Take her! snarled the shadow-voice again. The dead thing’s white teeth caught the moonlight as it gathered itself to spring.
Suddenly Vasya realized that there was someone else beside her—not a dead woman nor a voice made of shadows, but a man in a dark cloak. She could not see his face in the darkness. Whoever this other was, he seized her hand and dug his fingers into her palm. Vasya swallowed a cry.
You are dead, said the newcomer to the creature. And I am still master. Go. His voice was like snow at midnight.
The dead thing on the bed cowered back, wailing. The shadows on the wall seemed to rise up in clamorous fury, growling, No, ignore him; he is nothing. I am master. Take her, take—
Vasya felt the skin of her hand split and blood drip to the floor. She knew a fierce exultation. “Go,” she said to the dead thing, as though she had always known the words. “By my blood you are barred from this place.” She curled her hand round the hand that held hers, felt it slick with her blood. For an instant the other hand felt real, cold and hard. She shuddered and turned to look, but there was no one there.
The shadows on the wall seemed suddenly to shrink, quivering, crying out, and the dead creature’s lips writhed back over long, thin teeth. It shrieked at Vasya, turned, and made for the window. It gained the sill, dropped into the snow, and bounded for the woods, faster than a running horse, the tangled, filthy hair streaming out behind.
Vasya did not see it go. She was already at the bed, pulling away the filthy blankets, looking for the wound on the priest’s naked throat.
THE VOICE OF GOD had not spoken to Konstantin Nikonovich that evening. The priest had prayed alone, hour after hour. But his thoughts would not settle on the well-worn words. Vasilisa is wrong, Konstantin had thought. What is a little fear if it saves their souls?
He’d almost gone back to the kitchen to tell her so. But he was weary and stayed in his room, kneeling, even after it grew too dark to see the peeling gold on the icon.
Just before moonrise, he went to bed and dreamed.
In his dream, the gentle-eyed virgin stepped down from her wooden panel. An unearthly light was in her face. She smiled. More than anything, he wanted to feel her hand on his face, to have her blessing. She bent over him, but it was not her hand he felt. Her mouth grazed his forehead, touched his eyes. Then she put a finger under his chin, and her mouth found his. She kissed him again and again. Even dreaming, shame warred with desire; feebly, he tried to push her away. But the blue robes were heavy; her body was like a coal against his. At last he yielded, turning his face to hers with a groan of despair. She smiled against his mouth, as though his anguish pleased her. Her mouth darted down to his throat with the speed of a stooping hawk.
Then she shrieked and Konstantin jerked awake, pinned beneath a quivering weight.
The priest took a full breath and gagged. The woman hissed and rolled off him. He caught a glimpse of matted hair that half-hid eyes like rubies. The creature made for the window. He saw two other figures in his room, one limned in blue, the other dark. The blue shape reached for him. Weakly, Konstantin groped for the cross about his neck. But the blue-lit face was Vasilisa Petrovna’s: an icon in itself, all hard angles and huge eyes. Their eyes met for a moment, his wide with shock, and then her hands went to his throat and he fainted.
HE WAS NOT HURT; his throat and arm and breast were unmarked. So much Vasya felt, groping in the dark, and then a hammering came on the door. Vasya sprang for the window and half-fell into the dvor. The moon shone over the snowy yard. She dropped to earth and crouched in the shadow of the house, shaking with cold and the aftermath of terror.
She heard men burst into the room and pull up short. Clinging with both hands, Vasya was just tall enough to peer over Konstantin’s sill. The room stank of decay. The priest sat bolt upright, clutching his neck. Vasya’s father stood over him holding a lantern.
“Are you all right, Batyushka?” Pyotr said. “We heard a cry.”
“Yes,” replied Konstantin, faltering, wild-eyed. “Yes, forgive me. I must have cried out in my sleep.” The men in the doorway looked at each other. “The ice broke,” said Konstantin. He climbed out of bed and staggered as he found his feet. “The cold gave me bad dreams.”
Vasya ducked hastily as their pale faces turned toward her hiding-place. She crouched in the shadow of the house beneath the window, trying not to breathe.
She heard her father grunt and stride across to the broken casement, where the whole block of ice had fallen away. The shadow of his head and shoulders fell over her as he leaned warily into the dvor. Blessedly, he did not look down. Nothing moved in the dooryard. Then Pyotr drew the shutters closed and placed a wedge between.
But Vasya did not hear it. The instant the shutters closed, she was sprinting silently for the winter kitchen.
THE KITCHEN WAS WARM and dark, womblike. Vasya slipped softly through the door. She ached in every limb.
“Vasya?” Alyosha said.
Vasya clambered atop the oven. Alyosha knelt up beside her. “It’s all right, Dunya,” said Vasya, taking her nurse’s hands. “You will be all right now. We are safe.”
Dunya opened her eyes. A smile touched her shrunken mouth. “Marina will be proud, my Vasochka,” she said. “I will tell her when I see her.”
“You will do nothing of the kind,” said Vasya. She tried to smile, though her eyes blurred with tears. “You are going to get well again.”
At that, the old lady lifted a cold hand and, with surprising firmness, pushed Vasya away. “No, I am not,” she said, with a little of her old tartness. “I have lived to see all of my little ones grown, and I want nothing more than to die with my last three children on either side.” Irina was awake now, too, and Dunya’s other hand reached out and found hers.
Alyosha laid his hand over them all. He spoke up before Vasya could protest. “Vasya, she’s right,” he said. “You must let her go. It will be a cruel winter, and she is weary.”
Vasya shook her head, but her hand wavered.
“Please, my darling,” whispered the old lady. “I am so tired.”
Vasya hesitated for a frozen moment, then tipped her head in a tiny nod.
The old lady laboriously freed her other hand and clasped Vasya’s in both of hers. “Your mother blessed you at her parting, and now I do the same. Be at peace.” She paused as though listening. “You must remember the old stories. Make a stake of rowan-wood. Vasya, be wary. Be brave.”
Her hand fell away and she lay silent. Irina and Alyosha and Vasya were left to pick up her cold hands, straining to hear the sound of her breathing. Finally Dunya roused herself and spoke again, so low that they had to lean close to catch the words.
“Lyoshka,” she whispered. “Will you sing for me?”
“Of course,” whispered Alyosha. He hesitated, then drew a deep breath.
There was a time, not long ago
When flowers grew all year
When days were long
And nights star-strewn
And men lived free from fear
Dunya smiled. Her eyes glowed like a child’s, and in her smile, Vasya saw the shadow of the girl she had been.