I traced my hand over his arm, his skin waxen beneath my fingertips. Once I was sure he hadn’t awoken, I turned to the man and repeated what Vanya had whispered in my ear. The language was strange on my tongue, filled with undulating vowels and hard stops that vibrated in the back of my throat.

With a nod, the man responded in a low, consolatory tone, words I couldn’t understand but that I wished I could, that I wished had been meant for me and me alone. When I didn’t answer, he turned around and made his way back down the rows of beds, which in the encroaching shadows might as well have been funeral biers.

As soon as he was gone, I turned to continue on my way, but scarcely had I taken a step before a hand seized me by the wrist. I yanked it away and looked back.

The wounded boy gazed up at me, his parched lips moving silently, struggling to speak. At last, he forced out the word in a single gasp: “Vasyem.”

“I don’t...”

He pointed at the pitcher of water on one of the bolted shelves.

I retrieved it and returned to his side. Pouring a glass from the carafe, I held the brim to his lips as he drank greedily.

I wished I could ask him why he had joined the Fraktsiya. What had he been hoping for? But he just drank, and once he was done, he slumped against the mattress, ragged breaths pushing from his lungs. As I turned to leave, his fingers grasped at my sleeve.

“Wait,” he croaked, and I leaned forward. His voice crackled in my ear, crisp, like dead leaves crushed underfoot. “Save me.”

I wrenched my hand away without thinking, taking a step back. His mouth trembled. He repeated those two words, but I shook my head, moisture prickling my eyes. How could I save him when I couldn’t even save Galina? When I couldn’t even save myself?

I hurried to the next car over, a windowless compartment whose shelves were stacked with folded linen, rolls of gauze, and metal tins. Sinking to my knees, I unlatched the sliding door in the middle of the compartment.

The door shifted sideways on ball bearings, heavy enough that I had to lean against it until it locked in place. Across the platform, Mikhail met my gaze and lifted his hand. I mimicked the gesture before easing the door shut once more, until only a crack remained. Peering through the opening, I watched as Pelin retreated into an alcove along the side of the train station, her burgundy-black hair already whipping around her face by an unseen breeze.

At first, nothing happened. Then the wind shifted directions.

Within seconds, the breeze became a gale, casting trash and pebbles against the train’s hull, and sending hats and scarves flying. Dust rolled in off the tracks and filled the air with a brown haze as thick as smoke.

The wind intensified until the entire train shuddered in its onslaught. People ran for cover, shielding their faces from the scouring wind and abrasive dust.