“Here we are, Billi.”
They stopped by a small white propeller plane. It was about twenty feet long, its wingspan thirty. The cockpit looked like it had been built for hobbits.
“This is it?” said Billi. The two-seater seemed pretty fragile.
“They were out of MiG jet fighters. This will do the job.” He patted the fuselage. “I like to think of it as…cozy.”
The instrument panel was basic, just two small electronic screens and a couple of switches. Her mobile phone had more functions. Ivan unhooked the headphones and started the engine. The propellers turned slowly twice, then the engine sparked. Billi felt the aircraft wanting to surge forward. The displays came on and Ivan scrolled down a series of options on one of the screens. He tapped it.
“This is the EFIS: the Electronic Flight Information System. Most of the key data is on this nowadays. Altimeter, compass, the artificial horizon, stuff like that.” He pointed at the screen next to it. “That’s the GPS. Combined with the EFIS, the thing practically flies itself.”
“How long’s the trip?” Billi straightened out her coat as she settled into the cramped seat. The dark red cloth rippled with shades of deep pink and purple as she smoothed her hands over it.
I’m becoming as vain as Ivan. She found the seat belt and clipped herself in over the shoulders and across the waist.
“Depending on the tailwind, three to four hours.”
The plane started to accelerate down the runway. It lurched upward, and Billi’s stomach lurched downward. Wind buffeted the plane sideways, and Ivan swore, both hands fast around the control column, fighting to bring the plane level. Billi’s heart pounded, but then suddenly the fight was over and the plane rose smoothly away from the ground and toward the clouds.
Ivan’s bruised cheek was big and shiny now, and he winced as he adjusted his headset.
“That hurt much?” Billi said, pointing to his face.
“You want to kiss it better?”
Billi smirked. “I do that and we’ll crash.”
“You have a lot of confidence in your kissing.”
“No. I just don’t have much confidence in your flying,” Billi replied, looking out at the black horizon. “So, where are we going on our first date? Somewhere special, I hope.”
“Due south to the Ukrainian border. From there we’ll turn west. Then we’ll find somewhere to land.”
“There’s no airfield where we’re going?”
“We don’t need one for an aircraft like this. Just a bit of straight road.”
They settled into silence. The engine drone filled the small cockpit, but Billi couldn’t sleep. She just stared out the window.
“So, what is the plan, Billi SanGreal?” asked Ivan, his eyes never leaving the distant horizon.
Billi almost laughed-first Elaine and now Ivan presuming she would be the one to lead.
“Don’t you have one?”
“Me? I’m the good-looking one. You’re the brains.”
“You mean the smart but ugly one?”
Ivan glanced out the corner of his eye, amused. “I never said you were ugly. I said you were interesting-looking.”
“And I suppose you usually date supermodels?”
“I’ve not really thought about it, but yes. I suppose I do.”
Great. Interesting-looking versus long-legged glamazons. Not much of a contest.
“But one can get tired even of perfection.” Ivan took a hand from the control panel to brush back a strand of Billi’s hair that had fallen loose. “I like a little…battle-damage in a girl.”
“You think I’m battle-damaged?” Billi huffed and shoved herself farther into her seat, arms crossed. “You really know how to woo a person.”
“Billi…”
“No, don’t apologize. Good thing we’re only looking at the short term, then.” Exceedingly short term. It was now almost Friday. Saturday night was the full moon. No Vasilisa, no future.
“Yes. I know. But that’s if we fail.” Ivan’s eyes turned steely certain. “We won’t.”
“I wish I had your faith.”
“Tell me what you’re planning.”
“We find Vasilisa.”
“And then?” Ivan didn’t look at her, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew what Billi would have to do-the sacrifice she would have to make to save everyone else.
“If only we’d had a few more days…” Billi lamented aloud.
“What difference would that have made?”
“Baba Yaga has a weakness. The trouble is that the weapon we could use against her is back in London.”
She explained about the Venus figurine and everything Elaine had told her.
“We’ve got no way to kill Baba Yaga-you know that, don’t you?” Billi said.
Ivan gestured at the backpack. “Don’t you have some Templar super weapon in there? I thought your Order had all these holy relics. Don’t you have the Holy Grail?”
Billi’s face flushed. “Er, we did. Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Ivan smiled slowly, intrigued by Billi’s apparent embarrassment. “Tell me.”
Billi huffed. “It’s in Jerusalem now, but we did have it, all safely locked away in our reliquary. We took it out once a year, at Easter.” She waved dismissively. “Y’know, to celebrate the Resurrection and all that.”
“And?”
“And I dropped it.”
Ivan coughed loudly. “What happened?”
“What do you think happened? It broke.”
Ivan coughed again, but struggled. “What did your father say?”
Billi could picture it so clearly. The knights stood at the altar in Temple Church; Gwaine had gone white, still holding the velvet cushion Billi had lifted the clay cup from. She’d been so nervous. Arthur had picked up a few of the pieces.
“He said, ‘Better get some glue.’”
Billi waited while Ivan gathered himself. He didn’t say anything, but sat there biting his lip. “Ow,” he said.
“Still leaks a bit,” added Billi.
Ivan roared with laughter.
“Well, I’m glad you find it funn-”
The plane shook violently.
Lightning flashed in the distant cloud banks. Ivan frowned.
“Didn’t see that coming,” he muttered. The clouds were heavy and angry, and the winds buffeted the small plane.
“We okay?” asked Billi nervously. Ivan checked his controls.
“It’s meant to be clear skies the whole way.” He studied the storm clouds ahead. “We don’t have enough fuel to go around them.”
The plane shook fromasudden gust. The elements were making their threat known. Billi tightened her harness.
Ivan’s knuckles whitened around the control column, and Billi sat silently, focused on the rolling horizon. The cockpit blazed white as sheet lightning struck, and Billi saw Ivan’s face, his jaw locked and sweat dripping off his ivory skin, his concentration total. He breathed slowly through his clenched teeth.
Maybe we’ll make it.
Then the plane plummeted as thunder exploded around them.
It didn’t glide: it fell with all the aerodynamics of a brick. Ivan groaned as he fought with the control column.
“Downdraft! The winds are driving us down!” he shouted. “Hold on!”
He’d lost it. The plane spun wildly. Billi’s head was bashed against the side window, and all she could see through the spinning haze were black clouds. Another curtain of white light broke around them, and the next roar of thunder nearly blew out their windows. Through her blurred vision Billi saw treetops rapidly approaching, an endless mass of snow and a silver line-a river-glistening in the distance. Branches scratched the undercarriage, and the fragile shell of the plane bucked and jolted as it skated through the treetops. A thick bough caughta wing, which sheared off, the sudden impact throwing Billi forward in her harness. She grabbed hold of the straps and hung on wi
th all her strength.
No! Not like this! It can’t end like-
The plane spun horizontally, and in the scream of crumbling metal and splintering glass, Billi’s world shattered.
30
BLINKING HURT. BILLI TRIED TO MOVE, BUT SPASMS OF sharp pain shot through her; it was if she’d spent all week at the armory, losing. She opened her eyes, then shook the broken glass out of her hair.
Dirt and snow filled half the cockpit. The safety harnesses had done their work, but she could feel bruises across her chest and shoulders where she’d been hurled forward and held. The engines coughed like the airplane’s death rattle.
Thick branches skewered the fuselage. A spear of wood had been driven straight through the windshield, inches from her face. A bit to the left and she’d have lost her head. Instead Billi bore minute scratches from the twigs that had caught her.
Ivan was slumped in his seat, amida tangle of cables and wires. Sparks jumped from the shattered control panel and there was a faint whiff of fuel mixed in with the cold air. One cable, still humming with electricity, hung perilously close over the hydraulic oil that pooled at their feet.
“Ivan?” Billi unclipped the harness and checked his neck for a pulse. She couldn’t see any blood, but that didn’t rule out internal injuries.
“Ivan, are you okay?”
“Are we there yet?” he muttered. He had a fat new bruise on his forehead. He moaned and went pale as he tried to free himself. His right trouser leg was blood-soaked, and Billi gasped when she saw the deep gash through his thigh.
“It’s pretty bad,” she said.
“As they say in your language, No shit, Sherlock.”
Billi raised an eyebrow-she obviously hadn’t lost him quite yet. She pulled out a length of cable and wrapped a tourniquet around his leg as tightly as she dared.
“Do you know what you’re doing?” asked Ivan, through gritted teeth.
“Yes,” Billi lied. She knew enough first aid to make a sling and deliver a baby-in principle. But major surgery hadn’t been covered in the course. “The tourniquet will cut down the blood loss, but we’ve got to keep an eye on it and loosen the knot occasionally, otherwise you’ll get blood poisoning.” Billi kicked open the crumpled door. “Once we’re out we’ll put together a splint.”
“Then what?”
Billi sniffed: the acrid smell of melting plastic was filling the cockpit. The puddles of oil erupted into clusters of flames. “We’ll make you comfortable.” But first things first: they needed to get out. “This is going to hurt. A lot.”
Ivan bit down hard as Billi dragged him out of the cabin, hissing through his clenched teeth. Gaping holes punctured the fuselage, and the rear of the plane had been torn away. Billi half climbed out-using the aluminium frame and dense tree branches as a ladder. Unfortunately, Ivan ended up bumping almost every branch on his way out.
“You did that on purpose,” was about all he could say as they reached the ground. She dragged Ivan away from the wreck, then clambered back up as flames began to spread across the seats.
Scrabbling in the rear among the thickening, stinking smoke, she tossed out weapons and supplies before the heat became unbearable. Flames enveloped the front seats, and Billi shoved herself out of the wreck. Dangling from one of the branches, she dropped the last few feet into the snow, just as the fire consumed the plane. It rose up the tree, setting alight the higher branches until the tree itself was a burning torch.
Stepping away, Billi paused to properly examine their surroundings. They were deep in a forest, but it was unlike any forest she’d ever seen. The smell of decay was thick and pungent, even where dampened by the snow. The trees around her were thick-barked, their diameter wider than she could put her arms around. Despite the burning plane a dozen yards away, the sense of nature’s domination was overpowering. The old plane seemed like a toy next to the ancient strength of the huge trees.
“Where are we?” she asked as she cut a branch down with her kukri. Trimmed, it would serve as a crude crutch.
“On the Russian-Ukrainian border. There or thereabouts.”
“So this is it?”
Ivan nodded. “The eastern tip of the Belovezhskaya Pushcha. The primeval forest.”
Billi pressed her hand into the moss hanging from a giant oak trunk. “It’s beautiful.” She was awestruck, humbled by her surroundings. The earth around her was alive. Like a dragon slumbering in winter, but huge, ancient, and powerful.
Ivan continued. “Once upon a time, all of Europe was like this. From Ireland to Siberia.” He sighed as he leaned against the trunk. “This was the world before man came along. This is what it’ll return to, once we’ve gone.”
This is what Baba Yaga wants. A beautiful, empty planet. Billi could almost understand it. She gazed up into the dark canopy. “We’re not gone yet.”
Billi set up camp by a cave under a rocky outcrop. It was a house-sized boulder, all split by roots and covered in vines. She spread out a lattice of twigs so they were slightly off the ground, then added a layer of pine needles taken from the nearby conifers before covering it all with a plastic sheet she’d found in the plane.
She chopped down four straight sticks, which she bound together on either side of Ivan’s leg. But walking was agony even with the splint, and Ivan, leaning heavily on the crutch, ended up hopping to alleviate the worst of it.
“How does it feel?” Billi asked. She was starting to regret sending Elaine back. She’d have patched Ivan up, no worries.
“I’m…fine.”
“You’re such a liar.” Billi, kneeling in front of him, took a corner of the blanket and dabbed his face, wiping the sweat. She smoothed the cloth over his forehead and softly over each eye. Her hand moved down his face, touching his bruised cheek.
“Ouch,” he whispered. He looked up at her. “Now that I’m not flying…”
“A kiss right now would probably kill you,” Billi said as she drew the cloth over his lips, slowly down his jawline to his neck. She could feel his pulse beating strongly now. “There. All done.”
“Thank you.”
They sat facing one another, not speaking. She’d never thought she’d find anyone after Kay. Billi had buried her love under training and combat, and now, with the end so near, here he was.
“There was so much I wanted to do,” Billi said, rocking back onto her heels. She raised her eyes to the stars.
“Funny, but you think it’s all so endless.”
“Life is not measured in length, but in deeds.”
Billi laughed. “More Chekhov?”
“My father.”
Billi shook out her hair. She must look a total bomb site. “Not that I had any big plans, mind you.” She peeked at him from under the loose locks. “Not like you.”
Ivan shrugged. “Things didn’t turn out that badly.”
“Glad you’re so stoic about it. Last night you were sleeping in a four-poster bed with silk sheets; tonight you’ve got pine needles and snow.”
“But with you, da?” He smiled. “You would have made a fine tsarina.”
Billi scraped her hair back into a bun. “I’m sure I would have. When you’d run out of your supermodels.”
Billi saw Ivan try to smile back, but all he could do was shake. He’d lost a lot of blood, and was weak.
“We need to warm you up some more.” She picked up her kukri.
Billi quickly cut down some of the lower, drier branches and built up a fire at the mouth of the cave. It wasn’t quite Davy Crockett, but it would do.
“We’ll rest here tonight,” she said. She threw some more branches onto the fire. Damn it! We were so close. She stared into the forest. Vasilisa was in there some-where.
She picked up her satellite phone and called her father.
The reception was awful, but she could just hear his voice. He sounded like he was down a mine shaft, shouting up.
“Billi? Where are you?”
“We’ve been delayed. Badly.�
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“You okay?”
Billi looked at Ivan. His face was bloodless and his mouth drawn into a tight grimace.
“Don’t worry about us,” she said. Ivan flinched as she spoke. She couldn’t risk the Templars wasting time looking for them. Vasilisa was the priority. “Where are you?”
“En route. Elaine called and filled me in. But I found Vasilisa’s granny.”
“And?”
“You know most of it. Baba Yaga disappeared right after the Tunguska meteor strike.” Arthur huffed, probably angry that they’d had the means to destroy Baba Yaga-the Venus figurine-and not realized. “But the old granny gave us some useful advice. Baba Yaga is strongest in the wilderness; the deeper she lives in the forest the more powerful she becomes. So the opposite is true: she’s weakest in cities. It makes sense. That’s why she relies on the Polenitsy; otherwise she’d have come for Vasilisa herself. Take her out of the woods and we may have a chance against her.”
“We could kill her?”
“We could try.” He sighed. “But it’s a bloody big risk if we’re wrong. Stick to the plan, as agreed.”
Billi bit her lip. There was no escaping it. “We still need to find Vasilisa.”
“There’s a wolf reserve deep in the forest. And an extensive cave network in that region. If she’s anywhere, it’s there. I’ll text you the coordinates.”
So many pieces were coming together-Baba Yaga’s weaknesses, the location of the wolves-but was it too late? Without the Venus figurine, they were missing the biggest piece. Billi looked at her dad’s coordinates and checked the map. The boundary of the wolf compound was ten miles away. The sun would be up in a few hours, and she could get going. Ten miles through dense snow? It would take four or five hours.
But that meant leaving Ivan. He sat quietly, gingerly settling his leg in the least painful position. They’d only known one another for a few days, but she’d come to depend on him. She wouldn’t abandon him; she’d find a way to make him safe before she went. Maybe things would be clearer in the morning.
Billi turned and picked up her pistol and emptied the magazine, throwing the 9mm rounds into the bushes. The steel-jacketed bullets were man-killers, but she needed wolf-killers. She loaded in fifteen of Lance’s silver bullets.
Dark Goddess Page 17