The kitchen was a cavern of damp stone and thick, grey steam. The air smelled of wood ash and the sour scent of the leftover porridge. While the younger children were ushered off to their straw mats, Manya and I were left with a mountain of heavy wooden bowls and iron spoons that needed scrubbing.
I plunged my hands into the basin of lukewarm water. It was greasy and bit into the small cuts on my fingers. Manya stood beside me, her movements rhythmic and fast, her arms glistening with soapsuds.
"You're quiet, Mary Ann," Manya said, not looking up from the bowl she was scouring. "Is it the dress? Or is it the weight of all those eyes at the table?"
I scrubbed a stubborn bit of dried oats, my mind still stuck on the dinner hall. "It's Mikhail," I admitted, my voice dropping to a whisper. "He didn't eat. He just watched me. Like he was waiting for me to disappear or turn into a monster."
Manya paused, her hands submerged in the water. She let out a long, weary sigh. "Mikhail is a wall, Mary Ann. He was built to keep the world out so the children inside can sleep safely. Don't take his stare to heart. He doesn't know how to trust anything he didn't grow up with."
I looked at Manya. She seemed so capable, yet she was two years younger than Mikhail and me. "How long has he been here? And you, Manya? How did you... how did you find this place?"
Manya's gaze went distant, fixed on the flickering candle stuck to the wall. For a moment, the sound of the splashing water was the only thing between us.
"I was six years old," she began softly. "It was the winter of the Great Frost. My mother... she told me to wait by the church steps while she went to find bread. She never came back. I sat there until my fingers turned blue and I couldn't feel my toes. It was the Eldress who found me. She wrapped me in her own cloak and carried me here. I remember the smell of her wool—it smelled like safety."
I looked at her, my heart aching. In my world, a six-year-old would be in first grade, playing with bright plastic blocks, not shivering on church steps.
"When I arrived," Manya continued, starting to scrub again, "Mikhail was already here. He was only eight back then, but even as a small boy, he was... different."
"Different how?"
"He didn't cry," Manya said, shaking her head. "Most of us cry for weeks when we first come. We scream for our mothers. But Mikhail? He was silent. He would sit in the corner of the yard with a piece of wood and a dull knife, carving little figures for the younger ones. He never spoke of where he came from. Not a word. I've lived under the same roof as him for all these years, and I still don't know whose blood runs in his veins or what village saw his birth."
"Doesn't the Eldress know?" I asked.
"If she does, she keeps his secret as tightly as she keeps yours," Manya replied, glancing at me significantly. "All I know is that the Eldress is the only person he has ever truly loved. He treats her like a saint, and he treats this house like a cathedral. That is why he looks at you with such fire, Mary Ann. To him, you are a shadow that might put out the light she's kept burning."
I looked down at the murky water. "I don't want to put out any light. I just want to survive."
"Then show him that," Manya said, bumping her shoulder against mine playfully to break the tension. "Work hard. Be silent. And for heaven's sake, stop looking like you're about to faint every time he enters a room. Men like Mikhail feed on fear. Show him you have a spine of iron, just like the rest of us 'forgotten' girls."
I managed a small smile, the warmth of her friendship cutting through the chill of the kitchen. "I'll try, Manya. I really will."
After the last wooden bowl was dried and the kitchen fire was reduced to glowing embers, Manya and I walked silently through the drafty corridors. The orphanage was quiet now, filled only with the rhythmic breathing of dozens of sleeping children and the occasional creak of the old floorboards.
We reached the small room where I had spent my days battling the fever. I stopped at the doorway, hesitating. "Manya... I realized something. Where did you and Dasha sleep while I was sick? I've been taking your bed this whole time, haven't I?"
Manya gave my arm a gentle squeeze. "Don't worry about that. We squeezed in with the other girls in the main dormitory to give you proper rest. The Eldress insisted you needed the quiet. But tonight," she whispered with a small smile, "we are back together. All three of us."
We pushed the door open slowly. The room was bathed in the soft, silver glow of the moon spilling through the small window. In the center of the large straw-matted bed, Dasha was already fast asleep. Her small chest rose and fell evenly, her messy hair fanned out across the rough pillow.
We moved like shadows, stepping carefully so as not to wake her. Manya lay down on one side of the little girl, and I climbed in on the other, the scratchy wool of my new dress rustling against the straw.
The room was cold, but the warmth of the three of us huddled together made it bearable. I looked at Dasha's peaceful face and then at Manya, who was staring up at the dark ceiling beams.
"Manya?" I whispered, my voice barely audible. "How did Dasha and Vanya end up here? You said you were found on the church steps... but what about them?"
Manya turned her head toward me, her eyes reflecting the moonlight. She reached out and smoothed a lock of hair from Dasha's forehead.
"Dasha's story is a heavy one for such a small soul," Manya whispered sadly. "She is the illegitimate daughter of a nobleman—a man with a title and a cold heart. He had an affair with her mother, but the moment Dasha was born, he vanished. He never looked back, never sent a single copper to help them."
I felt a surge of anger. "He just left them?"
"Worse," Manya continued. "Her mother began to see Dasha as a curse. Every bad thing that happened—hunger, cold, the loss of her beauty—she blamed on the child. She was violent, Mary Ann. When the Eldress first found her, Dasha was only three years old. She was so thin her bones were showing, and her little back was covered in wounds and bruises."
I looked at the sleeping girl, my heart breaking. I wanted to reach out and pull her closer.
"The Eldress tried to reason with the mother," Manya said, her voice trembling slightly. "But the woman wouldn't let her go for free. She wanted to sell Dasha to a noble family as a 'house slave'—basically to be worked to death. So, the Eldress did the only thing she could. She bought her. She paid the mother to walk away and never come back. She bought Dasha's freedom so she could finally have a home where no one would hit her."
Silence fell over the room as I processed the cruelty of this era. There were no child protection laws here—only the mercy of an old woman with a purse of coins.
"And Vanya?" I asked after a long moment.
"Vanya's family was taken by an unknown sickness two years ago," Manya replied. "He was only four. Everyone in their village was terrified. They thought the house was cursed, that the air inside would kill anyone who breathed it. They wouldn't even go near the gate. They left that poor boy alone in a house with his dead parents, starving and crying for help."
I gasped, covering my mouth with my hand.
"Only the Eldress had the courage," Manya whispered. "People shouted at her, told her she was bringing death back to the town, but she walked right into that house, picked Vanya up, and brought him here. It's been two years since then. He's healthy now, but he still has nightmares about the silence of that house."
I looked at the straw beneath me, feeling a deep, humbling sense of shame for my own complaints about scratchy wool and tasteless porridge.
"We are all the same here, Mary Ann," Manya said, her voice growing sleepy. "We are the children the world didn't want. Mikhail, me, Dasha, Vanya... and now you. The Eldress didn't just give us a roof. She gave us a life."
I lay my head back, listening to Dasha's soft snores. For the first time since I woke up in this century, I didn't feel like a traveler or a victim. I felt like a member of a very small, very brave army.
"Goodnight, Manya," I whispered.
"Goodnight, Mary Ann. Tomorrow, the work begins. Rest while you can."