“Welcome inside...”
“Peace to your home!” Hryhoriy blessed them, stood his staff next to the oven-forks and embraced his nephew. “You haven’t grown up too badly!”
“Always in earth and manure, and the Lord’s not stingy with rain,” Oksen joked.
“He’s taken after you, Hrytsko – has a tongue like a razor,” Stepan said.
Hryhoriy looked into Katria’s blue eyes and asked in a numb voice: “You wouldn’t happen to be from Kovray?”
“No, I’m from Voronky,” the woman whispered and blushed.
“We barely managed to convince the landlord,” Stepan said sullenly. “Fleeced us of so much money and still bears a grudge.”
“Against us all,” Oksen buzzed.
“But you’re Cossacks!”
“She’s a Cossack girl too…”
“And where’s your mother?” Hryhoriy asked softly.
“At God’s side for the second year, may she rest i
