Peter Higgins - Wolfhound Century

Lom walked fast through the souterrain tunnels. There was no light, but he didn’t need it: the fear had gone and he was strong. He was going back to where they had first come down, under the giant’s isba. He knew the way. He knew how to avoid the earth fall caused by Safran’s grenades. The tunnels weren’t dark and cramped; they were bright, airy, perfumed, luminous, beautiful. He knew his way by the smell of the earth, the trickle of dislodged earth, the stir and spill of air across the dampness of stone. He felt it all — he felt the roots of trees in the earth and the sway of their leafheads in the wind — as he felt the rub of his cuff against his wrist, the sock rucked under his foot, the sting of the grazes on his belly. There were other things too, things he could not quite focus on, not yet, but he felt their presence: they were like flitting shadows, hunches, hints. He was a world in motion — a borderless, lucid, breathing world. The seal in his head was cut away. The waters of the river and the sea had washed him clear.

This would not last. He knew that. Aino-Suvantamoinen had said that. It would fade, but it would not altogether go, and it would come again.

As he passed through the dark tunnel without stumbling, he tried to reach out with his mind into the woods above him. He didn’t know yet what he could do. What the limits were. Further and further he pushed himself.

He found Safran. Safran was nearby. Moving with careful confidence almost directly above him.

He found the mudjhik, pushing its way through thorns. It was hunting but it had no trail. It was lost.

Lom reached out for Maroussia, but he couldn’t find her. He felt her presence, but she was… withdrawn. Barely breathing. Waiting. Still. She was hiding . But not from him.

And then he felt Safran’s death…

Lom needed to get out of the souterrain. Now. He need to get to Maroussia.

He came to the place where the giant had let them down, but when he pushed up against the wooden hatch it would not shift. It was high above his head: he could just about touch it with his hands but he couldn’t get his full strength into the shove. It seemed as if there was something heavy on top of it — the stove had fallen across it, perhaps.

He needed to get out.

There was another way. Perhaps.

Lom gathered all his strength into himself. Breathing slowly, focusing all his attention on what he was doing, he reached out around him into the perfumed earthy darkness, pulling together the air of the tunnel, making it as tight and hard as he could. He waited a moment, gathering balance. The earth above his head was cool and dark and filled with roots and life. It was another kind of air. Thicker, darker, richer air, and that was all it was. And then he pushed upwards.

Maroussia sat on the edge of the jetty and considered her situation. She had killed a man. She thought about that. When she had shot the militia man near Vanko’s, although she had not meant to kill him and didn’t think she had, afterwards she had been filled with empty sickness and self-disgust. But this time, though she had killed, she hadn’t felt that. There was only a pure and visceral gladness. Satisfaction burst inside her like a berry. She had wanted to do it. Now it was done. That was good.

She slipped off the jetty edge into the deep icy water of the creek. It came up to her chest and the coldness of it made her gasp. She wished she knew how to swim but she had never learned. She waded out into the middle of the stream, feeling the slippery mud and buried stones and the tangle of weeds beneath her feet. The strong current pushed at her legs. She ducked her head under the water, eyes open, letting it wash the clotted mud from her hair. Cleaning everything away, the mud and the fear and the blood that had splashed her legs. Surrendering herself, she let her body drift downstream, turning slowly, until she came to a place where the branches of a fallen tree reached out across the creek. There she climbed out.

When she got back to the jetty she kicked the severed head over the side. It fell in the water with a plop and disappeared. Then she put her clothes back on and prepared the skiff to leave: laid the oars ready in the rowlocks; made sure the lines were loosely tied so one tug would release them. She would give Lom till dusk to find her, and if he had not come, she would go alone. She drank a little water and wished there was something she could eat. She had not felt so hungry for days. But that was tomorrow’s problem. For the moment it was enough to sit with her back against a jetty post and wait.

She tried to keep her eye on the edge of trees that enclosed the wide clearing, watching for any sign of movement that would signal the coming of Lom. Or the mudjhik. But her gaze kept being drawn back to the burned-out remains of the isba. The outward sign of her desolation and grief. Killing the militia man had not healed that. Not at all. Desultory snowflakes appeared, skittering in the grey air.

And then the wreckage of the isba erupted. It was as if a shell had fallen, or a mine exploded. A column of dark earth and roots and stone and the remains of the isba spouted ten — twenty — feet up and slumped back down in a crump of dust. She saw the giant’s stove bounce and break open. A wave of dust-heavy air rolled over her, smelling of the raw, damp underground.

As the air cleared she saw something, a man-shaped figure, climbing up out of the earth. Its face was a mess of dirt and blood. A heavy cloak hanging from its shoulders. It stood for a moment as if dazed, looking around slowly, then it began to walk slowly towards her.

‘Vissarion?’ she said. ‘Vissarion? Is that you.’

The figure stopped to wipe its face with its sleeve. It was Lom. He looked lost, disoriented, stunned. She saw that the wound in his forehead had opened. It was seeping blood into his eyes and down across his mouth. He kept wiping at his face, vaguely, again and again.

‘Maroussia?’ said Lom. ‘There’s dirt in my eyes. I can’t see properly.’

‘What… what happened? Was that another grenade?’

Lom wiped his face again and looked at her, blinking.

‘That?’ he said. ‘That was me.’ He paused, and she saw that he was grinning at her. Grinning like a child. ‘This is going to be fun.’ Then his legs crumpled and he sat down heavily beside her with his hand to his forehead. ‘Ow,’ he said, looking at her balefully. ‘My head hurts. You haven’t got any water I could drink, have you?’

‘Vissarion?’ said Maroussia. ‘Where’s the mudjhik?’

Artyom Safran wondered where he was. Dead, certainly. But also… not. As the terrible flat blade had begun to slice into his neck and he knew that he would certainly die there, he made one last reckless throw of the dice. He grabbed at the mental cord connecting him to the mudjhik and hurled himself along it, all of himself, wholeheartedly, holding nothing in reserve. It was easy and instant, like jumping from a window to escape a fire. The mudjhik had been pulling at him insidiously for years, and the pull had been growing stronger all the time they were in the wetlands. More than once in the last few days he had felt himself slipping away, and it had required an effort of will to hold himself separate. Now he stopped trying, and threw himself instead at the door, and it was open, and he stumbled through. The mudjhik, reacting instantly, pulled him inside. Greedily. It felt like a great hunger being fed at last. In the last moment of his separateness, Safran had felt a surge of crude, ugly, inhuman satisfaction enfolding him.

What have I done?

It was his last purely human thought.

He was not alone. Dog-in-mudjhik came at him hard, scratching and tearing and spitting, before he had a chance to find his balance. Dogin-mudjhik would tolerate no rival. It was a territory thing. Only the death of the interloper would do.