His name was Kirill Kozmavich Grushev- “Kirka” as we called him. 

I teased him, when I trusted him in our circle of brothers, that was he quick as a fox, eluding the Reds. 

He knew his way up and down the Caucasus roads as well as he knew any cities- he could track and shoot like a proper Cossack, but had this sort of old-school refinement that made me believe he couldn’t fit in with the new world the Reds wanted.

How wrong was I- he was perfect for their world, he could adapt and change colors, like a magic lantern. 

And none of us knew the secret to his escapes laid in the fact he was of them- they let he and his attachment go to track the rest of us down. 

Sort of like favoriting one lamb out of your sheep herd, so the lamb leads your herd right to the slaughter pen, willingly. And all the more ignorant of those whetting their blades for the cut. 

I’ll describe Kirka more in another recollection.

But here, in his odd way, he betrayed me, killed me, and odder still, led me onto a twisted, winding road to resurrection. 

****

This too, will run its course. It’s those truths our elders remind us- they’ve seen too much pass over and through. The end of things is inevitable. 

We rallied like frantic men trying to stem the flood over the gate, but too many of us saw the tide was too great, and it’s wiser to surrender to the new gods when your old ones are dying. 

And when the old dies, many of your brethren go down with the fallen. Perhaps not so much fallen.

 More like shoot and hang them like common dogs and ruin their women and children. 

Despite what’s printed in textbooks, history seldom goes down so pretty like myths. No, it’s uglier. More painful. 

A pastiche, to use that fanciful word Lera likes, of ambition and treachery.

It began after that stupid, stupid fiasco of the damned retreat into the Caucasus. We had a number of mindless gits, a pack of outsiders, leading our atamans-it seemed the world wanted to wring some blood from our stone, thinking they could take down the Reds.

Would we have been better proudly facing the dragon on our own? Probably. Would we have lost? No doubt, perhaps swifter than if we hadn’t any damnable intervention from these goddamned outsiders. Their aid was worse than salt in an open wound. 

But yes, it began after that damned retreat. We ran, hoping it should buy time. It worked for our ancestors. Retreat and regroup- it always worked. But what worked against confused French and haughty Turks proved no avail against the steel-wrought Reds. 

No. Besides, the Reds had their own gospel, and many of our brethren, like our heathen ancestors before us, took such gospel into their hearts, and they wed themselves onto yet another empire. 

Our forefathers gave up their charging on the steppes for farms and families, while my brethren (at least those of us who survived) gave up our existence and blended into a submissive mix with everyone else. 

Such are our ways, for better or worse. 

And so this how people simply die. They don’t so much die, really. They more or less become whatever the mighty, being the arbiters they will be, deem “fine” and “upstanding”, or simply, “acceptable and proper”. 

After all, are not dogs just wolves we tamed?