by Chanel Smith
He smiled brightly at the man in the chair. “Someone's finally shut you up, eh?”
He sat down on the sofa, next to Anastasia, and looked at both women in turn. “I suppose it's up to me now to tell the story?” He received two nods.
“Bad things always happen in threes, don't they? The February Revolution was just one of those bad things. But it was one of three beginning conflicts. The second began January of the year thereafter in the Grand Duchy of Finland. The third is hardly ever discussed, and is one that continues in some way to this day.
“It happened a few days before open fighting began in Suomi and it happened in Kiev. Bishop Vladimir had been dismissed from Moscow a year before, driven from his post as Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia by the Reds. But they came to Kiev and dragged him out in front of his monks and shot him. It was the continuation of another argument, though he did not realize it himself at the time; the argument between himself and Gregori Rasputin.”
Anastasia looked disgusted at the mere mention of the name. “That disgusting man?”
“Yes, him. He was a disgusting man, but he was a great warlock, a great worker of magic and the dark arts. That is how he managed to gain so much influence so quickly. It was why he had such a hold over your family. When your father left for the front, he got cut off from the spell of Rasputin and he recovered his senses.
“But it began earlier than that. It began with the Bialystok Pogrom. I was not there, but I can tell you what I think happened there. Two Christian processions were attacked by the Jewish populace and as a result, the army began killing Jews, eventually driving them out of the Empire. But below the surface something else took place. The explosion that was thought to be a bomb was not a bomb; it was a direct attack by one witch on another. In the midst of the Catholic part of the procession was a man called Efrim. He was an ancient warlock, a wizard of great power, and the husband of a woman who was only ever known as Kulta the Fair, the Lovely, the Golden. She was the daughter of one of the greatest witches who ever lived, Louhi, and she possessed a great deal of her mother’s many powers. But she was of feeble mind, almost childlike sometimes. Efrim won her hand and kept her safe and hidden. Yet there were always people who wanted to get their hands on her. One of them was Gregori Rasputin. And with old Efrim out of the way, he was free to take Kulta. He used her to wield his influence over the empire and cast his spell on the Tsar.
“As he planned a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, he asked his close friend Father Iliodor to take care of the Golden Woman. When he returned, Kulta was gone. Father Iliodor had fallen in love with the witch and had taken her to a place where Rasputin could not use her for his own plans. The besotted fool had given her into the care of one of the advisers of the tsar, whom he knew he could trust to bring Kulta back to her own land and her own people and to a life of safety and freedom from being forced to wield her magic for others.”
Kullervo paused for a breath.
“Who did he ask?” Anastasia asked curiously.
“Me. I took her back to the north and left her in a village deep in the woods. All across Suomi, Karelia and Kola there are villages where weres have found a refuge. There used to be weres all over Ingria and Estonia as well, but along with the pogroms against the Jews, the weres were forced into hiding from the fear of falling the next victims to the political agendas of the day. Some fled to the New World, but most fled to the northern forests. Some, like you Ana, were lucky to find homes with powerful guardians. Your vampiric rebirth would not have gone down well with the Bolsheviks.
“But I digress, Rasputin was beside himself when he returned. He confronted Father Iliodor and they came to blows. They fought on several occasions, eventually ending with Father Iliodor stabbing Rasputin in a fit of rage. After that, he fled, travelling through Finland and Sweden to Bergen, Norway, where he boarded a ship to New York, somewhere that he knew he would be safe.
“Without Kulta and with the tsar at the front, Rasputin found it hard to hold on to power. He had a great influence over the Tsarina Alexandra, but the integrity of his net of spells was disintegrating.
“In a desperate act, he asked the help of a wizard who was then exiled in Siberia, a small, sickly Jewish man called Yakov Sverdlov. After hearing the story and gathering understanding of Rasputin’s motives, Sverdlov immediately decided he needed to find Kulta and clear Rasputin out of the way. He did not have the power to do it directly, but he did have the power to cast a spell on someone close to Rasputin: your cousin Irina. It did not take much to let it appear to Rasputin that she was attracted to him, and in his loneliness, he made his own advances. This was very much to the dislike of her husband, Prince Felix Yussupov. After a night of drinking, Rasputin remarked on the beauty of his wife and Prince Felix shot him.
“The road was clear for Sverdlov to take Kulta, but he had not reckoned on Father Iliodor confessing to Bishop Vladimir. The Patriarch knew nobody should capture Kulta again, but he did not know how to stop Yakov Sverdlov from finding her and taking her. So he called on the tsar. The tsar sent troops to the north to protect her. He sent troops he had commanded at the front, soldiers and officers he trusted with his life, and who trusted their emperor with theirs. Soldiers and officers from those very northern woods where Kulta had been hidden and who were born into the villages deep in the forests.
“But Sverdlov knew what to do. With revolution brewing and a great war being fought, he manipulated everything to his advantage. He was the one who persuaded Lenin to exile the tsar and then he killed Saint Vladimir. But the troops remained in place and he knew only one thing would stop them obeying the orders they had received from their commander; the death of that commander. In a last ditch effort to avoid doing that, he had you sent to Yekaterinburg, but when the soldiers did not stand down, he had the entire family shot.
“The soldiers were struck by grief and they were at a loss what to do when they heard the emperor was dead. When Sverdlov and his band of witches and loyal weres and vampires struck them, but they did not surrender. They did what they were trained to do, what they had done their whole lives. They retreated into the woods, taking Kulta with them. Sverdlov and his Red soldiers chased after them. They pursued them across the border, into the Grand Duchy of Finland. The chase lasted a week. By the end of that week, fighting had started in Finland between the Whites and the Reds. The tsar's soldiers and Kulta could not go any further. They were trapped.
“Sverdlov sent his son, General Andrei Yakovich Sverdlov to take control of a regiment of Reds and together they advanced on the men. The men fled into a village on the Finnish-Karelian border and made their last stand there. They changed, and together with the weres of the village itself, they stood against the advance of Sverdlov. They had no chance against the onslaught. So there, in that clearing in the woods, they died in the hundreds. But before Sverdlov won the battle, Kulta came out with the magical sword of Ukko. She did not want the fighting to continue any longer and she commanded the sword to kill her. It plunged into her chest and killed her.
“Sverdlov was beside himself with rage and slaughtered indiscriminately. He killed every were he could find and then returned to Russia, slaughtering every were he could find in the villages along the road.
“By the time he got back, the Grand Duke Mikhail had taken control of what was left of the empire and he tried to stop Sverdlov. Sverdlov had him exiled too, eventually killing him in Perm.
“Only a handful of weres survived the battle at Hiisi and they swore revenge. They allied themselves with the loyalists. And they began killing those humans, vampires, witches and weres loyal to Sverdklov to affect their blood vengeance. Some months later they heard two of the Romanov children, the tsarevich and his seventeen-year old sister, had survived the shooting in Yekaterinburg by virtue of a passing loyalist vampire. Since that time, Sverdlov has been hunting them down mercilessly.
“He needs you both dead to take the last wind out of the sails of the blood feud.”
; Kullervo finished his story and involuntarily touched the sword.
Veronica pursed her lips.
“That's all great, but where is Alexei?”
Kullervo stood.
“I thought that would be obvious. Sverdlov wants to end this blood feud and he will use Alexei to lure the weres back to Hiisi Pohjoisessa, the Hell in the North.”
***
Hundreds had gathered in the woods behind Veronica Melbourne and Anastasia Nikolaevna. Veronica was finally in her element again. She was carrying weapons to kill the prey that she was hunting.
Kullervo had asked her to scout the area, to find out how Sverdlov had organized himself and who was with him. Most importantly, she needed to find Alexei. Anastasia had insisted on going with her, so Veronica took her along.
They rushed through the trees and at the edge of the clearing she jumped up. She scrabbled through the branches of a large Scots Pine and perched on a branch holding the trunk of the large tree with one hand and staring around it. Anastasia sat on a branch in the tree next to her.
She is learning fast, that one.
On the journey north, Anastasia had spent several hours adjusting her military clothes, making them fit tighter. They had picked up a modern Walther PPK pistol for her in a Finnish town, and that now hung on her hip, the holster strapped to her thigh. The long bayonet was in a sheath on the back of her hip, out of the way but easy to draw. She had slung her rifle on her back.
Veronica had discarded the thick fur coat in favor of a padded leather jacket. She needed to be able to move with added agility… just like her preferred hunting style in warm, dry, beautiful, scented California.
Damn, I miss home.
The village before them looked peaceful. It was a group of wooden houses around a small wooden church. It was well kept, but there was no sign anybody had lived there for a long time. Veronica had expected to see tools everywhere, maybe kid’s toys, but there were no such objects of daily life. No boots outside the doors, no cars or tractors, nothing. But there were footprints. Clear footprints in the mud. They all centered around the church, leading in and out of the building. The trails only led to and from the houses just alongside the place of worship. There was an immediate problem facing them in that situation, Veronica reckoned. She could not enter the houses, nor could Anastasia.
A figure appeared out of one of the structures. Veronica did not recognize her, but she saw Anastasia unsling the rifle and load one of the silver bullets they had been given. She hissed at the figure below and shook her head.
“Who is it?” she whispered, hoping Anastasia's ears were as good as hers.
“That Averbach woman. She is the one who took Alexei,” came the whispered response.
Veronica nodded.
At least we’re in the right fucking place!
She sat still, waiting for Ida Averbach to move back in, and then she moved to the next tree. There was a spray of needles below and a rustling, but her jump to the next tree went unnoticed.
She could look through the large side window of the church now. She was glad of the Lutheran style of building that had been adopted throughout Scandinavia. The large plain windows let in the light, but also allowed for one to easily see inside as well.
There was a sound from behind them. A crowd of wolves and bears appeared through the far trees but halted about a hundred yards from the edge of the clearing. A single man led them. His blonde hair stood out, as did the sword in his hand. He had not changed. It was Kullervo. Slowly, he went to the tree Veronica sat in. He leaned against it and looked out over the village. “So, we're back here,” he said. “Do you know where he is?”
Veronica dropped down onto the forest floor. “He's in the church.”
“And Sverdlov?”
“Didn't see him, but I'd think he's in there too.”
Kullervo grumbled. “Time to make sure.” He winked at someone and the only other man in the company was led forward, flanked by two giant bears. The man looked pale and had a huge bruise on his crooked jaw. “Ready Andrei?”
Andrei struggled against the ropes that bound him, but a shove in the back made him go forward. Kullervo brought him forward, into the light, poking him with his broadsword.
Anastasia dropped down. “What are you going to do with him?”
Kullervo smiled. “I'm going to kill him, of course. He's slaughtered thousands of us just as his father before him and his grandfather down there has as well. As a spy and assassin, he's responsible for thousands more.”
Anastasia looked down; she shuffled her feet, not knowing how to say what she wanted to say. Kullervo patted her shoulder and went forward.
“Can I do it?” Anastasia suddenly asked.
“What?” Kullervo turned around.
“Can I kill him?” Anastasia hefted the rifle.
Kullervo thought for a moment, then nodded at her.
“Don't miss.”
He brought Andrei Yakovich Sverdlov forward.
“Yakov!” he bellowed. “Show your face Yakov, you coward!”
Anastasia went up into the tree again as Veronica began crawling forward in the high grass. She kept low to the ground, but she knew she wanted to be as close to the church as she could get. She had to get to the tsarevich before someone killed him in the chaos of battle. Closer she crawled, hiding her lithe form in the grass. Closer and closer, until she reached the edge of the buildings. Then she heard Kullervo again.
“Yakov, you coward, come and get your son! Or will you let him die by the sword of Ukko?”
Kullervo stepped aside, holding the edge of the blade at Andrei's throat.
There was movement in the village. A man and a woman came out of the church and came to the edge of the buildings. Veronica recognized them instantly. It was the woman, Vera, the one who had been in charge of her gaol. The man was the thin man she had also seen there. It was Yakov Sverdlov.
“So you showed up then?” she heard Sverdlov say.
“Yup.” Kullervo sounded very chipper. “Time to die, I'd say.”
“Yes, starting with you.”
There was a shot and Kullervo dropped to the ground. Not a second later the crack of a rifle sounded. Blood sprayed from Andrei's chest and showered over the grass on both sides of him. It sprinkled the small patches of white snow in the field and glistened in the dim moonlight. There was a tiny puff of gunsmoke from the trees and suddenly all hell broke loose. Sverdlov's hands seemed on fire. The crowd of werewolves and werebears rushed from the trees and Anastasia's rifle fired again.
Fire blazed at the oncoming crowd from Sverdlov's hands and Vera rushed back to the church. Kullervo rose to his feet and launched himself at Sverdlov, swinging Ukko's magical broadsword at him. The fire shot at him now, but Kullervo swung his sword to deflect it. The flame struck the nearest building and instantly set it ablaze.
Veronica got to her feet and ran. She focused on the church door and the world blurred around her. Zip! She was at the doorstep and using that astronomical momentum, she shouldered the door open. There was Alexei, bound to the altar, but otherwise unguarded. She crossed the threshold, drawing her katana, but then she felt an arm reach around her neck, while cold fingers gripped her wrist.
Vera wrenched her sideways and slammed her wrist into the doorpost. The katana dropped from numb fingers. Veronica kicked. Her heel flew up to the woman's groin and she felt the grip on her throat loosen as the woman buckled. She bucked her hips backward in a perfect karate move. Her firm bottom hit the woman's stomach, sending her backward. And then she was loose. Veronica stooped and picked up the katana. Vera pulled her lips up, showing a pair of sharp white fangs. She drew a long, single edged knife that looked ancient and heavy, but sharp as a razor.
“Hello again.” Veronica smiled, baring her fangs as well.
The knife came for her, slashing at her throat, then immediately dropping to cut at her stomach. Veronica stepped back, narrowly avoiding the blade. She lowered her katana and leveled the po
int at Vera. The other vampire smiled. This would be a good fight.
Vera brought her long knife up and slammed the thick back edge onto the katana's blade, pushing it aside. She stepped in and leveled the point, aiming it at Veronica's chest. Veronica let the blade be pushed aside and she stepped back. Then recovering the blade, she leveled it at Vera's throat again.
Short blade against long blade. Keep her moving, keep distance. Use the distance as a buffer.
The vampire came on again. She just ducked and charged. Veronica tried to slash her blade down, but Vera was inside it. There was no room to cut. The duller part of the Japanese steel struck Vera in the shoulder, but did not even cut through her jacket. She felt the knife coming. She felt the tip of the blade against her own jacket and just at the last moment she brought her knee up. The dagger slipped on the skintight leather of her trousers and the force deflected the lunge. Veronica's knee traveled further upwards, slamming into Vera's chin. And then she stepped clear again. Vera was stunned. She stumbled and went down, gasping for breath. Veronica slashed down, using all the strength in her hands and wrists, keeping her arms straight to maintain her distance. But her opponent dropped and rolled toward her, coming within the reach of the blade again. The long knife slashed at Veronica's boots, but she turned away, lifting her foot to let the steel slice thin air.
Vera was up again, her knife loosely in her hand. There was fight in her. She lunged clumsily, missing Veronica who was quick on her feet. She slashed again and came hard forward again. Veronica moved away and knew she had made a mistake. Suddenly her back was against a whitewashed wall. The knife came forward and the woman wielding it was within the effective reach of her katana.
At the very last moment, Veronica had the presence of mind to slide sideways. The knife struck the whitewash by her side and Vera followed it. The perfect target offered itself. Veronica brought her head down and pulled her lips back, baring her fangs. The razor-sharp tips plunged into the other vampire's neck, piercing the cold skin.
