. “A curse! Even if I believed in curses, which, as I have never seen one struck effectively, I don’t, I wouldn’t worry about one cast by a sick old woman hundreds of versts away, especially since, according to you, she failed in her attempt by falling ill. Speak to me no more of these unfounded rumors of curses!”

  Of all the reactions Slava had imagined when she had tried to envision how to break the news of the curse to her sister, this one had never crossed her mind. She had expected her sister to be wildly angry, possibly even afraid, but it had never occurred to Slava even for a moment that she would dismiss the information out of hand.

  “The curse is a serious matter, sister,” she said. “We must…We must consult with our own sorceresses immediately, and see what can be done to protect ourselves.”

  “What? And have it get out that the Empress of Zem’ is afraid of a curse? Don’t be ridiculous, Slava! What would people think of me?”

  “They would think that you were wise,” said Slava. “Many an empress has consulted with her sorceresses on magical business. It is why we keep them in Krasnograd, troublesome as they are at times.”

  “Nonsense! A curse! Let us have no more talk of such things! Come, I’m hungry, you must be starving, and the feast is no doubt long ready.” Slava’s sister stood up and held out her hand. “Let us appear in the Hall of Celebration arm in arm, to show my princesses how delighted I am to have you back.”

  Slava was too astonished, and still too annoyed, with her sister’s behavior to be able to think up a good answer, and so she silently let her sister link her arm through Slava’s and lead her down to the Hall of Celebration.

  To her relief, she saw when she arrived that Vladislava’s caretakers must have realized what had happened, and taken Vladislava down without waiting for Slava to meet them. Vladislava was just being seated in the place next to Slava’s, but she jumped out of her chair as soon as Slava drew near.

  “Slava! There you are! I was wondering where you’d been!”

  “May I present to you my ward, Vladislava Vasilisovna Severnolesnaya, the only daughter of Vasilisa Vasilisovna Severnolesnaya, heir to Lesnograd,” Slava said. This reminded Vladislava of her manners, and she managed quite a creditable bow to Slava’s sister, and said, “Allow me to express my inexpressible honor, Empress.”

  Slava’s sister gave her a sharp look and a curt nod, before turning and taking her own place. “Did you intend for her to be a companion to Prasha?” she whispered to Slava. “I suppose they are of an age, more or less, but I’m not sure she’s a fit companion for my heir…”

  “It would be a very good thing for Prasha to gain Vladislava as a friend,” Slava whispered back. If she’s capable of it, she added silently. Thus far, Prasha had shown herself to be more than adequately endowed with the imperial qualities of arrogance and self-will, so useful in issuing commands, but rather short on qualities such as intelligence and charm, which were equally useful in ensuring that those commands were fulfilled satisfactorily. Slava glanced over to where Prasha was seated on her sister’s other side, and saw that she was wearing her usual expression of self-satisfied dullness. She seemed barely aware of Slava’s return to Krasnograd. Looking at her face, Slava rather doubted that Vladislava would take to her—in fact, she could easily see Vladislava becoming so enraged by Prasha that an irreparable breach would follow hard on the heels of their first meeting. “But I fear Vladislava is rather behind on her education, and will need to spend all her time at first with mistresses and tutors on every subject,” she said. “Perhaps Prasha can befriend her once she has caught up.”

  “Yes…If she catches up. And I really don’t see how it would serve Prasha to have a half-wild barbarian from the North hanging on to her.”

  Fortunately it was so noisy in the Hall of Celebration now that Slava was sure Vladislava couldn’t hear them, and she herself had the perfect excuse not to reply to such an odd comment. Her sister had never struck Slava with the subtlety of her mind, but always before Slava would have assumed her at least capable of grasping the obvious advantages to the heir of Zem’ befriending the heir of Zem’’s largest province. Slava tried to observe her sister out of the corner of her eye, to see if she were showing any signs of fever or other illness—perhaps that was why she had not seemed herself, ever since Slava had arrived. Thoughts of the curse floated through Slava’s mind, but she tried to ignore them. She had just grown unused to her sister’s blunt ways, she told herself, but received nothing but an unpleasant twinge of doubt in reply.

  Slava’s sister made a very lengthy and florid speech about Slava’s safe return, which was greeted by many cheers, and then enormous piles of food were brought out, and consumed very slowly. Slava realized that she would have to retrain herself to eat at feasts after her journey, for she swallowed down the soup she was served before anyone else—except Olga and Vladislava—was even halfway done, and then realized that, despite the near-constant hunger that had accompanied her while she was away, she would not be able to manage much more of such rich and greasy food. The beet soup had had yellow spots of fat covering most of its surface, and now it looked as if Slava were being served pancakes full of sour cream and caviar, and there was a whole roast pig waiting as well…Slava’s mouth watered at the sight of all that food, but her stomach turned unpleasantly, and the pig’s squeals as it was being slaughtered rang loud in her ears. It looked like it was going to be a very long feast.

  Slava’s sister ate and drank a great deal and talked more and more loudly with everyone on the other end of the table from Slava. Everyone on Slava’s end of the table started drinking vodka as soon as it was poured for them, and quickly moved on to pouring it for themselves, as the servants were in no way able to keep pace with their demands. Vladislava ate for a little while, and then began to fidget in her seat with boredom, while looking at the ever-drunker princesses and princes around her with disgust.

  Just as Slava was beginning to worry that she might cause a scene, little Yanochka, who was daughter to one of the Empress’s serving women and therefore a valuable guide for someone such as Vladislava, who knew nothing of how to live at the Krasnograd kremlin, slipped up
beside her and whispered that the younger princesses were about to leave to go dance by themselves in another room, and would the little Princess Vladislava care to join them? After the most cursory of glances in Slava’s direction, seeking permission, Vladislava jumped gratefully out of her chair and followed Yanochka out of the room.

  Slava was not, however, left to be lonely for too much longer, for Serafimiya Svetlanovna soon came over from the far end of the table and sat down in Vladislava’s vacated chair. Of all the drunken guests at the feast, she looked to be the drunkest, or at least the closest to laying her head down on the table and weeping. She seemed much thinner than Slava remembered her, and walked awkwardly, as if too much movement was painful. There were large dark circles under her eyes.

  “You’re back, Ts-ts-tsalinonova,” she said. “Pueasant joulney?”

  “Yes,” said Slava. “I hear you are to be congratulated. Allow me to offer you my most heart-felt wishes for the health and happiness of yourself and your new husband. May the gods look with favor upon your union for many years to come.”

  “Aaaah,” moaned Serafimiya Svetlanovna, and laid her head down on the table and wept. After an internal struggle, Slava couldn’t help herself, and stroked Serafimiya’s head with compassion.

  “You—only one who understands me,” said Serafimiya, or at least she mumbled something into the table that Slava thought was intended to mean that.

  “Have you had many troubles?” Slava asked kindly. “They say that a new wife’s path is often strewn with rocks and thorns. Young husbands often bring much sorrow in their wake.”

  “But I love him so much!” wailed Serafimiya, speaking with perfect clarity, before subsiding again into inarticulate sniffling.

  “They also say that it is those we love who cause us the most pain,” Slava told her. It was something new brides were often told to comfort them, although why it should be comforting Slava had never understood. She thought it might be the kind of thing that Serafimiya would drink up without question, but instead it only provoked another round of sniffling, which showed that Serafimiya was not quite so stupid as Slava had always assumed.

  Eventually Serafimiya’s crying jag ran its course, and she raised her head from the table and—wiping her face with her sleeve in a way Slava was glad Vladislava was not present to witness—unburdened herself to Slava, laying out all the troubles that had accumulated since the last time she had poured them out on Slava’s heart.

  It seemed that Valery Annovich had, although with surprisingly bad grace, finally agreed to the match after months of his mother’s nagging. He had even shown up to the wedding mostly sober, and cut quite a fine figure as he stood beside Serafimiya before the priestess, and then as he danced with her at the feast afterwards, and all of Serafimiya’s tender hopes had rebloomed within her, as strong as on the day of their first tryst.

  But as soon as they walked hand-in-hand out of the feast, things took a turn for the worse. Valery Annovich had dropped her hand as they entered the bedchamber, fallen onto the bed with his boots still on, claiming he was too tired and drunk to be a husband just yet, and gone to sleep then and there.

  “I embroidered that bed cover myself!” Serafimiya sobbed. “With spells for happiness and fertility! I worked on it for a month! I thought…I thought our first child would be conceived there! And he spoiled it with his boots that very night, so I had to give it to my serving girl for her wedding! But I didn’t tell him, of course I didn’t scold him for it, perhaps he really was very tired…I swore to myself, when the engagement was made and again as we were standing there before the priestess, that I wouldn’t be a scold like my own mother…”

  “Did he…Did things improve once he’d sobered up?” Slava asked gently.

  They had not, of course. It seemed that Valery Annovich spent most of his time away from Serafimiya, and when circumstances forced him to come home, he mostly sat by himself and sulked, or made unpleasant, cutting remarks to Serafimiya about how unkind she was and how unhappy she was making him. Serafimiya had tried to combat this by spoiling him like a sick child, and when that had failed, by resorting to the common tactic of hysterical scenes and tearful reproaches, but that too, strangely enough, had only made him even more sulky and unpleasant.

  “He’s not even…he’s not even interested in…in being a husband,” Serafimiya told Slava. “Most of the time he just tries to avoid me, and when he can’t, he’s either…either…he’s either unkind, almost cruel, or, or, or…just…just…sort of limp,” she finished in a horrified whisper. “He says it’s my fault, I don’t…interest him, and the only way is to…is if I let him…hurt me. Just a little,” she added quickly.

  “And of course you let him,” said Slava.

  “What else could I do? I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. What am I doing wrong? I don’t think I’m doing anything differently than I did before…before we came to Krasnograd, when I was…I was the only woman, the only person, the only thing in the world that mattered to him, but then we came to Krasnograd and he…Oh!” And Serafimiya laid her head down on the table and wept some more. Her gown opened a little as she did so, and Slava could see what looked like the bruises left by a man’s hands all around the base of her neck and throat, as if Valery Annovich had grabbed her there and shaken her or choked her.

  “Excuse me,” said Slava, rising.

  “I’m sorry,” Serafimiya sobbed into the table. “I’m sorry I troubled you, Tsarinovna, but his mother reproaches me constantly for making him unhappy, and my mother says I’ve made my bed and now I must lie in it, every woman must learn how to rule her husband on her own, but I don’t know how, I don’t know how, and I love him so much, and I know that everyone despises me for my weakness, but I love him so much…”

  “Of course you do,” said Slava. “I understand you completely.”

  “You do, Tsarinovna?”

  “Even Tsarinovnas know what it is like to be in love sometimes,” said Slava, smiling down on her. “Even Tsarinovnas know what it is like to be weak and foolish when one needs to be strong and wise. So now I will be strong and wise for you. Go to bed, Serafimiya, if you’re tired, or stay and be merry, if that will make you happier. Do what makes you happier, Serafimiya; perhaps your spells will work after all. But now I have something I must do.”

  “I think I’ll…I think I’ll just go to bed,” said Serafimiya, rising unsteadily from her seat. “I feel…just terrible…I haven’t been able to eat or sleep since my wedding, it seems.” Slava watched as she made her way uncertainly out of the Hall of Celebration. Slava’s pride tried to tell her that she never had and never would be anything like Serafimiya, but she knew that she was in danger of being exactly like Serafimiya, if she were ever to be so desperately in love. Not only that, but she was fairly certain that everyone around her thought she was exactly like Serafimiya all the time about everyone. She waited until she was sure that Serafimiya had made it out of the Hall of Celebration, and then set off in search of Valery Annovich.

  She found him, as she had expected, drinking with a group of other young princes in a small chamber near the Hall of Celebration. They were all lolling on benches and laughing coarsely over something that, Slava was sure, did them no credit—judging from the words she managed to catch as she entered the room, something about some cruel trick on someone defenseless—and they all jerked upright in horrified surprise when they realized that Slava had entered the room.

  “Tsa…Tsall…Tsarinovna,” they said in drunken chorus, trying to bow without falling over. For a moment Slava was stricken with the sickening fear that all the promises she had been given that her future child would be a girl had been false. The horrifying thought that she might instead bear a son pierced through her with such intensity that for an instant she was afraid she had hurt herself. All her earlier brave words of welcoming a son with open arms fled from her at the sight of what all these other women’s sons had become. The task of trying to raise a little boy to be a man, not
a monster, rose up before her in all its hopelessness, and she knew that no matter how good her intentions were, no matter how much she tried, no matter how many advantages she tried to give any future son of hers, every hand would be against her in her attempt, his most of all. She wanted to tell herself that no flesh of her flesh could ever have anything in common with the men lolling on the benches in front of her, laughing vodka-induced laughter over some cruel trick they had played on some poor servant or peasant girl, but she knew that she was just telling herself comforting lies. After all, all these men had once been someone’s precious little boys. Of course any son of hers could so easily become just like his fellow princes. She wondered how much her own father had resembled them. Probably more than she would like. She wondered if, had he survived, she would be forced to feel for him the same pity and revulsion she felt for these men lolling before her, and for a moment all she could see was the memory of her father (who, being the memory of a girl of four, was enormous) slumped drunkenly on the bench and laughing at her in vicious, thoughtless mockery. Slava shook her head to rid it of this terrifying vision, but when she looked back at the princes, they were still there in all their foolish, cruel, drunken glory.

  “Ah, Valery Annovich,” said Slava, spotting him as he attempted to shrink back into the far corner. “I am so glad to see you. I wished to come offer you my congratulations in person. It is not every young prince who has the happiness of calling himself the husband of Serafimiya Svetlanovna Malokrasnova. You must be the envy of all your comrades here.”

  Valery Annovich mumbled something unintelligible and shrank even further back into the corner, an action that looked particularly ridiculous in someone so large and handsome. Slava had to give Serafimiya credit: she might have taken a spoiled child for a husband (although what woman hadn’t?), but he was certainly one of the finest-looking men in Krasnograd. Thick hair the color of ripe wheat, clear blue eyes, strong manly features and figure…and all ruined by a petulant expression and a tendency to whine. In some other life than the one he had been given, he might have been a good man, but as it was he was just good for nothing. It was hard for Slava not to sigh over the waste, but she controlled herself and looked around the room meaningfully.