It took several weeks to get rid of all the refuse and set the cave to rights. Izolda could only get away for short periods of time. There was always a task to finish, an errand to run. But she was nothing if not persistent, and patient as well.
Most of Varnya’s things she burned in a magical fire, including the bedding. The floor of the cave was not, as she had believed at first, dirt, but stone. It had taken considerable effort to clean it. There were some things she could not use magic for. At least not yet.
Most of the bottles she’d found held potions or tinctures she’d made to Varnya’s specifications. These now lined the shelf in a neat row. The work table, clean and polished, held the five books she’d found, and the papers that had been scattered in both the personal and work space.
The books were all hand written. One of them had been a record, of sorts, of Varnya’s life. This was the book Izolda decided to start with. She was curious to know how powerful the witch had been in the beginning, and if she had truly turned into a Rusalka.
Izolda had never heard of the village Varnya had come from. She supposed it no longer mattered, but she would have liked to know how far away it was. The account was interesting, but not especially helpful. There was no mention of how powerful she was as a child, nothing much about her family life, other than she had three sisters whom she did not get along with.
There were records of deaths, but not what caused them. Mention of an arranged marriage and of loathing her husband. There were no children mentioned. Then there was a large gap and somewhere between one entry and the next, the handwriting changed.
Izolda sat back. What happened during that gap? The entries after that were filled with accounts of moving, of being a kind of wandering healer. There was no mention of the husband and Izolda wondered what had happened to him.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
“Izolda, where have you been?” Olga demanded as her daughter tried to slip unseen through the door.
The girl gave a start, as though not expecting to be noticed.
“I—I—I was walking in the woods. I had thought to pick some goosefoot and nettles, but I forgot my basket.”
Olga knew her daughter well enough to know she was lying. Izolda had changed greatly, what she saw now worried her. Ever since the incident with the Rusalka at the river . . . She believed Matyei when he said he could not remember what happened. The boy was guileless as a lamb. But Izolda had seen more, knew more, than she was telling. She was sure of it.
“Then that shall be your task for the morning,” Olga told her daughter. “You will gather the nettles and goosefoot, and acorns as well. And you will take Mila with you, to make the work go faster.”
Izolda’s mask slipped for a moment. Olga saw anger in the girl’s face, just a flash before it was gone again.
“Yes, mamoolychka,” the girl said, every inch the dutiful daughter.
Olga eyed her a moment longer and then gave a sharp nod. “Now get to your duties.”
Perhaps she was being too hard on the girl. She knew how difficult it was to grow up surrounded by power and not be able to show your own. Had she made a mistake, ensuring Izolda had the power of seven?
It had seemed right at the time. Her mother had agreed, and they had even consulted a seer, who had assured them it was meant to be. The child had a destiny to fulfill. But looking at Izolda now, she could not imagine what that destiny could be. This had not turned out the way she expected, and she couldn’t help the uneasy feeling that filled her when she thought of the future.
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