by K L Conger
His lips left hers and went to her neck. Reaching lower with his arms, he hoisted her up. She didn’t object, but wrapped her arms and knees around him. Wanting to forget himself and this day in her, he carried her to the bed.
Chapter 35
THE NIGHT TURNED FRIGID when the sun went down. Sometime after midnight, the snow began to fall. It didn’t take long for the large powdery flakes to cover the ground. After two hours of steady downfall, several inches of snow covered the landscape. Finally, it stopped. The cloud cover moved on, leaving the night clear, frozen, and silent. Stars could be glimpsed through the wispy remnants of the storm clouds, and Nikolai sat looking at them without seeing them.
Snow this early in the season, and for so short a time, especially over an army camped outside enemy gates, was an evil omen.
He had not been able to sleep. Nights following days like this always brought unrest. On nights like these, Nikolai couldn’t find peace, so he’d stopped trying long ago. Instead he sat up, staring at the stars and trying to distract himself to pass the hours. Tomorrow he would be tired, but knowing that would not bring sleep.
He took another sip of vodka. It kept him warm. He'd hoped he might drink enough to dim his mind so he could rest, but he neared his limit now—it would not do to be drunk in the morning—and unconsciousness didn't feel close.
The crunch of footsteps in the frozen snow caught his attention. He wondered who it could be, walking around camp at this ungodly hour. Not the guarding sentries. These steps were too light and quick. The sentries moved slowly, deliberately on their watches. Perhaps a courier, but that could mean trouble. A courier would only be sent in the middle of the night if the message were urgent.
The footsteps grew louder, closer. They headed this way. Nikolai wondered why. Not much filled this side of camp except a hastily dug well a few hundred yards out, and the breathtaking view of the snow-covered plains of Kazan.
A figure emerged a few feet from Nikolai, and he recognized it instantly. He would know her anywhere.
She stopped, taking in the scenery. The tsar’s camp had been built on a natural plateau. This side of the camp came directly to the edge of a sharp drop off that ended sixty feet below in rocky ground. One must circle around toward the back of the camp to find a way down. The well, dug for water collection, squatted down there, but not much else.
A short retaining wall of rocks and sandbags had been built to keep animals and sleepy midnight wanderers seeking to relieve themselves from inadvertently venturing too close to the edge.
“Beautiful night.”
Yehvah jumped as high as the retaining wall, sucking in a violent breath. Nikolai chuckled softly, the first time he’d smiled in days. Not that it was funny; it simply made him smile.
“Nikolai Petrov! You always could make a good woman swear.”
He cocked his head to the side. “Did you swear?”
She turned to him. The moon shone behind her, and he couldn’t see her eyes. “It was a silent curse.” She threw an index finger up. “But that’s no excuse.”
He chuckled again.
“And what are you doing up at this hour?”
He drained the rest of his vodka before answering. “Can’t sleep.”
She half leaned, half sat on the short wall. “You never did sleep well after a battle.”
“Not all battles bother me, but some days are harder than others.”
“I remember.”
He would’ve thought talking of such things with her after so many years, would be difficult, even awkward. It wasn’t. “And what about you? You have given up on sleep entirely?”
She laughed softly. “No. There is so much work to do. I can’t sleep yet.”
“This is a battle campaign, Yehvah. There will always be ‘so much’ to do. You have to sleep sometime.”
“I know. We are sleeping in shifts. When it’s my turn to sleep, I will.”
Silence stretched between them and Nikolai could think of nothing to fill it.
“It’s been a long time.” Her voice came out quiet.
“Since what?”
“Since we talked like this. Since I’ve heard you speak my name.”
“Perhaps it means we’ve both moved on.” It wasn’t true, at least not for him.
“Perhaps.”
So, it wasn’t true for her either.
“Well,” she rose, “I should be going.”
“Out there?”
She held up a bucket he hadn’t noticed before. “I need water for the hospital, for the wounded.”
“The well may be frozen. You’ll have to break through the surface with a stick.” He stared down into his empty glass for a few seconds. “Would you like some help?”
She stared at him for a long time, but her eyes were hooded and he couldn’t read them.
“I think I can manage.”
He nodded. He should have expected as much. Yehvah crunched a few steps away from him, then stopped. He didn’t register it until she said his name.
“Nikolai.”
He looked up.
“Thank you. For offering. I’m glad you’re . . . well.”
Nikolai leaned back against the tent canvas, watching her walk away. She’d walked the same way for twenty years. It was true, then, what Inga told him earlier.
For the first time in many years, Nikolai dared to hope. He didn’t think she would ever take him back. Now . . . between watching Taras and what Inga him, and now this . . . could it be possible? After so much time?
Setting down his empty mug, Nikolai got to his feet. She said she didn’t need help, but Yehvah had always been a stubborn woman. He would help her anyway.
TARAS WASN’T SURE WHAT woke him at first. He couldn’t have been sleeping for more than a few hours. The fire had burned down, but not enough time had passed to snuff it out completely, or even reduce it to embers.
He lay on his back with Inga stretched out on top of him, her face buried in his neck. They were wrapped up together in the animal skins that made up both bed and blankets.
From somewhere out in the camp, shouts sounded. Then clanging sounds, though he didn’t think they were swords. Wondering what was happening, he sat up on one elbow, causing Inga to slide to the side. She raised her face to his.
“What’s going on?”
He listened, but couldn’t tell anything from what he heard.
“I don’t know. Something.” He put his hand on her cheek and pressed his forehead to hers. “Get dressed, all right?”
Taras rose and put some wood on the fire so they would have some light. Then he pulled on his wolf-skin leggings and stamped into his boots. Muffled voices came from outside. They got closer with each word.
“My lord, everyone is sleeping. You cannot—"
“Out of my way, soldier.”
Nikolai’s voice headed for Taras’s tent. Inga had only half-way dressed, as had he. With only a moment to react, Taras threw his body in front of her, standing between her and the door. She stood ten feet behind him, dressing on the other side of the bed. Anyone who came in would have only to look over Taras’s shoulder to see her, but he could do nothing more.
Nikolai burst through the tent flaps an instant later, nearly colliding with Taras, who he didn’t expect to be standing there. He stopped, glanced behind Taras, and quickly averted his eyes. Inga turned away from him, still pulling her smock up over her shoulders.
“Nikolai.” Taras’s voice held as much caution as it housed a year before when Nikolai burst in to find Taras and Inga not sleeping in the same bed.
Understanding came into Nikolai’s eyes. He swallowed, eyes on the ground. Black liquid covered his clothes. When Nikolai spoke, he kept his eyes on Taras. A quiet desperation Taras had never heard before tinged his voice.
“I’m sorry to intrude. It’s Yehvah.” It sounded like a plea. “She’s been attacked.”
Inga finished dressing. She still tied the lacings of her smock, but at least she was cove
red. She came around the bed to stand behind Taras.
“By who?”
“By what.”
“What?”
“It’s what attacked her, not who. A wolf.”
Taras and Inga gasped in unison. Taras remembered the wolves that attacked his party in Siberia. Inga’s hand flew up to cover her mouth. Her breathing became harsher. Taras put a hand on her arm, fearing the worst.
“Is she . . .”
“She’s alive. The doctors are with her.” Nikolai passed a hand over his eyes. “But she’s . . . she’s . . .”
“She’s what?” Inga verged on hysteria.
“There’s . . . so much blood.” Nikolai fell heavily into a nearby chair. “She was getting water from the well on the outskirts of the camp. It came out of nowhere.”
Taras shifted his gaze between the woman he loved and his best friend, wanting to comfort them both, not sure what to do for either. They both looked like they might be sick at any moment. Nikolai stood, looking at Inga.
“She’s asking for you.”
TEN MINUTES LATER, Taras strode rapidly through the camp in time with Nikolai. Inga practically ran out ahead of them. Before they reached the sick tents, Taras could hear Yehvah. She wasn’t screaming, exactly, but emitted whimpering, dilapidated, half-hysterical cries intermittently with moans of pain.
The flaps of the tent were tied open. Taras and Nikolai peered in easily. Yehvah lay on a bed, surrounded by the camp’s three best doctors. It looked like someone had thrown a bucket of bright red blood on her. It covered everything. The flesh of her arms reminded him of raw meat. Thin, deep troughs of blood ran from her cheek, all the way down her neck and further where the wolf mauled her.
When Inga ran in, the doctors waved her out with annoyance, saying she couldn’t be there. Inga spoke softly to Yehvah, who instantly calmed, making it easier for the doctors to do their work, and there were no more objections to Inga staying.
Taras stood with Nikolai in the doorway for a quarter hour, watching. Something strange occurred to Taras. These were the best doctors in the camp. In the Kremlin, people of different stations had different doctors, according to wealth and influence. These doctors looked after boyars, the officers among the military, even the tsar. It felt odd to see them at the bedside of a serving woman.
Pain and fear warred on Nikolai’s face. He must have brought the doctors.
One of them came forward. Yehvah had fallen into a fitful sleep. Her wounds had been washed and wrapped, but blood still covered her clothes and bed. Inga left Yehvah’s side to listen to what the doctor said.
“We’ve done all we can do, my lord.” He spoke to Nikolai.
“What does that mean?”
The doctor spread his hands. “All we can do is redress the wounds every few hours, my lord, and wait. If she is strong, she may get well. If not . . .”
Nikolai gazed at Yehvah, worry on his face. “I want one of you by her bedside at all times.”
“Forgive me, my lord. That is not possible. We have thousands to care for. We cannot sit by one bed—”
“You can and you will.”
“My lord, she is only a servant.”
Nikolai moved so quickly, Taras blinked. Grabbing the doctor by the neck of his robe, Nikolai yanked him upward so his face hovered inches from Nikolai’s.
“She is no less important than anyone you care for!”
“M-my lord. P-please. I only meant . . . I have many important people to see and . . .”
Nikolai’s fingers tightened around the man’s throat. Taras put his hands on Nikolai’s shoulders. He ought to restrain his friend, but thought it would be hypocritical. Wouldn’t he react this way if Inga lay on that bed?
“Nikolai.” Inga spoke. Nikolai tore his gaze from the doctor to look at her. “I can do it. I can change the bandages. I’ll take care of her. If anything happens, I can send for the doctor. So long as he promises to come when I call, he need not stay.”
Nikolai glared at the doctor.
“Of course, m-my lord. I will c-come r-right away. Right away.”
Nikolai seemed only slightly pacified, but he let the doctor go, pushing him back with more force than necessary. The doctor backed away swiftly. The other two doctors, who watched the exchange with ever widening eyes, gathered up their things to leave.
Inga put a hand on Nikolai’s arm. “It’s not as bad as it looks. A lot of blood, and we’ll have to guard against infection, but the wounds aren’t deep. If she rests and gets enough to eat, she may be all right.”
Nikolai dropped his forehead into his hand, unconvinced.
Taras sighed. “May” was more tenuous than it sounded in these circumstances. The camp was filthy, the weather, frigid. The food was already being rationed. Optimism didn’t go far on the war trail. “Inga,” He asked. “What can we do?”
Nikolai’s head came up, his eyes asking the same question.
Inga glanced back to where Yehvah lay. “I have to care for her now. And do all her work. I don’t think she’d want you here.”
She gave Nikolai a sympathetic smile.
“Yehvah’s a proud woman and . . . you should both get some sleep. You have a long day ahead of you. I’ll send for you if anything happens. She needs to rest, now.”
Nikolai nodded and turned toward the door. Leaning in toward Inga, Taras whispered in her ear.
“You didn’t get much sleep.”
“I got all I’m going to get tonight. Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”
“If you need anything, come and get me.” She nodded and gave him a brief smile. He kissed her on the forehead, careful not to rumple her headscarf, and left the tent with Nikolai.
The two men walked in silence. After a few minutes, it became obvious Nikolai was not heading toward his own tent.
“Where are you going?”
“To find the wolf.”
“Didn’t you kill it?”
Nikolai shook his head. “I stabbed it. It ran off, but I gave it a mortal wound. It can’t have gotten far. I might as well find it, bring it back. We can eat it, if nothing else.”
Perhaps Nikolai needed confirmation that the thing that attacked Yehvah was dead.
“Would you like some company?”
Nikolai arched an eyebrow. “Don’t you want to get some sleep?”
“I don’t think I could sleep now.”
Nikolai looked straight ahead again, completely focused on where his feet led him. “Then I would appreciate it.” He sounded sincere in a heart-breaking way.
The wolf was huge—easily as big as the one he’d killed in Siberia. A collage of white and gray, its razor-sharp fangs and claws trailing blood on the snow. When they came upon it, it had collapsed from blood loss, but still breathed. It lay under a stand of trees, whose limbs leaned far over, weighed down by the snow, as if to shelter the dying creature. Taras and Nikolai dragged the wolf out into the moonlight. It lay too near death to fight.
Nikolai cut its throat. He didn’t do it passionately or vengefully, as Taras would have expected, but slowly, sadly, as though he pitied the animal. The wolf’s blood—what remained of it—ran out into the snow in front of it. When its chest grew still, they lifted the deadweight together.
As they hoisted the carcass onto their shoulders, Taras fancied that the blood had congealed in the shape of a sword—a dull, crimson figure on otherwise glistening, crystal snow.
The image would haunt him for days.
Chapter 36
KAZAN, OCTOBER 1548
“We are almost ready, Your Grace. The sappers say soon.”
Ivan, whose beard had grown longer in the last two months, gazed up eagerly from the table. His haggardness showed in the lines and dark circles around his eyes. After two months of difficult siege, exhaustion took its toll on everyone.
Taras sat across the room from Mstislavsky and the tsar on a long narrow trunk—long since deprived of its cache of extra weapons—with one foot on the trunk, his elbow slu
ng casually over his knee, and the other dangling down. Dozens of men—as many of the generals and officers as could make it—squeezed into the tsar’s tent for a war council.
The tsar had been working on a plan for some time, but his generals remained in the dark until now. Many of the men suspected this “plan” was a ruse to keep them calm while they fought a losing battle. Finally, Ivan called a meeting, which meant it must be time to put the plan into action. Taras hoped it was good.
Yehvah survived. Two months were not enough to heal her completely, but she gained strength every day. Inga had single-handedly kept Yehvah alive, and not only by dressing her wounds. Inga had a great deal of determination when she set her mind to something.
Three weeks after the attack, Taras went to see her. She'd been with Yehvah, and he could hear their raised voices long before he caught sight of their tent.
“Of course not,” Inga shouted. “You have a lot of healing to do yet. That doesn’t mean I’m going to let you get out of this. I know you’re tired, but this is a war campaign. We’re all tired. I’m doing most of your work.”
“How dare you speak to me like that? How dare you imply that—”
“How dare you lie in that bed feeling sorry for yourself? You always taught me to take care of myself and do for myself because no one else will. Have you stopped believing that?”
Silence reigned for several seconds, and Taras dared to peek around the flap and into the tent. Yehvah lay in bed, while Inga stood, arms crossed and knees stiff, at its foot. The two women glared at one another.
Taras decided now was not the best time to bother Inga. He and Nikolai tacitly avoided this kind of confrontation.
“Very well,” Yehvah said, her voice subdued and dignified. “Then you’d better help me.” Without a word or condescending glance, Inga went around to the side of the bed and put her shoulder under Yehvah’s arm.
Deep scars graced Yehvah's cheek, neck, and shoulder where the wolf’s claws gored her. The animal shredded the tendons of her legs to a greater extent than anyone at first realized, making it difficult for her to walk. Even if she healed enough to work as she had before, she would always limp. Inga made her walk laps around the tents every day to build up her strength. It looked painful. Inga bore most of Yehvah’s weight, her face pinched as Yehvah tried to walk, crying out every so often. Taras wished he could go in and help them, but as Inga said the night it happened, Yehvah was a proud woman in the best sense. It would shame her for him to enter now.
