Free Blood and Salt by Barbara Sapergia Page B

first to the right, then to the left, weaving through the slender trees. Over time their work together has changed the horse. He can do things he would never have done on his own. He seems to enjoy doing them.
    Taras loves this horse, not as much as his mother or father or Halya, but close.
    He comes out of the trees, reins in the horse and looks down at Radoski’s sprawling house and grounds. An old man tends the lawn; its close-clipped blades catch the morning light. Beech and birch show fresh new leaves and a few flowers already bloom. In the distance a motor growls and moments later an Austrian army staff car races up the road in a cloud of dust. The old man jumps back, startled. A dog barks and is hushed as the car skids to a stop. The pahn comes out his front door, dressed in an ancient officer’s uniform, now bursting at its seams.
    The driver jumps out and opens the door for a man in the blue uniform still worn by many older officers. This is the man Radoski brags about in the village. “My brother-in-law, you know – General Loder.”
    Radoski puffs out his chest as he lunges for the general’s hand and kisses the general’s cheek. Everyone knows Loder is not exactly his brother-in-law. Their wives are cousins. In the village there were rumours that Sophie Radoski’s family tried to prevent the marriage. Taras can’t imagine what she could have seen in him. Pahns must have been thin on the ground then. People also say his mother promoted the marriage. Now that she’s long dead, though, others question whether Radoski had a mother at all.
    With another badly executed bow, the pahn ushers the general into the house. Now, why has the general bothered to come all this way for an awkward handshake and a kiss on the cheek? Can this be where the garrison soldiers are practising their skills?
    Taras turns Imperator back into the woods.

CHAPTER 6
    A horse like living smoke

    The next evening Taras’s friends grab him right after supper and let him know they wouldn’t object to hearing a little more of his story. So he tells them about Imperator and about the pahn, and then stops. Myroslav urges him to continue.
    “All right, if you want. The next part is about Batko going to the tavern.”
    “Were you there?” Yuriy asks. Taras shakes his head. “How can you tell us then?”
    “From what my father, Mykola, told me. I’m making a story about it.”
    Yuriy’s not satisfied. “But if you weren’t there?”
    “I can see it all very clearly. Still, if you don’t want to hear...”
    “I don’t know about all of you,” Tymko says, “but I could sure as hell use a story to take my mind off this place.” They nod agreement, Yuriy included.

    Mykola walked to the village tavern, a plain wooden building down the hill from the church, with his friend Yarema Mykytiuk, a man in his forties with a smooth, round face and blue eyes. His brown hair was carefully trimmed, his clothing neat. He had an agreeable look.
    In the lane, laughter and lamplight spilled into the dark.
    “Maybe this isn’t a good idea,” Yarema said. “We won’t be able to hear ourselves talk.”
    “That’s all right, they won’t be able to hear us either.” Mykola threw open the door.
    About twenty drinkers sat around a half-dozen wooden tables. Mykola and Yarema found a small table beside an old poster they’d seen countless times, advertising Cunard Lines ships and the Canadian Pacific Railway. And the advantages of moving to Canada.
    Isaac Stern, the owner, walked by with a tray of beer and they followed his steps to a nearby table where Halya’s father Viktor sat with a man from the next village. Andriy Kondarenko was a tall, taciturn fellow about Viktor’s age, known as a capable farmer and a man to be avoided if you had a choice. Now how had they wound up together? Viktor didn’t normally come here, in part because no one ever wanted to sit with him, and also because he hated to spend money unless it made him look