The Bear and the Nightingale(80)

She tore her eyes away. “Why did you bring me here?”

“My horse insisted.”

“You mock me.”

“Do I? You had been wandering in the forest too long; your feet and hands are frozen. Perhaps you should be honored; I don’t often have guests.”

“I am honored, then,” said Vasya. She could not think of anything else to say.

He studied her a moment more. “Are you hungry?”

Vasya heard the hesitation in his voice. “Did your horse suggest that as well?” she asked, before she could stop herself.

The man laughed, and she thought he looked a little surprised. “Yes, of course. She has had any number of foals. I yield to her judgment.”

Suddenly he tilted his head. The blue eyes burned. “My servants will tend to you,” he added abruptly. “I must be gone awhile.” There was nothing human in his face, and for a moment, Vasya could not see the man at all, and instead saw only a wind lashing the limbs of ancient trees, howling in triumph as it rose. She blinked away the vision.

“Farewell,” said the frost-demon, and was gone.

Vasya, taken aback by his departure, glanced cautiously about. The tapestries drew her. Vividly alive, the wolves and man and horses looked ready to leap to the floor in a swirl of cold air. She walked the room, examining them as she went. Eventually she fetched up in front of the oven and stretched out her frozen fingers.

The scrape of a hoof sent her whirling round. The white mare came toward her, bare of any harness. Her long mane foamed like a spring cascade. She seemed to have emerged from a door in the opposite wall, but it was closed. Vasya stared. The mare tossed her head. Vasya remembered her manners and bowed. “I thank you, lady. You saved my life.”

The mare twitched an ear. It was little enough.

“Not to me,” said Vasya, with a hint of asperity.

I did not mean that, said the mare. I meant that you are a creature as we are, formed raw from the powers of the world. You would have saved yourself. You are not formed for convents, nor yet to live as the Bear’s creature.

“Would I have?” said Vasya, remembering the running, the terror, the footsteps in the dark. “I wasn’t doing too well at it. But what do you mean, the powers of the world? We were all made by God.”

I suppose this God taught you our speech?

“Of course not,” said Vasya. “That was the vazila. I made him offerings.”

The mare scraped a hoof against the floor. I remember more and see more than you, she said. And will for a considerable time. We do not speak to many, and the spirit of horses does not reveal himself to anyone. There is magic in your bones. You must reckon with it.

“Am I damned, then?” Vasya whispered, frightened.

I do not understand “damned.” You are. And because you are, you can walk where you will, into peace, oblivion, or pits of fire, but you will always choose.

There was a pause. Vasya’s face hurt, and her sight had begun to fracture. The snowy countryside tugged at the edges of her vision.

There is mead on the table, the mare said, seeing the girl’s drooping shoulders. You should drink, then rest again. There will be food when you awaken.

Vasya had not eaten since suppertime, before she’d ventured into the forest. Her stomach took a moment, forcefully, to remind her. A wooden table stood on the other side of the oven, dark with age, rich with carving. The silver flagon upon it was garlanded with silver flowers. The cup was of hammered silver studded with fire-red gems. For a moment the girl forgot her hunger. She lifted the cup and tilted it in the light. It was beautiful. She looked a question at the mare.

He likes objects, she said, though I do not understand why. And he is a great giver of gifts.

The flagon indeed contained mead: thin and strong and somehow piercing, like winter sunshine. Drinking it, Vasya felt suddenly sleepy. Heavy-eyed, it was all she could do to put down the silver cup. She bowed in silence to the white mare and stumbled back to the great bed.



ALL THAT DAY, a storm tore across the frozen lands of northern Rus’. The country folk ran inside and barred their doors. Even the oven-fires in Dmitrii’s wooden palace in Moscow danced and guttered. The old and the sick knew their time had come and slipped away on the crying wind. The living crossed themselves when they felt the shadow pass. But at nightfall the air quieted, and the sky filled with the promise of snow. Those who had resisted the summons smiled, for they knew that they would live.

A man with dark hair emerged from between two trees and raised his face to a cloud-torn sky. His eyes glowed an unearthly blue as he scanned the mounting shadows. His robe was of fur and midnight brocade, though he had come to the twilit borderlands where winter yielded to the promise of spring. The ground was thick with snowdrops.

A song pierced the newborn night, thin and soft and sweet. Even as he turned toward it, Morozko tasted the darker side of the magic he had set in motion, for the music reminded him of sorrow: of slow hours heavy with regret. This sorrow he had not felt—had not been able to feel—for a thousand years.

He walked on regardless, until he came to the tree where a nightingale sang in the dark.

“Little one, will you come back with me?” he said.

The tiny creature hopped to a lower branch and cocked its dull-brown head.

“To live, as your brothers and sisters have lived,” said Morozko. “I have a companion for you.”