Total pages in book: 40
Estimated words: 38711 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 129(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38711 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 129(@300wpm)
Roman unbuckled his harness and stepped away from the tree.
“Don’t,” Andora said. “Maybe she will let you pass.”
“She won’t. Might as well get it over with.”
He walked into the snow and waited.
The snowflakes swirled. He was seeing it for the fifth time, and he caught the precise moment they snapped into the familiar shape. He walked across the snow, tall, slender, his face grim, his dark hair expertly cut. He was exactly as Roman remembered, down to his black robes with its embroidered hem. Roman had a set just like it, except his embroidery was silver, not glowing with deep, raging purple.
“Why can’t I get away from you?” Rodion asked. “You came into this world screaming, a loud, obnoxious thing, smelling of piss and shit. Everyone was showing you off, and I looked at you and thought, ‘It would only take a pinch to smother you.’ I could just reach out and squeeze. I should’ve drowned you when you were a baby.”
This was the part when he would ask, “Why didn’t you?” and Rodion would say, “I would get caught, stupid.” Except, for some odd reason, Roman didn’t feel compelled to follow the script.
“What going on?” Finn asked behind him.
“Roman’s brother was a psychopath,” Andora said. “He only cared about power, and when he became the Black Volhv, the dark magic seduced him. There are things in Nav and on the border with the Void that feed on human desires. If you let them, they will claim you.”
“You are the reason Mom and Dad separated,” Rodion said. “I never chose sides. I let them handle their own problems, but you, no, you had to wedge your way between them with your opinions on what was fair and not fair.”
The words just didn’t have that vicious bite they’d always had. The tone was the same, the hatred on Rodion’s face was the same, but somehow it didn’t hurt like it used to.
The evil thing that was Rodion waited for him to respond.
“What happened?” Finn asked.
“Rodion started passing judgements. He killed some people, and he would summon dark things to do his bidding,” Andora said. “The Black Volhv is supposed to intercede on people’s behalf. Instead, he terrorized them.”
“What about Chernobog?”
“He let it happen,” she said.
It was punishment. For their father and for the entire congregation. Chernobog had made his wishes known, and they were ignored. So, he let things take their natural course. He didn’t feed Rodion’s rampage, but he did not restrain it.
“You’re the reason Alyona died—”
“Their father tried to stop Rodion and got hurt. Rodion withdrew to Nav.”
Defiance required penance.
“—you’re like a fucking cockroach that’s too stupid to die—"
“The family called Roman. On this day, twelve years ago, Roman went into Nav and killed his brother.”
The torrent of verbal venom Rodion had leveled at him was still washing over him, but the guilt was no longer there. He still remembered this confrontation in excruciating detail, the fight, the vicious dark magic tainted with the Void that had boiled out of his brother and torn at him with phantom teeth, the black blade that had appeared in his own hand, the hiss it made as it slid into Rodion’s chest, and Chernobog’s voice, which sounded like the end of the world as he said an ancient greeting that was recognition, announcement, and acknowledgement rolled into one.
“GOI ESI, ROMAN, MOY VOLHV.”
Alive you are, Roman, my volhv.
There was no guilt anymore. No pain. Just acceptance. It took five tries, but he finally got the point.
Ha.
“—you were always a shit smear on the family’s name and now you think that by coming here you can do—"
“Look, dickhead,” Roman interrupted. “I’d like to stay and chat, but I have a tree to drag.”
He turned around and walked away.
A wail of rage screeched behind him. He felt the furious darkness streak to him, ready to rip him to pieces. But he was the Black Volhv. Roman waved his hand, not bothering to face the threat. It vanished, snuffed out of existence. The Glades became bright and empty.
He walked over to the fir, slipped the harness back on, and started toward the distant woods. The tree felt so light, it was as if it were floating behind him.
EPILOGUE
The woods parted. A snowy plain unrolled in front of them. A frozen river flowed through it, coiling in a ring, its surface slick like glass and a deep midnight-blue. In the loop of the river, poised against the distant forest and low, snow-capped mountains, a terem rose.
Crafted from pure white snow with huge, oval windows and panels of light blue ice, it perched upon the island like a fantastic, many-tiered wedding cake of a building. Six towers of various heights and widths thrust toward the sky, each more ornate than the last, their cupolas frosted with crushed teal ice and topped with ice spires that looked like sword blades. Lavish balconies with carved rails hugged the towers, snaking between them at different heights. A bridge stretched in a graceful curve across the water to the shore.