Page 93 of White Wolf

Ivan’s laugh floated toward them from the fire, loud and delighted.

Katya tightened her arms across her middle and shivered from a sudden chill. “So,” she said.

“So.”

It was quiet a moment, and then he said, quietly, “My mother was a part of Alexandra’s court. One of her maids of honor.”

Surprised, Katya blurted, “Really?”

“Really. She had to change her name, hide who she really was, take a factory job.” His smile was pained. “When I was a boy, she always came home smelling of cologne. I knew she didn’t like what she did, but I didn’t understand what that meant until I was older. Her hands” – he turned his own over and studied the moonlight that pooled in them – “were cracked and bloody from the cold; there was always machine grease under her nails. But that was just hard work – that wasn’t like the bruises on her arms. Her throat.” He touched his own, reflexively, gaze going somewhere beyond her left shoulder.

“I saw her once,” he continued, “getting out of the bath. We rented a room in another family’s flat – Pyotr’s family, actually – and everyone was always on top of one another. I saw the bruises, and they were blue and shaped like fingers. I didn’t know what they meant, then. But when I was sixteen I finally worked it out of her that it was her foreman. Forcing her. Every day after her shift ended.” He was speaking through his teeth, now. “He gave her an extra loaf of bread, a wheel of cheese sometimes. Food she brought home for me, so I could grow ‘big and strong,’ she said. She had three miscarriages, and I think she did it to herself, somehow. I…” He shook his head. “She didn’t want his babies, and I don’t blame her. I.” His hands curled into fists, and his eyes came to hers, suddenly, fever-bright. “When I was sixteen, and she finally told me, I went down to the factory after hours, and I beat him to death, slammed his face into his own desk until his skull split open like a melon.

“He owed an officer money, and I was still standing over the body, bloody up to my elbows, when the Cheka walked into the office.”

She took a deep breath.

“They congratulated me. Asked if I wanted to join. I had a skill, they said. And no one refuses the chance to join. So.”

Katya exhaled slowly, feeling shaky inside, like she hadn’t eaten yet. “So,” she repeated.

“I didn’t come out here intending to tell you all that,” he said, a bit awkward.

The internal shakiness intensified, a shiver along her bones and veins and nerves. “Why did you come out here?” she asked, voice unsteady.

The smile he gave her was different, wry curves in the corners, bashful almost. “I. Um. Well.”

“Oh,” she said, understanding. Felt her blush return, warmer than before.

“But,” he said, shifting his weight back and forth. “I. Well…it doesn’t matter.” He started to turn away.

But she could tell that itdidmatter to him. And though her heart raced with a frightening mix of fear and anticipation, his unexpected awkwardness flattered her. Any other man might have grabbed her and demanded what he wanted. Respect – regard as a person, and as a woman – might have been the most basic of expectations, but in her short life of greed, and violence, and war, and violation, it felt heavy and important. Touching.

She grabbed at his sleeve. “Nikita.” She thought it was the first time she’d said his name aloud, and it seemed to affect him, the way he went still, and then slowly turned back to face her. “Thank you for telling me all of that,” she said, meaning it. And then, because she felt compelled to reassure him in some physical way – and because she needed it, too – she stood up on her tiptoes and circled her arms around his neck in a careful hug.

A more experienced woman might have kissed him – and maybe that’s what he was expecting. But though she’d been subject to horrors, she’d never learned how to kiss properly, and, self-conscious, she pressed her face into the shoulder of his coat, hiding her face. It smelled of the woods, and campfire smoke, and a whiff of cordite. Wolf. And of man, something low and spicy that belonged just to him.

He kept still a moment, and then his arms closed around her, strong and warm. Comforting.

She felt his face against her hair.

“We should go back before it gets any colder,” he urged, voice quiet, not wanting to break the spell.

“Yeah.”

The warmth of the embrace lingered, though, even after they separated and walked back to camp hand-in-hand, his fingers finally sliding away from hers when they entered the fire’s ring of light.

21

SOLDIERS OR SERVANTS

“How long are we going to be out here?” Feliks asked two mornings later. A good question.

Nikita wanted a bath, badly, and he tried to tell himself it had nothing to do with the remembered feel of Katya’s face against his shoulder, the urge to have her do it again…and for him to smell like soap when she did. He also wanted a bed; the cold bunkroom back at the base was starting to sound heavenly.

He couldn’t complain about the food, though. Fresh game roasted over the fire was far preferable to SPAM and cafeteria slop. Sasha, who had no doubt been a talented hunter before, had become successful in a way that was uncanny, and inhuman.

But Nikita knew that they were out here for reasons besides teaching Sasha how to take down stags with his bare hands.

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