Mistress of the Solstice (4 page)
Wolf sat up. “Tell him, Gleb. Tell him everything you
know.”
M
y handwoman, Praskovia, was tall and handsome. In her late forties she
still maintained the passionate vigor of a young girl, so unlike the
calm detachment I had to uphold. We made a good match.
I was once told that Praskovia was the only woman who had survived my
father’s passions and come out of the experience
intact. I heard it whispered that she could even be my mother. I
didn’t care. There were too many women in my
father’s life for me to keep track of. Their lives were
too short and miserable to be worth noticing. I had more important
things to do.
“The village is called
Sosnovka
,
Mistress,” Praskovia told me. She stood with her
hands folded in front, palms together, in the ritual gesture of a
Solstice priestess.
“The pine village.”
“Yes, Mistress.”
Praskovia bowed her head. “It’s no
more than twenty-five
versts
by the main road.
You’ll recognize it by the pine grove
nearby.”
Twenty-five
versts
meant half a day
of travel with a wagon in tow. We had to leave very early to make it
back by nightfall. Still, fair was fair. Each village had to have an
equal chance, no matter how far it was from the capital.
“The villagers know who they want me to
take?” I asked.
It didn’t matter. If they hadn’t
prepared an acceptable maiden to be taken, all the worse for them. I
had the authority to pick any one I liked. Still, it was good to know
in advance. I didn’t like to come unprepared.
“Yes, Mistress.”
Praskovia’s eyes slid over me with a tenderness I found
disturbing. I looked away. I had no room for petty human feelings. My
strength was in my detachment. Anything else was the surest way into
the evil clutches of Love.
“Tell them to saddle Sunset for me at
dawn,” I told her. “And, leave me.
I will sleep now.”
Sunset’s auburn coat glimmered in the sun, making him
glow like an ember fresh from the firepit. As the first houses of the
village appeared ahead of us, I pulled him to a stop and patted his
steaming neck, waiting for my guards and the wagon to catch up. I felt
a pang of regret at having to break the canter, but I kept my face
still as I watched them approach. I couldn’t possibly
show my guards that I enjoyed the ride. Besides, I had to enter the
village properly, as befitted my station and my solemn task.
The pair of heavy draught horses pulling the wagon acknowledged Sunset
with brief snorts as they worked their way up the muddy track. This
village was no different from others. Peasants in our kingdom never
took time to fix the roads.
Rows of log houses lined the street, their dark windows gaping at us
like ethereal eyes. No one came out to greet us, and this absence of
welcome, while natural, made me feel eerie as I rode on, finding
reassurance in the smacking sound of the horses’ hooves
and cursing of the wagon driver behind.
I had never been to this particular village, but I knew where we were
headed. The well.
A small crowd gathered there watched us in silence. Mostly old crones,
undoubtedly there since morning to gossip about my arrival. I rode up
to them feeling mild relief that the village was not deserted as it
originally seemed. I followed their unspoken signs, falling into the
familiar game. No one would openly point me to the maiden, yet they all
knew I must find her, and their looks, their gestures, aided me every
step of the way.
A tall matron, her round face peeking out of a wrapped
headscarf like a hen out of its nest, glanced at me briefly and slid
her gaze toward a pair of younger women down a side street. They all
looked solemn, as if attending a funeral. I signaled my wagon driver to
wait and walked my horse in that direction, where the crowds thickened
and the hesitant gazes of the villagers eventually led me from group to
group and on to an
izba
at the end of the lane.
It was an old, crooked house. The logs composing its walls were laid
unevenly, as if placed by a drunken builder. The man and woman standing
in its doorway looked sad, but not desperate. They must have prepared
themselves.
Good. I hated tearful scenes.
I rode up and stopped my horse in front of their rickety wooden fence.
The man gave me a long glance, his sunburnt face etched with wrinkles so
deep that they made his face look like an old woodcarving. Then he
turned and pulled a girl out of the darkness behind the doorway. He
pushed her forward, holding her elbow from behind and I saw her stumble
and wince from the force of his grip.
“Mistress, this is my youngest
daughter.” His voice wavered, echoed by distant
sobbing from the depths of the house. The woman cast a frightened
glance into the dark doorway.
Warning her
other daughters not to reveal themselves to me.
I
forced myself to ignore it, surveying my quarry.
She wore a plain, baggy linen dress. A dirt-gray knitted scarf covered
her lowered head, hiding her hair and part of her face from view. Her
eyes looked swollen and her cheeks puffed, as if she had been crying
for a very long time.
“Remove your scarf,” I told the
girl.
She had dark blond hair, the color most common in our villages. She had
pulled it all back into a tight braid, and tucked it into her
dress—the usual style for a village maiden—it came in handy when
they did their housework. What showed of her braid, though, looked
thick enough to be pleasing when we let her hair loose on the night of
the Solstice. I leaned forward in the saddle to take a closer look at
her face. Her features would be pretty when she had a chance to calm
down. My servants would see to it.
Under her mask of tears she looked very young and innocent, barely of
age. My instincts told me she must be a virgin. The villagers must
believe it too, or they wouldn’t have offered her to
me. After years of the Solstice Sacrifices they knew better. I saw no
need to verify it on the spot, leaving the task to my women for later.
No need for ugly scenes.
I straightened in my saddle, turning around to look at the frightened,
expectant faces all around me. Silence wavered in the air like a heavy
woolen curtain.
I felt the weight of their anxiety upon me as I turned to my guards
and said: “Very well. Bring her
along.”
I watched my guards lead the girl into the wagon and bolt the door
before mounting their heavy horses and taking positions on the outside
for our long ride back. She didn’t try to fight. She
didn’t even turn to look back as she bent her head and
climbed in, settling on the straw mattress inside. Good. No trouble,
then.
Sighs of relief followed me all the way to the village gate. I could
still hear their echo in my head as I sent Sunset into a trot along the
road, winding over the nearby hill. I shut them out as I rushed to
leave the village behind.
Another gruesome task done. I did not need to dwell on it any longer.
When we finally made it back to the paved streets that led up into the
palace plaza I felt exhausted. A day in the saddle, with very little
food and no time for a proper rest stop took its toll. I did not look
forward to facing the crowd that I knew would be waiting at the palace
walls. I barely held up in my saddle, too tired to think straight. So,
when a young man stepped out of the crowd right in front of my horse,
it took me by surprise.
I pulled Sunset to an abrupt stop not to run this man over. My disbelief
at his audacity gave way to surprise and, belatedly, to irritation as I
saw my guards rushing to my side. Dawdling fools, too slow to keep up
with my horse.
Instead of cowering and retreating back into the crowd, the young
villager stood his ground. My heart raced in alarm, but he showed no
sign of attacking, just stood there with a smile on his face. A rather
stupid smile, in fact, as if he had encountered a long-lost friend. My
curiosity piqued again. A simpleton? A village idiot—likely
banished from his own village for stupidity. He certainly looked the
part, from his disheveled straw-colored hair, to his simple linen shirt
and trousers, ragged as if he had been wearing them for months. And
yet, something about his smile held my gaze. I stopped my guards, ready
to trample the man, so that I could look at him just a moment longer.