The Secret History of Moscow by Ekaterina Sedia

Author:Ekaterina Sedia [Sedia, Ekaterina]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Speculative Fiction
ISBN: 9781607012290
Publisher: Prime Books
Published: 2007-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 11

The Boatman

Yakov had never seen a river like this. Black as soot, with a quiet matte surface, rippling slightly as if tremendous pressure had been building underneath. Thin wisps of fog floated over the dead river, moving with a will of their own, twisting like ribbons and then unwinding; they dipped closer to the surface and drifted up, coalesced into a massive formidable cloud and broke apart again in an endless hypnotic dance, and Yakov could not decide whether he was more disturbed by the apparent life of the fog or its mindless stereopathy.

The bank was devoid of any vegetation; not even the glowtrees dared to colonize the barren black basalt of the embankment, natural or artificial, Yakov wasn’t sure. Even the pale grass recoiled from the black, slow water and the living mist roiling above it.

“How do we cross?” Yakov asked Zemun.

The cow looked at the river thoughtfully. “We wait for the boatman.”

Yakov glanced at Galina over his shoulder. “Did you hear that?”

She nodded. “I told you there was a Styx down here somewhere. We should’ve taken Fyodor and his coin with us.”

“How long until the boatman shows up?” Yakov said.

Koschey shrugged. “Whenever he damn well pleases. Takes his time, that boatman.”

“David said Elena might send us a message,” Galina said. “With some rusalka or vodyanoy.”

“And this will further our search how?” Koschey said.

“It won’t hinder it either,” Zemun said.

Yakov watched the fog, hoping that a boat would appear out of it, gliding across the sooty surface, steered by a tall man on the stern, a long pole in his withered hands—he shook his head to dispel the vision. “Why did you think there would be a river?” he whispered to Galina. “How did you know?”

She shrugged. “There’s always a river in the underworld. Or at least a bridge.”

Yakov left her to talk to the Tatar-Mongol, and sat down on the bank, half-annoyed, half-relieved that he was left alone for a bit longer.

Yakov wasn’t always like this, defeated in advance, dutiful out of habit. He once was a rose-cheeked youth fresh out of school who had wanted to be a policeman since he was a little kid, even though he didn’t remember that the original inspiration and desire for the grey and light-blue uniform came from a rhymed illustrated children’s book about a very tall policeman who had the ability to rescue cats from tall trees without any need for ladders or cherry-pickers.

He also was once a lover and a husband, an optimist; he looked to the future with his wife Tamara, a girl as pink and light-haired as he was, who worked at a textile factory and shared a small apartment with her alcoholic father and long-suffering mother, of whom Yakov only remembered that she had the most spectacular dark circles around her eyes that he had ever had the misfortune to observe.

They courted and married, and moved in with Yakov’s mother, whom Tamara seemed to like more than her own, even if they did argue occasionally

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