Author: Katherine Arden
Series: The Bear in the Nightingale #2
Genre: Fantasy, Historical, Fairytales
Release Date: January 25th 2018
Book Length: 384
Publisher: Ebury
For a young woman in medieval Russia, the choices are stark: marriage or a life in a convent. Vasya will choose a third way: magic...
The court of the Grand Prince of Moscow is plagued by power struggles and rumours of unrest. Meanwhile bandits roam the countryside, burning the villages and kidnapping its daughters. Setting out to defeat the raiders, the Prince and his trusted companion come across a young man riding a magnificent horse.
Only Sasha, a priest with a warrior's training, recognises this 'boy' as his younger sister, thought to be dead or a witch by her village. But when Vasya proves herself in battle, riding with remarkable skill and inexplicable power, Sasha realises he must keep her secret as she may be the only way to save the city from threats both human and fantastical...
Excerpt
Excerpt
I'm so happy to welcome you all to my stop on The Girl in the Tower blog tour! Girl was definitely one of my favourites books of last year and fans of the series can fall in love all over again with Arden's beautiful writing. I'll be bringing you an exclusive excerpt of Girl and my review!
1.
THE DEATH OF
THE SNOW- MAIDEN
Moscow, just past midwinter, and the haze of
ten thousand
fires rose to meet a smothering sky. To the west a little light
lingered,
but in the east the clouds mounded up, bruise- colored in the
livid
dusk, buckling with unfallen snow.
Two rivers gashed the skin of the Russian forest, and Moscow lay
at their joining, atop a pine- clad hill. Her squat, white walls
enclosed
a jumble of hovels and churches; her palaces’ ice- streaked towers
splayed like desperate fingers against the sky. As the daylight
faded,
lights kindled in the towers’ high windows.
A woman, magnificently dressed, stood at one of these windows,
watching the firelight mingle with the stormy dusk. Behind her,
two
other women sat beside an oven, sewing.
“That is the third time Olga has gone to the window this hour,”
whispered one of the women. Her ringed hands flashed in the dim
light; her dazzling headdress drew the eye from boils on her nose.
Waiting- women clustered nearby, nodding like blossoms. Slaves
stood near the chilly walls, their lank hair wrapped in kerchiefs.
“Well, of course, Darinka!” returned the second woman. “She is
waiting for her brother, the madcap monk. How long has it been
since
Brother Aleksandr left for Sarai? My husband has been waiting for
him since the first snow. Now poor Olga is pining at her window.
Well,
good luck to her. Brother Aleksandr is probably dead in a snowbank.”
The
speaker was Eudokhia Dmitreeva, Grand Princess of
Moscow.
Her robe was sewn with gems; her rosebud mouth concealed
the
stumps of three blackened teeth. She raised her voice shrilly. “You
will
kill yourself standing in this wind, Olya. If Brother Aleksandr
were
coming, he would have been here by now.”
“As
you say,” Olga replied coolly from the window. “I am glad you
are
here to teach me patience. Perhaps my daughter will learn from
you
how a princess behaves.”
Eudokhia’s
lips thinned. She had no children. Olga had two, and
was
expecting a third before Easter.
“What
is that?” said Darinka suddenly. “I heard a noise. Did you
hear
that?”
Outside,
the storm was rising. “It was the wind,” said Eudokhia.
“Only
the wind. What a fool you are, Darinka.” But she shivered.
“Olga,
send for more wine; it is cold in this drafty room.”
In
truth, the workroom was warm— windowless, save for the single
slit—
heated with a stove and many bodies. But— “Very well,”
said
Olga. She nodded at her servant, and the woman went out, down
the
steps into the freezing night.
“I
hate nights like this,” said Darinka. She clutched her robe about
her
and scratched a scab on her nose. Her eyes darted from candle to
shadow
and back. “She comes
on nights like this.”
“She?”
asked Eudokhia sourly. “Who is she?”
“Who
is she?” repeated Darinka. “You
mean you don’t know?”
Darinka
looked superior. “She is
the ghost.”
Olga’s
two children, who had been arguing beside the oven,
stopped
screeching. Eudokhia sniffed. From her place by the window,
Olga
frowned.
“There
is no ghost,” Eudokhia said. She reached for a plum preserved
in
honey, bit and chewed daintily, then licked the sweetness
from
her fingers. Her tone implied that this palace
was not quite worthy
of
a ghost.
“I
have seen her!” protested Darinka, stung. “Last time I slept
here,
I saw her.”
Highborn
women, who must live and die in towers, were much
given
to visiting. Now and again, they stayed overnight for company,
when
their husbands were away. Olga’s palace— clean, orderly,
prosperous—
was a favorite; the more so as Olga was eight months
gone
with child and did not go out.
Hearing,
Olga frowned, but Darinka, eager for attention, hurried
on.
“It was just after midnight. Some days ago. A little before Midwinter.”
She
leaned forward, and her headdress tipped precariously. “I
was
awakened— I cannot remember what awakened me. A noise . . .”
Olga
made the faintest sound of derision. Darinka scowled. “I cannot
remember,”
she repeated. “I awakened and all was still. Cold
moonlight
seeped around the shutters. I thought I heard something in
the
corner. A rat, perhaps, scritching.” Darinka’s voice dropped. “I
lay
still, with the blankets drawn about me. But I could not fall asleep.
Then
I heard someone whimper. I opened my eyes and shook Nastka,
who
slept next to me. ‘Nastka,’ I told her, ‘Nastka, light a lamp. Someone
is
crying.’ But Nastka did not stir.”
Darinka
paused. The room had fallen silent.
“Then,”
Darinka went on, “I saw a gleam of light. It was an unchristian
glow,
colder than moonlight, nothing like good firelight.
This
glow came nearer and nearer . . .”
Darinka
paused again. “And then I saw her,” she finished in a
hushed
voice.
“Her?
Who? What did she look like?” cried a dozen voices.
“White
as bone,” Darinka whispered. “Mouth fallen in, eyes dark
pits
to swallow the world. She stared at me, lipless as she was, and I
tried
to scream but I could not.”
One
of the listeners squealed; others were clutching hands.
“Enough,”
snapped Olga, turning from her place by the window.
The
word cut through their half- serious hysteria, and the women fell
uneasily
silent. Olga added, “You are frightening my children.”
This
was not entirely true. The elder, Marya, sat upright and
blazing-
eyed. But Olga’s boy, Daniil, clutched his sister, quivering.
“And
then she disappeared,” Darinka finished, trying for nonchalance
and
failing. “I said my prayers and went back to sleep.”
She
lifted her wine- cup to her lips. The two children stared.
“A
good story,” Olga said, with a very fine edge on her voice. “But
it
is done now. Let us tell other tales.”
She
went to her place by the oven and sat. The firelight played on
her
double- plaited hair. Outside, the snow was falling fast. Olga did
not
look toward the window again, though her shoulders stiffened
when
the slaves closed the shutters.
More
logs were heaped on the fire; the room warmed and filled
with
a mellow glow.
“Will
you tell a tale, Mother?”
cried Olga’s daughter, Marya. “Will
you
tell a story of magic?”
A
muffled sound of approval stirred the room. Eudokhia glared.
Olga
smiled. Though she was the Princess of Serpukhov, Olga had
grown
up far from Moscow, at the edge of the haunted wilderness. She
told
strange stories from the north. Highborn women, who lived their
lives
between chapel and bakehouse and tower, treasured the novelty.
The
princess considered her audience. Whatever grief she had felt
standing
alone by the window was now quite absent from her expression.
The
waiting- women put down their needles and curled up eagerly
on
their cushions.
Outside,
the hiss of the wind mixed with the silence of the snowstorm
that
is itself a noise. With a flurry of shouting below, the last of
the
stock was driven into barns, to shelter from the frost. From the
snow-
filled alleys, beggars crept into the naves of churches, praying to
live
until morning. The men on the kremlin- wall huddled near their
braziers
and drew their caps around their ears. But the princess’s tower
was
warm and filled with expectant silence.
“Listen,
then,” Olga said, feeling out the words.
“In
a certain princedom there lived a woodcutter and his wife, in a
little
village in a great forest. The husband was called Misha, his wife
Alena,
and they were very sad. For though they had prayed diligently,
and
kissed the icons and pleaded, God did not see fit to bless them with
a
child. Times were hard and they had no good child to help them
through
a bitter winter.”
Olga
put a hand to her belly. Her third child— the nameless
stranger—
kicked in her womb.
“One
morning, after a heavy snow, husband and wife went into the
forest
to chop firewood. As they chopped and stacked, they pushed
the
snow into heaps, and Alena, idly, began to fashion the snow into a
pale
maiden.”
“Was
she as pretty as me?” Marya interrupted.
Eudokhia
snorted. “She was a snow- maiden, fool. All cold and stiff
and
white. But”— Eudokhia eyed the little girl— “she was certainly
prettier
than you.”
Marya
reddened and opened her mouth.
“Well,”
Olga hurriedly continued, “the snow- girl was white, it is
true,
and stiff. But she was also tall and slender. She had a sweet mouth
and
a long braid, for Alena had sculpted her with all her love for the
child
she could not have.
“
‘See, wife?’ said Misha, observing the little snow- maiden. ‘You
have
made us a daughter after all. There is our Snegurochka, the
snow-
maiden.’
“Alena
smiled, though her eyes filled with tears.
“Just
then an icy breeze rattled the bare branches, for Morozko the
frost-
demon was there, watching the couple and their snow- child.
“Some
say that Morozko took pity on the woman. Others say that
there
was magic in the woman’s tears, weeping on the snow- maiden
when
her husband could not see. But either way, just as Misha and
Alena
turned for home, the snow- maiden’s face grew flushed and
rosy,
her eyes dark and deep, and then a living girl stood in the snow,
birth-
naked, and smiled at the old couple.
“
‘I have come to be your daughter,’ she said. ‘If you will have me,
I
will care for you as my own father and mother.’
“The
old couple stared, first in disbelief, then joy. Alena hurried
forward,
weeping, took the maiden by her cold hand, and led her
toward
the izba.
“The
days passed in peace. Snegurochka swept the floor and
cooked
their meals and sang. Sometimes her songs were strange and
made
her parents uneasy. But she was kind and deft in her work. When
she
smiled, it always seemed the sun shone. Misha and Alena could
not
believe their luck.
“The
moon waxed and waned, and then it was midwinter. The village
came
alive with scents and sounds: bells on sledges and flat golden
cakes.
“Now
and again, folk passed Misha and Alena’s izba on their way
to
or from the village. The snow- maiden watched them, hidden behind
the
woodpile.
“One
day a girl and a tall boy passed Snegurochka’s hiding place,
walking
hand in hand. They smiled at each other, and the snowmaiden
was
puzzled by the joy- like flame in their two faces.
“The
more she thought of it, the less she understood, but Snegurochka
could
not stop thinking of that look. Where before she was
content,
now she grew restless. She paced the izba and made cold trails
in
the snow beneath the trees.
“Spring
was not far off on the day Snegurochka heard a beautiful
music
in the forest. A shepherd- boy was playing his pipe.
“Snegurochka
crept near, fascinated, and the shepherd saw the
pale
girl. When she smiled, the boy’s warm heart leaped out to her
cold
one.
“The
weeks passed, and the shepherd fell in love. The snow softened;
the
sky was a clear mild blue. But still the snow- maiden fretted.
“
‘You are made of snow,’ Morozko the frost- demon warned her,
when
she met him in the forest. ‘You cannot love and be immortal.’ As
the
winter waned, the frost- demon grew fainter, until he was only visible
in
the deepest shade of the wood. Men thought he was but a breeze
in
the holly- bushes. ‘You were born of winter and you will live forever.
But
if you touch the fire you will die.’
“But
the shepherd- boy’s love had made the maiden a little scornt
ful.
‘Why should I be always cold?’ she retorted. ‘You are
an old cold
thing,
but I am a mortal girl now; I will learn about this new thing, this
fire.’
“
‘Better to stay in the shade,’ was the only reply.
“Spring
drew nearer. Folk left their homes more often, to gather
green
things in hidden places. Again and again the shepherd came to
Snegurochka’s
izba. ‘Come into the wood,’ he would say.
“She
would leave the shadows beside the oven to go out and dance
in
the shade. But though Snegurochka danced, her heart was still cold
at
its core.
“The
snow began to melt in earnest; the snow- maiden grew pale
and
weak. She went weeping into the darkest part of the forest.
‘Please,’
she said. ‘I would feel as men and women feel. I beg you to
grant
me this.’
“
‘Ask Spring, then,’ replied the frost- demon reluctantly. The
lengthening
days had faded him; he was more breeze than voice. The
wind
brushed the snow- child’s cheek with a sorrowful finger.
“Spring
is like a maiden, old and eternally young. Her strong limbs
were
twined with flowers. ‘I can give you what you seek,’ said Spring.
‘But
you will surely die.’
“Snegurochka
said nothing and went home weeping. For weeks
she
stayed in the izba, hiding in the shadows.
“But
the young shepherd went and tapped on her door. ‘Please, my
love,’
he said. ‘Come out to me. I love you with all my heart.’
“Snegurochka
knew that she could live forever if she chose, a
snow-
girl in a little peasant’s izba. But . . . there was the music. And
her
lover’s eyes.
“So
she smiled and clothed herself in blue and white. She ran outside.
Where
the sun touched her, drops of water slid from her flaxen
hair.
“She
and the shepherd went to the edge of the birch- wood.
“
‘Play your flute for me,’ she said.
“The
water ran faster, down her arms and hands, down her hair.
Though
her face was pale, her blood was warm, and her heart. The
young man played his flute, and Snegurochka loved him, and she
wept.
“The song ended. The shepherd went to take her into his arms. But
as he reached for her, her feet melted. She crumpled to the damp
earth
and vanished. An icy mist drifted under the warmth of the blue
sky,
and the boy was left alone.
“When the snow- maiden vanished, Spring swept her veil over the
land, and the little field flowers began to bloom. But the
shepherd
waited in the gloom of the wood, weeping for his lost love.
“Misha and Alena wept as well. ‘It was only a magic,’ said Misha
to
comfort his wife. ‘It could not last, for she was made of snow.’ ”
─
Olga paused in her storytelling, and the women murmured to
one another. Daniil slept now in Olga’s arms. Marya drooped
against
her knee.
“Some say that the spirit of Snegurochka stayed in the forest,”
Olga continued. “That when the snow fell, she came alive again, to
love her shepherd- boy in the long nights.”
Olga paused again.
“But some say she died,” she said sadly. “For that is the price of
loving.”
A silence should have fallen, as is proper, at the end of a well-
told
story. But this time it did not. For at the moment Olga’s voice
died
away, her daughter Masha sat bolt upright and screamed.
“Look!” she cried. “Mother, look! It is her, just there! Look! . .
.
No— no! Don’t— Go away!” The child stumbled to her feet, eyes
blank with terror.
Olga turned her head sharply to the place her daughter stared: a
corner thick with shadow. There— a white flicker. No, that was
only
firelight. The whole room roiled. Daniil, awake, clung to his
mother’s
sarafan.
“What is it?”
“Silence
the child!”
“I
told you!” Darinka squealed triumphantly. “I told you the ghost
was
real!”
“Enough!”
snapped Olga.
Her
voice cut through the others. Cries and chatter died away.
Marya’s
sobbing breaths were loud in the stillness. “I think,” Olga
said,
coolly, “that it is late, and that we are all weary. Better help your
mistress
to bed.” This was to Eudokhia’s women, for the Grand Princess
was
inclined to hysteria. “It was only a child’s nightmare,” Olga
added
firmly.
“Nay,”
groaned Eudokhia, enjoying herself. “Nay, it is the ghost!
Let
us all be afraid.”
Olga
shot a sharp glance at her own body- servant, Varvara, of the
pale
hair and indeterminate years. “See that the Grand Princess of
Moscow
goes safe to bed,” Olga told her. Varvara too was staring into
Marya’s
shadowed corner, but at the princess’s order, she turned at
once,
brisk and calm. It was the firelight, Olga thought that had made
her
expression seem an instant sad.
Darinka
was babbling. “It was her!”
she insisted. “Would the child
lie?
The ghost! A very devil . . .”
“And
be sure that Darinka gets a draught and a priest,” Olga added.
Darinka
was pulled out of the room, whimpering. Eudokhia was
led
away more tenderly, and the tumult subsided.
Olga
went back to the oven, to her white- faced children.
“Is
it true, Matyushka?” snuffled Daniil. “Is there a ghost?”
Marya
said nothing, her hands clenched together. The tears still
stood
in her eyes.
“It
doesn’t matter,” said Olga calmly. “Hush, children, do not be
afraid.
We are protected by God. Come, it is time for bed.”
It’s become quite clear that I will read
anything Katherine Arden writes. Her debut The
Bear and the Nightingale was one of my favourite reads of last year. I
dare say that Bear is a mere drop in the ocean when it
comes to Arden’s writing and clever plot twists in The Girl in the Tower.
Following on from the ending of Bear, Vasya is branded a witch and because she's not content with just being some man’s wife or living in a convent as a nun for the rest of her life, she leaves her village with Solovey. Vasya braves the cold wilderness and doesn't look back, she wants to see the world and experience life but the only way to do this is to disguise herself as a Russian boy.
There was a real sense of adventure in
Girl, Vasya finds herself embroiled in a brewing political war between
the Moscow royal family and the Khan of Mogul. Vasya cannot stand by while villages
are burning and children are being kidnapped and instead risks her life, battling bandits with nothing but her cunning mind and tenacious nature.
Vasya is reunited with her brother Sasha, a
priest and right hand man of Prince Dmitry and Olga a Russian princess who is
sequestered in a tower with her children and terem. I loved the complex
relationship Vasya had which each sibling and how they each battled with the
internal struggle of religion and what was expected of women and their role
within society compared to their wild sister. As always Arden’s abilitiy to carefully craft a book filled
with religion, history, politics and fairytales is truly genius.
I didn’t think it was possible to enjoy
Girl more than Bear but I was wrong. Between the stunning prose, the lush world
building and a slow burn budding romance, I was completely hooked and found
myself reading long into the night. I was absolutely delighted to see Arden include yet more Russian myths and legends, such as the fire bird, Polunochnitsa and I particularly loved reading about Kaschei the deathless.... and of course my beloved Morokzo. The elusive Frost-Demon is just as thrilling and enticing as always, there weren't enough pages with him in to satisfy my shameless obsession with him!
The Girl in the Tower is a bewitching sequel,
with magical writing and stunning prose that transports you to medieval Russia,
you would swear you could feel the winter frost nipping at your fingers while
reading. Arden takes readers on a thrilling adventure, elegantly weaved with
gorgeous Russian history and folklore that keeps you in its thrall until the
very end. The Girl in the Tower was easily one of my favourite books of the year and although I
really don’t want this series to end I can’t wait for book three!
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