Warning to Readers

The following story is pre-U.N.C.L.E. and IK only

This story is a Work in Progress (WIP) and is currently unfinished.

Conversion of a Heretic

by

Patricia J. Foley

-- And who do you think is the greatest poet?

asked Boland, nudging his neighbor.

-- Byron, of course, answered Stephen....

-- You don't care whether he was a heretic

or not? said Nash.

-- What do you know about it? shouted Stephen....

-- Here, catch hold of this heretic, Heron

called out.

In a moment Stephen was a prisoner.

James Joyce

December 11, 1949

Colonel Yuri Gavrilovich Novikov, the Military Commissariat of the General Staff, stood watching, slapping a clipboard against his thigh in frustration, while heavily armed sergeants herded the new recruits into the waiting trucks. Most of the young men were either drunk or walked with the unmistakable cant of hangover. Some were intoxicated to the point of unconsciousness, but their friends or parents carried them to the local assembly point and loaded them into the vehicles. All wore the worst possible clothes in their possession, either threadbare or stiff with mud or grease, in counterpoint to the bruises from their fights and celebrations of the previous night. They were not a prepossessing group.

Novikov's disgust with the group had nothing to do with their lack of sobriety or decent attire. His concerns lay with the lack of furnishings in their minds. Like the last three call-ups he had overseen, this group held not a single Category Zero or One level recruit. In addition, he was under quota for Category Two soldiers. This group held nothing but Category Six soldiers, spattered with a paltry number of Fives and a few Fours and only two Threes. The fault didn't lay with him. But the responsibility for supplying the Army with adequate manpower did.

As the military intelligence officer in charge of recruitment and mobilization for the Ukraine, his task involved the supply and distribution of men -- at least for his district. Of common Category Six soldiers he had more than enough, the rough, barely educated dross that would fill the ranks of the infantry or the tank columns. But where was he to find the Category Zero soldiers to serve the General Staff, the Category One soldiers for the rocket battalions, or the Category Two soldiers who could understand complicated mathematical formulas, who could interpret maps or possessed even the most minor analytical skills?

His own kind -- the nomenkultura, the members of the General Staff, of the Party, all the 'comrades of proven worth' -- procured exemptions and deferments for their sons from military service. Those sons found places in institutes, in universities, anywhere but the military. As for the former intelligentsia, Stalin had purged the country of what little of that group hadn't already found a way to flee. The result was that much of the military fodder left were ignorant kolkoz workers barely able to read and write. Even those with natural abilities suffered from poor kolkoz schools where citizenship was prized over scholarship. All very well, except when one needed intelligence beyond the sort needed to farm. Oh, they made good enough general soldiers. A man who could hoe potatoes could dig a trench. A tractor operator could drive a tank. His sergeants could teach ignorant peasants from Uzbekistan, who could not speak a word of Russian, and understood barely more, to drive tanks and operate the big guns. Rote learning and constant practice could overcome the barriers of language, and even that of stupidity. At least up to a point.

But when that point was met, he still needed soldiers who could think as well as be taught. And therein lay his problem.

The loading of the new recruits had finished. His sergeants, the toughest, most vicious of their lot, a necessary attribute on this day when their disorderly charges would indiscriminately attack their superiors as well as each other, had tossed, punched, kicked and otherwise forced the last of them into their places in the vehicles. Novikov signalled the convoy to move out, watching until the last of the trucks departed.

He turned away from his own waiting driver, shaking his head in dismissal. He had another call up to supervise, but he would walk to the train station. Too many days of climbing in and out of jeeps and standing around watching the same scene had left him short of exercise. And it would give him time to think and determine a solution to the problem.

The Great Patriotic War was over, but the military build-up continued unabated, and there was no question in his mind, or those of his comrades, that a greater war -- the war that would involve the ultimate triumph of communism -- was yet to be fought. In five years, in ten years, perhaps even sooner, the moment would come. For that war, his army needed soldiers of all kinds -- not mere cannon fodder. But where to find them? The former intelligentsia was nearly gone, and what little remained of it would not long survive the rest of Stalin's purges. So where was he to find the soldiers with the skills he needed to fill his ranks? How were they to be raised, trained and educated?

Novikov walked though the village, toward the train station. He was passing the remnants of an old orchard, one of the indulgences from an estate of the former nobility, now neglected, when he caught the movement out of the corner of his eye at first. Just a flicker of motion, and then nothing.

The wind, perhaps? An animal? The outskirts of this village were full of wildlife. It could have been a deer or a feral dog. Packs of feral dogs were becoming a real problem in many of the villages of the Ukraine. Turned out to survive, or starve, when their masters were swept up in the purges.

He drew his weapon, the better to deal with this threat, but walked on, senses alert.

It didn't seem like a dog. For one thing, dogs usually roamed in packs. Even wolves hunted with a mate, at least at this season of the year. It was too early in the winter for the dam to be denned up with her pups. So not a wolf, not likely.

But he was definitely being stalked.

And cleverly too. The stalker, whatever it was, paused when he paused, moved when he moved. His finger tightened on the trigger of his gun, and his breath quickened. A lone solder would make a convenient target for a people thirsting for revenge. The Ukraine had suffered brutally in the purges, but while it could be subdued, the country could never be completely tamed. His uniform alone made him a target. And now that he thought of it, last winter there had been reports of the murder of a sentry in the next village, not five miles away. The sentry, just a boy really, had made the mistake of falling asleep at his post; his throat had been slit as he slept; his weapons taken and oddly enough, his clothes, coat and shoes. Well, perhaps not oddly enough, clothes of any sort were next to impossible to get, shoes worse still. But even though the local dissidents had been interrogated, and the most vocal and troublesome had been taken out and shot, the milisia had never discovered the missing items, even though they had torn the village apart searching for the culprit.

Perhaps he was meant to be the next victim?

Though he was due at the railway station, he headed out, away from the village, as if he had planned to hike to the next village. He could always catch his train from there, and perhaps he would catch something else, too.

A murderer. An enemy of the state. He smiled slightly, thinking of how he would enjoy executing a traitor.

But as he walked, doubts returned. Whoever, or whatever, was shadowing him was doing an excellent job, he rarely caught a glimpse of movement, and even he, with his training, couldn't absolutely say it was not the wind in the trees and bushes, a shadow in the long grass, or an animal. An ordinary solder might well not catch such an elusive hunter. Nor was the shape of the stalker man-like, the figure was too far-shortened for that. No, definitely not a man, but then what? Even he felt the beginnings of being spooked. Were he not a high ranking Soviet officer, and some ignorant peasant, he might find himself prey to some absurd superstition.

As it was, he kept his gun at ready and his senses keen.

Ahead was a path into the forest, he took it, as if he were going for a hike, or to check trap lines, or on a surveying mission. Whatever followed him was in its element here. He heard the rustle of wind in the evergreens, the snap of twigs under his own heels, but he heard nothing from his tracker. And the glimpses he caught showed that the thing had moved back, shadowing him from a distance. That made sense, of course. Although there was more cover here, a lone man in a forest, particularly a largish one in a conspicuous military uniform, need not be followed too closely to be kept in view.

He walked for an hour and began to doubt he was being followed at all. Perhaps it had been a trick of the light, or the consequence of too many hours duty. Perhaps he wasn't too far removed from the superstitious kolkas[1] peasant.

Deciding to force the issue, he settled down as if to make a camp, clearing a small area, taking care not only that it was large enough to make a fire, but large enough for maneuverability in the confrontation he now doubted would come. Last of all, he pretended to doze, thinking, Come, come if you dare. I am ready for you.

He felt foolish sitting in the middle of the forest, with his head slumped on his chest. What soldier would do this? Not even a stupid sentry. He must have been mistaken on the road. Too many long days and late hours. He was beginning to see threats where none existed. Perhaps there had been something at first, a wolf or a wild dog, but now--

Then he felt it, like an icy shower on his skin. Eyes on him. Watching him. Approaching. From his back, then from his side, he felt the gaze of something surveying him. A wolf? Wolves studied their prey -- but the winter was hardly advanced enough yet to cause the wolves to be desperate enough to attack a lone man.

Still, the next time he felt the invisible surveyor move to his back, he took hold of his gun under his coat. Wolf, dog or man, he would kill the thing and have done with it.

When the rush came, he was almost unready, it came from a direction opposite to that he had expected. Clever, indeed. He rose and whirled, drawing his weapon, seeing the glint of steel in the hand of his attacker, and the startled flash of fear in the eyes that had been tricked. But the boy -- it was a boy, though ragged and filthy enough to be called an animal -- came on anyway -- there was little else he could do, certainly he couldn't outrun a gun.

With the small thinking part of his mind, he found himself surprised at the rush. He was used to peasants, even feral child peasants, dropping submissively at the sight of a gun -- illegal now for any citizen to own -- but this boy came on anyway, his knife -- a long wicked steel honed razor sharp, glinting in the murky dappled light. Novikov stepped back in surprise, and in the instant that he dropped his guard, the boy was on him. He knocked the child away with a vicious blow that flung his attacker several feet, stunning him, his knife dropping from a now lax hand.

Novikov rose quickly, catching his breath, but his caution was unnecessary. The child lay against one of the rocks he had used to encircle the fire, a trickle of blood staining the snow under his temple.

He turned the boy over with a cautious toe, but the child lay unmoving. After a moment, he sheathed his weapon and tucked the boy's knife in his own boot, and went through the ragged clothes, looking for any papers or sign of identification, wrinkling his nose at the foul smell of a body that hadn't known water in some time. Probably since the last warm days of summer.

The pack held an ancient shooting pistol with no ammunition, a military compass, some dry kindling, carefully wrapped in a threadbare undershirt, a flint and steel for firemaking, and a few wizened apples, shrunken mushrooms, and frozen berries, probably gleaned from the nearby orchard where he had attracted the boy's notice. There was nothing else. He sat back on his heels, and then took a closer look at the boy's layers of clothes. Under the too short jacket, and the shabby shirt, was a once fine woolen undershirt, worn only by the military. He pulled the knife out of his boot and confirmed its origin. Military issue too.

So here was the killer of his sentry. A besprizhornik. A purge orphan. Thousands of such children had been turned out of their homes over the years, their parents the casualties of Stalin's purges, their neighbors forbidden to take them in under pain of being swept up themselves. Most of them turned feral, and died within two years, the majority of them not surviving the first winter. It seemed this one was more resourceful, and had added murder to his list of survival skills.

Well, he probably thought it fair game, to attack the military of the country that had executed his parents.

Fair game, perhaps, but this world was not a fair place. This orphan had outmatched himself, and had not picked another ignorant, untrained sentry for his victim. He drew his weapon again, prepared to make the execution quick, clean and painless -- the boy would not even have woken, when a thought stayed his hand.

He'd have to take the body back, of course. The good citizenry had been complaining about the problems the bespriorzi caused. The Party would have liked to take the children in the sweeps too, but there had been some concern the populace would revolt at that. So they were left to freeze and starve, with dire punishments promised to anyone who helped them. And few did, after those who took them in or gave them handouts were taken away themselves, their own children turned out into the snow. Like many military men, he, himself, found the practice inefficient and untidy. The little girls ended up selling themselves for bits of food, then lost the food to the stronger, hungrier boys, only to be raped in turn by them. The boys sold themselves as well, or preyed like animals on the local populace, stealing, begging, threatening, until they had to be shot. The only good of it was that seeing the horrors the bespriorzi became kept the rest of the populace in line -- no one wanted to tempt such a fate for their own child.

So the lesson was useful, but the lesson had been learned, while the problems of dealing with the orphaned brats grew. To show a bespriorznik as a murderer would be an excellent example of why the purges should be total, involving the entire family. The boy might be more useful if his execution were delayed until after a public trial, after he had proven the dangerous predation his kind caused the Soviet state. He sheathed his knife. No, there was no need for haste, the boy could be made to confess easily enough. He was clearly guilty, the evidence would prove it, and with a proper inducements a man could be made to confess to anything. A boy would talk quickly enough. Probably the soldier's weapon was concealed in some hut somewhere, useless for lack of ammunition. That might be why the child had been so bold to attack him. The hardest edge of winter was yet to come, only so much could be done with snares and traps, and he had probably used the sentry's scarce ammunition for last winter's hunting.

Truthfully, it was more convenient not to kill him just yet. The boy stank badly enough, but in death he would void bowels and bladder, not to mention the quantities of blood if he cut his throat. No, carry him back to the village, turn him over to the local militsia, and let them do the dirty job.

He tied the boy hand and foot, trussing him like a small deer, and found a likely branch to put through the bonds. He tucked the rucksack under the boy's coat as needed evidence, and hoisted the branch distastefully over his shoulders. The boy was probably alive with fleas and lice. He would get himself a bath as soon as he disposed of him. And disinfect his clothing too.

But still, catching a murderer was not a bad day's work.

Halfway back through the forest, he grinned at the sound of a soft moan and a sudden tension in the once lax body. So the little cut-throat had awakened? So much the better. Let him chew on his fate instead of the throats of Soviet citizens for a change. It served the little bastard right. He expected oaths, epithets, questions, struggles, but there was nothing. The boy's body went relatively lax again and he was silent. Too silent. Thinking the child had fainted, he walked on unconcerned for a while, but then he grew troubled again. The burden across his shoulders was not the same as when the boy had been unconscious -- he was not unconscious now. And the weight had shifted. Perhaps he was trying to ease the strain on his wrists and ankles? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

With one sudden motion he lifted the carrying pole from his shoulders and whirled it around until the child was facing him. Furious blue eyes glared at him, but the boy didn't let his surprise stop him in his efforts. One small hand gripped the carrying pole by the remnants of the chewed through bonds -- a clever move to keep the weight balanced as well as he could -- the other hand had shifted to pull him closer to his ankle bonds, and surprisingly strong white teeth were hard at work reducing those to shredded ribbons.

With an oath of his own, he dropped the pole. The boy fell hard, the breath knocked out of him by the impact, but he still scrambled to rise to his knees, his feet still tied to the pole while his fingers scrambled to undo the knots, teeth bared in a snarl. It might have been ludicrous, except that nothing about the boy's manner was childlike, or even human -- rather he seemed like a vicious, deadly little animal. ... had no doubt that if the boy had been free he would have sprung for his throat, his opponent's weapons be damned.

No wonder the sentry had died so quickly, faced with this monster.

It would however, be easy enough to subdue him. Reaching out one hand, well away from the boy's teeth, he took hold of the other end of the pole and flipped him flat on his back, hard enough to knock the breath from him. He went down to truss his captive again, using the leather straps from his munitions belt instead. As he moved from securing the wrists to the ankles, he felt himself observed and looked down into a narrowed blue gaze. He met it keenly, not stopping his work, rather surprised at what it held. There was hatred in the gaze, balanced by a mixture of resignation, exhaustion and pain, but there was no fear.

In the last few years, he had spent more time as a Soviet officer preying on his own people than against foreign enemies of the state -- he had become used to the automatic terror his uniform, especially a commissar's uniform, would create in any citizen thus taken under arrest -- so used to it that he had come to expect it.

In the last war he had bayonetted his own troops deserting the front when they had no more ammunition with which to fight. He had set his own military hospitals aflame when in retreat, rather than leave his own wounded to the enemy. He sworn not only to shoot any soldier -- even wounded or unconscious -- who would let himself become a prisoner of war, and further, to shoot the families of any soldiers who escaped him. The Soviet Union allowed for no prisoners of war even if it meant holding the entire civilian populace hostage. Terror was part of his working relationship with the populace -- what struck him in this case was the lack of it. But perhaps the child was simply mad. Besprihorzniks sometimes did -- the ones that didn't die or turn to hardened criminals. But then the soft voice shattered both the silence as well as that presumption.

"Why don't you just shoot me?"

Novikov sketched his captive a look, failing for once to mask his own surprise.

"Even if you don't want to waste a bullet, there's always the knife," the boy remarked calmly.

He swallowed his own anger, irritated that he had betrayed himself once already and left himself open to being baited by a prisoner, a child less than one quarter his age.

Baited. That was it. The youth must be aware that any fate he would be taken to would be worse than a quick death -- he was trying to goad his captor into a rash act. Novikov finished his binding and gave the boy a look of more respect.

"What I do with you is my business."

The child closed his eyes and turned his head slightly away, as if dismissing him. Plot failed. Novikov gagged him, both to keep him from attacking his bonds with his teeth, as well as to halt further disturbing comments. Hoisting him, he walked this time plagued by thoughtfulness. Interesting, how he had become so used to terror, that he had almost failed to recognize a trap that might have snared a less experienced officer. Rage at insubordination in the civilian populace was almost a conditioned reflex for most of his colleagues -- and the results were often fatal for the civilians involved -- but he never known a civilian in this child's position to try it, usually they begged not to be killed -- pleas that fell useless on ears deafened from hearing so many in the past. This child hadn't begged, where pleas would have gained him nothing. He had taunted, which might have gained him all he had left. A quick death.

Was it a clever ploy on the child's part? Simply a lucky guess? Or was he simply too worn out from years of abandonment that he would welcome a bullet.

No. Sometimes death came too easily. Sometimes death was a slow and painful process. But a child with that razor knife need never be at a loss if he ever wished to hasten the process. He hadn't needed a Soviet military officer to come along and grant it to him. No, this boy had worked hard to live.

So, lucky guess or ploy was the question that intrigued him as he walked.

But it came to him he always believed a man created is own luck himself.

Could a boy? Could a starving, feral, besprihorznik evaluate a situation and determine when it was time to court death?

As he trudged back to the village, he mused upon the difference between the recruits he had just sent off this morning -- as stupid as the farm animals and machines they had tended, and this young villain, who could tempt his own death with the same apparent coolness as he had slit a sentry's throat.

A shame this one wasn't ten years older -- and that he didn't have a sentence of death on his shaggy blond head. He felt sure he could have used him to fill one of his unmet quotas.

But actually he did have an unmet quota of sorts this one would fill -- he would have a murder against the Soviet state avenged. And perhaps solve the nagging problem of the besprihorzniks.

So his death would serve something.

He dumped the body on the office floor of the head of the local militsia. The man looked at the ragged bundle distastefully.

"Why did you bring me this vandal, Comrade Colonel?"

"I have my reasons. I want an identification -- and the records on when this one's parents were arrested, and what were their crimes. Bring me the local schoolmaster," he commanded. "He can, no doubt, identify the child. You can research the records. I need to know how long this one has been feral."

"Very well, Comrade Colonel. I will have him here as soon as the school day is concluded."

"Did I make such a request? I have no time for delays -- I must be in Kiev tomorrow afternoon. Get the man here now. And make sure you clean that boy up -- he is probably infested with fleas and lice -- and so shall I be, if I don't wash up now. But keep him trussed up -- he is as quick as an eel and as cunning as a snake -- if you lose him, it will be your head. And get that schoolmaster and have him here when I return."

Turning on his heels, he went to guest officer's quarters of the local barracks, sent his own clothes, coat and possessions to be disinfected and then submitted to several hot, steamy, insecticide laden bath. To cleanse his pores while his uniform was being hurriedly readied for him, he treated himself to a long session in the banya. A necessary trial -- he had served in enough trenches to understand the horrors of vermin and the need to get shed of them -- and how quickly they could spread through a barracks if every infestation were not quickly dealt with. In his campaigns he had met with the French flea, the German flea and the Polish flea, and formidable as they could be, nothing met the match of the true Russian flea. And any starved from feeding on a sickly child would go into a virtual frenzy on meeting with a well fed healthy military colonel.

He had almost forgotten how long he had kept the schoolmaster waiting when he returned to the militsia office. But then again, the man probably owed his position to some Party favor, and had nothing better to do anyway. He was directed to the bowels of the building.

An guard, clearly on a watch for him, rose conciliatorily as he entered the tiny ward. "The child has been cleaned up as you requested, Comrade Colonel. And the schoolmaster has been waiting -- for several hours now."

"As well he should be. Well, his wait will soon be over. Take me to the child."

He stood outside the dank cell. The child had been cleaned up -- well enough that he ought to be recognizable to anyone who had known him before -- at least so that schoolmaster couldn't have an excuse to fail to recognize him. He looked human again, rather than a feral animal, even though he was tied, hand and foot to a cot and his head lolled drunkenly to one side.

"I gave orders for him to be disinfected, not to be drugged," he growled.

"It wasn't my order, Comrade Colonel, it was the doctor --"

"Fetch the damn doctor, then."

The doctor, however, was a tougher character, not as cowed by a military uniform. Nor as willing to placate one. His skills certainly didn't provide any guarantee from the dangers of their society, but they were rare enough that they provided some protection. The man strode into the cell as if he owned it, wiping wet hands on a small towel, which he then tossed without a glance at the guard. He examined the unmoving figure in the bed before turning to Novikov. "So what is the problem?"

"I gave no orders for this child to be drugged."

"I was impossible to follow your other orders without it."

"Surely in a military jail is equipped to deal with a boy."

"He struck at two guards, spit the orderly assigned to clean him up in the eye, and was tearing at his bonds and swearing curses like a black guard. If you wish him awake, Comrade Colonel, I will administer the antidote to the sedative -- after he is removed to you own quarters."

"Oh, very well," he said. "I suppose he does not need to be awake at the moment.

"What do you want with this child, Comrade Colonel?"

"That is none of your concern."

"Perhaps not, but how you wish him treated is my concern."

"What do you mean?"

"This boy is a besprihorznik, is he not?"

"You know him?"

"I have only been posted here a year. This one has been feral longer than that -- his condition is obvious. If you plan on shooting him for some minor theft, I won't waste expensive drugs better used on someone else. On the other hand --"

"My plans are not your business, doctor, your business is medicine. If this prisoner is ill, treat him. At the moment I want him alive. What I do with him tomorrow is not your concern. In fact, I would caution you, in future, not to inquire into matters that do not involve you. It could turn out to be a dangerous business."

The physician's nostril's flared at this insult, and then he sketched a short nod and left the room.

Novikov turned to the guard.

"Now, fetch that damned schoolmaster."

Novikov could see that he recognized the child. He had studied expressions, had interrogated enough prisoners to understand how to read truth in faces and body movements, even though the individual might try to deny the truth with much weaker words. Given a choice between a man's words and his actions, he knew which one he would trust every time. He had been concerned that this boy might have come from the other village -- certainly the range between the two was close enough. But he had been scavenging an orchard closer to this one, and the man's actions confirmed for him that his initial guess was correct.

As soon as this man's eyes fell on the figure in the bed, his eyes widened and he took an involuntary step back. Novikov didn't give the man time to recover.

"Identity!" He snapped. "You know this boy. I need his name. His records. And since you are an officer in the local party, I will need his parents records, as well."

The man darted him a nervous glance. "Comrade Colonel, I am not sure --"

"Perhaps you wish me to bring a few others to confirm your ignorance? Then you would have other questions to answer though, as to why you were so reluctant to identify an enemy to the state."

The schoolmaster drew himself up, as if in resolution, came closer to the bed. "What is wrong with him?"

"He has been drugged. You needn't fear, if you wish to conceal the truth, that he will awaken and call you by name. At least, not at this moment. That doesn't mean that he won't be awake an hour from now -- and be able to identify you."

By this time, the man had recovered his composure, his initial startlement at seeing the apparition of a long banished pupil before him. "You are mistaken, Comrade Colonel. I have not seen this boy for some time, and he is altered. Children grow rapidly, as you know."

"Not when they are starved, unless he is of a different sort than most. So, you admit you know the boy. Was he a pupil of yours?"

"Only in a rudimentary way. His father taught him, for the most part, though he did attend school."

"And who was his father?"

"Nickolai .... Kuryakin, a noted physicist. His mother was... a musician. Both were taken two or three years ago -- I can't quite remember. I haven't seen this boy since a few months after they disappeared. We all assumed he was dead, as such children soon become." The man was becoming bolder now. "And why should I be concerned with what had become of him -- were not his parents declared enemies of the state?"

"If that is true, then you should have no trouble providing confirmation of that. I want all the records of this family."

The man was curious, but he hid his curiosity better than he covered his surprise on first entering the room. "Yes, Comrade General."

"At once."

Novikov picked up the phone in the local office he had borrowed and heard the disgruntled voice of his superior.

"You were supposed to provide ten 0 level soldiers -- to date you have provided none," Colonel General P.K. Koshevoy growled.

"Comrade General, you cannot expect more from such peasant villages. The yields will be better in the contingent from Kiev," Novikov growled back.

"They had better be," Koshevoy returned.

Novikov hung up the phone as the dial tone signified a dead line. He would meet his quota in Kiev -- even if he had to falsify records. That would suffice for the day. But long range something had to be done.

He turned his attention back to the reports the schoolmaster had brought. The schoolmaster had signed a document testifying that the youth in custody was one Illya Nickolayovetch Kuryakin. Police records proved the boy had been besprihorznik during the sentry's murder, though it was unfortunate that his parent's had been arrested for only trifling reasons -- decried for having distant ties to former nobility -- it was entirely possible that the ragtag brat he had now languishing in jail was in fact the last scion of the Kuryakin family -- once significant landholders in Kiev, in fact the former owners of the very orchard in which the boy had been scavaging. The old Count had vanished in the first purges, this boy was no more relation than a grand nephew. Still, he was the last of them, and with him the purge of that particular branch of the nobility would have ended. And good riddance to all those parasites. But it would have been better if they had been arrested for more substantial crimes against the Soviet Union. For all that people were only too eager to hate any scapegoat, the whispers were that the old nobility was far less of a scourge on the land than Stalin. He would have rather they had been arrested for some legitimate crime, pilfering the state, or subversive activities or even having foreign relatives -- being one of the old nobility was least likely to cause the neighborhood to cry out for this one's death -- even at the cost of a Soviet sentry. In fact, probably most would secretly side with the boy.

Well, he still had more than enough to convict, and perhaps solve the besprihorznik problem, as well -- get the brats picked up with their parents. Though it was a shame in this one's case -- in five or six years he would have made a good 0 Category recruit. That was the crime of the former nobility and intelligentsia -- even years after their deaths, they still robbed the Soviet Union of their progeny.

Then the thought hit him -- a way for the purges to continue, with even more value to the Soviet state, a way to rid themselves of many of the problems of the besprihorzniks, and a way to increase the harvesting ration of the more valued categories of recruits.

They had been going about it all wrong -- arresting the parents on trifling excuses and turning the children -- those valuable, relatively untainted, intelligent commodities loose. They should tailor their arrests more finely -- test the children -- test all of them. Then arrest the parents of those the state most needed -- and put the children in institutions that would remake their attitudes and develop them into tools most useful to the state.

He called for a dictaphone and an touch typist. When that rarity was not available, he cursed his misfortune at being stuck in a Ukrainian burg, and settled for a pad of paper and a pen. He would get the proposal typed in Kiev.

***

Illya Nickolayovetch Kuryakin sat on the cot in his cell and stared at the opposite wall, less than eight feet away. For the first time in months, he wasn't particularly cold. He knew when his next meal was coming, and not just that meal, but the meal after that and the one after that -- the schedule of the jail was unvarying. He wasn't sure he'd be alive to eat the meal, but he knew when it would come.

What he wasn't sure of was why he hadn't been taken out and shot immediately. Why he hadn't at least been interrogated. Why everyone seemed to have forgotten why he was there, or what they planned to do with him. He hadn't been questioned, tortured, taken before any courts, or had any sentences pronounced. In fact, no one seemed inclined to speak to him or notice him at all, other than seeing to his basic needs. He had heard comments from his fellow inmates that he was considered the Commissar's prisoner, and thus no one dared address him, much less touch him. He would have been more grateful to be spared the abuse he knew would have been his due, except that the title Commissar filled him with as much dread as any other Soviet citizen. Whatever was in store for him, it could not be pleasant.

Except, for all his crimes, real and those he expected would be fabricated on him, he still felt he was below the notice of a Commissar. Had he been forgotten? Would he continue in this jail until he rotted?

He didn't even find it worthwhile to act troublesome to his jailers. It was pointless to be difficult when no one paid him any attention. Food was left for him, food was taken away, and no other notice was taken of him.

He might as well be dead already.

He found that a sobering thought. He had known, that terrible first winter when he killed the sentry, that he didn't want to die. He hadn't wanted to commit murder -- if the man had only stayed asleep, he would have let him live. But then it occurred to him anyway that for a soldier to return without his gun was a sentence of death anyway -- and when the man had woken, there hadn't been time to think or argue. He had slit the man's throat, taken the gun, and it's paltry store of ammunition had kept him alive that first winter. He'd had a choice of murder or survival and he had chosen survival -- even knowing that he had signed his own eventual death warrant with that murder.

But that wasn't really true. The Soviet Union had signed his death warrant when they had taken his parents away. His execution was just delayed.

He supposed, at this point, he should be wishing for the wait to be over. But he couldn't. He hadn't struggled so long and so hard to expire with a whimper. He wanted to live.

His prospects for that, however, had never looked bleaker.

***

"An excellent idea, Yuri Gavrilovich," Colonel General Koshevoy offered his subordinate a glass of vodka. "I have broached it with the General Staff and they agree it should be submitted to the Central Committee. The Soviet Union must be pro-active in training our youth. We are the first scientifically designed state -- we must not leave the training of the youth needed to defend our great country to chance like the bourgeoisie. I have no doubt of your plan becoming generally adopted in the upcoming five year plan -- perhaps sooner. And I will give you this, Yuri Gavrilovich -- you, yourself shall help to design some of the facilities to receive these first students. What do you say to that?"

"What any good solder replies, Comrade General. I serve the Soviet Union! I am honored."

"You shall be honored -- as shall I. There will be an award in this for both of us, Yuri Gavrilovich. The problem of appropriate manpower for our higher classes of soldiers has been a plague, and now we have the solution. And it is a solution so appropriate to communism. After all, every citizen belongs to the state. His first duty and his labor belong to the state. As for his children, their duty is not to their parents, but also to the state, and their first duty in adulthood is to serve in its defense. What you have proposed is to ensure their abilities are honed appropriately to its best defense. Your reasoning is brilliant!"

"Thank you, Comrade General."

"I wonder how you came to think of it," the General glanced at him, his small eyes cunning.

"It is a continual concern in my work, Comrade General," he replied carefully.

"Yes. But that is what is excellent about you. Other complain and make excuses about why they cannot make their quotas. You analyze the problem and propose a solution. Very admirable, Yuri Gavrilovich," the General drained his glass. "Very admirable, indeed." But his eyes did not meet his subordinate's as he dismissed him.

Novikov walked back to his own office, lost in thought. Obviously, he had done a good thing, and Koshevoy's praise was genuine. But his warning was plain too. It was excellent to come up with a good idea, and present it to your superior. But too many good ideas coming from the same source would not be well received.

He wasn't too dense to take a hint.

He picked up the phone, "Novikov."

"Comrade Commissar. This is the ... in ..."

"Yes? What is it?" he barked impatiently.

"Your prisoner, Comrade Commissar. The boy? We have no instructions for him," the man sounded apologetic but a trace of impatience laced through his tone too, the voice of a busy man taxed beyond his means. "If you wish him charged, Comrade--"

He had forgotten the boy. He cursed mentally. For a moment, he almost ordered the child's summary execution, but then he realized he wanted no attention drawn to his case. An execution of the boy, in his own town, would draw talk. And talk now was dangerous. It was unlikely anyone would draw conclusions between the boy, the dead soldier, the commissar who had ordered his execution and the instigator of this new campaign, but he didn't choose to risk that. His mind was in gear, now, only too aware of the fact that one never risked arousing the civilian population. Best to rid himself of the boy in relative obscurity. Keep him where he belonged. "No. I will take charge of that prisoner. Continue to keep him -- I will be back to transfer him to my custody in a week or less."

"Yes, Comrade Commissar. It shall be as you say."

Novikov put down the phone in exasperation. How irritating. He had succeeded with his proposal, been given a hero's award of the Soviet Union, and had forgotten the cause of what had set it all into motion. He would have to find time to divert to ... and pick up that boy. As to what to do with him, a public trial would draw embarrassing attention to himself, to the boy, the problem of the besprihorzniks and potentially of the new campaign he had set into motion. The idea of a trial would have to be abandoned now, the issue of the murdered soldier was of small importance anyway, since the problem of the besprihorzniks had been solved in another way. Notice could not be directed to that issue now. No one wanted Soviet citizens to realize that the purges were being conducted differently, or that the former besprihorzniks were being diverted to other uses. The boy may have been an inspiration, but at present, he was an encumbrance.

Well, he had bullets enough to spare one for the back of his head, and no one would notice the child's absence. He was a non-person in any event. No one would miss him. He had already served his country, in a way that he had never imagined.

His usefulness was over.

***

Illya Nickovetch had discovered that if he stood on his tiptoes, grabbed the thick stone edge of the window sill, and shimmied up the rough wall, that the view was the same as the view of the opposite wall from his bunk. The tiny window had been whitewashed over. In spite of that, he found himself checking the window every few days, when the itch to see something, anything, grew overwhelming. He had so little to do.

The constant confinement, the lack of exercise and mental stimulation, the anxiety over his future, or rather his lack of future, was wearing on him. He was used to constant fresh air, even if cold, rather than this stale, fetid substitute. Sometimes his lungs felt starved for oxygen -- as if all of that life-supporting element had been extracted from the jail, and left the prisoners with a poor substance that couldn't support life. Sometimes his chest ached with the need to take one clean, free breath, and he coughed and coughed as if it were his lungs and not the air that was the problem.

In the woods, his meals might range from famine to feast, depending on what he trapped or gleaned, but they were varied. After the lukewarm, watery soup of the last two weeks he found himself dreaming constantly, not of the foods from his parents' table, as he did in his forest hut, but of the foods he had procured himself. He hadn't realized what an excellent provider, considering his straitened circumstances, he had been. In the summers he had stuffed himself with all the fresh perishable food available -- all the berries, greens, soft fruits he could find. And what was finer than baby rabbit, skinned and roasted over a fire? As the fall came, he dried mushrooms and apples. He had tried drying meat but it had given him a terrible stomachache -- until the weather was cold enough to freeze meat he couldn't really save it. Still, in all, he prepared for the winter as best he could. His meals, as scanty and poor as they seemed at the time, seemed like a veritable feast now. If he could ever get away --

His mind shied away from the thought. More and more he was beginning to accept that he might never leave this cell. He had been here so long, and no one had taken him for interrogation. He was a non-person, even more so than he had been in the woods. Even the guards would not speak to him.

He felt like he was dying a little every day. What would be left of him in another week, another month? Would he last a year this way? Could he? Did he want to?

He had once had fairy tales read to him. He had thought the plots absurd, of children banished to the forest, of evil wizards and witches, of 'happy ever after' endings. But the stories had been almost a foreshadowing. The purges had come, his parents, and so many others, had disappeared. He had been banished to the forest. But he knew where the parallels stopped. He didn't believe in happy endings.

Something kept him alive, kept him breathing, kept his heart beating, but he doubted it was any benevolent force. He heard the tortures occurring in the other cells, heard the screams, saw the mutilations. Sometimes the men begged for death, but it eluded them, and they were forced to endure the tortures again and again before they finally died. In this land, life was sometimes no friend, but a tenacious fiend that forced you to endure horrors no one deserved. And death might be no evil specter, but a longed-for release from terror. His prospects in life looked bleak, his only release death. By all accounts he should actively seek it.

But he was like the other fools in the cell.

He lived. Life might be no friend, but it wouldn't leave him. And death wouldn't come, however warmly solicited.

***

Novikov put a little thought in how to get rid of the boy. He had never filed any papers or put formal arrest charges on the child -- that was one of the problems the jailer was complaining about -- which was fortunate, since he wanted no records or paper trails. The boy had been a non-person since his parents had disappeared; he would disappear now without a trace.

Novikov had a military post to visit in the Caucasus. He decided to pick up the boy before that trip. There were mines in those mountains, most of them disused since the Revolution and Collectivization. He would take the boy with him, put a bullet in his head, and drop him in one of the deeper shafts. Even if the body was ever found, the distance involved would make it impossible that anyone would associate the body with the missing besprihorznik. There were so many bodies, these days anyway, so many displaced children, that no one would ever care, either.

He pulled up in a jeep outside the jail, and after a very brief argument with the administrator, who made only the most tacit objection to this commissar housing a prisoner in his jail for two weeks and then removing him without any formal identification or record, he went to collect his prisoner.

The boy recognized him. That surprised him, a little, since the child had seen him only for a few moments. But there was no mistaking it, when he stood outside the cell the boy's eyes traveled from the guard to himself, and he straightened abruptly in recognition, and slowly rose off the bunk and stood facing him.

The child's eyes held no fear, only resignation, and oddly enough, a kind of relief.

He didn't speak to the boy. His natural caution made him avoid the chance of any prisoner perhaps remembering a conversation linking himself to the boy's disappearance. Not that it mattered, but he had a military officer's caution against giving the civilian class any reason for an uprising, and villagers, regardless of their opinions of besprihorzniks in general, could be sentimental about a particular child. No sense to risk anything. His methods had been born over the years of the purges, and while they might be extreme in this case, his professionalism, and long-standing habits, made him handle this case like any other.

The guard slipped inside the cell, bound the boy hand and foot and gagged him. The child made a token resistance, but submitted without inciting the guard to any real damage, apparently realizing when he was outmatched and recognizing resistance would be useless. Novikov was pleased at this, it boded well for the journey ahead. The guard wrapped the boy in the blanket from the cot, not to keep him warm but to hide his features. Novikov followed while the boy was dumped in the passenger seat in the jeep. He might rather have had the boy put in the back, but he remembered only too well the child's previous escape attempts -- he wanted to keep his eye on him.

He drove out of the village and then pulled over on the deserted road and flipped the blanket back from the child's face. Novikov studied him a minute. He had a long drive ahead of him, through many towns and villages, and the present arrangement would be impractical, at the least, and certainly noticeable. The boy was struggling to breathe around the gag, and while the thought of him thus quietly suffocating was tempting, still, he didn't want the mess of transporting a body to his planned disposal site. He preferred his first plan.

"If you will be quiet, I will remove the gag. Agreed?"

The boy nodded.

He slit the gag with a knife. The child took several deep lungfuls of air and coughed painfully, his eyes tearing, but stifled the coughs quickly. His eyes darted over to Novikov, and he nodded curtly and then looked away.

Novikov put the jeep in gear and drove on.

They drove for hours, Novikov turning a wary eye from time to time on his prisoner. The boy was quiet, but he wiggled his hands from time to time in his bonds. His hands had been tied professionally and very tightly, and he was probably just trying to keep circulation in them, but Novikov grew impatient at the blanket that kept his prisoner's hands from view. Pulling over to the side of the road, he pulled it from the boy and tossed it to the floor of the jeep. The child had succeeded in undoing some number of the knots.

He stared at the boy, who straightened in his seat and raised his chin defiantly, not a trace of fear in his eyes. Novikov raised a hand, but the boy's expression didn't waver. He struck the boy hard enough to knock him against the side of the jeep, but his captive didn't make a sound. Novikov swore and re-tied the hands, this time leaving the blanket on the floor. The jeep was unheated and the air bitterly cold as they ascended into the mountains, but his captive would just have to shiver in his thin clothing. He wouldn't be alive enough to suffer long, anyway. Novikov put the jeep back in gear without a word.

He drove on. Soon the boy was shivering, but he didn't plead for the blanket back. Novikov had to admire his spirit, thinking again that is was a shame the child wasn't a few years older. His attitude was of the sort the army favored. If he could deliver him to an army barracks instead of the bottom of a mine shaft, in six months the sergeants could turn that spirit into a considerable fighting machine. The stain of his parentage was a serious matter as far as him rising seriously in the ranks, but then the government had decided to evaluate the other besprihorzniks for special abilities, based on his own evaluation of this one. True he wanted no links drawn from his decision back to that village and that boy, but he had taken the boy away from his village, where he would, no doubt, be quickly forgotten and to which he could ensure the boy would never return. Should he reconsider this one's fate?

But he had no facilities set up yet. Nothing more than plans of action, which would take others months to implement. He had no immediate need for this boy, and no place to keep him. He put the idea out of his head.

The road grew difficult, slick with ice and snow, and he had to concentrate on his driving

He slit the bonds from the boy's feet and pulled him out of the jeep. The child actually pulled away from his grasp and ran a few yards before falling face down in the deep snow, his tied hands preventing him from breaking his fall. Novikov grabbed him easily and hauled him upright, one large hand keeping him captive.

"Walk," he said.

"No."

Novikov put the gun to his head. "Then I'll kill you here."

"You're going to kill me anyway," Kuryakin threw back. He was shivering so he could hardly stand or speak. But defiance and hatred warmed him enough for both. "Why should I care where it happens."

"You'll care how it happens -- do as I say, and you'll at least have a quick death."

"No."

Novikov struck him with the gun, and the boy went limp, falling in the snow, his forehead dripping blood. A surprising amount -- head wounds always bled excessively. The man swore; he had been wanting to avoid blood too close to the road. And since he'd knocked the child unconscious, he would have to carry him. Stupid, to let his temper get the better of him, flaring in distaste over what he had to do. He wasn't a monster, and killing brats -- even feral, murderous brats, wasn't to his taste. He reminded himself it was the easiest solution to his problem, and five minutes work would see the task done.

He holstered his gun and leaned over to pick up the boy. Suddenly the world went black around him. The bound hands had caught him in a telling blow to the throat. As he gasped for air, a foot caught him in the genitals. He groaned, refusing the pain even as he went down, one hand reaching for his gun. He pulled it out again, and still crouching, leveled it at the child. The boy's hands were also outstretched, intending to rob him of the gun. Now the child stood facing it and its even more angry owner. Novikov drew a deep breath and rose, his finger poised on the trigger.

"Walk, you devil."

They walked. The mine entrance was only a few hundred yards from the road, but the trip was long, because Novikov wouldn't release his grip on the child. The boy seemed to have used up his bag of tricks. With one of his captors hands holding him fast and the other holding a gun to his temple, he moved.

When the got to the mine though, he broke away again and stumbled to the entrance. To take his chances jumping into the pit, hoping he'd live and Novikov would assume he was dead? To try and lose himself in the dark passages, hoping his captor would grow tired and leave? Novikov didn't know, but the boy didn't make it far before he was caught. This time was the last, Novikov decided. He forced the boy to his knees and bent his head down, putting the muzzle of his gun to the base of his skull. It would be messy, but quick and definite. He pulled back the trigger. One thing more.

"Beg for your life, boy."

"No."

"Come on, beg like the whipped puppy you are! I want to hear you do it."

"No!"

Novikov swore and grabbing the boy by the shoulder, flung his over and put the pistol between the child's eyes. "This is it, boy. It's over. I'm going to blow your head right off, don't you realize that? Are you dense? Better men than you have begged me at this point, and you're going to beg for your worthless life."

"You'll shoot me anyway. Go and do it."

Novikov stared at him. The boy was shivering violently, his flimsy clothes soaked by the snow. Blood trickled down his temple, and his lashes were edged in snow. The blue eyes that met his were wide with hatred and fear. But there were no tears and there was no yielding. The eyes met his, vital with an intelligence that overcame even the hatred and fear. With a spirit that had kept him alive against all odds.

Novikov's finger poised on the trigger, his eyes locked to the boy's defiant ones. He wanted the boy to beg -- to prove that he was worthless, ordinary, the flashes of spirit he had witnessed not exceptional. But this was. Few grown men, at this point, failed to beg, failed to do anything their captors suggested that might prolong their lives. For a child to resist this long was exceptional.

Again his conscience assaulted him. The Army had trained psychologists who studied the recruits, looking for such men whose bravery held out before death. High level officers held jobs solely devoted to ferreting out, from the dross of five million men that ebbed and flowed in and out of the army like the tides, those with the strength of will to persist in spite of certain defeat, who refused to give up. Such men were considered worthy of special effort, questioned by commissions of high level officers to determine their particular strengths, sorted out to special divisions, and given exclusive training. Men who failed that training, who died in that training, were never overly regretted. Again, the officers and psychologists studied the failures. They sent to less taxing duties those whose performance made it clear the training was too much for them, but if some died due to lack of detection, well, the fortunes of war and preparations for war required a country had to do certain things in the cause of its defense. Such failures made it even more clear how valuable that particular commodity was. Did he have the right to snuff such a man out, a potentially valuable military resource, before he was even grown?

Had the boy begged, as he had expected, as he had hoped, his decision would have been easy, cut and dried, final. But for him to kill this one, now, was like squandering ammunition, or giving a prisoner to the enemy. In the terrible years of the war, he had been forced to make his men count every round, only too aware that if the ammunition were finished before the next resupply, his army would go down in defeat. A soldier in the Red Army did not waste rounds unnecessarily. That constituted a crime against the state.

Now his resupply problems were of a different sort, and before him in the snow lay a round of a different kind. Perhaps too valuable to squander. At least, too valuable to squander without further consideration. If the round proved to be defective, a dud, unusable, that would come out in due time, and would not be his responsibility, but now, it appeared to be the very sort he sought. He, who would watch, without a qualm, a soldier in training drown as he failed a river crossing, could not sanction his murder, by another solder, of one who had crossed it successfully. The issues were clear.

He was no KGB clown, to squander the state's valuable commodities in useless slaughter. He was a Red Army man. And he had learned that every round was needed to win a war.

Worse luck for him.

He would have to do something with this boy.

"Get up."

The child stared at him uncomprehendingly, then shook his head in stubborn defiance.

"I'm not going to shoot you." As if to prove it, he holstered his gun. "Now get up." He punctuated the order by pulling the boy up from the show, and shoving him in the direction of the jeep. "Move."

The boy walked. He was shaking hard enough in the flimsy, snow-soaked prison rags that his progress was slow, but he walked. The jeep was ahead of them, another few inches of snow around its wheels, but a refuge from the wind. He opened the door for the boy but stopped him before he entered.

"Get those wet clothes off and wrap up in the blanket." He drew his gun as the boy hesitated. "Do it."

Wet clothes were not warmer than no clothes. In fact, wet clothes leached the warmth from one's bones, as every solder knew, and as this boy -- who had spent two years in the woods, must also know. The boy slowly held his hands out, still bound. With a shrug, Novikov slit the wrist bonds. Standing in the icy wind, the boy stripped off the prison rags, grabbed the blanket from the floor of the jeep, wrapped it around himself, and climbed inside. Novikov closed the door after him and entered himself, tossing the boy's clothes in the back. The blue eyes met his, but confusion and wariness had overset the hatred in them. The child couldn't figure out what had just happened, or why. That satisfied Novikov, who did care to dwell on it himself. One learned, in the army, to expect the unexpected, to make decisions according to the situation, but he had never particularly cared for the times when his own version of events didn't come about as he would choose. Now he had to find a place for this boy, something he hadn't wanted to bother himself with. And it might all come to nothing, the child might be so vicious as to be untrainable. Still, the army valued that sort too. Novikov turned to his captive. "You're in luck, boy. I've decided not to kill you -- at least, not unless you give me cause. Sit quietly and ponder your good fortune. If you don't give me any trouble, I won't bind you and you may actually keep your skull intact. Do you agree?"

The boy sketched a wary nod, though it was rather hard to discern through his violent shivering.

"That is no way to respond. You've proven to have a tongue. Use it."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"You are Illya Nickolayovetch Kuryakin, correct?"

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"Well, for a boy who did such a poor job of choosing his ancestors, you may yet survive to become one yourself. Behave yourself, or you'll cause me to regret this.

Novikov looked his over, shook his head, and put the jeep in gear. It was going to be a trying day.

In the mountains were sanitariums, once built by the nobility to house the many affected with consumption, for which mountain air was considered efficacious. The military had appropriated many of them, including one in the area that at one time had housed the brother of the last Tsar. It was used now by the military as a place for officers of a certain rank and service to relax and convalesce. At this season of the year, it would be used primarily for the latter reason, except perhaps as a stopover by military sports clubs interested in skiing. It would serve as a stopover for him as well, a place to get a meal and a night's rest and to dry the boy's clothes. He glanced over at his passenger, and saw that Kuryakin had fallen asleep.

Well, perhaps it was a ruse, but probably not, the reaction was common and familiar to him. When young soldiers, the salagi[2] were first brought into the army for their two years of service, they of course were beaten, tormented, tortured by their seniors in barracks, the stariki[3], who had already served for six months or a year. After such a session, it was not uncommon to see the younger soldiers nod off, even standing in ranks. He supposed the boy's ordeal had been similar. Not that he felt any guilt over his actions. Rather he believe the boy uncommonly fortunate -- during his stint as a soldier, he would be more prepared for what the stariki would do to him.

The boy was still asleep when they arrived at the sanitarium. He decided the boy was less trouble asleep than awake, and picked him up. Kuryakin woke instantly though, and began to struggle until Novikov hissed at him to be still. A soldier guarding the entrance, attentive to rank, ran to the jeep to bring in Novikov's luggage kit.

"Bring in those wet clothes, too," Novikov growled, and stood waiting, the boy in his arms, until the soldier grabbed the items and held the door open for him. Once inside, he set the boy down on his bare feet, but kept one large hand tight on his shoulder. The child was still but looked anxiously about, evaluating this new situation.

The clerk behind the desk, also mindful of Novikov's rank and service, was stumbling over himself to be useful. Service in such places was considered easy duty, and those who held it did their best to satisfy their high-ranking customers.

Novikov ordered a room, and was given one of the larger suites, with a side room normally used for his adjutant, which might do for the boy. He arranged for a meal to be ready in the dining room after they had cleaned up.

The clerk was looking narrowly at his companion, at the shaved head and ragged blanket, but said diffidently, "I believe the cook has a son of an appropriate size. If you would like me to arrange for some dry clothes, Comrade Colonel?"

"Excellent. Deliver them to the room, he'll wear them to dinner." Novikov prodded the boy, pushing him toward the doorway the clerk held open. "Come, Illya Nickovetch."

The suite held all the ostentation of the bygone royalty, shabby now, but still opulent. It even had that rarity, a private bath, at a time when most Soviets in flats shared such facilities, and those in houses trudged outside, winter and summer, to outhouses, and did their bathing in basins or at the public banya. Novikov was used to the luxury, part of the rewards of his position in the nomenkultura, but the boy paused on the doorway, and had to be pushed inside. The clerk quickly kindled a standing coal stove, soaking the coals with kerosine to coax them to light, and laying Novikov's kit on a divan.

Novikov waived away the clerk's offer to unpack, but requested vodka before the man departed. He pushed the boy over to the stove. "Stay here." Then he went to run water in the bath, thinking longingly of working the kinks from his muscles caused by the long day of driving. The steam from the water was inviting. He would have to visit the steam bath as well.

A knock came at the door. Novikov came out of the bathroom to answer it, noting the boy was still crouched by the warming stove, clutching his blanket, his wary eyes fixed on the door like a deer poised to run. Novikov opened it, to admit the clerk, bearing a tray that included a bottle of vodka and a glass, a glass of milk, and a bundle that must have been the cook's son's best clothes, including a pair of fine valechi[4]. No doubt the cook would be horrified to discover she had sacrificed her son's finery to a besprihorznik, but then, she would never know. He handed the glass of milk to the boy without comment, and went to turn off the bathwater.

When he came back into the room, he had decided his bath was too important to worry about the damn brat. He would take it, besprihorzniks be damned. The boy hadn't moved though, still holding the untouched glass he had been given.

"I'm going to bathe," Novikov growled. "You will stay where you are. After you've bathed you can dress in the clothes that the cook's son was so kind to provide for you." He didn't bother to keep the irony from his voice, but Illya Nickovetch didn't seem inclined to notice it. "Then we will go to dinner. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"Very well," Novikov turned, then looked back. "Drink that milk, boy. Do you think they brought it for you to waste?"

Then he went into his bath. He kept his weapon with him, of course.

For being such a feral little wolf, Illya Nickovetch proved he could also be surprisingly tractable. Novikov had suspected he would be difficult, but the boy was obviously still trying to evaluate his changed situation, and was making no hasty decisions. When Novikov came out, sighing with satisfaction, from his bath, the boy was still sitting by the stove, but his eyes were fixed on the long windows, streaked with frost in spite of their double insulation, watching the snow piling up outside. One could almost see the calculations behind his eyes, the weighing of his alternatives. He had taken a few swallows of the milk, but that was all.

The wind howled and then rose in pitch to a scream, rattling the shutters and lifting sheets of snow into a virtual whiteout.

"Forget it, boy," Novikov advised. "Not even armies care to move in this weather." He handed over the bundle of clothes. "Go and bathe," he growled. "And mind you scrub hard -- I want no vermin in this room."

The boy gave him a sidelong glance, put down his glass of milk, and went.

Novikov poured himself a glass of vodka, dragged a chair over to the now warm stove, and listened to the water rushing into the tub, and then the unmistakable sounds of the boy splashing around in his bath. The child took his instructions to heart, he stayed in the tub as long as his captor had, until Novikov's stomach rumbled impatiently. He downed his second glass of vodka.

"Come on, boy. You've scrubbed enough to be decent for dinner, no doubt.

In a few moments, the boy had joined him. The clothes he was wearing were a fair fit. Except for his head, bare but for a two week stubble of growth, he looked decent enough. And there was a look in his eyes that Novikov hadn't seen there before. Something of the same sort of satisfaction he himself had felt after his bath, but different. Stronger. He met the man's gaze evenly, as if his own self respect had just been strengthened, and said. "Thank you, Comrade Colonel. For the bath. Thank you."

"Let's go," Novikov growled.

The dining area was empty but for a couple of men, seated well apart from them, but Novikov was amused at how the boy, who was unyielding and defiant in the face of a weapon held between his eyes, was momentarily cowed by the sight of damask tablecloths, china and crystal. He gave the boy a subtle push again, wondering when it was the boy had last eaten at a table. Two years, at least. And his parents may have been intelligentsia, but probably had no experience with the privileges of the nomenkultura. The son would no doubt never join that group, due to the stain of his parentage, but he need not know that now, it might not be a bad idea to intimate the privileges that a communist state awarded to those who gave their hard work and cooperation.

Novikov was hungry after a long day on the road, and he ate ravenously of the rich stew and new bread. It was sometime before he realized the boy had only eaten a few mouthfuls. He scowled. "What's wrong with your dinner, boy? Don't tell me it's not good enough for you."

"No, Comrade General," the boy hesitated. "But I have not eaten much for a time. It might not be wise --"

Novikov realized the boy was right. The jail no doubt served a thin soup and maybe a rancid potato. The boy's belly had probably been at his backbone for too long to shock it with a man-sized meal -- no doubt he'd only spew it right back up again, should he even try to attempt it.

"Quite right," Novikov answered. "I should have realized." He ordered the waiter to take the no doubt tempting plate away. As untouched as it was, the child's eyes followed its passing with a tragic grief that made Novikov appreciate even more the restraint that had kept him from indulging in what would no doubt have been a disastrous meal. Instead, he offered him a chunk of bread. "Nibble on that. Small bits. In a few days, no doubt, you'll be back to cleaning plates.

The boy flashed a small smile -- so quick a smile Novikov wondered if he had seen it, but he was surprised at how it had changed the boy's face. He wondered if it was the implied message in his words that had done it -- that the boy would still be alive in a few days, and, to a much lesser extent, that he would have food enough to need to clean off a plate. The first meant he'd let the boy live, the second meant he wouldn't be going back to another jail. But where would he be going?

First on his priority list, however was not his captive, but his own work. He had some paperwork to go over this even, some directives to read from the General Staff, and he had designated this evening to accomplish those tasks, when he hadn't expected to be saddled with an extra encumbrance. However, it was an encumbrance easily disposed of.

He didn't trust the child to the extent of sending him off to the adjutant's room, but there was a chaise lounge in his room, long enough for a boy to sleep on, and certainly the most comfortable thing he would have slept on in several years. When they arrived back in the room, he pulled the bed furnishings from the adjoining room, dumped them on the chaise, ordered the boy to make up his bed and get into it, and concentrated on his briefcase of work. When he looked up again, the boy had made himself a nice little nest, the sheet and pillow neatly arranged, and his nose just visible out of the eiderdown. The new clothes were neatly folded on the little table next to the chaise, the slippers set precisely square beneath. On the table corner closest to the bed was set the unfinished half glass of milk and chunk of bread.

Novikov blinked, surprised at this display of careful domesticity. On the other hand, the boy had been taking care of himself -- his home, whatever hideyhole that had been, his clothes and food -- for a long time. Preservation and care of foodstuffs and clothing was essential for the boy to have made it through his first winter on his own, much less two. The necessity would have become ingrained to the point of habit, or compulsion. He wasn't sure why he had expected any less. Perhaps because new recruits had to be kicked and beaten into neatness, and he had too little experience of children to expect any more of them. It seemed this one would make a good soldier in more ways than one.

He poured himself another glass of vodka, and went back to his paperwork.

The next morning, he was up early, but Illya Nickovetch was up earlier. When he woke, the first thing he saw was the boy, sitting on the chaise lounge, fully dressed. The blankets used to make up his couch were back on the bed in the other room. The glass of milk was empty and the chunk of bread was gone. The boy was looking at him speculatively.

He rose from his own bed, and growled at the boy. "You could have put more coal in the stove."

"I didn't know I was allowed to, Comrade Colonel. Or supposed to."

"Well, now you do," he disappeared into the bath.

While he bathed and shaved he considered the problem of his new encumbrance. Clearly he had to find a place for the boy, but just as clearly, there was no immediate rush. His own work would have to take precedence.

He packed his personal items, ordered the boy to follow him, and went into breakfast.

After a glass of tea and some food, he felt capable of dealing with his young companion. The boy was eating his own breakfast with a quiet concentration that indicated the importance with which he regarded meals, but at least he was a neat and careful eater.

"I have a military base I am scheduled to tour today," he stated, watching as the boy looked up from over his kasha. "As a temporary measure, you will accompany me. I expect you to remain quiet, draw no attention to yourself, and to otherwise behave. If you manage that, I will have time in a few days to settle you permanently somewhere. Displease me, and I may not be as careful where you are settled. Can you be trusted to serve your own best self interests?"

"I will try, Comrade General."

"Promising nothing," Novikov shrugged, and rose. "Let us go, then. I have duties."

Novikov stepped down from his jeep and joined the other officers observing the operation. The adjutant to the Major General handed him his field glasses, and he peered through them, noting with satisfaction the rapid deployment of the troops. When a nuclear war would begin and end in minutes, seconds counted.

"What is time for the regiment?" the Major General asked.

Novikov glanced at the adjutant with the stopwatch.

"18.2 minutes," the man reported.

"Better," the Major General noted. "I would like the troops in the field in under fifteen minutes."

Novikov and the adjutant traded glances. How the sergeants and the troops would sweat for those 3.2 minutes. But then, it was a soldier's job to sweat, and a sergeant's job to see that they did. "Yes, Comrade General," Novikov agreed.

"How did Battalion Four perform?" the general asked, studying the field through his glasses.

"Better by 2.7 minutes, Comrade General," the adjutant noted. The replacement of the battalion commander had been a recent decision.

"Excellent," the General put down his glasses. "You may stay to observe the conclusion of the exercise, but I have seen enough --"

"Comrade General," an aide came running from the General's vehicle. "There is a call for you, on the field telephone --"

"Very well."

Novikov raised his glasses to his eyes again, thinking about the fifteen minute requirement. Perhaps, the tanks could be arranged in a different order, another exit point created.

"Your boy has a good eye, Comrade Colonel," the adjutant said idly. "Perhaps we should put him with the riflerymen."

"Eh?" Novikov looked up absently, to see the adjutant looking across the field. Illya Nickovetch had wandered down to the far end of the target range, had taken up a handful of pebbles in his hands, and was amusing himself by flinging them, one after another, at the bull's eye of a target.

Novikov swore softly to himself. He had warned the boy to keep himself scarce, and the child had taken himself off out of the way of everyone, where he normally wouldn't have attracted any notice. If the adjutant had spent his time observing the troops in the field -- Then Novikov realized what was holding the adjutant's attention. All the pebbles were hitting the bull's eye. He watched himself for a moment, non-plussed, then turned abruptly as the General rejoined them.

"What are you two staring at?" the man complained.

"Comrade Colonel's boy, Comrade General," the adjutant teased good naturedly. "He hasn't missed a bull's eye yet with his pebbles."

"Well, what would you expect, Lieutenant? Naturally the Colonel would have grounded the boy in the basics. The real test, though, is how well he can shoot. Care to make a wager on that, Yuri Gavrilovich? I've taken a gross of fine ... out of ... Perhaps you would care to wager, say, XXX rubles against a case that he can't hit the bull's eye on the first try with a man's weapon?" The General began walking toward the boy.

Novikov fumed inwardly, "As you will, Comrade General." Illya had bent down restocking his supply of pebbles. When he straightened up, he faced the three Red Army men. His hands went to his sides, the pebbles slipping through his lax fingers to the ground. His eyes darted to Novikov, but the expression on his face was utterly blank.

The adjutant glanced at his superiors, and apparently decided it was his job to organize the wager. "We've been watching your skill with the pebbles, boy, and the General here, has placed a bet against your performing with the same skill with a gun."

Novikov sketched the barest nod to the boy's shuttered glance.

"I have skill with a gun, Comrade General," the boy said evenly.

"Good. Give him the weapon, Lieutenant, and let's see what he can do."

Novikov held his breath as the adjutant handed over the General's pistol. The boy took the gun in his hands, holding it uneasily. Novikov remembered how only a few days ago, he had held the boy in the snow, his own gun at the base of the child's skull. Now the boy had a chance to take out a Red Army General, and send his former tormentor, now sponsor, to a death sentence or a labor camp for a very long time. He felt rather sick.

The boy sketched him a bare glance, but only commented, "But I have not fired this type of gun."

The adjutant glanced at the General, but the senior man was in a jovial frame of mind. "Of course. Give the boy a couple of practice shots. Two. The third will resolve the bet."

Novikov stood watching as the boy paced to the end across from the target and raised the gun. The first shot barely struck the edge of the target, and the general laughed heartily. Novikov resigned himself to losing several thousand rubles. The second hit the edge of the fourth ring.

"If you don't have the rubles to hand, Yuri Gavrilovich, I will give you a few days to gather them together.

Novikov didn't watch as the boy raised the weapon the third time. He winced inwardly as the shot was fired, then opened his eyes in surprise as the adjutant whooped, "Well done, boy."

"Yes, indeed," the General didn't look particularly pleased, but then he shrugged philosophically. "Well done."

Novikov looked past the target, where the bull's eye was neatly perforated, to where Illya Nickovetch stood stock still, the gun still raised in a frozen hand.

Novikov went over to retrieve the weapon, but the boy didn't release it. He had to pry the gun from the child's hand, tense finger by tense finger, using his body to shield his actions from his companions. Illya shook himself as the gun was taken away, blinking from the target up to the man. Novikov

paused to squeeze the tense shoulder. "Get to the jeep, Ilyusha," Novikov said quietly. "That is quite enough for today."

The boy hesitated at the side of the jeep, but Novikov jerked his head in invitation. "Climb in, boy. It's time for dinner."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

They drove for several miles in silence before the boy commented tersely, "I am sorry."

Novikov looked over at him. "Why? You won me a case of vodka."

"Perhaps it would have been better had I lost?"

Novikov gave him a sharp look, a little surprised at the child's perception, then shrugged, "... is not a petty man. A case of wine is nothing to him, and besides, he likes to gamble." Novikov was silent for a few moments, before remarking, "Where did you learn to throw and shoot?"

The boy looked at him in astonishment, then his face twisted in an unpleasant expression. "Do you think I fed myself through two winters on mushrooms and berries?"

"Watch your tongue," Novikov warned automatically.

The boy didn't answer and Novikov thought about that for a while. "What did you do with the pebbles?"

The boy shifted uneasily in his seat. "You can kill a bird with a pebble, if you throw it fast and hard enough. Especially when it is very cold, and they huddle up and sleep. There were a lot of birds in the orchard, because of the fruit, and the insects. In summer and winter both, they would warn me if someone was coming. But in the winter," he hesitated, then shrugged, "in the winter, I would eat them."

"Yes, I see," Novikov nodded thoughtfully in approval of this practical outlook. "So, you ate your friends, eh boy?"

"I had as much right to live as they did," the child said with a certain stony indifference.

Spetznatz, Novikov mused. The primary right was that of survival. There was no altruism, because the rule was if one had the means to be altruistic, then the circumstances were not that dire. And when the circumstances were, then nothing took precedence over the right of survival. Except, as some of his superiors would say, the right of the party. But that was just propaganda, as the even the most fervent of party members would admit if the right persuasion were properly put to him. This child had already learned what many recruits and officers took years to learn, and some, due to wrong upbringing, could never learn. Survival always precedence.

"Come on, boy. Let's go to dinner.

At dinner the boy proved he had recovered from his momentary funk. Novikov had come to realize not much would put the boy off his food, once he had become accustomed to full meals again. When they got back to the room, the case of vodka was sitting on the desk. Illya gave it a jaundiced look, and went to prepare for bed, giving it an exaggerated berth as he walked around it. Novikov pushed the case to one side, pried it open, took out a bottle and poured himself a drink. He settled down with the division reports and his various quotas.

Illya came back into the room, put together his makeshift bed and went to sleep, all without a word, though he tossed a bit at first. Novikov looked up briefly, frowning slightly, but the boy settled down quickly. Novikov took another swallow of vodka and went back to his reports.

He wasn't the slightest bit interested in becoming a wet nurse to a brat. Had the boy been a chatty, talkative, precocious sort, he would have rid himself of him quickly. While he intended to find a school for the boy, it was hardly high on his list of priorities. He made a mental note to put his adjutant on it when he returned from his Spetnatz mission. In the meantime, the boy's relative unobtrusiveness made tolerating his presence possible; he was neat, quiet, undemanding, and useful at doing the most menial of tasks his missing adjutant might have performed. Whatever kind of social criminals the parents had been, they had raised the son well; he had a ready deference to adults which could only have been taught.

Novikov had begun to employ him in small tasks, and the boy had quickly come to open and hold doors, carry and fetch items, and perform some of the more menial duties of his adjutant. The usefulness was certainly to the child's advantage -- he was more willing to take time over his placement, rather than dumping him in the first available institution.

His first surprise over the boy's complaisance over staying with him had evaporated. The child, however wild he had become, was also a careful, forward thinking sort. The winter snows were deep outside, the country and terrain unfamiliar, potential shelter and food sources unknown. Here he was given several meals a day, adequate clothing and shelter and relative safety.

Novikov was not the sadistic type. He could be cruel where cruelty was required, where terror was necessary to subdue the population, or keep an army in line. But he was enough of a professional to consider it poor sport to terrorize a brat, and possessed neither leisure nor inclination for such trivial, self-indulgent occupations. Others in the military would not be so generous, but Spetnatz officers were carefully screened for sadism. Sadists and other bullies had long been known to be cowards at heart. As for the boy, he seemed intelligent enough to recognize when he was well off and apparently shrewd enough to take advantage of the opportunity, regardless of how he arrived there.

The continued absence of his adjutant was a nuisance, Novikov thought, as he went back to his work. The partitioning of a Soviet Army was a curious thing, unlike any other army in the world, he believed. Not only were its administrators plagued with providing men in quantities necessary for its mammoth tasks, but every battalion, every regiment, every army had to be carefully divided and distributed in reference to the origins of the recruits.

The revolution might have been some forty years old, but that was not so long ago that the General Staff and the Central Committee didn't recall how it had been engineered. Paramount was the cooperation between the garrison of troops guarding the populace when a state of civil unrest occurred. Collusion between the army and the civil population could be disastrous, therefore, Georgians were never stationed or trained in Georgia. Ukrainians might be sent to Siberia. Muscovites would never see Moscow again in any of their two years in service. If a rebellion occurred in Siberia, for example, a Muscovite would feel no particular connection to those people and would fire on them far more readily than those of his own region.

Nor could an army be too homogeneous. A battalion would be a careful mixture from all the various Soviet states. The General Staff would never risk too large a concentration from one area, fearing that in their unity they might foment a rebellion of their own.

Five million new recruits joined the Soviet Army every year; five million were decommissioned. The reassortment and allotment of these resources took a considerable amount of a military commissariat's time. Not to mention a confounded amount of reports.

Novikov rose and walked over to boy's makeshift bed. "Illya Nickovetch." He reached out a hand to the restless shoulders. "Illyusha"

The boy gasped in terror and flipped over, scrambling frantically for something under the pillow.

Novikov grabbed him and turned him over by main force, and then reared back, dangerously close to the fire as the boy came at him, madness in his eyes, all claws and teeth. "Ilyusha!"

Shock and recognition came simultaneously into the sleep dazed eyes. "Comrade Colonel!"

Novikov set the boy back down, placing his hands, clenched now into tight fists, firmly at his side. "You are a wonder, boy. First you try and slit my throat in the woods, then you try to rip it out with your teeth in my own quarters."

Illya Nickovetch shifted uneasily under the man's gaze, but he didn't move from where he had been placed. "I was dreaming, Comrade Colonel. Perhaps it was the shooting, today. It will not happen again."

The boy looked up as Novikov crossed to his desk and poured a shot of vodka into his glass, and then returned. Novikov handed over the glass. "Not tonight, anyway. Drink this."

The boy took it, giving him a doubtful look.

"Come on, drink it, all of it, in one shot. It will help you sleep."

Swallowing hard, the child tossed the liquor down, and erupted into violent coughing. Novikov rather expected that reaction, and held the boy's shoulders. For a moment he wondered if the boy would keep the liquor down, but two years in the woods had given him backbone; he coughed and choked, but eventually settled down, looking up at Novikov with eyes that, as he blinked away the tears from the coughing spell, were already developing an unfocused gaze from the powerful spirits. That had been Novikov's intent, he wanted to ask some questions, and the liquor would loosen the boy's tongue.

"Why should the shooting today give you nightmares? You performed very well." He tipped the boy's nodding chin up. "Come on, answer."

"It was the wolves."

Novikov leaned back against the fireplace hearth, raised glass to his lips, then realized it was empty. "Wolves?"

"They would come at night. Always at night. At first they were wary, but as winter grew worse, they became bolder. If I killed one, they would leave me in peace for a while, but they would always come back. That was why I needed the gun. They respected that." Illya looked down. "The sentry's ammunition got me through the first winter, but I used it all. That's why I needed your gun."

"I see," Novikov said, realizing what the boy had been fumbling for in his sleep. "Where was your camp, boy?"

Illya Nickovetch swayed slightly, passed a shaking hand over his eyes, and shook his head as if to clear it. The liquor was obviously taking hold. "There was a storage vault in the orchard. Sort of an abandoned root cellar. No one remember it but me. I dug a couple of tunnels in and out, and a flue hole for a fire that I screened with brush. No knew I was there. Even the tunnels looked like animal holes."

"Except for the wolves."

"They owned forest before it became mine. I was stealing their game."

"I doubt they thought of it that way. You would have made good game for them. Maybe not though," Novikov smiled a little, "too skinny."

The boy looked away and the Soviet officer realized how flippant he had sounded, against what must have been a real fear. Wolves often attacked people; their favorites old babushkas and young children. But in a hard winter, when game was scarce, even an adult human was considered fair game, even an army officer. He knew what it was like to be in the field, isolated from his unit, and to see a pair of eerie yellow eyes flash in the night. And then another pair, and another, as the pack grew bolder. No man was immune to that primordial terror. But he had only encountered it now and then and he had quickly rejoined his unit or his regiment. For him, the terror ended after a night or two, and he had always been well supplied with ammunition and the training to use it. He wondered briefly what it must have been like for a child on his own, unarmed, with no prospect of the terror ending.

No wonder the boy stayed with him. In his comfortable circumstances, he sometimes forgot the cost of survival.

There was another question he wanted to ask, and now was as good a time as any. "How did your parents come to be taken?

Illya slanted him a look, then shrugged. "The same as everyone else."

"That's no answer, boy. They must have done something." He threw the accusation out calmly, without letting on that he had no personal belief that it was true. He simply wanted to get the child angry enough to loosen his tongue.

"All the intelligentsia were being taken. The teachers at the college. The musicians from the symphony. One by one. My parents," the boy's voice broke, but he recovered quickly enough, his face stony, "knew they might be taken too. They hadn't done anything!" He glared at Novikov, his eyes wild for a moment, but just as quickly they lost their fire and he shrugged. "It didn't matter. None of those being taken had done anything."

"You don't know that."

"My parents were innocent," the boy answered flatly, but without heat. "But they were expecting it. They told me what to do. Where to hide in a wardrobe when the knock came on the door. And it came, just as they expected, at two in the morning. I hid, but it didn't matter, the militsia didn't want me. I heard shouting and noises, and then silence. When I came out they were gone." His face, as he stared vacantly into the fire, reflected the shock and desolation of that first abandonment.

"What did you do?"

"I knew they would come back," the boy said dully. "To go through the house. They did that to the others, I heard my parents whispering about it. If they found children then, bad things would happen."

Novikov blinked a little at the innocent phraseology. Abuse, rape, murder could be lumped, he supposed, under such a heading, but only a child would have the naivete to do so.

"I had been keeping some things, ever since my parents talked to me, and my friends started disappearing. A flint and steel, dry bread, some extra clothes. I took my bag and gathered a few other things, knives and other tools, more food. I almost took too long though, because the militsia came back very quickly. I only just barely got out a window, and huddled down in the bushes. There were many milisia, all around. I was afraid to run, so I stayed hidden. I was worried they would have the dogs, but it was just men, so no one found me. They must have had the dogs somewhere else that night."

Novikov said nothing. The boy was reciting mechanically, reliving the experience.

"I heard the men inside our house. Shouting, smashing, stealing. They were looking for me, too, but they didn't look too hard. Then they came out and I thought they would beat the bushes for me, but instead they set fire to the house. They laughed that they would burn me out, or burn me up. The fire made the area almost as bright as day, but still they didn't see me. I had dressed carefully, you see. I knew I would need clothes that matched the landscape. The house burned till there was nothing left, and the militsia left too. When everyone was gone, I got up and went to the orchard." The boy said nothing, his gaze vacant, his manner that of a watch that had wound down.

Novikov rose abruptly from the hearth, went back to his desk, and poured another shot of vodka. Later he would want to ask about the boy's habits in the woods, his murder of the sentry. But he had heard enough for now.

"I have work to do. You had best go to sleep, Ilyusha." He held out the glass. "Once more. After this you will have no more dreams. At least for tonight."

The boy took the glass resignedly and tossed back the liquor. His reaction was milder this time and more quickly mastered, but the liquor hit him hard and fast. He turned back to his bed, crawling under the covers, but his arms gave out from under him and he dropped clumsily to the bed. Novikov pulled the blanket over him, and turned away, satisfied. He had gotten some answers he had wanted. The boy's insistence of his parent's innocence meant nothing, but if the charges proved to have been trumped up or petty, it might make a difference to the boy's future. Spetsnatz was one of the few areas where ability and performance was a necessity that ideological purity could not override. But certain ideological standards could not be bypassed. On the other hand, there were precedents. So many had been swept up in the purges of the last twenty years, that it was hard to find anyone of ability who had not had a relative by blood or marriage, an associate, a friend, or some other link to a purge victim. After the crushing defeats at the hands of the Germans, even Stalin himself had realized the need for skill over political ideology in the military forces, and those officers with links to the intelligentsia or the former nobility, who had survived the prisons and camps, had been brought back into the army.

"Good night, Comrade Colonel."

Novikov glanced up from a folder. The boy was lying on his side, his face to the flames. For the first time Novikov let himself notice how pale and pinched the face was under the shaved head, and how discouraged the curve of the mouth. He fought and lost a small battle with his conscience. "Sleep well, boy. The wolves may be sniffing through your things now, but you aren't there for them to sink their teeth into. You're safe."

The blue eyes opened at that last statement and regarded him skeptically. Then the boy closed them without comment.

Novikov wasn't sure how he felt about that. Logically, the boy shouldn't trust him. Tactically he didn't want the child to trust him. But some part of him was disappointed and oddly offended.

He turned back to his paperwork with relief.

When he woke the next day, he was immediately aware that something was different. There was a chill in the room that had not been there -- since he had first told the boy to mind the fire, the child had been scrupulous in that duty, and always rose early to feed the stove. When Novikov would wake, the boy would have the fire mended, his bed made, and would be washed, dressed and waiting expectantly for the day to begin.

The boy's bed was unmade, and Novikov approached it reluctantly, half expecting to find the boy flown, knowing that it virtually meant his death sentence if he had left to take his chances in the wilderness outside. He was almost surprised to see the child still in bed. He seemed barely breathing, if at all. Novikov touched his shoulder, fearing the stiffness of a corpse, but the boy's muscles were lax under his hand as he turned the body over. His forehead was cool, there was no fever. Novikov shook his shoulder more roughly, but the boy didn't stir, though he took a deeper breath. It was then the reek of vodka hit the officer, and he stared at the child, and then went to order a doctor to be fetched.

The medical man was used to treating the effects of alcohol abuse, though he had undoubtably had rarely practiced his trade on such a young patient. He examined the child, heard Novikov's explanation of the previous night's events, and looked over the bottle.

"You don't give 190 proof vodka to a ten-year-old, Comrade Colonel. There are more efficacious sleeping agents, should you require them. This boy is lucky to be alive."

"Lucky to be alive?" Novikov was astounded. "He only had a couple of shots. Are you telling me the boy can't hold liquor?"

"If the child couldn't hold liquor, he'd be dead now. He must have the constitution of an ox. Alcohol is a central nervous system depressant, Comrade Colonel. Too much for the body weight, and the body stops breathing. Your boy is alive, and he will come out of this, but he could well have died. Next time, if you want the boy to sleep, try a glass of warm milk." The doctor snapped his case shut. "There's nothing I can do here. The boy is out of danger; he'll sleep this off. Keep him quiet for today, in bed, or in this room. He'll be back to normal tomorrow. I must go, I have a solder who had a shell explode in his face this morning. Good day, Comrade Colonel."

Novikov looked from the door closing behind the doctor to the boy on the bed. Then he looked at his own watch. He had his own day to begin, and he was behind already. He compromised by leaving the boy a note, telling him he was to stay in the room and quiet, and he could busy himself by keeping the fire built and drying out the greatcoat Novikov had soaked yesterday. He didn't let himself think about another reason he might want the room kept warm. He added he would be back for dinner at the usual hour and would have food sent in at noon. He sighed the note Novikov and left it where the boy would be sure to see it. Then he tugged the blankets up to the boy's chin and left.

Illya Kuryakin turned over in his bed and nearly passed out from the pain. Still, he struggled to a sitting position in spite of the pounding in his head, the sudden racing of his heart as he realized his incapacitation more than matching it. One of the worst fears of his life, one of the worst threats to his life, was illness. Wolves didn't respect incapacitation of any sort, and if he couldn't forage for food or feed his fire in the winter, he would quickly freeze or starve. Fugitives from the Soviet state couldn't afford to be ill.

He blinked groggily at his surroundings, and after a moments puzzlement recognized his changed circumstances. His stomach almost rebelled at that point, but after a moment's struggle, he kept his gorge down. If he made a mess, he'd only have to clean it up himself.

Several deep breaths and he managed to conquer his nausea. He held his aching head in his hands as if it were going to come off, then pressed his fingers against his temple in the way his mother always said helped a headache. It felt worse.

The fire sputtered in the stove, smoking a little. He squinted at it, frowning. The room was chilled. Not enough to bother him, unused to warmly heated rooms, but more chilled than it was generally allowed to get. He inched his way to his feet, and mended the fire, then sat cradling his aching head, nearly weeping with the pain. A thought came to him -- only a few days ago he had lain in the snow, a gun at the base of his skull, determined to live -- and now he only wished he could die.

The corner of his mouth quirked in amusement before he flew to the bathroom to be disastrously ill.

The day dragged on, with every second seeming like an hour. He mastered his nausea by mid-morning, but nothing could stop his headache. He found the note from the Colonel and kept the fire built and turned the greatcoat before it, but most of the time he spent sitting by the window, away from the stifling heat, watching the snow pile up outside.

Once, not so long ago that he couldn't remember it, he and his friends had played in the snow, building snow caves, having snow battles. Now many of those friends were dead, and he was in some halfway place between life and death, danger and safety, and the snow was an enemy that would shackle his feet in any escape attempt, cover all potential food, and smother all warmth. The beautiful crystals of ice fell until his breath frosted and opaqued the pane, and yet he still saw the mounds and piles of snow, heavy and gleaming, an icy blanket that would cover his tracks like a friend, but then like an enemy it would starve him, freeze him and bury him.

He remembered being thrust into the snow, the icy-cold flakes burning into his eyes, and seeing the blood from his temple wound staining the snow when he raised his head. And then the colder feel of the gun, at the nape of his neck, and the terrible click as the hammer was pulled back, when all his life had slowed to a stop, and all his options had flown away, down a river with last years leaves. Or down a mine shaft. He hadn't begged because there hadn't been anything to beg for. Everything had been blown away. Everything but the one last thing, the fireblast from the muzzle of the gun, the warmth of his blood soaking the snow, and then a long fall into cold darkness. He could wait for that.

And then he had been flipped over, and the gun put between his eyes. He could see the cold steel barrel, the hammer cocked, the finger on the trigger. One squeeze and he would be gone. But he was already gone. Illya Kuryakin who would have begged for his life had died hiding in the bushes outside his home, while Stalin's thugs took his parents away in the dark car and the Chekists looted and torched his home. The boy who'd retreated from that blaze into the black night had become capable of many things. He could hide and hunt, steal and murder. But he couldn't beg. The family and home he would have begged for was long gone, the words he might have begged choked into silence in the smoking darkness, and nothing and no one could ever induce him to beg again.

A noise from behind startled him, and he rose with a gasping cry, the blanket he was wrapped in falling to the floor, the pain in his head shocking him into the here and now.

An elderly man stood in the doorway, a tray in his hands.

"Forgive me, young man. I was told to bring this to you at noon."

"Thank you," he said from a tight throat, and watched the man turn and leave.

He approached the tray and looked at it, his stomach cringing inside. But it wasn't too bad. Weak tea and dry toast, except for a glass of milk he found too painful even to look at and that he covered with a cloth napkin. An interesting napkin, once he looked at it more closely. It had the double-headed eagle of the old Romanov dynasty embroidered on it's battered folds. The same symbol was in bas-relief in plaster over his head. Poor eagle. It too had seen better days, before all its family had been slaughtered.

He grabbed the mug of tea and went back to the window.

He drank a mouthful of the hot, heavily sugared tea, burning his mouth on the nearly boiling liquid, and after a brief complaint from his stomach, managed to keep it down. And the warmth of the cup felt nice in his cold fingers. He pulled the blanket closer around him, laid his cheek against the icy window, and considered.

Yesterday, he had held a gun in his hand. He remembered how it had felt, so heavy and rich with possibilities, and so calming. He had come to love guns, nothing was more giving. A gun was safety and security against the wolves that came to prey on him. A gun was food in his belly, security against the winter. A loaded gun in his hands was protection against enemies. He used to load and unload his weapons, the old target pistol of his family and the newer weapon he had taken from the sentry, looking at each fat cartridge and wondering what gift each would bring him: safety from the wolves' jaws, game for his fire, or retribution for himself and his family, should the authorities come after him. He rarely considered the last, since he would never had sought it out. His goals had been concealment and survival, not cheap revenge. Each bullet held a prize for him, concealed in its lead and copper jacket. But since he'd never had many bullets, he chose those gifts very wisely, indeed. Besides, there were so many equally responsible for his condition, whom could he take revenge on?

But he'd had the opportunity for some sort of revenge in his hands yesterday. He remembered holding the gun in his hand and considering that possibility, saw the look in the face of the colonel as the man realized the thoughts going through his head. He could at least have wounded the general, and seen the colonel arrested, before being shot himself. He'd had some sort of retribution in his hands. Why hadn't he taken it?

The fire behind him fell with a soft musical chime, smoke rising in the air from the ashes and he roused himself to rebuild it, feeling the heavy greatcoat to see if it was dry. The shoulder-boards caught his attention and he reached out to finger the stars curiously, bright and warm to the eye, but all hard, cold metal, and sharp-edged canine-like points. Like teeth. Wolves' teeth.

How could he be here, warm and fed and alive, when he was supposed to be dead? What kind of traitor was he, that he'd had the opportunity for revenge, and had failed to take it. Who was he?

He had never succeeded in fooling himself with his attempts at survival. He played out the game, and he was no quitter, but he had few doubts how it would end. Either he'd fall sick, starve or be eaten by wolves in the forest, or he'd be successful in surviving and the authorities would eventually catch up with him and do what the forest had not. Either way, his death sentence had been proclaimed by the Soviet State when his parents had been taken. The only uncertain fact was the manner of his death.

But the authorities had caught up with him, and instead of being killed, he was being cared for. Who was his enemy? The same man who captured, imprisoned and held a gun to his head was the man who had allowed a gun to be put in his hand without shooting him right there. The same man who had removed the gun from the nape of his neck, holstered his gun, pulled him out of the snow at the side of the mine, and brought him here.

He reached over and took a piece of bread off the tray and held it in his hand, looking at it. How odd it was, to have a fire without searching hours for fuel, hauling wood through the forest on his back with aching shoulders and heavy legs, and spending many frustrating minutes coaxing a spark to light. How odd, to have food in his hand, to eat without having searched for, cleaned and prepared the meal himself. To taste bread again, when he hadn't known bread for two years. To speak, when he hadn't spoken a word to another human. To sleep in a bed. To hold a book in his hand and read. To live, not like a fugitive animal, but a human, a boy again.

His mind shied away from that. To be a boy meant that he wasn't his own master, that he couldn't call his own shots, that he had to submit to another's will, and he wasn't quite ready for that. He was still choosing, item by item, incident by incident, day by day when to obey, whether to go along with the situation or steal what he could and flee. He hadn't given his care into someone else's safekeeping. He rather suspected he'd never be able to give that kind of trust again.

No, he wasn't ready to call any man his master, but the human part of him was flirting with the notion of becoming predominant again. The forest had split him into two people: the reasonable rational part, that had once sat in schoolrooms and learned his lessons like a very good boy. And the animal, who snared prey and slit throats and favored an animal silence over human speech.

On the frosty windowpane he could see a reflection of himself, hazy and indistinct in the halo of glass he had wiped clear of frost. He raised his hand to the ice cold pane, to touch the being opposite, and it beckoned to him, the snow creature, the wild boy, the one who ran with a wolf pack at his heels and counted his bullets as his best friends.

He dropped his hand, sighing softly. As his breath clouded the glass, the wolf boy vanished.

But he knew he was out there. Waiting for him. Was it time to go?

Novikov woke in the night, aware that something was wrong. He reached for the gun kept ready under his pillow, and then scanned the room, sliding soundlessly from the bed to crouch by its side, his head no higher than it had been on the pillow, but his body ready to spring or roll in an instant. He breathed shallowly, seeking to conceal his exhalations that turned into frost in the room's chill air. As his eyes scanned, he could see the closed doors, the window -- something was huddled by the window. An intruder?

The full moon should have been bright on the snow, but its light was obscured in banks of clouds. That served him, he moved cautiously upright in the dark miasma of the room, trying to get a clear shot, his gun outstretched. The figure didn't react and he wondered if it wasn't a man, but some inanimate object, left out of place. But he was habitually tidy, as befits a man who might be ambushed in the dark, and the room had been disturbed, he could feel a draft from a crack in the not quite closed window, and the whine of the draft that fingered its way inside.

Novikov cocked the hammer back of his weapon, aimed at the target. The mechanical rasp of metal on metal shattered the pristine silence of the room, that had held only the whine of the wind and the muffled breath of the occupants.

At the jarring snap, the figure moved, just as the moon likewise broke through the cloudbanks and glanced off the bright close-cropped blond head of his target.

"Ilyusha!" Novikov lowered his arms and laid the gun aside, relief and disgust expressed in bluster. "What are you doing out of bed? Have you lost your senses?" Crossing the room swiftly, he reached down to close the window and halt the ice-laden breeze whistling through.

Leaping back from the hand, Illya Nickovetch flatted himself against the window frame, teeth bared in a snarl, his wild eyes almost dazed by the moonlight, pupils constricting from where there had previously been only the thinnest strip of gray-blue around the wide open irises.

Novikov deliberately removed the boy's hand from the window latch and closed the window, rubbing the stiff fingers in turn, hanging on when the boy jerked from the shocked of flesh on flesh. "What are you doing here? Your hands are frozen." He looked down, "Your feet are bare and the floor is ice. Are you trying to catch an illness? What foolishness is this?"

The boy attention was focused on the window pane, as if he was looking for something. Novikov scanned the outside again, wondering if Illya Nickovetch had heard something and come to investigate. But no, the sweep of countryside beyond the window was vacant, bleak with snow, and the boy's hands were stiff enough to tell him they had been frozen some time.

"Ilyusha?"

"No. I am sorry, Comrade Colonel," the boy mumbled.

Novikov suppressed a shiver as the icy floor made it's presence known through the thick socks he had worn to bed. He had work to do tomorrow; he couldn't spend the night arguing nonsense with a child. Without thinking twice about it, he swung the boy up. "Come then, you should be back in bed."

Startled, Illya struggled briefly. With the boy's bony knees being in a position to do danger, even inadvertently, Novikov felt a thread of fear and nearly dropped his burden. He caught himself and snapped instead. "What is wrong with you? Be still, malchik."

The burden in his arms stiffened, as unyielding as a bundle of sticks. Novikov carried him across the room and dropped the boy down in his bed, pushing his own hair out of his eyes and he straightened, frankly annoyed at the whole scenario. "By now you should know I'm not the sort to mistreat children. Go to sleep, Ilyusha."

He sought his own bed, not realizing till morning how absurd his statement had been. He, who would execute a bespriorznik without a moment's thought and consider it work well done, or who would follow Stalin's edict and execute the wife and family of a Soviet soldier captured by hostile forces, would never raise a hand to a child in his own household, and think a man either weak or criminal who'd beat or abuse his own wife or children. His world was composed of a potetially antagonistic universe surrounding a scarce circle of intimates. He hadn't quite realized when the boy had crossed that important line, or even, until now, that he had crossed it.

It was certain Illya Nickovetch wasn't aware of it either.

The adjutant came back and reported early the next morning, some twenty pounds lighter from his exhausting mission, and burned red/brown from the sun glare off the snow. Novikov was still in the process of dressing, his weapons still on the table where he had left them in the night. He had not had time for breakfast, much less discussions about the evening's occurance.

While waiting for his Colonel's order, the adjutant blinked at the sight of Illya Nickovetch but said politely, "I am honored to meet your son, Comrade Colonel."

"Eh?" Novikov glanced up from the Lieutenant's papers and looked between the two. "He is not my son. Illya Nickovetch is a bespriorznik that I picked up on the road."

He had grown so used to his new plan that he had forgotten the standard response to his statement. The lieutenant jerked a little in surprise, his hand reaching reflexively for the automatic at his side. Illya Nickovetch saw the movement, and snarled deep in his throat, diving for cover and coming up with the weapon, cocked and loaded, that Novikov had left unguarded. Certain now that this was some kind of trap or test his wily commander had set for him, the adjutant drew his gun in earnest, aiming at the boy's shaven head.

"Piristan'!" Novikov snapped. "Ilyusha, for shame!" He stomped over to the boy and disarmed him, resisting the urge to knock him into a corner.

The lieutenant, looking on in astonishment as the Colonel harmlessly took the weapon from the feral child, hastened to holster the weapon he had drawn.

"And you!" Novikov turned on his adjutant. "Do you think your duties include turning on your superior's guests? He isn't a 'puppet' I brought for you to test yourself with. Even if he were, it isn't proper to take what hasn't been offered to you. Illya Nickovetch happens to be a protege of mine, odd as this may seem. You had better reconcile yourself to him, since he is part of a project in which you'll have duties to complete." Novikov paused for emphasis. "You two will be working together, so apologize to eachother."

"Izvinitye," the adjutant said stiffly, glaring at the boy who had gotten him in trouble with his superior.

A silence ensured before Novikov prodded, "Ilyusha!"

"Prashu proshcheniya," Illya Nickovetch said slowly in return, drawling the apology out in a low growling threat.

Novikov looked between the two of them, both locked in the challenging stares of dominance, and felt like snarling himself. He concealed it with the equaniminity years in the military had taught him.

"Excellent. Illya Nickovetch, meet my adjutant Lieutenant Tarasov. And now that everyone has been introduced, I am ready for breakfast."

Novikov felt a touch of satisfaction at his adjutant's obvious astonishment with his superior's new companion. It didn't do to be too predictable, not to one's enemies nor to one's supposed inferiors or friends.

After breakfast, he went over the man's duties, the new requirements from the General, the troop movements for which orders needed to be transmitted, the war games and exercises those troops would undergo. In the meantime, he watched with a trace of inner amusement the interplay between the adjutant and Illya Kuryakin.

The boy had seated himself by the fire when the adjutant entered after their breakfast, and pretended to read an arms manual he had been given. Secretly though, he had been tossing suspicious, resentful looks to the adjutant's back, while the adjutant, who had tried to keep his manner matter of fact, as if his superior made a regular habit of befriending besprihorzniks, couldn't keep himself from a few dark glances in return. Their reactions, when their gazes accidently met, were incendiary. Novikov noted, though, that if he were the adjutant, he would watch himself very carefully, with that wolf cub's obvious designs on his throat. He would have to speak to Illya Nickovetch.

But in the interim, he would have to speak to his adjutant. He ordered the boy to stay in the room, and then indicated the adjutant to follow him.

"Will he do as you say?" Tarasov asked, then colored slightly. "Forgive me, Colonel. But he seems so..."

"Feral. Yes, the boy is a bit wild, but he also has other qualities which, if developed, will become very useful to the state."

"Just as the Colonel says," Tarasov said carefully. "But are not besprihorzniks confirmed enemies of the state?"

Novikov dodged the issue, for a moment. "He reacted well, in the room, did he not? The briefest threat from you, and he rolled, covered, stole a weapon and had it pointing at your own head. He is a good shot, too, for being untaught. You might have lost your head, if he had less self-control."

"Or he, his," said Tarasov said, with a trace of heat.

"Nor did I stage that little scene," Novikov went on thoughtfully. "But it did make an interesting demonstration of abilities. We might consider that in future."

"Comrade Colonel?"

Novikov brought himself back to his adjutant's dismayed face. "Never mind. Just consider, Lieutenant, if you took any ten recruits from the recent intake in Illya Nickovetch's role, and you took your same part. How many would react so swiftly and correctly? Answer me truthfully."

"None, Comrade Colonel," the man admitted.

"Precisely. How many exercises have we had to drop from the Young Soldier's Course because the quality of the intake is so poor that they can only learn by rote and repetition? Few of them can be trusted to think and react."

"True, but besprihorzniks?"

"I have received orders from the General Staff, direct from the Central Committee. There is going to be a change in handling the besprihorznik problem. The leadership has decided to evaluate a potentially valuable resource. Sweeps of the besprihorznik population are going to be conducted, and any made new by further purges will be taken as well. They are to be evaluated, and those who are intelligent and resourceful are to be trained to useful purpose."

"But their parents?"

"Their parents are dead. Those children are the property of the Soviet state. Those we deem useful are to be remade in its image." Novikov smiled distantly. "Surely, if we can make soldiers out of ignorant Kolhas workers, we can reprogram a few children. And those imperious to our methods will be disposed of appropriately. Accidents are so unfortunate, but they will happen." Novikov returned his attention to the adjutant. "And in the course of four or five years, we might have some youths for the better categories of soldiers that have no influence to escape their service by deferment. They will be army recruits, perhaps, in time, even officers. They will taught to marry, as good Soviets do, and raise more intelligent children for the Army and the wars to come. At least we can hope not all will get future deferments," he added derisively.

"An interesting concept, Comrade Colonel."

"And a task for you. We need institutions, where this retraining can take place. Eventually, this project will be taken over by others, but the prototype is mine to set up. Your task is to evaluate locations. Old private institutes of the former Army would be best, as they will have equipment to cannibalize -- gymnasiums, target ranges, armories. Beyond that, there must be dozens of old private schools moldering since the reforms. Find me a few likely locations in the area, and I'll review them personally. And I will be asking for the dossiers of personnel I wish to review."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"One thing more. This task is considered secret. The general population are not to know that the besprihorznik situation may be handled differently in future. So conduct your investigations discreetly."

"What of Illya Nickovetch?"

"What of him?" Novikov glared at his subordinate.

"Forgive me, Comrade Colonel, but you intimated that I had some duties in regard to," Tarasov hesitated over the word, "your protege."

"I have an interest in his progress, since he will be a first test case. He's to go in the first school, of course. Until then, I'm not sure what to do with him. He'd taken over some of your duties while you were gone, fetching, carrying, and so forth. If he remains useful, he'll stay here until the first institute is ready. If not, you'll have to find some place for him. I may require you to keep an eye on him from time to time, is all I meant. So far, he's been little trouble. I expect an officer of your caliber can handle a boy, Lieutenant?"

"Of course, Comrade Colonel," the lieutenant said, seething through the polite smile on his teeth. "It will be my pleasure."

"Then carry on."

Illya Nickovetch looked in the window, but in the light of day, cured of the headache and sickness of his brief illness, he knew it had been a fantasy born of fuzzy thoughts and foggy thinking. Only snowdrifts lurked outside the window, and blizzard-like wind gusts rattled the shingles and howled in the trees. Nothing and no one else.

He itched for something to do, restlessness plauging him like a fleas worrying a cur. Laying the arms manual aside, he paced fitfully. Feeling the stiffness of his muscles from too much inactivity, he panicked, realizing he might be losing the edge that was so essential to survival, and did calisthenics remembered from his schooldays, until his heart was pounding and his breath was ragged. He felt strong, then, and devoured some of his cashe of food. Stealing and hoarding food had become as natural to him as breathing; he doubted the Colonel realized how deft his sleight-of-hand had become at table. Then he looked over his sparse store of clothes and possessions, including the arms manual and various items of the Colonel's he might choose to appropriate if it came to a quick flight. He arranged his own for quick seizure and mentally went through the motions of seizing and packing the others, so he would have no wasted motions in an emergency. He even drew himself a little map in the ashes of the hearth, with what he could remember of his surrounding landmarks, the principle roads he might use or avoid, and the position of the sun and the compass points, before fixing it in his mind, and sweeping it back into dust. After that, he felt a little more composed. He had done all he could to prepare for an immediate flight.

Everything but the hard task. Deciding whether or not to flee. The decision loomed before him; the most difficult of his life, and a deciding factor in his continuence. Up till now, everything in his life had been the result of something happening to him. He'd had to prepare, to flee, even to kill, because the choices had been clear as to which path led to survival. But now the choices weren't clear. He had no real understanding of the Red Army man's plans for him, and the brief mention of an institution hadn't sounded very promising. Jails, prisons and workcamps were institutions, as well as schools.

He'd always intended to leave, once he'd milked the situation for what he could. Only the snow, the wind, his lack of knowledge for his surroundings and the lack of a need to flee had stayed him. So far, the man hadn't done him any harm, and he'd been grateful for the food, the fire and the real bed. But if he stayed much longer, he might find himself too softened to leave. He considered that thought a moment and then rejected it. No. If he hadn't been too soft to survive his first flight, a few weeks billet here wouldn't make much difference.

He did understand the temptations he felt. How nice, to be a child again, to put one's future in the hands of adults, to lay down the heavy weight of responsibility that survival entailed. But even though he could see and even appreciate his temptations, when he thought about it, he couldn't see himself being swayed by them. He was surely past all trust in adults. After all, when you saw your parents killed, when every adult in your village turned against you as if you carried plague, could you ever be a child again? He didn't think so. But he didn't waste much time despairing over his lost innocence.

It came down to a question of tactics. He could see two possibilities. Either he was being set up by the Colonel for some unpleasant little trap, or Novikov was sincere in his intention to place him in some institution. What could such a place be, though? A school, a work camp, a penal military unit for children, perhaps to clear minefields or other dangerous duty? Knowing as little as he did, he couldn't tell if it would be better to run away soon, or on the way to being sent there, hopefully in more congenial country, or even to wait and see the place itself. He simply had to find out more.

So far, it had served him well to be silent, inconspicuous and slightly helpful; the Colonel had not misused him, nor abruptly disposed of him, and even seemed to trust him a little, at least enough not to run away. Foolish as that was. But he would have to risk more of a presence, he had to get some facts, if wanted to know what would happen before it happened to him.

He thought about how to do that, behind the concealing cover of reading the arms manual.

As Novikov entered his quarters, Illya Nickovetch put down the arms manual and rose. The Red Army man approved of the gesture, even as he doubted it stemmed from politeness or respect such gestures usually entailed. Still, it showed Illya Nickovetch was thinking, and it showed what he was thinking. Novikov would have thought less of him had the boy less controlled and more overly hostile, or less well-judging and more effusively servile. The subdued reserve was ambiguous enough it could cover a multitude of attitudes. He didn't want his protege to be caught short. Of course, he thought well enough of himself that he didn't consider himself in any danger of being caught either.

"You appear to be feeling better," Novikov said shortly.

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"What was that nonsense by the window, last night? What were you doing there?"

The boy paused briefly in his move to put coals on the fire, glancing at him with unreadable eyes. "I don't remember, Comrade Colonel."

Novikov wondered at that. It was possible the boy had forgotten the incident. Still, something in the boy's closed face made him press further. "You don't remember?"

"Perhaps I was sleep-walking."

"A boy who sleep-walks doesn't make it though a Russian winter without ending up in a wolf's belly."

The boy in question didn't pause in his movements to bank up the fire. "Perhaps I heard something outside the window," he suggested.

"There were no marks in the snow outside the window," Demichov said, nodding as Illya Nickovetch gave him a look, the firelight glancing off one sharp cheekbone. "Yes," Novikov nodded heavily. "I checked."

"Perhaps a wolf, howling in the forest, or an owl woke me." Kuryakin shut the door of the stove, his hands steady, but there was more of an edge to his voice.

"Perhaps you don't know," Novikov challenged. "Or you do know, and you don't wish to tell. The interesting thing about the latter: I have been known to think up inducements in such cases. Aids to memory."

Kuryakin stood at that threat and faced the Red Army man, his hands open, but the fingers twitched a bit, rubbing against the thumbs. "Perhaps I went to the window because I was restless. I had been quiet all day and could not sleep."

"Illya Nickovetch Kuryakin." Novikov studied the guileless blue eyes, the restless fingers. "Do you know who you are?"

"Perhaps not, Comrade Colonel."

"You don't know?"

"I will listen if you wish to tell me."

Novikov shook his head, his face breaking for the first time in amusement. "You are a Russian, Illya Nickovetch. You lie even in your sleep."

"I was born in Kiev, Comrade Colonel," the boy corrected politely.

"You deny that you are Russian, but not that you are a liar?" Novikov chuckled and toasted him with the vodka bottle he had picked up. "But I tell you, you are both, and too intelligent to be a Ukrainian. They are smart, but not that smart. No, you are a Russian Slav and a liar."

"You knew what I was when you took me prisoner, Comrade Colonel," the boy was angry, but it was reflected only in the narrowed look of his eyes.

Novikov turned aside, and poured himself a drink, keeping an eye on his protege. "I did, indeed. Do not think that I disapprove entirely of lying. A necessary survival skill at times. But choose well when you use it, Illya Nickovetch, especially with me." He sipped his drink. "I think you told me the truth that last time. As well you should. I was beginning to lose patience. One thing you should remember, malchik, especially when lying." He settled himself into a chair, his boots on a hassock, and looked across from them at his charge. "Get control of your hands. A man whose fingers dance is nervous, and such men are unacceptible in Soviet intelligence."

"I will keep that in mind," the boy said, turning away to move by the fire. "Though I will never be in Soviet intelligence. It is useful advice, never-the-less."

Novikov sipped his drink and settled back in his chair, considering Kuryakin's statement, then shrugged. "I will tell you a truth in turn, boy. Truth for truth, eh? You are safer here than in the woods." He stretched his legs out and smiled at the boy's sharp look. "Do you think I don't recognise the look in your eye? Or know why you are restless? You are a survivor, and you'd run if you thought there was need. But in truth, you are safer here. I will not tell you that you are safe -- you know as well as I that the only safety is in the grave. But to run is foolishness, tedious though your part might be for now. You'll be settled soon."

"Settled where?"

"I don't know that, yet either," Novikov said. "Patience."

"Then settled for what? What is this part you speak of? What am I to do, in exchange for my survival?"

"Nothing, for now."

"Then for what, later?" Kuryakin stood before the man, stubborn and determined. "I cannot eat nothing. If I am restless, it is because I am ignorant. I must know what you want of me, if I am to stay."

"Are you challenging me, boy?"

"I am telling you a truth."

"Truth for truth, eh?" Novikov chuckled a little. "No game is more dangerous. Very well. After such a challenge, I will play once more. Sit down, boy. This is not a shooting match." He waited until Kuryakin was once more settled by the fire. "I do forsee a use for you. You are a smart one. And brave, though do not think those are necessarily good qualities. Too many brave men are foolishly brave, and die quickly. A hero's death is a death all the same, and they accomplish little compared to what they might have, if they had been canny as well as brave. The smart ones are often smart in the wrong way, thinking when they should act. They hesitate, because they know the possibilities, and those possibilities paralyze them. They die quickly too, often with nothing to show for it. You, on the other hand, have a healthy balance of common sense, and a passion for survival, in addition to intelligence and guts. And you can kill."

Kuryakin raised his eyes from the fire, and stared at the colonel.

"That is important too. A soldier must kill, and be indifferent to it."

"I am not indifferent to it, Comrade Colonel", Illya Nickovetch denied softly.

"You misunderstand me. Only a monster is completely indifferent to death, Ilyusha. I am not talking of such slaughters as the murderous Chekists indulge in. The Army works differently. Blood is an expense, like bullets and boots. We prefer not to waste it, though no institution is waste-free. But when it comes down to it, a soldier must kill. I have seen too many men, good in other ways, on whom much training and attention had been given, who simply could not kill appropriately. Some reveled in it, became butchers. Some couldn't kill without hesitating over the possibilities and died themselves. But you, I think, have the right balance. or you could not have survived. Such qualities are rare enough in combination that they shouldn't be squandered. Properly trained, in a good school, you could be an asset to the Army, perhaps even an officer, someday."

"Me, in the Army?" Kuryakin stopped doodling with the poker, his blue eyes raised in shock. "I cannot be in the Army."

"Nonsense. Every Soviet male should consider it his duty to the state. You must serve in the Red Army."

"But I am -- I have --"

"Yes. You have. But we do not speak of that. I am the only one who knows that. Of course, you deserve to die for killing the sentry -- guerilla warfare against the Soviet state is unpardonable. But in your situation, I might have done the same thing, perhaps not as well. The sentry himself was criminally negligent anyway, and would have been executed for losing his weapon. He is an example of why you might be valuable, in time. So I have pardoned you, and you have become, so to speak a protege of mine, if for nothing else, than for the very good reason that in another six years or so, properly educated, you will exactly the kind of recruit I search for so fruitlessly now."

"You saved my life so I could go to school and join the Army?" Kuryakin said.

"Exactly."

"I think --" Illya Nickovetch stuttered. "I do not know what to think. It does not make sense."

"From your position, probably not. From mine, it makes perfect sense. Someday, if you become an officer, it will be all too clear."

"You expect me to become an officer?"

"Not without hard work on your part," Novikov demurred. "But, yes, I think it might be possible. The Army desparately needs good officers. Between the Germans and the purges, the Soviet Army has become open to ability. If you have that ability, there is a chance, even for you."

"A chance," Illya murmured, staring into the flames.

"Possibly. With hard work, and of course, luck. No future is certain. But there is a chance, certainly a better one than you could have scavenging in your orchard. This time, you turned up a meal of a different kind. Has your appetite been satisfied?"

"I am not sure."

"Truth is a hard meal to swallow, sometimes, much less digest. But don't let anyone but me hear your stomach rumbling. Being a besprihorznik alone is a death sentence on your head. I know your past, and there are circumstances that may make it immaterial. But your situation is better left undiscussed with strangers."

"I cannot discuss what I do not truly understand," Illya Nickovetch replied.

"Ah. Now you truly begin to understand me."

Now that he was well again, Illya Nickovetch discovered that he was expected again to accompany the Colonel through his day. Through the night he had thought about what the Colonel had told him. A chance for life. Not for a slower death, or a stay of execution, but actual survival. To take it he had to trust the very Soviet state that had condemned him. He found it a hard decision to make. But he found it harder to distrust the Colonel. Truth for truth was a dangerous game, but so far, the Red Army man seemed to be playing fair, and if he did speak truth, then it was possible they both could win.

He'd reserve judgement on that, but he'd play the game, for a time. The stakes, at least, were interesting. He'd never been prone to gambling games among his friends, for marbles or kopeks or toys. Interesting that the gamble had to be his life before he'd condescend to play.

Having thrown in his lot, at least temporarily, with the military man, he strove to understand what occupied him. If this was the game, he had to learn to play it.

Although he had expected cruelty and massacres and depridations among the citizenry, the Red Army man seemed more occupied with paperwork. Illya drifted off to sleep that night in a cot in the common room the Colonel occupied, while coals hissed in the stove by his side. At a desk on the opposite side of the stove, the man opened a briefcase and worked through his papers, a glass of vodka at his elbow. This morning differed in that the papers were delivered to the adjutant, who took them off somewhere, while he and the Colonel ate breakfast. The Colonel was not prone to conversation in the morning, dressing and shaving in silence. That suited Illya fine. Used to rising with or before the dawn, the better to hunt, he had dressed and fed the fire before the Colonel rose, and concentrated on staying well out of his way and studying the weather through the windows.

The adjutant took the papers away, and handed the Colonel others. Illya noticed he looked through them, and commented on some, scrawling with a pen and handing then back, but the majority he stuffed back in the briefcase. He didn't look at the papers at breakfast, clearing away a hearty meal. Illya approved and followed suit. Other officers were in the room, but not many and most seemed of lower rank. After breakfast, they went outside, where the adjutant was waiting for them, sitting in the driver's seat of a jeep.

Illya paused on the road, hesitating, wondering if he was supposed to return to the room. The jeep had only a storage area crowded with supplies behind the two seats. Before, the Colonel had driven and he, himself, had sat in the passenger's seat.

"Get in the back, Ilyusha," Novikov said. He added his briefcase to the supplies in the back and sat across from his driver, then paused as he put on goggles against the wind and sunglare off the snow, and turned around. "Don't tell me you have to visit the latrine?"

"No, Comrade Colonel," Illya swarmed over the back of the jeep and settled himself among the equippage as the adjutant turned a sardonic glance on him. Illya grinned back, his eyes narrowing as he leaned comfortably against the two loaded machine guns stashed in the crowded area.

"Good. Keep your head down and hang on, boy. Don't expect that we'll stop and retrieve you if you fall off."

"Comrade Colonel," the adjutant began, as Illya shifted the rifles to down around his knees and took hold of one of the metal siderails, while with the other he deliberately caressed the metal stock. "I am not sure that is safe. I no longer can easily retrieve my weapon in an emergency."

Novikov turned around, and glared at his charge. The adjutant turned, half-rising from his seat, as Illya took up one of the weapons in his hands, before offering it stock-first to the Colonel.

"I am sorry, Colonel," he apologized guilelessly. "I didn't mean to disturb them." He picked up the other, balancing it across his knees.

"Ilyusha." The Colonel checked his own machine gun casually, then pointed it at the boy's nose.

"Yes, Comrade Colonel?"

"Do you know how to use this weapon?"

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"You are quite sure?"

"I think so, Comrade Colonel," Kuryakin amended. He looked away from the muzzle of the weapon pointed between his eyes as if it wasn't there, frowning down at the gun.

Novikov lowered his own weapon and flipped a lever on the weapon that lay across the boy's knees.

"Then don't forget to take off the safety if a wild hoard tries to attack us. Before you hand the weapon to Lieutenant Tarasov. These weapons are not like revolvers." Novikov turned around.

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

"But leave the safety on for now. I don't see any need to kill someone."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel." Illya flipped the lever back and looked up expectantly.

"Let's go, Tarasov," Novikov said impatiently. "Ilyusha will keep your weapon at ready for you, won't you, boy?"

"Oh, absolutely, Comrade Colonel. I'll take very good care of it."

"Comrade Colonel--"

"Drive, Tarasov."

Illya had to clutch at the siderail hard as the adjutant put the jeep in gear and took off with a spurt of snow. But his other hand didn't let go of the rifle.

In a way, his new life started that morning, though he still didn't understand what that life might be. The Colonel took a portfolio from his briefcase and worked silently. The adjutant drove along the snow packed roads, still showing the tracks of the heavy equipment that had compressed the snow into a drivable surface. And he?

He did instantly what the Colonel told him to do. He retrieved maps from the mapbox strapped to the back of the jeep. They weren't maps for the driver; the Colonel was using them for something. He passed the Colonel his briefcase and took it back and stowed it when needed. Eventually, the Colonel simply handed him folders to replace into the briefcase, and told him which folders to remove. He snuck a look at the papers when he did so, but they made little sense to him, consisting mainly of directives addressed to the Colonel stating:

SEND TO MILITARY UNIT 78192

2 Men from Category 0

5 Men from Category 1

100 Men from Category 2

5000 Men from Category 3

SEND TO MILITARY UNIT 15400

150 Men from Category 0

(All physically well-developed)

Or other directives from the Colonel stating:

TO MILITARY UNIT 38241

You will receive 7500 men from Category 6:

100 men from Berdichev

900 men from Donetsk

1500 men from Kiev

5000 men from Kharkov

After the first few furtive glances, he decided the papers were useless to him, and not worth the risk of looking at them, and he passed them without further surveillance. After a while, he was passed back the machine rifle when the Colonel complained it was knocking against his knees. That meant he was more armed than the military men, who had only their personal weapons, the automatics strapped to their belt holsters. With both rifles at his side, it did cross his mind, more than once as they travelled, that he could raise the machine rifle across his knees, shoot the Colonel and his driver, kick their bodies onto the snow, steal the jeep and then...

That was the problem. He wasn't sure if even a jeep, two machine rifles, a box of ammunition and maps were worth the inevitible 'then'. After much considered opinion he decided they probably weren't. It bothered him a little that the Colonel had, when allowing him to get into the back with the rifles, already decided he wouldn't go for it. If being intelligent was being predictable, he wasn't sure he liked it. But he also couldn't help it, at least for the moment.

They arrived at another military base, in the middle of a caravan of trucks, each crowded with shaven-headed young men, whose wheels threw up snow, slush and mud on the jeep, causing the adjutant to swear softly under his breath. The guards at the wall surrounding the base saluted and waved them in one direction, while the trucks headed in another. Tarasov pulled up in front of a small two story building that was at odds with the other huge barracks. Illya rose to his feet in the back of the jeep, staring at row after row of tank columns, each lined up a precise distance from the others, and each surrounded by men swarming over them like bees over a hive, servicing them, fueling them, washing them till their red stars appeared through what looked like a fresh coat of mud. The tanks gleamed, while the men working on them grew progressively more grubby. But Novikov spared them not a glance, but snapped his portfolio shut and stepped out of the jeep. Illya, not willing to be separated from his benefactor, however questionable their relationship was, hopped out of the jeep too.

"You'll want him to stay with the jeep, Comrade Colonel?"

"Don't tell me what I want, Lieutenant," Novikov snapped. "Do your own interviews and report back as usual."

The adjutant stiffened and spun the jeep away.

"Stay quiet, Ilyusha," Novikov ordered. "This is no boy's school."

Illya didn't trouble the Colonel with an answer.

Novikov strode into the regimental commander's office prepared to do battle, as usual. The conflict, as usual, was over the lack of trained officers, officers of any sort, trained men, and men who could be trained. Stalin's purges of the Soviet Army, which wiped out 70 percent of the upper ranks, together with the depredations of the Great Patriotic War, had reduced the number of officers to critical levels. Other forces also contributed to the attrition of officers, for only good officers survived in the Soviet Army. When winter came, and soldiers experienced the sub-zero temperatures of the field, only superior officers survived confrontations with cold, hungry, often drunk men. The Soviet Union had a history of frustrated soldiers knotting into angry groups and turning their loaded weapons on unpopular officers. Or their bayonets or boots, if that was all they had. The Colonel had faced across from more than a few loaded weapons held by drunken companies in his time. It kept the army from being a popular career.

Illya slid into a seat in a waiting room in response to the Colonel's pointed finger, before the man disappeared into an office. A soldier behind the desk that had admitted the Colonel spared him one glance and then ignored him. He occupied himself with listening and watching.

From the papers in the briefcase, and eavesdropping on whispered conversations, he began to realize that his Colonel was responsible for the provisioning of men to the units in his military district. He remembered there had been a military call-up on the day the Colonel had captured him, Though he payed little attention to the affairs of the village, he had noticed the large numbers of rowdy, half-drunken young men walking the road to town, and had run a little surveillance and reconnisance of his own to determine what was happening. His Colonel must be involved in distributing the intake from those call-ups. But it was puzzling that the young men in the trucks this morning had looked more Asian than Ukranian. But the cities on the 'Receive' orders had been in the Ukraine. The Army must send Ukrainians away to other places, and other nationalities: Russians, Uzbeks, Asians, into the Ukraine. That made sense, none of the members of the militia, the policing force, were local either. Inconvenient for the townspeople, who could never bargain on familiarity giving them a break, but no doubt what the Soviet had planned at the outset.

He shifted on his seat, earning himself the attention of the soldier guarding the desk. He decided to take advantage of it, asking for the location of the latrine. He found it interesting that the soldier not only gave him the directions in a non-threatening, almost respectful tone of voice, but that upon investigation, the directions were correct, no bogus joke played upon him. He was used to being a fugitive, without status or protectors, and thus forever on his guard. This was his first taste of the benefits of status, not the spillover of status when he was in the Colonel's presence that he had experienced at meals, or from innkeepers on the road, but status conveyed to a request of his own, with the Colonel out of earshot. It felt as strange to him as the warm water in the washroom, or resisting the temptation to steal one of the fine bars of soap from the sinks.

He found it very hard not to steal that soap, especially since he doubted anyone would ever notice the theft, or link it to him they did. He hoped he wouldn't regret the wasted opportunity, and the thought of it robbed him of his equanimnity and made him surly through the remainder of his waiting.

"Comrade Colonel, I must have more sargeants, more officers. Some of my tank companies have only one officer!"

"Many tank companies have only one officer, Chernyev. They manage, and with excellent scores as well."

"These Uzbeks you send speak not a word of Russian!"

""By the end of their Young Soldier's Course, they'll understand enough to follow their orders. And a soldier only needs to know how to say 'Yes' to their superior officer at any rate," Novikov hinted broadly.

But the Regimental Commander remained obtuse. "My third companies are berefit of sargents."

"Then move them from your second companies, and give your first companies over to the Lieutenants in charge. Or give a Sargeant two companies to supervise, first and second. Or have the first appoint a deputy."

"That is against regulations."

"These are straitened times, and everyone must make sacrifices in this Army." Novikov tossed his orders on the desk and gathered his briefcase. "I will see you at the field exercises next week.

As the Colonel as the man exited from the room, Illya rose in a rush to follow him. He realized that he might have been completely forgotten if he had let himself be left behind. Outside, the adjutant was waiting in the jeep, and Illya himself opened the door for the Colonel, earning the first sign of recognition, a brief nod from the man. But the Colonel was irritated and he did no paperwork on the way to their next destination.

The next appointment though, seemed to find the Colonel in a better frame of mind. Upon arrival at this military camp, Illya followed his Colonel, but no one ordered him to stay in an outer office, and he slipped into a chair in the actual room itself. The officer there gave him a sharp look, but forbore to comment.

Novikov dropped his orders down on the desk, while the commander picked them up, paging through them.

"I reviewed the intake this morning, Comrade Colonel. Not a bad lot."

"No complaints that you haven't enough Russians and Ukrainians?"

"Ukrainians are wasted as common soldiers. Far better they should be sargeants. Too bad that, here in the Ukraine, we never get them. But the Tatars that you sent me make even better sargeants. I could use a dozen more, if you care to send them."

"I've none to send, but I'll keep you in mind."

"As for common soldiers it hardly matters what the intake is. In the end, they all perform. Though my officers tell me these Asians and Uzbeks make good tank crews. Fierce and bloodthirsty when they are riled. They'll do well enough in time, and the lack of Russian is no real impediment. They all learn by rote, anyway. Would you care for coffee, Comrade Colonel?"

The Colonel lowered himself into a chair. "Just a cup, Vasily Antoniovich.

The other officer poured coffee from a service already set out, and sat down himself.

"How are you managing for officers?" the Colonel asked.

"It is not easy. Some of our companies have only one officer. A very dangerous situation. Even if they are only out on manuveurs, if the officer should be incapacitated there would be no one to take responsibility for the tank company. But we make do."

"You do a credible job, Vasily Antoniovich."

"Thank you, Comrade Colonel. But my regiment's scores are average."

"Perhaps you collect them with more accuracy."

"I would be foolish to do otherwise, with the wargames coming up."

"Yes. It is one thing to put only one's best soldiers on display for an inspecting commission, and quite another to see a whole regiment perform in mock battle. I have expectations these exercises will provide much useful intelligence. And perhaps some changes afterwards."

"I think you will find my regiment up to the test, Comrade Colonel."

"I hope so, Vasily Antoniovich. I wish you good luck in the games."

As they exited out the regimental headquarters, Novikov was in a better frame of mind. "Now that is a commander, Ilyusha. Take note of it. No excuses, no whining about conditions. He has a job to do and he does it. Which attitude do you think will get rewarded with more personnel?"

"I didn't attend the first meeting, Comrade Colonel," Illya said cautiously.

"True enough," the Colonel walked down the steps toward his waiting vehicle. "Jump in the back, boy. The officers' mess, Tarasov."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel."

At a secluded table in the officers' dining hall, Novikov continued his lesson. "Do you know the primary difference between Soviet and European Armies, Ilyusha?"

"No, Comrade Colonel."

"It is amazing the things they don't teach in schools. Foolish, because it is the first thing every Soviet child must learn."

"What is that?"

"The State rewards those who win. Do you know that any European commander can request backup support? Air support? Replacement troops if casualties become high?"

"Is that a bad thing?"

"For the individual European commander, no, of course not. But for the Supreme Commander of an Army, it is foolishness. The Supreme Commander must concentrate his forces where they will do the most good. If all of his commanders are slogging away in rough going, and one Army breaks through its resistance, while another

falls behind, should the Supreme Commander be forced to shore up those who are failing? No, that is the European way, a way doomed to weakness. In the Soviet Union, the extra troops, the air support is given to the ones who are winning. They are the only ones with the rights to support, to supplies, to replacements." He pointed a heavy hand at the boy opposite. "Those who produce."

"I understand, Comrade Colonel."

"It is the same for every citizen as it is in battle. Those who fulfill the goals of the state are supported and rewarded. It is a citizen's duty to know the needs of the state and answer them."

"Shouldn't the state tell the citizen what to do?"

"Not necessarily. Men are not machines, Ilyusha. That is where judgement comes in. Sometimes you must anticipate the needs of the state." The Colonel grew thoughtful. "There are risks to that, of course. In a wrong gamble, the state can be unforgiving. But great rewards can ensue if one guesses correctly."

Illya looked mulish and concentrated on his food.

"What is the matter?"

"I was never fond of gambling, Comrade Colonel," Illya said politely.

"On the contrary. From what I have seen you are an excellent gambler, Ilyusha. I wouldn't have bothered with you if you were not."

Illya frowned. "I don't wish to be disrespectful, Colonel, but those were games I never bothered to play."

"You are such a boy I forget what you don't understand. I am not talking of wagering for marbles or kopeks. Only boys and worthless men bother with such games. The only worthwhile wagers are for life and death, for survival, for victory or ignomious defeat. A man who wishes for accomplishments must take risks, calculated risks, or roll over and die. You have not died, Ilyusha. You have taken appropriate risks and, so far, you have won. You are alive when most others would be dead. For ten years of age, it is not a bad accomplishment."

They were returning to the jeep when Illya thought of the flaw in the argument. "But Comrade Colonel," he looked up into the man's face, squinting a little against the sun, "How do you know I'll want what the State wants?"

"Naturally, you still have to be taught," Novikov answered.

For a moment, Illya was non-plussed at the casualness of assumption made. Then his temper, so rarely let out of concealment, flared. If he'd been a real wolf, all the hairs on his spine would have stood up in honest outrage. As it was, he stubbornly stopped and stood his ground. "How do you know I'll be willing to learn it?"

Novikov grinned back in answering challenge, then picked him up, and tossed him casually in the back of the jeep, knocking the breath out of him. He sat up in the cargo area, rubbing a bruise as Novikov took his own seat in the jeep and gestured his adjutant to drive on. "That, boy, is my gamble."

Kuryakin glared back at the adjutant's sardonic glance as the jeep sped away. He rubbed his bruises surreptitiously and vowed to be more careful, since he didn't have enough padding on his bones to enjoy such games. He'd been shocked that Novikov had handled him; so far, the Army Colonel had seemed, like him, to prefer a judicious boundary of personal space. But he reminded himself that he knew little of the man. As much as he had vowed to start asking the questions that would help him define his situation -- and his risks, the Colonel had been right about him weighing those carefully -- he did not flatter himself that he had even begun to understand the Colonel's mind, though he was not so modest as to doubt that he might in time. The real question in that area was would he ask the right questions soon enough to acquire the abilities needed before the Colonel discovered he didn't have them. And to keep his temper. The brief flare on the steps had been a serious breach of judgement. He had to be much more careful.

Though he puzzled over his problem with the Colonel, he flattered himself that he understood the Colonel's adjutant. He didn't blame the man; he might have felt the same if he'd returned to discover a rag-tag besprihorznik had attached himself to his superior officer. Illya Kuryakin didn't have a high opinion of his own kind. He didn't blame the adjutant for looking askance at this urchin who was sleeping in the Colonel's quarters, albeit in a made-up bed, and eating at the Colonel's table, while the adjutant ate and slept in less exhaulted surroundings. He didn't blame the adjustant for regarding him as a dangerous interloper. What he disliked about the man was his refusal to accept the situation, indicated by his scornful glances. Was it not the Colonel's risk? If the adjutant had his fate intertwined with his superior officer's, was it wise to undermine him, even with a glance?

And Illya expected the looks to be followed by actions. He felt pretty sure he knew the type. Perhaps even better than his benefactor.

For the Red Army man, for all his knowledge of the levels of power, operated on the upper tiers of that yardstick. He undoubtably understood the movements of armies, of divisions, of whole fields of battle. The Colonel also understood, though Illya hadn't thought to that level, the realm of power behind the battlefield: the plots and counterplots that accompanied the rise and fall of various officers in their struggle toward rank and position in the Army and the Party. What the Colonel had moved beyond, that was still fresh in Illya's memory, was the petty, juvenile, bloody-your-nose skirmishes, the kind that adjutants use to jostle in their tiny field of battle. They were the same kind that besprihorzniks played in life and death games, because having so few resources they end up wagering all they have for power in the pack, for the right to keep their own gleanings, for the right to survive unmolested. In his own particular situation, he had opted for concealment rather than outright confrontation, since he had decided early on he was too small to survive in a pack. That didn't mean he hadn't had to protect himself and the orchard where he had his base of operations: where he gleaned, hunted and went to ground. Some of the wolves that Illya Kuryakin had killed had been human, though he saw no need to advertise any more crimes than had already been pinned on him.

His feelings of animosity toward Tarasov had nothing to do with the adjutant's reflexive move toward his gun at their first meeting. He had a high respect for reflexes, and a low opinion of his own kind, for most who had not starved outright had survived by vicious predation. What he disliked was the adjutant's continued covert expressions of animosity, even after the Colonel had called a halt to hostilities. He, himself continued to feel hostility to the adjutant, among others, but he was usually discreet enough not to advertise it and wondered why the adjutant, older and presumably wiser, was not.

He thought the man indiscreet, if not actually foolish, to exhibit inclinations counter to his superior's wishes, especially when he gained nothing substantial by it. Illya had long ago learned to calculate risk against gain. He admitted, in this instance, that although the gain for the adjutant seemed worthless to him, he had more trouble calculating the risk involved. Novikov treated his adjutant rather like a tool and one rarely credited tools with independent thoughts or actions. Possibly Novikov didn't need to care how his adjutant acted when the Colonel's attention was elsewhere. But Illya's own back had been too vulnerable recently to feel comfortable discrediting any threat.

Illya looked at the brick-walled and wire-topped enclose ahead of them and rose up in the back seat, worried out of his usual silence into asking a question. "What is this place?"

The adjutant spared him a brief glance and frowned. Novikov, buried again in papers from his briefcase, didn't answer. The walls loomed even larger as the jeep approached; Illya estimated they were at least sixteen feet, and the wire added another three or four. Such potential confinement required drastic measures. "Comrade Colonel?" He reached out and joggled the man's elbow. "Comrade Colonel, what is this place?"

"Eh?" Novikov looked up from his work. "This is the Headquarters of the Kiev Military District."

"But Kiev is far away," Illya said. "Isn't it?"

"A military district is large, Ilyusha. There are only sixteen of them in the Soviet Union. But yes, Kiev itself is far by your terms. Too far to get there by foot. We don't quarter our armies in the back yards of our cities, even for the convenience of runaway boys. So put that thought out of your mind."

Illya crouched down as the top of the brick wall came over the jeep. Not because the wall was close overhead. The gate was big enough for the largest of equipment. But because the walls reminded him of the walls of his former prison. He looked behind him as the gate swept closed in the wake of the jeep and shuddered. He found himself looking to the Colonel, thinking he wanted to go home.

Home? What home?

He made himself very small in the back of the vehicle.

The jeep pulled up before an administrative building that dwarfed the former two headquarters they had visited. Novikov exited the jeep and Illya jumped out beside him, determined not to get lost or left behind in this huge place.

"No. Back you go."

Illya looked up at him with tragic eyes, but the Colonel was obdurate, pushing him back in the jeep. "Stay with Tarasov." Halfway up the stairs, he turned and issued a warning. "And behave yourself!"

Illya watched the Colonel enter the building and the door close with finality behind him. He turned to enter the jeep and caught the Tarasov's cold, unwelcoming, slightly sardonic eyes. Suddenly, as if the man's animosity had triggered something, his throat caught with a white hot rage. Every hair was standing up at attention on his skin and on his scalp. He clenched his teeth, baring them slightly in the effort not to launch himself at the military man and go for his throat. He struggled with the effort to hold himself in check. Never in the last two years had he felt this way toward an adversary, animal or human and had to hold himself back. The effort must have been visible; Tarasov had flattened himself back against the driver's door of the jeep, watching him warily.

Illya's hands unclenched, and he panted a little as he reached for the jeep door. Tarasov reached for the handle of the door behind him, then caught himself and straightened. "What's wrong with you? Did you have some sort of fit?"

Illya sat in the passenger side of the jeep, staring moodily through the glass. The adrenalin rush of rage had passed over him quickly and he felt a little dizzy with the force of repressing it.

"I'm all right."

"Are you sick?"

Illya slid a look at the man, who was studying him now with a trace of humanity in his manner.

"No."

Tarasov grunted and put the jeep in gear. "You are a little animal, aren't you?"

Although he still felt as if he'd been run over by one of the huge tanks they were passing, he managed to turn his head and measure the adjutant with calculating eyes. "Not so very little." "No. Tarasov said thoughtfully. "You're not."

They drove back out through the gate, and Illya concentrated on the mud stirred up by the jeep's wheels through the snowmelt. This road had been plowed at the gate entrance, not snowpacked. The air was warmer, icicles were dripping down off the edge of the snow wall and sparking on the barbed wire. It was a beautiful day.

He wasn't going to ask where they were going.

The adjutant obviously wasn't going to tell him.

After awhile, the eyes in the back of his head told him just where the machine rifle was, and he considered the various ways he could grab it in an emergency. Only for that. Novikov's warning regarding his behavior was rattling around in his head, but he hadn't been with the man long enough for it to hold much weight. Not quite 'out of sight, out of mind'; the Colonel held too much strength of will to be so absolutely negated.

But he was gone.

The jeep roared down the road. Cold air moved in as the afternoon advanced, and trapped the warm air next to the ground. The beautiful day turned cloudy. It looked like it was going to storm.

They stopped at a church.

A former church, actually. It had been boarded up, with signs warning that the property belonged to the state. Tarasov rounded the jeep in from of it, where the snow pack ended, and they stared at ruin of buildings. The lay of the land had put them in a valley, and mist and fog clung to the ground, with the sun hidden in the bulk of hills. It gave the scene a ghostly, surrealistic feel. Illya was Russian, and thus superstitious. Communism could rob the people of religion, but nothing could extract the superstitious peasant that held fast the core of every Slavic soul. To Illya, the site seemed wrapped in myth and mysteries, compounded by his lack of knowledge about the religious symbols. The crosses and figures in the stained glass windows seemed to bend and sway, almost beckoning in the mist. He looked over at the adjutant, but the man himself seemed uneasy.

The main structure, though it lacked the onion dome so common in such places, must have been where services were held. In another large building, the religious must have lived. A third had a sagging roof and broken windows, but enough remained of its lettered sign to indicate that it had been a school.

"What a ruin," the adjutant said, breaking the spell. He picked up a case from the back of the seat. Illya regarded it suspiciously, but the case was smaller than the gun holstered at the man's side, and what he removed was only a camera. After much fiddling, the man pointed the camera at the site and took a picture. Setting the camera down on the case, he picked up a notepad and began sketching a description, noting the dimensions and the lay of the buildings. "Make yourself useful and pack that up!" he added.

Illya picked up the camera curiously. He had seen people using them once or twice in his life, at school functions. But he had never held one in his hands. He looked the camera over carefully before sliding in back into the leather bag.

When Tarasov had finished his sketching, he got back into the jeep and they took off down the road.

They stopped at another ruined church, one even more dilapidated than the first. It had the classic onion domes to go with its age, and had once been more beautiful. Tarasov spent even less time with his picture taking and sketching. Illya saw he was taking the building in with its lay of the land, adding in the access roads and probable dimensions. He wondered what the activity was for, but it didn't concern him so much that he would ask.

He was more interested in seeing the countryside. It wasn't as barren or isolated as he had thought. The Colonel's military headquarters was on high ground. Not the peak of a mountain, but the top of a large foothill, and thus seemed more isolated than it was. If he had to run for it, he gave himself a better chance of surviving than he had originally estimated. And he appreciated Tarasov showing him these abandoned churches. In his village, housing was scarce, and the old church had been turned into a grainary by the state. It hadn't occured to him that there were actual empty buildings available for refuge. The possibilities offered by this gave him much food for thought, so much so that he reconciled himself to the presence of the adjutant, who seemed to prefer to overlook him as well.

The third place they stopped was not a church, but had once been a school, before a fire had destroyed half of it. The smoke blackened sign spelled out the words "St. Cyril's Military Academy." Illya could see a statue of a creature with wings brandishing a stone saber in front of the building, challenging them in their trespass. He stared at it, amazed at the thought that statues were erected of anyone besides Stalin. Absurd as the creature was though, it was better to look at than Stalin.

He figited while Tarasov fiddled with the camera, and got out of the jeep himself.

"Don't run off," the adjutant complained. "I'm not chasing after you."

Illya ignored him. Now that he doubted the adjutant would kill him, he had lost some of his reserve toward the man. "Why are you looking at these places? Aren't religious places prohibited?"

"None of your business, besprihorznik."

Illya looked over at the man's hasty sketches, and frowned. "You haven't got the proportions right, either."

"How would you know, scum?"

Illya climbed back into the jeep and stood on the passenger seat, so that he was at the adjutant's height, and stared at the buildings. "I have eyes."

"Hey! Get off there with your muddy boots. The adjutant grabbed for the boy, but he was hampered by his papers, and Illya scrambled down. Tarasov raised a hand.

Illya's chin went up, blue eyes cutting through the misty air at Tarasov, baring his teeth in a snarl. The adjutant hand stopped in midair, and then slowly lowered it and pointed instead to the jeep. "Do that again and I'll wipe the mess up with you," Tarasov growled into the silence. "That's the Colonel's seat."

"It is only snow, and not much snow." Illya brushed it aside with a sleeve. He was confused himself as to why the military man hadn't at least cuffed him, if only to save face. He felt a trifle embarrassed, almost apologetic, as if his world was turning inside out. Was he a boy or a besprihorznik, a vicious little animal? Did he have fangs or only teeth?

He didn't understand himself, and he sensed neither did the adjutant. None of them knew how to deal with the other.

He wished for the Colonel, who seemed to know who he was, and had a clear idea of where he wanted him to go.

"If you've finished with the seat, let's go," Tarasov growled. "I can't be late picking up the Colonel from his meeting."

"I'm ready to go back," Illya said soberly.

And most troublesome of all, he meant it.

Illya surreptitiously stamped his feet and tucked his fingers under his armpits. His toes were cold, but if he kept his feet moving he was all right. He lashes were coated with snow, and the wind howled through the trees like a thing possessed. The snow fell in sheets, thick and blinding, so thick the observers almost couldn't see the tanks. But the Colonel didn't seem to notice the snow, other than remarking it was perfect weather for field exercises.

Ahead of him were more high ranking military officers than he had ever seen in his life. He, who had run and hid like a rabbit at the sight of the local militsia, now was in the company of a half dozen generals and colonels. None of them paid any attention to him, of course, a little page who ran and did his colonel's bidding. Their eyes were fixed on the actions of the troops. Though how they could even see them through this white-out was a mystery to Illya. The tanks were covered with white sheets, for camoflage in the snow, making them even harder to identify. And the tank officers gave orders by radio or by flag signals. The tanks, for all their bulk, could move almost silently, eerily through the terrain. When the tanks were moving into position, searching for targets, the forest was almost quiet. But it didn't stay quiet.

These were war games, and they were played with live rounds. The first time he heard a tank fire, he hadn't known what to expect. He was used to the report of a gun, and he had foolishly expected something like that. When the first tank fired it's shell, he'd nearly jumped out of his skin, his coat and his boots from the shock of the explosion.

Still, he found it exhilerating. And he discovered he loved the crash of the guns, the burst of flame and sound as the huge tanks fired their shells, exploding and utterly destroying the mock targets. The blast of fire and black gunpowder jetting through the snow was wonderful to see. He, who had loved his guns and bullets, discovered an affinity with these huge machines. If a revolver was safety, and a machine gun security, then a tank had to be the ultimate in survivalist fare. He wanted to drive one. He wanted to fire one. He wanted to blast a target out of the ground, like the tanks below were doing to the mock missile battery.

He couldn't remember having so much fun.

It was, though, cold and wet. He could retreat to the jeep, and rest, but that was not much protection from the elements, and that was a child's action. And he had duties, too, of a sort. Novikov sent him on errands when the adjutant was busy elsewhere. It piqued his mischievious spirit to see the regimental commanders surprise when they saw the size of their messenger. But he was very quick in a footrace, even in the snow, and he learned the positions of all the regimental commanders quickly. The battalions and companies moved around, hiding their command posts, but the regimental headquarters were fixed during these wargames. He learned them all, and moreso, he learned which were good and which were bad. Which performed well, and which were out of favor. And why.

"10.9 seconds, 14.2 seconds, 12.8 seconds," one of the lietenants would run up and report, and an officer would scowl at the time it took to get a regiment into the field and on the move. Illya could see the men moved desparately, heroically, as though their lives depended on it. No doubt some day it would, but this time it was only a game.

People were injured and some even killed during the occasional accident, in spite of the fact that there was no enemy to fight here. In spite of the occasional accident, there was hardly the risk Illya had encountered in one day in his woods, with the State as well as every villager against him, and wolves and other besprihorzniks ready to prey on his throat. This was only a game. But Illya could see everyone took it very seriously, as a preparation for something else. Another war.

But what was another war to him? That was the problem of the State. He had his own problems to worry about. But he postponed them for a few days enjoying the fun.

Tanks ran down whole trees. Walls were knocked down in the tank parks in the rush to get the army in the field under those critical timespans. Equipment broke down, became enmired in snow and mud and everyone sweated and strained to get it free. And when a target came into view! How everyone flew into action! How silly and pathetic the targets were, with their tree-branch camoflagues and their painted mock signs. Then the tanks fired, sometimes together, sometimes not, but the air filled with the rush of flame and soot, the crash of explosions. Into his nostrils flew the stench of oil and gunsmoke, of burning wood and overheated metal.

His teachers and parents, and parent's friends had talked of the horrors of war. And he had memories of his own, of destruction. But there was a difference between fleeing like a rabbit from destruction or having a weapon of your own to fight with. If another war came, he made himself a promise. He wasn't going to hide in the woods, hoping to be missed, or run as a deserter from the army, everyone's prey: country and foe alike. He was going to have one of these. He was going to join the army. He was going to have a tank.

Illya wandered through the Colonel's quarters. The Colonel was in a staff meeting, and Illya had been left behind. He sat at the round table and flipped through the items there. The Colonel was not a reader; and Illya regretted that, with all the benefits of his return to civilization, if an army camp could be called that, he hadn't had returned to him the one thing he truly missed, books.

But the Colonel did possess a few items, and Illya had read them cover to cover. The arms manual and a few military journals. On the table was also a portfolio. After a moment, Illya flipped it open. The first few pages held the sketched Tarasov had done of the three sites they had visited. The rest of the book was empty, a bare expanse of creamy blank pages.

He bit his lip for a moment, staring at the paper. He hadn't held a blank notebook in his hand for two years, and he had never had a book like this.

He decided that compared to the food he consumed every day, using a few pieces of paper wouldn't upset the colonel too much.

He pulled the three drawings out of the book and carefully set them aside, so as not to smudge them. Then took the drawing pencil out of the spiral binding, and stared at the first blank page. What to draw? He could draw his old house, sometimes he dreamed of it so much that he felt it could easily draw it from memory. He could draw the view from the window just before him. Or he could copy illustrations from the arms manual, or from one of the magazines. It might be nice to have his own drawing of a tank.

But then his attention was caught by the last drawing the adjutant had done, the drawing of the school. It really was poorly proportioned. The adjutant hadn't had much time, trying to quickly sketch the thing. He could do the Colonel a service, and justify his use of the sketch pad, by drawing the school again.

He looked at the adjutant's poor drawing, then closed his eyes and envisioned the school in his mind. The lay of the hllls behind. The sweep of the fields. The placement of the roads. The position of the sun and the points of the compass. He'd learned a very good visual memory, since he hadn't had any paper or pencils in his hands. When he had found a good stand of berry bushes, or fruit or nut trees to glean, and had to return to the site again and again to gather the harvest, he'd had to remember such things very carefully. It had served him well to remember.

He opened his eyes, stared at the blank sheet of paper, and bisected it with a sweep of the carbon pencil.

He lost himself in the drawing.

Novikov entered his quarters and headed for the fire. He was disappointed to find it out.

"Ilyusha!"

"Comrade Colonel!" Illya came out of the bathroom. "Did you want me?"

"You let the fire die. This is not your hovel in the woods, boy. I don't care for ice on the inside of the windows."

"I am sorry, Comrade Colonel. I lost track of time," the boy dropped to his knees to fill the pot-bellied stove.

"Humphf!" the Colonel flexed his hands before the feeble warmth as the boy coaxed the still warm ashes to life. "I am getting old, boy. I can trudge about in snow in the heat of battle and it does not affect me. But put me in a chair for half a day, and I stiffen up like an old babushka."

"It will be warmer soon, Comrade Colonel."

Novikov didn't listen, picking up the pad off the table. "Where did this come from?"

"I drew it, Comrade Colonel."

"You?"

"Yes, Comrade Colonel. It was what I was doing when I let the fire go out. I'm sorry."

"But this is very good. Who taught you to draw, Ilyusha?"

"No one taught me, Comrade Colonel. Perhaps I come by it naturally. My parents are -- were artists of a sort. Musicians are artists, too, you know," Illya said diffidently.

"To think you did this better than Tarasov!" Novikov said.

"He did his drawing in a few moments, Comrade Colonel. I spent a long time on mine."

"I'm not speaking of the details. I am not interested in a pretty picture, boy. But the proportions, and the lay of the land are quite correct. Very nice."

"Thank you, Comrade Colonel."

"But I must tell you," Novikov went on, looking at Illya over the edge of the pad, "not to draw like this again."

"What?"

"Do you know what will happen if some scholarly administrator sees this? He'll put you in a school for artists. Yes, the state needs artists too. Photographs are all very well, but a camera's lens can be limited. It is only so wide, and it has no judgement. Important details can be obscured, like the lay of this road here. And unimportant details, like this pond in the foreground, can have too much emphasis. Elevations are obscure. Treelines conceal important details. Drawings and maps can be much more useful to a military man than photographs. Drawings and photographs combined, the most useful of all. But you have too much potential in other ways to sit behind a pencil and sketchbook. Oh, very well, don't look so martyred. Yes, you can draw, but only show the drawings to me."

"Thank you, Comrade Colonel."

"Now, tell me about this site. Let's see how accurate your estimation is."

Illya looked at the rough sketch he had made for reference, consulted his memory, then carefully shaded in a treeline. He and Tarasov had visited three more sites today, and the Colonel had made it a requirement that he draw them all. When the Colonel picked the sites he wished to personally inspect, he would determine the accuracy of Illya's drawings.

Purely as an exercise, Novikov had said. He wasn't interested in Illya's drawing ability, saying that although it was a useful talent, he considered it the least of Illya's useful talents. But even those should be exercised from time to time.

So Illya was drawing. Although his fussy sensibilities insisted he be as accurate as possible, he drew without any real sense of pressure. Odd, to do something without feeling that it had life or death consequences.

He popped a sunflower seed into his mouth, and cracked the shell to get to the sweet nut within. He nibbled away at the tiny meat with his front teeth, savoring the taste. The Colonel had unexpectedly given him a glass of the seeds yesterday, remarking he'd been practically forced to buy them by a insistant old babushka. But Illya had been touched by the kindness in the gift; he hadn't tasted any since the time he'd almost lost his life stealing a whole sunflower head from a village garden.

Leaning back against the hearth to study his drawing critically, he tossed the oily black shells from his lips into the fire, where they snapped and flared into flame. Laying the drawing down, he warmed his hands before the blaze, then laced his fingers together and stretched his shoulder muscles. His cup was empty; he rose on stocking feet to fill it from the samovar, and added a thick lump of sugar to it. Glancing over at the Colonel, he saw his cup was still half full. He would have asked if the Colonel wanted it freshened with hot tea, but the man's brow was furrowed over his papers, and Illya preferred not to bother him except when necessary when he had that expression. Beside, if the Colonel wanted tea, he wasn't above asking Illya to fetch it.

Carrying his cup back to the hearth, he sat down and raised his stocking feet to the stove, warming them from their trip across the chill floor, and then, feet still lifted to the fire, took a sip of steaming tea. The strong, aromatic liquid burned all the way down to his stomach, a comforting blaze. Feet, mouth and belly warm, he cracked another sunflower seed, and pulled his sketching pad into his lap. But instead of working on his drawing, he stared into the hissing flames.

He felt odd. Not sick, although the feeling was a rare as that. Not even content, which he couldn't remember being for a long time. No, it was even stranger than that. He felt happy. Happy to have food in his belly, a fire on the hearth, and occupation for his mind. But he'd had that in the woods, too, sometimes. He'd never had such a thick, cheerful blaze, or such a constant surfeit of food, but he'd never frozen or starved either, in spite of a familiarity with cold and hunger. He'd had plenty of occupation for his mind in the woods, too. Nothing could be more consuming than the puzzle of how to survive.

Perhaps this fragile feeling wasn't the result of something that he had, but something that was missing: the knawing sense that death could be waiting only minutes away. He knew he had no real security, death still waited out there, perhaps only a few days or weeks away. But he felt confident it wasn't coming tonight or even tomorrow. For someone who'd lived on the precipice of security, as he had done, it was enough to secure a kind of happiness.

It was a dangerous feeling. But he was familiar enough with danger that it didn't quell his pleasure one iota from enjoying it. He'd dare to be happy. Even if only for just a little while.

"Illyusha."

"Yes, Comrade Colonel," Illya squirmed his way through the knot of lieutenants to Novikov in the front of the ranks.

"Go and take this to Tarasov in the Regimental Commander's office.

"At once, Comrade Colonel."

Major General ... brushed shoulders with Novikov. "That's the boy who won you a case of vodka, wasn't it Comrade Colonel?"

"Yes, Comrade General."

"I thought you were sending him onto school."

"I have to, yes," Novikov replied thoughtfully, then shrugged. "It is a task I must get around to. Until then, the boy is proving useful in his way."

"Yes, I can see. He takes up less space than an adjutant, and probably is more inteligent. Of course, a raw recruit is also more inteligent than most adjutants," the General laughed at his own joke. "And a good shot in the bargain. Perhaps you should just get him a commision, Comrade Colonel?"

"In time, Comrade General. But you do remind me, I have been delinquent in my task. The Army is no place for boys, even useful ones."

"You have a good eye, boy," Novikov said, comparing Illya's drawing to the site before him. "I'm impressed. And I'm also impressed with the location. With such rising ground there's less risk from typhus. Good level fields for drill, too."

"It was a military academy before, Comrade Colonel," Tarasov said.

"Yes, I imagine under the snow is the remnants of the old firing range. The buildings are in some disrepair, but I suspect they can be renovated easily enough. This will do." He turned back to the jeep. "Organize those personnel searches, Tarasov. I'm going to need to find a director to take over the job of reconstruction and preparation."

"They are ready for your perusal, Comrade Colonel."

"Good. Set up the interviews immediately."

"At once, Comrade Colonel. I'm sure Illya Nickovetch is eager to settle into his new home."

"What did Tarasov mean by my new home, Comrade Colonel?" Illya had waited for dinner to be nearly over, and had choked down his own. It took a lot to throw off his appetite. Even under threat to what little security he'd known. Especially then. One could never be sure when that strength would be needed.

"You have to go to school, Ilyusha. I told you, from the beginning, that your stay here would be only temporary."

"I have tried to be useful."

"This has nothing to do with being useful or not, Ilyusha. You belong in school. But your school doesn't even exist yet; it still needs to be renovated and staffed. That will take some time."

"How long?"

"Perhaps six weeks. Perhaps longer."

Illya determined to make himself indispensible in the next six weeks. And to consider quietly disappearing if he didn't succeed. In six weeks winter would be loosing its grip on the land. In some respects that was the bleakest period: nature had been gleaned of all its natural nourishment of nuts and dried berries, and animals lived off bark and pruning the gradually swelling buds of vegetation. Non-existant pickings for him. But he could work on storing a chache of food stolen here to keep him till spring came in earnest. He could get hold of a weapon too, if necessary, and feast luxuriously off animals weakened by the winter to become easy pickings. He was a resourceful sort. He'd think of something.

"What are you calculating behind that mask of yours?"

"Nothing, Comrade Colonel."

"You are going to school, boy. Don't evnen think of anything else."

He could always run away from the school, too.

The truth was, he thought a week later, that Novikov simply didn't need him. That was obvious, of course. The man had managed all these years without one orphaned traitor to the State, and would probably manage as well, if not better in future, without him. He could run errands, hold doors, and summon jeeps and none of it made the slightest difference. He could even win cases of vodka, and shoot bulls-eyes and draw detailed maps and still none of that was essential.

It hurt, to realize that he was going to be abandoned again. To be completely alone again. With no one in the world to care if he lived or died. And no one to care for.

He racked his brains to think of a way to change fate, and nothing came to him.

And the weekly visits to check on the progress of the school continued.

"Proshaite, Ilyusha," Novikov said, putting out a hand and grasping the boy by the shoulder in a soldier's farewell.

"Proshaite, Comrade Colonel" Illya Nickovetch murmurred, then shook his head. "Nyet. Dosvidanya. Dosvidanya," But he said it to Novikov's retreating back.

The notice he received from the school had been delayed and forwarded several times and, like all Soviet mail, had been slit open, read, censored and approved as to content before being resealed and finally delivered. The text was short, merely informing him that students could be released to appropriate guardians for the long May Day celebrations and holiday.

He was only fifty miles or so from the school. Close enough to pick him up should he choose.

He didn't choose. Not consciously. But somehow, on his road to Kiev, he found himself detouring to ___.

He had not arranged it in advance, of course, as the letter dictated. But no one, seeing the General's rank on his uniform, dared to question him. He was shown into a small parlor and asked to wait for only a moment.

The room was spare but clean. Better furnished than most home parlors. The schoolyard outside was neatly policed and functional, a cleared space for drill, a melange of gym and athletic equipment, bars, ropes, obstacle courses, and farther afield, a shooting and target range. A good school. He hadn't had better.

The door opened and he turned, and was surprised, almost not recognizing the boy who entered. He remembered a shaven headed urchin, clearly an outcast even in his borrowed clothes. Now he could hardly see the child for his crisp school uniform, a stiffly starched bright red Komsomol scarf neatly knotted at his throat. The blue eyes were the same, but they were outshone by quantities of shining blond hair.

He didn't remember the color of the matted and lice infested thatch the boy had worn when he first encountered him, nor the color of the stubble growing out from his shaved skull in the two weeks he had kept him before turning him over to the school. But it had been six months. Hair grew in six months. Even if the boy hadn't seemed to.

Novikov said nothing for a moment, trying to reconcile his memories with the child that stood before him. The boy seemed to be equally in shock, his eyes growing almost too huge for his face, and he took a quick indrawn breath at the sight of his visitor. But he seemed only too aware of the school administrator at his back, and waited stiffly.

"Well, Illya Nickovetch, are you going to prove to the general that we taught you nothing here? Greet your sponsor properly, boy, and then you may go and get your kit. The General is taking you away for the holiday break."

The bored man looked up to his important guest. "Do you wish any refreshment brought before you continue your journey, General?"

"No. That will be all."

"Comrade General," the man nodded and left.

The boy waited for the door to close behind the man before he said, his face perfectly straight, but some imp of mischievousness in his face, "Greetings, Comrade General."

"And have you learned nothing here?" Novikov challenged.

The boy grinned then, fleeting and then ruthlessly suppressed to only a glimmer in his eyes. "A few things."

"Go and get your kit," Novikov growled.

He barely saw the flash of gleaming hair as the boy turned and ran from the room. A bellow from the hallway roared out as some monitor protested the running on the stairs, and then quickly broke off as someone must have warned him about the important visitor. Illya Nickovetch was back, breathless, in less than a minute.

"That was quick," Novikov commented, feeling an odd sense of deja vu as the child climbed into the jeep.

"Our kits are always packed," the boy commented. "It is the sign of a good soldier."

Novikov was amused. "And are you a good soldier?"

"I am learning some things," the boy answered. "But they are only teachers, you know. Not soldiers."

"Do you want to be a soldier?" Novikov asked curiously.

The boy met his eyes frankly, and Novikov was a little astounded by the intense, calculating look of them. But the boy avoided the question. "You could better teach me what I need to know."

"I'm no teacher," Novikov growled. "Nor any drill sergeant. You are better off where you are." He pulled the jeep over by the side of an in he favored for the equisite table it could offer to those of appropriate rank, and skewered his companion with a glance. "You don't seem to have grown, boy. You're as thin as when I first saw you. Don't they feed you at that school?"

"My teachers say the wiry physique is actually stronger than an overly muscular one, and endures better."

"That wasn't my question," Novikov growled.

"We are fed well enough," Illya answered, but his head went up as they walked into the dining room and the smells of food assaulted them. Novikov made a mental note to have the school audited to make sure the allocations made for provisions were being appropriately spent. No doubt the money was ending up in someone's pocket -- or the food was in someone else's larder. Considering the possible trail of corruption distracted him from his former conversation, until Illya raised it again.

"I could be useful to you," the boy offered, after they were seated around a linen-laid table and obsequious waiter had left.

"The school reports you have quite a head for math and science. The army needs such skills. You will learn to be more useful to the state where you are," Novikov dismissed.

"Where was the state when I was starving and freezing in the woods?" the boy said coldly, his voice low and soft.

Novikov frowned at him. "I hope you don't let your teachers hear you speak like that.

The child gave him a look equisite in its scorn, and tilted his head around the empty dining room, as if to emphasize their isolation, "I learned how to conceal myself in the woods. It is not very different to conceal myself at school, in a different way. No one knows me there. No knows who and what I really am, but you. Do you think I am a fool?"

"Would I waste my time with one?" Novikov growled. "But you are only a boy. You must learn to be careful. Never trust anyone."

"I stopped being a child a long time ago. And I do trust someone. I trust you."

"Don't," Novikov said.

"I will," Illya said. "And I could be useful to you. I was, before, you know." His voice dropped low as the waiter approached with a basket of bread. They paused in their conversation until the man had left.

"I cannot take a boy into battle," Novikov said impatiently.

Kuryakin paled, looking up from the roll he was lavishly embellishing with butter. "But there is no war. You do not go into battle now."

"There is always war."

He relaxed. "But not real war. No one is trying to kill you."

"What do you mean?" Novikov was amused, this time. He speared a piece of bread for himself. "Wasn't there a wolf cub, not six months ago, trying his best to slit my throat for me?"

The boy colored furiously, but then he looked worried again. "But then it is important that I stay with you. I could protect you. No one would suspect me, and I --"

"Enough of this," Novikov said, no longer amused. "At the end of the holiday, you are going back to school Ilyusha. I am a soldier, and have taken more risks than you have years. And if I should lose one day, well, you will easily forget about me, and go on. That is your duty. Your first duty is to the state."

The boy's jaw tightened and he stared down at his plate. "You told me before not to be a fool." He raised cold blue eyes to the military man. "Where is the lie in that?"

For a moment Novikov paused, first astounded, and then furious at the impertinence of the boy. He was accustomed, in his rank and station, to instant obedience or obsequious fawning from underlings. It took him a moment to remember he had saved this boy precisely because of that indomitable spirit as well as the intelligence that, so rare in combination to it, made the boy recognize the inconsistency. He spent another moment weighing the cost of candor.

"Very well, Ilyusha. You are wise enough to know, privately, that your first duty is to yourself. Then to the state. But never let anyone know that."

"And what of you?" The boy said. "I have a duty--"

"No." Novikov interrupted him with an abrupt hand gesture. "I am nothing to you, Ilyusha." He studied his companion, who was staring, eyes dark and mouth taut, fixedly at his plate, knowing the boy was thinking of the corollary, that the boy was nothing to him. And however personally he might feel otherwise, practically that was true. No use giving the boy false allusions. "I am a solder, and that means my future can never be certain. The state can take care of you, Ilyusha, and it will, if you are careful to preserve your usefulness to it. But I cannot take care of you, and you cannot rely on me. One day you may receive a notice that I am no more, and it will mean nothing to you.

He paused as the waiter brought their dinner, steaming soup and delicious cabbage rolls. Illya did not look up from his plate, where the crumbled roll sat uneaten, even when the waiter left.

"It will mean nothing to you," Novikov continue, trying to get through the boy's black mood. "You will continue your studies, you will eat your meals and you will go on. Come now, your dinner has arrived." He tapped the boy's chin up, a quirk in his own mouth chasing away the desolation in the boy's eyes. He handed him the soup spoon from his place setting. "I am not dead yet, and I know you are hungry." He fixed the boy with a determined glance before he let go of the chin. "And you will be hungry, then, too."

"I won't be hungry," the boy said, scowling, defiant, but he dipped the spoon into the soup, apparently willing to put off consideration of such a future.

But Novikov, refused to let him get away with that, leaning over and grabbing a handful of the thick blond hair. He tilted his head back, not roughly or painfully, but forcing him to meet his eyes. "You'll be hungry," he stated definitely.

The boy glared back, tacitly refusing the order.

Novikov tightened his grip on the blond hair, reinforcing his words with a little pain. "Yes. You will forget and you will go on." He held the gaze until the boy's eyes watered, and a single tear beaded at their far corners and wound their way down to his temples.

Illya blinked angrily, and tried to unsuccessfully shake his head free of the confining hand.

"Your first duty, Ilyusha," Novikov reminded him softly, but he didn't loosen his tight grasp. "Answer me."

"I'll be hungry." The words came from a tight throat, and as Novikov loosened the handful of hair, the boy ducked his head again.

"Eat your soup before it cools," Novikov growled.

They finished the rest of the meal in silence.

Six months later, Illya Nickovetch Kuryakin bounded down the stairs towards the director's office, carefully slowing as he reached the more public landing. He straightened his red kerchief, finger combed his hair, and continued sedately down the final landing, nodding to the adolescent guard on duty, before knocking at the wooden door.

The director looked up as he entered, and gestured him to a seat. Kuryakin sat, mystified. Normally, he remained standing though such interviews, having been called for chastisement, extra work details, or some other punitive issue.

"A notice arrived today, Ilyusha, concerning your sponsor." The man held out a scrap of paper.

Illya took it, and stood staring at the half dozen words on the page.

"Missing in action does not mean deceased, of course. But your benefactor was a true soldier, not likely to let himself be taken alive in battle. We will treat this as a notice of death. Therefore, you are excused from evening drill tonight. You are expected at morning drill tomorrow." The director took the paper back from the numb fingers. "You are dismissed, Illya Nickovetch." When the boy didn't move, he said sharply. "That is all."

Illya stood in the hallway as the door abruptly closed at his back. The sentry on duty stared curiously at him, and Illya moved automatically, going out to the empty drill yard. Everyone was in their quarters, taking advantage of the fifteen minute break between dinner and the evening drill. In a few minutes, the stairs would resound with trampling feet, and the yard would be filled with scrambling students.

He slipped into the kitchen yard to avoid the crush. The yard was small, crowded with garbage cans, a drying line for linens, and a scarred door that lead into the kitchens that were strictly off limits to the students. He could see through the door a wooden counter with a dozen loaves of bread for the morning's breakfast cooling on a wire rack. He stared at the loaves numbly.

"You'll continue your studies," Novikov's voice echoed oddly in his head. "And you'll be hungry. You'll be hungry."

He slipped in and out the kitchen door as quickly as an eel.

The fat cook stopped before the wooden counter and stared. She had set a dozen loaves out to cool. Though not highly educated, she could count well enough to see there were only ten loaves there now.

She looked around at the two doors, one leading to the washing up room, one to the dining room, one to the yard. She could hear the tramp and chant of students outside. No boy could be missing from that without instant repercussions. The theft had to have come from someone on the staff. But if she complained, an investigation might uncover her own liberties with the provisions.

She decided to slice the remaining loaves thinner for the students' breakfast. Likely, no one would notice, or if they did, the parentless brats wouldn't have anyone to take their complaints to anyway.

On the farthest side of the shooting range, Illya Nickovetch sat with his back to a target -- a dangerous practice for anyone who did not know the routine of the school as well as he did. No one would be shooting now, but no on