The Winter of the Witch (Winternight Trilogy #3)(38)

“Go away,” snapped the woman.

And, unbelievably, the Bear bowed to them both, and slunk away through the dark. His servants, shambling, the hell-light gone from their eyes, followed him.





13.


    Baba Yaga




THE SOUNDS OF THE NIGHT resumed. Vasya’s feet were numb in the water. The golden mare’s head hung low. The old woman pursed her lips, inspecting girl and horse.

“Babushka,” said Vasya cautiously. “Thank you for our lives.”

“If you want to stand in the lake until you grow fins, that is your affair,” the old woman replied. “Otherwise come to the fire.”

She stumped away, added sticks to the blaze. Vasya waded out of the lake. But the mare did not move. “You are bleeding,” Vasya said to her, trying to get a look at the gash on her foreleg.

The mare’s ears were still pinned to her head. Finally, she said, I ran, while the others flew, to lead the upyry away. But they were too fast, and then my leg was torn and I could not fly.

“I can help you,” Vasya volunteered.

The mare made no answer. But suddenly Vasya understood her stillness, the golden head sunk low. “Do you fear being bound again? Because you are wounded? Do not be afraid. I killed the sorcerer. Tamara is dead too.” She could feel the old woman at her back, listening. “I have no rope here, let alone a golden bridle. I will not touch you without your leave; come to the fire.”

Vasya suited action to word, making her own way to the fire. The mare stood still, the set of her ears uncertain. The old woman was standing on the other side of the flames, waiting for Vasya. Her hair was white. But her face was a distorted mirror of the girl’s own.

    Vasya stared, with shock, hunger, recognition.

The forest still seemed thick with eyes, watching. There was an instant of perfect silence. Then the woman said, “What is your name?”

“Vasilisa Petrovna,” said Vasya.

“What was your mother’s name?”

“Marina Ivanovna,” said Vasya. “Her mother was called Tamara, the girl who put a bridle on the firebird.”

The woman’s eyes roved over Vasya’s torn and bruised face, her cropped hair, her clothes, and perhaps more than anything the expression in the girl’s eyes. “I’m surprised you didn’t frighten the Bear off,” said the old woman, drily. “With your face so frightful. Or perhaps he liked it. Hard to know, with that one.” Her hands were trembling.

Vasya said nothing.

“Tamara and her sister were my daughters. Long ago, it would seem to you.”

Vasya knew that. “How are you alive?” she whispered.

“I’m not,” said the old woman. “I died before you were born. But this is Midnight.”

The golden mare broke their silence with splashing as she stepped out of the lake. As one, they turned to the horse. The firelight gleamed cruelly on the scars of whip and spur. “A pitiful pair you make,” said the old woman.

Vasya said, “Babushka, we are both in need of help.”

“Pozhar first,” said the old woman. “She is bleeding still.”

“Is that her name?”

A shrug. “What name would compass a creature like her? It is only what I call her.”



* * *





BUT HELPING THE MARE was not so easy. Pozhar laid back her ears if either of them tried to touch her. When she switched her tail, showers of sparks tumbled to the summer earth. One began to smolder; Vasya put it out with a booted foot. “Wounded or no, you are a menace.”

    The old woman snorted. The mare glared. But Pozhar was exhausted, too. At last, when Vasya ran a hand from her shoulder to her knee, she only shuddered. “This is going to hurt,” said Vasya grimly. “You are not to kick.”

I am not promising anything, said the mare, ears pinned.

Between them, they convinced the mare to stand still long enough for the girl to sew up her leg, although Vasya had a few new bruises by the time it was done. After, when a shaken Pozhar had escaped, limping, to graze at a safe distance, Vasya sank to the earth beside the fire, pushing sweaty hair off her face. Her clothes had dried in the heat of the mare’s body. It was still blackest night, although it seemed hours since the Bear had come.

The woman had a pot in her basket, salt, some onions. When she thrust her hand in the lake, she withdrew fish, as naturally as a woman pulls bread from her own oven. She set about making soup, as though it were not midnight.

Vasya watched her. “Is it your house?” she asked. “The house by the oak-tree?”

The old woman was gutting the fish and didn’t look up. “It was, once.”

“The chest—did you leave it there? For me to find?”

“Yes,” said the woman, still not looking up.

“You knew that I—you are the witch of the wood then,” said Vasya. “Who tends the horses.” She thought of Marya and the old, dread name, the fairy-tale name, came to her lips unbidden. With a shiver, she said, “Baba Yaga. You are my great-grandmother.”

The old woman brayed a short laugh. The fish guts shone darkly between her fingers when she flung them back into the lake. “Near enough, I suppose. This witch and that were woven into a single fairy tale. Perhaps I am one of the witches.”