Laurus

‌The Book

of Cognition

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He came into the world in the Rukina Quarter, by the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery. This occurred on May 8 of the 6,948th year since the Creation of the world, the 1,440th since the Birth of Our Savior Jesus Christ, on the feast day of Arsenius the Great. Seven days later he was baptized with the name Arseny. To prepare the newborn for his first Communion, his mother did not eat meat for those seven days. In expectation of the cleansing of her flesh, she did not go to church until the fortieth day after his birth. After her flesh had been cleansed, she went to an early service. She prostrated herself in the church vestibule and lay there for several hours, requesting but one thing for her baby: life. Arseny was her third child. Those born previously had not lived out their first year.

Arseny survived. On May 8 of the year 1441, the family held a service of thanksgiving at the Kirillov Monastery. After respectfully kissing the relics of the Venerable Kirill, Arseny and his parents set off for home and Christofer, his grandfather, remained at the monastery. The seventh decade of his years would end the next day and he had decided to ask Nikandr, the elder, what to do next.

In principle, replied the elder, I have nothing to tell you. Just this: live, O friend, close to the cemetery. You are so gangly that it would be difficult to carry you there. And there’s this, too: live alone.

That is what elder monk Nikandr said.

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And so Christofer moved close to one of the nearby cemeteries. He found an empty log house some distance from Rukina Quarter, right next to the cemetery fence. The house’s masters had not survived the last pestilence. These were years when there were more houses than people. Nobody could bring themselves to settle in this sturdy and spacious but heirless house. Particularly next to a cemetery filled with the plague dead. But Christofer brought himself to do so.

It was said that even then he pictured the further fate of that place quite distinctly, that, even at that remote time, he allegedly knew that in 1495 a cemetery church would be constructed on the site of his log house. The church was built in gratitude for the favorable conclusion of the year 1492, the seven thousandth year since the Creation of the world. The anticipated end of the world did not come to pass that year, but Christofer’s namesake did discover America (though nobody paid any attention to this at the time), unexpectedly for himself and others.

The church is destroyed by the Poles in 1609. The cemetery falls into neglect and a pine forest grows in its place. Apparitions chat up mushroom pickers from time to time. In 1817, the merchant Kozlov acquires the forest to produce lumber. Two years later, a charity hospital is built on the cleared site. Exactly one hundred years later, the district secret police move into the hospital building. In keeping with the property’s initial purpose, that institution organizes mass burials there. In 1942, the German pilot Heinrich von Einsiedel wipes the building off the face of the earth with a well-aimed hit. In 1947, the plot of land is retooled as a military proving ground and transferred to the Seventh Tank Brigade of the Order of the Red Banner, named for Kliment Voroshilov. The land has belonged to the “White Nights” gardening association since 1991. The group’s members unearth large quantities of bones and missile shells along with potatoes, but they are in no rush to complain to the local authorities. They know nobody would grant them other land anyway.

It fell to us to live on land like this, they say.

This detailed vision indicated to Christofer that the land would stay untouched in his lifetime and his chosen home would remain intact for fifty-four years. Christofer understood that fifty-four years was considerable for a country with a turbulent history.

It was a five-wall house: in addition to the four outer walls, its log framework had a fifth, interior, wall. Partitioning the framework formed two rooms, one warm (with a stove), the other cold.

When he took up residence in the house, Christofer checked for cracks between the logs and replaced the bull’s-bladder that was stretched over the windows. He took oily beans and juniper berries and mixed them with juniper chips and frankincense. He added oak leaves and leaves of rue, ground it finely, placed it upon coals, and worked to fill the house with smoke all day long.

Christofer did not consider this precaution excessive, despite knowing the pestilence left houses on its own, over time. He was afraid for the relatives who might visit him. He was also afraid for those he treated, because they were constantly in his house. Christofer was a herbalist and all sorts of people came to see him.

People came with torturous coughs. He gave them ground wheat with barley flour that he mixed with honey. Sometimes some boiled farro, too, because farro draws moisture from the lungs. Depending on the type of cough, he might give pea soup or water from boiled turnips. Christofer differentiated coughs by sound. If the cough was indistinct and didn’t lend itself to definition, Christofer pressed his ear to the patient’s chest and listened to his breathing for a long time.

People came for wart removal. Christofer ordered them to apply ground onion with salt to the warts. Or rub them with sparrow droppings mashed with saliva. He thought ground cornflower seeds, which were to be sprinkled on the warts, was the best method for treatment, though. The cornflower seeds drew the root from the warts so they would never grow on that place again.

Christofer also helped with bedroom matters. He immediately identified visitors with these concerns based on how they entered and hesitated at the door. Their tragic and guilty gaze amused Christofer but he did not let that show. Without ceremony, he called upon them to remove their pants, and the guests silently complied. Sometimes he sent them to wash in the next room, recommending they pay particular attention to the foreskin. He was convinced the rules of personal hygiene should be upheld, even in the Middle Ages. He listened, irritated, to the unsteady flow of water from the dipper into the wooden tub.

What wilt thou saye of this, then, he wrote on a piece of birch bark in a fit of temper. And how can it be that women let men like this near them? What a nightmare!

If the secretive member had no obvious damage, Christofer inquired about the problem in detail. They knew he was discrete so were not afraid to tell him. If there was no erection, Christofer suggested supplementing meals with expensive anise and almond or an inexpensive mint syrup; all increase the seed and promote bedroom thoughts. The same effect was attributed to the plant with the unusual name of livelong, as well as to simple wheat. Finally, there was also hare’s ear, which had two roots, white and black. An erection would arise from using white but vanish with black. The drawback to this method was that the white root had to be held in the mouth at the crucial moment. Not everyone was willing to do that.

If all that did not increase the seed and promote bedroom thoughts, the herbalist moved from the plant world to the animal world. Those who had lost their potency were advised to eat cockerel kidneys or duck. In critical situations, Christofer gave orders to obtain fox balls, grind them in a mortar, and drink them with wine. For those not up to that task, he proposed eating ordinary hen’s eggs while alternately taking bites of onion and turnip.

Christofer did not exactly believe in herbs; more likely he believed God’s help would come, through any herb, for a specific matter. Just as that help comes through people. Both are but instruments. He did not ponder why each of the herbs he knew was associated with strictly defined qualities; he considered that question frivolous. Christofer understood Who had established that association, and that was all he needed to know.

Christofer’s help to his fellow man was not limited to medicine. He was convinced the mysterious effects of herbs spread through all aspects of human life. It was known to Christofer that the plant sow thistle, its roots as light as wax, brought success. He gave it to commercial traders so they would be received with honor and rise to great glory wherever they might go.

Only be not proude beyond means, Christofer warned them. For pryde is the root of all sinne.

He gave sow thistle only to those of whom he was absolutely certain.

More than anything, Christofer loved a red plant, known as the tsar’s eyes or round-leaved sundew, that was about the height of a needle. He always had it with him. He knew it was good to have some on his person when beginning any matter. Bring it to court, for example, so as not to be convicted. Or sit at a banquet with it and fear not the heretic lying in wait for anyone who lets his guard down.

Christofer did not like heretics. He recognized them using Adam’s head, also known as mandrake. When gathering this plant near marshes, he blessed himself with the sign of the cross and the words: have mercye upon me, O God. After that, Christofer gave the plant to a priest for sanctification, asking that it be laid on the altar and kept there for forty days. When he carried it after the forty days had elapsed, he was able to guess, unfailingly, who was a heretic or a demon, even in a crowd.

For jealous spouses, Christofer recommended duckweed, though not the duckweed that covers marshes but the dark blue plant that spreads on land. It should be placed at the head of the bed by the wife: when she falls asleep, she will tell everything about herself on her own. The good and the bad. There was another method, too, for compelling her to start talking: owl heart. It was supposed to be applied to a sleeping woman’s heart. Few people took that step, though: it was frightening.

Christofer himself had no need for these remedies because his wife had died thirty years before. They had been caught in a thunderstorm while gathering plants and she was killed by lightning at the edge of the forest. Christofer had stood, unable to believe his wife was dead: she had just been alive. He shook her by the shoulders and her wet hair streamed along his hands. He rubbed her cheeks. Her lips stirred silently under his fingers. Her wide-open eyes looked at the tops of the pine trees. He urged his wife to stand and come back home. She was silent. And nothing could force her to speak.

On the day he moved to his new place, Christofer took a medium-sized piece of birch bark and wrote: After all, they are already adults. After all, their child is already one year old. I am of the opinion they will be better off without me. After thinking a bit, Christofer added: most important, this is what the elder advised.

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They began taking Arseny to see Christofer after he turned two. Sometimes they would leave with the child after a meal. More often, though, they would let Arseny stay for a few days. He liked being at his grandfather’s. Those visits turned out to be Arseny’s first memories. They were also destined to be the last thing he forgot.

Arseny loved the smell in his grandfather’s house. The smell was composed of the aromas of the multitude of herbs drying under the ceiling, and that smell did not exist anywhere else. Arseny also loved the peacock feathers a pilgrim had brought to Christofer. They were fanned out on the wall, and the design on the feathers was surprisingly similar to an eye. When the boy was at Christofer’s, he felt he was somehow under observation.

He also liked the icon of the martyr Saint Christopher, which hung under the Savior’s image. It looked unusual amongst the stern Russian icons: Saint Christopher had the head of a dog. The child examined the icon for hours and his grandfather’s features, little by little, began showing through the touching figure of the cynocephalus. Shaggy brows. Wrinkles extending from the nose. A beard that began at the eyes. His grandfather dissolved into nature even more readily because he spent most of his time in the forest. He began resembling dogs and bears. And plants and stumps. He spoke in a creaky, wooden voice.

Sometimes Christofer took the icon from the wall and gave it to Arseny to kiss. The child thoughtfully kissed Saint Christopher on his shaggy head and touched the dulled paints with the pads of his fingers. His grandfather observed the icon’s mysterious current flow into Arseny’s hands. One time he made the following note: the child has a special awareness. His future presents itself to me as outstanding but I have difficulty foreseeing it.

Christofer began teaching the boy about herbal treatments at the age of four. They wandered the forests from morning till night gathering various plants. They searched for the pheasant’s eye plant near ravines. Christofer showed Arseny its sharp little leaves. Pheasant’s eye helped with hernia and fever. When this plant was given for fever, along with cloves, sweat would begin streaming off the patient. If the sweat was thick and gave off a strong and nasty odor, it was necessary (Christofer stopped short, looking at Arseny) to prepare for death. The boy’s unchildish gaze made Christopher feel ill at ease.

What is death? asked Arseny.

Death is when people are silent and do not move.

Like this? Arseny sprawled on the moss and looked at Christofer, not blinking.

As he lifted the boy, Christofer said inside, my wife, his grandmother, was lying exactly like that, and that is why I was very frightened just now.

There is no reason to be afraid, shouted the boy, because I am alive again.

On one of their walks, Arseny asked Christofer where his grandmother now dwelled.

In heaven, answered Christofer.

That same day, Arseny decided to fly to the heavens. The heavens had long appealed to him and the attraction became irresistible after this announcement that his grandmother, whom he had never seen, dwelled there. Only the peacock feathers, from a bird most certainly of paradise, could help him with this.

Upon returning home, Arseny got a rope from the entry room, took the peacock feathers from the wall, and used a ladder to climb onto the roof. He divided the feathers into two equal bunches and firmly tied them to his arms. Arseny was planning a short trip to the heavens this first time. He wanted only to inhale its azure air and, if things worked out, finally see his grandmother. He could also say hello to her from Christofer while he was at it. As Arseny imagined things, he could easily return in time for supper, which Christofer just happened to be preparing. Arseny went up to the roof ridge, flapped his wings, and took a step forward.

His flight was rapid but brief. Arseny felt sharp pain in his right foot, the first to touch the ground. He could not stand and so lay silently, stretching his leg under his wings. Christofer noticed the broken peacock wings beating at the earth when he went outside to call the boy to supper. Christofer felt Arseny’s foot and knew it was fractured. He applied a plaster with ground peas to the injured place so the bone would knit together quickly. He bound a small strip of wood to the leg so it could have some rest. He took Arseny to the monastery so his spirit would strengthen along with his flesh.

I know you are planning to go to heaven, said Elder Nikandr, as soon as he saw Arseny. Forgive me, but I think your course of action is outlandish. When the time comes, I will tell you how it is done.

They began gathering plants again as soon as Arseny was able to put weight on the foot. At first they walked only in the nearby forest, then they would go further and further each day, testing Arseny’s strength. Along the banks of rivers and streams they gathered nymphaea—reddish-yellowish flowers with white leaves—to treat poisoning. Near those same rivers, they found the enchanted river plant. Christofer trained Arseny to recognize it by its yellow flower, round leaves, and white root. Horses and cows were treated with this herb. At the forest’s edge they gathered windflower, which grew only in spring. It should be pulled up on the ninth, twenty-second, and twenty-third of April. Windflower should be placed under the first log when building a log house. They also went looking for the mysterious sava. Christofer displayed caution here because encountering this plant carried the threat of muddling the mind. But (Christofer crouched down in front of the child) if this plant is placed on a thief’s tracks, the thieved item will return. He put the sava in his basket and covered it with burdock. Along the way home, they always gathered pods from the herb known as river crossing, which repelled snakes.

Put a seed in your mouth and water will part, Christofer once said.

It will part? asked Arseny, serious.

With prayer it will part. Christofer began to feel awkward. Everything is about prayer, after all.

Well, then why do you need that seed? The boy lifted his head and saw Christofer was smiling.

That is the legend. It is up to me to tell you this.

Once they saw a wolf while they were gathering plants. The wolf was standing a few steps from them, looking them in the eyes. His tongue dangled from his jaw and trembled from panting. The wolf was hot.

We will not move, said Christofer, and he will leave. O great martyr Georgy, do helpe.

He will not leave, Arseny objected. He came so he could be with us.

The boy walked up to the wolf and took him by the scruff. The wolf sat. The end of his tail stuck out from under his hind paws. Christofer leaned against a pine tree and attentively watched Arseny. When they headed for home, the wolf set off after them, his tongue still hanging like a little red flag. The wolf stopped at the border of the village.

After that, they often ran across the wolf in the forest. The wolf sat beside them when they ate lunch. Christofer tossed him pieces of bread and the wolf would catch them in the air, his teeth clattering. He stretched out on the grass and pensively stared straight ahead. When the grandfather and grandson returned home, the wolf escorted them right to the house. Sometimes he spent the night in the yard and the three of them would set out together in the morning to look for plants.

When Arseny grew tired, Christofer would sit him in a canvas bag on his back. An instant later he would feel Arseny’s cheek on his neck and understand the boy was sleeping. Christofer stepped, gently, on the warm summer moss. With the hand not carrying his basket, he straightened the straps on his shoulders and shooed flies away from the sleeping boy.

At home Christofer pulled burrs from Arseny’s long hair and sometimes washed his hair with lye. He made the solution from maple leaves and the white herb called Enoch, which they gathered together in the low hills. The solution made Arseny’s golden hair as soft as silk. It gleamed in the sun. Christofer wove leaves of garden angelica into his hair, so people would love him. While he did so, he recognized that people loved Arseny anyway.

An appearance from the child cheered people up. All the residents of Rukina Quarter felt it. When they took Arseny by the hand, they did not want to let it go. When they kissed his hair, they felt as if they had drunk from a deep, fresh spring. There was something in Arseny that eased lives that were anything but simple. And people were grateful to him.

Before bed, Christofer told the child about Solomon and the Centaur. They both knew this story by heart but always appreciated it as if they were hearing it for the first time.

When the Centaur was brought to Solomon, he saw a person buying himself boots. The Centaur began laughing when the person wanted to know if the boots would last for seven years. As he walked further, the Centaur saw a wedding and began weeping. Solomon asked the Centaur why he was laughing.

I sawe on that person, said the Centaur, that live he will not until the seventh day.

And Solomon asked the Centaur why he was weeping.

How sad am I, said the Centaur, that live this groom will not until the thirtieth day.

The boy once said:

I do not understand why the Centaur laughed. Because he knew the person would be resurrected?

I do not know. I am not sure.

Christofer himself also felt it would have been better if the Centaur had not laughed.

Christofer placed purple loosestrife under Arseny’s pillow so he would fall asleep easily. Which is why Arseny fell asleep easily. And his dreams were placid.

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At the start of the second septenary of years in Arseny’s life, his father brought the boy to Christofer.

Rukina Quarter is restless, said the father, people await the plague scourge. Let the boy stay here, far from everyone.

You may stay, too, Christofer offered, and your wife.

I have, O father, grain to reap. Where will we find foode in winter? Arseny’s father just shrugged his shoulders.

Christofer crushed some hot sulfur and gave it to him so they could drink it later at home, with egg yolk, washed down with rosehip juice. He ordered them not to open the windows and to lay a fire with oak logs in the yard every morning and evening. When the coals begin smoldering, toss wormwood, juniper, and rue on them. That is all. That is all that can be done. Christofer sighed. Guard thyself against this sorrow, O son.

Arseny began crying as he watched his father walk to his cart. How short he was, walking with a springing gait. After half-sitting on the side of the cart, he tosses his feet onto the hay. Takes the reins and makes a kissing sound to the horse. The horse snorts, jerks its head, and gently sets off. The hooves make a muffled sound on the tamped earth. His father rocks a bit. Turns back and waves. Diminishes in size and merges with the cart. Turns into a dot. Disappears.

Why wepest thou? Christofer asked the boy.

I perceave on him the sign of death, answered the boy.

He cried for seven days and seven nights. Christofer was silent because he knew Arseny was right. He had also seen the sign. And knew, too, that his herbs and words were powerless here.

At noon on the eighth day, Christofer took the boy by the hand and they set off for Rukina Quarter. It was a clear day. They walked, not trampling any grass and not raising any dust. As if they were on tiptoes, as if entering a room where someone was deceased. On the approach to Rukina Quarter, Christofer took a root of garden angelica soaked in wine vinegar and broke it into two pieces. He took half for himself, giving half to Arseny.

Here, hold this in your mouth. God’s power is with us.

The settlement greeted them with the howling of dogs and the lowing of cows. Christofer knew those sounds well, they could not be confused with anything. This was the music of the plague. Grandfather and grandson slowly walked along the street but only dogs rushed to see them, pulling at their chains. There were no people. As they neared Arseny’s house, Christofer said:

Walk no further. There is death in the air here.

The boy nodded because he saw death’s wings. They hovered over the house. They quivered over the ridge of the roof like warm air.

Christofer crossed himself and entered the yard. Sheaves of unthreshed wheat lay near the fence. The door into the house was open, its gaping rectangle looking sinister under the August sun. Of all the colors that day, it had absorbed into itself only blackness. All possible blackness and cold. What could remain among the living after ending up in there? Christofer hesitated and took a step toward the door.

Stop, a voice rang out from the darkness.

This voice reminded him of his son’s voice. But only reminded him. As if someone, not his son, was using that voice. Not trusting the voice, Christofer took another step toward the door.

Stop or I will kill you.

A crash rang out in the darkness and a hammer knocked against the door jamb as if it had tumbled out of someone’s hand.

Let me examine you, Christofer rasped.

He felt a lump in his throat.

We already died, the voice said. And we have nothing to do with the living. That Arseny may live, do not enter.

Christofer stopped. He felt a vein pulsating on his temple and understood his son spoke the truth.

Something to drink, Arseny’s mother moaned from the darkness.

Mama, Arseny shouted and dashed into the house.

He ladled water from a wooden bucket and gave it to his mother, who had fallen from a bench. He kissed her jelly-like face but it was as if she were sleeping and could not open her eyes. His palms could feel the inflamed nodes in her armpits when he tried to pick her up off the floor.

My son, I can no longer wake up...

Arseny’s father’s hand seized him and flung him toward the threshold. It was Christofer who dragged Arseny away. Arseny shouted as he had never before shouted, but nobody in the quarter heard him. When silence came, he saw his father’s dead body on the threshold.

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Arseny moved in with Christofer after that. The boy is unquestionably gifted, Christofer once wrote. He grasps everything right away. I have taught him about herbal healing and it will provide for him during his life. I will impart to him much other knowledge to broaden his horizons. May he learn how the world was created.

One starry October night, Christofer took the boy to a meadow and showed him where the earthly firmament and the heavenly firmament meet.

In the begynnynge God created heaven and the earth. He created them in order that people not thinke heaven and earth were without begynnynge. Then God devyded the lyghte from the darcknesse. And called the lyghte daye and the darcknesse nyghte.

Grass affectionately rubbed against their feet and meteorites flew above their heads. Arseny felt the warmth of Christofer’s hand on the back of his head.

And God created the sun to lyghte the daye and the moon and the stars to lyghte the nyghte.

Are the orbs large? asked the boy.

Yes, well, you know… Christofer wrinkled his brow. The moon’s circumference totals 120,000 stadia, and the circumference of the sun is, roughly of course, three million stadia. They only seem small: their real sizes are difficult to even imagine. Go upon the hill so high, and gaze down on the field below. Do not the grazing flocks seem as ants unto thine eyes? Thus are the orbs.

They spoke for the next several days about orbs and omens. Christofer told the boy about the double sun he had seen more than once in his life: its appearance to the east or to the west signifies great rain or wind. Sometimes the sun looks bloody to people, but this happens due to hazy vapors and indicates high humidity. Sometimes sunbeams look like hair, too (Christofer was stroking Arseny’s hair), and it is as if the clouds are burning, but that indicates wind and cold. And if the rays bend toward the sun and the clouds blacken at sunset, that indicates foul weather. When the sun is clear at sunset, that indicates calm, bright weather. A three-day moon that is clear and thin also indicates clear weather. If the moon is thin but also seems fiery, this indicates strong wind, and then when both the moon’s horns are even and the northern horn is clear, that indicates easing westerly winds. In the event of a full moon darkening, expect rain, and in the event of the moon tapering from both sides, expect wind, but if there is a ring around the moon, this is a sign of foul weather, and if the ring darkens, that is very foul weather.

Since this obviously interests the boy, why not tell him about it? Christofer asked himself.

One time they came to the shores of the lake and Christofer said:

The Lord ordered the waters to produce fishes to swim in its depths and birds to soar in the heavenly firmament. All of them were created to navigate their appropriate elements. The Lord also ordered the earth to produce a live soul, for four-legged animals. Animals were docile toward Adam and Eve until the Fall. One could say they loved people. But now that is only in rare cases; somehow everything went wrong.

Christofer ruffled the scruff of the wolf, who was trotting behind them.

And when it comes right down to it, the birds, fishes, and animals are similar to people in many ways. That, you see, is where our overall connection is. We teach each other. The lion cub, Arseny, is always born to the lioness dead, but the male lion comes and breathes life into it on the third day. This reminds us that human children come to life only at christening—if death occurs before that day, it lasts for all eternity, there is no heaven. And then there is the fish with many legs. No matter what color stone it swims up to, it takes on that color: if it is white, it turns white, if it is green, it turns green. Some people, child, are the same: they are Christians with Christians and infidels with infidels. There is also the phoenix bird who has neither mate nor children. It eats nothing, but flies among the Lebanese cedars, filling its wings with their aroma. When it grows old, it flies up into the sky and ignites from heavenly fire. When it descends, it sets fire to its nest and burns up itself, reappearing later in the ashes of its nest as a worm, from which a phoenix bird develops over time. And thus, O Arseny, those who take on suffering for Christ are reborn in all their glory for the Kingdom of Heaven. Finally, there is the caladrius bird, which is completely white. Yf one falls into illness, he can learne from the caladrius yf he will live or die. And yf he will die, the caladrius will turn his face away but yf he will live, the caladrius will merrily fly up into the air against the sun—and everyone will understand the caladrius took the sick person’s sore and scattered it in the air. And that is how Our Lord Jesus Christ ascended the tree of the cross and imparted to us His purest blood to heal sin.

So where can we get that bird? the boy asked.

You shall be that bird yourself, O Arseny. After all, you can fly a little.

The boy nodded pensively and his seriousness made Christofer feel ill at ease.

The last leaves were blowing from the shore onto the lake’s black waters. The leaves tumbled in disarray along the brownish grass, then quivered on the lake’s ripples. And sailed further and further off. Fishermen’s deep boot-tracks were visible at the very edge of the water. The tracks were filled with water and looked age-old: left behind, for ever and ever. Leaves floated in them, too. A fishing boat swayed not far from the shore. The fishermen pulled a net with hands reddened from cold. Their foreheads and beards were wet with sweat. The sleeves of their clothing were heavy with water. A medium-sized fish thrashed in the net. Glistening in the dim autumn sun, the fish whipped up a froth around the boat. The fishermen were satisfied with their catch and loudly shouted something to each other. Arseny could not make out their words. He could not have repeated a single word the fishermen said, though he heard them distinctly. Unhurried, the words turned into sounds and dissolved into the expanse, after shedding the shells of their meaning. The sky was colorless because it had given all its hues to summer. There was a smell of woodsmoke.

Arseny felt joy because they would also build a fire in the stove and enjoy a special autumn coziness when they came home. Like everyone else around them, they lit black fires. Once the fire got going, the house’s walls warmed, their thick logs holding the warmth for a long time. A clay stove held it even longer. The stones placed at the stove’s far wall got red hot. Smoke rose under the high ceiling and pensively went out through an open vent over the door. The smoke seemed like a living being to Arseny. Its leisureliness calmed him. The smoke lived in the upper part of the log house, which was black from soot; the lower part was tidy and bright. The upper and lower parts of the log house’s walls were divided by polavochniks, wide boards onto which the soot sprinkled. If a fire was properly stoked, the smoke did not sink below the polavochniks.

It was Arseny’s responsibility to build fires in the stove. He brought in birch logs from the woodshed and laid them in the stove like a little house. He pushed sticks of kindling between the logs. He got the fire going with smoldering coals taken from the ocheloks, special niches within the stove, where layers of ash preserved coals to use for lighting. He buried the coals in dry leaves and blew with all his might. The leaves would slowly change color. Burning now from their underside, they still appeared to be shrinking indifferently, but that grew more complicated for them with each instant: the fire seized them abruptly, from all sides at once. The fire spread from the leaves to the kindling wood, and from the kindling wood to the logs. The sides of the logs began to burn. If they were damp, they crackled, shooting out sheaves of sparks. The child saw a phoenix bird in the fiery blizzard and pointed it out to the wolf sitting next to him. The wolf squinted every now and then but it was unclear if he actually saw the bird or not. Arseny looked doubtfully at the wolf and announced to Christofer:

He’s sitting unnaturally, I would even say tensely. I think he simply fears for his skin.

The boy was right. The sheaves of sparks that flew out of the stove brought a distinct disquiet to the wolf. Only when the fire had settled into an even, complete burning did the wolf sprawl out on the floor and lay his head on his paws like a dog.

For what you have tamed, you become responsible forever, Christofer said, stroking the wolf.

At times, Arseny saw his own face when he looked inside the stove. It was framed by gray hair that was gathered on the back of his neck. His face was covered with wrinkles. Despite the dissimilarity, the boy understood it was a reflection of himself. Only many years later. And under different circumstances. It was the reflection of someone who is sitting by a fire and sees the face of a light-haired boy and does not want the person who has entered to disturb him.

The person entering the room shifts from foot to foot at the threshold and, placing a finger to his lips, whispers to someone over his shoulder that the Doctor of All Rus’ is busy now. He is observing the flame.

Let her in, Melety, says the old man, not turning. What do you want, O woman?

I want to lyve, O Doctor. Helpe me.

And you do not want to die?

There are those who want to die, explains Melety.

I have a son. Take pity on him.

Is he like that one? The old man points at the mouth of the stove, where the image of a boy is discernible in the contours of the flame.

There is no reason for you to kneel, my lady (Melety is agitated and gnawing his nails). He does not like that.

The old man tears his gaze away from the flame. He approaches the kneeling princess and sinks to his knees alongside her. Melety walks out, backwards. The old man takes the princess by the chin and looks into her eyes. He wipes her tears with the back of his hand.

You, O woman, have a tumor in your head. That is why your vision is worsening. And your hearing is dulling.

He embraces her head and presses it to his chest. The princess hears the beating of his heart. The labored, elderly breathing. Through his shirt, she feels the coolness of the cross he wears around his neck. The rigidity of his ribs. She herself is surprised she notices all this. Behind the closed doors, Melety is cutting splinters from logs so they may be burned as lamps. There is no expression on his face.

Believe in the Lord and His Most Blessed Mother and ask their helpe. The old man’s dry lips touch her forehead. And your tumor will shrink. Go in peace and grieve no more.

Why do you weep, O Arseny?

I weep from joy.

Arseny wordlessly turns to the wolf. The wolf licks away his tears.

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Man was created from dust. And will turn to dust. But the body that is given to him for the duration of his life is splendid. You must know the body as well as possible, O Arseny.

That is what Christofer said as he embalmed Andron Novgorodets before sending the deceased off to his homeland. Christofer was rubbing cedar resin mixed with honey and salt into Andron’s skin at one of the bathhouses in Rukina Quarter. Andron’s whole body shuddered every now and then from Christofer’s touch and seemed alive. Reinforcing that impression was the deceased’s large member, which did not seem to correspond to Andron, who was short of height though firmly built. Arseny thought Andron would stand up at any minute, thank Christofer for his troubles, and go outside for fresh air. But Andron did not stand. After a nighttime fight, he lay with a fractured skull and the first corpse-spots on his back. The out-of-towner Andron had taken an interest in the girls of Rukina Quarter (that was just yesterday). That caused the fight. Today Andron was preparing for his final journey to Novgorod.

God’s boundless wisdom is reflected in the small human body (said Christofer) like the sun in a drop of water. Each organ is thought out down to the smallest detail. The heart, for example, nourishes the whole body with blood and they say our feelings are concentrated in the heart, which is why it is securely protected by the ribs. The teeth are of hard bone because they chew, the tongue recognizes taste and that is why it is as soft and porous as a sponge, and the ear was created in the form of a shell to catch flying sounds. And protruding ears, by the way (Christofer ran a finger along Andron’s ear), are a sign of empty talk. But there is also an inner ear that is not visible. It leads sounds from the outer ear to the brain, and the brain turns the sounds into speech. Vessels from the eye go to the brain, too, and so the brain also turns letters into words. The brain is the body’s tsar and it is at the very top because—of all earthly beasts—only man is a rational being and walks upright. His incorporeal thinking, located within the body, ascends to the heavens and comprehends the perfection of this world. The mind is the soul’s eyes. When those eyes are damaged, the soul becomes blind.

What is a soul? Arseny asked.

It is what the Lord breathes into a body, what distinguishes us from rocks and plants. The soul makes us living beings, O Arseny. I compare the soul to a flame that originates in an earthly candle but has no earthly nature as it strives skyward, toward its kindred elements.

If a soul makes something alive, does that mean animals have them? Arseny pointed at the wolf, who stood alongside them.

Yes, animals have souls but the soul is kindred to their bodies and contained within their blood. And, mind you: people did not eat animals until the flood, they spared their souls, for an animal’s soul dies with its body. A human’s soul, though, is of a completely different nature from the body and does not die with the body, for the human soul cometh from nothing else but the Creator Himself and was inspirited by His grace.

What fate is judged for human bodyes?

Our body disintegrates into dust. But the Lord, who created the body from the dust, can make our disintegrated bodye come together. And as you know, it only seems to us that the body decomposes without a trace, that it mixes with other elements, becoming soil, a river, grass. Our body, O Arseny, is like quicksilver that lies broken into tiny beads on the earth but does not mix with the earth. It lies there by its lonesome until some skilled craftsman comes and collects it all, putting it back into a vessel. And that is how the Almighty will collect our decomposed bodies again for the universal resurrection.

Thanks to Christofer’s labors, the decomposition of Andron’s body was halting. The body had a dull gleam and gave off the scent of cedar. It was improbably white. The exceptions were the face and the arms up to the elbows, which preserved traces of a recent tan. After he finished rubbing in the embalming ointment, Christofer began winding Andron in linen strips. He ripped them with a loud tear from a piece of fabric he had been brought with him, moistening them in the ointment and tightly pressing them to the body of the deceased. Andron did not resist. His eyelids, loosely closed, lent him a sarcastic and even somewhat reckless look. It seemed Andron was chuckling at the perspiring Christofer’s efforts. It was as if he was letting it be known with all his person that he would certainly make it to Novgorod under any circumstances.

Christofer did not look at Andron’s face. He wrapped his body, strip by strip, tightly knotting the ends.

Since the conversation had already turned to the body, Christofer said, I’ll tell you how children are conceived. After all, you are no longer a child anymore, and it is time for you to know that ever since the time of the Fall of Adam and Eve, people are no longer created by the Lord but give birth to their children themselves. Later they die because they acquired the gift of death along with the gift of birth. A child is conceived from male seed and female blood. Male seed gives the firmness of bones and sinews, and it is female blood that gives flesh its softness. Blood, as you know, is red and flows through the blood vessels but male seed is located here (Christofer points out Andron’s large balls as he wraps them up against Andron’s thigh) and it is white.

Arseny did not tell Christofer he knew the color of seed. He had spoken about this to Elder Nikandr in Confession.

Keep your hands above the bedspread, Elder Nikandr had advised.

This was not at home but at the cemetery, Arseny said.

Well now, that is quite something, elder Nikandr said with a whistle. At the cemetery and everything. It is live people who lie there, after all.

I saw only the dead.

For God, all are living.

Arseny turned away:

But I have begun to fear death.

The elder ran his hand along Arseny’s hair. He said:

Each of us repeats Adam’s journey and acknowledges, with the loss of innocence, that he is mortal. Weep and pray, O Arseny. And do not fear death, for death is not just the bitterness of parting. It is also the joy of liberation.

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Arseny learned to read at an early age. Within a few days he had learned the letters Christofer had showed him and could soon combine them into words without difficulty. At first it bothered him that the words in most books were not separated from one another, but rather flowed in a continuous series. One day, Arseny asked why the words were not written separately.

But are they really pronounced separately? said Christofer, answering the question with a question. I will also tell you this. At times it is not crucial how a word is spoken and by whom. All that is important is that it has been spoken. Or, at the very least, thought.

Christofer’s notes written on birch bark became Arseny’s first—and much-loved—reading. There were several reasons for this. The birch-bark manuscripts were written in large, distinct penmanship. They were not large in size. They were Arseny’s most accessible reading because they were lying all around the house. Finally, Arseny saw how they were made.

Christofer worked on preparing birch bark in spring, during the time a tree’s sap is in motion. He peeled it from the trunks in neat, wide bands that he then boiled in brine for several hours. The bark grew soft and lost its brittleness. Christofer cut the bark into even sheets after processing it. It was now ready for use, a perfect substitute for expensive paper.

Christofer did not dedicate any particular time to writing. He could write in the morning, afternoon, and evening. Sometimes, if an important thought came into his head during the night, he would get up and write it down. Christofer wrote down what he had read in books: And King Solomon had seven hundreth wives and thre hundreth concubynes, and eighte thousande books. He wrote down his own observations: on the tenth day of the month of September, Arseny’s tooth hadst fallen out. He wrote down his doctorly prayers, contents of medicines, descriptions of herbs, information about natural anomalies, weather omens, and brief edifying statements: guard thyself from the silence of a loathsome man as if he were a loathsome dog who doth steale in secret. He used a bone stylus to scratch out letters on the inside of the birch bark.

Christofer did not write because he feared forgetting something. He never forgot anything, even when he reached old age. For Christofer, the written word seemed to regulate the world. Stop its fluctuations. Prevent notions from eroding. This is why Christofer’s sphere of interest was so broad. According to the writer’s thinking, that sphere should correspond to the world’s breadth.

Christofer usually left his writings in the places where he had made them: on the bench, on the stove, on the woodpile. He did not pick them up when they fell to the floor: he vaguely anticipated their discovery, much later, in a cultural stratum. Christofer understood that the written word would always remain that way. No matter what happened later, once it had been written, the word had already occurred.

By watching and following Christofer’s movements, Arseny already knew where to search for his notes. Sometimes, the place where one manuscript turned up would be the location for another one, or even more, that very same day. At times, Arseny’s grandfather seemed like a hen carrying golden eggs that needed only be gathered in good time. The boy even learned to guess the nature of what was written, based on Christofer’s facial expression. Knitted brows led him to surmise that the current manuscript denounced heretics. An expression of quiet joy accompanied predominantly edifying statements. According to Arseny’s observations, Christofer pensively scratched his nose when specifying heights, volumes, and distances.

The child read the birch-bark manuscripts out loud. Basically, during the Middle Ages people read predominantly out loud, at the very least simply moving their lips. Arseny piled the notes he particularly liked in a special basket. Yf someone choketh on a bone, appeal for help from the Saint Vlasy. Vasily the Great sayeth Adam was in Paradise forty dayes. Have not a friendship with a woman, and do not burne in fyre. The variety of information staggered the child’s imagination.

But the scope of Arseny’s reading was not limited to birch-bark manuscripts. The Alexander Romance, the ancient story of Alexander the Great, lay under one of the icons in the holy corner. This book had been copied at one time by Feodosy, Christofer’s grandfather. It is I, Feodosy, a sinner, who made a copie of this book in memory of brave people, that their deeds not go unremembered. That is how Feodosy addressed his descendants on the first page. He found in Arseny his most grateful reader.

Arseny carefully moved the icon aside and took the book from the holder with both hands. He blew the dust from the binding and ran his hand along its darkened leather. There was no dust on the binding but Arseny had seen Christofer act in this manner. Then the boy began on the clasps, unlatching them with a quiet brass sound. It is I, Feodosy… Under that note was a portrait of Alexander made by his great-great-grandfather. Its hero sat in an uncomfortable pose with a royal crown on his head.

Arseny read the Alexander Romance constantly. He read it sitting on the bench and lying on the stove, squeezing his arms between his knees and his head resting on his palms, in the mornings and in the evenings. Sometimes at night, by the light of a burning splinter lamp. Christofer did not object: he liked that the boy read a lot. The wolf would approach Arseny at the first words of the Alexander Romance. He settled at the boy’s feet and listened to the unusual narration. He carefully followed the events in the life of the Macedonian king, right along with Arseny.

And so it emerged that Alexander discovered savage people when he arrived in the East. Their height was two sazhens and their heads (Arseny’s hand was on the wolf’s head) were shaggy. After six days in the middle of the desert, Alexander’s troops encountered astonishing people with six arms and six legs each. Alexander killed many of them and took many alive. He wanted to bring them to the inhabited world but nobody knew what these people ate, so they all died. The ants in that same land were of such size that one of them dragged a horse off into its lair after capturing it. And then Alexander ordered straw be brought to the lair and set afire, and the ants burned to death. Later on, after walking another six days, Alexander saw a mountain to which a man was bound with iron chains. That man was a thousand sazhens in height and two hundred sazhens in width. Alexander was surprised when he saw him but dared not approach. And that man wept and they heard his voice for another four days. From there, Alexander arrived in a forested area and saw other strange people: they were people above the waist but horses below the waist. When he attempted to bring them to the inhabited world, a cold wind blew upon them and they all died. And Alexander walked from that place for one hundred days, feeling desolation when he neared the boundaries of the universe.

Arseny closed the book, which he had been reading at the cemetery in the rays of the setting sun. It was not yet cold. Stones that had warmed during the day radiated heat. When the boy stretched out on a gravestone, he felt the warmth with his entire body. The stone bore no name.

Why are there no names on the graves? Arseny once asked.

Because they are already known to the Lord, responded Christofer. And their descendants have no need of the names. In one hundred years nobody will remember who they belonged to. Sometimes that even happens after fifty. Or maybe even after thirty.

Do people remember like that in the whole world or only in Rukina Quarter?

The whole world, I suppose. But especially in Rukina Quarter. We do not build marble crypts and we do not carve out names, for our cemeteries are granted the right to turn into forests and fields. Which is gratifying.

Does that mean our people have a short memory?

One might say that. It is just that memory should not be too long. That, you know, is not for the best. After all, some things should be forgotten. As it happens, I remember (Christofer indicated a gray stone) that Yeleazar Windblower lies here. He was a prosperous person and could afford a stone like this. But I would have remembered him without the stone. This person had a slight limp and spoke with a sharp, guttural voice. He spoke in spurts, going silent from time to time, so his speech limped, too. He suffered from excess gases. He farted loudly and I gave him a chamomile infusion. I gave him dill water and other antiflatulence treatments. And forbade him to drink freshly drawn milk before bed. But since he had a cow, Yeleazar loved milk beyond measure and drank his fill in the evening hours. Which led to winds in the belly. Yeleazar also loved carving wood. And nobody in Rukina Quarter carved better than he, especially where window frames were concerned. He sniffled when he worked. He would keep saying something in low tones, as if to himself. He ran his palm along his lips, as if he were stopping his speech. As if he were afraid of what had been said. When it came right down to it, though, there was nothing dangerous in what he said. So he would hold forth about the qualities of wood, about what all of us in the quarter already knew: that oak is hard and pine is soft. And can you believe it, O Arseny, his window frames are still up, but people no longer remember Yeleazar? One might ask a young person, who is this Yeleazar? And he would not answer. And even the old men only vaguely remember him because they remember indifferently, without love. But the Lord remembers with love and does not let any small detail slip his memory, thus He does not need his name.

Arseny is lying on the warm stone. He is lying with his belly down, the closed Alexander Romance alongside him. The heads of yellow buttercups touch his face. It is ticklish and he smiles. The wolf wags his tail the slightest bit.

Yeleazar, fart, the boy quietly requests. Even if it is just once. Let that be your signal from there.

Offended, Yeleazar remains silent.

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The elder Nektary was killed during the stifling days of July. The elder lived in a forest cell not far from the monastery. Birds sat on his shoulders in the mornings and he gave them bread he had obtained from the monastery. Elder Nektary had been tortured before his death, with the expectation of money being found, but he had no money. He had only a few books. They were taken and the elder’s tortured body was left in the glade in front of his cell. The monastery’s novices found the body the next morning and thought he was dead. His spirit, however, continued to keep watch in the body, but only two words remained: I forgive. The scoundrels, though, continued roaming the region, languishing as they awaited Judgment Day. They attacked solitary travelers and distant hamlets, and nobody knew what they looked like because, as yet, nobody had come away alive.

One day they killed a man who was walking with a dog. They took the man’s clothing and threw the body to lie in the road, but the dog stayed to keep watch over its master. And a merciful man who owned a roadside hostelry found him. He recited the prayer for the eternal rest of God’s servant, only God knows his name, and committed his naked body to the earth. After seeing this act of mercy, the dog followed him and even stayed at his hostelry.

And then one day a certain drunkard attempted to enter the hostelry and the dog began barking horribly, preventing him from entering. When this happened several more times, the people of the hostelry remembered the dog’s history and suspected something was amiss.

The man was caught and subjected to dunking. He was bound and thrown into the lake, where he began sinking. This made everyone begin to think the man was innocent, just as he had maintained, but then an instant later he appeared over the lake’s ripples, swimming as if nothing at all had happened. He shouted that alcohol was holding him on the surface because it was lighter than water, but everyone understood it was evil forces holding him there.

After his guilt became apparent to everyone, he was subjected to torture with red-hot iron, another test he did not pass, since the character of the burns made it obvious he was lying. After he had been burned good and proper, he told them they ought to search for the other scoundrels, who numbered three, in an abandoned hamlet five versts away. They galloped those five versts so fast it might have been one, and surrounded the hamlet so no one could leave. They found two of the men in the very first house, along with the books taken from the elder. They did not notice that they had killed them as they were tying them up. And when they returned, they learned the man caught earlier was deade after the torture. Being humanitarians, they breathed a sigh of relief, because they had given the deceased men hope for Judgment Day: if not for acquittal (the dead men had, after all, killed a holy man), then at last for leniency, so that after suffering the ordeal here, their ordeal would be lessened there.

But the fourth scoundrel remained at large. They made additional attempts to capture him but that was challenging because both his appearance and even his identity were unknown.

Who is he? Arseny asked, woeful.

A Russian man, who else, Christofer answered. There does not seem to be an abundance of others here.

And then one day, as dusk was settling in, they noticed motion in the cemetery. More likely they sensed it. Disquiet had been breathed onto them from the wordless country graveyard. Arseny seemed to see in a flickering shadow the shadowy shape of someone deceased, but Christofer appealed to his grandson to maintain his presence of spirit. It was clear to the old man that it was the living who should be feared. All the unpleasantries that had occurred in his life hitherto had certainly originated with them. Without explaining anything to Arseny, he ordered him to leave the house unnoticed and go to the village to get people.

Let us go together, Grandfather. There is no need to stay here.

No, said Christofer, lighting a splinter lamp. I need to stay so as not to arouse his suspicions. Go, O Arseny.

Arseny went outside.

He appeared in the doorway again a minute later. He flew through the door, as if he were carried by some external power. That power quickly made itself known to Christofer, too. The old man immediately recognized the figure standing behind Arseny. It was death. Death gave off the smell of an unwashed body and the inhuman gravity that causes horror to arise in the soul. The gravity that everything alive could feel. That made the trees outside the window lose their leaves before their time. And birds fall from the sky in horror. The wolf crawled under the bench, his tail between his legs.

This little bird was planning to fly a long way but he did not get far.

He said this in a hoarse, unlubricated voice. Scratching a tangled beard. After hesitating, he pushed the bar on the door. He approached Christofer, who sensed his fetid breath.

What, are you frightened, landsman?

Believe thou in Christ? Christofer asked him firmly.

We live in the woods and pray for the goods. That is our belief. And we are in need of money, too, landsman. Have a look, will you?

And how is it I am your landsman?

The intruder winked. You are a landsman because you can consider yourself as already belonging to the land. (He reached into his boot top for a knife.) I am going to send you there.

I will give you money, and you may go with God. We will not tell anyone about you.

No, you definitely will not tell anyone. (He smiled toothlessly. He turned around and struck Arseny with the knife handle. Arseny fell.) Hurry up, landsman: I will hit with the blade from now on.

He exaggeratedly brandished the knife.

The wolf jumped.

The wolf jumped and hung on the intruder’s arm. He had clamped his jaws above the elbow and was hanging there, his paws pressed into the man’s side. This was the arm without the knife. The arm with the knife plunged into the wolf’s fur several times but the wolf continued to hang there. He had clenched his jaw for the ages. And then the knife fell. The right arm reached with a lifeless, mechanical motion to help the left. It grabbed the wolf by the scruff and began tearing him away from the afflicted flesh. The wolf’s muzzle stretched as if it were a mask being pulled off. His eyes turned into two white spheres. They looked off at the ceiling and reflected the flaring splinter lamp.

Christofer picked up the knife but the visitor was not thinking about the knife. Agonized, he finally succeeded in tearing the wolf from himself. What remained in the wolf’s jaws? A piece of shirt? Of flesh? Bones? The wolf himself did not know what it was. He was lying on the floor and snarling, not unclenching his teeth. He did not have the arm, though, because the visitor seemed to be leaving with his arm. Something seemed to be hanging from his shoulder but it was now impossible to know exactly what. It hung like a whip, limp and flimsy, and Arseny thought it could even fall off. The visitor beat at the door but just could not get out. Christofer held him by his intact arm and unbolted the door. The man hit his head on the lintel as he left. He banged himself again in the entryway. His small steps rustled through the autumn leaves. He went quiet. Disappeared. Dissolved.

Glory be to You, O God Almighty, for you did not desert us. Christofer sank to his knees and made the sign of the cross over himself. He bent over Arseny. The boy was still lying on the floor; his cheek and hair were smeared with blood. Even by the light of the splinter lamp, the blood looked especially bright on Arseny’s light-colored hair.

Only his brow was cut but it was nothing terrible. Christofer helped Arseny stand. We will paste it up with plantain.

Wait a minute, Arseny stopped him. Check to see how the wolf is.

The wolf was lying in a pool of blood. He was not moving. Christofer forced open his jaw and pulled out something frightening. He carried it outside the house, not showing Arseny. The wolf’s tail quivered when Christofer returned.

He’s alive. Arseny was happy.

Alive? Christofer snuffled as he looked over the wolf. I do not see any stable life in him. Only short-term signs.

The wolf quivered slightly; his head rested on his paws.

Save him, Grandfather.

Christofer took a knife and sheared off the fur around the wounds. He warmed a mixture of medicinal oils and carefully applied it to the cut flesh. The wolf trembled but did not lift his head. Christofer sprinkled ground oak leaves on the shaved parts of the wolf’s body. He covered them with pieces of ham that he warmed after taking them from the ice pit, then began binding them with linen. Arseny lifted the wolf and Christofer slipped the fabric under him. The wolf did not resist. Never before had his body been so pliant. There was no more spring in his muscles. His eyes were open but they reflected nothing beyond agony.

Arseny lit the stove and Christofer brought some straw from the shed. They neatly piled the straw by the stove and carried the wolf there. The wolf looked at the fire without blinking. Fire no longer disquieted him.

Arseny sensed the wolf had no more strength left. He sat, pressing hard into the bench with his hands. The last thing he remembered was Christofer’s soothing touch when he laid a pillow under his head.

The wolf was not in the house when they awoke in the morning. A bloody trail stretched from the stove to the door and from there into the yard. The trail left off in the slippery, decaying leaves on the road.

We will find him, he cannot have gone far. Arseny looked at Christofer. Why are you quiet?

He went off to die, said Christofer. That is a characteristic of animals.

At Arseny’s insistence, they set off in search of the wolf. They did not know where to search and so went where they had first seen him. But the wolf was not there. They went to other places the wolf knew but did not find him. The short autumn afternoon was verging on sunset.

It was already twilight when they sighted the intruder from the previous evening. He was smiling at them with a jowl that was falling off, and his arms were opened wide as if for a welcoming embrace. There was nothing natural about those embraces. The vestiges of his death-throes had hardened in his wide-open arms. And in his hopeless striving to stand, too. Arseny tried not to look at the dreadful mess where his left arm had been, but his glance returned, relentlessly, to the very place below the shoulder where white bone flashed. The arm injured by the wolf had already been eaten at. There was no need to doubt that their arrival had interrupted someone’s supper. Arseny vomited when Christofer approached the dead man up close.

You will feel better now, said Christofer.

They did not speak until they had almost reached home. When they were already near the cemetery, Arseny said:

I do not know how the wolf left in that linen. That would, after all, be difficult.

It would be difficult, Christofer acknowledged.

Arseny nestled his head into Christofer’s chest and began sobbing. His words came out with his sobs. They moved jerkily and loudly, like jolts. Disturbing the voicelessness of the cemetery.

Why did he go off to die? Why did he not die with us, the ones who loved him?

Christofer wiped Arseny’s tears with his scratchy touch. He kissed his forehead.

It was his way of warning us that everyone remains alone with God at the final moment.

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Christofer decided to take Communion for the Feast of the Protection of the Mother of God at the Kirillov monastery. He arranged for the travel with some men from the quarter who were among his visitors. A cart came to get Christofer and Arseny the night before the feast day. Four other people on their way to the monastery for the holiday were already sitting in the cart. Four plumes of vapor flowed from their lips when they greeted the new passengers. They did not utter another sound for the rest of the journey, preserving their words for the impending Confession. Hooves rang out on the frozen earth, echoing their silence. The thin crust of ice covering the snow crunched under the rims of the wheels. A frost had hit the night before and the mud had frozen into furrows and clods, turning the road into a washboard. Arseny heard his own teeth chattering. He tried clenching his jaw as firmly as he could to keep from biting his tongue. He did not even notice himself falling asleep.

He awoke when the cart stopped. The moon illuminated the torn edges of the clouds. Crosses raced through the clouds, cleaving them into pieces. As Arseny looked at the dark, massive cupolas, he thought he had never seen such a tall building. They looked more significant and mysterious in the night darkness than during the day. This was a House of God. It glowed inside with the light of hundreds of candles.

The new arrivals began by bowing to Saint Kirill: a total of twenty-eight years had passed since the day of his death. And eight years since the day of his Glorification. After placing candles at the venerable man’s reliquary, Christofer and Arseny stepped back into the semidarkness. From there, they listened to the end of the all-night vigil. From there they saw Elder Nikandr come into the center of the church and begin preparing those who had arrived for Confession.

After the elder had pronounced the prayer, he took a small—only an octavo—notebook titled Sins of Medium Gravity Characteristic of Laypersons and Clericals. Minor sins were not included in the notebook because they were not considered worthy of being pronounced aloud. (Repent of them on your own, he taught his flock, don’t pester me with them. Nonsense like this could mean you don’t make it to what’s important!) To avoid immortalizing serious sins, the elder did not write them down. He asked that they be conveyed directly into his ear, and he then entombed them in that ear for the ages.

The list of sins of medium gravity included tardiness in arriving at a church service, or its opposite, leaving the service prematurely. Or—during the aforementioned service—wandering around the church, and having extraneous thoughts. Improper observation of a fast, laughing to the point of tears, coarse language, idle talk, winking, dancing with devilish minstrels, using false measurements and false weights with a customer, stealing hay, spitting in someone’s face, striking with a scabbard, starting rumors, condemning a monk, gluttony, drunkenness, and spying on bathers. Elder Nikandr’s list was only beginning when Arseny sensed his eyes closing again.

When, toward morning, they moved on to personal Confession, Arseny and Christofer had almost nothing to add. It turned out that there were surprisingly few life situations Elder Nikandr had not foreseen. Christofer hesitated as he was confessing, and looked the elder in the eye.

What do you want to read in my eyes? asked the elder.

You knowest that yourself, O father.

I will tell you only that the reckoning does not go on for years. And not even for months. Accept that information calmly, without sniveling, as befits a true Christian.

Christofer nodded. He saw the weary Arseny crouched by a pillar at the other end of the church. The wind tore in through doors that continually opened and closed, and a chandelier swayed over the boy’s head. The candles’ flames flickered and stretched but did not go out. From the dampness in the wind, Christofer understood that the weather had warmed toward the end of the night. He heard the calls of distant roosters but beyond the church walls it was darkness that still gaped, cut into tidy rhombuses by the grated window.

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Christofer inspected the house carefully after they returned from the monastery. Two days later, the logs and boards he had ordered were brought from the quarter. Christofer and Arseny propped up the roof frame with a beam then changed the upper courses of logs, which had rotted from rain and warm condensation. Christofer tested the joints between the logs’ framework and plugged the many cracks with flax and moss. He then replaced holey floorboards with new ones. An aroma of freshly planed wood spread through the house along with the smell of herbs. Arseny sensed haste in Christofer’s work but he helped his grandfather without asking anything.

When dusk settled in, Christofer would test Arseny’s knowledge on the subject of herbs. He corrected or supplemented Arseny’s answers as necessary, but he rarely needed to: Arseny remembered superbly everything Christofer had ever told him.

On other evenings, Christofer looked through his books and manuscripts. He glanced through some quickly, stopping at certain pages and reading them, as if in thought. He moved his lips. Sometimes he would tear himself away from a page and look at the splinter lamp for a long time. This behavior surprised Arseny because in their home everything was usually read out loud.

What readest thou, O Christofer?

Books of Abraham not from the Holy Scriptures.

Go on, reade it out loud, I shall listen.

And so Christofer read. He moved the manuscript away from his eyes like an old man and read about how the Lord sent Archangel Michael to Abraham.

The Lord sayde:

Say unto Abraham that the time has come for him to go forth from this life.

Archangel Michael set off to see Abraham and returned again:

It is not so simple, he said, to announce a death to Abraham, a friend of God.

And then everything was revealed in a dream to Isaac, son of Abraham. And Isaac arose during the night and began to knock at his father’s room, saying:

Open the door for me, father, because I want to see that you are still here.

When Abraham opened the door, Isaac threw himself upon his neck, weeping and osculating him. And Archangel Michael, who was spending the night in Abraham’s home, saw them weeping and wept with them, and his tears were as stones. And Christofer wept, too. Arseny wept seeing how the ink on the sheet grew vivid from Christofer’s teardrops.

And the Lord ordered Archangel Michael to adorn Death—who was coming to Abraham—with great beauty. And Abraham saw that Death was approaching him and he was very afrayde and said to Death:

I implore thee, tell me, who may this be? And I ask you to get away from me, for my soul became confused when first I saw you. I cannot abide your glory and I see your beauty is not of this world.

While the boy slept during the nights, Christofer wrote on birch bark about those properties of herbs that he had not previously revealed in full to his grandson because of his youthfulness. He wrote about herbs that bestowed oblivion and about herbs that promoted bedroom thoughts. About dill, with which to sprinkle hemorrhoids, about the herb chernobyl, known as wormwood and used against wizardry, about ground onion to treat a cat bite. About the plant scarem that grows in low lands (do carry it on your person ther, wher thou wish to ask for some money or bread; yf you ask a man, place it on the right side under your shirt, on the left yf you ask a woman; yf there are minstrels playing, toss that herb under their feet and they will fight). To fend off temptation and wanton daydreaming, drink a tisane of lavender. To verify virginity, drink water in which an agate has lain for three days: after drinking the agate water, a woman who has lost virginity will not be able to hold the water within. Carrying turquoise on one’s person protects from murder because that stone has never been seen on a murdered person. A stone from a rooster’s stomach returns states taken by an enemy. He who wears a magnet is pleasing to women. Golde rubbed and taken internally cures those who speake unto themselves and ask questions of themselves and answere themselves and become downhearted. Dry, grind, and dissolve wild-boar lung in water. He who drinks this water will not become drunk at a feast. That is all.

One December morning in 1455, contrary to his usual habit, Christofer did not leave his bed. He raised himself up and sat on the bed but had no strength to move further. Christofer told those who came to him for certain matters:

Speake not to me of the earthly, for I have no more in common with the living. My weakening members give no doubt of anything excepte quick death and the Savior’s Judgment Day in a future tyme.

And the visitors left.

Toward midday, Arseny helped Christofer go out to the facilities. Only then did he grasp that the old man was already almost unable to walk. Arseny cast Christofer’s arm across his shoulder and dragged him across the yard. Christofer’s legs trailed behind him, powerless. They kept moving, taking turns, as if by old habit, and scraping at the freshly fallen snow. After returning to the house, Arseny asked:

What shall I get you, Grandfather?

Let me catch my breath, child. Christofer was sitting, hunched, on the edge of the bed. Perspiration had formed on his forehead. Let me catch my breath.

Lie down, Grandfather.

Yf I lie down, I will die at that very hour.

Do not die, Grandfather, for I will be left alone on this earth.

And therfore, child, mortal fear took hold upon me. My heart is breaking and I am crushed to leave you, but I cast my sorrow on the Lord, as the prophet says. From this time on, He will be your grandfather. Beholde, therefore I shall leave this world, O Arseny. Heal people with herbs, for you, too, shall make a living from this. But better yet, enter the monastery, you will be ther a lampe unto the Lord. Will you do as I say?

Do not die, Grandfather. Do not die… Arseny breathed in and choked.

But what am I supposed to do, Christofer shouted, with the last of his strength, if I shall die as soon as I lie down?

I will prop you up, Grandfather.

For three days and two nights, Christofer sat on the bed, one foot lowered to the floor, the other stretched along the bench. Arseny helped him maintain his sitting position. He propped up his grandfather’s back with his own back and he regulated his grandfather’s heartbeat with his own heart. And restored his quickening breathing to normal. The boy only absented himself a few times, to have a quick drink of water and use the facilities. On the third day, Elder Nikandr came from the monastery and ordered Arseny to go outside for a while. He sat with Christofer for a fairly long time. As he left, he saw how Arseny propped Christofer up. He said:

Let him go, O Arseny. It is because of you that he lacks the courage to leave.

But Arseny only leaned his back even harder into his grandfather’s back.

Keep vigil with him until midnight, said the elder, and then let him go.

At around midnight, Arseny thought Christofer was feeling better and that his breathing was not so labored. Arseny saw his grandfather’s smile, surprised he could see it with his back. He felt relief as he watched his grandfather walk around the room and touch the bunch of immortelle hanging in the corner. This made all the herbs hanging under the ceiling sway. The ceiling itself swayed, too. As he stroked the sleeping boy’s cheek, Christofer told the Lord:

Into Thy hands, I comende my spirite; have mercy on me and grant me eternal life. Amen.

He crossed himself, laid down beside his grandson, and closed his eyes.

Arseny awoke early in the morning. He looked at Christofer, lying beside him. He inhaled all the available air in the house and shouted. When Elder Nikandr heard this shout at the monastery, he told Arseny:

There is no need to shout so loudly, for his passing was peaceful.

When people in the quarter heard Arseny’s shout, they set aside their day-to-day cares and headed toward Christofer’s house. Their healed bodies preserved memories of Christofer’s good deeds.

And so began the first day without Christofer, and Arseny wept away the first half of that day. He looked at the arriving residents of the quarter but his tears washed away their faces. Worn by grief, Arseny went to sleep during the second half of the day.

By the time he awoke, it was already night. He began weeping again when he remembered that Christofer was now gone. Christofer was lying on the bench, where a candle stood at his head. Another candle illuminated the Eternal Book, which had formerly lain on a shelf. Elder Nikandr held the candle. He stood with his back to Christofer and Arseny, and read the Book to the icons in a muffled voice.

Here, read for a while, said the elder without turning, and I’ll sleep a bit. And be a pal, enough with that howling.

Arseny took the candle from the elder’s hands and stood before the Book. He saw out of the corner of his eye how the elder settled in on the bench alongside Christofer after moving him slightly. Lines from the Psalms kept floating before his eyes and his voice did not obey him. Arseny cleared his throat and began to read. Thou shalt treade upon the Basilisk and Adder, the yonge Lyon and the Dragon shalt thou trample under thy fete. Arseny read and thought about how Christofer might need to undertake the same actions. Arseny turned to Elder Nikandr.

Who is this Basilisk?

But the elder was sleeping. He was lying shoulder to shoulder with Christofer and both had their arms folded on their chests. Their noses dimly gleamed in the candlelight. Both were identically motionless, and both seemed dead. Arseny, however, knew Christofer was the only one of them who was dead. Nikandr’s temporary necrosis was a display of solidarity. In order to support Christofer, he had decided to take the first steps into death with him. Because the first steps are the most difficult.

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Christofer’s funeral took place the next day. When they had filled the grave with earth, Elder Nikandr said:

After spending the days of his life in the house by the cemetery, he will spend the days of his death in the cemetery by the house. I am convinced that the deceased will only welcome this type of symmetry.

The cemetery was quiet. It had been visited rarely since the time of the last plague because those who had gone there before now dwelled in other places. Christofer’s repose had become all-embracing after his move to the cemetery.

After the funeral, grateful residents from the quarter invited Arseny to move in with them, but Arseny refused.

Christofer’s memory, he said, should be preserved in his last place of residence, which he had fixed up to the best of his abilities. Here, said Arseny, each wall preserves the warmth of his gaze and the scratchiness of his touch. How, one might ask, could I leave this place?

They did not dissuade him. To some extent, it was easier for them that he stay in Christofer’s house. This way, the physician’s familiar and customary abode remained intact. By continuing to give out needed remedies from Christofer’s home, Arseny himself quietly became Christofer in people’s eyes. And even the journey the villagers had to take to receive the medicine was worthwhile because of the firm realization that everything was remaining in its proper place.

That realization immediately simplified the relationships between the doctor and his patients. Men and the women all disrobed in front of Arseny with the same ease they had formerly disrobed in front of Christofer. Sometimes it seemed to Arseny that the women did so even more easily than the men; he would then experience uneasiness. In the beginning, he touched their flesh with the tips of his finger, but soon after—this was about ill flesh, after all—he would place his entire palm on their flesh without agitation, even squeezing and kneading, if necessary.

The ability to lay hands, to ease pain with the laying-on of his hands, was part of what determined Arseny’s first nickname: Rukinets, rooted in ruka, for hand. That nickname was actually typical for his part of the world. It was what people from other places called residents of Rukina Quarter. People visiting from far away had also named Christofer “Rukinets.”

This nickname had no meaning for residents of the quarter because they were also Rukinets. Things worked out differently for Arseny. Even within the quarter itself, people began identifying him as Rukinets. This was generally perceived as a sort of issuing of honorary citizenship, like calling his beloved Alexander by the name “Alexander the Macedonian.” When the renown of Arseny’s remarkable hands reached lands where nobody had heard of Rukina Quarter (and that was the majority of places), the nickname lost its meaning again. And then they began calling Arseny “Doctor.”

The adolescent Arseny’s pudgy, childish hands took on noble contours. His fingers stretched longer, the knuckles became more prominent, and previously invisible tendons tensed under his skin. The movements of his hands grew smooth, his gestures expressive. These were the hands of a musician who had inherited the most astonishing of instruments as a gift: the human body.

Arseny’s hands lost their materiality when they touched a patient’s body; it was as if they flowed. There was something in them that was cool, like fresh water from a spring. Those who came to Arseny in his early years found it difficult to say if his touch was curative, but they were already convinced that it was pleasant. Accustomed to the pain that usually accompanied treatment, these people may have experienced, deep down in their souls, doubt about the benefit of pleasant medical actions. This, however, did not stop them. In the first place, Arseny treated them with the very same methods Christofer had treated them with, and Arseny did not have any more blatant failures than Christofer. In the second place (and this was probably the most important thing), the villagers simply had no real choice. Under the circumstances, pleasant treatment could be preferred over unpleasant in good conscience.

As far as Arseny was concerned, it was just as important for him to be around people. Beyond paltry money, people brought him bread, honey, milk, cheese, peas, dried meat, and much more, allowing him not to have to think about food. But the value of these visits was not so much that they provided Arseny sustenance. The point was, first of all, the interaction, which made Arseny feel better.

Patients did not leave after receiving the help they needed. They told Arseny about weddings, funerals, construction, fires, payments to landowners, and harvest prospects. About those who had arrived in the quarter and about the quarter residents’ journeys. About Moscow and Novgorod. About princes in Belozersk. About Chinese silk. They found themselves realizing they did not want to cut short their conversations with Arseny.

With Christofer’s death, it suddenly turned out that, essentially, Arseny had had no other interaction. Christofer had been his only relative, conversation partner, and friend. Christofer had dominated his whole life over many years. Christofer’s death had turned Arseny’s life into something empty. Life seemed to remain, but it no longer had anything inside. After becoming hollow, his life lost so much of its weight that Arseny would not have been surprised if a gust of wind had carried it off into high, high places beyond the clouds and, perhaps, simultaneously brought him closer to Christofer. Sometimes Arseny thought that was exactly what he wanted.

The visitors were the only link connecting Arseny to life. Arseny was, undoubtedly, glad of their arrival. But it was not the visits themselves or the opportunity to speak that gladdened him. Arseny knew the patients still saw Christofer in him, making each visit like a continuation his grandfather’s life. In closing the resulting emptiness, Arseny himself began to feel a little as if he were Christofer, and that identity was tacitly confirmed by the visitors.

Arseny was terse with his callers, despite valuing their interaction. Perhaps things worked out this way because Arseny was expending all his words in discussions with Christofer. These discussions occupied the greater part of the day and took place in various ways.

Arseny went to the cemetery right after getting out of bed in the morning. It is obvious that the word went bears a bit of exaggeration here: he had only to go beyond the fence outside the house to be in the cemetery. The house and the cemetery shared a fence, and there had been a gate in it from time immemorial. Christofer was buried alongside the gate. He did not wish to be taken far from his home in death so had selected his resting place while still alive; he showed no remorse now. Not only did he know about everything that took place in the house, he was almost in it. “Almost” because, remembering the relativity of death, Christofer was also aware that there were separate residences intended for the living and the dead.

A village carpenter slapped together a bench by the mound formed from frozen clumps of earth. Arseny sat on the bench and talked each morning with Christofer, who was lying under the hill. He told him about his visitors and about their illnesses. About the words they had said to him, the herbs he had infused, the roots he had ground, the movement of clouds, and the direction of the wind—about everything, in short, that it was now difficult for Christofer to get a sense of on his own.

Evening was the most difficult time for Arseny. He simply could not get used to Christofer’s absence by the stove. The flickering of the fire on his thick-browed and wrinkly face had somehow seemed as primordial and ancient as fire itself. That flickering was a property of fire, an integral characteristic of the stove, something that, essentially, had no right to disappear.

What had happened with Christofer was not the absence of someone who had departed for the unknown. It was the absence of someone who was, nevertheless, lying nearby. When the weather was frosty, Arseny threw a sheepskin on the mound. He certainly knew that Christofer was not sensitive to the cold in his current condition, but life in the heated house became unbearable when he thought of his grandfather lying there without heat. The only thing that saved Arseny in the evenings was reading Christofer’s manuscripts.

Solomon sayde: better to dwell in emptie earth than to dwell with a chydynge and an angrye woman; Philo said the just man is not he who will not offend but he who could offend but does not wish to; Socrates saw his friend, who was rushing to artists to order his image be carved upon rock, and he said to him, you are rushing for a stone to become like yourself, why not take care that you do not become like a stone; Philip II of Macedon assigned a certain person to serve amongst other judges when he learned the judge was coloring his hair and beard, and he barred him from judging, saying: yf you are not true to your hayrie lockes, how can you be a true judge unto people; Solomon sayde: There be thre thinges too wonderfull for me, and as for the fourth, it passeth my knowledge: The waye of an aegle in the ayre, the waye of a serpent over the stone, the waye of a shippe in the see, and the waye of a man wyth a yonge woman. Solomon did not understand this. Christofer did not understand this. Life would prove that Arseny did not understand this, either.

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It began to smell like spring at the end of February. The snow had not yet melted but the approach of a northern spring was obvious. Bird calls had become raucous, as in spring, and the air had filled with an unwinterly mildness. It was suffused with a light that had not been seen in these parts since the end of autumn.

When you died, Arseny told Christofer, nature was already dark. But now it is bright again and I weep that you do not see this. If I am to speak of the most important thing, then the skies seem to have heightened and turned light blue. Certain other changes are taking place, too, and I will report about them as they develop. In essence, I can already describe certain things.

Arseny wanted to continue but something stopped him. It was a gaze. He sensed it without even seeing it. The gaze was not severe, more likely hungry. To a greater degree: unfortunate. It flickered from behind distant gravestones. Following it, Arseny saw a kerchief and red locks of hair.

Who are you? asked Arseny.

I am Ustina. She stood from a crouch and silently looked at Arseny for about a minute. I want to eat.

A whiff of ill-being came from Ustina. Her clothing was dirty.

Come in. Arseny showed her the house.

I cannot, answered Ustina. I am from the places where there is pestilence. Bring something out for me to eat and leave it. I will take it when you go.

Come in, said Arseny. Otherwise you will freeze.

Several large teardrops rolled down Ustina’s cheeks. They were visible from a distance, and Arseny was surprised at their size.

Yesterday they did not allow me into the quarter. They said I carry the pestilence with me. Can it be that you do not fear the pestilence?

Arseny shrugged his shoulders.

My grandfather died and now I fear little. All is God’s will.

Ustina entered, not raising her eyes. When she took off her torn sheepskin coat, it was obvious she was doing so for the first time in many days. The smell of an unwashed body spread through the house. Of a young female’s body. The smell’s lack of freshness only strengthened its youthfulness and femaleness—it contained within it the utmost concentration of both things. Arseny felt agitated.

Ustina’s face and hands were covered with abrasions. Arseny knew sores could also occur on the body, from not changing clothing. Cleanliness must be returned to the body. He placed a large clay pot of water in the stove. In that long-ago time, nothing was boiled on a fire, it was cooked beside a fire. That is how the stove was designed.

Ustina sat in the corner, her hands clasped on her knees. She was looking at the floor, on which there lay straw sprinkled with soot. Her clothing seemed like an extension of that straw: black and matted. And it was not even clothing, but rather something not intended for a person.

When small bubbles began gathering on the surface of the water, Arseny took the largest grasper and carefully (the tip of his tongue was on his lip) dragged the pot out of the fire. He poured some cold water into a small wooden tub he had placed in the center of the room. Then he poured hot water from the pot. Added an alkaline solution of the herb Enoch, mixed with maple leaf. He placed a pitcher of cool water alongside for rinsing.

Bathe thyself, yf thou wylt.

He went into the next room, where it was unheated, and closed the door behind him. Ustina rustled her ragged clothes. Arseny heard her carefully step into the wooden tub and touch its sides with the dipper. He heard the sound of water. The sound in his own head. He leaned his back against the rimy wall and felt relief. He let out a prolonged breath and observed the steam slowly dissolving in the air.

What cloothes am I to put on? Ustina asked from behind the door.

Arseny thought. He and Christofer had nothing feminine in the house. Arseny’s mother had worn Christofer’s dead wife’s clothes, but everything had to be burned after the pestilence. Looking away from Ustina, Arseny went into the room and opened a chest. On the chest’s open lid he placed some of the clothing that had been lying on top. He found what he sought. He held out his red shirt to Ustina, still not looking at her. He blushed anyway. He blushed easily, like all light-haired people.

Ustina slid her arms into the sleeves and the linen fell softly on her shoulders. Clothing Arseny had previously worn now embraced such a different body. This is what their peculiar union consisted of. Arseny did not know if they both felt that to the same degree.

The shirt proved too long for Ustina so she rolled up the sleeves. She saw a piece of linen fabric in the clothes chest.

May I?

Of course.

She wrapped the fabric around her waist and hips, over the shirt. It ended up looking like a grown woman’s skirt, tied round with a cord also found in the chest. She looked at Arseny. He nodded and felt the surging tenderness that was reflected in his glance. He lowered his eyes and turned red again. A lump had formed in Arseny’s throat from compassion for the thin, red-headed girl who had donned his shirt. He thought he had never before pitied anyone so passionately.

Yes, I forgot, do show me if you have any sores on your body.

Ustina pulled aside the collar of the shirt and showed him a sore on her neck. After hesitating, she undid a button and showed him one sore on her underarm. Arseny inhaled the scent of her skin. The wounds were small but moist. Arseny knew they needed to be dried. He went to the shelf that held many little pots tied in rags, and thought for a moment. He found a small pot with burnt willow bark. He sprinkled a little on a clean scrap of fabric and moistened it with vinegar. He applied it to the sores, one by one. Ustina bit her lip.

Be patient, please. Have you any other sores?

I have but I cannot show them.

Arseny held out the scrap of fabric to her.

Here, dab at them yourself, I will not look. He turned toward the stove.

Ustina’s rags were lying by the stove, and their proximity to the fire decided things. Arseny tossed them in the stove without saying a word. It was a natural motion, and he made it. But there was in that motion a sign of irreversibility. This is how it was in some tale he had heard from Christofer. Watching as the flame enveloped the shabby clothes, Arseny thought that Ustina would now wear his shirt constantly. He also thought she was, essentially, his age.

He gave Ustina some bread and kvass, and felt the touch of her lips on his hand.

That is all there is for now, said Arseny, pulling away his hand.

He wanted to add something else but sensed his voice was not obeying him.

There was no hot food in the house because Arseny never cooked anything. In his day, Christofer had taught him to prepare simple dishes, but after his grandfather’s departure there was no more point in that—or so Arseny had thought. Ustina tried to eat unhurriedly but did not succeed very well. She broke small pieces from the heel of the bread and slowly placed them in her mouth. She swallowed them almost without chewing. Arseny observed Ustina and felt her kiss on his hand.

He poured some whole oat grain, husks removed, from a sack. He covered it with water and placed it in the oven to cook. He had decided to treat Ustina to porridge for supper.

Everyone died in our village, said Ustina, only I was left. And I dread my final hour. Do you dread it?

Arseny did not reply.

Ustina suddenly began singing in an unexpectedly strong, high voice:

The soul and white body say goodbyes,

forgive me, my white body (she inhaled some air),

you, my body, will go into the damp earth,

to the damp earth I do commit you (a vein on her throat swelled),

for them to eat, the worms so cruel.

Ustina went silent and calmly looked at him. As if she had not even sung. She did not avert her eyes. Her drying hair, not yet braided, shone, fluffy, around her head. Thy hayrie lockes are like a flocke of goates upon the mount of Galaad. In these forgotten times hair was more exciting than now because it was usually covered. Hair was almost an intimate detail.

Arseny did not lower his eyes as he gazed at Ustina. He was surprised that they did not find it difficult to withstand each other’s gaze, that the thread stretching between them was more important than the feeling of unease. He delighted in her red glow. And how the linen thread holding her cross rose and fell on her collarbone in time with her breathing. This was the only thing remaining on Ustina that was her own.

In the evening they ate the porridge, to which Arseny added flax oil. They sat by the hearth, holding clay dishes on their knees. The last time he had sat like this was with Christofer. Arseny inconspicuously watched the play of light on her hair, so akin to flame. It was braided now and looked completely different. Ustina stretched her lips amusingly as she brought the wooden spoon (carved by Christofer) to her mouth. It was like a kiss. A kiss for Christofer. Arseny remembered how those spoons had been carved: also in winter and also by the stove. When he looked at Ustina yet again, she was sleeping.

He carefully took the dish and spoon from her hands. Ustina did not awaken. She continued to sit, composed and restlessly, as if she were surmounting, in her sleep, some difficult journey known only to her. Arseny put Ustina to bed on the bench. He gently lifted her from the chair, trying not to awaken her, and was amazed at her lightness. Her head rested, thrown back, on Arseny’s arm: he held out his elbow to support it. He saw the veins on Ustina’s temples through her translucent skin. And sensed the scent of her lips. Thy lippes are like a rose-colored rybende. He pressed his cheek to her forehead. He gently laid her on the bench and covered her with a sheepskin.

Arseny sat at the headboard and looked at Ustina. At first he sat, arms folded on his chest, then with his palm pressed against his chin. Sometimes a light tremor crossed Ustina’s face. Sometimes she cried out. Arseny ran his palm across her face and she calmed.

Sleep, sleep, Ustina, Arseny whispered.

And Ustina slept. The linen under her gathered in folds. Her cheek touched the bench’s wood. Arseny carefully lifted her head to smooth the folds. Without waking up, Ustina took Arseny’s palm and laid it under her cheek. He had to bend and support his right hand with his left. A few minutes later, Arseny began feeling pain in his back and in his hands, but this was pleasing for him. It seemed to him that he was removing part of Ustina’s burden through his slight suffering. He did not even notice himself dozing off.

He awoke from the ticklish motion of eyelashes along his palm. Ustina was lying with her eyes open. A flicker from the coals in the stove reflected in her eyes. Arseny’s palm was wet from her tears. He touched Ustina’s eyelids with his lips and sensed their saltiness. Ustina moved over as if she were freeing up a space for him:

I got frightened in the darkness.

He sat alongside her on the edge of the bench and she laid her head on his knees.

Stay with me, O Arseny, until I sleep.

Through his clothing he felt the warm breath that came with her words.

I will stay with you until you sleep.

I have nobody but you. I want to firmly embrace you and not let you go.

I also want to embrace you because I am afraid alone.

Then lie down with me.

He lay down. They embraced and lay that way for a long time. He lost track of time. He trembled with fine trembling, though he was all sweaty. And his sweat mixed with her sweat. And then his flesh entered her flesh. In the morning, they saw the linen had become crimson.

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A new life had started for Arseny, a life filled with love and fear. With love for Ustina and with the fear she would disappear just as suddenly as she had arrived. He did not know exactly what he feared: a hurricane maybe, lightning, fire, or an unkind glance. Perhaps all of them together. Ustina was not separate from his love for her. Ustina was love and love was Ustina. He carried it as if it were a candle in a dark forest. He feared that thousands of greedy night-creatures would fly toward that flame all at once and extinguish it with their wings.

He could delight in Ustina for hours on end. He would take her hand and, slowly lifting a sleeve, feel the barely perceptible golden hairs with his lips. He laid her head on his knees and drew a fingertip along the spectral line between her neck and chin. Tasted her eyelashes with his tongue. Carefully took the kerchief from her hair and let her hair down; braided it. Unbraided it again and slowly ran a comb through it. Imagined her hair was a lake and the comb was a boat. He saw himself in that comb, gliding along the golden lake. Felt he was drowning and feared being saved more than anything.

He never showed Ustina to anyone. When he heard a knock at the door, he would throw Christofer’s sheepskin on her and send her to the next room. Casting a glance at the benches, he would search for anything that could betray Ustina. But there were no such things. There was really nothing feminine in Christofer and Arseny’s housekeeping. He would open the front door once he was convinced the door to the neighboring room was firmly closed behind Ustina.

Ustina sat there soundlessly and Arseny examined his patients. His appointments had become briefer, something his visitors noted. Arseny no longer kept up his end of conversations. He examined and palpated diseased flesh without uttering superfluous words. Listened to grievances with concentration and gave instructions. Accepted commensurate payment. After all the medical words had been said, he looked at the guest, marking time. Patients associated that with the doctor’s increasing busyness and treated him with even more respect.

Nobody knew about Ustina. She hardly ever showed herself in the yard and nothing was visible from outside through the small windows stretched with bull’s-bladder. Strictly speaking, nothing was visible when looking through them from inside, either. So even if someone took it upon himself to peer through Arseny’s window, he would not learn much. But of course nobody peered in.

Once, during an appointment with a sufferer of male impotence, Ustina sneezed on the other side of the wall. Not loudly but she sneezed; the room was, after all, cold. The patient looked questioningly at Arseny and asked what the noise was. Arseny responded with an uncomprehending glance. He suggested the visitor not distract him from the problem, otherwise he would never figure it out.

Never, Arseny emphasized, and then recommended eating more carrots.

As he was seeing his guest out, Arseny trod deliberately loudly but Ustina did not sneeze again. When she finally came in, Arseny asked that in future she sneeze into the inner part of the sheepskin because fur muffles sounds.

That is what I usually do, Ustina said. But this time it happened so suddenly that I simply did not have time to cover myself with the coat.

Arseny’s interactions with visitors took on a certain absentmindedness. It became ever more noticeable that Arseny’s thoughts were in other places. If his visitors had known of Ustina, they would have placed his thoughts in the next room. But they would not have been completely correct.

Arseny did not simply think about Ustina. He was submerging, little by little, into a distinct, complete world consisting of himself and Ustina. In that world, he was Ustina’s father and her son. He was her friend and brother, but most of all, her husband. Ustina’s orphanhood left all those responsibilities open. And he took them on. His own orphanhood offered the exact same responsibilities for Ustina. The circle was closing: they were becoming everything for one another. The perfection of that circle made anyone else’s presence impossible. They were two halves of a whole and any addition seemed not only redundant to Arseny but also inadmissible. Even for only a minute and without obligations.

Arseny saw the perfection of their union in the fact that their seclusion did not burden Ustina. He felt she saw the reason and purpose of this sort of life with the same sharpness as he. And even if she did not see it, well, she had, quite simply, grown infinitely weary from roaming, and so accepted his constant presence as undeserved good fortune.

In the evenings they read. They used an oil lamp so as not to keep having to stand up and change the splinter lamps. The lamp burned dully but evenly. Arseny read because Ustina was not literate.

Thanks to Arseny, she heard for the first time of Antiphon’s prophesies for Alexander. The ruler of the whole world, Antiphon said, will die on the iron earth under a sky of ivory. And Alexander was seized by fear in the land of copper. That fear glimmered from the duskiness of Ustina’s eyes. And Alexander ordered his warriors to study the earth’s composition. After studying the earth’s composition, they found inside it only copper, without iron. Alexander, who had a soul stronger than iron, commanded that they continue their forward movement. And so they moved along the copper earth and the clopping of horse hooves on copper sounded to them like thunder...

Ustina tenderly touched Arseny’s shoulder.

Understodest thou what thou redest or dost thou but turn the pages?

Ustina clasped her arms around her knees, pressing more firmly into Arseny. She asked him to read without hurrying. He nodded but began hurrying again without noticing. The five pages they had allocated for the evening were read faster and faster each time and Ustina asked Arseny again and again what made him hurry so. He pressed his cheek to her cheek instead of answering. A jealous thought was arising, that in the evening time Alexander interested her more than Arseny.

Sometimes they read of the Centaur. The Centaur carried his wife in his ear so as to hide her from others. Arseny wanted to carry Ustina in his ear, too, but had no such capacity.

‌

At the end of March, Ustina said:

A babe is in my wombe, for the custom of women is come upon me.

As she said this, she pressed her palms into the wood of the bench, slouching a little, and looking beyond Arseny. Arseny was throwing logs into the stove at that moment. He took a step toward Ustina and knelt before her. His hand was still squeezing a log. It fell and resonantly rolled along the floor. Arseny burrowed his face into Ustina’s red shirt. He felt her hand—loving and weak of will—on the back of his neck. With a soft motion, he laid Ustina on the bench and slowly, fold by fold, began lifting her shirt. After baring her belly, he pressed his lips to it. Ustina’s belly was as flat as a valley and her skin was firm. An anxious line of ribs bounded her stomach. And nothing foretold of changes. Nothing indicated who was inside and preparing to break those lines. As he glided his lips along her belly, Arseny grasped that only Ustina’s pregnancy could express his immeasurable love, that it was he growing throughout Ustina. He felt happiness that he now existed, constantly, within Ustina. He was an integral part of her.

Arseny grasped that Ustina’s new condition would make her even more dependent on him. That may be why the fear of losing her lessened slightly while, on the other hand, the tenderness he felt toward her took on an unprecedented keenness. Arseny experienced tenderness when he saw the eagerness with which Ustina had begun to eat. Her appetite seemed funny even to her. She snorted and breadcrumbs flew all over. Arseny experienced tenderness when Ustina’s face grew gray and she felt nauseous. He got nutmeg oil and fed it to Ustina from a spoon. He slowly pulled the spoon toward himself, his eyes following as Ustina’s lips glided over it. And he also tirelessly delighted in her eyes, which had become completely different in pregnancy. Something damp and vulnerable had appeared in them. Something reminding Arseny of a calf’s eyes.

Sometimes sadness shone through those eyes. The isolated existence with Arseny was, undoubtedly, her happiness. But it was something else, too, that was becoming more noticeable with each passing day. Arseny, who seemed like the whole world to her, still could not replace the whole world. The feeling of isolation from life with others begot anxiety in Ustina. And Arseny saw that.

One day, Ustina asked if they could purchase some women’s clothing for her. She had been wearing the same clothes as Arseny for the whole time she had been living with him.

Is it unpleasant to wear my clothes? Arseny asked.

It is pleasant, sweetheart, very pleasant, it is just that I would like to wear something of my own. I am a woman after all...

Arseny promised to think. He truly did think but his deliberations came to nothing. He could not buy a woman’s dress without revealing the secret of Ustina. There was nobody he could trust with the task. And there could be no discussion of sending Ustina to the quarter alone. In the first place, it would take no effort whatsoever for the villagers to find out where she had come from and, in the second place, well, Arseny loudly sighed and felt a lump rolling in his throat. He could not imagine Ustina leaving him for even half a day.

After some time had passed, she reminded Arseny of her request, but did not receive an answer. A few weeks later, it was already too late to think about buying anything: Ustina’s enlarged belly would have made it impossible to go and find suitable clothing. So then she began altering Arseny’s things for herself.

Not going to Communion worried him far more than clothing. Arseny was afraid to go to church because the road to the Eucharist ran through Confession. And Confession meant telling about Ustina. He did not know what response he would receive. To marry? He would have been happy to marry. But what if they said to leave her? Or live in different places for a time? He did not know what they might say, because nothing like this had ever happened to him before. In his fear of disobeying, Arseny did not go to church and did not confess. Nor did Ustina go.

One day she asked:

Will you take me as your wife?

You are my wife, who I love more than life itself.

I want to be yours, O Arseny, before God and man.

Be patient, my love. He kissed her in the dimple over her clavicle. You will be my wife before God and man. Just be patient for a while, my love.

They went into the forest almost every day. In the beginning that was not at all simple because there was still deep snow in the forest. They walked, stumbling in snow up to their knees, but they walked nevertheless. Arseny knew Ustina needed fresh air. Furthermore, even a difficult outing like this was better for her than sitting at home. Shod in Christofer’s boots, Ustina often got blisters on the soles of her feet. Winding her feet with scraps of fabric did not help the situation. The size actually did matter, even though boots were sewn from soft leather in those days, albeit without considering the difference between the left and right feet. Ustina’s feet were very different from Christofer’s.

Ustina followed, right in Arseny’s tracks. They walked along the exact same path each morning, and each morning they trampled a new path as if for the first time, because it had been covered with fresh snow during the course of a day. Drifted snow smoothed over their trampled path even if there had been no fresh snowfall. A strong wind always blew in the open space between the cemetery and the forest.

The wind subsided after they entered the forest. Sometimes they could find their tracks there. Those tracks were also snow-sprinkled, and other tracks—a wild animal’s or bird’s—sometimes intersected them, but they existed. They did not vanish without a trace, or so it seemed to Arseny.

It was not as cold in the forest as it was on the way to the forest. Perhaps it was even warm. A shroud of snow on branches, accumulated over the days, looked like fur to Ustina. She loved to shake it from the branches and delight in how it settled on their shoulders.

Will you buy me a fur coat like this? Ustina asked.

Of course, answered Arseny. I will certainly buy one.

He very much wanted to buy her a fur coat like that.

The snow began melting in the middle of April and immediately looked old and shabby. And porous from the rains that had begun. Ustina no longer wanted a fur coat like that. She stepped from one melting hummock to another, cautiously watching her feet. All the forest’s grime had emerged from under the snow: last year’s foliage, pieces of rags that had lost their color, and yellowed plastic bottles. Grass was already breaking through in glades that the sun reached, but the snow was still deep in denser places. And it was cold there. Even that snow finally melted, but the puddles it made remained until the middle of summer.

In May, Ustina traded her boots for shoes Arseny had woven from bast. Ustina liked the bast shoes because they were woven for her feet and—this was the main thing—woven by Arseny. He carefully wound the shoes’ ties around each leg, not allowing her to bend, and she liked that, too. The shoes were light but they leaked. Sometimes Ustina came home with wet feet, but she did not want to return to wearing boots, no matter what.

I will just be more cautious when I walk, she would tell Arseny.

Their outings became much longer. Now they did not just walk in the near forest but also in places far from any homes, places Christofer had once showed Arseny. Arseny felt calmer in those places. Sometimes they saw people in the near forest and hurried to hide after noticing them from a distance. Now that they were going far away, though, they did not meet anyone.

You are not afraid to get lost, Ustina asked Arseny.

I am not afraid for I have knowen these valleys since the very cradle.

On these outings, Arseny brought a bag with food and drink. There was also a sheepskin for them to sit on during lengthy rests: Arseny took care that Ustina did not strain herself. As they strolled, they gathered herbs that nature had sprouted as it revived. Arseny described for Ustina the properties of the herbs, and the breadth of his knowledge astounded her. He also told her about how the human body is built and the habits of animals, about the movements of the planets, historical events, and the symbolism of numerals. He felt like a father to her in those moments. Or, if he was thinking of the source of this knowledge, a grandfather. To Arseny, the red-haired girl seemed like clay in his hands, clay from which he molded himself a Wife.

‌

By now it would be an exaggeration to say nobody knew of Ustina’s existence. People had seen them both in the forest, more than once, if only from a distance. Of course they were not acquainted with Ustina, but they could recognize Arseny without difficulty, even from a distance. And when they visited Arseny in his home they heard Ustina on the other side of the wall, because a person cannot be noiseless forever. Many guessed someone was living at Arseny’s, but since he was hiding it, nobody asked him anything. Arseny was their doctor and people were always afraid to annoy the doctor. For his part, Arseny apparently guessed about those hunches, too. He did not attempt to either confirm or deny them. It suited him that nobody asked him anything, no matter what their reason. It was enough for Arseny that nobody came in contact with his world, the world where only he and Ustina existed.

At the beginning of summer, when Ustina began to find long walks tiring, they sat outside the house ever more often. A few logs and boards were left over from repairing the house, and Arseny decided to construct a shelter in the yard. As he was fitting one board against the next, he remembered, pained, that Christofer had been managing a similar repair project less than a year ago. Using his grandfather’s voice, Arseny asked Ustina to give him this or that tool, but it didn’t sound as good as when Christofer spoke. And the boards didn’t fit together as well. What would Christofer have said about his project? And what would he have said about Ustina?

The shelter abutted the back of the house and was not visible from the road. Arseny hung up some strings and several weeks later they were overgrown with dense bindweed. The roof was covered with thatch and did not leak. Now they could get fresh air in any weather. They most loved sitting under the shelter in the evenings.

On one long July evening, Ustina asked Arseny to teach her to read and write. That request initially surprised him. He could read everything they needed to read and that was a part of their complementariness. Arseny broke a flower off the bindweed and cautiously placed it on the tip of Ustina’s nose. Why do you need to know? Arseny wanted to ask her, but he did not ask. He went into the house and came back out with the Psalter. Arseny sat alongside Ustina and opened the book. He touched the very first cinnabar initial with his index finger. The letter glowed, reddish, in the rays of the setting sun.

This is the letter B. The word “Blessed” begins with it here.

Blessed is the man that doth not walke in the counsell of the ungodly, Ustina recited, unhurried. Nor standeth in the waye of sinners, nor sitteth in the seate of the scornefull.

Arseny silently watched Ustina. She laid her head on his shoulder.

I know many psalms by heart. From hearing them.

That proved very useful for her in learning to read and write. After reading a few letters, Ustina would remember an entire phrase, which helped her instantly recognize the letters that followed. Arseny had never expected her learning to go so quickly.

More than anything, Ustina liked that letters had names that carried meaning. She pronounced them to herself, her lips constantly moving, as she went through the old Russian alphabet. Az. Buki. Vedi. I. Know. Letters. She would break off a branch and write the names of the letters on the tamped earth in the yard and on forest paths. Glagol’ Dobro. Say good things. The names gave the letters independent lives. The names gave them an unexpected meaning that bewitched Ustina. Kako Liudie Myslete? Rtsy Slovo Tverdo. How think you, people? Speak a firm word.

To top it all off, the letters had numerical meanings. The letter az under a titlo meant the numeral one, vedi was a two, and glagol’ was a three.

Why does v come after a, asked Ustina, surprised. Where, one must wonder, is b?

The designation of the numerals follows the Greek alphabet, and it has no such letter.

Do you know Greek?

No (Arseny placed his palms on Ustina’s cheeks and rubbed her nose with his), that is what Christofer said. He did not know Greek, either, but he felt many things intuitively.

Ustina’s astonishment at the properties of the letters was reinforced further by their numerical properties, which were no less surprising. Arseny showed her how the numerals added and subtracted, multiplied and divided. They denoted the acme of human history: the year ҂ЕФ (5500) since the Creation, when Christ was born. They also signified the end of history, which miraculously appeared in the ghastly numeral of the Antichrist: ХѮЅ (666). And letters expressed all that.

Numerals had their own harmony, which reflected the overall harmony of the world and all that exists within it. Ustina found numerous pieces of information of that sort by reading Christofer’s manuscripts, which Arseny brought to her by the armful. A week hath seven dayes and serves as a prototype for human lyfe: the first day is a childe’s birth, the second day is for a yonge man, on the third day he is a growne man, the fourth day is for the middle of the lyfe, fifth is the day of graying, the sixth day is for old age, and the seventh day is for the ende.

The symbolism of numerals was not Christofer’s only pastime. Ustina also found records of distances among his manuscripts. From Moscow to Kiev was a thousande and a half versts, from Moscow to the Volga was 240 versts, from Beloozero to Uglich was 240 versts. Why did he write all this down? Ustina wondered as she read. Arseny responded to her in thought, saying Christofer had not, of course, been to either Moscow or Kiev or the Volga. It was possible that 240 versts, which appears twice, caught his attention in those data. The deceased attributed particular significance to coincidences like this (Arseny replied), though he did not fully grasp their meaning. What is important is that you and I already understand each other without words.

‌

Ustina’s pregnancy was not progressing without difficulty. She complained from time to time about headaches and dizziness. In those situations, Arseny rubbed her temples with dill oil or a wild-strawberry tisane. Because of her shyness, Ustina kept quiet about certain indispositions that arose. Constipation, for example. Arseny shamed her when he noticed it, saying they were now one whole, and she must not be shy with him. He gave her a tincture of young elderberry leaves for her constipation. Together they had gathered those leaves in the spring and together they had boiled them in honey.

Ustina’s sleep was not restful. Arseny could guess when she had woken up in the middle of the night because he would not hear her breathing. Ustina breathed though her nose, loudly and evenly, when she slept. To restore her sleep, Arseny gave her an infusion of tree moss before bed.

Ustina’s body was testing the endurance of her spirit in an obvious way. Heartburn tormented her constantly. She experienced heaviness and pain in her womb, the place the baby was located. Her growing belly itched mercilessly from the touch of Arseny’s linen shirt. Ustina’s feet swelled from the burden she carried. Her facial features looked puffy. Her eyes had become sleepy. An unfamiliar absentmindedness had come into Ustina’s gaze. Those changes were noticeable to Arseny and they worried him. He saw in Ustina’s lackluster eyes the beginning of weariness from pregnancy.

The newness of her condition helped her overcome the indispositions in the first months. As time passed, her condition was no longer new. It was habitual and onerous. And then autumn came and the days grew short, as they do in the north. The gloominess cloaking the Land of the White Lakes brought out despondence in Ustina. She saw nature dying and could do nothing about it. As she watched leaves fall from the trees, Ustina also shed tears.

She was now observing the changes in her body as if from afar. It was ever harder to see her former self—flexible, quick, and strong—in this bloated, unwieldy creature. Someone had lodged that self in another’s body.

But it was not just any someone, it was Arseny. When that thought hit her, it was as if she had touched bottom, pushed off, and swum to the surface again. And here she opened herself up to all the joys that surrounded her. Ustina’s joys were more vivid than her sufferings.

She rejoiced when her appetite awoke within her, because she knew she was not eating alone but with the child. She rejoiced at the colostrum that kept appearing on her nipples. She indulged herself in impetuous fantasies about the future child and shared them with Arseny:

If a girl is born, she will grow up the prettiest in Rukina Quarter and marry a prince.

But Rukina Quarter has no princes.

Well, you know, in that case he will come here. If a boy is born, which would really be preferable, he will be light-haired and wise, like you, O Arseny.

Why do we need two who are light-haired and wise?

That is what I want, sweetheart, what is wrong with it? I see nothing wrong with it.

One day Arseny slowly ran his palm along Ustina’s belly and said:

It is a boy.

Glory to God, I am so glad. Glad about everything. Especially the boy.

Ustina usually stroked her belly while sitting on the bench. At times she could feel movements of the one sitting inside. After what Arseny said, she had no doubt it was a boy. Sometimes Arseny placed his ear against her belly.

What is he saying? asked Ustina.

He is asking you to be patient just a little longer. Until the beginning of December.

Okay, fine, since he is asking. I think even he is tired of sitting around there.

You cannot even imagine how tired he is of it.

Ustina sang to amuse the little boy:

O Mother, O Mother, Mother of God,

Mary the Blessed (Ustina made the sign of the cross over herself and her belly),

Where, O Mother, did you spend the nights?

I spent the night in the city of Salem,

In God’s church behind the throne

I slept but a little but much did I see,

As if I had given birth to the Christ Child,

I swaddled him in swaddling,

Wound him in silken sashes.

Arseny said nothing, though he thought about how her piercing voice could be heard from the road. Let her sing, he thought; after all, it will be more fun for the baby.

She sewed clothing.

It is bad luck, she said, to sew clothing for an unborn child.

But she sewed anyway. She took the material from Christofer’s things.

Sewing from the property of the dead, she said, is also not encouraged.

As she made stitch after stitch, she would sigh deeply, making her whole huge belly begin moving. Her hands created swaddling clothes and doll-sized trousers and little shirts.

She made dolls, too. She made them from rags and drew on them in various ways. Wove them from straw. The straw dolls were all identical and all resembled Ustina. She burst into tears when Arseny told her that.

Thank you (she nodded) for the compliment. Thank you very much.

Arseny embraced her:

I said it out of love, you silly fool, nobody loves you or will love you as I do, our love is a special case.

He pressed his cheek to her hair. She warily freed herself and said:

Arseny, I want to take Communion before I give birth, I am afraid to give birth without Communion.

He placed his palm to her lips:

You’ll take Communion after you’ve given birth, my love. How would you go to church now, in this condition? And after giving birth, you know, we’ll open up to everyone and show our son and take Communion and it will get easier because nothing will need to be explained to anyone when the child is here, the child will justify everything, it will be like starting life with a clean slate, do you understand?

I understand, answered Ustina. O Arseny, I am afraid.

She wept often. She tried to make it so Arseny did not see but he saw, because they were inseparable for all those months and it was difficult for her to weep in secret.

It was ever more difficult to read to Ustina. Her attention was scattered. It was hard for her to sit and hard to lie. She had to lie on her side, not on her back. She asked Arseny to read to her ever more frequently now, and of course he did.

And then it happened that Alexander the Great came to the swampy places. And Alexander became ill but there was not even a place in those swamps for him to lie down. Snow fell from heavens unknown to him. And Alexander took off his armor and ordered his warriors to place all their armor together. Thus they assembled a bed for him in a boggy place. He laid on it, exhausted, and they covered him with shields to keep the snow from him. And Alexander suddenly realized he was lying on the iron earth under a sky of ivory...

Stop. Ustina turned heavily onto her other side and was now lying with her back to Arseny. Snow fell here today, too. Why are you reading all this to me...?

I’ll find something else for you, my love.

Ustina turned toward him again.

Find me a midwife. That is what I will need soon.

Why do you need some ignorant midwife? Arseny was surprised. You have me, after all.

Have you really ever delivered a baby?

No, but Christofer told me about it in detail. And he wrote everything down, too. Arseny rummaged around in the basket and took out a manuscript. Here.

Is it possible to deliver a baby by what is written? Ustina asked. And beyond all that, you know, I do not want you to see me that way. I do not want it, O Arseny.

But are we not one whole?

Of course we are one. But I still do not want it.

Arseny did not argue. But he did not look for anyone.

‌

Ustina’s water broke during the twilight hour on November 27. She did not realize this immediately, only when her bed had become soaked. Arseny remade the bed with some linen while she sat over the chamber pot. He began shaking. When Ustina laid down again, he lit their two oil lamps and one splinter lamp. Ustina took him by the hand and sat him down alongside herself. Do not worry, sweetheart, everything will be fine. Arseny pressed his lips against her forehead and began crying. He felt a fear the likes of which he had never felt in his whole life. Ustina stroked the back of his head. Her contractions began an hour later. Her face glistened frightfully in the duskiness and he did not recognize that face, with its beads of sweat the size of peas. Other facial features were now showing through the usual ones. They were unsightly, puffy, and tragic. And the former Ustina was no longer there. It was if she had gone and another had come. Or not even come: this was the former Ustina, and she was continuing to leave. She was losing her perfection, drop by drop, becoming less and less perfect. As if she were becoming more embryonic. The thought that she might leave forever took Arseny’s breath away. He had never considered that. The gravity of that thought turned out to be great. It dragged him down and he slipped from the bench onto the floor. It was as if he heard the faraway knock of a head on wood. He saw how awkwardly Ustina was rising from the bench and bending toward him. He saw everything. He was conscious but could not move. If he had known the gravity of that same thought before, his fear of speaking about Ustina in the quarter would have seemed laughable to him. Arseny slowly sat: I will run to the quarter for a midwife, in the blink of an eye. It is already too late (Ustina was still stroking him), I cannot be left alone now, we will somehow figure this out, the only thing that disturbs me… I did not want to say, said Ustina, I was not sure… Arseny sat Ustina down on the bench. He covered her hand in kisses and her speech was still all separated into diffuse words that would not join up in his head. He knew that this horror had not seized him for no reason. Ustina touched her belly: I have not heard him since yesterday… The boy. I do not think he is moving. Arseny extended his palm toward her belly and cautiously ran it from top to bottom. His palm froze at the bottom of her belly. Arseny looked at Ustina, unblinking. He no longer felt life in her womb. The heart he had heard there all those months was no longer beating. The child was dead. Arseny helped her lie on her side and said, the boy is moving, calmly give birth. He sat on the edge of the bench and held Ustina by the hand. He changed the splinter lamp time after time. Poured more oil into the lamps. Ustina sat up in the middle of the night: the boy died, so why are you silent, you have been silent for several hours already. I am not silent, Arseny said (did he not?), from somewhere in the distance. How can I be silent? He darted to Christofer’s shelves, knocking over the chamber pot. He turned and saw the pot slowly rolling under the bench. How could I be silent? But I also cannot speak. Arseny got a tisane of the herb chernobyl, or wormwood. Drink some of this. What is it? Drink it. He raised her head and placed a mug to her lips. He heard loud—for the whole room to hear—swallows. This is the herb wormwood. It expels… What does it expel? Ustina choked and the tisane ran from her nose. The herb wormwood expels a dead fetus. Ustina began soundlessly weeping. Arseny took a small box down from the shelf and sprinkled the contents on the coals. A sharp, unpleasant smell spread through the room. What is that? Ustina asked. Sulfur. Its smell speeds up labor. A minute later, Ustina vomited. She had not eaten anything in a long time and vomited the tisane she had drunk. Ustina laid down again. And Arseny stroked her again. She felt the contractions start up again. Pain overcame her. What she felt was first a pain in her belly, then it spread to her entire body. It felt to her as if the pain from all the surrounding hamlets had gathered in one spot and entered her body. Because her—Ustina’s—sins had exceeded the sins of the entire area and eventually that had to be answered for. And Ustina began shrieking. And that shriek was a snarl. It frightened Arseny, and Arseny grabbed onto her wrist. He frightened even Ustina, but she could no longer not shriek. She shifted her leg, even as she continued lying on her side, and Arseny began holding her leg down. That leg bent and straightened: it was like an independent, vicious being that wanted to have nothing to do with the motionless Ustina. Arseny held her leg with both hands but still could not restrain it. Ustina turned abruptly and he saw, in a streak of falling light, feces glistening on her inner thigh. Ustina continued shrieking. Arseny could not understand if the baby was moving or not. He remembered other touching as he felt the hair around her female place under his hand, and he prayed to God to transfer Ustina’s pain to him, even to transfer only half the pain. In her moments of lucidity, Ustina thanked God that she had been granted to suffer for herself and for Arseny, so great was her love for him. Arseny most likely felt rather than saw when the baby’s head appeared in Ustina’s female place. By touch, the head was huge, and the despairing Arseny thought it would not be able to come out. The head was not coming out. The crown of the head appeared, again and again, for a short while, but then disappeared again. Arseny tried to work his fingers under it but his fingers could not get through. He even thought he had pushed the head in deeper as he tried to pull it out. He broke into a fever. The fever was unbearable and he stood up straight, throwing his shirt off in one tug. As before, the baby’s head was not visible. Ustina’s shrieks grew quieter but they were more frightening, since they had not lost their strength because she felt better. Ustina was falling into unconsciousness. Arseny saw she was leaving and began shrieking at her, to hold her back. He slapped her on her cheeks but Ustina’s head flopped lifelessly from side to side. Arseny threw her leg onto his shoulder and tried to enter her female place with his right hand. His hand did not really seem to be getting through, but his fingers sensed the baby. Top of the head. Neck. Shoulders. His fingers closed up at the place where the neck becomes the head. They moved toward the exit. There was a cracking sound. Arseny was no longer thinking about the baby. That the baby might be alive after all. He was thinking only of Ustina. He continued pulling the child by the head as he fought his rising nausea. He saw the lips of Ustina’s female place had ruptured and he heard her ghastly shriek. The baby was in Arseny’s hands. He did not begin crying when he came into the world. Arseny cut the umbilical cord with the knife he had readied. He slapped the baby. He heard that was what midwives do to induce the first breath. He slapped again. The baby was silent, as before. Arseny carefully laid him on a swaddling cloth and bent over Ustina. The contractions were continuing. Arseny knew this was the afterbirth coming out. He cleaned off the bloody mucus that came from Ustina, putting it into the chamber pot. An entire piece of linen was drenched in blood and he thought there was more blood than there should be at birth. He did not know how much there should be. He only saw that the bleeding had not stopped. He was frightened because the blood was flowing from the womb and he could not stanch it. He took some finely grated cinnabar in his fingers and went as deeply into Ustina’s female place as he could. He had heard from Christofer that grated cinnabar stops bleeding from wounds. But he did not see the wound and did not know the exact place from which the blood flowed. And the bleeding did not stop. More and more was soaking the bedding. Ustina lay, her eyes closed, and Arseny felt life abandoning her. Ustina, do not leave, Arseny shouted with such might that Elder Nikandr heard him at the monastery. The elder was standing in his cell, in prayer. I am afraid it is already useless to shout, said the elder (he was watching as the first snowflakes of the year floated in through the open door and, just as a draft blew out the candle, the moon broke out from behind ragged clouds and illuminated the doorway), which is why I will pray for your life to be preserved, O Arseny. I will pray for nothing else in the coming days, said the elder, latching the door. Utter silence settled into the house for a minute and Ustina opened her eyes in the midst of that silence: it is a shame, O Arseny, that I am leaving in this gloom and stench. And the wind once again began whistling outside the window. Ustina, do not go, Arseny shouted, my life ceases with your life. But Ustina could no longer hear him because her life had ceased. She was lying on her back and the leg that was bent at the knee was turned to the side. Her arm dangled from the bench. It was squeezing a corner of the linen. Her face was turned in Arseny’s direction and her open eyes looked at nothing. Arseny was lying on the floor alongside Ustina’s bench. His life was continuing, though that was not obvious. Arseny lay there for the rest of the night and the next day. Sometimes he would open his eyes, and he had strange dreams. Ustina and Christofer were leading him, as a little boy, by the hands through the forest. He thought he was flying when they lifted him over the hillocks. Ustina and Christofer laughed, for his sensations were not mysterious to them. Christofer kept bending for plants and placing them in a canvas bag. Ustina was not gathering anything, she simply slowed her pace and observed Christofer’s actions. Ustina was wearing a red men’s shirt that she was planning to give to Arseny at the appropriate time. And that is what she said: This shirt will be yours, you need only change your name. Since you have no objective possibility of being Ustina, name yourself Ustin. Is that a deal? Arseny looked up at Ustina. It’s a deal. He thought Ustina’s seriousness was ludicrous, but he did not show it. Of course it’s a deal. Christofer’s bag was already full. He still continued gathering plants, though, and they fell from his bag onto the path in time with his steps. The entire path, as far as the eye could see, was strewn with Christofer’s plants. But he kept gathering more. There was, in that activity, which looked pointless at first glance, a unique beauty and expansiveness. And a generosity that was indifferent to whether it was necessary or not: it came about only through the favor of the giver. When morning came, Arseny noticed the light but he did all he could not to wake. Even in his sleep, he was afraid to discover Ustina had died. A special morning horror seized him: the coming of a new day, without Ustina, was intolerable for him. He once again nourished himself with sleep until he was unconscious. Sleep streamed through Arseny’s veins and beat in his heart. With each minute, his sleep became deeper, because he feared waking up. Arseny’s sleep was so deep that his soul abandoned his body at times and floated under the ceiling. From that moderate height, it contemplated Arseny and Ustina, both of them lying there, and was surprised that Ustina’s soul, so beloved, was absent from the house. Upon seeing Death, Arseny’s soul said: I cannot abide your glory and I see your beauty is not of this world. Right then, Arseny’s soul noticed Ustina’s soul. Ustina’s soul was almost translucent and thus inconspicuous. Can it be that I also look like that? thought Arseny’s soul, wanting to touch Ustina’s soul. But a gesture of warning from Death stopped Arseny’s soul. Death already held Ustina’s soul by the hand and intended to lead her away. Leave her here, wept Arseny’s soul, she and I have become entwined. Get used to separation, said Death, it is painful, even if it is only temporary. Will we recognize each other in eternity? asked Arseny’s soul. That depends in large part on you, said Death: souls often harden during the course of life, and then they barely recognize anyone after death. If your love, O Arseny, is not false and does not fade with the passage of time, one might ask, why would you not recognize each other there, where there be not illness, nor sorrow, nor groaning, but where there shall be everlasting life? Death patted Ustina’s soul on the cheek. Ustina’s soul was small, almost childlike. Her response to the affectionate gesture was more likely fear than gratitude. This is how children respond to those who take them from their kin for an indefinite period: life (death) for them will, perhaps, not be bad, but it will be completely different from what they are used to, lacking the former structure, familiar events, and turns of speech. As they leave, they keep looking back and seeing their frightened reflections in the teary eyes of their kin.

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Arseny woke up after darkness had fallen. His arm knocked against Ustina’s dangling arm. Her arm was cold. It would not bend. The coals in the stove had long gone cold but something still gleamed ever so slightly in the small oil lamp under the icon of the Savior. Arseny brought a candle to the lamp. He held it cautiously so as not to extinguish the last fire remaining in the house. The candle flared (not immediately) and lit the room. Arseny looked around. He gazed attentively, noticing every little thing. Scattered items. Broken little pots of remedies. He did not miss a single detail, because it all allowed him to continue not looking at Ustina. And then he looked at her.

Ustina was lying in the same position as yesterday but she was completely different. Her nose had sharpened and the whites of her open eyes were sunken. Ustina’s face was alabaster but the tips of her ears were a minium red. Arseny stood over Ustina and feared touching her. He was not experiencing disgust; his fear was of a different nature. There was nothing of Ustina in the body sprawled out in front of him. He extended his palm to her half-bent leg and cautiously touched it. He drew his finger along her skin: it turned out to be cold and rough. It had never been like this during Ustina’s life. He tried to straighten her leg but was unable, just as he was unable to close her eyes. He was afraid to apply pressure. Whatever he touched was, perhaps, very fragile. He covered Ustina with a bedspread, everything but her face.

Arseny began reading the prayer service for the departed. He asked God to deliver Ustina fro the snare of the hunter and fro the noisome pestilence, that she not be afraide of any terrour by night, nor for the arrowe that flieth by daye. From time to time he turned and looked at her face. He heard his own voice from afar. At times, it contained the sound of tears. The voice dully announced that God was commanding the angels to keep Ustina safe in all her journeys. Arseny remembered how Ustina had gone, holding Death by the hand, how her shape had diminished until it turned into a dot. It was Death with her then, not angels. Arseny tore his eyes from the sheet.

You should be in the arms of the angels now, he meekly addressed Ustina. They shall beare thee in their handes, that thou hurt not thy foot against a stone.

He turned again and it seemed Ustina’s face had flinched. He could not believe his eyes. He raised the candle slightly and stepped closer. The shadow of Ustina’s nose was shifting around her face. And more than the shadow was moving: Ustina’s face was changing along with the shadow. This change did not look natural. It did not correspond to Ustina’s living facial expressions, but there was also something in it that was not characteristic of a dead person. Even if Ustina was not completely alive, she was not exactly fully dead, either.

Arseny was afraid he might let the small shoots of life he had noticed in Ustina expire. He might let them freeze, for example. Only now did he sense that the house had cooled down over the last day. He rushed to the stove and lit a fire. Arseny’s hands shook from agitation. It suddenly occurred to him that everything depended on how quickly he could now manage to get a fire started. The wood was already crackling a few minutes later. Arseny still did not look at Ustina, giving her time to pull herself together. But Ustina did not get up.

So as not to scare off the shoots of life within Ustina, Arseny decided to pretend he had not noticed them. He continued reading the prayer service for the departed. After that, he began reading the Psalms. He read them unhurriedly, distinctly pronouncing each word. He came to the end of the Psalter and pondered. He decided to read it again. He finished toward morning. To his own surprise, he felt hungry and ate a chunk of bread.

It was as if the food had opened his nostrils; he drew in air. The smell of rotting flesh was apparent. Arseny thought the smell was coming from the baby. And there truly were signs of decomposition on the small body. At dawn, Arseny moved it closer to the window.

You never saw sunbeams, he told the baby, and it would be unjust to deprive you of light, even in such small quantities.

Of course Arseny secretly hoped Ustina would intervene in his conversation with their son. But she did not intervene. And even the position she was lying in remained, outwardly, the same.

He decided to read the Psalter over Ustina a third time. At the tenth Kathisma, he perceived movement on the bench. He continued to observe by keeping his peripheral vision on the bench, but the movement did not recur. Arseny felt bewildered when he finished reading the Psalter. He did not know what else he could read over Ustina, in the shaky position between life and death where, by all appearances, she now resided. He remembered that in life she had loved hearing the Alexander Romance and so he began reading the Alexander Romance. Her reactions to the book about Alexander had always been lively, so now, in Arseny’s opinion, it could play its own positive role.

He read the Alexander Romance over Ustina until the next morning. After a bit of thought, he read The Apocalypse of Abraham, Legend of the Indian Kingdom, and stories about Solomon and the Centaur. Arseny purposely chose things that were interesting and likely to stimulate life. As night fell, he took to reading those of Christofer’s manuscripts that did not contain day-to-day instructions and recipes. Arseny read the last manuscript at dawn: a desecrated robe mayn’t be washed with anything but water and only tears may washe away and cleanse desecration and spiritual feces.

He had wept out all his tears over the previous days and they never came again. He had no more voice: he read the final manuscripts in almost a whisper. He had no strength. He sat on the floor, leaning against the kindled stove. He did not notice when he dozed off. A rustling by the window woke him. A rat was sitting alongside the baby. Arseny motioned with his hand and it ran away. He realized that if he wanted to preserve his son’s body, he should not sleep. He looked at Ustina. Her facial features had swollen.

Arseny stood up, with difficulty, and went over to Ustina. A ripe smell hit his nose when he lifted the bedspread a bit. Ustina’s belly was huge. Much larger than in the days of her pregnancy.

If you truly did die, Arseny said to Ustina, I should preserve your body. I had expected you would need it in the short run but since things have not turned out that way, I will make every effort to preserve it for the impending universal resurrection. First and foremost, of course, we’ll stop stoking the stove, which promotes tissue decomposition. Besides, flies are already circling now and, honestly, their appearance surprises me because this is not typical for November. Our son particularly concerns me: he looks very bad. Essentially, our task is not as complicated as it might appear at first glance. According to my grandfather, Christofer, it is fully possible the end of the world will come in the seven thousandth year since the Creation of the world. If we consider that 6964 is coming right up, our bodies still need to hold out for thirty-six years. You have to agree that is not so long compared to the amount of time that has elapsed since the Creation of the universe. Cold spells are on the way and we will all be lightly frozen. Of course then summer will come thirty-six more times (summer can be hot, even in these parts) but we will manage to settle into our new situation before the warm season, for the first months are not only difficult, they are also decisive.

From that day on, Arseny stopped lighting the stove. He also stopped eating, because he no longer felt like eating. He occasionally drank water from the wooden bucket. The bucket stood by the door and he would notice thin films of ice covering the water in the morning. One time, he thought Ustina was moving when he was drinking water. He turned and saw that her raised leg, the one he had moved aside, was now lying on the bench. He walked over to Ustina. Looks were not deceiving him. Ustina’s leg truly had descended. Arseny took hold of the leg and discovered it would bend again. He took Ustina’s dangling arm and gently placed it on the bench. Arseny knew rigor mortis of the flesh had already gone by, but he forbade his heart to beat faster. A glance at Ustina’s belly killed all hope. It had distended even more and expelled everything that had not managed to come out of her female place on the day of her departure.

Arseny no longer read anything. He saw from Ustina’s condition that she was no longer up for reading. He spoke with her ever less because for now he could not tell her anything reassuring.

I am frightened for our boy, he said one day, because today I saw white worms in his nostrils.

He said that and then regretted it, for what could Ustina do here; she was not in such an easy position herself. Her nose and lips had bloated and her eyelids were swollen. Ustina’s white skin had become an oily brown and was bursting and oozing pus in places. Her veins were unnaturally and distinctly green under her skin. Only her hair, all stuck together, continued to retain its reddish color.

Arseny sat by the stove, hugging his knees and staring incessantly at Ustina. He no longer even got up for water. Sometimes he heard knocking at the door and experienced quiet joy that he had managed to latch the door before his transition into motionlessness. He did not answer the shouts or pay attention to footsteps in the yard. When they stopped, Arseny again submerged himself into tranquility. A feeling of repose seized him ever more intensely and fully. And from somewhere at the very depths of that repose there sprouted, like a meek flower growing out from under the snow, the hope of seeing Ustina soon.

One day he noticed movement by the window. The bull’s-bladder that was stretched across the frame tore with a pop and then a hand with a knife came into view. Behind it was a face. But the hand covered the nose right away and the face itself disappeared. Arseny sensed movement of air and heard screams. They were addressed at him. He turned to Ustina again and stopped looking at the window. A short time later there came the sound of banging on the door. Arseny saw the door shake. He regretted that he had not managed to die before that knock.

The top of the door gave way and crashed over the high threshold. Those who had broken it down did not rush in. They were obviously terrified and were really in no hurry to come in. Arseny recognized the two in front. They were Nikola Weaver and Demid Hay, people from the quarter who had come to him for treatment more than once. They stood on the fallen door and spoke quietly amongst themselves. They covered their mouths and noses with the collars of their heavy, rough woolen coats.

When Demid headed toward Ustina, Arseny said:

Do not touch.

Arseny gathered his strength and stood. He wanted to impede Demid from approaching Ustina but Demid lightly pushed him in the chest with the palm of his hand. Arseny fell and did not move. Nikola poured some water from the wooden bucket on him. Arseny opened his eyes.

He is alive, said Nikola.

He took Arseny under the arms, lifted him a bit, and propped him against the stove. Arseny’s head slipped onto his shoulder but his eyes remained open. Demid said the bodies they had found needed to be brought to the potter’s field. Nikola said they should get a wagon from the quarter for that. They sent some third person, who had not uttered a word, for the cart.

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The potter’s field was a mournful place. Somehow, even the cemetery whose fence Arseny and Christofer lived beside seemed more comforting. The potter’s field was located on a hill two versts from Christofer’s house. There lay the plague dead, pilgrims, the strangled, unchristened babies, and suicides. Those drowned by waters, and taken by battle, and kylled by kyllers, and stricken by fyre. Suddenly surprised, those who had fallen from lightning, were deade from frost and every sort of wounde. The lives of these unfortunates were varied and it was not life that united them: their resemblance to one another consisted of death. It was death without Confession.

Those who died such deaths were given no funeral service and were not buried in ordinary cemeteries. They were brought to the potter’s field. There the bodies were lowered to the bottom of a deep pit and heaped with pine branches. These deceased thus became the “heaped.” They lay in a common pit, languishing from their own restlessness and having no place in this world. Every now and again their gray faces, sprinkled with sand, peered out from under the branches. It was an especially sad sight in the spring when the melting snow moved the branches out of place. Then the heaped deceased—deprived of eyes and noses—appeared in their least attractive condition, their arms and legs slipping onto neighboring bodies as if they were embracing one another.

Even their lot, though, was not hopeless, thanks to the boundless mercy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. A priest came from the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery on the Thursday of the seventh week after Easter and gave a service for the heaped deceased. This day was known as Semik. They filled the pit and dug a new one. And the new pit remained open until the next Semik.

Difficulties did not always end for the heaped deceased even after the service, though. They were remembered in days of poor harvests. It is no secret for those who honor tradition that more often than not it was the heaped deceased who became the reason for calamities. There was a superstition that those whose lives were cut short did not die immediately. Damp Mother Earth did not accept them and pushed them out, forcing them to find some use for themselves on the surface.

It was as if these dead people lived out, in their other existence, the time taken away from them, but they did so while inflicting losses on those around them. They destroyed harvests and created summer droughts in their search for ways to expend their unspent strength. People well versed in such matters explained the dryness, saying the deceased (particularly those who died from boozing) were experiencing an inhuman thirst and were sucking moisture from the earth.

In difficult times those heaped deceased who had already been buried were sometimes exhumed and dragged away to thickets and swamps, despite protests from the clergy. Of course sometimes they were left in place but only after having been exhumed and turned face down. Needless to say, this might seem like a half-measure to some, but even this was considered a lesser evil than blatant inaction.

When it came right down to it, the position of the living was not so simple, either. When they buried those who had not made their Confessions, they aroused the wrath of Damp Mother Earth and she answered with spring frosts. When they did not bury them, they aroused the wrath of the deceased themselves, who ruthlessly destroyed the harvest in the summertime. In a complex situation such as this, Semik was, essentially, a judgment worthy of Solomon. If they did not commit the dead to the earth before the end of spring, those who cultivated the earth got through the period of light frosts without losses. By concluding the burial service and funeral during the seventh week after Easter, they could hope the vindictive deceased would not destroy their mature harvest.

Now Ustina had to end up among these deceased. They intended to toss her—Arseny’s eternally beloved Ustina—into the potter’s field. Along with a son who had not even received a name. Demid and Nikola wound their hands in rags, carried Ustina out of the house, and placed her on the cart that had driven up. A minute later, Nikola carried out the half-decomposed baby in his outstretched hands. Residents of the quarter slowly came behind the cart and gathered. They did not enter the house but stood, silent, in the road.

Arseny, who had been sitting vacantly on the floor until then, stood and took a knife off the stove and went outside. He was moving slowly but steadily, as if he had not spent all those hours in a daze. The sound of bare feet slapping at the earth became audible in the quiet. His eyes were dry. The crowd standing by the cart recoiled, for they sensed that his power was far above any human power.

He laid his hands on the cart:

Do not touch.

He shouted:

Do not touch!

The horse snorted.

He shouted:

Leave them with me and go back to where you came from. They are my wife and my son, and your families are in the quarter, so go on back to your families.

The visitors did not dare come closer. They saw his marble-like fingers on the knife handle. They saw the wind blow at the fluff on his cheeks. They were afraid of Arseny himself, not the knife. They did not recognize him.

That is a sharp object, give it to me, please.

Elder Nikandr appeared from the very depths of the crowd. He walked, holding his hand out to Arseny and dragging his foot. The crowd parted before him as the waves of the sea parted before Moses. The monk accompanying him followed.

Trust me, I am not in the best shape right now, but I decided I had to show up here and take the knife away from you.

They want to take Ustina and the child away to the potter’s field, said Arseny. And they do not understand at all that the dead can be resurrected in no time at all.

The knife fell from his hand into the elder’s extended hand.

Give them these bodies since this has nothing to do with the bodies, said the elder. If you place them in a normal grave, then they—and he pointed Arseny’s knife at the crowd—will dig them up during the very next dry spell. You will dig them up, am I right, you heathens? he asked those standing round, and they cast their eyes down. They will dig them up, you can count on it. As far as resurrection and the saving of the souls of God’s deceased servantes, well, I’ll present that information to you, as they say, tête-à-tête.

The elder signaled to the monk to wait outside a bit. He took Arseny by the arm and Arseny immediately slackened. As they walked up the stairs to the front door, the elder’s foot slipped several times on the steps. Those who were standing saw that and began weeping. It had been revealed to them that the elder’s resolute spirit was in irreconcilable contradiction with the decrepitude of his body. They knew how things like this ended. The cart noiselessly began moving. Elder Nikandr and Arseny disappeared inside the doorway.

First I will speak about death, said the elder, and then, if things work out, about life.

He sat on the bench and indicated the place next to him. After Arseny had sat down, the elder pressed his hands against the bench and lowered his head. He spoke without looking at Arseny.

I know you are dreaming about death. You are thinking death now possesses everything you held dear. But you are wrong. Death does not possess Ustina. Death is only carrying her to Him Who will administer justice over her. And thus, even if you decide now to give yourself to Death, you will not be united with Ustina. Now, about life. You think life has nothing of consequence left for you and you see no purpose in it. But it is precisely at this time in your life that the greatest purpose has revealed itself.

The elder turned to Arseny. Arseny stared straight ahead, unblinking. His palms were lying on his knees. A fly crawled along his cheek. The elder shooed away the fly, took Arseny by the chin, and turned his face toward him.

I will not pity you: you are to blame for her bodily death. You are also to blame that her soul may perish. I should have said that beyond the grave it is already too late to save her life, but you know what, I will not say that. Because there is no already where she is now. And there is no still. And there is no time, though there is God’s eternal mercy, we trust in His mercy. But mercy should be a reward for effort. (The elder had a coughing spell. He covered his mouth with his hand and the cough puffed out his cheeks as it tried to escape.) The whole point is that the soul is helpless after leaving the body. It can only act in a bodily way. We are only saved, after all, in earthly life.

Arseny’s eyes were dry, as before:

But I took away her earthly life.

The elder looked calmly at Arseny:

So then give her your own.

But is it really possible for me to live instead of her?

If approached from the proper perspective, yes. Love made you and Ustina a united whole, which means a part of Ustina is still here. It is you.

The other monk knocked, entered, and gave the elder a saucer with burning coals. The elder sprinkled them in the stove. He tossed some twigs on top and laid several logs on them. An instant later, fire was licking at the logs. The elder’s pale face turned pink.

Christofer advised you to enter the monastery. I am asking myself why you did not obey him and I cannot find an answer… (He approached Arseny.) Well, goodbye, or something, because this is our last meeting. As circumstances would have it, my life will cease very soon. If I am not confusing things, it will occur on December 27. At midday or so.

The elder embraced Arseny and headed toward the door. He turned on the threshold.

You have a difficult journey, for the story of your love is only beginning. Everything, O Arseny, will now depend on the strength of your love. And, of course, on the strength of your prayers, too.

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Winter that year turned out to be unlike any other winter. It was neither frosty nor snowy. It was foggy and misty, not even like winter but like late autumn. If snow fell, it mixed with rain. It was clear to the population that this sort of snow could not live in this world. It melted before reaching the ground and brought joy to nobody. People wearied of winter as soon as it had a chance to begin. They saw a sinister portent in what was happening with the weather. And it proved true.

The day after Christmas, Elder Nikandr slepte. At the end of Christmas vespers he announced to the brethren that he intended to celebrate his birthday, on the twenty-seventh day of the month of Decembre. The elder monk had never celebrated his birthdays and the intrigued brethren gathered at his cell at the set time.

This is a birthday for eternity, he explained from a wooden sleeping bench in the corner. His arms were crossed on his chest.

The brothers began sobbing when they grasped what was happening.

I saye unto you: sob not for me, for thys day I wyll loke upon the face of my Lord. I saye unto you, too, O Lord, I commit my spirite to Thy hands, have mercy upon me and give me lyfe eternall. Amen.

Amen, repeated those who had gathered, as they watched Elder Nikandr’s soul leave his body.

Their eyes dried and their faces lit up. The monastery filled with people from the surrounding area who expected miracles, for a newly departed holy man contains a special power. And they received according to their faith.

Meanwhile, winter still had not really begun. The roads were totally soggy and the rivers had not frozen over.

Getting from point A to point B, they wailed in the quarter, either seems impossible or is overly complicated. We are practically deprived of roads, they said, something we did not have before now, either, in the true sense of the word.

But even the absence of roads did not prevent the spread of the primary misfortune of the time: the pestilence. The disease was first discovered in Belozersk, the princedom’s primary city. From there it slowly moved to the southeast. It captured village after village like a hostile army, behaving ruthlessly in the occupied territory.

Everyone remained in place because there was nowhere to escape the disease. Even overcoming the washed-out roads did not necessarily lead to salvation. According to rumors that reached the residents of Belozersk, the weather was raw in all Rus’, which meant outbreaks of the pestilence could flare up anywhere. After getting started in autumn, as often happens, the disease could not be killed by frost during the winter because winter never set in.

The residents of Rukina Quarter were already worried about the pestilence, though it had not yet reached the quarter. Foreseeing the arrival of the pestilence, they decided to get advice from Arseny. The changes in Arseny had frightened residents of the quarter and at first they did not want to go to him. In light of the impending danger, however, they were left with no choice. They found Christofer’s house empty when they arrived.

The door was not closed and they made their way in unimpeded. Despite complete order, it was obvious nobody lived in the house any longer. More accurately, it was an unlived-in order. The villagers touched the stove, which turned out to be completely cold. There was not even the memory of warmth inside, something that is unmistakable in stoves that have been recently stoked. The villagers searched to see if Arseny had left a note anywhere. But there was no note, either. Dreading the very worst, they peered under the benches, looked around the outbuildings, and even took a walk though the cemetery that abutted the house. The villagers found no traces whatsoever of Arseny, dead or alive. It could happen that he had melted away, for wax melteth before the fire, they thought. More accurately, they simply did not know what to think.