The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy 1)

Pyotr could not remember running. But suddenly he found himself standing, gasping, between his children and the beast. He was steady except for his pounding heart, and he held his broadsword two-handed. Vasya stared at him as at an apparition. He saw her lips move. Father.

The Bear skidded to a halt. “Get you gone,” he snarled. He stretched out a clawed foot. Pyotr turned it with his sword and did not stir.

“My life is nothing,” said Pyotr. “I am not afraid.”

The Bear opened his mouth and roared. Vasya flinched. Still Pyotr did not move. “Stand aside,” said the Bear. “I will have the old witch’s children.”

Pyotr stepped deliberately forward. “I know no witches. These are my children.”

The Bear’s teeth snapped an inch from his face, and still he did not move.

“Get out,” said Pyotr. “You are nothing; you are only a story. Leave my lands in peace.”

The Bear snorted. “These woods are mine now.” But the eye rolled warily.

“What is your price?” said Pyotr. “I, too, have heard the old tales, and there is always a price.”

“As you like. Give me your daughter, and you will have peace.”

Pyotr glanced at Vasya. Their eyes met, and he saw her swallow hard. “That is my Marina’s lastborn,” he said. “That is my daughter. A man does not offer up another’s life. Still less the life of his own child.”

An instant of perfect silence.

“I offer you mine,” said Pyotr. He dropped his sword.

“No!” Vasya screamed. “Father, no! No!”

The Bear squinted its good eye and hesitated.

Suddenly Pyotr flung himself, empty-handed, at the lichen-colored chest. The Bear acted on instinct; he batted the man aside. There was a horrible crack. Pyotr flew like a straw doll and landed facedown in the snow.

THE BEAR HOWLED AND LEAPED after him. But Vasya was on her feet, all her fear forgotten. She screamed aloud in wordless fury and the Bear whipped round again.

Vasya heaved herself onto Solovey’s back. They charged the Bear. The girl was weeping; she had forgotten she held no weapon. The jewel at her breast burned cold, beating like another heart.

The Bear grinned broadly, tongue lolling doglike between its great teeth.

“Oh, yes,” it said, “Come here, little vedma, come here, little witch. You aren’t strong enough for me yet, and never will be. Come to me and join your poor father.”

But even as he spoke he was dwindling. The Bear became a man, a little, cringing man that peered up at them through a watering gray eye.

A white figure appeared beside Solovey, and a white hand touched the stallion’s straining neck. The horse put his head up and slowed. “No!” shouted Vasya. “No, Solovey, don’t stop.”

But the one-eyed man cringed down into the snow, and she felt Morozko’s hand on hers. “Enough, Vasya,” he said. “See? He is bound. It is over.”

She stared at the little man, blinking, dazed. “How?”

“Such is the strength of men,” said Morozko. He sounded strangely satisfied. “We who live forever can know no courage, nor do we love enough to give our lives. But your father could. His sacrifice bound the Bear. Pyotr Vladimirovich will die as he would have wished. It is over.”

“No,” said Vasya, pulling her hand away. “No…”

She pitched herself off Solovey. Medved cringed away, grumbling, but already she had forgotten him. She ran to her father’s head. Alyosha had gotten there before her. He pulled aside his father’s torn cloak. The blow had crushed Pyotr’s ribs on one side, and blood bubbled up between his lips. Vasya pressed her hands to the wounded place. Warmth flared into her hands. Her tears fell onto her father’s eyes. A hint of color tinged Pyotr’s graying skin, and his eyes opened. They fell on Vasya and brightened.

“Marina,” he croaked. “Marina.”

The breath sighed out of him and he did not take another.

“No,” Vasya whispered. “No.” She dug her fingertips into her father’s slack flesh. His chest heaved suddenly, like a bellows, but his eyes were fixed and staring. Vasya tasted blood where she’d bitten into her lip, and she fought the death as though it were her own, as though…

A cold long-fingered hand caught both of hers, leaching the warmth away. Vasya tried to wrench her hands free, but she could not. Morozko’s voice wafted icy air across her cheek. “Leave it, Vasya. He chose this; you cannot undo it.”

“Yes, I can,” she hissed back, breath catching in her throat. “It should have been me. Let me go!” Then the hand was gone, and she spun round. Morozko had already drawn away. She looked up into his face, pale and indifferent, cruel and just a little kind.

“Too late,” he said, and all around, the wind took up the words: Too late, too late.

And then the frost-demon had swung onto the white mare’s back, up behind another figure, that Vasya could only see out of the corner of her eye. “No,” she said, running after them. “Wait—Father.” But the white mare had already cantered off between the trees and disappeared into the darkness.

THE STILLNESS WAS SUDDEN and absolute. The one-eyed man slunk off into the undergrowth, and the chyerti disappeared into the winter forest. The rusalka laid a dripping hand on Vasya’s shoulder in passing. “Thank you, Vasilisa Petrovna,” she said.

Vasya made no answer.

Solovey nuzzled her gently.

Vasya did not heed. She was staring at nothing, holding her father’s hand while it slowly turned cold.

“Look,” whispered Alyosha, hoarse and wet-eyed. “The snowdrops are dying.”

It was true. The warm, sickly, death-smelling wind had chilled, sharpened, and the flowers wilted down onto the hard earth. It was not yet midwinter, and their hour was months away. There was no clearing, no muddy space beneath a gray sky. There was only a huge old oak-tree, its branches twisted together. The village lay beyond, now clearly visible, a stone’s throw away. Day had broken and it was bitterly cold.

“Bound,” said Vasya. “The monster is bound. Father did it.” She reached out a stiff hand to pluck a drooping snowdrop.

“How came Father here?” said Alyosha in soft wonder. “He had—such a look about him. As if he knew what to do, and how, and why. He is with Mother now, by God’s grace.” Alyosha made the sign of the cross over his father’s body, rose, went to Anna, and repeated the gesture.

But Vasya did not move, nor did she answer.

She put the flower in her father’s hand. Then she laid her head against his chest and began, softly, to cry.

They kept a night’s vigil for Pyotr Vladimirovich and his wife. The two were buried together, with Pyotr between his first wife and his second. Though they mourned, the people did not despair. The miasma of death and defeat had gone from their fields and houses. Even the bedraggled remnants of half a burnt village, led past their gate by an exhausted Kolya, could not frighten them. The air bit gently, and the sun shone down, studding the snow with diamonds.

Vasya stood with her family, hooded and cloaked against the chill, and bore the people’s whispers. Vasilisa Petrovna disappeared. She returned on a winged horse. She should have been dead. Witch. Vasya remembered the touch of rope on her wrists, the cold look in Oleg’s eyes—a man she had known since childhood—and she made a decision.