Cedar Sanderson is doing N'inktober, so I'm going to follow along and do what I've been trained to do by the Raconteur Press Postcard books: come up with a story to match her visual prompts. I can't guarantee that I'll have a complete story for every image, but I'm going to at least try to come up with a scene, a start, or an idea!
Wolf-Man Abandoned
Sacha crouched in front of his cabin, tending his cook fire as he watched the soldier limp up the mountain through the growing shadows. The smell of simmering venison stew rose from his old cauldron, making his stomach growl.
He barely looked up when the soldier stumbled into the clearing. The man’s uniform was so matted with blood and gore that he couldn’t even guess as to its provenance. He nodded at the log next to him and the soldier dropped onto it with a sigh of contentment.
“Koschei.” He stopped, cleared his throat. Spat. It had been a year since he’d last spoken. “Heard you coming.” The howling of the profane things in the forest the night before had been even more intense than usual.
The soldier grimaced. “Ah! Every damn time, I tell you, Sacha. You think they would learn, but no. They do not. For all their supposed cunning, every year, they try to kill me.” He shrugged. “Though I will admit, it took me some time to find one stupid enough to try.”
“There are fewer of them these days. They are dying out, I think.”
Koschei smirked. “Largely from my visits.”
“You could come in from the south, you know. They stay close to the Gate, trying to pry it open again.”
“Bah!” Koschei laughed. “Where is the fun in that? Best to get it over with. I let one eat me. Then I carve it open from the inside. Simple.”
“And if one day, you can’t?”
“Then I get what I want. Though it would be a shame to miss out on your delicious stew.”
Sacha took the hint. He slopped stew into a pair of wooden bowls and handed one to Koschei. The soldier dug an oversized metal spoon out of his coat and dug in. Sacha sat on the ground at his feet and ate his own helping by tilting the bowl and slurping down the contents.
They ate in silence, until Koschei put the bowl aside and stretched with a sigh.
“I mean it. That is good. You killed the deer yourself?”
“With my own hands. Claws.” He held his hand up, turning it in the firelight. It was a man’s hand, hairy and calloused. Then the flames would flicker and it would be a wolf’s paw instead, just for a moment.
“Still straddling both worlds, I see.”
Sacha grunted. “That’s the way she made me. Sometimes it is easier to deal with things, being the man. Other times? Better to be the wolf. It is easier to balance the two out here.”
“Our people could use a wolf right now.”
“You always say that.”
Koschei shook his head. “I mean it, this time. Sacha, you would not believe these idiots. They are stupider than the things in the forest. Every year, it is a new war. And every battle, it is Stalingrad again; our countrymen dying in droves. Only without the purpose. Or the victory.”
Sacha reached over and flicked a bit of bone off Koschei’s uniform. “Is that why you’re fighting? To give them hope?”
Koschei threw back his head and laughed, long and hard. When he looked down again, tears were streaming from his eyes. He wiped them away with the back of his hand, chuckling.
“Oh, that is good! Nobody else makes me laugh like you. Fight for the idiots? Bah! I take up arms for the other side. I am death in the night. I kill the weak, the fools, the zampolit and their spawn. The strong I let live, and hand over to Rasputin to whisper words of revolution.”
“He is still trying to get the people to rise up and reinstate the tsars?” Sacha shook his head. “How many times has he tugged at the strings of revolt, now? Three? Four?”
“He is confident he will get it right this time.”
“Unlikely.”
Koschei leaned forward. “That is why I need you, tovarishch! Let Rasputin play his games of revolution. You and I both know why everything has gone to hell. We have lost our heart. She has abandoned us.”
“She has not.” As he spoke, he flickered like the firelight, shiting between wolf and man. The sounds he made were part words, part growls of warning. Go no further.
Koschei was not familiar with sorrow, but something close to it left a shadow on his face. “I am sorry. It is true. It’s been more than a century. I beg you, come with me. The people – they need their soul back. They may not have Grandmother, but they can have you.”
The raw emotion in his voice cut Sacha to the bone. She had loved her Russia and her people, in her own rough way. Sometimes a very rough way. But then, what was love without discipline? What was life without struggle? What was laughter without loss? Who would show that to the people, if not her?
Sacha turned away from the fire to stare out at the forest. Tatters of light still slung to the tallest trees, tiny points of light amidst the growing darkness. As he watched, they disappeared, one by one, until a single point of light lingered, alone in the darkness.
Alone. He did not mind being alone. At times like this, though, when he remembered what it was like before she left, he was tempted by the idea of an end to his solitude. The Gate was shut. What would happen if he left? Who would know?
I would.
As he wondered, the last point of light was consumed by the darkness. As soon as it disappeared, one of the malevolent things in the forest screeched. Its banshee wail echoed through the night and crawled up the mountain like a thing with too many legs.
“Do you remember when it happened, Koschei?” His voice was barely a whisper on the wind. “When Grandmother called us all together, to let us know what was coming? She gathered her tools. Prepared her weapons. Filed her iron teeth to points.”
Koschei cast his eyes down. “I remember.”
“So do I. And when it happened? When the Gate opened, and the Unholy things sought to walk our lands?” His voice was rising, and he did not care. “When Hell fountained up out of the earth, and Heaven struck it down from above? I was here. I was by her side when she took up her mortar and pestle. I watched her as she walked, laughing, into the Gate and shut it behind her. A you know what she told me. You know.”
Koschei sighed. “Yes. Stay.”
“Stay. Defend. Protect! Let nothing through until I return.”
He clenched his jaw, willing his heart to slow. Counting his breaths until he was able to speak again.
“Until I return, she said. She will be back.”
The corner of Koschei’s mouth curled up. “When I listen to you, I can almost believe it.”
“She will be back,” Sacha said simply. “Until then, brother, I wait.”
“Then I will wait with you this evening.”
“And tomorrow?”
Koschei grinned and reached into his jacket, pulling out a clear glass bottle.“Tomorrow, I will go back to the idiots, and you will go back to your watch. Tonight, though, we’ll drink good honest vodka to honor her, and wish her a quick return.” He uncorked the bottle, took a swig, and held it out.
Sacha took the bottle and sniffed. The smell of it made his eyes water. He titled it back and enjoyed the burn as it slid down his throat.
“And maybe even a successful revolution for Rasputin?”
Koschei laughed. “Let’s not push it, friend. There are limits to what even vodka can do.”
So good. I do have a fondness for Russian folk tales.