Page 51 of Spinning Silver

Sergey nodded. Then he took the axe. “I will go break up some logs,” he said, and went out into the yard, even though it was dark. We needed more wood. We had not put any wood on the fire all day, but the box was almost empty.

I found the knitting lying on the cot. It felt different, and when I unfolded it, the piece was the same size as I had made, but it had all been done over from the beginning.

It had a pattern in it now, a beautiful design like a raised vine with flowers that I could feel with my fingers.

I had never seen anything like it except for sale in the market for money, and not so fine, either.

I unraveled some of it to try and see how the picture was made, but each line was so different, the stitches changed so much from one to another, and I couldn’t see how to remember which one was next.

Then I thought, of course, it was magic.

I took a stick out of the fireplace with one end charred, and I used the magic that Miryem had taught me.

I started at the beginning of the vine in the first row, and I counted how many of a stitch there was in a row, and I wrote down that number, and if it was a forward stitch, I put a mark above it, and if it was a backwards stitch, I put a mark below.

I had to make some other marks too, when stitches were brought together, or added.

I had to make my numbers small as if I were writing in Miryem’s book.

There were thirty rows all different before I came back to the first one.

But when I was done, I had the whole picture there on the floor, turned into numbers.

It looked very different. I was not sure I believed it could really be the same thing.

But I remembered how those little marks in Miryem’s book became silver and gold, and I took the knitting and I began to add on another row.

I did not look back at the picture while I worked.

I thought I had to trust the numbers. So I did, and I followed them, for all those thirty rows, and then I stopped and I looked at what I had done, and there were all the vines and leaves, just as beautiful, and I had made it. The magic had worked for me.

Sergey came back in, stamping off his feet. There was a dusting of white across his shoulders. He put his big armful of wood into the box, but it only filled it halfway. “I must go get more,” he said. “It is snowing again.”

“Are you warm enough, Stepon?” Panova Mandelstam asked me.

I said I was because however warm I was, that had to be warm enough, because there was nothing to do about it if I wasn’t.

I was in the best place in the sleigh, huddled between Panov and Panova Mandelstam under the blankets and furs, but I was getting colder the whole time.

At first I thought I was feeling so cold because Algis was there spying on us, but that wasn’t why.

It got colder and colder all that afternoon, and overhead there were dark grey clouds getting thicker and thicker.

We were not halfway to Vysnia when it finally began snowing.

It was only a little bit at the beginning, but then it began to come faster and faster, until we could not see what was in front of the horses’ heads.

After a while Panova Mandelstam said, “Perhaps we should stop at the next village for the rest of the night. It should not be far.”

But we did not come to any houses, even though the sleigh kept going a long time. “Algis,” Panov Mandelstam said to the driver finally, “are you sure we are still on the road?”

Algis hunched a little in his coats and darted a look back at us.

He didn’t say anything, but his face was scared.

So he knew he had lost the road. Sometime ago, when the road had turned, the horses had gone between two trees that were not on either side of the road, they were just far apart from each other.

The snow was covering the road and the bushes, so Algis had not noticed.

He had just kept going. Now we were lost in the forest. The forest was very big and there were not any houses in it away from the road and the river.

The Staryk killed anyone who made a house away from the river.

The horses were not going very fast anymore. They were tired and they plodded. Their big feet were digging into the new snow and they had to pull them up again each step. Soon they would stop. “What do we do?” I asked.

Algis had turned around again and was just sitting hunched over the reins.

Panov Mandelstam looked at his back, and then he said, “It is all right, Stepon. We will stop somewhere there is not too much wind and get the horses under blankets and give them their grain and any grass we can find. We will stay between them and under blankets and keep warm until it is light. Once the sun comes up we can tell where we are. I am sure you can find someplace good, Algis.”

Algis did not say anything, but in a little while he turned the horses’ heads and stopped near a very big tree.

If we did not know we were in the forest before, we knew then, because there were no trees so big anywhere near the road.

Someone would have cut it down to use it if it was close enough to get it out of the forest. It was as big across as one of the horses almost, and there was a rotting hole on one side of the tree that made a little sheltered hollow.

Panova Mandelstam and I held the reins of the horses while Panov Mandelstam and Algis stamped down the snow next to the tree and made a wall of snow around an open place.

Horses are much bigger than goats. I was a little scared of them, but I had to help hold them, and they only stayed still and did not jump like goats did, and I could tell they were very tired.

Finally we led the horses in the open place and then we took all the blankets from the sleigh and covered them with the blankets.

Panov Mandelstam took the bags out of the sleigh and put them in the little hollow, and then he helped Panova Mandelstam climb down from the sleigh and over the snow to sit on them.

Then he straightened up and looked at Algis. Algis was standing next to the back of the sleigh. His head was hanging. He said, low, “I didn’t fill the bucket.” He meant the grain bucket. So there was no food for the horses.

Panov Mandelstam didn’t say anything for a minute. The silence felt very long. Finally he said, “It is lucky this is a late snow. There will still be some fresh growth under. We must dig and get them some grass and whatever else we can find for them to eat.”

He was still kind, but I thought that he had not felt kind, and that was why he had been quiet.

I thought that meant he must be very worried.

So then I was very worried. I did my best to help to dig.

Because Panova Mandelstam had given me the boots, I could kick away snow and get down to the ground.

But it was mostly dry pine needles here under the big old tree.

We all went in different directions. “Do not go so far that you cannot see the big tree,” Panov Mandelstam told me. “The snow will cover your steps and you will not find the way back. Every ten steps turn around and look.”

The big tree was so big that I could see it for a long way.

I counted and looked every ten steps until I came to a place that was open to the sky.

There was a big dead tree under the snow making a lump.

It had been here and then it had fallen over.

Now there was an open place. I dug under the snow with my boots and a broken branch and I found some grass.

It was dying because of the snow, but it was not all the way dead, and also there was old dry grass under it.

I pulled up as much of it as I could get to.

It did not seem like a lot, but even a little bit of food is very good when you are very hungry.

I thought maybe it was the same for horses as people.

When I had an armful I carried it back. Panova Mandelstam had stayed with the horses.

She was petting their heads and singing to them softly.

Their heads were hanging low. She had given them water at least. I didn’t know where she had found water that wasn’t snow, but then I saw she was shivering and then I knew.

She had put snow into the water bucket and wrapped herself around it so it would melt for them.

I gave them each half of the grass I had found.

They did not start to eat it right away, but Panova Mandelstam took it and gave it to them by hand.

Then they ate, and they ate it all up very fast. Panov Mandelstam and Algis came back too.

They had not found any grass, but Algis had brought some wood to try to make a fire with.

It was wet and I didn’t think it would work to start a fire, though.

“There was more grass where I got this,” I said.

“I will go with him,” Algis said to Panov Mandelstam.

He still did not look up. I think he was ashamed he had gotten lost and had not filled the grain bucket, and now he was trying to say he was sorry.

I did not really want to listen to him saying sorry, but I couldn’t say I didn’t want him to come with me so we went back to the clearing.

Algis spread his topcoat out on the snow, and we dug up more grass until we made a big heap on top of the coat, and then Algis took the heap back while I kept finding more grass until he came back to help again.