But then cold fingers touched his neck. He spun back forward and felt a little breath of cold air hit his face.
“Pyetr?” he heard Sasha ask—Sasha was puzzled; but he had another demand on his attention at that instant, an urgent and impatient presence, carrying with it a fear he could not immediately understand. It only seemed that the contact was fading and that if he turned his head and lost touch with it now, that would be the last of it.
“It’s here,” he said. “Keep with me…”
He had no doubt now which direction to take. He started off as quickly as he could over the rough ground, dodging around thickets and up over the shoulder of the hill. He heard Sasha behind him, trusting that Sasha would keep up, and battered through increasing brush and foliage with his arms, a course virtually in a straight line, disregarding of obstacles.
“Pyetr!” he heard, and waited a breath or two, but, he felt that breath of cold again, felt a gentle touch of icy fingers, smelled a taint of river weed.
“Pyetr!” Quite close now. Sasha was all right. They both were. He started to move again, less and less liking the feeling he had of something behind them, and feeling equally strongly that safety was in front—
Himself, Pyetr Kochevikov, who only recently believed in ghosts and vodyaniye and such, found himself fighting his way uphill in blind terror of what might be stalking them and blind trust of what was guiding them—
Knowing, absolutely, that the situation might be completely backwards of what he felt—
Sasha saying, That could have been your heart, Pyetr…
He heard thunder behind him, a crack that shocked the forest, felt the increasing chill in the air and the shadowing in the sky. Sasha overtook him, held him by the arm and protested they should stop, it was coming up a rain…
No, he said, brushing off Sasha’s grip.
No. Not yet. She said not; and his feeling of where safety lay remained constant. “It’s all right,” he said to Sasha without looking at anything in its distracting detail, not Sasha, not the woods around them. “It’s Eveshka. She’s still in front of us. She’s moving…”
“She’ll come back,” Sasha said.
“I’m not sure she can,” he said, and walked while a fine mist drifted down through the branches…
They had left the bracken. It was leaf mold underfoot now, a thick carpet glistening with rain, easier going, except the brush and the thorns. He walked, followed the wisp of a notion where he was going until his side ached and his legs were shaking with every step, jogged when the presence grew fainter, caught his breath and walked again while it was-strong—until finally on the bare side of a ridge he slipped, lost his balance and skidded feet first down the slope into a rain-pocked spring.
He gasped a breath and hit the muddy ground in disgust, having landed up to the knees in water. But when he collected himself to get up he could see her reflected in the roiled surface, standing behind him.
He whirled to look, grabbing at his sword—and saw nothing but the wet leaves, the forest around him… and a very distraught Sasha Misurov coming sideways down the slippery face of the ridge to reach him.
Fool, he chided himself, heart pounding, and did not want to look back at that pool of water, because he had a cold, nape-prickling certainty that her reflection would still be there.
“Pyetr!” he heard Sasha calling him.
And saw her instead in his water-filled handprints in the leaf-mold, reflection after reflection, whole and part, repeated in every puddle and every water drop around him.
“God,” he breathed, and slowly, unwanted and irresistible impulse, looked back at the pool.
Pyetr was sitting staring at the surface of a spring, finally, when Sasha arrived, drenched and panting, at the bottom of the slope—Pyetr was just sitting, staring as if that were far more important than the fact he had nearly lost himself in the woods—or lost him, more to the point.
It was certainly not Pyetr in his right mind—Pyetr scratched and soaked, flecked with bits of dead leaves with and his hands and his breeches all muddy.
“Pyetr?” he asked.
Pyetr asked, without looking at him, “Do you see her?”
“No,” Sasha said, desperately regretting they had ever left the boat. He was trembling in the arms and the knees from the chase Pyetr had led him, and he wanted nothing so much now, if he did not carefully smother that thought, as to be back on the boat with Pyetr locked in the deckhouse, if that was what it took to keep him out of the rusalka’s reach.
“She’s the way she was,” Pyetr murmured, “not—not like at the house…”
“What do you mean, not like at the house?” A cold doubt bobbed to the surface with that: but Uulamets had always put it down, Uulamets had been so sure, Uulamets had always insisted—
He felt a wish touch him, a very strong one: befell whatever
Pyetr could see was well-disposed to them, and terrified of this place—
“That’s enough!” he said, and picked up a branch and flung it at the surface, scattering ripples. “Pyetr!”
Pyetr dropped his face into his hands, drew a breath, and did not take offense when Sasha grabbed him by the packs he was carrying and tried to haul him away from the pool. He was not strong enough; but Pyetr made his own effort to get up, leaning on his arm-Stopped then, looked away, distracted—
“Don’t,” Sasha said, hauling at him, wishing him not to look, because suddenly there was a wisp of white drifting in the tail of his eye. He looked fearfully toward it, saw a haziness in the misting rain, as if the water was settling there a moment before it fell.
He felt reassured against his will. He saw it retreat, saw the surface of the pond ripple as a veil of droplets slowly sank into it and vanished.
Pyetr walked a few steps away and sat down as if his knees had simply gone out from under him.
“What’s with Uulamets isn’t her,” Pyetr said, and rested his head in his hands. “Damn, it’s not her, it never was, it never acted right. I should have said—”
“Is that what she told you?”
“She can’t. I can’t hear her.—I just know the difference.”
Sasha sank down on his heels in front of him. He suddenly felt exhausted, cold, set about with too many questions.
“I’m not crazy,” Pyetr insisted, starting to shiver.
“I know you’re not.” He reached out and grasped Pyetr’s hand. It was like ice, white, flecked with bits of leaves and dirt. “Look, it’s raining, it’s late, we don’t know where we’re going. Let’s stop here—put up the shelter, get a fire going, have supper.”
“What were we sharing the house with?” Pyetr asked.
“I don’t know,” Sasha said, with a queasiness in his own stomach; he had never imagined he would feel safer spending the night with a rusalka than on their own—but in this place he did.
Keep away from Pyetr, he wished her; and felt she assented to that—
She wanted them safe.
Especially, and for special reasons—Pyetr.
Which notion far from reassured him.
They had supper—fish and turnips again, but honest fish and turnips. The trick was to keep the fire hot enough to overpower the drizzle—and not high enough to come back on a gust of wind and catch the canvas, which they had stretched from several makeshift poles and pegs to make a shelter: smoky from time to time, but the smoke meant warm air, and it was actually pleasant despite the sting it brought to the eyes. With a hot meal and a little measure of vodka afterward they were tolerably dry and comfortable—sitting on the wooded ridge, not by the pool, to be sure; and with the heat and light of the fire between them and Eveshka, Sasha had seen to that, having set up the shelter while Pyetr was gathering wood.
Not that he completely disbelieved the rusalka’s good intentions. But he had marked how pale Pyetr seemed by dusk, how clearly exhausted.
And he was not much better after supper.
“How are you feeling?” Sasha asked.
r />
“All right,” Pyetr said. “I truly apologize. The stupid thing was, I knew at the time it was stupid.”
“Did you know I was behind you?”
Pyetr nodded. “But I had this feeling of something else behind us. And I couldn’t explain it. I don’t know why I couldn’t. It was altogether, irredeemably stupid—”
“That’s how strong she is. I couldn’t stop her. Or you.” He reached out and shook at Pyetr’s arm. “Be careful. I don’t think, I truly don’t think she’s after us, or we wouldn’t be sitting here right now, but that doesn’t mean she won’t change her mind.”
“She doesn’t mean us any harm,” Pyetr insisted, with a conviction that did nothing to ease Sasha’s misgivings; and Sasha shook at him a second time.
“Listen to you, Pyetr Illitch. It’s her. You know exactly what she’s making you know. Don’t start believing it. Maybe she’s on our side, maybe she wants to help her father, but she’s not alive, and you are, and that’s what she needs. Don’t be stupid. Don’t let her close to you!”
Pyetr gave a kind of shiver, staring into the fire. “That’s not easy.”
“I know it’s not easy. You’re white as a ghost tonight. Don’t let her touch you.”
Pyetr took a drink, swallowed hard, and nodded. “I know. I know that. I’m not being stubborn about it.”
“Listen, if she doesn’t tell us tomorrow morning where she thinks her father is, or what’s going on here, or what we’re going to do about it, I think we’d do best to turn south, just start walking out of this woods—”
“I know where Uulamets is,” Pyetr said, and made a motion of his hand to the general direction he had been going. “She does. He’s being a fool. I suppose wizards can be that the same as the rest of us. She’s upset about it.”
“Is she talking to you?”
Pyetr shook his head. “I just think that’s where she’s taking us.”
“Maybe we’d still better go south,” Sasha said, afraid now, wishing he had long ago listened to Pyetr when he was sure it was Pyetr’s own idea. He could only see Pyetr slipping deeper and deeper, and of that he could only see one conclusion. “We can get to the house, float a log across if we have to—”
“Hwiuur,” Pyetr reminded him, and Sasha’s heart thumped an extra beat at that name, here, where they did not want attention.
But Pyetr had no power to wish up a thing.
“Then we just walk all the way to Kiev,” Sasha said. “I’m sure there’s a ferry. And too many people around for things like him to try anything. I don’t think magical things like too many people around. I don’t think wizards do. But I don’t mind going there.”
There was long silence.
“I don’t think we’ll get there,” Pyetr said. “I don’t think we’ve a chance.”
So they were face about in their arguments. “We can try!” Sasha insisted.
And Pyetr slowly shook his head.
“What does that mean?” Sasha asked.
Pyetr did not answer.
“Pyetr, why not?”
“We won’t get there.”
Sasha stared at him, helpless, being far from him physically to make Pyetr do anything—and he did not want to wish him into it; which was immediate failure in itself.
“Feels better here,” Pyetr said. “A lot better than the boat, crazy as it sounds.”
“It’s not crazy,” Sasha said. “It is better.—But do you know—like you knew leaving me was stupid—that it’s stupid to believe her?”
After a moment Pyetr nodded, then said, “But I just have this feeling—I think it’s her, talking to me: telling me grandfather’s alive—that he’s in some kind of trouble; that if we don’t get him back something dreadful’s going to happen—something I don’t understand, but I don’t understand any of it anyway. Nothing new for me.” He reached down for the jug and started to unstop it.
And yelled and grabbed for his sword, nearly taking the shelter down as he leapt up—
—because something was skittering along the bushes near them.
Sasha tried to get out of Pyetr’s way and miss the fire at the same time; but whatever it was circled to the side behind the fire and vanished into a bush.
With a hiss.
“Babi!” Sasha exclaimed, and caught Pyetr’s arm. “Don’t scare him.”
“Don’t scare him!” Pyetr retorted; but a round black head had poked out of the brush and blinked at them.
It showed shiny white teeth, a huge row of them.
“Babi?” Sasha said.
It crept out into the firelight and the drizzle, a very abject and flat-to-the-ground Yard-thing.
“It can stay out there!” Pyetr said. “Throw it something to eat. We don’t need it in here with us.”
It crept closer, chin on ground, and folded its little manlike hands in front of its face, staring up at them.
A very diminished, very sad-looking Babi.
“Where’s Uulamets?” Sasha asked of it, and it growled.
“Pleasant as always,” Pyetr muttered, not about to put his sword away.
“But it is Babi,” Sasha said. “I’m sure it is.”
“One Thing probably looks a lot like another,” Pyetr said. “It can keep its distance!”
It crept a little closer, flat to the ground.
“That’s enough,” Pyetr said; but—
“Don’t hit it!” Sasha said, and grabbed up the food basket, found a turnip and tossed it.
Small black hands seized the offering, turned it. Babi sat up and gnawed at it with delicate, busy bites, darting little glances at them. Then it gulped the turnip in one gape of its mouth, scuttled into their shelter and grabbed Sasha around the ankle.
“Damn!” Pyetr exclaimed. Sasha yelped with the instant thought of those teeth and his leg. But it simply held on; and Sasha gingerly bent down and patted its head.
It grabbed his wrist, then, and held on as he stood up.
“Be careful!” Pyetr said.
“It’s all right,” Sasha said, trying to hold the creature in his hands. But it jumped for his chest and scrambled for his neck and ducked around behind him as Pyetr grabbed for it—after which it was still, arms locked around his neck, Pyetr in front of him with his sword lifted, and Sasha thought it a very good idea not to alarm either of them. “It’s behaving itself,” he said, calmly trying, pulling at one wiry arm, to persuade it to let go of his neck. “Come on, Babi. Let go.”
It rose up against his ear and hissed at Pyetr.
“God,” Pyetr muttered.
“It’s all right,” Sasha said, sat down on the log inside their shelter and carefully pulled Babi’s hands loose.
Babi hissed again, bounded down onto the log and down to shelter under his knees.
Pyetr stood with his sword in hand and finally, with a scowl, ran it into its sheath and rescued the jug, which fortunately had landed unbroken.
He muttered, “I suppose it’s a good sign, over all,” put the sword down and sat down inside the shelter again, his hair glistening with rain and a scowl still on his face when he looked down at the creature.
Babi took tiny fistfuls of Sasha’s breeches and climbed up into his lap.
“He’s scared,” Sasha said.
“He’s scared.” Pyetr made a face, unstopped the jug and drank. “What’s with grandfather? That’s what I’d like to know. If Ugly here ran off from it—”
Babi growled.
“Your pardon.” Pyetr hoisted the jug. “Have some?”
It scampered down and snatched up Pyetr’s cup, holding it up with both hands.
Pyetr poured. It drank, gulp after gulp, and held it up for more.
“I’d be careful,” Sasha said.
He poured; it drank, and held up the cup again.
“Bottomless little devil,” Pyetr said, and filled it again. “What’s grandfather into? Do you know?”
It gulped the third cup, exhaled, and fell down in a heap where it stood.
/> Pyetr gave Sasha a puzzled look.
“I don’t know,” Sasha said.
CHAPTER 19
SASHA SLEPT lightly by intent, rousing himself throughout the night to keep the fire going, while Pyetr stirred only the first and second times he laid a log on and Sasha said, “It’s all right, go back to sleep.”
Pyetr seemed to give up caution for himself then, and tucked down and simply rested, like Babi the dvorovoi, who or which curled itself into a ball where it or he had fallen, and snored.
Babi had disappeared when the imposter showed up at the house; Babi had come back to them last night, and as signs went, that was the most heartening thing that had happened to them lately, Sasha was sure of it.
But when the rain had stopped and the morning came cold and misty, when he had stirred his aching bones to get the fire going for morning tea, he kept an anxious eye toward the pool that lay invisible in the mist.
Not, again, that he did not trust Eveshka’s intentions. It was her resolve he doubted.
He started the tea, he nudged Pyetr awake, and Pyetr put a rumpled head out of his coat and his blankets and took his tea with a murmur of thank you.
Babi came and held out his hands. Sasha gave him his own cup and had his tea in their mixing bowl: if one had a well-disposed dvorovoi in a situation like this he was by no means going to offend it—Yard-things being by reputation uncouth, not so home-loving and dependable as House-things nor so wise and so dangerous as the banniks: and fierce and uncouth seemed very fine company in their situation.
So it might have his cup if it made it happy.
So he was thinking when he saw Pyetr gazing off downslope.
He looked that way with apprehension and saw the mist moving, swirling as if a slow disturbance were passing through it.