Rusalka

CHAPTER 9

THERE WAS WARMTH, there were quilts to wrap in when they had shed the dew-damp coats, there was a cup of spirits, and Pyetr finally felt warm again.

He felt foolish, too, and altogether put upon. He stood there in front of the fire sipping vodka while Uulamets went straight to his precious book, by oil light, and Sasha hovered between the fireside and the old man’s mutterings, scared and half-soaked from the ground as he was, and both of them like to take their deaths, Pyetr reckoned, from all this foolishness.

“Here,” Pyetr said sullenly, offering the cap to Sasha, “have some. Warm up.”

Sasha drank a little, made a face as he swallowed, and gave the cup back.

Not a word out of him, not a word out of Uulamets. Only there was something shifting about uncomfortably under the house, like a bear or something that had decided to make a den of the cellar—only it was past that time of year that bears waked, by all he knew, and nothing made sense anyway.

Sasha hovered between the fireside and the table, watching him, watching Uulamets. It annoyed him. He wished most of all that it were morning, when the sun would make sense out of the night made confused, and most of all he wished he would wake up from this bad dream. Probably, he thought, his memory was already confused, probably he had hit his head when he had fallen, and believed the boy’s addled nonsense, and imagined the girl who had wafted right through a thorn thicket, the solidity of which his right hand very bloodily attested.

He took another sip. Uulamets turned another page and another, opened up an inkpot and wrote, with a black raven quill. Pyetr found himself shivering, his throat pricklish, his stomach upset.

He thought about Uulamets at dinner, about the chance that Uulamets had slipped something into the stew or even—he swallowed a mouthful of vodka too suddenly, and it burned his raw throat all the way down—into the drink. That was too cruel.

He thought, We have to get out of here, tomorrow, first thing, before he does us some violence—

Uulamets rose from his place at the table, closed the inkpot and closed the book.

Then Uulamets walked over to them at the hearth, frowning. “Did she,” Uulamets asked, “did she seem—unhappy? …”

Pyetr shoved back his hair, lifted the cup, and glared at the old man. “Who seem unhappy? Your imaginations? Your conjurations from mushrooms and whatever you dropped into the tea?”

“My daughter,” Uulamets shouted at him. “My daughter. Did she seem unhappy?”

“She’s your daughter!” Pyetr cried, flinging off the quilt, ignoring Sasha’s reach for his arm. “Can’t you tell if she’s unhappy?” The whole question was ridiculous. He found himself answering and disgusted with himself, sat down in front of the fire with his vodka and tugged the quilt up about his shoulders. “She’s a damn mushroom. A taint in the tea. How should I know if she’s happy or not?”

Except it seemed to him that the girl he had dreamed of had been lost and wrathful, and that she had tried to speak to him—a soundless speaking face all pale and beaded with water—

“ Insolent hound!” Uulamets said and snatched the quilt away. “My daughter never had any sense about men. So she’s chosen you.“

Pyetr stared up at him with the sinking realization that Sasha equally well consented in this insanity. Sasha was kneeling, tugging at his elbow, asking him to answer Uulamets—

“His daughter,” Sasha whispered at his side. “He’s worried about her. She’s dead, Pyetr—”

“Well, he has perfectly adequate cause to worry about her, then! This is all crazy, this is all absolutely crazy!” He contemplated his cup in desperation and feared indeed that it was drugged.

“Tell him!”

“She was soaking wet, was how she was,” Pyetr snapped, “and I doubt she was happier than I was.” His teeth started to chatter and he took a deep drink of the potion that was surely the cause of his visions—but there was no cure for them until dawn, he knew there was not, and he humored the boy, if not the old man. “She tried to talk. She went away—”

“To which tree?” Uulamets demanded of him.

“To which tree? It’s a damned forest out there, haven’t you noticed? To which damned tree? How should I know?” The grandmothers said that drowned girls haunted trees. Lured lovers to die. He had had to follow, in his dream. The dose of drugs had been too strong and he had fallen, and Uulamets wove lies, encouraging them by his questions to remember, as charlatans would, exactly what he intended they should remember. “I didn’t ask her about her tree, for the god’s sake. It didn’t occur to me.”

Uulamets walked away in disgust. Sasha shook at his arm and whispered, “Pyetr, I think she’s a rusalka. And that’s a dangerous kind of ghost… she’s terribly dangerous, even to her own father. She could be responsible for the forest dying. Please. Don’t make jokes. Answer him. Tell him everything you saw.”

“I didn’t see anything,” Pyetr said irritably. “He’s drugged the damned stew, is what he’s done. I told you watch him. Now we’re seeing drowned girls and there’s a bear under the house.” He took another drink, telling himself that if it was drugged, it had proved a dreamless sleep given enough quantity; and that was good enough tonight.

“Pyetr. Did she say anything?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Let him be,” Uulamets said from across the room. “Let him drink himself into a stupor if that’s what he chooses. It’s not required he be sober.” Uulamets went back to his chair and his book.

“Please,” Sasha said, “master Uulamets—”

“Don’t be gullible,” Pyetr snapped.

“No need of anything tonight,” Uulamets said, “except his existence here.”

A man could justly feel indignant when the only company he had left sided with a man like Uulamets. Friend, indeed—boy, child, ward, charge: he had promoted ’Mitri to friend, and most of ’Mitri’s faults, he thought, outside Mitri’s outright villainy and the fact that he was increasingly tending to his father’s character—were the faults of a sometimes-man, sometimes-boy. He had his own faults, too, the god knew, among them that he had constantly to look for loyalty in someone younger than himself, because he did not, he admitted it to himself in his most morose broodings, seem to inspire it in more mature folk-Mature folk who had no sense of humor, damn them all, and who could not laugh, and who plodded about their work and their affairs and their petty concerns as if it was all too grim. Or there were villains, plenty of those, who laughed only at the folk they robbed. That was more than grim, and Pyetr had never wanted to be a villain. His father had been one, the god of thieves knew, and Pyetr did not miss him: he only aspired to pluck the fools a little and make them wiser, and play pranks on the ploddingly sober sort and wake them, and generally to amuse himself and find a handful of well-placed, lively friends and of course a lady or so to admire his wit. It seemed a modest ambition for a lively, easy-going fellow, in a world in which so few people cared to fill that role.

But tonight he decided he must be out of step, he must have mistaken everything, to end up here with no friend in the world, only a boy to take care of, one of the ox-sober ilk who was desperately determined to take the world seriously, and who somehow had taken him in hand and bartered and traded him to some lunatic self-named wizard, all for his own good, of course, never mind the wizard was poisoning them with drugs—the god only knew what had happened to his daughter…

He was drunk. Or drugged. Probably the wizard boiled people up in his kettle when he got them to trusting him. Or fed them to whatever he kept in the cellar. Domovoi indeed. Rusalkas. House-things and Things in the yard and things going bump in the cellar under the boards he was sitting on.

He dropped his head against his arm. He listened to the boy talking to Uulamets, who was telling him things about spells and incantations and how he knew that he could bring his daughter back if he could find the right tree.

And the boy stood there and listened to all this.

The boy who thought he was a wizard himself—listened to all this and answered questions like: How did she seem to you?

Sasha said: Just a wispy thing. All white. Like a cloud. Couldn’t you see her, sir?

And the old man said, after a moment: No.

Then, the boy asked—how did you know where to look for her?

Liquid gurgled into a cup. The old man said, I didn’t. But my daughter wouldn’t give up life so easily. Her mother—

The cup banged onto the table.

Her mother’s disposition and my ability, Uulamets said harshly. Go to bed, boy…

The cup was in danger. Sasha lifted it carefully from Pyetr’s fingers and put it on the shelf, and Pyetr never twitched. The old man wanted his book, Pyetr was asleep, and that was just as well, Sasha reckoned: Pyetr just did not deal well with this kind of thing—no discredit to Pyetr: Sasha reckoned that, too, that being deaf and blind to certain things all one’s life and then being knocked down and trampled underfoot by one had to disturb a man like Pyetr, who, Sasha figured, might joke and clown about—but certainly, certainly when he had ridden so recklessly under The Cockerel’s signboard, and it looked as if it was all chance—Pyetr had known better than most folk ever did just precisely where the ground was.

That was what he sensed about Pyetr, and Sasha was greatly put out with the ghost-girl, who after all was cruel—rusalkas were always cruel, it being their nature—but still, still, he was the one of the two of them who truly would have wanted a glimpse of her, and the one of the two of them who might have-he hoped—had at least a chance of reasoning with her; and she had gone and played her tricks instead on poor Pyetr, who could have gone all his life quite happily thinking there was a dog in the yard and a bear under the house and that Sasha Misurov’s wishes had no power over him.

He wanted Pyetr safe. That was all he let himself think about, sitting there beside Pyetr, listening to the slow turn of pages in Uulamets’ book; and knowing that the domovoi beneath the house was mightily disturbed and manifesting itself with all the threat it could muster.

He wanted himself safe. He did not forgive Uulamets for tricking them, most of all for not forewarning him, when a forewarning might have helped. He did not forgive himself, for losing his wits in the chase after Pyetr and not remembering that against a magical thing, his wishing might have some virtue. So he sat and wanted them safe now with all the strength he had, quite collectedly, and did not want to-see the rusalka: he dis missed all curiosity toward her, and simply did not want her, as hard as he could.

After which decision the domovoi at least settled down and quit meandering about the basement. He thought that that was a good sign.

He did not let himself think otherwise.

Only, eventually, there came a prickly feeling to his left, and he was aware that there had been a long silence of pages, and that Uulamets was looking at him.

Then he knew by wishing that way he had made a great mistake.

For a long while Uulamets looked at him, and finally crooked a finger. Sasha let go the blanket and got up and came over to the table, with a greater and greater feeling of hazard. Under his feet the domovoi stirred and shook the house beams. He thought of wishing it quiet, directly against master Uulamets, of trying himself against a wizard, but that was only the merest passing thought, and he knew it was foolish, foolish now to do anything but be polite and show respect and not even to attempt to defend himself except as the most extreme last hope.

He bowed. He looked up at master Uulamets and the timbers of the floor creaked softly.

“Who sent you?” Uulamets asked softly.

“Master Uulamets, no one sent us. We haven’t lied. Only—”

“Only?”

“When I was very small my relatives thought—” He was going to stammer, he knew that he was, and he locked his hands behind him and got a quick breath. “—I might be a wizard, or unlucky, or something of the like. But the wizards in Vojvoda just said I was born on a bad day.”

“Born on a bad day.” Master Uulamets snorted and reached after his cup. He took a drink. At the same time Sasha felt his breath stop and his heart lurch and ache and start again, along with his breath. He went very dizzy for a moment, and master Uulamets said, “They’re fools.”

He had no idea what to answer. He hoped master Uulamets meant fools because they were wrong, and not fools because they failed to drown him at birth. He hoped master Uulamets had no disposition to correct that mistake, if that were the case—and he even hoped, for half a breath, that master Uulamets might tell him something better about himself than any of Vojvoda’s wizards.

“How have you gotten this far,” Uulamets asked, “without killing someone?”

Uulamets might have stopped his heart a second time. It felt like that. He said, feeling as if he were strangling, “I don’t know, sir. I try not to.”

“How do you try? Explain to me.”

“I try not to wish for things that can go wrong.”

“Who told you to do that?”

“Just—when things go wrong. I know better after that.”

Uulamets lifted a brow and looked at him a moment before the edge of his mouth drew into a crooked, unpleasant grin. “Know better,” he chuckled. “Know better. Indeed.” He chuckled to himself for a moment. And a very uncomfortable feeling crawled up and down Sasha’s neck. “Know better than to try me, for instance.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Smart,” Uulamets said. “Smart lad. Your friend’s very lucky.”

To be with me? Sasha wondered, and clenched his hands, suddenly beset with a very unreasonable hope in this old man, who was more knowledgeable than anyone who had ever laid eyes on him: but, again, Uulamets might only mean Pyetr was lucky not to be in worse trouble, considering his company.

“Altogether taken,” Uulamets said, “you’ve managed very wisely—concealed yourself quite well, till your inexperience betrayed you. And so impeccably dean a warding. Very well done, lad.”

“Thank you, sir,” Sasha whispered, and wished himself and Pyetr safe against the attack he was sure would come.

“Wary, too. You don’t trust flattery.”

“No, sir.”

Uulamets’ brows drew together. He crooked the finger again, beckoning him still closer. No, Sasha thought, and stayed where he was.

Uulamets smiled, and the smile became that unpleasant grin. “An impeccable ward. But an egg is impeccable. And vulnerable. Inexperience and too little strength, young Sasha. I had a student once. He was a fool.”

He wished harder that they were safe, wherever they were. He wished so hard he stopped seeing the room around him, or Uulamets in front of him. Only himself and Pyetr, equally, inseparable, indivisible. He was aware of Uulamets getting up, taking up his staff. Walking around him. He let that go. It was Pyetr and their mutual safety he thought about and he did not look at anything.

“Stubborn,” he heard Uulamets say. “I’ve met fools before.”

He stayed as he was. Then pain struck his ankle, and the floor came up under his knee.

“Very good, boy. Very good. Magic’s so simple for the young.” He felt a touch on his hair, and heard Uulamets say: “But much simpler for a creature that is magical. Your friend’s in danger, you and your friend are in terrible danger, and you can only thank yourself you found this house before my daughter found you. But now she has. I admit I had somewhat to do with that—but I didn’t let her have her way, did I? Nor will, if you’re reasonable; otherwise—you’ll lose, boy. I was strong enough to hit you. I chose not to harm you.”

Or the wish worked, Sasha thought, even on Uulamets. So he wished farther, and farther, to forever, and he let go then, and stood up, because that was all he could do.

“The effrontery of you,” Uulamets said, standing back, leaning on his staff.

“You said you’d let us go. You said if I did what you asked you’d let us go and give us food and clothes and blankets.”

“Oh, that I will,” Uulamets said. “But getting out of this woods—that’s another matter.” Uulamets walked back to the table and leaned his staff against the wall. “The strength of magic depends on age; the ease of magic depends on youth. Simplicity of motives, you understand, makes magic ever so much easier. My daughter is older than you are—but her motives are ever so much simpler. You might say—a rusalka is motive. Could you stop her tonight? I think not. Perhaps you’ll want advice.”

He wanted advice—from someone other than Uulamets. But Pyetr would be for running; and Uulamets was telling the truth in one thing, that they were in very deep trouble, and there was no one else to ask.

“What should we do?” he asked meekly enough. But he was not prepared to believe anything Uulamets said.

Surely Uulamets was wise enough to know that. Uulamets gave him a long, calculating look.

“I want my daughter back,” Uulamets said. “It’s very simple. She wants your friend. You want your friend alive. Your wanting has a certain force that may prove useful—if you can hold on to that single mindedness of yours and learn a thing or two.”

“What, sir?”

Uulamets grinned. “The nature of your enemy. The nature of what you want. The nature of nature itself. I’ve wanted someone like you, boy, for much longer than you’ve been alive.”