Kate Furnivall: The Concubine's Secret

She twirled one of the coins between her fingers and flashed him another quick glance. ‘So what is your point?’

‘They won’t forget you.’

A shimmer of a smile touched her full lips. ‘So?’

‘So when anyone comes asking questions, the people here will take pleasure in recalling every detail about you. Not just the colour of your hair or how many vodkas you fed into Popkov or your name or your age or the names of your companions. No, Lydia. They’ll remember carefully the numbers on your passport and on your travel permit and even what train ticket is hidden away in your bodybelt.’

Her eyes widened and a blush started to creep up her cheek. ‘Why would anyone bother to remember all that? And who would come asking?’ Suddenly her tawny eyes were nervous. ‘Who, Alexei?’

He pushed his shoulders away from the door and only one half-pace took him to the bed where he sat down next to her. The mattress was bullet-hard and the three piles of coins tottered slightly in her lap.

She treated him to a surprised smile but her gaze was wary. ‘What?’

He leaned close, so close he could hear the whisper-soft clicking of her teeth behind the smooth curve of her cheek. ‘First of all, keep your voice down. The walls are paper-thin. That’s not just to save money on materials, they’re designed to be like that.’ His voice was the faintest trickle in her ear. ‘So everyone can eavesdrop on everybody else. A neighbour can report a muttered complaint about the cost of bread or about the incompetence of the rail system.’

She gave him that direct look again and rolled her eyes so dramatically he almost laughed out loud, but stifled it with a frown instead.

‘Damn it, listen to me, Lydia.’

She took his hand, scooped up one of the piles in her lap and dribbled twenty coins on to his palm.

‘I don’t want your money,’ he objected.

But she gently wrapped his fingers round the little heap, one by one.

‘Keep it,’ she whispered. ‘One day you may need it.’

Then she turned her face to him and kissed his cheek. Her lips felt feather-soft and warm on his skin. His throat tightened. It was the first time such an intimate gesture had passed between them. They’d known each other for eighteen months now, much of it unaware of the fact that they were brother and sister, and he’d even seen her stark naked that terrible day in the woods outside Junchow. But a kiss. No, never that.

He stood up awkwardly and flexed his legs. The room was suddenly claustrophobic, and silent except for the vibration of a woman snoring next door.

‘Lydia, I’m just trying to protect you.’

‘I know.’

‘Then why do you make everything so…?’

‘Difficult?’

‘Yes. So damn difficult. As if you prefer it that way.’

She shrugged and he studied her for a long moment, the mane of fiery hair that she refused to cut, the delicate heart-shaped face with candle-pale skin and the firm chin. She was seventeen years old, that’s all. He needed to make her understand, but he knew she had long ago learned to be stubborn, learned to be strong enough and difficult enough to deal with the hardships of her life. He knew that. Something in him wanted to reach out to her, to bridge the gap between them and touch her, to pat her shoulder or her undisciplined hair, to reassure her. But he was certain she wouldn’t welcome it, would regard it as pity.

Instead he said gently, ‘We have to work together, Lydia.’

But she didn’t look at him, didn’t answer.

Just a faint murmur escaped her lips and it struck him as a wretched and lonely sound. Alexei saw her eyes unfocused and her lips moving silently. She’d gone. Sometimes she did that. When things became too much she would disappear, leave him and float away into her own private world, somewhere in her head that brought her… what? Joy? Comfort? Escape from this dingy room and this dingy life?

Alexei’s back stiffened. He could guess where she’d gone. And with whom. Abruptly he opened the door to leave.

‘I’ll see you at the station tomorrow,’ he said in a brisk voice.

No reply.

He walked out and shut the door with a sharp click behind him.

Alexei stepped out into the gloomy corridor and stopped dead. Right in front of Lydia’s door loomed Liev Popkov, that crazy Cossack of hers. Alexei himself was tall and unused to looking up at people, but Popkov was considerably taller and as broadchested and bad-tempered as a water buffalo. Popkov didn’t back off. He was rooted to the scuffed floorboards, deliberately in Alexei’s way, huge arms folded across his chest so that he seemed to swell with every breath. He was chewing something vile that turned his teeth the colour of old leather.

‘Get out of my way,’ Alexei said quietly.

‘Leave her alone.’

Alexei gave him a long cool stare. ‘Leave who alone?’ ‘She’s young.’

‘She’s dangerous because she’s impetuous. She has to learn.’

‘Not from you.’

‘You let her take a risk tonight in that bar.’

‘ Nyet . You are the danger. You, not her. You, with all your fancy talk and your aristocratic stiff neck. I tell you, each day that dawns in this land, you are the risk to us, not-’

‘You’re a brainless fool, Popkov.’

‘I’m here to protect her.’

‘You?’ Alexei dragged out the single word and gave the Cossack a slow, insulting smile.

‘ Da .’ Popkov’s black curls were as unruly as his temper and sprang over the ragged scar that sliced across his forehead into the eyepatch. ‘ Da. ’ Popkov spat it out more vehemently, his breath escaping in a foul-smelling hiss. ‘Frighten her,’ he growled, ‘and I will rip your fucking balls off.’

Alexei’s eyes narrowed. He spoke softly. ‘Touch me and I’ll snap your windpipe before you even open your ignorant mouth to cry for help. Now tell me what she said to you.’

‘What?’

‘Tell me, ox brain, what she said to you when you were arm wrestling. What words, when you were dead in the water, did she whisper in your ear that made you find the strength to win?’

‘You’ll never know.’

Alexei dropped his voice to little more than a whisper. ‘Did she promise to fuck you, is that it?’

The big man bellowed.

A door slammed open. The sound of it cracking against a wall reverberated down the grey corridor, jerking both men’s attention off each other and on to the woman standing in the doorway next to Lydia’s. With hands planted firmly on her hips and feet wide apart, she was apparently unaware that her striped cotton nightshirt was unbuttoned to the waist, allowing an intimate, if partial, glimpse of the curves of her abundant breasts.

‘Shut up, you braying donkeys!’ she yelled at them. ‘I’m trying to sleep here and all I get is two oafs banging their heads together.’

Alexei took in her broad flat feet with toenails that seemed structured out of moose-horn, the loose hang of her stomach under the nightshirt, her tangled hair that might once have been a luxuriant brown but now had the colour and texture of last year’s hay bales. With an effort he kept his gaze firmly away from her breasts.

He gave a small stiff bow of his head. ‘My apologies.’

‘Piss on your apologies, comrade,’ she snapped. ‘Just let me get some sleep.’

Alexei glanced across at Popkov and nearly burst out laughing. The big bearded ox was standing there with his mouth gaping wide open, his one good eye focused without the slightest embarrassment on the pale half-moons on display. Little grunting noises escaped from his throat.

The woman was having none of it. Her dark eyebrows shot up and she darted forward, jabbing the Cossack in the stomach with a thick finger, not once but three times. Instantly Popkov recoiled, lurched back against the opposite wall as though prodded with a rifle butt, and Alexei took the opportunity to stride off down the corridor without another word. He needed some peace. Some quiet. Needed to think. Dear merciful God, protect me from the insanity of these peasants.