Chapter 25 #2
His daughter Polina was watching the match, sitting this game out as a rider. She was joined by a massive crowd of earth vampires, all wearing the emerald green and white colors her territory was known for.
And more than any other, Rudov’s clan had gathered, wearing green-and-red jackets in the Cossack style typical of his daughter Juliya’s people. So many had gathered that the border of the chaugan field positively glowed blood-red under the torchlight.
There were other guests from the Poshani. Radu, who waved as Oleg passed, was joined by a large company of mounted Poshani vampires and numerous humans, all clad in colorful finery and heavy fur coats.
Lidik’s clan mingled with the Poshani Hazar, who took to the air to observe the match from a higher angle.
There were Russian mortals in sleds that pulled alongside the mounted vampires as they trod steadily out to the field, and on the far side of the field, there were stables already set up, grooms tending to horses who waited among the heated shelters for their turn to play the game.
The far side of the field was for players, and the forest side of the field was for the spectators.
When the majority of the company had reached the chaugan grounds, Rudov rode forward to the center of the field, pointed to the tall painted poles on either side of the field, and shouted, “Welcome, friends, to the battle ground!”
The first two chukkas were not as brutal as the typical matches Oleg fought with his brothers, but then again, this was more of a ceremonial match than a competitive one.
Tatyana’s and Oleg’s teams were at a draw, each having scored two points.
Only one player had been sidelined on Tatyana’s team—a young Poshani who wasn’t prepared for a sudden blow to the chest with a chaugan mallet—so while there was blood on the field, it was mostly confined to bloody noses or cuts from flying ice.
The horses were resting, so Oleg and the five others on his team had gathered on the far side of the field to see how they could push out of the current draw while Juliya and Rudov led the crowd in chants and singing.
Music and dancing were a vital part of the chaugan match, keeping the spectators entertained while the riders regrouped.
“I’m honestly surprised how well Tatyana le Tala is doing,” Lazlo grumbled. “Did you see her take that mallet to the chest?”
“Yes.” Oleg cut his eyes to Oksana. “Am I going to have to bring out my axe?”
“Don’t give me that look—it’s a contact sport.” Oksana’s face was smeared with dried blood from her nose. “And she’d already drawn first blood by the time I hit her.”
That much was true. His wife was showing her competitive side, and while she didn’t have as much dexterity hitting the pul as others, what she could do very well was aim that chaugan mallet at anyone trying to take the ball from one of her teammates.
“We need a strategy,” Oleg said. “They may be down one player this half, but we aren’t going to walk away with this game when they have Mika, Lev, and Pavel. We need to isolate Mika.”
“Her Hazar is good too,” Ivan said. “Very good rider for a wind vampire. And his strikes are accurate.”
“That’s Sándor,” Oleg said. “And you’re right. He’s better than expected.”
“He scored one of their goals and has had the most attempts.” Ivan narrowed his eyes. “Can wind vampires cheat and use wind to alter the ball?”
“If you think they can do that, don’t you think he would have scored more than once?” Lazlo asked.
“Fair point,” Ivan muttered.
“We can,” one of their Poshani players named Jodi chimed in. “Use our amnis on the ball, I mean. But we don’t. We’d feel it if Sándor used his wind to score, and he’d never hear the end of it and no one would ever play him again.”
“Understood.” Oleg nodded at the Poshani players. “You two are doing well.”
“Thank you.” Jodi nodded to the other player, a woman named Meri. “We’ve been practicing for weeks.”
Lazlo slapped one on the shoulder. “You haven’t embarrassed yourself.”
“Double-team Mika,” Oleg said. “Ignore Tatyana. She’s not confident enough with her mallet to take the ball.” He pointed at Jodi and Meri. “And you two move forward. We need to throw them off. Do you think you can hit the net?”
They exchanged a look. “Yes, captain,” the woman said. “We can score.”
Oleg glanced at the large clock near the horse-staging area where the grooms were tending the mounts. “Go. We have ten more minutes. Get some blood and keep loose.”
“Yes, captain.”
Ivan wandered off, chatting with Oksana, in a far better mood than what Oleg had seen in ages.
“We kill Ivan.”
“Just like that?”
Never. Never just like that. Playing chaugan with his brother had reminded Oleg of the good times. The camaraderie. The nights of—
“Whatever sentimental drivel is circling your mind,” Lazlo muttered in Old Norse, “forget it.”
He cut his eyes toward his oldest brother. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Of course you do.” Lazlo kept his voice low and continued in the old language. “You think I don’t see what’s happening? I hear the rumors, and I know who is spreading them. So does he.”
Oleg focused on adjusting his gloves. “I don’t know what you’re talking—”
“It’s time.” Lazlo walked closer and tugged on the edge of Oleg’s kaftan. “Do you hear me?”
Oleg felt words catch in his throat. So he turned and scanned the crowds of people that were surrounding the field. “Have you ever thought about how ridiculous this is?”
Lazlo’s eyebrows went up. “What is ridiculous?”
“This empire. Even the idea of it.” He gestured at the crowd.
“It’s absurd. What does a vampire who works with Lev on the Kamchatka Peninsula have in common with one of Pavel’s shipping officers?
Or one of Juliya’s agronomists? All we share is a bloodline.
We share no… affection. No language. No common traditions. ”
“Bullshit,” Lazlo growled. “Besides, what do they need to have in common? They all work together, don’t they? Lev’s people need to eat. Juliya’s farmers grow the crops, and Pavel’s people ship it there.”
Oleg watched Tatyana from across the field. She was smiling, and her aura was bright and warm despite the chilling cold night. “The Poshani are spread apart in a diffuse, mobile territory, yet they have a very close clan. It is curious, is it not?”
Lazlo shook his head and continued in the old language. “We’re not the same as they are.”
“Do you think we could be?”
“No.” His brother was blunt. “We cannot be like them, and if you have thoughts about letting the empire break apart, perhaps Ivan is right that you have lost your stomach for leadership.”
Oleg’s eyes flashed. “What did you say?”
“I’m only repeating what that one” —Lazlo jerked his head toward Ivan, who had already mounted his horse farther up the field— “has been whispering to anyone who will listen. Saying that you’ve done so well over the past few centuries, but this move to legitimate business—this turn away from black markets—it’s too soft. Too appeasing.”
Oleg felt the fire lick along his collar. “I need to kill Ivan.”
“Good.” Lazlo walked over and tugged on Oleg’s kaftan. “Why have you been waiting? Did you want my permission, brother?”
Lazlo had been the one to finally descend the staircase. The one to finally tell Oleg that the bloodshed was over.
For so long, he’d thought it was over.
“Perhaps,” Oleg said softly. “Perhaps I do need your permission.”
“Then you have it.” Lazlo shoved Oleg away and swung himself up on his horse. “Do what you need to do.”
“Three minutes!” Rudov called out.
Oleg’s groom walked over with his mount, and Oleg swung himself up before he urged his horse to the edge of the field next to Lazlo’s.
They waited, watching the last two minutes tick down.
“What you don’t need to do,” Lazlo continued, “is break up this empire that you kept together even before Truvor died. It is your empire, Oleg. Not that bastard’s. Yours.”
Coats of blue and gold. Slashes of red. Pops of green. Oleg watched the stands, the mounted spectators, and the wind vampires hovering overhead. The colors of his people hardly mixed at all; most of the clans remained among their own.
“Did I though?” Oleg looked at Lazlo. “What have I really created, brother?”
“Them!” Lazlo said fiercely. “Don’t look at me—look at all of them.”
The vampires and humans in attendance were ebullient as they let out a cheer, and while they did not sit together, they were singing together.
An old song. A folk song. A rowing song that all of them passed down if they came from Truvor’s blood.
Oleg remembered singing it as they rowed the rivers of the Kievan Rus, as he and his brothers sat around fires, and as they walked through eternal nights in the cold and the chilling wind and the snow.
We walk along the river
We sing our song to the moon
We bid farewell to the sun
For the river is our home.
Mother River, deep and wide
Feed the earth, feed the trees
We bid farewell to the sun
For the river is our home.
They finished singing; then as one, the crowd began counting down the seconds before the bell rang and the second half of the match began.
“Forty-seven, forty-six…”
“You held them together,” Lazlo said. “You kept us from chaos and war. We’re not like other peoples, Oleg, but you have allowed our children and their children to find a little bit of peace in a harsh world. Are you willing to throw all that into the fire?”
Oleg looked away from the cheering crowds in the last seconds before the bell rang. He looked at his brother. “We did not choose death.”
“No,” Lazlo said. “Death would have been easy. So we did not choose death.”
The bell rang out, and the riders returned to battle.
“And for the victors of this match tonight…” Rudov held up the wreath of fir branches with red and blue ribbons tied around it over his head, making a show of the presentation even though everyone knew who had won. “…our new queen—”
“Hey, bastard!” Lazlo shouted as everyone laughed. “You can only cheat in her favor so much in one match.”
“The winner is, of course, our beloved knyaz, Oleg Truvorovich Sokolov!” Rudov shouted. “And his fine team, who probably all cheated even though I could not catch them.”
The crowds laughed and cheered, breaking into another song as Oleg mounted the steps in front of Rudov’s grand house.
Tatyana, urged on by her teammates, reluctantly walked up the stairs on the opposite side.
Oleg, standing in front of Rudov and facing his wife, whose cheeks were flushed with fresh blood and whose eyes were dancing, felt inexplicably grateful for this one night of camaraderie and teamwork.
Ivan was at his back, arm in arm with Oksana. Lazlo was drinking blood-wine with the two Poshani players who were facing good-natured ribbing from their own people in the crowd for being part of the team that beat their terrin.
And Tatyana had her eyebrows raised, holding out her left hand, palm down. “Lord Oleg, as the losing captain, I offer my hand.”
The crowd gave a groan, and multiple vampires shouted at him.
“Mercy, Oleg!”
“Don’t make the cut!”
“Boo! Not fair, it’s her first match.”
Mika rushed over, bending at the knee and holding out his hand. “The fault is with me for allowing the last goal. If you’re going to take a finger, take mine.”
Oleg muttered, “Don’t tempt me.”
The spectators erupted in more laughter, all of them confident that Oleg Sokolov would not take a finger from his bride-to-be or his chief boyar.
Then Oleg pulled out a silver dagger, and the crowd gasped.
Tatyana narrowed her eyes, but he felt the calm in her blood. She wasn’t worried, merely curious.
“Are you serious right now?” Rudov muttered. “You complete asshole.”
“Tatyana le Tala.” Oleg ignored his brother and bent slightly over Tatyana’s hand. “In one week, I will take your hand.” The gathered vampires were utterly silent. “Metaphorically speaking, of course.”
Nervous, scattered laughter.
“But in deference to tradition and as winner of this very important chaugan match, I will take as my prize… a lock of your hair.”
There was a collective sigh all around him.
The corner of Tatyana’s mouth turned up in a rueful smile. “I offer this prize to the winner of the match,” she said. “In deference to tradition.” She glanced over her shoulder at her team. “But I believe Lord Oleg should start growing out his hair going forward, should he not?”
Eruptions of cheers, laughter, and good-natured ribbing.
Oleg leaned over to his mate, snipping off a lock of her hair as he whispered in her ear so softly that none but she could hear. “They love you nearly as much as I do.”
He stood up straight, held the beautiful slip of gold hair high over his head, and shouted, “To the victor!”
The whole of the Kievan Rus erupted in applause as Tatyana stood motionless, her eyes wide and her mouth frozen in a silent O.