"We'll soon see," said Katerina.

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing," she said. "Don't be afraid of me. I've seen men bathing, I have no particular fear of seeing through the holes in your tunic."

"I'm not afraid, I just... I'm not the one who should be here."

"Oh, now I understand you. Well, Ivan didn't belong here either. Just bad luck, him finding me."

"Not luck, I don't think," said Sergei. "He's your husband now."

"An oath, but it can be annulled if it isn't acted on."

"I think," said Sergei, "that he's a better man than you believe he is."

"I believe he's a very good man," said Katerina. "Not a king, though."

"A bird can't pull a plow."

"I needed God to send me a plowhorse. I tried to make do with what he sent instead. I failed."

"Maybe God's message is that you don't need plowing." Then Sergei realized the double meaning of what he said. "Not to say he's the plow and you're the—I mean, I—"

"I understood you," she said.

There was a soft knock on the door. Sergei opened it. A hand thrust another robe through the door. Sergei took it, then closed the door again. He pulled a priestly robe over his head. It had fresh burn holes on the back. Of course—Father Lukas couldn't continue wearing a damaged garment.

"Imagine," said Katerina. "A Slavic priest."

"I do imagine it," said Sergei. "But it will not be me."

"Why not?"

"Never me."

"And I say, why not?"

Sergei laughed bitterly. "How convincing will I be, talking about how Jesus healed all the sick and the crippled? What more proof does anyone need that I'm not a man of faith?"

"Jesus isn't here."

"Jesus is everywhere. And as he often said, 'Your faith has made you whole.' "

"So don't be a priest," said Katerina. "But if you aren't that, what are you?"

"Is that how priestly vocation comes?" asked Sergei. "Because my foot was born twisted, I must be God's chosen servant?"

"We are all called to be servants of God in whatever way we can. Perhaps I can serve him as a princess. Perhaps you as a priest."

"Do you think I served God when I wrote down those old stories?"

Katerina shrugged. "That's beyond my judging."

"I'll tell you what I think. I think God made all men, including the people who told these stories. So these things are the creations of God. Or the creations of his creations, but it amounts to the same thing. And if God created the people who would make up these stories and tell them, then by saving them I'm also honoring God."

"God made the murderers and adulterers, too."

"I think these stories are good. I think they teach us to love goodness."

"Or to wish for the power to do great deeds," she answered. "But we've given them time enough. We need to give the alarm."

Sergei winced. "You do all the talking, would you?"

"Yes," she said. "I'm good at talking, I suppose." Then, without warning, she gave a shriek.

They could hear the crowd outside the window fall silent, then set to murmuring. Who screeched? Was it the princess? Is he hurting her?

Katerina rushed to the window, flung open the shutters. "Did he come out here? Did you see him pass?"

"Who?" asked the people.

"My husband! We were new-shriven, Father Lukas left, Ivan and I were talking, and suddenly he wasn't there!"

The people took only a moment to digest the tale before they reached the only conclusion that made sense. "The Widow took him! Another curse! Another spell!"

Katerina burst into tears. "Am I never to be free of the witch's plots?"

Even as she wept, however, she was scanning the crowd, watching to see who reacted. A couple of druzhinniks started walking briskly around the crowd, heading for what? Some rendezvous. If only she could see more clearly at such a distance. Who was it? Which of the king's knights? She would know who the plotters were by seeing who began first to search for Ivan.

"Were you bedded?" asked an elderly peasant woman.

Katerina bowed her head. "We had the blessing of the priest. How could I guess the devil could reach us through that wall of glory?"

From the walk, Katerina recognized one of them. Dimitri. A part of her said, No, not Dimitri, not the hero, the man who should be king. Another part of her said, Of course Dimitri. Who else? If he was in the plot, then it was his plot. Even if he didn't begin it, once in he would lead it. Ivan's danger was worse than she had feared. For in the back of her mind, she had counted on Dimitri being on the king's side.

Unless by plotting to kill Ivan he was on the king's side. Or thought he was.

Katerina began crying harder, but pretending less. She reached out and drew the shutter closed. The moment the crowd could no longer see her, her tears stopped. "I have to get out of here now, with no one following me."

"Good luck," said Sergei. "Dressed like that, you can hide just about as easily as you can stuff a rainbow into a pot."

"Almost I wish I could wear your clothes."

"Men's clothing?"

"It wouldn't work," said Katerina. "There's only one priest in Taina, and there's no way I can pass for Father Lukas."

"So what will you do?"

"Ask you to turn your back, while I change into something less becoming."

Sergei complied, trying not to imagine what the rustling sounds he was hearing might mean, or what the sight of her might be at any given moment. Katerina was not and never could be for him; there was no point in thinking thoughts that would excite desires that could never be satisfied. It would only make his life taste more bitter, to dwell on the sweetness that could not be his.

"Thank you," she said. "We can go now."

Sergei turned and saw her in her simplest dress, the one she wore when she helped with the harvest. Every year she bound sheaves with the best of them, her fingers as deft as any woman's at tying them off, and Sergei had often seen this dress covered in straw and dust. No matter. She was as beautiful in this simple clothing as she ever was in the more royal finery.

She opened the door for him.

"But it's my place to open the latch for you, princess," he said.

"I'm on my way to help my lord escape from this land," she said. "What do I care about courtesy?"

Sergei followed her out the door. "Then the marriage," he said softly. "It's real, despite all?"

"I'll have no other," she said. "My word is given."

At that moment, they heard a tumult outside. Shouting. Much running.

"I think perhaps I heard someone shout your husband's name," said Sergei.

Katerina stopped, crossed herself. "Holy Mother, make me fleet of foot," she said. Then, hiking up her skirts, she scampered down the corridor, into the great room, and out the door.

Ivan thought everything was going so well. Father Lukas might be humorless and rigid about religion, but when it came to politics, he knew how to be flexible. Why was Ivan surprised? There was a reason why Christianity thrived in the barbarian kingdoms of Europe, and this was it: The missionary priests knew how to make themselves useful, how to put royalty into their debt. Katerina wanted to save the life of this preposterous husband she acquired through witchcraft? Very well, Father Lukas would do his part.

They headed westward through the village, toward the gap in the woods where Katerina had first shown him the village. A few children ran along, chattering to the priest, calling out to him. Many people waved a greeting. But one little girl, snot-lipped and covered with dirt, paid no attention to Father Lukas. She came right up to Ivan, tugged at his robe, tagged along beside him.

"What's wrong with your foot?" she demanded.

Ivan did not want to speak. He didn't want anybody hearing that his voice was not Sergei's. Ivan's accent wasn't bad—but it wasn't native, either, not in proto-Slavonic.