TATIANA RETURNS TO THE BAWDY house with a suffocating feeling to her chest. Yury had cried when she left, his little face flushed pink and wet with tears as he clung to the folds of her skirt. It took a great deal of coaxing from Tatiana for him to release her, but only after she had promised to visit him again.

She had returned to the brothel house in a daze, her mother's words a litany that haunts her with each step. She had given Haleen enough to keep wood and food in the house, to purchase Yury and herself new clothing for the cold months that will come.

Tatiana expected nothing of Haleen; gratitude was not something her mother could express, not to her.

Yara greets Tatiana upon her return, her smile bright and eyes warm with affection. Tatiana gives her the gift she had promised — a little bag filled with biscuits and hard candy. Yara thanks her, her voice high with delight as she runs upstairs to where Madam Nazeer was to show her what she's received.

It does not take long for Tatiana to become busy. She smiles coquettishly at the men that come, offering them saccharine words and a warm body to caress. It is ingrained within her, this facade. They tell her she is beautiful, that their hearts cannot help but beat for her and she laughs as though charmed and flattered.

Through it all, she feels only numbness.

Ivan comes to see her again, the silly thing. He is smitten and ensnared by delusions of heroism. Ivan wants to save her from this life. In her arms, he speaks of a life together, of a family together. Tatiana does not indulge him.

She smiles, but her eyes are cold. "Sweet boy," she whispers into his sweat-soaked hair. "You will only hurt yourself trying to save others."

VASILY HAD BECOME ACCUSTOMED TO the frequent appearance of the komandr. When he left the bawdy house early in the morning, Komandr Yankovsky waits for him. He was meticulously put together and looked well rested.

"Did you enjoy the company of that girl?" Ilya inquired, doing little to mask his clear displeasure.

"I could ask the same of you," Vasily says as he brushes past the man. "You sought the company of a boy who shared similarities with me. Should I be flattered or disgusted, Komandr Yankovsky?"

The man stalks after him, close enough that Vasily could feel the heat of his body against his turned back. Ilya, perhaps out of desperation or aggravation, splays a hand over Vasily's hip and holds onto it. His grip is tight, immobilising and, briefly, Vasily considers the merit of twisting the latter's fingers.

Ilya turns Vasily to face him, his eyes dark with emotion. It takes Vasily a moment to decipher it, this complex gleam in the Komandrs' eyes. It is an obsession.

"How easily your words wound and infuriate me," Ilya says, the pads of his fingers from his free hand mapping the shape of Vasily's cheeks and jaw. "I did not sleep with him. What use is an imitation, when what I really want is within my grasp?"

"I am not yours to claim."

The eyes of Ilya map the shape of his face, his eyes, his cheeks and jaw and mouth. It is suffocating, Vasily thinks, this mans obsession. It is a dangerous thing. It is a threatening being that should not exist.

"My time is limited, Yankovsky," Vasily says, giving no sign of his thoughts or feelings. His tone is simple, patient. "What is it that you want from me?"

Ilya's eyes follow the curve of his jaw, chin, his mouth and eyes. He takes in the features of his face in lieu of speaking, his actions speaking for themselves. Vasily is not surprised, not entirely, when the mouth of the other man descends upon his.

It was not his first kiss, but it differed greatly from the few chaste, experimental pecks he had shared with the other children at Herzog's residence. Ilya is ravenous in his hunger, his grip tight. Vasily recognised the bitter remnants of the coffee and kvas the other man had consumed earlier, and his lips fell open at the provocation of the dexterous tongue.

The kiss seems never ending, as though Ilya is determined to consume every facet of Vasily's entirety. He steals each gasp before it can come to fruition, explores each crevice and corner of his mouth, embedding the taste and feel of it to memory.

When Vasily deigns to tear his mouth away from the other man's, Ilya stares him down with dark eyes, a sharp, satisfied smile on his lips.

"Have you had enough, Yankovsky?"

"For now," the Komandr says, releasing his hold on Vasily. "I will have to be patient," he continued on as he smoothed the wrinkles from his military jacket. "But, soon, I'll have you to myself."

Following this, the Komandr went about his business. Vasily watched him walk a distance away before vanishing into the postal headquarter before resuming his own trip.

Aseev waits for him at the steps of the church. That is unusual for the old physician who is always found either at the bedside of a patient or in his lavatory concocting draughts. The old physician beckons Vasily to follow behind him, a pinched expression on his face.

"Is something the matter?"

Aseev wears a curious expression, his lips pressed tightly together as he navigates through the winding corridors of the church. When they finally came to a stop, it is at the door of Aseev's lavatory. The old physician leads him inside and Vasily pauses to examine his surroundings minutely.

The laboratory was smaller than Vasily expected. It housed a fireplace with a dying fire beneath a sooty cauldron, a long table overfilled with herbs and glass tubes and spheres. The air held the perpetual scent of medicine and wild flora, of smoke and wood fire.

When the old physician deigns to speak, it is to say: "They have issued a new draft."

Vasily looks at him then. The expression Aseev wore was akin to the matrons whenever a draft notice was sent to Herzog Aleksandrov's. A mixture of exhaustion and resignation. A public notice would never be announced — but those households whose family members have been called to duty always carried an air of despondency to them.

He had seen it numerous times. The tightly closed shutters, the drawn curtains. During this time of year, it was not unusual to hear the grief-stricken wailing of women and children.

They mourned for the living as though they were already dead while those who escaped the draft notice breathed a sigh of relief for the time being.

"They sent one here," he said at last.

"No," Aseev responds, his voice low and hoarse. "No, the keeper of the house you reside passed the message along."

Aseev cannot meet his eye, Vasily notes. The old man had always been brash and often boorish with Vasily, his tongue glib and quick to speak without hesitancy. And yet now he cannot bring himself to look at the young man in front of him.

"I've been drafted, I presume," Vasily says, bringing an end to the suffocating silence that surrounds them.

The weight of the admission ages Aseev. He sags a bit, looking even older. When he finally brings himself to look at Vasily, there is unveiled despair in his eyes.

In that moment, Vasily wonders if the old man is reminded of his own child who was long dead.

"Yes."

A single word, and yet it was tantamount to the end of everything for Vasily.