Anya and the Dragon Read online

  She crossed the bridge, passed through the village, and followed a little dirt road east along the river until she reached the Mihaylov house. Oleg Mihaylov had left with Papa when the conscription officers had come through, leaving his wife, Sveta, alone with their new baby. Sveta and her sister, Zlata, liked to take the baby around the village, and Anya hoped they were gone so she wasn’t caught.

  Anya hesitated on the road, looking around. When she was sure she wouldn’t be seen, she dashed to the home’s front door and tied the vial to the handle.

  She made sure it would stay tied there, and then she ran away. Babulya mixed potions and salves for people all over the village, but she never wanted anyone to know she was the one making them. “They won’t take them,” she said. “Because of what I am. What we are.”

  Anya knew what that meant: because they were Jewish, and they were foreigners. Well, Anya liked to think she was only half-foreigner. While Babulya and Mama had been born far to the south where the mountains touched the sea, Papa had been born in Zmeyreka, and his papa, Dyedka, had been born in Zmeyreka, and so on, back to the beginning.

  Only half-foreigner, but entirely Jewish. Babulya said only mothers mattered in this case. Anya could trace mothers and grandmothers back all the way to Hadassah in Persia. Or so Babulya said.

  Once Anya was out of sight of the Mihaylov house, she slowed to a walk. The Mihaylov domovoi would tell Sveta the potion was safe, and hopefully the baby’s cough would get better.

  She detoured on a riverside path and threw pebbles into the water. One splash spooked a bird in a nearby tree, and it flew away with a rustle of feathers. She watched the bird startle into the air, and something red flashed in her peripheral vision.

  Anya jerked toward the red thing. She swore it had been in the water upriver, but now there wasn’t anything there but ripples.

  The red thing had been a fish, she decided. And it hadn’t really been red. It was a trick of the light.

  “Just a fish,” she whispered, and she ran the rest of the way to the miller.

  Chapter Four

  The village of Zmeyreka sat in the crook where two arms of the Sogozha River met. A wide open space in the middle was ringed with shops, all of which were currently decorated with flower garlands for Semik. The villagers who still practiced the old Slavist rituals would decorate birch trees, string up flowers and branches, and leave extra offerings for the rusalki. The ghostly water nymphs were normally confined to their homes in the river, but during Semik, they could come out at night and would dance in the fields under the stars.

  Mama liked to set up shop near the docks and the village center. The miller and the smithy were also in the town center, right next to each other. The mill was on the southernmost end of the town, and the miller, Rostislav Melnik, met Anya outside as she approached. His grandson Sasha lingered in the doorway. Sasha was two years older than Anya—​still too young to be conscripted—​and one of those fellow village children she didn’t play with. He held a bag of flour in his arms.

  “You’re a little late this morning.” Gospodin Melnik tilted his head down at her, arms crossed. “You’d better get this mixed and rising, or you’ll have very sad bread next week.”

  She nodded. “I know, Gospodin.”

  “Hmph,” he said, and then he motioned at Sasha. “Get on with her flour, boy!” He turned back to Anya. “He’s got rocks in his shoes today.”

  Sasha darted forward, handed the heavy flour sack to Anya, and took the empty one from her. It snagged on the horseshoe as she pulled it out of her pocket, and Sasha raised an eyebrow. Anya didn’t offer an explanation, and Sasha didn’t ask for one.

  Anya clung to the heavy flour sack as she made her way toward the blacksmith’s soot-stained smithy. It sat beside the river next to the mill, but the coolness of the Sogozha’s waters couldn’t make a dent in the stifling heat the forges inside breathed out. Anya was sweating before she even opened the door.

  Walking into the smithy felt like looking into her oven while challah was baking. Kin the blacksmith had his back to her, hammering out a sheet of glowing red metal on his anvil. As sunlight flooded into the room, he turned toward the door.

  Kin frowned at Anya. She didn’t know if his frown was directed at her specifically or was the permanent expression on his face. He was always grumping around town, limping here and there. No one could pronounce his full name properly—​he was from somewhere far away, and whatever gobbledygook they spoke there was impossible to make sense of—​so everyone called him the first syllable of his unmanageable name, which was something like Kin-edge-or-kwart. He was shorter than most of the men in the village but easily twice as thick, with a tangle of graying red hair that matched his bushy beard. Above the beard, a fading black ropy tattoo stretched across his cheeks and nose.

  “Ye need help?” he said, his strangely accented Russian reaching her ears on a heat wave that smelled of fire and metal.

  Anya set the flour sack by the door and shuffled forward. “Um, yes.” She fished the horseshoes out of her pocket. “I found these, and we don’t have a horse, and I wanted to know . . . if . . .”

  Kin turned back around. “No.”

  “But—”

  “I’m busy, little girl,” he said. “If ye have something worth buying, bring it. Those are old and brittle. They’re worthless.”

  “You didn’t even look at them,” Anya said.

  He didn’t turn around. “I can tell from here. Now get out.”

  Anya hesitated in the smithy, sweat rolling down her face, and then she dropped the horseshoes back into her pockets. She stiffened her lip to keep it from trembling and took a deep breath to seal the tears inside.

  She grabbed her flour and hurried outside, sighing as a cool wind hit her face. With her dress’s long sleeve, she wiped the sweat from her forehead, and then she went to find her mother’s favorite market spot.

  Anya spotted Mama’s cart wedged between two fish stalls by the river. Each of the flanking booths had a small pile of onions on it, and two thick packages wrapped in cloth sat on Mama’s cart, probably fish she had traded onions for.

  The onions were almost all gone, which was a relief but not surprising. Mama used her plant magic to coax delicious, sweet onions out of the earth. Anya was certain everyone in the village knew Mama used magic, and equally certain that none of them cared. She knew the fishermen used water magic to pull the edges of their nets wider as soon as they hit the river’s surface. And Gospodin Melnik used it to grind his flour faster, blasting air magic past small stiff sails he had rigged to his mill. She had it on good authority that even Father Drozdov, who openly preached against magic whenever he could, used it to dust the hymnbooks at the church.

  The magistrate was the only one who seemed to care at all about magic. He had fined people for open magic use, but only if he could prove it. The villagers were too smart for the most part.

  Mama spotted Anya and waved, her mouth hanging in a tired scowl. The sight of her mother’s grimace made Anya’s heart heavy. Anya was sad that Papa had gone to Rûm, but Mama had changed completely. She hardly smiled anymore. She didn’t tell jokes. She didn’t laugh. Papa had left just before Purim, which was normally Mama’s favorite holiday, but she had barely acknowledged it that year. She certainly hadn’t dressed up, and when Babulya recited the story of Esther to them, Mama had barely made a sound.

  “Anya,” Mama said, wiping the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. Strands of black hair peeked from under her kerchief. “You’d better get that flour home now. You’re getting a late start.”

  “I know,” Anya said, setting the heavy bag on the ground. “I had to deliver a potion to the Mihaylovs for Babulya.”

  Mama put her hand atop Anya’s kerchief and rubbed it around on her head, tousling her hair. “That’s a good girl, Annushka.”

  Anya ducked away from Mama’s hand and smoothed her kerchief. Papa had always been the one to mess up Anya’s hair, and Mama
had dutifully taken over the role when he had gone. She didn’t do it right, though, and it made Anya miss her father even more.

  A low murmur rippled through the crowd behind her. Anya turned to see a gray charger clop into the village square. A man sat astride it: the largest person Anya had ever seen. Curly hair as pale as spun straw spilled over his shoulders, and eyes like icicles touched on the crowd of villagers for a heartbeat each. He wore a vest of metal scale armor and a cloak of what appeared to be bear pelt. Atop his head rested a smooth metal helmet with metal wings on either side. A long sword hung from his belt, sharp edges gleaming in the sunlight.

  Anya swallowed hard. The man on the horse exuded coldness, bringing with him a wind that gave Anya goosebumps.

  Mama slipped her hand to Anya’s shoulder and pulled her closer. “Who is that?”

  From behind them, a voice said, “A Varangian, I think.” One of the older fishermen, Andrei Vasilyevich, stepped carefully away from the river, watching the man on the horse with wide eyes. “I seen them a few years ago up North. They’re traders, but some of them are just mean, nasty warriors.”

  Anya held her breath as she looked back at the alleged Varangian. What was a warrior from the North doing in their little village?

  The man on the horse steered the animal along the street, past the miller and the blacksmith, to the announcement board. As he went, townspeople stopped whatever it was they were doing and watched him, eyes wide. A few people hurried away from the square, but most stayed and began to gather. Anya remained next to her mother and watched as the man with the winged helmet dismounted and studied the various postings.

  Father Drozdov stepped from the crowd and approached the horseman, who squinted at the announcements with a heavy scowl.

  “Welcome to Zmeyreka,” the priest said.

  The Varangian turned slowly, his movement smooth and calculated. He studied Father Drozdov in his black robe and white collar with a snarl. With a finger as thick as Anya’s wrist, he jabbed at the square and rumbled, “Zmeyreka?”

  Father Drozdov nodded as he inclined away from the angry warrior. Anya could imagine his round face, scrunched with confusion, blinking slowly as he tried to work out how best to help the mountain hulking before him.

  “Hvor er dragen?” the warrior bellowed.

  Finally, Father Drozdov said, “I’m sorry. I don’t underst—​grk!”

  The Varangian snatched Father Drozdov by the collar, wrenching him forward and up. The priest’s feet hardly touched the ground; he pointed his toes in an effort to support himself somehow. The warrior smashed Father Drozdov into the announcement board; Anya could hear the crunch of his face connecting with the wood all the way back where she stood.

  She gasped and ran forward, shoving past people. She heard Mama shout her name, but that didn’t slow her down.

  The warrior pulled Father Drozdov away from the board, yanking him around by the collar like he was a disobedient dog. Half the crowd surged forward, and half of it shrank back. Father Drozdov lifted his arms up to halt the crowd coming forward, blood dripping from his nose down his face.

  Anya didn’t stop. A bad feeling was crawling its way across her skin, making her feel sick.

  “Hvor er dragen?” the warrior demanded, screaming it into the priest’s face. He turned to the crowd. “Hvor er dragen?”

  Father Drozdov shook his head. “I can’t understand you!”

  The warrior snarled again and lifted the priest up, bringing his feet completely off the ground. Father Drozdov kicked feebly, trying to feel for the ground, and his face turned the color of a sliced beet.

  Townspeople screamed for the warrior to release the priest. Anya waited for someone to do something, but, looking around, she realized no one in the village could do anything. They were all very young or very old, or they were women, like Mama, who were small compared to the Varangian. Anya shoved past them. Up close, he was even bigger than he had seemed.

  Anya hesitated, not sure what she could do against such a giant bear of a man, when a choking noise wrung itself out of Father Drozdov’s mouth.

  She had to do something, or Father Drozdov was going to die.

  Chapter Five

  Anya reached into her apron pocket and touched a horseshoe. She hesitated—​Mama and Babulya would have told her not to interfere, and to wait for someone else to step in. She balanced it in one hand. “Hey!” she yelled. Without waiting for the Varangian to look at her, she flung the horseshoe with all her strength.

  All that practice throwing onions into the handcart paid off. The horseshoe hit the warrior—​crack!—​on the side of his helmet’s bottom brim. He dropped Father Drozdov to the ground. Anya pulled the other horseshoe out of her pocket as the warrior turned to her, face twisted in a furious snarl. The first one had cut him at the top of his cheek, and blood trickled down the side of his face.

  The crowd behind Anya had gone silent. Father Drozdov’s coughing was the only sound in the village square. Anya brandished the other horseshoe in her hand, planting her feet in the dirt, certain the monster of a man was moments away from literally ripping her head off her shoulders.

  Anya heard her mother scream her name, but Anya had to focus on the Varangian before her, or she was going to lose every last bit of her nerve and collapse to the ground. Already her legs were shaking.

  She gasped and ejected a quiet, trembling order: “Go away.”

  The Varangian inhaled hard through his nose and bared his teeth at her. He stepped forward, one giant foot slamming hard on the ground. Anya couldn’t move out of his way. She was too scared. She could only watch as he reached down toward her.

  “Hello!”

  A voice called out from behind her somewhere. She hardly heard it past the blood pounding in her ears. It attracted the Varangian’s attention enough to break his stare, and she dared to turn and see who it was.

  A tall, thin man with fair hair ambled into the square. Anya was certain she hadn’t ever met him, but he looked familiar. He strolled past booths, picking up random items as he dropped coins in their place. As the stack of items in his arms grew, he got closer.

  “My goodness,” he said, stopping beside Anya. His accent was strange but familiar. His brilliant blue eyes twinkled. “We’ve got quite an angry Varangian with us, haven’t we?”

  It seemed to Anya a stupid question to pose while they were both within stabbing distance.

  “Hold this.” He handed her the items in his stack one by one: a white candle, a pair of sour apples, another white candle, a coil of string, one of her mother’s onions, a third candle, and a gutted fish.

  The newcomer hesitated, thought for a moment, then picked the fish back up. He spun to the Varangian and extended his non-fish hand for a shake.

  “Good day! I’m Ivan Ivanovich! But”—​he executed a flamboyant bow—​“you may call me Yedsha.” He popped back up. “I understand your name is Sigurd!”

  Anya stared at him, wide-eyed. Ivan Ivanovich. That’s why he looked and sounded familiar. This man was the father of the boy she’d met on the road, and the tsar’s fool.

  The Varangian—​apparently named Sigurd—​growled at Yedsha.

  Yedsha pointed to the Varangian’s mount. “That’s a beautiful horse!”

  With another low growl, Sigurd grabbed the horse’s reins in one giant fist.

  The fool laughed and turned to Anya, then dropped the fish in her arms again. As he did, his eye caught the horseshoe she held, and he said, “Ooh, horseshoe!”

  He grabbed it with the hand he’d been holding the fish with. The fish slime glistened on his fingers as he raised the horseshoe, and Anya caught the briefest flash of magic spiderwebbing out from it. In the next second, the horseshoe slipped out of Yedsha’s slimy hand and rocketed at Sigurd’s face. The warrior ducked and avoided the brunt of the projectile, but it clipped his helmet and sent it tumbling off his head. The helmet hit Sigurd’s horse on the flank, and the charger whinnied, spooked.


  Sigurd released the reins and tried to step away from the horse, but he stopped short. The reins were tangled in the buckles of the metal bracer on his arm.

  Yedsha pulled Anya back as the horse reared, tearing Sigurd off balance. The horse brought its enormous front hooves down and galloped south. Sigurd was dragged after it, twisting from one arm, shouting what Anya assumed were the worst swear words he knew.

  The crowd stood, silent, watching Sigurd dragged out of town by his own horse. Then, one by one, they turned to Yedsha.

  “Thank God!” Father Drozdov yelled. His voice sounded wet and nasally. “You saved my life!”

  He stumbled toward Anya and Yedsha, and she smiled uneasily as he shouted his thanks. She had just saved him, but she’d broken her grandmother’s cardinal rule: Don’t stand out.

  Father Drozdov shot straight past Anya and went to Yedsha instead, clapping him on the shoulder as he shook his hand energetically.

  “A blessing,” the priest was saying. “We are truly blessed to have you here. I would be dead if not for you.”

  “I’m blessed to be here,” Yedsha said, extending his hand toward Anya. “But—”

  He never finished whatever he was trying to say. The crowd surged forward, pushing Anya aside, patting and congratulating and thanking Yedsha for his bravery.

  Anya lingered, wondering if anyone had even seen her throw the first horseshoe, and then Mama shoved past the crowd.

  “Anya!” Mama grabbed her in a violent hug. The force of it knocked Anya’s armful of miscellany to the ground. “What were you thinking?”