Chernevog (39 page)

“
We all have our faults,
”
Chernevog said to him.
“
And the limits of our pride. Some are less fastidious than others.
”

He gave a backward jab of his elbow.
“
Leave me alone!
”

It did Chernevog no damage. He was dizzy for a time after that and thought he might fall off the horse, but his body went on balancing the way it knew how to do. He was quite awake: he simply did not remember for the moment how to make
his
arms move, he scarcely knew how to breathe—

“
Let me go,
”
he said finally, discovering he could speak.

And was back in Chernevog's house, with Eveshka sitting in front of the fire with her back to him—and he thought, again, No, it isn't, it isn't her—I know this dream
...
oh, god, I want out of this—

He was standing on the river shore, tall trees grayed with
morning mist. He saw a far, dim figure coming down the grassy bank, cloaked against the chill.

Eveshka had answered him, Eveshka came walking down from the house to meet him there. Come back at dawn, she had said. I'll talk to my father.

But there was no hope of reasoning with Uulamets. He knew that. He knew mere was none of reasoning with Draga. If he did what Draga had said and brought her Eveshka, then there was no hope for him, either, mere was no hope in the world for a young wizard who had (Eveshka knew the truth, but not the significance of what she knew) already betrayed her.

She came walking up to him, she put back her hood. She was sixteen, she would die in that blue dress—Chernevog had already made up his mind that he would have to kill her—

“
God, no!
”
he cried, and kicked Volkhi and tried to carry Chernevog off with him, but Volkhi no more than jumped, and he could not even as lift his arm.

‘‘You don't appreciate your wife's abilities,
”
Chernevog said, holding him on the horse.
“
I did. I asked for her heart and she gave it to me—to give to Owl. To free her, I said—to put it with mine, where it would be safe. And it was. Do you know how I could lie to her?
”

He did not. He did not want to know.

“
The same way your friend could lie to us. By caring for nothing else in the world.
”

Sasha wouldn't, he thought. He couldn't.

Dmitri walking away from him in the yard—

Sasha's not like that, dammit!

He remembered Sasha riding away. He thought how terribly frightened he was in Chernevog's hands, and how desperate, and how if Sasha could not hold off Chernevog, and Sasha had surely known he could not
...

Dammit, Sasha's doing something, he thought; and wondered, while he tried not to wonder: What
can
he do that won't involve magic?

Uulamets—giving Sasha his knowledge at his death, leaving too damned much to Sasha
...

God, no! He tore his ragged thoughts toward pain, remembered old Yurishev, who had run a sword through him one night.

That for Chernevog's eavesdropping. He realized in vivid detail how much it had hurt, falling in the stable—

(Sasha had gotten him to safety, Sasha was resourceful, Sasha would
g
o—where?)

He kicked poor confused Volkhi again and made him ran a few paces, but that lasted no more than the other times; Volkhi settled back to a walk, snorting a
nd switching his tail, and Cher
nevog said against Pyetr's ear:

“
You're not my match, Pyetr Ilyitch. Got the old man's dying bequest, has he?
”

He owed Sasha his life, Sasha had risked his neck for him
...
he said, aloud, biting his lip till it bled, because thoughts kept getting away from him:
“
Nobody's ever cared much about you, Snake. I can't say as I blame them.
”

‘‘So where are these friend
s of yours now?“
Chernevog
asked.
“
They ran. He ran. He left you. He's quite desperate. Where would he go next? Deal with Uulamets' ghost—alone, with what he already carries? That's not damned smart of him!
”

Eveshka, he thought without wanting to think: he was not even sure it was his thought. He thought, trying to back out of it: But he wouldn't trust her by herself. He'd—

He tried to move. Chernevog wished him utterly helpless.
“
I have the books, Pyetr Ilyitch. You know there's little I can't find out from them. I'll find the answers.
”

“
Given time,
”
he said, tasting blood. He had this thing slithering about inside him, it was scared and angry, and in his own foolishness he thought about Eveshka's writing in that book, and Sasha telling him not even another wizard could change what was written there.

I
know you 'II follow me
...

It began to mean something more than ominous. She had written it in Sasha's book... not talking to him at all. To Sasha.
I
know you 'II follow me
...
Like
the bannik's visions—that Sasha said were coming true.

He bit his lip hard, looked at the trees, trying not to think about all the things that might mean. But he went on giving away what, except for him, Chernevog had had no time to find out—maybe no way to understand the way he understood it until he gave it to him
...

“
Has she spoken to you at all?
”
Chernevog asked him.
“
She
came north. Why? What do you suppose she was looking for, if not me? You expected her across the river. But I wasn't her purpose. What would it be?
”

“
Wonder,
”
he said though he had no idea either. Chernevog said, distant voice against the sighing of the trees, the sound of Volkhi's moving:

“
Sasha's to follow her. To what?
”

“
I don't know. I've no idea.
”

I know you'll follow me. I beg you don't
...

Something had separated them. She had packed quite purposefully, taken the boat—something, the god only knew what, had held her asleep on the river, unable to talk to them
...

“
That much
I’ve
gathered,
”
Chernevog said.

He wondered how much else Chernevog had gathered, how much he had told Chernevog in his lapses from reason. He bit his lip to distract himself, and thought, amazingly clear-headed for a moment, Sasha won't leave me. No matter where he is, no matter if he doesn't come back, he won't have left me.

The woods went curiously blurred. There was a pain in his chest. He thought, That damned well made him mad. I wonder why
...

After which he knew nothing clearly. Chernevog held him on the horse, and the cold spot was wider and stronger. Chernevog said against his ear,
“
Pyetr Ilyitch, for entirely different reasons, I do hope you're right.
”

“
You might eat something,
”
Chernevog said to him—and Pyetr found himself lying on his back on the ground, firelight on the young leaves overhead. He had come up abruptly, he fell back again, mumping his head on the ground, and by the feel of it he had done that before. He looked again and saw Chernevog calmly reading by firelight, Volkhi browsing on the undergrowth.

He really should have done better than this, he thought. Sasha would expect
him
to have done better than this. His sword, the books, everything
...

“
Supper,
”
Chernevog said, and waved a hand toward the
baggage
, lying the other side of the fire.

He had no choice about that either. He got up, walked over where the baggage was lying, then bent and started to get the
pack
with their food in it.

But something was sitting on the brush just beyond his shadow, something that stared at him with red-gold eyes.

He froze in mid-reach.

Chernevog moved suddenly, casting his standing shadow beside his.

The bannik, the fragment, whatever it was—hissed; Pyetr scrambled backward, stood up, while the cold spot in the middle of him—grew colder and colder.

It
wanted
him.

He watched it slowly fade. He took another step back for good measure before he looked at Chernevog—found him nothing but a shadow against the fire; and himself trembling from head to foot, for no reason he could say, except it was
him,
dammit, it was what he was carrying that the creature wanted.

Volkhi snorted, snuffed the wind, made a small uneasy sound.

“
A piece of you,
”
Pyetr said when he got a breath.
“
Piece, is it? Dammit, it wants what you gave me!
”

Chernevog said nothing, faceless shadow against the fire-but of a sudden Pyet
r thought of the house that had
burned
the bathhouse outside.

He hid there by night, he barred the door—he tried to summon up a magic against Draga—by whatever creature would answer him.

God
...

“
It didn't work,
”
Chernevog said.

Pyetr looked back to where the baggage still lay, next the bushes. It was stupid to think whatever it was might still lurk there—it was their bannik, dammit, it was something Sasha had not trusted, but they had met it before. He walked over and snatched up the jug and the pack Chernevog had asked for, walked back to the fire and said, if shakily,

“
Supper, Snake.
”

Missy had her misgivings about this trek, in the dark, in a pathless, tangled forest. So did Babi, evidently, who preferred to sit on Missy's rump or occasionally to clamber around to Sasha's lap, and never to go on the ground at all.

Sasha half expected ghosts. But none had troubled them; and beyond that he tried not to think at all beyond his narrow concern for Missy and Babi, and the single purpose of finding the
boat. He kept to small, immediate thoughts, rode Missy's senses, and Missy's memories, which at the moment involved The Cockerel's nice warm stable at this hour, and apples—only fair for a hard day's work, Missy thought; but they were here, apples were not likely, and her favorite person thought it would be a good idea to keep walking and get out of this place where he feared bogles and grabby-things.

Missy agreed with that, although she would gladly have had something to eat along the way and she wished she had company.

Which Sasha did not want to think about, damn, he did not.

Babi held to him quite forlornly, and might want him to know things, too, but he never had been able to fathom what Babi was thinking, and he feared to wonder at all deeply about Babi's thoughts, considering the temptations that posed: thank the god Babi had run away and not made himself available when he had been both desperate and foolish.

About which he also did not want to think, so he thought instead about the vodka and how Babi did deserve it, and how Missy deserved all the apples she could eat, when next he could find some.

Missy put a little enthusiasm into her gait, and wondered where these apples were.

She did, on the sudden whim of a breeze, smell water. Sasha could, on his own, eventually, and Babi clambered down Missy's mane and Sasha's leg and dropped down to the leaves.

He hoped Babi meant to stay close. He had a very anxious feeling of a sudden: that was, perhaps, Missy; but it seemed to him he had smelled better places—this one had the flavor of too little light and too much water.

And Babi, wherever he had gotten to, was growling at something in the brush, while Missy slowed her pace, doubtful of this place they were going, which did not smell like what her person wanted and certainly did not smell like the promised apples. It smelled more like old wood and rotten ground, a stable, perhaps, but not a nice one; and Sasha could not tell, riding Missy's senses as he did, whether it was that bad or whether it was simply Missy's keen nose.

Babi turned up, a much larger and more imposing Babi, walking along at Missy's feet, and something plunked into water
close at hand—a startled frog, Sasha hoped, and bit his lip to keep from the idea of Pyetr's sword, which was dangerous to want and the god only knew what he would do with it that he could not do with a stout stick. He regretted the one that was standing in the corner at
home, where it did him no good
…
a stick was a perfectly adequate weapon. A branch would do
...
except he had no desire to get down to find one.