Alyosha slid from Solovey’s back. “As if I’d leave you,” he said. Some of the Bear’s creatures circled them. Alyosha cried a war cry and swung his sword. Solovey lowered his head, like a bull about to charge.
“Dunya,” Vasya said. “Dunyashka.” Dimly she heard her brother grunt as the edge of the battle found them. From somewhere, there came a howl like a wolf’s, a cry like a woman’s. But she and Dunya stood in a little core of silence. Solovey pawed the earth, ears flat to his skull. That creature does not know you, he said.
“She does. I know she does.” The look of terror on the upyr’s face warred now with avid hunger. “I will just tell her she need not be afraid. Dunya—Dunya, please. I know you are cold here, and you are frightened. But can’t you remember me?”
Dunya panted, all the light of hell in her eyes.
Vasya drew her belt-knife and dragged it deeply across the veins of her wrist. The skin resisted before it gave, and then the blood raged out. Solovey shied back instinctively. “Vasya!” cried Alyosha, but she did not heed. Vasya took a long step forward. Her blood tumbled down, scarlet in the snow, on the mud and on the snowdrops. Behind her Solovey reared.
“Here, Dunyashka,” said Vasya. “Here. You are hungry. You fed me often enough. Remember?” She held out her bleeding arm.
And then she had no more time to think. The creature seized her hand like a greedy child, fastened its mouth to her wrist, and drank.
Vasya stood still, trying desperately to stay on her feet.
The creature whimpered as it drank. More and more it whimpered, and then suddenly it flung her hand away and stumbled backward. Vasya staggered, light-headed, black flowers blooming at the edges of her vision. But Solovey was behind her, holding her up, nosing her anxiously.
Her wrist had been worried as though it were a bone. Gritting her teeth, Vasya tore a strip from her shirt and bound it tight. She heard the whistling of Alyosha’s sword. The press of fighting swept up her brother and drew him away.
The upyr was looking at her with abject terror. Her nose and chin and cheeks were speckled and smeared with blood. The wood seemed to hold its breath. “Marina,” said the vampire, and it was Dunya’s voice.
There came a bellow of fury.
The hell-light faded from the vampire’s eyes. The blood cracked and flaked on her face. “My own Marina, at last. It has been so long.”
“Dunya,” said Vasya. “I am glad to see you.”
“Marina, Marushka, where am I? I am cold. I have been so frightened.”
“It is all right,” said Vasya, fighting tears. “It will be all right.” She wrapped her arms around the death-smelling thing. “You need not be frightened now.” From beyond there came another roar. Dunya jerked in Vasya’s arms. “Hush,” said Vasya, as to a child. “Don’t look.” She tasted salt on her lips.
Suddenly Morozko was beside her. He was breathing fast, and he had a wild look to match Solovey’s. “You are a mad fool, Vasilisa Petrovna,” he said. He caught up a handful of snow and pressed it to her bleeding arm. It froze solid, clotting the blood. When she brushed away the excess, she found the wound sheathed in a thin layer of ice.
“What has happened?” said Vasya.
“The chyerti stand,” replied Morozko grimly. “But it will not last. Your stepmother is dead, and so the Bear is loose. He will break out now soon—soon.”
The fighting had come back into the clearing. The wood-spirits were as children beside the Bear’s bulk. He had grown; his shoulders seemed to split the sky. He seized the polevik in vast jaws and flung it away. The rusalka stood at his side, shrieking a wordless cry. The Bear threw back his great shaggy head. “Free!” he roared, snarling, laughing. He seized the leshy, and Vasya heard wood splintering.
“You must help them, then,” snapped Vasya. “Why are you here?”
Morozko narrowed his eyes and said nothing. Vasya wondered, for a ridiculous instant, if he had come back to keep her from killing herself. The white mare laid her nose against Dunya’s withered cheek. “I know you,” the old lady whispered to the horse. “You are so beautiful.” Then Dunya saw Morozko and a faint fear crept back into her eyes. “I know you, too,” she said.
“You will not see me again, Avdotya Mikhailovna, I very much hope,” said Morozko. But his voice was gentle.
“Take her,” said Vasya quickly. “Let her die in truth now, so that she will not be afraid. Look, already she is forgetting.”
It was true. The clarity had begun to fade from Dunya’s face. “And you, Vasya?” Morozko said. “If I take her, I must leave this place.”
Vasya thought of facing the Bear without him and she wavered. “How long will you be gone?”
“An instant. An hour. One cannot tell.”
Behind them the Bear called out. Dunya shook at the summons. “I must go to him,” she whispered. “I must—Marushka, please.”
Vasya gathered her resolve. “I have an idea,” she said.
“It would be better—”
“No,” snapped Vasya. “Take her away now. Please. She was my mother.” She seized the frost-demon’s arm with both hands. “The white mare said you were a giver of gifts. Do this for me now, Morozko. I beg you.”
There was a long silence. Morozko looked at the battle beyond them. He looked back at her. For a flickering instant, his glance strayed into the trees. Vasya looked where he did and saw nothing. But suddenly the frost-demon smiled.
“Very well,” Morozko said. Unexpectedly he reached out and drew her close and kissed her, quick and fierce. She looked up at him wide-eyed. “You must hold on, then,” he said. “As long as you may. Be brave.”
He stepped back. “Come, Avdotya Mikhailovna, and take the road with me.”
Suddenly he and Dunya were astride the white horse, and only a crumpled, bloody, empty thing lay in the snow at Vasya’s feet.
“Farewell,” whispered Vasya, fighting the urge to call him back. Then they were gone, the white horse and her two riders.
Vasya took a deep breath. The Bear had thrown off the last of his attackers. Now he wore the scarred face of a man, but a tall, strong man, with cruel hands. He laughed. “Well done,” he said. “I am always trying to get rid of him myself. He is a cold thing, devushka. I am the fire; I will warm you. Come here, little vedma, and live forever.”
He beckoned. His eyes seemed to drag at her. His power flooded the clearing and the wounded chyerti shrank before him.
Vasya breathed in a frightened breath. But Solovey was at her side. She felt his sinewy neck under her hand and then, blindly, she clambered onto his back. “Better a thousand deaths,” she said to the Bear.
The scarred lip lifted and she saw the gleam of his long teeth. “Come, then,” he said coldly. “Slave or loyal servant, the choice is yours. But you are mine either way.” He was growing as he spoke, and suddenly the man was a bear again, with jaws to swallow the world. He grinned at her. “Oh, you are afraid. They are always afraid at the end. But the fear of the brave—that is best.”
Vasya thought her heart would beat its way out of her breast. But aloud she said, in a small, strangled voice, “I see the folk of the wood. But what of the domovoi, and the bannik, and the vazila? Come to me now, children of my people’s hearths, for my need is very great.” She ripped the skin of ice off the wound in her arm, so that her blood tumbled forth. The blue jewel was glowing beneath her clothes.
There was an instant of stillness in the clearing, broken by the chime of Alyosha’s sword and the grunts of the chyerti who still fought. Her brother was surrounded by three of the Bear’s people. Vasya saw his face intent, the gleam of blood on his arm and cheek.