I nodded. I went to the man and cradled his head in my arms. “Tell him that all is going to be well, that he is only a little injured and that I am a doctor and will help him.”
“What—”
“Tell him!”
Aleksey squatted down and began to translate. The man’s eyes widened and fastened onto me with a look that made me want to weep. Such misplaced hope. “Tell him to close his eyes.”
After a slight pause, Aleksey added this. The man closed his eyes with complete trust in my ability to save him. I suppose I did that in a way. I took the knife from my boot and drew it forcibly and without hesitation across his throat. I cut deep and sure. I had done this many times before for different reasons and knew the feel of chords and tendons parting to the kiss of my blade.
I heard a stirring of anger around me. Aleksey was very pale and had clearly not expected this outcome. He stood quickly, though, and moved toward the angry soldiers. I dropped the dead man’s head and stood too. The officer was glancing between the increasingly irate mob and me. “Who are you, Doctor, and who is your companion?”
I stepped forward quickly. “I am a doctor traveling from England to the court of the Tsar. This is my servant. We met some merchants last night who informed us that we might be able to replenish our supplies if we rendezvoused with your wagons. As you can see”—I waved at our two horses—“we lost our supplies in an attack by bandits some days back. It has been a very cold journey since then.”
He nodded, glancing between us. I prayed that Aleksey would not choose this moment to assert his true position. I even stepped slightly in front of him, so the officer was speaking only with me.
We were taken to a command tent. Another officer questioned me. He also spoke some French and a little German, so we were able to muddle through our various questions and answers. Finally he consulted for a while with his younger subordinate and then said, “Doctor, you find us in something of a dilemma. We lost our doctor yesterday to a fall from his horse. Can we persuade you to stay with us and minister to the men? We will compensate you royally for your time and inconvenience, of course. This is not a good time for you to be traveling, especially through the wilds of Russia, which are impassable during winter. Stay with us until the spring and resume your journey then.”
I lifted my eyebrows in surprise. I had not expected this. I bowed slightly. “May I have a moment to consider your very kind offer, sir?” I stepped outside and found my “servant” holding the horses and looking around the camp with great interest. I stepped up to him and said in an undertone, whilst appearing to tighten Xavier’s girth, “I have been asked to join them as their doctor. What do you think? Is this not a good opportunity to discover their plans?”
He gave me an incredulous look. “You get asked to be their doctor on the strength of slitting a man’s throat! I could have done that!”
“Butyouwould not have. Like all other men, you would have attempted to help him, and that would have killed him more slowly and far more cruelly. It is harder to be dispassionate than it is to be kind. But concentrate on this now. What do you think about their offer?”
“Oh, you decide. I am now yourservant, after all.”
“Aleksey, if you do not stop being such a baby, I will treat you accordingly, put you over my knee, and spank you here and now. You are my prince and my general still.Youdecide. This isyourmission.” I was good at flattery as well as dispassion. It was only a little while before that I had decided upon not respecting what his highness thought about anything, but this seemed like a very good opportunity to me, and I did not want to see him lose it to spite me. Reluctantly, he nodded. I returned to the command tent and told them of my decision.
Within a few days, therefore, I went from traveling with an army as their doctor and sharing a tent with Aleksey to traveling with an army as their doctor and sharing a tent with Aleksey. Other than that we were now heading west and not east, there was very little difference. Not a particular friend of this army’s general, I was not included in officers’ orders groups or spoken to of plans and strategies. However, it was not hard to pick up a huge amount of useful information from the simple use of eyes and ears. It had been an unplanned-for advantage for us when I had claimed Aleksey as my servant, for it enabled him to wander around, eyes cast down, no one taking any notice of him, and talk to the ordinary soldiers. As in any army, ordinary soldiers always know what is happening, even if their officers do not realize that they do. By keeping his eyes cast down whenever an officer appeared, he was also able to hide the give-away green.
He was troubled by something he saw. It took until the next night before I could coax it out of him, as I don’t think either of us could remember whether we were speaking or not, so had apparently decided on the same option of not being the first one to break the impasse. Finally, however, I just asked him as we lay side by side on our cots. “What have you learned? Anything useful? We cannot carry this deception off for very much longer before suspicions will be aroused.”
“Why would anyone suspect us?”
“You are a terrible servant; that is why. What have you discovered?”
“There are not enough of them; that is what I have discovered.”
I turned over onto my side, propping my head on my hand. “I would not have thought any general would wantmoreenemy.”
“I do not. I want to know where the ones thatdoexist are. Their army is much larger than this, Niko. Where are they all? Their cavalry numbers here are laughable. The infantry I can see consists of only two battalions. But logistically they are set up for three times this number.”
I had no idea what any of this meant in detail, but I got the big picture. “You think this is a ruse? That their main thrust is elsewhere?”
He nodded, pleased to have his suspicions spoken out loud. “I need access to the command tent. Imustsee their maps. I do not think they have any intention of defending the peninsula.”
I thought for a moment. “Perhaps they did not want it in the first place.”
“What do you mean?” He turned on his side too. We were inches away from each other, speaking in low voices.
“I’ll show you.” I sat up, cross-legged, facing him, and reached out my hand, placing it upon his raised hip. Under his loose shirt, it was bony and sharp. His eyes tracked the movement and stayed firmly locked onto this small contact. I let my hand travel down to the front of his breeches. He was definitely concentrating now. “See?” He turned to look at me, a question upon his face, and then he felt the knife at his throat.
He swallowed. “I did not see that coming.”
“I did not intend you to. I kept you pleasantly distracted by stroking your hip.”
“They have been stroking my hip,” he murmured.
“Yes, I believe that, metaphorically, they have.”
