Last Citadel

unmanned like that. No shame in thinking Valentin Berko is a brave man.

What does Medvedenko know? Only what he sees. The General came back for him.

He gripped a handle and hoisted himself up onto the T-34’s deck.

Gore from the wounded slicked the armor. The new General Platov was blooded now. It had performed well. Dimitri patted the tank’s warm turret, then stepped around the stains.

Valentin’s hatch was open. Valentin sat on his commander’s seat, his soft helmet doffed, a map spread across his lap. He lifted his eyes to the shadow falling over his hatch. He looked up into Dimitri’s face. The boy’s cheeks were filthy, black outlines marked where his goggles had been. The grit made him look older, seasoned.

Valentin lowered his eyes back to his map. He said nothing.

Dimitri could reach down and grip him by the throat, pull him up out of the tank like a salmon out of a river, he could do it, man or no man, this little Communist piss-ant. It felt stupid, leaning over like this, his head only one foot above Valentin’s, the two of them not speaking. Dimitri wondered, Is he mad at me? What was I supposed to do out there, wave goodbye to poor Medvedenko and his crew, wish them luck there beside the river with ten thousand Germans making ready to cross? Won’t risk three tanks for four men! What the hell does he want, how does he expect to fight this damn war? Waiting for orders, doing only what he’s told, dying on the Soviets’

schedule?

Dimitri sat on the fender, dangling tired legs. Valentin stayed inside the General, silent armor separated father and son. After several minutes, Dimitri saw Pasha and Sasha returning from the aid tent. Plucky little Sasha’s arm was wrapped in fresh white gauze. Both boys waved to Dimitri.

A jaunt was in their steps, veterans now, one of them wounded. Dimitri turned to look again down into the hatch, into the pool of shadow where Valya sat, head bent over his maps.

He may not be a Cossack, this boy, he thought; the Communists may have undone that.

‘Hey,’ he said down into the hatch.

Valentin did not lift his head at the word. His hands plopped onto the map, crinkling it. ‘What.’

Dimitri squatted on his haunches, closer to the opening. ‘Medvedenko said to tell you he’d follow you into hell. Said you were his hero.’

Valentin made no response.

Dimitri reached down to pat his son’s shoulder. He climbed off the General to hear Sasha brag about his first bullet and his bandage.

* * * *

CHAPTER 13

July 7

2350 hours

outside the village of Stepnoe

Thirty-two horses stopped in the darkness when Plokhoi hauled back his reins. The leather of saddles and boots creaked and the metal jangle of rifles eased. At the head of the pack, Plokhoi spoke to one of his lieutenants posted at his side. A black mile off, across an unhindered plain of field, a village glowed with the pallid light of lanterns, winking stars, and a quarter moon.

Katya had named her partisan horse Anna, after her favorite Tolstoy novel. Anna was the name she’d given to the first pony Papa presented her when she was only ten; she figured this horse might prove to be her last in this life, so why not go out where you came in? Anna was quick and responsive to Katya’s touch, even though the animal showed little affection for her new rider. Despite the lack of nuzzling, Katya trusted this horse, and thought how quickly trust blossoms in wartime. You trust the person ducking in the hole with you, you trust the ones wearing the same uniforms, and the ones you do not know who give the orders. You may not even know their names; they share an enemy with you, and that’s all you ask in war. But in this rag-tag collection of farmers and lost soldiers she rode with tonight, she knew there was a traitor, and so trusted only Anna, the knife in her belt, and the loaded rifle across her lap.

Plokhoi turned in his saddle. The little light made the man’s deep eye sockets look empty.

‘Witch.’

‘Yes.’

‘Up front. Josef, you too.’

Katya nudged Anna to the front, beside Plokhoi. Josef rode up from the edges of the group.

Plokhoi pointed to Stepnoe village with his nose.

‘You two reconnoiter. You’re father and daughter, if anyone asks. If there’s trouble, head west. We’ll wait here thirty minutes.’ Josef wheeled his mount away and trotted off to the village. Katya nodded to Plokhoi. The colonel returned the gesture. She spun Anna to follow.

Josef rode well. He knew his way around a horse. Katya told him so.

The man made no answer.

‘If we’re going to be father and daughter, we ought to talk, don’t you think?’

‘Plokhoi said if anyone asks.’ Josef did not turn his head. ‘No one has asked.’

‘Why are you mad at me? What did I do?’

‘You chased off the pilot.’

‘Lumanov.’

‘If that’s his name.’

Katya wanted to defend herself; she hadn’t chased Leonid off! She’d come to rescue him, just like Josef had. Things went wrong, it wasn’t…