Oksana took a few deep gulps of breath, as if she were about to dive underwater, not into the roaring flames with the sizzling corpse of a dead bear inside. The flames surged upward, licking the pale moon with their red dog tongues, and curved inward, opening a dark glowing passage between them. Oksana closed her eyes and stepped through, buoyed by the blindingly hot gust of air from the pyre's heart; her feet left the ground and for a while she hovered, surrounded by gleaming walls of solid fire, her arms outstretched, flying like a bird, until it hurled her with the force of an ocean wave toward the dead bear, and she felt the two of them-burning, burning-hurled into the empty ocean of the dark October sky.

Fyodor remained quiet-what could he say? He didn't give any promises, he was blameless and yet guilt nestled somewhere close to the surface. He watched the rats streaming in a small dark rivulet around Oksana's walking small feet. There seemed to be more of them coming from the cracks in the pavement and out of houses, joining the glossy throng of brown fur. He looked up, at the white birds in the trees.

"All we see here are those albino things,” he said to break the awkward silence. “I wonder where all the black ones went."

"There aren't any,” Oksana said.

"I meant the ones that flew in from the surface. The ones we've followed."

She nodded. “I heard David and Sovin talk about that but I never saw any myself. That girl's sister is one of these birds, isn't she?"

"So I heard,” Fyodor said. “But isn't it strange? These birds go here and disappear."

"It is strange,” Oksana agreed and fell quiet.

He knew that she didn't want to talk about the birds or the thug, of everyone's agitation. She was remembering a private pain, and at the moment it eclipsed everything else. Fyodor had no comfort to offer, and had he done so it wouldn't have mattered-she didn't want to be comforted.

"Do your rats have names?” he asked.

She nodded. “That one's Alex, and this is Sasha, and Sonya and Masha and Artyom."

"How can you tell them apart?"

"They are different,” she said. “And they tell me their names. They try to tell me more but I don't understand."

"One of them was looking at the coin you gave me. I think it smelled you."

She gave a small rueful smile, briefly transformed into a naked skeletal grimace by the flaring of a glowtree. “They like me, and Sovin doesn't mind if they spend time with me. Want to see the tricks they can do?"

"Sure.” Fyodor was eager for anything that would distract her from dark thoughts and self-pity. “There must be a hundred of them here."

Oksana whistled to the rats and they fell into formation-the blur of rat bodies acquired a shape as they parted like the Red Sea and formed neat rows, their eyes glittering red coals in the dusk.

Oksana whistled some more and the rats obeyed-they jumped on each other's backs, forming tall columns instead of rows. Fyodor admired their organization and architectural cleverness-each column had a base of several dozen rats, and grew slimmer as it grew taller, with only one rat crowing the taper of the column.

"Neat,” Fyodor said.

She smiled. “Look at this.” She whistled a low sad note that hung in the air a moment too long, trembling, and the rat columns twisted, falling toward each other. The rats formed chains, made of rats twining their tails back to back and holding hands face to face; the chains grew thicker, writhing, rising away from the ground, coalescing into shape-Fyodor recognized two stout legs and a bulky body, two long arms and a round head with a long snout. The creature stood before him, tottering a bit. And he laughed. “This is the weirdest thing I've ever seen,” he said. “That's a bear made entirely of rats. Can it walk?"

Through a miracle of coordination, effort, and desire to please, the creature took one laborious, shuffling step forward, its arms swaying freely, giving a disturbing impression of broken bones.

Oksana tilted her head to her shoulder, looking the creature over critically. “What do you think?"

"It's impressive,” Fyodor said. “I'm always amazed at how smart those things are-rats and crows. And they're just vermin, you know?"

"I know,” she said, and stopped smiling. “Like gypsies-isn't it what you're going to say?"

"No,” he said. “I know how people see you. But when I was little, my mom was telling me how gypsies would steal me."

"Sure,” she said. “Blame it on your upbringing."

"I think I wanted to be stolen,” he said. “And yes, I know you don't really steal children, but that's not the point. You complain that they treat you differently…"

"And you do."

"I just wanted something magical,” he said. “I'm sorry. I didn't know that different is always bad."

"Of course. Admitting that different can be better is actually a confession of inferiority; who would agree to that?"

The bear made of rats took another stumbling step forward. Oksana judged that it was safe to resume walking, and the rat-bear stumbled behind.

The sleeping albino birds woke and suspiciously watched the bear glittering with a myriad of rat eyes and festooned with dangling naked tails. Some even joined along, hopping from tree to tree, exchanging quiet caws.

They turned back to the pub, the white birds still following.

"At least this bear is not going to die,” Fyodor said. “You made yourself an immortal pet who'll never leave you."

She nodded, smiling, and walked faster, her skirt swishing around her ankles. Good, Fyodor thought. He had finally found the right thing to say.

Galina could not sleep that night-in Sovin's'warm house smelling of animals and the suffocating comfort of hay, it should've been easy to sleep. But every time she started to drift off she dreamt of Masha, sometimes human, sometimes a bird. Masha cried and reached for her with her jet-black wings and called in her sweet voice. “Where are you, Galka? Why aren't you coming for me?"

"I am,” Galina told her. “I am looking for you."

"Don't leave me here,” Masha pleaded. “Please don't leave me, don't forget me."

"I would never leave you."

"Find me beyond death, beyond the river."

Masha's eyes grew huge and wide and human in her bird face, and Galina woke with a start, Masha's high voice still ringing in her ears. She sat up on the inflatable mattress that was already sagging; must've been a leak. She was alone in the room-the years of privation and a habit of hard work prompted Sovin to build big when he got a chance, and his house sprawled, irregular, in a maze of small angled rooms. The naked beams of the walls, warm and worm-holed, felt rough and reassuring under her fingers.

She thought about what Yakov told her, and she felt uneasy. The darkness surrounding Sergey's associates’ plans and their underground allies worried her. There was an expectation she learned in her childhood that the universe was essentially predictable, even if the life didn't always work out the way it was supposed to. She didn't expect to be diagnosed in high school and prevented from going to college; but things turned and she could find a job without any formal education, just a good working knowledge of English, French and German acquired through studying by herself, in the mental hospital, just to pass the time. Back then, foreign words and strange letters warded off the heavy breathing of stygian beasts that crouched around her bed. They were her talismans, those words, those varied shades covering the same meaning like masks. There was order in the world, even if it was occasionally disguised. It chased away the monsters.