The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy 1)

Dunya opened her eyes. A smile touched her shrunken mouth. “Marina will be proud, my Vasochka,” she said. “I will tell her when I see her.”

“You will do nothing of the kind,” said Vasya. She tried to smile, though her eyes blurred with tears. “You are going to get well again.”

At that, the old lady lifted a cold hand and, with surprising firmness, pushed Vasya away. “No, I am not,” she said, with a little of her old tartness. “I have lived to see all of my little ones grown, and I want nothing more than to die with my last three children on either side.” Irina was awake now, too, and Dunya’s other hand reached out and found hers.

Alyosha laid his hand over them all. He spoke up before Vasya could protest. “Vasya, she’s right,” he said. “You must let her go. It will be a cruel winter, and she is weary.”

Vasya shook her head, but her hand wavered.

“Please, my darling,” whispered the old lady. “I am so tired.”

Vasya hesitated for a frozen moment, then tipped her head in a tiny nod.

The old lady laboriously freed her other hand and clasped Vasya’s in both of hers. “Your mother blessed you at her parting, and now I do the same. Be at peace.” She paused as though listening. “You must remember the old stories. Make a stake of rowan-wood. Vasya, be wary. Be brave.”

Her hand fell away and she lay silent. Irina and Alyosha and Vasya were left to pick up her cold hands, straining to hear the sound of her breathing. Finally Dunya roused herself and spoke again, so low that they had to lean close to catch the words.

“Lyoshka,” she whispered. “Will you sing for me?”

“Of course,” whispered Alyosha. He hesitated, then drew a deep breath.

There was a time, not long ago

When flowers grew all year

When days were long

And nights star-strewn

And men lived free from fear

Dunya smiled. Her eyes glowed like a child’s, and in her smile, Vasya saw the shadow of the girl she had been.

But seasons turn and seasons change

The wind blows from the south

The fires come, the storms, the spears

The sorrow and the dark

A wind was rising without, the cold wind that portends snow. But the three atop the oven sat insensible. Dunya listened, open-eyed, her gaze fixed on something that even Vasya could not see.

But far away there is a place

Where yellow flowers grow

Where rising sun

Lights stony shore

And gilds the flying foam

Where all must end

And all—

Alyosha was cut off. The wind slammed the kitchen door open and tore shrieking through the room. Irina gave a little scream. With the wind came a black-cloaked figure, though no one saw it but Vasya. The girl caught her breath. She had seen it before. The figure gave her a single lingering look, then reached out to lay long fingers on Dunya’s throat.

The old lady smiled. “I am not afraid anymore,” she said.

Next moment, the shadow came. It fell between the black-cloaked figure and Dunya as an ax cleaves wood.

“Oh, brother,” said the shadow-voice. “So unwary?” The shadow smiled, a great black gaping smile, and seemed to reach out and seize Dunya with two vast arms. The peace on Dunya’s face turned to terror. Her eyes started from her head, bulging, and her face turned scarlet. Vasya found herself on her knees, frightened, bewildered, shuddering with sobs. “What are you doing?” she shouted. “No—let her go!” The wind roared again through the room, first a wind of winter, and then the humid crackling wind that runs before a summer storm.

But the wind died quick as it had risen, taking with it both the shadow and the black-cloaked man.

“Vasya,” said Alyosha into the silence. “Vasya.” Pyotr and Konstantin rushed in, the men of the household on their heels. Pyotr was flushed with cold; he had not gone to bed after the incident in the priest’s room but set his men to patrol the sleeping village. They had all heard Vasya shouting.

Vasya looked down at Dunya. Dunya was dead. Blood suffused her face and a little foam flecked the corners of her mouth. Her eyes bulged, the dark swimming in pools of red.

“She died afraid,” Vasya said, very softly, shaking. “She died afraid.”

“Come on, Vasochka,” said Alyosha. “Come down.” He had tried to close Dunya’s eyes, but they bulged too much. The last thing Vasya saw before she climbed off the oven was the look of horror on Dunya’s dead face.

They laid Dunya in the bathhouse, and at dawn the women came loud as hens cackling. They bathed Dunya’s withered body; they wrapped her in linen and sat vigil beside her. Irina knelt weeping, her head in her mother’s lap. Father Konstantin knelt, too, but it did not seem that he prayed. His face was white as the linen. Again and again, his trembling hand felt at his unmarked throat.

Vasya was not there. When the women looked for her, she was not to be found.

“She has always been a hoyden,” muttered one to another. “But I never thought her so bad as this.”

Her friend nodded darkly, mouth pinched small. Dunya had been as a mother to Vasilisa when Marina Ivanovna died. “It is in the blood,” she said. “You can see it in her face. She has a witch’s eyes.”

AT FIRST LIGHT, VASYA crept outside, a shovel over her shoulder. Her face was set. She made a few preparations, then went to find her brother. Alyosha was chopping firewood. His ax whistled down so hard that the logs burst apart and lay strewn in the snow at his feet.

“Lyoshka,” said Vasya. “I need your help.”

Alyosha blinked at his sister. He had been weeping; the ice-crystals glinted in his brown beard. It was very cold. “What, Vasya?”

“Dunya gave us a task.”

The young man’s jaw tightened. “This is hardly the time,” he said. “Why are you here? The women are keeping vigil; you should be with them.”

“Last night,” said Vasya urgently. “There was a dead thing. In the house. An upyr, like in Dunya’s stories. It came as she was dying.”

Alyosha was silent. Vasya met his gaze. His knuckles showed white when he drove the ax down again. “Ran the monster off, did you?” he said with some sarcasm, between chops. “My little sister, all by herself?”

“Dunya told me,” Vasya said. “She said to remember the stories. Make a stake of birch-wood, she said. Remember? Please, brother.”

Alyosha paused in his chopping. “What are you suggesting?”

“We must get rid of it.” Vasya took a deep breath. “We need to look for disturbed graves.”

Alyosha frowned. Vasya was white to the lips, her eyes great dark holes. “Well, we will see,” Alyosha said, with the barest edge of irony. “Let’s go dig up the cemetery. Truly, it has been too long since Father beat me.”

He stacked his wood and hoisted his ax.

It had snowed in the hour before dawn. There was nothing to be seen in the graveyard but vague hummocks beneath the sparkling drifts. Alyosha glanced at his sister. “What now?”

Vasya’s mouth twitched despite herself. “Dunya always said that male virgins are best for finding the undead. You walk in circles until you trip over the right grave. Care to lead, brother?”