Questions & Answers about Мы прятались под ветками, но ни у кого не брали воду.
Why is the preposition у stuck in the middle of ни у кого?
This is the main rule for negative pronouns! When a word like никто (no one) needs a preposition, the preposition physically splits the word into three parts: ни + [preposition] + [pronoun]. Here, the preposition у splits никто in the Genitive case (никого) to make ни у кого.
Does Russian always use a double negative, like in ни у кого не брали?
Yes! Whenever you use a negative pronoun (like 'nobody' or 'nothing'), Russian strictly requires you to negate the verb as well with не. Literally, this translates to 'from no one we didn't take'.
Why use у to mean 'from' here instead of от?
When taking, borrowing, or buying something from a person, Russian typically uses the preposition у + Genitive case. Since we are saying we took water from no one (referring to people), we use у with the Genitive form of who (кого).
Why is the word for branches, ветки, written as ветками?
The preposition под (under) requires the Instrumental case when describing where something is located. Ветками is the Instrumental plural form of ветка (branch).