The Fifth Doll(60)

She stepped backward into the glade and turned around, searching for any lurking faces, straining to hear any sounds beyond the forest. Finding nothing, she gazed skyward, staring at the imprint of the wood grain against the blue. She took a few more steps, watching it, the brightness of the sun making her eyes water.

She knew where the edges of the doll were—the loops in the wood. Slava had mentioned teaching her about the loops. What did he know? How could she escape this place and go back to Russia? Back . . . home?

She paused, turning toward the village. If it was a doll spell that had spilled Slava’s secrets to her, then the others would all know the truth, too. Her parents, the Maysaks, Feodor and Luka and Pavel . . .

Grabbing a fistful of skirt, Matrona rushed for the village, taking the well-worn path from the glade. Her thoughts raced faster than her feet. Surely Slava hadn’t willingly revealed his secrets. If not him, who? And what would Pavel and Oleg do, knowing who they really were? Matrona could finally explain Roksana’s condition. Maybe, maybe, if she could get Roksana outside the loop, her mind would become whole again.

She slowed after the wood opened up to the village, not far from the school where Roksana taught. Smoke wafted from a few chimneys. The bleating of sheep sounded far to the east. Baked bread scented the breeze.

Matrona scanned the village, unease churning in her gut. Something was amiss, but she couldn’t determine what. Clenching her fists, she walked toward the village center, casting glances in the direction of Slava’s home. What should she do if he appeared? Demand he tell her the mystery of the loops, or run?

She neared Zhanna’s home. Laundry hung from the clothesline. A half-filled basket of damp clothes sat unattended beneath it. The next izba’s front door had been left open. Matrona knotted her fingers together as she approached the Grankins’ potato farm. Their best labor horse was hooked up to the plow, without a driver. A stray goat slipped through the fence in search of something to eat, dragging its rope leash behind it.

Matrona paused.

She was alone.

No villagers. No Zhanna, no Georgy. She could see the Kalagin izba from where she stood. It appeared empty.

Stomach tightening, Matrona changed direction and followed the goat across the potato farm, leaving footprints in the plowed rows. Her family’s cow pasture lay across the path. The cows chewed on cud or swatted flies with their tails. Hurrying through the gate, Matrona came around to the back door of her house and called, “Mama? Papa?”

No answer.

She hurried past the milk barrels and into the kitchen. “Mama?” The front room was empty, and she checked both bedrooms to no avail. Her palms and the ridges of her spine began to sweat. What have you done with them, Slava?

Backtracking, Matrona cut through the front room toward the door. Her toe hit something, sending it rolling across the floor. A marble or a stone, she thought, but her eyes glimpsed yellow and gray.

Pausing, Matrona bent over to pick up the item and gasped.

In her hand, no longer than her pinky finger, was a wooden doll painted to look just like her mother, albeit a couple decades younger.

“Mama?” Matrona whispered. The details were vague, but she recognized her mother’s face, nonetheless. She drew her thumbnail over the doll’s center, searching for a seam, but she found none. This doll didn’t open.

Matrona felt the weight of Slava’s hand on her shoulder as though he stood in the room with her. “Five,” he had said.

This doll was small enough to fit inside a fourth doll . . .

She thought of the quietness that plagued her from Slava’s home to hers. The empty children’s glade, the bare path.

Was this . . . her mother? But how?

Shuddering, Matrona pocketed the doll and retraced her steps through the izba, slower this time, searching low instead of high. She found what she was looking for just outside the barn in the cow pasture—another small doll painted to look like her father. It was the same size as the other, and with no seam.

Her chest squeezed in on itself as she stared at the likeness of her father. Were they all like this?

Shivers traced circles along her back and shoulders as she added the second doll to her pocket. “Roksana,” Matrona whispered, and she ran from the cow pasture, not even bothering to close the gate after her. The skirt of her sarafan billowed as she pushed herself up the path from her home. Her lungs blazed with fire by the time she arrived.

A low moan within the Zotov izba answered her.

“Roksana!” Matrona called, throwing open the front door. The room before her looked empty, as did the kitchen, the hallway. But Roksana lay in her bedroom, blankets pulled halfway up her round stomach. Her black hair, wavy from its braids, scattered loosely over her shoulders and pillow. She opened her eyes, looked at Matrona, then gritted her teeth as a contraction rippled up her belly.

Matrona’s doll-sight flickered to life, but the only emotion she sensed in her friend was confusion.

On the floor, at the foot of the bed, lay two dolls: one painted to look like Alena and the other depicting the midwife, both younger versions of themselves. Matrona scooped them up. She bit her lip to keep it from quivering.

“Roksana.” She stowed the two women in her pocket and hurried to her friend’s bedside, where she took up Roksana’s hand. “Are you all right?”

Roksana’s head rolled to the side, and her lips formed the words of that strange lullaby. The madness still had its hold on her.