Page 15 of The Bone Doll
“I didn’t mean anything by it,” he continued apologizing dumbly. “I just meant you shouldn’t be alone in this world.”
Her posture eased, her features softening. “I’m not alone. I have my parents, my siblings, my nephew, my clan…”
And I took them all from you.Viktor nodded, letting his shoulders slump.Hewas the one who was alone. The one who wanted someone to protect, to hold. Syra didn’t need him. She just wanted to go home.
“Once you’ve subdued theleshy, I’ll take you home,” he lied because he knew it was what she wanted to hear. And he wished then that he was someone else, someone good, so that he didn’t have to lie to make her happy.
Chapter 10
Star Souls
Syra sat on a retaining wall, watching a puppeteer perform. She had never seen anything quite like it; and, though she didn’t recognize the story, she was delighted by the puppets, which were made from multicolored paper and sticks and decorated with fabric and glass beads. The puppeteer played out a story of a knight who went to slay a giant but befriended him instead.
Viktor came to lean against the wall beside her, and she was a bit surprised to realize that she was no longer frustrated by his presence. When had that changed?
“That’s the story of the knight Ilya and the giant Sviatagor,” Viktor said. “It’s one of my favorites.”
“Do you have any stories without knights?” she asked.
“Plenty.” He crossed one ankle over the other and folded his arms across his chest in an easy, relaxed pose. “But my favorites have knights.”
The puppeteer finished with a flourish of streamers on sticks and a magnificent puppet in golden armor. Then, the crowd tossed coins into his hat. Viktor slipped forward to hand the man a silver coin before resuming his position against the retaining wall. His hair gleamed like copper in the fading light, and Syra found remembering how he had given her clan most of his supplies.
Viktor fidgeted with his belt purse. “I meant to give this to you earlier.”
Syra frowned at the strand of beads that dangled from his fingers. The beads were fine and detailed, just like the bone, antler, and ivory jewelry the Sarnok wore. The Sarnok didn’t use glass, so she was surprised at how much it looked like colored ice. Itwasbeautiful. But that didn’t explain why Viktor was showing it to her.
She squinted at the necklace and then him. “What is it?”
“Just something I found.” In the gray-blue twilight, she could not tell if he blushed, but he did start smoothing the front of his caftan with his free hand. “I know you didn’t want to come, and this hasn’t been an easy journey. I thought maybe this would be something good. That came from Ruthenia.”
Syra sucked on her lower lip. Part of her was touched. The other part insisted this wasn’t what it seemed. “You don’t need to bribe–”
“It’s a gift.” Viktor’s voice grew more insistent. “It made me think of you. That’s all. Will you take it?”
She remembered lying on the floor of Aron Iosifovich’s home in Bereza, so homesick that she couldn’t sleep. He had scooched closer, warming her, and told her the story of Dobrynya and thezmey, lulling her to sleep. He could be sweet. Maybe that was what this was: sweet.
Syra held out her hand.
Viktor looked at her expectantly and then cleared his throat. “May I put it on you?”
Syra nodded and felt a strange ache in her chest. Undoing the first button of her coat, she pushed back her hood and collar. Viktor slipped the beaded strand around her neck, tying it in the back. He was swift, and he was proper. But he did not wear his gloves, and even the slightest brush of his fingertips sent heat crackling across her skin.
Viktor stepped back and seemed to look at everything but Syra.
“It’s … not ugly,” she said, letting the cool glass soothe her suddenly too-hot skin.
“Thanks,” he said. “I tried to avoid the ugliest ones.”
She had no gift for him – none that she had planned – so she thought quickly. Unbuttoning the rest of her coat, she slipped her hand into one of the interior pockets. There, she found a knife barely the length of her palm that her father had carved from bone. “Here.”
He held a hand up, his palm facing her. “There’s no need.”
“I want you to have it,” she said. “It is meant for gutting fish.”
“Practical.” He took it and turned it over in his hands, examining the workmanship. “I gut so many fish.”
Her lips quirked, and she almost smiled. “I can tell.”
