"My cousin's house. But Marek and Sophia have always made me as welcome as if I had been born here."
"Where is the village?"
"A long way from here, if you're walking. But not far by gruzovik."
"The servants live there?" She pointed.
"No, they keep birds there." Chicken wasn't part of the regular diet in Taina, and Ivan had never learned the word, if they even had one. "Like geese, only they don't roam free."
"To keep them safe from the foxes?"
"Yes," said Ivan. It occurred to him that the new henhouse Marek had shown him so proudly stood exactly where the church had been until it burned down yesterday.
No, it wasn't yesterday, it was this morning. His wedding morning. All of this in a single day? No wonder he was tired and hungry.
They came to the door and Ivan knocked.
The door was flung open so immediately that Ivan was momentarily frightened. Had Marek been watching at the window?
No, it was Sophia. "Vanya's back!" she called over her shoulder. Then she turned back to face Ivan, radiant with joy at seeing him. She opened her arms and was about to embrace him when she saw Katerina.
"What's this? What are you wearing? You must be freezing! And Itzak, you foolish boy, where is your - oh, she's wearing it. What was she wearing before she was wearing your - never mind, come in, get warm, get warm, time for stories in the kitchen, are you hungry? I have a big soup, I made plenty of borscht today, as if I knew you were coming, and cold, come in, don't dawdle."
Laughing, relieved at the welcome, Ivan ushered Katerina into the house. How much of Sophia's torrent of words did Katerina understand? She stayed close to him, her arm around him, as she looked around her at the wonders of the house.
He tried to see the room through her eyes. Dimly lighted by the setting sun through the windows, it was a mass of shadowy shapes, hummocky furniture, and vaguely reflective frames on the walls. A fireplace. A rug on the wooden floor. How did that feel on her bare feet, the varnished wood? Or maybe she was merely looking for the fire that was keeping this room so warm.
They came into the kitchen, and Katerina blinked against the brightness of the electric light.
"You keep a fire on the air," she said in awe.
Sophia stopped cold. "What accent is that?" she asked. "I can't place it."
"It's not an accent," said Ivan. "It's another language... you understood her?"
Sophia ignored his question. "It's not a fire, child, it's an electric light," she said to Katerina.
The word made no sense to the princess. She reached up toward the dangling light.
"Don't touch it," said Ivan. "It can burn your hand."
"But it's not a fire," said Katerina. "It's like a single drop of water, alive with light, and larger than any water droplet ever was."
Ivan could not resist impressing her further. He reached for the light switch, toggled it off. The room went almost fully dark, for the kitchen window faced east, the direction of darkness in the evening.
"Turn it on, foolish boy," said Sophia.
Ivan obeyed.
Katerina turned to him, her eyes full of wonder and consternation. "Why did you not do this in Taina, if you had this power?"
"I told you," said Ivan, "it's not my power. It's a tool." He showed her the switch, made her touch it, then turn the light off and on again.
"So the magic is here on the wall, for anyone to use," she said. "Who ever heard of witches sharing their power so readily?"
Ivan might have tried to explain more, though he was acutely aware of Sophia watching them, her eyes sharp with curiosity; but the conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Cousin Marek, freshly bathed after the day's work. "Vanya, you young fool, do you know how worried Sophia and I have been these three days since you went off in the woods and didn't come home?"
So it was only three days that he was gone?
He might have pondered more about the differing flow of time between Taina and the modern world, but he was distracted by Katerina. For upon seeing Cousin Marek's face, she sank to her knees and hid her face in her hands. "What's wrong?" Ivan asked her.
"You have brought me to the land of the gods," she said. "Are you a god yourself?"