Gods? Only at that thought did Ivan notice what he should have spotted first of all. Just down the slope from the king's house was a wooden chapel with an Orthodox cross above the door.
That's right, Katerina had spoken of Christ. Yet this land was so far north and west—there was no record of a missionary journey that resulted in the conversion of this kingdom in the foothills of the Carpathians.
The reason was obvious, of course. Such a missionary journey would only have been recorded if the kingdom itself had survived. The very fact that Ivan had never heard of the conversion of Taina—indeed, had never heard of Taina at all—suggested that it got swallowed up in a kingdom that was not Christian, its identity lost, its brief flirtation with Christianity forgotten. Whatever cultural influence the Byzantine priests might exercise here would amount to nothing. This place was doomed—the cross on the chapel was a sure indicator of that.
With that doleful thought in mind, Ivan stood behind Katerina as she embraced her weeping father and then introduced him, in all his splendid nudity, shivering from the cold and bleeding from a hundred scratches. When the king took the cloak from his own shoulders and wrapped it around Ivan, he was moved by more than the graciousness of the gesture. This man will lose his kingdom, Ivan was thinking. The story of the sleeping princess will survive and spread all over Europe, but the witch will have her way with this kingdom after all, and waking the princess from her slumber would turn out to be no blessing to these people. Ivan thought of this place in flames, and shivered, even though now, with the cloak around him, he was not so cold.
When King Matfei asked his name, Ivan almost blurted out "Itzak Shlomo." What was he thinking? It took a moment even to think of his Russian name. And then to decide against the familiar Vanya and use the formal Ivan. And then to remember to pronounce it the Russian way, instead of like an American. "Ivan," he finally said. He decided against giving a surname, since family surnames were not in use at this time, except for royal dynasties. Besides, Ivan was in a fairy tale now, wasn't he? And in the fairy tales, Ivan was always Ivan, just as in the English tales Jack was always Jack.
With a gracious speech and promise of hospitality, the king brought Ivan inside. Behind him, he heard Katerina address the crowd, but did not linger to listen to what she said. He was more interested in the room surrounding him. It was smoky from the large fire in the center; the hole in the center of the roof drew most of the smoke upward, but left enough behind that Ivan's eyes stung. A deer's carcass was sizzling and spitting over the fire as a servant lazily turned the spit.
King Matfei sat, not on a throne, but on a large chair at the head of the banquet table, while Ivan was shown to a seat at his right hand—the place of honor. Still, except for the cloak, no clothing had been offered to him, but as Ivan's eyes got used to the interior darkness he realized that he was not the only naked or nearly-naked man here. A goldsmith working at a second fire in one corner of the great room wore nothing but his apron, and now Ivan realized that most of the smoke that was irritating his eyes came from the goldsmith's hearth. It took only a moment for Ivan to understand why this craftsman was laboring in the king's house instead of his own work shed—this was the king's gold the man was working with, and it didn't leave the king's house. There were also two boys of perhaps eight or ten years who wore nothing at all as one of them swept the floor of old straw and the other strewed new straw behind him. Slaves—that's who went naked here.
The king had shouted instructions to his servants from the moment he entered the house, and Ivan was no sooner seated than bread and cheese and mead were set out in front of him. Moments later, a steaming bowl of borscht was added, and, lacking a spoon, he picked up the bowl and drank from it eagerly. It was a rich broth, beety and strong.
The crowd was cheering outside and shouting the names of Katerina and Matfei, as Katerina herself made her way into the great room and took her place at the king's left.
"So," said King Matfei. "You saved my daughter!"
"Yes, sir," said Ivan. He drank again from the soup bowl. Borscht dribbled from the sides of his mouth, down his chin and onto his chest. The bright red dripping broth would look for all the world as if he had bitten into the raw, warm heart of a fresh kill in the forest and let the hot blood run. For a moment he felt like a savage indeed, who had triumphantly brought back the prize from the teeth of the bear.
"He wants you to tell him the story," said Katerina. Her tone of voice added an unspoken epithet: idiot.
"It was nothing," said Ivan. "Really."
Matfei and Katerina looked at him as if he had just peed on the table.
"Saving my daughter was nothing?" asked King Matfei.
"No, no, Father," said Katerina, glaring at Ivan. "My beloved Ivan is merely waiting until your other knights have gathered, to tell the glorious tale of his triumph over the Widow's fiendish and hideous bear."
Ivan realized his mistake at once. He knew this from his studies. Modesty wasn't valued in this culture. A man boasted about his exploits and won extra points if he told the story well. What else was he forgetting?
Ivan tried to cover his faux pas by taking another draught of borscht, draining the bowl entirely.
"Then let's gather them all," said King Matfei. He called out to the naked boys who were sweeping and strawing. "Run and summon my boyars!"
The boys dropped broom and straw where they might fall, and took off for the door.
"Won't they be cold?" asked Ivan.
Katerina rolled her eyes. "You see how compassionate my rescuer is?" she said to her father. "He even cares for the comfort of slave boys, as if he were forgetting they would stay warm by running."
"You talk funny," said King Matfei to Ivan. "Are you a foreigner, or are you simple in the head?"
"Simple in the head," said Ivan at once.
Katerina glared at him. "He jokes."
"On the contrary," said Ivan. "Your daughter has made a great effort to tell me just how stupid I am."
King Matfei turned to face the princess, and for a moment she seemed to wither under his gaze. Then he laughed and smiled and hugged her close to him. "How can I think for a moment you would be ungracious to your rescuer!" he cried. "The man is jesting!"
"You'd be amazed at all the funny things he does," said Katerina. Her smile could freeze steam.
"I speak differently," Ivan explained to the king, "because I learned another dialect of your language as a child, and there are many words I don't know. I promise to learn as quickly as I can."
"Katerina will help you," said King Matfei. "She knows all the words!" With that he roared with laughter, and hugged Katerina even tighter.
She smiled and hugged her father back. Such a happy family, thought Ivan. What the hell am I doing here?
This is the first day of happily ever after, that's what I'm doing.
And, when he made the effort to see past his own fear and his resentment at the way Katerina had disdained him, he had to admit that Katerina and her father really did seem happy. King Matfei teased her, but treated her as someone to be proud of, someone to like as a person, not just as a property to be married off. Apparently women were not so oppressed as they would become in later centuries.
"I was so afraid for you, my daughter!" said the king. "I thought I might never see you again. All my boyars went in search of you, and found no track or trace or rumor. The dogs found no scent, and the prayers of Father Lukas went unanswered. I was going to set them all again to searching—or praying—but here you are, rescued, betrothed, and sooner than I could have hoped."