by Purple Hazel
Meanwhile Captain Vyacheslav rode up to a nearby signal pyre and pulled out a leather pouch with flint to set spark to the straw and thatch located at its base. The pyre stood several feet high, and was built with additional logs from the paling wall’s construction. When lighted—within only a few minutes—the resulting smoke pillar could be seen for miles and miles in every direction. Vladimyr and his fellow soldiers soon watched from a distance as the flames and smoke ascended into the sky. In no time, the signal had clearly been recognized, because miles away, another pillar of smoke could be seen rising. Then a short time later, another…and then another could be seen even further away. In no time the whole defense line would be alerted.
Soon the whole countryside would be aware! Farmers would see the signal, and peasants would know to make their way to the fortified cities or forts nearby them—if they could get there in time. But Vladimyr saw right through the enemy’s little game: this was only a diversion by the Tatars. They wanted to be seen, he just knew it. This couldn’t be the main Tatar force, no. Not enough of them in that band anyway; and they typically didn’t ride up and perch themselves on a hilltop in full view of the Russian line unless they were trying to draw the army’s attention to one sector while they planned on raiding simultaneously in a far different area. One that was lightly defended or unmanned.
Vladimyr wondered about his family back home in the Belgorod area. Would they survive this attack? Were the Tatars already circumventing the Zasechnaya Cherta right now and sneaking into the region where his farm was, unbeknownst to Russian forces? He worried for them. Missed them terribly. Missed the relative safety of farming life suddenly—if only just a little. But he worried about his father, his brothers and his little sister Ludmilla the most. Oh, they’d been safe and sound when he left—Ludmilla especially. She was tough—probably toughest among his siblings. She could work all day from dawn ’til well after dusk. And in a scrap—Ludmilla was definitely someone you wanted on your side. Certainly she was no one you should pick a fight with in the first place! But the Tatars, if they were heading that way, oh, how Vladimyr wished he could go back and warn them. Alert them to the invasion. Get them to the relative safety of the walled fortress at Belgorod. Hopefully they'd already seen a signal pyre or eventually would in time, then make the fifteen-mile journey before it was too late.
He looked back across the Wild Fields to see if the Tatars were still there. They most certainly were. Hundreds of them it would have seemed initially: ponies with riders, and rider-less spare ponies trotting alongside so they’d have fresh mounts for battle. At first the enemy amassed on that hillside, forming a large group that appeared formidable. Then when they saw the signal pyres had been lit they simply rode along the ridge they were on and proceeded away at a trot.
That's when Vladimyr confirmed that it was indeed nothing but a feint. Some horses clearly had straw dummies perched upon them to make the Tatars’ numbers seem larger. Vladimyr could detect this, and muttered about it in aggravation to anyone who might be listening nearby. “Dummies, my friends…the bastards have dummies on some of their horses,” he snarled. “Eti d’yavoly, they’re trying to fool us. This is not the main body.”
Vladimyr had suspected that was the case…just waited for them to begin moving so he could make this out clearly, and he commented about it to a worried comrade standing next to him who was frantically loading his musket. “Relax my friend,” said Vladimyr to the terrified soldier. “It’s only a trick. They just wanted us to see them today. And tomorrow…God only knows where they’ll appear.” For that matter, no one ever knew where the main body of the Nogai Horde truly was until it finally appeared in full force. They could be anywhere…and this group riding out there in the distance was clearly only a diversion. It was a typical tactic of the Tatars.
Vladimyr suddenly felt a cold chill run through his body. He closed his eyes and prayed quietly for a few moments. Others around him started doing so as well.
“Please Ludmilla,” whispered Vladimyr to himself as though he were praying to a Saint, “You’re the brightest of all of us. Please protect Father and my little brothers. Lead them to safety before the Tatars come. I believe in you, sister.”
Chapter 2
Ludmilla
It was now 1570, and back on Vladimyr’s family farm another four years had gone by sowing barley fields, harvesting crops and paying rent to the local landlord. In the fall they bundled up freshly cut barley stalks. Come November they huddled inside and endured the bitter cold nights of the long Russian winter. Come spring they went right back to work tilling their fields and preparing for the next planting season. Life basically went on as usual.
The Tatar raids continued almost every year though, hampered only slightly by the construction of the new defense line. In fact, about sixteen long years had passed since the newest Khan of the Nogai Horde—Devlet Giray—had made his first foray into Russia. He was a very ambitious man; and, though he had certainly taken a beating on occasion for his audacious efforts to raid into the lands of his powerful northern neighbor, he was not the type of man to turn away from adversity or accept defeat.
In 1552 for instance Devlet Giray tried unsuccessfully to disrupt a Russian attack on Kazan; and in July of the same year he even tried to storm Tula, but failed to take the city. To make matters worse, Tsar Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible) then dispatched a large force from the fortress of Kolomna to pursue him. The retreating Tatars were eventually caught out in the open, which rarely happened, and severely routed by mounted Boyars of the Russian army. This disaster did not settle well with the determined Tatar Khan; and while the remnants of his tattered army limped back home to the Crimea, he was already plotting his revenge. Someday he would make all of Russia, and especially Tsar Ivan IV, pay dearly for this humiliation.
Yet in that same year, a beautiful bouncing baby girl named Ludmilla was born. Her mother, once a lovely peasant girl in her own right, died unfortunately when Ludmilla was but a toddler. And tragically Ludmilla’s father had neither the patience nor the time to bother raising her as a little girl. No, not when there was work to be done and no one else remaining but five older brothers to help tend the farm. The family had an annual farming quota they had to meet, just to pay rent to their landlord, and to fail meant dire consequences.
Subsequently, Ludmilla never had much in the way of a female role model to emulate; and for that matter never got the chance to be a little girl at all. She went right to work with her brothers on the farm; and when her little girl clothes wore out, she donned her older brothers’ hand-me-downs. Gradually she fell into the life of a farm hand…with everyone pitching in come harvest time to haul in the crops. Repairing, digging, sowing, and plowing took up much of her youth, and by the time she was fifteen years old, she was already pushing 5’6” tall and weighing in at over 170 pounds of solid muscle. She was even bigger than most of her lanky older brothers.
In the winters, they rationed their food to get through the long cold months. In years of bumper crops, they fattened themselves up before planting season came. Come summer time they tanned in the warm sun, and by the end of harvest time, they were lean and muscular once again. Ludmilla grew up living like a boy—and then as she aged into her teens she looked more and more like a strapping young man. After all, she never really knew what it was like to be a girl. Didn’t remember much about her mother by the time she was ten; and had nothing but her five older brothers and her father to emulate. Frankly, she never saw anything odd about this; since it was all she’d ever known. And when it came to “being a boy” in almost every possible way—including defending herself—she was able to adapt to that as well, when the time came.
When she was ten, one of her older brothers unwisely taunted her about her gender, remarking cruelly that when she was born, Father had been expecting Mother to bear him another son…another strong boy to raise and help work the farm. He went even further by stating that Father had planned on naming the boy “Lyev,”
just to make it more hurtful.
“But when you were born,” said the evil brother, “and Father looked down to see you had no penis…he was terribly disappointed!” Then he laughed at her cold-heartedly, inspiring chuckles and snickers from her other brothers. These horrible words made the young Ludmilla cry; and the memory of that devastating moment stuck with her for years. Was this true? Was she truly unwanted by her father? Certainly not. Her father loved her as much as his other sons. Nevertheless, the damage was done.
Father always treated her just like her brothers. When she misbehaved—which was rare—he punished her in the same way, with a tree sapling struck across her back. And when she did well, her father merely nodded and blinked approval. This became more of a regular occurrence as she grew and grew into a strapping field hand. She could do almost anything he assigned her to, yet Father showed her no preferential treatment compared to her siblings.
Even when she remarkably picked off the alpha male in a pack of wolves which were lurking in the evening darkness one cold winter night—using nothing but a stone that she heaved over fifty yards—father merely patted her on the shoulder and turned to walk back in the house. Her other brothers had of course attempted several throws of their own beforehand. But Ludmilla patiently waited for them to frustrate themselves until they were done. She instead took her time and carefully selected a rounded stone which would bounce across the frozen ground, and slung it right at the pack leader in such a way that it skipped once and then struck the midsection of the beast. The creature heaved a pathetic yelp and then the entire pack fled together. Her brothers stood in awe of her that night. She was only thirteen at the time.
But that same mean-spirited older brother who’d insulted her so terribly three years before, continued his taunting well into her teens. He never let up either, and the other brothers typically laughed right along with him. No one ever stood up for her, not even once. Ludmilla resented the abuse, yes. Yet she didn’t want to let on that his occasional provocations were getting to her—until one fateful night, when it finally came to blows.
One evening after dinner his senseless mocking ultimately went too far, and when the provocations turned into an argument, and the argument turned into an altercation, soon the two were wrestling around in the mud inside the family’s barn, with her other brothers howling and cackling in the background. Though very strong already at nearly fourteen years old, Ludmilla had never been in a real fight before; and as her slightly older brother began to get the better of her, Ludmilla became frustrated and angry. Here she was finally standing up for herself and her cruel nemesis was winning the fight!
Eventually the momentum changed however, as her other brothers laughed and jeered, except for the eldest Vladimyr who shouted kind-hearted encouragements and even gave her tips on how to break out of her opponent’s wrestling holds. Ludmilla found herself face down, with her brother pinning her to the ground and laying across her back to try and push her face down into the wet manure. And as the evil lad grasped her locks of hair and pressed her face further and further down screaming, “Sdavat’sya! Lowly peasant! Yield! Beg for mercy,” her other siblings only continued with their cat-calling and whistling. But then Ludmilla suddenly felt something…something odd at first then unmistakable when she realized what it was. It was the bulging erection of her despicable brother’s penis against her buttocks! The fiend was somehow becoming sexually aroused!
How disgusting! she thought. A feeling of foulness and degradation came over her. It made her feel ashamed and humiliated. And not long after that, a far more intense emotion arose within her that she'd never felt before: RAGE!
Within only a few moments, the tide had turned. Ludmilla began to process Vladimyr’s advice on wrestling moves to finally escape from the pin. Shifting her body and curling herself underneath her opponent, she started to escape and wriggle free of him. In a few more seconds she was completely free; and to everyone’s amazement, she was soon on top of the boy, knees holding down his exhausted arms at one point and pressing the back of his head into the muddy foulness of the barn floor.
Then things got ugly. Real ugly.
Surprised and befuddled by his little sister’s escape, the mean older brother managed to free his tired arms, only to cower and curl up into a little ball after she began wailing on him with fists of fury. She clawed, she punched, she slapped…even stood up and kicked the poor helpless youngster as he begged for mercy. His other brothers meanwhile laughed uproariously; as the eldest brother Vladimyr enthusiastically cheered her comeback victory. Ludmilla was winning the fight!
Yet she continued to pummel the boy, even bit his ear savagely like a fighting dog in a pit. She wouldn’t let up either. He pleaded with her to relent; but she would not. He tried to surrender but she would give no quarter. She was emotionally imbalanced and exacting terrible retribution. It almost looked like she’d kill him if it continued much longer. Very nearly would have, if no one had intervened! His terrified screams gradually stilled her brothers’ cheers and caused a few to beg her to stop the attack.
“Ludmilla…sestra…Ludmilla stop!” one hollered. “Please stop, Ludmilla! He’s begging for mercy. Ludmilla…pozhaluysta!” another yelled soon after. Father could eventually be heard approaching way off in the distance from the farm house, complaining loudly about all the racket going on out in the barn. Everyone knew it was time to put a stop to it—or they’d all get whippings!
However, when one brother crossed the barn to try and grab her the young girl spun around. She then flashed a look of such extreme indignation and bloodlust that it froze her brothers in icy terror! They’d never seen such a look on their sister’s face before! It was like an angry bear protecting a cub—or a she-wolf protecting her litter. She meant business too, as without any warning she punched the poor lad in the gut so hard it doubled him over in pain.
“NOT LUDMILLA! NOT LUDMILLA!” she screamed repeatedly, in a gurgling snarl that curdled their blood. “I am Lyev now! Lyev is my name!” she then blurted, spitting out the words with eyes on fire. Her startled brothers stood with arms at their sides nodding fearfully while the two injured boys cowered at her feet. Father’s footfalls could be heard just outside the barn. No one knew what to say.
That’s when Vladimyr—always being the one to say just the right thing at just the right moment—commented, “Byt’ po semu! You heard what our dear sister has said! We shall call her Lyev from now on.”
And that’s precisely what they did. Even Father took on the practice in time. Ludmilla—Lyev, that is—had taken on her new persona both proudly and firmly. She shed her identity as a girl that night, and in her own mind became “Lyev” from that day forward ….
By the time Ludmilla reached age sixteen her other brothers had one by one been conscripted into the army – or simply run off to join up in order to get away from farming life, then never returned. All that remained to tend crops were her and Father. Yet Ludmilla quickly proved to be all that Father needed for a farmhand. Over time, and especially after Vladimyr had left for the army, Ludmilla developed an amazing acumen for learning and memorizing tasks.
She was a quick study. Father could teach her anything and her mind was like a steel trap. Taught once, she could perform the task or complete the job easily. Given time though, she would inevitably improve upon the process and Father gradually came to rely on her. Thus, as he aged into his fifties and could handle less and less of the more strenuous tasks, Ludmilla could pretty much run the whole farm by the time she was approaching her seventeenth birthday. There was good reason for this.
The best thing about Ludmilla was her ingenuity in devising inventions to increase her efficiency. This developed early-on. She had that rare gift of being able to see the big picture and question the way things were done until she developed a better solution. For example, she designed an irrigation system that was far more efficient than Father’s old water trenches leading into the fields from the nearby creek. These dried up
and had to be re-filled via buckets of water from the creek as the season wore on and the creek’s water level receded. Her brothers loathed this task more than any other.
Recognizing the need for an improved system that required less man hours, she designed and built a large water wheel using parts from and old wagon; and attached scoops to its outer rim which lifted water from the creek and poured them into a sluice system which delivered water right into Father’s irrigation trenches. In the summer, when the creek reduced to a small stream, she stood in the water up to mid-thigh and cranked the handle she’d attached to it, to lift hundreds of gallons of creek water into the sluice box above her in only a fraction of the time previously required. Father was impressed! It flooded his fields in a matter of hours and kept the crops well-irrigated during growing season.
Besides that, from cranking that wheel ’round and ’round all summer, she got bigger and stronger every year until by seventeen she was pushing 180 pounds of sheer muscle! She both looked and acted like a full-grown Russian farmhand. Walked like a man. Lived like a man. Dressed like a man. Smelled like a man. She lacked only two physical attributes: a penis and a beard; and the latter of those two presented a glaring difference that would otherwise distinguish her from one. But it rarely caused her trouble even when she went into town. And for that matter, many men in that part of the world had Asian lineage in their family tree! It simply wasn’t that unusual in southern Russia to see a sandy blonde headed man with bright ice-blue eyes who had not even a pluck of hair on his face.
She also developed a good acumen for business, Father noticed. When big crops came in, she’d brew barley ale from the surplus using Father's own recipe—and then wisely take the lion’s share of the product into town to sell before Father tried drinking it all. There she could trade with it and acquire much-needed supplies for them before winter. Father went with her at first, but by her seventeenth birthday Ludmilla traveled by herself. Frankly she didn’t need help anymore. He’d only slow her down.