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Chapter 35: Storm Brewing
“I do not trust Kosti,” Morozko hissed, looking at Anya. “I do not like how he danced with you. I do not like how that blasted koldun even looked at you.”
“You know that he is a koldun too?” Anya asked.
“Of course he is.” Morozko wiped dust from his jacket. “A powerful one.”
Anya shivered. “He creeps me out.” Anya did not want to admit that she was also intrigued by Kosti, albeit in a sickening way.
Later that night, as Anya slaved over homework at her rickety desk in the kitchen, Iosif came in, his fur bristling as he swept. He moved about frantically.
“Whatever is wrong, Osya?” Anya asked.
Iosif let out a low moan. “Something is amiss. I have seen something horrible in my kasha. There is a dark presence in this inn, only I cannot place the face. I fear it is your cherti.”
Bab terkait
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 36: War
Anya woke early the next morning, restless. She dressed in jeans and a pale sweater, then went to fix herself a bowl of Cheerios. Morozko slept all the while. Pouring over the cereal, Anya stirred the milk idly. There was a scratch at the door.“Mistress, you seem unhappy,” purred Aym. He slinked in on jazzy feet, bending his ears as if tipping his hat to her.“No. I am just tired. That is all. I cannot for the life of me sleep.” Anya took a bite of cereal.Aym leapt onto the table and settled beside her, his tail twitching. “And what has you blue, damselfly? Is it a man?”“What?” Anya echoed.“You look frazzled, that is all. Bags under your eyes, hair askew.” Aym licked his paw. “Usually the signs of love troubles.”Anya was amused. “And what does a cherti know of
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 37: Hail and Rain
Outside was madness. A fire had been set, and enemies ran mad-dash between the tongues of flame. The inn’s guests fought for their lives. Cherti and witches swarmed the field. Guts spilled onto the snowy ground; vampir went for necks and vodyanoi summoned water from the mill pond to drown opponents. Vila and leshy battled above.The kolduny and witches that had been staying at the inn formed a circle, casting spells to turn the tide of the battle. They summoned a storm, directing lightning to strike the swarms of vila above. The vila’s lightning-charred bodies fell from the sky.As the sky darkened and storm winds picked up, the flames grew higher, setting fire to the inn. Aym ravaged the enemy, ripping out their throats, his iron hide impenetrable to arrow and sword. Anya punched bolts of golden flame at her opponents, letting her rage manifest as magic. Morozko struggled to defend her
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 38: Wounds
Anya sat in the waiting room, her eyes following the second hand of the clock. Minutes turned to hours, and still there was no news of Morozko's health. No matter how often she asked the doctors, they refused to answer her, saying she couldn't enter the operating room. So she waited, desperate, her thoughts turned to the burning inn and gory battlefield. How many members of her family were dead? How had they broken through Liliya's encampments to the north? Was Morozko going to survive? A myriad questions rattled her mind.“Anya?” a nurse asked.Anya looked up. “Yes?” she said quietly.The nurse smiled softly. “Your friend is stable.”Anya clasped her hands together. “Sweet Mokosh, thank you. Can I see him?”The nurse nodded.Anya rushed to Morozko's room. Morozko lay asleep, an IV attached to his arm. His heart
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 39: Taken
Winter dragged his chains of hoarfrost across the ground, and December came roaring into the world.Morozko was in Father Frost's kingdom of eternal snow, in the northern-most corner of Buyan, where the spirit of winter reigned supreme. Kind but capricious, Ded Moroz – or Father Frost in Anya’s lilting English – was known for granting maiden's wishes and freezing the less fortunate. Morozko, thankfully, carried a furnace inside him from his wayward father’s side, so he was impervious to the cold. He was temping as a bartender for the time being, working under his love-fickle mother Snegurochka: Ded Moroz's granddaughter and present-deliverer to a myriad excited Russian children.Morozko had wandered far and wide over the past month, rushing as a cloud of steam across the harsh Russian winter-scape. He had settled himself in the darkest corner of Buyan, closest to the deathless lands, where the northern lights
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 40: Glazed
Ded Moroz's eyes seemed to pick the meat clean from Morozko's bones. Father Frost stroked his hoary beard, glacial icicle spiked crown resting atop his brow. His courtiers thronged round his throne, whispering at the scandal of his scion, the bannik bastard born out of wedlock to Snegurochka.“So,” Ded Moroz boomed. “You wish to be reinstated to the family legacy and become my heir? A responsibility you have shirked since your birth, all to save some orphan witch?”Morozko sweated, the furnace in his belly roaring. “Yes,” he said, temple throbbing under the scrutiny of his forefather, a man he had never wanted please.A thin smile graced Ded Moroz's lips. “I cannot say that I am glad that it has taken so long for you to accept your heritage. But for the love of a woman, you are willing. So be it. I will give you your crown, my grandson.”Morozko let out t
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 41: Lion in a Cage
Anya sank onto the bed, head in her hands. “No,” she whispered. “That is not right. You disgusting liar.”“Would I lie to the daughter of a goddess?”“The gods are gone. They abandoned Buyan eons ago. You are delusional, you bastard.”“Which is perhaps why Baba Yaga found you on Earth, little demigod.” Kashchei sat beside Anya and put his arm around her. She was too panicked to resist.“No.” Anya looked out the open window, at the treacherous beauty of the land of the deathless. Anya clutched the firebird pendant at her throat and inhaled sharply.“And here Baba Yaga has raised you all this time, keeping you in the dark about your heritage so you could be her perfect little pawn.” Kashchei tapped his shoeless feet on the ground. “Cruel, really. Keeping your true family from you.”&l
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 42: Ivan Tsarevich
Morozko was on the shadow-side of Saint Petersburg, in Buyan’s reflection of the metropolis. He rode the train aimlessly, smoking cigarette after cigarette. All of his searching had turned up ash. Dirt. Nothing. There was no sign of where Kosti had disappeared to, and the fear of what had happened to Anya was a bird freezing in its cage in his snowy ribs, where his heart would have been, if Anya was in his arms. Instead, she had flown away, because he had been foolish enough to make his wish on a firebird girl.Morozko caught his reflection in the dark window. There were his lips, a dark blue, and his cheeks sunken in like a junkie’s. His hair was hardened with ice. He could barely smoke cigarettes now: the cold of his mouth put them out. He cursed his new form under his breath.Morozko touched the window’s glass and traced Anya’s face in the oily smudge. Just her eyes, really, a
Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 43: Even Gods Can Be Killed
Ivan Tsarevich and Morozko trekked farther each day. Ivan told Morozko of the legions of cherti that guarded the deathless lands, of the women who had crumbled to dust upon trying to leave Kashchei’s kingdom. Their spirits haunted the thick black forests bordering the area. So many maidens that had been spirited away over the centuries now lingered there. Bodiless, they roamed the wilderness, leading travelers astray to try and suck the life out of them. There were packs of vucari, Greyback’s people, who would as likely help a traveler as eat them. Finally, there was Zmei Gorynych, the fearsome three-headed dragon who guarded the portal to the deathless lands.“Zmei leaves his cave once a year, on the summer solstice,” Ivan said as he turned hares over a spit for their dinner. “A being of fire, Zmei cannot resist the call of the sun. He flies as close as he can to her, fancying the star his lover, a
Bab terbaru
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 48: Happy Ending
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 47: Promenade
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 46: Falcon Wild
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 45: Gardens To Tend
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 44: A Goddess Is Born
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 43: Even Gods Can Be Killed
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 42: Ivan Tsarevich
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 41: Lion in a Cage
- Jack Frost's Bride Chapter 40: Glazed
