Chernevog

Начало книги

Snow fell in the woods, drifted deep, a pristine, starlit world in which a single winter hare made significance — slow advance from a wandering, footprinted time past into a white, unwritten time to come. One wondered where it had come from. One wondered where it was going.

Wings snapped. A white owl stooped and rose, flapping heavily with its burden. The track stopped in a circle of wing-flailed snow, a dark splash of blood—

Sasha lay with eyes open, heart thumping, unable to move, unsure where he was or what bed he was in. He did not know what should be so ominous in such a dream, or why a spatter of blood should seem so terrifying. He lay listening to the house timbers creak above and below him, gained courage to put a chilled arm beneath the covers, and knew he was in his bed at his uncle’s place, in Vojvoda.

It was forest snow, river snow piled up and making the roof creak. He was safe in his own bed in his friends’ house, where nothing evil could come.

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