“Still there?”
The whine of the enemy’s engine took on a different tone. He peeled out of the dive, up and mercifully away from them. “Gone, he’s gone—can we please—”
“Now,” Revna shouted.
Linné pushed with everything she had. The engine roared back to life. Revna pulled the Strekoza onto a new set of strands and it turned sharply upward.
Laughter bubbled out of them. They sped toward the sky, half choking, half screaming. “I told you I could do it,” Revna gasped.
She could do it. She could do anything. Together, they could do anything. The Strekoza danced up, cocky and exulted, toward the enemy plane. Now it was Linné’s turn. She had nothing but flash bombs and the fiery spark in her body, but she didn’t need anything more. It was time for the Elda to see what they’d brought on themselves. She brought her hand up, waiting for her moment. Heat pooled in her palm.
The underbelly of the plane flashed by in a stream of red and gold. Firebird and stars. “Shit.” The spark boiled out of her. She twisted so it missed the tail of the plane by centimeters, streaming out into the cold air.
“You missed!” Revna yelled. The cockpit grew warm with indignation. “How could you miss? He was right on top of you.”
Linné sagged. “He wasn’t Elda.”
Around them, the Falcons began to break formation. She saw it again, the star of the Union under one wing, the bird under the other. Her stomach dropped, and this time it had nothing to do with her fear of flying. The new planes sped toward the base, leaving a few confused Strekozy and a cluster of tiny figures on the field staring up at them.
Revna turned in her seat to stare after them, openmouthed. “What happened?”
“We got screwed.”
Everyone landed and disembarked before the viewing party got back to the base, and the girls clustered together against a sea of angry faces. Seventeen adapted Falcon-class planes took up most of the space on the airfield, and thirty-four male pilots and navigators stood opposite the Night Raiders.
“Were you trying to kill us?” one of the Falcon pilots said.
“Can you tell the difference between our flag and the Elda’s?” said another.
“You’re a joke. This whole thing is a joke.”
The girls looked as if they wanted to cry. For once, Linné didn’t blame them. Anger burned in her belly. But shame crept through her, too. Her old regiment would never have fired on their own. She imagined her father, pale with rage. He’d have said that a soldier took his dressing-down and punishment without complaint, like a man.
But the Night Raiders weren’t men, and Linné wasn’t her father. She was their supervisor, and she’d been cheated of her right to a fair judgment. Again.
She stepped forward, pushing her shoulders back, taking charge. “You had no business flying on an active airbase without notifying us you’d be coming.”
“Notifying you?” sputtered one aviator. “These maneuvers were arranged yesterday by radio.”
“We almost died because you didn’t read the paperwork?” said another.
Arranged? Zima would never have surprised them on their examination day. Hesovec must have undermined them. Hesovec, who knew they couldn’t afford to look like fools. Hesovec, who wanted them off his base and out of his life.
The palanquin pulled up and settled on its spindly haunches. Men began to pile out. At first Linné couldn’t see Zima among them, but her commander soon appeared, running to keep up with a storming Colonel Hesovec.
“Disgraceful,” he shouted smugly as he approached. “Engaging your own troops. Unable to distinguish between your allies and your enemies. In the confusion of battle, we would have had a bloodbath. You think you’re ready to go to war? You can’t even figure out who to shoot.”
“Colonel.” Zima caught up to him on the edge of the field. “You’re being unfair, Colonel. You know this.”
“I know no such thing,” he snarled. “You want to coddle these girls, but that’s not what the war is for. You can’t keep lying to them. We all saw what happened.”
“Yes, they showed an impressive array of skills and tactics to avoid enemy aircraft.” Zima spoke in cold, clipped tones. Her face was white with rage. “They were able to think in the air and discern that the other planes in the sky were not a threat. Many of them completed the planned maneuvers.”
“More than one of them fired on my boys,” Hesovec said. “Would you call it good skill or bad that they missed, Miss Zima?”
“You set them to it. You told them to make the ambush. What does the army say about using resources to damage reputations and prove a point?” she shouted.
“Enough.” Tcerlin stood next to the palanquin, having a smoke. The night obscured his face, but his tone was far from friendly. “You men: I presume you’re here to drop off your aircraft. Kindly familiarize the pilots who will receive them with their workings. Ladies, there’s a field that contains your flag and a few shells. It would be fine exercise to hike out and pick them up. As for the two of you,” he said to Zima and Hesovec, “I presume we can finish this inside.”
Zima started off briskly. “My office,” she said, and Tcerlin followed. Hesovec seethed at the girls one last time before he broke into a trot to catch up.
The Night Raiders’ mood was subdued for the rest of the day. They collected their shells and went back to the barracks, but no one could sleep. Revna’s anger toward the colonel and his aviators was squashed by an ugly disappointment. She’d thought she was doing well. She’d thought she could finally face the Elda and make her magic something she could be proud of. And in the end, it had all been for nothing. She wondered how long it would be before Mama got the notice revoking their Protector of the Union status again.
She should have known something like this would happen. The Union didn’t care about her. It didn’t want her to succeed. And it never would.
“How long until they send us home?” said Katya, shrugging out of her jacket and pulling a pile of hairpins from her bag.
Nadya set down her writing kit and began counting on her fingers. “If Tcerlin radios now, we could be grounded by tonight. But it would still take… three days minimum to requisition the Strekozy and take them off the field.”
“As long as everyone plays by the rules,” added Pavi.
Katya began pinning her hair in too-tight curls. Her normally agile fingers fumbled the pins until she finally put them down with a growl of frustration. “I don’t understand,” she said. “We practiced so much. How did we get everything so wrong?”
“We didn’t.” To Revna’s surprise, it was Linné who spoke. The room rustled as thirty-two girls turned to look at her. She didn’t lift her eyes from her bed. “We were ready. That’s why Hesovec cheated. It’s why he planned the maneuvers and didn’t tell us.”
There was a short silence. “Linné,” Katya said in a hushed, almost reverent voice. “Are you being nice?”
Linné sighed and flopped back onto the mattress. “Screw you.” But she didn’t sound as if she meant it. Revna felt a warm flash—was it affinity? Perhaps both of them were cursed. Linné to never fight, no matter how hard she tried. Revna to destroy her family, whether that family was Mama and Papa and Lyfa or a flock of ragtag girls from every country in the Union.
The room fell into a gloomy silence. No one wanted to talk about the mess they’d made, so they went through their routines, over and over, as if the repetition itself might finally put them to sleep. Katya took up her pins again. Revna rubbed her residual limbs with a cream she’d requisitioned from the hospital. She loved her prosthetics, but it was nice to give her legs a break at the end of each long day.
As she worked in the cream, she thought about the letter she was trying to write to Mama, but all her news seemed so pointless. Dear Mama: Today we were tricked, and I’ve probably ruined your life again. Dear Mama: I know I’m cursed now. Dear Mama: The Union still hates me. Even though she was trying to risk her life for it
. Thirteen-year-old boys were good enough to be drafted, but Revna was apparently so odious that grown men would cheat to keep her grounded.
She’d received two letters in the last mail drop, a detailed one from Mama and scrawled loops that, Mama assured her, meant I LOVE YOU from Lyfa. Mama spent three full paragraphs on their new status—the green ration stamps that got them pork once a week, the bunkers with concrete reinforcement and benches, the old rifle she’d bullied out of the commissar. ------ would have laughed, she wrote.
Revna could guess what the redacted portion said. Papa would have laughed. He’d often said that the only time Mama yielded to anyone was the day she agreed to marry him. Once he’d been taken away, her will had seemed to wilt. Revna was glad to see some of it returning.
Lyfa was finally gaining weight again, catching up to the height she’d put on in the last few months. Mama thanked Revna for the money she’d sent home, too, but money didn’t buy food anymore. Workers were paid in ration stamps at the end of each fourteen-hour shift. No one liked the increase in hours, but there wasn’t much they could do. Revna didn’t need the redacted portions to see what Mama meant. If you didn’t agree to work, you didn’t eat. Mama hoped Revna’s money would make good savings for after the war.
Longing swept through Revna all the same. She didn’t want money. She wanted to press her little sister against her chest and ask her about every star in the sky. But she couldn’t go back yet. She couldn’t bring the curse of the secondary bunker and the reduced rations.
The barracks door opened a fraction. “Ladies?” Tamara said.
They bolted up, setting their projects aside. Revna tried to push away her thoughts of home and scooted to the edge of her bed.
Tamara entered and sat in the nearest chair with a thud. She rubbed at the deep circles under her eyes. The regiment was around her in an instant, a flurry of well-meaning subordinates offering a little of what they did not really have. Did she need tea? Water? A cigarette? She waved them all away. “I still have to make my report tonight, so I cannot stay. But General Tcerlin has approved your training.”
For a moment no one spoke. Then the girls let out a cheer. Someone started to clap, and the applause built momentum until it filled the room.
Tamara held up a hand and the applause died as quickly as it had begun. “Nikolai Tcerlin was not at all impressed by your mistakes. Despite that, he believes you have the necessary heart and skill. But he’ll be keeping a close eye on us and he could easily change his mind. Every move from here on out must be impeccable. If I give an order, you follow it. You do not stop to ask questions; you do not argue; you do not think you know better.” She rubbed at her temple. “Perhaps if I had treated you like soldiers from the beginning, Tcerlin would not have needed so much convincing to approve you. But I can’t change that now, so I must hope that you trust me enough to follow my orders when I give them. And once I have given you an objective, you must complete it. Do you understand? Nothing will be more important than the missions. You must follow through. You must succeed. The fate of your sisters and your Union depends on this.” She looked around the room with red-rimmed eyes. “Tomorrow evening at nine bells you will report for your first assignment. Clear?”
“Yes, ma’am,” they replied in unison. As if they’d practiced it. As if they were disciplined.
At that Tamara was awake again, smiling, full of the energy she always brought with her. “Soldiers,” she said, “we will bring great change with us, wherever we go.”
12
WE WILL BRING THEM WAR
They appeared in the briefing room at nine bells and not a minute late. Revna trembled on her nervous prosthetics. The room was hot and primed like a rocket ready to fire. If Nikolai Tcerlin didn’t like tonight’s report, Tamara Zima’s experiment was over, and so were their chances. Magdalena’s hand found Revna’s and squeezed. Revna squeezed back.
Tamara gave no sign of trepidation as she sifted through communications. Her desk held two neat stacks of papers, a cup of tea, and a typewriter. An enormous map with the Karavel range sweeping across the bottom third covered the wall behind her. The largest peaks had been labeled in a slanting, near-sideways script, and Intelgard base was marked with a hasty X. On the other side of the mountains lay the taiga—a snowy forest with only a few settlements—and the plains that stretched down to Adovic Reaching. An old border fort along the eastern edge of the plains delineated the official divide between Rydda and the Doi Ungurin, though both were part of the Union now.
As the last bell rang, she looked up and counted the girls. Then she nodded.
“The Elda have advanced on the Karavels from Adovic Reaching, with reinforcements from the war on the Ungurin front. Our Seventy-Seventh and Forty-Sixth Night Armies are moving to intercept them on the plains, and they have requested air assistance. If the Elda successfully cross the Karavels, we’ll be forced to abandon Intelgard.
“You have your partners, and you have your training. Don’t think about your test flight or about what happens tomorrow. Use formation C-one to drop incendiaries on the Elda lines. Focus on the mission. Katya and Asya will take point. Any questions?”
Revna had thousands. Would the Elda be asleep or awake? Would it be hard to find the Elda lines? Did Linné really have to be her partner?
But everyone else chorused, “No, ma’am,” so she mumbled it, too.
The girls shuffled around one another as the navigators milled forward to collect the localized maps with the latest on troop movements. Linné was first in line; she leaned over the desk and muttered something to Tamara. Tamara’s frown grew irritated. “I haven’t had time to think about it,” she said curtly. “Do your work, and we can discuss it when you get back.”
“Yes, sir,” said Linné. Her expression was blank and hard. But Revna knew what she’d asked.
So did Magdalena, who began walking with Revna to the Strekoza. The wind had picked up, and her long hair flapped in her face. “Honestly,” she said. “What a miserable hag. She should do us all a favor and drop out. Then she can complain to her daddy about the awful Tamara Zima and get us shut down like she wants.” She picked out a cigarette from her rations and shoved it into her mouth.
“Not right now,” Revna said. She should be the better woman and tell Magdalena to leave Linné alone. The more she resented her flying partner, the harder their mission would be. But Linné made it so difficult to be on her side.
“It’s true,” Magdalena said. “She’s foul. She’s been foul since the first day and the harder we’ve worked, the fouler she’s become.”
Revna got out a cigarette of her own. Mama would kill her for smoking, but the rascidine helped her body remember that night was day now, and the last thing she wanted was to crash on her first assignment. Working with Linné would be hard enough. “You don’t have to convince me, but I don’t want to talk about her.”
“About who?” Katya appeared on the other side of Magdalena. She held her cigarette as if she were ready to be photographed for the magazines. Even with her aviator helmet on, her curls fanned out perfectly in the wind.
They paused. “No one,” said Revna, as Magdalena said, “You know who.”
Katya smirked. “I don’t blame you. I’d probably try to ground myself if I got stuck with her.” She reached for Revna’s arm. “Do you need help getting to your plane?”
“I’m fine,” Revna said.
“The ground’s pretty slick.”
“I’ve got a good grip.”
Katya shrugged and blew out a thin blue stream. The wind tore it away from her as if the smoke was a scrap of her soul. “All right, then,” she said. “Let’s go be heroes.”
They started walking again. Magdalena tried three times to light her cigarette with the spark before she gave up and let Katya do it for her. “I’d kill to fly with you, Revna. You’re the best pilot we’ve got. But I’m stuck on the ground, while that entitled little—” She coughed as the smoke hit her wrong. “If she can�
��t work as part of a team, she should go do something else and stop endangering the unit.”
“Like what?” Linné’s voice cut colder than the wind. Revna jumped. Magdalena turned as if she’d known Linné was there all along.
Katya took a quick step back, then fled to the safety of her own plane. Magdalena tilted her chin, welcoming the challenge. “Anything,” she said, folding her arms. Two bright red spots burned in her cheeks. “Anything that puts you far away from us.”
A muscle moved in Linné’s jaw. For a moment Revna thought she might hit Magdalena. But when she spoke, her voice was level. “Is the plane loaded?”
Magdalena’s silence was all the response Linné needed.
“Now who’s endangering the unit? Or did you think we’d lean out and ask the Elda to leave?” She stalked off without waiting for a reply.
“I really hate her,” Magdalena whispered as they followed.
“Come on,” Revna whispered back. “We need to get through this.” And as much as they’d like to get through it without Linné, they couldn’t. Revna extinguished her cigarette in the snow before lifting herself into the cockpit.
Linné clambered in behind her. “Let’s get this over with.” The engine started with a grumble.
Get what over with, exactly? “It’s not only tonight.” Revna slid her hands into the flying gloves. She barely winced as the Strekoza hooked into her chest. The lines of the Weave flickered into visibility.
“Sure it is. We’ll fly, and tomorrow we’ll tell Commander Zima she has to give us new partners.”
“Like we did before our test flight?”
“She’ll break down eventually.”
Linné would go to war against everyone until they gave up out of sheer exhaustion. The Union should send her to the Elda emperor and have her badger him until he agreed to retreat.
Magdalena hooked four glass shells filled with liquid fire under their wings. The glass would break apart on impact and burn through everything in its path until it scorched the very ground black. It was the first time Revna had flown with something so volatile. Unless she counted Linné.
We Rule the Night Page 16