The dying itself was another matter.
I wondered how long it would take, and how much it would hurt. A lot, I thought. The bones of my face ached where the Patriarch had struck me, and my cheek was bruised and swollen.
I prayed.
I cried.
I thought about all the people who would never know that I had died here and would always wonder what had befallen me. I wished I could speak to them. My mother, most of all—and Bao, a close second.
What would become of him? If I were right and I died with my diadh-anam unextinguished, he would live, condemned to wander the earth in search of the missing half of his soul, never knowing for sure.
Mayhap it would be better if I were wrong.
I thought about everything I had done here in Riva, wondering what I could have done differently. Something. Nothing. If I had not lost my temper and sworn the sacred oath of the Maghuin Dhonn earlier, mayhap the Patriarch would not have sought to bind me with it—or mayhap not. He had known of Berlik’s oath. Mayhap if I had not baited the Patriarch in the temple, the Duke of Vralsturm would have relented and aided me.
Mayhap.
Bao had accused me of being impulsive. He was right; he was usually right. But I had been patient for so very, very long; and Pyotr Rostov had already condemned me to death. I didn’t know if it would have made a difference if I had held my tongue.
I leaned my head against the wall and watched the light change in my narrow window, mellowing to an afternoon glow, fading slowly to dusk, a painful reminder of the twilight that was forbidden to me.
Come dawn…..
They would gloat, those bedamned villagers. Hurling stones that broke my bones and tore my flesh, eking out a slow, painful death; oh yes, they would gloat, glorying in their almighty self-righteousness.
It was going to hurt a lot, for a long time. It was a bad way to die.
I closed my eyes, slow tears leaking beneath my lids. I wished I could be brave and defiant on the morrow, but I was fairly sure I would just be terrified. And I was fairly sure the Patriarch had granted me this day’s reprieve only that I might fully experience the depth of my terror.
No, I was sure.
When I heard the sound of a key turning in the lock of my cell door, I thought at first that I was dreaming.
I wasn’t.
My narrow window was dark. I sat upright on my narrow bed, watching a gilded wedge of lamplight enter my chamber as a lone figure slipped through the door, tall and rangy.
“Aleksei,” I breathed. “You’ve risked everything to free me after all?”
In the lamp-lit darkness, he shook his head. A silver key dangled from his fist on a chain. “Not I, no. My mother.”
THIRTY-SIX
Valentina; oh Valentina! “How?” I whispered.
Aleksei knelt at my feet, busying himself with the key, unlocking the shackles around my ankles. “My uncle takes tea after supper. From time to time, Mother puts a sedative in it to ease his rest and give the rest of us a measure of peace. A tincture of valerian. He’s never known about it.” He eased the cuffs from my ankles. “Better?”
“Yes.” I wanted to leap to my feet and dance. “But….. you?”
“She stole the key and gave me a choice,” he murmured, his head bowed. “To do this myself and see you to the border, and take my own freedom. Or to let her free you, and watch her suffer the punishment for it. I chose. Hands, Moirin.”
I held them out to him. “You chose this?”
Aleksei gave me a pained, fleeting smile. “What is the fifth commandment that God inscribed on Moishe’s tablets?”
This, too, I had memorized. “Honor your mother and father.”
He nodded. “Even so.”
One shackle opened. I raised my left hand, shaking it. I didn’t feel any different yet, and a creeping fear filled me. I tried to take comfort from the spark of my diadh-anam inside me, but I was scared. What if that were the most I would ever feel? What if the damage done to me were permanent? What if God and Yeshua were punishing me after all? I had lied, I had violated the sanctity of their rites. I whispered a soft prayer for their forgiveness as Aleksei unlocked the second wrist cuff.
“That almost sounded genuine,” he murmured, moving behind me to unlock the collar around my neck.
“It was.”
“I’m pleased.” Aleksei got the lock undone and removed the silver collar, the chains coming away with it.
My diadh-anam blazed riotously as my senses opened and expanded in a hectic rush, my awareness surging outward to embrace the world. All of my senses were suddenly keener, sharper, more alert.
I laughed aloud for the sheer joy of it. “Aleksei, Aleksei, I can see again! I can feel!”
“Hush,” he cautioned me, looking perplexed. “But you weren’t blind, Moirin. Were you?”
Bao. Where was Bao? I stood and turned instinctively, seeking the beacon of his diadh-anam.
It was far away, far to the south, and fainter than it ought to be even at such a distance. I frowned, wondering what that meant. Was he ill? Injured? It seemed I should have felt some flare of recognition in his diadh-anam at sensing mine unveiled after so long. But mayhap I was wrong. After all, this was uncharted territory. Insofar as I knew, no one had ever had the divine spark of the Maghuin Dhonn Herself divided and shared with another living soul.
“Moirin?”
I glanced at Aleksei, still looking perplexed. Fretting over Bao would have to wait. I had a long way to go before I was safe. Wherever he was, my magpie could take care of himself. “Not blind, no, but something akin to it. The chains blocked my sense of magic in the world.”
“I see.” Now he looked uneasy.
“You will,” I said to him. “Close your eyes a moment.” Although he didn’t like it, he obeyed. I took a deep breath, let it out, took another and summoned the twilight, breathing it out over both of us.
It settled over me like an embrace, soft and gentle, drenching the lamp-lit cell in silvery-violet dusk, turning it into a magical place. It felt like a homecoming, like being reunited with a long-lost love.
I smiled. “Now, see.”
Aleksei opened his eyes. “Oh!” Wonder dawned over his features. “It’s….. it’s so beautiful!”
“Aye.” I breathed it deep into my lungs, along with the scent of pine-trees growing on the outskirts of town. I longed to touch their rough bark, listen to their slow thoughts. “Now you’ve seen the great and terrible sin of witchcraft at work.”
“It’s beautiful,” he repeated. “And you….. you’re beautiful in it.” He smiled shyly at me. “Even more so, I mean. And it doesn’t feel like a sin.”
I touched his cheek. “Thank you, my sweet boy. Now, how do we get ourselves safely away from here?”
“Oh!” Caught up in the twilight’s charm, he’d nearly forgotten our plight. “Here.” He fetched a bundle from the floor and thrust it at me. “From my mother. Clothing, shoes, a head-scarf. Bread and cheese, as much as she could get on short notice.” He jingled a purse at his belt. “She had a little money. Not much.”
“Blessed Valentina,” I murmured, shaking out the drab woolen dress. It was a good deal less conspicuous than my catechumen’s white robe. “Do we have waterskins? A striking kit? Bow and arrows?”
“No.” Realizing I was preparing to change my clothes, modest Aleksei turned his back on me. “I’m sorry, Moirin. I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“No matter.” I shed the robe, donned the dress. Shoved my feet into the shoes, and wrapped the scarf around my head. “We’ll find what we need along the way. You can turn around,” I added.
He did, looking dubious. “We haven’t much coin, truly.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to say I’d gladly steal whatever was needful when my gaze fell on the hateful, discarded chains. “Actually, we do.” I picked up the chains. “These are nearly solid silver. They must be worth a small fortune.”
Aleksei frowned. “You mean to steal them?”
“Aye, sweet boy, I do,” I said. “As fair exchange for the months of my life stolen from me. They were made for me, were they not? And I mean to sell them to a smith who will melt them down and ensure they are never, ever used again to bind someone against their will.”
He was silent a moment.
I raised my brows at him. “Aleksei, whatever sins must be committed in the pursuit of freedom, I will gladly take on myself. If you are going to scruple at it, stay. Stay and take your punishment, and break your mother’s heart. Only tell me first where I might find a smithy south of Riva.”
“Moirin, you can’t go south.”
I glanced in the direction of Bao’s distant diadh-anam. “Oh, but I am.”
“Not right away,” Aleksei said in stubborn tone. “That’s exactly where my uncle will look for you. And he will look, believe me.”
I shrugged. “He cannot find me in the twilight.”
“Can you work your magic while sleeping?” he asked shrewdly. “Can you be on guard every minute of every day? Do you imagine there’s a single village between here and the border that doesn’t remember you passing through it in those chains? It’s not a sight one forgets. Any smith you approach would know you in an instant for the Patriarch’s witch. Any baker in the market, any….. anyone!” He shook his head. “I may not have thought this through, but this part, I have. It’s too dangerous to do exactly what my uncle will expect.”
I didn’t like it, but he had a point. “Where, then? We haven’t much time to debate this.”
“Udinsk,” Aleksei said promptly. “It’s a city some days away to the northeast. It’s a trade center. I thought I could find work there. I’m sure we could find a smith willing to ask no questions, and aught we need to purchase for the journey.”
“The journey south,” I said.
He nodded. “In two weeks’ time, my uncle will realize his mistake and begin searching farther afield. Then we can slip through, amply provisioned, hidden by your magic when need be.”
I hesitated.
Every impulse in me yearned to go south, toward Bao, to flee. To trust to my magic to conceal me, to my hard-won skills to allow me to survive. But I’d ventured into Tatar territory alone despite being warned of the danger and nearly died because of it; and I’d had all the supplies I thought I would need there. If I’d learned nothing else from this ordeal, I’d learned a measure of patience.
And, too, there was Aleksei to consider. He was betraying everything he held dear to help me. I owed it to him, and especially to his mother, Valentina, not to do anything rash and impulsive for once in my life.
“So be it,” I said. “Let’s go to Udinsk.”
Cloaked in the twilight, we stole through the Patriarch’s living quarters, Aleksei carrying bread and cheese and a few weighty yards of bespelled silver chains knotted in a worn woolen blanket.
My senses heightened in the twilight, I let my awareness roam through the quarters, touching on its inhabitants.
Stone and sea, it was good to feel wholly myself once more!
Pyotr Rostov slept deep and hard, and the acrid taste of his dreams reminded me of the sulfur and saltpeter of the Divine Thunder. Even in his sleep, he was angry. I shuddered, and looked elsewhere.
His wife, Luba, slept beside him, more lightly. She was smiling in her sleep, no doubt dreaming of selecting the perfect stone to hurl at me come dawn.
Valentina…..
She was awake, kneeling in the antechamber by the outer door, her head bowed and her arms wrapped around herself, filled with a despairing mix of hope and fear.
“Aleksei.” I touched his arm. “Your mother is waiting for us. I think she wishes to say farewell.”
His eyes widened. “How do you know?”
“I just do.”
A moment later, he saw her huddled figure. A faint sound escaped him. Valentina didn’t hear it, didn’t raise her head. Aleksei glanced at me in alarm. “Moirin…..”
“It’s all right, sweet boy.” I brushed his cheek with my fingers. “I told you, they cannot see or hear us in the twilight. I will try to bring her into it.”
I breathed it in deeper, blew it softly over Valentina, spinning it around her like a gentle cocoon.
Her head came up. “How—?” She glanced all around her, eyes stretched wider than her son’s. “What is this? Am I dreaming?”
I smiled at her, helping her to her feet. “No, my lady. It is only a small piece of magic. I will release it if you like, but I think it is better if I don’t. Your sister-in-law sleeps lightly, dreaming of cracking my skull open.”
Valentina gave her broken laugh, hands rising involuntarily to stifle it. “Moirin. It is you. So Aleksei….. he did it. He did it. Oh, God. God have mercy on me. I was afraid he wouldn’t. Will you…..?”
I nodded. “I will try.”
She glanced at her son. In the twilight, the tears in her eyes shone like stars. “Aleksei…..”
He embraced her. “Mother.”
Valentina clung to her tall, broad-shouldered son like a drowning woman—and mayhap she was. My heart ached for the both of them. She tugged his head down to her shoulder and whispered somewhat in his ear. What she said to him, I could not say. Even if I could have heard it, I would not have listened.
Aleksei nodded, tears streaking his cheeks.
I peered through the small window set into the outer door. It was hard to gauge the hour in the twilight, but the summer nights were short, and every hour of darkness was precious. “My lady, I’m sorry, but we have to go.”