The Fifth Doll(29)

The dolls watched her enter. All their faces looked forward, as if in anticipation of her arrival. Matrona tried not to shiver under their relentless, flat stares, but her resolve could go only so far. She hoped Slava had not seen her shudder.

She stared back, her gaze jumping from face to face. There was Boris, Pavel, Oleg, Roksana, Irena, Lenore, Nastasya, Darya, herself. Slava moved for her doll, and Matrona stepped to the side, inching closer to the watching kite, to study more of the faces. She found Jaska and his siblings, Feodor, the Avdovin clan. A few of the faces took longer to recognize, for they were either younger or older versions of the people they represented. Children were depicted as adults, their faces still round in Slava’s style of art. A few of the elderly were youthful, free of the wrinkles they bore in life. Matrona wondered, briefly, what had inspired Slava to draw some of the villagers old and others young.

Slava turned about, his large hands wrapped around her third doll, but Matrona did not meet his eyes. She turned, scanning the dolls on the shelves. Slava said nothing, and when Matrona’s attention returned to him, she asked, “Tradesman, where is your doll?”

Slava’s expression did not alter the slightest bit, not even a twitch of an eyebrow. “You assume I have one?” he asked.

“Everyone has one.” Matrona gestured to the full tables. She could not think of a single person in her acquaintance that was not represented among the figures, and there was not a single doll she did not recognize. “But I don’t see yours.”

“Hmm.” He lifted her doll in his hands. He removed the first two layers and presented Matrona with the third. “It is time.”

Matrona folded her arms. “You will not answer me?”

He held out her doll.

Swallowing back a complaint, Matrona took the doll in her hand, looking it over. It was the length of her hand, and today she wore the red sarafan that matched it. She turned it over, studying its back. Ran the pad of her thumb along the seam.

“Why must I do this?” she asked, half a whisper.

“I have explained it to you.”

“Have you?” she asked, feeling bold, ignoring a second hiss from Pamyat.

Slava’s lips drooped. “You must find your center, Matrona. You cannot understand any of this until that is done.”

Matrona took a long breath and let it out slowly. She examined the doll. “What will happen this time?”

“You will see.”

“You will tell me.” Her tongue was whip-like in her mouth. How her mother would fuss should she say such a thing at home. “I’ve endured two burdens for your sake already, tarnished my name among the villagers, and hurt my relationship with my parents. I nearly lost my engagement because—”

“You mentioned it the last time you were here,” Slava cut in. “Open the doll, Matrona. You must comprehend what I have done for you before you can help the others.”

Matrona’s breath paused in her lungs. Help the others? What was wrong with them?

Slava planted his hands on his hips, making him look broader in the poor light. “How old are you now, Matrona?”

Her gaze flickered from the doll to him. “Twenty-six. Why?”

“Then perhaps nothing will happen at all.” He dropped his hands. “I am weary. Open the doll before I force your hand.”

She gritted her teeth together. So much for conversation, she thought, and clutched the head of the doll in one hand, the base in the other. Her heart sped, making her feel light headed.

“What can he do that’s worse than what he’s already done?” Jaska’s voice whispered in her thoughts.

Squeezing her eyes shut, Matrona twisted the halves and pulled until their snug sealing opened with a faint pop. She held her breath, but as before, she felt no change overtake her. Opening her eyes, she looked down at the doll. A fourth doll sat inside it, identical to its counterparts, save for the simplified details to the clothes and kokoshnik. As Matrona fingered the small fourth doll, however, she noticed the third doll was different from the first two.

The inside was painted completely black.

She held the top piece toward the lamp, causing Pamyat to rustle on his perch. Entirely black, not a sliver of clean wood to be seen. The bottom half, too. She wondered at it.

Slava’s hands overpowered hers and pulled the dolls away. Her signal to leave, but as she turned for the door, the tradesman said, “You will return in three days. Do not try to thwart me again, Matrona.”

She glanced his way; he reassembled her doll and put it back on the table before meeting her eyes. She thought of the satchel and bridle and asked, “Will you be here in three days?”

His eyes narrowed. “If you think I will merely vanish, or give up on this, you are wrong,” he continued, blue eyes piercing even in the dim room. “If you knew who I was, you would not dare to hide, to speak out of turn, or to deny me in any way.”

Matrona’s skin prickled into gooseflesh. Trying to steel her voice, she asked, “And who are you, Slava?”

He straightened, then snorted, the corner of his mouth turning up ever so slightly. “I am a more patient man than I once was. Three days. Good night.”

Unsure of what to do, Matrona offered a simple nod and stepped from the room, following the faint guidance of the front room’s candle until she reached the door. She paused, searching behind her for the tradesman, but he did not follow.