Janna handed her a cup of tea.
Gerta’s head cleared. She looked toward the doorway and the hide drape, and remembered Nan and Aaron with the crossbow. She was a prisoner. She took a drink, hoping that hot tea would fill up the spaces in her that would otherwise be filling with despair.
“I’ll come with you,” she said. Part of her wanted to go back to the peacefulness of the rowan dream, to sleep away as much of her captivity as possible, but the wood-pigeons would be outside. Outside was closer to freedom than inside.
And I might see Mousebones again.
She pulled on her clothes under the nightgown. Janna watched, looking faintly amused, and Gerta flushed for no particular reason. I know I’m plump and pasty and I look weak. She doesn’t need to look at me like that.
When she was dressed, Janna went up the ladder again. She flipped the hatch back—more snow fell inside—and climbed the rest of the way out. “Come on,” she called down. “It’s not warm, but the snow’s let up.”
Gerta went up the ladder slowly and poked her head out at the top. Janna put down a hand and pulled her out onto the roof of the earthlodge.
The world was blinding, dazzling white. The sun blazed off the snow crystals. Gerta shaded her eyes and blinked away red spots.
Mousebones landed on the snow next to her, looking like a black paper cut-out against the snow.
“Aurk! Are you hurt? Did the humans pick at you?”
“Only a little,” said Gerta. “At least, for now.”
“Arrk!”
Janna shook her head. “I admit, I’m starting to believe that you do talk to him.”
“It’s easy to prove,” said Gerta, a bit nettled. “Hold up your fingers behind your back.”
Janna raised her eyebrow, but put her hands behind her back. “And now…?”
“Mousebones, can you tell me how many she’s holding up?”
The raven made a grumpy noise. “I’m not a circus animal, you know.”
“Please? It’ll make my life easier.”
“Arrrkk…” The raven hopped around behind Janna. “Two.”
“Two,” said Gerta.
Janna’s eyebrows went up. Her hands moved a bit. “How many now?”
“Four,” reported Mousebones. Gerta passed this on.
“How many now?”
The raven took off, cawing irritably.
“Um. He says he’s not doing this any more. If you won’t listen to another human tell you the truth, you’re an…addled egg that shouldn’t hatch.”
The sound of Janna’s laughter was loud and exuberant, even through the muffling effect of the snow. “Does he, now? That’s the sort of thing I’d expect. He used to peck at me when I tried to check on his wing.”
She put her hands on her knees and leaned forward. “Well. I suppose I am obliged to believe that either you are telling the truth, or you are some kind of witch, and I do not believe that a witch would let herself be caught so easily. So. You can speak to ravens. Interesting.”
“One raven anyway,” said Gerta. “I haven’t tried any of the others.” Janna laughed again.
The pigeon coop looked to be half falling down, but the door was solid in its frame. Janna scraped aside the snow blocking it with her boot and pushed it inward.
Soft cooing greeted her, and a grunt that definitely did not come from a pigeon.
Gerta followed her inside.
Perches ran across the wall on one side. Birds lined it, fluffed up and cooing. Those highest up were silent and still.
On the other side, there were no perches. Instead there was a reindeer.
Gerta stared.
It was old. She could see that, even knowing nothing of reindeer. The bones of its face were fine and sharp, the skin stretched tight over them. Its muzzle was white and its eyes were cloudy.
“Rescued him from a trader,” said Janna shortly. “He’s too old to haul a load like he used to, but the damn fool was beating him. By the time we were done, all that man’s goods would fit in a backpack he could carry himself.” She smiled grimly.
“Good,” said Gerta, and was surprised at her own anger. “Good.”
She crouched down and offered the reindeer her hand, as if it were a strange dog. The animal looked at her with its filmy eyes, then stretched out its neck. It breathed gently into the palm of her hand.
Janna cursed. Gerta looked up, startled.
“Frozen,” said the other girl grimly. “Right on the perches. Oh, damn. I thought it would be warm enough. It’s always been warm enough. What happened?”
She stroked one of the silent birds on the top perch, and Gerta saw that it was dead.
The Snow Queen happened, thought Gerta. My dream last night. The Snow Queen passed over, and froze them.
She did not wish to say this right now. She scratched the reindeer’s forehead instead, and it sighed.
There were four dead birds, and two that were stupefied with cold. Janna took the dead ones down and set them on their backs in the snow outside the door. The other pigeons cooed and flapped their wings. The dazed ones sat in silent, stupid misery.
Janna crouched over the two injured ones, frowning. When she stretched their wings out, they shed feathers from wings patched white with frost.
“What a mess,” she muttered. “I can’t fix this.”
“Where do they come from?” asked Gerta.
“I find them, mostly,” said Janna. “Sometimes traders carry them. There’s good eating on a pigeon, and they’ll last in a cage for awhile. But mostly they fall out of trees and I pick them up. They’re not bright.”
“What will you do with them?” asked Gerta. “Will you kill them?”
“Kill them?” Janna looked surprised, then amused. A smile crossed her lips as she looked at Gerta. It was not entirely kind.
She stood up and took a step forward, then another. Gerta backed away, suddenly nervous, but the coop was small and there was a doorframe in her back.
Janna was taller than she was, a good deal taller. Taller than Kay, it occurred to her. Gerta had to look up to meet the robber girl’s eyes.
“What you’re really asking,” said Janna, her voice quite gentle, “is will I kill you?”
Gerta swallowed hard.
Janna tilted her head. She was standing very close. Gerta could feel the doorframe digging into her shoulder, the metal bolt against her back.
She’s waiting for an answer. Don’t look scared. Don’t look scared.
Bit late for that, isn’t it?
Gerta licked her lips. They felt very dry. “Yes,” she said. “That’s what I’m asking.”
Janna kissed her.
Gerta’s eyes went very wide.
But girls don’t—not with other girls—
Well.
Apparently they did.
This was not like kissing Kay behind the stove. This was not even remotely close to it. Janna’s hand slid up the back of her neck and drew her face up. Her mouth was hot, not cold. Her fingers were warm and strong.
Kay hadn’t touched her at all.
Somewhat dazed, Gerta thought, Am I supposed to be doing something with my lips—?
The thought was not even half completed. Janna’s tongue flicked over her lips, coaxed them open. There were no more thoughts. She had never felt anything like that. She was aware that she was shaking. Her chest felt as if it were melting—was she holding her breath? Who could breathe?
They broke apart and Gerta gasped for air.
Janna chuckled.
They were close enough, breast to breast, that Gerta could feel the laugh as much as hear it. She stared at Janna’s collarbone, much too shocked to look in her eyes. There was a pulse in her head and between her legs and she could not seem to get enough air.
Janna slipped her fingers under Gerta’s chin and lifted it. Her thumb stroked the corner of Gerta’s mouth.
She turned her head, just a little, into the caress—then realized what she was doing.
She just—we just—
Her cheeks burned with sudden mortification.
“Oh dear,” said Janna softly, while Gerta cursed the pale skin that made her blushes so obvious. I bet you can’t tell when she’s embarrassed.
It was almost impossible to imagine Janna being embarrassed by anything.
The robber girl let her go. Her smile was secret, sardonic, kind.
“Sometimes I kill them,” she said. “If they can’t be healed. If they can’t stop attacking the others.” She stepped back. “But mostly I let them go. Eventually.”
She walked out of the coop and it was several minutes before Gerta could summon the composure to follow her.
CHAPTER TWENTY
It was a short winter day and absolutely nothing happened. Gerta stayed out of the way of Nan. Janna needed help dragging hay in for the reindeer, so she did that.
The snow, when she tested it, was deep. The trees all looked the same. If Mousebones was her guide, she might make it out, but she would be cold and floundering and would leave a trail that a blind man could follow.
Do I leave? Do I dare? I can’t run. I have to get Janna to let me go.
The kiss burned in her memory like a brand.
Surely…surely… She did not even know what she was thinking. Her mind was tossing up nonsense phrases.
She dragged hay from an outbuilding, armload after armload. She was fairly certain that she blushed whenever Janna looked at her.
She’s the one who did it! I don’t know why I’m the one who’s embarrassed!
Because you enjoyed it, and you weren’t thinking about Kay at all, said a traitorous part of her mind.
If she could have buried that part in the snow, she would have.
Marten glared at her from across the yard. Gerta ducked her head and pretended not to see.
That night, when they crawled into the same bed, Gerta’s heart thrummed in her chest like a nervous bird.
Will she kiss me again?
She shivered at the thought.
The act of pulling on her nightclothes was suddenly fraught. She caught a glimpse of Janna’s lean, scarred body in the mirror and turned away, feeling pasty and wobbly by comparison. She blushed again, for no good reason, and yanked her clothes over her head.
When she had her arms through the proper holes and her hair out of her face, Janna was smiling at her, and that made her shiver again, for reasons she couldn’t even begin to explain.
“Cold?” asked Janna. “Get under the covers. It’ll warm up.”
It was easier to nod. Cold. Yes. Not shaking hard for some other reason that felt like fear and Christmas morning wrapped up together.
Will she?
They lay down. Janna rolled over and snuggled her back against Gerta’s side. She was very warm and very solid.
She could roll over any minute. She could put her mouth over mine again…
…I wouldn’t mind.
She blushed again, grateful that Janna couldn’t see her face. What was wrong with her? Girls didn’t kiss other girls, or at least, not like that. Boys kissed girls like that.
Well, in theory.
Kay didn’t. I don’t think he knew how.
In fairy tales, it was the kiss that woke the sleeping maiden. After her only experience with kissing, Gerta had been skeptical about that, but she certainly wasn’t now. A kiss like Janna’s could have brought back the dead. Corpses three days old would hop off the pyre if someone kissed them like that.
There were always warnings in town, about nice girls not letting boys do too much before they married. Gerta’s grandmother had muttered about that a time or two, once Gerta was old enough to wear a proper bodice.
Nobody ever mentioned that you didn’t let girls kiss you. It had never even occurred to her that was an option.
Having now occurred to her, she couldn’t think of any reason it shouldn’t be an option…and then she thought of at least three houses in the village where two women lived together and felt a rush of embarrassment for having been so incredibly dim.
“What will you do?” asked Janna.
“W…what?” Gerta felt slow and stupid.
The robber girl looked over her shoulder in the dim light. “When you find your friend. And the Snow Queen.”
“Oh!” Gerta struggled to think. Yes. Kay. Yes. “I don’t know. I suppose I’ll see if there’s some way to sneak him out.”
“And if she catches you?”
Gerta shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess…I guess I’ll try to stop her.”
“Stab her with your little kitchen knife, will you?” asked Janna, rolling over on her back.
“If I have to,” said Gerta.
Janna laughed again, ruefully, and shook her head. “I believe you would. I suppose you’ll get killed, if no one goes along with you.”
“I’ve done all right,” said Gerta indignantly. “I got this far, didn’t I?”
“Yes, and walked into a bandit camp like a fuzzy little chick into a fox’s den.”
Gerta flushed again.
She opened her mouth to say that it had been Mousebones’s fault and she’d certainly know what to look for in the future, and Janna propped herself up on one elbow and kissed her again.
It was slower this time, more languid, just as deep. Janna tasted like woodsmoke and cinnamon tea. When Gerta came up for air, gasping like a drowning woman, Janna did not stop but moved her lips slowly down the other girl’s jaw, up to her ear.
“You could get into a great deal of trouble alone,” she breathed.
Gerta trembled like a leaf in a gale, surprised her teeth weren’t chattering. “Yes,” she said finally—an agreement, an encouragement, she had no idea at all. “Yes.”
“Of course,” murmured the robber girl, “you could get into a great deal more trouble with me.” She trailed a fingertip over the edge of Gerta’s ear. “Go to sleep. Tomorrow we’ll see about getting you out of the fox’s den.”
“And how,” said Gerta, surprised at herself, “am I supposed to get to sleep after that?”
Janna threw back her head and laughed. “Perhaps you really would stab the Snow Queen after all.”
She bent over—Gerta tensed—but she only pressed a chaste kiss to Gerta’s forehead and rolled over.
And apparently went to sleep.
Gerta let out a long, wavering sigh. Her body felt drawn agonizingly tight.
Is she going to let me go?
That’s…that’s a good thing. I’ll get away from the robbers. That’s good.
I’ll be able to go after Kay.
Kay. Right.
Him.
Right.
Staring into the dark, her skin seemed to burn in the place where Janna had touched her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
They went the next morning to feed the pigeons. Gerta felt her stomach lurch whenever Janna came near her, but the bandit girl seemed to realize this and left space between them wherever they stood.
The message—if it was a message—seemed clear. If she wanted the distance between them crossed, Gerta would have to be the one to cross it.
I’m leaving, though. I don’t have to do anything. I just…I can leave. Yes.
One of the injured pigeons had died. Janna sighed, cradling the cold body in her hands.
“It was the Snow Queen,” said Gerta.
Janna glanced up at her, raising an eyebrow.
“She passed overhead,” said Gerta. Did the other girl believe her? She wasn’t sure. “Two days ago. In the rowan dream, I saw—” She put her hands to her face, feeling her cheeks heating under her fingers.
“You didn’t say anything,” said Janna.
“I didn’t think you’d believe me,” said Gerta. “I know how it sounds. I dream about trees and the trees saw a frost spirit and by the way it’s the one who stole my friend away.” Her laugh rang thin and wild in her own ears. “I know it’s mad. But that was what I saw.”
Janna sighed. “I sa
id that I believed you,” she said. “And you may be foolish enough to walk into a robber’s den, but I think you’d come up with a better story than that.” She stared down at the dead bird in her hands, brooding.
Mousebones landed in the doorway with a flirt of wings. “Ark!”
“Mousebones!”
“Ark. You’re alive, yet. And so am I, and so is she, so I suppose that’s something.” The raven picked at one of his feet with his beak. “Is she going to eat that pigeon?”
“He’d like the pigeon,” said Gerta. “Um.” It felt strange to ask that. “You don’t have to. I don’t think he’ll starve.”
“I might,” said Mousebones, aggrieved. “It’s not like someone’s leaving eyeballs out in the snow for any hungry raven that might come by.”
“He can have it,” said Janna. “Someone might as well get a little good out of it.” She approached the doorway and set the dead pigeon down in the snow to one side of the door, where they would not need to see the raven picking at it.
“Did you mean it?” asked Gerta. “About letting me leave?”
“Yes,” said Janna. “Though I’m still working out the details. I am not planning on staying here myself, you understand. But Marten and Old Nan won’t be happy to see me go, and Aaron will not be best pleased either.”
“Aaron?”
“With the crossbow. A friend of my father’s.” She stood up. Outside the door, Mousebones tore at the frozen pigeon.
“In theory, I am in charge here until my father comes back,” Janna said, “but I believe he’s been hanged. And since it is only fear of my father that is keeping Marten from throwing his weight around, that will make things difficult for me sooner rather than later.”
Her father’s been hanged. And she doesn’t sound like she cares at all. Gerta was not sure if Janna’s indifference impressed her or frightened her.
Then again, he must be a bandit chief, so he’s probably not a nice man…
“Aaron fears I’ll get myself into trouble going off,” Janna continued. “But staying up here with a restless bully and a pair of old cannibals is not my idea of pleasure. Nan knows I’m bringing in most of the food, and Marten’s got a fool notion that if he is ruling the roost, I’ll swoon at his feet, so no one’s keen to see me haring off into the woods.”
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