Chapter 16

1951, District of Kursk Oblast, USSR

Lena stumbled across the rocky drive with nothing but her stockings to cover her feet. Edmund led her to a dark colored Renault and helped her inside before heading around to the driver's seat. He backed out slowly, being unable to turn his body without causing great pain to himself, but he managed to put good distance between them and the house before the explosion happened.

Lena jumped and turned around in her seat. "Merda! They've found the house. They'll find us. You have to drive faster."

Edmund didn't respond. Lena fell back in her seat and looked at him frantically. "Go! You must hurry." At last he looked over at her.

"What?" he asked loudly. "Sorry, I…I can't hear very well in this ear right now." He put his finger up to touch to his right ear; when he pulled it back, there was blood on his finger tip.

"The house," Lena pointed behind them. "They blew it up."

"It wasn't them."

"What do you mean it wasn't them? Then who was it?"

"It was us. We did that," he said at the same time.

"What? No. How?"

He looked at her as best he could with his one good eye, the other was now completely swollen shut.

"Gas," he began, "is very flammable, meaning it catches fire with the smallest flame. I turned on all the gas at the stove and we left the cigarette burning on the counter. Eventually, the room filled with enough gas vapor and the air caught fire."

"The air caught fire?"

Edmund nodded, not a wise choice as the motion sent a wave of pain blazing through his body which he tried to conceal. "And that fire ignited the whole gas tank, leading to the explosion."

"We blew up the house…" Lena repeated softly.

She leaned back against the seat. She went to run her fingers through her hair but froze when she saw her red hands. Her breathing became labored as flashes of the Polkovnik flittered through her mind and her head began to ring. 'You weel give me vat I vas promised.' He grabbed her hair and slammed her into the wall. There was a bloody knife in her hands. A dead body at her feet. His hand dug into her thigh.

"Ileana. Ileana?"

Lena jumped and screamed a little at the sudden sensation of a hand on her leg. Edmund pulled his hand away quickly. Even in the dim lighting he could see the fear in Lena's wide eyes.

"God, Lena, I… I'm so…"

"Don't," she said looking away from him. "Not tonight."

"But, I…"

"I don't want to talk about it," she said sharply. "Just drive. Get us out of here." She rubbed her hands down the front of her dress and refused to look at him anymore.

Edmund did as requested. He drove through the darkness. He drove through the pain. He drove through the ringing in his ear. And he drove until his muscles became stiff with his ever present failure. He had sworn to protect her; 'failure isn't an option', he had promised. She trusted him and he failed her. He didn't think he'd ever live this down.

"Pull over," Lena said. Edmund didn't hear her so she lightly laid her hand on his arm. "Pull over."

"Why?" He brushed at his eye.

"I will drive."

"No, I…I'm fine."

"Edmund, you are swerving. Pull over."

"I…" He grimaced as pain soared through his chest. "All right," he relented. "We should change cars any way."

He drove about another five kilometers before pulling off to a service station. The station lot was empty save for the one attendant, the lighting was poor, and the bath house was detached from the main building. Lena took Edmund's arm before leaving the car.

"I need to pee."

Edmund looked around them. He couldn't see anyone following them, but he didn't want to take the chance. So he walked with Lena over to the house.

"I'll wait here," he said.

"What about the car?"

"We'll do it after."

"It will save time if you go now."

"I won't leave you."

Lena appreciated the sentiment, but knew they shouldn't linger long. "Andrà tutto bene."

Edmund was hesitant to let her out of his sight, but she was persistent. "Lock the door then. Don't come out, and don't let anyone in until I return. I won't be long."

The room inside was small with only a single toilet, a pedestal sink, a small square mirror, and a very unpleasant odor. Lena almost left immediately, but then she caught sight of her reflection. Her mascara had run down her cheeks. Her lip stain was smeared around her mouth. Her intricate braid was now little more than a tangled knot. And the same blood that stained her hands spotted her face. She promptly bent over the toilet and spewed the contents of her stomach. She was about to wipe her mouth with her hand but she saw the blood again and spewed some more.

It took a few dry heaves for the nausea to pass. When it did Lena moved back to the sink. She scrubbed her hands with the bar of soap that was provided. She scrubbed until they turned raw. Then she did the same to her face. She wiped away every sign and smear of makeup, she even tidied up her hair, but it wasn't enough to forget what happened. The Polkovnik's words echoed in her head. His touch vibrated throughout her body until she felt sick again. She wanted to scrub every inch of skin that he had touched. She wanted to scream. She wanted to cry, only the knock on the door interrupted her.

The voice on the other side spoke Russian and Lena's heart jumped to her throat. She grabbed the sink to keep the room from spinning. It was them. They found her. Why had she sent Little King away? He had insisted on staying together; why didn't she listen to him? The voice spoke again. Lena felt like her head would implode with pressure. She could barely see through the tears, let alone respond.

Another voice answered the first. "Sorry. Sorry, that's my *zhena in there." His voice was muffled through the door but she would recognize it anywhere. Little King was back. "She, ah, how do you say—doesn't speak Russian—*ne govorit po russki." Little King struggled more than he had to; he was much better at speaking Russian than Lena was.

"*Vasha zhena?"

"Da. My zhena." There was a tap on the door. "Love? Are you just about finished in there?" Little King asked. His voice was clearer as he leaned against the door. His gentle timbre was calm and soothing; it eased Lena's panic. "You're beautiful, Love, truly. Now why don't we give this good man his bathhouse back again and resume our trip?"

There was a pause before Edmund tapped on the door again, softer this time. He said, "Ileana, it's all right. He's gone. You can come out now."

Lena slowly opened the door and poked her head out. The attendant was indeed gone. She stepped out and looked at Edmund. He had acquired a fedora somewhere to hide his eye, but even still Lena could see the swollen purple mass. She ran a shaking hand down her side.

"Your zhena?" she asked hiding the quiver in her voice.

Edmund shrugged. "It worked, didn't it?"

"Then let's go…*muzh."

Lena took the driver's seat without any complaints from Edmund. A short ways down the road they passed a car lot where Lena saw the Renault they'd been driving sitting next to an empty spot Lena assumed the Buick they were now in once occupied. Of course, the car lot was closed when Edmund made the trade.

"What's that?" Lena asked as Edmund pulled out a bottle from the pocket in the door.

"Vodka. It was sitting on the desk at the lot, and I thought I needed it more than the empty room at the moment." He took a long swig straight from the bottle.

"Hand it here." Lena didn't much like the taste of vodka, but she preferred it to the taste of sick. She handed the bottle back after taking a long swish and drove on.

She drove for several hours. When Edmund grew silent and began to doze off she roused him from his sleep. "Tell me a story," she said.

"A story? What kind of story?"

"I don't care. Tell me about Narnia, if you wish, just don't fall asleep on me." Lena didn't want to be alone with her thoughts where the Polkovnik could slip back in.

"Narnia, huh? All right." He paused a moment to get his thoughts in line. "There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it. …"

Edmund's tale of his voyage on a vessel called the Dawn Treader, carried them through the rest of their journey, or at least until Lena could drive no more. It was now in the very early morning hours and Lena pulled up to the office of a small hotel. Edmund was in no shape to walk in and request a room, so Lena did it. She used his jacket to cover up the bloodied and torn dress she still wore, and fortunately, the counter was too high for the clerk to see her bare feet; she had removed her stockings a few hours ago. Lena didn't think twice when the desk clerk said there was only one room available. After her panic at the service station, Lena didn't want to be left alone. She drove around to the room and helped Edmund inside.

"*Sedere," she instructed pointing to a chair. Edmund was too tired and in too much pain to refuse as he stumbled over.

While Lena had taken the time at their last stop to clean up a bit, Edmund had done very little in regards to treating his wounds apart from drinking half of the vodka. Lena realized she'd have to do it for him. She found a small decorative basin in the room. She emptied the contents onto the floor and filled the basin with water. She grabbed towels from the bathroom and made her way back to where Edmund sat. Then she began to scrub the dried blood from his face.

He pulled away. "Wha' you doing?"

"What does it look like? I'm trying to treat your wounds."

"I's fine." He slurred his words slightly.

"It is not fine," Lena said adamantly. "Now sit still, shut up, and let me work." Edmund said nothing as Lena resumed her work. She took care to be less aggressive than she had been with her own face.

"I don't like the look of this eye," she said after a while. She had cleaned it the best she could with the water and towel and the light rubbing had caused it to bleed again. "I think it might need to be stitched."

"I didn't know you were a field medic as well."

"If I was a field medic I would have insisted on seeing to this earlier."

"I think putting enough distance between us and them took precedence. Do you even know how to stich?"

"All Telmarine women know how to stich. It was a requirement at the House of Labugia, right alongside how to please a man in bed."

Edmund laughed until he realized that Lena wasn't. He looked at her. Due to her careful ministrations they were much closer than they normally would be. He could smell the vodka on her breath, and the sweet perfume she always wore. His breath hitched in his throat.

"Sorry. Have you ever stitched a wound before?" he asked.

"On a man? No. But I stitched a cat once."

"A cat? When did you have a cat?"

"It wasn't mine. It came to me one night, early on after I'd taken up residence at the castle…after my first occasioni. Mind you, I didn't much like cats; my father had one that was a nasty vermin, but this one…I don't know. There was something different about this one. I remember thinking it must have gotten into Lady Gianny's perfumes because it had a sweet fragrance about it, and its fur was soft. It stayed with me through the night, but it was gone by morning. It came back though."

"How often did He return?"

"After every occasioni. One night he had gotten into a fight though; it was badly injured. So I took my needle and thread and I stitched him up. I used the glass of wine I had with my dinner to sterilize the wound."

"I am glad He was with you then."

Lena pulled back and looked at him. "It was only a cat, Edmund."

"Are you certain of that?"

"Well it wasn't a dog."

Edmund smiled and laughed softly. "If you think my eye needs stitches, then I trust you to do it."

"We will need to sterilize it first, and we have no wine here." She looked at the vodka bottle sitting on the floor.

"Oh…" Edmund cursed rather profoundly. "Can I at least have a bit more before you do?"

Lena looked around. There were two cups sitting by the sink. She divided the contents of the bottle into each of them and left just enough for one last shot in the bottle. Then she pulled the clip from her hair and handed it to Edmund.

"Can you get this pin out?" she asked. While he worked on that, she attended to the frayed hem of her dress and carefully picked a long thread from it. She dropped the needle into one glass and held the other one out for Edmund.

"What are you doing?"

"Taking off my belt. I'll use it as bite guard," he replied. Then he took the offered cup and gave cheers before downing its contents.

Lena carefully and slowly poured the alcohol over the cut; Edmund only squirmed a little. The worst of it came when she began her stitch work. She tried to move swiftly but precisely as she had always been very proud of her needle work. The thread was just long enough for her to tie a small knot at the end. She used one of Edmund's throwing knives to cut off the excess.

"There. It wasn't that bad, was it?"

Edmund glared at her. When he removed the belt there were visible indentions.

"Oh, fine. Take this then." She handed him the last of the vodka and he drank swiftly.

"I…I should inspect your ribs as well," she said, a wave of awkwardness coming over her. Lena didn't understand why she felt so strange. She had seen plenty of men's chests, as well as other body parts usually concealed. Still, she could feel the heat rising to her cheeks.

"My ribs?" he asked, his voice a little higher than normal.

"You are having difficulty breathing, yes? Then I should inspect them to make sure they aren't broken."

Edmund grinned. "If you want me to take my clothes off, you need but ask." If her impromptu stitch-work did nothing else, it sobered Edmund up enough to return to his usual, playfully-cocky-self.

Lena could not meet his gaze as she instructed him to remove his shirt. "*Togliti la camicia."

Edmund could not wipe away his grin as he began to unbutton. Lena kept her eyes averted, but when she heard him struggling she couldn't help but look. He was having a rough time getting his arm through the sleeve; so, she tried to help him. Her hands brushing over the bareness of his skin sent a rush of flames to her cheeks and made her breath catch in her throat. She swallowed it back down and removed her hands.

"That should be enough," she said.

Edmund sat with his shirt on but unbuttoned; his chest exposed to her. She could already see the discoloration of the skin where bruises were forming. For a moment she just stared, and fortunately for her Edmund chose to remain quiet in that moment. Then she gathered her wits, slipped into a mask of nonchalance, and bent down on her knees.

"Tell me if it hurts terribly," she said as her fingers began to roam over his chest.

Edmund was not sure if he'd be able to say anything. It had been so long since he'd felt her hands on his bare skin, he was sure his voice would betray him if he tried to speak. His body was currently trying to betray him and he had to fight that off. But then she found a rather tender spot; he hissed rather than spoke.

"Sorry," she said.

"I know. Continuare," he said through his teeth.

Her fingers pressed with a gentle firmness across the tender spot while Edmund held his breath. "Well, I don't think it's broken. If it is, it's not a large break. But it will be sore for several days, and you should refrain from any extraneous movement."

"Too bad we don't have Lucy's cordial on us."

"What?"

"Lucy, my sister, she had a magic healing cordial. A single drop would cure any injury; works great on the common cold and sea-sickness too."

"A magic healing cordial?" Lena asked skeptically.

"Not in this world, of course. She had it in Narnia. It was a gift from Babbo Natale."

"Now I know you're teasing. Babbo Natale isn't real. He's a children's' fantasy."

"Don't let Lucy hear you say that. And just because you've never seen him, doesn't mean he isn't real."

Edmund didn't mind that Lena had kept her hands on his chest after her examination, and she seemed unaware that she had. When her fingers found an old but not forgotten scar, her brow pinched in confusion.

"That is curtesy of the White Witch's wand."

"The White Witch? I thought you said her wand turned things to stone."

"It did, until I broke it. She didn't really like that, so she stabbed me with it."

Lena's fingers continued to run over the scar as she studied it. Judging by the length and positon of it, Edmund shouldn't have survived the stabbing. "How are you not dead?"

Edmund grinned. "Because I had a drop of Lucy's magic healing cordial."

Lena looked up at him. She wanted to accuse him of trying to tease her again, but she saw that he was being completely serious. Lena saw something else in his eyes as well: a longing, a desire for her. She had seen it on occasion before, and she had felt it in the way he kissed her in Vienna, but she always chose to ignore it. Now, for some reason, she could not. More accurately, she didn't want to ignore it.

Instead of removing her hands from his chest, as she knew she should, they slid around his waist and she leaned up to kiss him. It was soft and gentle; her lips hovered above his afterward. She looked up into his eye and held her breath. A second passed. Then he drew in a deep breath and kissed her back.

He smelled like vodka and blood, but he tasted like the sweetest wine. Lena wanted more, needed more of him. She crawled on to his lap while his hands let loose her braid and tangled in her hair. Her hands ran down his arms pushing his shirt off. Then they ran gently over his chest, and across his back. Anywhere she could touch skin she touched and tasted. Still, it wasn't enough.

Lena had the button on his trousers un-done before she was consciously aware of the action. Edmund pulled back with a jolt and grabbed her wrists before her hands ventured too far.

"What…" He swallowed roughly and began again. "What are you doing?"

Lena wasn't sure what he meant. They were kissing; it seemed obvious enough to her. Then she noticed a few oddities to his person: his tousled hair, the flare of desire in his eye, the frequent rise and fall of his chest, the positioning of their hands, the button on his trousers. She felt heat rise from her naval to her cheeks.

"I…I'm not sure," she said.

Edmund closed his eye and nodded his head, leaning away from her as much as he could. "It's… It's all right. It's nothing that can't be undone." He released her wrists.

Lena studied him carefully. Though she was sitting on his lap still, dress hiked high around her thighs, he seemed to be trying his hardest not to touch her, an impressive feat really considering how close they were. Lena wondered why. She knew she hadn't misinterpreted all the looks he'd given her; she'd seen it so many times from so many men. He wanted her, desired her, so why would he stop her when they got so close? Why was he pulling away from her now? And why did that hurt?

"Why did you come upstairs?" she asked.

He opened his eye slowly and looked at her. "What?"

"Why did you come upstairs? Why did you fight him?"

"I think you know why," he replied after a pause. He was still leaning away from her, trying to keep his distance.

"Because I am your asset."

"No, Ileana. You are much more than an asset to me."

"Because you…you desire me for yourself."

There was another pause and when Edmund replied this time, there was an unusual edge to his voice. "If that is all you have gotten from me, then I have been a very poor Knight indeed." He tried to move her off of his lap but she resisted.

"It's not," she said quickly. "It's not all, but it's…It's all I can give you tonight." She placed his hands on her hips and rocked forward slightly. "I can give you this, but I do not think I can give you all that you want. Girls like me, Edmund, aren't meant for things like that."

"Girls like you?" he asked incredulously. "Do you mean girls as clever as you? Or girls as funny as you? Perhaps you meant as strong as you? As good, or as kind and gentle as you? As determined, or dedicated, or loyal as you? As talented as you? As deserving as you? As loved as you?"

"Loved?"

"Loved," he repeated. "Loved by your daughter, loved by Caterina, loved by…by a cat you once stitched back to health who was more than just a cat, and loved by…by me, if only you'd let me."

Lena blinked away her tears as she leaned forward to kiss him again. This kiss was different, more tame but with no less passion. Her hands cupped his face, and his brushed the tears from her eyes. Slowly it grew into a desperate sort of hunger that could only be satisfied by one thing.

When her hands resumed their work from before, Edmund did not stop her. The transition was easy. Lena and Edmund pushed the events of the night into the farthest recesses of their minds. The fear and pain were momentarily forgotten until they found the release they were looking for, and then found it again. First one and then the other, and then both of them together soon after. When they retreated to the bed they did so without the burden of clothes. Edmund wrapped his arms around Lena's waist and held her close until sleep came upon them both.

*Translations

Zhena: wife

Ne govorit po russki: No speak Russian

Vasha zhena: your wife

Muzh: husband

Sedere: Sit

Togliti la camicia: take off your shirt