Dan Smith - Red Winter

‘So you’ve been travelling a long time?’ I asked Lev as he spooned soup into the bowls. It looked to be full of turnip and pieces of dried fish, but not much else.

‘You could say that.’ He pushed a bowl of salt towards me and I took a pinch for my soup before tearing a piece of bread.

‘And that’s all you’re going to tell me?’ I asked, lifting the spoon to my mouth.

‘Who’s Koschei?’ Anna asked.

Her words took me by surprise and the hot soup caught in my throat, making me cough and bringing tears to my eyes.

‘He’s from a story, my angel, a skazka . And don’t pry,’ her father told her, as he pushed away from the table and went to the cabinet.

‘But you asked as if he was someone real,’ she went on. ‘Who is he?’

Lev came back from the cabinet carrying a bottle and two small bowls that served as cups.

‘I can see she obeys your every command.’ I smiled.

Lev sighed and shook his head as he uncorked the bottle, pouring a small amount of the clear liquid into each cup before pushing one towards me. ‘Just like her mother. If I said “shaved”, she’d say “cut”.’ He looked across at Anna with the strongest expression of love I had seen for close to six months.

‘I used to say the same thing about my wife.’ I smiled again and lifted the cup to sniff at it. ‘Vodka?’

‘Or something like it.’ He put his close to his lips and looked over at me. ‘So what do we drink to?’

‘A safe night.’

Lev nodded. ‘A safe night.’

The vodka burned as it went down, warming my chest, and I took a deep breath to feel its full effect. When I put the cup down, Lev had drained his too, so he refilled them both.

‘So who’s Koschei?’ Anna leaned forward and watched me, expecting an answer.

‘Your mother never told her the stories?’ I asked.

Lev tore a piece of bread. ‘She died.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Typhus,’ he said.

I sat back and put down my spoon.

‘No. A long time ago,’ he said. ‘Just after Anna was born. She knew all the stories, but I can never remember them. All I remember is that Koschei’s soul was on the island of Buyan, inside an egg that was inside some other animal inside a chest… or something like that. You had to find his death to kill him.’

‘That’s one of the stories,’ I said. ‘He’s in more than one.’

‘Do you have children?’ Anna asked.

‘I have two sons.’

‘Then you’ll know the stories. Tell me one.’ She tried her soup once more, but it was still too hot for her, so she left the spoon in the bowl and sat back, crossing her arms.

‘It doesn’t always work like that,’ Lev said, watching me. ‘Perhaps Kolya has been away from home for a while…’

‘I have,’ I admitted, ‘but I still remember bits and pieces.’

‘Then tell me one,’ Anna said.

‘I’m no storyteller. That was always…’ My words caught in my throat and I stopped myself from finishing. Storytelling had always been Marianna’s love – that’s what I was going to say, but a flood of emotions had surged with that thought and threatened to overcome me. In the warmth of the small house, with the lamp burning, and sitting with Lev and Anna, I couldn’t help but remember the way Marianna told the stories to the boys, the way she revelled in the telling and they delighted in the hearing. The old skazkas . Mama and Babushka had both loved those stories, always filled with princes and princesses, witches and wives and devils and some poor peasant wandering back from the tavern.

‘Please.’ Anna shuffled on her seat.

When she had come into the house, she had removed her cap and jacket, making her look smaller. She had a slight, boyish frame draped in a shirt that was too big for her – or perhaps it had once been a perfect fit. Her skin was as white as the delicate flowers of the thimbleweed that rose from the forest floor in spring, and while there were dark circles under her green eyes, there was also the sparkle of a bright young girl burning in them. The plait in her hair had loosened further, strands protruding in all directions, and there was a look about her that suggested Lev had done the best he could for her, given their circumstances.

‘Have you heard about Marya Morevna?’ I asked.

Anna shook her head.

I dipped my bread in the soup and took a bite. I chewed it well, tasting every crumb, savouring the heat of it as I tried to remember the story.

All eyes were on me. Waiting. Expecting. Marianna would have enjoyed this. She would have drawn it out, turned down the lamp, leaned in to the table and lowered her voice. I saw her now, her blue eyes sparkling, the lamplight glistening on her golden hair, her fine features alive with the pictures she painted with words. I was no match for her in this, but I looked at each of them in turn as I finished the bread and ran my tongue round my teeth.

‘A long time ago,’ I said, ‘there was a prince. Ivan, he was called, and he was young and bold, as princes always are in the stories, and he had three beautiful sisters with shining black hair. But the tsar and his queen were ill, and as they lay dying, they made Ivan promise to look after his sisters and make sure they married well. He agreed, of course, and when they died, they died happy, knowing Ivan would take care of their daughters. Ivan and his sisters buried their mother and father in the palace grounds, and on the way back, a great storm arose. Black clouds covered the sky, and lightning flashed. Ivan and his sisters hurried home, and when they arrived in the great hall, there was a huge clap of thunder and a falcon flew into the room. When it landed, it turned into a handsome prince, who asked for one of the princesses in marriage. Ivan thought he was a good man, so he agreed.’

‘Princes and princesses,’ Anna said with disdain. ‘I want to know about Koschei.’

‘We haven’t come to him yet,’ I told her, taking another bite of bread. ‘We have to get past the princes and princesses first. You want me to stop?’

Anna shook her head.

I waited, recalling the story, and when I was ready, I hunched lower to the table and began speaking in a quieter voice. ‘So, three years in a row, three different princes came in a clap of thunder and a flash of lightning – first as a falcon, then as an eagle, then as a raven – and each time, Ivan sent his sisters away to get married. When they were all gone, he was left alone in the palace.’

‘Does that mean he was the tsar now?’

‘I suppose it does,’ I said. ‘Does that matter?’

Anna screwed up her mouth and thought. ‘Aren’t the tsars bad?’

‘You’re a revolutionary?’ I asked, and the image of a branded red star flashed in my mind.

‘Not really.’

‘Well. In this story, the tsars are good.’

Across the table, Lev held up his cup. ‘Your health.’

I lifted my own. ‘And yours.’

We drank and Lev refilled the cups as I continued. I was feeling good now. The izba was warm, the soup was nourishing, and the vodka was softening my thoughts.

‘So Prince Ivan was alone in the palace,’ I said.

‘That wouldn’t be so bad.’ Anna looked around. ‘Better than here.’

‘Better than without your family?’ I asked.

She looked into her bowl and took a spoonful of soup, blowing on it before tasting.

‘So he decided to go travelling,’ I said, ‘to visit his sisters. Only, the first thing he came across was a battlefield and a whole army lying dead on the steppe. Bodies everywhere. But he found one man alive among them, just one, and when he asked who had done this—’

‘Koschei?’ Anna asked.

‘No,’ I told her. ‘Not yet. The man told Ivan that the fair princess Marya Morevna had done it.’