"If you had done this first," she said, "I could have—"
"I know," he said. "But I didn't think of it till after. Let's just add it to the long list of stupid mistakes I've made."
The job done, he stepped away from her. He looked at her face for a moment, but what he saw there must have displeased him, for he turned his back and walked to the edge of the pit and looked down.
What had he seen in her face? All she felt was fear, uncertainty. She was wearing a shameful thing and trying not to act ashamed. Was that what made him turn away?
She could see that Ivan was trying to be a good man. He was not a devil, nor a servant of Satan. She had seen his actions long enough to know that he was almost priestlike in his gentleness. He had never used a sword. He was peaceable as a lamb. Wasn't that more Christian than to be a druzhinnik, spending his days preparing to kill other men?
How could she, a Christian, have failed to see such Christlike attributes in this stranger? Jesus said to judge not, lest ye be judged. How unjustly have I judged him, again and again?
"Ivan," she said softly.
He did not turn to face her. "What," he said, his voice dispirited.
She had to know if he really was the man of peace she had just imagined him to be. "When you fought the bear—had you ever fought an enemy before?"
He did not answer.
She asked again. "Was it the first time you ever used a weapon, when you flung that stone and put out the bear's eye?"
He turned on her, and to her shock there were tears on his cheeks. He made no effort to brush them away, and he sounded, not sad, but angry when he answered her. "You're right," he said, "I'm a contemptible weakling, I'm not strong and brave like the men in your father's druzhina, you're right to despise me."
She would have interrupted him, told him that her question had not implied criticism of him; but he gave her no chance to speak.
"I never fought an enemy," he said. "I never held a weapon in my hands, and I never intended to, and I still never intend to, now that I'm not in Taina anymore. And if, for some reason, I ever did have to take up a weapon and use it against an enemy, there is one thing I can promise: I would not be doing it to impress you with how manly I am, because I don't give a rat's ass what you think of me."
She had never heard anyone curse by referring to the anus of a rat before. It was a loathsome thought, and her face showed her disgust.
"Whatever you may think of me," he said, "and however you may hate wearing that shirt, I know where there's a warm house and a clean bed, and plenty of food and water, so I'd suggest you follow me. Princess."
And to think that for a moment there, I was actually imagining him to be a little bit like Jesus.
But he knew the way to the house and the fire, to the food and the drink. And he was her husband, and she knew her duty. He had dressed her in rags of shame, and now she would come and bear her shame among his people. She stepped toward him. He turned his back on her and strode off into the woods. She followed him. Only now and then did he glance back to make sure she was with him. She always was.
Katerina's nakedness might be somewhat covered, but her appearance would certainly excite comment if she were seen. Besides, her feet were bare, and the road, so smooth to the tires of a car or the soles of Ivan's American running shoes, would be rough to feet more accustomed to meadows or the leafmeal forest floor. So they stayed in the woods, within sight of the road, except where they had to cross a stream or avoid a steep hill.
Katerina said nothing—never asked for help, and her breath never grew labored—so he had to glance back to be sure she was still with him. Only now, when her body was covered, did he allow himself to think of the sight of her body, of the electric moments when his hand brushed against her. My wife, he thought. By right, the woman whose body I should know, the woman who should know me. Each glance at her, dressed loosely in his shirt, the cloth sliding across her skin as she moved, filled his imagination and fed his desire for her.
It also fed the bitterness in his heart. Of course she was being unfair to him. What difference did that make? In games of love there is no umpire to call foul. By twentieth-century standards he wasn't a bad guy, but Katerina had no way of knowing that. He could see her beauty and wit and nobility, while easily forgiving the flaws that came from her culture; but she could see only his flaws and forgave nothing, and that was that.
He had no business loving her in the first place. It was Ruth he was engaged to, Ruth he should have married. How was he going to explain this to Ruth? Something came up when I was vacationing in the ninth century, and I married this girl who hates me. In 1992 we'll celebrate our eleven-hundred-and-second anniversary. Oh, and she doesn't speak any language now spoken on earth, and I had to become a Christian to marry her, and... you understand, don't you, Ruth?
The marriage hadn't been consummated. It could still be annulled, couldn't it?
Of course it couldn't. Baba Yaga still threatened Taina, and was held at bay only by the fact that Ivan was married to Katerina.
Only now, walking alongside this modern road, Taina already seemed less real. How could something he did now in the twentieth century have any effect on the distant past?
He glanced back again. She was still behind him. Still beautiful. Still the woman whom he had come to admire and love. Without him, whom would she speak to? Where would she go? The only merciful thing would be to annul the marriage and take her back to the pedestal and leave her where he found her. You cross your bridge, baby, and I'll cross mine. Status quo ante. Have a nice life.
Only it wouldn't be a nice life, if she went back to Taina without a husband.
I'm stuck.
He heard a truck engine, the indescribable rattling noises that can only be produced by Soviet-made vehicles. It was coming up the road toward them, the wrong direction for him to ask for a lift.
He glanced back again and, for the first time since he had known her, saw Katerina frozen with fear.
"She's coming for us," said Katerina.
"What?"
"The Pretender," she said.
"She can't make a noise like that. It's only a... truck." He had no choice but to use the modern Russian word, gruzovik; there was no proto-Slavonic equivalent.
His use of a strange word didn't help much, but his utter lack of apprehension did seem to have a calming affect. He took her shoulder and led her off into the brush by the side of the road. By the time the truck came along, they were invisible to the driver. Ivan kept his arm around Katerina, and she stayed close to him. It was sweet to have her body beside his, to feel her—well, technically, his—shirt pressed against his bare chest. He wondered fleetingly if Dimitri would stand so calmly in the face of the hideous monster now coming up the road. But that was a cheap thought, and he despised himself for thinking it. He was not brave to face the coming of the truck. He knew there was no danger. But a druzhinnik showed courage in the face of enemies that Ivan could never dream of fighting off.
When the truck rattled by, she put an arm around his waist and retreated deeper into the crook of his arm. Let there be a hundred such trucks, he thought.
"You saw the man inside," he said. "It's like a wagon, but instead of horses or oxen to pull it, there's a... fire inside. An oven. Not for cooking. An oven that makes the wagon roll."
"It was rolling uphill, and nothing pulled," she said. "Why did you lie to me?"
"Lie? When did I lie?"
"You said there was no magic in your world."
"This isn't magic. This is... a tool. Like a scythe or a basket. A tool for doing work. The truck carries the man and whatever load he needs to bear. Just like a wagon. Only faster, and bigger loads, and the truck doesn't need to rest as often as a horse."