Words on Fire

I shrugged, which was all the answer he was going to get. I didn’t want to talk to him any more than was necessary, and certainly not to tell him anything about me. If he were one of Rusakov’s spies my father had told me about, then I wouldn’t be foolish enough to give myself away.

Or at least to make things worse than they already were.

“You know, there’s a story for a girl like you,” he said. “Once upon a time, there was a girl named Rue—”

“Rue! That’s what my father calls me!” Then my shoulders sank. “Used to call me.”

“Yes, but this was actually her name.” Lukas cleared his throat, then continued. “Rue was the daughter of a wealthy man, and a very special girl because she could do magic. For this reason, the snake that lived on that same land wanted the girl for himself so she could do magic at his bidding. One day the wealthy man was injured when his cart overturned on him. The snake said, ‘I will save you, but you must give me your daughter.’ As it was the only way to save his life, the man reluctantly agreed.”

I found myself smiling as Lukas spoke. I’d heard similar stories from my mother all my life, though never one quite like this version.

“The snake went to a bear that lived in the nearby forest and threatened to bite the bear if the bear did not help him free the trapped man. ‘I will help you, snake,’ said the bear. ‘But when the man gives you his daughter, you must let her choose between us, choose which of us she prefers.’ The snake agreed, for he was certain the daughter would never take the side of a bear.”

“I wouldn’t choose either one,” I said.

The expression in Lukas’s eyes warned me to let him finish the story. “The man was freed and the next morning he brought his daughter into his fields to choose between the snake and the bear. Like you, Rue wanted nothing to do with either of them, but her father warned that if he did not keep his promise, the snake might bite them and the bear might eat them.”

I screwed up my face. “How awful!”

“Well, it would be, if Rue weren’t so clever. She told the snake to swim up the longest river in Lithuania, and if he were her choice, she would meet him at the end. She told the bear

to run to the deepest part of the forest, and if he were her choice, she would meet him at the end. The snake immediately began swimming, farther and farther north, until one day he swam right out of Lithuania.”

“And what of the bear?” I asked.

“He waits there still, hoping one day she will come.” Lukas glanced back at me. “He knows he was tricked, but he believes if she comes, she will be a most valuable friend.”

“That’s a lovely story,” I said. “I’ve never heard that one before.”

“There are many more stories to be told of Rue’s adventures,” Lukas said. “Perhaps I can tell you more of them one day.”

“You won’t have time, I’m sure,” I said. “You must have a family who needs you, or someone you work for.”

Lukas only shrugged. “My family doesn’t want me and certainly doesn’t need the sort of help I might offer them. And I work out here for Ben, though he doesn’t exactly pay me. Making money is hardly my concern, though. If I have a bite of food each day and I’m on my feet each morning, then I have enough.”

So he was a sort of thief, then, maybe living on his own for some time considering how comfortably he moved about these woods.

I said, “Someday you’ll have to learn to work a proper job instead of wandering through the forests on some mysterious errand for a person named Ben.”

He snorted. “So says the girl who I found wandering through the forests carrying a bag of tricks and a mysterious package.”

I rolled my eyes but remained silent. He’d made his point.

Lukas stopped and turned around to face me. His eyes flicked between my bag and my confused expression. “So what’s in that package?” When I hesitated, he added, “Oh, you don’t know what you’re carrying! Where did you get it?”

My eyes darted away. Officer Rusakov had called my parents criminals, and this package was obviously evidence of their crimes. Evidence of my crimes now, I supposed. Before long, Lukas continued walking again, whistling a tune as we went.

“You shouldn’t do that,” I said. “The Cossacks—”

He stopped again, and this time the expression in his eyes was far more serious. “Have you had trouble with them?” Again I refused to answer, but he said, “I make a point of traveling where the soldiers do not. But they’ll come if they believe you have something to hide.” He glanced back. “Do you?” Another pause, then, “Was your trouble with the police, or with the border guards?”

“Border guards?” I sat up straight. “I’ve never gone near the border.”

“Well, you should sometime. It’s beautiful there. Even prettier across the border in Prussia.”

“I have no papers to cross the border.”

“Why should papers matter?” He chuckled again, but it sounded forced this time, as if too much truth was hidden behind his words. That made me suspicious. If talk of the border made him nervous, there was good reason for it. Although my home was far from the border, that was another of my father’s rules: Never get close to the border. The only people there were either challenging the law or, worse, they were the law.