Authors: Jasper Kent
He grabbed the lamp from the table and hurled it at one of the men by the window. It was a modern device, fuelled by paraffin rather than oil, and so when it shattered against the man’s shoulder he was quickly enveloped in the liquid, which in an instant was aflame. The curtains behind him caught alight too and soon the whole of the window was framed with lashing orange and yellow tongues.
Yudin tightened his grip on Tarasov and began to shuffle towards the door, navigating his way around the bed and not needing to fabricate the terror that the fire held for him. The two men at the door stood their ground, as did the one who remained at the window. Clearly they had been trained well. They watched unmoved as their burning comrade rolled around on the floor, his agonized screams filling the room. The scent of his roasting flesh reached Yudin’s nostrils.
At last the other man beside the window could bear it no longer. He had been forced to take a few steps from it, because of the intense heat, but now he abandoned his post altogether and threw himself towards his fallen colleague, attempting to smother the flames by covering him with a rug. Yudin did not wait to see the result of this act of humanity. He released his grip on Tarasov and flung himself across the room towards the window. Tarasov shouted, but it was too late. All that Yudin could see was the fire, but he overcame his every instinct to cower from it and instead plunged through and out into the night. His feet scarcely touched the balcony beyond before he was over it and falling on to the lawn below.
He was up again in an instant. The arm of his shirt was ablaze,
but
he knew he could not waste time there trying to put it out. He raced over to the bushes at the side of the garden and disappeared within them. With a few pats of his hand, ignoring the pain which he knew would be only temporary, he put out the flames on his arm. He looked at the blackened, blistered flesh beneath, but it didn’t concern him. Fire might kill a vampire, but only if it consumed his body totally. Otherwise, as with every injury, he would soon recover. He climbed the wall and glanced briefly over his shoulder. The fire was still blazing, but wasn’t so large that it would not soon be put out. Tarasov would almost certainly survive, and that was all to the good. Yudin might soon have need to question him again, though on such an occasion he would be more circumspect.
But that occasion would not be soon. Yudin dropped from the top of the wall on to the street below and ran.
DMITRY STEPPED DOWN
from the sleigh, making sure his left leg touched the ground first and then putting down his right, taking most of the weight on his stick. Moscow looked beautiful – matching the picture in his memory that could only be true for half the year. The whole city was covered in snow. The people took it in their stride. All wore heavy coats and hats and mittens, and travelled in sleds rather than carriages, but other than that, life in the city continued.
It was late November now – almost three months since Sevastopol had been evacuated. Dmitry had been in the water only moments, unable to hear the shouts of the men above him but still perceiving the low rumble of explosions. Then his sergeant on the bridge and the two
ryadovye
in the water had managed to heave him out. The remainder of his short journey north had been on foot – on one foot – rather than lying in a makeshift stretcher, but his brief immersion had invigorated him. He had recuperated for a few days in the Severnaya, where the great surgeon Nikolai Ivanovich Pirogov himself had treated him. He’d told Dmitry to sniff a liquid called ether, which made him light-headed, and had then stretched his ankle back into something like its correct shape. The effect of the ether had been to dim the agony, and also to make Dmitry care less about the not insubstantial degree of pain that remained. It hurt more to recall it than it had to experience it. Then Pirogov wrapped Dmitry’s foot, ankle and calf in wet bandages, which after a few hours miraculously stiffened and became hard as stone, allowing Dmitry no movement of his foot.
After that he was moved north, to Simferopol, away from the
heart
of the action, and after several weeks the hardened bandages had been cut away. Beneath them, his leg was withered, and the skin was dry and scaly, but he was able to move his foot very slightly and even put a little weight on it, though not without pain. They said that that would improve and had given him the stick. Then had begun his slow journey home. He’d travelled only short distances each day, at least at first, which resulted in many of the hostelries he slept in being of the lowest order he had ever experienced. But who was he to complain? He’d cheated death – he could suffer a few flea bites. He spent over a week in Kharkov, the largest city en route, and after that had felt sufficiently well to travel faster.
He’d finally arrived in Moscow late the previous afternoon. He slept in his hotel for almost twelve hours and the following morning his first port of call was the office of his oldest friend – the man he must nowadays remember to call Vasiliy Innokyentievich Yudin.
The sleigh had dropped him right beside the Armoury. He had never seen the building completed, though they had been constructing it when he was last in Moscow. That was over five years ago – longer than he would have guessed.
He was about to knock on the door when it opened and a small, bespectacled, balding man with bushy grey eyebrows appeared from behind it.
‘Major Danilov?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m Titular Councillor Gribov. Actual State Councillor Yudin is expecting you.’
Gribov led him down a flight of stone steps which Dmitry found difficult to navigate. There was no banister rail and little room for Dmitry to place the tip of his cane. Gribov seemed concerned at Dmitry’s injury, but hesitated to offer any direct assistance, guessing perhaps how much Dmitry would have loathed it if he had. Dmitry lost his footing only once, but slipped down just one step and easily took his weight on his left leg. Soon he was in Yudin’s office.
It was a grim place, but much like the rooms which had served Yudin the last time Dmitry had seen him. That had been in 1849,
still
in the Kremlin but further to the south. Yudin was on his feet the moment Dmitry entered and walked swiftly over to embrace him.
‘Mitka!’ he said, warmly.
‘Vasya! It’s good to see you.’
Yudin stepped away. ‘You’re doing better than I had dared hope,’ he said. ‘You’ll soon be throwing that cane away.’
‘I’m not sure. I think it’s beginning to suit me,’ said Dmitry. ‘But you’re looking wonderful. You never seem to age.’ It was a lie, and they both knew it. Dmitry had never been sure just how old Yudin actually was. They had first met in 1812 when Aleksei had been away fighting the French and Yudin had introduced himself to Dmitry’s mother as a friend of Aleksei’s. Dmitry had been only five at the time, so it was hard for him to recall how old Yudin was, but he must have been a young man. Generally, Yudin was vain about his appearance. His obviously dyed hair was testimony to that. Dmitry remembered how in younger days he had possessed a striking blond mane. But Yudin’s face – his skin – had always remained young. Today it did not seem so. Even the backs of his hands showed wrinkles. He must have been at least in his sixties, perhaps even his seventies. For the first time it showed.
Yudin pulled back a chair at his desk and Dmitry sat down. Yudin returned to his own seat, speaking as he went. ‘I’ve heard all about what happened. Not just in your letters, but in dispatches too.’
‘It’s nothing heroic,’ said Dmitry. He meant it. However necessary it might have been, burning down a Russian city was not a noble act.
‘You were wounded in the service of the tsar – that’s what matters. Your mother would be very proud.’ A slight pause. ‘I’m sure your father is.’
‘You’ve not heard from him?’ Dmitry tried to disguise his eagerness.
Yudin shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not.’
‘You’re sure he’s alive?’
‘I would have been informed,’ explained Yudin. ‘I’ve written to the governor of Irkutsk, to see if he can speak to Aleksei and explain his silence, but as yet I have heard nothing.’
‘He’s ashamed of me,’ said Dmitry.
‘It’s not that. It couldn’t be. But Lyosha can be a difficult man. He may just think it’s for the best.’
‘For the best?’ said Dmitry angrily.
Yudin shrugged, but could explain no more. He changed the subject, if only slightly. ‘As it happens, you’re not the only person who’s interested to know what’s become of Aleksei.’ Dmitry raised a questioning eyebrow and Yudin continued. ‘A colleague of mine is very keen to hear about him.’
‘Raking up dirt on the last few Decembrists?’ Dmitry did not know exactly what Yudin’s role within the government was, but doubted it was anything underhand. The same generosity could not be extended to his colleagues.
‘No – this goes back before the revolt. It’s about murder; two sets of murders, here in Moscow – one in 1812, the others in 1825.’
Dmitry stiffened. He knew a great deal about deaths in Moscow in those two years. His father had told him about the former, and to those of 1825 he had been a witness. ‘So what does he want to know – your colleague?’
‘She.’
‘She?’
‘Her name’s Tamara Valentinovna Komarova – née Lavrova.’
‘Lavrova?’ It was a name that Dmitry knew well.
Yudin nodded. ‘The same family of Lavrovs that took in your father’s mistress for a time.’
‘Does she know?’ asked Dmitry.
‘That she’s investigating her nanny’s lover? I don’t think so. And I wouldn’t tell her. Be careful of her – she’s a shrewd woman.’
‘Why don’t I just refuse to speak to her?’
‘Because
I
need to find out how much she knows.’
‘About Papa?’
‘No – I’m sure that’s nothing. But Tamara Valentinovna belongs to a strand of the civil service that is somewhat less in favour of the new regime than you and I. I need to find out how far they’re prepared to go.’
Dmitry nodded. Yudin had never been as radical as him or Aleksei, but he had grown to share their distaste for despots,
especially
Nikolai. Yudin would never have conspired against the old tsar, but Dmitry guessed he would do anything to protect the new one.
‘When shall I see her?’ asked Dmitry.
‘There’s no rush. I’ll arrange something. You still need to recover.’
‘Lana is expecting me in Petersburg.’ Yudin said nothing, and Dmitry was glad to put off his return home. ‘But if I’m needed here, she’ll understand.’
‘Good. Good. Now, you be on your way, and enjoy the city. And make sure everyone knows you’re a hero.’ Yudin rose and indicated the stairs up to the Kremlin. Dmitry stood and slowly made his way across the room, the tapping of his stick sounding louder in the enclosed space. ‘And we must have dinner one evening,’ Yudin added, ‘so you can tell me all about Sevastopol.’
Ascent of the steps proved to be easier than coming down had been. At the top he looked down and saw Yudin staring back up at him. He waved, and his friend waved back, then Dmitry turned and walked outside, pausing only to glance into the office where he saw Gribov diligently working.
The sleigh was waiting for him, as instructed, but he dismissed it. Just to see Yudin’s familiar face once again had made him feel stronger and he decided to walk. A hero of Sevastopol could not disdain a little snow on his boots.
‘He lied,’ said Raisa. ‘You
are
looking old.’
She had emerged almost as soon as Dmitry left, from the door that led down to the dungeons.
‘I know,’ replied Yudin.
‘How can you know? A mirror won’t tell you, and everyone else will flatter you, just like he did.’
‘I know I look old because I intended to look old,’ he said. ‘I don’t need to see it to be sure.’
She held out her hand. ‘Come with me. Let’s drink. It will make you young again.’ She smirked. ‘As young as you can be.’
Yudin contemplated. He was thirsty – more thirsty than he could ever recall. It had not yet affected his strength, or his mind, but the skin was always the thing that changed the soonest. He
had
seen it first in Zmyeevich. When they had met, the old vampire had appeared to be just that – an old man, weak and decrepit. On the next occasion, Yudin had hardly recognized him. He was young – or at least vibrantly middle-aged – restored to the state he had been in when first he had become a
voordalak
, centuries before. It hadn’t taken Yudin long to guess that the rejuvenation was the effect of feeding. A few experiments had proved it beyond doubt.
‘I can’t,’ he said to Raisa. ‘Dmitry has known me longer than anyone. He’d suspect.’
‘So you starve yourself for him?’
‘What did you make of him?’
‘He’s diffident – a typical soldier – but he can’t hide his sadness. He can’t hear his father’s name without pausing to imagine what might have been.’
‘He’s his father’s son,’ said Yudin. ‘That makes him as dangerous as he is useful. I’ll have to deal with them both soon enough.’
‘You sound disappointed.’
‘It’s taken me a long time,’ Yudin sighed. He was always melancholy as the final moves of the game approached.
‘So what will you do with him?’