But deep down she knows one thing for sure. As long as there’s a rifle in her hands, she is not helpless prey. She is dangerous.
The next few weeks change Katya’s life completely. She is officially moved out of the foul common barracks and into a tiny supply room by the service block. It’s barely six feet by six feet, windowless, but it has a small stove.
She is issued a nearly new sheepskin coat. New felt boots that don’t leak. And a luxury beyond reason—real fur mittens.
Every freezing morning begins the same way. Katya goes to the guarded armory. The duty officer signs out a sniper rifle to her and exactly five rounds.
Only five. No more, no less. “Tonight you return five spent casings or fresh carcasses,” the officer warns.
“Lose even one casing and you go straight to the punishment cell.” Katya nods. No one needs to explain the value of a bullet to her.
At the front she could lie in swamp water for two days for one shot. On her first trip into the woods in her new role, she causes a sensation.
As Katya walks past the line of women heading to the logging site, hundreds of eyes follow her. In those eyes: envy, hatred, fear. “Look at her,” someone hisses from the back. “Camp pet.”
“Sold out.” Katya doesn’t react.
She knows explanations are useless. Real authority isn’t built with speeches. It’s built with results. The winter woods greet her with silence.
The kind of silence she loved before the war. No rusted barbed wire. No guards shouting. No stink of the barracks. Just clean snow, tall pines, and animal tracks.
Katya reads the snow the way some people read a newspaper. Here a snowshoe hare doubled back. There a fox stopped to hunt mice.
And by the creek—deep, fresh holes. A large deer. That first day she returns with a heavy kill.
A young buck, fat and healthy. She has to drag the carcass on a sled for nearly two miles. Her muscles scream, her breath comes hard, but she doesn’t stop.
She comes through the service gate with the deer behind her. The smell of fresh meat travels fast. Half the carcass goes straight to the guards’ kitchen and to Captain Ivashin.
The other half—bones, head, organs, scraps—goes into the prisoners’ kettle. That evening, for the first time in a year, the soup in the barracks smells like actual meat.
The women eat in silence, fast and hard. They scrape their bowls clean. No one thanks Katya, but the whispers about her being a camp pet die down quickly.
A hungry stomach is the most honest judge there is. After lights-out, the door to Katya’s little room creaks open.
Lute stands there. Her bear wound is healing, but her arm is still in a sling. Behind her is one of her women carrying a bundle.
“You awake, game warden?” Lute’s voice is rough but no longer hostile. Katya sits on her narrow cot cleaning the rifle.
She has to turn it in within the hour, but for now it’s still in her hands. “I’m awake. What do you need?”
“Business.” Lute steps inside and lowers herself onto a wooden crate. “The women said the soup was good tonight. Your work?”
“Mine.” “Good.” Lute nods to her helper, who sets the bundle on the table.
Inside is a pair of warm wool socks. Hand-knit. Thick. In camp, something like that is worth real money.
“Take them. You’re out in the woods all day. Keep your feet warm. Call it payment.”
“And a signal.” Lute, who runs the barracks, is officially recognizing Katya’s new place. She’s no longer a traitor. She’s a provider.
“Listen, Katya.” Lute lowers her voice. “Things are getting jumpy around here. New transport came in from the south a few days ago.”
“Those women are bad news. No respect for camp rules, no respect for anybody. Their leader’s called Rat.”
“Mean as they come. Sleeps with a shiv. She’s already making a play for my spot. But that’s not the point.”
Katya keeps wiping down the bolt with an oily rag. “I’m not getting into your politics.”
“Rat’s got her eye on you too. She wants your rifle. Understand? She’s planning a break.”
Katya stops. “A break.” The word hangs in the air of every prison camp.
A fool’s dream. In winter, with deep woods and no towns for miles, escape is usually just a slower way to die. “Let her dream,” Katya says dryly. “She’s not getting my rifle. And if they come for it, I’ll shoot.”
“They won’t ask,” Lute says with a grim little smile. “They’ll catch you in the woods or choke you in your room at night.”
“I told my people you’re off limits. But these women are different. Be careful, sniper. Sleep light.”
Lute leaves behind the smell of cheap tobacco and a heavy sense of trouble. Katya looks at the socks. A gift from a thief is never just a gift.
Now she’s in the middle of a gang war whether she wants to be or not. Another month passes.
December buries the camp under a white shroud. The cold drops to forty below. Birds freeze in midair.
Ivashin keeps demanding more game. He’s planning a New Year’s feast for a visiting inspection team from the capital. Katya goes into the woods every single day.
She is exhausted. Her face is wind-burned nearly black. Her hands are all blisters. But for the first time in a long while, she feels alive.
One day while hunting she goes farther than usual—more than four miles from camp, into a deep, empty hollow. There, among storm-felled spruce, she finds strange tracks.
Not animal tracks. Ski tracks. Homemade wide skis, fur-lined underneath.
The tracks lead toward an abandoned logger’s shack. Katya is a trained scout. Curiosity and instinct beat caution.
She follows the trail quietly, blending into the woods. Her white camouflage smock makes her nearly invisible. Near the half-collapsed shack, she sees movement.
Two men. Not in prison coats, but in worn civilian clothes. One has a hunting shotgun over his shoulder. The other has a submachine gun.
Escapees. Or armed bandits from outside. Katya drops flat into the snow.
Distance: about two hundred yards. Light crosswind. Through the scope she sees them hiding something under the floor of the shack.
Crates. Heavy green military crates. Weapons, food, explosives—something serious.
Katya understands at once: this is no poacher’s stash. It’s a supply base. Preparation for something bigger. She backs away on her belly, careful not to leave obvious signs.
Her heart is pounding in her throat. If they spot her now, she’s done. A bolt-action rifle against a submachine gun at close range is bad math.
Back in camp, Katya does not go to Ivashin with a report. Something stops her. Instinct.
If she reports armed men in the woods, Ivashin will raise an alarm and send out a sweep. And as camp game warden, Katya will be put in front where the bullets are. Besides, what if the men are tied to someone in the guard force?
