The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy, #1)

by Katherine Arden

“No, I will not take one as a concubine or ravish her in a snowbank. You are bringing gifts for your children, are you not? Well, I have a gift for your younger daughter. You shall make her swear to keep it by her always. You shall also swear never to recount to any living soul the circumstances of our meeting. Under these, and only these, conditions will I spare your son his life.”

Her madness was worse here in the north—far, far worse. Pyotr’s house was alive with devils. A creature with eyes like coals hid in the oven. A little man in the bathhouse winked at her through the steam. A demon like a heap of sticks slouched around the dooryard.

What he did not say—at least not then—was that the Grand Prince was ill, and that Vladimir Andreevich’s marriage was all the more urgent in consequence. Dmitrii was barely eleven, freckled and spoiled. His mother kept him in her sight and slept beside his bed. Small heirs of princes were wont to disappear when their fathers died untimely.

“No, Dunya, what else lives in the river? Something with eyes like a frog and hair like waterweed and mud dripping down its nose.”

There was something hostile about the nighttime house. Almost, it seemed to breathe…

She dreamed of wolves howling, of winter stars swallowed up by warm clouds, of a man with red hair, a woman on horseback, and last of a pale, heavy-jawed man with a look of hunger and malice, who leered and winked his single good eye.

no good Christian maid ever had eyes like that, or walked with such grace in the dark.

“My people,” said Vasya, very low. They wept before the icons while the domovoi starved. I do not know them. They have changed and I have not. Aloud she said, “I am not afraid.” Good, said the mare. We shall begin when the mud dries.

“He will kill us all,” the rusalka replied, voice soft, eyes never leaving her prey. “Already it has begun. If he goes on as he has, all the guardians of the deep forest will disappear; the storm will come and the land will go undefended. Have you not seen it? Fear is first, then fire, then famine. He made your people afraid. And then the fires burned, and now the sun scorches. You will be hungry when the cold comes. The winter-king is weak, and his brother very near. He will come if the wards fail. Better anything than that.” Her voice shook with passion.

I want a daughter like my mother was, Marina had said. Well, there she was, a falcon among cows.

“We will not survive the winter. You did not let me kill the hungry man, and your wards are failing. You are only a child; your bits of bread and honey-wine cannot sustain the household-spirits. Not forever. The Bear is awake.” “What bear?” “The shadow on the wall,” said the rusalka, breathing quickly. “The voice in the dark.” Her face did not move like a human face, but the pupils of her eyes swelled black. “Beware the dead. You must heed me, Vasya, for I will not come again. Not as myself. He will call me, and I will answer; he will have my allegiance and I will turn against you. I cannot do otherwise. The leaves are falling. Do not leave the forest.”

She did not see Kyril smile to himself and follow.

“Well done.” The voice echoed in Konstantin’s bones. The priest froze, every nerve alight. “Above all they must fear me, so that they can be saved.” Konstantin flung his brush aside and knelt. “I wish only to please you, Lord.” “I am pleased,” said the voice.

In the instant before the room fell into chaos, Vasya followed her stepmother’s pointing finger. The risen Christ over the door was smiling at them now, when before he had been solemn. His two dog-teeth dented his lower lip. But instead of his two eyes, he had only one. The other side of his face was seamed with blue scars, and the eye was a socket, crudely sewn. Somewhere, Vasya thought, fighting the fear that closed her throat, she had seen that face before.

“Your brother?” Konstantin whispered. “But you…” Then the candle went out, and there was only the breathing darkness. “Who are you?”

You do not know what you are; can you know what I am? retorted the horse. I am called Nightingale, and does it matter why?

“I am Death,” said Morozko slowly. “Now, as in the beginning. Long ago, I was born of the minds of men. But I was not born alone. When first I looked upon the stars, my brother stood beside me. My twin. And when first I saw the stars, so did he.”

And I came back in time because there is nothing beneath these stars that runs faster than the white mare.”