Sasha was back. She’d come home late last night, looking like she’d been beaten up, and Mom had been hysterical, rushing her into the bathroom to get cleaned up and bandaged. Her dad had acted like he didn’t even care, and Teo supposed that was the first time she’d thought that maybe the banya was behind this.
That was the first time she’d sensed the danger.
She wished they were back in California. Things like this had never happened there. As she stared out the window of her room at the yellow-leafed cottonwood, at the cloudless blue sky and the tan rock of the canyon cliffs, she did what she had been trying so hard not to do. She cried.
3
Agafia had fallen asleep on Semyon’s couch, waiting for him to return. But by morning she’d known that something was wrong, that something had happened to him. He was supposed to have come back immediately after telling the others to bring the prophet to her house, that that was the location of the breach, the source of the neh chizni doohc. She and Semyon were then supposed to go together and try to rescue Julia and the kids. She knew there might be a problem with Gregory, that he might not want to let them leave, but with Julia, the kids, Semyon, herself, and the power of prayer and God’s grace, she had no doubt that they could get away.
Semyon had not returned, however, and she’d eventually fallen asleep, waking up this morning to find that she was still alone in the house.
And she’d hurried immediately back home.
Or hurried back as fast as her old legs could take her. All of the running around the past two days had taken quite a toll, and she ached all over: her leg muscles were sore, even her lungs hurt when she breathed. She considered herself to be in pretty good shape for her age, but that age was 74, and as much as she would like to deny it, she was not a young woman anymore.
God gave her strength, however, and Agafia hobbled doggedly along roads that had not changed or improved much since her own teenage years, grateful that the way was mostly downhill. Semyon’s house was not too far from theirs, and in less than fifteen minutes she was walking up the porch steps.
Luckily, they were all home.
Luckily, they were all right.
She didn’t know what she’d been thinking. She should have made sure Julia and the kids were out of here and safe first, before she’d even gone to Semyon’s, and she was filled with guilt at the thought of her irresponsibility. It was pure luck that it hadn’t turned into a disaster, that she hadn’t come back to find them butchered.
What could have made her act so stupidly? She looked around the living room, dark even in the day, and she wondered if she had been influenced by whatever power had taken up residence here, if she had done what it wanted her to do rather than what she knew to be right.
Of course, now that she was thinking clearly, logically, did that mean that its influence was gone?
Or did that mean that it now wanted her to help Julia and the kids get away?
Neither, she assumed. It probably meant that Gregory was enough in control here to enforce its will and it didn’t need to expend any extra energy trying to influence the other people in this house.
She’d noticed the difference in atmosphere the moment she’d come back, the second she’d walked through that door. Tension hung thick and heavy in the air, and the feeling here was far different than the one at Semyon’s. As always, she’d said a prayer before even walking inside, and she was grateful now for even that small bit of protection.
There was hrehc here.
Evil.
She and Julia huddled around the kitchen table, trying to decide what to do. The phone was dead. It had not exactly been a surprise, but it still brought home to them the seriousness of their predicament, the lengths to which the spirits here would go in order to cripple them, to thwart their efforts to escape. They were both wary, conscious of the fact that they might be under surveillance, that it was more than possible they were being spied upon.
Gregory had the van keys, and Julia had proposed going up there, confronting him and trying to take the keys from him, but it was too dangerous, Agafia told her. Even if both of them went up to the attic, they would not be facing just Gregory, they would be facing Gregory and whatever else lived in this house. Agafia doubted that even with weapons and a Bible and prayers of protection, the two of them could stand up to that sort of power alone.
Semyon had driven his car last night, but he had another old Chevy in his carport, and Agafia wondered aloud if there weren’t keys for the vehicle somewhere in his house. There was no guarantee that it would work even if they did find the keys, but taking Semyon’s Chevy was a possibility. She had not driven since coming to McGuane—Gregory had not let her do anything but ride in the van—but if worse came to worst, she could try to drive the car.
“Or I could drive it,” Julia said.
“Even better,” Agafia told her in Russian.
They talked quietly. Sasha was still asleep in her bedroom, and when the two of them went in to look in on her, they could see that she was not ready to go anywhere. Even if they could sneak out of the house, even if Semyon’s old car worked, even if they could find the keys for it, even if they could get it back here, they would have to carry Sasha out, and they both doubted that Gregory would allow them to do that.
Agafia did not like the fact that Sasha was upstairs, in her own bedroom. The girl had gone there herself, apparently, had insisted upon it after Julia had taken care of her cuts and put some salve on her bruises, but it was still too close to Gregory and the attic, and it made her nervous. If they were lucky, Gregory would remain upstairs until they had a chance to get out of here or to figure out how to call for help.
If they were unlucky…
She didn’t even want to think about that.
As Julia bathed her daughter’s forehead with a cold washcloth, Agafia had an idea. She took Adam with her out to the carport, where the two of them picked up a ladder and brought it back into the house. The attic door opened only one way—down—and they positioned the top of the ladder against the trapdoor, wedging the bottom between the wall and the floor in order to block the door and keep Gregory from opening it. Adam knew what they were doing, but he said nothing about it, and Agafia wondered what was going through his mind as they trapped his father inside the attic. It could not be healthy, it could not be good, for a young boy to have to do something like this.
All three of them walked downstairs to where Teo sat alone in the living room, reading a book and listening to the radio. Adam went to join her, and Agafia looked at her daughter-in-law. She suddenly had another idea.
“You take Adam and Teodosia,” she said in Russian. “Take them to… I don’t know. Take them away from here. I will meet you with Sasha as soon as she is strong enough to walk.”
Julia shook her head. “She’s my daughter. I can’t leave her. Besides, what do you think would happen after Gregory discovered we pulled something like that? You think he’d just wait around for several days until Sasha’s condition improved, and then let you two go walking out of here? No. He would cripple you if he had to. He’d do what he needed to make sure you two couldn’t go.”
Julia thought for a moment. “You take Adam and Teo,” she said. “I’ll stay here with Sasha. Go to your friend Semyon’s house. Draw me a map.”