Thirty-Four #3
Three more pistols, all of them ringed with that signature Auric gold. Several cartridges of bullets. Nadiya picked up one
of the pistols and peered down its barrel.
“Please tell me these are foam bullets,” Julian said. He looked vaguely ill.
“No,” said Nadiya. “They’re real.”
Julian exhaled shakily. “And I suppose there’s no chance you’re going to grow two extra arms and use all four of them at once.”
“Not unless Deckard has also included some kind of experimental enhancement drug.” Nadiya held out the gun to him. “I think
there’s one for each of us.”
Klaudia’s heart sank. The implication was obvious. Real humans, like the man in the bowler hat, and now real bullets. Giselle
looked even more nauseated than Julian.
Nadiya cocked her head. “Didn’t you have to take a basic weapons management course at Valeran?”
“I may or may not have bribed a first year to do my shooting for me when the instructor wasn’t looking.”
“Bribed them with what?”
“I wrote a military history paper for them.” Julian grimaced. “And . . . I may or may not have told them I’d have my father
mail a check.”
“You’re impressively dishonorable,” Nadiya said, “even for Valeran.”
“You’d be surprised by how many options you have once you stop caring about things like honor.”
Julian had said something similar during the confrontation with Carter. Maybe he was being truthful when he claimed he no
longer valued such lofty ideals. The actions that had led him to Valeran in the first place certainly seemed to suggest that.
But . . . he could have walked away. Or worse, taken Carter up on his sickening proposal. Instead, he had protected her, risked
his own reputation, his own standing at the academy, to help her. That was not the behavior of a boy without honor.
“Yet you draw the line at firing a gun?” Nadiya asked. “Seriously? Don’t you want revenge against Deckard? Don’t you want
to make him feel afraid?”
“I can’t do that with a single pistol,” said Julian. “He still has all the power here.”
“That’s what he’d like you to believe. But the truth is, everyone is afraid when they’re staring down the barrel of a gun.
It’s the great equalizer.”
Hard power. Realpolitik. Material force. Norms and ideologies ceased to matter when you were looking death in the face. Lethal
weapons simplified the world. That was true on a global scale, in the nuclear age. But it was true on an individual level,
too. The same rational choice model applied. The zero-sum game was between the person holding the gun and the one at their
mercy.
Klaudia reached for one of the pistols.
Nadiya looked at her approvingly. “At least you know how to shoot, don’t you?”
“Passably.” Klaudia had taken the weapons management course as a first year, and she hadn’t needed to bribe anyone in order
to get an A.
“That’s a relief.” Nadiya glanced at Giselle, who had not ceased to look horrified. “It’s going to be okay. If all goes to
plan, no one will even need to pull a trigger.”
“Yeah,” Giselle said, rather unconvincingly. “All right.”
She took the gun, but her hands were shaking. Klaudia was a bit surprised. Rural Americans of Giselle’s demographic were largely
avid hunters. A stereotype, yes, but one confirmed by statistics. Except nothing about Giselle was stereotypical. Especially
not the way she looked at Nadiya.
For a long moment no one spoke. They had been outside for long enough now that Klaudia had begun to feel the chill settle
into her skin, and she shivered. Then—
“There was something else I saw in the tunnel.” Giselle spoke up suddenly. “On the wall . . . there were words in Russian.”
She bent over and began to trace the letters into the snow. Klaudia watched over her shoulder. When Giselle finished, she leaned back on her heels, allowing Klaudia full view of what she had written.
“Zavesa zimy,” Klaudia read.
“What does that mean?” Julian asked.
“Veil of winter.” Klaudia pressed her stiffening hands into her pockets. “It’s a Soviet term for anything related to the Cold
War. It’s almost always used in the context of explaining certain actions or justifying certain behavior. There’s a famous
speech by the secretariat where he said ‘everything is permitted under the veil of winter.’ ”
Silence lay over the clearing, as crisp as the air itself. Nadiya grimaced. Giselle stared pointedly at the ground.
But Julian lifted his gaze skyward. The mist had not fully dissipated, though the sunlight that filtered through it was white
and sharp. “I wish,” he said, “that we could just get this over with.”
“I can tell him,” Crispin said, so abruptly that Klaudia flinched. She had almost forgotten he was there. “I can tell Deckard
to . . . accelerate the timing.”
“Really?” Julian’s expression grew hopeful. When Crispin nodded, he said, “Well, tell him to do something special for our
last night. I’ve always wanted to see the northern lights.”
A small smile crept over Crispin’s face. It was the first time Klaudia had ever observed him looking anything but somber and
eerie. For some reason it made her skin prickle.
“Okay,” he said softly. “I will.”