Page 67 of Spring's Arcana
A simple piece of lined paper, three holes for a binder’s rings on its side, like a schoolchild might use. Written upon it in a fair, likewise schoolgirl hand were highway and exit numbers. He glanced at the end—some no-name town in South Dakota; at least she hadn’t been lying.
Did this girl even know how to mislead? Even her silences were telling.
“That where it is?”
“That’s step one,” she corrected, still cautious but not quite fearful. “Whoever’s there will tell me the next step, I guess.”
“Your mama took no chances.”
“Yeah, well.” The paper quivered. “Do you want it or not?”
“Got it right here now.” He tapped at his temple with two fingers, and returned his itching, aching, burning hands to the yoke. The car, sensing its true speed might be called upon soon, gave another restless thrumming mutter. “So, we get there before she die, what you gonna do?”
The paper retreated; the girl folded it again, sliding it into that silly kid’s backpack. If she was going to learn to lie, well, now was a good time.
Instead, thezaikazipped the bag closed and hugged it again, her gaze fixed out the windshield. The farther she got from Mascha, the more the process of burning away the dross of rube camouflage would accelerate. It was already well underway, and no doubt Matchenka felt it in the root of her own being, a terrible draining lassitude gaining speed, the thing that made her what she was slipping away bit by bit.
She’d held on this long, though. A will of iron had Maria Drozdova, very much like Dima himself. Her daughter was too soft; it was going to get her killed.
Those who eathad noticed this tempting meal. He could feel the pursuit, their blind, grasping, maggoty interest.
Not his problem, right? His knuckles were white again and he exhaled, the car leaping forward now that it knew its true destination. A low roar like a plane’s breath curled away on either side and the ride smoothed, the road shaking off a crust of ice as it arrowed west. Indiana’s pavement arteries unreeled while the light took on a strange depthless cast.
Chasing the sunset could even be fun. It wasn’t like the thiefways, but he would not take the girlthere.
Not unless forced to.
“I don’t know,” hiszaikafinally said, softly. “If I take it to de Winter it saves Mom—ifBaba’s telling the truth. But she stole it from you. Right?”
“Took it from Baba’s cabinet.”
“But if it’s stolen, don’t you…” She trailed off, stealing a little sideways glance at him. The trepidation might have been pleasant, on another day.
“Some things not so simple.” Normally a stolen item would cry out to him in its own deep, brazen, wordless voice, but the turning of seasons was an even more powerful force than greed, and Mascha had hidden the item well.
It rankled to have to admit as much, even if only to himself.
“Did it hurt?”
What kind of a fucking question was that? “Life hurts,zaika. Any other stupid questions?”
“I guess not.” She huddled as far away from him as possible, almost pressing against the door. He tried to imagine being raised as a rube and thrust into the first stages of incarnation when your mother sickened, tried to imagine a rube threading through one of Koschei’s little traps, a young rube girl meeting the Cold Lady and seeing the Elysium for the first time, not to mention facing down Friendly and climbing into a car with Dima himself.
A brave little bunny, and what did that make him? Shame was familiar to some of his nephews, but he didn’t like its bite.
“Stop cringing,” he spat, harshly. “You toughen up, andstop cringing. Or you die before you bloom, and then neither of us get what we want.”
“You want to kill me anyway.”
“Not before the right time.”Whenever that is.His irritation mounted another notch. “Let me ask you something, little girl. You think Maria Drozdova would do this for you, huh? Littlezaikain hospital bed, you think dear little mamma get in car with Dima and go riding to fetch what she stole?Doyou?”
He waited, but she said nothing. A tightly closed rosebud, refusing to peek its petals free while frost was still thick on stem and leaf. The car took another deep breath and arrowed forward, rising over a slight hill; the glitter of Indianapolis blurred on the northwest horizon.
A nice town, but they were going to drive straight through. Thehunting-thrill was upon him now, and the emptiness behind his strong flexible ribs twitched.
What would it be like to hold that bloody gem in his fist again? To feel that pulse, the warmth that had left him when Baba shook her head and closed her own thin, iron-strong fingers inside his bony chest-cage with that sickening, tearing sound? To feel the black ice settling in his bones again as his adopted land ceased its struggle to eject or remake him, but also to feel… what?
When he stole a hateful glance at the girl—for no real reason, he told himself, just to check if she was about to do something stupid like open the door and spill out onto the freeway—she had closed her eyes, and there might have been a damp gleam on her soft, lucent cheek. She hugged her idiotic backpack like a baby with a rag doll, and why, in the name of every fucking divinity, power, principality, or other Endless Being, would Maschka have raised her daughter like a rube?
