There were double shadows everywhere, those cast by the sun and those cast by the Firebird, but at least the common shadows remained in one place. The others moved across the steppe as their source moved across the sky, overlapping and parting like shadows cast by children making finger-play by lamplight. After only a few seconds they became impossible to watch, because their movement provoked a near-drunken unsteadiness as if the earth itself was moving.
It was easier to watch the expressions and reactions of everyone nearby; from Mar’ya Morevna’s astonished oath to the children yelling with delight and the Grey Wolf’s silent satisfaction, from the near-panic of the ordinary Tatars and some of the more susceptible Rus, to Amragan tarkhan’s glare laden with a shocked fury he dared not vent. Ivan kept his own face neutral, but inwardly he rejoiced. The Khan’s envoy needed an occasional one that he wasn’t dealing with the usual sort of Russian prince, and this reminder would do him no end of good.
The Firebird dropped vertically through the last thousand feet of its descent, braked almost to a standstill with three huge, heat-scented strokes of wings feathered with tongues of fire, then landed softly right in front of —
Nikolai and Anastasya.
“Hail, my friends!” it said in the hissing metallic voice Ivan remembered well, giving the flare of wings and crest and tail that was its version of a salute. “Greetings and well met. Be welcomed back into the Summer Country, you and all your …” The beaked head went on one side then the other as its hard raptor’s eyes took in the scene. “Guests.”
That it had greeted only his children came as no great shock. But the way it greeted them, and the place it evidently thought they were, was more unsettling.
“Hail, noble Firebird!” he said, drawing an immediate sharp-pointed predator’s stare. It was a relief to see recognition cool the hot, gold-rimmed black jewels of the Firebird’s eyes. This might not be the same Firebird he had encountered before – one flame-hot falcon with an eight-foot wingspan looked much like another – but all were inveterate gossips, and even if it didn’t know him, it had at least heard of him.
“The Tsar of Khorlov’s duties must have grown lighter at last,” said the Firebird, rather sarcastically. “My companions in adventure,” it indicated the two children with a jerk of its head while Ivan and Mar’ya Morevna wondered exactly how the twins had gained that particular title, “say constantly that you’re too busy to return to the Summer Country and exchange pleasantries with the friends of your youth.”
“Noble Firebird, the passage of eight years doesn’t make Then my youth and Now my dotage.” The Firebird looked at him and, though it didn’t actually possess any, Ivan had the distinct feeling it had raised its eyebrows. “But despite your welcome, this isn’t the Summer Country.” The Firebird gave him a long stare, glanced about, stared again and then produced a series of blinks that suggested bewilderment.
“But —” it started to say, then clattered its beak and fell silent. A Firebird struck speechless by surprise wasn’t something Ivan had ever encountered in his last dealings with the creatures, and it was worth seeing since they had views about everything under the arch of heaven and no reluctance about voicing them.
“Not the Summer Country,” Mar’ya Morevna repeated. “This is – was – lately the southern part of the principality of Peryaslavl and is now a province of the Khanate of the Golden Horde.” She managed by great effort to keep her voice neutral, though another twitch of its head and a snap of that hooked pickaxe beak suggested that the Firebird had heard what lay behind her toneless words and didn’t like it. “But it isn’t the Summer Country, and never was.”
“I was not Summoned.” It wasn’t a question, just a flat statement of fact which saved the twins from an unpleasant interview later. “I was in the Summer Country,” it said, the iron voice scraping harsh with anger, “and then… And then I was here!”
The Firebird spread its wings in sudden passion, lashing them though the air in trails of sparks while it gouged its talons into the dry grass of the steppe. Small fires sprang up, then choked in curls of blue smoke as they died for lack of the fuel their own brief fury had consumed.
Ivan sympathized with the Firebird, something he would never have dreamed possible until now. It had no enemy to strike at for this insulting behaviour, and while he definitely had enemies to hand, striking was out of the question. Their frustration was the same. “Apologies for the inconvenience,” he said weakly. “You’ll go home now, of course?”
He didn’t know whether he wanted it to do so or not, because from the appalled expressions on various Tatar faces, its presence might prove a useful club to beat concessions from the Khan. But it was also a liability, and an opinionated one at that. Natasha was tugging at his shirt with the probable intention of making him ask it to stay, but Mar’ya Morevna’s face suggested an urgent need for a few minutes alone to discuss the whys and hows of its being here in the first place, and preferably after it had gone back to where it came from.
“Is this, ah, change of scenery a trouble to you, noble Firebird?” said Volk Volkovich. He sounded more painfully polite than ever, and only those who knew the Grey Wolf well could hear the soft rumbling growl down in his chest, warning the irritable Firebird that any trouble it felt had better not be visited on his companions.
“No trouble, noble Wolf,” said the Firebird, staring at Volk Volkovich speculatively for such a long time that Ivan felt an overpowering desire to back away and leave them room to sort out their differences. A quick sideways glance showed that none of the Tatars, not even Amragan tarkhan, thought ‘wolf’ was anything more than a mild insult aimed at the magnificent cloak Ivan’s sinister henchman was wearing. “No trouble at all.” It scratched its beak briskly with one sickle claw, sending a shower of sparks skipping across the already-charred grass as if someone was sharpening a sword on a grindstone. It sounded like that too; in fact it sounded, with a high, steely singing, as though the sword was entirely too sharp already.
Then the Firebird flapped its wings once in a flurry of heat and sprang into the air. It hung there like a kestrel for a few seconds, hanging on the rising thermals of its own creation; then went spiralling upward in the same way as a dry leaf might escape from an autumn bonfire. As it rose, it flared impossibly bright until it was casting heat and light like the very sun itself, and once again two shadows instead of one went stretching out from everything on the ground. Abruptly the yellow glare surrounding it went blue-white, the colour of a lightning flash, and all the other colours of the world were bleached to black and white. Then light and heat and Firebird disappeared together.
Blinking and dazzled like everyone else, Ivan wondered if they shared his thought; that though the world’s colouring had returned, its tints and shades were somehow plain and common, grown more drab with the Firebird gone.
“Name of Tengri, man!” rasped Amragan tarkhan, sounding most satisfactorily appalled. “What under the Blue Sky was that?”
Ivan turned and looked him up and down, a slow, insolent stare that had the Turk not been so shocked he would have found insulting. “You know so much about me and my doings, Amragan,” he said. “That was just an old friend of the family. Surely you recognize a Firebird when you see one?”
“I …” Faced with the revelation that even Ivan’s children were acquainted with demons from the sky, and admitting he’d never seen a Firebird before, Amragan tarkhan fell silent.
Mar’ya Morevna had other interests, though from the sound of it, not very important ones. “How far from here to Sarai and the Khan’s court?” she asked, her voice only mildly curious. That lack of any excitement suggested the encounter with the Firebird was an everyday occurrence. Ivan smiled inwardly. Such a display of unconcern might not, and probably wouldn’t fool Amragan tarkhan, but he would wonder how much was real and how much pretence, and that would help keep him off balance until the time came to make his report to Batu Khan. It was fortunate that with the exception of the ch
ildren and the various lesser dignitaries, Ivan’s people had remained calm and untroubled. That made the present display of nonchalance so much more convincing.
The Turk stared at Mar’ya Morevna for a few seconds and Ivan could actually watch the man pull his confused mind back into some sort of order. Amragan covered well, but Ivan had the advantage of having seen variations on this same reaction a dozen times: eyes shifting rapidly about as though checking the normality of the rest of the world; dry tongue licking dry lips on a sweat-damp face; hands clenched into fists to conceal their shaking. Ivan’s hidden smile grew broader. The envoy couldn’t claim he’d been threatened, far from it; but his own imagination was doing far more to encourage future respectful behaviour than any number of Rus soldiers armed with swords.
“We are …” The tarkhan coughed savagely to clear an unmistakable squeak from his voice, and tried again. “We are only three days’ march from the Golden Court. Maybe less if this camp is struck within the next hour!” He looked from side to side, glaring at his own Tatars in the way he no longer dared glare at Ivan and the others, “Get to it! We’re wasting time!”
He strode off, bellowing.
Ivan watched him go, then looked sidelong at Mar’ya Morevna. “How far to Sarai, eh? You don’t ask idle questions, even of Tatars – so what was that about?”
“Use your brains, my dear.” Mar’ya Morevna gave her husband a sour little smile, but no hints. “You don’t usually ask idle questions either. At least you ask less of them than most people.”
“It’s about the crowns?”
Mar’ya Morevna nodded. “The Firebird thought it was still in the Summer Country,” she said. “It felt nothing during the transition – and when it left us, you saw how that transition usually looks and sounds and feels.”
“Not quite,” said Volk Volkovich. “That Firebird wasn’t in the best of tempers, although they seldom are. What you were seeing was like a door being slammed.”
“When I want your opinion I’ll ask for —”
“Then you’d never get it. Noble Lady, this matter has gone beyond your – I beg pardon –” and the Grey Wolf gave her a bow worthy of a courtier, “our petty differences. You know things I don’t, but I know things you don’t – and if you constantly refuse to listen, how will you learn what those things might be, or if they might be useful?”
Ivan heard the way Mar’ya Morevna drew in her breath and laid one restraining arm on her shoulder. That might not have had any effect, as well he knew, except for Nikolai and Anastasya simultaneously tugging the skirts of her long riding-coat. They said nothing, knowing well enough not to abuse the privileged position of being present during an adult argument, but Mar’ya Morevna looked down at their anxious faces and swallowed whatever she’d been about to say. Then she stared accusingly at Volk Volkovich. “Are you trying to steal my children from me?” Her voice was flat and cold. “Because I think you’re succeeding.”
The Grey Wolf returned her stare with glowing yellow-green eyes that never blinked. “I’m trying to prevent Death stealing them from you,” he said, and with huge dignity turned his back. He didn’t stalk away, but his silent presence was more an accusation than any dramatic exit.
Face expressionless, Ivan looked at his wife, then pointedly walked around until he was face to face with Volk Volkovich. They gazed at one another for several silent seconds before Ivan inclined his head. “Later,” he said. That was all. He hoped it was enough.
When he turned back to Mar’ya Morevna, he knew it was impossible to be angry with her. She had told him enough of why she felt the way she did about the Grey Wolf for Ivan to understand all the parts she hadn’t dared to explain; but he’d hoped she might be able to control such feelings for the sake of that political abstraction ‘the greater good.’ Not today.
Perhaps Volk Volkovich would understand. Perhaps he already did understand, and all he wanted was the simple apology that cost no more than a little flex in the rigidity of her pride. And he might receive it. But not today.
Ivan let the matter drop. It wasn’t something easily dealt with in the open, in front of the children and in front of the Grey Wolf and in front of as many of Amragan tarkhan’s Tatars with ears sharp enough to heard what was being said. He hoped Volk Volkovich would understand that, as well.
At least, and there was a gloomy humour about it, Ivan’s brain had been shaken from its boredom in a way not even the appearance of the Firebird had done. He knew exactly why Mar’ya Morevna wanted to know how close they were to Sarai, and exactly why the Firebird’s unexpected arrival – unexpected even by itself – concerned her so. Things were already beginning to slip to and fro between the boundaries that kept each world separate from the next. The doors leading into the corridor were no longer locked, and some of them were hanging ajar.
A Firebird was impressive enough, but it was nothing by comparison with some of the, the things that dwelt in the cold dark and might find the bright warmth of the wide white world as appealing as a candle to a moth. Most moths burned up in a candle-flame; but a big enough moth could put the candle out. Ivan shivered, and all the eminently sensible things he was going to say fell out of his mind. “Back to the tent,” he said finally. “There are things I want before it’s packed away.”
That was sensible enough for now.
*
The rest of the journey to Sarai took less time than Ivan feared, but more than he hoped. There was a taut, unpleasant atmosphere about the caravan which hadn’t been there before. Some of it came from the incident with the Firebird, some from the sharp exchange between Mar’ya Morevna and the Grey Wolf and some, quite simply, from the all too human curiosity of Rus and Tatars waiting to see if a juicy scandal was on the way.
Was there more than just honest duty between the Tsar’s handsome henchman and the Tsar’s beautiful wife? Was there more than that between the Tsar’s handsome henchman and the handsome young Tsar himself? Was it true that the Tsar’s twin children were as close to the henchman as to their own father, and if so did that simply mean they were as close to their own father as to the Tsar? The possibilities and permutations were endless and delicious.
Ivan officially heard none of it, and neither did Mar’ya Morevna. If Volk Volkovich heard any, as seemed likely with his sharp ears, he didn’t pass the information on and for that much at least, Ivan was grateful. What he didn’t know, he didn’t have to answer. But there was a list of names taking shape at the back of his mind, cross-referenced with other lists that went back almost eight years, a list that one day quite soon he might sign and seal and hand over to Khorlov’s under-worked executioner. And if any of what he had not heard was reported back to him by either of the children, he wouldn’t even wait that long.
In the meanwhile he tried to find out why the Firebird should have appeared where it did, when it did. The why of the matter he knew already, but for a long time the rest was more puzzling.
Mar’ya Morevna was of little help. There had been more words between them, as they lay in bed together on the night of the – was it a quarrel when it hadn’t been between the two of them? There had been other fallings-out in the course of their marriage, sharp-worded differences of opinion about one thing or another. But both had long been content that those were nothing more than bickering. It was only human nature that even when two people were very much in love, if they were both well-educated in the same subjects then sometimes there was a reluctance to allow one to score what the other felt was an undeserved point. It was an almost childish silliness, the sort of thing that within an hour might be laughed or grimaced at. And if this business had blown up out of all proportion, what was only one of those in eight years? Unusual? Remarkable? Ivan knew the real answer.
It was one too many.
The words they’d exchanged had been pointless for the most part, spoken in such low tones for the sake of privacy that they’d been robbed of any impact, wandering round and round the subject at hand without ever piercing t
o its centre, where it would have done some good.
“Apologize,” he’d said at last. Not to whom, not for what. Just, “Apologize.”
That was when her eyes went as cold and hurting as daggers of blue crystal; cold, and guilty, and ashamed. And unbendingly proud. “No. I can’t apologize.”
“Why? Why?”
“Because …” Again the cold daggers, pride and shame together, aimed not at him but through him, at someone beyond him, and he knew who that someone might be. “Because I can’t find the words. Because I don’t know how.”
He took those daggers full in the face without a word, understanding while not understanding, and not daring to say so because that was the last thing in all the world she wanted to hear right now. Then he took his wife’s hand in his, and held it all that night, while they lay on their backs in the silence of two people with nothing left to say, staring at the low, dark, musty ceiling of the felt tent as they tried to sleep. All that night, fingers entwined, their hands remained together; wrist to wrist, elbow to elbow, shoulder to shoulder. But there had been no other touch, and it was as if a bared sword lay between them down the centre of the bed.
*
Sarai, capital of the Khanate of the Golden Horde;
September, 1243 A.D.
There was an escarpment where the dreary flatness of the steppe became the valley of the river Volga, just as wide, just as flat, marsh-wet instead of dust-dry. Ivan reined his horse to a standstill on the crest of that low eminence and looked down towards Sarai and the Court of the Splendid Khan. He did it not so much because he wanted to, as because he thought he must. There was a feeling of portent and significance about this moment, though whether it would turn out good or bad rested in the hands of a man Ivan had never met, but who controlled his destiny as surely as though he pulled the strings of a puppet.
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