I am standing on the rim of a forest.
My breath is so cold that it forms a white yuhina bird, and floats over evergreens more white than green, beyond them a panorama of ice-clenched mountains and valleys speckled with villages. I put my hand to my cheek, and feel the prickle of a beard. At the back of my head, despite the protection of an ushanka, I can sense the vulnerability of a bald patch. We held hands so tightly, Raisa and I, in the passage between books, but somewhere in the roaring dark of the transit I lost her. Did the Booksurfers make a mistake? I turn: mountains, evergreens, a village.
When I look up, my heart beats with a violent joy. High on the Western Peaks is the Czaritsyno Palace, red flags unfurling from its onion domes. After all those weeks of searching and waiting in Manchester, I was ready to give up and resign myself to Booksurfing prison, the ultimate death of my body. The sweetness of my days with Raisa only sharpened the poison: the terror that we might fade before we have a chance to build a life together in the real world. But here it is, just as the Surfers promised: the place where we will find the Storyteller. Tears burn at the back of my eyes. I will soon see my mother 202again, hold her tight, reassure her that I am still alive. I feel a fierce desire to hug Raisa, to shout the news. She will be glad too, surely she will be glad, despite her strange reluctance to return home.
From the dark and white of those trees, she might emerge at any moment.
There is a group of men close by, laughing, joking. Smoke surrounds them so thickly that it forms a will-o’-the-wisp. In my pocket, my trembling fingers find cigarette papers. It is only then that I notice that I am wearing a uniform: that of the Carpathian Royal Guard. There is something about the act of lighting this cigarette – the flare of flame; drawing in its smoke – that binds me to this world, as though I am no longer an observer but an actor. ‘Samskaras’: one of Raisa’s words. Imprints, impressions, recollections that take root, form habits, conditioning us. Don’t let them form, I tell myself fiercely; remember who you are.
He wants you to be fully immersed in his characters. But who is T. S. Maslennikov? We had no time to learn of his characteristics before we fled. I fear he is a puppeteer like Fate; I hope he will let us breathe. I do not trust any narrator since Gwent, who tired of us and wrecked our paradise. Capitalism will inevitably lead to schizophrenic swings of boom and bust, but he weaponised the downturn. Raisa tried to blame herself, once broke down and wept that she was doomed to repeat fucked-up patterns, but I assured her that Gwent was responsible. A narrator will always find peace stagnant and will crave conflict. 203
Where are you, Raisa?
Raisa?
Raisa?
My fate is falling on me like snow: a tenderness for those distant mountains, after years of loving them as a boy. At their peak, they become austere and harsh in their beauty, birds swooping in the mists. A brotherly affection for my colleagues: hard men with lined faces, skin coloured by vodka and cigarettes, long days and gruelling duties. In the distance, there is the howl of a wolf. We are an hour away from the fall of darkness.
This is not real. This is a backstory being wrapped around my soul. You’re in a book, you’re in a book. I close my eyes, memory a weapon.
But Manchester is already fading. I sharpen the details of the night Raisa and I went to Daniel’s party, before the misery and hunger set in: we ate canapés, came home in a taxi, made love with such tenderness, confided in one another. I lay awake for hours watching her sleeping, recording the pattern of her freckles and lashes, aching to tell her I love you, not daring to let the words fall. She always seemed so elusive. One day, I felt assured of her feelings for me; the next, I was discordant with doubt.
A fear comes over me. Perhaps Raisa’s absence is not due to authorial malice.
I picture her negotiating with the Booksurfers, slipping into another text, furtive with guilt; I reach for a butchered tree to steady myself.
204I look up at the palace again. An unease seems to seep from its turrets, carried down like woodsmoke from the cottages.
This is not real. I must keep my goals simple: find Raisa; find the Storyteller, alone if necessary. Yet even if I find him, it will be a hollow triumph, if she is not with me.
—Jaimus Luzhkov! one of the soldiers calls.
I have worked with this man for many years: his name is Radomir.
—Stop your daydreaming and give me a cigarette.
I pass it over.
—Спасибо. I heard they’ve caught the trail of a wolf. A big one. We’re on the hunt.
I blow out smoke. —Let’s hope we catch him.
Another shout: we are being summoned. In my pocket, behind my cigarette papers, I find a small notebook. MANCHESTER, I scribble desperately, before the troop envelops me. REMEMBER MANCHESTER.