Twelve

I wished it were not the case, but the argument was far too easy to answer. 'They killed Maksim with our consent,' I replied. 'He was as good as French.'

Vadim nodded grimly. 'Perhaps you should tell me everything you've discovered,' he said. 'Dmitry Fetyukovich may have his own reasons for believing in the…' he hesitated to use such a superstitious word, '… voordalak, but I need a little more persuading.'

Vadim's arrival had so quickly transformed into a discussion that I had no opportunity to greet him, as I had Dmitry, with the affection that had been building within me over the past few days. But had there ever been an appropriate moment, it had now passed.

'I'll tell you,' I said, 'but we had better walk. The Oprichniki may arrive here at any moment.' We walked across Red Square. When almost empty, as it was now, it is the perfect place for a private conversation, if one stays close to the middle of it. No one can approach without being seen; no one can get within earshot. The nearest hiding places would be amongst the market stalls and simply constructed shops that ringed the perimeter of the square and – to my mind – detracted from its grandeur. No one was trading at this hour and those stalls which had not already burnt were abandoned. We were free to talk in private. A raised voice could echo from one side of the square to the other, but a whisper dies away unnoticed by any but those for whom it was intended.

I realized that I had to be careful of what I told them – more specifically, of what I told Dmitry. If it was no great surprise to him to discover the true nature of the Oprichniki, then that would make it even more of a shock to him to discover that I had killed two of them. I wasn't so sensitive as to worry about shocking Dmitry, but I felt fairly sure that he would sooner or later be telling the other Oprichniki what I had done. That I could do without.

I told them of how I had followed Foma. There was not much in that to contribute to my condemnation of them, but it established the pattern that I was later to see Matfei follow. Then I told them of my pursuit of Matfei, and told them what I saw beneath the tavern – of how he tore out the throat of that Frenchman with his teeth and of the wounds I found on the body when I got closer. Then I had to stay close to the truth, but not reveal all.

'I followed him further,' I continued, 'to another cellar, north of Tverskaya. I waited outside and soon I saw Varfolomei arrive. I was already pretty sure about what we were dealing with, so I waited until it was fully daylight before following them down. Inside, I saw them. They sleep in coffins. I could look close enough even to see their teeth. The stories you hear are true – they have fangs like wolves.'

The most unambiguous proof as to what these creatures were lay, of course, in the manner of their deaths, but I was unable to reveal that part of the story. Instead, I extemporized. Matfei and Varfolomei were in no position to contradict me.

'They awoke and came towards me. I don't know if they were going to attack me, but I backed away; back out of the door, into the light. They stopped, as if the doorway was a barrier to them. They dared not step into the light.' Still I faced a problem. Their fear of the light was not enough to convince Vadim as to what manner of creatures they were. I had seen them face to face – that had been enough for me – but without describing how they actually died, what proof did I have? I realized the best way to condemn dead men was also the most traditional – to claim that they confessed to me.

'So I felt a little safer and we began to talk,' I continued. 'They're not ashamed of what they are; they freely admitted it. They couldn't see why I should be shocked at it.' The reaction I was describing was in fact close to the one that Dmitry had displayed moments earlier, but it seemed the safest bet for how they might have reacted if I had given them the chance.

'And you believed them?' asked Vadim, as if I were a fool. I turned to him, my face expressing something of my outrage. 'I wouldn't have expected such credulity in you, Aleksei.'

'I wasn't being credulous.'

'Oh, come on!' Vadim raised his voice, and then lowered it, looking around in case he had been heard. 'Either I can accept that all that rubbish the peasants believe about the dead rising from their graves and drinking the blood of the living – things that no intelligent man has countenanced for centuries – is true, or I can believe that one of my officers got hoaxed by a couple of foreign mercenaries with a twisted sense of humour. That's hard enough to swallow, but it's the better option.'

'But I saw Matfei, tearing the flesh from a man's throat with his teeth!' Now it was my voice that was raised.

'You could have seen anything.'

I took a breath. It seemed I would have to tell them the evidence of my own eyes, whatever the risk. Before I could speak, Dmitry came to my rescue.

'It's true, Vadim. I've seen far more than Aleksei has. Not here, but back in Wallachia. I knew what they were when I called them here.'

'And you decided not to tell us,' said Vadim.

'I had promised them that I would keep their secret.'

'That wasn't your decision to make.'

'It was part of the deal. They wouldn't have come otherwise.' He could see that Vadim was still unconvinced. 'We need them, Vadim. When it comes down to it, they are very proficient soldiers. They have killed who we wanted them to kill. They will help us to drive out the French. You're not going to throw all that away, are you?' He was talking only to Vadim. There was little point in trying to persuade me.

'Forget about them,' said Vadim. 'I don't have any quarrel with them, Captain Petrenko.' He was at his most formal and therefore his most irate. 'My quarrel is about why you chose not to tell us what you claim to know.'

'Then quarrel with me later. We're in the middle of a war.' I had never heard Dmitry – or any of us – speak to Vadim in such an openly rebellious tone before. Vadim was not one to lord it over his subordinates, but Dmitry was crossing into unknown territory as to what he would put up with.

Vadim covered his face with his hands and breathed deeply. 'This is madness,' he said. 'Arguing as to whether you should have told me they were vampires. I should be dressing you both down for being so gullible.'

'Perhaps we had better postpone this,' I interrupted, nodding across the square to where I had seen two figures approaching. At a distance it was unclear who the shorter one was, but they were undoubtedly Oprichniki and the taller one could be no one but Iuda.

Vadim and Dmitry stepped apart, trying to look somehow nonchalant for the benefit of the creatures that approached us.

'We'll speak of this later, Dmitry Fetyukovich,' muttered Vadim through a false smile. 'If what you say is true, then that was no way for Maksim to die.'

'So what's a good way for a traitor to die?' came Dmitry's reply. Before anyone could add anything else, the Oprichniki were with us.

It was Ioann that accompanied him, but as usual, Iuda did all the talking.

'Good evening, Vadim Fyodorovich, Dmitry Fetyukovich, Aleksei Ivanovich.'

We each acknowledged his greeting.

'How is your work progressing?' asked Vadim.

'According to plan,' replied Iuda. 'We are restraining ourselves so as not to give too much alarm. At present the fires are causing as much trouble for the French as we are.'

'I think they've nearly run their course now,' said Vadim. 'The French have organized themselves enough to deal with them. On top of that, there's not much left to burn.' He said it with a casualness that belied how deeply we all felt for the devastation of the city.

'Good. They have been a cause of much concern to me and my friends. Indeed, we have not seen some of our friends for several days,' said Iuda. 'Have any attended your meetings?'

'We saw Matfei and Varfolomei last night,' said Dmitry.

'We?'

'Vadim Fyodorovich and myself.'