by Anna Kashina
“Give the boy some food,” Wolf said. “He’s always hungry.”
Now that Wolf mentioned it, Ivan did become aware of the emptiness in his stomach. His last meal had been with his hosts in the previous village. A twenty-verst walk through Leshy’s woods was a great distance to cover in one day.
Gleb chuckled. “You came all the way here for food?”
Wolf growled. “A bloody waste of time, if you ask me. But no. He wants information. He’s a talker, too much so for his own good.”
“What do you want to know?” Gleb asked, turning his full attention to Ivan.
“I want to see the Mistress.” Ivan swallowed, unnerved by the man’s direct gaze. “To talk to her.”
Gleb got up, reached into the top of the stove, and pulled out a bundle wrapped in a cloth. He set it on a bench and carefully took the cloth off. It was a warm cabbage pie.
“It is her father you need to see, …?”
“Ivan,” Wolf supplied.
Gleb’s eyes lit up with sudden interest. “Ivan.” He broke off a piece of the pie and gestured for Ivan to help himself.
The pie was still warm, with eggs mixed into the moist cabbage filling. Ivan hadn’t eaten one like it since he’d left home.
“Hasn’t Wolf told you?” Gleb asked. “Her father’s powers feed off virgins. Without those girls he would wither like a corpse. It is their love that keeps him whole.”
“Love?” It was the second time Ivan had heard the word today. Mentioned in connection with a dark sacrifice, it sounded offensive.
Gleb sighed. “Kupalo,” he said, “is the god of the crops. Of fertility. You do know that true fertility feeds on love, don’t you, lad?”
Ivan felt his ears get hot. Luckily, the room was dark enough to conceal his blush.
“Our Tzar Kashchey,” Gleb continued, “has found a way to tap into the power of Kupalo. It was even more ingenious than finding a way to separate himself from his own death and hide it in the tip of a Needle. One virgin a year—not too big a price for having a powerful sorcerer protect your kingdom, eh?”
“What Needle?” Ivan asked.
Gleb threw a glance at Wolf.
“Go on,” Wolf prompted. “Tell him.”
“Why haven’t you told him yourself, Wolf? Why look for me in the first place?”
“We could have gone on without you,” Wolf answered. “But no one knows more about the Solstice than you do.”
“What about your other herb man?”
“He left this kingdom—too long ago. He already told the boy what he could.”
“I see.”
The pause seemed to last forever. The old man’s slender fingers broke off pieces of the pie one by one. He chewed slowly, his eyes staring unseeingly into the distance. Finally he finished his share and leaned back against the wall. He looked tired.
“I don’t see how telling him anything would help,” he said to Wolf. “The Mistress has no feelings. Talking to her wouldn’t do a thing. As for Kashchey—how do you persuade a wolf to give up his meat?”
There was a growl from the mat by the stove.
“Sorry,” Gleb said. “It was a figure of speech.”
“I want to try,” Ivan insisted. “It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t try. Tell me how I might do it, old father.”
The herb man chuckled. “Old—yes. But your father I certainly am not.”
“You could help me. If you would.”
“Like I said, young man. You need to see Kashchey, not his daughter. At least Kashchey will kill you quickly. The girl—she’ll just make you fall in love with her and send you on an impossible task. No one has ever carried out one of her tasks and lived to tell the tale.”
Ivan leaned against the wall, staring at the shifting shadows by the fire.
“I won’t fall in love with her,” he said at length.
Gleb shrugged. “They all say that, boy. You’re no different than the rest.”
Ivan held his gaze. “She’s his victim too. She hasn’t been given any choice. And everything she must do—it’s just so wrong. I thought—maybe I’d convince her to help.”
In the silence that followed, Ivan watched Gleb’s shoulders shake with silent laughter. He turned to Wolf, but the beast’s face was impenetrable.
“This one is even worse than I thought, Wolf,” the herb man said. “A romantic. How could a bloody romantic possibly accomplish anything at all?”
Wolf only growled on his mat by the fire, shifting to expose his other side to the heat.
Ivan sat up straight. “I may be a romantic, Gleb, but one thing is definitely true. I’m the one who is here, now; the one committed to this quest. I’m the one who found you, and you’ll have to deal with me, like it or not. The only way I can do things is my way.”
Gleb’s smile faded as he studied Ivan intently. “The hard way, you mean.”
“The right way. Or so I hope.”
Gleb shook his head. “You’re just like the rest of them, chasing after a pretty face. Don’t tell me that rumors of her beauty didn’t attract you. Don’t tell me that you, like all the other young men, don’t desire to—”
Ivan lifted his chin. “She is a young girl in Kashchey’s power. He’s using her, whether she knows it or not. This makes her fate even worse. The virgins’ souls die quickly as he devours them, but hers must perish slowly, year by year, with every sacrifice she must conduct in his name.”
Gleb’s gaze wavered. “She has no soul, boy.”
Ivan held a pause. “I must try to reach her. I wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t. Besides, going through her might give us some advantage over Kashchey. I heard they’re very close.”
Gleb crossed his arms on his chest. “We’re wasting time with idle talk, boy. It’s impossible to see the Mistress. She lives in a high tower in the Tzar’s castle. She only comes out under heavy guard when necessary, for her Solstice duties. Or, sometimes, she turns into a dove and flies around. But then, you could never recognize her.”
“A dove?” Ivan stared.
Gleb sighed. “Haven’t you ever heard of shape-shifters?”
“She’s a shape-shifter?”
“She can only take two forms. Human and dove. And—heed this—when she’s in bird form, she has the feelings of a dove.”
“So?”
“Have you ever heard of birds being prone to emotion?”
“The villagers call doves ‘birds of love’,” Ivan said uncertainly.
“Only in mockery.” Gleb shook his head. “They look lovely, that’s all. Don’t let yourself be fooled by looks.”
“She must do something else,” Ivan insisted. “Doesn’t she ever have…fun?”
Gleb sighed and turned to Wolf.
“I don’t know why you brought him here. The boy knows nothing. You could have at least found a warrior, like the others. This one just wants to talk. And you, best of all, should know that talking won’t help. It never does.”
Wolf stirred, but it was Ivan who spoke.
“You speak true, old father. I’m no warrior. Yet, I’m the one you have, now. I came to you because Wolf believes I can learn from you. He believes with your help I can succeed. Will you not help?”
There was a long pause.
“Why him?” Gleb asked.
Wolf growled. In the darkness of the room his eyes shone like two hot coals. “Because he’s not like the others. And the others have all failed.”
“But he—”
Wolf’s stare cut Gleb’s words off like a knife. “I know what you are risking. If we fail, if Kashchey learns you are helping us, you won’t stand a chance. Yet, the Gleb I used to know wouldn’t be afraid to help the right cause. Perhaps you are not the man we sought, after all. Years have turned you into a coward.”
The old man lifted his chin, the fire in his eyes more frightening than the wolf’s.
“You know this is madness,” he said. “Years have turned you blind, Wolf. And yet—” He turned and gave Ivan a
long look. “You really believe this boy can succeed?”
Wolf sat up. “Tell him, Gleb. Tell him everything you know.”
Marya
My handwoman, Praskovia, was tall and handsome. In her late forties she still maintained the passionate vigor of a young girl, so unlike the calm detachment I had to uphold. We made a good match.
I was once told that Praskovia was the only woman who had survived my father’s passions and come out of the experience intact. I heard it whispered that she could even be my mother. I didn’t care. There were too many women in my father’s life for me to keep track of. Their lives were too short and miserable to be worth noticing. I had more important things to do.
“The village is called Sosnovka, Mistress,” Praskovia told me. She stood with her hands folded in front, palms together, in the ritual gesture of a Solstice priestess.
“The pine village.”
“Yes, Mistress.” Praskovia bowed her head. “It’s no more than twenty-five versts by the main road. You’ll recognize it by the pine grove nearby.”
Twenty-five versts meant half a day of travel with a wagon in tow. We had to leave very early to make it back by nightfall. Still, fair was fair. Each village had to have an equal chance, no matter how far it was from the capital.
“The villagers know who they want me to take?” I asked.
It didn’t matter. If they hadn’t prepared an acceptable maiden to be taken, all the worse for them. I had the authority to pick any one I liked. Still, it was good to know in advance. I didn’t like to come unprepared.
“Yes, Mistress.” Praskovia’s eyes slid over me with a tenderness I found disturbing. I looked away. I had no room for petty human feelings. My strength was in my detachment. Anything else was the surest way into the evil clutches of Love.
“Tell them to saddle Sunset for me at dawn,” I told her. “And, leave me. I will sleep now.”
Sunset’s auburn coat glimmered in the sun, making him glow like an ember fresh from the firepit. As the first houses of the village appeared ahead of us, I pulled him to a stop and patted his steaming neck, waiting for my guards and the wagon to catch up. I felt a pang of regret at having to break the canter, but I kept my face still as I watched them approach. I couldn’t possibly show my guards that I enjoyed the ride. Besides, I had to enter the village properly, as befitted my station and my solemn task.
The pair of heavy draught horses pulling the wagon acknowledged Sunset with brief snorts as they worked their way up the muddy track. This village was no different from others. Peasants in our kingdom never took time to fix the roads.
Rows of log houses lined the street, their dark windows gaping at us like ethereal eyes. No one came out to greet us, and this absence of welcome, while natural, made me feel eerie as I rode on, finding reassurance in the smacking sound of the horses’ hooves and cursing of the wagon driver behind.
I had never been to this particular village, but I knew where we were headed. The well.
A small crowd gathered there watched us in silence. Mostly old crones, undoubtedly there since morning to gossip about my arrival. I rode up to them feeling mild relief that the village was not deserted as it originally seemed. I followed their unspoken signs, falling into the familiar game. No one would openly point me to the maiden, yet they all knew I must find her, and their looks, their gestures, aided me every step of the way.
A tall matron, her round face peeking out of a wrapped headscarf like a hen out of its nest, glanced at me briefly and slid her gaze toward a pair of younger women down a side street. They all looked solemn, as if attending a funeral. I signaled my wagon driver to wait and walked my horse in that direction, where the crowds thickened and the hesitant gazes of the villagers eventually led me from group to group and on to an izba at the end of the lane.
It was an old, crooked house. The logs composing its walls were laid unevenly, as if placed by a drunken builder. The man and woman standing in its doorway looked sad, but not desperate. They must have prepared themselves.
Good. I hated tearful scenes.
I rode up and stopped my horse in front of their rickety wooden fence.
The man gave me a long glance, his sunburnt face etched with wrinkles so deep that they made his face look like an old woodcarving. Then he turned and pulled a girl out of the darkness behind the doorway. He pushed her forward, holding her elbow from behind and I saw her stumble and wince from the force of his grip.
“Mistress, this is my youngest daughter.” His voice wavered, echoed by distant sobbing from the depths of the house. The woman cast a frightened glance into the dark doorway. Warning her other daughters not to reveal themselves to me. I forced myself to ignore it, surveying my quarry.
She wore a plain, baggy linen dress. A dirt-gray knitted scarf covered her lowered head, hiding her hair and part of her face from view. Her eyes looked swollen and her cheeks puffed, as if she had been crying for a very long time.
“Remove your scarf,” I told the girl.
She had dark blond hair, the color most common in our villages. She had pulled it all back into a tight braid, and tucked it into her dress—the usual style for a village maiden—it came in handy when they did their housework. What showed of her braid, though, looked thick enough to be pleasing when we let her hair loose on the night of the Solstice. I leaned forward in the saddle to take a closer look at her face. Her features would be pretty when she had a chance to calm down. My servants would see to it.
Under her mask of tears she looked very young and innocent, barely of age. My instincts told me she must be a virgin. The villagers must believe it too, or they wouldn’t have offered her to me. After years of the Solstice Sacrifices they knew better. I saw no need to verify it on the spot, leaving the task to my women for later. No need for ugly scenes.
I straightened in my saddle, turning around to look at the frightened, expectant faces all around me. Silence wavered in the air like a heavy woolen curtain.
I felt the weight of their anxiety upon me as I turned to my guards and said: “Very well. Bring her along.”
I watched my guards lead the girl into the wagon and bolt the door before mounting their heavy horses and taking positions on the outside for our long ride back. She didn’t try to fight. She didn’t even turn to look back as she bent her head and climbed in, settling on the straw mattress inside. Good. No trouble, then.
Sighs of relief followed me all the way to the village gate. I could still hear their echo in my head as I sent Sunset into a trot along the road, winding over the nearby hill. I shut them out as I rushed to leave the village behind.
Another gruesome task done. I did not need to dwell on it any longer.
When we finally made it back to the paved streets that led up into the palace plaza I felt exhausted. A day in the saddle, with very little food and no time for a proper rest stop took its toll. I did not look forward to facing the crowd that I knew would be waiting at the palace walls. I barely held up in my saddle, too tired to think straight. So, when a young man stepped out of the crowd right in front of my horse, it took me by surprise.
I pulled Sunset to an abrupt stop not to run this man over. My disbelief at his audacity gave way to surprise and, belatedly, to irritation as I saw my guards rushing to my side. Dawdling fools, too slow to keep up with my horse.
Instead of cowering and retreating back into the crowd, the young villager stood his ground. My heart raced in alarm, but he showed no sign of attacking, just stood there with a smile on his face. A rather stupid smile, in fact, as if he had encountered a long-lost friend. My curiosity piqued again. A simpleton? A village idiot—likely banished from his own village for stupidity. He certainly looked the part, from his disheveled straw-colored hair, to his simple linen shirt and trousers, ragged as if he had been wearing them for months. And yet, something about his smile held my gaze. I stopped my guards, ready to trample the man, so that I could look at him just a moment longer.
His smile held childlike wo
nder of one beholding a miracle. It creased his freckled face and lit up his eyes, blue like cornflowers in a field of ripe wheat. I felt warmth wash over me, echoing through my tired body as I looked into those eyes. It made me feel invigorated, as if an invisible stream of power emanating from him cradled me it its beams.
I shook it off.
“You’re in my way,” I said.
His smile widened. “You are so beautiful.”
His voice was so clear, so intense, even though he spoke quietly. It echoed through the plaza that had grown deathly still, watching us. Against reason, his words sent shivers down my spine.
I recognized trouble.
I had been complimented many times by men much more impressive than him. And yet, they’d never made me feel like this.
They’d never made me feel.
I struggled for words, but he seemed to have no lack of them.
“Can I come and visit you in the castle? I would very much like to get a chance to know you better.”
His eyes continued to draw me in. Their cornflower blue held warmth, a mischievous vigor I had never seen before. I knew I should stop looking, but instead, I looked closer and saw something else I had missed at first. Beneath his childlike wonder, his eyes held sorrow. Old pain, surely older than he could possibly be. I felt an urge to come closer to him, to touch his hand.
Stop it, you fool. I forced my eyes away from his face and looked past him at the crowd of frozen onlookers, then at my nearest guard.
“Don’t harm him,” I said. “Just get him out of my way.”
I urged Sunset to side-step the man and continue on towards the palace. A whip cracked behind me, followed by a grunt and gasps in the crowd, but I never looked back.
My room occupied the entire floor of the East Tower of the palace. Its gray, roughly hewn walls lay in a circle, covered by plain hangings to keep out the worst of the drafts. As I stepped in, smells of herbs, stone, and old parchment enfolded me, soothing and familiar like welcoming hands. Calm spread over me as I glanced around at the simple furnishings, the things necessary for my life and my magic. Basic, essential things, nothing that could induce feeling, that could bond me in any way. A low wooden bed; shelves of books running along the wall; a tall dark wardrobe in the corner; a massive chest between two narrow windows bearing the sacred objects for the Solstice Ceremony; the Mirror in its dark wooden frame, between the shelves and the door. And, of course, Raven’s perch, a large, gnarled branch of an ancient tree fixed above the shelf in the corner.