‘You have something that this Lord Bethrayal needs.’ A change in the girl’s tone brought him back to the room. ‘You did take something from the mounds, something which belongs to the demon who stalks you.’
‘This demon?’
‘Bethrayal, his name is Lord Bethrayal.’
‘And how do you know this?’ Now his voice was sly.
‘A small stone, a trinket to anybody else, but this demon has need of it,’ she continued slowly, well aware of the indecision that played across Grunmir’s face. Would he really believe her if she told him about Miskyia?
He could hardly deny the demon, something he’d seen with his own eyes, but this talk of hidden places and buildings of stone? She’d never have believed it herself. Of course she hadn’t been to the lands of the Moors or any of the other places Grunmir had seen, and had no idea that he’d seen anything more than one of the wooden castles of the Polish lords.
‘This thing,’ he said, ‘this trinket, where is it?’
‘Let me go and I can point it out to you. Give it to me and then get out of here as far and as fast as you can. The demon will not follow, so long as you free the clan and do not return.’ There was a long pause as Grunmir looked her in the eye, and all Iwa could hear was Yaroslav’s breath, soft and painfully shallow on the other side of the curtain. ‘It is a fearful way to die,’ Grunmir said at last. ‘To be sacrificed as the blood eagle.’
‘Somehow I didn’t think that Wislaw had planned an easy death for me.’ Iwa couldn’t help but glance at the ropes that held her. ‘The ancestor world beckons to us all, sooner or later.’ But her voice held little conviction.
‘But what happens in the ancestor world is a mystery, little Rusalka. I do not believe that Wislaw plans to sacrifice you to Piórun. Never before has the thunderer commanded such a thing. Wislaw keeps a second statue, a tiny stone god, a mangled thing with the head of a snake and the wings of a bat.’
‘Do you imagine that I can be scared by children’s tales?’ Still she clung to the hope that Grunmir might help her. ‘Just help me get the amulet and I can take his demon away from you.’
‘To end up being sacrificed to something like that, yes I would be afraid. When the northmen craft the blood eagle it is bad enough, but Wislaw plans to crucify you upside down, so that you will face the earth and your soul will pass into the mud and be eaten by whatever god he truly serves. Is that the fate you really want, little Rusalka, to die in such a manner? Do you think that Wislaw’s god will let you into the ancestor world?’
It took all of her self-control not to start tugging on the ropes. If only Grunmir would give her a few hours alone, she’d slip the knot and get away from the camp forever. But what would happen to Yaroslav?
Yet the idea that she could take the demon from them played on his mind. Somehow he couldn’t see it, the forest stripling covered in mud. Could she really do more than Wislaw and all his cunning magery? Yet some of the wanderers of the Moorish deserts claimed many powers, and there were the Avar shamans of the rolling steppe. Were they any more to look at? Somewhere in the back of his mind the desperation stirred. Part of him wanted to believe. Who really knew what it would take to rid them of this demon? And yet, as he looked over her fragile body, he couldn’t bring himself to trust her. No, she’d have to do more first.
‘Wislaw indulges in a public sacrifice each night, and on the third he will kill you. Already his voice holds too much influence amongst the gullible, and with each ceremony his influence grows. Even the krol looks on and bids me to attend. Give me a name,’ Grunmir said, ‘anything so that I can go to Krol Gawel and plead for your life. But do not talk to me of such foolish things as trinkets and demons.’
‘Bielobog, Chernobog and Jezi Baba: are those names enough for you?’
Grunmir’s gaze flickered to the ground and then he looked her in the eye. ‘Wislaw has not told us of this god that he secretly worships, though there are a few amongst us who have suspected it right enough. But we are too scared, whilst this demon has us caged none will dare stand against it.’ He paused and waited for Iwa, but she said nothing. ‘Then there’s nothing to save you.’ Without a moment’s pause, he left, the curtain flapping behind him.
‘Maybe I won’t disappoint you after all,’ Iwa said to herself as she began to try the knots again. She gave the rope another tug and tried to wriggle her wrist free. Slowly the rope began to loosen. She tugged harder and felt the knot give, her wrist almost slipping through. Then she stopped and looked to the doorway. They were alone.
Chapter Eighteen
For the rest of the day she waited, her wrists aching and her legs barely able to touch the ground. Slipping the knot would have been easy, but what then? There was no chance of escape until nightfall, and she daren’t risk anyone finding her.
So she waited, the feeling of unease growing as the sun began to set. Grunmir
