The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy 1)

“Because she is not a girl formed for convents,” said Rodion. “A blind man could see it.”

Konstantin set his jaw, and Rodion saw with surprise the priest’s face ablaze with anger. “She cannot marry,” said Konstantin. “Only sin awaits her in this world; better she retire. She will pray for her father’s soul. Pyotr Vladimirovich is an old man, he will be glad of her prayers when he goes to God.”

This was all very well. Nonetheless Rodion knew a pang of conscience. Pyotr’s second daughter reminded him of Brother Aleksandr. Though Sasha was a monk, he had never stayed long at the Lavra. He rode the breadth of Rus’ on his good war-horse, tricking and charming and fighting by turns. He wore a sword on his back and was adviser to princes. But such a life was not possible for a woman who took the veil.

“Well, I will do it,” said Rodion reluctantly. “Pyotr Vladimirovich has been my host, and I can hardly do less. But, Brother, I wish you would change his mind. Someone surely can be persuaded to marry Vasilisa Petrovna. I do not think she will last long in a convent. Wild birds die in cages.”

“And so?” snapped Konstantin. “Blessed are those who linger only a little in this mire of wickedness before going into the presence of God. I only hope her soul is prepared when the meeting comes. Now, Brother, I would like to pray.”

Without a word, Rodion crossed himself and slipped out the door, blinking in the feeble daylight. Well, I am sorry for the girl, he thought.

And then, uneasily, How thick the shadows lie in that room.

PYOTR AND KOLYA TOOK their men hunting not once but several times before the snow. The rain would not cease, though it grew steadily colder, and their strength faltered in the long, wet days. But try as they might, they never found so much as a trace of the thing that had torn the buck to pieces. The men began to mutter, and at last to protest. Weariness vied with loyalty, and no one was sorry when the frost put an end to the hunting.

But that was when the first dog disappeared.

She was a tall bitch: a good whelper and fearless before the boar, but they found her near the palisade, headless and bloody in the snow. The only tracks near her frozen body were her own running paw prints.

Folk took to going into the woods in twos, with axes in their belts.

But then a pony disappeared, while it stood tied to a sled for hauling firewood. Its owner’s son, returning with an armful of logs, saw the empty traces and a great swath of scarlet splashed across the muddy earth. He dropped his logs, even his ax, and ran for the village.

Dread settled over the village: a clinging, muttering dread, tenacious as cobwebs.

November roared in with black leaves and gray snow. On a morning like dirty glass, Father Konstantin stood beside his window, tracing with his brush the slim foreleg of Saint George’s white stallion. His work absorbed him, and all was still. But somehow the silence listened. Konstantin found himself straining to hear. Lord, will you not speak to me?

When someone scratched at his door, Konstantin’s hand jerked and almost smeared the paint. “Come in,” he snarled, flinging his brush aside. Anna Ivanovna it was, surely, with baked milk and adoring, tedious eyes.

But it was not Anna Ivanovna.

“Father, bless,” said Agafya, the serving-girl.

Konstantin made the sign of the cross. “God be with you.” But he was angry.

“Do not take offense, Batyushka,” the girl whispered, wringing her work-hardened hands. She hovered at the doorway. “If I may have only a moment.”

The priest pressed his lips together. Before him, Saint George bestrode the world on an oaken panel. His steed had only three legs. The fourth, as yet unpainted, would be raised in an elegant curve to trample a serpent’s head.

“What do you wish to say to me?” Konstantin tried to make his voice gentle. He did not entirely succeed; she paled and shrank away. But she did not go.

“We have been true Christians, Batyushka,” she stammered. “We take the sacrament and venerate the icons. But it has never gone so hard with us. Our gardens drowned in the summer rain; we will be hungry before the season turns.”

She paused, and licked her lips.

“I wondered—I cannot help but wonder—have we offended the old ones? Chernobog, perhaps, who loves blood? My grandmother always said it would come to disaster, if ever he turned against us. And I fear now for my son.” She looked at him in mute supplication.

“Better to be afraid,” growled Konstantin. His fingers itched for his brush; he fought for patience. “It shows your true repentance. This is the time of trial, when God will know his loyal servants. You must hold fast, and you shall see kingdoms presently, the like of which you do not imagine. The things you speak of are false: illusions to tempt the unwary. Hold to truth and all will be well.”

He turned away, reaching for his paints. But her voice came again.

“But I don’t need a kingdom, Batyushka, just enough to feed my son through the winter. Marina Ivanovna kept the old ways and our children never starved.”

Konstantin’s face assumed an expression not unlike that of the spear-wielding saint before him. Agafya stumbled against the doorframe. “And now God will have his reckoning,” he hissed. His voice flowed like black water with a rime of ice. “Think you that just because it was delayed two years, or ten, that God was not wroth at such blasphemy? The wheel grinds slowly.”

Agafya quivered like a netted bird. “Please,” she whispered. She seized his hand, kissed the spattered fingers. “Will you beg forgiveness for us, then? Not for my own sake, but for my son.”

“As I can,” he said more gently, putting a hand on her bowed head. “But you must first ask it yourself.”

“Yes—yes, Batyushka,” she said, looking up with a face full of gratitude.

When at last she hurried out into the gray afternoon and the door clicked shut behind her, the shadows on the wall seemed to stretch like waking cats.

“Well done.” The voice echoed in Konstantin’s bones. The priest froze, every nerve alight. “Above all they must fear me, so that they can be saved.”

Konstantin flung his brush aside and knelt. “I wish only to please you, Lord.”

“I am pleased,” said the voice.

“I have tried to set these people on the path of righteousness,” said Konstantin. “I would only ask, Lord…That is, I have wanted to ask…”

The voice was infinitely gentle. “What would you ask?”

“Please,” said Konstantin, “let me see my task here finished. I would carry your word to the ends of the earth, if only you asked it. But the forest is so small.”

He bowed his head, waiting.

But the voice laughed in loving delight, so that Konstantin thought his soul would flee his body in joy. “Of course you shall go,” it said. “One more winter. Only sacrifice and be faithful. Then you shall show the world my glory, and I will be with you forever.”

“Only tell me what I must do,” said Konstantin. “I will be faithful.”

“I desire you to invoke my presence when you speak,” said the voice. Another man would have heard the eagerness in it. “And when you pray. Call me with every breath and call me by name. I am the bringer of storms. I would be present among you, and give you grace.”