Snow Wolf (50 page)

He was lying in the snow and the back of
his head was touching something hard. From the way he lay he saw he was propped
against a fallen tree trunk. There was a dull ache at the back of his skull and
he felt a throbbing pain flow through his body. His clothes had been shredded
by the explosion, the material scorched, and he smelled of burned material and
fuel.

And something else.

To his horror he saw his false hand had
been sheared off, exposing his stump, and the end of the flesh had burned to
black.

Lukin stared at the wound in agony and
alarm. He tried to move his arm but the stump refused to budge, his whole body
frozen stiff, from cold or shock, he couldn't tell which.

Perhaps he was paralyzed and the
explosion had shattered his spine?

He couldn't recall, but he must have been
doused in fuel when the helicopter's tanks ignited. All he remembered with
certainty was the awesome crash as the MIL hit the ground and an eruption of
flames moments before. He vaguely recollected the passenger door bursting open
from the force of the fall. He had been flung out and his skull had hit something
hard.

After that was blank.

He had landed in the snow. It must have
damped the flames on his clothes and arm and prevented them from spreading.
Still, the pain in his stump was excruciating.

A thought occurred to him; if his back
was broken would he still feel pain in his limb?

Somewhere near he could sense light and
heat.

There was a tangle of hissing metal,
steam rising from the wreckage of the MIL. The forest had not caught fire but
there was a small blaze in what remained of the cockpit, lying at the base of a
huge electricity pylon. Severed metal cables swung in the wind, a shower of
sparks erupting every time they brushed against the pylon.

Flames licked in the center of a tangled
heap of metal. He saw the body of the pilot lying half in and half out of the
shattered wreckage. His body had been half burned, the man's left arm dangling
over a chunk of jagged metal. The bone had cracked cleanly and was only held on
by the exposed tendons.

Lukin winced. The man was certainly dead
and it was his fault. He had been too intent on capturing Stanski and the
woman. Too intent on stopping them from escaping. But they had escaped and he
had lost them.

So close ... he had been so close.

He was unaware of how much time had
passed but he guessed it hadn't been long because the wreckage was still
burning. Flakes of snow began to fall and hiss on the flames.

He was barely conscious but he knew he
couldn't remain in this temperature for long. He tried to move but still his
body felt numb.

Suddenly he was aware of a flash of light
through the trees and heard the rumble of an engine. He remembered the highway.
Perhaps someone had come to investigate the explosion or the damaged pylon.

He cried, hoarsely, "Help!"

It was a weak cry, a cry of desperation,
and no one answered.

Seconds later the noise and the light
vanished beyond the trees.

It was useless. Waves of pain rolled up
from his scorched arm. His eyelids fluttered.

. He wanted to close his eyes and sleep,
forget about his suffering.

Not sleep, he thought: I'm living.

For a moment, in his feverish mind, he
saw Nadia's face, smiling at him.

Leningrad.

The storage room at the end of the
courtyard was in pitch darkness when Vladimir unlocked the two heavy padlocks
and flicked on the switch. The room flooded with light and he beckoned them
inside and closed the door. The large room had obviously once been one of
several individual stables belonging to the house during the Tsar's time,
entered through the courtyard. Vladimir's storeroom was packed with ancient
rotting furniture and on a narrow workshop table were bits of engine parts.
There was a dusty sheet in a corner, covered with paint stains.

Vladimir pulled it off to reveal a German
Army BMW dispatch rider's motorcycle with twin leather saddle pouches hanging
at the back. The bike's gray paintwork had been repainted dark green and the
tires were broad, deeply grooved thick rubber made for rough terrain. Vladimir
smiled and ran a hand lovingly over the leather saddle.

"I could say a lot against the
Germans but the bastards still made the best motorcycles. There are lots of
these models still around and they're much better than the Soviet variety. Even
the army uses them. I took her for a spin last week. The engine still runs
sweetly." He wheeled the BMW out into the center of the room and said to
Stanski, "You've ridden a motorcycle before?"

"Never."

"Christ! Now you are fucked, little
brother."

"I could learn, quickly."

"On Russian roads? You may as well
put a gun to your head and squeeze the trigger. Here, you'd better start it and
try it for size. Don't worry about the neighbors, they're used to me riding
this thing."

Stanski took the handlebars and climbed
onto the machine. It felt rugged and heavy.

"Of course, it'll be damned cold
riding it," Vladimir remarked. "You have to be well wrapped up or
your balls will freeze hard as rocks."

"I'll try to remember that."

Vladimir smiled at Anna. "Sit on the
back, dear. Get a feel for it."

Anna slid onto the machine behind Stanski
and put her arms around his waist.

Vladimir said, "Right, start her up.
The kick starter's on your right. That's the metal arm that swivels out."

Stanski found the kick starter, flicked
it out, gave it a blow with his foot and the machine started first time. A
steady, reassuring throbbing filled the storeroom.

Vladimir smiled. "See? She still
starts first time. Well, what do you think?"

"Considering we don't have many
options, it's worth a try."

Vladimir poured them each another vodka
as they sat in the kitchen again and spread out the map.

"Not bad for a first-timer. You did
well."

Stanski had ridden around the yard for
half an hour to get the feel of the machine. Difficult at first, but with
Vladimir's instructions he managed to keep the BMW reasonably well controlled,
learning how to change gears, operate the various switches on the handlebars,
and what to do if the engine flooded. A group of curious, scrawny children had
come down from the tenement flats to beg Vladimir for a ride until he had
shooed them away and wheeled the BMW back into the storeroom.

Now Stanski looked at the man and said,
"Tell us what you have in mind."

"The KGB and militia are probably
going to be checking the railway and bus stations, the airport, and maybe even
doing spot checks on the Metro." He pointed to the map, a web of roads
leading out of Leningrad to all points on the compass. "They may even set
up roadblocks on all the main roads out of the city if they haven't already
found that car you abandoned. And when they do find it they'll definitely get
to work trying to find you. It's over six hundred kilometers to Moscow. Using
the motorcycle you should be able to avoid the main roads out of Leningrad. But
the one road they probably won't be checking is the road back to Tallinn."
Anna said, "I don't understand."

Vladimir grinned. "Simple. You
double back on the Baltic road, past Pushkin, to here." He pointed to a
place on the map. "It's a town called Gatchina, approximately eighty
kilometers from the city. At this point you take any of the minor roads that
fork southeast to Novgorod. That leaves you with just over five hundred
kilometers to cover to get to Moscow. But once you get to Gatchina and beyond,
there are so many minor roads through hilly, uninhabited forest that it would
take half the Red army to find you, and you could make it to Moscow without
much difficulty.

"That motorbike out there was
designed for rough terrain and can easily travel over dirt tracks, no trouble.
The route I'm suggesting is an indirect one, and longer, but probably the
safest, considering the circumstances. Don't worry about getting lost; you can
keep the map and I'll give you a compass. With luck you could be in Moscow in
just over twelve hours. "There are also several trains that run there by
an indirect route from smaller towns along the way if you have to abandon the
motorcycle. It means changing trains many times, of course, but that can't be
helped and this is the best route I can suggest. Don't worry about removing the
license plates on the bike if you ditch it. Like most of the German motorcycles
still around, mine isn't registered." He grinned as he looked at them.
"How does all that sound?"

Stanski smiled. "When do we
leave?"

"Who knows how long before the city
is ringed with checkpoints'? For your own sake, the sooner you leave the
better."

Stanski checked his watch. "Let's
say this evening. As soon as the traffic starts to fill the main roads it'll
help give us a better chance of not being noticed."

"That would be perfect-"

Estonia.

Lukin heard a sound like an animal cry
and came awake with a start. The pain in his stump hadn't gone away and his
body shivered with agony. How long had he been lying here?

He moved the fingers of his left hand,
slowly. An effort. But there was no pain there and at least he could move
something. He tried his wrist next. It budged slightly. Enough so he could read
his watch.

A quarter past one. over three hours.

He had been lying in the frozen woods for
o Blasts of freezing air raged through the trees in gusts. His limbs still felt
like ice and his bones ached through with the intense cold. His teeth
chattered. He licked his lips. They felt dry and the chilled air bit into his
face like slivers of ice. He inhaled his lungs filling which made him cough He
heard the cry again.

He had heard that sound before, in
childhood. He and his brother as small boys, playing in a field near their
father's house one winter's evening. His father off in the distance by the
house, chopping wood, looking up, waving at them.

And then the noise that startled them.
When they looked around they saw the two pairs of piercing yellow eyes staring
at them from the trees, until the eyes moved out of the woods and became
bodies.

Two white wolves.

Snow wolves.

Their white coats so bright they were
almost luminous. Lukin had screamed in flight and run back to his father as the
man raced toward him. He swept him up in his arms and Lukin still remembered
his comforting smells, an odd mixture of disinfectant, soap and sweat.

"Wolves, Papa!" Lukin had
screamed.

"Bah! He's afraid of
everything," his brother Mischa tested, laughing.

He looked at his brother accusingly.
"Then why did you too?"

"Because you ran, little brother. An
Mischa smiled. couldn't stop you." His father said, "Wolves don't
kill humans. Not unless they're threatened. Remember that. Now, come, Mama has
supper ready."

His father carried them into the warm,
happy house and there was bread on the table and hot soup their mama had made.
A log fire crackled in the hearth and cast shadows about the old room. His
mother was hugging them, fussing over them, her belly swollen with a child,
warning them not to go into the woods again alone.

And afterwards? What had happened
afterwards? He tried to think, but a fog rolled in. It was a long, long time
ago. Fog and memories a blur the years had eroded. He remembered little of that
time, before Mischa had died.

Maybe he was remembering now because he
was close to death; the way they said recollections flashed before dying eyes.
He blinked and pushed the fleeting memories from his mind. Now was important,
not the past.

He focused on the wreckage and the
half-burned corpse the pilot. Maybe the wolves had smelled the cooked flesh.

He tried to push that prospect from his
mind. The fire still dying, the hot embers smoldering. If he could get close to
the fire for heat, maybe he could thaw out his bones. Slowly he dragged himself
over to the fire. It took a long time, trying to block out the pain in his
stump, but he finally made it.

The heat from the embers was like a balm
as it started to soak through his body.

God, it feels good.

There were two sparking cables dangling
beside the debris. Lukin couldn't understand why someone hadn't come to
investigate the damaged pylon. Until he noticed there were still half a dozen
or more cables intact at the pole. The repairmen would come, eventually. But
when?

And by then he could be frozen to death.
The helicopter's radio would have been useful if it was still working, but the
wreckage told him that thought was a waste of time.

After five minutes, he tried to stand,
but his legs felt like rubber.

He swore. He needed more heat. The fire
was definitely helping. He shifted around until his legs were closer to the
embers.