He rummaged through the kitchen cupboards until he found a stack of envelopes and thin leather-bound booklets. He threw the whole lot into a burlap sack, carried it back to the high priestess, and shoved it into her hands. “Just go and take them. Take my name, my life, my only other set of clothes, why don’t you just take everything from me?”

“Farewell, Ivan Zoravich.” She held out her right hand. “You will not be forgotten here. I can assure you of that. Don’t think to come back, or you will truly die a heretic.”

Referring to Vanya by his first name and matronym was a sign of respect, a way to show that the priestess and the boy stood on equal footing. Yet Vanya stared suspiciously at the woman’s offered hand like he expected her to strike him. At last, he extended his own hand and gave a firm, brief shake.

As the door closed behind her, Vanya trudged back to the table and stared down at the cake and tea. His expression was unreadable.

Hesitantly, I approached him. “Vanya, I’m so sorry.”

I laid my hand on his shoulder, and he shuddered like he hadn’t noticed me standing there. He brushed my hand away without saying anything, walked over to the counter, and retrieved a bottle of clear liquid from the bottom cabinet.

Turning back to us with the bottle cradled against his chest, he smiled brightly. “Didn’t you two hear? They’re going to execute me tomorrow. I think this calls for a celebration.”

The night brought uneasy dreams of Galina trapped in a sack, writhing and screaming until she disintegrated into a pile of bones and ashes. I woke alone in Vanya’s bed in a heavy sweat, gasping for breath and shivering. My mouth tasted sour, and my head ached.

Still exhausted, I sank against the pillow and stared at the yellow bars of light that the streetlamp outside painted across the ceiling. I couldn’t stop thinking about Vanya’s banishment or what Mikhail had told me about Koschei’s obsession with the resurrected dead.

“Just don’t think about it,” I whispered, my fingers drawn to the bead strung around my wrist. I traced its weathered facets to soothe myself.

You think they’re sapphires?

Tears prickled my eyes, threatening to spill free. How long would it be before I forgot the sound of Galina’s voice? Before her features faded from my memory like so much smoke? Soon, she might become no more substantial than my birth parents, just another phantom to join the procession.

“You’re going to save her,” I told myself sternly. “She’s going to be fine.”

The floorboards were cold beneath my bare feet as I padded around the partition wall separating the bedroom from the parlor. Mikhail lay asleep on the sofa. A rumpled pile of blankets and furs on the floor marked where Vanya had slept.

The lamps in the kitchen were extinguished, but I paused to marvel at them. Electrical lamps, Mikhail had called them. I gently touched one of the glass orbs that had once contained pure gold light. It was cool to the touch.