by K L Conger
The stench became unbearable—exponentially worse once inside the wall. Taras’s hand flew to his mouth. His eyes watered and his nostrils burned. He gagged, fighting not to sick up.
The Tsar had been here for weeks. Some of these corpses were that old. They were putrefying. Every stage of decomposition could be identified. Some of the freshest ones still looked human. Others crawled with maggots. Still others had bloated, bulging with unseen forces. Some were rotted down to the bone. Screaming skulls peered out from otherwise human bodies. Taras couldn’t tear his eyes from the ghastly sight.
How could there be this many bodies? He’d expected brutality, but this must be most of the city’s population.
To make matters worse, the ground was not dry. As at the Andreev estate, the snow melted where it met hot blood. No snow remained inside the gates of Novgorod. Some of the corpses swayed and ebbed on the water, like leaves on the sea. What looked like a narrow river had been cut like a path through the bodies.
Afraid Jasper might trip on obstacles unseen beneath the water, Taras dismounted and his boots disappeared up to the ankle in red liquid. No wonder it oozed out of the gates. The earth could not absorb so much blood all at once.
Nikolai took his horse firmly by the bridle. Taras did the same with Jasper. The smell of blood made the horses skittish. They bucked and whinnied as they moved into the city. Taras gently stroked Jasper’s muscular neck. Normally he spoke to his horse in low tones—Jasper responded to the sound of Taras’s voice—but he couldn’t force air through his throat. He couldn’t even work moisture back into his mouth. His touch had to be enough.
As it turned out, the river path had been cut to accommodate the sledges. Beneath the bloody water—or watery blood—sat smooth mud they could easily navigate. Up ahead, Nikolai dismounted as well. Taras followed him as they wove their way carefully between the two banks of human carnage.
Novgorod took the shape of two half-moons, the flat sides of which flanked the river. The frozen surface of the Volkhov gleamed dully in the light of the overcast sky. Several tall bridges joined the two sides of the city. When their supply train reached the river, Nikolai turned north, leading them along the bank.
The bodies didn’t thin out. If anything, their numbers became denser as Taras drew closer to Novgorod’s center.
As they plodded along, Taras kept thinking he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. It came from the river itself. The top layer was one frozen sheet of ice. Strange shapes writhed beneath the surface—dark, sinuous figures that moved with the river’s undercurrent. Taras wondered vaguely if demons or ghouls swam beneath the ice. Nothing surprised him now, and his hands hadn’t stopped trembling since passing through the gate.
Near the center of the city stood a particularly large bridge, probably the biggest one in the city. The ice below it had broken into chunks. The black water swirled with the sharp, frozen tips of miniature icebergs.
Hundreds of Oprichniki soldiers lined the banks of the river at the bridge’s foot. In a raucous mood, they shouted and whistled as they watched the apparent festivities, as though thousands of staring corpses weren’t piled mere feet from them.
Dozens of resigned-looking Novgorodian men lined the length of the bridge. A wooden platform—almost a scaffold—had been built at the bridge’s apex. Women and children lined the platform, looking terrified. All the Novgorodians, both the women and children on the scaffold and the men watching with lifeless eyes, were bound hand and foot. Taras watched in horror as the Oprichniki kicked the women and children, one by one, into the river.
Most went screaming into the black water. A few were impaled on the ice chunks. Bound like that, the victims could not swim away but a few floated to the surface. When this happened, a group of Oprichniki soldiers stood ready. They balanced precariously at the edges of the ice under the bridge, armed with hooks, clubs, axes, and knives. Victims that surfaced or made any attempt to climb out of the water were hacked to death or pushed under the water until they drowned or the churning water sucked them beneath the thick ice. With every scream and sickening thunk, the Oprichniki bystanders cheered and brandished weapons like madmen.
None of the Novgorodian men screamed when their women and children went into the icy water. Most watched with resignation. Tears streamed down the cheeks of some. Others looked oblivious to what happened around them. A few pitched themselves over the side of the bridge, not waiting for the Oprichniki’s prodding.
The black ‘ghouls’ Taras saw earlier had been bodies. Inches below the surface, the river carried them away. Taras thought of the amount of movement he’d seen. Thousands upon thousands of bodies. It must have been. Would Ivan send an entire civilization, frozen and silent, floating down the Volkhov?
Taras’s eyes fell on a woman who stood at the top of the scaffold, high above the river. He noticed her because she looked a lot like Inga. For one heart stopping second, he thought it was her. He took several steps forward before realizing this woman’s hair was a different shade and her face held deeper lines than Inga's did.
The woman clutched a small girl with blond hair in her arms, not more than five years old. Inga’s children would probably look like that. As he watched, soldiers tore mother and daughter away from one another. The soldiers easily held the little girl. She screamed so loudly that, even from a distance, Taras picked her voice out above the noise of the crowd. They continued as the soldiers tore her mother from her and threw her over the side of the platform. The woman hit a chunk of ice, but was not impaled on it. She glanced off and disappeared into the swirling void below. The little girl squirmed away from the soldier and lunged to the edge of the platform where she sat on hands and knees, tears streaming down her face, looking over the edge. Taras didn’t expect the woman to resurface, but she must have because suddenly the little girl's expression turned hopeful. She thrust a tiny hand toward the river, screaming the same word over and over.
“Mat! Mat! Mat!” The Russian word for mamma.
With a callous laugh, the Oprichniki soldier who'd restrained the child kicked her savagely in the behind and she tumbled, head over heels, into empty space. Taras turned away, shutting his eyes. He wouldn’t have been able to see her land anyway, as he couldn’t see whether her mother resurfaced, because the spectators blocked his view of the water. He still turned away. He couldn’t look toward such savagery and expect to keep control of his stomach.
When she hit whatever she hit, the soldiers lining the bank cheered.
A hand on Taras’s arm made him jump. Nikolai looked empathetic. And haunted. Taras felt a surge of sympathy for Nikolai. He’d been in Novgorod for weeks. Taras didn’t think he would stay sane in a place like this for so long.
“Come,” Nikolai said, “we must take the supplies into the inner city.”
“I don’t want to go farther in,” Taras gasped. They'd only come as far as the outer city. What waited for him further in?
“It doesn’t get any worse,” Nikolai assured him, “but then it doesn’t get any better either.”
Taras let his head fall into his palm, covering his eyes with his hand. He couldn’t breathe. He shut his eyes, but the corpses still jeered at him.
“Come,” Nikolai said again, “we must take the supplies in. We have no choice.”
With that, Nikolai started forward again. Taras followed him. No choice. An excuse for many things in Russia.
After what felt like hours of wading through the corpse-lined streets, Nikolai halted again. Men came out to direct and unload the sledges and Taras officially reported to the Master of Supplies, who would take control of the train from there.
His task complete, Taras went to stand beside Nikolai. At length, Nikolai moved through the dense crowd of Oprichniki filling the main square of Novgorod. Something happened down in front. Taras did not particularly want to know what. He also didn’t think he could escape the carnage anywhere in the city, so he stayed close to Nikolai, not wanting to be left behind.
>
They didn’t make it all the way to the front, but came close enough to see what was happening. Ivan stood in the center of the square, surrounded by the crowd. He looked as ghoulish as ever. His red hair stood up from his head and the bones of his skull tried to push through his face. Eyes that had once been blue and bright now looked dark and dead. His clothes, plainer than what he usually wore, were spattered with bright red blood. The choice of attire had to be intentional. Ivan greatly enjoyed taking part in the torture himself.
On his knees in front of Ivan knelt a man whose clothes, though now ruined, had once been expensive. Thick fur and shiny satin were torn around the man’s torso, dripping water. He shivered at Ivan’s feet. Apparently, the man had been thrown into the river. Ivan ordered him pulled out before he drowned. As Taras listened, it became apparent that the man was hiding the whereabouts of his personal fortune and Ivan wanted it. Nikolai leaned toward Taras.
“Fyodor Syrkov," Nikolai whispered. "He’s the richest merchant in the city. His fortune is one of twelve thousand silver rubles.”
Despite his disgust, Taras raised an eyebrow. None of the boyars in Moscow could boast a fortune that size. This might be the wealthiest man in Russia, aside from the Tsar himself.
Ivan held his hands up and silence fell in the square. When he spoke, he addressed the man cowering at his feet, though is voice carried clearly across the square. “Did you see anything in the river, Syrkov? What did you see?”
Taras thought of all the bodies under the ice. He shuddered to think of being thrown in with them.
“I saw evil spirits living in the deep waters of the Volkhov River,” Syrkov’s voice shook, then turned to a snarl. “They are about to rise to the surface to steal the Tsar’s soul from his body!”
Thick silence filled the square while the crowd waited for the Tsar’s reaction. Taras felt a pang of admiration for Syrkov. Few were bold enough to stand up to Ivan. No doubt the man knew he was dead either way at this point. He held his ground, raising his chin several inches, though his body trembled with cold.
As Syrkov spoke, Ivan’s face darkened. The Tsar had never been impressed nor amused by boldness. He preferred those who sniveled and trembled before him, begging for his mercy and magnanimity.
The Tsar opened his mouth, pausing for effect. “Bring the cauldron.” The crowd erupted in cheers.
Oprichniki soldiers filled the largest cauldron Taras had ever seen—larger around than Jasper's belly—with water and set it over a fire. They forced Syrkov to stand knee deep in it. Long before the water boiled, Syrkov gave in. Taras didn't hear the details, but then the Tsar wouldn’t want the crowd to know the money's location. The Oprichniki might try to loot it before he got there.
When Ivan had the information he wanted, he gave Syrkov a sinister smile. Then he turned to several Oprichniki beside him. “Hack him to pieces. Throw the remains into the river.”
Taras felt no surprise when Sergei appeared and moved to obey. He did so gleefully and without hesitation, his black robes glistening wetly in day’s waning light. As demonic as Sergei looked in Kazan, his look had intensified now. Taras turned away, pushing through the crowd and away from the square. He needed to get away from the mob.
He didn’t realize Nikolai had followed him until he stumbled onto a vacant side street—vacant of living bodies, anyway—and heard the other man’s footsteps behind him. Even away from the throng, the city remained crowded. Corpses stared from everywhere except the sky, but Taras couldn’t look up as he walked or he would trip and end up face-down on top of bodies missing limbs.
As claustrophobia set in, Taras walked aimlessly, not caring where he ended up. He only wanted to escape. He tried focusing on the architecture. Even that didn’t work. Crimson blood spattered the churches eight feet high and more. It was inescapable.
As they passed a particular church, Taras noticed the doors were barred. Nikolai walked up beside him, following his gaze.
“Why are the churches sealed?” Taras whispered. He couldn't make his voice any more solid.
Nikolai swallowed. “When he arrived, Ivan first rounded up the clergy and closed the cathedrals. He didn’t want people to have a sanctuary to escape into.”
“The clergy?”
“Yes. Monks, abbots, abbesses, nuns, all of them. On January seventh, he gave the order to have them clubbed to death.”
Taras shut his eyes, trying not to envision the horror of such a thing.
“All the surrounding monasteries are empty now,” Nikolai went on, “silent wastelands of the dead.”
They pressed on, picking their way through rotting bodies and pieces of corpses. Eventually Taras came to a building that looked like a prison. The small piles of bodies outside it obviously belonged to prisoners. Raw strips of flesh around their ankles and wrists showed that clearly enough. Taras squatted down between the two piles of corpses.
“Why kill the prisoners? If he’s punishing Novgorod...isn’t the enemy of his enemy his friend?”
Nikolai came to stand beside Taras, but didn’t squat down. “The larger group were Livonian prisoners of war. The other was made up of captured Tatar nobles. The Tatars attacked their executioners. They were outnumbered.”
Taras nodded. “They died courageously.”
“Or in a vain attempt to save themselves.”
Taras gazed up at Nikolai in bewilderment. “Is that what you believe?”
Nikolai sighed. “I don’t believe anything, Taras. It depends on how you interpret things.”
Taras ground his teeth, then straightened his legs aggressively. “And how do you—”
He didn’t finish the question. His eyes fell on one of the Tatar corpses. Stepping around Nikolai, he walked to the smaller pile of bodies and bent to push dark hair out of the eyes of one of the dead men.
Almas.
Taras straightened, letting his head fall back. The last conversation he’d had with Almas, the last thing Almas said to him, flashed through his memory like lightening.
“You are a decent man, Taras. I can see you are conflicted. Never lose that decency. Never let anyone take it from you. Not ever, not for any reason. If you lose it, I fear your soul will soon follow...”
Almas’s final words echoed, driving home so forcefully that Taras grasped his chest, finding it hard to breathe. Almas had been right. If Taras continued to live like this, he would lose his soul. He sanity would go along with it. Everything needed to change. Now. No more rationalization. No more putting up with the terror Ivan gleefully spread. Taras refused to do it anymore.
A ruckus behind them turned both men's heads. The road they walked was one of many radiating out from the main square like the spokes of a wagon wheel. In the distance, they could see the square with its milling throngs pushing and shifting for a better view of the execution. Ivan was leaving. He would not pass close to Taras and Nikolai, but they saw him clearly, walking across their line of vision from left to right, heading farther into the inner city. More blood dripped from his clothes than had only minutes before, which meant he'd taken part in the ‘hacking’ of Syrkov.
A hideous anger, the likes of which Taras had never known, lit in his chest. It smoldered from his core and radiated out to his fingertips, making his body tremble more violently than before. He lurched toward the square and the now-retreating figure of the Tsar. He didn’t have a clear plan in mind. He only knew he wanted to get his hands around Ivan’s throat. Ivan no longer qualified as a king, or a man. If he died, perhaps this festival of gore would end.
A soft voice in Taras’s head told him if he attacked the Tsar in a throng of Oprichniki, he would fail. That he would die both because of and despite that failure. Taras didn’t listen. He couldn't. He was past listening to reason, past justifying the carnivorous deeds of a fallen Tsar. Someone must do something.
Taras got all of two strides before Nikolai’s hands closed around his upper arms, yanking him back him backward several steps.
“Let me go
!” Taras screamed. “I’m going to kill him!”
Ivan did not hear Taras, lost in the throng of voices. Several Oprichniki with their backs to Taras and Nikolai turned in surprise and curiosity.
Nikolai was a strong man, but Taras was determined. Younger than Nikolai, he had a larger build. Despite Nikolai’s strength, Taras got away from him. Untwisting himself from Nikolai’s grasp, he shoved the other man away from him with all the force he could muster. Nikolai staggered back several steps, barely keeping his feet. Taras turned and strode toward the square again. Half a dozen large Oprichniki soldiers gazed at him, now. Their faces didn't look alarmed, but grim, as though sensing what they saw was worthy of their attention. They fingered swords and daggers as they waited to see what Taras would do next. Taras didn’t care if he was outnumbered. He lunged toward them anyway.
The breath whooshed from Taras’s lungs as Nikolai’s full weight hit Taras in the back, his arms wrapping around Taras’s middle. The two men slammed into the nearest building, Nikolai's weight flattening Taras against the rough brick. Nikolai wrestled him into the narrow alley between the two buildings, taking advantage of the fact that Taras gasped for air.
The two of them staggered drunkenly together down the alley, Taras trying to break free of Nikolai’s grasp while Nikolai forced him away from the main square. A side entrance to the building on their right was barred. Thick planks covered the door so no one could enter.
Nikolai threw Taras roughly to the ground. Red mud spattered Taras’s pants, soaking his backside and soiling his cloak. His palms dripped with sticky red water.
Breathing raggedly through gritted teeth, he glared up at Nikolai, who busily used his dagger as a lever to pry the wooden planks off the door. When enough of them came loose, he kicked the door in.
Eyes blazing, he picked Taras up by the shirt and threw him bodily through the door. Taras skidded several feet, coming to a sudden stop when he slammed into a pew. He raised his eyes. The cathedral looked huge, dark, and silent. The door had been barred because this was one of Novgorod’s many churches, sealed up weeks ago. The inside looked to be the size of one of the smaller reception rooms in the Terem Palace. Pews filled most of the space. At the front stood the usual alter and cross. The back held a vat for holy water. He saw no icons anywhere. They'd been taken as booty, no doubt, by Ivan’s soldiers. Only shadows.
