The Bear and the Nightingale

by Katherine Arden

  “Vasya,” said Dunya.

  Vasya jerked awake with a sob. Dunya’s voice was feeble, but lucid. “You’re all right, Dunyashka. I knew you would be.”

  Dunya smiled toothlessly. “Yes,” she said. “He is waiting.”

  “Who is waiting?”

  Dunya did not answer. She was struggling for breath. “Vasochka,” she said. “I have something your father gave me to keep for you. I must give it to you now.”

  “Later, Dunyashka,” said Vasya. “You must rest now.”

  But Dunya was already fumbling for her skirt pocket with one stiff hand. Vasya opened the pocket for her and withdrew something hard, wrapped in a scrap of soft cloth.

  “Open it,” whispered Dunya. Vasya obeyed. The necklace was made of some pale, glittering metal, brighter than silver, and shaped like a snowflake, or a many-rayed star. A jewel of silver-blue burned in the center. Anna had no jewels to equal it; Vasya had never seen anything so fine. “But what is it?” she asked, bewildered.

  “A talisman,” said Dunya, struggling for breath. “There is power in it. Keep it hidden. Do not speak of it. If your father asks, tell him you know nothing of it.”

  Madness. A line formed between Vasya’s brows, but she slipped the chain over her head. It swung between her breasts, invisible under her clothes. Suddenly Dunya went rigid, her dry fingers scrabbling at Vasya’s arm. “His brother,” she hissed. “He is angry that you have the jewel. Vasya, Vasya, you must…” She choked and fell silent.

  From without, there came a long, savage chuckle.

  Vasya froze, heart hammering. Again? Last time, I was dreaming. Then came a scrape: the soft sound of a dragging foot. Another and another. Vasya swallowed. Noiseless, she slid off the oven. The domovoi was crouching at the oven-mouth, frail and intent. “It cannot get in,” said the domovoi, fierce. “I will not let it. I will not.”

  Vasya laid a hand on his head and crept to the door. In winter, nothing smells of rot outdoors, but on the threshold, she caught a whiff of decay that turned her empty stomach. There came a flare of burning cold where the jewel lay over her breastbone. She made a low sound of pain. Wake Alyosha? Wake the house? But what was it? The domovoi says he will not let it in.

  I will go and see, Vasya thought. I am not afraid. She slipped out the kitchen door.

  “No,” breathed Dunya from the oven. “Vasya, no.” She turned her head a little. “Save her,” she whispered to the empty air. “Save her, and I care not if your brother comes for me.”

  WHATEVER IT WAS, IT stank like nothing else: death and pestilence and hot metal. Vasya followed the track of the dragging footsteps. There—a quick movement, in the shadow of the house. She saw a thing like a woman, hunched down small, wearing a white wrapper that trailed in the snow. It moved crabwise, as though it had too many joints.

  Vasya gathered her courage and crept nearer. The thing darted from window to window, pausing at each, sometimes reaching out a flinching hand, never touching the sill. But at the last window—that of the priest—it went taut. Its eyes gleamed red.

  Vasya ran forward. The domovoi said it could not get in. But a swipe of a bloodless fist ripped the ice from its mooring in the window-frame. Vasya saw a flash of gray skin in the moonlight. The trailing white garment was a winding-sheet, and the creature was naked beneath.

  Dead, Vasya thought. That thing is dead.

  The grayish, weeping hands seized the high sill of Konstantin’s window, and it—she, for Vasya caught a glimpse of long, matted hair—flung itself into the room. Vasya paused beneath the window, then followed the thing up and over. She pulled herself through with brute strength. It was pitch-black inside. The thing crouched, snarling, over a thrashing figure on the bed.

  The shadows on the wall seemed to swell, as though they would burst out of the wood. Vasya thought she heard a voice. The girl! Leave him—he’s mine already. Take the girl, take her…

  A pain in her breastbone goaded her; the jewel was burning with a fiery cold. Without thinking, Vasya raised a hand and shouted. The creature on the bed whirled, face black with blood.

  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.

  But seasons turn and seasons change

  The wind blows from the south

  The fires come, the storms, the spears

  The sorrow and the dark

  A wind was rising without, the cold wind that portends snow. But the three atop the oven sat insensible. Dunya listened, open-eyed, her gaze fixed on something that even Vasya could not see.

  But far away there is a place

  Where yellow flowers grow

  Where rising sun

  Lights stony shore

  And gilds the flying foam

  Where all must end

  And all—

  Alyosha was cut off. The wind slammed the kitchen door open and tore shrieking through the room. Irina gave a little scream. With the wind came a black-cloaked figure, though no one saw it but Vasya. The girl caught her breath. She had seen it before. The figure gave her a single lingering look, then reached out to lay long fingers on Dunya’s throat.

  The old lady smiled. “I am not afraid anymore,” she said.

  Next moment, the shadow came. It fell between the black-cloaked figure and Dunya as an ax cleaves wood.

  “Oh, brother,” said the shadow-voice. “So unwary?” The shadow smiled, a great black gaping smile, and seemed to reach out and seize Dunya with two vast arms. The peace on Dunya’s face turned to terror. Her eyes started from her head, bulging, and her face turned scarlet. Vasya found herself on her knees, frightened, bewildered, shuddering with sobs. “What are you doing?” she shouted. “No—let her go!” The wind roared again through the room, first a wind of winter, and then the humid crackling wind that runs before a summer storm.

  But the wind died quick as it had risen, taking with it both the shadow and the black-cloaked man.

  “Vasya,” said Alyosha into the silence. “Vasya.” Pyotr and Konstantin rushed in, the men of the household on their heels. Pyotr was flushed with cold; he had not gone to bed after the incident in the priest’s room but set his men to patrol the sleeping village. They had all heard Vasya shouting.

  Vasya looked down at Dunya. Dunya was dead. Blood suffused her face and a little foam flecked the corners of her mouth. Her eyes bulged, the dark swimming in pools of red.

  “She died afraid,” Vasya said, very softly, shaking. “She died afraid.”

  “Come on, Vasochka,” said Alyosha. “Come down.” He had tried to close Dunya’s eyes, but they bulged too much. The last thing Vasya saw before she climbed off the oven was the look of horror on Dunya’s dead face.

  They laid Dunya in the bathhouse, and at dawn the women came loud as hens cackling. They bathed Dunya’s withered body; they wrapped her in linen and sat vigil beside her. Irina knelt weeping, her head in her mother’s lap. Father Konstantin knelt, too, but it did not seem that he prayed. His face was white as the linen. Again and again, his trembling hand felt at his unmarked throat.

  Vasya was not there. When the women looked for her, she was not to be found.

  “She has always been a hoyden,” muttered one to another. “But I never thought her so bad as this.”

  Her friend nodded darkly, mouth pinched small. Dunya had been as a mother to Vasilisa when Marina Ivanovna died. “It is in the blood,” she said. “You can see it in her face. She has a witch’s eyes.”

  AT FIRST LIGHT, VASYA crept outside, a shovel over her shoulder. Her face was set. She made a few preparations, then went to find her brother. Alyosha was chopping firewood. His ax whistled down so hard that the logs burst apart and lay strewn in the snow at his feet.

  “Lyoshka,” said Vasya. “I need your help.”

  Alyosha blinked at his sister. He had been weeping; the ice-crystals glinted in his brown beard. It was very cold. “What, Vasya?”

  “Dunya gave us a task.”

  The young man’s jaw tightened. “This is hardly the time,” he said. “Why are you here? The women are keeping vigil; you should be with them.”

  “Last night,” said Vasya urgently. “There was a dead thing. In the house. An upyr, like in Dunya’s stories. It came as she was dying.”

  Alyosha was silent. Vasya met his gaze. His knuckles showed white when he drove the ax down again. “Ran the monster off, did you?” he said with some sarcasm, between chops. “My little sister, all by herself?”

  “Dunya told me,” Vasya said. “She said to remember the stories. Make a stake of birch-wood, she said. Remember? Please, brother.”

  Alyosha paused in his chopping. “What are you suggesting?”

  “We must get rid of it.” Vasya took a deep breath. “We need to look for disturbed graves.”

  Alyosha frowned. Vasya was white to the lips, her eyes great dark holes. “Well, we will see,” Alyosha said, with the barest edge of ir
ony. “Let’s go dig up the cemetery. Truly, it has been too long since Father beat me.”

  He stacked his wood and hoisted his ax.

  It had snowed in the hour before dawn. There was nothing to be seen in the graveyard but vague hummocks beneath the sparkling drifts. Alyosha glanced at his sister. “What now?”

  Vasya’s mouth twitched despite herself. “Dunya always said that male virgins are best for finding the undead. You walk in circles until you trip over the right grave. Care to lead, brother?”

  “You’re out of luck, I’m afraid, Vasochka,” said Alyosha with some asperity, “and have been for some time. Do we need to kidnap a peasant boy?”

  Vasya assumed a righteous expression. “Where greater virtue fails, the lesser must do its poor best,” she informed him, and clambered first among the glittering graves.

  In honesty, she doubted that virtue had much to do with it. The smell hung like evil rain over the graveyard, and it was not long before Vasya stopped, choking, in a familiar corner. She and Alyosha looked at each other, and her brother began to dig. The earth ought to have been stiff with frost, but it was moist and fresh-tumbled. As Alyosha cleared away the snow, the smell struck up with such force that he turned away, gagging. But, lips tight, he drove his shovel into the earth. In a surprisingly short time they had uncovered the head and torso of a figure, wrapped in a winding-sheet. Vasya drew out a small knife and cut the cloth away.

  “Mother of God,” said Alyosha, and turned away.

  Vasya said nothing. Little Agafya’s skin was the grayish-white of a corpse, but her lips were berry-red, full and tender, as they had never been in life. Her eyelashes cast lacy shadows on her wasted cheeks. She might have been asleep, at peace in a bed of earth.