Outside, the night air hits my face, cold and clean after the smoke inside. Cars line the drive. Men move around us, speaking into radios, helping the wounded, watching the windows.
The old Volkov house glows behind us, cracked open and bleeding light.
Yaromir doesn’t look back.
I do. Just once.
Through the shattered doorway, I see Kirill still sitting near the stairs, looking after us. Behind him, the house that built men like Dmitri stands damaged but not destroyed.
An uneasy peace.
Not forgiveness. Not surrender. Only a pause between wars.
Yaromir carries me to the waiting car, and Viktor opens the door.
As he lowers me inside, I touch his face.
He stops.
“Come with me,” I say.
His eyes search mine. Maybe he hears what I’m really asking.
“I’m here,” he says. Then he gets in beside me and pulls me carefully into his arms.
The car starts moving.
The house recedes behind us.
For the first time since the river, I let myself breathe.
36
YAROMIR
I takeAnya back to the hospital myself.
She’s pale by the time we reach the emergency entrance, though she tries to hide it. Her head rests against my shoulder, one hand curled weakly into my shirt. The hospital staff sees the blood on both of us and moves fast. Too fast. Hands reach for her, voices overlap, a stretcher appears.
I don’t want to let her go. For one irrational second, my arms tighten around her.
Anya notices. Her eyes lift to mine. “Yaromir.”
“I’m here.”
“I know.”
The words settle me enough to place her carefully on the stretcher.
The second she’s out of my arms, the cold comes back. A doctor starts asking questions. A nurse checks her bandage. Someone tries to look at the wound in my side, and I push his hand away.
“Her first,” I say.
The doctor opens his mouth, sees my face, and chooses wisely.
They wheel her into a treatment room. I follow until a nurse blocks me. “Sir, you need to wait outside.”
“No.”
