Page 17 of When Among Crows
“Ah,” Lidia says. “A relatively recent addition to our little community, then.”
“Not that recent.” Ala sounds terse. She’s taller in reality than she is in Dymitr’s mind. Maybe one seventy-five, or however she says it in feet and inches.
“The first of us came earlier,” Lidia says. “After the November Uprising. Do you know about the November Uprising?”
She softens over the words like she’s speaking to a child. Dymitr wonders how old Ala really is. Older than she looks, surely. Zmory age slowly—slower even than strzygi.
“A little,” Ala says.
“So, no, then.”
Ala flushes, and that’s when Dymitr pieces it together: Lidia is making Ala angry on purpose, not simply to embarrass her but also to feed on her emotions. At this point it must be an instinct, so deeply ingrained that she might not even know she’s doing it.
“Others had taken our country and broken it into pieces,” Lidia says, and all around the room are murmurs of assent, of recollection, or simply echoes of appreciation, it’s hard to say. “They ignored even the smallest bits of our sovereignty that we had carved out for ourselves.This affected our people as much as mortals. And so some of our kind joined the resistance effort. We fought Russian governance, and we lost. So we fled here. We were not the first—or the last—to flee our country to survive. Sometimes it was because we weren’t human, but sometimes it was because we were too human—the wrong religion, during the war, or perhaps the wrong political affiliation, after it. It’s interesting to me that your mother didn’t tell you why she had to leave.”
Lidia tucks a lock of her red hair behind her ear.
“She thought of it as a kindness,” Ala says. “She wanted me to have a fresh start in the world. So she didn’t do to me anything that she hated being done to herself. Unfortunately, that included teaching me certain things. Her history. Her language.”
“I see.” Lidia looks unimpressed, but she doesn’t provoke Ala further. Instead, she asks, “And what became of her?”
“A curse killed her,” Ala says bluntly. “It then passed to her younger sister, to my cousin, and to me, in turn. I came here in pursuit of a cure.”
“You came to a strzyga for a cure to a curse?” Lidia smiles. “You are aware, of course, that we can do only small magic, like you?”
It’s just a quick look that passes between Ala and Dymitr, but it’s enough to catch Lidia’s attention. Before Ala can answer her, Lidia is coming to her feet and moving toward them.
Lidia is the same height as Ala, but spare as a wraith,willow-limbed and delicate. She folds her hands together in front of her, and stands before Dymitr, her head tilted up so she can look him in the eye.
“You are no Dryja cousin,” she says to him.
“No, I’m not,” he replies.
“What is it you carry, boy?” she asks. She reaches out and pinches the edge of his jacket pocket, but doesn’t reach in. “I saw you touch it as you came in, and now your hand bears its imprint.” She hooks a finger around his thumb, and lifts his hand, as a hunter might display a kill to a room of peers. Dymitr can’t see what she sees, but one of Lidia’s companions on the sofa stands, blinking wonderingly at Dymitr. She’s the banshee from before, he realizes. The one who sang at the beginning of the fight.
“I see it,” the banshee says softly. Her speaking voice is as musical as her singing voice was, low and clear as a bell. “He was already incandescent with sorrow, but now—”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Lidia says dryly. She releases his hand. “Let me guess. You have something that can help our friend Aleksja here. But you don’t know how to use it. So you likely went to the oldest zmora first, and when she didn’t help you…” Lidia taps her own chest. “Second-best option.”
“Actually,” he says, “I’m looking for someone older than any of you.”
The hint of amusement curling Lidia’s mouth disappears. He didn’t even know it was there until it was gone. She was tickled at the idea that they would come seeking her because of her wisdom, born of age, but instead… he’srevealed that she’s just a means to an end. A severe miscalculation on his part.
“Baba Jaga,” Lidia says, turning away. She sits down on the sofa again.
“I thought, if anyone might know how to contact her,” he says, “it would be you, proszepani.”
“Take note, Aleksja. That’s how you say it,” Lidia says, sliding an arm along the back of the sofa. “I’m not buying it, boy. If I’m correct in thinking it’s the fern flower that you carry—and given the time of year, it seems likely—then you would have had more luck asking the wraith who guarded it. You came here because you had no idea where else to go.”
A severe miscalculation indeed.
Dymitr looks at Ala, as if she’ll know something he doesn’t. She sighs.
“What gift can we offer you?” Ala says. “To communicate our gratitude for your help, before we even receive it?”
Lidia taps her fingers on the back of the sofa. Her fingernails are filed into neat ovals and painted deep red. She glances at the strzyga to her left, who leans forward to murmur something in her ear.
“A fine suggestion,” Lidia says to her. She looks at Ala and Dymitr again. “You have a valuable ingredient you want my help with. So you will supplymewith a valuable ingredient, and I will consider helping you.”
