Fenek Solère - Rising

Tom acknowledged a mixed group of trainees, gathering about them. ‘New recruits?’

‘Just last week’, Alyosha confirmed.

‘They look fit’, the Professor mused out loud as his eyes fixed on a girl in khaki shorts and a crop top, pounding a punchbag.

‘Saniya is a Masters student at the Finance and Economics University.’

‘I wouldn’t want to fight her’, Tom breathed.

‘Don’t!’ Alexei warned from behind. ‘She floored me yesterday with one kick!’

Alyosha sat down with his guests under a double-headed eagle flag.

‘The situation here is becoming critical’, he admitted. ‘Survival skills will be vital in the future. The Tajiks, Turkmen, and Uzbeks are everywhere. Muslim gangs run the drugs and the girls. They don’t hesitate to kill and neither should we!’

‘And the military?’

‘Mixed experience’, Alyosha said sardonically. ‘Some, of course, are sympathetic, others, like the cops, can be bought.’

‘But at least political correctness is weak here. You are freer than us to push back.’

‘Yes’, Alyosha laughed. ‘I have seen how your rulers impose laws that mean you cannot fight. It is crazy!’

‘Such pain is self-imposed.’ The Russian shook his head.

‘We will have none of that shit here!’

‘So I see.’

‘Our patrol is very united’, Alyosha insisted. ‘Alexei and Yuri will tell you. Close physical contact creates deep bonds and weapons training builds confidence.’ At that point he slipped an OTS-38 revolver out of his combat trousers and released the safety. ‘We will fight to the finish.’

When Tom returned to the Astoria, a receptionist thrust a bundle of messages into his hands. His telephone was jammed with incoming calls, a little red light winking in the darkness. He bent down to pick up a calling card that had been slipped under his door. It read Tom Hunter RIP.

Sitting on the corner of his bed, he flicked through the concierge’s hand-written notes. One was a coded message from the League of St George in London requesting his immediate return. He knew it must be important so picked up his mobile phone and keyed a response. His head was full of the girl. Her ever-changing expression, the way she paid attention as he spoke.

He kicked off his shoes, pondering the text reply he subsequently received from the UK, lying silent for many hours. Outside, a damask shroud hung over St Isaacs. Glass in hand, he was weighing up his options. Staying and speaking was certainly risky. But it also gave him the chance to make his name. He would also be furthering the Russian cause and show support for the intellects of Evraziiskoe obozrenie. He pondered the odds of him making a difference and why after all these years of emotionless sex this young woman should appear on the scene, just when he needed a clear head? He poured himself another scotch, swirled the ice, and took a deep, satisfying gulp. The hours passed.

A pale sun rose over the eastern shoulder of the Dome, the Cathedral’s heavy head propped on granite forearms. Tom caught hold of the curtains. His mind drifting, he had been dreaming about Yesenin slashing his wrists, composing those last verses in his own blood. The Professor rolled off the bed, wandering into the bathroom. Looking at his face in the mirror, it struck him as particularly vulnerable and forlorn. He was in in need of a strong shot of coffee. Splashing cold water on opaque eyes, he looked over his shoulder, feeling self-disgust at the sight of discarded clothes and soiled tissues strewn on the carpet.

Ekaterina woke and almost immediately asked herself why she was so interested in this man? He was not especially good looking, nor rich. Turning over on the pillow she pondered, I am a modern woman, I can do whatever I desire. So what if he was old enough to be her father? What if he was a foreigner? His politics attracted her. His intellect drew her like a moth to the flame.

Leaping out of bed and taking a shower, she looked at her narrow waist and long legs. She touched her breasts and the dark triangle between her legs. His face was in her mind, his aftershave in her nostrils. Afterwards she towelled herself dry, fixed her hair, and pulled on her panties. Standing bare-breasted in front of the mirror, she applied a little make up, not so much that it looked like she was trying, but just enough to add some haphazard elegance. The world around her began to wake. First, the familiar door slammed, then the radio stations broke that morning’s news:

• Teip head-hunting clans tighten their grip on the former Soviet-Orient, characterised by patronage and nepotism on a colossal scale;

• The rate of extraction of hydrocarbons in Central Asia escalates to feed unprecedented growth in the Chinese economy;

• Immigrant shanty towns spring up around Suzdal’s Golden Ring, Kostroma, and Myshkin. The M8 motorway is log-jammed by carts and wagons rolling westwards;

• At the Kotorosi River crossing in Yaroslavl Utro Rossii, militants clash with armed immigrants ransacking districts on the east bank;

• The Kozelshchina icon is seized and destroyed by as yet unspecified people in Poltava.

Ekaterina fastened her trousers, slid on shoes, stirred and drank instant coffee. She watched as a silver ripple of condensation ran down the window. Outside, birds swooped, flocking to catch the breadcrumbs old Mrs Kozlov cast from her balcony.

Swinging on her coat, Ekaterina made to leave, eager to make their rendezvous at the Blue Bridge. The door rattled in its warped frame. Twisting the key in the latch, a double lock mechanism clicked inside. Then, the sound of her footsteps carried up through the cavernous stairwell, as her shoes tap-danced to the street.

Ten minutes later they were walking over the Sinny Most, making towards the Yusupov Palace, which sat shrouded in spectral mystery on the bank of the Moika. She was thinking that Tom looked great, his face shaved and flinty in the morning light. His body was tall and firm inside his long black coat. There was something unique about him, she thought. Something she could not resist.

They were talking about history and philosophy, arguing over the merits of Kierkegaard’s Fear and Loathing and Knut Hamsun’s Growth of the Soil.

‘It’s good we debate’, she said. ‘It is a sign of a healthy relationship.’ A white coach with Swedish registration plates sat opposite the palace on the rain raddled road.

Starry-eyed with scurrilous rumour, Ekaterina related, ‘The Yusupov’s were one of the richest families in St Petersburg. Felix, Rasputin’s killer was a well-known homosexual. It is said that he was a most beautiful man, married to the Princess Irina, the Tsar’s niece…’ She paused, pushing on the door to number 94. ‘He had been to England, educated at Oxford. There were stories that he had won the heart of a Duke’s daughter, but when he returned home there was disapproval of the match with Irina because of his predilections. Being gay was punishable by exile. Some historians even say there may have been strong love feelings between Yusupov and Rasputin.’

‘I thought Rasputin was a ladies’ man?’

A wicked smile passed over her face, reading the signs, checking the entry price. ‘He was, how you say, bi-curious too!’

They bought tickets for 300 roubles, then gathered with some Americans and Scandinavians at the foot of a marble staircase. Chandeliers swung on the roof above as they followed the guide up the red carpet, turning to look back down into the vast lobby.

Professorial in demeanour, with white hair knotted in a tight, spinster-like fist at the back of her small head, the interlocutor struck a pose of relaxed authority, coughing loudly to gain their attention.