Whitefire

by Fern Michaels

  “The Kat ordered your death. We were selected to carry out the order. You crept into our camp and tried to steal our secrets and then ravaged the hetman’s daughter. Your death is to be slow and painful. The secrets of our village will never find their way to Moscow and that lunatic Czar you serve under. We have finally succeeded in tracking you after all these weeks. Your tongue is to be removed and then your hands,” Oles said coldly.

  “Secrets be damned!” Yuri shouted. “It isn’t Katerina that is making you do this. I didn’t ravage her; she came to me of her own free will. I don’t expect you to believe me, but she didn’t tell me any secrets, and if she had, I wouldn’t divulge them to the Czar. I love her and want to marry her. My plans are to return to Moscow and settle things, and then I am coming back for Katerina.”

  “You lie; all Russians lie. The Kat said you lie, and that is all we need to know. Even if you somehow managed to escape us and return to Moscow, you would be too late. We leave for the mountains on the last day of August. There is no way you could find your way into the Carpathians once the snows come. You were doomed from the moment you rode into our village.”

  So intent were the three men on their conversation that they heard nothing until a wild whoop split the soft, dark night. Yuri backed away from the flickering fire as a dozen men converged into the semidarkness with sabers drawn and evil smiles on their faces, Oles swiveled and immediately brought up his saber as he danced around the tiny fire. Iron clanked against iron as the three men fought for their lives. They were outnumbered, and Yuri watched as the valiant Cossacks lost their heads with wicked sweeps of the strangers’ sabers. He threw down his saber and waited.

  “Who are you?” he demanded.

  “Your executioners.” One of the men laughed. “Surround him,” the leader ordered his men, “and lash him to the horse. Throw those heads into a sack so they can be returned to Gregory.”

  Katerina jumped to her feet; she had to get back to the village. Her father was right. Yuri had not come and summer was over. Had the Czar put him in prison when he failed to deliver his contract for the pure whites out of Whitefire? Had the Kat sent someone after Yuri and killed him? She would never know. Tomorrow they would go to the mountains, and that would end any remaining hopes.

  Her eyes were wild as she looked around the grassy copse and lashed out at the gnarled old tree with her booted foot. Now she would never know if he had lied or not.

  It would soon be dawn and time to start for the mountains, and still she hadn’t talked with her father. No, there was no point in trying to talk to her father now.

  It was a night made for lovers, but Katerina didn’t notice the warm, scented air or the star-filled night as the moon crept from behind its hiding place, lighting up the steppe as she trudged along the grassy field. She welcomed the indigo darkness when the moon slipped behind the cloud. The inky blackness was her ally, her confidant.

  Blinded with tears, she skirted a small outgrowth of shrubbery and raised her eyes when a high-pitched wail reached her ears. She wiped at her eyes, and for the first time was aware of the smoke on the road and around the pens. They were gone! All the horses were gone! Everyone was dead! All around the compounds and enclosures lay the lifeless bodies of the Cossacks. The buildings were burned and gutted, the stables nothing but smoldering ashes. “Father!” she screamed.

  “He’s over here.”

  Katerina whirled at the sound of the voice and ran to where an old woman, leaning heavily on a cane, pointed. She dropped to her knees and gathered her father to her, crying openly. “Tell me what happened—who did this?”

  “You know who did this!” the old woman shouted malevolently. “You are responsible!”

  “No! No! I was over by the copse. I didn’t know. I heard nothing, saw nothing. Who did this?”

  “They’re all dead! The horses are all gone. Soon I’ll die like the others.” The old crone cackled as she opened her shawl to show a large, gaping wound in her side. “They thought I was dead when they left.”

  “Who? Tell me, who did this?” Katerina screamed.

  “Your own father said you were a traitor to our people. You ask me who did this? It was the Terek Cossacks that rode into this camp, but it was your Russian that made it possible. With the horses, they could do nothing. Even with the two stallions, Snowfire and Wildfire, they could not breed, but you told the Russian the secret and now it’s over. Your heritage is gone! Your father lies dead! My husband and my three sons lie dead!” She coughed suddenly, and a bright stream of blood spurted from her dry, cracked lips. “Look around you, traitor, and see what your lusting ways have done. Bah!” she said, waving the stick she carried in the air. “He did not come for you as he promised. He will never come for you! Your father sent men after him when he left here. They were ordered to cut out his tongue and cut off his hands. Now he can never tell the secret.”

  “You lie! The children, the women, where are they?”

  The old woman cackled insanely. “Dead. All of them. I am the only one left, and soon I will die and you will be the only one alive. What will you do? How will you live with this on your soul?”

  How can this have happened? Katerina cried silently. “Where were our glorious fighters, where were all the glorious Cossacks?” she demanded bitterly of the woman. “Drunk with vodka water? Look at me!” she commanded the old woman. “They were drunk, weren’t they? Once we started the trip to the mountains, there would be no vodka during the trip and none at my father’s house. Speak the truth before you die, old woman!”

  “They fought superbly,” the woman said weakly. “There was none that did not rise to the battle. They died valiantly. And for what? To save the horses for you. For you, because you are your father’s daughter.” Suddenly she lashed out with her stout stick and brought it down on Katerina’s arm. The pain was excruciating, but Katerina made no sound as she watched the old woman fall to the ground.

  Katerina crawled over to the old woman and gently closed her eyes. “I didn’t betray my father or my people,” she whispered.

  There was a chill in the early-morning air as she waited for the sun to come up. Only her eyes moved.

  When the sun was high in the sky and the last drop of dew was scorched from the lush grass, she still sat. She stared at her father and at the others and did nothing. The pain in her arm was wild, and she welcomed it. It would keep her sane and remind her of what had happened.

  She was hungry and thirsty, but still she didn’t move. Food would lodge in her throat and choke her, water would make her vomit.

  By sundown the pain in her arm was alive and fierce. Her lips were dry and parched from sitting in the open sun all day. Still she sat, her eyes going from body to body and then back to her father.

  At dawn the following day, the stench of the dead bodies forced her to her feet. Hobbling to the water trough, she wet her lips with her hand and smeared water over her face, wiping it on the shoulder of her dress. She had to do something about the bodies. Carefully she explored her injured arm, feeling to see if any bones were broken. She could move it, but just barely. Another day and Mikhailo would know something was wrong when the caravan didn’t arrive in the mountains. He would ride down on horseback to see if something was wrong. But the dead had to be taken care of. The bodies would have to go into a drainage pit; when Mikhailo came, he could cover it over and give the necessary eulogy. There was no other way. She bit into her full lower lip till the blood spurted. Her amber eyes went to the pit at the far side of the enclosure and back to the dead bodies. She would have to drag them one by one till they were all taken care of.

  A grim look on her face, the cinnamon eyes narrowed against the bright sun, she started her grisly chore. Her arms felt as if they were being pulled from their sockets as she dragged body after body to the pit. Her legs gave out once and she collapsed, falling onto Olga’s corpse. She screamed and quickly rolled over as a gurgling sound from the body split the quiet air around her. If there was one
thing she could be thankful for it was that Stepan had returned to the mountains to alert Mikhailo of their coming.

  This is my punishment for lying with a man, she said over and over to herself as she rose to drag another friend’s body to the pit. I am guilty of nothing except lying with a man. I will pay the price because I want to live. “I’ll drag everyone to the pit if it kills me,” she said harshly as she bent to grasp a pair of feet in her hands.

  Some time later, only her father’s body remained. Katerina looked down at him, her face expressionless. How could she drag him through the road like a sack of flour? The same way you dragged the others, a voice inside her answered.

  Savagely, she bent to grasp the big man under the armpits, her injured arm sending shooting pains down the side of her body. She clenched her teeth and began to pull him down the length of the road. Tears of pain and sorrow trailed down her cheeks as she cried over and over, “I did not betray our people! I harmed no one but myself.” Over and over she repeated the words until she came to the pit. “I did nothing, Father,” she said quietly as she pushed his body in with the others. “Forgive me for what you thought I did. I forgive you,” she cried brokenly as she collapsed at the edge of the cavernous hole.

  Mikhailo, the horse trainer from the House of the Kat, found her a day later, feverish and muttering in delirium.

  He looked around the devastated village and then at the girl. He shook his shaggy gray head as he picked her up gently and laid her down beneath the shade of a tree and sponged off her dirty face. From his saddlebags he lifted a goatskin and poured a trickle of vodka into her mouth, waiting for her to swallow. Her eyes opened, and at the sight of the old, weather-beaten face she sighed and slept. Mikhailo bound the injured arm in a splint and sat back, waiting for her to wake again.

  Angry at what he did not understand, the old man made a small fire and boiled some water. Carefully he added herbs and waited for the water to boil again. When it cooled, he would give it to Katerina for her fever. More than that he could not do.

  From time to time he would lay his hand on her brow and then spoon the herb tea into her mouth. She muttered and thrashed about, then would lie still, the dark lashes like smudges of soot on her pale cheeks.

  She was sleeping peacefully, a natural sleep; the fever had broken. He walked around the village, hoping that some explanation would rear up at him. From the countless blood-crusted weapons that lay upon the bloody roads, it was evident that the village had been attacked. Who? Was it some nameless tribe? The horses and the mares were gone. Thank God Whitefire and Stepan were already in the mountains. He knew why, there was no point in asking himself that question. There wasn’t a man, a Cossack, a soldier of a Czar, that wouldn’t pay, and pay handsomely, for the Cosar horses. Men had killed and fought for the horses, and they would kill and fight again.

  Mikhailo Kornilo was a small man by Cossack standards, but he was a fighter and had served his tribe well until the day a wild-eyed Tatar severed his leg at the knee with one flourish of his scimitar. Now he had grown stocky with food in his belly three times a day and vodka water at night. He shook his wooden peg leg and cursed all Tatars for what happened. His normally ruddy face was crimson with the expletives he spat out. His straggly gray-and-white beard was sparse as his hands now pulled and tugged at it in anger. His brown eyes traveled around the village and came to rest on the sleeping Katerina. He was her godfather. He remembered how he had dangled her on his knee when she was a baby. Too ugly to take a wife, he had devoted himself to Katlof and his family, and they, in turn, regarded him as one of their own. He gladly would have given his life for any of them, but now it was too late.

  One day soon the elder Katmon would die. Already he was preparing for an elaborate funeral. Soon the old man would join Katlof and the other dead Cossacks, leaving only Katerina, Stepan, himself, and the other old people. His eyes lighted for a moment when he remembered that Whitefire was safe in the Carpathian Mountains. If one had to be thankful for small favors, this was the one to be thankful for. Katerina knew the secret. Katerina would rebuild, and he and Stepan would help her. It never entered his mind that the mares were gone, that without Wildflower, the stallion, Whitefire, was just another stallion. He tugged at the straggly beard as he limped back to the sleeping girl.

  Three days later Katerina was on her feet, her eyes haunted, her mouth a grim, tight line. “What are we to do, Mikhailo? It will take us ten years to get any breeding stock. Twenty before we have a herd. I’ve been thinking while I lay here.”

  “You plan to go to your mother’s people, is that what you’re going to tell me? I see it in your eyes. You intend to ask the Khan for help?”

  “There is no other way, Mikhailo. I must get the horses. How can I live with this?” she said, waving her arm around what had been Volin. “I have to try. If I fail, then that is something else, but first I must make the effort. I didn’t betray our people. You say you believe me. That’s all I need to know. Somehow you will make it sound right when you tell Grandfather what happened.”

  “And the Russian?” It was a question that, up until now, Katerina had refused to think about. Now she would have to bring the matter into the open and discuss it with Mikhailo.

  “I loved him. He loved me. Nothing you or anyone else says will ever convince me differently. I don’t know what happened. I was told that Father sent two of the men after Yuri to slice out his tongue and cut off his hands so he couldn’t divulge the secret. Father would never let him go back to Moscow thinking I gave him the secret. He’s dead, Mikhailo. And my father killed him just as surely as if he wielded the weapon himself. I have to try to prove to myself that Yuri was not responsible for what happened. Every Cossack on the steppe will think me guilty, and this must not be allowed to happen. I don’t know who or why the raid happened, but I will find out!”

  “So you will journey to the Khanate of Sibir, and then what? You’re a woman, what can you do?”

  “As you know, the Khan is my mother’s brother. He’ll help me. Sit down, Mikhailo, for what I have to tell you will shock you off your feet.”

  The old man eyed her warily but sat down, his face full of dread.

  “We all know that the Mongols’ military strength has deteriorated to the point where they are no longer the fierce warriors they once were. I plan to ask the Khan for men from his prisons to take back with me to the House of the Kat. I will work with them through the winter months and make Cossacks out of them. In the spring we will ride out and seek that which belongs to me—the Cosar horses.”

  The old man shook his head. “Just like that, eh? The Khan will give you the prisoners, criminals of the worst sort, and you are going to train them to be fighting Cossacks! And then you will set out in search of your horses. You’re a woman. What makes you think you can do this, and what makes you think you can make the Khan help you? A Cossack is born, you can’t create a Cossack.”

  “Make no mistake, Mikhailo, as sure as the first wildflower blossoms on the frozen banks of the Dnieper River, a new breed of Cossacks will be born,” she said savagely.

  “I know in my bones the Khan won’t help you,” Mikhailo said.

  “He’ll help me,” Katerina said coldly. “And the reason I know I will succeed is because I am my father’s daughter. Yes, I’m a woman, but I’m also a Cossack. If it comes to money, I will give the Khan whatever he asks. I will do whatever he wants if he agrees to my plan.”

  “Criminals! The men are criminals! They’ll kill you!” the old man said fearfully.

  “Mikhailo, you don’t for one second believe that a man, a Mongol, could kill me, do you? Where is the Cossack courage you forced me to cut my teeth on? Have you no faith in my ability? Where else can I get the men? Men that will fight for me? Our village is wiped out; our men are gone. You and I are all that are left, save Grandfather and the elders in the mountains. If you have a better solution I would be happy to hear it.”

  “I have no thoughts, Katerina. But crimin
als? How many do you plan to bring back with you?”

  “As many as the Khan will give me.”

  “What if they kill you on the journey home?”

  “Mikhailo, they will be shackled together. If I am not worried, then you should not be. It is the only way. I’ll leave in the morning, and I’ll have to take your horse. When you next see me I shall have my new Cossacks with me. Be gentle with Grandfather when you tell him. Make him understand, please, Mikhailo.”

  “How can I make him understand when I don’t understand myself?” her godfather asked irritably. “Mongols are ugly sons of bitches.”

  “I hate to remind you, but Mongol blood runs in my veins. You know my mother was a Mongol. I never knew you thought I was ugly,” she teased lightly.

  “You are beautiful, but Mongols are ugly,” the old man said sourly. “All that yellow skin and slanted eyes. Sneaky! Don’t turn your back on them or they stick a knife in you. Mark my words.”

  “Mikhailo, who is better, a Mongol or a Cossack?”

  “A Cossack—what sort of question is that?”

  “Then you have your answer. I want your promise that you will not worry about me.”

  “How long?” the old man asked curtly.

  “A week’s ride each way. Three days at the Mongol camp. I’ll be in the mountains before the snows come. My word, Mikhailo, as a Cossack. You’ll see me before the snows come. If I’m to get an early start, I must sleep now.” She kissed the leathery cheek and lay down. She was asleep immediately.

  The sun was coming up and the old man had not closed his eyes once. He watched the sleeping girl who was now a woman with fear in his eyes. She was right; she was her father’s daughter. If there was a way to bring the Mongols back to the mountains, she would do it. Never had he seen such a look in anyone’s eyes. Not even in Katlof’s eyes, and he was the most awesome, the most fearsome of all the Cossacks.