The Shining Falcon

Maria giggled in spite of herself. «But if Svyatoslav finds out…»

«How can he? The prince has no idea how many or how few of us there are. He can't put us all in prison, not when he's given a working estate to his pet boyar.» Sasha grinned triumphantly. «I didn't know when you'd get out of the city. The gossip told me mat you hadn't been caught. So I hid the rig and waited. Old Brownie here's a sensible nag, not the sort to carry on or try to go wandering off.»

«Sasha," Danilo said softly, «we can't repay you for this.»

«You already did.» The man's eyes were suddenly solemn. «Took me in that day, years back, remember? When no one else wanted a boy who'd been called a thief? Only thing left to me would have been outlawry. Or maybe starvation.»

«You weren't a thief.»

«That I wasn't.» Sasha stirred suddenly, staring earnestly up at Danilo. «But now, you're sure you know how to get there?»

«Your directions were very clear.»

«Well. They're all dead and gone on that farm, remember. No one's going to come claiming it. And no one's going to know to look for you there, either. The tools and seed and all should keep you going till it's safe to come home.» Sasha hesitated, uneasy. «I hate to be just leaving you like this.»

«Nonsense, man. You have your wife and family to concern you. God be with you, Sasha.»

«And with you, master, mistresses. And with you.»

The trail they were following was just barely wide enough for the wagon, and for a time Danilo was too busy keeping them from getting stuck to be very talkative. But at last the trail joined up with a road that, muddy and full of ruts though it was, was a marvel of smoothness and width by comparison. Maria cleared her throat.

«Ah, Father?»

«Mm?»

«Where are we going?»

«Sasha, bless his kind and clever soul, told me all about a place where we should be safe. It's an old farm; the owners died some twenty years back, leaving no heirs. No one else ever moved in. Till now.» He shot his daughter a wry glance. «How do you fancy yourself as a farmer's daughter?»

Better than as an orphan! But she kept that thought to herself. «I know we've got seed, and the tools to plant it. But what are we gong to do about anything else?»

«There's supposed to be a small village about a day's journey from the farm, a 'mind your own business' sort of place, where we'll be able to get whatever we need without anyone asking awkward questions.» He shook the reins at Brownie, who'd taken advantage of the conversation to snatch a mouthful of leaves. «We'll manage. After all, this is just a temporary setback. Svyatoslav may be stubborn, but he'll come to his senses soon enough. And then we'll be able to come home.»

Did he really believe that? Maria glanced at her father, but his impassive face gave no clue to his thoughts, no clue at all.

* * *

It had been a long and torturous journey, even with stops every now and then to rest the horse and their own aching bones. It had been a frightening journey, too, what with never knowing whether someone from Stargorod might have picked up their trail, and never knowing whether they might simply lose themselves forever in this apparently endless forest. Vasilissa was no help, convinced that dark woodland magic was all about them. And who knew but that this time she might be right?

But at last Danilo said with some relief, «Ah. This has to be the riven birch Sasha mentioned. The trail we want should be just beyond it… Yes.» He glanced wryly at Maria and said, too softly for Lissa to overhear, «Know why the forest hasn't engulfed it? Sasha told me the farmers who cleared it had sworn pacts with the forest. And so the forest Folk, instead of turning the trail into part of their everchanging mazes, let it remain. Even, as the poets say, unto this day.» He eyed the overgrown way dubiously. «More or less, at any rate. I think we can still get the wagon through here. Hold fast, daughters! A short way, and we'll be arriving at our new home.''

The three of them got slowly and stiffly down from the wagon, staring. For a long time there was silence.

«You mean that's it?» asked Maria faintly.

What more could have been expected after twenty years of neglect? It might have been a neat little farm at one time, but the forest had gone a good way towards reclaiming it. What had been a wooden palisade was now only so much sagging, splintered kindling. Within it, a tangled wilderness might once have been a garden. What outbuildings there'd been had pretty much caved in. The farmhouse itself, being of good, sturdy logs, seemed to have suffered the least, though there were shingles gone from the roof and vines twining up the walls. An empty doorway gaped forbiddingly.

Silence fell once more. Maria, heartsick, glanced back at her father and sister. And what she saw there made her spirits sink even lower. Vasilissa's face was ashen, as might have been expected, her stance that of the proud but doomed, also as might have been expected. But Danilo—