Twice between errands, I tried to slip away, but each time she would catch me and chastise me. “There is still much work to be done, and the day is young.”

She curtly introduced herself as Zemfirka Akhatova. But despite her strictness, when I told her to call me Toma, she huffed and said, “I suppose Zemfirka will do. Just don’t call me Zemfirochka.”

I wondered where Vanya and Mikhail were. I doubted they had gone far—Mikhail had been right in suspecting that the train was as much a mobile hospital as a means of transporting troops. Several cars I passed through were crammed with soldiers.

Past noon, Zemfirka and I stopped in the canteen for a brief lunch. Weak tea and another hot bitter drink made of roasted cornflower root, and slices of pickled herring served atop black bread. From behind some sacks of flour, Zemfirka retrieved a fresh red apple and cut it into segments. She offered me half.

I didn’t realize how ravenous I was until we sat down and my legs started quivering. I crammed half a slice of bread into my mouth, nearly groaning at the herring’s tangy bite and silken texture.

“Hey, slow down.” She laughed. “Keep eating like that and people are going to start thinking you’re an upyr.”

“Sorry.” I licked the salty brine off my fingertips and took a few smaller bites to show her I still had manners.

“When was the last time you ate?”

“Not since last night.” Aside from a few gulps of copper-tasting water from the bottom of my canteen during our rush to the train station, I hadn’t drunk anything either. “Speaking about an upyr, I heard there was one onboard.”

“Mmm.” Zemfirka cocked her head, resting her cheek in her palm. “Did Dima tell you that, too?”

A herring spine snapped between my molars. I winced involuntarily, recalling in an instant the sound Dima’s body had made when he struck the ground. Slowly, I lowered the remnants of my bread.

“You know him?” I said, taking my tea in both hands to still my trembling fingers. The glass rattled in its metal holder. I told myself it was only from the jostling of the train, that my face revealed nothing.

“We were stationed in the same unit until a few months ago.” She sipped her tea nonchalantly. “Serebrograd brigade, along the front lines. When I saw him this morning, he was bragging about catching an upyr on some top-secret mission he took with that blond soldier, the skinny one, er...”

“Stanislav,” I said quietly.

She cocked a finger. “That one. Dima said he’d show me later, but honestly, he scares me more than an upyr!”

“Did he say where she—er, it was?” I asked.

“The morgue, I believe.”

“And where is that?”

Zemfirka looked at me as though I were daft. “By the pharmacy car. You know, the windowless ones in the middle of the train. Maybe once we arrive in Eyry, we’ll be able to see them unload it.”