    




    F I R E B I R D    73
    
              '-d Ruslan and Father Mikail carefully, for he had decided to keep his
    
    s
    
    11
    
    S,
    
    c
    
    be
    ho
    ar-
    is
    
    bers, it was impossible to understand the shouted words, but the tone
    was clear enough.
     Well. I don't think Mischa is going to have much opportunity to worry
    about me for a while. It was hard to keep a certain amount of self-
    satisfaction out of his thoughts, for this certainly was one of the brighter
    moments of his life. Mischa, of all people, was in trouble with their fa-
    ther! And he was not going to live down the tsar's disappointment in
    him for quite some time. Still. How was it that I fell asleep? I wasn't tired,
    I hadn't been drinking--in fact, the last thing I remember is settling in for
    a long watch. Is the thief somehow putting something into the food? But
    why would it affect only the guards in the orchard?
     As Ivan's voice, inuffled by layers of wood and stone, continued to roar
    incoherently on, Ilya worried at that problem until he lost it entirely in
    the labyrinth of sleep.
    
    ~ THE next day, as they sat together on a bench in the sun, he interro-
    
    own presence in the orchard a secret even from them. He told his two
    mentors everything that he knew without betraying that he had been the
    one who witnessed it all. Then he asked their opinions.
     Father Mikail was very certain who-or what-was stealing the cher-
    ries. As the sunlight poured down over them like warm honey and the
    birds singing nearby seemed to mock all the shadowed thoughts of the
    night, the priest's generous mouth took on a grim cast.
     "It's a demon," he said darkly. "Sent to punish the tsar for his blas-
    phemy and unbelief. This is only the beginning. It begins by taking
    cherries, and it will end by taking his soul."
    -For a moment the words cast an eerie chill to the warm air. Could it
     Was that the answer? It was the one DOSSibility that bad not occurred
    
     But Ruslan snortcd with contempt. "Don't be absurd!" he countered
    bluntly, as his fingers played among the small bones, carvings, and tal-
    ismans woven into the fringes of his belt. "If it was a demon sent to pun-
    ish Ivan, why hasn't it announced itself? I thought your demons always
    midc a point of telling their victims just what was in store for them-
    
    111

    




    74   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    or what would the point be of sending them? If Ivan doesn't kn
    what's about to happen, he doesn't get a chance to repent now, d
    he? And if he doesn't get a chance to repent, isn't that mighty unfair
    your God?"
     Mikail opened and closed his mouth several times, looking remar
    ably like a startled fish, then shook his head. "I have no refutation
    that. God would not give a sinner no chance to repent," he admitte
    crestfallen. He bent his head, and Ilya suddenly noticed just how mu
    gray there was among all the blond hair. Ruslan had always been gri
    zled, but when had Mikail begun to show his age? The priest sighed, u
    aware of Ilya's scrutiny. "I suppose it cannot be a demon after all."
     He looked terribly disappointed, and Ilya couldn't blame him.
    would have been such a triumph for him to have something like a dem
    to combat, and it would have been even better if in the course of his w
    he could have made a penitent convert of Tsar Ivan as well. Was Rus
    right? Ilya couldn't think of any tales of demons coming to torment v
    tims without announcing themselves. Normally, it was the heathe
    pagan spirits of the house, forest, and fields who carried off victims wi
    little or no warning beforehand.
     "It might be a saint," Mikail ventured, his brow creasing with d
    "I'm sure I've heard tales of Saint Elijah the Prophet being terribly ven
    ful when he thought he was slighted-"   i
     "Nonsense," Ruslan interrupted. "Every one of those tales is just
    story of the god Perim that you Christians stole for Elijah. And even y
    have to admit that such stories are hardly the kind of behavior you'd e
    pect out of a saint!"
     Glumly, Mikail nodded.
     "So what do you think it is?" Ilya asked Ruslan. The old man chew
    on his lower lip thoughtfully, as his fingers continped to move amo
    his talismans.
     "What I thought it was before," Ruslan told them both, eventual
    'A spirit, either of the fields or the forest. And I'll grant you," he
    tinued, turning to Father Mikail, "that there isn't a great deal of di
    ence between a spirit and a demon, particularly where You Priest
    concerned. It may not be able to take Ivan's soul, but I think he's e

    




    F I R E B I R D
    
    75
    
    lucky that so far all it's taken is his fruit. Leshli and polevoi aren't for-
    giving of those who forget to honor them, and I'll not be surprised if this
    spirit gets weary of cherries and looks for blood."
     The priest crossed himself hastily. "Holy Christ and His Blessed
    Mother forbid," he said. "Perhaps I had better go out and bless the or-
    chard?" He looked frightened at the idea of confronting a spirit, but Ilya
    thought that he would probably go ahead and bless the ground if Rus-
    ]an thought it would help.
     "That might only anger it," Ruslan cautioned. "These things have
    taken Christian priests before, old friend." His expression soured. "Con-
    sider this, before you think that this is something you really must do.
    Ivan hasn't asked you to do anything, and I don't see where it's your duty
    or mine to voluntarily help him in this."
     When Father Mikail looked at them both doubtfully, Ilya added his
    own voice to Ruslan's. "Think of this, Father. This spirit may be serving
    both itself and God. It is giving my father a lesson in humility that he
    sorely needs-indeed, it isn't only the tsar who is being humbled! Last
    night it was Mischa, tonight it will be Gregon, the next night, Pietor. I
    don't think that either Gregori or Pietor are going to have any more luck
    than Mischa, and this may be the first time in their lives that any of them
    has been defeated or humbled in any way. I believe that it will do them
    all good, though I think we ought to take pains to stay out of their way
    forawhile." ,
     'And thanks be to God that they cannot find any reason to say you
    are to blame for this, Ilya," the priest replied, then sighed heavily. "Well,
    Ruslan,you are right; Ivan has made no requests of me, and I am in no
    way obligated to aid someone who has repeatedly spurned both Church
    and God. And Ilya, you are also correct; this could be God's way of giv-
    ing the tsar a much-needed lesson in humility. It only shows that
    Almighty God can use even a pagan spirit to do His will."
     Ilya grinned at the shaman, who winked a reply. "Going back to what
    this spirit is ... If I were to guess," Ruslan continued, "I would say that
    the spirit is probably a polevoi; the spirits of the forest are usually stronger
    andMOFe dangerous, and the spirits of our fields have been neglected
    for so long that they have probably become relatively weak. Still, I have

    




    76   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    no intention of finding out for certain by trying to propitiate it, and
    would probably think twice about it even if I liked the tsar."
     Mikail started to say something, thought better of it, and shrugge
    "In any case, it is out of our hands. Now, young Ilya, about that secti
    of Plutarch's Lives I asked you to read-"
     "I am out of my expertise! " Ruslan exclaimed, as Mikail produced t
    book he had mentioned. "I shall be of f-thcre arc several things I wou
    like to do." He smiled grimly. "Just in case this spirit does move its a
    tentions onward, I intend to see to it that the three of us are protected
     Mikail nodded; Ilya was perfectly pleased to apply himself to t
    Latin that Father Mikail had requested he study, for he had the best a
    swer he was likely to get about the thief in the orchard. A spirit wou
    be able to make people sleep against their will, and a spirit would n
    have to trouble itself about getting past walls and guards. Though wh
    a spirit would want with cherries he had no notion.
     Then again, why does Ruslan set out porridge for the bannik in th
    bathhouse and the domovol? They are spirits, too.
     But spirits could also be warded against, and Ilya had every intenti
    of trying his own vigil at least once more. Not tonight, for Gregori
    a famous hunter and was also unlikely to fall prey to the overconfide
    that had led Mischa to game- and gamble and ignore his surrun'
    Gregori might well be able to detect Ilya in the orchard-andif a
    would bear or otherwise sense a spirit approaching, it would be Gr
     But Pietor was the worst hunter of all of Ivan's sons, and he was
    observant to boot. It would be no problem for Ilya to slip back into p]
    in the treetops without alerting him.
     But this time, when he did, he would have a way to keep hi
    awake, no matter what befell.
     But it was a strange thing, to find himself actually willing to ac
    that there was a spirit working mischief out there, after all these
    of hearing and half-believing in Ivan's assertions that such things did n,
    exist.
    
    TWO nights later, he was back in his tree-shelter, his coat covered ~~.it
    ward-charms and other protections he had learned to make after all

    




    F 1 2 E B I R D    TV
    
    Ruslan's instructions. And to keep himself awake in case the charms
    failed, he had filched a half-dozen pins from the ladies' work-baskets.
    He had them strategically placed in his clothing, and he held one. If he
    fell asleep, one or more pins would jab him as his muscles relaxed, and
    in the meantime, he planned to stick himself at intervals with the one
    he held.
     If this doesn't work to keep me awake, I can always see if Father Mikall
    won't allow me to call it a form of self-flagellation, so it would count as
    penance, he thought wryly. If I'm going to hurt myself on purpose, I might
    as well get something out of it.
     Every time he got the least bit comfortable, he jabbed himself with
    his pin, all the while watching Pietor to see if his brother showed any
    signs of nodding off. Pietor had surrounded himself with a ring of
    torches, but he wasn't sitting, he was pacing back and forth like a sen-
    try on duty. But Ilya knew his brothers, and he knew that with Pietor,
    good intentions didn't last very long. Sure enough, at about the same
    time that Ilya got tired of jabbing his right thigh and changed his target
    to the left, Pietor sat down under a tree with his back up against it.
     As Pietor began to relax against the tree-trunk, Ilya jabbed himself
    with the pin-at precisely the same instant that a bird began to sing, very
    softly, somewhere in the far distance.
     Wait--a moment- He felt his eyes start to close and, with alarm,
    jabbed himself in the thigh again. He jerked awake with the pain, not
    only of that self-inflicted injury, but with the added insult of three of the
    other pins sticking into him as he relaxed a bit too much.
     Down below, Pietor's head nodded forward, his chin resting against
    his chest.
     The fluting music neared, and whatever it was that was singing, it was
    not a bird. The tones were birdlike, but the music itself, soothing, lulling,
    sending one into a trance, was nothing that ever came out of a bird's
    throat. Ilya stabbed himself again, fiercely, as he felt the music steal over
    his mind and start to send him into slumber again.
     So this was how the thief was getting past the guards! It was magic,
    the first magic that Ilya had ever experienced, and there was no deny-
    ing that it was powerful as well as subtle and clever.

    




    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
     Movement out among the trees caught his attention before he real-
    izcd that it should have been quite dark out there, and he shouldn't have
    been able to see movement. But it wasn't just movement that had
    alerted him, it was a moving light, and it was up among the branches,
    not down on the ground.
     The song neared, and insofar as he was able to figure, the moving light
    was the source of the song. He bad to lab himself again and again to keep
    from being captured by those entrancing notes, but by now, he didn't
    care that his thigh was beginning to resemble a pincushion. Whatever
    this thief was, it was not a leshii, nor a polevol. Neither of those'~Pirit~,
    had ever been known to lull people to slee p with magical lullabies.
     He hardly dared breathe, and yet at the same time he had the
    curious feeling of lightness, of aliveness, that he had felt the first
    he had followed Mischa out here.
     Maybe I'd better pretend that I'm asleep-Whatever was carrying that
    flickering light might not come too close if it thought that he was awake
    and could see it. On the other hand, he had the feeling that if he closed
    his eyes, pretending to be asleep, that pretense might turn into the real
    thing.
     But the very appearance of the light now argued for a perfectly hurna
    thief rather than a spirit. What would a spirit need with a torch or a
    lantern? The light-source could only be a flame, not the spectral, blue-
    green globes supposedly borne by the rusalka and other spirits. He had
    no notion of how the thief was staying up among the branches of the
    trces-
     Could he be climbing from tree to tree? Or perhaps he's on stilts, like a
    clown at a festival? That could be the reason why no one has found
    sign of a ladderf
     So he waited, every sense so acutely active that he could swear th
    he heard Pietor's breathing, felt the least little movement of air on
    skin, smelled the cherries ripening just out of reach, and saw the
    toothed edge of every leaf. Slowly, the flickering light worked its
    nearer, one tree at a time. He held his breath, not daring to move. it
    just barely concealed by the branches of the tree nearest his now.

    




    F I R E B I R D    79
    
    moment, it would come into view, and he would see the face of the thief
    at last.
     In an agony of anticipation and impatience, he waited as the light
    danced tantalizingly lust out of sight-now seeming as if it was about
    to come around to his side of the tree, now dancing back. He wanted to
    shout at the thief, demanding that he show himself, even though he
    knew that would be the worst possible thing he could do at the moment.
    But his nerves were strained to the breaking-point, and he didn't know
    how much more he could bear without losing control.
     Then the, flame hesitated, faltered, as if the unseen band holding it
    responded to a cautious thought, a warning that all was not as it seemed.
     I Ic wanted to scream.
     Suddenly, lust when he thought for certain that the thief was about
    to turn and bolt back the way he had come, the flame darted around the
    concealing branches, and he saw the thief clearly.
     It was a bird. A huge bird, bigger than any eagle he bad ever heard of,
                                  as the span of both
    a bird with a wingspan that was easily twice as wi
    his arms.
     A bird with feathers made of flame.
     The bird sang softly as it plucked the ripe cherries and ate them one
    by one; as it hovered in place beside each branch, its feathers coruscated
    in ever-changing hues of scarlet, gold, white, and a touch of blue. He
    could not see the front of the head clearly, but it had a long, graceful tall
    that trailed halfway down to the ground, and its head was crowned with
    a crest of stiff feathers whose edges sparkled with the glint of faceted
    gems,
     He gasped.
     The bird broke off its song and whirled somehow, although he had
    never seen a bird able to fly the way that this one could, and stared
    straight at him.
     That was when he finally saw the bird's face clearly, and gasped again
    as the strangeness of it struck him like a blow to the sf omach.
     The face was a beautiful yet disturbing mingling of human woman
    and exotic bird.

    




    so   MERCEDES LACREV
    
     The eyes-they were not round, like a bird's, and they had w
    well as irises. The completely human, intensely blue luminesce
    stared into his for one heart-stopping moment. Then, inexplica
    face of the creature shifted and became wholly that of a bird.
     Before he could even draw a breath, the bird made a most un
    squawk of sheer terror. He had not even begun to move when
    straight up into the night sky in a thunder of flame and feathers
    upward, a fiery comet in reverse.
     Then it was gone, leaving only the dazzling afterimage burn
    his mind.

    




    ~WXIE_Iw, IVIUM E E
    
    HIS HANDS lost their grip, his mind went blank, and Ilya fell out
    of the tree.
     He landed on his back with a dull thud, driving all the breath from
    his lungs. He saw stars, and his mouth opened in a silent gasp of agony.
    Somehow, perhaps because he was so limp with astonishment, he didn't
    do himself any serious injury, although he lay on the ground under the
    tree for several moments, thrashing and trying to make his lungs work.
    His injuries of the last beating reminded him with force that they were
    not quite healed. In all that time, neither his brother nor the pair of
    guards with him woke or even stirred.
     Finally, with a sobbing intake of breath that broke the bizarre stillness
    it
    n the cherry-orchard, he managed to get a gulp of air. After a second
    and third, he rolled over onto his side, wheezing and coughing. His
    lungs labored and his eyes watered with pain as he groaned. Still, despite
    all the noise he was making, the other three lay as if dead, with only their
    faint snores showing that they were asleep and not corpses.
     His throat was raw, his chest afire, and his body felt bruised from toe
    to head by the time he managed to get up onto his knees, and from his
    knees to his feet. With every movement, he thought he was not going
    to be able to make the next, and yet he managed. As the moments
    passed and his mind cleared a little, he could think only of two things:
    the memory of the magical bird burned into his heart, and the urgent
    nee to get out of there before someone came and found him.

    




    82   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     Clutching his ribs in a futile attempt to make them stop aching, he
    realized that he was in no way going to be able to climb a tree, get ove
    the wall, and climb another tree back down to the ground. He was going
    to have to take his chances with getting out the gate.
     He found that he couldn't straighten up, and that his left knee hurt,
    so he bent over in a kind of stoop as he limped toward the,gate as fast
    as he could go. Surely there wouldn't be too many guards here, would
    there? How many would the tsar have guarding his cherries when his son
    was supposed to be watching for the thief?
    
    HE ducked from shadow to shadow in spite of the extra pain, but as
    soon as he got near enough actually to see the gate, he realized that"
    needn't have gone to all that trouble. There had been two guards left
    
    the gate, and both of them were asleep, slumped down against th
    gateposts and looking like nothing so much as a pair of drunks caug
    on their feet when the liquor hit them.
     He scuttled between them, noting that they were slumbering a&
    soundly as the three still in the orchard.
     At that point, with the dark path ahead of him and all danger of di
    covery behind him, his mind blanked, perhaps with shock. The next
    thing he knew, he was in his room; he was crouched on the floor beneat'.
    the open shutters with no memory of how he'd gotten there. With grea
    difficulty, since his bruised muscles were all starting to,stiffen, he pulle
    the shutters closed and fastened them, then fell into bed still
    clothed. For once, he didn't care if he slept in his clothing; he hurt t
    much to try and strip down.
     Once he was actually lying down and able to relax, the pain started,
    to ebb as cramped and knotted muscles unlocked. On the whole, he
    thought, as his mind began to work again, albeit slowly, I've been hurt
    worse by beatings. I'll probably be a bit stiff and sore in the morning, but
    I can cover that easily enough. Maybe all those beatings have toughen
    me up enough that I can fall out of trees and not get hurt!
     That might be the case, but he wasn't about to thank his brothers
    
    for it.

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    83
    
     What was it I saw? He couldn't close his eyes without seeing the bird,
    as if the creature had branded her image on the inside of his eyelids.
    Larger than any eagle he had ever seen or even heard of, with feathers
    that resembled flickering flames and a face that he would never be able
    to forget as long as he livcd-what was she? He knew the bird was fe-
    male; everything about her, from her face to her voice, had been com-
    pletely feminine. Why had she chosen to raid his father's cherry trees,
    and how was it that her song, if song it was, could send people into a
    sleep so deep that it took tremendous effort to wake them?
     Her eyes ... they had been the most beautiful, the most expressive
    eyes he had ever seen in any face, beast, bird, or woman. Of a more in-
    tense blue than the clearest sky in high summer, there had been no
    doubt of the intellect and vivid personality behind those eyes. Nor was
    there any doubt that she had been as startled to see him as he was to see
    her. It had never occurred to her that anyone could escape being en-
    trapped in her spell of sleep.
     What was she? Where had she come from? And where would she go
    when the last of the cherries had been devoured? Why had she never
    appeared here before?
     Would she come back? I don't think so. I don't think that she'll take
    the chance, now that she knows there is someone who has seen her and
    knows how to defeat her magic. I wouldn't, if I were in her place.
     There it was, the word. Magic. He had to acknowledge it-he had seen
    magic, real magic, alive and at work. The bird herself must be magic, and
    what she had done to put the orchard-guards to sleep had to be magic.
    Tsar Ivan was wrong, and Ruslan and Mikall were right. Magic existed,
    it was real, and it worked even on those who did not believe in it. But
    even more important, creatures existed-supernatural creatures-that
    used that magic as naturally as breathing. If the bird was not a spirit like
    the rusalka or the bannik, then she was something like the Mare of the
    Night Wind or the Snow Dragon. She was certainly not the sort of thing
    one would find on a walk through the woods. She was something that
    was out of a book or a tale, and ordinary means of dealing with her sim-
    ply would not work. Could she be shot with arrows or trapped with nets?

    




    Perhaps, but he would not count on it. She might be able to burn
    way free of nets, outfly arrows--or both might pass through her as if
    were made of fog.
     There were things in the world that common sense dictated could
    exist, logic failed to explain. And he would never, ever convince his
    ther of that.
     At least there will be more cherries left than there have been fo
    while....
     He giggled at that thought, his ribs and back aching. He had just se
    the impossible, the inconceivable; he wanted to shout out his disco
    to the whole palace, and he knew he was going to have to remain sile
    He couldn't even confide his discovery to Ruslan; if he did, word wou
    eventually leak out that he had been in the orchard at night, and Iv
    would assume he was the thief, or that he knew the thief and was nia
    ing up preposterous stories to hide the thief's identity.
     Even if I could tell them, would V If Ivan believed the tale of the bi
    with flaming feathers and the eyes of a beautiful maiden, he would
    to kill her for her skin, or catch her to keep her in a cage as a trophy. 14
    could he possibly permit that?
     She cannot live in a cage. I know she cannot, I feel it. She is a bird, S
    but wild and free, and she could not bear to be in a cage where idiots cou
    gawk at her. She will die first. And how could I be a part of anything t
    killed her? Now that I have seen her, I cannot imagine a world without
    I . n it.
     He dozed only fitfully for the rest of the night, his dreams hau
    by wings of fire and startled blue eyes.
    
    BREAKFAST was an entertaining meal, as Pietor got the ton
    lashing Ilya had expected for failing asleep just as his older brothers
    But then came a
    pected.
     After the first failure, Ivan chose to make his sons' humiliation pu
    lic, perhaps to add incentive for the next to try. He stood up and a
    dressed Pietor at the high table once the great hall had a sufficie
    number of people there to form an audience. Pietor had clearly been ex
    
    turn of events that neither Ilya nor anyone else had ex

    




    pecting this; he left his breakfast balf-eaten and set his jaw angrily Ivan
    started his lecture in a tone loud enough to carry well across the great
    hall, as Pietor sat with his head banging, and it got worse from there.
    Used to Ivan's ranting, most of the servants and family members went
    on with their meals, although some who had reason to rejoice in Pietor's
    failure hid their smirks behind their cups. Pictor endured the tsar's
    tirade, scowling, for as long as it took Ilya to cat a piece of buttered bread,
    
    F I R E 8 1 R D    85
    
    but then, just as Ilya reached for his knife to cut a second slice, Pietor
    exploded with temper of his own.
     "Demons haul you to hell, old man!" Pietor roared, shooting up to
    his feet and shaking his fist in his startled father's face. "I have taken all
    I shall takef rom you!"
     Ivan turned red as a poppy and spluttered incoherently for a moment.
    Ilya and everyone else present stared in startled fascination; no one, no
    one, had ever shouted back at the tsar, least of all one of his children.
       the bell do you think you are, you puppy?" be bowled, spittle fly-
    ing as he shook with rage. "You're my son, and you'll damned well take
    what I tell you-,,
     "That I will not!" Pietor shot back. 'And as for the rest, you can call
    me your son no longer!" He swept dishes from the table in a dramatic
    gesture, and Ilya winced as they crashed to the floor and shattered. "I've
    had all I can stomach of your playing with us, making us dance like pup-
    pets, bowing and genuflecting to you as if you were Holy God, and all
    for what? So that you can dangle the hope of becoming tsar in front of
    each of us in turn? Well, I've had my fill of it!"
     Ivan by now was so apoplectic that he could not even get out a sin-
    gle, strangled syllable; he stood rooted to his place, scarlet-faced and
    shaking, his eyes bulging and a fleck of spittle on his lips. It was the tsar's
    wifewho asked, clutching her hands at her throat, "Pietor! What do you
    mean?"
     "I mean I'm off!" Pietor snarled, flinging his arms wide. "I'm taking
    my inheritance, and I'm leaving! Don't think you can have me followed
    cither,'Fsar Ivan. You may think I am no hunter, but I know the forest
    better than any man here except my brothers, and I doubt you'll get one
    of them to chase after me!" His bark of laughter rang out in the tense

    




    86   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    stillness like the crack of a whip. "They'll be too pleased that there's
    less competitor to follow me with much enthusiasm!"
     And with that, while his father stood rigid with shock and ange
    turned on his heel and left, his boot-heels ringing on the hard woo
    floor. Ivan continued to remain rooted where he was, face now nearly
    ple with rage, while the tsarina shook her head silently, her hands
    tering helplessly. Ivan seemed trapped within his own rage, and
    stared in morbid fascination, wondering if he might actually die of a
    How ironic if Pietor precipitated the tsar's death without knowing
     How provident for me if he did! There will be such scrambling over
    inheritance that I will be able to get away without anyone noticing u
    I'm long gone! Ilya was torn-to hope that the tsar would drop dead
    unfilial, and Mikail would certainly say it was a sin, but-
     Ivan still had neither moved nor spoken a moment later when a
    vant ran in, babbling that Pietor had taken two horses, one loaded d
    with a pack, and had ridden out of the stableyard at a gallop, h
    I . nto the forest.
     He must have planned all this. He must have had the horses sadd
    loaded, and ready. Holy Virgin, he's smarter than I thought! Much sma
    than I thought! Maybe he's not a fast thinker, but it's pretty clear he
    thorough planner!
     That was when the tsar finally came to life again. With a word
    shout of fury, he ran out of the room, heading for the stables, the
    rina in hysterical pursuit, crying and fluttering her hands. "Ivan! Iva
    She wept as she ran. "Don't! I pray you! Don't!"
     Ilya had sat through the entire scene in a state of amazement, as
    most of the others here in the great hall. Some still sat or stood, fro
    in various odd positions, as if they had been turned into statues.
    rest only turned their heads to stare after the tsar, still not quite beli
    ing the scene that had just taken place before them.
     The utter silence that had fallen over the great hall was so full of t
    sion that Ilya wanted to jump to his feet, shouting, just to break it.
    neither he nor anyone else seemed able to move, just as if they had be
    caught in a different kind of spell.
     But as with all such spells, something did break it. A plate slipped f

    




    F I R E B I R D    ST
    
    t Meenumbed fingers of a scrving-girl, just out of Ilya's reach. He saw
    it drop, saw her eyes widen with horror, yet neither of them was able to
    ,,move to catch it before it crashed to the floor, spilling its burden of sliced
    cold meat as it broke into several pieces, the sound shattering the un-
    bearable silence.
     The girl burst into hysterical tears, threw her apron over her head, and
    fled the room, weeping.
     The spell broken, people began moving again. Another of the servants
    hurried to clean up the mess and salvage what he could of the meat be-
    fore the dogs got to it. Five of the dogs converged at once on the fallen
    meat and began a snarling fight over it as the servant waded into their
    midst, kicking them ineffectually.
     And everyone else, it seemed, began talking at once. Except for Ilya,
    Ao deemed it a good moment to make his escape, lest someone some-
    ho r anaged to find a way to blame him for what had happened.
    
    ".SO that was when Father got to the stable, Ilya reported to an
    avid audience of Ruslan, Mikail, and Mother Galina. They had gathered
    in the dairy; the dairymaids had been useless for work, so Galina had
    turned all the milk but a gallon or two into the souring vats and chased
    them all out. With the appropriation of a loaf of fresh bread from the
    kitchen, a few mugs, and some of yesterday's butter, the four were well
    fortified to discuss Pictor's defection. "He found that all of the bridles
    had their reins knotted together, all of the saddles were gone, and all of
    the horses had been chased out into the field and thoroughly spooked.
    There was no getting near them for anything. It must have taken Pietor
    hours to do all that."
     "Unless he bad help," Ruslan observed with a sly grin. "What hap-
    pened to the saddles? Those would be hard to get rid of."
     Ilya nodded. "It turned out that the saddles bad all been hidden up
    in the hayloft, but no one found that out until one of the stableboys
    stumbled over them. It took so long to catch horses and find the right
    saddles that Pletor had almost a half-a-day head start. They still haven't
    unsnarled more than a third of the bridles and reins."
      "It sounds as if he had this planned even before he went out into the
         wl_~,,

    




    88   RIERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    orchard last night," Ruslan said, not making any attempt to conceal his
    gI "Well! He has more  than I gave him credit for!"
    r n.
     "I would say craft rather than intelligence," Mikail observed. 'And I
    would also say that Pietor had help; I cannot imagine how he could have
    done this otherwise. At least one person must have stood guard so that
    he would not be caught at his work, and perhaps more than one person
    helped him."
     Ilya nodded, pausing for a bite of bread-and-butter and a swallow of
    milk. "No one will admit it, though, and Father can hardly punish the
    entire stable staff, although I'm certain he would like to try right now."
     "Even Ivan isn't that foolish," Mother Galina observed dryly. "Not
    he expects to be able to ride or sell any of his horses for the next ye
    Ivan could punish a man or two on the suspicion that they had helped
    Pietor, and there would be nothing worse than grumbling and corn-
    plaint-but punish everyone, and I don't have to tell you what would
    happen."
     "He'd have every man and boy that had anything to do with th
    horses taking their revenge on him, but in ways he couldn't prove." Ru
    ]an sat back and licked butter from his fingers, grinning with satisfa
    tion. "Well, with a half-day's head start, no one is ever going to ca
    Pietor. Ivan might as well count the losses as gone forever. Two ho
    Pietor's weapons and armor, and a pack of supplies-whatever els
    took-oh, that's going to stick in the old man's craw for a long,
    tinic."
     "Where would he go, do you think?" Galina asked, echoing Ilya's o
    thought.
     Ruslan shrugged. "Who knows? Through the forest, certainly, foi he
    will be able to break his trail many times there. Pietor knows the fokst,
    and he has more sense than to stop anywhere within Ivan's reach. He'
    probably leave the trees in a few days and come back to one of the roads,
    and I don't doubt that there are plenty who would be willing to hirc&M
    as a fighter. He could find work for his sword almost anywhere, if it conics
    to that."
     Ilya sighed. "There isn't a chance now that anyone else will ever I)c

    




    F I R E R I R D    89
    
    able to make the same escape," he said wistfully. "I wish I'd been as clever.
    Father isn't stupid, after all; he'll have the stable under watch from here
    on in, and it won't be guarded by anyone he thinks is suspect."
     Oh, how I wish I had thought of delaying pursuit the way Pietor did be-
    Pe he got away, he thought with envy and regret. I could have done what
    he did-and without ever confronting Father. I iust wasn't audacious or
    cleverenough to think of it. That could have been me making my escape if
    I'd been as cunning and bold as Pietor. He solved all the problems that I
    COUldn't resolve. With a half-day head start, Father didn't send more than
    a token pursuit, and with two horses instead of one, Pietor can go anywhere,
    even to the court of the Great Tsar.
     Ilya would be berating himself for days over this one. If he had just
    had the sense to realize that pursuit could be delayed, and then deal
    with it!
     But how could I have done what Pietor did without help? And who
    would dare help me? It's one thing for the stable-master to give me a safe
    trysting-spot; it's quite something else to help me knot reins and hide sad-
    dles. I know one thing; he wouldn't have done it for me, not for any bribe
    I could manage. I wonder who Pietor got?
     "I would imagine that Pietor bought the help of the guards that were
    with him in the orchard, convincing them that they would be safer after
    he was goric," Galina said idly. "He was right, too! After all, now that he's
    run off, Ivan's mind isn't going to be on punishing them! Was there sup-
    posed to be anyone watching the stable last night?"
     Ilv,q sl~oo~ his head. "Not the stable or the paddock directly; there's
    no need right now. There aren't any mares in foal, the gypsies are long
    gone, and it's too early to worry about wolves. Father couldn't imagine
    any one of us daring to take his horses."
     Father Mikail spread his hands. "There, you see? With perhaps the
    help of two friends, Pietor could have done everything last night and had
    his horses ready to mount and ride. My only question is why he didn't
    just go? Why stay and confront the tsar?"
     Ilya snorted; the answer seemed obvious, given his brother. "Because
    it's Pictor, that's why! He knew what Father would do and say to him

    




    90   RIERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    when he failed to catch the thief; he'd heard it twice before. His tem
    per is Just as hot as Father's. He couldn't resist the chance to tell Fath
    what he thinks of him!"
     'Ah, now that is a more logical explanation than the one I had thought
    of," Mikail said thoughtfully. "I had thought that he did so because h
    wanted to create more upheaval and confusion than would have occurred
    if he had simply vanished, because the more upset that there was, the
    longer it would take Ivan to organize pursuit."
     Ilya passed him more bread and butter and poured his own mug full
    of milk.
     "I doubt he put that much thought into it," Ilya replied. "But being
    able to see Father going purple and spitting with rage-now that he
    would not be able to resist. Especially not since it gave him the chance
    to interrupt Father in the middle of one of his tirades."
     'And we still do not know what spirit is stealing the tsar's fruit,~
    Galina said, shaking her head. "There is not much fruit left on the tree
    and now I doubt we ever shall. And it must be a spirit, wouldn't you say,
    Ruslan?"
     "I have no doubt," the shaman said firmly. "I favor the Old Man
    the Fields, personally. By now that one must have a lively grudge against
    Ivan, and this would be a choice bit of revenge."
     As he and Galina entered a lively discussion of the characteristics
    the different sorts of spirits that might be thieving the fruit, Ilya saw his
    chance, and led them into a discourse on spirits and supernatural crea-
    tures in general. He began planting hints and asking leading questions
    all directed toward the goal of identifying his mysterious bird, and even-
    tually he had an answer.
     'A creature that flies but looks like a burning brand high in the s
    that would be the classical Phoenix," Mikall put in, after Ilya guardedl , y
    described the bird's burning feathers and how it looked in the distance.
    "You must be recalling that Natural History I read to you while you A~crc
    hurt; the Phoenix is exactly like that, and is the bird that builds its own
    funeral pyre every hundred years, dies upon it, and is reborn from the
    ashes."
     The shaman burst out laughing, startling all of them. "Nonsense! I

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    91
    
      know what your Phoenix is, but Rus has no need to import fool-
    ish, suicidal foreign birds!" Ruslan countered. "Not when we have the
    Firebird, who is lovelier by far than your Phoenix and has no need to go
    killing itself!" He rubbed his hands together, warming to his subject.'Ah,
    the Firebird is a precious jewel indeed! She dwells beyond the North
    Wind, and she is a tsarina in her own right; when she chooses, she can
    put off her bird-form and become a beautiful maiden. She knows where
    the Tree of Immortality grows, and she eats of its fruit whenever she
    chooses. Her feathers seem to burn, but are not consumed, and it is said
    that she shines in the night like a thousand bonfires."
     "I renicinber the tales! She sounded as if she was very beautiful,"
    Galina said wistfully.
     "Oh, she is! But it is the worst of all possible luck to see her unless
    she chooses to show herself to you, and worse still to take one of her
    feathers unless she gives it to you."
     Ilya kept his thoughts to himself. I don't know how my luck could be
    any worse than it is now, he told himself. And she didn't drop any feath-
    ers, so that is hardly an issue. But at least now I know what she is. Some-
    ho,k; I)eing able to put a name to her made him feel a little better,
    although he didn't know why it should.
     "The Firebird-I do remember that creature now, and I remember
    thinking how it seemed both like and unlike the Phoenix," Mikail put
    in. "I recall other things, Ruslan-you may'say that seeing her only
    brings bad luck, but my recollection is that she is far more perilous than
    that."
     "How so, Father Mikail?" Galina asked curiously. "I never heard that
    the Firebird was inclined to hurt anyone herself. In the tales, it was only
    those who tried to trap her who brought ill fortune on themselves."
     "She is a temptation, that is what makes her so dangerous!" Mikail
    said gravely. "Like the succubus, that evil demon who imperils the souls
    of men by luring them into bodily congress, I was told that the Fircbird
    seduces the mind and spirit. Once seen, she cannot be forgotten, and
    thoughts of her intrude on holler thoughts and even prevent prayer. It
    
               stt`ntl ~0-1 'Nit Mt-it      Vhvicl
    
    damnation."
    
    K~l

    




    92   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
     "You Christian priests think everything threatens spiritual da
    tion, especially if it is a pleasure to look upon," Ruslan said crossly.
    lieve me, it is enough that seeing her curses you with bad luck.
    needs to worry about damnation when every moment of your life s
    thing else is going wrong?"
     That lcd the two into a spirited argument over whether it was
    to have one's soul or one's well-being in peril, and Ilya eventual]
    them when he became bored. He decided to make himself useful i
    stable, helping to undo the mess that Pietor had left there. The st
    master gladly turned the great knot of tangled reins and bridles o
    him, and he sat down with the snarled leather in front of him,
    enough for something to occupy his hands while he thought.
     Maybe Father Mikail is right. I certainly can't get my mind off her.
    Firebird continued to glide through his thoughts, and there was a
    ing need in him to see her again. Was there a chance that she wou
    turn to the orchard tonight? If there was even the slightest hope, he
    he had to be there. Perhaps she would think she had frightened him
    perhaps she would simply be more careful with her spell of sleep.
    haps she would be tempted enough by the cherries to take that ch
     Ruslan said she could become a beautiful tsarina when she chose.
    seeing her eyes, he had no doubt that this part of the tale was t
    only I could see her as a maiden! I think-I think I might be content m
    to look at her, if her eyes are a match for the rest of her...
     With his mind involved in dreaming of what she must look li
    fingers flew unheeded, and he finally looked up in surprise when th
    of the bridles fell from his hands.
     With nothing more to do, he gathered up the bridles and took t
    over to the tack room, where he hung them on their pegs on the
    The saddles, retrieved from the hayloft, had been neatly replaced on
    stands. Everything appeared to be as it had been, except that the h
    in their stalls either hung their heads with exhaustion or jurnpe
    cVcrv sound, trcmbling.
     Once again, he found himself at loose ends, unable to think of
    thing constructive to do with himself. He wasn't a servant or a serf,
    had tasks assigned to him. His usual activities were severely curtaile

    




    e-
    w
    
    V.
    r
    e.
    er
    if
    ly
    
     is
    ast
    
    eir
    
    ses
     at
    
    ny-
     bo
    
    F I R E B I R D    93
    
    Pietor's escapade this morning. He couldn't ride, for all the horses were
    still exhausted, and most were so nervous that they shied and rolled their
    eyes at anyone who approached them. Several actually kicked the sides
    of their stalls in anger or fear if they heard someone walking in the sta-
    ble. Whatever Pietor had done to spook them into flight had left them
    badly shaken; it might be days before the most sensitive were fit to ride.
    Ivan would be livid when he realized how much damage had been done.
     As if he isn't already livid.
     Knowing Pietor, Ilya could only think that he must have chased and
    beaten the horses until they were in a frenzy of fear and impossible to
    approach. Pietor treated horses as he did dogs: They either obeyed or
     re beaten. He would have had no compunction about mistreating
    them to serve his own purposes.
     Ilya didn't dare go anywhere near the weapons-practice field, given
    that his brothers were probably all in a nasty temper and looking for
    someone to abuse. The oldest-well, their pride must be smarting, since
    Pietor had done what they had not dared, had defied Ivan and gone off
    with two horses and an unknown amount of booty. And the younger were
    afire with envy, and with anger, knowing that Pietor had spoken only the
    truth, and that Ivan was toying with them, and would continue to toy
    with them until the day he died. All of them must know that the tsar
    would punish them since he could not punish Pietor, and that life would
    be restrictive and uncomfortable for all of them for the next month or
    more. All that must be building up inside them, and they would be look-
    ing for an outlet for it. But they had no imagination at all; they would
    do wbat they always had, and work out their frustrations in fighting. If
    ll.va came anywhere near them, they would have a real target for their
    anger. Somehow they would find a way to blame him for their troubles,
    and be would pay.
      Let them abuse each other for a change. I'm tired of being their target.
     He was too restless to borrow a book from Father Mikail to read and
     not feeling social enough to rejoin Ruslan and Mikall in their discussions.
     Going off into the woods or fields to carve would make Ivan suspicious
     and give bis brothers an excellent opportunity to ambush him. So what
     did that leave?
    
    t
    
    I

    




    94   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
     He stretched with a groan as he turned toward the door to th
    room. His muscles still ached after his fall of last night, and it ha
    all he could do to keep from appearing still and sore. That woul
    raised questions, and with Pietor running off as he had, questions
    lead to suspicion that he had helped his brother prepare for his
    After all, who would believe his protests that Pietor hated hi
    would never have wanted his help? His other brothers certainly
    have made no effort to substantiate his story.
     Which meant it wasn't wise to sit in the sun for very long to N
    muscles-and again, that would put him where his brothers cou
    him; a verv bad idea. It was too bad that the window of his room I
    in the wrong direction, or he could go and lie on his own floor to get
    sun and heat on his back.
     But there was the bathhouse....
     Now that was a good idea! He knew that no one was likely to
    use it at this hour; if he fired up the stove himself, it would occu
    time and serve a useful purpose. Those who bad been out searchi
    Pietor would be glad of the heated bathhouse, and those who had
    trying to capture the loose horses would need it. If the horses we
    kicking the sides of their stalls in agitation, they had probably been
    ing their captors as wcll. ,
     "I'm going to go use the bathhouse," he called as he left the
    "I'll leave it heated and ready for anyone who wants to go after in
     "I will," the stable-master called. 'And thanks to you. I got kicked
    times than I care to think about, chasing down those damned s
    nags. By the time you're out, my bruises will be ready for a steam."
    he laughed. 'And since you'll be first and I'll be second, I'll su
    member to leave the third steaming for the bannik."
     Ilya laughed, although he did not really know if the stable-maste
    serious or not. According to Ruslan, it was necessary that when the
    house was fired up, one must allot the third steaming to the banni
    spirit of the bathhouse-but he had never beard of anyone here
    so. Did the stable-master or others actually make sure that the trad
    was followed?
     A few days ago he would have thought such a thing impossible

    




    F I R E B I R D    95
    
    fietor could manaze to persuade people to help him, almost anything
    
    Id be going on here, and Ivan wouldn't know anything about it if all
    
    he servants conspired to keep it from him.
    ., He shrugged and headed down the path. It hardly mattered to him;
    he just wanted to ease his aches.
     The bathhouse was quite removed from the rest of the palace build-
    ings, a little two-room log hut set near to the stream to ensure that bring-
    ing water would not be a chore even in the dead of winter. Windowless
    and dark, surrounded by the shadows of the fir trees growing all around,
    it was a rather spooky place when all was said and done, and Ilya didn't
    wonder that bathhouses allegedly had their own spirits, the banniks. He'd
    never seen a single sign of a bannik about, and be probably used the bath-
    house more frequently than anyone else-but after last night, he was no
    longer inclined to dismiss the tales of the bannik out of hand. He might
    not be a] one.
     Still, this was hardly the time or place when one could expect to see
    a spirit, with the sun high in the sky and birds singing in the thick
    boughs of the fir trees. Night; now that was when spirits appeared, not
    in broadest daylight. All those stories, they take place at night, too. Only
    sorcerers and witches appear by daylight. And saints, too, but they don't
    count.
     As usual, the last person to use the bathhouse had left it bare of
    evervthing but soap and had failed to leave the doors open long enough
    
    for the steam-room to air out. Probably one of my brothers; they think they
    never have to clean up after themselves. With a sigh, Ilya opened the doors
    and hauled wood from the nearest woodpile until the breeze had taken
    niost of the musty smell away. Only then did he feel his way into the
    steam-room, and in the dim gloom clean the ashes out of the stove, leav-
    ingonly enough for a bed for the fire. Fortunately, the discourtesy of the
    last occupants had not extended to carrying away the tinderbox; he set
    a good fire with dry pine-needles and twigs as the base, then got it going
    after a few false starts with steel and flint.
     ~\`hlle the fire heated up the stove and the inner room, it was time
    to haul water, and haul he did. The bathhouse needed a lot of water,
    water for throwing on the stove to make steam, water to heat on the stove
    
    : I

    




    96   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    for bathing, and the purest, cleanest water for drinking so that the b
    didn't pass out.
     Men he finished filling all the buckets, he stood in the inner
    until his eyes adjusted to the dark, and looked around. He survey
    floor with disfavor; what was the point of getting clean when the
    so much dirt on the floor that it was bound to make mud once the
    began? What were they doing? Steaming with their boots on?
     There were blown-in leaves and other trash on the floor of the
    ing room, too, as well as dirt. It looks as if I was the last person
    up in here. He made himself a broom of fir-branches and swept t'
    out, muttering under his breath that it was a shame that his
    were such pigs. It occurred to him as he swept out the last of I
    that it bad sounded as if he was apologizing to someone unse(
    brothers' conduct!
     Oh well, there's no one listening. And even if there is, half i
    here think I'm a little mad at the best of times, I don't suppose I
    my talking to myself at all surprising.
     Frcsh bunches of fir-branches would complete the restocl
    bathhouse, and he went out to get them. It took him some
    to select the right size of branches, cut them properly, and
    togcther into bundles. When he returned, there was some
    in the bathhouse.
     It startled him when he realized that the steam-room
    occupied, for he hadn't noticed anyone approaching whil
    gathering fir. When he opened the door to the inner roo
    dark shape on one of the shelves, it took him aback, "Ol
    peering into the steamy darkness, trying to make out who
    your pardon, I hope you don't mind if I join you. Ah, he
    branches. . . ."
     He handed them in and felt the other take them, the
    thing that might have been "thank you." The bather souni
    vaguely like the stable-master, and Ilya retired to the oth(
    off his clothing before joining him.
     He must have finished sooner than he thought. Well, thi

    




    cady
    
    been
    saw a
    said,
    'I beg
    c fir-
    
    some-
    ooked
    o strip
    
    didn't
    
    F I R E B I R D    97
    
    particularly need to be alone, and if one of my brothers shows up, he'll be
    less inclined to start something with another person present.
     As his eyes ad)usted to the gloom, it seemed that his identification
    was correct; it was the stable-master, lying back on a shelf with his eyes
    closed. Out of sympathy, Ilya kept quiet, making as little noise as possi-
    ble as he bathed, then took a shelf himself and let the steam ease his
    own aches.
     As his mind drifted in the heat, and his body relaxed, he found the
    image of the Firebird floating in the darkness behind his closed eyelids.
    She was as vivid and real to him now as she had been last night, and that
    alone was astonishing. Even the most exciting experience usually lost a
    little of its immediacy after a night's sleep, but not this one. He'd been
    certain, somewhere in the back of his mind, that when he woke up this
    morning his glimpse of the Firebird would seem like a dream, but if any-
    thing, it was the opposite. Pietor's dramatic scene, the discussions af-
    terward, those were far more dreamlike than his memory of the Firebird.
      If only I could see her again-
     "Oh, you will," chuckled the stable-master.
     "What?" he said, startled by the comment. Did I say that out loud? I
    must have. Oh, fine, now he'll think I'm losing my wits. Well, perhaps he'll
    think that I'm simply lovesick.
     "You'll see her again. You've got that way with women, youngster. I
    hear a lot about you, all the time." The man chuckled again. "You would
    be iniazed what women will say when they think there's no man about
    to ovcrhear them, and they seem to favor the hay-barn and the bath-
    house for their gossip-sessions in rainy weather. I hear plenty."
     Oh, good. He must think I meant one of the dalrymaids, perhaps even
     Ludmilla. He does think I'm lovesick. Ilya bit his tongue, blushing so heav-
     ily that he felt warmer than the steam wreathing around him. He wanted
     to ask what the stable-master had heard, but-
      I'm not asking. Not for anything!
     "Oh, they think you're a fine lad, and no mistake about it," the stable-
    master continued. "Even the ones that have gone on to the tsar wish they
    were still with you, and they'll tell the others as much when girls with
    IF11"

    




    9S   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    fewer trinkets get to envying them. But you know how it is: You do
    you have to in this world, and that's for women as well as men. If a g
    gets a chance at the tsar, well, who's to blame her for taking it? Not wh
    she's bound to get a good husband, a place in the palace, and a fine
    of trinkets out of it."
     Oh, I know only too well. How could anyone blame them?
     "But you ought to know they think well of you," the man conclude
    "I think so, anyway. You're a good ]ad, and they appreciate that."
     'Ah," Ilya said faintly, "thank you."
     He didn't know what else to say, so he said nothing, as the heat in t
    bathhouse built up to the point where he felt faint. How the
    master was bearing it, he had no idea; occasionally the man wou
    up one of the bunches of fir-branches and lash himself with it, only.
    lie back down again. Finally Ilya rose, murmured something in the
    of an embarrassed farewell, and went back out into the changing ro
    The cooler air put an end to his blushes, and the bucket of cold wa
    he poured over his head helped revive him.
     He scraped the water off his body with one of the sanded, curve
    shaped sticks kept there for the purpose, then rubbed himself down wri
    a bundle of bircb-leaves. Once he was dry and dressed, he headed
    toward the palace. His mind was on dinner, which was not far off, a
    he didn't really notice that there was someone approaching him on
    path to the bathhouse until that individual spoke.
     'Ah, I'm ready for that steam, and that's a fact," the stable-mast
    groaned. "Thanks for setting the bathhouse up, lad."
     Ilya stopped in the middle of the path as the stable-master went
    oblivious to anything other than his goal. He turned and stared after
    man, dumbfounded.
     But-but-the stable-master was l'ust-but-I just saw-I talked
     If the man in the bathhouse hadn't been the stable-master,
    wbo-or wbat-had he been?
     As be stared after the stable-master's retreating back, one of Rush
    tales came back to him:
     "When you see someone in the bathhouse, and later you find that
    ers swear that person was elsewhere at the time, then you have s

    




    F I R E B I R D    99
    
    bannik. It is best to treat anyone you share the bathhouse with properly,
    with respect, for if by chance you do encounter the bannik, he is quick to
    take offense, and deadly when he does. He can kill a man by peeling the
    skin from him, and in other ways; he has killed a dozen or more strong men
    at once, and no one even heard them cry out. But if you are a good guest,
    he can be an equally good host. "
     That was what Ruslan had said.
     It was the bannik. Ruslan has seen him, he said so. Ruslan probably
    saw someone else that he knew was elsewhere, and that was how he knew
    what it was he'd seen.
     I le licked lips gone suddenly dry and wondered if he should shout after
    the stable-master to warn him.
     No-by the time he reaches the bathhouse, the bannik will be gone.
    When he shows himself, it is only to one person at a time.
     He was so benumbed by his realization that be was already walking
    toward the palace before he was quite aware of what he was doing.
     First the Firebird, then the bannik-what did it mean? Why was he
    suddenly seeing spirits and supernatural creatures? What was happen-
    ing to him?
     Could that last beating have driven him mad?
     But Ruslan sees these things, or says that he does. And other people have
    seen them. Given how adamant Tsar Ivan was about the fact that such
    creatures did not exist, if anyone else had seen the bannik or the domovoi
    or any other spirit, would they have even mentioned such a thing?
     Hardly.
     Engrossed in his thoughts, he stumbled over a root in the path and
    looked down. When he looked back up again, the path was blocked by
    his brother Gregon, who held in his bands a short length of stout branch.
     ll~ a blinked at him, and quickly decided to take the route of concili-
    ation. His brother's face was set in a grim mask, his eyes narrowed. "Gre-
    gon! I just cleaned out the bathhouse and it's heated and ready if-"
     He got no further, as a blow to his back knocked him to the ground
    and made him gasp for a breath that wasn't there. He landed on his hands
    and knees, and a foot to his side sent him tumbling, choking on bile and
    
    njin

    




    IGO   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
     Gregori and whoever had hit him from behind were not alone.
    never got a chance to escape; he never even got a chance to recover fro
    the first blows before they were on him. As blows and kicks rained o
    him from all directions, he could only curl up into a ball and try to pr
    tect what parts of himself he could.
    
    HE woke to pain and darkness, more of either than he had ever expe
    rienced in his life. The pain was so intense it nauseated him. He was s
    cold that he couldn't even shiver; he was lying on some hard surface th
    radiated an aching cold into him that hurt more than it numbed.
    left arm was twisted up over his head; it throbbed abominably, but th
    moment he tried to move it, he regretted it. Agony shot from his wris
    to his shoulder, overwhelming everything, until it was all lost in mere
    ful oblivion.
     He swam gradually up into awareness again, and nothing had change
    not the pain, not the cold, not the darkness. His arm, his ribs and bac
    his legs, they all hurt worse than he had ever imagined anything could
    even with his wide experience with pain. Nausea mingled with th
    pain, and he tasted bile in the back of his throat. Tears poured helplessl
    down his face, he moaned and sobbed, but there was no one to hear him
    no one to help him this time.,
     He didn't know where he was, could not even move a single finge
    without awakening more pain; two more attempts to do so sent hi
    screaming down into unconsciousness again. There wasn't any room fo
    anything in his mind but the pain; it defined a suddenly narrowed exis
    tence, with the only certainty being that when it stopped, be would b
    dead.
     He couldn't even think coherently enough to guess where he
    dumped, and it didn't matter; obviously his brothers bad dra
    off somewhere so that no one would find him and rescue him. His onl
    clues were a iriustv smell of decay and the terrible cold, and he was t
    disoriented to think what those clues could mean.
     Neither Ruslan nor Mikail would find him in time to help him; bi
    brothers must have made sure of that. He was utterly and profoundly
    alone, and not all of his tears or crics would change that.

    




    F I R M 8 1 R D    Vol
    
    11.1,11 ,
    
   111, "Oh, I wouldn't say that, Grandson. " The voice was everywhere, echo-
    ing inside his bead.
     "Wha-what?" he gasped, blinking, wondering if the pain had driv-
    en him to hearing things.
     "You're not entirely alone."
     His eyes blurred, then refocused, as a pale smudge of light hanging
    in the air above him, a strange glow he'd thought was just another of
    the manifestations of pain, became brighter. A moment later, it was a
    mll-defined sphere, floating above his head, fully bright enough to il-
    luminate his surroundings.
     The four walls around him were lit, dimly but clearly, by the cool,
    white glow. Ile turned his head a little to look, and when he saw where
    he was, he thought his heart was going to fall. Involuntarily he gave a
    yell of sheer terror, and his whole body jerked in a futile and illogical at-
    tempt to push it all away-and the ensuing agony of every shattered bone
    and torn muscle sent him crashing into unconsciousness again.
     He floundered back up to consciousness with a moan; his head and
    body throbbed, and he thought for a moment that he was going to
    vomit. The bright sphere still hovered above him, but this time it was
    as tall as a man, and it appeared to contain something....
     Someone. Someone who leaned over and looked down at him with a
    face he knew by its resemblance to his father's.
      "Gently, Grandson. I'll grant you, a crypt is not a pleasant place, but
     you'll only hurt-"
      Ilya's scream drowned out the rest, and once again he plunged into
     darkness as his body spasmed with terror. The single glance had been all
     he needed to know where his brothers had left him, for he was in the
     family crypt beneath the church. He could not mistake the four rough-
     cut stone walls with their crude stone niches that held the mouldering
     remains of Tsar Ivan's father, grandfather, great-grand father ...
      He's come to claim me. He's come to claim my soul! The charnel smell
     of death told him what his own fate would be-and the spirit of his
     grandfather, hovering above him, was surely there to welcome him into
     death, or perhaps bring him there if his hold on life proved too tena-

    




    lot   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     When he blundered into awareness again, the sphere of light a
    occupant were still there above him. If this was a hallucination, h
    still trapped inside it. He shut his eyes, desperately hoping they
    go away.
     It's the pain-it must be the pain. The pain is making me see th
    He isn't there; not any more than the Virgin from the icon was looki
    me the last time my brothers beat me senseless.
     But the last time, he'd been safe with Ruslan, and not about to d
     A groan shook him, and his eyes opened involuntarily. His gra
    ther looked down on him with concern and care. "This is bad,
    Ivanovitch. This is very bad. I had no idea that you were being mistre
    so terribly. You must find a way to protect yourself from your brothe
    fore it is too late."
     As if he was ever going to get a chance to. As if it was not alread
    late! Tears coursed down the sides of his head, burningly hot agains
    chilled skin and soaking into his hair above his ears. He closed his
    and lost himself in pain and despair.
     Some time later, he opened his eyes to darkness, tried to move,
    the agony his attempt caused brought strange, animalistic sounds
    of his mouth. But this time, he did not lose consciousness. He ha
    bring that arm down and get himself into a sitting position; that wa
    immediate goal. He would think no further than that. Weeping
    howling with the pain it caused, he seized his left wrist with his r
    hand and pulled. Bone grated on bone, and pain made shafts of
    light and stars dance across the darkness behind his closed eyes, b
    managed to get his left arm down and lying across his chest.
     Now for the next part.
     Before he could change his mind, he rollcd onto his right side
    inched his way along the floor until he came to a wall. He didn
    stop, no matter bow much it hurt, or he knew he would never 1i
    courage to start again. His breath came in short pants, and hisleft
    felt as if he had dipped it in molten metal; every time the bones gr
    together, it sent spasms all over his body. His ribs stabbed hi
    dozen points of red-hot agony with every movement, and a bu
    other injuries declared themselves to him with a hundred different p

    




    0
    
   s
    s
    
   d
    t
    
    0
                                        is
                                        d
                                        t
                                        te
                                       lie
    
    nd
    are
    he
    rm
    ted
    h a
    rcd
    ills,
    
    F I R E 8 1 R D    103
    
     lie did not stop moving. Finally he achieved his goal; he sat with his
    back against the wall and his limp left arm cradled in his lap. When death
    took him, he was not going to meet it lying down. When his brothers
    returned, which they would, his corpse would greet them defiantly.
     Once he stopped moving, some of his pain subsided, and he closed
    his eyes, wondering if that meant he was dying already. Had he jarred
    something loose in his crawl, was he bleeding to death inside? Now that
    he was still again, the sweat of his efforts chilled on his skin, and he sbiv-
    ered anew
     The shivering woke fresh pain in his body and arm; he opened his eyes
    in an automatic reaction-and shrieked aloud at what he saw before him.
    The globe of light was back, hovering now a little above the floor and
    before him, but in it was a stranger, a rough-looking, heavily bearded man
    in the furs of a hunter. What terrible spirit was this? The domovoi come
    to take him?
     The man scowled and took several steps toward Ilya as he tried to
    shrink back into the wall that supported him. It was all the more horri-
    ble to see this man walking, for his heavy, thick-soled boots made no
    sound at all on the stone floor when they should have been falling with
    dull thuds.
     The man leaned down and peered into Ilya's terrified eyes, practically
    nose-to-nose with him. And there was no hot brush of the other's breath
    on his face, only a clammy chill that surrounded the man the way the
    light did. Ilya stared into his eyes, petrified to move or speak. The man
    frowned ferociously at him, and finally straightened up. "You've got a
    UP . Tid, boy, why don't you use it to save yourself all of this?" he snapped,
    as if he was angry with Ilya. "Even your idiot brother Pietor found a way
    to escape! Gods! That my line has produced such a half-wit!"
     "Don't be too hard on him, Gregori. "
     Ilya yelped again, for his grandfather was back, clapping the stranger
    oil the shoulder in a most familiar manner. The man turned toward him
    with a scowl.
     "The boy hasn't helped himself at all!" the bearded man shouted,
     starriping one booted foot with frustration. "Surely there must be a hun-
     dred ways to beat those fools!"

    




    101
    
     "The boy has done the best he could under the circumstances,"
    grandfather said soothingly, but the stranger was not to be soothe
    shook his head like an angry bear plagued with bees, in negation of
    Grandfather had tried to tell him.
     He rounded on Ilya and jabbed an accusatory finger at him. "Yo
    shouted, as Ilya's heart tried to leap out of his chest with panic, a
    chest tightened until he could not breathe. "What have you done
     This time it was terror as well as pain that overcame him, a
    fainted.
     He woke to find that he had fallen over sideways; his head didn'
    in any new places, so presumably he had slid down the wall slo
    stead of dropping straight to the floor. Fortunately, it had been his
    side he bad fallen onto; be leveraged himself up, panting for breath
    groaning with pain at every movement.
     This time the darkness when he opened his eyes was very welco
    him; the darkness meant that there were no more spirits, or hallu
    tions of spirits. He leaned his head back against the stone of the wa
    waited for the pain to subside again with his eyes tightly closed.
     "You! Boy!"
     His eyes snapped open at the new voice; there was another str
    standing before him, this time with a nimbus of strange, blue light a
    him instead of a glowing halo of white. This stranger was dresse
    bearskin robe covered with the ribbons, talismans, bones, and oth
    tifacts of the traditional shaman. Ilya recognized it, for Ruslan o
    such an outfit, though it was a costume that he seldom wore.
     The newcomer, too, was bearded, but his hair was long, flowing
    his back, and on his head he wore a headdress of deer-antlers. He
    ried a drum in one hand, the beater in the other.
     He smiled grimly as he saw Ilya's eyes fixed upon him. "Pay atte
    to what's around you, boy! Really bear what is said, don't just listen
    might learn something. Pay attention! Take note of everything-that
    on! That's the way you'll learn what you need to know to get out of h
     He vanished with an audible pop before Ilya had time to react
    more than stupcfactioii.

    




    F I R E R I R D    105
    
     His mind began to work, sluggishly, a few thoughts making their way
    past the fog of pain. Great-great-grandfather Gregori was a hunter, that's
    i~'hy my brother Gregori tries to be a greater hunter. Great-great-great-great-
    grandfather Potanka was a shaman, Ruslan told me so. Were they-
     Again, the light rose, this time with another stranger in the midst of
    it, a fierce boyar with a bristling moustache who took one look at Ilya
    and clapped his hand to his sword-hilt as if he was about to draw it and
    run Ilya (or something) through. Then, as if he thought better of the
    idea, he let his sword go and leaned over Ilya with a fierce but worried
    frown. With a little moan, Ilya lost consciousness again.
     Time and time again he woke, to be confronted by either a stranger,
    or by his grandfather, or both together. His mind reeled under the im-
    ages that presented themselves to him, and every time a new one ap-
    peared, his heart pounded so with fright that the blood roared in his
    ears until he passed out again. Some tried to advise him, some berated
    him, but he was so terrified he really didn't listen to any of them. He
    thought he must be going mad with the pain, finally, and began to
     Um at the top of his lungs. Perhaps if he screamed, the visions would
    
     It hurt to scream, and his fit of panic couldn't last for long, so he had
    descended to whimpering incoherently when a new light appeared. But
    unlike the others, this was a yellow light that flickered unsteadily, and it
    accompanied the distant sound of real footsteps on stone.
     "Ilva?" called a distant, echoing, but joyfully familiar voice. "Ilya? Are
    Vou down here?"
     "Here!" he cried out hoarsely, then doubled over, coughing, as the ef-
    fort made his ribs stab into him like fifty knife-blades.
     "Ilya?" Both the light and the voice were stronger now, and there was
    no doubt in his mind that this was no spirit or hallucination, it was re-
    illy Father Mikall. "Ilya?"
     "I'm here! In the crypt!" he managed, before another fit of coughing
    uertook him. He fought it down, and shouted with the last of his
    strength. "Here! In the crypt! Help me!"
     The footsteps broke into a run, and as he fought against pain and dark-

    




    06   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    ness closing in again, Father Mikail appeared in the door at the fa
    end of the crypt, a lantern held over his head.
     And that was the last thing that Ilya saw for a very long time.
    
    T H IS time, he woke out of a drugged and dreamless sleep to find
    self back on his pallet in the chapel, his arm already splinted and bo
    his ribs likewise tightly bound. He assumed that the rest of his inj
    had also been treated.
     His head spun when he tried to move it, with the peculiar diso
    tation and bitter taste in his throat that told him Ruslan had dosed
    thoroughly. Ruslan had treated him before when he'd been unconscj
    trickling the medicines down his throat with care, a little at a ti
    keep from choking him. That was why he wasn't feeling any pain.,
    and he mentally blessed Ruslan for his consideration.
     "Don't stir much if you can help it," Mikail said, as he moved into
    view and sat beside him. 'And if you have to, tell me, and I'll he]
    shift yourself. They didn't kill you-but this time they actually trie
     Mikail's expression was far more somber than Ilya had ever seen i
    fore, and he wasn't certain what to make of it. Mikail had a basin
    cloth, a pitcher and cup, and a prayer-book beside him. In the can
    light, it was impossible for. Ilya to guess what time of day it was,
    did not feel as if he had been unconscious for more than a day or s
     He licked his lips, aware of a burning thirst engendered at least in
    by the drugs. "Could I-have a drink?"
     "Surely." Mikail poured a cup of something from the pitcher and
    ported Ilya's head as he held the cup to his lips. It was watered wine,
    and clean-tasting, and Ilya drank it down with gratitude.
     Mikail helped him to lie down again, and placed the cup beside
    pitcher. "I'll tell you what I know," the priest said, before he could
    any questions. "You've been drugged since last night when I found
    after supper. I went looking for you when your brothers told your
    at dinner that they'd discovered that you were the one w
    Pietor escape and that you had followed in his wake befo
    catch you." He sniffed, frowning. "I didn't believe them. T
    enough, didn't believe them on either count. I suppose that might h

    




    F I R E B I R D    107
    
    s
    
    S,
    
    to
    
    a s
    ou
    
    0.
    
    c-
    rid
    le-
    t it
    art
    
    up-
    ool
    
    the
    ask
    you
    ther
    lped
    ould
    ddly
    have
    
    been because he had men guarding the stable and knew that the horse
    that you supposedly took was actually led out by Gregori and found
    roaming out in the orchard. The tsar didn't seem particularly interested
    in trying to find you, however, so Ruslan and I went looking."
     Mikall patted his shoulder as he began to shudder, remembering the
    darl and the endless hours of fear in the crypt. Not the fear of death-
    he'd been angry that he'd been left to die, and afraid, but not that kind
    of fear. No, the real terror had begun when the spirits appeared. There
    are things worse than death....
     "We didn't find you in the usual places, so we split up. I thought I
    heard someone crying out as I searched about the palace, and I followed
    the sound under the chapel, through the maze that keeps thieves out
    and spirits in, to the crypt itself, and there you were." He shrugged. "That
    is all there is to tell."
     "Except for what happened afterward-and the why of it all." That
    was Ruslan, coming in at last, burdened with a tray of hot food that in-
    terested Ilya not at all. He kicked a stool over and sat down at Ilya's feet.
    "This time, we not only didn't try to hide the fact that you were hurt,
    ~~e made a great deal of fuss about it. We shouted and roused the en-
    tire palace, we conscripted servants to carry you out on a litter, and we
    Made certain that Ivan saw you before we brought you here."
     "What did he say?" Ilya asked weakly. His father had never shown any
    
    interest in lils injuries before this.
     "Nothing then. Later, he called all of your brothers in and ranted at
    tl~em." That was Mikail, but he didn't look pleased that Ivan had taken
    attinterest in his injured son.
     "The trouble is, when he went after your brothers, it was because they
    lied, not because they tried to kill you. I don't think that was lost on
    them." Ruslan took out a knife and a piece of wood and began carving.
    "Later, he told us to take care of you, as if we wouldn't have without him
    
    telling us. That's about all that happened."
     "Your brothers might leave you alone for a while, but Ivan has given
    them the message that if they can arrive at a reason for getting rid of you,
    they won't be punished," Mikail said unhappily. "What a father! Con-
    ming at murder is bad enough, but conniving at the murder of your own

    




    108   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
    child is a sin so terrible that he would never be able to do pena
    enough to save his soul, even if he repented of it!" Mikail seemed aim
    as distressed about the state of Ivan's soul as about the peril of Ilya's b,
     'As for why your brothers actually tried to kill you-that all boil
    yesterday afternoon before they attacked you." Ruslan didn't look
    from his carving, but he scowled at it as if he suspected it was resp
    ble for the entire situation. "Ivan is certain that one of them hel
    Pietor and he's determined to find out who it was. He is also sure n
    that it was Pictor who was behind the theft of his cherries, since
    thefts ended when Pietor fled." Ruslan grimaced, and kept his atten
    on his carving. "Mind you, there wasn't that much fruit left to ste
    I suspect the reason the thefts ended was because the thief didn't
    to be bothered with the little that was left."
     Or the Firebird was afraid we'd trap her, since I had seen her ...
     Mikail nodded his agreement to all of it. "He's convinced that the
    son Pietor ran away is that he was the thief. He hasn't yet managed
    contrive a convincing explanation for how Pietor managed to put
    those guards to sleep, but I suppose sooner or later he will decide t
    Pletor hired one of those gypsy sorcerers to do it for him. Meanwh
    he's blaming your brothers for helping Pietor, and probably will dec
    sooner or later, that one or more of them were in a conspiracy with
    over the thefts. I'm sure they have thought of this, too. And they
    know that the only way they can escape such an accusation is to g
    of you, then blame you as the conspirator. We think that was what
    tried to do when they dumped you in the crypt, and Ruslan thinks t
    probably will keep trying. 1-wish I could think otherwise, but I cann
     "How ... pleasant," Ilya whispered. He blinked, as Ruslan and
    nodded grimly.
     "The three of us must think of a way to make them leave you
    Mikall told him, his brows knitted with anxiety. "I don't know ho
    if we don't . .
     He didn't need to finish that sentence. Before, all Ilya had to w
    about was the risk that one of his brothers would actually injure him
    manently. Now, the stakes were considerably higher.

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    109
    
    ,ce
    
     Ruslan coughed. "We thought about helping you to run away the way
    Pletor did," he offered, "but it's hopeless. Ivan is locking the horses up
    in the stable under guard at night, and be has more guards patrolling
    the palace after everyone has gone to bed. He's making sure that no one
    else escapes him before be has a chance to discover who was helping
    Pietor. I don't think he's likely to change those orders before spring."
     And by then, my dear brothers might well take care of the situation for
    him. Ills licad felt light and empty, and his broken bones throbbed with
    pain, making it hard to concentrate. I have to find an answer. I have to!
     But not now. Even as he tried to think, the little energy he had ran
    out all at once, and while Ruslan and Mikail argued over his head, he
    fell asleep, despite trying desperately to stay awake and think.
    
    rea-
    i to
    t all
    ffiat A
    'lile,
    ,ide,
    'lus t
    t rid
    they
    they
     t
    
    )nc,
    ,, but
    
    vorrN
    I per-
    
    "Voul Fool!" The spirit rushed at him, brandishing a spectral saber.
    "You don't deserve to live!"
     Ilya woke with a start and a yelp, sweating with fear; Ruslan's hand
    was on his unin*ured shoulder, where the shaman had been shaking him
    to wake him.
     "You were crying out in your sleep," the shaman said with a worried
    frown on his face. "I was afraid you'd start thrashing about and hurt your-
    self,"
     Ilya blinked at him, shivering. His nigbtmare bad been a re-creation
    of his ordeal in the crypt, complete with the terrifying spirits torment-
    ing him.
     Well ... not precisely tormenting him. Shouting at him, scolding him,
    hectoring him, just as they bad in the crypt. That was bad enough, with-
    out being tormented. One spirit would have been enough to haunt his
    dreams for the rest of his life; after being plagued by a dozen or more,
    he wondered now if he would ever be able to close his eyes without fear.
    Would nightmares mark every attempt to sleep from now on?
     It's a miracle I'm not mad-
     Nlad? I've got every right and reason to have gone mad! How many men
    couldspend the night in a haunted crypt without going mad? How many
    tales are there of those who did?

    




     And what if I had gone mad? What would my father, my brothers think
    and do then?
     The idea struck him with the force of the first blow that had fell
    him, and he gaped at Ruslan stupidly as the implications of that thou
    ran through his mind.
     Ruslan frowned at him. "What is it?" he asked and, when Ilya did n
    immediately reply, repeated more sharply, "What? I've seen that look on
    your face before; you've thought of something! What is it?"
     He grabbed Ruslan's sleeve with building excitement. "What if
    said I was mad?" he asked intently. "They left me in the crypt-what if
    that had driven me mad? Holy Virgin, I'd have every right and reason to
    have gone mad under circumstances like that, and there are a dozen tal
    of people who did. I could rave, put on quite a show for them to pro
    that I'd lost my senses."
     Ruslan chewed his lip, scowling as he thought it over. "That could
    very bad for you," he said finally. "They could easily declare that you'r
    dangerous, and lock you in a room for the rest of your life. But let in
    think about this some more; there's some merit to the notion if I ca
    iust get past that little problem."
     Ruslan hunched down on his stool, his eyes far away and his mout
    set in a fierce frown as he pondered the question. "No," he said at lengt
    "Not madness-not precisely. Not the kind of madness you were thin
    ing of, with raving and carrying on. But if you'd been damaged-mad
    feeble-minded-now that could be exactly what we need! They wouldn'
    lock you up; you'd be perfectly harmless, so they wouldn't need to. If Am
    were able to take care of yourself in a reasonable manner, you'd be fine,"
     "Feeble-minded?" Ilya said, puzzled. What exactly did Ruslan rMan
    by that? "You mean staring off into space all day? Sitting in one p4ce,
    drooling and rocking?"
     Ruslan laughed at his confusion. "Not that. Foolish! Like the sill i
    in the tales, the one who sits on the top of the stove talking 631're
    and sings to the chickens. The one who makes up ridiculous tales Ut
    flying pigs and walking trees."
     "The one who kills the Snow Dragon and marries the tsarina."

    




    F I R E 8 1 R P    lilt
    
    wan't going to laugh at anything for a good, long while, but be did man-
    age a smile at the idea of acting like that. "How is that going to help?"
     "In several ways, I think," Ruslan told him. "If you've become-well-
    an idiot, you are no threat to your father. How could he possibly suspect
    you of plotting to be rid of him when you can't even count your toes and
    come up with the same number twice?"
     He's right about that-Father is hardly going to be threatened by a fool.
    "if licis no longer concerned about me, he wouldn't care at all what hap-
    pened to me-and my brothers could do anything they liked to me
    without him saying a word," Ilya protested.
     "That's true enough," Ruslan replied. "But think of your brothers. Is
    there any reason why they would bother with you if you were no longer
    a threat to them in any way? Think about it a moment, Ilya."
     He closed his eyes and did think about it. If I'm nothing, useless, no
    threat at all, completely helpless, in fact ...
     It was so hard to think; he didn't hurt unless he moved, and since he
    had managed to protect his head with his arms, he hadn't suffered the
    injuries to his head that he had the last time, but he was still dazed and
    disoriented. The potions Ruslan fed him made it easy for him to sleep,
    and rather disinclined to move, but they didn't exactly help his ability
    to think.
     Think! What would it mean to his brothers if he became the local
    fool?
     "Let me tell vou what I think, and you can tell this old man if he's
    seeing things or not," Ruslan said at last, interrupting his attempts to
    make his mind work. "I think that as you have been turning into a bet-
    ter fighter, they have been more worried about you. Is that right?"
     "You might be right." He frowned. "I know that when they couldn't
    beat ine up just one at a time and they did start to coordinate their ef-
    forts, the beatings got worse."
      Ruslan nodded, pursing his lips thoughtfully. "Here's the next thing.
     I think that as you have gotten older, they have been really concerned
     that you actually are a sorcerer. And I think that as you have shown your-
     self to be much more clever than they, they have begun to fear you, even

    




    112   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    as the tsar has. They feel that anyone who is clever must be capable
    being a sorcerer or at least is able to think of ways to get rid of them to
    clever for them to guard against. That is why they were so afraid of
    and no matter how much you tried to reassure them, they would
    be certain that this was a clever ruse to get them off their guard."
     Ilya nodded; all this made perfect sense, if you allowed for the f
    that both the tsar and his brothers had a very skewed idea of the t
     "So, if you become an idiot, you can't work sorcery, can you? You
    come up with amazing traps in the woods to make it look as if a
    killed them, you can't murder them with subtle poisons. And you can
    fight, so it isn't even worth trying to beat you. Not only are you no long
    a threat to them, but there is no glory or even satisfaction in beating you
    up, either." He smiled slyly. "Here's another thing. The maidens aren'
    going to be nearly as interested in an idiot as they are in the handsome
    and clever Ilya. They will not even have that to make them 1'ealous."
     He gulped; that was one aspect that was not going to be very pleas-
    ant to deal with. Better chaste than dead, I suppose.... It wasn't an d
    petizing prospect, though. Perhaps he could find a way to attract the
    maidens as a stranger, disguising himself as a gypsy or some such thing.
     Or perhaps some of them will decide to see if the tales are true, that a
    man who is deficient in his wits is well endowed elsewhere to make up
    it, he thought wistfully, although he knew very well that neither of those
    possibilities was likely.
     Better chaste than dead. And if he was an idiot-well, no one would
    entrust him with any kind of responsibility, which meant that
    there was hard work to be done during planting or harvest and ev F-Y4(
    in Ivan's little kingdom was expected to toil in the fields from dawn to
    dusk, he would be left to scare the crows with the littlest childri or
    bring water to the workers. So there was a good side to all of this.
    y
      I think I can manage to be a convincing fool," he said dr ly to
    Ian, then sighed with resignation. "Do you think you could convince Fa-
    ther to come have a look at me? The sooner we start the story spread'
    the safer I will feel."
     Ruslan nodded soberly. "I think that you are right. Let me tell Md I
    what we've decided and see if he can poke any holes in our clever

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    113
    
    If he can't, we'll go off together to the tsar and see if we can convince
    him that it's important he come have a look at you."
     "And I'll just rest here for a while." Ilya closed his eyes and listened
    to the sound of Ruslan's retreating footsteps. On the whole, this did seem
    the best way to ensure his safety, although now that Ruslan was gone,
    he could see a few more difficulties with it. Ivan would probably leave
    him completely alone, but his brothers were hardly known for their com-
    passionate natures. He'd seen them pulling cruel tricks on the dogs, and
    cqUally heartless "Jokes" on their own friends who might be drunk or oth-
    erwise incapacitated. He would end up being the butt of endless pranks
    unless he managed to stay out of their sight. He could count on being
    tripped and sent sprawling any time he walked near one of them, expect
    to have trash tied to his sash for the dogs to chase, plan on being given
    a bottomless bucket to fetch water. He would no longer be pursued, but
    fic would be tormented from time to time. Whenever his brothers
    needed amusement, they would drag him out and amuse themselves at
    his expense.
     I can bear that, I think. I hope.
     At least it was better than waiting for ambushes, knowing that he
    would end up hurt, wondering how badly, dreading that it would be worse
    than before. It was much better than waiting for a dagger in the dark, or
    a fatal blow to the bead.
     Even if he wasn't sleepy, Ruslan's drugs had the effect of making his
    mind drift like a leaf on water whenever he closed his eyes. He could not
    have told how long it was that he lay that way, for he couldn't hold to
    thoughts for long unless be really concentrated and focused on them.
    There didn't seem to be any pressing reason to make the effort-which
    I I tself may have been another effect of the drugs-and he wasn't able to
    raise much concern either. So long as he didn't move, he didn't hurt, and
    that made it hard to care about anything.
     "Ilya? Someone is here to see you." Mikall's voice, gentled, as if he
     were talking to a child, warned Ilya that the pair had managed to con-
     vince the tsar to come have a took at his offspring. He waited for a mo-
     ment before opening his eyes, schooling his expression, readying himself,
     deciding right then what he was going to do.

    




    114   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
     When he opened his eyes, he widened them guilelessly, and smi
    as if he hadn't a care in the world.
      Hello, hello!" he said brightly, and giggled at Ivan's dumbfoun
    expression. "Did you know that the sun and the moon are to be mar
    tonight? I'm to carry the rings." Should I pretend I don't know him?
    ter not; no point in doing anything that makes him suspicious. He blin
    at his father. "Tsar I-van, Tsar I-van," he chanted in a singsong, "cou
    to the Moon-man! " He stuck one finger in the corner of his mouth a
    smilcd.
     The tsar frowned and turned to Mikail. "What is this? What is all t
    about? Why is he babbling like this?"
     Mikail sighed and spread his hands wide. 'As you see, Tsar, the
    has lost his wits. He babbles because his thoughts are broken past men
    ing. I fear that the beating has damaged his mind forever and he will
    this way for the rest of his life. He can't even keep his mind on his
    nonsense for more than a moment or two."
     Good! That gives me another cue. He pretended to lose interest in h
    visitors and began to walk the fingers of his good hand among the hil
    and valleys of his blankets, whispering nonsense to himself in a sin!so
     The tsar watched him for some time more; Ilya continued to P
    taking the opportunity to catch a glimpse of his father out of the c 0
    of his eye now and again. The tsar had never been any good at cov ":
    his emotions; at first, he was dumbfounded, then his expression gra
    ally hardened into anger, but that anger was not directed at Ilya.
     With a curse, he tore himself away from Mikail's side and flung hi
    self out of the chapel, heading toward the great hall, still cursing. He
    soon out of Ilya's sight, but Mikail stood in the doorway and watc'he
    with apparent satisfaction.
     Finally he turned back to his patient. "He believes us," the priest
    quietly, but with a half-smile. 'And I would not care to be any of
    brothers now."
     Ilya looked at him with puzzlement. "Why? Why is he angrv at thcm
    now? Why now, and not when they nearly killed me?"
     Mikail turned to look after the tsar, then sat down beside Ilya. He
    lost his smile, and his face was troubled. Ilya sensed that he had ]car

    




    F I R E B I R D    113
    
    something about the tsar that made him a little ill. "Because-I think-
    he would not have cared if they killed you, but they have made you into
    something more helpless than a child, and helpless you will remain, a
    burden and a stone about his neck, useless and worthless, for as long as
    he lives. He will nevcr be rid of that unwanted burden, and for that bur-
    den, he will never forgive them."
     "Ob," Ilya said, for that was all he could manage. Finally he closed
    his eyes again and let himself drift. He didn't have to think about all of
    this right now, and he didn't intend to. This might be his last respite,
    and he was going to take full advantage of it.

    




    If I were a lazy man, this would be paradise. Unfortunately, I'm not,
    this is getting very boring.
     Ilya watched the comings and goings in the great hall through
    eyes. He lay atop the stove that heated the place, a structure bui
    bricks and faced with brown and white pottery tiles. It was more
    large enough to hold him, standing as high as his chest, and Ion'
    deep enough for him to sprawl at full length on the top, even wit
    arms fully extended over his head. The really comfortable rooms in
    palacc-all three of thern-had such stoves to keep them -warm
    winter. Needless to say, two of those rooms, the great hall and th
    private quarters, were places where Ivan spent a great deal of tim
    third stove heated the weaving room, a concession by Ivan to the
    that the women couldn't work in the winter without heat.
     At the moment, with only the smallest of fires burning, it was
    warm on the top where Ilya lay, but it would never become uni
    able, not even in the dead of winter, when it was keptThis was the place where Ilya now spent a good part of every
                                        sl
    sometimes sleeping or pretending to sleep, sometimes just il
    kicking his heels against the tiles, sometimes strumming on his ol
    alaika.
     This was all at the suggestion of both Ruslan and Mikall. The
    the stove would have been a coveted place for winter lounging, exc
    
    116

    




    F I R E 8 1 2 D    it?
    
    that a long tradition reserved it for the useless, the incurably lazy, the
    worthless. Perhaps this tradition had been started to keep the place from
    being contested; in winter, tempers grew short as the light faded, and an
    rgument could escalate into a fight, which could end in death. But
    
    hanks to tradition, only a fool would sit on the stove, earning the con-
    tempt of every adult male and most of the youngsters. No one contested
    Ilya's place on top of the stove, which permitted him to watch everything
    and everyone while being left alone.
     The main reason he was here now was to establish his presence as the
    fool on the stove before the snow fell, so that when most of the folk of
    the palace were crowded in here during the winter, his position and con-
    dition would be firmly established in their minds.
     It was working. He had already overheard some of the servants refer-
    ring to him as "Ilya the Fool," or as just "the Fool," and this was a good
    sign. Before very long, his new character would be set in their minds, as
    changeless as the rocks. Long after he was dust, there would be stories
    about Ilya the Fool to enliven winter nights.
     I might as well give them plenty to laugh about. He decided to sit up
    and give up his pretense of sleep. He opened his eyes, yawned hugely,
    and stretched; no one paid him the slightest bit of attention. Blinking
    sleepily (and stupidly), he sat up and leaned back against the wall of the
    chimney behind him. Well, now what am I going to do? I can't sleep, and
    I'm getting awfully tired of playing nonsense-musi I c.
     The tsarina hurried by, her expression harried, as she searched among
    the servants for one who was not already busy with some task. This was
    a difficult season, with every servant and serf busy every waking moment.
    Not only were there the normal tasks, but this was the height of har-
    wsting, with several crops coming in at once. The household chores took
    last place to the harvest, which often left the tsarina and her ladies to
    do jobs normally only a servant would touch. This did not do a great deal
    for her temper, and she would be willing to take almost anyone with a
    pair of hands to help her.
     Her eye fell upon Ilya; she frowned slightly, and turned toward him.
     "Ilya, I need someone to help in the wool-room," she said perempto-
    rily. "Come down off that stove now."

    




    11S   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
     Should I help her? He vacillated; he wanted to, if only to relieve
    boredom, but if he did he would establish some sort of competence.
    would be a bad precedent to set, just when he was trying to prove
    utterly worthless he was.
     Of course, the other option was to go with her and then make a
    of things, which would leave her with twice the work she had bef
    Fouling things would establish his worthlessness, but he didn't dis
    her, and it would be cruel to double her workload with feigned inc
    petence.
     He stared at her, his hand creeping toward his mouth until his fin
    finally reached the corner. He left it there, nibbling on the nail, w
    continuing to stare at her with blank eyes.
     She must have been truly desperate, for she tried again. "Ilya, co
    down off the stove and follow me. I need help in the wool-room,
    fleeces are too heavy for the women to carry."
     That's not true; they're heavy, but the women can carry them if they
    so one at a time. She's iust looking for a beast of burden she can load
    the fleeces onto at once. That made him feel a little better about pla
    the idiot.
     He let his eyes unfocus as she continued to talk to him, at first c
    ing, then nagging, her voice becoming shriller with each sentence.
    ignored her for a while, but then, when she paused for breath to sta
    him, he spoke. But not to her.
     He stared off to one side of her. "The cabbages are dancing," he
    clearly. "Can't you hear the brook playing for them?" He narrowed
    eyes and whispered in a conspiratorial tone, "You know that the dom
    and the bannik are having a feast tonight."
     She said nothing, but her eyes widened with a little fear, and.
    backed up a step. Now he looked down at her and smiled as swee,
    he could. 'Are the honey-cakes done?" he asked. "I like honey-ca
    you like honey-cakes? I like honey-cakes. Are they done?"
     Fear turned to exasperation. The tsarina's delicate features twis
    an expression of utter disgust. "Oh, go see for yourself, Fool!".,,'
    snapped, and turned on her heel to find someone more useful. 1 ~

    




     He picked up his balalalka and began to Pluck aimlessly at it. The brief
    interaction had attracted some attention from the servants preparing the
    great ball for the evening meal. One or two of the upper servants stared
    for a moment or two, and several of the tsar's warriors snickered, but after
    a while, when nothing else happened, they lost interest in him.
     Technically, he was supposed to be under the supervision of either
    Mikall or Ruslan, but so long as be didn't get into trouble, people were
    leaving him alone. It was just too much trouble to coax him down from
    the stove and lead him by the hand back to his "keepers." He wasn't very
    cooperative about being led, always finding something to distract him
    on the way-and unlike a small, willful child, whose manners he was
    aping, he was large and strong, and it was very difficult to move him when
    be didn't want to be moved. He bad managed to watch a stream of ants
    for the better part of an afternoon yesterday.
     When people were ignoring him again, he set his instrument aside
    and tucked his knees up, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting
    his chin on his knees. Now that there were more people appearing in the
    hall, things were a bit more interesting.
     Scrubbing the tables and laying out platters of bread were the servants
    in drab brown woolen skirts and breeches and smocks of unbleached
    linen. Ivan's warriors, dressed in black breeches and half-corselets of
    lightarni0l'over tunics of brighter materials, were drifting in by ones and
    twos.
     He hadn't had much chance to simply watch people before this, and
    at the moment, at least, it had the potential to be rather fascinating.
    When he'd been "himself," he hadn't dared permit anyone except the
     servants to catch him staring at them, because it might have been taken
     as a challenge. But now that he was the Fool, it didn't matter, and he
     could watch everyone from the tsar on down with the avid interest of a
     boy watching a frog. He'd learned a lot in the last few days, things that
     he wished he had known before.
      The life of the palace swirled around him like a dance, but it was a
     dance with very distinct patterns, and rings within rings. The heart of
     the dance was the tsar, and everything revolved around him, like the vir-
    
    ig
    
    F I R 6 8 1 R P    119
    
    ~he
    I as
    Do

    




    120   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    gin bride in the center of the wedding-dance, or the last sheaf of g
    at harvest. But unlike the bride or the sheaf, the tsar remained the ce
    tcr of the dance no matter how circumstances changed.
     The first circle surrounding him was composed of his sons, the ca
    tain of his fighters, and his steward. All of these had their own little pa
    terns that brought them into and out of contact with each other, b
    the dance always brought them circling back around the tsar. Becaus
    the tsar was so suspicious of his sons, his closer partners in this danc
    were his captain and his steward, but he was the one who called the st
    and the music.
     Next outward came the tsar's fighters, a solid formation within t
    larger dance that in turn circled about their captain. Farther out ca
    the superior servants, who were all freedmen rather than serfs.
    that circle were the tsarina and her women. This was a simple cir
    out much in the way of eddies and other patterns, except that the su
    perior servants were barely subordinate to the tsarina, and were t
    equals of her women.
     Then came the inferior servants, still free, but only peasants,
    the superior servants had some pretensions at rank. Each group of the
    made their own patterns around their immediate superior and literd
    could not be co-opted by another unless their supervisor permitte
    or if the person who was commanding them was the tsarina.
     Lastly, the drudges, who were all serfs, as much the tsar's prope
    his cattle and reckoned of less worth. These could be commanded by an
    of the servants above them in rank, but for all practical purposes the
    was no point in taking them away from the jobs that they knew. Sup
    stitious and purposefully kept ignorant, they formed the larger part o
    both Mikall's congregation and Ruslan's pagan celebrations and rites
    and generally worshiped both Christ and the old gods with equal ferw
     He had not much noticed them before, except for the few pr
    maids among them, and he wouldn't have now if he hadn't been
    side the patterns of the dance himself. Their place in the dance was
    imal: to repeat the same steps in the same place, over and over, un
    someone from one of the inner circles noticed one of them an Ci
    him (or her) into a new pattern. It suited the tsar to believe that th

    




    9
    
    . as
    
     any
    here
    
    per-
    rt of
    rites,
    rvor.
    rettv
    out-
    
    Min-
    
    111CSS
    called
    t they
    
    F I R E B I R D    121
    
    wcre happy, contented, and at one with the land. They would never give
    him a sign that this was not true, for although they worshiped him, it
    was out of fear, the way a whipped dog worships the hand that beats it.
     And I-I am the Fool, the one who runs through all the patterns and
    disrupts them for a little while. Then I stand outside it all until the next
    unexpected moment when I break in.
     Well, that was the theory he had, anyway. He hadn't really done much
    in the way of disruption since he'd bealed up enough to venture out of
    his bed and into the rest of the palace again. Most of the disturbances he
    caused were among the folk of the third rank, the superior servants, the
    tsarina, and her household. Frankly, be didn't really want to regain the
    attention of either his brothers or his father, and he felt too sorry for
    the drudges and the lower servants to want to make their lives any more
    coniplicated. Ivan was probably still seething over the loss of not one, but
    two sons, and as for his brothers-well, they were still smarting from the
    varlous punishments that Ivan had levied on them for turning Ilya into
    a uscicss burden. If it hadn't been for the fact that getting revenge on Ilya
    would have been hollow, they'd have sought just that before now.
     lie scratched the end of his nose, watching the warriors come in and
    take their places at the long tables, seizing pieces of bread, grabbing at
    mugs and filling them sloppily from pitchers set along the center of the
    tables. Soon the varied scents of dinner drifted into the hall as the next
    lot of servants carried in platters loaded with meat and other dishes.
     B~, the time Ilya had been able to rejoin the household, harvest was
    half over, and both day and night were distinctly cooler. There had been
    at least one hard frost, for the leaves had all turned. This would be the
    first N,car since he could remember that he had not been part of the bar-
    wst workforce, but no one trusted him to do anything other than frighten
    the birds off the grain and there were plenty of children to do that. Dur-
    ing the harvest, everyone worked, and meals were eaten in shifts.
     He overheard his name, and listened carefully; the steward was cau-
    tioning some of the housc-servants not to let him wander out into the
    f1dch or he would get in the way of the harvesters.
     "I don't suppose we could count on him to go fall into the river and
    drown," grumbled one of them.

    




    122   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    aga in!
    f le reflected that although he hadn't actually seen anything since his
    incarceration in the crypt, be hadn't been any place where he was I Ix
    to see something. It was commonly assumed even by Ruslan that t~
    was no house-spirit, and Ilya had yet to move beyond the kitchen ~vifTi_
    out being gently herded back to the house, so he would not have se
    the spirits of the yard, the fields, the barn. He might have manageO
    convince himself that all those ghosts in the crypt had been ballucim-
    
     The steward looked at him sternly. "First of all, he's a fool, not an idiot.
    Secondly, to wish such a thing is a violation of God's law And thirdly,
    such a thing would bring terrible bad luck on us for years to come, and
    he might even come back as an angry spirit to haunt us."
     The rebuked servant looked uneasy at that last, and Ilya reflected that
    before the incident of the cherry-thief, the third possibility would n
    have been mentioned. But now the household seemed equally divided
    between those who thought that Pietor was the cherry-thief, who ha
    run away to escape Ivan's wrath, and those who thought the cherry-th
    was a spirit and Pietor had been gravely wronged. And in any case, so
    thing of the subject of Ilya's unconscious ravings had reached the ser-
    vants; it was commonly supposed that if the beatings hadn't damaged
    his mind, the spirits in the maze had. Which meant, of course, that there
    were spirits, and now it behooved a man to keep that in mind.
     "We'll keep an eye on him," one of the others said, looking une Sid
    over his shoulder at Ilya. "Be bad enough having a spirit come back ...
     He did not continue, but it wasn't hard to fill in the rest: It would be
    bad enough to have a spirit come back to haunt the palace, but one w
    had died as a result of neglect, one who had been driven mad because
    the actions of those within this house- Such a spirit would be vengeful
    and fully capable of exacting 'that revenge. Furthermore, such a
    spirits were quite likely to destroy whoever and whatever came wi
    their grasp, whether or not they were guilty
     This would be a frightening prospect for anyone who believed that
    Ilya would return after death. It was a frightening prospect for me, in the
    crypt. I know what I saw, and I would do anything not to see those spi

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    123
    
 Zristorn of his injuries, except that he had seen two spirits before the
     ating one admittedly at night, but also one in broad daylight.
    
    n
    
    at
    le
    ts
    
    is
    ely
    re
    tll-
    en
    to
    
     He might have been able to dismiss the Firebird as a dream, eventu-
    ally, even though she was still as vivid in his memory as if he had seen
    her only a few moments ago. But the person in the bathhouse could only
    have been the bannik, for there was no way that the stable-master could
    have been in two places at the same time. There was his proof that Rus-
    Ian, Mikall, and the drudges were all correct in their belief in such things.
     Well, my brothers are due here at any moment, and I would Just as soon
    be elsewhere. He sighed, and jumped down off the stove. One of the ser-
    vants kept a sharp eye on him as he wandered in the direction of the
    chapel and out of the great hall.
     just as he rcached the door of the great hall, Gregori entered. Some-
    thing about the way that Gregori stared at him for a moment made him
    suddenly wary. There was a glint in his eye and a smirk on his face, the
    kind of expression be wore just before he would drop a hot coal on a dog's
    tail. Evidently Gregori, at least, had recovered from the tsar's tongue-
    lashings.
     He's going to do something. Knowing that a prank was coming, Ilya
    kept his eyes fixed on the ground, but watched his brother closely under
    the cover of his long eyelashes. In this way he caught the surreptitious,
    sideways movement of Gregori's foot before he tripped over it.
     He considered stepping on the foot for an instant, and thought bet-
    ter of the idea immediately. Instead, he allowed Gregori to trip him, but
    fell under his own control. It looked as if he had gone sprawling, but ac-
    tually he landed without even taking a minor bruise.
     Gregon got the laugh he had expected from those who witnessed
    the fall, and the shadow of ill-temper that had been in his eyes faded.
    11~11 sat up slowly, rubbing his head comically, earning another roar of
    laughter.
     "My, A my!" he exclaimed. "Was there an earthquake just now? Or
    did the house-spirit make the floor heave up?"
     Gregorl laughed. He reached down and grabbed Ilya by the back of
    his shirt, trying to baul him to his feet before giving up. "You tripped

    




    124   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    over your own big feet, Fool," he said, loud enough for everyone in
    hall to hear him. "Next time, be more careful of where you put then
     Ilya sat up, but rather than paying any attention at all to Gregori,
    stared at his feet for a moment, then began addressing them with a w
    dering harangue about being careful where they went. Shortly, Grq
    went off to his position at the tsar's table, his lip curled with ill-disgui
    disgust, and the servants snickered as they listened to Ilya. Once C
    gori was gone, he stopped right in the middle of a sentence, stare(
    the wall as if he had only lust noticed it, and got to his feet again.
    began shuffling, a few dance steps in a little circle, and the rest of ft
    watching him lost interest as well. Once their attention was off him
    slipped away from the increasingly crowded great hall. The only pei
    watching Ilya now was the single servant dragooned by his fellows i
    
    keeping an eye on the lunatic.
     Ilya's restlessness had increased a hundredfold. He would even I
    welcomed the most menial work in the fields right now. I have to get s
    exercise. I'm going mad with inactivity. And I don't want to get soft; I
    gori and the others might not be trying to kill me now, but I'll have I
    fit to meet more of those jokes of theirs. He needed to be agile, to d(
    plausibly whatever was thrown at him. He needed to be strong and
    ible to make it appear that he tripped over obstacles and outstreb
    feet without really coming to grief. He had to find a way to keep',
    self in the same condition as any of the warriors.
     Buthow?
     He was already walking quickly, and frustration made him spee
    steps. Before he quite knew what he was doing, he was running,
    outdistancing the surprised servant who had followed him.
     He ran down the length of the palace, heading for the door thi
    to the gravel-covered yard between the palace and the barns and st,
    It felt wonderful finally to stretch his legs, and as his muscles looi
    and warmed up, he continued to run, out the door. He made an al
    right turn as he burst out into the sunlight, and continued to rur
    wise around and around the palace itself. He would have rather ru
    to the orchard or down to the river, but he was afraid that the servai
    tailed to keep him from getting himself into trouble would raise an,

    




    F I R E B I R D    125
    
    1"Resides, it was perfectly mad to run circles around the palace. No sane
    person would waste his time running for no other reason than to get ex-
    ercise.
    The hapless servant ventured out past the yard and cautiously waited
    at the point nearest the path leading to the river, while he circled the
    palace, head up, legs churning. After the initial burst of speed, he kept
    his pace down to something he could sustain for a while. With the
    bright blue sky overhead and the cool wind of autumn keeping him
    from getting overheated, there was a certain pleasure in the exertion,
    aimless though it was.
    No, it's only aimless to someone who doesn't need to resort to subterfuge
    to keep in fighting trim. He passed the servant again, and to enliven the
    image he wanted to project, leapt and snatched at imaginary butterflies
    as he ran by. A couple of children toddled out from the cow-barn and
    watched him for a while, but what he was doing was not of enough in-
    terest to attract a crowd of adults.
    
             keep his legs in good trim and his wind strong. But
    le Wou d need more than that; he needed activity that would stretch his
    muscles as well as strengthen them. He also needed something that
    could be done in the winter; once the snow closed around, he wouldn't
    be able to run anymore. What was enough like the exercises the fight-
    ers used to give him for that same sort of conditioning? Surely he could
    think of something!
    Hah. I have it. And it will add one more log to the fire, so far as the ques-
    6on of my sanity is concerned.
          ew more laps around the palace, just to be certain that his
          med up, then he stopped right in front of the servant. Ig-
          Ilow altogether, he began to dance to a music only he heard.
      0   bit of prancing and stamping, either, but the serious steps
        I press onlookers, the ones that the young men performed to
          the maidens-squatting kicks and split-Jumps, whirling
          inning kicks, cartwheels and aerial somersaults, all of the
          equired agility, balance, and immense strength. In between
          sive move, he concentrated on intricate footwork, until
          d down his face and back and soaked his linen shirt. Only

    




    26   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    then did he slow, to give his body time to cool down, before he finis
    with a pose and a foolish grin plastered to his face.
     The servant stared at him with a gaping mouth, looking more
    prised than bewildered, and far too impressed by Ilya's fancy footwo
     Hmm. This is a good idea, but I shouldn't have been quite so enth
    astic in front of an audience. Ilya realized that he was going to ha
    do something to keep the man from spreading tales that might give s
    hint to his true mental state.
     Mopping his brow with his sleeve, he sauntered over to the man
    stared fixedly at him with that silly smile still plastered on his face
    nally, after he stared long enough to make the man uneasy, he leaned
    and said in a confidential voice, "The rusalka taught me to dancej~
    know. But I have to dance whenever I hear her musicians playing, or
    be very, very angry with me."
     The servant's mouth snapped shut, like a frog with a fly, and his
    paled. "She did?" he whispered. "You do?"
     He nodded solemnly. "Of course," be replied. "Her musicians are
    frogs, you know, which means I have to dance a lot. But I don't mi
    like to dance." Then he suddenly frowned, and the servant backed U
    pace involuntarily.
     "If I were you, I wouldn't.go down to the river," he said fiercely.
    might drown you. She doesn't like you, she likes me. She likes my dan
    ing." His frown deepened. "Maybe you'd better tell the rest, too. T
    them to stav away from the rusalka,. She's mine."
     "Of course, master, of course!" the poor man stammered. "I wo
    think of it! I'll tell the others, you can depend on met
     Ilya struck a pose copied from one of Gregori's lordlier moment
    that you do," he said haughtily, and with lofty pride strode off down t
    path to the weaponry field, certain that the servant would not follo
    Once be claimed that a rusalka was interested in him, none of the low
    servants would dare to follow him. The river-spirits were some of th
    most dangerous of the natural spirits, for according to the tales, the
    power was not necessarily confined to the area of the river itself, and an
    particular rusalka had allies among nearly all the other water-spin
    wherever one went. Besides, sooner or later everyone had to go down t

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    t 2 7
    
    the riverbank for one reason or another-to fetch water for washing, to
    bathe, to cross, or to fish. And once someone marked by the rusalka put
    a foot in the water, he was in her power.
  Ilya's grin was genuine now. Even if he decides that the rusalka is noth-
      ore than a phantom of my madness, nothing is going to entice him
      How me anymore.
    e'd bad another idea while he was dancing, and he wanted to col-
    the equipment he was going to need before it occurred to anyone
    to lock it up away from him. There wouldn't be anyone where the
    practice-weapons were stored right now; all able-bodied males were
    either out in the fields swinging scythes or in the great hall eating their
    licads off. With the servant gone, no one would see him or think to
    stop him.
     It was the work of a moment to purloin a heavy wooden shield and
    wooden practice-sword, both of them double the weight of the real
    thing. He carried them off, not to his room, where they might be found
    and taken away from him, but to one of his old hiding places, used for
    secreting toys away from his brothers when he was a child.
     He had several options among those places, but the one he felt the
    most secure about was the area beneath the raised floor of the bathhouse.
    No one wanted to step on cold stone floors once the bathhouse was nicely
    warmed. And no one would have wanted dirt floors, which would have
    turned to mud. The bathhouse was actually built on a raised platform,
    several hands above the ground level, with a tightly caulked wooden floor,
    the chinks sealed with pitch and rope. Caulking cracked and worked
    loose, though, so to prevent the winter wind from whistling up through
    cracks in the floor, the area beneath the bathhouse was walled in with
    extensions of the tight bathhouse walls themselves. That didn't stop
    clever animals from burrowing under it to make dens in the warmth be-
    iicath, and an enterprising boy with a knife and a great deal of ingenu-
    could easily create a removable hatch, one that would not be visible
    "to anything but a close inspection.
     No one as lacking in imagination as Ilya's brothers would ever have
     dreamed that someone would hide anything he really wanted in a place
     ,as Mconvenient, awkward, and spooky as the bathhouse. As children, it
    
    r
    
    ke
    
    3W.
    
    vcr
    the
    leir
    any
    rits
    A to

    




    128   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    wouldn't have occurred to them to look there, and as adults, even if the)
    had an inkling that something might be there, they were above such non
    sense as poking around under the bathhouse. That, of course, was wha
    made it a perfect hiding place. And, of course, if the servants ever founi
    anything hidden there, they would assume it was the property of the bafl
    nik, and quickly put back whatever they found.
      The bannik! I forgot about him- Ilya paused with one hand on tb
    panel of his hatch, and wondered if this was a good idea after all. I
    child, he hadn't thought of the bannik when he was hiding things h4
    and the few times as an adult that he had used this place, he hadn't
    ally believed in the existence of the bathhouse spirit.
      On the other hand-he seems to like me. And he hasn't bothered me;
    my things in all this time. But now that I know he exists, there is no 4
    cuse for not asking his permission. He bit his lip, thinking. I'd betters
    something, however awkward it is. He cleared his throat and coughed
    or twice.
      'I beg your pardon, bannik, and I really don't mean to disturb yi
    but I need to hide these things from my brothers. Ah, perhaps I
    to explain why."
    
      Feeling both awkward and rather foolish for speaking to empty ~
    explained his situation, starting with the most recent beating. Givel
    knowledge of the household that the bannik had demonstrated ati
    last meeting, Ilya assumed that the spirit must keep himself currentj
    the news of the palace, and it was quite likely that the word of Ilya's s
    posed condition was common gossip in the bathhouse. But the bar
    could not know that the idiocy was feigned, nor could he know wl
    bad been. That was what Ilya took on himself to explain. He couldj
    hope that the spirit was still sympathetic enough to him that liev'A
    not mind the intrusion into his domain.
      He waited, holding his breath, for some sign of the bannik's appi
    or disapproval, but nothing happened. Finally, he simply let'his
    out and opened the hatch.
      There were still some things hidden in there: Ilya's toy sworq
    of pretty pebbles that he had collected, a top, and a bunch of fez
    stuck into a ball of clay. All those things were covered with a thick

    




                       F I R E B I R D    129
    
    of dust, and moths had been at the feathers. He moved these childhood
    
    t
    
    IOU,
    
    ~ght
    
                                       r, he
                                        the
                                        heir
                                        with
    
                                        sup
                                        nnik
                                       hy it
    
    Only
    
    roval
    rcath
    
    a box
    Lthers
    . laver
    
    keepsakes to one side and laid the practice sword and shield inside, then
    closed the hatch.
     Dancing, fighting my shadow, running. Those should all keep me in ad-
     uate shape. On the whole, he was fairly satisfied with the progress of
    the day. It only remained to return to the palace and the great hall and
    resume his position on the stove.
     But now that he had gotten outside for a while, he felt a great rclue-
    tance to go back in. Inside meant more idleness and boredom, and while
    he bad managed to escape from the attentions of the servant meant to
    follow him, he might as well enjoy himself for a while. Granted, it was
    cold, but he had on a coat and the sun was shining.
     The orchard! There wouldn't be anyone there; every apple but the
    most worm-eaten had been harvested days ago. The only creatures in the
    orchard were the horses, turned out to eat the discards and trim the grass
    and weeds beneath the trees. The horses weren't being guarded through
    harvest, for every band was needed in the fields. The tsar was taking
    advantage of his horses' notorious reluctance to be saddled and bri-
    dled, and of their own greed to bring them back in at night when their
    mangers were filled with fresh hay and corn, to keep anyone from mak-
    iT.ig off with one.
     He got to his feet, dusted off the knees of his breeches, and sauntered
    to the orchard with his hands clasped behind his back, whistling tune-
    lessly. It hadn't occurred to anyone to take his small carving-knife away
    from him, and it was in its sheath in his coat pocket; if he could find a
    good branch, there might be enough sound wood on it to carve some-
    t1mig. Just now, it didn't matter what be carved; it would just be some-
    thing to do.
     Out in the open fields and the yards around the palace there was
    enough wind that it was rather chilly; in the orchard the trees cut the
    mrid, and the sun was extremely pleasant. His muscles ached a bit from
    t~C Lulexpected exercise, and it was good to stretch, listen to the spar-
    rows chatter, and let the sun beat down on tense shoulders.
     He looked for a fallen branch of reasonable size, neither too old and
    dry nor too green, but there wasn't anything to be had, not even old or
    
    J31M

    




    130   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    green. Probably the tsarina had sent some of the scrvant-children to glean
    the orchard for fallen and broken branches once the harvest was over,
    for apple-wood made a fine scent in the stove. In the spring, once win-
    ter was over, there would be more broken branches to collect for
    stove. The tsarina was a frugal woman, inclined to make a thread str
    to cover as much as humanly possible. Very little went to waste in the
    palace since she had wedded Ivan.
     He wondered if the Firebird had come here, too-there were far m
    apple trees than there were the tsar's special cherry trees, and she co
    have eaten her fill without anyone really noticing that any of the frui
    was missing. It wouldn't have taken as many apples to fill her up as che
    rics, either.
     His foot kicked up a windfall; there were iriore apples here than he
    had expected and he was a bit surprised that the tsarina hadn't order
    they be collected for cider. The Firebird probably wasn't here, he decide
    picking up another bruised windfall, this one only a little soft in o
    and taking a bite out of the unbruised half. It was warm, both s
    tart, and the half that was bruised just beginning to turn, givin~
    winy scent. There's nothing special about these apples. Surely sheJ
    takes things that are rare and special.
     If he was tsar, he'd leave the cherry-orchard there, but he'd neve
    vest the f ruit. He'd leave it all on the trees in hopes that she would coM
    there again to eat, and he might catch another glimpse of her. It Would
    be worth the entire orchard to him, if he could see her aga n.
                                      i
                                       i
     Of course, if I convinced Father that she was real, he'd have bird-eat(,
    out with nets and traps, trying to take her. He can't see anything that's raro
    without wanting to own it.
     He nibbled carefully around the soft, pulpy bruise on his appl an
    when there wasn't anything left on it that he wanted to eat, loo
    a horse to give the rest to. One of the geldings he liked to ri
    nearby; he chirruped to him and the horse lifted his head from t1i - ra
    and swiveled his ears in Ilya's direction. Ilya and the stable-ma
    just about the only people who could approach the horses
    were loose in the field without them running off. Of course, given th
    wav his father and brothers rode, be didn't much blame the ~04 for

    




    F I R E 8 1 2 D    131
    
    not wanting to spend any time under saddle, as it was rarely a pleasant
    experience for them.
    
     Ilya held out the remains of the apple; the sorrel gelding's nostrils went
    wide as it sniffed, catching the heady scent of bruised fruit. It looked
    around, but saw no other apples nearby; that seemed to make up its
    mind, for the gelding moved lazily toward him, drifting sideways as if it
    was of two minds whether or not to bolt.
     As it got within a pace or two of Ilya, it eyed him suspiciously, look-
    ing for any trace of a halter or bit. None of the tsar's horses could be en-
    ticed to hand if there was a bit of bridle-leather about. They knew every
    place a bridle could be hidden and every possible disguise for one. Head-
    shy and skittish, it took the stable-master himself to get any of them into
    hell.
     Ilya laughed and held the apple out on his palm; again the gelding
    sniffed, testing for the scent of leather as well as of the apple, and the
    scent of apple-flesh decided it. A moment later, soft lips brushed his hand
    as the sorrel gelding plucked the remains of the apple, making it vanish
    as if by magic.
     I he horse shied just a little as he reached out to scratch its neck, but
    when there was still no sign of a halter or anything like one, it relaxed
    and leaned into his scratching and munched the apple meditatively.
    ,j "You know, if I had a way to take you and get away with it, I'd ride off
    with you now and we'd both be better off," he told the gelding. "Because
    then ncither of us would ever have to put up with my brothers again. I
    have the feeling that between the fact that I'm the butt of all possible
    jokes and the fact that I'm not getting any woman-flesh anymore, pre-
    tending to be a fool is going to become very wearisome before the win-
    ter is over."
      "Oh, probably," the gelding agreed. "Though I do think you're overly
     concerned about the woman-flesh. It really isn't that great a sacrifice to
     do without it."
      Ile blinked, and froze in place. He hadn't really heard that-had he?
      "Don't stop scratching," the gelding said with irritation, leaning a lit-
     tle harder into his hand. "What's the matter with you? You're not supposed
     to nist stop like that once you've started a good scratch. "

    




    MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     1-uh-I've never heard a horse talk before," he stammered.
     "You never saw a Firebird before, either," the gelding pointed out
    would think that seeing her had something to do with the fact that you
    hear me. Probably since you were awake when you saw her, some of
    magi . c rubbed off on you. I have certainly been talking to you for some ti
    but you haven't heard me. Or else you just didn't understand me.'
    reached down and lipped a bit of grass. "Or maybe you just didn't lis
    I do have Night Wind blood in me. Ifyou'd been paying attention and
    ing what I said to you, you might have understood me before this."
     "How did you know I saw the Firebird?" he asked, astonished.
     "These things get around, the horse said vaguely. "You can't ke
    crets in a place this small. I think the dogs might have said something.
    generally hear about everything that goes on in the household; that's h
    they know when it's a good idea not to be somewhere. I think the dogs h
    you when you came in, and smelled the Firebird on you."
     Hc thought about the ever-present hounds, how they always s
    to be underfoot except during one of Ivan's rages or the times w
    one of his brothers was brooding about something. Had any of th
    been around when he'd slipped into the house that night? He thou
    perhaps he did remember them, wagging their tails when they rec
    nized hiiii.
     "The dogs knew all about the Firebird, of course, but do you think
    of the humans would listen to them when they tried to report what was
    pening in the cherry orchard? Of course not! Now, the milk-cows kn
    about the Firebird too, but they aren't the brightest things in the wo
    and you can't always trust what they say. They'll believe anything anyo
    tells them. The milk-cows said that the dairy-maids said that you'd be
    a fool, but we told them not to believe what they heard," the gelding sa
    with a slightly superior air. "The dogs knew all about what you and yo
    friends were planning, and they told us. It's a clever plan, but it could u
    a 11 'ttle work.
     11 Well, I've done the best I can!" he retorted, stung. Criticism from
    horse was not what he had ever expected! "It isn't as if I've been i
    good position to actually do much of anything, you know! I thi
    done very well so far, in fact!"

    




    F I R E B I R D    133
    
      "Don't be so prickly." The gelding snorted. "I said it was a clever plan,
    14dn't I? It's just that you could use a little work with the details."
     "Like what, exactly?" he asked suspiciously. Just what sort of advice
    could a horse give him, anyway?
     "Like-you must know that you're going to get pushed, tripped, knocked
     about quite a bit, right?" The horse waited, looking at him expectantly.
      He nodded.
      "Well, then you ought to do something to protect yourself from what you
    
     Ilya frowned. "I could-go to the wool-room and take as many gaudy
    rags as I can find, make those into pads for my knees and elbows. I
    should choose the gaudy ones, because they'll look more like something
    a fool would make to dress himself up than something I meant to use
    to protect myself. Have you any other ideas?"
     "lust one." The gelding pawed the sod meditatively. "Your brothers are
    all very predictable. I mean, we can even tell when it's about time for feed-
    ing by when we see them and what they're doing. They always do every-
    thing the same way, in the same order, at the same time every day. If they
    were cooks, you'd be eating Pease-porridge every day until you ran out of
    ~'t,#Wpeas. If you take the time to plot out their days, you'll have a general
    idea of where each one is so that you can avoid them. Avoiding one of their
    Okes is better than wearing padding to protect against it."
    ~ "You have a point." It seemed a bit odd, taking advice from a horse,
    but if he remembered his old tales correctly, he wouldn't be the first to
    do so. Generally the horse in question was one of the Night Wind's foals,
    but it was still a horse. Besides, it was obvious that the gelding knew
    Ivan's household very well, and could probably be expected to render bet-
    ter advice on such matters than a heavenly horse would.
      "Thank you very much," he said with feeling. "You've been quite
     helpful."
      The gelding shivered its skin all over and stamped one forefoot.
    "Think nothing of it," the beast replied. "Just keep me in mind for apples
    (r carrot-ends. I like cabbage too, but it gives me wind. And a piece of bread
    ~is nice, now and again, if there's a scraping of honey on it."
      "I'll do that," he promised. The gelding wandered away in search of

    




    I t.
    
    An
    
    134   RIERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    more windfall apples, and Ilya did a quick mental calculation to detl
    mine where everyone in the household was likely to be at that mornent
     The great hall. By now everyone is in there for supper; it'll be dar Soo
     This would be a good time to go purloin those rags the horse ha su
    gested. The only people in the wool-room would be servants, lower se
    vants at that, and not permitted to question anything a member of t
    family did.
     Even if that member of the family is a fool.
     As long as be didn't run off with entire bolts of cloth, the tsarina woul
    probably sigh with exasperation and ask the saints for patience, but do
    nothing more. After all, what was the point of trying to punish a fool~,
    She probably wouldn't even complain to the tsar.
     Even if she did, it wouldn't do any good. The loss of a few rags is no4-
    ing he is going to care about. Her frugal nature may be insulted, but thal
    I I ust too bad.
     Well, standing there wasn't going to get anything done, and the mori
    time he wasted thinking about the horse's advice, the less time he wotA
    have to follow through on it tonight.
    
    He shook his head, wondering if, after all, he really was mad. Not even
    Ruslan claimed to be able to talk to horses!      I
     Could the horse be some other spirit in disguise? Could this all have
    taken place only in his own mind? One seemed as likely as the other at
    this Point.
     But I know this horse, I've ridden him more times than I can count, and
    I'd be willing to swear not only that the beast spoke to me, but that
    couldn't possibly be a spirit in horse-disguise. Though he did say he
    some blood of the Mare of the Night Wind in him-
     Suddenly it all became too much for him to cope with. His h
    swam, and he staggered over and put a hand to the tree-trunk to st,
    himself. Then he looked up nervously, half-expecting tf
                                           h,
    
    something as well.
     But nothing happened. He swallowed with some difficulty, and wiped
    the back of his hand across his mouth.
     Talking horses. Banniks. What next, I wonder?
     He forced himself to think about the advice for a momen

    




    F I R E B I R D    135
    
    saN
    
    f concentrating on who (or what) had given it. It was good advice, very
    clever and direct. If it hadn't come from a horse, he'd have bad no sec
    ond thoughts about taking it.
    So whether it's coming out of my own imagination or really coming from
    a horse, I can't lose anything by following it, be decided. It can't hurt to
    keep track of my brothers, and it can't hurt to pad my knees and elbows.
    Ormy head, come to think of it. There's no reason why I can't make a stu
    Pid hat and pad it as well.
    It could actually be that this was a vision of some kind, all indirectly
    caused by his injuries, and brought on by all that strenuous exercise.
    aybe he shouldn't have been surprised that he heard a talking horse;
    maybe he should just be grateful that he didn't hear voices telling him
    to do something really foolish!
    The more he thought about it, the more logical that explanation
    seemed to be. It was certainly more logical than the idea that the Fire
    bird's magic had somehow affected him.
    That idea seemed to prove itself out, as none of the other horses
    seemed at all inclined to speak to him, no matter how hard he coaxed
    them with apples. They simply took his offerings, crunched them up in
    their strong yellow teeth, and went about their business, ignoring his ten
    tative dtteMpts at conversation. Finally, as the sky reddened with sun
    set, he gave up. He didn't have much time to carry out his raid on the
    ol-room if he was going to do it tonight.
    
             THERE was only a single maid in the wool-room, which was a large
             chamber where everything needed to clothe the household was kept,
             ~om unspun and uncombed fleeces and hanks of flax to thread and fin-
             ished cloth, to the rags carefully and thriftily cut from clothing that was
             too worn even to be made over again. They were called "rags" by default,
             but no one in the household would ever dare use these rags for clean-
             ing. Ilousehold rags were made from old sheets and servants' clothing
             nd Undersmocks, but decorative "rags" were cut from the outerwear the
              r and his family and retinue wore. It was the latter that he was after;
             since there were no longer any children in the tsar's immediate house-
    ea       hold, adult clothing that was too worn to be cut down for someone

    




    smaller and too fine to be given to the servants was cut into strips
    turned into ribbons or wider strips to become the bases for bands o
    broldery that could be applied to other garments. He didn't dare
    finished ribbons or embroidered strips, for the tsarina would have
    about that, but if he could get his hands on raw-edged stuff-
     He peeked in the half-open door and spotted a basket full of ex
    what he was after, and while he was at it, it occurred to him that
    the batts of combed wool would make fine padding as well. He hid
    behind the doorframe and watched the maid for a moment. As s
    she turned her back to the door, he moved.
     He sprinted into the room, snatched up the basket of rags waiti
    be worked into ribbons with one hand, and grabbed a roll of wool
    the other. She saw him, but too late. He dashed out of the room
    I . ust as she was turning around, one hand outstretched to stop hi
    mouth forming an indignant little 0.
     Her crics followed him out the door, but by then he was a
    there was no one to catch him. She certainly couldn't run after hi
    dened as she was with heavy skirts, petticoats, and an apron.
     Alone in his room with his booty, he took the largest of the rags',
    wiched wool inside, and made padded bandages out of them.
    an old cap that he padded with wool stuffed into the lining. The re
    the rags he used to decorate the cap and the ends of his band
    the time be was done, he had some very gaudy and odd-look ing
    indeed. For good measure, he found as many odd bits of things
    could in his room, and festooned his bandages with something like a
    ody of a shaman's charms. When be tied them on, he looked as if a
    bad purloined the costumes of a clown and a shaman and h d
    them with his own dress for a most peculiar effect.
     He rattled when he walked, the bits of inferior carvings, but
                                       I
                                       a
    
    antler-tips, and bones clashing together with every moverrien
    wouldn't be possible to sneak around wearing these things,-bi
    wasn't the point; the point was to avoid injury if he could. It would
    take landing wrong to shatter a knee or an elbow, and he was quite
    aware that it had been only luck that had prevented such an injury

    




    st
    as
    
     to
    ith
    am
    her
    
    and
    bur-
    
    and-
     had
     st of
     S; by
    
    tICICS
    
    as he
    a par-
    
    9VPSV
    
    billed
    
    ttons,
    nt. It
    t that
    d only
    tc well
    when
    
    F I R E B I R D    137
    
    his brothers had beaten him. Break a joint and he would effectively lose
    the use of that limb, for not even Ruslan could set such a break with any
    certainty of it healing well. It would never heal correctly, and the best he
    could ever hope for in such a case was that there would be some move-
    ment left in the limb when the splints came off.
     When he was finished, it was very late, and he had completed his work
    mostly by moonlight. No one had come looking for him, so things had
    Ellen out pretty much as he bad expected: The maid had probably re-
    ported the theft, the tsarina undoubtably had thrown up her hands in
    exasperation, and no one had bothered to do anything about such a triv-
    ial infraction. After all he was a fool and fools did thinsys that made no
    
      Their actions were dictated by convoluted reasons of their own
      o sane man could expect to understand.
     He went to bed feeling rather pleased with himself, although he tried
    not to think too hard about the talking horse.
     When he woke the next morning, it was with reluctance, for be had
    dreamed of the Firebird again. This time she was more maidenlike than
    bird, and he had pursued her across an endless landscape as she stayed
    Pst barcl~ out of reach. And yet, she had kept looking back at him every
    time he thought of giving up the chase, as if she was luring him onward.
     He'd had a similar dream the night before, and another, where he sat
    *er a tree while the Firebird sang to him, three nights ago. In between
    
    4ose dreams he'd had the kind he'd expected: dreams of encounters
    with willing and nubile girls, as insatiable as any man could wish; but as
    tinic went on, he dreamed of the Firebird more and more, and of real
    ~vorncn less and less. He had cause to wonder lately just what that meant!
     He sat up in bed and stretched lazily, feeling only minor aches after
    all his running and dancing; he had half-expected to find that he was
    exhaustcd after so prolonged a dream-chase, but in fact, he felt re-
    markabl\ well. I needed that exercise, he decided as he dressed himself
    in his rags and decorated cap. No wonder I've been dragging about; I
    haven't had anything to get my blood stirred up since Ruslan took the
    
    He had to smile as he surveyed as much of himself as he could see by

    




    
    M

    




    138   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    craning his neck around. His elbow- and knee-bands were quite f
    with all the colored streamers and the bits of flotsam dangling
    them. If they were going to call him Fool, he certainly looked the
    So, if I'm going to look the part, let me act the part as well! In high
    its now, he literally danced his way down to the great hall, hoppin
    onto the stove and surveying the place with a lordly air as he drum
    his heels against the stove-front. The servants stared, then averteO
    eyes; the warriors and members of his family did more than stare!
    brothers snickered, the tsarina and her women looked outraged an
    mayed, according to their natures, and his father frowned with all
    foreboding aspect of a thunderstorm. Ivan was not pleased to b
    minded of the condition of his middle son.   i
     He ignored them all, snatching what he wanted to eat from the t
    that the servants carried by. He shortly had quite a feast laid out n
    him on the stove, of buttered bread, apples from the late harvest, a
    chicken-leg. This he ate while he continued to watch the room as I
    were the tsar and not his father. He even issued orders to phan
    courtiers and servants, brandishing his chicken-leg at them the en
    time.
     After a while, when he did nothing else outrageous, the others be
    to ignore him. This was exactly what he had hoped for; he did not re
    their attention by playing his balalaika or dancing, because that was
    what he was after. He finished his meal, tossed the remains to the d
    and lay down on the top of the stove as if for a nap.
     Eventually the great hall was deserted, even by the drudg
    clean up after the meal. That was when he jumped down off the sto
    stripped off his padding, and went to spy on his brothers, choosing G
    gori as the first to follow.
     In a matter of two or three days he had worked out what each of th
    patterns was, and had calculated the best places to be to keep out of th
    way. On the occasions when he couldn't, or when they actuallN cj
    looking for him in order to have some fun at his expense, he was
    ally ready for them.
     No matter what he was doing, he could always turn it into a disp
    of foolery at a moment's notice. Whether he was running or practl'cl

    




    F I R E B I R D    139
    
    with his purloined weaponry, he could make it look as if he
    thought in his head if he was caught. It took a lot of plan
    fore the snow fell, he had an entire repertoire of nonsense
    sert for any occasion and on any cue.
    
    re
    
    an
    a'll
                                         I
                                        Lot
                                        gs,
    
    ive
    ,re-
    
     Mother Galina didn't entirely approve of what he was doing, but she
    had to admit that be didn't seem to have another viable alternative. Rus-
    Ian and Mikail supported him, both with their protection and with fur-
    ther tales to the tsar and the household servants of strange things he was
    supposed to have done and said when they were "caring" for him.
     No more animals spoke to him, which was a decided relief. He decided
    that the incident with the talking horse had been nothing more than a
    waking dream-or even a true dream, and he had only thought he was
    awake.
    
    He even managed to get away with practicing with the heavy sword
    nd Shield in public by pretending to fight his own shadow. When be
    first began his exercises, he deliberately made his movements slow and
    clumsy because the warriors were watching him. Once they tired of the
    novelty of watching the Fool fight his shadow, he moved into real prac-
    tice, feinting and striking against an imaginary opponent. It wouldn't
    have been good enough to keep him in practice if he'd been planning
    real fighting, but it was quite good enough to keep him in sound phys-
    ical condition. The heavy shield and sword built up his arms and shoul-
    ders the way running and dancing built up his legs and back. Soon he
    was in the best physical condition be had ever enjoyed.
     I I(: managed at last to get to the dairy and spend time with Galina,
    and soon the servants stopped trying to chase him away from his other
    refuge. Whal Ruslan and Mikall could not tell him about household gos-
    sip, she could.
     The harvest was soon over, the first snow came and melted, and by
    
    time he had established his new character so thoroughly that hardly
    
    I
    
    anvonc ever referred to him by his real name, except Galina, Ruslan, and
    
    play  I  AFTER a+enuous workout, he was dozing on top of the warm stove
          J
    'Cing    for a moment one day, when three of his brothers entered the other-wise

    




    140   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    deserted great ball. The clatter of metal and heavy footfalls aleTtedh
    and he sat up and watched them warily as they approached the sto
    hoping that they weren't looking for him.
     Unfortunately, they were.
     "Hey, Fool!" Gregori called, with that false joviality that made
    wary these days. "We were all going riding; wouldn't you like tc
    with us?"
     Something about his manner warned Ilya that it would not be a g
    idea to refuse outright, so he tilted his head to one side, stuck his fi,.
    in the corner of his mouth, and looked at his older brother with a-,
    cant a gaze as he could con'ure. "Ah?" he replied. "Go with youl
    brother?" Some of the dogs congregated behind the three, lookingi
    him from between and around the brothers' legs.
     "I said," Gregori repeated, with an edge to his voice that hadn't
    there a moment ago, "do you want to go riding with us?"
     The dog behind Gregori's feet whined, looking up at Ilya with
    ried eyes. The other dogs all looked nervous and uneasy, and Ilya
    blame them. Gregori seemed as if he was in a bad mood today.
     Gregorl's hand clenched, as if he was hoping that Ilya would giv
    an excuse to cuff him. Except that it probably wouldn't stop at ~
    although it wasn't likely to escalate to a full beating. Still-why ris
    that?
     'Ah, ride!" Ilya said brightly. "Ride, sure! I like to ride! Hey!"
     He lumped down off the stove before Gregori had a chance i
    him down, and followed along in Gregorl's wake. He was hopir
    chance to escape, but Mischa and Alexi kept him hemmed in, P
    ing any such notions. They clapped him on the back, staggent
    and laughed at his stumbling. He was very careful, however, not b
    ble into Gregori.
     He felt like a prisoner among them, and wondered what on
    could do to make them entertained enough to let him go,
     They did allow him to stop long enough to cram a coat on
    motley finery, at the same time that they donned their own, but
    all. When the odd procession reached the yard between the Ik
    the stable, there were four beasts saddled and waiting for riders,

    




    F I R E B I R D    141
    
    of them was an old donkey normally used for hauling wood. Riding this
    beast was going to be bad enough, since Ilya's feet were going to drag
    the ground, but he saw that Gregori had a nasty, metal-tipped riding crop
    at his saddlc-bow, and he guessed that his brother intended to sting the
    poor donkey into bucking or bolting as soon as be got into the saddle.
     He stopped where he was, staring at the donkey, wondering how he
    ts going to avoid injury to both of them. He didn't want the donkey
    hurt, for the poor little thing hadn't done anything to deserve 111-
    treatment. And he particularly didn't want himself hurt, which was what
    would happen if the donkey was maddened or frightened by the whip-
    Ping.
     The donkey was already frightened; its eyes showed white all around
    as it strained at its bridle, clearly wanting to escape. It looked at the rid-
    ing crop as Gregori slipped the loop over his wrist as if it knew exactly
    what he intended to do with the whip.
     They're going to make him buck as soon as I'm on top of the poor beast,
    and he won't be able to help it; if they hit the little creature with that crop,
    he'll have to buck!
     The donkey wheezed, rolling its eyes to look at Ilya.
     I'll mount him backwards! If I slap his rump, he'll trot off before they
    can grab the reins, and then I can dump myself off into the bushes!
     That was the best spur-of-the-moment plan he could contrive. He
    shuffled over to the little beast and quickly climbed into the saddle.
    There he perched with his head facing the donkey's tall before his broth-
    ers could do anything about it. Gregorl grabbed for the reins, which had
    been left dangling, but it was already too late. Ilya slapped the donkey's
    rump, and the clever donkey flipped its head, adroitly jerking the reins
    just out of Gregori's reach. The little beast trotted off as fast as it could
    put hoof to ground, heading for the nearest clump of bushes.
     This was possibly the least comfortable way to ride that Ilya had ever
    encountercd. He held on tight to the tall, but the donkey's jerky trot
    combined with the odd riding position jarred his teeth with every step.
     He was going to have bruises in places it didn't bear to think about when
     this was over.
      The. dordcev braved- and that was all the warnin-a Ilva had as it StODDed

    




    142   MERCEDES LACREV
    
    abruptly with its head down between its legs. It stopped complete4_,
    which was more than he was going to do, and he went sliding off
    its neck backward into the bushes. Fortunately, they were junipers,
    not the holly bushes that grew farther along. They were, however, q,
    prickly enough.
     The donkey brayed again as it bolted, heading for freedom as fa!
    its four tiny hooves would take it.
     He flailed around in the embrace of the bushes for a great deal lu
    than was necessary, because all of his brothers, and Gregori in pad
    lar, were laughing so hard they could barely stand upright. Gregori
    braced himself against the doorpost, while the other two were hol
    each other up. Finally Ilya worked himself free of the springy bran
    and stood up with a fatuous smirk. "That was a fine ride, brothers
    said clearly. "Why, I can't recall a better ride nor a finer mount! You i
    join me again some time!"
     That sent them off into another paroxysm, and while, they were I
    ing their sides and wiping tears out of their eyes, he was able to
    jauntily off to the safety of the chapel and the company of Ruslar
     He described what had happened while he picked bits of Jun1P(
    of his clothing and hair.
     "It could have been worse," the old shaman said when he'd fini
    "If that donkey had gotten out to the river and bucked you in-"
     Ruslan shook his head, and Ilya only sighed. "My one saving gi
    that my brothers aren't very bright," he replied. "if they were, 11
    be in very deep trouble."
    
    I LVA woke with a start, his bedding in a knot, and his hair dam
    sweat. He stared off into the darkness for a long time, listening
    heart pound.
     This had been a very disturbing night, full of dreams that le
    aching and frustrated.
     His first set of dreams had all been about women. In the Erg
    something unspecified had happened to Ivan and all of his brothel
    ing him the only heir. He'd been made tsar and was presiding ow

    




    DUt
    
    F I R E B I R D    143
    
    tival at which there were no men, nothing but women, and there wasn't
    ,a single one that was less than pretty. Most of them he didn't recognize;
    
    there were shy, dainty maidens just blooming out of childhood, saucy
    
     girls his own age with tiny waists and flashing blue eyes, and handsome
    older women with the kerchiefs of married matrons covering their golden
     braids. He had been the center of a dance, during which he had part-
     nered each and every female in the dream. All of them had flirted with
     him, the young girls with self-conscious blushes, and the older women
     with lightly veiled promise. He had known, in the dream, that when the
     sun went down, he would be dancing with them in another fashion en-
     tirely.
    The second set of dreams had been even more explicit. He had been
     kidnapped by the Turks because it seemed that he was not Ivan's son,
     but the son of their Great Sultan. He had been presented with four wives
     and a harem of one hundred other beauties-and then the Great Sul-
     tan had sat down with him, telling him that he had something serious
     to speak with Ilya about. "I am old and no longer able to father children,"
     the old man had said sadly, the white beard on his chin wagging comi-
     callv with every word. "You are my only surviving son, and there must
     be other heirs as soon as possible. Ilya, you must go in to your harem
    
              and strive among the women until every one of them carries your child-
              and you must not come out again until you have accomplished this
    'C is     mighty deed!" Then the sultan had taken him to the door of the harem
    )uld      and locked it behind hirn, leaving him alone with a hundred and four
              luscious girls, of all shapes, colors, and types, all dressed in little more
              than beads and scraps of silk.
    ,vitb      That, sadly, was when be woke up. He'd gone back to sleep immedi-
    his       ately, but instead of returning to the harem, he'd dreamed of the Fire-
              bird again. This time, to his disappointment, she was more birdlike than
    him       maiden, and she had carried a ripe cherry in her beak. She had swooped
    
              down toward him and he had opened his mouth like a baby bird-and
              -,~;f ~he was feeding him, she had dropped the cherry into his open
    cam,      ~. I
    leav-     mouth. He could still taste the sweet juice of it
    a fes-     Now that is entirely too strange a dream, he thought, throwing the

    




    144   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    blankets aside. Or rather, trying to throw the blankets aside. He and th
    were so inextricably tangled that he couldn't just throw them off h
    to wrestle with them until he could get free.
     He ran his hands over the tangle and sighed. I am never goi 9
    able to get to sleep again like this. There was only one possible rerri
    and that was to open the shutters and let some moonlight in so that
    could see to straighten his blankets. They didn't let him have a candle
    and striker anymore, for fear he'd set the house afire. If he opened th
    shutters, that would let cold air in, too, but it couldn't be helped.
     Maybe I ought to take to sleeping on the stove at night, too. * * . Wb
    he opened the shutters, a blast of cold air hit him and almost made him
    yelp, which might have awakened someone. It was in biting back that
    reaction that he happened to look down on the windowsill.
     There, on the sill, red-black in the moonlight and shining as if it had
    been polished, was a single ripe cherry. A bead of juice or dew clung to
    the top, where the stem would have been.
     He couldn't stop himself; it was as if he was in a dream, where he ius
    compelled to do something he knew he shouldn't, but his lirnbs,n'
    longer obeyed the commands of his head. He reached out, picked upth
    tiny piece of fruit, and lifted it to his mouth.
    
     When he bit down on it, the juice filled his mouth with sweet4ur
    flavor, exactly as it had in the dream. And, as in the dream, there was no
    stone to this cherry, for some sharp instrument (like a beak?) had already
    extracted it.
     For a brief moment, his entire being filled with euphoria, a heady in-
    toxication that was very similar to the way he'd felt in the orc
    before he'd seen the Firebird.
     First the dream, then the cherry, now the intoxication. What was be
    hind all of this?
     Then the moment passed, leaving him standing in the moonlig
    shivering from the cold breeze entering the window, with a bed to make
    up. And there was no sign of the cherry he'd just eaten except a few lin-
    gering fragrances-they were too fleeting and fugitive to be flavors--ca.
    ressing the back of his tongue.

    




    F I R E B I R D    145
    
     He turned away from the window, put his bed to right, and closed the
    shutters. He felt his way back to the bed and fell into it, fully expecting
    ,,to lie awake for the rest of the night, but in fact the opposite occurred.
    He slept so late that if he had been Ilya instead of "the Fool," he'd have
    gotten into trouble. He didn't remember any dreams, not even frag-
    ments. Not a single girl from either of his previous dreams appeared, even
    for a moment. And since the only girls he was getting these days were
    the ones in his dreams, even in sleep he felt a deep frustration.
     He was still tired when he did wake, and he resolved to be lazy for the
    rest of the morning. He hadn't managed to fasten his shutter properly
    last night, and a cold wind had penetrated into his room, leaving a drift
    of snow on the floor. When he convinced himself to get out of bed, he
    couldn't even have a wash, for the water in his pitcher had frozen. Right
    now, the top of the warm stove sounded very good indeed.
     He dressed carelessly and drooped into the great hall. No one paid any
    attention to him at all; he intercepted a servant with plates of pancakes
    and helped himself, seizing a plate and heaping it high with buttered
    cakes and honey, taking his booty up to his accustomed perch to eat with-
    out disturbance. He was beginning to appreciate that there were ad-
    vantages to being the Fool as well as disadvantages: He could take
    whatever food he wanted, even before the tsar got to taste it, and no one
    rebuked him. fie could set his plate down on top of the stove and his
    food stayed warm for the entire meal.
     It looked as if everyone else had suffered a frustrating night; the war-
     riors all had hangovers from their drinking, his brothers had dark circles
     under their eyes and barked at one another, and even the tsarina was list-
     less, picking at her food without really tasting it.
     That was a shame, since the cooks had made a splendid meal. Of
     course, he'd gotten the best of it; perhaps the cakes that reached the
     tsar's table were cold or burned.
      Well, serve them all right.
     He stuffed himself with pancakes, eating until he couldn't touch an-
     ot~cr morsel. Then, as had become his habit, he tossed the remains to
     the hounds who zathered below him expectantlv, awaitin2 the distribu-

    




    146   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
    tion of what he didn't want. Sometimes he acted as if he were a pr
    distributing alms to them, which the warriors seemed to find scre
    ingly funny.
     The dogs leapt for the fragments as they fell, tails wagging, but
    a minimum of growling. They were in good humor this morning,
    if the humans were not.
     "Not bad!" said one, nosing among the reeds for the pancake bit.
    Boy-on-the-stove is a generous one, there's butter on these cakes! Oh, g
    good,good!"
     "Oh, yes!" chorused another joyfully. "There is butter, you can tast
    smell it! Rich butter, lovely butter! I'd eat a brick if they'd butter it,".
     "I'd eat a log if they'd butter it," a third said wistfully, having
    under the table too late to set a tooth to the coveted pancake fragme
     "I'd eat a featherbed if they'd butter it, " put in a fourth, at which po
    all the hounds laughed as if he had told a tremendous joke.
     "But you already did eat a featherbed, Silk-ear," the first laughed,
    plaining the joke. 'And you did it without butter!"
     Ilya sat very quietly, almost as surprised by what the dog said as
    the fact that it was talking and he could understand it. Ilya recalled
    well the incident in question, and it was a good thing for Silk-ear t
    the tsarina had no clear evidence of the identity of the criminal, or S
    ear would have ended up as part of a meat pie. Or at the very least,
    skin would have become a hawking-glove.
     Ilya felt his mouth falling open, and quickly shut it. He lay do
    the top of the stove, but not for his intended nap. He could hardly
    lieve his ears, but the evidence was incontrovertible.
     He'd heard the dogs talking-not a single horse talking only to
    this time, but all of the dogs, conversing among themselves. As he c
    tinued to listen, it occurred to him that he was actually hearing
    things: the panting and whining of adult dogs, and over the top of t
    the voices speaking in a way he understood. This could not be his in
    playing tricks on him, for there was no way for him to know which
    had ruined the tsarina's featherbed-and there was no reason for
    mind to have recalled that incident.
     He rolled over on his back-still hearing the dogs talking to one

    




    F I R E R I R D    147
    
   .0 er: quarreling briefly over a bit of meat, planning to trip one of the
    servers if they could to get more of the pancakes.
     I must be going mad, he tho
    was the first sign of it. And now
    
                    ught abstractly Hearing the horse-that
                     I'm going mad....
     Fear sent shivers over his body in spite of the warmth of the stove. It
    was one thing to pretend to madness, but quite another to actually
    be mad.
     Ta," said one of the dogs, right below his head. "You have the fear-
    smell, Boy-on-the-stove. "
     He looked cautiously over the edge; one of the borzoi, the white
    ~wlfhounds, was looking up at him, tail wagging slowly.
     "You have the fear-smell," the dog repeated, looking up into his eyes.
    "But there is nothing to be afraid of "
     "I can licar you," he whispered, knowing that the others would only
    take it for more of his lunacy if they heard him.
     Only this time, is it real lunacy?
     "Of course you can hear me, foolish boy," the wolfhound replied im-
    patiently. "You ate the Firebird's gift, I can smell it on your breath. You can
    hear all of us now, if you want to listen. But the fear-smell is disturbing
    the others; if you are going to smell of fear, you should take yourself some-
    where else. "
     With that, the great, graceful dog, marked with a red leather collar as
    the pack-leader, turned and stalked away. Ilya stared after him, too as-

    




    T H E H A RV E S T was over, the frosts turned to snow, the butc
    ing done, and winter was fully upon them. It was still possible to hun
    though, and Ilya's brothers were out every day, bringing back deer a
    bear, rabbits and duck and geese, boar and great white-winged swa
    if they intended to single-handedly denude the forest, fields, and
    of game. Perhaps they were taking out their own frustrations and inge
    on nature, since they could no longer do so on Ilya.
     Breakfast was over, the brothers were gone, and Ilya reclined on tbe
    top of the stove, vaguely aware that there was some excitement among
    the animals, but too sleepy after a night of Firebird-chasing dreams to
    pay too much attention. Slowly, gradually, he had come to accept flidt
    he could hear and understand what animals said-and that if he was~
    little crazy, at least it was a useful kind of madness.
     The dogs tended to get excited about very minor things, so he
    too concerned about what they had to say this morning. They were'
    bering to one another now about preparations for a feast, but to the dogs,
    almost any large meal looked like a feast. Any time hunting was good
    and it looked as though more than one kind of meat was going be
    servcd-particularly if it was game with large bones that they wol~d get
    to chew when the humans were done-they thought it was a fea
     He liked the dogs, on the whole, but he had discovered that,_14 lai,
    to make allowances for them. They were quite kind and protective wh
    
    148

    




    F I R E B I R D    149
    
    he was concerned, and careful about keeping him informed of the state
    of his brothers' tempers, but they weren't too bright, and they had trou-
    ble remembering anything that took place more than a week ago. In a
    dog's world, only three states existed: "now," "in a while," and "forever."
    If someone left, he was gone "forever," and when he returned they re-
    iced as much as if he were back from the dead precisely because he'd
    
    been gone "forever." This would have been sad if they hadn't existed in
    a state of continuous optimism, certain that something good was going
    to happen in the next few moments. It took a lot, Ilya had learned, to
    break a dog's spirit. Not even his brothers had managed; only continu-
    ous and unrelenting cruelty could do it, and bad as they were, his broth-
    ers just weren't able to sustain that level of cruelty.
     But when the cats started to gossip, Ilya woke from his half-doze and
    took notice. The cats never paid attention to anything that the humans
    did unless it was new and different.
    ~, "so what do you think Kicks-at-everything told Cries-a-lot?" the cat on
    the bench in front of the stove told the tabby that had 'ust leapt up to
    Pin Ilya. "Kicks-at-everything" was Ivan, of course, and "Cries-a-lot" was
    thetsarina, who used tears in a futile effort to get her own way. "He said
    they'd found a mate for one of the Monsters!"
     "No!" gasped the cat cuddling up beside Ilya, her eyes going round
    with astonishment. The "Monsters" were Ilya's brothers, a category from
    which he ~N as excluded. The cats bad adopted the dogs' name for him
    of "Bov-on-the-stove. " "You don't say!" the tabby continued. "Who would
    be stupid enough to send them a mate? The Monsters should have been
    birth, not allowed to grow up and then mated!"
    
    first cat, a privileged female who was allowed to grace the tsarina's lap
    I)ecause she was pure white, graceful, and had exquisite manners. "But
    they are both very excited. The mate 1 1 s coming soon, they said. Already there
    is excitement in the kitchen, and soon there will be much food."
    Ilva slipped down off the stove and left it to the cats; the white one
    )umped up to join her friend in a cozy gossip-session, casting Ilya a look
    of gratitude for his consideration in making room for her. They didn't
    
    "I don't know, but it must have been someone very far away," said the
    
    ad

    




    ISO   MERCEDES LAC16EV
    
    have anything more of interest for him, since their speculations, li
    those of the dogs, had gone on to possible feasts and what might b
    filched from the kitchen or table during the confusion.
     The tsar had found a wife for one of his brothers! That was fairly am
    ing-and it couldn't possibly be for any of the three oldest, since a \1
    would bring lands as her dowry, which would make them technicall i
                                            y
    dependent of Ivan. The tsar would never give them that much
    tive to rebel, not after Pietor's defection. So it must be for one of t C
    younger boys. Alexi, perhaps? Or Boris? Surely not Yuri
     Well, there was one way to find out; if the dogs and cats knew, th
    place for word to come would be among the tsarina's women, wV o
    gossip to their maids, who would take it to the rest of the women o t
    household. It was time to head for the kitchen. Orders would already a'
    been given to start baking-a wedding would mean a series of feasts, a
    much of the baking would have to be done ahead of time or there wo
    never be enough bread, buns, and cakes. By now, the kitchen-staff Woul,
    not only know why, they would probably have most of the details.
     Ilya dawdled, even though be wanted to go there directly, because a
    fool never did anything directly He happened to pass by a door and
    peeked out because it was the sort of thing a fool would do, and saw wit
    out much surprise that a light snow was falling, adding a new dusting
    white to the layer already on the ground. Well, the cats were right about
    one thing-this new bride would probably be arriving very soon, if she
    was going to travel at all before spring.
     He was a regular fixture in the kitchen now; he wandered throug the
    orderly chaos, being avoided by the servants and cursed absently "h 11
    he could not be avoided, until he got to his special kitchen-corner b,
    the baking ovens. On his way there he filched a honey-cake from a tray
    left to cool, also because it was expected of him. The head cook swung
    her wooden spoon at his snatching fingers and missed, then went In, wit
    her conversation as if she had swatted at a fly rather than a person,
     "So when he went off to the horse-fair, old Ivan managed to find not
    only a boyar with nothing but one daughter to wed off, but one who was
    stupid enough to wed the girl to one of his sons?" the chief cook laughed.
    "If I hadn't heard it from you, Anastasia, I wouldn't have believed it. r'

    




    e
    
    d
    
    a
    d
    
    ut
    lic
    
    he
    en
    by
    ray
    ng
    ith
    
    F I R E B I R D    151
    
     "Well, if the rest of what I've heard is true, it's not surprising the old
    man is trusting her to little Boris," the maidservant said, taking a bite
    from a currant-bun and speaking through a mouthful of bread. "They
    say she looks like a sow, with the temper of a mouse, and has the brains
    of a goose. Even with her dowry, they say he couldn't get anyone but Ivan
    to take her. No one else is that desperate."
     "Or that cunning," the cook retorted. "That's one boy that won't have
    to be provided for, and the lands are too far away for Ivan to have to worry
    about his son going to war against him or running home to escape his
    wife."
     Ilya finished his cake and drifted back out, but a strange sadness
    
    made him seek his room rather than going back to his spot on the stove.
    ust at the moment, he didn't want to be around people at all.
    
                 find himself shackled to a fat, ugly, timid, and
    stupid bride! Ilya felt more sorry for the girl than for his brother. Wed-
    
    not
    
    to make much of a change in Boris's habits,
    
    and it was entirely possible that his dear brother would start looking for
    11 s to eliminate the boyar himself as soon as he settled in with his new
    
    fide. He certainly wasn't going to stop chasing girls, and Ilya doubted
    that he'd visit his bride's bed for longer than it took to get a son on her.
       opened the shutters iust a crack, wrapped blankets around his
    shoulders, and sat watching the snow fall.
    It was barely possible that the boyar wasn't just desperate, he was cun-
    ning too, more cunning than Ivan. After all, accidents could happen to
    anyone. Once Boris produced a son, he was-well-superfluous. It would
    be supremely ironic for Boris to be plotting to get rid of his father-in-
    law whilc the father-in-law was plotting to be rid of Boris. Old age and
    treachery will overcome youth and treachery every time, Ilya thought cyn-
    ically. The old ones have had more experience, and it wouldn't take much
    to be smarter than Boris.
    Oh, what a family he had, that he should be thinking these things!
    He wished, as he had often wished in the past, that he had been born
    into a common household. Ivan might have even been a good father, if
    he hadn't had land and wealth. If he'd been a simple warrior, for instance,
    he would have welcomed the birth of each son as an addition to his

    




    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    fighting-force, and he would have
    
                        trained them all to work together in
    stead of plotting against one another. We'd have been quite a force
    reckon with, Ilya thought wistfully, as he imagined what they all woul
    have looked like, armored-up and standing behind Ivan, shouldcr-to
    shoulder. We'd have had our pick of loot and girls-we could hav:
    fighting the Turks instead of the neighbors. We could have had song
    ten about us, and maybe even gone into the service of the Great Tsar.
    cha would have been our champion, I would have been the one to negotia'
    our fee-it could have been good.
     Ivan could have done that in any case; he could have seen his s
    assets and protection instead of rivals as greedy as he was. Ivan an
    eight sons could have become legends, the sort that fathers told t
    children about to show them how important loyalty was. But Ivan
    been born greedy, and he'd grown up greedy and wanting more, seein
    rivals even in his own sons for the wealth and land he'd accumulated
    Ilya sighed. Granted, his life had been comfortable, but he would hav
    traded any amount of comfort for a life with fewer enemies among hi
    own kin.
     He certainly felt sorry for the poor girl who was coming into this
    no notion of what she was about to get involved with. Even if she'd bee
    clever and pretty, it would have been bard on her; Boris had plenty o
    clever, pretty girls to tumble, and he didn't have to go out of his V,~Y t
    please any of them. To tame Boris to her hand, she'd have had to be stuii
    ningly beautiful, clever and intelligent, and far more cunning and craft
    than anyone here. Ugly and stupid-well, he could only hope that sh
    was too stupid to be made unhappy by this, that she was so stupid tha
    the mere possession of a matron's status and a wedding band woul
    please her, because Boris certainly wasn't going to.
    
    THE new bride, Katya, arrived with her father and his escorts,
    weeks later, just before noon, in a light snowstorm. Since her father Wa
    a mere boyar, Ivan was not going to unbend an inch to meet them ou
    side; he set himself and his family up in the great hall with the un
    bridegroom firmly at his side, between himself and the tsarina. %fin
    with them were all the wedding guests Ivan had invited, and most of th

    




    I&
    19,
    
    F I R E B I R D    153
    
    household. It made for quite a crowd, and there were servants peeking
    in from every doorway. Ilya watched their reception in the great hall from
    
    I his place on the stove
    
     First came the boyar's escort, with tokens of the dowry and gifts for
    the tsar and his family; older men with long beards and serious expres-
      s, they brought in rolls of legal contracts that Ivan barely glanced at,
      h was hardly surprising since he couldn't read, and lists of the prop-
      s that would be settled on the bride which he also ignored Every-
    
    ing that need d to be read be quickly passed on to the steward, who
    
    could read, and who would see to it that everything that had been agreed
      n 11111C fbprp Mnrp fr% the oint nt this moment so far as the tsar was
    
    fine gifts, which Ivan seized with greed. The gifts
    
    were quite generous-silver goblets for himself and the tsarina, a belt of
    silver for himself and a massive necklace of amber and silver for the tsa-
    
    rina, a fine sword for Boris, and fur coats for the other sons.
    
    When Ilya saw that last, a little of his family's greed rubbed off on
    him. Ile knew very well that if Ivan bad anything to say about it, Ilya
    would never see so much as a scrap of fur. I need that coat! I haven't had
    a new coat In years, and no one is going to waste one on me now that I'm
    the Fool! Ile clenched his law and was determined that he should have
    his share. Ile jumped down off the stove and made his way through the
    crowd, rcaching the wedding-party just as the boyar arrived at the last
    
    coat with no more sons being in evidence. "But don't you have seven sons
    
    still?" the boyar began, puzzled.
    
    "Yes but-" Ivan reached for the coat. "I'll "
    
    Ilya gavc a great whoop and leapt forward, snatching up the coat and
    
    whirling it into a dance before throwing it over his shoulders.
    
    "This inust be the bride!" he crowed, giving the astonished boyar a
    
    smackina kiss. Whoo, Boris! She s a saucy one! Me 11 set you a
    
    c
    as
    ut-
    asy
    ing
    the
    
    pretty dance, for sure!"
    
     He turned to the poor, bewildered girl and seized her hand, pumping
    it with great enthusiasm. Poor thing; she was just as ugly and fat as she'd
    been painted, and from the dull, dazed look in her eyes, just as stupid
    as well. "NVelcome to the familv. Par)a! " he shouted. "We'll be Oad to
    
    e that pretty girl among us, you bet!'

    




    154   MERCEDES LACREV
    
                J
    
     Then he capered off, back to the stove, where he took off his coat a
    pillowed his head on it while the entire company stared. There had
    been such a profound silence in the great hall since the day that Pie
    rebelled and ran off.
     The tsarina cleared her throat in the silence. "That is the middle s
    Ilya," she said, with a malicious glance at Ivan. "I fear he is rathe
    simple."
     'An accident! A blow to the head, and he lost his wits!" the tsar p
    claimed hastily, as the boyar began to look as if he was thinking twi
    about this particular bargain. 'A terrible thing, but it could have ha
    pened to anyone, and as you can see, the rest of my boys are a fine set
    strapping, handsome, healthy fellows-especially young Boris here...
     Ilya lounged at his leisure, ignoring the stares of the strangers a
    Ivan's near-frantic cajolery He had mastered the art of seeming to sta
    at the ceiling while watching the room out of the corner of his eye. Iva
    was certainly dancing a merry jig, trying to salvage the situation! The ts
    rina wasn't helping, either; she kept inserting little comments abou
    "poor Ilya" that were intended to alarm rather than to soothe. And if th
    boyar had really cared anything about his daughter, the wedding woul
    probably have been canceled right then and there.
     But Ilya had been watching the party carefully, and had the feellin
    that there was more than met the eye here. His suspicions were con
    firmed when the boyar launched into a speech that sounded suspicious
    rehearsed, just as Ivan began outlining the festivities to come.
     "My friend," the boyar said, his face a mask of mock-regret, "I f
    that I must return to my lands and leave my dear daughter in \7
    hands. It breaks my heart not to see her wed-but terrible disasters oc-
    curred Just before we left, and I cannot even stay the night. Had this
    blessed event not been of such great import to both our faniflics, I
    should have asked you to postpone it until spring, but I know I can trust
    you to do all that is proper. . . ."
     As the tsar stood there with his mouth agape in shock, the boyar con-
    tinucd on in the same vein, edging toward the door as he spoke. He had
    obviously had this planned from the beginning, although the poor
    daughter clearly had no idea that this was going to happen, and stood,

    




    F I R E 8 a R D    155
    
   re bling, clinging to the arm of her elderly maid with her face going
    otcby as she suppressed tears.
     So dear Boris is not to go live with his father-in-law after all! The boyar
    is much cleverer than my father-
     , And of course, in the spring, when our children are ready to start their
    own household on their new lands, we will be prepared to help them
    build their new home, the home they will share together-"
     Which means that there is no house on those lands, no servants, no serfs,
    no livestock. No farms, perhaps? It makes one wonder-wide acreage is a
    fine thing, provided it isn't all swampland, or likely to flood at the light-
     t rain, or so full of rocks it's impossible to plow-and now, I must bid you all farewell. No, we cannot waste another
           t that we return-" With that and other such protesta-
           tions, the boyar and his men detached themselves from the wedding
           partv and all but ran out the door, leaving the tear-streaked, confused
           bride, her party of servants-a couple of dim-looking fellows who might
           have been kitchen-boys conscripted to play guards, and a single, elderly
           lady-in-waiting-and a pile of wedding gifts. And Ivan, who had gath-
           ered all of his relatives and allies as witnesses, was left to try and make
           the bes~t of it. Silence as thick as a midwinter snowfall descended on the
           great hall, broken only by the whiny sniffling of the bride.
     Before Ivan could say or do anything, the sound of rapidly retreating
     hoofbeats told everyone there just how eager the boyar had been to
     make his escape.
      Ivan turned red, then white, then red again-and strangely enough,
     it was the tsarina who salvaged the situation.
      "Well!" she said brightly. "I am sure that it is unfortunate for Katya's
    poor, dear father to have to return so quickly to his own land, but that
    is no reason why all of us should not celebrate such a wonderful occa-
    sion as fully as if he was here with us in body, as I am certain he is in
    spirit!" She left Ivan's side and took the arm of the unfortunate maiden,
    who timidly allowed herself to be led forward. "Come, Katya! " she pro-
    claimed in ringing tones. "You shall have the place of honor beside me!"
    She led the girl to the head table and sat her in the place her own chief
    iE Ldy usually had, leaving Ivan and Boris to sullenly take their own seats.

    




    156   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    "Let the feast begin!" she called gaily, quite taking over the proceedin
    as the remainder of Katya's escort was left to find their own seats amo
    Ivan's people.
     The poor maiden's blotchy face and dim eyes brightened a bit at t
    sigbt of all the food. Ilya acted as be was expected to, snatching wh
    he wanted from the platters being carried by. At this point, several of t
    servants had made it a habit to pause briefly beside the stove to give him
    a chance to snatch; Ilya bad the feeling that it tickled their fancy that
    the Fool got his pick before the tsar did. Before long, Ilya had his plate
    full of goodies, and could sit back in the shadows, munching and watch-
    ing at his leisure.
     Ivan was furious, that much was obvious. He knew now that he'd been
    duped, that the boyar had dumped an unwanted and unmarriageaNe
    daughter on him. He couldn't read the dowry list or the deeds.,t,$the
    property, but he probably figured it was worth about as much a4tb'e
    daughter, no matter what it said on the paper. He wasn't going to get q
    of Boris without a fight, if that was the case, for Boris was hardly goi*
    to relish going off to build his own house in the middle of a swamp or
    field full of rocks. That meant, instead of getting rid of a son, Ivan m
    now stuck with a useless cow of a daughter-in-law.
     But Ivan was never one to give up, especially not when he'd been got-
    ten the better of. He had revenge as a motive now, and as the evening
    wore on, Ilya saw the signs that his brain was stirring. It might take him
    a while to work it out, but by spring, he'd have found a way to get back
    at the boyar.
     Boris, meanwhile, was just as furious and disgusted as well. Ilya didn't
    know what the tsar had told him about his prospective bride, but he'd
    bet it was nothing like the reality sitting at his mother's left hand. At
    this point, he was trying to think of a way to get rid of the girl and get
    back at his father, but Boris's brains were duller than Ivan's, and he
    probably wouldn't have an answer before Ivan did.
    
     The tsarina was in her element, full of malicious en'oyment. She Wa
                                    I      . 5
    the happiest person in the hall at this point. She had a palace full of peo
    ple here to impress, and Ivan wouldn't dare do anything to her until they
    were gone, or all the festivities would grind to a halt and make him look
    
                                           j

    




    F I R E B I R D    157
    
    I even more a fool than he did already She and she alone had the power
     to turn this fiasco into something better than it was, and she knew it.
     The new bride was worse than anyone had dreamed, and that meant that
     she would not be eclipsed in her own home by the newcomer; not even
     awedding-day was going to make this girl shine, and the real star of the
     wedding would be the tsarina. Assuming the girl could actually do any-
     thing besides eat, the tsarina could make another handmaiden out of
     her. This might well be the happiest moment in her marriage to Ivan,
     for she had some splendid new gifts, and if she managed to turn this dis-
     aster into any kind of celebration so that people forgot or overlooked the
     fact that Ivan had clearly been duped, Ivan would be in debt to her. For
     once, she had the upper hand, and she was going to use that power for
     all she was worth.
     The other brothers were Jabbing one another with their elbows and
     making pig-faces (and probably grunting noises), united in relief that
     they weren't the ones being married off to Katya.
          for the bride herself, she was finding solace for her vague
    
    a
    s
    
     9
    in
    ck
    
    .n't
    
    ,Metsm her plate, literally innaling everything that landed on it. She re-
    fIlse
       tj iing, and the tsarina smiled poisonously as she heaped the girl's
    piate from every platter that came to the head table.
    Poor thing, Ilya thought more than once as he watched the scene being
    played out in front of him. Poor, poor thing. She has no idea what she's
    gotten involved in. Boris will marry her; he'll have no choice in the matter,
    unless some family disaster here makes it impossible. And short of some-
    one dying or the barns burning down, I can't see that happening. I hope
    she doesn't fall in love with him, but I'm afraid she's going to, and unless
    Father finds a way to convince him, I doubt that the marriage is evergoing
     opnsummated. I'll bet he spends his bridal night with one of the shep-
    herdesses.
    Somconc-probably the elderly lady-in-waiting-had taken pains to
    make Katya presentable. Sadly, it was a lost cause. Her hair, lank and thin,
    was of no color at all, and twining her braids around her head and sur-
    mounting her hair with a round headdress only made her head look
    rounder. Her face, puffy and vacant, was the color of dough, and her tiny
    eves resembled a r)a *r of currants sunk deer) into it. Her nose was red and

    




    Ass   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    turned up at the tip, her mouth large, her teeth bad, probably from eat-
    ing too many sweets. The fine blue wool tunic she wore strained o
    her pillow-breasts and barely contained the rest of her. Her clothl
    could have been cut down to fit three of the tsarina's women, and li
    had to wonder if that was exactly what the tsarina had in mind in bein
    so superficially kind to her. Would Katya's wardrobe shrink, as t
    wardrobes of the tsarina and her ladies grew?
     No matter what happened here, Katya was the one who would suffe
    the most, and she was the one who deserved it the least.
     Ilya lost his appetite, and decided to take himself into the kit
    He slid down off the stove, taking his platter and his new fur coat wi
    him. He might want the former, and he knew that if he abandoned t
    latter, someone would happily purloin it. He slid deftly and silenth- i
    between the hurrying servants, not playing the Fool because
    
    wouldn't notice in their hurry, and tucked himself into the corner C.
    side the m cii,
     Here in the kitchen at least, people were acting more normally. There
    wasn't the high-pitched, nervous chatter that there was out in the great
    hall, as Ivan's people tried to guess which way Ivan would jump, a
    strangers tried to make the best of a miserable situation. As platters came
    back from the hall, the servants seized them and divided the conten
    among themselves according to some arcane system only they unde
    stood. Here where people were talking normally, even laughing and e
    joying themselves, Ilya was able to relax, too, and reapply himself to his
    food.
     "Holy Mother, did you see that bride?" someone said, causing a flurry
    of laughter to erupt.
     "I'd say Ivan got a bargain," someone else called. "He's got t
    wenches in one for Boris! Too bad be can't divide her up and
    Alexi and Yuri too!"
     "She's easy to please, at any rate," one of the younger ser i I
    pipcd up. "No turning up her nose at anything we've served her, and n
    complaints that something's a bit burned or the like. In fact, I don't thifl
    I've heard her say two words all night."

    




    F I R E B I R D    159
    
     "Well, I've been serving her escort, and they say the boyar's got a pretty
    little widow with property back at his home that he wants to wed, but
    she wouldn't share the house with the girl," said another in a carrying
    voice. "That's why he's hurrying back, and not some disaster at home,
    unless it would be that the widow would marry elsewhere while he's
    gone-the sooner home, the sooner wedded and bedded, and he's look-
    ing to make himself a son as fast as he can get himself between the
    sheets."
     "Oooh! Won't that be one in the eye for Ivan!" The cook herself
    chuckled. "Mark my words, he's been planning on getting the boyar's
    lands for Boris; now all he'll have is a great lump of uncooked dough and
    whatever bits of howling wilderness her father fobbed off on him!"
     The kitchen was taking as much malicious pleasure in Ivan's down-
    fall as the tsarina, and with as much cause.
     So, the poor girl was as unwanted at home as she was here. Ilya felt
    even more sorry for her. For once there was going to be someone who
     S more despised in the palace than he was, and from the sound of it,
    
    urry
    
    her fither didn't care any more for her than her father-in-law did. Small
    wonder she took refuge in her food.
    
    THREE days of festivities had been scheduled before the wedding;
    everyone knew it, and Ivan could hardly get by with less. Boris stamped
    around with a face as black as a thundercloud, the rest of the brothers
    
    er-
    cn-
    his      inade every kind of tasteless joke imaginable, and the bride was so shy
             in the company of nothing but strangers that she would have hidden be-
             Iiind her maidservant if it had been possible. In a pretty girl, such shy-
             ness would have been sweet; in Katya, it was ludicrous and exasperating.
             It was hard to tell if Katya really understood how matters stood, or if she
             was just incredibly timid.
              The first day was supposed to be a day of games and contests among
             the young men-mock-fights, tests of strength and endurance, all de-
             signed to make Boris look valiant, young, strong, and show him off like
             a hot stallion. But Boris did not deign to participate, although the prizes
             were good. Instead, he stood by himself on the sidelines, with his arms
    
    hree
    V off
    
    -girls
    d no
    think
    
    .1

    




    160   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    crossed and his hat pulled low over his eyes, while he glowered at all a
    sundry. The rest of the young men ran and jumped, tossed Javelins
    targets and battled in the snow with a will, while the poor, fat brid
    watched them without comprehension and bestowed the prizes with a
    trembling, pudgy hand when her maidservant prompted her. Rolled
    in a cape of white wolf and ermine, she looked like a snowbank hers
    Ilya, bundled warmly in his new coat and festooned with gaudy rags a
    his ridiculous hat, hung about the sidelines and watched his brothers
    carefully, figuring that their minds were already tuned to mischief, a
    waiting to see if he or the new bride was going to be the target.
     They were indeed plotting trouble; the first prank that they devised
    was one he could do nothing about, though it was extremely cruel.
    Singly and together, they got the bride alone for a few moments and as-
    sured her that Boris was madly in love with her, and that the reason he
    was so sullen and quiet was because he was so overcome by passion
    her that he didn't know what to say or do in her presence.
     Now, Ruslan had always told Ilya that every woman, no matter how
    ugly, wants to believe that a man somewhere could love her, and p
    Katya was no exception. So when Boris's brothers, all but the Fool, ca
    to her assuring her with every possible oath that Boris, golden, han(4o
    Boris, was inad for her-well, given her extraordinary stupidity,~how
    could she not believe them? It was a tale of magic come true for t a,
    and unlike Ivan's family, she believed in magic.
     The fruits of their labor manifested that very night, at the feas , a
    followed the games. In an attempt to make herself beautiful in the eyes
    of her betrothed, Katya succeeded only in making a spectacle of herse
    Festooned with enough necklaces and bracelets to open a small shop,
    pudgy hands covered with rings, with her lank, colorless hair braided wit
    rcd silk ribbons and wearing a scarlet-embroidered skirt and tunic, top
    ping it ail with a gaudy shawl worthy of a gypsy, with fringes twice
    long as any other woman's, she attracted stares and snickers the inorne
    she entered the room. And small wonder: She resembled nothing so f
    much as one of the egg-shaped nesting-dolls given to little girls to p ]a
    with. And oh, how she flirted and coquetted with Boris, who kept t,

    




    F I R E B I R D    161
    
    that
    eyes
    rsclf -
    shop,
    with
    top-
    ice as
    ment
    ing so
    o play
    pt tak
    
    ing horrified glances at her and seeking salvation in the bottom of his
    wine cup.
     But Ivan was in better humor with Katya and her father tonight; he'd
    had the deeds of the land she'd been dowered with examined carefully
    by his steward and a few of his poorer relatives-all people so impover-
   ed and dependent on his goodwill that he felt safe in taking them into
    confidence. Although all of it was wilderness, most of it was not
    swamp. It was, in fact, very valuable hardwood forest, and the source of
    all the skins for the fabulous fur capes and coats that Katya owned and
    that had been given as gifts. So he encouraged the poor girl in her delu-
    sions, filling her cup over and over again with particularly potent honey-
    wine, Joking crudely about the kind of husband that Boris would make.
    Ilya cringed, and left the room early; the girl was drunk before the meal
    was half over, making a clumsy fool of herself, and unaware that people
    ~\ere choking down their laughter with their food.
    It was obvious to Ilya that his brothers bad found an entirely new and
    novel target for their humor. He would have liked to speak with either
    Ruslan or Father Mikall about the situation, but Ruslan was temporar-
    ily banished to the woods, because the boyar and all his people were
    sturdy Christians, and Father Mikail was taken up with the preparations
    for the wedding. There was no one he could turn to for advice. Mother
    Galina was completely uninterested in Katya's fate.
    It was a real pity for the girl's sake that Ivan hadn't arranged to wed
    her to Ilya instead of Boris. Not that even the boyar would have put up
    with having a fool for a son-in-law-his expression had made that much
    ~Icar when Ilya had pulled his own little prank to get his coat. But Ilya
    would at least have been kind to the poor thing, and tried to see to it
    thit his brothers didn't torment her too much.
      I would have taken her away to her dower-land, even in the middle of
     winter, even if we had to live in a wooden hut, he thought glumly. Per-
     haps if she was happy, she wouldn't need to eat so much. Certainly hav-
     ing to work as hard as any peasant in the winter would slim her down!
     If she wasn't the girl of Ilya's dreams, he would at least have kept his
      cs with the peasant-girls discreet-unlike Boris, who would proba-

    




    162   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    bly send her out of the bed-chamber so he could use it with one of his
    Icnian!
     He decided to stroll around the palace in the dark; it wasn't really dar,
    outside tonight-there was a full moon and the moonlight reflecti
    from the snow made it almost as bright as day.
     A peal of laughter rang out from the great hall, and Ilya had no d
    who had caused it. Poor Katya!
     The great wolfhound, chief of the pack, J*oined him in his stroll.
    new fat one is kind," he remarked to Ilya. "I'm glad she's here. She
    bones for us, and slips us bits of good things under the table. "
     Ilya looked down on the borzoi's long, lean head, and the dog's gre
    liquid eyes looked up at him. "She's going to need friends like you a
    the rest," he told the wolfhound. "No one else likes her, and the one they
    mean to mate her with hates her."
                                            sa
    
     The dog wasn't surprised, for nothing much surprised a dog-it re-
    quires imagination to be surprised, and as Ilya had learned, they, hadn't
    any. "Stupid, " he remarked. "If they're going to mate her, they should trea
    her properly. Fat ones make good mothers. "
     "'Well. if Boris has anything to sav about it
    
                               I she won't get the chance
    to prove that," Ilya replied sourly. "You dogs ought to keep her company
    if you can. She'll be good to you."
     The borzoi snorted agreement, then caught the scent of some&ng
    interesting off in the direction of the river and loped off to inves4ate.
    Ilya continued his walk, ignored by the guards.
     If only she wasn't so stupid. He would have been happy to let her in
    on his secret and at least keep her company if she hadn't been so a
    pallingly stupid! He would have been glad to have someone besid
    Galina, Ruslan, and Mikail to talk to, but there wasn't much doubt that
    her head was as empty of thoughts as a blown egg.
     When does pity call for self-sacrifice? he asked himself, as he tr
    through the snow. I feel sorry for her, but-the only way to keep her frQm
    my brothers'pranks is to put myself in their way, and I'm not sure nt
    to do that.
     Then again, this was supposed to be the poor creature's we
    festival, the one time in her life when she should have a little hap

    




    nce
    any
    
    ing
    ate.
    
    er in
    
    iap-
    s des
    that
    
    dged
    from
    want
    
    ding-
    iness.
    
    F I R E B I R D    163
    
     uld it hurt him so much to try and give her that? It could be his
    wedding-gift to her, though she wouldn't recognize it and wouldn't ap-
    preciate it. The Holy Virgin Herself knew that, as soon as the wedding
    was over and Katya found out just how much Boris detested her, she
    would be made thoroughly miserable.
     Let her have her happiness for a little. Even if that happiness is based
    on a lie. It could be worse for her. At least she's so fat that if Boris takes a
    stick to her, it probably won't hurt her as much as it would a thinner girl.
    He winced at that cruel thought. Well, maybe I can save her from that,
    too. If it looks as if Boris is going to beat her, I'll get him to chase me until
    he's tired. Blessed Elijah knows I can outrun any of them now, I've had so
    much practice at it. He looked up at the sky and the stars. I hope you've
    noticed this, Holy God! I hope you're paying attention! Because I think I
    should have earned a chance to escape from here myself with all of this!
     With those virtuous resolutions firmly in his heart, he went straight
    to his bed. He couldn't get the girl out of the trouble she'd woven for
    herself tonight, but at least he could start "protecting" her in the
    morning.
     And in the morning, he set straight out to do just that-only to dis-
    cover that events had conspired against him. Or perhaps they bad con-
    spired with him, since his intention had been to make himself a target.
    There seemed to be an unusual amount of noise as he made his way
    toward the great hall for his breakfast, and when he arrived there, he
    found out why. A wedding meant many feasts, including the great feast
    following the ceremony itself, and Ivan was no longer inclined to im-
    povensh himself and deplete his stores of pork, beef, and fowl to pro-
    vide those feasts. Last night after Ilya had left, Ivan had declared that
    there would be a great hunt, or rather, series of hunts, the next day, to
    provide the gathered throng with wild game for their tables. Virtually
    every man and even some of the women had greeted this announcement
    ~vith a mingling of pleasure and relief-tempers were getting short as the
    tension around Ivan and Boris mounted. The folk in Katya's entourage
    found her behavior embarrassing, yet also felt guilt over not defending
    her; anyone who was out on the hunt wouldn't have to sit and watch her
    continue to make a fool of herself.

    




    164   RIERCEDES LACKEV
    
     Every ridable horse in the stables was being saddled, all the dog-pack
    were ready and waiting out in front of the palace, and the hunters were
    catching a quick breakfast before going out ahorse or on foot to denude
    the countryside of game. Those servants who had no duties were going
    to course hare and rabbit. Lesser nobles were setting out afoot aftcr
    game-birds. Those who were older, not so strong, and the women were
    taking the falcons to hunt flying game as well. One group of foolhardy,
    daring young men was going after bear. The rest were making up several
    mounted parties to chase deer and boar. The great hall was full of hearty,
    shouting men-and a sprinkling of women, lust as hearty, if a bit more
    genteel. Even the space in front of the stove was crowded with a parq
    of strangers, one of the groups Ivan had invited to the wedding. Ilya was,
    about to retire to the dairy to ask advice of Mother Galina when hands
    seized both his elbows and he found himself sandwiched between Sasha,
    
     "So, Fool, care to join us on the hunt?" Mischa asked, baring his teeth
    in a feral smile. "I see you've got your coat and your knife-I think youl
    must be."
     Ilya let his jaw go slack. "Hunt? For what do we hunt?" He grinn)
    vapidly. "I know a place where there is a handsome flock of fish grazing;
    we could bag us a fine catch of fresh salmon out in the meadow!"
     He wasn't about to get off that easily this morning. The brothers were
    obviously in a savage humor and looking for something to torment. Per-
    haps Ivan had warned them off Katya until the wedding was oveL
      We're hunting boar, little brother," Mischa replied silkily, his eyes nar-
    rowing as lie feigned a feral smile. "Don't you want to hunt boar? Y(6-4
    certainly like to cat it."
     I le nodded violently, hoping to appear cooperative, and thinking tfi
    God must have been listening a bit too closely to his thoughts last nigh, J~
    "Sure, boar! I can hunt boar! Just you watch me! I'm the best boar-hunter'
    in Rus! I kill boar bare-handed! I kill bear boar-handed! Just you watch!"
     "Good." Together, Mischa and Sasha propelled him through the
    crowd and out into the thin light of early morning, where a group of sad-
    dled horses was waiting. Before Ilya had a chance to say or do anythi
    
    and Mischa.
    
    I

    




                       F I R E B I R D    165
    
    he found himself up in the saddle, with Sasha at one foot and Mischa
    at the other. They were tying his legs to the stirrups, a move he found
    altogether disquieting.
     "Ho, brothers!" he said, trying to sound jovial, "My boots are fine, they
     n't need polishing!"
     "Relax, little brother," Mischa replied with a savage grin. "We're just
    making sure you'll get your chance to kill the boar. This way, the horse
    won't throw you off when he sees the boar and tries to run."
     It was then that be saw that the horse they had put him on was one
    of the most skittish in the berd: young, just broken to saddle this year,
    and quite likely to be spooked by almost anything.
     Except that it was also his friend from the apple-orchard, and this
    horse, at least, bad his best interests at heart.
     "Don't worry, boy," the horse said, rolling his eyes to look back at his
    rider. "I think I know what they're up to. We'll play their little game, but
    we'll do 1, t by our rules."
     That was all the horse bad time to say before the boar-hunt was off,
    with the massive boar-hounds, all shoulders and laws, ranging out in
    front of the horses, and the hunters carrying boar-spears and javelins at
    the ready. Ilya's horse was herded in front of Mischa's at the very rear of
    the group, and that told Ilya that all of this was his oldest brother's idea.
    He shouldn't be thrown-but when Mischa spooked his sorrel gelding,
    it was a good bet that he was meant to be stampeded through thickets
    of raking branches and possibly through some swampy areas as well. A
    skittish horse like this one could be counted on to try and scrape his rider
    off on tree-trunks, or knock him off with low-banging branches. It was
    clear to him from Mischa's comment about his coat that his older
    brother intended the new coat to end up a ragged mess. That was MIS-
    cha ail over: If he could not have something, be would spoil it for the
    one who did have it.
     "I'll do what I can to keep from bucking when he stings me, boy!" the
     11orse called over his shoulder as the hounds belled ahead of them, sig-
     naling that they bad found a scent-trail. "I can't promise anything,

    




    166   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     The horses in front of them broke into a canter as the dog-pack brok
    into a run, giving tongue as they did so. Ilya caught sight of Mischa mov
    ing in on the gelding's flank with his riding-crop upraised. "Look ou
    he warned the horse-and the crop came down on the gelding's ru
    with a savage slash.
     The horse gave a very realistic shriek but managed not to buck.
    stead, he put all of his energy into a great leap away from Mischa an
    tore off at an angle to the hunt at a full gallop.
     "The Fool's horse is running away with him! " Mischa bellowed. "Se
    the dogs after flicin!"
     This, of course, was the wrong way to stop a running horse, andNfis-
    cha very well knew it. But the rest of the party must have been in on the
    "jokc," for somehow a group of mastiffs was pelting after the horse, ba ' y
    ing on his heels. Ilya hung on for dear life, although it would have beck
    a far worse case if the horse had really been running away with him. Th
    gelding made every effort to keep his gallop smooth and to keep aWdY
    from such obstacles as low-hanging branches, trees growing too clos
    together, and tangles of thorns. But the mastiffs baying and snapping
    the horse's heels were enough to unnerve any equine, and Ilya w
    amazed that his mount wasn't sent into hysterics. He looked back OV
    his shoulder and saw that they had already outdistanced the "pursuing
    hunters, who weren't making any kind of effort to keep up or c in t~
    the rescue. The dogs, however, didn't seem to notice.
     "We'll see about this!" the horse snarled, and stopped, reare , nd
    turned on his hind feet as soon as they were deep into the forest. It
    a good thing that Ilya had been hanging on to the saddle with bo,
    hands, or he'd have had a leg wrenched out of its socket; the horse co
    move as quickly as a ferret, and he was in no mood to put up with th
    pack of mastiffs. He charged, and laying about him with hooves a
    teeth, he scattered the dogs before him. He whirled again and faced
    surprised and disorganized pack.
    
     "What do you think you're doing, you idiots?" the horse snarled
    is your friend, the boy-on-the-stove!
    
     The pack-leader suddenly stopped in his tracks, sniffed loud~; an
    dropped his head and his ears. The rest followed his example. "Beg

    




     d
    
    is-
    
     C
    
   ay-
    en
    he
   way
    sely
    g at
    was
    over
    ing
    e to
    
    and
    
                                      t was
                                       both
                                      could
                                      h the
                                      s and
                                      ed the
    
    . "This
    
    y, and
    eg par-
    
    F I R E B I R D    167
    
    don, boy," he whimpcrcd subserviently. "Hunt-master said to chase, we
    chased, you know-beg pardon-"
     The horse shook his head and neck violently so that its ears flapped
    and its mane whipped Ilya's hands. "Well, now you know, so quit trying
    to bite my heels. The Monsters want him to get hurt, so we're going to make
    them think he's in trouble. Now, if you can manage to contain yourselves,
    I waid you to follow me and bay as if you were chasing me."
     The dog's head came up, and his tail wagged slowly. "We can do that,
    you bet! We can do that!"
     'All right, then-follow, and stop when I stop," the horse said, its good
    emper restored by their subservience. Its ears were up, and its tail
    flagged. It turned again and cantered off in a different direction, the
    hounds loping happily after, baying as if they were in full view of a boar.
     The horse changed its course at random, apparently only doing so
    when hc heard the hounds of the rest of the hunt belling in the distance.
    Ilya began to enjoy the ride, for the gelding had an easy canter, fast
    enough to be exciting, comfortable enough that Ilya was in no discom-
    from the position he was forced by his bindings to assume. Al-
     ough he had lost his hat, the upturned collar of his coat kept his ears
    warm, and although there no longer seemed to be any sun, it was still a
    good day for a ride.
     Once the gelding was fairly certain there would be no pursuit, be
    slowed to a brisk walk, with the baying dogs trotting alongside, their
    tongues hanging out of their moutbs.
     Ilya hoped that the horse bad some notion of bow to find its way back,
    for he had never seen this part of the f orest bef ore. It didn't look to him
    as i(anyone had ever hunted it this season: Snow lay untouched and pris-
    tinaeverywhere except on the game-trails, and there it was broken only
    by the tracks of wild animals. The mastiffs stared wistfully off after these
    tracks, but remained dutifully at the horse's side. The rest of the forest
    was heavily overgrown, and the light that filtered through interlacing
    branches of conifers and leafless hardwoods seemed unusually dim.
     hnallx, thelhorse stopped in a small clearing where many game-trails
    crossed, and addressed the dogs. "You can go back now," the horse said.
     'Or 2o chase whatever vou blease.

    




    16S   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     The mastiffs needed no second invitation. With the leader lop'
    through the snow, they headed off down one of the other garne-trait,
    noses to the ground, tails waving.
     "Now, boy, you can untie your feet and we can
    
                                         or
                                  be more comfi tabl
    the horse said. He cocked his head and swiveled his ears to the side.
    hear the hunt, but they aren't close enough to worry about. Maybe a C,
    ple of leagues away."
     "You can hear things that far away?" Ilya said, astonished, as he be'
    down, and with fingers still stiff from holding onto the saddle, worked
    the knots on his right leg loose and untied his right foot from the stir-
    rup. The horse snorted.
     "I can hear things farther away than that!" he said scornfully. "Now,
    this is my idea. We'll wander about here until dusk, browse where we can
    find food, then go in the direction I last heard the hunt. Sooner or later,
    I'll scent the horse-scat, we'll hit their trail or our own, and we can follow
    it back home."
     Well, that sounded just like the idea that a horse would come up w . Ith,
    but since he couldn't think of anything better, he might as well go along
    with it. "So long as we don't go in circles," Ilya replied with a shrug, free
    ing his other foot. He shoved the pieces of rope into his pocket so thil
    he could tie his legs back onto the stirrups later. Mischa shouldn't get
    the idea that he had enough wits to free himself. "I've heard of people
    who are lost going in circles for hours. I don't think either of us wants
    to meet a wolf-pack after dark."
     Ile didn't bother to mention that only the horse would be browsing,
    and that he hadn't had anything to eat since last night. He wouldn't
    starve to death in a single day, and although being out in the cold on an
    empty stomach wasn't the best idea, he at least had the new fur coat
    keep hini warm.
     The gelding Just snorted. "You seem to think I'm a dull-sensed human!
                                            A
    I can tell my own scent from other horses'," it replied scornfully 'Andt
    can tell fresh scent from old. If we start going in circles, I promise you, I'll
    know it."
     The horse plodded leisurely along the game trails, following a plan
    best known only to itself. Occasionally in the distance Ilva heard hou

    




   belling, although it was so faint and far that he couldn't tell if it was the
    cup Mischa was with, the smaller pack that had been sent to chase him,
    or sonic other hunting party The horse found things to snatch at and
    eat from time to time, but Ilya's stomach was not pleased with the
    mouthfuls of snow he ate to stave off hunger-pangs. The birds here had
    left no berries on the bushes, and whatever fallen nuts there might be
    were buried under the snow, past finding. Ilya discouraged himself think-
    ing with longing of the fine breakfast of hot bread and butter, of sausage
    and boiled cLms that he had missed. He resolved to start hiding boiled
    eggs and other things that wouldn't spoil in his room, and keeping a
    packet of such things in his pockets, just in case this happened again.
    
    F I R E 8 1 R D    1169
    
    The horse stopped at a patch of old grasses poking up out of the snow,
    afld Ilya caught sight of the tail of a squirrel whisking around the trunk
    of a tree. It occurred to him that if be could get a squirrel to hold still
    and talk to him, he might persuade it to part with some of its cache of
    nuts. "Can I talk to wild things, do you suppose?" Ilya asked the horse,
    after d 1011g silence broken only by the sound of equine teeth grinding
    away at tough grass.
     If they understand the human words, I expect so," the horse replied.
    ", Fhat would be the problem, you see. We who live with you have learned
    to understand your words, and now you can understand ours, but we aren't
    speaking the same language. So you could understand a wild thing, thanks
    to the Firehird's magic, but you may not be able to make it understand you. "
     Well, that explained why he didn't have to bark for the dogs to know
    kkU bc was saying, but it was a bit disappointing to know that he would
    'probably not be able to talk a bear out of eating him, or that squirrel into
    slumigsome of its board.
     He thought about that for some time, wondering Just why it was that
    ,the Firebird bad given him this gift in the first place. Limited under-
    d
   ,*an ing of just one or two animals, seeing spirits-tbat could have
    come frorn the fact that she had been near him, that the magic had
     she had brought him that cherry-and
     aher that, be could understand all the animals he came in contact with,
     no matter whether they were talking to him or not. Why bad she done
     44PAnd how had she known which window was his? He hadn't seen

    




    lye   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    her again except in dreams-had she given him this gift out of gratitu
    for his silence? That seemed the most likely.     I
     It could be a perilous gift, though, if it turned out that he was going
    to see more spirits, as well as being able to understand the animals. A4,
    the moment, he was feeling so desperate for a girl that he might well fa
    prey to the temptations of a pretty rusalka.
     But that was supposed to be the way it was
    
                                          with the gifts of ma
    creatures: They had both advantages and disadvantages, and sometinic;
    there were perils involved. On the whole, though, he was inclined 4
    agree with Ruslan's assertion that to see the Firebird was the worst of,
    bad luck. It had been after he saw her that Pietor had bolted and
    brothers had beaten him and left him for dead. It had been after he Ow
    her that he'd been forced into this role of the Fool.
     If she was really grateful, she should have found a way to get me saflelyl
    out from underneath my father's roof, he thought sourly. Surely, i, S
    could put the orchard-guards to sleep, she could do the same to evervo,
    in the palace andgive me enough time to steal a pair of horses andgetfar-
    ther away than Pietor did.
     If he'd had any warning, this very prank of Mischa's could have
    his doorway to freedom-he could have put a lot of provisions in the in.
    ing of this new coat. The horse was certainly prepared to cooperate, Un
    fortunately, riding out in the winter with nothing on his person but the
    clothes he was wearing and a belt-knife was suicidal. He was prepared
    to take the horse's word for it that he could hear danger coming in tim
    to avoid it-by day. But night would be a different matter, for neither of
                                             A
    them could see in the dark, and the horse couldn't climb a tree to av
    the wolves.
     The forest still didn't look at all familiar, and although Ilya could
    claim to be the hunter that some of his brothers were, he had walke
    and ridden over a great deal of Ivan's land, and he thought by now.
    should have seen something familiar. Where had Mischa taken the
    How far from the palace were they, anyway?
    
     Tall, drooping pine trees had replaced most of the deciduous, and t
    made the forest seem even gloomier, for the trees blocked most of the
    light, and grew so closely together that it wasn't possible to see far off

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    171
    
    the trail. Ilya's stomach growled, and he was getting very cold, in spite
    of his handsome coat. His nosc and ears were particularly cold, and he
    kept taking off his mittens to cup his hands over his ears to warm them
    and keep them from getting frostbitten. How much longer before they
    could turn back and try to find their way home?
     An angry snort was the only warning he had that the gelding's hear-
    ing wasn't quite as sharp as it claimed. He looked up, and so did the
    horse, to see one of the sights every hunter dreads.
     A huge wild boar, easily the size of a young bear, stood blocking the
    path. Blood dripped slowly into the snow from a wound in its shoulder-
    clearly one of the hunters had cast and missed. Now it was mad with pain
    and anger, and considered everything that moved to be its enemy, the
    same enemy that had hurt it. It filled the game-trail, and in the pecu-
    liar clarity of the moment, Ilya starcd in fascination at it, its image fill-
    ing his mind. Its tiny red eyes glared as the pig turned its head from side
    'to side, clashing its tusks against the bushes. Every black hair on its body
    stood up, bristling, especially the hair of the ridge that began between
    
    9
    11
    ic
    es
    to
    of
    his
    aw
    fely
    she
    one
     far
     ccn
     lin-     trotter, as it pawed furrows in the snow with its right. Its breath puffed
      Un-     out in white clouds as it snorted, and he could smell its musky, feral odor
    t the     as it grunted angrily at them. The yellowish, dirty tusks dripped foam;
    ared
    
    tilne
    her of
    avoid
    
    Id not
    alkcd
    O\v hC
    them?
    
    nd that
    t of the
    far off
    
   s backbone. The blood from its wounded
    its leg to pool in the snow beside its left
    
    there was an old scar running along its snout where something had once
    clawed its face open.
    The horse froze, caught between the urge to flee and the urge to stand
    still and hope the boar hadn't seen them properly That moment of hes-
    itation was all that the boar needed.
    With a squeal of rage, the boar charged, slashing savagely at them with
    4huge tusks, blood and foaming spittle flying in every direction.
    That was all Ilya saw In the next moment, he was flying through the
    air, with a tree-trunk coming at him. The moment aftcr that, he knew
    nothing.
    
    Uk opened his eyes, his head aching horribly, wondering where he
    was and who bad cracked his skull for him this time. Somewhat to his

    




    172   MERCEDES LACREV
    
    surprise, he saw only an interlacing of bare tree branches against a g
    overcast sky. Slowly, painfully, bits of memory came back to him. Pi
    hunt. Mischa and Sasha tying his legs to the horse The horse rete
    ing to spook, and running off. The boar.
     I must have been thrown when the boar charged. Or maybe the ho
    bucked me off on purpose to get me out of the way. He didn't rcmembe
    I . ust what he'd hit to give him su
    ably something large and hard.
    
                       ch a terrible headache, but it was p
                       One by one he moved his limbs and
    covered that nothing was broken, or even seriously inj*ured. Once again,
    it seemed, being beaten to a pulp on a regular basis had toughened hi , in
    to a certain extent.
     However, if he continued to lie here, he was going to be in danger ho
    the cold. The coat had saved him so far, and that was another stro
    of luck; in his old woolen coat he might have frozen to death before
    woke up.
     He listened, closing his eyes to concentrate,
    
                                         for any sounds indick
    ing that the boar was still around. There was nothing, other than the oc-
    casional, melancholy quork of a raven in one of the trees nearby. Slowly'
    carefully, he sat up; his mouth filled with saliva as his stomach heaved
    in protest. He closed his eyes for a moment, hoping for the sensat'on t
    
    pass.
     He was in the middle of a tangle of J*uniper bushes and could 't se
    anything past the thick mass of branches around him. Another stroke
    luck-that was why he hadn't broken anything but his skull. He mu
    have cracked his head on the tree just above him, fallen straight into t1le
    springy Juniper boughs.
     The nausea faded, though not the headache. If he couldn't do any-
    thing else for it, he'd have to clap a handful of snow to his head to case
    the pain a little. He listened again-and this time, he heard a grdan of
    agony.
     The horse! He wanted to rush to his friend's aid, but he kn
    tried, he'd probably pass out again. As quickly as his damag
    would allow, he fought his way clear of the bushes, shoving and
    the spiky branches clear, eventually burrowing through them-and as

    




    F I R E B I R D    173
    
    soon as he broke free of them, tumbling headfirst into the churned-up
    snow of the game-trail, he knew that his luck had run completely out.
    But not as completely as had the poor gelding's.
    
   ng
    as
    
     The horse had collapsed in the middle of the game-trail; blood sprayed
    over the snow all around it, and its hind-feet kicked feebly and without
    purpose, for his front legs were not so much broken as shattered. Splin-
    ters of bone poked whitely through the ruined flesh, and blood oozed
    into the snow from the savagely torn wounds.
     Ilya gave a strangled cry, struggled to his feet, and ran, stumbling over
    hidden obstacles, toward the horse; but when he fell on his knees beside
    him, he knew that there was nothing be could do for the gelding. Such
    damage was irreparable, and the horse was dying even as he gazed help-
    lessly into his eyes.
     Those eyes were fogged with suffering, but there was still some sense
    and understanding in them. Perhaps that was the worst part of all, and
    the most horrible, that the horse should know it was doomed.
     "Boy," the horse whispered. "Boy, I'm sorry. I failed you. You trusted
    me to protect you, and I failed you.
     How could he think of him at a moment like this? "Don't be ridicu-
    lous!" he cried, tears choking his words and streaming down his cheeks
    to drop into the snow. "How could this be your fault? How could you
    guess a wounded boar would get this far away from the hunt?"
     "I should have kept the dogs with us," the horse persisted. "But I was
    so sure I could keep us both safe. I was so proud that I was strong, fast,
    and smarter than a dog. This is where my pride got us. "
     "It's not your fault," Ilya sobbed, stroking the soft, warm neck in a fu-
     tile attempt at comfort. "It's not your fault. I should have just let Mis-
     cha do what he wanted. I should have told you to run back toward the
     hunt."
      "Be merci ul, boy," the horse went on, as if it had not heard him. "It
     will either be you or the wolves, and I'd rather it was you. Take your knife,
     and be merciful-and when I am dead, mount me backward as you did the
     donkey and cut some hair from my tail to make a bracelet with. Your luck
     will comeback."

    




    174   MERCEDES LACREV
    
     The horse knew what was coming, as surely as the dark and 1h
    moon-and so did Ilya. The wolves would scent his blood and come
    the easy kill; they would tear the horse apart, still alive. The least he coul
    do would be to end his pain.
     He'd hunted enough deer to know how to make the end quick a
    painless, even though he had only a knife at his disposal. Still crying,,l
    moved around until he had the horse's head cradled in his lap.,
    cupped his left hand around its eye so it couldn't see what he was do
    and whispered in its ear, telling it how brave and faithful a friend it
    been, assuring it that none of what had happened was its fault. With
    right hand, he took his knife and made a quick, deep slash along t
    great, throbbing artery that ran up the horse's neck.
     It was over in a moment, as a gush of blood poured out over the's
    in a crimson flood, and the life ebbed from the horse's eyes. All the rnw-
    cles relaxed, the eyes slowly closed, and the noble heart slowed, thenji.
    nally stopped, along with the pain. A great shudder ran over the horse's
    body, a last spasm, then it lay perfectly still.
     "I'm sorry," Ilya whispered, stroking the soft nose for the last tiluc,
    weeping as he had never wept for himself. "If it hadn't been for me, you'd
    be in a warm stable right now. I'm so sorry...
     He clambered over the gelding's barrel, mounting it backward so fit
    he could cut that handful of hairs from its tail-because it had asked
    him to, and not because he thought it was going to change his luck , Pa
    stuffed them into his pocket with the rope and stood up, trying to thij
    through his grief and the pain in his bead.
     I have to take everything I can carry. But I don't care how hungry la -
    I won't eat him. I'd rather die first.
     But he was bleakly aware that dying was an all-too-real possibility.
     He loosed the horse's cheek-straps, pulled the bridle over his head,
    and took the bridle and reins, setting them aside for the moment. Tle
                                            t
    
                                            aw-
                                            n ji
    
    saddle was next; he unfastened the girth and cut as much of the ~,Irth,
    leather free as he could. He got the saddle-blanket off, then cut one of
    the stirrup-straps and the stirrup off. The saddle itself was of no use to
    him, but if he managed to live out the night, the rest might help hi
    survive a little longer.
    
    1P
    
    I

    




    F I R E B I R D    ITS
    
     Unless he could somehow get back to the trail of the hunt, though,
    it might not be very long. Nevertheless, there was one thing that was cer-
    tain. The scent of blood would soon bring a wolf-pack, possibly even be-
    fore night fell, and if he stayed, he would be the tidbit before the main
    ,course. He had to get away from there, as far away as possible, before
    they came.
     He didn't dare trace back along the trail that he and the horse had
    taken here; that was the way that the boar bad gone. He could only go
    listen for the dogs, and hope they would lead him to people.
      "I'm sorry," he whispered again to the horse. "I wish I hadn't been here.
     wish you'd had a cleverer friend than me." And once again, tears filled
     his eyes and he turned away, blinded.
      He took 'ust long enough to roll his meager booty in the saddle-
    
   ad,
    he
    th-
    e of
    c to
    him
    
 lanket, tie it with the reins, and sling it over his shoulder. He left out
     the stirrup-leather with the dangling stirrup; he held that in his hand
    
    s an improvised weapon. It wasn't much, but it was better than noth-
    ing. If he'd had something more than a knife, he might have been able
    to cut himself a staff or a cudgel, but unless he found something already
    fallen, he'd have to d
    He plodded along
    getting thinner. That
    
    o without.
    through the snow, which was surprisingly thin and
    was a blessing, at least; he was able to get a good
    distance away in a relatively short time. Before too long it had gone from
    calf-deep to ankle-deep, then from ankle-deep to little more than the
    depth of the first Joint of the thumb. He was able to get away faster than
    he would have thought possible, which put him out of immediate wolf-
    danger. He had no idea of the real passage of time; as he stumbled along,
    he had the sensation that time wasn't passing at all. But his head hurt
    somuch that he knew better than to trust his senses completely; the only
    thing lie knew that he had to do was keep moving. If he stopped and sat
    down, he would probably pass out, and if be did that, he would die.
    But as the dim light began to fade, and night fell, it soon became
    obvious that he was not going to find the track of the hunt any time
    soon. There was no sign of human life anywhere: no scent of woodsmoke,
    no tracks, no sounds of hounds or voices. The woods themselves
    Weye Weirdly silent, enough to make the skin on the back of his neck

    




                                            I M
    
    crawl, and he thought that he felt eyes peering at him from out
    shadows.
     The light faded but never died completely, and that was enou ~40
    make him bite his tongue and wonder about going on. It should have
    been as dark as the crypt here, yet the forest was full of a faint, bluish
    light; it had no source, and yet it was possible to see everything in it,
    There were no shadows, not even beneath the thickest pine trees, but
    no obvious bright spots, either.
     But in the end, he knew he had no choice: If he stayed, he would be
    tacitly giving up, and if he gave up, he would die. He went on, okiflg
    each step carefully, not only to save his still-aching head and to avoid
    tripping over something, but also to be able to listen for sounds ou
    in the semidarkness beyond the trees along the game-trail. He wasn't cer.
    tain that he would hear anything coming before it was upon him, but it
    was better to try than not.             I
     Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, he did hear a sound, but
    wasn't the one he expected. It was the sound of running water.
     The trail he was following seemed to lead toward the sound, and
    followed it. If he could find a stream, there would surely be cress gro
    ing in it, and although the blow to his head had made him nauseous,
    knew he would have to find something edible soon or he would be s
    to his stomach. Where there was water, there was usually someone I
    ing along it, and if he followed the stream, sooner or later he would come
    to a dwelling. And even if all he found was a hunter's hut withb4any.
    one living in it, he would have shelter, and a door he could bar against
    the wild beasts.
     He found the stream by stumbling into it; be was so busy watching
    the forest around him that he wasn't paying any attention to where Ins
    feet were going. He heard a splash, felt the cold around his ankle, dnd
    quickly pulled his foot back before the water could seep into
    
                                             0
    
                                            Ish
                                            itt
                                            )u
                                            be
    
                                              WS
    
    He looked down at the bit of water, no wider than his forearm was ion
    and quickly realized that he was not going to find edible plants gro%ri 11
    in it except by accident; the faint blue light of the forest did not extend
    into the stream, which was a winding path of blackness against the snow-
    covered forest floor.
    176   MERCEDES LACREV

    




    But it would Eive him somethinE to follow.
    
    F I R E B I R D    177
    
    14,- 6-1 n,, idea which direction he or the stream was goinL, in at this
    
    point, so he simply turned in the direction it was flowing and followed
    along beside it without crossing it. From time to time, he bent down and
    dashed a handful of the cold, sweet water over his aching head, or knelt
    down and drank directly from the stream. By this time, he was so tired
    that be was walking in a kind of weary daze; he knew that the state he
    was in was danaerous but there didn't seem to be anv choice in the mat-
    
    take a rest on the ground, and climbing a tree
    
    in this semidarkness was out of the question. He could only force his
    
    aching, exhausted limbs on, and hope that dawn wasn't far off
    
     In a way he was glad he hadn't taken the time to try to cut a s aff; e
    knew if he'd had one, he would have been tempted to stop for a moment
    and lean on it, and that would have been fatal. He would have fallen
    
    asleep standing up if he had.
     Father will send out searchers looking for his horse, I'm sure of that.
    Maybe I should have s    Z I
               tayed w'th 't. But the wolves were coming ... maybe
    they'll all think the wolves got me when they got the horse. Poor horse. It
    was all my fault. If I hadn't seen the Firebird ... if I hadn't talked to
    him ... if I had just turned around and gone back to my room when I saw
    
     From there, his thoughts wound to the usual conclusions: ... if I'd
    
    all the hubbub in the great hall
    
    inst
    
    ing
    his
    and
    oot.
    
    Ong,
    
    wing
    
    never been born ... if I'd just given up and died in the crypt
    
     Suddenly, he realized that he wasn't following the bank of the stream
    anymore, 'it was in front of him, and it seemed to have gotten much
    
    broader. Much, much broader.
    
    He stopped and rubbed his eyes with his free band and slowly the
    
    truth dawned on him.
    
     He stood on the shore of a lake whose waters sparkled under a sky that
    had inexplicably cleared, allowing the full moon to shine down upon it.
    But more inexplicable than the appearance of the moon and stars was
    strange transition he had wandered through while his thoughts had
    
    6een preoccupied.
    
    There was no snow on the ground, not the slightest sign of snow, and
    
    although the air was chill it was not cold, and his fur coat was growin

    




    178   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    a bit too warm for comfort. There were leaves on the trees, which ills-
    tled with a dry sound, and the tang in the air suggested that as he had
    walked, the land had gone backward in time from winter to fall.
     He rubbed his eyes again, but nothing changed.
     I can't have gone so far south that I've walked into warmer la
    could I?
     A strange lassitude came over him, compounded equally of exh
    tion both physical and emotional, of depression, and of a sense of bein
    too overwhelmed to care about anything anymore. He plo
    hausted, along the winding, contorted shore of the lake, bar
    put one foot in front of the other, and wondering with a tire
                                           n&-
    
                                            ii
    
                                        dded,
                                        ely able
                                        d fatail
    what new disaster was going to present itself to him.
     His answer came before he'd gone more than a fraction of the dista
    around the shoreline. As he rounded a concealing curve, he all but fell
    over a young woman sitting on a projecting stone and gazing out dreain-
    ily over the waters.
    
     He was so dumbfounded at seeing another human being that for a
    moment or two all he could do was gape at her.
     The moonlight fell fully on her upturned face as she twisted to loo
    up at him. She was beautiful-heartbreakingly, stunningly beautiful, a
    perfect snow-maiden created by the hand of a master-artist. She was
    dressed in nothing but white-silken shirt, embroidered tunic, and flow-
    ing skirt; even the hair braided and wrapped around her hea&1111'
    crown was a blond so light it looked silver in the moonlight. HeF ski
    was as pale as the snow he had left behind, and only her huge, dark eyes
    gave any contrast to the whiteness of her skin, her clothing, her hair. She
                                            r I
    
                                            o0a
                                           11
                                             owwaIs
    
    turned those eyes on him and he thought he would melt beneath thei
    power.
     "Who are you?" she cried in alarm, as she started back a litt -line
    hand to her throat. "Where have you come from?" He couldn't blarn
    her 'for being alarmed, and he hastened to soothe her.
    
     "I am Ilya Ivanovitch; I lost the hunt I was with, then I cracked my
    head, I lost my horse, and then I lost my way entirely." He spoke as qui-
    etly as he could, and endeavored to look both harmless and helpless. "Frn

    




    F I R E R I R D    179
    
    awfully tired, my head hurts like anything, I haven't eaten all day, and I
    haven't the least notion of where I am. I don't suppose you could help
    me, could you?"
    
     She stared unwinkingly at him, then suddenly smiled. "Poor man!"
    she replied in her sweet, breatby voice. "Poor, lost fellow-we don't see
    many strangers here, Just a peddler or two, now and again. You quite star-
    tled me, coming up on me like that! But what a tale of misfortune! Poor
    Ivanovitcb! Of course I shall help you!"
     He wanted to kiss her, and not just because he felt such relief, but be-
    cause her full, smiling lips looked so very kissable. And in the back of his
              little voice said, You managed to calm her down aw-
    fully quickly, don't you think? She's a maiden, alone, by the side of the lake,
    and a stranger has l'ust stumbled up out of nowhere....
    Well, perhaps-but sh
    eyes so trustfully. He told
    
   e smiled so charmingly, and looked
    the nagging little voice not to be f(
    this lovely maiden was simply friendly. Not all families were li
    trustful, competitive, more ready to see an enemy than a fr
    hadn't she said they seldom saw strangers? She was simply sh(
    gentle, with no reason to think badly of anyone, even someo
    never seen before.
     am sorriest to hear that you have hurt yourself," she con
    ing as slowly and gracefully as an exotic being in a dream, an
    out to take his band. Her sleeve drifted down from her outstre
    I e a cascade of mist.
    
    "I shall give you all the help in my power, but what
    
      u could start by telling me where I am-and who you are," Ilya
    aid, finding himself getting lost in those huge, dark eyes, until the pain
    n his head and his growling stomach pulled him back with a start.
    Yes, and she can't be a peasant, now, can she? said the nagging voice.
    Look at that dress-it doesn't look like any peasant smock, and it must have
    cost more than three of Katya's dresses combined. Look at that silver, that
    embroidery! Those are real pearls, there in the embroidery! Ilya gladly
    obeYed the voice, using his examination of her clothing to sway a little
    closer to her, He'd never seen materials like that; they flowed about her,

    




          MERCEDES LAC14EV
    ISO
    
    the skirt falling in cascades to the grass, with the soft sheen of moon-
    light reflected in the still water of the lake. He breathed in the scent o
    
     "My name is Vasilisa," she said, gazing deeply into his eyes, unawa
    of the little voice commenting suspiciously on her appearance. She did
    not seem to mind that he had not yet relinquished her hand; it lay lin
    his, cool and perfect, a tiny sculpture with nails of pearl. "My fifherj'~
                                          19
    
                                           to
    
    the boyar-we dwell over there, on the other shore, across the lake, I
    often walk along the shore here at night, when the water is still and
                                           th
                                           t
    mist rises. I often think that it looks as if our home is built among,ltht
    clouds."
    
    her-the scent of clean water, of water-lilies-
    
     Really? You don't know that many boyars' daught
    clean
    
      She waved her free hand in the direction of the other side of thel
     Ilya looked up and, for a puzzled moment, saw nothing there
    mist obscuring the trees.
      But in the next instant, the mist parted as if on comma
    saw an impressive palace rising above the water on the oppo
     of the la~,e, a palace with walls as white as the finest marble as Whi e
     the mist on the lake itself. If someone had built a lofty hail out oil
     finest white birch, ornamented with the most fantastic carvings,'hiii
     have looked like this. It had dozens of windows, huge, or
     porches, and was at least three stories tall.
      How could the horse have carried me that far away from ho ?
     Ivan or Gregori would know about this palace-this maiden.
      She took a step nearer to him, still holding his hand, and     dhe
    could not look away from her eyes. "There are few peopl e,
    breathed. 'And no young men of any rank, least of all sons [sar.la
    lonely, Ilya, and I often come here to think about my lonelin xichj'~,,
    for a young man to come and take it away. Have you been sent in'
    swer to my wish, Ilya Ivanovitch?"
     Now her eyes held very little of innocence and a great deal of pro
    She pressed closer to him, looking up into his eyes, the warmth o
    body a subtle caress all along his, leaving him no doubt of what she
    offering. He wanted to say, Yes! but something held him back.

    




                         F I R E B I R D     181
    
     Perhaps it was because she had gone so suddenly from shy innocent
     to experienced seductress in the time it took a horse to canter from the
     palace stables to the orchard. Perhaps it was simply that any of his broth-
     ers would have had her down on the grass without thinking twice about
     it. Perhaps it was the fact that he had never heard of a boyar with a white-
     birch palace out here in the forest. Perhaps it was all of these things-
     for whatever reason, Ilya felt a sudden disinclination to take what she
     offered, and an equally sudden and strong wish to have his hand back.
     He stepped back a pace and managed to free it, just as his foot struck
     something that had been half-hidden in the grass at the girl's feet.
     "Never mind that, it's Just a bit of flotsam," she said, in an oddly cold
    and commanding voice. The voice had the opposite effect on him. He
    Mmih.bed down at the obstacle and poked it out of the grass with his toe,
    
    ore
    
    peering at it with a slight frown on his face.
     "It's just a fish-trap," she said in that same cold voice. "It doesn't mat-
    ter, and it's empty. Leavc it alonc."
     Why was she so determined that he not examine an old fish-trap? He
    looked closer, for he thought he saw something moving in the trap-a
    tiny, hopping form, aflutter of wings, a single, bright black eye. It's a bird!
    he realized. A nightingale! But why would anyone put a nightingale in a
    fish-trap?
     Somehow, though, he didn't feel like asking Vasilisa directly. The bird
    
   te as
    the
    ight
    mted
    up at him pathetically, its shining, frightened eye peering between
    two ot the slats of the trap. "Help me!" it cried. "Help me! She urely
               to drown me!"
    
    nd he
    
    11
    , she
    
    I am
    d wish
    
    in an-
    
    ormse.
     of her
    he was
    
    Vasilisa made as if she was about to reach down for the trap. Ilya didn t
    even stop to think; he snatched the trap up before Vasilisa's hand
    touched it. It was made of brittle willow-withes; he wrenched at the slats
    with both hands, and in a moment he had broken it open with a splin-
    teringcrack. It fell to pieces and the bird flew off like a shooting star, into
    the deep woods.
    Vasillisa gave a horrific scream and flung herself at him, and Ilya found
    ~Irrisclf fighting with a vicious harpy of a woman. Gone were both the
    shy, demure maiden and the sweetly tempting seductress. In their place
    was a demon, a terror, a woman-shaped monster who spit at him and

    




    182   MERCEDES LAC16EV                   IN
    
    tried to bite him, who tore at his face with clawlike nails, and kicked and
    kneed him like one of his brothers in a wrestling-match. Only the
    that she was hampered by her skirts saved him from some painful dam.
    age. She clawed and struck at him while he protected his head with hit
    arms, then tried to seize his wrists and drag him toward the lAe with
                                           M
                                           hi
                                           ith
                                            and
    
                                           he
    preternatural strength. Once she got a good grip on both wrists,
    started hauling him to the water, and nothing he could do woU14' get 'ell
    to let go-he dug his heels in, and realized to his horror that she
    still pulling him toward the water, while his heels made twin furrows
    the earth His wrists burned with a terrible cold that was worse in iC
    
    way, than fire, and try as he might, he could not break her grip
    
     It was at that moment that he knew what she must be: a rusal , I
    water-spirit in the form of a beautiful girl, whose only purpose in life wZ
    to find ways to drown foolish young men. And that was exactly what s
    
    was going to do to him; she was near her watery home, and her strell
    far surpassed his. She had both of his wrists in a grip of steel, and she
    r)ulled him toward his death with a grim determination that nothing,
    
    He flung himself sidewavs hoDing to break her hold on his wrists
    
    by sheer good luck got his left hand free. He groped inside his coat for
    his knife and nulled it out with some of the gelding's tall-hair wrar)T)ed
    
    around it, and some of his blood still staining the blade. He brandished
    it at her not certain if a simple knife could hurt a creature like a rusalka
    
    She cackled scornfully and reached for the dagger, unafraid
    
     At that moment, the unthinkable happened. Out of nowhere, ou
    of the fog and the night air, a horse appeared-a horse of mist,,as
    transparent as glass, but as real as the thing clutching his wrist. W4
    
    mane and tall of streaming smoke, the horse screamed a challenge, and I
    the rusalka answered it with a scream of her own. It reared up beside Ilya,
    pawing savagely at the rusalka, striking at her with sharp hooves made
    of ice and snaking its head about to snap at her with formidable teeth,
    Ilya would have known that head anywhere; it was the sorrel gelding!
    
     rhe rusalka might not fear a knife of steel, but she was afraid of a
    spirit-horse; she screamed again and loosed her hold on his wrists enough

    




   ll~ a,
    ade
    eth.
    ing!
    
                                       of a
                                       ough
    
    F I R E B I R D    183
    
    for him to wrench free of her. He whirled and ran as hard as he could
    back into the forest, away from both the stream and the lake it fed. He
    stumbled through the brush, clawing his way past branches without re-
    gard for his hands or his face. He fell and recovered too many times to
    count iuniner-branches whinning into hiq f;ice- not r..qrIng whetber be
    
    was on a trail or not, so long as he got away.
    
     He heard pursuit, but it didn
    Praved, the rusalka couldn't vent
    
    't last very long; as he had hoped and
    
    ure far from her waterv home. Still, he
    
    ran on; there was no telling what allies among the spirits this rusalka
    
    1IF-11t have. Finallv. when his sides ached and his breath burned in his
    
    lungs, he slowed and came to a halt in the middle of a tiny clearing.
     Moonlight poured down on him and reflected off the snow filling the
    tiny glade. The chill of winter was back, the snow easily calf-deep again.
    Had he ever really been in that false-autumn, or had that been as much
    an illusion as the white palace? There was a flat rock in the middle of
    the clearing, proj*ecting up out of the snow. He sat down on it and tried
    to catch his breath. What bad gone on back there? Where had the geld-
    ing come from-the horse that he knew was dead? It must have been a
    
    spirit, but did horses have ghosts?
    
     His sides hurt, and he thought he might have wrenched his ankle; it
    certainly hurt as if he had His wrists burned where the rusalka had held
    
    when he pulled back the cuffs of his coat-sleeves, there were
    
    rks like burns encircling his wrists
    
    . He still had his knife, though, and
    
    with silent thanks to the spirit of the gelding, he cleaned it in the snow
    
    and resheathed it
    
     One thing was certain: He couldn't go on any farther tonight. He was
    exhausted, hurt, and too disoriented to find directions in the dark. He
    [boked all around and, peering into the darkness, decided that one of the
    
    I e trees surrouncling the clearing looked possible to climb, even it lie
    
    couldn't see.
    
     The huge old pine tree had branches all the way down to the ground,
    and it was no worse than climbing a ladder. He continued to climb until
    he was we I out of reach of all but the most determined of bears, and
    flien took the reins, the saddle-girth, and his own belt and tied himself
    to the tree. It wasn't bad; there was a branch chest-high to a sitting man,

    




    184   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    and only a little farther from the one he was sitting on;
    
                                                          he made a ki
    of pillow out of the saddle-blanket, wrapped his arms around it, a
    leaned over onto the next branch. Once he was in position, exhaustion
    did what nothing else could have done. Before he knew it, he was aslee.1
    and he stayed asleep until he awoke the next day.

    




    Pt ~ Arm 1!1~k .4V 2 ,a
    
    A
    
    I LVA WOKE with ravens quorking nearby at dawn; sore everywhere,
    cold, starving, and so stiff he could hardly move. Once again, an over-
    cast sky threw the forest into a gray gloom, and the clouds were so thick
    e couldn't even tell where the sun was. "This is not going to be one of
    Y etter days," he said aloud, startling the ravens into ungainly flWith some difficulty, he untied himself from the tree, rolled his mea-
               saddle-blanket, and tied the resulting bundle to
               his back, all without rising from the branch he was sitting on. Every
               movenient hurt-and it almost did not seem worthwhile to climb down.
               lie would still be lost, without food, with no idea how to get home. Even
               as high up in this tree as he already was, he couldn't see anything but
               forest. The only sound was the melancholy calls of the ravens in the next
               tree.
     They're proba ly waiting for me to die.
    
    He just couldn't seem to make the effort to move. He leaned back
    against the tree and felt something soft in his pocket. Pulling off his mit-
    tenand fishing around in the hopes he might have shoved a bit of bread
    in there, he encountered the hank of horsehair he'd taken from the geld-
    ing's tall. For lack of anything better to do, while he waited for the sun
    to burn off the overcast so he could get some direction, he braided the
    hair into a bracelet and slipped it on. Maybe it would change his luck;
    certainly the spirit-horse bad saved him last night. Finally, after more
    time of just sitting, his thirst drove him down to the ground. Once

    




    186   MERCEDES LACREV
    
    there, he ate snow, which eased his tbirst but did nothing at all for his
    hunger.
     He thrashed around in the underbrush for a while until he came to a
    game-trail, and lacking any other direction, he struck out to his left.
    There were still no sounds of life, and if it had not been for the rings of
    tender flesh on his wrists, he would have dismissed the encounter with
    the rusalka as a dream. He stopped once to cut himself a staff, which
    gave him some help in the rougher spots in the trail, and late in th
    morning he came across another little stream and actually found sonic
    cress growing in it, which he devoured down to the last shred. His stom-
    ach was not convinced that this constituted real food, and continued to
    rumble complaints long after he had left the stream and gone on. A lit-
    tle later, he found a bush that still had a few rosehips on it, somelim-
    overlooked by the birds. He ate those as well, though they were so ac,idic
    they puckered his mouth. Beside the rosebush was a fallen tree with~SO
    eral forms of shelf-fungus growing on it, one of which he knew was e
    ible. He hunted out and ate every last scrap of this as well, though it was
    as dry as an old book, and he had to cat more snow to get the paper~,
    taste out of his mouth.
     The longer he walked, the less he felt like going any farther. The forls"
    est seemed to go on forever, with 'no end in sight, no sign of game, noth-
    ing to give him hope. As a crowning touch to his plight, snow began to
    fall again, thick, and with a light wind to blow it around.
     I should have let the rusalka take me, he thought with heavy
    as be plodded onward, concentrating on getting one foot in front of
                                           j e
    next. What's the point ofgoing on? The only way I'm going to find in
    back home is by a miracle. Even then-if by a miracle I did get home ag, U
    Father would probably find a way to punish even the Fool for losing one of
    his precious horses. The farther along he went, the more desperate his
    thoughts became, and he considered sitting right down in the snow and
    letting the cold take care of his problems for him.
     But if he did that, wouldn't it be suicide? The half of him
    Christian was horrified at the idea of even thinking about suicidej
    killed himself, he would go straight to hell, and he'd already had Aaste

    




    F I R E B I R D    187
    
    of what hell was like recently. But how could it be suicide if it wasn't he
    himself who did the deed, but the chill that did it for him?
     Maybe I ought to go back and give myself to the rusalka after all. But
    wouldn't that be just as much suicide as sitting down and letting your-
    self freeze to death?
     Would it? Or would it be more along the lines of aiding in a murder-
    his own?
     But it was looking as if he was going to have only a choice in how to
    die-at the lovely hands of Vasilisa, by cold, by wolves and other wild
    beasts, or by starvation.
     Of the four, at least death at the hands of the rusalka would be quick.
    He turned around, but be hadn't gone more than a few paces when he
    realized that going back to find Vasilisa was as futile an idea as trying to
    find his way home. The thick snow was already erasing his footprints
    from this path, and he'd passed several clearings that looked just like the
    one he'd spent the night above. He hadn't kept count of them; he'd never
    be able to tell which was the right one, and then he'd never be able to
    trace his panicked flight across the forest. The lake was as lost to him as
    his father's palace.
     He turned around again, and just as be was about to give up and lie
     down in the snow, be spotted something brown lying atop the snow right
     underneath a hole in the trunk of an enormous tree. just in case it might
     be something useful, he shoved his way through the snow, and discov-
     ered that it was a matted mass of dead, dried leaves, with a chestnut lying
     atop them. -
     He snatched up the nut, which was sweet and still sound, and peered
     into the hole in the trunk of the tree, then felt around inside it with the
     two fingers he could get in, thinking that it was too much to hope for,
     that squirrels had used a hole so close to the ground for a cache. But they
     had-not a large cache, but there were nuts in there! With a bit of work
     enlarging the hole with his knife, he was able to get his hand inside, and
     came up with a pocketful of sound nuts among the ones that insects or
     t had gotten to. This looked as if it was an old cache, last year's rather
     an this year's; perhaps that was why it hadn't been touched.

    




    188   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    He sat ri-aht down in the snow and cracked nufz
    
                                           I picking out even th
    tiniest fragments of meat, until he had devoured every morsel of his find.
    Chestnuts were better roasted than raw, but beggars couldn't be
    choosers, and he had no way to make a fire. Having a little more in his
    stomach revived him a little, and gave him the strength and hope to
    on. He still did not dare to go off the game-trail in search of food;
    was afraid that if he did, he could wander in the forest without findiiig
    another trail until he died. Game-trails at least led to and from water
    and clearings; he might find another stream with cress, or even
    gish fish he could catch by hand.
     But by late afternoon, when nothing more to eat had presented itse f,
    the light had begun to fade, and he still had not seen a single sign of life,
    that hope and strength ran out again. He was so exhausted that he
    couldn't even look up to take note of his surroundings. Once more, it
    was all he could do to place one foot in front of the other, his eyes fixed
    on the sunken track defining the snow-covered trail in front of him, and
    he wondered if he ought to simply lie down in the snow tonight and tak
    his chances.
     He went on in this manner for quite some time, following the twi
    and turns in the trail, while the undergrowth grew denser untill
    hemmed in both sides of the game-trail. He began to grow dizzy witli
    hunger and weariness, and it seemed to him, in a dull fashion, that his
    actual range of vision had narrowed and gone gray. Then it occurred to
    him that there was nothing wrong with his eyes-the bushes on either
    side of the trail were blocking out the light in a most peculiar fasl4n.
    He stopped, braced himself on his staff, and looked up, and saw th e
    1,
    dense evergreens growing beside him were very thick and very tal I 11re
    like a pair of parallel walls than bushes. The trail turned a little farth4
    on, and he turned with it, now wondering how deer or other animals had
    made a trail through such thick shrubbery, and why. There raust be,.J,
    something very important to them on the other side of it for them W
    have gone to such effort.
     The trail divided; he took the fork to the right. It turricd a time
    two more, then ran into a dead-end. Now thoroughly interested, aiid rio
    longer thinking of lying down in the snow to die, he retraced his Ste

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    189
    
    and took the other way. In a few more turnings and dividings, the
    path through these bushes seemed very familiar-and it was beyond odd
    that the turns were at perfect right angles, as if they bad been laid out
    that way.
     Finally, it occurred to him why it seemed so familiar. Following this
    path was just like being in the maze that protected his family crypt from
    robbers getting in and ghosts getting out. Out of curiosity, he contin-
    ued to make the turns he would take if he were, indeed, in a larger ver-
    sion of the family maze. When he ran into no more dead-ends, he
    stopped for a moment to consider how this could possibly be, for after
    encountering the rusalka, he was no longer able to take things as they
    appeared.
     flow did a copy of our maze come here, to be made of bushes? he won-
    dered, with a healthy feeling of apprehension. Is it just that our maze is
    a common pattern, and my great-grandfathers replicated it for our crypt?
    Or perhaps one of them came here, saw this maze, and copied it? The sec-
    ond idea didn't seem too likely when he bent to examine the bases of
    the bushes forming the maze walls. If the bushes had been hundreds of
    years old, their trunks would have been as thick as his thigh; instead, they
    were only as thick as his wrist. They had been here for some time, but
    not more than twenty-five or thirty years at best. It might be that the
    family maze was a copy of a more famous one, for certainly Ivan would
    never have admitted that anything his family had was a copy of anything
    else, not even of the Great Tsar's.
     But why had anyone planted a maze out here in the middle of the
     foresP Unless of course, the gardener was some sort of forest spirit.
     chill, for there was a spirit who would know just what
     eir maze oo e ike and might be inclined to copy it-their old house-
     spirit, the one Ruslan swore had gone away because Ivan didn't believe
     in or appreciate it.
      Did our domovol plant this maze? What if he's still here? He shivered,
     for the domovol, though not as powerful or easily offended as the ban-
     ink, could still be deadly when provoked.
      If I meet an old man in the center of this place-an old man who might
     be the domovoi-I'll tell him what happened to me before I tell him who

    




    190   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    I am. If he knows that I am as despised by my family as he is, maybe he'l
    take pity on me.
    
     At any rate, it was worth going on and getting to the heart of this
    maze. It would protect him from wind and wild animals, and he would
    be able to spend the night in relative safety. And it might not be a cop
    of the maze he knew, after all. He had only made a few turnings, a
    they might simply lead to a more elaborate dead-end.
     As the light faded, he plodded on, feeling relief at least from the bi
    ing wind, though not from the snow or from hunger. He didn't need
    see to know his way through the maze; even the stupidest of his broth-
    ers had learned how to thread it in the dark, as it had been an ongo4,
    "joke" for the eldest to take the youngest in blindfolded and leave th
    there without a light. They had stopped taking Ilya in when he was
    to take the alternate route out and beat them back to the palace
    fun was in waiting to see if the terrified younger brother could get t
    in time for supper.
     But this could not have simply grown here; not only were the t
    ings and turnings planned, but the bushes showed signs of havinz been
    trimmed recently, to prevent them from blocking the path, and it iook
    very much as if someone was attempting to train them to interlace th'
    branches overhead, so that eventually the path would become
    Would a spirit go to all that trouble, or could it command the
    do what it wanted, insThere were no trees here, at least, and be had an unbroken view
                                          d,
    the sky. As he walked, he watched it darken, still without the clou s cl
    ing away, until it was as black in here as it was in the crypt-maze, th
    nowhere near as musty-smelling.
     When he finally felt his way around the last turn and came ou
    the square clear space in the heart of the maze, where the crypt would
    have been, part of his answer was there in the form of a snug, beautifully
                                            ou
    
    built little house. This was no peasant hut or hunter's shack; this was
    more the sort of building that a boyar or tsar would have constructcd
    a hunting lodge. Though log-built, of sturdy trunks with the bark peel
    off, there was nothing ramshackle or slipshod about it. Light shown
    warmly from its windows, which had panes of something opaque that

    




    F I R E B I R D    191
    
    kept cold air out yet let some light in. He couldn't tell what the substance
    in the windows was from here, but their golden light beckoned far too
    temptingly. The place was so wcll-constructed, in fact, that he was even
    more suspicious. How could anything be that well-built out here in the
    middle of nowhere, unless there was a supernatural hand at work?
     Could this, in fact, be the hut of Baba Yaga? If rusalkas and banniks
    were real, why not the dreadful old witch herself? He didn't see any sign
    of chicken legs underneath it, and it was supposed to stand up on them
    at the mere sign of a stranger, but what if the witch already knew he was
    coming and had craftily ordered her hut to stay on the ground like a nor-
    mal house?
     Still, he knew the stories, and forewarned was forearmed. He knew bet-
    ter than to agree to do anything but the most simple of tasks, and Baba
    Yaga had a weakness for handsome young men and a tendency to un-
    derestimate them. If he knocked on the door, and an old woman answered
    it, he could act like a handsome simpleton. If he chose the work, she could
    not trick him into anything impossible in exchange for food and shelter.
    He could offer to split wood for her fire-yes, that was a good plan.
     If it was any other kind of spirit-he tried to think further, but the
    breeze suddenly changed to carry the smoke from the chimney toward
    him, and he nearly fainted at the wonderful odors in it. It carried the
    scents of roasting meat and fresh bread, and his stomach growled so
    111d y it sounded like a bear stood here rather than a man.
      really did sound like a bear, and worse than that, it hurt. He gasped
    with the pain, dogs started barking inside the hut, and the door flew
    open. Three huge white wolfhounds bounded out of the open door and
    headed straight for him, followed by an old man in the long tunic and
    baggy breeches of a peasant, a spear in one hand, a knife in the other.
     Ilya froze in terror, expecting to be torn to pieces in a moment, but
    the dogs had no interest in him. They gave him a perfunctory sniff, cir-
    cled the house once, then came back and sat beside him, the leader giv-
    ing a short bark. 'All's safe, " the dog said in that single bark.
    
    n
    d
    ir
    
    gh
    
    AXII
    
    hat
    
     "No wolves, boars, or bears, eh? Well, if you're a man, come into the
    light, and if you're a beast, go your way," the old man called. "I don't bunt
    deer and fox on my own ground, unless I'm starving, which I'm not."

    




    192   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     Ilya stepped forward, slowly, the wolfhounds following at his heels,
    plumed tails wagging gently. The old man peered at him, but with the
    light at his back, Ilya couldn't tell what he looked like, only that he Wa
    old enough to have gray or white hair.
     "We]], boy, you certainly look the worse for wear. Come in; I've
    to share, and no visitors till spring." His voice seemed kindly enough;
    was it the domovoi? There was no way to tell for sure. Presumably the o-
    movoi wouldn't need dogs to protect him, but-
     The scent of rich meat-juices was too much for him
    
    and Ilya s -
    bled forward. The old man stepped aside, then took his elbow as he
    passed and guided him in. The dogs followed, surged past them once
    they were all in the hut, and went straight to the hearth, where theV
    Curled up.
     "By Rod and Perim! You look more than the worse for wear!
    man exclaimed, once he got Ilya inside and shut the door. "Here now"
    don't say a thing, just sit right there and let me get some food into you."
     Ilya was perfectly happy to do just that, sitting down on the rough-
    made stool the old man pointed to, while his host swiftly carved up three'
    slices of meat from the joint on a band-built table, laid them on a thick
    slice of bread to serve as a plate, and banded it to Ilya. While Ilya hun-
    grily cut bits of meat and bread soaked through with juice and stuffed
    them in his mouth as fast as be could, the old man cut a second slice of
    bread and topped it with a smear of honey, then poured a cup of horne-
    brewed honey-wine and handed the cup to him.
    
     The old man himself looked just as ordinary as any of the
                                                                      peasants
    and servants at the palace: tall, tough, and muscular. His weathered,
    wrinkled face sported a large gray moustache though no beard, and his
    shaggy, gray-white hair looked as if the only time it was trimmed
    when he took his own knife to it. His blue eyes had a kindly and con-
    cerned gleam to them, and his clothing showed signs of long wear
    hard use. Both the shirt and the breeches were the same off-white o
    dinary rough woolen peasant-garb, with no embroidery or trimmings nd
    only a single button carved of a slice of horn closing the shirt at the skoul-
    der. His belt, made of oiled leather, held a formidable hunter's knife
    his boots, of the same material, showed even inore wear than the

    




    F I R E R I R D    193
    
     The hut itself had been built with great care and a love for crafts-
    , Manship; again, more like a boyar's hunting-lodge than a peasant-hut.
     It had an actual wooden floor, a stone hearth and a real stone chimney.
    The material in the windows looked to be plates of mica, carefully fit-
     ted into wooden frames and caulked with pine-tar and moss. The logs
     of the hut had been chinked with more moss and mud, so tightly that
     not even a hint of chill crept in. All of the furniture was hand-built,
     mostly of carefully bent and formed branches with the bark peeled off.
     The only things that could not have been made by the old man himself
     were the pottery, ironmongery, woven goods, and weapons. Ilya noted
     three pottery mugs, the pitcher, and several crocks. There were weapons
     and knives hung on the wall, and they appeared to be in good repair and
     functional. There were also some fine examples of ironwork: the kettle,
     pot, tongs, hook, and poker at the fireplace. The bedding on the bed in-
     cluded 'coverlets and blankets as well as some beautifully tanned furs.
     Bunches of onions and herbs hung from the rafters, there was a hand-
     fashioned splint-basket of tiny apples in one corner, another of nuts
     next to it, and other assorted supplies that were not immediately iden-
    
    D11-
    
    ind
    
    or-
    and
    
    3111-
    and
    
    This place and this man had never had a woman around long enough
    to make any changes; both the man's clothing and his dwelling were of
    the sort only a bachelor would have. No woman could have resisted dcc-
    orating the wool of his tunic with at least a little embroidery, and no
    woman would have left the house so utilitarian and unadorned. There
    were no curtains at all, for instance, and no fancywork on the bed-linens.
    Everything was entirely functional, with nothing to make it "fancy." A
    woman would have woven some rugs rather than use somewhat moth-
    eaten bear- and wolf-skins; a woman would have painted the shutters and
    tic splint-baskets with flowers and fanciful beasts.
    Ilya was so hungry he atc most of the meat without tasting it; when
    he did slow down enough to gulp some of the potent honey-wine and
    cat the last few bites carefully, he identified it as venison, nicely seasoned
    and Juicy. This man might be a bachelor, but he had learned how to cook
    with his limited foodstuffs, and do it well.
     lie finished the last few bites, drank about half the honey-wine, and

    




    194   MERCEDES LACI~EV
    
    his host handed him the honey-smeared chunk of bread he'd been hold-
    ing. "Now," the old man said, when he finished the honeyed bread and
    the last of the wine. "You need sleep more than you need anything else,
    I'm thinking. Bide you there a bit, and let me pull out the trundle.
                                           ie
     Before Ilya could say anything, the old man went over to the larg 4d
    and pulled a second out from beneath it. It wasn't much of a bed, more
    like a box filled with soft grasses and herbs, but the old man threw, a
    coarse sheet over the filling and dropped a pillow, a blanket, and. a
    bearskin down on it from his own bed.
     "I use it for puppies when my bitch whelps," be explained, as
    tucked the sheet in all around, "but on the rare times when I get a ped-
    dler through here, I can give him a safe night's sleep-it makes them
    more likely to pass here again, when stopping with me takes them so far
    out of their way. Most often when I need something, I have to go fetch
    it myself, and that's a long trip."
     "I slept in a tree last night," Ilya said hoarsely, standing up and putting
    out a hand as he swayed. 'And I meant to sleep on the ground t
    Any bed, even a piece of your floor, is like a gift from heaven ri
    Thank you. Thank you! May all the kind spirits bless you!" He
    coat and fell into the bed as the old man stood aside. He sta
    scious just long enough to kick,off his boots and roll himself up in the
    blanket and the bearskin. After that, he remembered nothing.
     He woke with dim, golden light coming in the windows, and the old
    man had already tidied up the place without waking him. The in ed
    was neatly made, the coverlet tucked in tightly; the floor had been swept,
    the dishes washed and put up, and the dogs were nowhere in sight, so
    they were presumably outside. The old man was quietly carving up the
    now cold roast into slices, chopping some and dropping it intot, pot;
    turnip-tops on the table and the scent of onions told Ilya what sTe of
    the rest of the ingredients were. When he saw that Ilya was awak, the
    old man showed him a basin of water waiting for a wash, which Ii
    
     Ilya doused his face and neck with the cold water, making free oi'so~nle
    soft soap in a box beside the basin. Seeing no other recourse, he Jov,~
    the basin to the door and tossed the dirty water outside; as he did so'.
    
    glad to take advantage of.

    




    F I R E B I R D    195
    
    the ogs came bounding up from out of the maze and slipped past him
    into the house, tails wagging. For a few moments, the small room seemed
    full of dogs until they settled themselves in their usual places, each with
    a generous bone to chew. Ilya wiped out the basin with his towel and set
    it back where he had found it. When Ilya was done, the old man offered
    him the stool beside the fire, and presented him with a breakfast of cold
    venison and bread, which he ate slowly and with more appreciation than
    he had the food last night. While Ilya ate, the old man shoved the
    trundle-bed beneath the larger one, and went out several times, bring-
    ing in firewood that he put in a rack beside the fireplace. Ilya offered to
    help, but his offer was cordially refused, and after Ilya tried to rise and
    couldn't, he gave in.
     The old man waited until Ilya was clearly finished eating, then poured
    himself a cup of his own brewing, taking a second stool by the fire.
    .N " h said, "I've been the one doing most of the talking. Tell me
    
      you ended up here, back behind the north wind."
     Ilya told his story slowly, leaving out nothing except most of the su-
    pernatural events, from the theft of his father's cherries onward. He went
    back that far under the premise that if this was the domovol, he wanted
    the spirit to feel as much sympathy for him as possible. But in case the
    old man was a simple mortal, he said nothing of seeing the Firebird, nor
     hi  presence in the orchard-only that Pletor had failed as had
              , and what Pictor had done that ultimately led to
    Ilya's own beating. He very cleverly managed to give neither his father's
    name nor the name of the village associated with the palace, just as he'd
    planned last night. Ilya also left out the fact that the gelding had spo-
    n to him, but left in the rusalka; left out the spirit-horse that had come
    to Iiis rescue, and left out the fact that he had recognized the maze. The
    old man listened carefully, nodding now and again but never interrupt-
    P9, except to refill his mug with honey-wine. Ilya was careful not to drink
    ~uo deeply or too often; he couldn't imagine how the old man drank his
    
     potent brew without becoming tipsy. When Ilya came to the end
    of his story, the old man rubbed his nose with the back of his hand, and
    harrumphed a bit.
     "There's no one in the world that you could be except the grandson

    




    196   RIERCEDES LACKEV
    
    of my old master, Vasily Gregorovitch," the old fellow said decisive
    slapping his knee for emphasis. "That's who I copied my maze from,
    keep out the bears and the wolves-they get tired of trying to follow sce
    about halfway in, except in really bad winters, give up, and go back o
    again. Only one of Ivan Vasilovitch's sons would know how to find h
    way in so easily, and damn if you don't have the look of your grandfa
    ther about you. I'm Yasha, boy; I was your grandfather's friend as well as
    his wolf-hunter; when your grandfather Vasily decided I ought to 4
    turned out to pasture, I came here, built this place with a bit of help from
    him. I like silence, and I didn't like what Ivan was turning out to be-
    he was bad to his wife and worse to his men. So, what's your name,
    Ivanovitcb? It's a damn shame young Ivan turned out to be more of
    fool than you pretended to be, or he'd have chucked the other boys out
    and kept you. And who's your mother?"
     "I'm Ilya," be replied, limp with relief. He'd actually heard of Yasha
    once or twice from Ruslan and some of the older servants, especially the
    hound-master, who swore that only Yasha could properly breed and raise
    the borzoi. Even if this was the old domovoi, Yasha was kindly inclined
    toward him. And if it wasn't-Yasha was still kindly inclined toward hi
    "I'm the middle son, from Ivan's second wife, Ekaterina."
     "Middle son?" Yasba's eyebrows arched. "Two wives? I got the ilfl-
    pression from you that there were more than three boys-how big I lit-
    ter did he raise?"
     "Eight, altogether, and he's on his third wife," Ilya replied, rubbing
    his arms a little to ease some of the aches still in them.
     Yasha snorted in contempt. "Eight! All still at home,"
     "More or less," Ilya sighed. "I told you that Pietor ran off with two of
    his best horses and a load of loot. I think that Ivan had planned to ship
    Boris off to his new father-in-law along with that poor dumplilqg of a
    brldc, but he might use my 'death' as an excuse to call the wed(*g off
    and bundle her back to Papa." He laughed ruefully. "Dying this oppqr-
    tunely would be the only thing I'd ever done that would make Father
    happy, I'm afraid. He'll be able to pick whether to use it as an excuse to
    hurry the wedding up or cancel it."

    




    F I R E B I R D    197
    
     Yasha shook his head. "Gods. And you the only one with sense in the
    lot. And my poor old friend Ruslan, how does he fare? I told him he ought
    to come with me, the way young Ivan was turning out, but he wouldn't
    leave your grandfather. Loyal to a fault, and now he's probably too old
    to come hunting for me." Yasha sucked at his lower lip thoughtfully "I
    
    suppose I ought to think about going to fetch him myself; by now, he
    probably thinks I'm dead."
     "Well, he's safe enough, and he's got at least two friends," Ilya replied
    with truth, and went on to describe Ruslan's situation, Father Mikail,
    and Mother Galina. He tried to make it clear how much Father Mikail
    - d Ruslan respected each other, and how Mother Galina would make
    use of her own indispensable position to see that they got decent treat-
    ment, if nothing else. Old Yasha nodded every now and then, but had
    the solitary man's habit of never interrupting until a speaker was finished
    with what he had to say.
     "I told Vasily that the boy was going sour," Yasha said bitterly. "But
    Ivan was the only boy to survive, and he was precious; his opinions were
    taken as if he'd earned the right to voice them-whatever he said was
    taken seriously. By the time I left, the boy was a little buzzard, waiting
    for Vasily to die, impatient to have everything it took ten generations to
    build as if it was all owed to him."
     "Mischa's like that," Ilya ventured. "Maybe all young men are."
     'All young men are impatient to have a life, and that's understand-
     le," Yasha replied. "But Ivan-he wanted everything, but never cared
    for all the work and effort it took to create what he wanted. When no
    one's opinion counted to him but his own, he didn't even have the re-
    spect to cherish and protect what his father felt was important, and what
    went into making up what he was." Yasha groped for words. Ilya re-
    mained silent while the old hunter searched for the way to say what he
    wanted to.
    
            know all old men complain that young men pay no at-
    it ntion to tradition, but there's usually a reason for a trad tion. Some-
    times it's a reason that doesn't bold anymore, but there was always a
    reason for it. That's why it's important to listen to old men-they know

    




    198   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    the 'whys' as well as the customs. And a man without custom and tra-
    dition is a man without roots; he'll blow away in the first hard storm,
    and no one will ever miss him."
     "I think I see what you mean," Ilya replied, creasing his brows. "If you
    don't have a tradition behind something, there's nothing to keep you
    from changing it every time you don't happen to like what's going on at
    the moment. And if you keep changing your mind and the way you do,
    things, you'll never really figure out what is going to work."
     Yasha nodded eagerly. "The reason traditions start is because thcY
    work, and someone probably paid a dear price to find that out. Willell
    you throw all that away, you're throwing away their lives and alflffic.~
    stood for and sacrificed along with it! When you throw it away, ydu~re
    saying that your ancestors had nothing to do with what you are now, that
    your prosperity and your life all came into being because you were some-
    how so meritorious just by being alive that the world made it all spTing
    up out of nothing Just for you. And that was Ivan all over; throwing eve
    thing away so that he could make his own rules-and what has it g
    ten him? A houseful of contention, enemies in his own family, a wife who
    despises him, and the only son worth more than the earth to bury NIP
    in is the one that is the least regarded." Yasba snortcd. "So much for be-
    lieving that every new idea has to be a good one just because it's new!"
     He asked more questions about the incidents that had led tol, Ilya's
    becoming the Fool. Ilya obliged him, although he made no mention of
    the more outr6 supernatural elements of his story. He didn't talk abt)U!
    his grandfather Vasily and all his great-greats appearing in the crypt.
    he continued to leave the appearance of the Firebird out of his story, al
                                           I
    his own subsequent ability to hear and understand animals. At t
    point, the wolfhound bitch left her place at the fire and walked del -
    ately over to the two of them, gazing searchingly into Ilya's face. S4,e was
                                           "dible
    one of the most magnificent animals he had ever seen, an inc`ii~
    specimen of her kind, with a pristine white coat, delicate mu and
                                         Al
    huge, intelligent eyes. It was easy to see that the wolfhound edimith,
    leading Ivan's pack was out of her line.
     "You ought to tell him," the bitch said directly to him, gazing at

    




    I
    
    be-
    
    W!
   ya s
    [I of
    lout
    knd
    and
    that
    ber-
    
    ~ was
    fible
    aud
    ~ntly
    
    him
    
    F I R E B I R D    199
    
    with liquid brown eyes. "He has the right to know, does my master, what
    has come into his house. I know that you would not harm him, but he has
    the right to know. "
     "He ought to tell me what?" the old man asked her sharply "What is
    it I have the right to know about my guest?"
     Ilya's mouth dropped open, and he stared at each of them in turn, his
    eyes going from the dog to the man and back again in a manner that was
    probably quite comical.
     The wolfhound turned her attention to her master, bending her slim,
    aristocratic muzzle to him. "He ought to tell you he's Firebird-touched, "
    
    she said. "We can scent the magic on him, and we know that he hasn't told
    you everything that happened to him yet. He can talk to us, just like you
    can, and he is wearing a thing on his wrist that is also magic-scented, but
    it is a different scent from the Firebird. "
     "You-the dogs-l-ah-I didn't know-" Ilya stammered. "I beg
    your pardon, but I thought-"
     For the first time, Yasha interrupted him with a wave of his hand.
    "Never mind. I understand why you didn't say anything." He chuckled.
    "You probably thought I was like most people; that I wouldn't believe
    V you if you started talking about Firebirds and being able to understand
    animals. It must have taken a great deal of courage to mention the
    rusalka.
      "Well, I have the marks on my wrists to prove she almost bad me,
    Ilya replied with a wince. 'And most people believe in the water-spirits.
    But I never heard of anyone who could speak with animals before, and
    I certainly never heard of the Firebird outside of a tale, and I don't think
    anvoric else I know has, either."
    kYasha chuckled. "I can certainly guess how you've been feeling. The
    ft of tongues is a strange gift to receive, especially if you aren't prepared
    for it. I got it years ago, from the leshii; I did one of them a great favor,
     they gave it to me to help me be a better hunter. You thought you
     viere mad when you started to hear the beasts, right?"
     ~ .1 wondered," Ilya admitted. The old man laughed, throwing his head
     back and shaking his head.

    




    200    MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
     "You poor fellow!" he chuckled, wiping his eyes. 'At least the leshil
    told me what he was going to do. But yours is from the Firebird! I sut-
    pose you must have seen her. Is that who was stealing the cherries?"
     Ilya nodded. "I was in the trees, watching, while Pictor took his turn
    at guard. I kept myself awake with pins. I didn't tell anyone about her. I
    couldn't; I didn't think Father would believe me, in the first place, arld
    if he did, I was afraid he would try and catch her. He can't see or hear
    anything valuable without trying to get it-you should have seen 10
    he went through in order to get our prize stud! I guess that's why sh
    made me the gift."
     "But ever since you saw her, you've had terrible bad luck." Yasliq riod
    ded wisely, as the wolfhound bitch lay down at his feet. "Not too sur-
    prising. So, let me think back along your story. Since you could speak with
    beasts, most of them would have been trying to help you. So your horse
    didn't really run off, he ran away with you a-purpose, knowing what your.
    brothers intended-that's why you aren't more knocked about than you
    are. When he got savaged by the boar, you had to kill him. And the gift
    of tongues-that's how you knew to rescue the nightingale from the
    rusalka, right?"
     "Exactly." Ilya frowned for a moment. "I still can't imagine why she
    had a bird in a fish-trap."
      Terrible bad magic," the old hunter said, with a shake of his head
    and a sad and serious look on his face. "The water-spirits hate thequ-1-
    its of the air, and they kill air-creatures to make the worst of theirA,
    ics. That rusalka's a mean bitch; I know her, and she's as muchwitch as
    spirit, and spiteful enough for twenty. Sometimes you can get the rusalka
    to like you and help you, but never her; she's the daughter of the'
    of the lake and never lets the other spirits forget it. Proud, petty,
    cious, and a good thing you had help, or you'd never have gotten IT
    from her." He cast a sharp glance at Ilya. "You did have help, didn't,,jio
     Ilya nodded, and told the old man about the spirit of his sorrel geldin
    and the bracelet of horsehair he now wore. "Maybe it's foolish, but
     horse did tell me to make and wear it  He trailed off.
     "Let me see." Mutely, Ilya held out his hand, and the old man ex-
    amined the horsehair bracelet minutely. "Huh. Not one of the Night

    




    F I R E B I R D    tat
    
    Wind's foals, or the boar wouldn't have touched him, but I'll bet be was
    telling the truth and he's Night Wind get, all the same. There's enough
    of her sons about to have sired or grand-sired your gelding. Your luck
    started to change about when you put it on, didn't it?"
     Ilya thought for a moment, and realized with surprise that he was cor-
    rect. "Come to think of it, you're right. After I made the bracelet and
    put it on, I found a few things to eat, and nothing harassed me on the
    trail. I never even heard or saw anything but ravens all day"
     "That's it." Yasha smiled and nodded, and so did the wolfhound, in
    a sombcr imitation of her master that would have been funny if both of
    them hadn't been so serious. "He's countering the Firebird's bad luck.
    He's not got enough of the Night Wind blood to give you good luck, but
    Oe can counter the bad. I'd wear that until the bad luck wears off, or she
    akes it off, but she'd have to see you to do that, and you'd probably have
    to do her a good turn again. She's already paid you for the last one."
     Ilya pursed his lips in thought. "But why did I get bad luck in the first
     lace just by looking at the Firebird?"
     1-Yasha laughed spreading his hands wide. "Who knows? She's a spirit-
     creature-, they have their own rules! If I were to guess, though, it's prob-
     ably something she does to make sure that those who see her can never
     catch her-if suddenly their luck goes bad, even if she doesn't know
     they're there, then she's a bit safer. If she can foul their luck, their nets
     will tangle, their snares will foul, their arrows will go astray, bowstrings
     snap, bows break. Of course, if anything came to catch her that had
     stronger magic to counter hers, then she would be in trouble." '
      Ilya sighed, then jumped as a knot in the fire popped. "I can't thank
    I )Tou enough for your hospitality," he said slowly. 'And I can only think of
     TePaVin.g vou by offering to help you, if I can."
      a matter of fact, you can, if you don't mind a bit of hard work,"
    theold nian told him. "But first, you sleep a bit more, and eat a bit more,
    and we'll see to the chores tomorrow." He smiled, as Ilya belatedly won-
    dered what he'd gotten himself in for. "Don't worry, I'm not the domovoi
    from your house; the Old Man was still in residence when I left, and
    being honored as was proper. If I were to guess, I'd say he took up resi-
    i, d cc in the hunting-lodge the master of the hounds built for your
    
    he
    
    ad
    
                                        ag
                                        as
                                       1ka
                                      ~ya r
    
    V1 -
    
    ,vaN,
    
    U?11
    
    ling
    the

    




    202    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    grandfather; it never had a proper domovoi, and it's the closest dwelli
    The dog-master knows how to properly honor the spirits, and that
    be the only reason why the domovoi hasn't given Ivan what's coming o
    him-that, and Ruslan is protecting the brat as he promised Vasily he
    would, I know he says he isn't, but I'll bet that he is. Maybe when Rus-'
    Ian dies or goes away, the domovol will make up for lost time, and no
    I know would weep."
     "Have you a domovol?" Ilya whispered, looking over his shoulder.
     "Of course," Yasha said matter-of-factly. "Don't worry about him;
    know better than most how to honor spirits. You likely won't see
                                            hi
                         like me. The bannikio
    the other hand, I know is there, but I've never seen him."
     At the mention of the bannik, Ilya realized how filthy he was
    of his sudden longing for a bath must have shown in his face, fo
    
                                   P.
     "Speaking of our bathhouse friend, I am overdue for a stea
    don't fire up the house as often as I should, being alone, but with
    here, it's worth it. Care for a bath Ilya Ivanovitcb? You'll have to
    me chop extra wood."
     "It will be worth it!" Ilya exclaimed, getting stiffly to his feet.
     The next hour or so was spent in readying the bathhouse and getti
    the fires going. Then they both chopped wood madly, replacing woo
    for the house-fire that they had used up in the bathhouse. When they
    were done-and Ilya made a point of chopping more than his share, more
    than old Yasha asked him to-they were both ready for that stea
     Yasha liked his steambaths the old-fashioned way-a bath, t
    steaming, followed by a dash into the snow, a brisk beating wit
    branches, then another steaming. Ilya was quite content merely to
    himself with cold water from a bucket, but if the old wolf-hunte
    toughened himself with this particular ritual, there was little wonde
    he had survived so long by himself.
     "Third steaming's for the bannik," Yasba said, leaving fir-bran
    soap, firewood, and water ready. 'And we could stand a change of c
    ing. I hate getting into dirty clothes when I'm clean, and yours a
    going to be fit again until they're washed and mended."
    
    while you're here, he's shy-but he looks just
    
    looked at him intently for a moment, then stood u

    




    F I R E B I R D    203
    
    ting
    ood
    ,bey
    norC
    
    en a
    -1 f ir-
    Ouse
    had
    that
    
    [ches,
    -loth-
    aren
    
     Ilya didn't ask where the old man was going to get clothing to fit him;
    be was too drowsily content after the hot steam, which had done won-
    ders for all of his aches and pains, and even for his head. He wondered
    if Yasba bad bealing herbs in the honey-wine; there bad been a taste there
    he hadn't recognized. It was a pleasant taste, to be sure, but quite un-
    famillar.
     They trudged back through the snow to the house; once there, the
    old man went up into the loft above the main room and came down with
    an armload of wildly disparate clothing. The only thing all the pieces had
    in common with one another was that they were clean, obviously had
    been worn at least once, and were a bit faded.
     "That rusalka and her father are good for one thing," he said slyly.
    "When they're done with a victim, they haven't any use for his posses-
    sions, and they cast them up on the beach. I go gleaning there about once
    a week in the summer; most times I find nothing, but I've been here for
    years, and I haven't had to buy a stitch of clothing for myself in all that
    time."
     Ilya wondered for a moment if he should feel squeamish about wear-
    ing the clotlung of a dead man-but Yasha obviously didn't feel that way,
    and lie was more familiar with ghosts and spirits than Ilya was. Finally,
    he bent to help Yasha in picking over the clothing.
     "This ought to fit you, and this," Yasha said, picking out a streaked
    and faded red tunic of fine wool with an embroidered collar, and a shirt
    oNght linen, a little discolored, to wear beneath. 'And this," holding up
    a pair of black leather breeches. "I couldn't get into those, but I save what
    I can't fit, for patches and all." He tossed the clothing to Ilya, who
    caught it, and stripped off his own peasant-garb of wool. Then Yasha
    swiftly changed into a sober brown tunic and matching breeches with a
    rnodest amount of trim at the collar. Ilya sacrificed squeamishness in
    favor of clean clothing, and climbed into Yasha's offerings.
     They fit perfectly. With the addition of thick stockings and his own
    boots and belt, Ilya's outfitting was complete, and he hid to admit he felt
    Much better. The clothing was scrupulously clean, and there was no sign
    of how the rusalka and her father had eliminated the previous owners.
     Supper was venison stew, and afterward it was Yasha's turn to talk,

    




    204    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    telling simple stories of wolf-hunts and dog-breeding, made a bit dif-
    ferent by the casual way he would refer to what his dogs had told him-
    and the way his borzoi-bitch would chime in with additions or
    corrections as needed. Finally, weariness, relaxation after the bath, and
    the honey-wine all caught up to Ilya. He pulled out the trundle-bed him-
    self and fell into it, pulling the blanket and furs over his head. His last'
    sight was of Yasha and the hounds discussing things over the fire.
     In the morning he felt very much his old self, and woke at the same
    time as Yasha. He discovered that he need not have worried that Yasha
    was going to set him to impossible tasks; the chores that Yasha 4,,d in
    mind were all simple ones. He wanted help with chopping wood, f his
    old shoulders were not as pain-free as young ones. He also wanted help
    with a few tasks that needed two sets of hands: some mending of the
    roof of the house, the bathhouse, and his storage sheds. That was eDough
    for one day, and the next two or three were similar. Ilya helped birn with
    nearly everything, from tanning the stacks of hides he'd accumulateO,
    to smoking the deer and boar he brought down the third day after l1va
    arrived, to chopping a small forest of deadfall wood. Days of hard
    always ended in the bathhouse, and at night Ilya slept and dreame
    didn't remember what he dreamed, except that it bad to do with the
    bird, and he felt an increasing certainty that she had meant Mott
    her gift than merely to give him the means to understand the spel of
    animals. In the end, though, there wasn't much left to do; Yashalcould
    go the whole winter without having to leave the clearing in the"
    of the maze unless he wanted to.
     "Well, you've seen to it that I needn't do a bit of bard work this
    ter, and that's a fact," Yasha said the night Ilya finished the last 0
    wood-chopping. The wolf-hunter laughed, as he often did. "I'll have 0
    be diligent in my hunting, or I'll run to fat! But now what will you do?
    Go back to Ivan? I can show you the way, if you'd like-maybe you could
    persuade that old fool Ruslan to come back here with you. By Perun,,
    maybe you could talk the Christ-man into coming too, and see if we con-
    vert him or he converts us first! We could be four bachelors together until
    spring, then see if a pile of furs will buy you a pretty bride to take care
    of all of us,"

    




    F I R E B I R D    295
    
    'IS
    
    th
    d,
    
    ya
    A
    ie
    
    re-
    th
    W
    ild
    
    ter
    
    in-
     he
     to
     10?
     ild
    
    in,
    
    )n-
    
             ing Firebirds."
    
    are
    
     "I could go home and frighten Mischa-make him think I'm a ghost!"
    Ilya replied. "Then, maybe I could let things go back to the way they
    were, but only after I threw a good scare into him by coming in his win-
    dow at night!,,
     Yasha laughed hugely at that, then sobered. "The trouble is, you'd
    have a damned hard time convincing anyone you were a fool after wan-
    dering around in the woods for so long. I can go fetch Ruslan myself in
    the summer, and I will, since things aren't going so well for him. So don't
    think you have to go back because of him. You decide for you; what will
    vou do? Go back, or go on, or stay here? You're welcome here, and no
    doubt of it."
     Ilya twisted the horsehair bracelet on his wrist and considered his op-
    tions, slightly dazed by the fact that now he had options. "I think, and
    no slight meant to you, Yasha, that I would like to go on. I think the Fire-
    bird meant something when she gave me her gift; I don't know what,
    but I want to find out."
     Yasha and the wolfhound bitch exchanged a look, and it was the dog
    who spoke first. "I told you no one who is Fi rebi rd- touched is ever satis-
    fied with a common life again. I told you he was going to have to follow
    the scent of magic. "
     "Eh, well, you were right, dog," Yasba admitted and sighed. "Good
    enough, and I can't blame you. But winter can be deadly in these woods;
    if.vou haven't found anything by the time the going gets bad, come back
    here and bide with me the rest of the winter, all right? We'll go after
    Ruslan in the spring, and maybe steal some of Ivan's horses, and then
    vou can he off again in high style!" He grinned ferally. "There isn't a
    dog on that estate that will so much as bark at me, and the day I can't
     gel past One of Ivan's stupid hired guards is the day I will lie down and
     dic. Between me and my silver beauty here, when the horses get turned
     out for spring grazing, we could nip you a pair as smart as any gypsy,
     and no one the wiser. Then you could be off; maybe go to the Great
     Tsar, and sell your services to him as a horse-talker if you tire of chas-
    
     The idea had merit, Ilya had to agree. Certainly, if things were parceled
    out honestly, his inheritance would amount to far more than a couple

    




    206    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    of horses-and a horse-talker could command fees as
    
    cian.
     "I'll do that," he promised. "But first-just say I have a trail I have to
    follow, at least to see if it comes to a dead-end or not. If it does, I'll be
    back."
     "Fair enough," Yasha agreed. "Now, let's see what the rusalka s leav-,
    ings are, and how well we can outfit you."
     In the end, the rusalka outfitted him very well indeed. He had a pack,
    changes of clothing, a cloak to go over his coat in case he needed to sleep
    in the snow some night, a coil of rope, two knives, a sword, a bow and
    arrows, a spear, a fire-striker and tinder-box, everything a traveler nitht
    need to trek through the forest in winter. The only thing he lacked was
    a horse or a donkey, but in the winter, it would be hard to find an am-
    mal fodder, so perhaps it was just as well he was taking only what he could
    carry. He knew that Yasha would have parted with the youngest oChis
    three dogs if he'd asked, but he wasn't going to ask. He'd already *di-
    rectly been the cause of one animal's death; he wasn't going to tak0he
    chance of putting one of Yasha's precious wolfhounds in danger. 4
     Yasha gave him a rough map of the area around his maze, to the
    best of his knowledge, but to the west the map was mostly a blank. 1
    don't go there much," Yasha admitted, as they sat over the sketch just
    before Ilya shouldered his pack to leave. "I'm a creature of habit, and
    there was never anything to the west that I needed to see." He rubbec
    his nose. "Maybe there's something in the west that wanted me to feej~
    that way, eh?"
     "It could be," Ilya agreed. "If there's any direction it feels like I ought
    to be going in, though, it's to the west. So maybe that ought to be in~
    sign." He hoisted his pack to his shoulders and shifted until it balanctd
    correctly If he got into a fight, he could drop it immediately and have
    knife and sword in his hands in moments, for both were belted on ovei
    his coat.
     "Good enough!" the wolf-hunter said. _"Just remember my promisc,
    and your own."
    
     "I will, and you have all my thanks, Yasha," Ilya replied, taking a mo-
    ment to study the old man's face. He was looking for something sLib-
    
    high as any magi-

    




    F I R E B I R D    207
    
    tle-loneliness, the vague fear of being on his own through the long win-
    ter -and if he saw it, he was going to change his mind, put the pack
    
    d0 .
     wr, and wait to see what spring brought. He'd already taken the
    wolfhound bitch aside and asked her if she thought Yasha would be all
    right when he left. Her opinion was that he would. But Ilya wanted to
    know for certain. After so long a time of being alone, Yasba could not
    bide his thoughts; he wore them as clearly as if he had them written on
    his shirt-front.
     Ilya saw nothing in the old man's eyes that he had not already seen
    every day that they had spent together, and he felt the release of great
    relief. Yasha was used to being alone-and he wasn't precisely "alone"
    as long as he bad the gift of animal tongues. He would be fine' and so
    would Ruslan. Yasha would not leave his old friend in Ivan's house a mo-
    ment longer than he had to, now that he knew how things stood. Ilya
    had some thought that Yasha might well go after Ruslan as soon as his
    guest left, if the weather looked to bold for a while. Ilya was free to go
    wherever his need led him.
     With a wave of his hand and an odd feeling of contentment, he
    plunged into the maze.
     When he emerged again, according to Yasha, he was going to have to
    follow the outside walls of the maze until he was going due west. There
    was a game-trail along the outside, for birds and small animals sheltered
    in the dense bushes, and deer browsing there where grasses rooted at the
    base of the hedge. Then, the game-trail went westward, more or less, for
    at least a league; beyond that, Yasha didn't know, for he had never gone
     that far.
      But with a pack full of supplies and food, and with weapons in his
     hands and at his belt, Ilya felt more confidence than he had in months.
     He followed the game-trail as Yasha had described it, with the wall of
     dense bushes to his right, and did indeed find a new trail striking off to
     the ~~ est that Joined the one around the outside of the maze. The snow
     there was no wind; the sun shone brightly
    
    down on the forest, and if there was ever a perfect day to strike out on
    a journey, this was it.
     I know of the rusalka and her father to the south of here-who knows

    




    208    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    what there might be in the rest of the forest? he thought, with more of I
    thrill than a feeling of trepidation. There might be anything! There mig i ~ I
    be the palace of a magician, the tower of a lovely, lonely sorceress, Or an
    f
    enchantedgrove where maidens have been turned into statues, waiting 'or
    the kiss of a warrior to change them back into girls! The world seemed
    fraught with possibilities, and Ilya found that he was paying attention
    to everything.
     His first day passed without anything of real note happening, and t ic
    second and third were like the first. He used his bow to take down a cou-
    ple of rabbits to make his supplies last a little longer-either there was
    a great deal more game in the forest here, or he had been so dazed and
    disoriented when he had wandered after the accident that he had mis d
    all signs of the animals around him.
     Or else, his luck had been so bad that all the animals had avoided him,
    and now he was enjoying perfectly normal luck, in which he hit some
    rabbits, fired at others and missed, and lost one arrow when it hit a rock
    and shattered. That was the way an ordinary day of hunting in ordinary
    forest should pass. Normal luck pleased him completely; it was pleasant
    to be able to hope that the universe would not always muster its Mrces
    against him.
     But having had completely bad luck for so long made him very,~au-
    tious. When he made camp, he would always stop at the first good 01ce
    that presented itself, instead of trusting that something better, oqght
    show up later. He never had to camp in the open, thanks to that p
    The first night he was on his own, he found a rough tripod of d
    trees with a cavity beneath them just big enough to curl up in. Th s
    ond night, he discovered a group of rocks at the edge of a ravine wifil a
    similar shelter. The third night, be made a rough lean-to beneath4
    branches of one of those enormous pines, a sheltered space beneath tEcir
    drooping boughs. Although he sometimes wished the next morning t1lat
    he had walked a little farther, there were always enough downed,trees,
    groups of rocks, or sheltering glades to provide some protection if the
    
    weather turned bad. Yasha assured him that a fire was sufficient to keep
    off wolves and lynx, and suggested that he always have something solid
    on three sides of him, and he was usually able to situate a lean-to so that

    




    F I R E B I R D    209
    
    he had that protection and could sleep without worrying about preda-
    tors. Between the fur-lined wool cloak and his coat, he slept as warmly
    and safely as if he were in the trundle-bed.
     All the while, his sense that something was about to happen strength-
    ened and made him aware of everything around him, from the winter-
    birds in the trees above to the tiniest movement in the woods beyond.
     So he when he came to a place where one large tree had crashed to
    the ground some time in the last summer, taking several smaller ones
    down with it, he didn't miss the hint of movement just as he rounded
    a turn in the game-trail, nor the scrap of reddish-brown fur lying oddly
    atop the fallen trunk. He ventured off the trail, cautiously, wading
    through fresh, unbroken snow up to his thighs in places. As he neared
    the tree with the fur on it, he saw that there was a split in the trunk, and
    that disturbed snow seemed to indicate that the trunk moved a little,
    very recently. As he got even closer, he saw that the tree had caught it-
    self a victim.
     The scrap of fur was the tip of a tail, stuck in the split trunk, and the
    tail belonged to a live fox vixen, who peered up at him from behind the
    trunk, her teeth bared in a terrified snarl as be approached. It wasn't too
    a vixen, not a dog-fox; not with the way her tail
    was being held. She alternated her actions among tryinE to friehten him
    off, trying to escape, and trying to hide,
     "You poor little thing!" he exclaimed, seeing her terror. "Your luck
    rnust have turned as bad as my own was!" Something must have been
    holding the split trunk apart-perbaps a bit of wood wedged in the
    crack-that had given way as the vixen was hunting for mice in and
    around it, catching her tail in a viselike grip. She could get away by
    gnawing her tail off, but obviously that would be painful, and she hadn't
    gotten to that extreme yet.
     Now, he was not a hunter, like Yasha, with a market for fur, and fox
    was not edible. He had no reason to want to kill the little vixen, and he
    never killed anything without a good reason if he could help it.
     He didn't want to leave her here; she might have to gnaw herself free,
    which would be very dangerous as well as painful, creating a place for
    wound-rot to set in. If she didn't free herself soon enough, she could be-

    




    210   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    come prey for another animal: a lynx, a bear, or a wolf, perhaps. But li
    also had no intentions of getting bitten for his pains, and he couldn't
    count on the fox understanding his human words, as his friend the geld-
    ing had pointed out.
     So he shrugged out of his pack, took the rolled-up cloak off the top
    it, and while the vixen watched him with eyes that were nearly insane with
    terror, he threw it over her. The moment its folds fell around her, shi;,~
    began fighting it, snapping and whining with pain, but he picked her an(
    the cloak up together and rolled her tightly in it, immob
     "Now, pretty little lady, you must stay still," he said
    
                                     Ilizing her.
                                     in as soothin"
    tone as he could manage. "I'm going to free your tail and let you go, but
    the job will go faster if you don't struggle."
     Whether she heard and understood him or not, she suddenly stopped
    fighting, and remained a tense but unmoving bundle inside the entan-
    gling folds of the cloak.
     After that, it was only a little work to take his hand-ax, cut a crude
    wedge from a bit of branch, jam it into the split trunk at the narrowest
    part, and hammer it home with the butt of the ax. The split widened
    again, and as the fox involuntarily flicked her tail, it came free of the
    
    bruising.
     Ilya smiled and chuckled. "There, you see," he said, very quietly.
    told you I didn't mean to hurt you. Now go run off, and find a
    I put in
    
     She turned and looked at him, looked him straight in the eyes
                                            Id-
                                            ILI
    
                                          4~
    might want to know," she said, slowly and clearly, "that if you go on t7he
    way you have been, you'll come to the maze around the Katschei's palace,"
    
    'a
    
    wood.
    Ilya picked her up again, took her over to a clear spot, and gently freed
    her of the cloak, stepping quickly away so she wasn't tempted to silap
    at him. She lay in the snow for a moment, as if dazed, then got to r
    feet and shook herself hard.              I
     Then she craned her neck around and stared at her tail as if she
    didn't quite believe that it was free and undamaged, except for a bit of
    
    some dog-fox. But watch out for this tree-the wedge
    not hold any better than the last thing wedging it open did."
    
    things very seldom do. "Thank you, man-child, I won't iget

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    211
    
     Then, with a bound, she was gone, vanishing with that a
    ability that foxes and cats seem to share.
     A maze? Around a palace? That piqued his curiosity as n
    could have. Who besides Yasba bad built a maze in the mi(
    wilderness? And who besides a water-spirit would have a pal
     Well, I'm not a bad hand at mazes; perhaps I can solve thi
    find out what a "Katschei" is.
     First, he would make sure no other animal got caught in the
    Using the wedge he had already driven into the trunk, he spli
    tree completely and left the two halves standing slightly apa
     He rolled up his cloak, replaced it and the hand-ax in his p
    dered the pack, and went back to the game-trail. Katsche
    strange, exotic sound to it. Maybe this was the "scent of mag
     d been chasing.
     Th was another possibility, and it drew him irresisti
     ere he would see th.e Firebird again.
    
    ILVA had reached the maze the fox had told him about, and now he
    stared up at the strangest structure he bad ever seen in his life.
        a wa -a stone WRII-reaching twice as high as he was tall. It
    
    was made of perfectly fitted square blocks of some polished gray stone,
    put touether, so far as be could see, without the use of mortar or cement.
    The wall went for furlongs, perhaps a league, in either direction, and he
    bad walked quite some distance to find the opening.
     The only stone walls that he had ever seen bad been made of field-
    stone mortared together with cement. He had heard of marble, of course,
    and knew that it was supposed to be of surpassing whiteness, so he
    didn't think this wall could be made of that substance, but what was It?
    d why waste so much obviously fine material on the walls of an out-
    maze? amount of labor implied in the construction of this wall
    e his head reel. How long and how many men had it taken to quarry
    and smooth all these blocks? How long to transport them? And how long
    to fit them together?
     When the fox had said that there was a maze ahead of him, he had
    naturally thought of a simple little maze, perhaps of wooden fence-

    




    212   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    sections, or hedges, or, just possibly, rough fieldstone walls. He had never
    imagined anything like this! Either the Katschei was as fabulously
    wealthy as the Great Tsar and as mad as a cuckoo, or he was a sorcerer
    of unbelievable power. In either case, Ilya found himself eaten alive Ah
    curiosity. He had to find out what lay on the other side of the maze!
     Still, if he stood here staring at it, he'd never get anywhere. He hitched
    his pack a little higher on his shoulders, made sure that his sword was
    loose in the sheath, and entered into the Katschei's maze. Sureh 11
    could not be that complicated; the sheer cost of building these enormous
    stone walls would make it impossible to construct a large maze. A few
    turns and he would be at the Katschei's palace, and find out just what
    a Katschel was. He was quite confident that he could solve this little
    problem in time for his midday meal.
     It was a little before noon when he enhausted and hungry, and ready to admit defeat. He'd already made one
                                        ly los.
    attempt to find his way back out, and now he was complete . Thel,
    maze went on forever, or so it seemed; monolithic gray stone walls on
    either side of him, twice the height of a man and with about as nuich
    space between them, and nothing whatsoever to relieve the gray of the
    stone, the white of the snow. He should have been able to retrace his steps
    by retracing his own path in the snow, but somehow he had come to an
    intersection where all four of the paths were trampled, and that wjs
    wlicrc lie had gotten lost. He was just glad that this was winter and there
    was snow to melt for drink-for otherwise he'd be very thirsty by;low
     fie still could not imagine how anyone had ever built this plocc-
    unless it had been by magic. When he'd read of the legend of the M1110-
    taur in Father Mikail's books, he'd never been able to figure out ho~
    those Greek boys and girls had managed to get lost in the Minotaur's
    maze-he'd pictured a maze like the one protecting the family crypt.
    His father's maze was frightening for a child, of course, and it took re-
    maining calm to master it, but you couldn't wander about for niorc
    than half a day without finding your way out, if only by accident. Now
    he understood how people could wander for days in a maze anA nc\ef
    know where they were. He was not certain that he could have found a
    ball of string long enough to mark where he had gone so far.

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    213
    
     He came to another dead-end, and stopped, just as the sky reddened
    n the west. He'd tried to use the location of the sun as a guide, but not
    t had kept him from getting lost. Now the sun was about to set,
    nd he was faced with a decision: stop here, camp in this dead-end
    where he would at least be safe in three directions, or try to keep going
    with the stars as his guide?
     As the light faded and he considered his options and the top of the
    wall, he suddenly grinned. It would be a great deal easier to negotiate
    this maze from above; the builder had probably never thought that
    someone trapped in his construction would climb to the top and make
    his way where he could see where he was going.
     But if I'm going to do that, he thought, I'd better try and get up there
    now, while I can still see.
     He set down his pack and took out his rope, tying one end to the pack
    and the other to his belt. He took off his sword and added it to the pack,
    knowing that to try and climb while wearing it was a recipe for comedy,
    but wouldn't help him much. Then he took a running start down the
    i, long leg of the dead-end and launched himself at the wall.
     He hit it perfectly, but could not catch the top, and slid ignominiously
    down it.
     He could hardly believe it, the first time it happened, thinking that
    he surely must have hit a slick patch. He removed his mittens, backed
     and tried again, with similar results. It was almost as if the top of the
    'Wall suddenly moved out of his reach just as his fingers touched it!
    
    He tried several more times, including using the corners, and all with-
    out any success whatsoever. It was like trying to climb a wall of glass.
    When he tried to find finger- and toe-holds to scramble up the wall
    -fashion, he failed again. There wasn't enough room between the
     eks of stone to insert a piece of paper, much less his fingers, and there
     re no rough places or imperfections. W"hen he tried to make an im-
     ised grapple out of some of his equipment, there was nothing on
  the top of the wall for the grapple to catch onto. The moon rose long
      re he finally gave up and sat down in the snow, defeated by the
    
    o
    
    kow what am I going to
    lithic stone giants guarding the Katschei's palace.
               do? Wander for days? If he'd had any notion

    




    214   RIERCEDES LACKEV
    
    that this was going to happen, he'd have marked the walls or the sm,
    next to them with arrows, so he would at least have known how to ge
    back out. But maybe that would have failed, too. Maybe something or some
    one would have come along and erased the arrows....
     He was too baffled to feel despair yet-he wasn't anywhere near ou
    of supplies, and there was plenty of snow to drink, but what if tl* maz
    had guards patrolling it? The Katschei clearly didn't want visitA.
     What if it has something worse than guards patrolling it? he thoug~
    with sudden dread. Ruslan's tales were full of hideous possibilities, frof
    man-devouring tigers to demonic monsters. What have I gotten MYse
    into? Now despair settled over his heart in a black pall. What good is a
    dinary luck going to do me in a situation like this one? I could be &66
    with Yasha right now, planning how we're going to get Ruslan andlP
    Mikail out without my father knowing. I could at least be outside this eni
    less maze! I'm nevergoing to find my way out of here-it would take a mi
    acle to get me out of here now.
     But just as he thought that, he heard a sudden trill of song above
    head, a bit of melody more often heard in high summer than the sto
    of winter.
     Birdsong? Here? Now?
     It was a nightingale, but what was it doing here?
     Startled, he looked up, but of course saw nothing; it was dirk, ai
    there was no way for him to see a dull-gray bird against the ht S
    The nightingale, however, saw him very clearly.
     "Boy! Boy!" she called. "Look at me, boy! Hear me! I live in KatschE
    garden! Follow, and I lead!"
     Was it the nightingale he had rescued from the rusalka? Helou
    imagine any other bird remaining in the north in winter. Butlowv
    he going to follow the bird when he couldn't see her?
     He shouldered his pack quickly, and went to the end of the ameaFe
    passage. When he came to the first turning, he found out how he
    
    to follow her.                      0
     "Right! Right, boy! Right, and then follow, follow!" the bird sang ga
    
    as if she flitted through warm summer skies. "Follow, and I lea&" f
    dently she was flying ahead to the next turning, and landing and w~

    




    I
    
    F I R E B I R D    215
    
    ing there for him. Now he had the aerial view he wanted, even if it was
    by means of a bird's eyes!
     At every turning, the nightingale flitted overhead and sang his direc-
    tion; he moved as quickly as he could, given the heavy burden of the
    pack, praying that she would not lose interest in leading him. And as be
    followed the nightingale through the maze, he began to sweat, until his
    fur coat seemed unbearably hot. At first he thought it was because he
    was moving at a quick trot and was overheating beneath the heavy fur
    coat. But then be saw that the snow was gone-
     A few turnings more, and the feeling of the ground beneath his boot
    changed. He stopped for j*ust a moment, pulled off his mittens, and knelt
    cautiously to feel it. With a sense of shock, he ran his hand over the sup-
    ple blades of fresh, green grass. This was not just grass that was growing
    niccly, it was grass that had not yet felt the touch of frost.
     Shock might have held him there for some time had the nightingale
    not circled overhead, warning him that this was not a good idea. "Hurry,
    boy! The Katschel's guards look for wanderers! Follow, follow, or they
    find you! "
     That was eriough to send him lurching to his feet and on to the next
    turning. No wonder the nightingale didn't feel the need to migrate to
    the south-she had summer here, in the middle of this inaze! Perhaps
    that was why she understood the human tongue; she must have heard
    it here. And no wonder the Katschei had no trouble raising the walls of
    the maze itself-to anyone capable of keeping summer alive through the
    midst of winter, raising a few paltry walls to make a maze would be
    child's play.
      Ilya stopped only once more, to pull off his coat and add it to the bun-
     the atop his pack-he hadn't wanted to stop at all, but he was sweating
     so beneath the burden of fur that he simply couldn't stand it anymore.
     Once he had the coat off, it was as if he was running beneath a mid-
     summer moon, the air was that balmy and warm. It even carried the
     scent of flowers, roses and other blossoms, quite as if it was not only sum-
     mer, but spring as well, a mingling of three seasons.
    
    s
    
            The maze was changing as he got nearer to the center. The walls were
            taller, as if the Katscbei wanted to block out every glimpse of the world

    




    216   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
    on the other side of it. As if the maze itself was not discourage
    enough! It was a good thing that he had the bird as his guide, for the
    was no pattern to the turnings that he bad yet been able to discern. P
    haps there was a pattern here, but if so, it was too complicated for bim
    to figure out on the run.
     "Two turnings, boy!" sang the bird overhead. "Now one! Left, left-
    yes! Now you are here! "
                                             re
    
     Ilya rounded the last corner of the last wall and simply stood a
    stared. The Katschei's palace rose above the orchard immediately in
    of him.
     So this is the Katschel's palace, he thought dimly, then shrank
    afraid. What in the name of God am I doing here?

    




    -CHAPTE
    
    U N T I L T H I S moment, Ilya had never in his life seen anything like
    the walls of the maze, and he was completely unable to conceive of the
    amount of work it must have taken to build them.
Now he had finally seen what the maze was protecting, and the
         palace made the walls of the maze look insignificant.
     He wasn't actually at the palace yet; it was clear from the trees before
    him, and the substantial amount of land between him and the structure,
    of orchards and gardens to traverse before he
    reached the building. The land covered by the maze and grounds alone
    must be as much as Ivan claimed for his palace, the family farms and
    fields, and all of the bunting preserve besides. But this palace loomed
    over the tops of the trees, lit up like a Christmas cake, an incredible con-
    fection of turrets and domes, of towers and twisting staircases, decorated
    in every color be bad ever seen in his life.
     Whoever the Katschei was, he seemed to be very fond of rainbow
    hues. Every dome was tiled in a different color: scarlet and blue and
    emerald green, some in multiple colors and patterns, every tower roofed
    in silver or gold. Each window had beautifully painted shutters, and a]-
    though it was quite obvious that the palace was made of stone, it was
    made of a dozen different kinds of stone, cut and laid together, forming
    intricate geometric patterns up and down the walls. Doorways and arches
    were rimmed in carved alabaster so finely detailed that from here it
    looked like lace-Ivan had a collection of alabaster eggs, so Ilya knew

    




    21S   MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    what alabaster looked like, and this was either that fine material or some-
    thing very like it-and the twisting pillars of serpentine, I . ade, onyx, and
    carnelian upholding porticoes and porches were twined with bands of
    gold. He couldn't even begin to count how many stories tall the struc-
    ture was; he had to crane his neck to look up at it. He couldn't begin to
    estimate the number of rooms-two hundred? Three? A thousand? His
    father's palace wouldn't even qualify as an outbuilding to this place. A
    toolshed, maybe, or a gardener's shed, but anyone who lived in a I
    this grand wouldn't put even his gardener in a house like Ivan's p
     Ilya had to rub his eyes, pinch himself, and look again to convincc
    himself that be wasn't dreaming. Nothing had changed the second tinie
    lie looked. And what was lighting the building? The walls were as bri
    as if the sun were shining on them! How was the Katschei doing thaF
    He'd seen buildings with every window alight at a festival, but never
    more than an hour or so, and he'd never seen anyone illuminate the
    side of a building before. The expense in an hour's worth of lamp-oil or
    candles alone would ruin the richest man he knew!
     just as that thought occurred to him, the illumination went outvii av-
    ing the building ht only by the moon. A few of the windows still glowed
    with light from within, but many of those were winking out. He glanced
    up at the moon and realized that it was well after midnight; qui
    even by the standards of someone who owned a palace like this
    bad somehow arrived just in time for the occupants of the palac
    to bcd.
    
     And he didn't blame them for making the light go away-it would be
    impossible to sleep with all that light glaring in through the wind ws
    20
     But now that the palace no longer commanded his attention, he nj
    ticed that there was a furtive light in the orchard itself, very near to hand.
    It moved and flickered, but never went far from one spot. It might be a
                                          te late,
                                          one. He
                                          C to
    
    good idea to go have a look at that light before he did anything else. The
    nightingale had already warned him about guards-well, maybe that was
    where the guards were. And in any case, it was pretty obvious that the
    Katschei was not particularly fond of unexpected or uninvited visitors,
    else why the maze? It would be the better part of prudence to go slowl.v

    




    F 1 2 E 8 1 R D    219
    
     But he was going to have a hard time being stealthy with a pack the
    size of his torso!
     The moonlight was exceptionally strong tonight, and it wasn't diffi-
    cult to see. He took time to examine the area where the maze ended and
    found a place where an animal-or a human-bad tried to burrow under
    the wall, leaving a respectable hole )ust about the size of his pack. He
    stuffed his cloak and coat inside the pack, tied off the top, and wedged
    
    the pack down into the hole.
     It Just fit, with a little room at the top and the sides. He scraped in
    sorne of the dirt that had been left until the hole was full, scattered the
    rest to bide the bole in the grass, then went a little ways into the orchard
    and carefully cut a square of turf with his knife. He brought that back
    and squared off the hole, then fitted the turf over the top, stamping it
    down in place. When he was confident that the pack was as well hidden
    as be could manage, he looked about to see if the light was still there.
     It was, and it was still in the same place, so he began to slip from tree
    to tree, moving toward it.
     The outermost trees were of no kind that be recognized, and although
    they had neither flower nor fruit, their bark was fragrant in a way that
    think of-incense! Could these be incense-trees? Was this
    incense the traders said they brought from China actually
    carne from? Were there trees like this in China, where the traders got
    their incense? Or was the scent merely coincidence?
     There was no one to ask, and no way to find out, so his curiosity would
    have to go unassuaged. But beyond the first trees there were others that
    were quite familiar, though not in form.
     The strangest yet most beautiful apple trees he had ever seen in his
    life were arranged with mathematical precision down rows in all direc-
    tions. They were strange because he had never seen an apple tree with
    flowers, tiny applets, green fruit and ripe all on the same tree at the same
    firne. The fragrance of the blossoms was utterly intoxicating, and as for
    the fruit, although be could not see the color, the aroma was mouth-
     tering. The mingling of the two scents was like nothing on earth.
      If Father could see these, he'd forswear cherries forever, be thought, as

    




    the scent of lushly ripe apples wafted down toward him, tempting ~Irfl
    to take one. He wouldn't be able to stand not having a tree like thij, or
    better still, an orchard full.
     Ilya was tempted by the fruit, but not stupid. Everywhere he looked,
    there was evidence of powerful magic at work, and the mark of some-
    one very like his father in the level of his greed. There was the 1~ze_
    and the guards that the nightingale had warned him about. just becau
    he had not seen anything like a trap here, that did not mean there we
    no traps here. The way in which the orchard was laid out made it easy
    to keep track of what was on the trees, and there was no windfallen fruit
    anywhere on the ground. He had the feeling that the Katschei was as bad
    as Ivan when it came to his possessions; that he made an inventory
    every blossom, demanding to know why it did not develop into a fruit,
    and that he knew the placement and ripeness of every fruit on the tree.
    Where were the windfalls, if not on the ground? Probably thriftily (greed-
    ily) gathered up and sent off to be made into cider. There would prob-
    ably be a price on these apples that Ilya would not be willing to pay.
     I wonder what he does about insects? Ilya thought to himself, as an-
    other breath of fragrance wafted down toward him. Or is that wha
    nightingale and her cousins are here for?
     As he neared the furtive, flickering light, it began to take on an air of
    familiarity, and as he got within sight of the source, he knew why it
    seemed so familiar.
     Someone had not heeded the signs of vigilant greed here, and h4paid
    the price. As he had thought, the fact that there were no visible traps
    did not mean that there were no invisible ones. Someone ha I een
    tempted to take the apples, trusting in her own magic to keep her safe,
    and had learned that the Katschei's magic was stronger than hers.
     It was the Fircbird, and she was trapped beneath a net thartUered
    the entire tree. Where had it come from? How had it dropped ciown
    her? The only answer could be magic. In comparison with the KAsc
    ability to keep high summer in his orchard, such a magical trap must hay
    been quite a trivial exercise in power.
     The Firebird should have known that, but evidently, the ap
    proved to be too great a temptation to resist in spite of that kno

    




    F I R E B I R D    221
    
    Or perhaps she had trusted to her own magic to protect her. Now she
    was trapped. In an agony of terror, she tore at the net, trying without suc-
    cess to free herself. She changed as he watched, from a bird, to a min-
    gling of bird and maiden, to a maiden as human as any Ilya had ever seen,
    though far lovelier than his own little milkmaids. In all these forms she
    ripped at the seemingly fragile netting keeping her captive, and in all
    these forms she failed to free herself. In her maiden and half-maiden
    form, she wept with fear, soundlessly, great crystal tears rolling down her
    cheeks as she circled the tree, endlessly trying to find some weak part in
    the net that she bad not found before.
     Part of him felt a rather nasty satisfaction that she had finally met her
    match and been caught in her thieving ways. After all, she would not
    have been caught like this if she bad not been trying to steal fruit in the
    first place. And it could be said that all of his troubles dated from her
    thefts in his father's orchard. Despite the gift of animal tongues she had
    granted him, she had not taken the bad luck off, and that bad luck had
    nearly killed him twice. It had killed the sorrel gelding, who bad done
    nothing to deserve his terrible fate.
     But the rest of him ached with pity for her. She was clearly petrified
    with terror. Whatever the Katschei had in mind for her, it probably
    wasn't very pleasant, and if he was as powerful a sorcerer as he seemed
    tobe, he could shrug off her bad luck as a goose shrugged off water. He'd
    pugbt her, hadn't he? That was proof enough that her bad-luck magic
             ainst his.
     her shouldn't be kept in a cage and displayed! That
     as w y e a n't told his father about her, because Ivan would have
     wanted to catch and cage her. She beat at the net with slender, delicate
     hands, pulled at it until her hands were cut and bleeding, and still with
     no result. He'd seen animals caught in traps that looked like this, so
     ffightened that they were the next thing to mindless.
   s powerless ag
       creature like
       b h b d
    
     It could be argued that she had taught Ivan a lesson in the cost of
     greed-thougb whether he bad learned anything from that lesson re-
     mained to be seen. With all the trees in this orchard, she couldn't pos-
     sibly have taken enough fruit to make any real difference, anyway.
      He could not possibly leave her like this, no matter if be did get a see-
    
    n
    
    d
    
    ,e
    
    d
    
    I

    




    222   MERCEDES LACIKEV
    
    ond dose of bad luck on top of the first. For that matter, by getting this
    close, he probably already had it, so he might as well help her and be
    done with it.
     He walked straight up to the net, openly, and she fled in bird-form
    the top of the tree, her eyes blank and staring with tcrror. "Be at eas
    lady-bird," he said, as he drew his knife to cut the meshes of the net. "It s
    only me, Ilya Ivanovitch. Remember me, don't you? I saw you when I
    was up a tree in my father's cherry-orchard. You came to take his special
    fruit this fall, and he set guards, and you put them to sleep. Do vou knm!
    how I kept from falling asleep myself? I stuck myself with pins. I'll wager
    you never thought anyone would do that, now, did you?"
     He continued to talk to her without looking directly at her, in the voice
    he used to calm frightened horses, as he sawed at the fabric of the net.
    But it wouldn't cut, it wouldn't even fray, and it quickly dulled the edges
    of his blade. He regarded the ruined knife with a frown before reluctarltl)
    sheathing it, and studied the bottom of the net instead. It appeared to
    have a weighted edge, but a weighted edge shouldn't be so heavy that
    
    the Firebird herself couldn't lift it.
     Well, "shouldn't" is relative, when you are talking about magic.
     While he examined the net, she fluttered down out of the branches
    of the tree, changed again, and approached him warily in a form of a
    flaxen-haired maiden, pale and proud, with a cloak made of scintill
    ing feathers. As he bent down to try and lift the edge of the net SOS
    could slip out beneath it, she put out her hand in an involuntary
    turc.
     "Don't-" she said, her voice exactly as he remembered it from her
    singing, melodious and sweet-and just now, tense with fear. "Ob, don't
    don't stay, don't try to help me! Flee, Ilya Ivanovitch, I beg you! Th
    Katschel has many guards, and surely they will be coming soon. I was
    fool to come here, and you will be a fool if you stay."
     He heaved and grunted with effort, and discovered that although 64C
    net appeared to be perfectly ordinary, he could not lift the edge at a
    .re u
    any more than he could cut it with his knife. "I won't leave any c at
    in a net, lady-bird, not even fruit-thieves. You got me in a lot of trouble,
    you know. I could have done without seeing you that night. By the time

    




    F I R E 8 1 R 0    223
    
        your ifl-wishing was done with me, I was in worse condition than you
        are now."
        She wrung her hands-a gesture he had heard of in tales, but had
        never actually seen anyone do. She did it rather gracefully, actually. "Oh,
        go, Ilya Ivanovitch!" she cried, and another of those great crystal tears
        formed at the corner of her eye and trickled slowly down her face. "Go.
        You cannot cut the net, and you cannot lift it. The Katschei will kill you
        if he finds you, or worse! You cannot know how powerful he is, or how
        evil!" She gave a little sob, the first sound of weeping he had heard her
        make yet. "Perhaps this is only what I have deserved, for putting my ill-
        wishing on someone who never meant me harm. Now I have taken my
        ill-wishing from you, if that was what you wanted out of me. Now go,
        while you still can! I would not have your death on my soul!"
         He left off trying to lift the net, and took a moment to look into her
         eyes. They were still the most beautiful, most expressive, and bluest eyes
         he bad ever seen. "I won't leave you here, lady-bird. If he is evil, then
         that is all the more reason why I should help you escape. How could you
         have known I wasn't like every other man, who would see you only to
         desire you, and desire you only to cage you?"
         The Katschei will be very angry when he finds the trap sprung and the
         prey escaped, be thought wryly. Still, I. think it might be a good thing for
         him to learn that he cannot always catch what he sets out to snare. Cer-
         tainly everything Ilya had seen so far bespoke arrogance as well as greed.
         He did not at all mind helping to teach this Katschei a little lesson. Per-
         haps he would learn, as Ivan had probably not.
    84W She raised both hands, the fingers crisscrossed with welts and cuts,
          and clutched them on the meshes of the net, desperately "Listen to me,
          and do not be a brave and well-meaning fool! The Katschei is a power-
          fu, sor(
            cerer, and when he catches you, I promise that you will wish that
          he had killed you. You would not be the first young man he has caught
          in his webs of sorcery"
           "Oh?" Ilya replied absently, as be looked carefully all around the tree.
          And how is that?"
           "He lives but to cause others grief and torment," she replied, still
           tching the net. "He keeps twelve of the most beautiful tsarinas in all

    




    224   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    of Rus imprisoned here in his gardens. Each one of them is more lovelv
    than the last. Whenever he hears of a beautiful woman of noble birth,
    he uses his magic to spy upon her, and if she is as lovely as those alread~
    in his collection, he kidnaps her, and puts her with the rest. The most
    powerful sorcerers in the land have tried to defeat him, and have failed,
    for they say that he sold his soul to the devil-yes! the very devil!-for
    power and magic, and the only person who could defeat him in magic
    would be another like him." Her eyes were wide and pleading, but lie
    was not trapped in them the way he bad been in the rusalka's eyes. "I
    only know that he sold a part of himself to some dark power, for there it
    no one more evil, or more powerful, in all of Rus. Perhaps it is only that
    he has forsaken all things good and gentle to devote himself to harm and
    pain that has made him powerful, But he has no weakness, Ilva
    Ivanovitch. You cannot defeat an opponent with no weakness!"
     'And how do you know all that?" Ilya asked, still studying the net
     "Because I have studied him," she replied, her head high. "I havs d
                                           , s~e
    the birds and the beasts here about him, and I have watched the coin-
    ings and goings of his servants. I have sought information about Inin
    from every possible source, for I am a creature he might well wish to P(S-
    sess. I have seen much of what he can do with my own eyes. No sorcei
    has ever been able to defeat him,"
     "So? If a sorcerer cannot defeat him, perhaps a
    
    n ordinary man'
             an,
    
    Ilya replied, stepping back a few paces and once again examining the net.
    There must be a way to release this thing, a way that did not require
    magic. Surely a powerful sorcerer, a greedy man like Ivan, would be just
    as suspicious as Ivan. He would not want any of his servants to have any
    magical power that could counteract anything of his own. So the release
    must be purely mechanical.
     'A man?" the Firebird laughed hysterically. 'A warrior, you mean? Do
    you think that none have tried? He makes no secret of the fact that he
    holds these beautiful women here-in fact, he makes certain that th~
    tale is well known! He keeps them here as bait for his own sadistic traps!
    Men, warriors, boyars, all have come, some singly, some with armies, and
    all have met defeat at the hands of his magic. And when he catches the
    poor fools who think to rescue these maidens, be changes them into stat-

    




    I
    
    F I R E B I R 0    225
    
    ues-but living statues, statues that can see and remember all that hap-
    pened to them and all that continues to happen to them-statues that
    can see others coming to make the same mistakes they did, and can do
    nothing about it! This is but one of his amusements, and it is the mildest
    of the lot! Now go, and leave me to pay the penalty of temptation!"
     "Oh, I think not," Ilya said casually. He had found the release, or so
    he thought; it was cleverly concealed, but precisely the same sort of re-
    lease that dropped the ordinary bird-nets Ivan had draped over his trees.
    It was a rope sewn into the side of the net along one of the seams, but
    it moved in its pocket, and Ilya was fairly certain that it held the net to-
    gether at the top. He pulled the rope-and to his immense satisfaction,
    the top of the net parted, and the net dropped to the ground in a neat
     rcle around the tree.
     The Firebird stood there stunned for a moment, and that gave Ilya
    the chance be had hoped for. He dashed in and caught her by the wrists
    before she could flee. She seemed to know everything about this
    Katschei, and be wanted to bear what she knew. At the least, be bad to
    e Katschei's land-and at the most, well, there might be some
    ere.
       ediately as his bands closed around her wrists, she changed into
       in of the fiery bird, beating him with her powerful wings, trying
      scratch him with her talons, and stabbing furiously at his eyes with
    
    beak. He ducked his head and held on, though she buffeted his head
    
    ith such force that he saw stars, and her beak scored a line across his
    skull that burned.
     She changed again, into the half-bird, half-maiden, and fought him
in fli~if form as well, kicking at him and clawing and scratching, twist-
      d turning to get him to break his hold. He held her at arm's length
    and,,wuld not let go. The strangest thing about this furious battle was
    
    that she was absolutely silent-probably because any noise would bring
    the Katschei's guards. He took his cue from her and clamped his own
    lips shut, even when she stamped furiously on his instep and managed
    to kick blin once in the privates. He saw more than stars then, but be
    kept his hold on her.
     She changed back into the bird, then into the half-and-half, then into
    
    K!,

    




    226    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    the bird again, trying anything and everything to get him to let golie
    held fast through all of it, and finally, exhausted, she became a maid
    again. She half-collapsed onto the ground, but fearing a ruse, he kept
    tight hold on her wrists, though he was afraid he was hurtin her cru-
    elly.
     "Listen, cherry-thief," he said, before she could speak. "You made a
    ruin of my life, and because of what you did, my brothers nearly killed
    me twice. You owe me more than the gift of animal-speech; because of
    you I lost everything that I had-it wasn't much, but by the Holy Ghost,
    at least it was mine! I want your promise that you won't try to escape,
    and I want something more out of you than the removal of yo se
    and the ability to speak to the beasts!"
     She drooped with weariness against his grasp. "Speak," she repli d,
    her voice faint with exhaustion. "You have my promise that I will not es-
    cape until you give me leave. And as for what you want, if it is in rn
    power, I shall grant it to you. I have no gold nor silver, although I kn'-
    where such may be found, so do not look to me to ransom myself Wit
    treasures I do not have."
     He let her go, then, and she sagged back against the trunk 0 be re
    putting her hands against the trunk to keep from falling. He 'was glad to
    see that he had not marked her wrists; he would have felt very badly if
    he had bruised her. "I want to know about this Katschei," he told her
    sternly. "You seem to know a great deal about him."
     "I do; nearly all," she replied. "But not enough to keep me fronlicl~ F
    ing his magic apple trees." As she spoke, she looked hungrily up at the
    apples hanging so temptingly near. "My kind-we require what
    rare and sweet, and if it is magic too, it nourishes us the better.
    nearest such fruit is in Egypt at this time of year, and I did not want to
    fly so far."
     Ilya dared to seize one of the nearest apples, thinking that, since t e
    trap had already been sprung, they were probably safe from a second,
    such.
     He was right; nothing happened,
    
              and he handed her the app " 'vi
    a gallant gesture. She took it with a surprised smile; seized it and d
    voured it in the blink of an eve. "Tell me about this sorcerer_.qndq1l th

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    227
    
    you know about his powers and his palace. Tell me bow to defeat the
    Katschei then, if you know," he demanded. "Tell me how to kill him, if
    he can be killed."
     It can hardly be an evil deed to rid the world of such an evil creature,
    he thought to himself. And even if I didn't do it myself, I could barter the
    information to the next boyar who comes to rescue the maidens, surely.
     "Oh, he can be killed," the Firebird admitted, seizing another apple
    herself and making it vanish after the first. He had never seen anyone
    eat so quickly, nor so daintily. "Not that anyone is likely to succeed.
    But-" she glanced around, suddenly wary. "We should not talk here.
    Follow, and we will go somewhere safer."
     He bad no fear that she would suddenly turn into a bird and vanish
    ,again; he trusted her to keep her word. As an afterthought, he picked a
    half-dozen apples and stowed them inside his shirt, then followed her
    in the direction of the maze, Sure enough, that was where she led
    into a dead-end that was presumably safer than the rest of the maze.
    She no longer glowed so brightly, although she did sbine in the dark, with
    a light that was a little like the light in the rusalka's part of the forest.
    They made themselves comfortable, settling on the soft grass that car-
    peted the floor of the maze, and he gave her all but one of the apples,
    reserving that last one for himself. After one bite, he was glad he had; if
    one liad somehow managed to blend the sweetest apple with the finest
    boncy, and flavor it all with a hint of clove and cardamon, it might have
    approached the taste of that delicious apple. He ate it all, every bit of it,
    licking the seeds and the stem clean of Juice. In the time it took for him
    to eat that single apple, she had finished all five of hers.
      There was a faint light about her, although it was as if she was illu-
    minated from some invisible source of sunlight or flame rather than lit
    from within, like a lantern. It wasn't the moon touching her, either, for
    fis NNas a warm light, not the cool and silvery light of the moon.
    
          said, keeping his voice down, in case
    within earshot. "Tell me about the Katschei."
    
    "lie cannot be killed like ordinary men," the Firebird told him. "In
   fact, one of his games is to allow the young warriors to close on him and
    ab him through the heart. He only laughs, then lets his demons seize

    




    228    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    them, for he has no heart, not in his body. There is no way to slay him
    with steel, not even by cutting off his head."
     "No heart?" Ilya repeated skeptically "How can he have no heart?"
     "That was part of his bargain with the powers of evil, they say," the
    Firebird told him. "The evil ones took his heart of flesh and replaced it
    with a stone. Instead of a heart of flesh, he has a heart of black, enchanted
    glass, and the Katschei keeps that safe, let me tell you! It is true enough
    he has no heart, though whether that is of his own doing or the devil's,
    I do not know. It is true that the heart of black glass is what keeps him
    alive, and it is true that he has a stone in his chest instead of a heart, for
    I have seen men blunt and break swords upon it. To kill him, you mu
    break that heart at his feet-but he keeps the heart in a diamond, whicl
    will only shatter if it is struck correctly."
     "Oh, that hardly seems so difficult," Ilya said slowly. "It is not hard to
    shatter something if you know how."
     The Firebird leveled a withering look at him. "The hard part is get-
    ting the diamond. The diamond is in a duck, the duck is in a rabbit,xid
    the rabbit is in a locked chest to which only the Katschci holds the key.
    And as if that were not enough, the chest is in the top of the tallest Oak
    tree in the garden, and the oak tree is guarded by the Katschei's dragoll.
    The dragon is chained to the tree, and don't think that you can simpl~'
    climb the tree by slaying the dragon at a distance. If you can see and licar
    the dragon, the dragon can see, hear, and scent you, and he will begill
    roaring the moment he does. Then the Katschei and his guards will
    come." She sighed. "Even if you could somehow get past the dragon,, ou
    must get the chest down out of the tree, and the only way to do is
    to chop the tree down. Open the chest and the rabbit will run; cat be
    rabbit and open it, and the duck will fly out. Catch the duck, and you
    still have to break the diamond and get to the Katschei to break the heart
    at his feet."
                                           in
                                           cl~
    
     Ilya chuckled. "Well, it does sound more like a task for a great hero,,
    and not for someone like me. I confess that I bad hoped that it would
    be easier to defeat this sorcerer; while I should like to do so, I think it
    might be simpler to fly to the moon and take up residence there."
     Still, I should like to have a look at these twelve maidens. I cannot be-

    




    1~
     in
    
    F I R E B I R D    229
    
    lieve that the twelve most beautiful women in all of Rus are held captive
    I . n a sorcerer's garden. For one thing, some of them must have begun to age
    by now, unless he has put a spell upon them that keeps age at bay.
     The Firebird sighed with relief, and the pinched look about her eyes
    and mouth eased. "I am glad to hear you say that, Ilya Ivanovitch," she
    replied softly, with real warmth in her voice. "You have a good heart, and
    a true and noble nature. That is why I gave you the gift of tongues, for
    I could not take off the ill-wisbing without seeing you, and I was afraid
    to come near you again." She was silent for a moment. "I am sorry that
    you came to lose so much."
     "Not all that much," he said, truthfully, and found himself reciting
    his own history to a stranger for the second time. She was a sympathetic
    listener, and watched him with those remarkable eyes as if she found his
    words utterly fascinating. When be bad finished, she sat silent for a mo-
    ment, then stood. He followed her example.
     "Well," he said, with growing reluctance, but knowing that it was
         thing to do, "you have fulfilled your pledge, and I free you
    
    fromit."
     'And I must go, for I cannot remain here and be caught by the dawn,"
    she said quietly. "If you will take my advice, Ilya, you will not go further.
    The pattern to enter and leave this place is a simple one. You always turn
    to the right, but only by passing other possible turnings. You take the
    first turn to the right, then pass one and take the second, then pass two
    and take the third, pass five and take the sixth, pass eleven and take the
        the pattern is the sum of the ones before it-and it repeats after
    you make five turnings. There are other ways out and in; that is merely
    the quickest."
     'Ah! I see!" be exclaimed, and laughed. 'And it is a good thing that it
    is I and not one of my dolt brothers who stands here now, for they could
    not add one and
    
           two together and get the same number twice in a row."
    She did an unexpected thing, then, and seized his hand as the rusalka
    had, looking up earnestly into his eyes with hey own oi blazing blue.
    "Please, Ilya, leave this place. Go no further. I would not see you fall vic-
    tim to one of those beautiful and heartless women-for the tsarinas have
    In
    
     more heart than their car)tor. They are alike in that, and I think per-

    




    230    MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    haps that the Katschei chose them for that reason. Be wise, and go back
    to your friend the wolf-hunter, or on into the west. Sell your services to
    the Great Tsar as a horse-talker; he has many fine horses and most are
    mishandled. But do not stay here to serve the Katschei's humor. If you
    must stay, even for a little, beware of traps. The Katschei's guards are
    demons, and they are not very bright. You can trick them easily enougji,
    and avoid them easier still, if you are not trying to rescue a tsarina. At
    go; go and save yourself, and grow to be a fine and noble man in the ser-
    vice of the Great Tsar."
     She released his hand as abruptly as she had seized it, and took a step
    back. She stooped down as gracefully as a swan and pulled a feather loose
    from the hem of her cloak, a lovely thing of blue and gold and red that
    shone like a star in her hand, shedding soft sparks of warm light.
     She held the feather for a moment, cupped in her hand. "You asked
    nothing special for saving me, beyond that I take away my misplaced
    curse, so here is my reward to you. If you ever need me, as often as you
    need me, wave this three times in the air, and I will come to you, unless
    death prevents me."
    
     She held out the feather, and he took it, dumbfounded at the mag-
    nitude of the reward she had gifted him with. Before he could say any-
    thing, even to thank her, she had turned back into the Firebird again,
    and launched herself into the air. She did not soar into the sky, she shot
    up into the sky, less like a bird and more like a comet with a fiery tail. In
    a moment she was gone, and he would have thought it all a dream but
    for the taste of honey and cardamon on his lips, and the feather in his
    hand.
     He stood there for a moment, simply gazing at the feather, which was
    a marvel in and of itself. It changed colors constantly, the blue shifting
    into red, the red into gold, making ever-moving patterns across its Sur-
    face. Little sparks seemed to form at the edges and drop off, but when
    he held his hand beneath the feather to catch them, he felt nothing. At
    length he tucked the feather into the breast of his tunic, extinguishing
    its light, and gave a moment of thought about his next move.
     The logical thing would be to cross the Katschel's gardens-perhaps
    see if he could filch a few supplies out of the palace kitcben-and go on

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    231
    
           into the west as the Firebird had suggested. That would be easier than
           plunging into the maze again, for he was afraid that in the dark he
           would miss a turning, and if be missed one, he would be quite lost
           again. It might be smarter to try getting out the other side. But that as-
           sumed that the maze did not surround the entire palace, and he had a
           second thought that it probably did. Otherwise, what would have been
           the point of having it at all, if someone could get in simply by going
           ,round it?
            I
             sti
           ill wish to see these maidens, he thought, a bit rebelliously For all
           that the Firebird is a magic creature, she is still a female. I think she may
           be 1'ealous of the beauty of the tsarinas, and that is why she warned me off
           them. It would not have been the first time a woman told a man that this
           or that maiden was cold-hearted and cruel out of jealousy of her beauty.
           And besides, it would be a pity to come this far and not see them. It would
           be like going to Africa and not seeing the Monopods or the Lyons.
           He decided to leave his pack hidden where it was for the time being.
           It would be much easier to scout through the gardens without it, and
           until he knew exactly what lay on the other side of the palace, he needed
           as much mobility as he could muster. Only when he had an idea of what
           he would be encountering in the western end of the grounds would be
           come back after it.
           He slipped back into the orchard, and although he would gladly have
           used his favorite trick of going into the branches of the trees to travel
           above the ground, he decided against it. Climbing into the trees might
           tfigger a trap, and it would be decidedly ignominious if he had to sum-
           mon the Firebird to free him from the same kind of trap he bad freed
           her from.
             Instead, be used what cover there was, flattening himself against the
             nks of the trees, listening and watching for distant movement before
            pping into another bit of shadow and hiding behind another tree-
            trunk. Without the Firebird's light, the orchard was very dark indeed,
        JLM,ru
~~and it wasn't at all difficult to find shadows big enough to swallow a cart
            and donkey, much less one young man. But as the Firebird had told him,
            when he finally did encounter some of the Katschei's guards, they proved
            to b c even dimmer than his brothers.

    




    MERCEDES LACREV
    
     There were five of them, all bunched together in a group, and they
    were all carrying torches and arguing at the tops of their lungs. They cer-
    tainly weren't making any effort at all to hide themselves. Perhaps that
    was because they counted on the Katschei's traps to snare intruders, and
    had no reason for stealth. Or perhaps they were simply stupid.
     They didn't look much like his conception of a demon, given all of
    Father Mikail's horrific stories. They did have long, barbed tails and ves-
    tigial, batlike wings, both of which poked through slits cut in their cloth-
    ing for the purpose. And they had horns, rightly enough-two had the
    horns of a goat, two of a cow, and one had the horns of a young stag. And
    yes, they had fangs or tushes like a boar sticking out of their lipless
    mouths. And they themselves were either bright red or ebony black, with
    yellow, goat-slit eyes.
     But they weren't eight feet tall; they were half that. The tallest of theni
    rose no higher than Ilya's breast. From the tattered and unkempt look
    of their clothing, they hadn't changed it in months, perhaps years. It was
    rumpled and food-stained; tears had never been mended and worn spots
    never patched. He was glad that there was no wind; it looked as if the
    odor of their bodies would gag a goat. Their armor looked like something
    put together out of what was left after all the real warriors got their pick.
    They had mismatched breastplates, ill-fitting arm-guards, chain mail
    that was too short, too long, or had holes in it, and silly little skullcap
    helmets. As Ilya hid behind a tree, he heard them talking, and it even
    sounded like his brothers arguing over something particularly stupid.
     "Now I say," one of the Goat-horns declared, "that there is not
    absolutely nothing to match a big plate of fried grubs and beans
    smacked his lips noisily, and the Stag-horned one made a gagging
    Ilya peeked around the tree, and saw the Goat-borned speaker glaring
    at Stag-born.
     "Oh, grubs and beans is fine, if all you want is something filling
    with no flavor," asserted one of the Cow-horns. "But you take a big bowl
    of borscht, and you add a mess of fish-guts-now that is a meal fit for
    a man!"
     Now Goat-horn glared at Cow-horn, while
    noises of contempt.
    
    Stag-horn made more

    




    low
     I
    
    ots
   the
    ing
    ick.
    all
   Icap
    ven
    d.
   ing,
    I Ic
    oise.
    
    aring
    
    filling
     bowl
     fit for
    
     inore
    
    F I R E B I R D    233
    
     "You're both crazy!" shouted Stag-horn. 'And you neither one of you
    has any taste whatsoever! Fish-guts! Grubs! Baby-food! Serf-fodder!
    Garbage! You give me a nice, juicy man-part, and you wrap it in bacon,
    and you put it inside a brcad-roll, now that is what I call eating!"
     The other two glared at him; the ones who bad not taken part in this
    discussion tramped on stolidly, without taking any notice of any of the
    three.
     "Where are you gonna get a man-part?" jeered Cow-horn. "Since
    when is the Chief gonna give a little frog like you a man-part?"
     Stag-horn looked superior. "I got one the last time the Chief caught
    that boyar with all the followers." The others looked skeptical, and he
    began to puff up and look angry. "I did! He gave it to me himself! A nice,
    long man-part, fresh off one of the ones with the pikes! That's how I
    know! And I got promised another!"
     'And that was how long ago?" Goat-horn scoffed. "Hell, all of us got
    a piece of man-flesb that day! You only got the man-part because you
    weren't good enough to rate a buttock!"
     Stag-horn danced with rage, and the other two )eered at him.
     It was at that point that Ilya realized just what part a "man-part" was,
    and he felt his own man-part trying to retreat into the safety of his body
    in automatic reaction. The five guards continued on into the distance,
    still arguing about food, as he quickly reassessed his first impression of
    the demons. They might not be very bright, but-well-they were man-
    eaters. Literally. And it didn't take being very bright for a number of them
    to swarm someone and take him down.
     For that matter, they might be like their master: impossible to kill, or
    even hurt. In that case, they didn't have to be bright, just persistent.
     He was even more careful after that.
     The apple trees ended and pears began, with the same peculiar com-
    bination of flowers and green and ripe fruit on them. After the pears
    came cherries, then apricots, then, to Ilya's utter astonishment, oranges.
    HeW seen an orange only once in his life, when Ivan got one as a bridal-
     for his third wife to impress his new mother-in-law, and he had
    never, ever tasted one. It took a great deal to resist the temptation to
    %pluck one of those. The scent of the blossoms was positively erotic, and

    




    234
    
    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    the sweet-acid scent of the fruit intriguing because, even though h
    didn't know how the fruit tasted, the scent still made his mouth wate
     Finally, the orchard gave way to gardens; it was easier to hide here, for
    there was a great deal of shrubbery. This was clearly a pleasure-garde
    for it was full of flowering plants and bushes, and little nooks and bm'-
    ers for privacy. Ilya wondered why the Katschei had such things, when
    it was fairly obvious that he didn't use them, his visitors couldn't use
    them, and his servants wouldn't use them.
    the Katschei liked gardens?
    
                               Maybe it was just bec
    
     The pleasure-gardens ended in a brick wall, hardly more than a
    or so taller than Ilya's head, and easy to climb. He seized the top a
    pulled himself up, thinking to take a peek before making the effort
    climbing it.
     He looked down into a walled garden softly lit by hundreds of pate
    colored lanterns. It was lit because the garden had occupants, and when"
    be saw them, he could hardly believe his eyes.
     The rest of the palace might be deep in slumber, but the Katscbei's
    captives definitely were not.
     Inside the wall was an exquisite pleasure-gardcn not much larger t
    the great hall of Ivan's palace, with a fountain in the middle spraying
    perfumed water and hundreds of soft cushions scattered about aniong
    the flowers-more flowers than be had ever seen in his life, in morc cQ -
    ors than he had ever known existed. Pretty little birds in golden ca
    sang from every corner of the garden, and the garden was full of girls.
     That was Ilya's first impression, at any rate. Everywhere he lookcd, it
    seemed, there was another ravishingly beautiful maiden. He really had
    believed the Firebird when she claimed that the women that
    Katschei held were the most beautiful in Rus; now he did.
     Nearest him was a black-haired, dark-eyed creature with the slow, lan-
    guorous movement and costume of a woman out of a Turkish harein,
    dancing with sinuous grace to the music played by another girl. This
    who was strumming the balalalka to produce an unfamiliar melod) in a
    wailing minor key, was black-haired and dark-eyed as well, but her coin-
    plexion was duskier than that of the dancer, and her costume resembled
    
    J

    




    F I R E B I R D    235
    
    that of an Arab rather than a Turk. The first wore gauzes so diaphanous
    as to be transparent, made into trousers gathered at the ankle and knee,
    a skirt over the trousers, and a thin tunic over both. The second wore a
    bright skirt of more opaque stuff, without the trousers, and with a tiny
    jacket that barely covered her breasts. Beyond them, two ice-princesses
    with silver-gilt hair and pale blue eyes clad in the heavily embroidered
    c ts and b eches of the women of the farthest north, the Sami, were
    
    playing ball, and beside them were another pair of goddesses with rosy
    round cheeks and hair the color of wheat-straw dressed like the girls of
    his own country, chattering over embroidery.
     The remaining six, all wearing differing gowns and skirts and tunics,
    were playing a game of tag, skirts hitched up to show ravishing ankles
    and even calves, cheeks flushed, eyes sparkling, high, round breasts heav-
    ing with exertion. Five of the six were just as stunning as the previous
    half-dozen, but the twelfth-
     Ilya nearly fell off the wall when he saw her. She was perfection itself.
    Golden hair, indistinguishable from the true metal, failing in two braids
    as thick as his wrist all the way down to the ground; huge, melting eyes
    as blue as a perfect summer sky; a sweetly heart-shaped face; a pair of
    \vInglike brows arching coyly above the enormous eyes; and a delicate
    nose and a rosebud of a mouth beneath. Her neck was so long and grace-
    ful that a swan would have envied it; her shoulders were as white and
    flawless as a pair of snowbanks. The body beneath a dress that matched
    her eyes to perfection was as supple as the Turkish girl's, with a pair of
    ibreasts like perfect balf-mclons, a waist so small he could span it with
    his bands, and curving hips that begged him to try. The glimpses of ankle
    land calf he caught as she ran told him that the legs matched the rest of
    here was nothing about her that was not exactly as it should have
    from the sound of her voice, as sweet and piping as a flute, to the
    of her skin. She wore a gown of silk embroidered with gold around
    ollar, down the front, and at the hems, but she could have worn a
    sack and looked as lovely. If someone had taken the shape of Ilya's imag-
    inative girl-daydreams and melded them into a single maiden, it would
    have been this one.

    




    236    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
     Ilya was smitten, in love "at first glance," as the tales said-and he
    knew he would never rest if he didn't try to rescue her from the Katschei
    terrible captivity.
     He pulled himself up and over the wall, and dropped down into th'
    midst of the girls before they even knew he was there.
     He had expected shock, squeals of fear; expected them to run froni
    him at first. But instead, they surrounded him immediately, exclaiming
    over him in the most flattering of tones. They touched the hilt of.
    sword gingerly, chattered about the breadth of his shoulders, his strong
    arms, his well-muscled back. But it was the Turkish maid who was the
    first to address him directly.
     "You must be a great warrior!" cried the Turkish maiden, the first
    reach his side. "Oh, good sir, have you come to rescue us? What great
    king sent you, and what is your name?" Her big brown eyes gazed up at
    him so meltingly that, if he had not already lost his heart to the, I in
    blue, he probably would have lost it to her.
     "To answer the last question first, I am Ilya Ivanovitch," Ilya said
    estly. "I am a mere boyar, and not a well-known warrior, but I shall do
    my best to free you all. I vow it! No king sent me-I came on my own
    when I heard of you, and the terrible fate that has been inflicted onyou."
     That was not quite a lie, and.it wouldn't hurt anything if they di
    know all of his story yet.
     The maiden of his dreams neared, and perfect tears
    
    filled her won-
    
    derful eyes. "It is a horrible fate, you are right, Ilya Ivanovitch," she said,
    in a voice that trembled. "It is all the more horrible that we know of all
    the bright and noble warriors who have tried to rescue us, and failed. \,Ve
    see them every day, for our Master makes us take a daily walk aniong
    them-or rather, among the statues that he made of them. You should
    fly this place, Ilya Ivanovitch, lest you become one of their num'er
     Nevertheless, as she spoke, she held out a hand, as if she WOUld so,,
    how be able to keep him there with that gesture. He seized the hand R
    kissed it while she blushed captivatingly. She was so different from the
    rusalka, who had truly been the kind of cold-hearted creature the Fire-
    bird had described. The rusalka had never blushed, never hidden her e~,es

    




    F I R E B I R D    237
    
    or looked away She had been as steady in her gaze as an owl, and as false
    as this girl was true.
     "How could I leave, now that I have seen you?" he asked her. "How
    could I possibly leave you to such a terrible fate? Even if I were such a
    loathsome coward as to abandon you, I would be tormented for the rest
    of my life by the memory of you, the knowledge of what I left you to en-
    dure, and the dreams of what I might have done."
     He made no indication that his "you" did not include all of the maid-
    ens, but his eyes never left the face of the twelfth as he spoke, and he
    did not let go of her hand. She blushed an even deeper pink, which did
    no more than heighten the color in her cheeks and spread no farther. Her
    little hand grew warm in his, and it trembled there, like a shy bird.
     "Let us at least make you comfortable for a little," said one of the ice-
    princesses, and before he knew it, she had unfastened the belt that held
    1:i1s sword and knives. As it dropped, the other Sami woman caught it.
    Before he could protest, it had been whisked off somewhere, and the
    twelfth maiden was leading him to a softly lit bower where plates of sliced
    fruit and a pitcher of cool wine were waiting. He thought about resist-
    ing, then recalled that the lights were mostly out in the palace. Surely
    bv now the Katsebei was asleep. Surely be could take a moment to rest
    before he found a place to hide.
     "We can hide you, if you like," whispered the Arab girl, in an uncanny
    reflection of his thoughts. "We can see to it that the Master doesn't find
    you. You can find a way to slay him and free us, and we can keep you
    safe until you can. We would gladly help you all we could."
     The twelfth girl nodded solemnly "None of the others got so far as
    this, or we would have helped them," she said, with tones of deep sad-
    ness in her melodious voice. "We tried, but we couldn't get to any of
    them before the Katschei's guards found them. "
     What were they doing, tramping through the gardens calling challenges?
     he thought, recalling how easy it had been for him to evade the guards.
     Then again, perhaps they had been doing exactly that. At least one
    or two of his brothers would have been that stupid-and the rest would
    probably have tried to snatch fruit from the trees and triggered the traps,
    
    I

    




    238    MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    or walked openly along on the paths once they got through the maze. It
    was entirely possible that so far, none of the would-be rescuers had even
    the wits to try and sneak in. Hadn't the demons said something about
    a boyar with pikemen? And hadn't the Firebird mentioned those who
    had brought armies? Anyone with followers would certainly have issuei
    a formal challenge, stupid as the idea was. In fact, they probably stood
    outside the walls of the maze with their armies ranged behind thern,
    while the Katschei giggled hysterically at their self-important posing.
     "You know my name, but I don't know any of yours yet," he said, look-
    ing from one lovely face to the next. "If we have time enough-"
     A chorus of feminine voices assured him that he had time enough,
    and they began, not only introducing themselves, but telling him how
    the Katschei had come to carry them off.
     The stories were monotonously the same. The Katschei, it
    
    had a penchant for stealing these girls magically, transporting them from
    their very bedrooms on the eve of their sixteenth birthdays. They wo
    go to sleep in their own beds, and wake up in a strange bed, a strange
    room, in the part of the palace called the maidens' tower. One of the
    other girls would be ordered by the Katschei to go in and explain things
    to the newcomer, then the Katschei himself would appear to reinforce
    that explanation.
     Something that did seem rather odd to Ilya was that none of them
    ever mentioned that she tried to fight or attempted to escape. Thev all
    appeared to become resigned to their state immediately.
     But perhaps they do try and escape, and learn It's not possible. Or P
    haps the ones that did try became-examples to the rest on the /614- oftq-
    ing to escape. Perhaps what the Katschei did to those who ran was horrific
    enough that they don't care to think about it.
     They were allowed the run of the maidens' tower and this garden be-
    neath it. When the Katschei summoned them to his throne room, the V
    were expected to play and dance for him. Otherwise, he left them alo
    except for the daily walks among the statues; he would appear for these
    if he happened to have made an addition to the collection, and he w
    take care to point it out.
     They didn't lack for amusements, apparently. Their servant~ w

    




    F I R E B I R D    239
    
    were ugly rather than monstrous, although they were far from human-
    could and would get them anything they craved. Musical instruments,
    books, the supplies for handicrafts-whatever they needed to pass the
    time. Clothing appeared magically in their wardrobes. One of the girls
    from Rus mentioned that she had purposefully destroyed every gown in
    'her chest every night for a month, only to have new ones appear to Ye-
    place all the old ones when she woke in the morning. Finally, she sim-
    ply gave up. Likewise, jewels appeared for them to wear, sometimes
    objects so rare and precious that the girls knew they must be more of
    
    the Katsebei's prizes, stolen, just as they were.
     One of the ice-princesses and two of the girls from various parts of
    Rus had been taken not only on the eve of their birthdays, but also on
    2the eve of their weddings. The Turkish maiden had been taken out of
    the harem of the Great Sultan himself; she had been a gift from a
    wealthy tradesman, and the Sultan had not yet summoned her to his
     uch. The Arab had been stolen from her father's house, where she was
    'the only child, and accorded much more freedom than most girls of her
    race and religion. One of the girls he had mistaken for a maid of Rus was
    actually Circassian, and had also been in a harem, but like the rest, had
    not yet been touched.
     There had been other girls-but either their beauty had not lasted,
    or they bad marred it themselves when they found that they were cap-
    tive. They vanished in the night, and none of the twelve wanted to talk
    about them.
     So, the moment they are no longer the most beautiful women in Rus,
    the Katschei ... replaces them. I doubt that they become statues. A truly
    horrid possibility occurred to him that he couldn't help but think about.
    He already knew that the monstrous guards ate human flesh-and the
    girls, once marred or faded, were no longer trophies to be kept as the
    statue-warriors were. So, the most likely fate for them ...
      Maybe it's better not to know.
     But the only story he was really interested, in was that of his golden
     princess, and hers was the last tale to be told. He waited while she com-
     posed herself, for she had remained silent while all the others poured out
     their tales, and be sensed that it was painful for her still.

    




    240    RIERCEDES LACKEV
    
    "My name is Tatiana, and I was the first maiden
    
    that the Katschefcol-
    
    lected," she said, her head bowed over her hands. "You may not believe
    it, but this was once the simple palace of a boyar, and I was his da4-
    ter, his only heir. Although many of his people urged him to wed again
    and produce a son, he loved my mother too deeply to put aside her mem-
    ory, and so I was to be the inheritor of all his lands. He was very pro4d
    of two things: myself and his orchards. He used to give great baske f
    fruit as gifts to any visitors we had, presented by me in my finest got
    and was a little inclined to boast of both the trees and my beaulty"
     "That was dangerous," said the Turkish girl solemnly. "That is pro -
    ably how the Katschei heard of you, and he cannot hear of anything, rare
    or precious without desiring it."
     Two tears fell onto Tatiana's clasped hands, but her voice did no't
    waver, it only became lower, perhaps with grief. "That is probably true,"
    she admitted. "But it is too late to do anything now. The Katschei
    came-and yes, it was on the eve of my sixteenth birthday-and killed
    my father, turned all our people into horrid monsters, and built his
    palace where ours had been. He conjured it up all in a night, but that
    was not enough for him, for the next day he built the maze about the
    palace and our orchards, and began his wretched games." She looked up,
    and her eyes flashed, even as another two tears formed in them. "Oh!"
    she exclaimed. "How I wish I had been born ugly, or that Father had been
    less kind, less hospitable! It was with me that these horrid games began!"
     Brave girl! To take the responsibility for all this upon herself! Howgo
    she is, as well as brave!
    
     Ilya took up her hands again, clasping them tenderly in both of his,
    and tried to reassure her. "Tatiana, my own father is as greedy in his way
    as the Katschei, so I know how greedy men think, and please believe me
    when I tell you that this vile sorcerer would have done just as he has if
    you had never been born. He was only looking for a maiden of great
    beauty and a remote location-and if he had not found the two togetheL
    he would have set up his palace somewhere and stolen all these other
    maids. You are not to blame, not in the least."
     She looked deeply and earnestly into his eyes as he spoke, as if scare
    ing for the truth there, and sighed deeply when he finished. "I tbougA

    




    F I R E B I R D    241
    
    hat, sometimes, but I could not be certain that it was the truth, or onl
    my wish. But if you say it, then I must believe it."
     They gazed into each other's eyes for so long that Ilya lost all track o
    the passage of time and completely forgot to speak. After a while, sh
    began asking him quiet questions about himself, and he answered he
    just as quietly, but his attention was on her and not his answers. H
    thought that the other girls began to steal away, one at a time, leavin
    him alone with Tatiana, and he blessed them for their consideration. No
    that he was going to attempt anything with her--or nothing more thar
    kiss or a tentative caress. This was no heart to trifle with; he would no
    treat her as he had his light-of-loves-
     But his reverie was rudely interrupted. "Well!" said a deep, sardon
    ically masculine voice. "How very touching! What a charming picture
    Someone should paint it on the cover of a lacquer box!"
     Ilya looked up, startled. He and Tatiana were no longer alone.
     Their little bower was the center of a circle of demonic creatures, all
    armed to the teeth, and looking considerably brighter than the guards
    he had evaded in the garden. There were no two exactly alike; some
    sported horns of various kinds, some bald heads, some had more hair
    than most women. Many had tail s-horse-tail s, cat-tails, wolf- and fox-
    tails, rat-tails, tails with barbs or hooks on the ends, tails with a ridge of
    spines. Their faces were all grimacing masks with yellow, slitted eyes, and
    their skins were every color, but all somehow unpleasant. Some had bes-
    tial muzzles, some humanlike faces. They were armored with a uniform
    of bronze chain with a hammered breastplate of bronze; they carried var-
    ious weapons, but they all held those weapons as if they knew how to
     e t em. Standing before them was someone who could only be the
     tschel.
     Ilya had pictured a spidery sort of creature in his mind, a wizened lit-
    tle man who let others do his work for him. Nothing could have been
    farther from the truth. The Katschel was tail, taller than Ilya, and as dark-
    haired as the Turkish maid, but with strange, ley green eyes. His com-
    .plexion was pale, but not pallid; he was not as muscled as a warrior, but
    he was not emaciated or gone to fat, either. His manner was languid, his
    wardrobe flamboyant, but Ilya got the distinct impression that both

    




    242   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    were meant to deceive. He wore breeches of silk brocade patterned in
    scarlet and gold, a black silk tunic, and a floor-length vest that matched
    the breeches, with black leather boots and a matching belt. His lids were '
    lowered lazily over his eyes, and as he gazed on Ilya and Tatiana, a slight
    but unpleasant smile touched his lips. This was not a spider, this was a
    snake, a huge and powerful serpent, and his reach was much farther tha
    most people would anticipate.
     Behind him were the other eleven maidens, huddled together in a
    frightened knot. And of course, Ilya's weapons had been spirited off else-
    where.
     But Ilya had one weapon that no one could take from him: his,4"its,
    and he used them now. Snatching up the Arab girl's balalaika, he fol-
    lowed his first impulse and sprang to his feet, striking a chord, and
    a well-playcd one, either.
     He began to play and caper about, precisely like the Fool his broth-
    ers were so familiar with. He had played this act when his brothers came
    in and found him at some task he didn't want them to know about. He
    had been at that game for so long that it was second-nature.
     As the Katschei and Tatiana stared at him in bewilderment , he ran
    through his entire bag of tricks. He never finished the song; he dropped
    it in midstanza, pausing in the middle of his dance as if he had forgot-
    ten where he was and what he was doing. Then he brightened, and
    walked straight up to the Katschei with never so much as a hint of the
    fear he felt inside. The Katschei's demon-guards tensed and moved their
    weapons threateningly, but the Katscbei motioned them to remain calm,
    and watched Ilya with surprise and a little sardonic amusement.
     He knows he's safe from anything I can do; he doesn't know what my
    game is, and I'll wager he hasn't been surprised in a long, long time. Let's
    see how long I can hold his interest.
     "Hoy, brother! " he exclaimed, seizing the Katschei's hand and pump-
    ing it vigorously. "So you are to wed my dear sister here! Well, congrqt-
    ulations! That will make us brothers-in-law! Hoo! We'll be a family
    then! And I can't wait for the two of you to make me an uncle, hey?" He
    leaned close to the Katschei, and noticed as he did so that the mail's
    breath was as cold as if it came off an ice-floe, and bitter. "I know she's

    




    F I R E B I R D    243
    
    rather plain, brother, but she's the best cook in Rus, and you couldn't
    ask for a better heart. Besides, don't they say ugly women are best be-
    tween the sheets? That the best girl after dark is an ugly one-because
    when the lights are gone you can't see her face, but she'll be grateful for
    your attention? And isn't it true that ugly women give birth to handsome
    sons?"
     Then be capered away again and seized one of the surprised demons
    as it tried to restrain him, whirling it into a dance. Tatiana watched him
    with a blank look on her face, and the Katschei began to lose his look of
    amusement and became annoyed as the dance went on with no signs of
    stopping.
     Finally he became quite disgusted, and lost all patience. "What is this
    nonsense?" he demanded of his demons, angrily. "I am awakened in the
    middle of the night because there is an intruder in the garden, only to
    discover that it is a fool! Who raised the alert?"
     The guards looked uneasy, and shuffled and looked up at the sky or
    1,down to the ground-anywbere but at one another. Then one turned tall
    and tried to run.
     It was the last action the poor creature ever took.
     The Katschei frowned and pointed his index finger at The retreating
    ionster. There was a flash and a crack, exactly like a bolt of ligbtning.
          blinded and deafened for a moment, and where the creature
    ipd been was only a smoking, blackened hole in the turf.
     Ilya ignored all of it, or pretended to. He dropped the balalaika and
    ~(andered over to the plates of fruit and the wine, neither of which hhad touched until now. He began cramming his mouth with fruit, using
           to stuff it untidily into his face. Keeping his body loose, he
    waited to see what the Katschei would do, how he would react.
     "Take him up and bring him here," the Katschei said, his voice tight
    with anger. Ilya made certain not to tense up and not to resist when he
    
    felt two sets of hands grabbing his shoulders and dragging him to their
    master. The monsters deposited him on the turf at the Katschei's feet,
    and Ilya remained there, first gulping the last of the fruit, then wipins mouth on his sleeve, grinning up at the sorcerer, making his eyes as
           as possible.

    




    "Who are you?" the Katschei barked.
    
            I
    Ilya wagged his head from side to side. "Some diys, I'm 1 dog, an
    
    244    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    some days, I'm a fool, and some days, I'm a fool dog of an idiot bastard,'
    he said conversationally. "But most days, I'm the gpod fellow on t
    stove, Ilya-You-Blockhead. Hey! That's me!"
     "I can see that," the Katscbei remarked sardoni  s
    How did you get here?"
     "I went to hunt boar with my brothers, but I got lost," he replied as
    pathetically as a child, and stuck his finger in the conwr of his mouth,
    letting his lower lip tremble. "I got lost for a long tii~' . " fie made his
    lip quiver. "I didn't like it, and no one came to find me." Now he man-
    aged to conjure a lump for his throat, and tears to trickle down his
    cheeks, mostly by thinking about the poor sorrel gelding. "It was dar~i
    and there were wolves!" he walled. "I was alone! I was scared,"
     He began to cry hysterically then, and it wasn't pretty, for lie drooled
    and howled like any small child would have, until the Katschei t4ed
    away in utter disgust. He rolled over and buried his face in his arms as
                                 cil~i 1"Mo se~t ou.,
    
    he lay on the grass, letting his sobs quiet so be could hear what the
    Katscbei would do next.
     "Only a fool would be able to wander in here by acci4ein, f
    Katschei shouted. 'And you let him! What do you think
    here? A home for the feeble-minded?"
    
    much brighter.
     "Never mind," be snarled at last. "Half of you go beat t   I
    ten lashes. Then the ones that were beaten do the same for themt.
                                                                      coupl~
    take this-idiot with you. Give him a couple of kicks and a 6(
    lashes, and throw him in the kitchen to wash pots. If be lives witho
    one of you losing your temper and eating him for insulting you, the,
    you did the last fool, I'll give him the old one's place. We might as
    get some use out of him while we see if be's going to survive."
     "Don't we get to eat him now, Chief?" asked one of the demons hope.
    
     Ilya peeked out from underneath his arm. The Katschei glared
    sadly bewildered creatures, who looked entirely baffled by his question.
    They might be brighter than the ones that Ilya had evaded, but n t
    
    fulIv.

    




    F I R E B I R D    245
    
     "Nof " the Katschei snarled, making the questioner cower. "First of all,
    you don't deserve any man-flesh, and second of all, he might have some-
    thing that would make you even stupider than you already are-if that's
    possible. Make him useful; at least he's smarter than the kitchen drudges
    we have now. I think we can count on him not to try to eat the pots rather
    -than scrub them. Now all of you, get out of here!"
     Two of the demons separated themselves from the rest, grabbed him
    by his shoulders, and hauled him up unceremoniously. In keeping with
    his disguise as a fool, Ilya completely "forgot" he'd been crying, and with
    drool and tears still wct on his face, tried to dance with the confused
    monsters. That led to a comic tangle that was resolved only when two
    more pried him off the original two, and the first two managed to get
    his arms wedged behind his back and frog-marched him off to the yard
    by the kitchen. Once there, they followed the Katschei's orders to the
    letter. One lashed him a couple of licks with a stick; he fell down and
    began howling at the top of his lungs, just in case the Katschei was lis-
    tening. The other kicked him twice while he was down, and he howled
    a bit more. Strangely, they neither hit nor kicked him half as hard as he
    remembered his brothers doing. Then they picked him up, hauled him
    in the kitchen door, and dumped him in the center of the kitchen.
     The kitchen was as big as Ivan's entire palace, and Ilya bad an uncanny
    sense that he had been here before-a momentary flash of memory of
    the laboring servants in Ivan's kitchen, looking like laborers in hell. But
    Here, the creatures working bare-bodied over the tables of bloody meat,
    the roaring fires, and the red-hot ovens were creatures out of hell....
     Stone floors, stone walls, stone fireplaces, stone ovens-only the ta-
    bles Nvere of wood. And the place looked like a slaughterhouse; Ilya
    hadn't seen that many carcasses since butchering-time. Recalling what
    the guards had said about eating humans, he couldn't help but take an
    apprehensive, sidelong glance at the tables, and gratefully saw nothing
    but a cow, three deer, and five hogs. He resolved, though, to eat noth-
    ing but vegetables while he was here, unless he could certify himself what
    was in his meal.
      A bulky brown creature the size of a small shed, with a bearlike head
    
    bands looked up at their entrance and grunted.

    




    246    MERCEDES LACKEV
    
     "Whazzat?" it asked.
     "Pot-scrubber for you, from the master," replied one of the monster-
    guards.
     The kitchen-creature gestured with its chin, and Ilya's captors hauled,
    him over to one corner where there was a huge kettle of water hot enough,
    to have a bit of steam rising over it, a mound of dirty pots, and soap.
    There he was let fall. He sat for a moment, rubbing his sore rump.
     "You heard the master, Fool-boy," said one. "He said scrub pots,
    scrub pots."
     Ilya nodded and picked himself up off the wet stone floor, which
    sloped in this corner, so that water would drain down into a hole in the
    floor. He tested the temperature of the water with a finger, and found
    that while it was hot, it wasn't as hot as it looked. With a sigh of
    gled relief and resignation-relief at his narrow escape, and resig
    for his short-term fate-he set to work scrubbing pots. It did amus
    to think of Mischa set to this task. Mischa would have gotten h
    killed and eaten in the first moments of the encounter with the
    Katschei-the only way he'd have been in the kitchen would have I)cen
    as part of the evening dinner!
     He'd never appreciated how much work it was to scrub pots. First the
    pot had to be soaked; to loosen whatever was crusted and burned to it.
    Then it had to be scrubbed with a boar-bristle brush until his
    
    ached, to get all of the crust off. Water slopped everywhere during
    process, and in mere moments he was soaked from head to toe with co
    greasy water. But that didn't matter, because it was so hot in the kitchen
    he'd have been soaked through with sweat anyway. Now he was glad that
    he'd hardened his muscles with all that exercise and wood-chopping.
    After what seemed like hours of scrubbing, he finished the mound 01
    greasy, blackened pots and pans, and looked up to see six monsters star-
    ing at him expectantly.
     They all had eyes like saucers,
    
                       and huge, lipless mouths, and they eye~
    him as if they were considering how well he would do to flavor the so I
    He jumped back-and all six of them stepped forward and took co
    trol of his wash-kettle. Two of them emptied the kettle of cold, greas-
    laden water bv manhandlinp, it over qnd tinning flip mirifenf, Jnwn f

    




    F I R E 8 1 R D    247
    
    MEN&
    
    drainhole, while the other four refilled it with pot after pot of fresh, clean,
    hot water. Then all six went away, vanishing somewhere in the depths
    of the kitchen, and two more monsters brought another heap of dirty
    crockery as large as the earlier stack. Ilya gave thought to trying to es-
    cape, but the one he now thought of as Kitchen Monster turned around
    and gave him a significant glare.
     Run, that glare said, a gaze that measured and weighed him, and cal-
    culated just how many meals he would serve. Go ahead and run, and the
    stew will have a little more meat in it tonight,
     Ilya shuddered and bent to his work with a will. The longer he
    scrubbed, the narrower his world became. He had never worked so hard
    in his entire life-not at the height of harvest, when not even the tsar's
    sons were immune from working in the fields, not when the sheep had
    to betheared, not when he'd spent the whole day chopping wood for
    Yasha. His vision began to gray, and hunger gnawed at him constantly.
    At some point, he grew so tired that all that existed for him was the next
    pot, the scrubbing-brush, and the kettle of hot, greasy water. He couldn't
    even think, he was so tired.
     Some time near dawn, he was allowed to stop. The monsters who
    came to empty his kettle did not refill it, and when he looked up, weary
    beyond words, he saw that the kitchen was empty. Even the Kitchen
    Monster had gone away.
    I There was bread on the table-that seemed safe enough. He took a
    half loaf, and found some onions, some cheese, and decided not to take
    any chances on anything else. He drank water from a hand-pump, using
      of the bowls he himself bad cleaned for a cup.
     "His hunger assuaged, he found that he was fighting to keep his eyes
     pen. It was time to find somewhere to sleep.
      He crept away as quietly as a cat, out into the fresh air and dawn-light
     of early morning, and looked dully at his hands, which were wrinkled and
     white with so much immersion in water. Got to find a place to sleep, he
     ,[bought, vaguely. Got to figure out how to get out of this....
     But he was alive, he wasn't a statue, and he wasn't in the stew. He'd
     already come out ahead of every other man who'd attempted to get into
      e KAschei's domain. If be bad to, he could scrub pots for a few days,

    




    24S    RIERCEDES LACIKEV
    
    while he saw how the land lay, and bow to manipulate things to his own
    advantage.
     He stretched, and felt every strand, every fiber of muscle in his arms
    and shoulders ache. If he kept soaking his hands in hot water, he'd lose
    the calloulses he'd gotten from all of his weapons-practice and wood-
    chopping.
     Well, maybe be could scrub pots for a few days. It would be a lot bet-
    ter to find a way to stay here and be ignored. He still had the sorrel geld-
    ing's bracelet, and the Firebird had taken off her ill-wishing, so now, for
    the first time in his life, be should be able to enjoy good luck for a
    change.
     Ahead of him were kitchen-gardens, which would probably be better
    places to look for food than the kitchen itself. He rather doubted that
    the Katschei bad put traps on the turnips and onions. It would be a
    safer to go pull up raw vegetables than trust to anything in a stew.
     He remembered the discussion of food in the orchard and shuddered.
     As if to demonstrate that his luck had turned, as he looked back to
    the palace to hunt for a place to sleep, he saw that a small door was stand-
    ing open not far from the kitchen door. Something made him drag his
    weary feet over to it, and peer inside.
     It was a storage chamber, a rubbish-room, and from the look of it, no
    one had brought anything in or taken anything out for a very long time.
    Mostly what lay here was broken furniture, all plied up as if waiting for
    repairs that no one would ever do, and it was all coated with a thick layer
    of dust. But what caught his eye immediately was a bedstead, withfOuT
    legs all broken off to approximately the same length, the feather mat.
    tress still in it. The mattress was a bit worse for wear, with holes in the
    cover and evidence that moths had been at it, but it was far better than
    anything he'd hoped for. And in a pile beside the door were rugs, moth-
    eaten furs, torn blankets, pillows with the seams splitting and feathers
    coming out. He seized an assortment and tossed them on the bed.
     He closed the door behind him, and in the- total darkness stumbled
    toward the bed and fell into it, too tired even to sneeze in the dust-cloud
    
    he raised. There were probably spiders and moths, probably mildew. But
                                              I T_
    dust or no dust, mildewed or not, it was soft, the room was warm, and i
    
                                                 Z

    




    F I R E R I R D    249
    
    once he had tucked a pillow under his head and pulled some of the cov-
    erings over himself, he was asleep in less time than it took to think
    about it.
     When he woke, he lay in his purloined bed for a long time, staring
    into the darkness and feeling every muscle in his arms and bock aching
    as if he had never exercised them before in his life. Should I go back to
    the kitchen? he wondered. They don't know where I am. Will they miss me
    if I don't show up?
     It was entirely possible that they wouldn't, but he decided that it
    wouldn't be a good idea to test that too much. On the other hand, be
    "was supposed to be a fool, so maybe he could make himself so very use-
    less that he would even be demoted from kitchen-drudge.
     He unwound himself from his bed-coverings, wrinkling his nose at his
    own odor. Another two or three days of this, and I'll begin to smell like one
    of these demons!-and that thought triggered another, one that be
    ~~Couldn't quite get to come clear, so he let it simmer in the back of his
    mind, and felt his way to the door of his impromptu bed-chamber, lis-
    tening carefully before opening it a crack. He didn't want anyone to know
    where he was sleeping; he didn't want to be hauled off to wherever it
    was that drudges were supposed to sleep, since he doubted it would be
    any~vbere near as comfortable as the broken bed. It certainly wouldn't
    be as private.
     The advantage of being in a palace this big was that if he could find
     away to fit in, no one would pay any attention to him so long as it looked
     as if he knew what he was doing and where he was going. As long as he
     looked as if he bad a job, it was quite likely that no one would interfere
     uith him. So, his first task was to get himself dismissed from the kitchen-
     staff so that he was free to move about.
     He peeked through the crack in the door, and waited until there was
     a lull in the activity in the kitchen-court before slipping out and quickly
     shutting the door behind him. He slumped bis shoulders and shuffled
     his feet, shambling his way slowly toward the kitchen door, attracting sev-
      1,a] curious-and several hungry-looks. Well, so much for fitting in.
      The problem was, he didn't look like one of the local inhabitants. Un-
      ss be could disguise himself, he was going to attract attention, un-

    




    250    MERCEDES LAC14EV
    
    wanted and possibly dangerous attention. As long as he looked like the
    demonic equivalent of a nice, fat chicken, he was going to attract the
    demonic equivalent of underfed, overworked, and none-too-honest serfs.
    He could probably defend himself against one or two, but against
    of them he'd need weapons.
     He had barely stepped inside the kitchen door when the Kitch
    Monster spotted him. 'Airrgar!" it growled around the mouthful
    strangely shaped teeth it was afflicted with. "Gerroork!"
     Which he interpreted as "There you are, get to work!"
     His interpretation was evidently correct, since the slovenly little crea-
    ture doing duty at the wash-kettle scuttled away, and one of the othcr
    kitchen-staff gave Ilya a cuff across the back of the head that sent him
    stumbling in the direction of his appointed station.
     He waded into the pile of greasy pots, waiting for the first bowl to
    come his way. And as soon as he got something breakable in his hands-
    he broke it.
     He broke the next piece, and the next, finding ways to drop them that
    were quite noisy and increasingly spectacular. And every time be dropped
    something, he screwed up his face a little more, and started to wbimpcr
    and tremble as if be was frightened. Which, of course, only made his
    bands less steady. He was using ahl of the lessons in "How to be an idiot"
    that be had learned to protect himself at home.
     Finally, at the crash of the fifth or sixth pot, the Kitchen Monster
    turned toward him, fury in every line of it. "Ill'it! Oron! Ahellooooin?" it
    bellowed at him.
     He took that opportunity to jump back, as if startled, slip, and fall pur-
    posefully into the pile of stacked-up crockery waiting his attentions. His
    practices as his brothers cuffed at him made his aim so true that he fell
    without hurting himself in the slightest-but oh, the 0 wreck he made of
    the dishes!
     The resulting penultimate crash brought the entire kitchen to a stan~_
    still. And in the resulting silence Ilya burst into noisy walls and a t)r-
    rent of tears.
     The Kitchen Monster screamed and stalked toward him, hands on'
    hips. Ilya cowered and wailed, and babbled apologies, covering his bcad

    




    F I R E B I R D    251
    
    with his bands, and rocking back and forth. In this position be couldn't
    see anything but the Kitchen Monster's feet. After a few moments of
    tears and babbling, one of them began to tap. He took that as a good
    sign, and flung himself at the foot that wasn't tapping, burbling all over
    it, clinging to the ankle-which wasn't particularly easy, since the ankle
    
    was as big around as a tree-trunk.
     "Ell," he heard the thing mutter. Then, "Ehisool Oua ear!" it said
    aloud, then presumably it pointed to two of the other monsters. "Oo.
    Oo. Eh 1h ou, ow!"
     Or, You. You. Get it out, now! That much, at least, he recognized.
     Two large and bulky monsters pried him off the Kitchen Monster's
    ankle, hauled him to his feet, and got him out of the kitchen by cuffing
    .him in that direction. Every time he stopped, or when they wanted him
    to change direction, they cuffed him-and once again, the lessons in
    evading his brothers'blows made it possible for him to avoid being badly
    bruised, although it looked as though they were knocking him to pieces.
     ce outside, they delivered another few blows until he sprawled on the
    
    ground, picked him up, and carried him a short distance, then threw him
    through the air.
     He landed on something relatively soft, behind a screening of bushes,
    while the two monsters stomped off, grumbling to themselves. He re-
    mained there quietly for a moment, then sat up and looked around
    when it appeared that no one was going to do anything more to him.
     He had landed on the palace trasb-pile-as opposed to the kitchen-
    midden, which would have been much less pleasant. Here is where
    things went that were past being stored in rubbish-rooms. And it was in
    looking around at the contents of this trash-pile that the idea which had
    been only balf-formed when he first woke up finally sprung into full life.
     Resc creatures were anything but intelligent; he'd bad ample evi-
    dence of that. All he had to do was to disguise himself as one of them-
    make himself look sufficiently unhuman-and he would be able to
    explore this place as much as he cared to. He would no longer look like
    a potential dinner, and since he hadn't yet seen an end to the variety of
    forms tlicse creatures came in, )ust about anything he put together
    would probably pass muster.

    




    He spent the morning scavenging through the trash-pile, and took
    
    MERCEDES LAC14E
    
    gleanings into "his" rubbish-room. Once there, he combined them
    more things he found there. He found a bit of broken knife-blade, an
    
    by wrapping leather about it, he had something that would cut and
    pierce as long as he was patient. He cut himself many things out of old
    leather, and went to work building his disguise. Out of the motheaten
    furs he made a sort of bead-gear, embellished with a pair of cow-horns.
    He made huge flapping cars out of old leather, and stuck those on the
    outside. With more leather, he created a false nose the size and general
    shape of a large, wilted carrot, which be could tic on around his head
    with a pair of strings under the head-gear. He decided to forgo fangs after
    one attempt to counterfeit them because they were so uncomfortable
    to wear. To counterfeit a misshapen body, he stuffed his shirt with rags
    
    to create a bunched back, and he cobbled up armor very like that offbe
    orchard-guards with leather, bits of real armor, and pieces of metal froM
    the trash. When be was finished, he put his disguise on, and went OLL
    to test it. He knew that be wouldn't have fooled a human-f-or a momej,
    but as he shambled out of the kitcben-court and down one of the lancs,
    he attracted no attention whatsoever. The Katschel's monsters were
    possibly the dimmest creatures on the face of the earth. Evidently it was
    difficult for the forces of darkness to find good servants.
     All I have to do now is stay out of sight of the more intelligent monst
    and the Katschei himself, and I can go anywhere I want!
     Now he was free-and able to roam the Katscbei's property at will,
     If there was any chance under the sun of rescuing Tatiana and the rest,
    
    surely now he would find it!

    




    HT
    
    ILYA STOOD in a corner and held a pole at a semblance of atten-
    tion-a curtain-pole, in fact, scavenged from the trash-heap-and tried
    to look like one of the other bottom-rank guards at the back of the
    
    Katschei s throne-room. Those who were at the lowest rank were given
    crude pikes and left to stand at "attention" all day whenever the Katschei
    was not in fits throne-room. When the Master was on his throne, he had
    far inore intelligent creatures guarding him.
     Ilya had found the place he now held largely by accident, failing in
    
      with a group of guards going on duty, and ending up here. That was how
      had discovered a way of getting meals without getting into trouble
      steal ing-falling in with a group of guards going on duty somewhere,
    ~ TUN,
      falling out when they were dismissed, and following along with them to
      their ineal. Since he'd stood duty with them, there was never any prob-
      lem about getting dinner with them. They were always hungry when they
      came off duty-in fact, the guards seemed absolutely obsessed with
      food, talking about it incessantly when they talked about anything at all.
      ne incident with the first bunch of guards in the orchard was absolutely
      tv ical of the bottom-rank monsters; there weren't too many things that
       1P,
      .hey thought about or talked about. Food was one, sleeping accommo-
      btions-sleeping, not assignations with lady-monsters-was another,
      g punishment was a third, and the punishments others had in-
      was the fourth and last. All conversations revolved around those
      pics. All Ilya could assume was that there were no lady-monsters,
    
    253

    




    4
    
    254   MERCEDES LACKEV
    
    for the topic of women never came up at all. It was a strange life these
    creatures led, and a curiously confined one.      W
     No one ever questioned where he came from when he added himself
    to a group; they assumed he'd been assigned there. No one ever asked
    him where he went when he wasn't working; none of them ever had the
    initiative to go find a place other than their assigned barracks and bed
    to sleep. When he showed up at a particular meal, they made room for
    him without thinking about it. He even had an excuse for why he didn't
    eat much mcat-instead, he mostly ate vegetables and cheese and bread,
    with the occasional bits of fowl that he could identify positively as being
    safe. His excuse was that he had stomach troubles or a toothache. Many
    of the monsters had stomach troubles; there were some poor souls w1lo
    couldn't handle anything more than mush. It not only seemed that the
    forces of darkness couldn't get good servants, they couldn't even get
    healthy ones!
     The others would pat him on the back in cuommiseration, then hap-
    pily gobble up his share of whatever he had rejected. Among humans,
    that would have made him mildly popular, but these creatures didn't
    even have enough imagination for that. He'd have felt sorry for tbein,
    but he couldn't muster up a sense of pity They were man-eating men-
    sters, after all; if they knew what be was and why he was here, he would
    have been on the table rather than at it. They had done horrible things
    to other human beings, and he could never forget that, no matter 11
    confined and pathetic their lives were.
     They were at the bottom of the hierarchy here, like the hapless serfs
    his father used and abused. Perhaps that was why he thought he ought
    to feel sorry for them. The analogy only went so far, however, and it only
    took having one of them describe the last bit of man-flesb he'd had in
    reverent tones to make him lose any empathy he'd had for them.
     Now, those at the top of the hierarchy here needed no one's pity, and
    this room was proof enough of that.
     The Katschci's throne-room was as stunning and impressive as the ex-
    terior of the palace suggested, and Ilya was busy taking it all in while ie
    was supposedIf the kitchen was big enough to swallow up Ivan's palace, the throne-
                              4

    




    F I R E B I R D    255
    
    room was big enough to swallow the palace and the grounds. The ceil-
    ing loomed so far above them that the many beautiful paintings up there
    lost a great many of their details. The ceiling was actually painted, and
    not in icons, either-not that it would have made any sense for a mas-
    ter of demons to have the face of the Virgin or Christ gazing down on
    him! Light came from a dozen constructions of crystal and brass, each
    the size of a table and supplied with hundreds of tiny lights. Ilya had no
    idea how these things stayed ht; they couldn't be candies, for the lights
    never flickered and never wavered. They couldn't be oil-lamps, for there
    was no source of oil. These shimmering creations sparkled and tinkled
    softly whenever a breeze moved the crystals against each other.
     The walls were paneled in floor-to-ceiling mirrors, the clearest, most
    flawless mirrors Ilya had ever seen. When he thought about how much
    Ivan had paid for the single, flawed mirror his third wife had bought, he
    couldn't even begin to calculate how much these were worth. There was
    scarcely a ripple or an lap"erfection in the glass, and the reflections that
    they cast were indistinguishable from the original. Ilya couldn't imag-
    ine how the stupid guards managed to keep from walking into them. Pos-
    sibly the only thing that saved them was that they were not allowed into
    he throne-room itself, only the gallery that ran across the back of it.
                                 . How anyone could
         for draperies was beyond Ilya, and he knew that if his step-
    
    In between the mirrors were drapes made of silk.
    
    mother could get a single glimpse of this place, the Katschei s drape
    would never be safe as long as she lived. She'd probably break one of th(
    mirrors as well, and risk the bad luck that came of such an action, in the
    hopes that there would be fragments large enough to be carried away
     The floor was a mosaic of semiprecious stones of all kinds: jasper and
    sardonyx, carnelian and serpentine, soapstone and rose-quartz. Alabaster
    pillars carved in spirals supported the ceiling.
     The throne itself could not be what it looked like-yet Ilya was be-
    coming convinced that it was. It appeared to be jade, a huge, single piece
    of grass-green jade, carved into a throne with the backs and sides made
    of sinuous, intertwining dragons. It stood on a dais approached by three
    steps. The first step was made of a slab of rose-quartz, the second of
    amethyst, and the third of crystal veined with gold. The platform that
    