Vasilisa (Hearth and Bard Tales Book 1) Page 3

  Staver got me indentured by asking me to take him into the forest. But it was my fault, and the bear's, as much as his. It is his mother's fault most of all. She should bear the blame, not him.

  I plunged my hands deeper into the hot water, soaking in the heat, and scrubbed the hardened egg from a plate.

  He put himself between the bear and me. He lowered himself to scrape paint from a pigsty. Maybe that wasn't pity. Was it friendship? Did friendship turn his gentleness into bravery? He was brave, though I hadn’t seen it under what I thought was weakness. But it wasn’t weakness. He charmed the animals and gentled his mother. That was power. And because he used that power for me, I’m back to my regular duties and can pursue freedom.

  I wiped the last dish dry and set it on the shelf, then sat on a low stool in front of an oven to peel potatoes.

  I have to thank him. But how?

  I peeled the potatoes and ran through ideas. Wildflowers? No, silly, not for a boy. A cake baked just for him? I’d burn it. The cook hadn’t let me do more than peel, cut, and clean since the last time I’d filled the kitchen with smoke. A painting? Where would I get the paper or the paint, and even if I did, then what? I’d never drawn with more than a fire-blackened stick on rocks, and the pictures didn’t look like much. A flute? Yes. I could hollow out a willow shoot and cut holes in it. He liked music and birdsong. He could create the one and mimic the other with the flute. It was perfect.

  I set the basket of peeled potatoes on the worktable, and the cook snatched it up. “Wood for the fires.”

  The crickets chirped their night-time serenades when I crawled onto the pallet I shared with my mother. I’d made up for my missed hours of work in the morning with after-sundown chores.

  Mama scooted over and gave me her warmed spot beneath the blanket. “I’m sorry she's punishing you so harshly.”

  I grunted a reply. I'd not tell her of the indenturement either.

  She wrapped her arms around me. “Master Staver is a good young man. I saw what he did at the pigsty.”

  “Hmm.” I yawned and slipped toward sleep.

  Her voice cut through the fog. “He’ll make a fine master someday.”

  I stared at her indistinct form in the lightless servants' shed, then whispered so only she could hear, “Mama, even if he were my master, I’ll not stay here past my sixteenth birthday. I'm returning to the forest as soon as I've learned the needed skills.”

  Silence stretched out. Mama’s quiet voice trembled. “When you are sixteen, I will return to the woods with you, if that is still what you want.”

  She'd come! Ten months. I could endure that long. And I still had much to learn. I’d spend my free time watching the furrier tan hides, the smith smelt iron from ore, and all the other skills that I would need. We were going home.

  Birds chittered and trilled in the afternoon. A thrush sang. I closed my eyes, letting the speckled light of midday sun and forest canopy fall on my eyelids, and opened my ears to hear more distantly. Warbler and wren added their tunes to the west. The extravagant song of the lark brightened the forest to the east. I spun, eyes shut, wrapping the music around me.

  A new melody sounded behind me: the mournful call of the nightingale. The notes came in vibrating plucks. A voice added sweet notes on top.

  Staver.

  I wrapped the birdsong tighter around me, blocking his voice, and ran deeper into the forest.

  4

  “Vasilisa.” Staver ran to catch up to me as I carried a damp bundle of laundry from the stream to the lines.

  I quickened my pace. If he started talking to me, I’d have to listen, and then I’d be slower in my work and I’d not have time to work on the flute. I hardly ever had time. The mistress hadn’t forgiven my trespass. I wasn’t given more men’s tasks, but I did more work than any of the women. Mama offered to take some of it, but she’d also been ordered to do more work, and I wouldn’t add mine to hers.

  I fit in working on the flute by the kitchen fire glow before the others woke or after they’d gone to bed. I was almost done. If he’d just let me alone, I could hang up these clothes, start my first half-day in two weeks, and finish the flute.

  “Here, I’ll help you with that.” He took hold of the bundle. A tunic and hosen fell onto the dirt path.

  “Bothersome! Clumsy! Can’t you just let me do my work without adding to it!”

  “I’m sorry.” He stooped over to pick up the fallen clothes, now coated with dust, and started to lay them back on the bundle.

  I stepped back. “Stop! You’ll make me have to rewash all the clothes.”

  He backed away, holding the dirty clothes. “I’m sorry Lisa. I wish—.”

  “Just stop.” Tears burned in the corners of my eyes. I pressed my face into the damp bundle and ran to the clotheslines.

  A clean sheet lay on the ground. I dumped my bundle onto it, then snapped a red skirt free of wrinkles before pinning it to the line.

  Staver came beside me, picked up woolen trousers and flicked them. The legs of the trousers wrapped around Staver’s legs. He laughed, his voice undulating between a man’s deepness and a boy’s higher pitch.

  The sound was so ridiculous that I laughed too, as I peeled the wool trousers off him and hung them.

  He picked up one of the mistress’s embroidered blouses and held the arms like a dancer. He set into a traditional Rylio, tap-step, tap-step, step-step-step-step, humming out the melody. The blouse flopped around to his movement. When he finished the tune, he bowed to the blouse, grinned sideways at me, and hung it up on the line.

  We worked side by side until only one stocking was left in the pile. I grabbed the toe and he the top.

  “I’ll do it.” He gently pulled it from my hand. “I’ll talk to my mother. If she won’t give you enough moments to even say hello once in two weeks, then she’s working you too hard. Servant or no, you are my friend, and what she’s doing is wrong.”

  “Friend?”

  “Of course. How do you wash the clothes? Because I’ll clean the ones I knocked to the ground.”

  “You’ll get all wet.”

  “Good. It’s a hot day.”

  I glanced towards the manor house. No face watched from the window.

  He glanced back too. “She’s asleep. We still have a little time before she’ll wake.”

  “Does she ever scare you?” I clapped my hand over my mouth. I was speaking all sorts of impudence that day.

  He nodded. “She is loving in her own way. And Papa is a gentling influence on her.”

  “That’s where you got it from.”

  “What?”

  “Your gentleness.”

  “Oh.” His neck reddened. “I'm too gentle, even for him. I'm supposed to be strong and commanding—so I can manage the manor someday.”

  “Is that why he wants you to learn swordsmanship?”

  He nodded. “And he wants me to be able to defend myself and my family if war comes.”

  “Do you think it will?”

  Staver studied the ground, his face tightly intent. “It will come. Maybe not this year or in the next ten. But it will come. The Kahn of the Golden Horde is always pushing into the southern lands.”

  If war came, I’d be the better warrior. But I wouldn't be here. What would happen to him? I shrugged aside the thought. The Master had many men-at-arms. They wouldn't need Staver to fight, though he had other worthy skills. I grinned at him, trying to push away the gloom that had gathered in his brows. “Maybe you could charm the attackers as you do the animals?”

  He scuffed his boots on the path. “A wolf wouldn’t listen to my quiet. Sometimes people need to fight.”

  Should I fight his mother for what she forced me to? Or should I run? She was too powerful. I'd leave.

  He jostled my elbow. “A tune for your thoughts.”

  “I'll learn to fletch arrows.” I clapped my hand over my mouth. Where did that come from? He not only got me to speak impudence but also my secrets.

&
nbsp; He laughed and cupped his hands around his mouth, then whispered, “No shame in taking up new skills. You'll do wonderful at it.” Staver glanced up the hill to the manor. “I’d better go. But will you promise to at least nod when you see me? And on your next half-day, I’ll teach you chess.”

  “Why?”

  He called over his shoulder as he dashed up the hill, “Because you’ll like it.” He reached the door just as the mistress opened it.

  After I washed the last of the clothes, I carved the final three holes in the flute. A mellow note floated upward as I blew through the wedged mouthpiece. It was ready. I’d give it to him on the next half-day, when he had promised to teach me chess.

  I ran back to the stream and slid down to the bending willow. A grey stone nestled between the willow’s roots. After a quick glance confirmed that no one watched, I brushed the dirt from the stone’s edges. Then, with a grunting shove, I rolled the stone on its side to reveal a box made of broken tiles and pottery. Remnants of saddle leather, a broken horse's bit, frayed twine, and even a shard of red-and-yellow glazed china lined the bottom—treasures from the rubbish heap. I laid the flute on top, then reset the stone, brushing dirt back over the edges. Other servants kept their treasures tucked under their sleeping mats, but I planned on hiding away things that would get me horsewhipped if found—arrows, a bow, and a hunting knife.

  Which should I work on first? I’d go to the fletcher. I’d brought him feathers from my snared birds before. He’d be open to teaching me. Then I could trade my arrows to the bowyer for lessons in making a bow. It would be better than stealing the weapons, and in the half-days I had before we left I’d have time to make everything I needed.

  The fletcher’s stall sat at the end of the smithy. The fletcher, a lean man with a perpetual scowl, sat cross-legged on a table surrounded by metal arrowheads, a pile of arrow shafts, and a box of feathers.

  He picked up one of the arrow shafts and peered down the end.

  “Master Fletcher.”

  He rotated the shaft, shook his head, and picked up a different shaft. “What do you want, wild child?”

  “I have more feathers.”

  “Set them on the table. Come for your extra loaf tonight.”

  “I don’t want bread. I want to learn how to fletch arrows.”

  He looked up. His scowl deepened. “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re a girl.”

  “I only catch small birds with snares. I’d be able to get you turkey or goose feathers if I had a bow and arrows.”

  He titled his head.

  I hurried on. “I'll share my first turkey or goose with you.”

  “The first five.”

  “Two.”

  “Three, or you’ll not get any learning from me.”

  “Two and all the wing feathers from the first five.”

  He grunted agreement and made a place for me to sit next to him.

  I climbed up on the table and set down a sack of feathers from birds I’d snared before my hours of work increased.

  I first peeled bark from coppiced saplings. They all looked straight to me, but after several cuffs to my head for handing the fletcher bent shafts, I began to see the little variations, the insect damage, the twists and turns.

  Next I chewed sinew until it became tacky. My throat tightened at the flavor. The last time I’d eaten venison was with Papa. I gulped to keep back the tears.

  “Don’t swallow it, girl!”

  I spat out the sinew. “Now what?”

  He measured feathers against each other and split three of them. I found three same sized feathers.“No! All right wing or left wing, otherwise it won’t spin in flight.”

  “Spin?”

  “Spin. Keeps it going straight. If you mix right and left wing, it will wobble all over the place.”

  When I’d split my feathers to his satisfaction, after ruining twelve and hearing a string of curses for my waste, I moistened the sinew again and wrapped it around the shaft and the base of the three feathers. It stuck to itself and the arrow.

  After notching the back for the string and the front for the arrowhead, I dipped the point in pine resin and reached for a metal arrowhead.

  He slapped my hand away. “You’ll use bone chips.” He pointed to a bowl of fragmented bones.

  I swallowed my retort. I’d have to do without metal in the forest, so it would be best to start now. I wrapped a sharp piece of bone to the shaft with sinew and handed my finished arrow to him.

  He held it up to the low sunlight of evening. A few grunts and scowls later, he handed it back.

  “How is it?”

  “It’s a start.”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “The feathers aren’t set equally around the shaft and one is higher than the rest. The bone is tilted in the tip. Make another.”

  I completed the second one in a third of the time it took me to do the first. The room grew dark enough that the fletcher lit the lanterns.

  He studied my second attempt. “You’ll come back tomorrow and make more.”

  “I can’t. I have my duties.”

  “When your duties are done, you will come. You will fletch ten arrows for every one you keep.”

  “It will be dark.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow. And be careful in the forest. It's rumored that an ogre's been killing the sheep. He'd like nothing better than to feast on a young woman.”

  I laughed to shake off the chill. Ogres only roamed at night. At least that’s what the laundress said. The servants gathered in the evenings to hear her stories. I didn't, but I couldn't block her words drifting over to my corner of the servant’s sleeping shed. I hated her tales. Of men that changed into animals and tore the throats from their victims. Of the ogre witch, Baba-Yaga, who tricked young girls into becoming her dinner. Her tales that kept children from playing in the forest or servants from ever dreaming of escaping.

  The forest was my safe place. I'd make a protected place for the night. I'd be safe, and I'd be free. No tale would change that.

  I walked along the top of a fallen tree in the slanting morning sun. Termites made tunnels in the dead wood around flat shelves of mushrooms. A squirrel raced down a pine, and a crow swooped at it. The squirrel chattered curses as it spiraled up the trunk into the safety of the boughs.

  Someone walked behind me. I knew who it was, but I wouldn't turn. This was my dream. Staver shouldn't be here. He didn't belong in the forest.

  I skipped from one dead-fall to another that lay balanced across a stump. The dead-fall dipped, and I threw out my arms for balance. Slender fingers, stronger than they looked, caught my arm and steadied me.

  5

  The mistress reduced my workload almost to the level it was before our meeting with the bear. Staver must have spoken with her. Every day Staver practiced his balalaika outside the kitchen’s open window, filling my work with his voice and plucked music. Whenever we crossed paths, he waved. I nodded back, as promised, and smiled if the mistress wasn’t watching.

  I split my evenings between fletching arrows and setting snares in the fields for grouse and quail. I cooked the fowls in the field so as not to draw attention, though Mama insisted we share the meat with the other servants. Why couldn’t they just set their own snares?

  On my next half-day, Staver found me as I finished shelling a bowl of peas. He popped a pea pod in his mouth then grinned a green smile.

  I laughed.

  He spat out the pod and grinned his white-toothed smile. “My mother lay down for her rest. What can I do to help?”

  “I’m finished for the day.” I reached under my three-legged stool and pulled out the flute. “Here, I made this. It’s not much, but I wanted to do something to thank you.”

  He ran his fingers over the flute and blew a sweet note. “It’s beautiful! But why are you thanking me?”

  “You got me out of trouble with the mistress.” At least, the trouble he knew about.

/>   “I got you into trouble. You didn’t have to do this. But—” he looked down at the flute, then back to me, “I love it. Thank you! Now it’s my turn. I have something for you.”

  “What is it?” I tried to keep my voice calm.

  “I’ll show you after we play chess.”

  “Oh.” My shoulders slumped. I'd hoped he'd share his new song. I wanted to learn the words to the one he'd been playing outside the kitchen window.

  He touched my chin, bringing my face up. “You’ll like it.”

  “Maybe. What is chess?”

  “It’s a war between stone pieces.”

  “War? And you like it?” I snorted as I followed him to a blanket set in the shade of a tree. On the blanket sat a square board, all checkered with red and yellow paint. Lines of little stone pieces sat in two rows on two sides of the board.

  He sat on the white stone side. I picked up one of the black stones; a little man with a long beard stared back at me with stone eyes.

  “That’s a pawn,” Staver said. “It’s the foot soldier and can only go one space forward, at least most of the time.” He picked up piece by piece and showed me how each could move. Then he picked up one of the tallest pieces. “This is the tsarina. She is the most powerful piece. She can move any direction, for as far as she wants.”

  I fingered my tsarina piece. Powerful. Could go wherever she wanted.

  He picked up the tallest piece. A figure with a carved crown. “This is the tsar. He can move any direction, but only one space. If you lose him, you lose the game. Protect him, even if you lose every other piece. Capture my tsar, and you win.”

  I stumbled through the first game. He won quickly but filled me with tips on things to watch for. He won the second and third games.

  On the fourth game, I started to look ahead to what moves each of us could make. I became the hunter. I tracked the possible paths and cut them off so he could only tread the path I wanted him to take. Move by move, I hemmed in his tsar until he couldn’t move except into capture.