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Solovey slanted a thoughtful ear.
“And so Marya, that brave girl”—here Vasya tugged her niece’s black plait, and Marya giggled—“stole Kaschei’s magic handkerchief and gave it to Ivan in secret. And he went away to the Baba Yaga, to win the finest horse in all the world for his own.
“The river of fire was great and terrible. But Ivan crossed it by waving Kaschei’s handkerchief and galloping through the flames. Beyond the fire, he found a little house by the shore of the sea. There lived the Baba Yaga and the finest horses in all the world—”
Here Marya interrupted. “Could they talk? Like you can talk to Solovey? Can you really talk to Solovey? Does he talk to people? Like the Baba Yaga’s horses?”
“He can talk,” said Vasya, putting a hand up to stem the flow of questions. “If you know how to listen. Now hush, let me finish.”
But Marya was already asking her next question. “How did you learn how to listen?”
“I—the man in the stable taught me,” said Vasya. “The vazila. When I was a child.”
“Could I learn?” said Marya. “The man in the stable never talks to me.”
“Yours is not strong,” said Vasya. “They are not strong in Moscow. But—I think you could learn. Your grandmother—my mother—knew a little magic, they say. I have heard a tale that your great-grandmother rode into Moscow on a magnificent horse, gray as the morning. Perhaps she saw chyerti just as you and I do. Perhaps there are other horses, somewhere, just like Solovey. Perhaps we all—”
She was interrupted by a decisive step in the aisle between the stalls. “Perhaps we all,” said Varvara’s dry voice, “are in need of supper. Your sister trusted you to go and get her daughter, and here I find you two rolling in the straw like a couple of peasant boys.”
Marya scrambled to her feet; Vasya followed painfully, trying not to favor her injured side. Solovey stood up with a heave, his ears pricked toward Varvara. The woman gave him a strange look. For an instant, there was a kind of remote longing in her face, as a woman looks upon something she coveted long ago. Then, ignoring the stallion, she said, “Come on, Masha. Vasya can finish your story later. The soup will be cold.”
* * *
THE STABLE HAD FILLED UP with shadows in the time Vasya and Marya had been talking. Solovey stood still, ears pricked. “What is it?” Vasya asked the horse.
Can you hear that?
“What?” said Varvara, and Vasya looked at her strangely. Surely she hadn’t…
Marya looked suddenly frightened. “Does Solovey hear someone coming? Someone bad?”
Vasya took the girl’s hand. “I said you are safe and I meant it. If there is any danger, Solovey will take us all galloping far away.”
“All right,” said Marya in a small voice. But she held tight to Vasya’s hand.
They walked out into the blued evening. Solovey went with them, huffing uneasily, his nose at Vasya’s shoulder. The blood-colored sunset had diminished to a faint smear in the west, and the air was still and strange. Outside the thick walls of the stable, Vasya could hear what Solovey had heard: the rush and tramp of many feet and a muted rumble of voices.
“You are right; something is wrong,” said Vasya to the horse, low. “And, curse it, Sasha is not here.” Aloud, she added, “Do not worry, Masha, we are safe here behind the gates.”
“Come on,” said Varvara, and made for the outer door, the anteroom and the stair that would lead them back up to the terem.
2.
Reckoning
THE DOORYARD WAS STRANGELY QUIET; the day’s bustle had given way to a heavy calm. Varvara slipped through the outer door of the terem, holding Marya tight by the hand. Vasya turned back at the foot of the stairs, pressed her forehead to Solovey’s silky neck. She wondered why it was so still in the dooryard. Many of Olga’s guards had died or been wounded in the fighting in the Grand Prince’s dvor, but where were her sister’s grooms, her bondsmen? From beyond the gates, the shouting rose. “Wait for me,” she told the horse. “I am going up to my sister, but I’ll come back soon.”
Hurry, Vasya, said the stallion, unease in every line of his body.
Up the stairs to Olga’s workroom. Vasya’s broken rib ran a claw of fire down her side as she climbed. The big, low-ceilinged workroom had a stove for heat, a narrow window for air. It was crowded now; Olga’s attendants had been awakened by the noise. The nurse sat near the stove, clutching Olga’s son, Daniil. The child was eating bread; he was a placid boy, if a bit bewildered. The women were whispering as though they feared to be heard. An air of disquiet had invaded the palace of Serpukhov. Vasya found her blistered palms sweating.
Olga was standing at the narrow window, looking out beyond the dooryard. Marya ran straight to her mother. The princess put an arm around her daughter’s shoulders.
The hanging lamps threw sinister shadows, quivering with the breeze of Vasya’s entrance. Heads turned, but Vasya only had eyes for her sister, who stood unmoving beside the window.
“Olya?” Vasya asked. The voices in the room sank to hear her. “What is it?”
“Men. With torches,” Olga said, still not turning around.
Vasya saw the women exchanging frightened glances. But still she did not understand. “What are they doing?”
“See for yourself.” Olga’s voice was calm. But she wore layers of chains draped over her breast, hanging from her headdress. The lamplight shimmered on the gold, blindingly, showing the speed of her breathing.
“I would send for the guards,” added Olga. “But we lost so many last night, in the fire, or fighting the Tatars. The rest are at the city-gates; the bondsmen are in the city on errands of mercy. All the men we could spare, and they have not returned. Perhaps some were prevented from coming back, perhaps others heard something we did not.”
Daniil’s nurse clutched the child until he squawked. Marya was watching Vasya with hope and blind trust: the aunt who had a magic horse. Trying not to limp, Vasya crossed to the window. As she passed, a few of the women averted their eyes and crossed themselves.
The street before the gates of Serpukhov was thronged with people. Many bore torches; all of them were shouting. Near the open window, their rising voices came clear at last to Vasya’s straining ears.
“Witch!” they shouted. “Give us the witch! Fire! She set the fire!”
Varvara said flatly to Vasya, “They are here for you,” and Marya said, “Vasochka—Vasochka—do they mean you?” Olga’s arm was stiff, holding her daughter close.
