The Breathing Sea II - Drowning

by E. P. Clark

  “But not tonight, Tsarinovna,” Vlastomila Serafimiyevna said, seeming to guess Dasha’s thoughts. “You have already done more than enough for tonight. Come, I will take you to your cell for the night, and we can discuss this and other things at greater length in the morning.”

  ***

  Dasha’s cell, despite its unappealing name, was more comfortable than her chamber at the castrates’ sanctuary had been. While it was no larger, it had a real bed, stuffed with fragrant fir needles, and the wool blankets were only somewhat scratchy. Once Vlastomila Serafimiyevna had left her, Dasha checked the corners carefully for domoviye, and, finding none, changed out of her borshch-stained robe and into the nightgown that had been provided. Linen, thank the gods. Not that linen wasn’t scratchy as well, but it was much more tolerable than wool, and this particular gown, even though it was coarsely made, had been worn till it was soft and pleasant to the touch. Dasha cleaned her teeth and settled into her bed, closing her eyes and trying to block out the moonlight that was streaming in through the shuttered window. Was it already the full moon again? Had it already been a month since they had spent that ill-fated night at that waystation, and that man had found Dasha standing guard in the corridor and tried to hurt her? It seemed like so much longer and so much shorter than a month. Flowermoon was almost past, and soon it would be Summermoon, and Midsummer. Perhaps Dasha would already be in Pristanograd by Midsummer! That was an exciting thought! And her mother would be there too. Dasha had to admit to herself that she desperately wanted to see her mother again.

  At least you can see your mother again.

  Dasha sat bolt upright. A very pale, transparent Vika was sitting at the foot of her bed.

  “What are you doing here?” Dasha demanded.

  I am with you, remember?

  “Do you want me to send you away forever, as I did Lyubomila?”

  Vika appeared to give Dasha’s words serious consideration. I don’t know, she finally said. What you did to me before…I thought you had given me peace. I wanted that. But now I am back. You must not have given me enough peace.

  “Or maybe you still have some purpose to serve,” Dasha told her.

  I do not think the gods are so kind. I do not think life is so kind.

  “Maybe not. But we women can be. Come here.”

  Vika’s form billowed, in what Dasha thought was a twitch of surprise. Why? she asked.

  “Come back to me. I am not going to banish you, or burn you, or anything of that nature. I am going to take you back inside me for the moment. You do still have a purpose to serve, even if it is only my purpose. Come here, and we will work on serving my purpose together in the morning. And then you will have justice of a sort, and peace as well. Come.”

  Vika hesitated, and then, struck by a ray of moonlight and lit into a pearly glow, she rose from the foot of the bed and flowed over into Dasha. In a moment she was gone.

  Chapter Twenty

  Dasha was awakened at dawn, which by now was extremely early, by the sound of people walking past her cell door. When she looked out into the corridor, she saw that all the sisters were emerging from their cells and setting off together somewhere.

  “Ah, Tsarinovna.” Sister Yeseniya stopped in front of her. “We are just going to our morning prayers. You are welcome to join us. Or if you’d rather rest,” she continued, correctly guessing the expression on Dasha’s face, “you will be welcome to join us at breakfast later.”

  “Thank you,” said Dasha, and ducked back into her cell before anyone else could suggest that she join them at their morning prayers. Probably she should join them in their prayers, probably it would do her good, but she was still sleepy, and it sounded boring. Horrendously boring. Her mother had said that prayers at sanctuaries could go on for half the morning, or so it seemed, and her grandmother had said something similar. Of course, her grandmother had claimed that sitting in prayer brought with it a tremendous sense of clarity and peace, but Dasha had her doubts. Perhaps when she was her grandmother’s age things would be different. Perhaps. In any case, she had other plans for the morning.

  “Vika,” she said, going over to where she had hung her robe from the night before. In the dim light of dawn the borshch stains didn’t look any better. She slipped out of her nightgown, her flesh goosepimpling as the chill morning air struck it, and pulled on the robe, which was warm, even if it was just as scratchy as she remembered. She looked at her boots, but they were stiff with drying mud and yet still damp, and she wasn’t sure she could even get them on without help in their present condition, even if she had wanted to, which she didn’t. They would need to be cleaned and thoroughly greased before they would be wearable again. She would just have to go barefoot. It was summer, or almost. She would take no harm from it. Surely not.

  “Vika,” she repeated, dabbing at the stain with water from the ewer sitting on the small chest that was probably supposed to serve as a wardrobe. She waited until she was done cleaning her teeth before trying again.

  “Vika, I want to help you,” she said. By now the sound of the sisters setting off for their prayers had receded. Perhaps that was why Vika now appeared before her, so faint she was little more than a shimmer in the air, or perhaps it was because she had called for her three times.

  How? she said. Go out to the garden, she added, before disappearing.

  Dasha poked her head out of the cell again. The corridor was empty. She slipped out of the cell, closing the door as quietly as possible behind her, and tiptoed down the corridor, in the opposite direction from the one the sisters had been headed. After a couple of turns she found herself in front of the garden door, where she had encountered Lyubomila the night before. There was no one there, and the door was latched and barred from the inside. Dasha hesitated for a moment, thinking that she would have no way of latching the door behind her once she went through, and therefore anyone who came this way would know where she had gone, but it wasn’t as if she were doing anything wrong, she told herself, and made herself start to unbar and unlatch the door. She just had had a lifetime of never being allowed to go anywhere by herself. But here she was, with no escort. Inside a sanctuary, so what could possibly happen to her? Other than being drained and drowned by a water-maiden, that is. Several unpleasant visions of what could possibly go wrong with her plan had already presented themselves to her by the time she had finished unlocking the door. She pushed it open and stepped through anyway.

  A faint mist was rising from the grass. As soon as she stepped into it, Vika reappeared beside her, as faint as the mist around her.

  They are waiting for you in the garden, she told Dasha.

  “You can sense them? Speak to them?”

  A little. Sometimes.

  Dasha made her way through the wet grass that was overgrowing the path to the garden. By the time she stepped through the garden gate, her bare feet were muddy and wet, and the hem of her robe was soaked, making her shiver every time it slapped against her bare ankles. Perhaps coming out without her boots had not been such a clever idea. Too late now, though. The water-maidens were already waiting for her.

  At first she could sense them only as a coldness in her heart, but then the mist in the bottom corner of the garden, shimmering pink and gold in the rising sun, began to thicken, and then to separate, until five distinct forms stood in front of her. Each was of a young woman, most of them no older in appearance than Dasha, with sad sad faces and water dripping from their hair.

  “I have an offer for you,” Dasha said.

  All the eyes focused on her. Mouths opened as if to speak, but no words came out. They were all growing fainter and fainter as the sun rose. They must be weak, Dasha thought, so far away from their native pools and streams, and could not stand against the strength of the sun.

  “I know you thirst for justice,” she said.

  They all nodded, their faces contorting with lust at her words.

  “I can give that to you.”

  They all stepped clo
ser, close enough now that they were almost brushing against Dasha, their cold making goosepimples rise on her arms and neck.

  Step back! Vika commanded.

  They all took a reluctant half-step back.

  “I can take down your stories,” Dasha told them. “The ones that no one would believe, or that no one has heard.”

  The air grew even colder. Dasha was starting to shiver, and the ground was becoming unsteady under her. She wrapped her arms around herself and continued. “I can take down your stories, and send them to your home villages, and record them in Krasnograd as well, as part of our library. Your stories will be told, and justice will be done.”

  Will you punish them? The voice was so faint Dasha couldn’t tell at first who had spoken.

  “If they are still alive, they will be brought to justice,” she promised. “But more importantly, your stories will be told and recorded. Others will know what happened to you.”

  They should be punished. And their children and their children’s children as well.

  “No,” said Dasha.

  The figures all crowded around her, their eyes hungry. Vika attempted to push them back, but her faint fingers only slid through their faint forms, with no effect on either of them.

  “No,” repeated Dasha. “There will not be that kind of punishment. You do not need it. You need to have your stories told, and that is what I will do for you.”

  The water-maidens, now so transparent in the rising sun they were barely visible at all, murmured silently amongst themselves.

  We must think on it, said one.

  “Then think on it. I will come back for you in the evening, when you are stronger.”

  Most would seek to speak to us when we are at our weakest.

  “I know. But I will return to you when you are stronger.”

  The sun rose above the tops of the trees surrounding the compound. The last wisps of mist disappeared. When Dasha called for Vika, she did not respond. Dasha turned and went back into the main building, not sure if she were alone or not.

  ***

  Dasha spent the time waiting for breakfast trying to clean and dry her feet and her boots. Her success was only partial, but by the time Sister Yeseniya came to summon her, she was able to jam her feet into her boots and walk around in them.

  “Oh Tsarinovna, I should have brought you some slippers,” Sister Yeseniya said, as soon as she saw what Dasha was doing. “I’ll be right back with a pair, and then we can go to breakfast together.” She hurried off, leaving Dasha to struggle out of her boots as best she could.

  Getting them off was even more difficult than getting them on, but eventually they had been removed and left in a corner to dry a little more, and Dasha had soft slippers on her cleanish feet, and they were walking down the corridor to the same chamber where Dasha had eaten the night before.

  “Everyone heard what you did last night, Tsarinovna,” Sister Yeseniya was telling her. “It’s given us such hope! Now if only you could do the same to the others plaguing us, and do something about the wolves, well, we’d know the gods had forgiven us, and sent you to us in truth!”

  “I already have a plan,” Dasha told her. “At least for the water-maidens.”

  “Really?! Vlastomila Serafimiyevna will be so glad to hear it! We all prayed for you this morning.”

  “Oh. Ah, thanks.” Hearing that made Dasha want to squirm, but she managed to summon up a grateful smile instead.

  All the sisters were seated at the table when Dasha and Sister Yeseniya entered. Everyone rose and bowed when they came in, and there was a general murmur of “The Tsarinovna! The Tsarinovna!” as Dasha made her way to the space next to Vlastomila Serafimiyevna, which had been saved for her.

  The table was already set with bread and tea and jam, but no one had taken any yet. First there was another prayer, during which they all sat silently with their eyes closed. Dasha tried to imitate them, but her eyes kept opening and her stomach kept growling. She tried to speak to Vika, or think of refinements to her plan, or come up with anything sensible to think about so that she wasn’t just wasting her time sitting there, but the more she tried, the more scattered and distracted she became. How did all the sisters do this, and not just once, but many times every day? They all seemed happy and at peace. They were not fidgeting and wishing this were already over. Was this how the water-maidens felt, all anxious and impatient and powerless? No wonder they…

  “Let us eat,” said Vlastomila Serafimiyevna, interrupting Dasha’s thoughts just when she thought she was finally about to think something important.

  Dasha expected Sister Yeseniya to tell everyone that Dasha had a plan for dealing with the water-maidens, and to be quizzed on it closely, but no one said anything during the entire meal. It was not until the other sisters had finished and left, carrying away the dirty dishes with them, that Vlastomila Serafimiyevna turned to Dasha and said, “We should speak further, Tsarinovna.”

  “I have a plan,” Dasha blurted out. “For the water-maidens. It came to me in the night.”

  “Indeed? I am pleased and honored, Tsarinovna. Do tell me.”

  “We should take down their stories. They should tell their stories, how they came to be…what they are. We should record their stories, and send them on to their families, if any are still alive. It will give them relief, and justice of a sort.”

  Vlastomila Serafimiyevna was nodding. “True enough, Tsarinovna. But how? They are dangerous. We cannot simply walk up to them and engage them in conversation.”

  “I can.”

  “You did very well last night, Tsarinovna. But what you are proposing is risky. I doubt Oleg Svetoslavovich would allow it.”

  “He doesn’t need to know about it.”

  “I doubt your mother would allow it either.”

  “She’s not even here. She doesn’t need to know either.”

  “I am not sure that I would allow it, Tsarinovna. I admire your courage, and am honored by your offer, but I cannot allow you to risk yourself over something so small. Our troubles are our troubles, not yours.”

  “They are mine too,” said Dasha stubbornly. “All the troubles in Zem’ are mine, or will be one day, and I would not exist if it were not for you, for this sanctuary and its sisters. This sanctuary gave me life. I would return the favor. It is fitting that I should save it from the threat of death. It is right. And I do not think the risk is as great as you say it is. Twice I have encountered water-maidens, and both times I have emerged still alive. Stronger than ever, even. I just need your help.”

  “What kind of help, Tsarinovna?”

  “I need you to teach me how to control my flames.”

  Vlastomila Serafimiyevna’s mouth quirked in a little smile. “That, Tsarinovna, is the study of a lifetime, especially for someone with as much inner flame as you.”

  “This isn’t the time to make teacher-like remarks, and tell me how difficult things are going to be, and how I will need years of study to become truly proficient. I already know that. I just need your help to get started. No one else has ever been able to do anything for me, not after years of training, but you could light and extinguish the flames on my fingers with a single breath. I need you to show me how to do that. I think now I am ready to learn.”

  Vlastomila Serafimiyevna looked at her with her head cocked, the half-smile still playing over her face. “You may be right, Tsarinovna,” she said. “In any case, it will do no harm. First you must learn, though, learn it well, before I will agree to your plan to speak with the water-maidens. Are we agreed?”

  “Agreed,” said Dasha.

  “Then come, Tsarinovna. Let us retire to my cell, where we will be able to work undisturbed. And I must fetch a candle.”

  ***

  “A sorceress focuses her will,” Vlastomila Serafimiyevna was telling Dasha. “A priestess focuses her faith.”

  They were sitting in Vlastomila Serafimiyevna’s cell, which was almost exactly the same as Dasha’s, except that there
was a little table and two small stools in it, which left no room to walk around. Dasha’s stool, which when they had entered had been stacked on top of the table, was pressed up against the door. She shifted on it, trying to get more comfortable, and almost fell off; it was barely wide enough for her to keep her seat on. No one could accuse Vlastomila Serafimiyevna of living in a luxury she did not permit her sisters.

  “Some say they are the same thing,” said Vlastomila Serafimiyevna. “Will and faith. They are just two different names for the same thing. That part of our mind that gives us power over ourselves and others. And yet will is pointed, gathered, sent outwards towards a target like an arrow released from a bow. Faith is the target, not the arrow. Faith is…the deep pool that accepts the rain, the rich soil that takes the seed. When you focus your faith, you do not gather your thoughts and send them out to strike at your target, to snatch up your object, to mold and change your object into what you want it to be. You do not exert your will upon another. You clear your mind, you open yourself to that other to exert its will upon you, and let it flow through you.”

  “That doesn’t sound very useful,” said Dasha.

  Vlastomila Serafimiyevna held out her hand to the unlit candle sitting on the table between them. After a moment, a small flame blossomed on the wick. She let it burn for a few heartbeats, and then closed her hand over it. When she withdrew her hand, the flame was extinguished, and her hand was unmarked by burns or even soot.

  “Sorceresses can do that too,” said Dasha.

  “Give me your hands, Tsarinovna.”

  Dasha obeyed. Vlastomila Serafimiyevna took her hands in her own cool, strong hands, and squeezed gently. A heartbeat later, Dasha felt a surge of warmth through her hands. When she looked down, flames were dancing across her fingers, intertwined with Vlastomila Serafimiyevna’s. Vlastomila Serafimiyevna allowed them to play over their joined fingers for a moment, and then squeezed Dasha’s hands more firmly in her own. When she released them, the flames had disappeared without a trace.