The Girl in the Tower (The Winternight Trilogy #2)(67)

Marya nodded. “I am glad we went riding,” she whispered. “Even if Mother is angry. And I am glad we jumped over the Tatar.”

“So am I,” said Vasya.

Varvara took the child firmly by the hand and began towing her away. “My mistress wishes to see you in the chapel,” said Varvara over her shoulder. “Vasilii Petrovich.”



IT DID NOT OCCUR to Vasya to disobey. The chapel was crowned with a small forest of domes and not hard to find. Vasya stepped into the disapproving gaze of a hundred icons and waited.

Soon enough, Olga joined her there, walking heavily, with her time almost upon her. She crossed herself, bowed her head before the icon-screen, and then turned on her sister.

“Varvara tells me,” said Olga without preamble, “that you went riding at sunup and paraded my daughter through the streets. Is this true, Vasya?”

“Yes,” said Vasya, chilled at Olga’s tone. “We went riding. But I did not—”

“Mother of God, Vasya!” said Olga. What little color she had fled from her face. “Have you no thought for my daughter’s reputation? This is not Lesnaya Zemlya!”

“Her reputation?” asked Vasya. “Of course I care for her reputation. She spoke to no one. She was properly dressed; she covered her hair. I am her uncle, they say. Why can I not take her riding?”

“Because it is not—” Olga paused and dragged in air. “She must stay in the terem. Virgin girls mayn’t leave it. My daughter must learn to be still. As it is, you will have unsettled her for a month, and ruined her reputation forever, if we are unlucky.”

“Stay in these rooms, you mean? This tower?” Vasya’s eyes went involuntarily to the shuttered slit of a window, to the massed ranks of the icons. “Forever? But she is brave and clever. You can’t mean—”

“I do mean,” returned Olga, coldly. “Don’t interfere again, or I swear that I will tell Dmitrii Ivanovich who you are, and you will go to a convent. Enough. Go. Amuse yourself. The day is barely an hour old, and already I am tired of you.” She turned for the door.

Vasya, stricken, spoke before she could think. Olga stilled at the lash of her voice. “Do you have to stay here? Do you ever go anywhere, Olya?”

Olga’s shoulders stiffened. “I do well enough,” she said. “I am a princess.”

“But, Olya,” said Vasya, coming nearer. “Do you want to stay here?”

“Little girl,” said Olga, rounding on her with a flash of real rage, “do you think it matters—for any of us—what we want? Do you think I have any indulgence for any of this—for your mad starts, your reckless immodesty?”

Vasya stared, silenced and stiff.

“I am not our stepmother,” Olga continued. “I will not have it. You are not a child, Vasya. Just think, if you could only have listened for once, then Father would still be alive. Remember that, and be still!”

Vasya’s throat worked, but the words would not come. At last she said, eyes fixed on memory beyond the chapel walls, “I— They meant to send me away. Father wasn’t there. I was afraid. I didn’t mean for him—”

“That is enough!” snapped Olga. “Enough, Vasya. That is a child’s excuse, and you are a woman. What’s done is done. But you might mend your ways in future. Keep quiet, until the festival is over, for the love of God.”

Vasya’s lips felt cold. As a child she had daydreamed of her beautiful sister, living in a palace, like the fairy-tale Olga with her eagle-prince. But now those childish dreams dwindled to this: an aging woman, magnificent and solitary, whose tower door never opened, who would make her daughter a proper maiden but never count the cost.

Olga looked into Vasya’s eyes with a touch of weary understanding. “Come, now,” she said. “Living is both better and worse than fairy tales; you must learn it sometime, and so must my daughter. Do not look so, like a hawk with clipped wings. Marya will be all right. She is too young still for great scandal, fortunately, and hopefully she was not recognized. She will learn her place in time, and be happy.”

“Will she?” Vasya asked.

“Yes,” said Olga firmly. “She will. As will you. I love you, little sister. I will do my best for you, I swear it. You will have children in your turn, and servants to manage, and all this misfortune will be forgot.”

Vasya barely heard. The walls of the chapel were stifling her, as though Olga’s long, airless years had a shape and a flavor that she could breathe. She managed a nod. “Forgive me then, Olga,” she said, and walked past her sister, out the door, and down the steps into the roar of festival gathering below. If Olga tried to call her back, she did not hear.





18.


Horse-Tamer




Kasyan met her at the gate.

“I thought you came to drink wine with me,” Vasya said.

Kasyan snorted. “Well, you are here,” he returned easily. “And wine can be got. You look as though you could use it.” The dark glance found hers. “Well, Vasilii Petrovich? Did your sister break a bowl over your head, and bid you marry your niece at once, to redeem her lost virtue?”

Vasya was not entirely sure if Kasyan was joking. “No,” she said shortly. “But she was very angry. I—thank you for helping me return Marya to the house without the steward and the guard seeing.”