Uulamets leaned on his staff and glowered at him, no less pleasant than he ever had been. Then he said, “Follow me,” and walked away through the shadow.
Volkhi showed no inclination to go. Pyetr argued with him once, twice, before Volkhi started picking his way down the rough hillside, following the old man in the same direction that they had been moving. More bits and pieces started coming back to him—how Eveshka was waiting at home, how Uulamets was dead, upriver, how he had left the house riding and somehow lost himself in the woods… so far lost he had not even recognized his father-in-law for a moment.
That Uulamets’ ghost should come to his rescue did not seem entirely incredible: they had not liked each other, the god knew, but one could certainly believe Uulamets might stay around as a ghost, if anyone would—the old reprobate had never trusted anyone to do anything right, least of all his daughter: Eveshka had abundant reason for her secrecies and her touchiness.
Still, it did seem to him that Uulamets, being dead, should be paler, glow in the dark like a proper ghost, not just show up in the lightning flashes with shadows and all…
Follow me, Uulamets said.
But what did a ghost mean by that, looking more and more solid?
God, he did not like this. “Grandfather?” he said, respectfully.
Uulamets might not have heard for all the sign he gave. Certainly that was no different than in life.
He urged Volkhi to a faster pace at the bottom of the hill, fought Volkhi’s misgivings until they were close at Uulamets’ back.
“Grandfather, do you know what’s going on? Do you know what’s going on back at the house?”
No answer. One naturally expected a ghost to be peculiar-angry, perhaps, especially this one. But there were definitely shadows about this figure which one did not expect in a ghost, except a rusalka when she had stolen a bit of one’s life… or unless, frightening thought, he had somehow strayed over to the ghostly side of things himself in the cold last night and never known it.
He did still have a heartbeat. He felt his chest, to be sure. He felt Volkhi’s warmth under him and he heard the crunch of last year’s bracken under Volkhi’s hooves: if he was slipping over some line, somehow, he damned well ought to have some sense of crossing a boundary. Even if he had frozen in the rain, certainly Volkhi ought to be alive.
He missed ducking. A branch caught him across the face and he clapped a hand to what felt like a bleeding scratch across his cheek. He heard Uulamets’ staff disturb the ground, heard Uulamets’ body move the brush, the same as he and Volkhi did—but Eveshka in her ghostly form could never disturb a leaf. Neither sun nor moon could touch a rusalka—unless she had gotten strength from somewhere… and a rusalka only got it from living things.
Rusalkas were drowned girls, that was what he had heard, drowned girls unhappy with their lovers. Surely crotchety old men only turned into ordinary ghosts, the sort with cold fingers and dead, awful eyes, the sort of ghosts that only wailed and blamed people—not half so dangerous.
“Grandfather,” Pyetr said faintly, less and less sure he knew what he was dealing with.
Uulamets just kept walking; and of a sudden Pyetr was sorry he had called out to what was moving in front of him. He hoped to the god it did not turn around. He pulled Volkhi quietly to a stop, turned his head-Something in the brush crashed toward him, growling, and he ducked flat and hung on as Volkhi shied and scrambled for footing, breaking them uphill through branches, through vines, up a slope too steep, too slick with recent rain—he felt Volkhi start to slide, stayed on somehow as Volkhi veered off on a downward slant. A limb hit his shoulder with numbing force as they passed under, all but took him off Volkhi’s back. Branches whipped at his shoulders. He had no more wish to stop than the horse did, he only saw a way through and steered for that sole black gap in the brush.
A pale shape loomed up in front of them. Volkhi reared, came down again, uncertain, bemazed and still in a way nothing natural could stop a panicked horse.
The apparition held out its hands, saying, in Sasha’s voice: “Pyetr, are you all right?”
Pyetr held on to the reins, shivering as much as Volkhi was. Sasha walked a step closer, making a soft, very welcome sound on dead leaves. But Pyetr reined Volkhi back from him.
“It’s me,” Sasha said.
“I sincerely hope so,” Pyetr said shakily, “because just now it was Uulamets, and I don’t know what’s going on.”
“Babi’s after it,” Sasha said, and shed a sack he was carrying from his shoulder to his hand, then started searching into it. “I brought your coat. Eveshka sent some bread and sausages… “
A shapeshifter could be that plausible, and a shapeshifter in Uulamets’ likeness was surely what he had been dealing with: there had been flaws in Uulamets’ appearance, there were always flaws with a shapeshifter, Eveshka had told him—and he saw none in Sasha.
Sasha came closer, offering him up the coat with one hand, calming Volkhi with the other, and Volkhi stood still for it—that was what told Pyetr who he was really, truly dealing with. He hoped to the god it did.
“Is everything all right at home?” he asked, taking the dry coat, deciding Volkhi would stand still a moment while he let go the reins and put it on.
“Eveshka’s terribly worried,” Sasha said, keeping his hand on Volkhi’s neck. “A bannik came. And we couldn’t find you anywhere.”
Sometimes Sasha’s accounts of events seemed to leave out essentials, especially when a man was having trouble following things in the first place. Pyetr said numbly, “I lost Babi. Then nothing looked right. I don’t know where I’ve been.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Let’s get out of here.”
“Fast as we can,” Sasha said, patted Volkhi’s neck and started walking.
So they were going home. That was quite all right. That was exactly what Sasha would do. That was entirely the way Sasha would talk.
It was still a better sign that of a sudden there came a panting in the dark, a quick pad-pad-pad in the wet leaves beside Volkhi’s feet and Sasha’s—no visible sign of the dvorovoi, but that was Babi, Pyetr had no doubt of it.
Then he began to believe he was safe.
Go home, Sasha wished Babi silently, as they walked along, himself and Pyetr leading Volkhi on this level ground, where they had come on the road again. Go back to the house, let Eveshka know everything’s all right-But, perverse as everything else magical, Babi obstinately stayed with them—for promise of more sausages, or because of some wish, his or Eveshka’s—Sasha had no idea.
“I don’t know what’s the matter with him,” Sasha said. “I don’t know what’s going on. Babi won’t listen, or can’t, I don’t know. Nothing’s worked right, except finding you.”
“Thank the god you did,” Pyetr muttered, and asked, after a moment, “What in hell’s this about a bannik?”
Sasha shook his head. “I don’t know. It showed up just after you left. I don’t know why. I hoped it might help.”
“Help what?”
Sometimes Pyetr’s questions seemed so clear and his own answers so abysmally stupid. “I don’t know. It only showed up, and after that—or about the same time—everything stopped being there…”
“What do you mean—stopped being there?”
“Things. People. They’re there.” He was not even sure how ordinary folk felt the world around them. He had thought he knew; he thought at least he had known once, before he had taken up with Uulamets and started listening to the wizard-gift he had been born with; but lately he doubted he knew anything about ordinary folk. Lately he doubted he understood himself. “Right now it’s—like seeing the trees move and not hearing the leaves.”