Mia was assigned with her infantry squad to a patch of ground that had been a pasture. Now it was an expanse of mud, and they sheltered from the constant rain under a series of tarpaulins stretched over a framework of wood. Without dry wood, a fire was impossible, so the men huddled together for warmth. Mia unashamedly leaned against a man whose name she didn’t know.

She was sorry she didn’t smoke, for the men seemed to draw some comfort from their foul-smelling cigarettes and warmed one hand over the glowing ash when they weren’t puffing on them.

“Comrade Zhurova,” someone said, and it took a moment for her to react. Glancing up, she saw it was Colonel Borodin, and she struggled to her feet. She saluted as smartly as she could while shivering, noticing a moment later that he was accompanied by Alexia.

“Congratulations for your sharpshooting today. You and Senior Corporal Mazarova made it possible for us to move one village farther west. Keep that up, and we’ll end up in Berlin.”

“Yes, Comrade Colonel. It took me by surprise, too.”

“I see that you still have Senior Corporal Petrova’s weapon. Well, if you can shoot that well with a sniper’s rifle, I’m assigning it to you until she returns to duty. Then we’ll see about another one for you. In the meantime, we’re transferring you to the sniper squad. Senior Corporal Mazarova has requested you as her spotter.”

Mia saluted again. “Thank you, Comrade Colonel. Request permission to visit Corporal Petrova in the medical station.”

“Permission granted.” The colonel saluted quickly and strode away from them.

Alexia embraced her awkwardly, impeded by their heavy coats and rifles. “Well done, you. Who would have thought, eh?”

“Certainly not me. How’s Kalya? Have you seen her?”

“Not yet, but one of the stretcher bearers said she was sitting up and smoking, so she’s not dead yet. Come on. The med station’s over there in the church. Lucky devils have a roof over their heads.”

The church was dry, but that was all it was. The folding beds they’d had in the previous village had not been brought over yet, so the two dozen wounded lay on blankets on the floor.

A few wooden benches, odd remainders of those used years before by parishioners, were piled up in the rear, though some of the soldiers were smashing them to fuel the fire that burned just outside the door. The altar, such as it was, had long ago been cleared of religious objects and now held bundles of bandages and bottles of disinfectant.

They walked along the rows of wounded on the floor until they found Kalya, leaning against her backpack and trying with one hand to roll a cigarette. Alexia knelt beside her.

“Let me do that for you. You’re making a mess of it.” She took hold of Kalya’s tiny sack of mahorka tobacco and shook a line of it into the folded paper. She rolled it slowly, and her trembling hands revealed she was more worried than her banter suggested.

Mia squatted next to her. “So what the hell happened? I wasn’t paying attention, and suddenly you were on the ground. Are they going to ship you back?”

Kalya accepted Alexia’s somewhat uneven cigarette roll and held it in her mouth while she lit it. She inhaled, blinking from the harsh smoke, and sighed. “Not sure. Something hit my arm and broke it. Shrapnel, maybe, because it hurts like hell. They’ll send me to the nearest surgical unit to clean it up. I should be back in two weeks, with luck.”

Alexia shook her head. “With luck, you’ll be sent home for a good rest. In the meantime, Marina here has surprised us all by being a crack shot. She’ll take your place until you’re ready to come back.”

Mia laid a hand lightly on Kalya’s good shoulder. “They gave me your rifle, but don’t worry. I promise I’ll take good care of it. I’ll oil it, keep it dry, all the things they tell you.”

“You better, because I’m coming back for it. You’re not going to Berlin without me.”

“Wouldn’t think of it.”

The assurance had come from Mia spontaneously, but the word Berlin caught her up short. She hadn’t thought of that. She hadn’t thought of the future at all and now had to consider the possibility of being trapped in the Red Army until victory, whenever that would be.

“All right, you two. Clear out. You can’t hole up here all night just to stay out of the rain.” It was one of the nurses, and she was serious.

“Yes, comrade. Just give us a minute.” Alexia rolled another cigarette and slipped it into Kalya’s shirt pocket. “We’ll check on you tomorrow if they haven’t moved you out.” She kissed Kalya on the forehead. Mia would like to have done so, too, but it seemed presumptuous. Instead, she once again touched Kalya’s good shoulder. “Think of us while you’re in your clean bed eating hot food. And hurry back.”

Kalya stared up at them, wan, as the nurse returned and hustled them out of the church.

As they stood on the stone steps outside, a private rushed up to them. “Comrades, have you heard the news? The Americans landed this morning in France.”

“Hurrah!” Alexia hugged her suddenly, a long, tight, wonderful hug.

When she released her hold, Mia beamed. “Thank God! Finally I’m not the only American fighting north of Italy.”

She thought of President Roosevelt poring over his maps, of Churchill, grumbling about the lack of landing craft, of Stalin’s endless reproaches. And now, in the fourth year of the war, the Western allies had finally come through.

“Better late than never.”

Chapter Nineteen

June 1944


As the weeks rolled by, marked by small and costly victories, Mia realized she liked being a sniper, if for no other reason than that they were privileged. They were too valuable to be used as cannon fodder, and the colonel kept them in reserve until after the initial attack. When the enemy dug in and set their own best marksmen on their pursuers, they were called up. Then it was a contest between experts, countering skill with skill, guile with guile. So far, she’d come out each time on top and now had her own collection of spent shells.

This evening, she slouched on her pack in the hovel they’d been bivouacked in outside of Pskov, and before she fell asleep she glanced around at the comrades who, through skill or just plain luck, still remained.

Curiously, they didn’t swagger or try to outdo each other in prowess, other than the implicit competition of scorekeeping. And there was nothing masculine in their demeanor. When they were off duty, sitting among themselves, most talked of girlish things: parents; fiancés or flirtations; the dresses, makeup, hair styles they would wear again when the war was over.

And since the mortar elimination at the bridge, when she’d gained her sniper stripes, something had changed in her. Or changed again, since the dull-witted accountant who had accepted a job at the White House had fallen away in stages. She had been a victim multiple times—of her father’s abuse, of Grushenka’s deception, of a false accusation of murder, of blackmail, of Molotov’s attempted murder. The injustices had piled up and could have crushed her. But now she had recovered her vision and a rifle, and it seemed nothing could hurt her.

And then there was Alexia.

The original attraction had been her striking Slavic beauty, an idealized symbol of a past Mia could scarcely remember. But unlike Grushenka, who had merely aroused her in the most vulgar manner, Alexia had an elegance and a restraint. Over the weeks of shared hardship, something wonderful had evolved that she couldn’t quite define. She watched Alexia, sleeping a few feet away. She desired her, of that she was certain, but more than that, she felt profound allegiance to her. She understood now that soldiers did not die for the homeland, but for each other.

The door to the hovel flew open, and at least four of the women reached for their rifles.

“Hey, hey! Take it easy, girls. It’s me. Doesn’t anyone recognize me, or have I gotten too fat on my mother’s cooking?”

“Kalya, you vixen! How are you?”

Mia leapt to her feet, along with most of the other women, and hugged her. “Why did they let you come back so soon?”

“What a question. They brought me back because I’m a damned fine shot, and the rest of you are just not up to snuff.”

Klavdia pounded her back. “But your score is way behind now, old girl.” She laughed. “Come on, sit down. Tell us about home and we’ll tell you about the war.”

Even in the darkness of the hovel, lit only by a few shell-case lamps, Mia could see that Kalya was flushed with happiness. They sat down in a circle leaning on their packs and began to talk like sisters. Focused on the new arrival, Mia was surprised to feel the pressure of another shoulder against hers.

“Alexia,” she said, pleased at the touch. “It’s good to have her back, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is. I wonder if they’ll pair us up again.”

Only then did Mia remember that Kalya was Alexia’s spotter, and her joy faded to resentment.

* * *

At three in the morning, Col. Borodin ordered his officers, and the half dozen snipers who remained, to his headquarters. He was somber.

“Comrades. As most of you know, Pskov is at least a thousand years old and has been in Russian hands since Alexander Nevsky took it back from the German knights in the thirteenth century. Today we face the Germans again, but the blood of Alexander Nevsky runs in our veins. The enemy has blockaded himself behind the walls of the old Kremlin of Pskov, and we do not have the luxury of being able to lure him out onto a frozen lake.” Soft laughter rippled through the room from those who had seen the Eisenstein film of Nevsky’s icy victory set to Prokofiev’s music.