Golden Paradise Part 25

Militza smiled and then chuckled. "Darling, this is your home. Please do exactly as you please."

Lisaveta smiled back. "I see you must have had a hand in Stefan's upbringing."

"One never actually had a hand on Stefan so much as simply being there to pick up the pieces. He was a headstrong boy." Neither her tone nor her expression was disapproving. "He has in fact," she finished, "been the joy of my life."

"He does that, doesn't he?" Lisaveta's features were less grave, her golden eyes taking on a warmth. "Without even trying."

"He does indeed," Militza emphatically replied.

A few moments later, Lisaveta stood on the threshold of Stefan's bedroom suite while the footman lighted several of the wall sconces. The gas flames s.h.i.+mmered and fluttered briefly before the crystal fixtures turned into a brilliant glowing white, and when he left she remained motionless just inside the door, her gaze taking in her husband's bedroom for the first time. One entire wall was curtained in white gauze, luminous now as the moonlight competed with the fitful shadow and light of the enormous interior s.p.a.ce, glistening white against the green silk of the side draperies and valances.

Walking slowly over to the windows, Lisaveta remembered a warm summer night scented with lily, and leaning her head against the gossamer curtains, she felt the coolness of the gla.s.s beneath her forehead. The warm summer was gone, their time in the mountains long past; she could feel the chill of fall in the air and the bleakness of fear in her heart. So recently married, she might as swiftly be widowed, she morbidly thought. And tonight when she wished Militza to offer her a.s.surances, Stefan's aunt had instead been more subdued than expected. How did soldiers' wives cope? Was there some prayer for consolation, some wish or hope one could pet.i.tion for, some solace in this awful loneliness?

She moved then as if drawn by invisible hands to Stefan's large bed. The balconies fronted all the bedrooms in this wing and this room was very similar to the one she'd stayed in last time, but Stefan's bed was different, larger, darker, more masculine, a mahogany-and-tulipwood marquetry cut on ma.s.sive lines. Climbing up onto it, she sat in the middle of the forest green expanse of silk coverlet, looking like a flower blossom in her peach silk gown, her skirt in poufs about her, her glance surveying the immensity of the room.

And that's when she saw it.

A note directly in her line of vision, an envelope with her name on it propped against the mantel. Her heart stood still.

Sliding off the bed, she approached it cautiously, dread and longing both prominent in her mind. Stefan had written it. Short hours ago he'd held that exact envelope in his hand, his words the closest she could come to having him near. She wanted to s.n.a.t.c.h the letter down and devour the words and feel for a transient moment as though he were here. But apprehension held her hostage against that impulse and she stood beneath the ornate and polished mantel, reluctant to know what her husband might have written her before riding off to war.

She lifted it down finally because her longing was greater than her fear. But the weight of that fear crumbled her to the floor, where she sat before the small fire the footman had set before he left and read Stefan's letter. She cried as his words unfolded across and down the page; she cried for their beauty and tenderness, for his sweetness and devotion. He was more articulate in many ways than she in expressing the imagery of love.

"When the war is over," he'd written, "we'll join the eagles in the mountains and show them our new baby... I can scent the wind and freedom even now."

There was hope in his words and a love so intense she hardly noticed the menace of the closing phrase he had written so reluctantly.

She reread his scrawling script over and over, his strength evident in the rhythm and form of his letters, his spirit alive in his words. In the silence of his room, surrounded by objects familiar to his world, his cologne lingering in the air, photos from childhood displayed on the walls and bureau tops, she could almost hear him speak of his love for her. She could almost hear his deep rich voice echo within the confines of his bedchamber, his love surrounding her, and she prayed to all the benevolent G.o.ds to protect him and bring him safely home.

She slept that night in his bed with his note clutched in her hand, as a young child might cling to a cherished toy or a young woman ardently in love to her lover. She dreamed of mountain landscapes and moss-covered mountain pools, of starlit ceilings and a rain-damp bridegroom on a honeymoon night.

It wasn't till morning that she found the second note. She was dressed already and wandering about Stefan's room, thinking as she walked: he sat here and stood here and brushed his long dark hair before this mirror and wore these slippers in his leisure and wrote at this desk- The small white envelope was addressed with the single word "Baby."

It lay pristine and chaste on the red-embossed leather of the desktop.

He'd left no instructions concerning its unsealing, although addressed as it was to their baby, the implication was perhaps to wait until its birth. And she intended to, she decided a moment later, as if that punctiliousness would annihilate the panic beginning to creep into her mind. There was no need to write to their child now; he'd be home certainly-at some point-in the months before its birth.

She moved back a step as though she were standing on the brink of an abyss.

She found herself a moment later seated on a chair on the far side of the room, clutching the chair arms with undue force, her eyes trained on the stark white envelope. Why had he written?

She poured herself a gla.s.s of water from the carafe on the nearby table and moistened her dry mouth, forcing herself to look away from the object of her terror. Catherine the Great's tall cypresses stood majestically against the blue morning sky, marching down the hill in solemn procession, immune to the years and her puny fears. She wished she could deal as tenaciously with her emotional turmoil and persevere like Catherine's trees.

In the end she rose, walked over to the desk and opened the envelope as perhaps Stefan had intended.

No! she silently screamed as she read. No! No! No! She felt herself trembling when she'd finished, her heart beating in her chest as though she'd run ten miles. Stefan had written this note to his child because he wasn't coming back!

"Masha!" she screamed into the sun-dappled silence of the room, struck with fright, unable to move. "Masha!" she cried. A bird sang its morning song somewhere beyond the window as though it were unaware shadows were beginning to cover the earth. "Masha," she whimpered, helpless against her pain, a great darkness overtaking her, and she crumpled to the floor.

Lisaveta woke in Stefan's bed, Militza holding her hand, the room filled with hushed and reverent servants. She remembered instantly, and her eyes filled with fear.

"You mustn't worry," Militza said, wis.h.i.+ng she could soothe that trepidation. "Stefan wouldn't want you to worry."

"I'm frightened, Masha," Lisaveta breathed, her voice so faint it was barely audible.

"He didn't mean to frighten you, Lise. He only wanted to talk to his child before he left." Militza stroked Lisaveta's hand as one would a distrait child.

"He'll be back?" It was a heartrending plea.

"Of course he will," Aunt Militza firmly declared. "Stefan's invincible." But her own confidence was shaken by Stefan's note. His tone was almost prescient, alarming in a man who'd always felt indomitable. "Would you like to see the vineyards or Stefan's special Barb horses? We could take a small picnic with us and make a day of it." She could have been coaxing a small child.

"When do they plan on attacking?" Lisaveta's voice was strained, her mind immune to the distractions Militza offered.

Militza debated a moment the style of her answer and then decided on the truth. "Tomorrow," she said.

Stefan rode into his cavalry corps headquarters at midnight to find his entire staff had been on the ready since word of Hussein Pasha's march had been received. When he walked into the large tent, a cheer went up and he smiled. "We're slightly pressed for time, I hear," he said, stripping off his gloves, his grin remarkably cheerful. "But we're conveniently ahead of Hussein." A collective sigh of relief went round his officers. Prince Bariatinsky was back in time.

A magnum of Cliquot materialized, and while it was being poured, Stefan accepted all the numerous congratulations on his sudden and novel state of matrimony. He took the teasing good-naturedly.

"So you're finally leg-shackled," one of his brigade commanders said, his smile wide. "You're the last one we thought would succ.u.mb."

Stefan's brows rose, his eyelids dropped marginally and he observed his grinning officers for a moment with a narrow-eyed smile. "I recommend it," he said.

"In a bit of a hurry, Stash?" Loris Ignatiev sportively inquired, friends with Stefan long enough to press for details.

"I didn't want to give the Countess any opportunity to change her mind." Stefan's reply was mild, amused and unmistakably untrue.

"Was that all?" Loris apparently wasn't going to be satisfied with evasion.

The telegraph line must have been completed, Stefan drolly thought. "You may congratulate me," he pleasantly said. "I'm about to become a father."

"Hip, hip, hooray!" Their cheer brought the dogs in camp into a second-round chorus, and Stefan had to sustain a great number of friendly back-slapping felicitations.

"It'll be the richest brat this side of the Tsar if you're not careful tomorrow," one of the young captains said.

"Don't worry, Karev, I'm going to do my d.a.m.nedest to make sure my child waits a long time to inherit." Joking about death was common practice, a kind of relief for everyone's tension.

"Speaking of death, how was Michael?" Captain Tamada was a Daghestani Prince and as such found Grand Duke Michael's military incompetence more exasperating than most.

"Polite," Stefan softly said with a quirked smile. He'd stopped first at the tent of the Chiefs of Staff and had been treated with the deference he accepted as his right. Everyone realistically understood that not only was he an extremely competent and successful general for Russia but he also controlled most of the border tribes in the Trans-Caucasus. His name alone could muster a hundred thousand mounted warriors. Not all were presently campaigning for the Tsar, but those not actually committed to Russia at least remained neutral. There wasn't a border tribe that would take arms against their Prince.

"Now, then," Stefan genially said, as though time were not of the essence, "if we've covered all the gossip sufficiently, what say we get down to business?"

Fresh tea was ordered and Stefan unrolled the maps he'd worked on during the train ride to Vladikavkaz. For the next hour he issued orders, explaining in detail what he wanted, what he expected of the cavalry in the attack, what he antic.i.p.ated as defense from the Turks. His officers took notes, asked questions when they needed clarification, their attention riveted on the tall dark-haired man with the crisp clear voice. Stefan's tanned hands moved gracefully over the maps, detailing the nine forts of Kars, its citadel and numerous batteries and redoubts, pointing out small features of the terrain or indicating areas to approach with caution, stopping occasionally to punctuate his recital with a sharp stabbing finger. He was deferential to his officers, asking for their opinions when he'd fully described the a.s.sault plan, listening to those opinions with courtesy and attention. He rubbed his neck from time to time to ease the tension and fatigue from his muscles. Or stood completely still for long periods, concentrating on the details of his officer's recitals, the lantern light modeling his face in dramatic chiaroscuro. When the discussion became repet.i.tive, when mild arguments erupted as to technique, he politely said, "Any more questions, gentlemen?" and after a moment of silence, for they recognized his dismissive tone, he smiled and gently added, "Very good. Wake me in an hour." And lifting the tent flap, he walked out into the cold night air.

In his own tent, his batman had his cot turned down, a new uniform laid out, hot water at the ready and food set out on clean white linen.

"Ivan," Stefan said with grinning affection, "we have the amenities again, I see." Everything was immaculate. "You've been busy during the hiatus. What would I do without you?"

Ivan beamed with pride. "Your father trained me well, Excellency." Fifty years ago Ivan had been a young serf saved from hanging over the theft of a chicken he'd taken to feed his starving family. Stefan's father had interceded, paid the villainous landowner for the chicken and Ivan's family and offered Ivan a position. His devotion was unconditional.

"Are we going to win this tomorrow, Ivan?" Stefan asked with a smile as he began was.h.i.+ng his hands in the copper basin set on a table near his cot.

"The Bariatinskys are always victorious in battle, Excellency."

Stefan looked at the small elderly man beside him holding a crisp white towel out for him. "I like your confidence," he softly replied, Ivan's peasant certainty in some measure more rea.s.suring than his officers' confidence, as though the very earth and spirit of Mother Russia had affirmed his victory.

Stefan found he couldn't sleep, though. Until tonight he'd always been able to doze off immediately, a habit honed to perfection after years of campaigning, a necessity when sleep was often limited. But now when he should, he couldn't, and he lay on his cot with his eyes closed so Ivan wouldn't fuss.

The battle was going to be desperate, he knew, and its outcome decisive to the war. And, irrelevant to the a.s.sault on Kars but oppressively relevant to his sleepless mind, he missed Lisaveta with a wretched miserable despair. There had never been a woman he cared about on the eve of battle so he'd been able to sleep on horseback, on the hard ground, in rainstorms and blinding sun. He'd never loved a woman before and now it colored every thought he entertained as well as those he tried to avoid. It made him hopelessly sad and wildly happy, it caused him to lose much-needed sleep and it impinged dramatically on the a.s.sault on Kars.

He might never see Lisaveta again, or ever see his child, he realized. The reflection struck him like a blow and he held his breath for a moment, frantically rationalizing away that possibility. He was never hurt, he reminded himself, never wounded. He was charmed. The familiar phrases should have been more comforting. Two weeks ago they would have been enough, even a week ago they would have been acceptable, but in that time his life had irrevocably changed.

Ivan swiveled around when Stefan abruptly sat up.

"I can't sleep," Stefan brusquely said. "Could I have a gla.s.s of tea?"

He dressed while Ivan made fresh tea, putting on his boots and clean tunic, strapping on his revolver belt and his sword scabbard decorated with his Saint George ribbon. At the last he added an extra cartridge bandolier and placed the long-bladed knife within easy reach in his belt.

Standing, he drank his tea and then the small gla.s.s of arrack Ivan always handed him before an attack. It warmed his throat and he smiled at Ivan and thanked him. The familiar activities eased the disturbing turmoil in his mind and brought the focus of his thoughts back to the a.s.sault.

"We'll dine at Kars tomorrow, Ivan," Stefan said, sliding his hands into his pigskin gloves. "Wish me luck."

"May G.o.d ride with you, batioushka," Ivan quietly replied, kneeling to kiss Stefan's hand, and as he rose he sketched the sign of the cross in the air between them, the orthodox religion a politic adjunct to his peasant superst.i.tion. For added a.s.sistance he murmured a cossack maxim having to do with a good horse and strong sword arm, surrept.i.tiously gesturing to ward off the evil eye.

Stefan was smiling broadly when he stepped out into the chill night air. How could he lose, he thought, with G.o.d and the peasant spirits on his side?

The troops had been moved into position in the past hour under cover of the moonlit darkness. As was customary for him, Stefan went among his men, talking to them, telling them just what they were to do, offering encouraging words and good-natured chaffing, promising the musicians they would play a waltz in the streets of Kars tomorrow, answering the question asked a hundred times, his smile white against the darkness of his face. Yes, he would be leading the a.s.sault in person.

Stefan would be leading the Eleventh Cavalry Division, twelve battalions strong, on the right wing, directing their columns against the Karadagh and Tabias forts, guardians to the citadel. The cavalry had the most serious task to perform-the initial charge, clearing the way for the infantry-and everyone knew, although the orders hadn't yet been given, that they were to carry the forts at any cost. For twenty minutes or more Stefan conversed with his men, taking special care to talk to his noncommissioned officers, who bore the brunt of the decision making once the attack began. When he was satisfied each understood his directives and goals, he stood at the head of his troops for a final prayer. As he always did before battle, he asked for courage and G.o.d's grace to see them through. His dark hair whipped by the wind, Stefan stood, head bowed, and spoke the words so they carried across the moonlit army, his men murmuring the prayers with him, row upon shadowed row, calling on G.o.d's succor in the coming hours.

This final prayer was a ritual learned at his father's knee, comforting more for the litany than the content. As a cultivated man, Stefan realized Mukhtar Pasha prayed to his G.o.d for the same victory. In the end it would be men and not G.o.ds who determined the outcome, but the rhythm of the phrases soothed him and the priests' chanting was a calming, familiar musical undertone to the restless agitation gripping him before an attack.

A low hum of conversation broke out afterward as each soldier spoke for a final time to his companions. Haci was trading facetious remarks with one of the Kurdish troopers. The numerous cavalry officers around Stefan were exchanging comments or smoking their last cigarette or checking their weapons. For a small s.p.a.ce of time, Stefan stood alone in the midst of his cavalry. Shutting his eyes, he shook his hands briefly at his sides to stimulate the circulation-for his sword grip would be essential in the coming minutes-took a deep breath, opened his eyes and quietly said, "Mount up."

His muted order was immediately obeyed, as though his soft voice had carried to every man in his corps.

Leaning forward in his saddle, he spoke to Cleo, promising her green pastures and respite when Kars was taken, his fingers smoothing the soft velvet of her ears, his voice so low it didn't even carry to Haci at his side. Whether Cleo understood the words or merely responded to his tone and the preparations for battle, she turned her head for a moment and looked at him with her large intelligent eyes. She'd carried Stefan across the plains of Asia on the Kokand campaign and in every battle since with as charmed a life as his own. A bond existed between them that was based not just on sentiment but on mutual need.

With a brus.h.i.+ng stroke down her neck, Stefan straightened and turned to survey his officers and men formed in ranks behind him. His cavalry was mounted in tight order, knee to knee. Circa.s.sians, Kurds, Daghestanis, cossack lancers and some of the elite Gardes, the grenadiers and infantry arranged behind them by battalion. All eyes were on Stefan, the only general who actually led his men himself, dressed in his white Gardes uniform on his favorite black horse, his tattered banner flaring in the wind, the pennant as medieval in appearance as his Circa.s.sian standard bearer dressed in surtout and helmet. The square of silk fastened to a cossack lance had the white cross of Saint George on one side and on the other the letters S.B., for Stefan Bariatinsky, and the date 1872 in yellow on a red ground. It had been carried throughout the Kokand campaign from the taking of Kazan to the subjugation of the Kirghez tribesmen, carried beside him in all the fights that had made him famous as the best young commander in Russia.

The cold was intense and penetrating as they arranged themselves in order of attack in the ravines at the base of the steep ramparts guarding the forts, the wind chilling their blood. A full moon shone from a dark blue sky on the waiting men, on the open plain and valleys of the foothills, on the snow-wrapped mountain ridges glimmering in the distance. A remarkable silence invested the thousands of men, a total silence, for after days of bombardment the guns and cannons had now fallen mute. Even the Turks would now know that an attack was coming after weeks of artillery fire s.p.a.ced fifteen minutes apart, day and night.

Gazing up at the formidable bulk of Karadagh and Tabias, forts built by Prussian and English engineers to withstand any conceivable attack, Stefan surveyed the ground he knew so well he could see it in his sleep and picked out the routes for each of his battalions in the shadows of the rocky incline.

He was ready, his men were ready, the Turks were holding their breath for the a.s.sault.

The time had come.

Wrapping his reins lightly around his left arm, leaving slack for Cleo to maneuver on her own, Stefan raised his right arm and a pulse beat later swept it forward, his signal for the music to play. With banners flying, the Eleventh Cavalry Division disappeared into the cloud of dense white smoke that erupted before them.

The advancing columns were a dark ma.s.s in the haze of defensive artillery and rifle fire, moving upward, wavering at times under the intense Turkish volleys, hesitating in instances until supporting regiments carried the ma.s.s farther on with their fresh momentum, the army always rolling forward despite the varying terrain or circ.u.mstances in an undulating propulsion of human bravery. Stefan rode through the torrent of rifle fire, unmindful of the bullets, his mind once again free of personal concerns, his concentration solely on the progress of the battle, placing himself where he saw encouragement was most needed, moving back and forth across the line of a.s.sault urging his men on, rallying them when needed against the withering fire. Men fell around him, his officers and escort were cut down, but he seemed immune to the bullets flying past him, always in the thick of the barrage, impelling his men forward.

Chapter Nineteen.

Behind their redoubts, the Turks were firing with such rapidity a flaming red line of fire tore into the advancing columns. As they drew closer to the entrenchments the second and third attack battalions slowed down and began to falter. In horror, Stefan saw the first break begin, the first men turn in retreat before the annihilating fire storm, and knew not a moment could be lost or his men would lose heart. He had only two battalions of sharpshooters left in reserve, the best in his detachment. Quickly waving them forward, he put himself at the head of these, picking up the stragglers in his rush forward, reaching the troops that were considering retreat and giving them the inspiration of his own courage. He gathered up the whole ma.s.s as if with a single sweeping motion of his arm and carried it toward the redoubt with a rush and a cheer.

The entire fortress before them was like a vision of h.e.l.l, enveloped in flame and smoke, the steady crash of deadly rifle fire a lethal barricade they must cross, but his men pushed on because their general was a dozen yards ahead of them and they wouldn't fail him. Stefan's sword was shot in two twenty yards from the ramparts, tossed aside and replaced in a reflexive blur of motion from his saddle scabbard; his uniform was covered with mud and filth, his cross of Saint George twisted round on his shoulder, his face black with powder and smoke, but he charged forward the last few yards with a savage yell and Cleo soared over the last ditch, the scarp and counterscarp, over the parapet and swept into the redoubt like a hurricane. Stefan was smiling, feeling the old frenzied energy and brashness. He heard his own scream with a sense of exhilaration, heard the answering roar of his troops streaming in behind him and knew his men would follow him anywhere.

Like a pressured d.a.m.n breaking, the Turkish defenses crumbled against the onslaught of an army that shouldn't have been able to reach their entrenchments, that should have retreated against the superiority of their Peabody-Martini rifles, that was led by a maniac they all recognized as the phenomenal White General... Bariatinsky.

And twenty b.l.o.o.d.y minutes later the Tsar's army had taken the redoubt.

The question then was how to hold it, dominated as it was by the Tabias fort, exposed to the fire of sharpshooters concealed behind the next line of trenches and the artillery sights of the citadel. Stefan knew they would be counterattacked. Mukhtar Pasha had no other choice but to try to retake Karadagh and hold that and Tabias at any cost. Both armies understood the significance of the forts protecting the entrance to the citadel.

In less than ten minutes, Stefan's cavalry met the first rush of the regrouped Turks, giving the grenadiers and infantry time to scramble over the parapets, giving the last reserves time to advance up the hill, and ten minutes later what was left of the cavalry faced the Turkish counterattack pouring down the earthworks toward them.

The fighting was brutal. Stefan and his Kurdish troopers were in the thick of the combat, slas.h.i.+ng and parrying, slas.h.i.+ng and parrying, the motion of their sword arms dogged and automatic, their bodies numb to any sensation save the drive to survive. Sweat streamed down their faces despite the frigid temperatures, their bodies pumping adrenaline in a frantic effort to thwart death, their minds concentrated with focused intensity only on stopping the next fatal blow... and the next... and the next.

They fought mechanically without thought, by instinct alone, their skill a fusion of courage and tactic so ingrained the question of breeding or training was moot. They fought for two hours on the parapets and parade ground and paved squares of a fortress the English and Prussians had guaranteed invincible. They fought while the sky turned a dull gray and the stars lost their brilliance.

Stefan's uniform was no longer distinguishable as white; it was bloodstained and torn from numerous wounds, the worst a saber cut on his right shoulder that had cut clear to the bone. He was fighting now with his left hand. Cleo's reins were wrapped around the saddle pommel, for his right arm was useless even for the light guidance his trained mount might need. Cleo was lathered and foaming, her black coat sleek with moisture. Haci and his men, sword and dagger in hand, marshaled around Stefan, committed to protecting him with their lives. Twice in the past hour Stefan had sent for reinforcements, but in the melee of battle there was no guarantee his dispatches had gotten through and his position was becoming untenable.

With a feeling of unease, Stefan heard the ominous drumbeats of another Turkish attack, the rapid staccato rhythm signaling another sortie. His men heard it too, and knew the sound to be a warning of disaster. Even if Stefan's call for reinforcements had reached their base camp, the ascent up the side of the glacis was so precipitous that troops couldn't be brought up with the same speed as Mukhtar Pasha's attack force, and after hours of fighting, Stefan's remaining men were exhausted, low on ammunition and grimly aware the next Turkish a.s.sault could be mortal.

Calling on his last reserves of strength, reaching down beyond his pain and fatigue to an inner strength that had carried him through countless campaigns in the past when the odds were as slim or worse, Stefan shouted to the men, his voice hoa.r.s.e and raspy, and rode toward the advancing Turks pouring over the entrenchment. They had to stop this attack or all would be lost; he had to rally his men or the hours of fighting would be in vain; he couldn't allow this Turkish counteroffensive to succeed or all the lives lost would have been useless.

Raising his sword high, he spoke to Cleo, nudging her forward with his knees. With her own valiant spirit undiminished, she broke into a trot.

The Turkish rifles ripped into his first line, his bodyguard began to fall, and a moment later Stefan's forward cavalry was fully engaged, the infantry short yards behind. They fought like men with their backs against the wall, knowing there were no options short of death. Soon the ground was slippery with blood, strewn with the dead and dying.

When Haci fell, Stefan saw him go down in the extreme border of his peripheral vision and, shouting for help, jumped from Cleo to go to his aid. The remaining seven of Stefan's guard followed him, and standing back-to-back against the Turks, they protected Haci with their bodies. The waves of Turks seemed unending as Stefan and his bodyguard stood in a circle on the paving stones laid in an intricate variation of a herringbone pattern. They kept coming while daylight rimmed the horizon; they kept coming while Stefan and his Kurds stood unflinching; they kept coming as Turkish bodies piled up in heaps around the phalanx protecting Haci, Stefan's men firing their revolvers in relays like a well-ch.o.r.eographed ballet of death.

But their own casualties mounted, too, against the expensive modern Peabody-Martini rifles the Ottoman Empire had purchased from America, and at last only three of the phalanx remained standing, and then, ten b.l.o.o.d.y minutes later, none were left...

The battle washed over their bodies in the muted light of dawn, as though their gallant stand had never existed, as though their human lives were no more than a flicker of an eye in the cosmic universe, as though the heir to the Bariatinsky-Orbeliani fortune and honor were a grain of sand on an ocean sh.o.r.e and the battle for Kars a vast tidal wave.

The Tsar's soldiers came up at last as color brightened the sky in numbers sufficient to force a Turkish retreat, but the Turks fought like demons, street to street, house to house, to the very end. Kars was their most important stronghold, the Sultan had poured a fortune into its defenses, and their generals and ruler and religion offered them paradise if they died in its defense. So they died instead of surrendering; they stood and fought at each corner and barricade; the citadel was emptied of defenders, the auxiliary forts and trenches were emptied, and hour after hour the Turks fought until at last it was over.

As the autumn sun shone feebly from its midpoint, a silence began to gather, a silence of dead men and victory, a silence of exhaustion and weary triumph, a silence of Turkish defeat and hesitant Russian hope. The Russian cries began sporadically then, small rejoicing hurrahs from parched throats, exhalations of personal good fortune from men too tired to shout, smiles exchanged with adjacent comrades-in-arms. They had won, they began to realize. The Tsar's army had gained the impregnable, the unconquerable citadel of Islam and its defenders were vanquished. Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!