Dymitr's grandmother accompanied him on his first hunt. Before they set out, they met in the stone chamber to prepare.
The front of the family house had been redone in a mid-century modern style, just as his mother preferred. All primary colors, medium-toned woods, and rounded corners. Tables that stacked, chairs that looked like italicized versions of ordinary seating, sofas standing on spindly legs. The house itself was old, but you would hardly know it from the interior.
In the back, however, lay the family history. A dim library packed with ancient volumes with nowhere to sit but the rigid seats in the center; a modest chapel with a floor-to-ceiling wooden cross; and the stone chamber, round and sunken beneath the ground, where the weapons were kept.
His grandmother usually wore soft slacks, long diaphanous skirts, and prim blouses with tiny patterns. Today, she wore the clothes of a Knight: a vest fastened with Velcro across her ribs, a leather jacket, canvas trousers, and boots laced up to mid-calf. Her hair was braided.
"Do you know why your father isn't accompanying you?" she asked. She went to the cabinet at the back of the room and took out a pot of red paint and a brush. Dymitr knew what it was for: a symbol of protection, to be painted over his heart. Most of them didn't bother with it after they had a few kills under their belt, but for those first few times… yes.
"No, Babcia."
He unbuttoned his shirt a few buttons. When she stood in front of him with the open pot of paint, he tugged the fabric aside to expose the skin over his heart.
"I asked him if I could do it instead," she said. "This will be my last time. I have chosen you to witness it."
She said it as if it were an honor, and it was. Dymitr knew it. He had three siblings, two older and one younger, yet he was the one she had taught herself. The one she had decided was worthy of her wisdom.
She touched the cold paintbrush to his chest and swept it in a capable circle. She held the brush like a calligrapher held a pen—almost delicate. Almost.
"You have doubts," she said as she drew. "Tell me about them."
He hesitated. She looked up, sharply.
"Do not pretend," she said. "We cannot rid you of your doubt if you hide it. You must bring it into the light."
She dabbed the paintbrush inside the pot and began filling in the symbol, a six-petaled rosette. It was pagan, as far as Dymitr knew, but if the Holy Order could make use of something, they did—regardless of its origins.
"It's only…" He trailed off, searching for the right words. "She seemed so human. Getting groceries like that."
His grandmother nodded a few times. She closed the lid of the paint pot and tucked the brush behind her ear. Then she brought her hand up and smacked him hard across the face.
"Do not trust your eyes more than you trust your duty," she said harshly. "Deception is in their nature. They make you believe that they're close to human, that they're capable of our virtues, but the truth is deeper and darker. The truth is, they are hunger and cruelty personified. The truth is, they can read your heart, and they will prey upon it if you allow them!"
Dymitr's cheek stung. He blinked tears from his eyes. The paint was cold on his chest, still drying.
"My dearest boy." His grandmother's voice softened. "I don't intend to hurt you, only to make sure that you remember. Remember what I have taught you."
She touched his cheek, the same one she had just hit. Her eyes were soft.
"You will be the best of us. You will do things that none of us have managed," she said. "I know it."
***
For a moment after Niko speaks, nothing happens. Then Dymitr hears something—cracking, and the shiver of dust hitting the ground. Stone falls away from the skull embedded in the wall, leaving the brown of old bone behind. For a moment, Dymitr thinks he can see the face of the witch hovering over it, like she's trapped alive in the wall—young, with frizzy yellow hair and a puckered mouth—but then the skull takes its place again.
The eye sockets grow wide, like two tunnels opening in the wall of the theater, or maybe like Dymitr himself is shrinking. He chokes on panic as his sense of reality warps and bends. Then a massive brown root, as if from the base of the world's largest tree, spills over the edge of one of the eye sockets. It reminds him of the *leszy* with the daisy growing in his skull, only this root moves with the deadly speed of a snake. It weaves between the theater seats and splits, then splits again, its tendrils spreading down every row like a many-fingered hand. It reaches Dymitr's feet. He steps around it, but one of the roots snags his ankle and then grows around it as firmly as a manacle.
He looks at Niko, who has drawn the sword from his back and is now hacking at the roots encircling his own ankles, and at Ala, who is hopping from one foot to the other like a child playing hopscotch. Dymitr doesn't bother to take out his bow; he just watches the roots tumble into the space, bulging from the aisles, growing over and around each other until the entire left half of the theater is a labyrinth of bark and old, dusty seats.
Then the roots stop moving. But when Niko hacks at the ones trapping his ankles, they regrow immediately, as if he had never cut them.
"Well, fuck," Ala says, and Dymitr swallows a laugh. He feels like he's teetering at the very edge of his control.
"We're not dead," Niko says, bending down to prod at the roots winding around his legs. "Which means there must be a way to get out of this."
"Could try asking." The only sign of Ala's fear is the quiver in her voice. "Dymitr?"
She wouldn't ask him if she didn't need him to speak Polish, so Dymitr raises his head and says, into the stifling air: "Czego chcesz od nas?"
He feels foolish, speaking to nothing and to no one and expecting a response. But the jawbone of the skull hinges open, the teeth separating, and a high, inhuman voice speaks.
"What I want," the skull says, "is that which you are unwilling to give."
The roots squeeze tighter around his legs, tight enough to hurt.
"Another riddle?" he says, grimacing.
"Hardly qualifies as a riddle," Niko says, smacking a root that's climbed up one of the theater seats and is now reaching for his wrist. "We have to make an offering, each of us. Something we'd rather not offer."
Dymitr bends down to shove his fingers between his calf and the root to create space. The rough bark bites into his knuckles. "If I have to pull out another goddamn fingernail—"
"Baba Jaga isn't that crude," Niko says. "She'd prefer something more powerful—a secret, or a confession—"
Dymitr yanks his fingers out from under the root so they don't go numb and goes still, his eyes on the floor.
It's not that he doesn't have secrets—it's that he has so many, so many secrets and so many confessions, that he can't decide which one will do the least damage but still have enough power to satisfy Baba Jaga.
The roots seem displeased with his silence. They squeeze tighter and grow, now twisting around his knees.
"Fucking hell—" Ala grabs the root that's again reaching for her hand and yanks down, breaking it. "Fine. I'll go first. My confession is that I killed my mother."
Dymitr can't help but stare at her, despite the roots creeping around his thighs, binding his legs together. He knows that Niko has killed people—he knew the first moment he saw him that he was capable of it. But Ala just doesn't seem like she has it in her.
If Niko is surprised, though, he doesn't show it. He offers his own confession.
"I was not born a *strzygoń*," he says. "I was changed into one."
For a moment, Dymitr forgets about the roots wrapping around his legs. "That's impossible."
He's never heard of someone becoming *strzygoń* before. He's heard of magic that can store a mortal soul beyond their death, or infusions of magic that empower mortals to perform unnatural feats. He's heard of bites that make ordinary men monstrous, or curses that warp a woman beyond recognition. But rumors of their vampirism are false; *strzygi* are born, not made.
"Oh, and you suppose that you, an ordinary mortal, understand the limitations of magic?" Niko says, with a quirk of his mouth.
"Dymitr!" Ala snaps. "Now!"
His silence is like a stone rolled over the entrance to a tomb. He's trapped by it, too weak to heave it aside.
"Just do it!"
"I am not," Dymitr says, his voice breaking, "an ordinary mortal."
As he speaks it, he's not sure it will be enough. But he knows that as vague as it sounds, the harder they tug on the thread of it, the more of him will unravel. The roots twist away from his knees, releasing their grip on his calves and ankles. They disappear under the seats behind him. His legs are throbbing, and when he lifts a pant leg to see the damage the roots did, he sees a raw, red welt crisscrossing his ankle.
He's about to ask what the purpose of all that was when he sees, descending from the ceiling like a single snowflake, a scrap of paper. It wafts toward Niko, flutters, and then settles in his outstretched palm, folded neatly down the middle. He opens it.
"It's an address."
"Let's go, then." Ala stalks down the aisle toward the door, and Dymitr follows her, with Niko at his heels.
By the time they step out onto the sidewalk again, it's dark. The night air has never smelled as good to Dymitr as it does then, away from the close, decaying smell of the theater. Petrichor and wet pavement, fried food and cigarettes. At any other time, it would have been unpleasant, but now, it signals normalcy. Humanity.
They walk to the Jeep together in silence. But when Niko reaches the driver's side door and sticks his key in the lock, he stops and sighs.
"We could just agree not to talk about any of it," he says.
Ala, standing on the sidewalk by the passenger-side door, kicks at the curb with the toe of her boot.
"I'm not ashamed," she says. She raises her head and looks up at the Uptown Theatre, where even the back of the building is decorated with patterned stones, diamonds, concentric circles, and flourishes. Sections of it are covered with plastic to keep it from crumbling in the wind.
"My mother was in agony," she says. "She begged me to end it, and I did, even knowing I was furthering the curse along. I thought… she had put in enough time. Enough suffering. The irony is…" She smiles, and though Dymitr can tell it's forced, it still looks alarming, her inhumanity laid bare. Her cheeks crease around her too-wide mouth, as if straining to keep it contained. "The irony is, it was her suffering that gave me the magic to do it. I put her to sleep, first."
Dymitr braces himself against the back of the Jeep, where the spare tire is fixed just above the bumper. He sees a puddle of rainwater in the middle of the street.
Strange. It hasn't rained in days.
"I don't feel bad about it," Ala says, though she must, or it wouldn't have counted as a confession.
"Good," Niko says. His eyes are like sunlit honey, like the amber that preserves insects forever, like a fire burning low. Dymitr can feel the pressure of his mouth, the tickle of his speech—
"You did her a service," Niko says. "And it took strength."
Ala offers him a small smile. It doesn't reach her eyes.
"And you?" she says to him. "You were… born mortal?"
Dymitr has never heard her voice so gentle before.
Niko rolls his eyes. "I had *strzygi* blood. It was dormant in me. A powerful witch simply… awakened it."
"Who?" Ala says. "Why?"
Niko looks at Dymitr as if pleading with him, and Dymitr feels compelled to make his own confession, to finally release himself from the lie that's stood between them from the start of all this less than twenty-four hours ago—
And then an arrow hits the streetlight above them, shattering it so glass rains down on the sidewalk, right next to Ala.
Dymitr has his bow in one hand and an arrow in the other before he draws his next breath. He steps in front of Niko, his back to the car, searching out the source of the arrow. But the moon is hidden behind the clouds, and the streetlight is out, and all the houses along this quiet side street are dark. The glow of Broadway on his left casts long, strange shadows.
He can hear something drawing nearer. Something with heavy, dragging footsteps. No—many somethings. Somethings that stoop over the puddle of rainwater to suck it into their mouths, somethings that snort and paw at each other. Pale, hairless things that glow in the faint moonlight.
*Upiór*. A horde of them.
Most of the quasi-mortal beings of his home country have been called vampires at one point or another. For the *upiór*, the term is perhaps the closest to being accurate—but they aren't similar to *zmory*, or *strzygi*, or even wraiths. In cities, they gravitate toward each other, driven by the same need to drink and content to share food sources as long as there's enough to go around. They're creatures of mindless thirst, his grandmother once told him, easy to kill because they're stupid and hard to kill because they keep coming.
And coming.
They're skinny, ungainly creatures, their arms and legs too long for their bodies, their eyes as milky white as their skin. They have long, sharp teeth that stick out from their lips, not lining up quite enough to fit into their mouths. The only sound they make is a loud hissing that reminds Dymitr of a video he once saw of a Madagascar hissing cockroach recoiling from the jab of a man's finger.
Beside him, Niko shifts, his face morphing into the fierce, inquisitive visage of an owl, his round eyes still the same bright amber. Wings explode from his back, bypassing his clothing by magic, and his trim fingernails grow into claws.
Ala is the first to move. She steps toward the advancing *upiór*, and she relies on a familiar trick: a dozen copies of her fan out from the toe of her shoe, illusions that seem to confuse the horde. They tumble into each other, confused by the disconnect between their snorting noses and their eyes. Then Ala grabs one and digs her thumbs into its eyes. It's more fragile than a human would be; her fingers pierce its flesh like it's a peach. Dark blood gushes over her fingers and rolls down the backs of her hands. The *upiór* screeches and lashes out, not at Ala, but at one of the other vampires; the two topple to the street, streaked dark red with blood. They scratch and claw and bite at each other.
Niko and Dymitr move at the same time. With a powerful beat of his wings, Niko rises into the air just enough to stab down at an advancing *upiór*'s chest. Dymitr lets an arrow fly at the one closest to him; it strikes the creature's throat, and it lets out a horrible scream. Dymitr backs up against the Jeep, nocks another arrow, and fires again in one movement. This time he only hits one in the leg, and it keeps coming, clawed hands outstretched.
It's too close now to fire. Dymitr takes an arrow in hand instead and stabs at its neck. He hits the juncture of neck and shoulder—not enough to stop it. The *upiór*'s hands close around his throat. Dymitr twists and thrashes, but *upiór* are strong, and they don't feel pain.
Inspiration strikes, and Dymitr goes limp, letting the creature bear all of his weight at once. Startled, its grip slips, and Dymitr rolls under the Jeep, where its bulk keeps the *upiór* from following him. Little bits of gravel and glass cling to his palms as he army-crawls beneath the Jeep to get to the other side. He needs more distance if he's going to use his bow and arrow.
He rolls out from under the Jeep, this time on the sidewalk, and then heaves himself onto the hood of the car. In the street, Niko is bringing his blade down on two *upiór* at once in an elegant, deadly arc; seven versions of Ala lash out with a short sword at once. Only one of them strikes true, but the other six create chaos, turning the vampires against each other in a tangle of pale limbs.
And then Dymitr sees her. Elza. His sister.
She stands at the end of the alley, dressed in black tactical clothing, her hair tied back. Her palms are the color of a port-wine stain, and her eyes glint red. She has a bone sword in each hand, one short and one long. Niko is right in her path, his back to her.
Dymitr told her to go home. Apparently, she didn't listen.
"Niko!" Dymitr screams as an *upiór*'s cold fingers tighten around Dymitr's ankle.
The *upiór* yanks, and Dymitr falls on the windshield, hard. He kicks as hard as he can at the vampire, but its grip is too strong. It clambers up onto the hood of the Jeep, and Dymitr punches it in the jaw, which startles it but doesn't stop it. He twists his free hand behind his back to reach for his quiver, but the angle is wrong, and the *upiór* opens its mouth wide, its mismatched needle teeth drawing close to Dymitr's throat. Its breath smells like copper and rotting meat.
In the light of the last remaining streetlight, he sees Niko's sword flashing silver as he spars with Elza. Dymitr spits in the *upiór*'s face, twisting his body to break its grip, but he's pinned, he's aching, he's out of options—
Then it screams as Ala grabs it by the head, wrenches it back, and slits its throat. Blood splatters on the pavement. The smell of rot makes him choke.
There's no time to thank her. Elza is only holding one sword now, the other lying forgotten on the street, but she's still besting Niko, quick and deft and deadly. Niko is bleeding from a wound in his side, holding his elbow tight to his ribs. He stumbles, and Dymitr breaks into a sprint.
He loses himself in a rush of adrenaline, grabs his sister's discarded sword, and thrusts it just in time to block her from cutting Niko's throat. For a moment they stand braced against each other right above Niko's Adam's apple, Dymitr's sword pressing up, his sister's sword pressing down. He feels heat in his palms, in his eyes, clawing up his throat like acid.
Now, his palms and fingers are stained the deep red of the Holy Order.