The Breathing Sea II - Drowning

by E. P. Clark

  “I told you I would be back in time for our departure for Pristanograd,” Dasha told her. “And I am. I apologize,” she said, turning to the group of people gathered in front of the dais, obviously in the middle of reporting something unpleasant. “I did not wish to interrupt you; I was merely anxious to greet my kinswoman.”

  “You should bow.” Vladya’s voice rang out through the hall, and the clump of petitioners jumped. “You should bow to the Tsarinovna. The gods forbid that she should bring ill reports of us back to Krasnograd.”

  There was a flurry of bowing.

  “I didn’t mean to interrupt you,” Dasha repeated. “I just thought…I heard on the way in that there has been another attack. Was it your village?”

  The clump of petitioners all nodded and bowed and murmured something that sounded like “yes.”

  “I am very sorry,” said Dasha. “I will help in whatever way I can.”

  “If you wanted to help, you could stop interrupting and start listening,” said Vladya impatiently.

  “The Tsarinovna should rest,” Oleg put in, before Dasha could agree. “She’s just come from a long journey.”

  “I’m not tired, really I’m not,” said Dasha. “I’ll rest after I listen to their story.” She climbed up onto the dais and took her seat next to Vladya before anyone could object.

  The story, when it was finished, was much the same as all the others. An armed group of foreigners had come in the night and attacked the village, intent on stealing supplies. The difference this time was that they had stolen not just food and clothing, but horses and humans as well. Three boys, all of about ten summers, had been taken. The villagers had sent a party to try and take them back, but all of its members had been killed, and now the foreign raiding party was long gone.

  “Horses I understand,” said Vladya. “But why steal the boys? What good are the boys to them?”

  “There’s only one thing monsters like that would want with our boys!” cried a woman.

  “Yes, but…” Vladya was starting to look less reflexively angry, and more thoughtful. “Why? If they’re fleeing for their lives, I think even the most depraved foreigners wouldn’t burden themselves, and take the risk of retaliation, just for that. They must have some better reason.”

  “We should ask Birgit,” said Dasha.

  Vladya opened her mouth, Dasha thought in order to tell her she was being silly, but then another thoughtful look crossed her face, and she said, “You’re right. We should ask Birgit. Let her be of use, for once.”

  Dasha wanted to argue against that way of looking at it—she would have said that Birgit had only been there a few days, and already she was being of use—but Vladya was acting so reasonably that she didn’t want to risk a confrontation, so she just smiled and nodded instead.

  “You will be avenged,” Vladya was promising the petitioners. “I will send soldiers after these foreigners, and they will be killed, and those whom they stole will be returned to you. We must stop this scourge!” There was another flurry of bowing, and the petitioners thanked her profusely for her promises, before being ushered out of the Great Hall by Mstislav Mayevich.

  “You don’t know that,” Dasha said, as soon as the petitioners were gone. “You don’t know that you’ll be able to find the raiders, much less that you’ll be able to retrieve our boys from them. And you shouldn’t kill them.”

  “No? What should I do with them, then? Become their bosom friend, and take them into my bed?”

  “No! Just…not kill them. They might prove useful.”

  “Some of them might. But we can’t keep all of them as our honored guests, Dasha.” Vladya spoke dryly, but her face was as much worried as angry. “They’re barbarians. Even if they wanted to be our friends, they wouldn’t know how, and they don’t want to be our friends. They want to steal everything they can from us. If they could steal our land and drive us out of our homes, no doubt they would. And so what are we to do with them? Keep them as our prisoners? That would hardly be kind either. Can you imagine what it would be like? A whole…encampment, I suppose, full of nothing but desperate barbarians. Like our road crews and convict mines, but worse. I will not have that on my lands!”

  “I can imagine what it would be like,” Dasha said softly. “You are right. We can’t have that. But slaughtering them is no good either.”

  “Then what should we do with them? I ask in all seriousness. If your visions have some suggestion, please tell me. When I look to the future and try to guess what to do, all I see is fighting. But I do not have the gift. You do. So if your gift is telling you what to do, please share its words of wisdom with me.”

  Dasha tried to look into the future, to see possible solutions, but, as usual when she strained after visions, all she saw was blankness. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t see anything either.”

  “I thought they were supposed to teach you something at the sanctuary,” said Vladya. “What did you do there?”

  “Well…”

  “Not that it matters.” Vladya waved her hand dismissively, and then began chewing on her thumbnail in agitation. “Nothing matters now other than this problem with the raiders.”

  “Well, actually…” began Dasha again, but she was interrupted by the return of Mstislav Mayevich, who was escorting Birgit and Yuliya.

  Birgit, Dasha was glad to see, looked slightly better than she had the week before. She still appeared to be afraid and in pain, but she was not quite so emaciated as she had been, and her bruises were starting to fade. She bowed awkwardly when Mstislav Mayevich brought her before the dais, as if she had decided to try copying the bowing that everyone was doing around her, even though no one had ever taught her how. She even, Dasha thought, appeared pleased to see Dasha, and flashed the faintest hint of a shy smile in her direction, before fixing her eyes firmly on the edge of the dais.

  “There has been another raid by your people,” Vladya said. She had stopped chewing on her thumbnail and was looking imperious and angry again. Birgit shrank down inside of herself when Yuliya relayed Vladya’s words to her, and shrank down even more when she glanced up at Vladya. Dasha couldn’t blame her. She wanted to shrink away from Vladya too.

  “They took boys,” Vladya continued. “Why did they do that?”

  This information, once Yuliya had passed it on to her, seemed to cheer Birgit up. Dasha thought this was very strange, till it occurred to her that Birgit had quite possibly been expecting Vladya to threaten to kill her in response to the raid. Being questioned was much better. Birgit said something.

  “She wants to know what kind of boys,” Yuliya explained. “How old were they?”

  “Ten summers, more or less.”

  Birgit was nodding in understanding as soon as Yuliya began speaking. She spoke at length in reply. Judging by the look on Yuliya’s face, what she was saying was not pleasant, even though Birgit did not appear particularly distressed by it.

  “She says,” said Yuliya, once Birgit had finished her lengthy explanation, “that it is very likely that the boys were taken as slaves. Either to serve the raiders, or, more likely, to be sold on once they cross Zem’ and make it into the East. That is the plan of many of the parties: to cross Zem’ and sell as many slaves as possible to the Hordes. They have their own people to sell, she says, but they would sell Zemnians as well, if they could. She says that boys of ten summers are the most prized, as they are old enough to survive such a journey, but young enough to still be trained. She said that adult Zemnians make poor slaves, but children can be trained, and Zemnians trained to slavehood from childhood would fetch a high price. Probably they will be castrated”—disgust crept into Yuliya’s voice, which until then had managed to remain level and impassive—“and then trained as guards. Having gelded foreign guards is a sign of high status in the Hordes, or so Birgit has heard. Many families who have fallen on hard times hope to sell their sons into such service.”

  “I have heard the same,” said Vladya. Her face was al
so twisted in distaste. “I just never thought those foreign guards would be Zemnians. I always thought they were from the far East, or from the South, across the Middle Sea.”

  “That too,” said Yuliya. “But Birgit thinks that they would welcome Zemnians as well. That is her guess for what will happen to the boys.”

  “Well, we have to go get them now!” Vladya, to Dasha’s surprise, jumped to her feet. Her pale face was flushed, and she was stabbing her finger at some imaginary opponent in the air in front her. “We have to go get them now! We can’t just leave them! We can’t!” She turned to Mstislav Mayevich. “How close are my troops to being ready?”

  He shrugged uneasily. “In truth, Vladislava Vasilisovna? Not very. We are still only at half strength, and those we do have are only half-trained. But, if I could suggest it, we could send a raiding party. It would be the best solution anyway: a raiding party after the raiding party. I don’t think it would be difficult to track them down and take back the boys—if they’re still alive.” He held up his hands in response to the look Vladya gave them. “They very likely are, Vladislava Vasilisovna, if what Birgit says is true. If these raiders hope to sell the boys for a high price, then they will do their best to ensure that no harm comes to them. But it would be very easy for them to take sick, or have an injury, or fall afoul of their captors. The sooner we can retake them, the more likely we are to retake them alive, but…I will give no guarantees until I see them safe in the arms of their mothers.”

  Vladya nodded. “There is sense in what you say. I don’t like it, but it is true. How soon could a party be assembled to go after them? Could they set off today?”

  “They could set off this evening if you wish it, Vladislava Vasilisovna.”

  “I do.” Vladya gave a decisive nod. “Have them present themselves to me before they go, but have them ready to leave this evening.”

  “It will be done, Vladislava Vasilisovna.”

  “Good.” Vladya gnawed on her thumbnail again. “Let it be so. And thank you.” She bobbed her head in a sort of half-bow in Birgit’s direction. “I don’t like what you had to say, but if it helps, I will be grateful. Come on, Dasha. Let’s leave them to their preparations, so that we can begin our own.” She jerked her chin at Dasha, and strode off of the dais and out of the Great Hall at such a pace that Dasha had to jog to keep up.

  ***

  “Wait up,” begged Dasha, as soon as they were out of the Great Hall. “I’m sore. I can’t walk as fast as you.”

  “You didn’t seem sore when you came in,” said Vladya.

  “Yes, but that was before I sat down. Now I’m stiff and sore. Not just from the riding, but from all the other things as well.”

  “Yes, I’m sure it was very interesting. You’ll have to tell me sometime. Let’s eat.” She led Dasha, followed by Oleg, into the small chamber by the kitchen. “And there’s no need for you to be here,” she told Oleg. “Dasha’s safe enough with me, and we need to plan.”

  “I’m not leaving Dasha,” said Oleg. “She shouldn’t go anywhere without an escort, you know that as well as I.”

  “I’m her escort. And we need to plan.”

  “Well, in that case I’m certainly not going anywhere. You two need a level head with you even more than you need an escort.”

  “It’s a shame we have you, then,” said Vladya.

  Oleg grinned. “True enough. We’ll just have to make do. And shouldn’t you summon your mother? And Olya? If you’re going to be plotting and conspiring, shouldn’t they be included as well? Or are you plotting and conspiring against them?”

  “We’re not plotting and conspiring against them,” said Vladya. Dasha thought she might have been fighting a smile. “I just already know what they’ll do. My mother will wring her hands, bewail the situation we find ourselves in, and tell me to be careful. Aunty Olya will tell me to do what I think is best, as long as it doesn’t involve her being trapped here for too long. I don’t need Dasha’s uncertain gift to be certain of what they will say. We can just pretend that they’re here with us, and hold exactly the same council, without the inconvenience of actually summoning them.”

  “I’m not saying you’re wrong,” said Oleg, “but they might appreciate being summoned, even so.”

  “Fine. Then go summon them. Go! Go! The Tsarinovna has survived for seventeen summers without your presence; she can survive for long enough for you to walk across the kremlin. Go!”

  Oleg gave Vladya a hard stare, but eventually nodded and left, without saying a word.

  “That was cruel,” Dasha said, once he was gone. “He feels bad enough about leaving me so much.”

  “But that never stopped him from leaving you, did it? I used to feel sorry for myself, you know. Because my father was a halfwit who half the time didn’t know who I was, and couldn’t stand to be in the same chamber with me, and then he died. But I think, compared with you, I was the lucky one. My father couldn’t help who he was. He couldn’t help the fact that he abandoned me. But your father had a choice. He could have chosen to spend his life with you, and he didn’t.”

  “His duty…” Dasha began, angry with herself for defending him against things she had said to herself a hundred times, and even angrier with Vladya for saying them.

  “Duty! I’m sure the gods would have released him, if he’d have asked it. Even if only for a few years, while you were a little girl.”

  “We can’t know that,” said Dasha, wishing Vladya hadn’t said that. Now she was even angrier with Oleg than before. She swallowed it down. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done, and can’t be undone. What did you bring me here for, anyway? What is it we must plan?”

  “I need your council.” Vladya gnawed on her thumbnail some more. “Don’t look so surprised! I do take council from others, you know.”

  “Really? I’ve never seen any evidence of it.”

  “Aha! You are my sister!” Vladya punched Dasha lightly on the shoulder, as Aunty Olga might. “That’s just the kind of thing I’d say myself!”

  “You must be a bad influence on me,” Dasha told her.

  “Or a good influence. Frankly, Dasha, I don’t see how you can stand it. Being so meek and gentle and kind all the time. Don’t you ever just want to make everyone around you squirm, just because you can?”

  “Sometimes,” admitted Dasha. “But I always feel bad when I do it.”

  “Don’t. It’s good for them. But right now I need your council.” Vladya laughed a laugh that wasn’t very mirthful. “You’re the only one I can trust. Not that I think the others are unfaithful, or seeking to bring me down, or anything like that—they’re too eager to have me do their work to do something like that! But what I said to Oleg is true. I know what my mother and Aunty Olya will say so well that I don’t need them by me to take their council, and I won’t find much of use in their council, real or imaginary, no matter what I do. Aunty Olya’s Andrey was actually more use than either of them, as long as he was willing just to give council, rather than letting his head get so puffed up that he’d start trying to rule himself. I’m almost sorry he left us, not that he ever had much love for me. Even so, sometimes he was useful, more so than the others. But maybe you can be useful too.”

  “I hope so,” said Dasha. “What council would you have me give?”

  “It’s just…” Vladya bit her thumbnail so hard she drew blood, and had to stop to stanch the bleeding with her shirtsleeve. Dasha couldn’t help but imagine how her maids would react if she were to do something like that. They were always after her about staining and ruining her clothes. She had always thought she must be exceptionally careless, but here was Vladya getting blood all over her bleached linen shirt as if there were nothing strange about it at all.

  “It’s just…I’m so angry,” Vladya said, once she had gotten the bleeding under control. “Whenever I think of these foreigners on our lands, stealing our things, now stealing our children…I want to go after them. I want to hunt down every last one of them and
wipe them off the face of Zem’, and make it so that no foreigner ever dares set foot on our land again. And no one else seems to care! The only one who seems to care at all is Princess Belova, and she’s been slow and cautious in acting. I want to go after them, I want to stop them, and I’m willing to do it myself if I have to—probably I’d do a better job than any of those other princesses, who can’t seem to decide what to have for breakfast in the morning, let alone what to do about invaders on their own lands—but I don’t know if I can. And lately, whenever I think of going to Pristanograd, I have a bad feeling, as if something bad is waiting for me there. As if I’m about set off down a dark path, and I don’t know where it will lead me. I don’t have the gift of foreseeing the way you and your family does, but I do have gifts, you know. I was just never allowed to train them properly.” Her face twisted into what Dasha now recognized as its permanent expression of resentment and discontent. Not that she could blame Vladya. “I can’t do anything, but I can sense enough to know that something bad’s waiting for us ahead. That’s why I asked if you’d seen anything. I thought perhaps your visions might have told you something, might have some council to give over which way to go: to Pristanograd, or after these foreigners. And when you said no, I thought that perhaps you’d just seen something really unpleasant, and didn’t want to tell me in the Great Hall. But you can tell me now, you know. Even if it’s unpleasant, I swear I’ll listen. Your visions might not be very reliable, but they’re all we’ve got right now.”

  “That’s not true,” said Dasha. “We have all kinds of other sources of information. Birgit—even Ratibor and Yaromir. And if you manage to capture those raiders alive, you can question them as well.”

  “I doubt we’ll take them alive,” said Vladya. “Most of them will fight to the death, my head for beheading.” She made a face. “Which means some of those I send might die too. Tfoo!” She shook her shoulders. “I’ve never sent anyone to their death before.”

  “You don’t have to,” Dasha said. She was suddenly acutely aware that Vladya was shorter than her, and that she, Dasha, was the Tsarinovna, not Vladya. Which was probably why Vladya rarely had these kinds of conversations with her, or anyone else. Vladya’s slim shoulders were hunched over her hands as she continued to stanch the bleeding of her thumbnail with her shirt, and her face was twisted up in pain and worry. Even with the silver threads Dasha could see spreading out from her temple and—Dasha now saw—the top of her head, she looked almost comically childlike.