The Skarbnyk

      Mama always said that my blood will protect me.

         My boots tap against the flagstones at the mouth of the tunnel, each pair of echoes seeming to say, ‘Turn back, turn back…’

           Anya clutches at the embroidered sleeve of my vyshyvanka as we follow the priest, her fingers still dimpled with baby fat, her six years of life a stark reminder of how long I’ve gone without my beloved mother.

           And now, in the wake of this latest death, she will be a ceaseless reminder of the man I’ve grown up calling father.

           Already Anya has the same hawkish nose, the same copper hair as the towering Hetman, whose sash festooned with medals of valor made him jingle with each step. I can’t count how many times I’ve stared into the mirror, wondering why I don’t look like Anya does, why I was cursed with this diminutive form, this wild hair bursting from my braids, this spattering of freckles like mud sprayed from a wagon wheel. . Even as I strive to be worthy of the title and lands that now fall to me, in quieter moments I wonder what life would be like if I’d been raised as the miller’s daughter, or the banker’s, or any of a number of households led by men with unruly black hair. ‘The other girls are just jealous. Don’t worry,’ Mama said once after I confronted her with the rumours. ‘Worry causes wrinkles.’

           Today there is nothing but worry. It pelts my mind like winter sleet.

           “Irynka,” Anya says, tugging at the needlework depiction of scarlet roses and curling vines. “I don’t want to go see the skarbnyk.” Her petal-pink lips roll into a pout. “Can we go home?”

           “Hush, little one,” I say, pulling my arm free to stroke her smooth head. “Skarbnyk are good. The money will ensure we eat well this winter.”

           I glance over my shoulder at the crowd following in our bootsteps. Mourners, yes, but the real reason all of them have come is for the spectacle. I don’t need them to know how much we need the treasure the skarbnyk is guarding, but they’re not stupid. My big toe can just feel the cobbles through the hole in my sole and the farmers know how little crops there were this harvest. Anya can’t go hungry, and I have nothing else to give. I take her soft hand again in mine.

           “What if it thinks you’re trying to steal the treasure?” she asks. “I’ve heard of them swallowing people whole!”

           “Nonsense. They don’t do that. Especially not when Tato’s daughters themselves are coming for the gold.”

           Anya looks up at me, her chocolate eyes piercing mine before dropping to the ground like a stone. “I miss Tato,” she whines.

           “Me too,” I lie.

           Deeper we go. Down and down and always curving, through tunnels lit with glowing torches, their flames transitioning through the warm red and ochre of autumn leaves, to emerald, cerulean and violet the farther our feet take us from our home and into the mountain. The smell of wet rock and iron hangs thick in the air.

           There is singing and laughter as we go, but its joyous melody passes through me without touching anything. Instead, dread bites at my bones like the cold nip of winter’s wind.

           Anya wasn’t alive to remember the last time we’d made the journey to the skarbnyk’s lair. Tato had brought the whole village then too, had walked arm in arm with Mama to meet the small man with metallic eyes. I’ll never forget the feeling of that calculating stare as it raked over my frail frame before dismissing me. In the end the banker shook the skarbnyk’s hand and we left with a portion of the gold. We’d feasted for a month. It could be the same again today.

           The priest, in his saffron robes threaded with silver, falls back a few paces to walk next to me. “Be at ease, child. I can do the talking, just remember your role. Only one of the Hetman’s bloodline may touch the treasure. It was he who summoned the skarbnyk to guard the tzar’s fortune, it must be his kin who collect from it.”

           I glare at the old man. I know. Of course I know, it’s all I’ve been thinking about. It’s why the empty wagons at the end of the procession have just one shovel for my hands to use, why my palms will be blistered and raw tonight. But something wrinkles the edges of my memory.

           “Didn’t the banker shovel the treasure for Tato?” He’s dead now too. Drowned in a pond last spring.

           The priest turns to me, white eyebrows disappearing up into his white hair. “Of course not. That’s impossible.”

           I frown. I must be mistaken. It was a long time ago.

           At last, we come to a leveling of the path. The narrow tunnel widens into an immense cavern, its ceiling so high that not even the lavender firelight can reach it.

           “Pretty…” Anya breathes.

           The villagers mirror her amazement with gasps and cries as they take in the far side of the cavern, where mounds of gold sparkle and overflow from a carven pit. And standing before it, the skarbnyk.

           Stiff robes festooned with opals and rubies hang from his stocky frame. His hair is pulled back, framing an owlish face with wide golden eyes like two suspended coins. He is older than my eighteen years, but he could be thirty or three hundred, I cannot say. The top of his pointed hat comes only up to my elbow. Small as I am, he is smaller, but I will never be afforded this amount of respect, and I don’t want it. It’s fuelled by fear, as was Tato’s.

           The villagers leave a crescent of space around the skarbnyk as they finish crowding into the cavern, and the priest steps forward. His candle swings on its chain like a pendulum.

           “Ho, Treasurer,” the priest says in a carrying voice. “We have come for what is rightfully ours.”

           “It cannot be rightfully yours.” The skarbnyk’s voice is the grating of two boulders rubbing together. His eyes flash. “You are not the man I made the bargain with. Be gone!” The skarbnyk’s shadow stretches in the flickering light, climbing up the cavern walls, growing to twice its original size.

           My heart hammers against my chest. The priest takes a half-step back, shock stretching the wrinkles on his face.

           “We are his daughters,” I say, moving forward. I do my best to hold my head high under the onslaught of those unnatural eyes. Everyone is counting on me. “We bring gifts. Pierogis made with wheat from our fields, salted fish from our rivers, and cheese from our mountains.”

           Wives rush forward, removing lids from steaming bowls and placing them at his feet, followed by baskets spilling over with fish and goat’s cheese. It’s everything we have left.

           “No gemstones?” the skarbnyk asks, hunger sharpening his features.

           I shake my head. We’ve bartered all of them—Mama’s jewelry, our house stores, all of it—for wheat and potatoes after the summer’s droughts and pestilence destroyed our crops. The tzar will never notice such a tiny dip in his stores. He doesn’t need it anyway. “We bring you this amber, a gift from our trees.”

           I reach into my skirt pocket and draw out the heavy, tawny hunk. I approach the skarbnyk, extending my hand and freeze in my tracks.

           Something ripples beneath his skin.

           I hold my breath as tiny black protrusions like feathers or scales lift from his neck, moving in a wave that undulates as he reaches out his arm. His eyes are hard and bright, but as our hands touch, the black barbs disappear and a smile curves across his face.

           “You may approach the treasure. If you are of the blood, there will be no danger to you.”

           Though my mouth is dry as ashes, I swallow, then put one foot in front of the other. Too soon, I am standing at the base of the heap of gold. I glance once at Anya’s expectant face, then thrust my hand deep into the coins, pulling free a handful. One of the coins slips free of my grasp, bouncing across the uneven ground away form the skarbnyk.

           I turn to look at him. He stands motionless, watching.

           As I heave a sigh of relief, Anya lets out a whoop of laughter and takes off after the runaway coin. She lifts it up before her face and we grin at each other across the cavern. Then her face becomes slack, her eyes widen in terror and she opens her mouth to scream.

           I turn in time to see the skarbnyk’s face contort with rage. “THIEF!” he cries, and leaps into the air.

           My stomach lurches into my throat and I stare, dumbstruck as the skarbnyk’s skin seems to melt. It sags away from his cheekbones before splitting in half as something erupts from beneath. Robes and skin fall to the ground as the massive body of a raven rips free of its casing, wings stretching wide to carry it through the air. Horror has me paralyzed, my limbs no longer responding as the skarbnyk’s black beak gapes open, rocketing towards me with rows upon rows of needle-sharp teeth.

           I clench my eyes shut and wait for the end. A soft breeze rustles my hair.

           My eyes snap open in time to see Anya hidden behind a cloak of ragged feathers, her scream cut off in the split second in which the raven’s head bobs, swallows.

           Swiveling slowly, ever so slowly, the skarbnyk's onyx eyes regard the gathered group. My chest is about to implode beneath the crush of an invisible fist as the raven’s beak opens into a maw of endless darkness. Rivulets of scarlet drip from its teeth to patter against the stone floor. My half-sister’s blood.

           The skarbnyk does not give me a second look as it rushes past me once more, chasing the screaming villagers back up the tunnel.