Page 11 of The Maiden and Her Monster

Aleksi craned his head to look back, a lazy smile on his face. “You’re in quite the rush to die if what you say about these woods is true, Malka. Is my company that bad?”

Some of us have a lot to lose, she would have said if she were braver.

Malka’s only indication of time was the increasing ache in her feet and the numbness of her reddened nose.

“The forest was not always like this,” Amnon said, breaking the silence. He watched the shimmer of wind brush the blackened leaves, his eyes glazed over by the cold.

Malka knew the phrase well, having uttered it over and over to herself.

When the shektal filled with visitors, Eskraven villagers expressed the same sentiment to the southern travelers.

The forest was not always like this, they would claim.

It didn’t matter to the southerners, who were happy if they acquired their Valonian furs for a good barter price.

Mavetéh didn’t take their girls. The Yahad kept the phrase close.

Perhaps it kept the memory of the past alive, dragging its existence into the present.

Maybe they said the phrase over and over again to make it true.

The forest was not always like this. The forest was not always like this. The forest was not always like this.

She uttered the phrase now as the wind blew a foul odor through the trees.

“Do you think there are dybbukim here, Malka?” Amnon asked, his voice wavering on the word.

Malka tucked her arms around her waist. The idea of restless spirits did nothing to keep her calm. But with the body count Mavetéh racked up, it was hard to believe there weren’t dybbukim waiting for warm bodies to inhabit.

The woods were restless and cold—the same way all stories of dybbukim began.

A person walking through the woods only to be met with an untimely end.

So untimely, they had not yet made peace with their wrongs.

They had not doused themselves in white and atoned, or serviced themselves to make amends for their sins.

Thus, a restless spirit was birthed from their death and climbed into the body of another living soul.

Malka had wondered if Chaia became a dybbuk, forced into death too early. But Chaia did not leave her sins to fester; did not hold guilt close as Malka did. She was steadfast in her decisiveness, no matter the consequences. There would be no unforgiven sins to which the dybbuk could cling.

Perhaps Malka’s bravery to find the Rayga budded from her friendship with Chaia.

Václav stopped abruptly and jumped off his horse. He handed the reins to Aleksi. “Hold him, will you? Gotta piss.”

“It smells like someone did already,” Aleksi remarked, scrunching his nose.

Václav disappeared behind the trees.

The wind blew stronger, and Malka recoiled from the rancid odor. She covered her nose with the back of her hand.

Aleksi lifted his cloak above his nose. “What is that smell?”

Malka had an idea, and desperately wanted to be wrong. But the wind further carried the scent, and she couldn’t deny it, like rotted meat and the sickly sweetness of fruit.

Decay.

A crash rang through the woods, and Václav grunted from behind the trees.

Aleksi cursed and jumped off the horse, abandoning the reins as he jogged toward Václav.

Malka moved to follow, but Amnon halted her. “Malka, we’re not here to protect them, as they sure as hell won’t protect us.”

Malka shrugged out of his grip. “I don’t think the threat is a live one, Amnon.”

When he came into sight, Václav was on his knees, his metal armor covered in muck and… blood.

Bile pooled in her throat. Dead bodies rose from the ground like half-raked plants.

Their limbs twisted in unnatural angles; intestines strewn across the ground like snakes.

Dried blood caked their remaining skin, mixed with earth and secretion.

On the still intact skin were bite marks near missing limbs, the rough cut of flesh and the white bone visible among the wreckage.

There must’ve been four or five of them, though Malka couldn’t be sure.

The putrid scent of their rotting flesh soured the air.

Amnon doubled over and retched. But Malka scanned her eyes over the bodies, looking for any signs of Chaia—her silk brown hair, her round face, the scar on the palm of her hand she had had since birth.

She whispered a soft prayer. Do not let her be here, she begged. Do not let me find her body here. Her mind fogged with rot and grief. It had been a year since Chaia had disappeared, and the truth was she would be long past recognition by now, just bones pasted with lingering dried tissue.

Despite knowing that, she still searched.

There was no familiarity among the dead women. I would know her even here. She said it the same way the villagers talked about the forest. I would know, I would know, I would know. If she said it enough, it would be true.

Malka shuddered thinking what the night held in store. If Mavetéh stole girls once the sun set, she did not have much time left before the Rayga would come for her. She needed to come for it first.

“There is a man here,” Aleksi remarked, crossing himself. “An Ozmini man.”

Malka examined the bodies again. He was right. The Rayga had not only killed the women, but a man, too. Ozmini, denoted by the array of prayer beads on the ground. Rzepka was not the first Ozmin the Rayga had taken.

And the attack had been recent; the bodies were still bloated with gas, feasted on by insects. Their intestines recognizable.

“Do you think the Church knows about this yet?”

Václav shrugged, but his jaw tensed. “The Church knows what Triorzay shares. There is no reason to worry, Aleksi, if you have been pious and followed Triorzay’s wishes.

After all, sinners hide like mice.” He locked eyes with Malka.

“In the cracks, where they think they won’t be found. But they always squeal.”

“I don’t know if…” Aleksi began, rolling on the balls of his feet, fingering his own prayer beads attached to his belt.

“There is no reason to worry, you understand? There is no reason to worry.”

Malka wondered if the man had died the same way she worried Amnon would—defending the women and ensnaring himself between the Rayga’s teeth.

The Yahad would be blamed for the Ozmini deaths. She couldn’t help what Václav and Aleksi reported to Father Bro ? ek, but she would die before letting Amnon end up forgotten in the dirt with only feasting beetles for company.

Václav stomped away, disappearing again through the brush and back on the path they had chosen. With one last regretful glance at the bodies, Malka followed.

“We should rest here.” Václav drew his horse to a stop.

Hours had passed since they stumbled upon the decaying bodies.

Malka ached, her sides cramping from a full day of walking.

Night had washed over them in a blackness deeper than a devil’s alphonsa plant, leeching its poison into skin.

When their lanterns died, Malka held her hand in front of her face and stared at nothing.

Malka drew a match from her sack, replacing the candle in her lantern and lighting it. The fresh flame erupted, and Malka blinked to adjust to the light. They were in a clearing.

“Out in the open?” Amnon questioned.

Aleksi tilted his head toward the trickling sound of the stream. “Isn’t the point to attract the Rayga, pretty boy? We’re by a water source and in plain sight.”

Amnon swallowed, face ashen. “Right.”

They pulled dry kindling from their pouches and assembled the firewood. Once the fire was lit, Malka leaned into its warmth, the cold visceral without the heat of the sun. Some dexterity returned to her fingers, but they were still fattened by the cold.

Václav slapped Amnon on the back. “Time for a fisherman’s son to shine, boy.”

Amnon eyed Aleksi. “I’m not going to leave either of you alone with her.”

Václav wrapped his fist into Amnon’s cloak and hoisted him back. “You don’t have a choice.”

“Go,” Malka said, heart twinging. “I’ll be fine.”

Amnon threw up his hands in surrender. “Alright, alright.”

Malka watched them until the lanterns they carried grew dim behind the thicket.

“Don’t worry,” Aleksi said. “Václav’s appetite is bigger than his fist.”

Malka raised her brow. “How much do the odds of violence increase if Amnon is already acquainted with his fist?”

Aleksi chuckled, his handsome face softening. “If there’s one thing you Yahad are, it’s sharp-tongued. I guess it’s helpful, to slide your way into Ordobav’s politicking. Well, not you. But your people.”

Her mind drifted back to the bodies they had found.

“Do you believe me now?” she asked. “That the Rayga is real. That Imma didn’t do anything to Rzepka.”

Aleksi sucked his bottom lip between his teeth. “We don’t know what happened, Malka. Could’ve been a bad deer attack. Or a bear. Hell, maybe even a human drugged up on a manta joint who had access to a rake.”

He wouldn’t meet her eyes. Wouldn’t lie to her face.

“Maybe it was that golem your infamous rabbi created. I was there when it happened, you know. When it killed that boy.” He considered. “I wouldn’t put this past something it could do.”

Her gut twisted. Of course, he would find another way to blame her people.

But it was not possible. After the tragedy, the Maharal had been desperate to save his reputation.

He laid the golem to rest in the attic of the shul Bachta, where it would stay, forever slumbering, unable to do more harm.

A constant reminder of the Maharal’s mistake and the dangers of Kefesh.

The same holy magic her mind drifted to when she prayed.

“Václav said you were safe if you followed Triorzay’s wishes. That He would protect you here,” Malka said, pivoting the conversation before her mind knotted on thoughts of Kefesh. “What exactly does your God wish?”