Steve Doyle

This story was inspired by artwork titled “Not an Angel” “Not an Angel” by Liza Eshkenazi which she created for the Herscher Project #11, “Careful What You Wish For”.

White Death

The frigid cold is nearly unbearable. I cannot feel my fingers or toes. I stamp my feet but it does no good. Swirling snow stings my face and I pull my frozen collar up further against my raw cheek. I wish I had a full beard like the older men. My heavy great coat and fur-lined cap do not keep my teeth from chattering. I long for a cigarette. I crouch down to rejoin my comrades. A thick blanket of fog shrouds us so we cannot see beyond our own little circle. We are forbidden to light a fire lest the enemy see. He is said to be closing in and shortly we will continue the march to meet him. Sergei, a grizzled veteran at twenty-six, calls him “The White Death”. He points a gloved finger at me.

“A man would be sitting there one minute, just like you Tovarishch^* Volkov, and the next he would fall over dead, a gaping hole where his eye used to be, killed by a sniper nine hundred meters away or more. Other times they would come floating swiftly and silently over the snow like ghosts. You would never see them or hear them until they opened up at close range with their submachine guns.”

Dmitry, a raw recruit like me, shudders; I don’t know if from cold or fear or both. He is from the south, Sochi, on the Black Sea. I don’t think he has ever seen snow before. None of us have ever been this far north except Sergei who fought in the Winter War. Comrade Stalin has sent us to the furthest reaches of the empire to protect the precious lifeline of Allied supplies—the ice-free port of Murmansk and the solitary railroad line to Leningrad. Most of the Red Army is engaged to fight the invading Germans. We face Finns.

Vasily clears his throat. He has a nice bushy beard. There is ice in it, but still, I bet it keeps his face warm. He is older than me but younger than Sergei. I do not know much about him; he never talks of himself. He says he has heard that a single Finn can stop a tank.

“Yes!” Sergei nods vigorously in agreement. “It is true! I have seen it myself. One flew up on skis and jammed a tree trunk in the tracks. Then he was gone. Vanished before we even realized what he had done. Ghosts.”

Dmitry groans. “How will we ever stop them?”

Sergei claps him hard on the shoulder. “Ha! We will stop them for the simple reason that we are many and they are few.” I hope he is right. His grin disappears and his face takes on a solemn countenance. “But the Finns aren’t the only killers in this vast wilderness. There are others. Unnatural beasts.” Dmitry asks what he means.

He shifts his gaze from one to another of us like he has a secret and cannot decide if he should tell it. “In Murmansk they whisper of the upyr, a vicious vampire that sleeps through the long night then rises with the sun to hunt. They also warn of the vourdulak, who appears as a beautiful woman but carries a deadly bite. I have met Finnish prisoners who say the vourdulak is one of their own, a member of the Lotta Svärd, women who wander the dreary battlefields looking for wounded soldiers. If they find a Finn, they feed him and nurse him back to health. If they find a Russian, they kill him—or worse.”

Vasily motions for silence. “Do you hear that?”

Barely audible over the howling storm, the drone of a solitary airplane. I look up into a sheet of white. My only reward is a pellet of ice which stabs my eye. Sergei grunts. “How can they fly in this? Surely he can’t see.”

Our break is interrupted by muffled shouts and stomping footsteps. We are moving out. Dmitry whines. “Must we march in this? Can we not at least wait for the storm to subside?”

Sergei slaps him on the back once more. I think he tires of Dmitry’s complaining. “Did you not hear the plane? The pilot risks his life to support our advance. It is our duty to oblige him, comrade.”

So we march, though we can hardly see where we are going. We battle frostbite and fatigue, as deadly as Finnish guns. With every forward step I expect those guns to welcome us and add to our misery. I am apprehensive, but do not know if I am afraid. I think Dmitry is afraid but Sergei is not. I do not know about Vasily. I know only that I will not ask him.

We halt. We are not told why. Perhaps an obstacle blocks the road. A fallen tree. Or a Finnish trap. Perhaps the Finns themselves already surround us, and are preparing to open fire. The wait is agonizing. I cannot get warm. I still wish for a cigarette. Finally we move again. Plodding footsteps. Relentless cold.

Every so often I hear the purring engine of the plane. He must be searching for the Finns. I hope he finds them before they find us. Maybe I am afraid. I wonder if my rifle is frozen. That thought annoys me and I don’t know why it crept into my head. I force myself to think of something else. I am hungry. The airplane is getting closer. Is he headed for home? I wish I was going home. I would build a great roaring fire and sit right in front of it, warming my toes and smoking cigarettes one after another. Vodka would fill my belly and I would drift off to a comfortable sleep.

A deafening roar yanks me from my daydream. Ear-splitting cracks ripple through the air—machine gun fire! The Finns have found us! I peer into the thick white fog but can make out nothing except a few birch trees. I should throw myself to the ground. I stand like a statue. Bright flashes burn through the clouds in the sky ahead of me. I feel a searing heat in my belly. I find it strange that anything warm exists in this frozen place. I glance around but cannot see anyone else. Nor can I hear anything. It is eerie. How can I be alone?

My legs tremble, buckle, and I crumble. I do not even try to break the fall, only land in the snow with a dull thud. I hit my head. It does not hurt. I do not know how long I lie there, but finally I sense movement around me. I am not alone. I try to call out. My mouth is dry and I only utter a feeble cry. I try to raise my arm but it refuses to obey. Shadows flit before my glossy eyes. Soon they are gone.

How badly am I hurt? I struggle to lean up against a nearby rock. Red ice on my uniform. The snow beneath me drinks my life. My comrades have left me. I realize now that I’ve been shot by my own countryman, flying blindly in a storm, shooting at what he must have thought was the enemy. And so no Finns are even coming to take me prisoner. I am alone here. And I am going to die here.

Without warning the iron fist of fear grips my heart. I do not want to die! I appeal to the power of Perun to save me. And in desperation I beg Veles as well.^†

My fear fades as quickly as it had stolen upon me. Once again my thoughts drift toward home and the giant wood stove around which my family and I would keep warm. Or at least partly warm. Feet would bake while everything else froze, but still, it was better than this. I think of my village; old men play the balalaika while young women dance around in bright red skirts and colorful scarves. I close my eyes. I can almost hear the music. And the sweet voices of the pretty girls.

“Nikolay. Nikolay, where are you?”

The sound is so real my eyes fly open. In the thick fog that surrounds me I can barely make out a figure. Could it be one of my comrades come looking for me? But no, the voice belongs to a woman, I am certain. I recall Sergei’s story about Finnish women providing food and medical care to wounded soldiers. Unless, of course, the soldier is Russian. Can this be one of them? But she knows my name; how?

The shadowy shape approaches. It is indeed a woman. She wears a long white dress and her shoulders are bare. In this cold? I must be dreaming. She cannot be real. Her wavy long hair is the color of blood.

“Nikolay! I have found you.” She kneels in the snow beside me, scarlet hair brushing my face. She reaches out, touches my chin. Her fingers are ice. She lifts my face so I can see into her eyes. They are black as coal.

“Who are you?” My voice cracks when I speak.

“I am Lyubya. I have been sent to find you.”

“But who—who sent you?”

“I have come to grant your wish. You wish not to die; is that so?”

“Yes, I did wish it.”

“Then you shall not. My name means ‘Love’ and you must know ‘love never dies’.” She leans forward, brings her slender face close. With nervous excitement I realize her soft lips are dancing over mine in a delicate kiss. She bites my lip. Hard. I pull back wide-eyed as fresh blood trickles down my chin. She smiles and wipes it away with an icy finger she puts in her mouth. She pats my chest. “Soon you will regain your strength. And you will develop an insatiable hunger. This hunger will drive you and keep you alive.” She rises slowly to her feet. “Goodbye, Nikolay.” Like a ghost she turns and glides away. The fog envelopes her and she is gone.

I am hungry.

I wander through the arctic circle, the land of the midnight sun and northern lights where mirages fool the eye and nothing is as it seems. I think often of Lyubya, the vourdulak who made me what I am. The Red Army sent me out to kill, but she made me a killer. The Red Army left me to die, but she made me to live. Indeed she ensured I would never perish. But I cannot blame her; I wished for this. Foolish boy! Afraid to die—begging to live!

And so I live. My loved ones must think me dead by now but they are better off not knowing the awful truth. They would never be safe from the hunger I cannot control. The people in my village do not deserve to live in fear. So I remain far away in this vast wilderness, this frozen wasteland where no one ever comes except those who are sent, like I was, to kill. Men who deserve to die.

To satisfy my hunger I hunt. I hunt for wounded soldiers, who rejoice when they first see me, but shriek with terror when they realize what I am. White Death. My comrades left me to die in the snow. I am their punishment.

And they are mine.