The Fifth Doll(10)

Again she glanced toward the door, keeping her eyes down in hopes that Slava would not notice. She could outrun him, couldn’t she? Take the doll and flee into the wood? She did not know the way to any other villages or towns, but surely she’d find one eventually . . .

She eyed the kite, wondering how well trained he was. Did Slava use him to hunt?

But the bird was hardly her biggest worry. She remembered how her father’s doll had looked cradled in Slava’s hands, its body little more than an eggshell. She couldn’t run off with both, not now. And what of her mother’s doll? Roksana’s? Feodor’s?

“Please,” she begged, daring to look up at Slava’s face. While not unkind, it was tired, calculating. A face she didn’t feel confident trusting. “I don’t . . . I don’t understand why . . .”

Slava nodded, the faintest smile touching his lips. He selected a doll seemingly at random—Jaska Maysak’s doll. Matrona stared at it, drawn to its dark eyes. It was well dressed, not in a potter’s apron, but in simple slacks and a gray shirt. The paint used for his face and hands was a smidge darker than that of the surrounding dolls, and several shades darker than Matrona’s own. Somehow Slava had even mastered the unkemptness of the potter’s hair. Oddly, the image of Jaska looked older than he was at present. When had Slava painted this likeness?

“Do you know how these work?” he asked, giving Jaska’s doll a small shake. Something rattled within.

Matrona shook her head.

“They come from a distant island. To get there, you have to travel far over land and across a sliver of sea,” Slava explained. “A narrow isle steeped in tradition and war, full of a studious and honor-bound people. I went there long ago, on one of my journeys, and found something similar to this in a small hut.” He turned Jaska over, his fingers crossing the potter’s clothes like spider legs. Matrona quelled the sudden desire to snatch the doll away. “I could sense the dolls’ magical properties immediately. It requires expert craftsmanship to create them, and I learned all I could.

“You see, inside every doll is another doll,” he said, and Matrona felt the skin between her eyebrows crinkle. “And inside that doll is another doll, and another. However many the maker wishes to create. Your doll, Matrona, is actually five dolls, each hollowed out to fit the next. They all are,” he added, gesturing to the others.

Matrona glanced down at her miniature and rubbed the pad of her thumb along the seam. She gave it a gentle shake. Whatever lay nestled inside was large and had little room for movement. Another doll? Did it also bear her likeness? How strange.

“To understand what I need you to learn, you need to separate yourself from the rest of the village,” Slava explained. Matrona’s head snapped up, her stomach sinking, and the old man had the audacity to chuckle at her. “You will still be here, if that is your worry. It is . . .” He waved his hand in a circular motion before her, and Matrona could see him picking through his thoughts the way her father so often did, searching for perhaps the sweetest or tamest words to explain something she couldn’t possibly fathom.

Heat prickled beneath her skin, and before she could cage the words, she said, “I’m sure I’ll understand you if you speak bluntly, Tradesman.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Yes, I’m sure you will, Dairymaid,” and he smiled at the foolish nickname. “But there are some things I cannot merely explain, which is why you must open the dolls. But—” He added the last word hastily and set down Jaska’s doll without taking his eyes from her. “You must not open all of your dolls at once. Are you listening carefully, Matrona Vitsin? You must open them one at a time, slowly, and under my supervision, or else there will be grave consequences.”

The kite watched her with both eyes.

Matrona stiffened, her fingers clutching her doll as though they were talons. “What sort of consequences?”

“You will see, if you are foolish.” Bitterness leaked into his voice. He looked over the large table, but Matrona could not determine which doll had caught his attention. Seconds later, his gaze returned to her. “You must also promise not to tell another soul about the dolls. Give me your word, on your honor, not to speak of it.”

Matrona bit her lip.

Slava’s gaze darkened. “You know what I can do. I did not intend to threaten, Matrona, but it is easier than the alternative. This is for the good of the village, as you will learn.”

She found enough moisture in her mouth to say, “You would have me swear it? But the Good Book—”

Slava grumbled. “You must swear it, regardless of God.”

Regardless of God. It was near blasphemy. Still, the memories of her father’s condition forced her to bob her head.

It was enough for Slava. “Very good. You will open your doll now, just one, and place it on the table.” He gestured to the empty spot on the leftmost tabletop. “Then you will return to me in three days’ time to open the next. Understood?”

Again, she nodded, her hands sweating against the glazed paint of the doll, her dress too hot against her skin. Just open it, she told herself. Open it and leave. How desperately her lungs ached for fresh air.

She twisted the two pieces a hair’s breadth. “What will happen?”

“You will be unharmed.” Slava folded his arms. “The rest will soon become apparent.”