Dan Smith - Red Winter

I knew Lev would struggle to settle his horse and climb onto her, and with Anna to consider, it would be even more difficult for him, so I went straight to her, sweeping her off the ground and swinging her high, lifting her onto Kashtan.

‘Papa!’ she called out to him, struggling against me, reaching out as if she would be able to touch him. ‘Papa!’

Lev spun round when he heard her cry, his face contorted with panic.

‘I’ve got her,’ I told him, and when he saw that she was safe with me, he shouted to us, saying, ‘Go!’ then turned back to the horse that was trying to escape the mayhem.

Anna squirmed in the saddle, still leaning out towards Lev, still shouting for him, saying, ‘Papa! Papa!’ Her voice rose in pitch as she became more and more afraid for him.

I held her tight with one hand to keep her from slipping out of the saddle, controlling Kashtan with the other.

‘Stay there,’ I pleaded with Anna as I encouraged Kashtan to turn. ‘There’s nothing you can do. He’ll be fine. He’s coming. Don’t worry.’

Kashtan knew me like we were part of one another and she responded well to my instruction, turning to face into the forest, no longer staring into the mob of soldiers. She prepared to run.

With only himself to consider, Lev managed to grasp the reins of his own horse and hold her steady enough to climb up, the animal rearing as the men surged around us. The horse’s actions deterred the wounded soldiers for a moment, giving Lev a chance to spur his animal on towards the trees, but then they were coming forward again, so I kicked the man closest to me, pushing others away, clearing enough space for me to put my foot in the stirrup.

Kashtan didn’t wait any longer. She was forging into the undergrowth, just behind Lev’s horse, even as I was swinging myself up into the saddle.

I held Anna tight, feeling the tension in her, hearing her sobs as I glanced back to see the commander standing in the crowd, holding a rifle to his shoulder. Further along the train, other soldiers were also raising weapons. The commander leaned this way, then that, trying to find a shot at us, but he was frustrated by the men obscuring his line of sight, and when he finally chose to fire, his bullet struck one of his own soldiers from behind. The man’s head snapped forward and he went down as the gunshot echoed in the mist, but the commander didn’t stop. He worked the bolt and fired again, his second shot crackling into the undergrowth to one side as Kashtan carried us away.

And then we were out of sight, among the trees, running from the barrage of gunfire that erupted behind us.

Bullets ripped through the brushwood. They sang in the air, whistled and whined, thudded as they tore into the trees, powdering bark and ice. The sound of the shooting was accompanied by the shouts of the soldiers, the calls of help from the wounded, and then a single long blast from the train’s whistle as a call to arms for all men.

I gripped Kashtan’s reins with both hands, leaning into Anna to press myself against her and stop her from falling. She, in turn, had taken fistfuls of Kashtan’s mane and was holding tight. We thumped together with every step Kashtan took.

Lev’s horse crashed through the forest ahead of us. She was out of control, bumping into low-hanging branches, her hind legs throwing up broken twigs and dead leaves as she careered among the dark trunks. Lev was bent low, leaning right down along her neck to protect himself from the tree limbs that whipped and snatched at him, and I could see he was trying to calm the horse, pulling the reins hard, but to no effect.

I spurred Kashtan on, thinking I might be able to catch up with Lev, somehow help to bring his horse under control, but as we came closer, a bullet smacked into the horse’s right shoulder with a loud slap. The animal let out an awful scream as her front legs twisted beneath her, then she crumpled to her knees, her head going down as she skidded forwards, throwing Lev from the saddle.

Lev was in the air for less than a second before he hit a frosted tree, crashing through a low branch, striking the trunk and showering a white cloud of ice around him.

His body was limp when it hit the ground.

Anna called for him. She screamed for him.

‘Papa!’

It was the single most terrible thing I had ever heard.

Behind us, the soldiers continued to shoot. They didn’t know who they were shooting at or what they might hit, but they shot anyway, over and over again, their bullets peppering the forest.

‘Papa!’

Lev’s horse writhed and kicked in the undergrowth, the black hide around her shoulder glistening with the dampness of her blood. She screamed and rolled her eyes, adding to the already nightmarish sounds that enveloped us.

‘Papa!’

Kashtan tried to choose a new route to avoid the fallen animal, so I resisted her, slowing her as we approached the spot where Lev had fallen. It was the most natural thing in the world for me to want to reunite Anna with her father, but as soon as we were close enough to see him, I knew there was nothing to be gained from it. We couldn’t help Lev now, and if we stopped, we would be in greater danger from the soldiers behind us who might already be advancing into the forest.

I spurred Kashtan on and put one hand around Anna, pulling her to me as we passed the place where her father now lay.

Lev wasn’t moving.

He was on his front, his head turned at an awkward angle, his face pressed against the base of the tree he had struck. Underneath him, a fallen branch, one of its broken fingers piercing his neck just under the chin.

There was no doubt that he was dead.

As soon as she realised I wasn’t going to stop, Anna began to struggle. She wriggled to get away from me, calling for her papa, trying to turn and look back, but I held her firm. Strong and wild though she was, she couldn’t match my strength, and even when she bit down on me, her teeth crushing through the cloth of my coat, all she succeeded in doing was pinching the skin of my forearm. So she took to pummelling my arms with her fists, begging me to stop, crying out again and again for her papa, but I resisted her. I focused my thoughts on what lay ahead and concentrated on leaving the train behind us, on keeping Anna safe.

There was nothing for me to take Anna back to except the pain of seeing her broken father once more. The soldiers would have reached the place where he fell and they would shoot at us on sight, but I doubted they would come after us. Even if there were horses on the train, they wouldn’t use them to chase us. They had instructions to go to Tambov, so someone would bring order to them and slip into Commander Orlov’s role quickly enough.

There were other riders to think about, though. The seven men on our trail.

And we had delayed long enough, so I kept on.

I held Anna, wishing I had the words to soothe her, and I turned Kashtan north and kept on.

She moved quickly. The forest passed us by, tree after tree after tree. The mist showed no sign of clearing and we pressed further into it. Disappearing further and further into the forest, on and on until Kashtan grew tired and could run no more.

She slowed her pace to a trot, and eventually we were walking through the forest.

Anna was silent now. She had exhausted herself and no longer fought against me. She had ceased calling for her papa too, but I still held her tight, my arm aching, and she swayed with Kashtan’s movement. When I spoke her name, there was no response and I suspected she had descended into shock.

I wanted so much to be able to return her father to her. I wanted to rewind time and somehow save him from his fate, but I had to content myself with Anna’s safety. I considered how lucky it was that I had put her onto Kashtan’s back, otherwise she too would be lying dead in the forest behind me. And, thinking that, I held her even tighter.