Matfei jumped to his feet, roaring. "It's a practice, you bone-headed fool!"
"Tell him that!" cried Ivan. "He was about to kill me!"
"It's a practice axe!" shouted Matfei. "It has no edge!"
"It's heavy! It would have crushed my head!"
"He wasn't going to hit you!"
"How was I supposed to know that?"
"Because he's a true knight and you're betrothed to the princess! That's why! Now look at what you've done."
"Isn't that what I should do to an enemy?"
"An enemy will be wearing a solid steel plate with a point, to catch and impale the shin of any man who tries such a maneuver in battle. What, you think you're the first to come up with the idea of kicking a man in the groin?"
"Nobody told me," said Ivan.
"Why should I have to tell you? Do you think your enemy is going to be as stupid as you?"
"You all grew up fighting and talking about fighting. In my homeland we used none of these things."
"Your homeland must be a nation of women!" cried Matfei.
Only after saying it did he realize that, apart from his voice, there was no sound on the practice field. Everyone had stopped to hear the argument. And now these words, this deadly insult, had shamed Ivan in front of all the men and given credence to the rumors that had been flying for the past week, about how readily Ivan had put on women's clothes. Rumors that Katerina had reluctantly confirmed to King Matfei in private.
"One soldier of my land," said Ivan icily, "could kill every man here in five minutes or less."
Keeping his voice down, Matfei nevertheless could not leave such an empty boast unanswered. "Then why don't you show us this amazing process?"
"Our soldiers use weapons that you don't have."
"Make one for us! Or show us how it's made, and we'll make our own!"
"It takes better iron than you have. No smith could make it here."
"Easy to brag about what you cannot show us."
"Easy for you to shame a man who comes from another land, with different customs. If you came to my land, you would be as unskilled as I am, in the things that matter to my people."
"Perhaps that's so," said Matfei, keeping his voice low but unable to hide the fury he felt. "But I am not in your land. You are in mine. You are engaged to my daughter. My people need you to lead them into war."
"I agree with Dimitri—I'll never make a soldier," said Ivan. "As for your daughter, I release her from—"
Matfei punched him in the mouth before he could utter the words that would have opened the door for Baba Yaga to come in. Ivan staggered backward, holding his face. Blood poured from his nose and his lip, which had torn against his teeth.
"What did you do that for?" the boy asked, gasping.
"Are you a fool?" said Matfei. "If you break off this engagement, then all is lost!"
"All of what is lost?" asked Ivan. "All my blood? How's that for a beginning?"
"Are you such a coward and a weakling?" Making no effort to hide his scorn, King Matfei turned to help Dimitri rise from the ground. Dimitri leaned on Matfei's shoulder and limped gingerly to a grassy place where he could lie down to recover.
"Father Matfei," said Dimitri—for he had earned the right in battle to address his king so familiarly—"I have borne many things for you, and will bear anything you ask, but I cannot teach this fool."
"For God's sake, try," whispered Matfei.
Dimitri spoke more quietly. "He goes to it with a will, but he hasn't the strength in him. Everyone has seen how badly he fights. No one would follow him."
"For my sake, try," said Matfei. He helped Dimitri stretch out on the grass. Their heads were very close together.
"You should have let me marry her," whispered Dimitri.
"The Widow's curse—"
"Hang the old bitch," said Dimitri. "If the people chose, they'd choose me."
"We face a witch," said Matfei. "She has powers your sword can't fight. Maybe God sent this boy to us for a reason."
"What can he possibly do that we can't do better? He knows nothing. He can do nothing."
How could Matfei argue with him? All he had was a faint hope—hope in a miracle. "Maybe we'll be lucky," said Matfei, speaking the thought that had crossed his mind earlier. "Maybe this boy will father a child and die."
He spoke wryly, meaning it as a joke. But the moment the words passed his lips, Matfei knew he had crossed a chasm, and there was no turning back. For Dimitri had heard the king speak of Ivan's death as a desirable thing and even name the time when it would be most convenient for it to occur. No matter how Matfei might protest in the future that he never meant it, he could not have found a clearer way to sentence young Ivan to death. If not Dimitri himself, some other man would find a way to rid the kingdom of this interloper. And his blood would be on Matfei's hands.
"I didn't mean it," Matfei said, knowing that Dimitri would not believe him.
"I know you were joking," said Dimitri. But it was in his eyes that he did not take it as a joke. "Still, we need an heir, and soon. There are ways to make sure that a child is conceived at once, and that it's a boy."
"And have the baby born ensorceled?" asked Matfei. "We might as well hand the baby over to the Widow herself. I don't want my grandsons to die as my sons did."
"I thought you didn't believe that it was magic killed your boys."
"I believed that seeking vengeance for it would do no good. Nor will killing this young man. He saved my daughter from the witch. He saved your sister."
"And no harm will come to him from me," said Dimitri. "You can be sure that if he dies, it will be an accident."
"An accident that you and I will do all in our power to prevent," said Matfei.
"Our vigilance will be marvelously complete," said Dimitri. "At least until we know the baby is a boy."
Matfei could see now that no matter how sincerely he might plead with Dimitri to spare the stranger's life, he and all the knights of the druzhina would know that Matfei's original reasoning was sound: Only with a child conceived and the father dead would the kingdom be better off than it was before Ivan rescued the princess.
Matfei rose to his feet and returned to where Ivan was whacking futilely against the wooden dummy with his practice axe. Oh, Lord Jesus, what have I done? thought Matfei. The boy has a king's heart. He's trying to learn. God brought him to us. And I have betrayed him and God.
Or have I? My people matter more than this one young man. It was my mouth that asked for him to die, and I am the one who will stand before the judgment bar of Christ to answer for it. Let the sin be on my head. If Jesus damns me for saving the life and freedom of my people at the cost of one life, then I'll damn him back. Let me burn in hell—I'll burn there knowing that I did what my people needed, and that is the duty of a king, however he might pay for it later. I, too, have a king's heart.
I'm no King David, killing a man so he can hide the shame of stealing his wife. When I kill, it is for the good of others.
But I'm still a murderer, Matfei told himself, refusing to hide from what he had done. I have killed with my mouth. There is no mercy in me. What difference now, between me and Baba Yaga?
There is a difference, something inside him shouted. Please, Jesus. Please, some god, some wise man, show me what it is.
Sergei didn't like the way people were talking about Ivan. Mother swore that she told no one but Father Lukas in confession, and Sergei knew that Father Lukas never betrayed the secrets he learned that way. Yet the rumor was abroad, that Ivan was a man who dressed in women's clothes. No one quite believed it, or something would have happened already. But no one completely disbelieved the story, either. Not even Sergei.