58

Tivil July 1933

‘Is she there?’

Rafik shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Is she close?’

‘She’s close to death.’

‘Can you save her?’

‘No.’

A sigh like the moon’s breath whispered round the walls of the chamber. Three faces grew pale.

‘Save her.’

‘Save her.’

‘Save her.’

‘I cannot. I am losing her down a labyrinth.’

Blood, like wine, was poured into a copper bowl.

‘She is too far from me. I cannot disentangle the shadows.’

White flesh, like bread, was crumbled into the blood.

‘She is alone and beyond my reach.’

Herbs, bitter as pain, were scattered on the glistening surface.

‘How can we protect her, tell us how?’

‘I need greater power.’

‘Drink the blood.’

‘Eat the flesh.’

‘Swallow the herbs.’

Rafik drank and looked at the faces gazing at him. ‘It’s not enough.’

‘You’ve come.’

The priest swept into the room, red hair ablaze, eyes bright with belief. His beard gleamed like a breastplate of fire.

‘I’ve come.’

‘Your strength is needed.’

‘My strength is the strength of the Lord God Almighty.’

Rafik rose to his feet, ghostly in his white robe. ‘The girl is in an abyss.’

‘All are in peril of the Bottomless Pit, all who worship the image of the Beast. It is written in God’s Word.’

‘Help us, Priest.’

‘Gypsy, if what you are doing provides food for the Devil, the smoke of your torment will be never-ending and you shall have no rest by day or by night.’

‘We need her, I tell you this. She is rich in power.’

‘What are riches? God in His infinite wisdom tells us this: that it is when we think we are rich that we are at our most wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. And as surely as night follows day, His wrath shall come to smite the scorpions of this earth.’

‘Priest,’ Rafik’s voice rang out clearly, ‘this village knows too well that it is poor and wretched. Will you join with us?’

‘God will curse you, Rafik.’

‘Will you watch Tivil bleed to death?’

‘Sorcerers are condemned to dwell outside the City of God and you are a sorcerer.’

‘Rafik.’ It was the blacksmith, his darkened fingers pointing at the gypsy’s chest. ‘Tell the priest.’

‘Tell me what?’

The light seemed to flicker and dart across the copper bowl as Rafik spoke slowly. ‘The girl has a stone, a White Stone. It has drawn help to her side already.’

Priest Logvinov’s face grew pale as his long fingers sought the cross that hung on his chest and clung to it. ‘Do not blaspheme.’

‘I do not.’

The priest shook his fiery locks. ‘The Lord says in the last Book of His Holy Word, “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna and will give him a white stone and in the stone a new name is written which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”

‘She has the stone.’

59

Marshlands August 1933

The light was so clear and so white that at times the land looked as if it was made of bone. As they journeyed north through the taiga, the forest of pine and spruce thinned, giving way to open marshland that left Sofia feeling exposed. They were waiting for the creeping gloom of night before they crossed the flat wetland that stretched ahead, but every delay drove Sofia to distraction.

‘Patience,’ Mikhail cautioned.

He was adjusting the packs on the horses and picking burrs from their manes. The chestnut’s head hung low, its eyes half shut, and Sofia was shocked by how weary it looked and how its ribs poked through its hide. Was that how she and Mikhail looked too? She studied Mikhail as he tended the animals. She loved to see the skill with which his hands moved over them, soothing their twitchy skins the way he soothed hers. They didn’t talk much now, images of the dead patrol ousted words from their heads, and in silence her fingers ruffled the ears of the yellow dog that was resting its head against her thigh.

‘I’m not good at patience,’ she said.

Mikhail’s grey eyes skimmed over the marshland. ‘You’re good at other things.’

‘Anna’s out there.’

‘So are the soldiers who are searching for that patrol.’

A thickset old man sat half asleep in the afternoon sun, leaning back against the timber wall of his solitary izba, a picture of contentment in the middle of nowhere. He wore patched trousers and a threadbare shirt, a twist of smoke rising from the carved pipe in his mouth, keeping the mosquitoes at bay.

Mikhail greeted him pleasantly. ‘Zdravstvuitye, comrade.’

‘What can I do for you, comrade?’

‘My saddle girth has snapped and I need-’

‘In there.’ The old man jerked a thumb at the barn beside the house, which was well built but slowly turning green with moss. ‘You’ll find plenty of tack hanging on the hooks. I’ve not much use for it now. Old Ivan is all I’ve got left to pull a plough.’ He scratched his beard, a long grey mat that looked much older than his blue eyes. ‘Who’s she?’ He smiled a welcome at Sofia.

‘My wife.’

The man blew out an appreciative billow of fragrant smoke. ‘She can talk to me while you fix your girth. I don’t get much conversation these days, not since my Yulia died.’

Mikhail took the reins from Sofia’s hand and headed for the barn.

‘What would you like to talk about?’ Sofia smiled and sat down on the bench beside him, stretching her legs out in the sunshine. The word wife had taken her by surprise and to her ears it sounded good. She laughed as a tiny kitten with spiky white fur scurried to safety under the man’s ankles when it saw the dog trailing across the clearing. Several scrawny chickens paused in their dust-baths to bob their heads at the intruders.

‘Do you know Moscow?’ the old man asked.

‘I’ve never been there, I’m afraid,’ she said.

‘Is it true Stalin dynamited the sacred Cathedral of Christ the Redeemer and is planning to build a Palace of the Soviets in its place?’

‘So I believe.’

‘And what about that Dutch Communist burning down the Reichstag in Germany?’ He chuckled into his beard and slapped his thigh with glee. ‘That’s one up the arse for that goose-stepping fascist monkey who has seized power over there.’

‘You’re very well informed.’

‘Da. I read Pravda. My son comes to see me every three months and brings me all the newspapers I need.’ He nodded his head proudly and chewed at his tobacco-stained moustache. ‘He’s a good son to me.’

They talked further, about bread rationing, the high prices in shops, the increase in educational places for girls and Kirov’s plans for Leningrad. None of it could touch the old man out here in the wilderness, yet he was passionate about seeing the rebirth of Russia. Alongside a steady flow of chatter, he provided a welcome meal of chicken, boiled potatoes, salted cabbage and cucumber with smetana, and in return Mikhail took an hour to split logs while Sofia stacked them up against the wall. It was almost like normal living again. Even the dog lay in a patch of shade and snored contentedly, its stomach sated with chicken scraps.

‘Time for us to leave,’ Mikhail finally announced. ‘Thank you for your hospitality. Spasibo.’

‘I’ve enjoyed the company.’ He smiled at Sofia and patted her hand, pulling a face at the scars on her two fingers. ‘Been in the wars, have you, girl?’

‘Something like that.’

‘You should take better care of your wife in future, young man.’

Mikhail gave Sofia a pointed look. ‘She’s not the easiest of women to take care of.’