It was surely mere coincidence that the route Kyesha had chosen to take away from his meeting with Aleksei at the Church of Saint Clement was exactly that taken by the Oprichnik Foma after a similar meeting at the same location in the autumn of 1812. Aleksei’s desire to follow had been much the same on both occasions, though in 1812 he had had no idea what his pursuit might ultimately reveal; today, his intent was merely to confirm what he already suspected – that Kyesha was a creature of exactly the same nature as Foma. They were to the south of the city centre, and so to head north was a reasonable decision for anyone. It was just before the Vodootvodny Canal that Kyesha’s path diverged from Foma’s, turning to head west instead of continuing north.
Aleksei kept a safe distance. It was no surprise to him that he could remember the route along which he had pursued Foma, so many years before. There were few events of that autumn that had not been retraced and repeated endlessly in his mind in the intervening years. The process of following was different now. The city was free. It was crowded, even at this late hour, with Muscovites, and empty of occupying soldiers who would stop anyone who caught their interest and question them about their business. The benefits accrued more to the pursued than the pursuer. Aleksei still had to be stealthy, to avoid Kyesha seeing him, while Kyesha had nothing to slow his progress.
Kyesha turned north again and on to the Stone Bridge. Aleksei was forced to hang back. On the streets, it had been possible to get quite close to his quarry, to use buildings and alleyways to hide in if Kyesha happened to turn back. But now there was nothing. From the middle of the bridge, Kyesha would have a clear view all around him, the streetlamps providing ample illumination, despite the lack of moonlight. Aleksei could only wait while Kyesha moved further and further away. Eventually he would have to risk crossing the river himself, but he was fortunate. A group of three men – drunk, but not so drunk as to slow their progress – began to walk over the bridge. Aleksei followed, a few paces behind. Now he had mobile camouflage. He could easily step out to the side and look around the men and make sure that Kyesha had not got too far from him, but if Kyesha were to turn, all he would see would be the three revellers ambling along. Even if he did catch a glimpse of a figure behind them, he would not recognize it as Aleksei.
Aleksei was in the dead centre of the bridge when Kyesha stepped off its northern end. Aleksei could not see which way he had turned. There was no sign of him heading east along the embankment, or north along Manezhnaya Street, clearly visible as it ran alongside the Kremlin. Aleksei darted over to the left-hand side of the bridge and looked down. There he saw Kyesha heading west and about to disappear once again between the built-up houses. Aleksei instantly abandoned all attempts at subterfuge and sprinted across the remainder of the bridge. He was unlikely to be seen by Kyesha, who was now out of sight, but unconcerned if he was. Kyesha’s chosen route was precisely that which Aleksei would have taken had he decided not to follow Kyesha but return straight home. True, there were many turnings Kyesha could take in the tight web of streets he had just entered, but the one that figured greatest in Aleksei’s mind was towards Arbatskaya, where Valentin and Yelena Lavrov lived as, more importantly, did Domnikiia and Toma.
Aleksei reached the end of the bridge and stared down the road where he had last seen Kyesha. There was no sign of him. But Aleksei’s intention had now changed. Instead of determining where Kyesha went, his highest priority was to ensure that he did not arrive at one particular address, or that if he did, he would find Aleksei there waiting for him.
Aleksei ran home by the directest route. He saw no further sign of Kyesha, but made no attempt at stealth. Kyesha – or anyone trying to avoid detection – would have heard his approach a block away. He entered the house and went to Domnikiia and Tamara’s rooms. Both were asleep. All was as it should be, but that only told him that Kyesha had not come yet, not that he would not arrive later. It was impossible to guard both Domnikiia and Tamara while they remained in separate rooms. He went into his daughter’s room and pulled back the bedclothes. Only her head and feet poked out of her long nightdress. Even her hands were hidden, tucked into the sleeves. He picked her up and carried her across the room. She stirred a little, but did not wake. They entered the other bedroom and he laid her down on the bed next to her mother, pulling the blankets over her. Then he went back to their living room and, for the second night in a row, opened up his saddlebag.
He gripped the solid wooden handle of Dmitry’s toy sword. It was well made, even though all those years ago Aleksei had had no idea what the real function of such a sword might be. He went back to the bedroom and slipped it under the mattress on his side of the bed. Then he lay down. He reached across and rested his hand on Domnikiia’s hair, listening to the sounds of breathing that came from her and from Tamara, easily distinguishing one from the other. It would have been a blissful way to spend the night, were it not for the fear that gripped him.
He knew it would have been safer to wake Domnikiia and warn her, but he refrained, not, as he at first told himself, to spare her anguish, but to spare him her reproach. It was he who had brought this on them; his inquisitiveness that had meant he couldn’t resist Kyesha’s bait. She would not have said anything directly; quite the reverse. She would have told him that they were in this together – there had been only a few months, at the beginning of their relationship, when they had not known and feared the voordalak together. More than dividing them, it was a part of what they were as a couple.
But Tamara made things different. Whatever Domnikiia might say about being unafraid for herself, she would loathe Aleksei for bringing her daughter into danger. And in those circumstances, it would be ‘her’ not ‘their’. There was only one person in the world that Domnikiia would turn her back on Aleksei for – at least, he hoped only one.
But whatever Domnikiia’s thoughts might be, it was easier to avoid the issue. He would explain Tamara’s presence by saying she had had a nightmare – even if she had no memory of it herself.
Nightmare or no nightmare, it was not Toma who lay awake that night until the first orange light of dawn glowed behind the curtains and the birds struck up their announcement of the new day. Kyesha had not come. Moscow was a big city. There were many places towards which he might have been heading, and why should he know where Aleksei was living anyway?
The dawn meant he would not be arriving here, whatever his ultimate intentions; not until nightfall at any rate. If he was a voordalak, then in some dark cellar of the city he would be settling down to rest. The knowledge brought comfort to Aleksei, and he finally allowed himself to fall into a troubled sleep.
Dawn came to the Dardanelles an hour later than it did to Moscow. It did so just as R zbunarea steered quietly out of the Aegean and into the strait. Its passenger hovered at the top of the ladder that led down to the hold. He had wanted to see them pass this place. An oddly mundane desire for a man of his stature, whose journey would change the face of Europe, but he was, nonetheless, a man with a sense of history. He gazed out at the coast of Asia Minor stretching away to the south. Somewhere there had stood Troy. Even he was not old enough to know where, but he was wise enough to know its existence was no myth.
The route that the ship was taking, at least for now, was that of Jason. Ultimately, their destinations were different, but Jason’s goal of Colchis had not been so far from where R zbunarea was headed. Jason’s quest had been to bring back the Golden Fleece. That – unlike Troy – was surely a myth, certainly as far as its magical properties went. And it had been guarded by a serpent. If that were true, the passenger of R zbunarea would surely have known about it. He glanced down at the golden beast that entwined his finger and smiled to himself. He was in danger of believing his own propaganda. But he, like Jason, would bring a great treasure back with him when he returned this way.