The Forest of Vanishing Stars(28)

Rosalia’s grip was firm but not crushing, and her eyes were kind as she assessed Yona. “Leib tells me you are here to help us. And that you are the one responsible for last night’s bounty of fish.”

Yona ducked her head. “The fish were Aleksander’s and Leib’s doing, too.”

“They were much appreciated, Yona. We’ve been very hungry.”

Yona had the feeling she had passed some sort of test. “You have a gun,” she said, gesturing to the weapon in Rosalia’s hands.

Rosalia looked down, almost as if she was surprised to realize it was there. “Oh, yes. It belongs to Aleksander. He and I take turns guarding the camp. Leib, too.”

“That’s wise.” Yona glanced around. “Of course Ruth has the children, but what about Sulia and Miriam? They’re young, healthy. Do they not take a turn?”

“They are wary of guns.” Rosalia’s voice was a serene thrum. “It’s just as well. Those who protect the group must be confident.”

Yona nodded. Rosalia hadn’t taken the opportunity to criticize the other two women, and she appreciated that.

“Have you used a gun before, Yona?” Rosalia asked.

“No.”

“But how do you protect yourself out here? Leib said you’d been in the forest for a long time.”

“I avoid people.”

“Surely the forests are crawling with partisans now, though.”

She thought of the footsteps she and Jerusza could hear in the forest, the way Jerusza had warned her to stay hidden, their journey to the swamp in the summer of 1941 to avoid Russian soldiers fleeing from the German onslaught. “I have learned to stay away. To keep to myself.”

“That sounds very lonely.”

Yona bowed her head. How could she explain that she had never really felt alone, because she didn’t know what it felt like to be with people? She understood now, though, that her yearning to visit the villages on the forest’s edge might have been exactly that, a longing deep within her, a loneliness she hadn’t known a name for. “Perhaps.”

“And yet you are here now. With us. No longer alone.” The words weren’t exactly a question, but Yona felt the curiosity in them. The other woman was trying to understand her. Yona wished she could explain, but she could hardly grasp the decisions she had made in the last twenty-four hours, which went against everything she knew.

“There was a family,” she began, but then she didn’t know how to explain Chana and the strange dynamic with the girl’s parents, or the way she had let them down so terribly. “I failed them. I—I did not do enough. And they were killed.”

Realization sparked in Rosalia’s eyes. “They were like us. Jews.”

“Yes.”

“You are a Jew, too?”

“I was raised by one.” She looked away, feeling a surge of guilt. How was she supposed to explain to anyone what it was to feel a part of a religion that would perhaps never be hers? “But we’re all children of the same God, don’t you think?”

“I think the Germans would disagree. I think they would want to know just what is in your blood.” Rosalia looked as if she wanted to say more, but Aleksander interrupted by striding up to them.

“I think we are ready to move,” he said.

Yona scanned the campsite. It had indeed been dismantled, packed away, and the girls were back with their mother, who was carefully picking through their basket of berries. But they couldn’t go yet; the campsite was still full of signs that people had lived there, cooked there. It would be a poison arrow handed to the Germans, pointed in the direction the group had gone. “First,” she said, “we must erase all signs that we’ve been here at all, as best we can.”

Aleksander nodded and glanced skyward. “But it will be dark in a few hours. We should be on our way, so we can cover more ground.”

Yona understood what he was saying. With a group largely composed of older people and children, it would be difficult to move without daylight. They would need to learn how to navigate by the stars, to walk by the light of the moon, but not tonight. “We will do our best here, quickly, and then we’ll move. We will walk until twilight and find a place to settle.”

It took a few seconds before he nodded. “Very well.”

A few minutes later, with Rosalia standing guard and the two little girls perched on a fallen tree, eating berries with Leon, Oscher, and Bina, Aleksander called out to the group, “We must scrub the clearing of signs we’ve been here.”

“It looks empty now,” Leib said, looking around.

“Not to those who are accustomed to tracking,” Yona replied.

“Tell us what to do, Yona,” Aleksander said.

Yona took a deep breath and tried to ignore Sulia’s pursed lips, the glances Oscher and Moshe exchanged, the way Miriam and Luba were regarding her dubiously. “Luba, Miriam, gather big branches and sweep away all the footprints you see in the dirt around the outskirts, working your way back to the clearing, making sure you erase your own prints as you go. Leon, Oscher, if you can manage, please scan the campsite for any burned logs, embers, and ash—any sign that there have been man-made fires here—and put them in a stack, over there. Leib, you take them to the stream and submerge them. Sulia, please sweep the places all of you slept for any trace that you’ve been here—imprints in the dirt, leaves in unnatural piles, even fallen strands of hair. Moshe, you and Aleksander should take the bark that you used for roofs and spread it around the forest floor so that it looks untouched.”