the Mother of All Knowledge, you mortals,” a low voice boomed, startling Ana.
“Shamaïra, it’s me,” Yuri called.
There was a strange shuffling sound, and from behind a heavy brocade curtain emerged a middle-aged woman. Her eyes were outlined in black kohl against her rich olive skin, and she wore a silken shawl over her head, draped loosely over her shoulders. It was her bold cheekbones and fierce eyes that drew Ana’s attention. She was beautiful; a diminutive lioness.
“Oh, it’s just you,” the woman growled in the raspy voice of a pipe smoker. She paused as her gaze settled on the rest of the group. Her expression shifted and she broke into a smile as fiery as the sun. “Welcome.”
“Not tonight, Shamaïra,” Yuri said wearily, and tilted his head toward Ana.
Shamaïra’s eyes softened. “Oh,” was all she said as she strode over and placed a hand on May. Ana tensed—but the woman’s touch was gentle. Her eyes found Ana’s, and there was such a profound sadness in them that Ana felt the blank, unfeeling wall she had put up beginning to crack.
“A Chi’gon Affinite,” Shamaïra murmured. “We shall return her soul. Could I?”
Ana tightened her grip on May. She felt as though, if she just held on for a bit longer, she could delay the terrifying reality that awaited her. The reality of a world without her friend.
“She is passed, my child,” Shamaïra said softly. “And we must return her to her gods and her loved ones. It does not do for the dead to dwell in this world.”
This time Ana let Shamaïra lift May from her arms, as carefully as one would hold a newborn. May’s head lolled against Shamaïra’s shoulder, and Ana remembered the times she had carried May after a long day of travel. She hadn’t minded the weight back then.
Now that was all Ana had left: memories, and the ghost of May’s weight in her empty arms.
Shamaïra’s dacha had a garden covered in overgrown vines and potted plants of every species imaginable, some of which Ana hadn’t come across even in her studies at the Palace. She pushed past the ferns, venturing deeper into the silence. The scent of fresh, overturned mud and melted snow and the mysterious fragrance of plants lingered in the cool night air. Behind the yard loomed the vast outline of the Syvern Taiga.
Ana leaned against a wooden trellis, wrapping her arms around herself. The cold crept into her bones, but she might as well have been frozen—a girl carved of ice.
She felt as though if she let herself thaw, she would lose everything.
Someone moved behind her. Ana knew that presence like it was a part of her: warmth and light and flame, the smell of the kitchen hearth and freshly baked ptychy’moloko and hot tea served in a silver samovar. She turned, and it was like gazing at a stranger. The boy she had known had been soft, cheeks round and pale from the comforts of the Palace, hair shorn short. He’d laughed easily, his eyes had sparkled, and if she closed her eyes she could see him turning from the fire in the kitchen, sweat shimmering on his forehead and soot on his face.
Now, only twelve moons later, he towered over her, muscles replacing his thin freckled arms, chin chiseled and shadowed with scruff. His hair had grown to his shoulders, swept up in a ponytail that shone like a flame when it caught the light. There was a hardness to his coal-gray eyes that had never been there before.
They watched each other for a minute, Ana looking for traces of the boy she’d known. It was as though he had become a stranger. She reached out, tentatively, to touch a cut on his neck.
Something melted in Yuri’s expression. “It’s me, Kolst Pryntsessa,” he murmured as he caught her hands, his own rough and calloused. Ana choked down a sob as she looked at them, remembering how the creases of his fingers had always been stained white with flour.
As Yuri pulled her into his arms, she buried her face in his strong shoulders, searching for the scent of baked goods and sweat and kitchen soot. Instead, she smelled fire and smoke.
But he was still Yuri—her Yuri, the one who had sat outside her chambers during her worst nightmares. The one who’d brought trays of pirozhky pies to her just so he could crouch outside the crack of her door and whisper to her.