“Was it true?” Yeva broke the quiet as they passed the church.
“Was what true?” Galina looked up, brown eyes blank.
“What they said about Solmir.” Yeva glanced behind them, checking that no one was near enough to hear. She felt her cheeks warming despite the cold. “About his attention to me.”
Galina smiled. The expression was always sudden and unexpected on her small, solemn face. She was a relatively plain girl, but her smile was beautiful. “Yeva, you silly thing. You can’t say you haven’t noticed. They tease you only because they feel certain there is an understanding between you.”
Yeva stopped short, abruptly enough that slush sprayed up onto the hem of her skirts. “An understanding?” She had tied her cloak too tightly—her breathing felt labored, uncertain.
“I am sorry to be the one to tell you,” said Galina, dimming her smile with clear effort. Her expression was still brimming with amusement. “See you tomorrow,” she added, before turning at the corner to make her way toward her own father’s house, in the opposite direction. Yeva stood stirring the slush with the toe of her boot.
Solmir? He was nothing, barely more than a name in her mind. No, that was unfair; he was more than that. One of the baron’s hunting party, he was without land or title, but his family was wealthy nonetheless. His father had been a respected cooper and manager of the baron’s wine cellar until his death, at which point Solmir had become the baron’s ward. Rumor had it that the baron, childless after two previous marriages, might confer his lands and titles to Solmir if the new baronessa failed to produce him an heir.
Yeva tried to picture Solmir in her mind, conjuring up hazy memories of dinners past. They’d always been a trial for her. The afternoons with the baronessa were one thing; they kept Yeva—for the most part—from longing for the forest trails. The dinners, however, were another. She’d always counted the moments until she could be back home again with her father, feeling like one of those ragged birds at the market beating halfheartedly against their wicker cages. The only image of Solmir her memory provided was of friendly hazel eyes and a soft voice that made her cheeks flush all the more. She recalled him broaching the strangest subjects, though she preferred his bizarre company to the dull conversation of the other gentlemen.
How long had the other ladies been talking about them, with Yeva completely unaware?
She tried to ignore how warm she was under her furs. It was not quite cold enough for full winter gear but she wore it anyway—a blizzard could rise swiftly and without warning, even this early in the winter. Sweat started to form between her shoulder blades and trickle down her spine; she set off down the road toward her father’s house.
They lived toward the edge of town not because Yeva’s father couldn’t afford to live at its center, but because he, like Yeva, felt more comfortable with a house that bordered on nature. He’d given up life as a hunter to marry Yeva’s mother, using his wealth to start a career as a merchant, but he couldn’t wholly give up the need for the woods and the snow and the wild tang of the beasts.
Yeva felt a tension draining that she hadn’t realized she was carrying. She liked the baronessa, and she appreciated having been taken into her circle, but some part of her still longed for the freedom she’d had even a year ago. Her father used to take her with him, training her, teaching her what he knew of hunting. It was all in fun, because what harm was there in teaching these things to a child? Echoes from a past life; things his own father taught him. Sharing them was the only way of keeping them real. Being a merchant held no passion for him, but it was safe, and it had made his wife happy until she died when the girls were young. It was only recently that her father had noticed Yeva’s age, and thought that she ought to be a lady now, and no longer his wild little Beauty.
It was time to join her older sisters in society—such as it was.
The houses became smaller and more spread out as she trudged along, the laneways connecting them covered with snow once more instead of the slush churned up by many feet and carriage wheels. Yeva could see her father’s house on the ridge and hurried her steps.
The sky was growing darker, though the hour was too early for the sun to set. The clouds were thickening. Perhaps there would be a storm after all. Yeva felt no shame at the fiction—there had been something in the air—but she would feel better able to face the baronessa tomorrow if some kind of weather came in the night.
The hill was steep enough to make Yeva’s breath puff white in the cold air, and she sputtered an oath. Such terrible shape for a hunter to be in. She used to be able to run for hours, uphill or down, blood coursing through her and urging her onward. But then, she was not a hunter anymore. The roundness of face and limb she saw in the washbasin each morning, the sleek deep red of her hair, the full lips, the lazy gaze—every day she was more a lady. Every day less herself.
Yeva hurried through the door, trying to still her panting breath so no one would see her winded. One of the servants met her at the door, his lanky arms outstretched to receive her furs.
“Thank you, Albe,” she told him with a smile that made him blush and duck his head. Albe had been with them since he was a boy, but lately he’d been inching around Yeva and her sisters as if they were made of glass.
All the merchants’ daughters were spoken of as beauties. Yeva would have preferred to be admired for her skill, but she’d suffered the great misfortune of having been born a girl. And so no one would ever know. When she was younger, she used to dream of a husband who would love her all the more if she could hunt with him, side by side. But age, and time spent with the baronessa, had worn away that imagined future.
She could remain unmarried, but to do so would make her a financial burden to her father. To marry would be to leave the wood forever, surrendering what little freedom she still had.
But Solmir is a hunter, whispered a sinuous thought. And a good one. If anyone were to admire your skill in the forest, it would be him. . . .
“Your sisters are in the kitchen, mistress,” said Albe, head still bowed. Yeva could see a flush on the back of his neck and the tips of his ears.
“Thank you,” she repeated, and left the poor boy to recover.
As she headed down the hall, a thumping, clattering, wild noise exploded from the back corner of the house. Laughing, Yeva crouched down so that when a pair of dogs came barreling around the edge of the hall, they hit her square. Less painful than letting them catch an arm or a leg. Doe-Eyes whined eagerly, burying her face in the fold of Yeva’s hip, while Pelei sniffed her all over, circling and circling and snuffling his aggravation at her collection of the day’s scents.
Pelei was the scent hound, thick and shaggy and red-brown, named for the clay he so resembled. Doe-Eyes was the runner, slimmer and lighter built, less armored against the biting cold in winter. They were her father’s hunting dogs, but any time the subject arose, he delighted in moaning about how his youngest daughter had stolen them from him, how they betrayed him every day they ran to her. But he loved to see them love her, and always spoke with a twinkle in his eye.
Yeva ordered the dogs back to their corner of the house, sending them reluctantly away, and went to the kitchen. She found Asenka and Lena kneading bread together, moving as one, each leaning down into the stroke as the other folded. They were closer in age to each other than Asenka was to Yeva, and so alike as to be nearly twins. Asenka’s hair was two shades darker than Lena’s chestnut brown, and her cheeks fuller and pinker, but from a distance the two were indistinguishable.