Jaran

'Who is it? Where is Ilya? Why hasn't Yuri come back?' She shook her head. 'No. Don't answer that.'

'Ilya has been gone three days, my child.'

'It's raining.'

'Yes.' There was a note in his voice she could not recognize. 'Yes, my child, it is. Are you warm enough?'

The rain sounded like pebbles being shaken in a distant tin. 'My toes.'

He moved around out of her sight. She fell into a long, dreamless sleep. When she woke, she was thirsty, and he gave her water; after that she was hungry, and he fed her. She slept again.

A cool breeze on her face woke her. Someone had thrown up the tent flap. Light caught the outlines of her feet under blankets. The sides of the tent stirred, brushed by the wind. A dark figure sat outside, engaged in mending a shirt.

'Niko?'

The hands stilled. 'Tess.' He crawled in to her. 'How do you feel, my child?'

'I hurt. Where are we?'

'We are in your tent, here where-well, we will move you to Veselov's tribe when you are safe to be moved. You had a very deep wound, young woman.'

'Am I lucky to be alive?'

'Yes, child. I should think you are. Now let me look at your wounds.'

As he reached for the blanket, she felt down along her body. She wore only her shirt.

'Niko.' He paused. 'Niko, how long have I been lying here?'

'Five days.'

'Five days,' she said in a small voice. 'You've had to do everything… Oh God, Niko, I'm so…'

'Embarrassed?' he supplied. 'My dear girl, if you're strong enough to feel embarrassed, then you are certainly going to recover. This is the best sign I could have looked for.'

'Don't tease me.'

'I'm not. I have tended both men and women in my time for any number of illnesses and injuries, some far more intimate than yours. And I had six children. The human body holds no surprises for me.'

Tess laughed. 'Damn, it hurts to laugh.'

'Well, hold this. This will hurt more. Cry if you wish.' He rolled her onto her side.

It did hurt more. She clutched at the belt he had given her, squeezing it until her hand ached. At last, at last, he let her down, but then he pulled up her shirt and examined her abdomen with great care, pushing and probing with excruciating gentleness.

'Well. Not as bad as I feared. Not quite so good as I hoped. But you will do, my child. You will do.'

'Can I move?'

'In a few days, we'll see.'

'Unless I die of frustration before then. Niko, I don't even remember getting hit.'

'You weren't hit. That is, you have two saber cuts, one on your back and one on your thigh, but they're healing neatly. No, you were stabbed with a knife. What man would do that to a woman, I cannot imagine.''

She shut her eyes. She saw things in a haze, blurred by pain and grief and blessed oblivion. 'I don't know. I don't know. It wasn't Mikhailov. And Vasil pulled him off me, whoever he was.'

'Vasil!'

'Yes, Vasil. Vera's brother.'

'I know who Vasil is. Was he party to Yuri's death?'

'No. No. He told Mikhailov to let Yuri go. It must have been Leotich.'

'Leotich. One of Doroskayev's riders, I think. I might believe that he would-well, he's dead, Tess. We found him on the field.'

'Who else?' she asked, not wanting to. 'Who else died, Niko?'

'Come, child, let's not speak of that now.'

'Tell me.'

'We had to put Myshla down, Tess. I'm sorry. Four riders from Mikhailov's jahar. I don't even know their names. Three from Veselov's: Ivan Charnov, Matvey Stassov, and Leonid Telyegin. But perhaps you didn't know them.'

'Who else, Niko? Oh, God, not Kirill?'

'No, Tess, no. Last I saw Kirill, he was badly hurt but alive. Konstans, too.'

'Not Mikhal? Oh, gods, what will I tell Sonia?' She began to cry.

'Tess. Tess. Don't cry. It wasn't your fault.'

'Yes, it was my fault, damn you, and you know it. If I hadn't made Garii take me there, Ishii wouldn't have found us, and he wouldn't have killed Garii, and he wouldn't have wanted to kill me, and then Ilya wouldn't have made us wait and come after and we wouldn't have run into Mikhailov and then Yuri wouldn't be dead. And now Mikhal. It is my fault. It is my fault.' She began to sob, noisy, awkward, painful sobs that wracked her body.

Niko settled back and did nothing. Soon enough she exhausted herself and, with tears still seeping down her face, she fell asleep.

When she woke again, she was alone. She called out Niko's name once, softly, but he did not answer. Well, it was all she deserved. As if the memory had been seared into her, she could see Yuri falling from his horse, ever so slowly. If she could only catch him, then perhaps he might live-but Yuri was dead. Mikhal was dead. The ache of her wound paled beside the ache of her loss.

Niko came then, but she would not speak to him and only mechanically obeyed his injunctions to eat and drink. After a while, having tried stories and songs and one-sided conversation, and even reading aloud from the volume of Casiara, he left.

It was better that way. Yuri would have cajoled her into crying, teased her, laughed her into it. She hated herself for not dying with him, hated herself more for wanting to live, a coward afraid of the dark. How could she ever face Sonia? Sonia, the one person with that same open confidence that Yuri had, whom she had deprived of a brother and a husband in a single swift stroke. Sonia would never look at her again with anything but loathing. And Ilya. He would know very well whose fault this was. Her thoughts wound down in this manner and left her in desolation.

It rained for hours, for days, perhaps; she neither knew nor cared. She submitted listlessly to Niko's care.

'It's clearing,' he said finally. She did not know whether it was morning or afternoon, only that where the flap lay askew a thin line of light lanced across the dark floor. She refused to ask how many days it had been. 'Today we are moving you to Veselov's tribe.'

She stared at the shadowed roof. Although he kept her scrupulously clean, still her back itched, a constant, damp prickling. Mold was surely growing in the blankets. The air was overpowering, dank. Her legs chafed where they rubbed the coarse bedding.

He sighed. 'Your wounds are showing some progress, girl, but your spirits aren't.'

He knelt close to her, filling all her space. Before his entrance she had been remembering Yuri demonstrating, to her immense delight, how not to use a saber, with Kirill acting as his willing and hilarious foil. 'Why can't you leave me alone?'

'To what? To die? I believe you promised Bakhtiian that you would live.'

'Did I?'

'Don't you remember?'

'I don't care.' And then, perhaps because his words had triggered it, she did remember. She flung an arm across her eyes so that she wouldn't have to look at Niko. 'He doesn't care anyway. Why should he? I killed Yuri and Mikhal.'

'You are a difficult child. Why do you suppose Ilya wants you to live?'

'To torment me.'

'Tess, I am getting rather tired of you. I'm leaving now, and when I return, it will be to take you out of this tent and move you to Veselov's tribe. Do you understand?'

'I don't want to go.'

'You haven't a choice.' He left.