Deathless

this place, but come with our family!’ The old bitch.”

A groan rose around the table, with much nodding and sympathetic tears wiped away.

Each by each, all twelve of the domovoi told their tales, of the lost Dyachenko fortune; of the tragic Piakovsky children, who had lost their older brothers to the war; of the Semeoffs’ disgrace.

“You must see,” chirped Chairman Venik finally, “that a communal house requires communal domoviye, and communal domoviye require a committee. We are happy to do our part! It is a new world, and we do not wish to be left behind.”

“Of course, I’ve been here since before you were a baby,” said Comrade Zvonok. “This house is my husband, and we eat warmth together by the stove.” Her broad face grew sly. “I saw the birds come, too.”

Marya started. In all her life, she had never expected to meet another who had witnessed her sisters’ seductions.

“Deliver your report, girl!” shouted Chairman Venik. “We haven’t got all night to reminisce!”

Marya drew herself up. She tried to calm her little heart. Though they had merry mustaches and very fine vests, when they spoke she could see the domoviye’s long yellow teeth, sharp and jagged.

“I … I wish to report that I have examined the … the matter carefully, and I think, I am fairly sure … I am certain there can be no doubt that the house is at least two steps larger than it was a few months ago, and possibly more. I cannot investigate the Dyachenkos’ room, which adjoins ours.”

“Too right you can’t!” bellowed a domovaya with a glossy brown mustache that had been curled with a tiny iron. “It’s not your business!”

Chairman Venik hushed the Dyachenko domovoi. “Is that all, giantess? Do you really think there is anything about this house we do not know? You have selfishly allocated excessive size to yourself, and forgotten to steal a bigger brain to go with it!” He polished his watch-medal proudly. “We are widening the house! We conferred over a period of six months, and determined that the Revolution requires more from us than mere mischief and teacup- breaking. If such a great number of people must hold the house, the house must hold a great number of people!”

Chainik clapped his hands. “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need!” he crowed.

“Well said, Comrade! We have abilities we have hoarded, selfishly, because we did not understand that we owed them to the People, that we had become decadent, lazy bourgeoisie, in love with wealth and houses and ignoring Great Duties, High Philosophy!” Chairman Venik thumped the table with his little red fist. “No longer! The domoviye belong to the Party!”

“But surely,” protested Marya, “if you widen the house the houses on either side of us shall be crushed.”

“Child,” said Comrade Zvonok in a patient tone, “we are not architects. We are imps. We are goblins. If we could not make a little room on the inside without budging the outside, we would not be worth our tails. After all, we have been making our little homes in the walls for centuries.”

“We will open up the floors like untying a stack of newspapers—pop!—out they will spring! The house on Gorokhovaya Street will be a secret country in the midst of St. Petersburg! They will plant turnips in the kitchen, and grow wheat on the ceiling, and we shall all have biscuits till we are so fat we will roll and never walk!” burst out the Piakovsky domovoi deliriously.

Silence forked across the table like ice cracking.

“It’s Dzerzhinskaya Street now, Comrade Banya,” the chairman said quietly. “It’s Petrograd.”

“Of … of course.” Banya sat down, abashed. His face grew bright red, and he began to tremble.

“Oh, don’t worry!” Marya cried, wanting desperately to save the poor creature from embarrassment. “I can never remember!”

“It is our duty to remember,” said Chainik coldly at her side.

“You must not tell anyone what we have done,” interrupted the chairman. “You understand? We will report you to the House Committee, the other one, the Big Committee, and you’ll be carted away, faster than you can yawn!”

“I won’t, I promise,” Marya said hurriedly. “Though you ought not to report people. It’s not neighborly, and really rather horrid of you.”

Chairman Venik grinned, and all his yellow, jagged teeth showed, like the teeth of a wolf-trap. “Don’t misunderstand us. We are very sweet when you have cream for us, and biscuits, and boots, but you have brought us nothing, and so we owe you nothing. The Party is a wonderful, marvelous invention, and it has taught us wonderful, marvelous things—chiefly, that we can cause more trouble with less effort by filing complaints than by breaking teacups.”

Marya began to tremble herself. Her stomach felt cold. “But a domovoi can’t file a complaint.…”

“Who’s a domovoi?” laughed Comrade Banya, her teeth out, too. “I’m Ekaterina Piakovsky.”

“I’m Pyotr Abramov,” chuckled Chairman Venik.

“I’m Gordei Blodniek,” smirked Chainik.

“It takes two of us to hold the pen, but we manage,” giggled the Malashenko domovoi.

All the domoviye were laughing at her; all of their teeth were shining in the candlelight. Marya Morevna buried her face in her hands.

“Stop it, Venik!” snapped Zvonok. “You old stove-snort! You’re frightening her, and she’s mine, so I say stuff your chimneys!” Her mustache quivered with rage. She left her seat to stroke Marya’s nightgown. “There, there, Masha dear,” she cooed, calling her by her old pet name. “If you like I shall mend your teacup. Would that make you feel better?”

But Chairman Venik was leaning over the table, his grin wider and wider, until the sides of his mouth met somewhere behind his ears. “Just you wait,” he hissed. “Just you wait. Papa Koschei is coming, coming, coming, over the hills on his red horse, and he’s got bells on his boots and a ring in his pocket, and he knows your name, Marya Morevna.”

Marya could not help it; she screamed. The domoviye’s mustaches were all blown back.

Zvonok whirled on him. “Venichek, you are a hedgehog’s ass. You weren’t supposed to tell! Is it worth it to scare a poor girl?”

“Zvonya, I live to scare poor girls! Their tears smell like the freshest, warmest cakes with cherry jam smeared all round them. Of course it’s worth it!”

“We’ll see, when Papa gets here,” warned Comrade Zvonok.

The domoviye drew away from Venik slightly, as if waiting for him to turn to ash before their eyes.

“You all saw,” quavered Banya, twisting her mustache, eager to make up her fault. “I didn’t tell! It was Venik!”

“It’s been recorded in the minutes,” Zvonok said darkly.

“I don’t understand,” said Marya, her tears drying on her cheeks. “How do you know my name?”

“Don’t worry about it, dear,” said Zvonok brightly. “It’s far past your bedtime. Let’s get you to sleep, shall we?”

All Marya’s fingers and toes were numb. She let herself be led away from the cackling komityet, shaking as though she had been drenched in water dragged in frozen buckets from the Neva. The domovaya pulled her past a grim Lenin demanding: Have YOU Volunteered for the Front Lines? Marya had a moment of panic: What if she could not get big again, and was to be stuck down here forever with the goblins and frowning paper Lenin staring her down? Suddenly she wanted very much to see the front of the stove again, and her own bed.

“What did he mean? Who is Koschei?” she asked softly.

“You know, you’ve been very careless, Masha. I try to watch out for you, even though you’ve never given me boots or cream, and I think that’s a testament to my generous soul, but you insist on drawing attention to yourself.”

“But I don’t! I’m so quiet the Abramov twins tripped over me last week.” Since the affair of the scarf she had tried very hard never to be noticed by anyone.

“Marya Morevna! Don’t you know anything? Girls must be very, very careful to care only for ribbons and magazines and wedding rings. They must sweep their hearts clean of anything but kisses and theater and dancing. They must never read Pushkin; they must never say clever things; they must never have sly eyes or wear their hair