C. Cherryh - Yvgenie

“Ilyana,” he began.

“Hush,” Ilyana said fiercely, without looking up: his next breath stopped in his throat, while the quill continued its furious course.

He had never thought he would long for Owl or the black Thing that had hissed at him—but no matter it had spat and hissed and bared its teeth every time it got close to him, so long as Babi had been there, they had been safe. And they were not, now. So long as Owl was with them, Chernevog loved—not Owl, precisely: Owl knew nothing about love, but Owl was saner than the wolf, he was sure of that.

Perhaps it was an answer to the wolf Ilyana sought—he saw how frightened she looked, how desperately she clutched the edge of the book and turned pages—looking for some spell, perhaps, some incantation to banish that drifting shadow from the brush, where it circled their fire.

He rested his elbows on his knees, his locked hands before his lips.

He saw it—passing at the very edge of the firelight, not so terrible as the wolf of his imaginings: thin, rather, lank and furtive—

“It’s out there,” he said. And Ilyana said nothing. He could hear the scratch of the quill above the wind in the leaves.

His father’s hounds had killed a servant boy once—torn him in pieces. That night the same dogs had sat at the great fireplace beside his father’s chair, great black beasts that feared his father, no less than the servants did—

Wolves in the woods—hunting him down an aisle of thorns.

Hate, and fear, and never help from anyone—until—

Trees moved like living things. Vines writhed like snakes and crept across gray, weathered stone—

A fair-haired little girl walked precariously along a streamside, a little girl who would look up any instant and say, with a glance to fill up all the empty spots—

“Who are you?”

Threatening question. Important question. He had been hiding in the woods. A terrible lady would find him and take him to her house. She had Ilyana’s face. Or Ilyana would have hers someday. But for now Ilyana was a little girl who walked balancing on the water’s edge—lonely, too, he was sure, though lonely did not always mean harmless.

He was on a porch, at a door of a house he knew, and Ilyana opened it—of course: it was her house the lady had sent him to find and it was Ilyana’s father the lady aimed at— a fierce, unforgiving wizard, who lectured him about honesty, and wanted things of him the way the lady did—

But he would not, could not give himself or his trust to anyone again. The lady held him. The lady made demands on him. He stole the old man’s book and searched it for secrets that might free him or save him—before the old man caught him at it.

Ilyana wanted him back, Ilyana or Eveshka or Draga, the images tumbled over and over in his memory—fair-haired child or girl or woman, all alike. Ilyana wanted him to a meeting, wanted him to face her father, trust her father—

He had drowned Ilyana. Or was it Draga? He could not remember. The wolf was there again, in the brush—he saw it staring at them.

If Ilyana would scream, if she would move, he might move—if she would say, Yvgenie, help me—he might have strength enough. But nothing moved, except the wind among the leaves. His joints were locked, his jaw would not move or let out a sound—

He could only remember he had killed her, or would kill her, to save himself. He bit his lip until the pain could bring sense back and he could recall the bathhouse, and the way back to what he knew. He remembered the hunters, and Ilyana, and Vojvoda—

He remembered his mother, and his nurse—a fat, comfortable woman who had told him about wizards and wolves, and flying houses. But that did not agree with being lost in the woods, or living in that terrible house with Ilyana. His house had had tall pillars. Dogs, not wolves, slept at the door. And he had never met Ilyana until he had come to her house to be betrothed to her, but he had ridden to Vojvoda, because they were hunting her to kill her—for wizardry—and murders—

Both could not be true, god, he could not remember both at once. Draga’s wolf circled their fire, while Ilyana wrote by firelight, the way Draga would…

“You take this,” her father told her, and put a packet of something in her hand. “Salt and sulfur. You put it in a ring about you and Sasha, and you stay inside that ring no matter what and don’t trust anything you see, no matter if it looks like me, or Yvgenie, or anyone else you know.”

“Why?” Nadya asked.

“Shapeshifters. Vodyaniye. Trust Babi. And take care of him.” With a glance toward Sasha, and to her again: “Tell him where I’m going and tell him—” He hesitated, with a second worried glance and a shake of his head. “You don’t have to tell him. He knows things like that. Just take care of him. He doesn’t remember to do that himself.”

He’s a wizard, Nadya thought. What kind of wizard is he that he needs people to take care of him?

Her father turned his back to her. Her father was going after his legitimate daughter and Yvgenie, alone, because somebody, he said, had to look after Sasha till he waked, and because the other horse was too old and too fat, and the black one could not make any speed carrying her. She knew that he was right, and that she was no help but here. But his saying tell Sasha this and tell Sasha that upset her stomach He should tell Sasha when he had found Yvgenie and his daughter and come back—because she was not through talking to him, please the god. He knew the important things about her. She knew nothing about him.

She thought—I should at least tell him I want him to come back, I should at least hug him goodbye—it’s not lucky, him saying those things…

But he was in the saddle before she had quite made up ha mind, and then it was too late. He looked down at her, said, “If everything else fails, there’s a house south of here, on the river. No one comes there.”

And while she was wondering what house, and what he meant, he turned the horse’s head and rode away, fading quickly into the dark outside the fire.

A shadow fell across the page. Ilyana looked up at Yvgenie’s dark shape between her and the fire, and he said quietly, kneeling and taking her hand:

“Ilyana, put the book away. Please. You’re coming no closer to the truth.”

“You’re eavesdropping!”

A lowering of lashes—a glance up at her: Yvgenie’s eyes, pale and deep and gentle. Kavi’s unmistakable gesture. And the motion of Yvgenie’s hands to lips and heart and to her. I love you. To brow and to heart, frowning. I’m worried. It was the old way of talking. Maybe it was the one he found easiest now. And he was as silent as only her uncle could be, not a whisper of his being there the moment she accused him.

“Sasha’s very good,” he said ever so softly. “And very strong. He scares himself. And that’s good. A little fear will save you so much pain.”

Sweat glistened on Yvgenie’s face. A bead broke and ran. “Kavi—is that truly your name?”

A nod.

“Is it so hard to speak?”

A second nod. A gesture toward his heart, with a hand visibly trembling. “He can’t last much longer. He has to rest. Just a little farther, Ilyana, and then we can all rest…”

One did not like this idea of resting when a ghost said it. But looking into his eyes this close made her think how it felt to touch him and to be touched, and one wished—

—one wished, that was the trouble, when a wizard loved a ghost: one wanted, and one could have, and if it were not for Yvgenie’s gentle, distressed look to warn her she would not even be thinking no, this is wrong, this is dangerous. He looked so dreadfully upset—

“Please don’t,” Yvgenie asked her, “please don’t.” And after that, taking her hand in his, on the open book that nobody was ever to touch but her, “He loves you. He loves you very much, Ilyana, and he’s very scared, and something’s dreadfully w-wrong tonight. We’re going somewhere dangerous—and he’s trying to t-tell you—I don’t think he’s ever loved anything in his life but Owl, and he loves you so much he doesn’t want you to go on with this. He wants you just to go home to your father and not to try to help him anymore. Please. He can’t—can’t—go any farther with this—”