The Winter of the Witch (Winternight Trilogy #3)(3)

Olga said, slow with exhaustion, “This house is safe. But what of the city? Do you think Dmitrii Ivanovich or his poor fool of a wife are sending servants out with bread to feed the children that this night has orphaned?”

The girl sitting on the oven-bench paled, and her teeth sank into her lower lip. She said, “I am sure Dmitrii Ivanovich is making clever plans to take vengeance on the Tatars, and the impoverished will just have to wait. But that does not mean—”

A shriek from above cut her off, and then the sound of hurrying footsteps. All three women glared at the door with identical expressions. What now?

The nurse burst into the room, quivering. Two waiting-women panted in her wake. “Masha,” the nurse gasped. “Masha—she is missing.”

Olga was instantly on her feet. Masha—Marya—was her only daughter, the one who had been stolen from her bed just the night before. “Call in the men,” Olga snapped.

But the younger girl tilted her head, as though she were listening. “No,” said the girl. Every head in the room whipped round. The waiting-women and the nurse exchanged dark glances. “She’s gone outside.”

    “Then that—” Olga began, but the other interrupted, “I know where she is. Let me go and get her.”

Olga gave the younger girl a long look, which she returned steadily. The day before, Olga would have said that she’d never trust her mad sister with one of her children.

“Where?” Olga asked.

“The stable.”

“Very well,” said Olga. “But, Vasya, bring Masha back before the lamps are lit. And if she is not there, tell me at once.”

The girl nodded, looking rueful, and got to her feet. Only when she moved could one see that she was favoring one side. She had a broken rib.



* * *





VASILISA PETROVNA FOUND MARYA where she’d expected, curled up asleep in the straw of a bay stallion’s stall. The stall door was open, though the stallion was not tied. Vasya entered, but did not wake the child. Instead she leaned against the great horse’s shoulder, pressing her cheek to the silky skin.

The bay stallion put his head around and nosed irrepressibly at her pockets. She smiled, her first real smile of that long day, drew a crust of bread from her sleeve and fed it to him.

“Olga will not rest,” she said. “She puts us all to shame.”

You have not rested either, returned the horse, blowing warm air onto her face.

Vasya, flinching, pushed him away; his hot breath pained the burns on her scalp and cheek. “I do not deserve to rest,” she said. “I caused the fire; I must make what amends I can.”

No, said Solovey, and stamped. The Zhar Ptitsa caused the fire, although you should have listened to me before setting her loose. She was maddened with imprisonment.

    “Where did she come from?” Vasya asked. “How did Kasyan, of all people, put a bridle on a creature like that?”

Solovey looked troubled. His ears tilted forward and back, and his tail lashed his flanks. I do not know how. I remember someone shouting, and someone weeping. I remember wings, and blood in blue water. He stamped again, shaking his mane. Nothing more.

He looked so distressed that Vasya scratched the stallion’s withers and said, “Never mind. Kasyan is dead and his horse is gone.” She changed the subject. “The domovoi said Masha was here.”

Of course she’s here, returned the horse, looking superior. Even if she doesn’t know how to speak to me yet, she knows I will kick anyone who tries to hurt her.

This was not an idle threat coming from seventeen hands of stallion.

“I cannot blame her for coming to you,” Vasya said. She scratched the horse’s withers again, and the stallion’s ears flopped with delight. “When I was small, I always ran to the stable at the first sign of trouble. But this is not Lesnaya Zemlya. Olya was frightened when they found her gone. I must take her back.”

The little girl in the straw stirred and whimpered. Vasya dropped gingerly to her knees, trying not to jar her sore side, just as Marya came awake, thrashing. The child’s head butted into Vasya’s ribs, and she narrowly avoided a scream; her vision went black around the edges.

“Hush, Masha,” Vasya said, when she could speak again. “Hush. It’s me. It’s all right. You’re all right. You’re safe.”

The child subsided, rigid in the older girl’s arms. The big horse put down his head and nosed her hair. She looked up. He lipped her nose very gently, and Marya squeaked out a tiny giggle. Then she buried her face in the older girl’s shoulder and wept.

“Vasochka, Vasochka, I don’t remember anything,” she whispered between sobs. “I just remember being scared—”

Vasya remembered being scared, too. At the child’s words, images from the night before crossed her mind like flung darts. A horse of fire, rearing up. The sorcerer withering, crumpling to the floor. Marya ensorcelled, blank-faced, obedient.

And the winter-king’s voice. As I could, I loved you.

Vasya shook her head, as though motion could dispel memory. “You don’t have to remember; not yet,” she said gently to the girl. “You are safe now; it is over.”

    “It doesn’t feel like it is over,” whispered the child. “I can’t remember! How do I know if it’s over or not?”