I knew the answer, of course. They’d already told me why. They wanted to keep me safe. “One more year, Henri.” That had been my mother’s plea. One more year before telling me the truth about anything. One more year before putting a book in my hands and explaining why it mattered to them, why it should matter to me. Always one more year. All to keep me safe.
And now, here I was. Could I do what was necessary to make them safe again too?
The priest rested a small stack of books on the side of the wagon, getting my attention. “Thinking about your parents?”
I nodded. There were no words in my language, or the Russian language, to describe how much I missed them. The closest phrase we had was aš labai pasiilgau taves, which failed to express my utter emptiness without them.
The priest continued, “I never met them, but I’ve heard stories of their work. Your mother collected orders for books and passed the information to your father, who would secretly cross the border into Prussia. We have printers there who gladly take our money to make the books for us. Then your father smuggled the books back here into Lithuania. Their work was exceptionally dangerous, but if they were anything like Ben and Lukas and the other carriers I work with, then I understand why they did it.”
I stared back at him, hoping he would explain further. Because I desperately wanted to know the answer. Yes, I had felt the rush of excitement in getting a single book past that soldier in town, but what did that matter? I’d failed in my attempts to smuggle since then and it had left a horrible pit in my gut all day.
The priest smiled. “Your parents must have loved you very much to care so deeply about your future. They hoped to give you the chance of growing up in a Lithuania that was free, that belonged to our own people.”
I glanced down. Maybe that was true. But if my parents loved me so much, why couldn’t they have made choices to keep us together? Of course I wanted my country to be free, as much as anyone, but no matter whether Lithuania was free or occupied, I’d still rather have had the chance to grow up with my family at my side.
The priest must have sensed my feelings because he added, “Your parents couldn’t stand by and watch our light be extinguished by the occupation. If our country ceases to exist, then who will you be? An orphan to a nameless people, not Lithuanian, not Russian, not anything.”
That was exactly the problem. I would become an orphan … unless I helped Rusakov. Helped him destroy the very thing my parents had worked so hard to protect.
“I found a book in our home once,” I said, keeping my eyes down. “Years ago, but I still remember it. Mama snatched it from my hands and told me books were dangerous.”
Lukas was passing by to get another load of books. “Your mother was right. Books can be exceptionally dangerous.”
Now I looked up. “How?”
The priest picked up a book from the wagon, one in a simple leather binding with letters on the cover that meant nothing to me. “This book speaks of what Lithuania might have been now if we’d been left on our own. Read it and you will see that what the Russians have stolen from us is so much greater than simply our land and our lives.”
“What good does it do to wish that things were different?” I asked. “The Cossacks are here to stay. A few words of protest in a book won’t change that.”
Lukas took the book from the priest and widened it to show me the pages inside, as if that would matter. “It’s not just wishing, Audra. This is a book of ideas. Someone thought the idea and put it into words on paper. That became a seed, and every time someone reads those words, the seed is planted in their mind, too, and it grows and spreads and soon that tiny seed of an idea becomes belief, and belief becomes a plan, and those plans begin to change the world. Control the books and you will control the people.”
I smiled as I began to understand. “Give them books, and the people will control themselves.”
“Control their own future!” Lukas added.
He started to leave, but I said his name, and when he turned back to me, I asked, “With enough books, could we control our future enough to get the Russians out of Lithuania? Isn’t that the purpose of the book?”
Ben had been listening to us and now ducked in. “The book gives knowledge, but don’t expect freedom from it. The Russians have been here a very long time now.”
“But could it happen?”
“In other words, is there any chance for your parents to come home again?” Ben frowned. “I already answered this. In my lifetime, I’ve never once seen anyone come back from Siberia.”
A tear escaped my eye, leaving a wet trail down my cheek. If that were true, then I really had no choice. I couldn’t let my parents die in Siberia, not for a few books. I knew what I had to do.
Lukas had been gathering another stack of books in his arms and now lowered them again to face Ben. “That’s not what you’ve told me before. You’ve said—”
“Don’t get her hopes up. We’re not doing this to make Lithuania free. We do this just to preserve the idea that Lithuania exists at all.”
“No, Ben!” Lukas shouted the words, then calmed himself with a deep breath before adding, “I know what you’ve always said, what you really believe. That books themselves are freedom. Freedom to think, to believe, to dream.”
Ben had been nodding as Lukas spoke, then said, “Put a thousand more hosts of Cossack soldiers on our roads if that’s what the tsar commands, but if I have a book in my hand, I am free. Now, I’d appreciate it if you’d get several books in your hands and help this old man unload the wagon.”
Lukas grinned playfully, and as he began piling a stack into his arms, he glanced over at me. “I warn you that once you start carrying, you won’t be able to go back to who you were before. Will you help us, then?”
His simple question seemed to choke me, too much for an honest reply. Whatever I did next, it would feel to them like I was helping, but the truth was just the opposite. I had to meet Officer Rusakov in two days and tell him how to find Lukas. I just had to. Slowly, I nodded.
“No, she won’t help,” Ben countered, then faced me directly. “A book carrier’s work is dangerous, her life is at risk at all times, even in the moments when she’s not carrying books. Just as it was for your father.” I winced, and Ben continued, “You’ll sleep in cold ditches, run when your heart threatens t