Page 14 of The Bone Doll (The Ruthenian Chronicle #1)

The Screamer

Viktor was already buttoning his caftan when Syra opened her eyes. She stared at him a long moment, trying to reconcile the warmth in her bed and the almost fully-dressed man before her.

“Zoldrovya is three days south of here.” He adjusted his sleeves, avoiding her gaze. “I’ll help Yefrem pack the supplies.”

She cocked her head to the side. No Sarnok man would sleep chastely beside his new woman, wake up, and simply get dressed. Was that a Ruthenian habit? Or was it only Viktor?

“Why did you touch it?” she asked, wishing he would stay.

Viktor went still, his hands frozen midway through buckling his belt. Then, as though making a conscious effort, he continued. “Your door was open. I thought perhaps you were awake. But you were asleep and the Bone Doll was … moving.”

Her hairs stood on end. “You should have left.”

Viktor looked stricken as though he couldn’t fathom the thought of leaving her in the room with the half-sentient Bone Doll. The pang in her chest sharpened. He cared about her in a way she had never expected.

“The Bone Doll called you.” Syra climbed off the bed and padded towards him. It called her family, her clan members. It gave them nightmares. It lured the youngest children and the animals away from camp. Now, it was doing the same to Viktor. “It will try again. You have to resist it.”

“It’s three more days to Zoldrovya,” he said. “I’ll be careful.”

“And on the return journey,” Syra said. “You will be the one to take me back, right?”

“Of course,” he said with one of his odd smiles. “But you will need to defeat the leshy first.”

Syra knew that Viktor preferred the road, but she didn’t like the idea of staying in Zoldrovya while he went off on more errands. “Will you stay with me, in Zoldrovya, while I bind the forest spirit?”

His smile faltered. “I will, at the beginning. But I … may be pulled away.” He turned from her. “I should pack.”

Syra wanted to reach out and hold him. But it was pointless.

Whether they left now or this afternoon, they would still arrive at Zoldrovya in the end.

Whether she had enough power to bind the leshy or not, she would return to the tundra.

And Viktor would return to his solitary travels.

Holding him here wouldn’t change any of that.

Besides, he didn’t seem to want to stay.

She stared at the door after he left.

Enough moping, she told herself. She dressed in the plain, gray clothes left for her, grateful they weren’t as heavy as her now too-warm reindeer hides. She tucked the Bone Doll into the heavily scuffed belt purse before heading downstairs.

After breaking their fast with Yefrem, eating white bread and fresh eggs, she and Viktor left the old man and the stone house behind.

They walked in silence through the city of Beluvod, which was alive and swarming like a hornets’ nest just like the day before, then through miles of fields where men and women were burying seeds in the dirt.

And finally, by late afternoon, the road returned them to the forest.

Though different from the tundra’s wide expanses, the forest calmed Syra with its quiet. And it was beautiful with its shades of blue, gray, and green. After Beluvod’s cacophony, returning to the solitude of nature felt like the sweet music of a reed flute.

“This road goes from Beluvod to the great city of Khirzan,” Viktor said, “which is where the Grand Prince lives. More than 60,000 people live there, not including the serfs and peasants living outside the walls.”

Beluvod was already impossibly large. A larger city was simply unfathomable. Syra shook her head in disbelief. “Have you been there?”

He shook his head. “I’ve been to Rodgorod in the north, but I have not gone very far south or west.”

“This is very south,” she said.

“Compared to the tundra, I suppose it is,” he said with an easy smile. “I should go. I’ve heard that Khirzan has an emporia unlike any other, where Bolghar, Skanians, Greshkaya, Abbasids, Tang’ans, and even Makurians come to trade…”

Syra stopped listening as her belt purse twitched. The Bone Doll. It jerked harder this time, making her belt cut into her hips. And then it began whispering in a language all its own, its voice urgent. Fear settled in her stomach like a block of ice.

“Viktor–” she began, just as his stride faltered.

“Do you hear that?” he asked.

The air hung still.

Then, an unearthly scream shook the forest. Syra covered her ears as the sound pierced into her bones; and, a step ahead, Viktor staggered. By the time the scream stopped, Syra was nauseous, her ears ringing.

It came from behind.

A great force pulled Syra’s pack, hauling her backwards.

Her backside struck the dirt and she was dragged across the road, into the thicket, through the trees.

She thrashed, trying to get away, but her pack’s straps trapped her arms. Something tore in her shoulder, radiating pain down her arm and into her chest. Crying out in pain, she caught a glimpse of the creature attacking her – a hairless, bone-thin monster with long limbs.

The thing screamed again; and Syra’s vision blurred as her bones turned to liquid fire.

Everything turning fuzzy, Syra felt for her knife. If she cut herself free…

A black form launched from the forest. Viktor. A knife gleaming in his hand.

He slashed the beast across its forearm in a spray of inky black blood. The creature dropped Syra and rounded on him. Its head was unnaturally large for its thin body, its face a wrinkled mass of skin. It screamed, the force of its voice visible as it knocked Viktor off his feet.

Her entire body throbbing, Syra cut herself free from her pack and then crawled a few inches away. She tried to recite her grandfather’s chant, but she couldn’t hear anything over the creature’s scream. The Bone Doll jerked again. She ripped open her belt purse.

As her fingers closed around the doll, the world went dark.

And then exploded in blue light.

The source of the blue light was … her. It was as though Syra hung in the sky, watching her body below.

The Bone Doll clasped in her fist, she hovered above the ground as bright blue light spilled from her mouth and eyes.

Syra – or her body – turned towards the screaming creature.

Her body snarled incoherent words, the blue light frothing from her lips, and the beast recoiled.

Her arm raised, holding the Bone Doll above her head.

And then the monster fled.

The light vanished like a candle’s flame that had been blown out, and Syra’s body crumpled. Then Syra was falling. All the way from the sky. She opened her eyes – in her body – and gasped.

Viktor knelt beside her, concern painted across his features as he cradled her head. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” Or at least Syra thought she was. Nothing hurt – not even her shoulder – and the Bone Doll lay on the ground just out of arm’s reach. She sat up. “You saved me.”

“That thing grabbed you,” he said. “And I almost lost sight of you. And then I thought that thing was going to kill me. And then you were glowing.” Viktor clasped her face between his hands. “Fuck, I was so worried.”

Then, he kissed her.

His fingers tangled in her hair as he cupped the back of her head; and Syra let him drink his fill from her mouth.

She ran her hands up his chest, relishing the feel of his lean muscle; and he groaned.

Viktor’s free hand slipped beneath her tunic, his thumb tracing shimmering circles against her skin.

“I want you,” she whispered as he trailed kisses down her throat.

Syra witnessed something inside Viktor break. His brow furrowed as though she had both destroyed and rebuilt him in the same breath. He kissed her again, slowly this time and deep as though offering a piece of himself.

“You’re beautiful,” he said when he came up for air, tracing the shape of her lips.

“Are you trying to flatter me?” she said, her tone half-teasing and half-needy.

He groaned, bending his head to her neck. His mouth was warm, his teeth gently as he nibbled her delicate skin. And then he found her mouth again, kissing her so hard that she forgot where she ended and he began. She wrapped her arms around him and held him tight.

And they kissed and kissed and kissed – a tangle of mouths and hands and moans – until they both came up gasping for air.

The air smelled of fallen leaves and spring flowers; and the birds were twittering away around them. Syra couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this good. But all good things came to an end. Kissing him one last time, she stood and then helped him to his feet.