Free Red Winter by Dan Smith Page A

Lyudmila spoke to me, but I kept my eyes on Tanya as I shook my head.
    ‘She said nothing at all?’ Lyudmila asked.
    ‘Nothing.’ I looked out at the lake again and wished the world were different. ‘I have to look for the others now.’
    For a moment there was no sound but those that should be there: the sigh of the breeze in the trees; the gentle lapping of the water at the bank; the trickle of the river flowing into the lake.
    ‘Will you come with me?’ I asked. ‘To find the others?’
    Tanya turned to the forest and raised her eyes to the treetops. ‘There’s nothing in there for me,’ she said. ‘All that matters is finding Koschei.’
    ‘Maybe he’s still there,’ Lyudmila suggested.
    ‘No, he’ll be long gone.’
    ‘And when you find him?’ I asked.
    ‘I’m going to kill him.’
    They walked away, going to their horses and mounting up.
    ‘Which way will you go?’ I asked as they came back towards the path.
    ‘North,’ Tanya said, stopping her horse and looking down at me. ‘So far we’ve been following him north. What’s the next town from here?’
    ‘Dolinsk.’
    ‘Anything else?’
    ‘A few villages between here and there. Farms. Nothing else.’
    Tanya considered me for a long moment then pulled my revolver from her pocket and dropped it on the ground beside me. ‘Good luck, Kolya,’ she said.
    I didn’t turn to watch them leave. I stayed where I was, staring out at the lake, dreading what I would find deeper in the forest.

 
     
     
     
7
     
     
     
     
    So it was that I went to my family home for the last time, crossing the bridge and walking the lonely road through the village. I found myself at my own front door, acting only on instinct as I went into the darkness within. I didn’t have a coherent plan in mind, but took a basket from the shelf at the far end of the room and collected every scrap of food I could find. In the drawer, I found a good knife that went into the basket, along with the food, a handful of matches wrapped in a cloth, candles and a single spoon. I collected the saddlebag I had brought from the outbuilding and threw it over my shoulder before picking up the blankets that had covered me during the night. Arms full, I walked back to the front door and pulled it wide, but something stopped me and I stood like that, with my back to the room, the door open to the cold.
    I needed a reminder.
    Of Marianna. Of Misha and Pavel. Of everything I was leaving behind and everything I had once been. Something was beginning and I had to prepare for it in the right way.
    Closing the door, I put everything on the floor beside it and went through to the bedroom. I picked up Marianna’s
chotki
and wrapped it round my right wrist, tucking it into my sleeve, mouthing the words ‘Have mercy on me, the sinner’, just as Marianna would have done. Then I vowed to find my family, no matter what it took. And when I had found them, alive or dead, I would follow Tanya’s path to Koschei and I would kill him.
    ‘Nothing will stand in my way,’ I whispered.
    Taking the small icon from the wall above the table and putting it in my satchel, I returned to the kitchen and sat down just as Marianna would have wanted. This was the traditional way. It was bad luck to go on a journey without sitting for a moment. Marianna made me do it every time I left to go anywhere and I had always come back.
    I was anxious that Tanya and Lyudmila would already be off the road and hidden in the forest – they were my best lead to Koschei and I didn’t want to lose them – but I would take this time. It was the kind of superstition I used to tease Marianna about, but it had served me well enough until now. My parents had always done it, my grandparents too. Marianna said it was to trick the evil spirits into thinking the travellers had decided to stay, but whatever the reason for the tradition, I could spare a few moments if it was going to bring me luck.
    I sat at the table and closed my eyes, and