Dan Smith - Red Winter

Krukov was quick. He didn’t wait to watch Stepan’s death. As soon as he fired the first shot, he swept his pistol across his body, bringing it round to aim at Artem, who was so surprised that he’d barely moved. Without wasting a second, Krukov pulled the trigger, jolting Artem’s head back as the bullet tore into his skull.

The suddenness of the gunshots unnerved the horses. They were hardened animals, all of them accustomed to the crack of gunfire, but they still moved beneath us, forcing us to bring them under control. I didn’t want Anna to see such things, but if it bothered her, she didn’t show it. She just lowered her head so she didn’t have to look, and she concentrated on controlling Tanya’s horse.

With no living riders, Stepan and Artem’s animals bolted away from us. Stepan’s forced its way between Anna and me, racing off in the direction of the izba , while the other went round us, galloping off towards the forest. I didn’t turn to watch either of them go; they were of no consequence. What mattered now were the remaining soldiers.

But none of them made a move to turn his weapon on me. Each of them settled his horse as if rider and animal shared a firm bond, and when all was still, Krukov holstered his weapon and came forward.

‘I’ve been with these men a long time, just as you had. I think I know their minds well enough to speak for all of us.’ He took a folded document from his pocket and held it out to me. ‘Whatever your reasons for leaving, there isn’t one of us who would call you unpatriotic.’

‘Never,’ said Bukharin, and the others nodded in agreement.

I took the document and unfolded it to look at the identity papers I had left on a disfigured body in Ulyanov a thousand years ago.

‘I kept them for you,’ Krukov said. ‘And these belonged to Alek.’ He passed my brother’s papers to me, but I didn’t open them. That was for another time.

He took the bag from the saddle in front of him and passed it across to me. ‘Before he died, Stepan Ivanovich was good enough to tell me that a day’s ride north from here is a ruined village called Nagai,’ he said.

I took the bag and opened it to find it filled with clothing.

‘In the forest just north of Nagai, there is a holding camp for conscripts and exiles,’ Krukov went on. It was usual for Cheka units to set up temporary camps to contain prisoners before allocation to units, deportation or transportation to labour camps. There was one such labour camp near Kaluga, but this area was much further north than I had operated as a Chekist. I was unfamiliar with the camps here.

I took the first garment out of the bag.

‘It’s my thinking that a Chekist commander could go into that camp and take away anybody he wanted.’

I looked up at Krukov.

‘For any purpose,’ he said. ‘As long as he has papers and a uniform.’

I held up the uniform and studied it for a moment. When I lowered it, Krukov and the other men were watching me.

Krukov cleared his throat and spoke again. ‘When do you want to leave?’ he asked. ‘Your men are waiting for your orders, Commander Levitsky.’

It felt strange to be on the open road with a small company of men behind me. For so long I had kept to the forests, stealing across the country as a fugitive, but now I was a soldier again. There was no reason not to keep to the roads now, and our progress was swift as we moved from road to field, heading towards Nagai, our horses scattering the thin layer of snow and ice underfoot.

Anna rode beside me, more resilient than I could have imagined, but her manner both uplifted and saddened me. She was tough, and that would serve her well; she would not be a burden to me or the other men, but she was a child. A twelve-year-old girl who should have been playing with her friends, arguing with her mother and twisting her father round her little finger. She shouldn’t have been riding with a company of armed men.

Yet I was as proud of her as it was possible to be. I would protect her as I would protect my own child, and I was glad she had not stayed behind with Oksana and the old woman. Anna and I had been together a few days that had lasted a lifetime, and the prospect of never seeing her pale face again was one that haunted me when I allowed my mind to linger on it.

Krukov rode on the other side of me, stiff-backed in the saddle, gaunt and bearded as if I was crossing the country with Koschei the Deathless himself. But Koschei was a fairy tale. A myth. He didn’t exist; at least not in that sense.

Ryzhkov was close to the truth when he said that we were all Koschei because we were all capable of terrible things, but he had tried to take the name for himself and was now turning to ash in a nameless field. There had been nothing arcane about finding the key to his death. Ryzhkov had died like any man dies. Just as Koschei always died in the skazkas .

We stopped by a river at midday to eat and to rest the horses. My wife and sons were almost within reach now, but the horses were tired, and Anna was beginning to look as if she might fall asleep in the saddle.

The steppe was open in all directions, dull now that the sun was lost behind another wall of grey cloud, which threatened to bring more snow. Grass grew thick and long around the riverbank, but the ground was at a gentle slope and the water was shallow, so we led our horses to drink. It was the first time we had dismounted since meeting Krukov, and Anna positioned herself so she and I were side by side, sandwiched between our horses, and she could take the chance to speak to me alone.

‘I don’t trust them,’ she whispered. ‘And that man Krukov is more frightening than the old woman at the farm.’

‘I don’t think they mean us any harm.’ I stopped at the edge of the river and watched the current swirl and eddy. ‘They would have done something already if they were going to.’ I felt as if I was trying to persuade myself.

‘So we’re staying with them?’

‘I’ve known these men a long time – we’ve been through a lot together.’ Two of them had been at Grivino with Alek and me. Krukov and Bukharin had stood by my side.

She made a face and released her horse’s reins so it could dip its head to drink. ‘Well, it makes my back tingle, having them behind us.’

I smiled. ‘I know what you mean.’

‘So can’t we ride at the back?’

As Kashtan drank, I scanned the steppe behind for any sign of Tuzik. He had kept pace with us for a while, but he didn’t have the strength or stamina of a horse so he had soon fallen behind.

‘He’ll catch up,’ Anna told me. ‘He always does.’

I nodded. ‘You’re right.’ I squatted and dipped my hands into the icy river, downstream from the spot where the horses were drinking. I scooped the water and splashed it onto my face, rubbing away the dry blood and letting the cold numb my nose and mouth.

‘How do I look?’ I turned my face towards Anna.

‘Not good. Your lip’s fat, and you have a black eye. Your nose is bruised too.’

‘It feels worse,’ I said, standing and taking a cloth from the saddlebag to dry my face. If I left it, the water would most probably freeze.

‘So can we?’ she asked.

‘Hmm?’

‘Ride at the back? It would be safer for us to be behind them.’

‘The thing is, Anna…’ I looked about. Krukov was no more than a couple of metres away on the other side of Kashtan, so I lowered my voice further. ‘I’m their commander. They expect me to lead from the front.’

‘But are you, or are they lying?’

‘Well, I don’t think they’re lying. I’ve known these men a long time.’

‘But they might be. And if you’re the commander, you can do what you want.’