Hour of the Wolf

by Andrius B Tapinas

  “Beautiful puppies,” Sidabras complimented the dogs.

  The mastiffs reacted by baring their sword-sharp teeth.

  “This is a temple of life where guns are banned, but you are armed,” said one of the grey suited men.

  Sidabras looked at him from head to toe and gave a slight smile. It was obvious that the laws of the temple were not applicable to the men themselves, as there were slight bulges under the jackets of both men, suggesting a pistol case attached to their belts underneath.

  “You jest, surely,” Sidabras said.

  The grey men simultaneously turned to the third man. It seemed that he was the one making the decisions. The man with a plait gave it a moment’s consideration, then gave them a slight nod.

  “Take this path, then turn right and go over to the pond,” he gestured, his eyes not leaving Sidabras’ face. “But try not to lose your way.”

  The meeting with the Elder of Vilnius Vitamancers was short. Sidabras found him sitting on the bench by the pond, feeding black swans. The elegantly greying man was wearing an orange robe, his eyes concealed under round-lensed glasses. The sight of the intruder neither surprised, nor angered him. On the contrary, he welcomed Sidabras by getting up and politely assuring him that the Vitamancer Lodge was always ready to co-operate with the guards of the city, day or night.

  Without wasting any more time, Sidabras immediately handed the mysterious drawings to the man.

  “Any idea what this is and who the author might be?” he asked, watching the man carefully.

  The chief Vitamancer took the papers in his hands and stared at them with his spectacle-clad eyes for a few moments, his facial expression revealing nothing. Eventually he shrugged his shoulders.

  “I cannot help you with this in any way,” he said. “It is the first time I see these drawings. Maybe...” he deliberated for a moment. “Maybe they were made in another city of the Alliance? Or maybe not in the Alliance at all?”

  Having promised Sidabras he would inform him if he came across any useful information, he bade him farewell and went back to the bench to continue feeding the swans.

  Outside the gate Sidabras chuckled quietly. Concealing one’s eyes under spectacles might not be a bad idea, but not so much when dealing with someone who had interrogated hundreds of captives during the war, as he doesn’t need to look into your eyes to tell when you are telling the truth, lying or concealing something.

  The Elder of Vilnius Vitamancers had lied, and it was obvious.

  Antanas Sidabras was not surprised, and so as soon as he was outside the gate, he slipped into the nearest gateway and waited.

  The wait was not short. An hour later Sidabras was on the brink of giving up what seemed to be a fruitless occupation and going back to Sluskai, when the gate to the Vitamancer estate was suddenly flung open to let through two Leon Serpolett gas tricycles.

  Although the machines did resemble a carriage, instead of reins and horses there were a control stick and a boiler and two-cylinder steam engine. A tarpaulin palanquin served as a rain shelter for the passengers while anyone who desired to hide away from the curious eyes of passers-by could conceal themselves behind a little curtain. Although not very fast, the petite serpoletts were highly manoeuvrable and were excellent for riding in the city streets.

  After leaving the gate, the two tricycles turned into Subacius Street and continued ahead. The Legate ran to his carriage.

  “Follow them,” he directed the corporal from inside the carriage. “But keep your distance and make sure they do not notice us.”

  The serpoletts slowly buzzed along Subacius, then Paplaujos Street, seemingly heading into the Old Town. The Legionnaires’ carriage rolled behind, keeping a safe distance. It seemed that the drivers of the serpoletts were not aware of the tail, so the Legate could relax, leaning back in his seat. Then came an unpleasant surprise.

  As soon as both the serpoletts and the carriage had driven past the Fish Market alongside Mirth City and turned into Safjanikai Street, the tricycles dashed off in opposite directions without any sign of warning – one driving to the right and crossing the Vilnele into Mirth City, while the other rolled down in the direction of St Ann’s Church. Sidabras had not foreseen this happening. But he had no time to think – as he was about to lose sight of the serpoletts.

  “Keep with the one that went right!” Sidabras shouted to the corporal. “Then go straight to Sluskai and report it.”

  With the last words of his instructions Sidabras leaped out of the carriage. After a swift look around, he slipped inside a two-storey brick house and raced up the stairs. Finding a small ladder on the first floor, he used it to climb on to the roof, from where he looked down. There were no serpoletts in the narrow streets below. The Legate cursed.

  Suddenly a shadow draped over the rooves. Caught unawares, Sidabras looked up.

  Suspended in the air above his head was a Mail Balloon. A long rope was swinging in the air beneath it. A postman would pull the rope inside the basket and use it to lower the packages, thus avoiding the need to go down to the Post Office himself. As the balloon was slowly ascending, Sidabras had no time to waste. He sprinted and jumped over the abyss, landing on the roof of the next two-storey building. Thanking the unknown architect for making the street so narrow, he was already standing right underneath the balloon, firmly clutching the rope with both hands. His weight caused the balloon to sway and the surprised pilot stuck his capped head out of the basket to look down.

  “Vilnius Legion!” Sidabras shouted at the top of his lungs, noticing the captain was wearing thick earmuffs to protect himself from the bitterly cold wind.

  Nonetheless, the captain must have heard his words, or maybe seen his blue uniform, because a moment later his head disappeared from view, while the rope, wound around a wheel, started to rise. Even though hemp ropes were generally strong, they were not meant to carry such weight, which meant that Sidabras’ journey up was extremely slow – alternating between rising ten feet and slipping several feet down. When he eventually reached the gondola, he braced against its lower part with his feet and the upper edge with his hands, and then, breathing heavily, plunged down over the edge and on to the floor. With his eyes closed he tried to bring his breathing back to normal, and when he opened them at last, he saw the worried pilot’s face looming over him with goggles pushed up over his forehead.

  “What is this?” the postman spoke up, but Sidabras would not let him finish his sentence.

  He jumped up to his feet, leaned over the edge of the basket and feverishly searched the ground below.

  Of course, by now the tricycle could have hidden in any of the narrow little streets, but Sidabras was having an exceptionally good day. He saw the tricycle roll away along Uzupis Street. He looked the other way and spotted the second serpolett passing by St Ann’s Church. Right behind it was his own carriage, moving steadily under the guidance of his diligent corporal.

  “I am Antanas Sidabras, the Legate of Vilnius,” said the man sternly, his eyes fixed on the pilot. “I am carrying out a task of the utmost importance. Follow that tricycle,” he pointed his finger at his serpolett. “You mustn’t let it out of your sight.”

  The stunned postman obeyed immediately. But it was easier said than done.

  So as not to be solely dependent on the wind, mail balloons also had a relatively weak coke engine and stabilisers installed on their sides. Thus, with the engine on, the balloon could fly as directed, rather than spin around its centre line. However, postmen tried to use the fuel sparingly and usually glided above the Old Town roofs, resorting to the engine only when required, to ascend or change direction.

  The postman rushed to switch the engine on, which made the balloon shudder before changing direction. But misfortunes never come alone. Light mail balloons were only intended for one single passenger, which meant that the weight of another rather bulky man made it start to drop. A strong gust of wind threw the balloon to the side above Mirth City, right into the mena
cingly rearing spires of St Ann’s Church.

  “Oh my God, we are going to crash,” the postman squealed before desperately attacking the burner valve handle, frantically pumping heated air into the envelope. The balloon started to ascend again but not fast enough to avoid a collision with the church.

  “What are these?” – keeping his eyes on the tricycle, Sidabras kicked some metal boxes lying on the gondola floor.

  “Important letters.”

  “Over the edge!”

  “But it’s…” the shocked postman gaped. To him such sacrilege seemed more horrid than a collision itself.

  “Over the edge!!! Now!!!” Sidabras yelled.

  The sudden paper rain on the heads of people walking in St Ann’s Street rooted them to the spot. People began to gaze up and point at the balloon as it expelled white dove-like envelopes, which fluttered and spread in the air. The heavy box plummeted down and hit the bridge before plunging into the Vilnele. This frightened two horses, who had been pulling a carriage steadily just a moment ago, and they galloped away over the cobblestones covered in paper snow, making the women inside the carriage scream at the top of their voices.

  “Isn’t this a great sight? No doubt, The Truth of Vilnius would be pleased,” Sidabras thought.

  But the pilot was a real expert at his job, and the balloon started to ascend even faster, and the sharp needles of the church only brushed lightly against the bottom of the gondola. The only thing to concern them now was to not lose the tricycle.

  Binoculars were a compulsory accessory in every mail balloon and Sidabras could now conveniently use them to observe the journey of the serpolett. The longer he looked, the more his face became shrouded in worry. At first he thought that it would take Olandu Street and go as far as peaceful Antokolis, but instead it unexpectedly turned right.

  “Is he going back to the Vitamancers’ Headquarters?” The Legate could not conceal his disappointment.

  But Sidabras was wrong, as the serpolett kept on rolling until Polotsko Street turned into Batoro Highway. This wrong-footed him, as it now looked as if the serpolett was about to leave the city.

  The postman seemed to think the same. With a puzzled look on his face he looked at the Legate.

  “Follow him!” Sidabras ordered flatly.

  The tricycle stopped at the Alliance border checkpoint. A few minutes later, however, it continued towards the horizon where it was grimy with dark clumps of smoke.

  It had now become obvious that its destination was Novovileysk – a gloomy and malformed copy of Vilnius.

  Chapter XXI

  Novovileysk, afternoon

  24 04 1905

  “I hope they choke on their damned Vilnius. We will build a magnificent city outside its walls, a real city of the dreams,” said head of Vilnius Province Jegor Steblin-Kamenskiy through gritted teeth at the sunset of his glory days, following the transfer of Vilnius to the Alliance.

  The Tsar’s bureaucrats were taken with the idea. Shortly afterwards the small village to the North of Vilnius chosen for this purpose started expanding quickly and furiously. New factories sprang up one after another, a train station was erected and freight carriages rolled back and forth along the newly built rail track between the new city and Minsk, Petersburg and even Kharkov. It became home to the largest scythe factory in the world and a monumental manufacturer of railway bearings. Novovileysk – New Vilnius – was the name given to the newborn city, and it took in workers who had moved in from the Russian-occupied remote corners of Lithuania, as well as other godforsaken provinces of the Russian Empire.

  Russian agents, disguised as traders, workers or city guests, travelled to Vilnius to snoop around the city, and later delivered the news on the latest creations in this part of the Alliance to their leaders in Novovileysk. The latter were devoted to one simple rule – accomplish too many tasks in too short a time. Due to their constant attempts to bite off more than they could chew, the fire and soot-spewing Novovileysk factories ran into the ground and started to resemble the anteroom of hell, as the machines that they employed were dated and unsafe. Housed in barracks permeated by relentlessly blowing winds, workers found consolation in drinking vodka and cursing their fate to the noise of whistling trains. They dreamed of the inns, baths and parks of nearby Vilnius, the same as they dreamed of ascending to Heaven.

  When promethelium – so useful to industry – was created by the Alchemists of the Alliance a few years later, the queues of refugees in search of work and shelter extended from Novovileysk to Vilnius itself. As the Tsar’s authorities had expected an influx of Vilnius residents into their new city instead, it had not occurred to them that there was any need to guard the road between the old and new Vilnius.

  When they realised what had happened, the Russians promptly blocked all roads leading to Vilnius and set up a very close watch on them. Troops encircled Novovileysk, holding all its residents and workers hostage to the Russian Empire. However, due to a labour shortage, the Burgomaster of Novovileysk was struck with the brilliant idea of building a mental hospital in the only park that the city had managed to retain, where patients from all the neighbouring provinces could be prescribed the treatment of ‘work therapy’.

  These ambitions caused the city to suffer, and its streets to be impregnated with an unbearable stench; while in summer this malodour became even stronger, winters were marked with an insufficiency of firewood and warmth. Even the Tsar’s soldiers responsible for encompassing the city treated their posting to Novovileysk as an exile; and other, less malodorous towns were chosen for the manoeuvres of the Tsar’s troops.

  However, not everything was gloom and doom. There were things that made the authorities in Novovileysk happy, the East wind being one of them. As soon as it started blowing towards Vilnius, Novovileysk factories opened all their steam control valves, allowing massive globs of stinking poisonous fumes to advance in the direction of the detested rival, which caused Vilnius residents take to their heels and desert the streets, and those at home to scrupulously shut their windows and doors. Before too long the Alliance retaliated – the Alchemists of Vilnius came up with a shield against smog. The outlay was astronomical but the Alliance could not care less. There was a line Protection from outside threats in the budget of every free city, which was a good excuse to spend the money whichever way was deemed fit.

  And this city of dreams had now become the destination for the Vitamancers’ tricycle, pursued by Legate of Vilnius Antanas Sidabras in an air balloon.

  Upon reaching the smoke-shrouded Novovileysk, the postman became alarmed.

  “I have no right to fly there. They will shoot at us,” he moaned trying to suppress a cough.

  “No, they will not,” Sidabras muttered back.

  He was watching the serpolett, which had just been approached by two Tsarist soldiers, with strained attention. Three more, their overcoats in shreds and mouths covered with scraps of muslin, sat on the rocks beside the wooden hut.

  The Vitamancers’ tricycle was checked with no delay. Soldiers inspected the visitors’ documents, saluted and let them through into the city.

  Sidabras shook his head in amazement.

  The serpolett continued along the road. After about a verst the road forked, the left branch leading to the train station, the right to the factories.

  Now Sidabras was coughing as well – the screen of smoke being so thick that the rays of the sun had to force their way down through it, adding a dirty orange hue to the artificial looking ghostly clouds. The black factory chimneys pierced the clouds of smoke like the ugly talons of some cyclopean monster.

  The tricycle turned right, rolled past the factories and, one turning later, entered the park.

  Once upon a time this park might have been green and luscious, but now it was overgrown with shrubs and decaying trees with darkened leaves. In the middle of the park there loomed a large building.

  The baffled Sidabras scratched his chin.

  “Erm... quite a stran
ge building,” he said quietly. “What could it be?”

  “A mental hospital,” the postman explained. A glimpse of surprise in the Legate’s eyes made him break out in a contented smile.

  Scaring some crows off the road, the tricycle approached the hospital and stopped. A Vitamancer in a grey suit clambered out and headed straight for the building.

  Sidabras had a good look at the sky.

  “Fly the balloon behind these,” he pointed at the trees. “It will not be long before someone notices us. You go as low as possible, and I will slide down the rope. Then you go up again and hurry back to Vilnius. And send a wireless message to Sluskai palace,” his order followed. “Is everything clear?”

  “It is, it is,” the pilot nodded. “But what about you?”

  “Don’t worry about me,” Sidabras reassured him. “But...” he looked at the small-framed postman from head to toe. “You know what, friend? Maybe you could help me.”

  The postman understood the Legate’s intent, and obligingly removed his jacket.

  The mail balloon had already disappeared from view when Sidabras came running beside the hospital and hid behind a bush. The postman’s jacket, which he wore over his t-shirt, was unbuttoned, while its sleeves were scrunched up to his elbows. He hoped that no one would notice this garment was way too small for him. A postman’s bag was hung over his shoulder.

  The three-storey red brick Novovileysk hospital was a rectangular brick box, resembling a prison, with its first and second floor windows protected with security bars. A discordant onion-shaped metal dome, adorned with the Orthodox cross, served as the only reminder that the people within these walls were protected by God.

  This must have been true as the patients of this institution were not blessed with mercy from humans. If truth be told, the first director of this hospital, a man called Krainskiy, was not really a ruthless creature; although he was aware of the true mission of his institution – supplying the industrial dragons of Novovileysk with free labour. But as soon as he started to speculate that people with muddled minds were also worthy of respect, he was declared a madman and kicked out. His successor appeared to be more loyal to the Tsar. He especially detested those who came to hospital with papers marked Secret. He took great pleasure in sending these people – mostly poor rebels against the regime – to special window-free wards.