“Then shit in a cup.” The Cossack jerked the slide back on the weapon and released it to snap a round into the chamber. One pull on the trigger and Grisha would no longer need water, ever.
His knees trembled uncontrollably, the familiar burning told him he’d slightly fouled himself, and the stench of his body hung around his face like a rotten wreath. A raven called from deep in the trees. His tongue ran over cracked, parched lips, and he felt the last reserve of energy, and care, drain from his soul. Only anger remained.
The anger sparked a determination to end this animal-like existence. If nothing else, he would die like the soldier he once was. His arms dropped.
The corporal’s mouth slowly twisted into a parody of a grin and he raised the weapon. “Go back to work now or you die.”
Grisha felt incredible freedom. This moment would have presented itself sooner or later; why endure any longer in a world without hope? He squared his shoulders and lifted his head, a Troika Guard major and boat captain one last time, and finished throwing away his life.
At least fight me bare-handed, you louse-infested sodomite.” The insolence felt so good that he grinned.
The corporal snapped the weapon to his shoulder and squinted down the barrel. He shuddered and his expression shifted to surprise.
Grisha frowned at him, wondering at the hesitation. Could the huge fool actually be considering his challenge?
The Kalashnikov clattered to the ground.
Grisha jerked back in amazement.
The corporal slowly leaned forward, and picking up momentum, toppled off the platform into a heap on the ground. An arrow protruded from the base of his skull.
Grisha snatched up the automatic weapon and, dashing back to the water, stuck his whole parched head into the wide tin basin. After three huge sucks he threw himself to the ground behind the water tank and peered around, trying to make sense of the situation. Another raven called from the forest. Two women prisoners stood in the framed—in doorway of the lodge, staring silently at the dead Cossack.
He checked the weapon. The chamber indeed held a round. He remembered the muzzle steadying on his chest and shivered.
Grisha twisted to see how the tankers would react. The soldier who always sat on the turret seemed to be patting the cannon; a feathered shaft jutted from his back also. Grisha realized the man was trying to escape.
The soldier gracefully slid around the barrel and fell to the ground. A figure popped up from behind the riverbank and deftly tossed a blocky object into the now-vacant hatch. Grisha blinked in disbelief as the figure vanished.
The camp was under attack.
Footsteps pounded behind him and he turned to see the burly army guard racing toward the fallen Cossack. He pulled the Kalashnikov up to shoot the guard. The guard pointed his rifle from the hip, the muzzle bobbed back and forth.
Silence expanded like a bubble, then exploded with the tank. A piece of flaming debris scorched past Grisha’s head and hit the guard, knocking him gurgling to the ground, his chest a mass of blood, ripped flesh, and mangled organs.
A Kalashnikov suddenly racketed off a burst. Another explosion blew the main Cossack cabin into flinders. Chunks of wood rained down.
Out of the corner of his eye something moved rapidly toward Grisha. He recognized the straw boss, the Creole woman from west of here, what was her name?
The women all hated men. She could shoot him as well as Russians. He tightened his grip on the gun.
From the half-formed lodge a guard stepped backward on stiffened legs, staring down at his hands grasping the arrow buried in his chest. His thin scream died away and he fell over backward. The straw boss slammed into Grisha and hunched down beside him.
“If you ain’t gonna use that thing, give it to me!”
“Who do you want to shoot?” he asked.
“Cossacks!” she hissed.
Chunks of wood exploded off the guard tower at their back as the sound of another Kalashnikov grabbed Grisha’s attention. The sergeant, framed in the window of one of the finished cabins, sprayed the trees at the edge of the clearing, then again turned his weapon toward the two convicts huddled at the water station.
Grisha finally felt himself shift into combat mode. He squeezed off three rounds as the weapon bucked furiously in his hands. The window frame around the sergeant disintegrated and the man’s face suddenly burst in a grisly spray.
“Pretty good shooting,” the woman said.
“Thanks.” He stared down at the rifle, then up at her. “Answer a question for me?”
She frowned and her eyes flicked around the area before coming to rest on his face.
“What?”
“What’s your name? I’ve been trying to think of it for five minutes now!”
She laughed, showing gaps that remembered teeth. “Blue. My name is Blue.”
Abrupt silence fell across the work site except for the crackle and pop of the furiously burning tank. The trees stood listless in the last surge of summer heat. Birds and insects, reeling from the cacophonous assault, remained silent lest they bring the racket anew.
His heart slammed against his rib cage and his hands shook unless he gripped the weapon tightly. He mentally eased back into slavery.
“I wish something would happen.” He didn’t realize he whispered the words.
Somebody tried to stifle sobs. The quiet became so loud that Grisha’s ears began to ache. Blue moved beside him, her hand touched his.
“Don’t be afraid.” Her voice rose barely above a breath, but he heard her clearly. “These are my people.”
His eyes flashed back to hers. Her face, alive with emotion, shone with sweat. He thought she looked beautiful just then.
“Soldiers of the Czar,” a voice called in Russian. “Lay down your weapons and you will not be harmed. If you continue to resist you will die, slowly.” A moment later the ultimatum was repeated in English.
“Who are they, your people?” Grisha asked.
“The Dená. The English call us Athabascans. We have lived here for hundreds of generations. This is our land.” Even though she spoke softly, her words possessed backbone.
“My mother was a Kolosh,” Grisha said. “She told me once that her ancestors traded with yours before the Russians came.”
“And after, too,” Blue agreed. “You have nothing to fear from us.”
“I hope you’re right. The last woman who told me that almost got me hung.”
The tall Russian corporal everyone called “Professor,” because of all the books he read, walked into the center of the square with his hands above his head. He didn’t appear frightened, merely curious. Another guard shambled out of a cabin supporting a third soldier who dripped blood from an arm wound.
“Don’t shoot! We surrender. My friend is hurt and in shock.” They came to a halt near Professor and the wounded man slumped to the ground.
“I saw three of them die,” Grisha said. “But there could have been more in the tank.”
“Two,” Blue said, “were in the tank.”
“Then there are two more somewhere.”
“The cabin that blew up?” she suggested.
The voice called out again, this time in a language Grisha didn’t recognize.
From the other side of the clearing another voice answered in the same tongue.
“They’re doing the same thing we are, making a tally,” Blue said.
One at a time, voices reported from around the clearing. The birds began to sing again. The voices stopped.
Movement flickered in Grisha’s peripheral vision. He jerked around to see a lithe youth, face painted black and green, dart into the edge of the square and take cover behind the corner of a cabin. The young man’s movements, quick and deliberate, suggested much practice—or experience.