Orest Stelmach - The Boy from Reactor 4

Twelve cozy seating areas of various sizes offered rich upholstered chairs and sofas. Wide-screen monitors hung along every wall, all tuned to the same program. Four boisterous men in tuxedo shirts and pants dug into steaks and blintzes at one table. Three slinky girls cackled over mixed drinks with a man in safari gear at another.

Misha arrived with puffy eyes and cherry cheeks, hair sopping wet as though he hadn’t even bothered with a towel. When he thrust his hand out, Kirilo cringed. A young man never offered his hand to his elder in Ukraine. Did this moscal have any manners at all?

“Good morning,” Misha said.

Kirilo smiled and shook his hand firmly. He had two million reasons to forgive Misha’s lack of etiquette.

Kirilo and Misha sat at the bar. A pyramid of liquor bottles rose against a mirror in front of them. The bartender, a hunk of steel who’d been a Russian Black Beret in a former life, leaned in to them.

“What can I get you, boss?”

Kirilo turned to Misha and raised his eyebrows.

“What kind of beer do you have?” Misha said.

“Bass and Guinness,” the bartender said.

“That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

Misha frowned at Kirilo.

Kirilo shrugged. “This country’s obsessed with everything British. The majority owner here is the worst. A royal watcher. Ever since Independence Day. I don’t really understand it.”

After Misha ordered a black and tan, the bartender looked at Kirilo.

“English breakfast tea,” Kirilo said.

Misha nodded at the television monitor, where an auburn-haired beauty pulled up in her skates and sprayed ice in a handsome man’s face.

“What is this?” Misha said.

The bartender glanced at the screen. “ On Her Majesty’s Secret Service .” He turned back to Misha. “It’s Bond twenty-four/seven in here. But only Craig and Connery. No Moore or Brosnan. Dalton and Lazenby, but only in the morning.”

Misha frowned. “Lazenby?”

The bartender nodded gravely. “Only in the morning.” He moved down the bar to prepare the beverages.

“How did you sleep?” Kirilo said.

“Fine. But I would have slept even better if you’d used the cattle prod a few more times.”

“No. Once was enough. Steen was telling the truth. He knows nothing about Damian or the ten million dollars.”

“Okay. If you say so. Is there any risk Steen will tell someone about last night? Do we need to worry about him?”

“Not if he values his business and his life, and he values both. It was an accident. We were drinking, I got carried away. Lost my balance. He got some accidental voltage. End of story.”

“All right. Well, I appreciate all your help.”

“Don’t mention it.” Kirilo decided to switch the subject. “Tell me more about my cousin.”

“What’s there to tell? He’s not like you. He never graduated to bigger things. He was small time and still is.” Misha shrugged. “We did some business together. He taught me how to think ahead.”

Kirilo rolled up his right sleeve. A tattoo of a cat sprang from his forearm as he flexed it. “You know what this means?”

“Of course. Voroskoi Mir . You were a thief in your prior life.”

Kirilo showed Misha his hands. “The tattoos on my fingers and palms, I had to get removed. Laser. So I can mingle in polite society. But the stars on my shoulders and knees are still there. I kneel for no one.”

“What did your cousin do to make you so upset?”

“He was born. His father was a bitch for Stalin, and that makes him a bitch. It’s a matter of honor. All the bitches who helped Stalin must die. All their offspring must die. I took an oath as a child to see this through. How are you going to help me with this?”

“It’s already in the works. I expect him in Kiev any day.”

“Why? Are you sure of this?”

“He taught me how to think like my enemy. He’s bankrupt. He’s got nothing. He’ll come to protect his share of the money.”

“The ten million dollars. Are you sure it exists?”

“I hired one of Victor’s men recently. A man by the name of Stefan. He’s playing poker down below with my other bodyguards. Victor is certain about the money. If it’s not ten million dollars, it’s a treasure of some kind.”

“And you believe him?”

Misha nodded.

“Where is she? The Tesla woman. New York?”

“No. She’s here. In Kyiv.”

“You’re having her followed?”

“As we speak.”

The bartender delivered tea and beer. Two sips later, Misha’s cell phone rang.

“We have to go,” he said to Kirilo after hanging up. “It’s the Tesla woman. She lost my men on purpose, as though she’s about to meet someone.”

“Where did they last see her?”

“On the funicular headed to Podil. But that was misdirection. She just arrived at the Caves Monastery.”

NADIA LOOKED AROUND for someone who could guide her toward the proper entrance. She’d studied the Pecherska Lavra, the Caves Monastery, as a student in Ukrainian School growing up. It was a mythical place, one she read about but wasn’t sure really existed. Now, as she stood beneath the peach-and-ivory Lavra Belltower, despite the urgency of the moment, excerpts from lectures came flooding back to mind.

In 1051, St. Anthony Pechersk left Mount Athos in Greece to live in a man-made cave in Kyiv. As his disciples followed him, he expanded his home into an underground city of tunnels, rooms, and chapels. Monks spent lifetimes praying, meditating, and writing in what became known as the Pecherska Lavra. Memoirs suggest the underground network may have once stretched for hundreds of kilometers, from Kyiv to Moscow. By the twentieth century, more than 120 saints were buried in the Caves Monastery.

In 1959, Nikita Khrushchev began a fresh campaign to destroy all remaining traces of Christianity in the Soviet Union. He confiscated religious icons, burned churches, and either executed priests or tortured them into recanting their religious convictions. He also ordered the removal of the bodies of the saints as a prelude to the destruction of the Pecherska Lavra.

No one is certain exactly what happened next, but the accepted story is something like this: A platoon of soldiers arrived in a truck to remove the bodies. They loaded them onto their vehicle, but when they tried to leave, the engine wouldn’t start. Mechanics were summoned to examine the truck. They found nothing wrong. Still, it wouldn’t start.

A priest told the soldiers that it was impossible for the bodies of the saints to be removed from the caves. At his suggestion, the soldiers unloaded the bodies from the truck. The engine started. When they put the bodies back on the truck, it wouldn’t start. After lying outside for three weeks while Soviet officials debated what to do, the bodies were returned to the caves, and Khrushchev gave strict orders: nothing belowground was to be touched again.

Later, Soviet scientists conducted tests to understand why the bodies remained preserved despite no embalming. They determined that lack of moisture prevented decay. An experiment with wheat plants proved that the bodies also emitted an organic matter that influenced the nuclear content of living matter and may have helped preserve the monks’ remains.

Nadia got directions to the lower entry to the Far Caves from a tour guide with a badge hanging around her neck. As Nadia hurried down a sidewalk, a flock of monks swooped by her, their long black cloaks billowing in their wake. They appeared to float slightly aboveground like spirits who alternated living among the earthly and the celestial. Nadia followed them down the steep drop along the fifteen-foot-high fortification wall toward the southeast corner of the Lavra, in her black weather-resistant jacket and leggings.