Daughters of the Night Sky(54)

That afternoon in late July was glorious. One of the days so drenched with sunlight that the world itself seemed to vibrate with joy. It seemed perverse to be fighting a war under the splendor of such a summer sun. I wanted nothing more than to bask under it in one of the two-piece bathing suits the American actresses wore in magazines. Hand in hand on a white-sand beach with Vanya, sipping a frothy drink made with raspberries or some such thing.

But he was hundreds of kilometers away. I wasn’t sure precisely where—his postcards would have been censored if he’d been careless enough to divulge his location—but he seemed no better or worse with each missive than he had for months. He was suffering, I knew. He did not wax on about how he missed me, how he missed home, but that absence itself was telling. I would have given a week’s rations to see him, to comfort him, but leave was about as easy to procure as pixie dust and unicorn hair. I would have to tend to mending his spirit once the fighting was over, and I sensed it would be a task as large as the one we now faced in the air.

Sofia briefed us as she did before each night’s mission. We would be flying three minutes behind Sofia and Oksana, as we often did. They would bomb the searchlights the Germans had been so fond of using to aid their antiaircraft gunners and blind our pilots, and then Taisiya and I would swoop in, along with Elsa and Mariya and their navigators, and take out a target of our choice, or else drop bombs willy-nilly just to keep the soldiers awake. Those nights were the most fun. Less precision needed, and the knowledge we were being a proper nuisance to a lot of people who definitely deserved the treatment.

We took off toward the end of twilight, which was odd for us. The nights were so short, we couldn’t wait to make our first sorties until after full dark, as we usually did. If we’d waited for pitch black, we might only get in five or six runs, which wasn’t even close to our standard. It was getting darker, though, and we’d be well enough protected by the shroud of night once we arrived at the German outpost.

We couldn’t see the outline of Sofia’s plane ahead once we got closer to our target, but we could hear the unmistakable guttural whirr of its propeller.

It was far too quiet at the base. No spotlights to blind us.

I felt a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach, much like I had when I once sat for a mathematics examination and had forgotten one, rather essential, formula. Something was missing.

I felt the hairs pricking at my neck, the metallic taste of fear heightening my hearing and drawing the shadows of twilight into sharp relief.

Sofia and Oksana’s plane coasted in over the site like a ghost, marked the target with a flare, dropped their payload, and roared back to life—but still no antiaircraft shells were fired, though the German gunners would’ve had time to take aim several times over. Nor was anyone frantically trying to find Taisiya and me—and they had to know another plane would be behind the first.

Either these German troops hadn’t been briefed about us, which seemed like the type of oversight the meticulously organized Germans wouldn’t make, or something was terribly wrong.

I didn’t see the German night flyer until the pilot was practically sitting in my cockpit.

“Go!” I screamed to Taisiya over the interphone. “They’re following us!” To see a German plane in the sky with us seemed as unnatural as a green sunrise. They flew during the day and hadn’t had enough intel to anticipate our attacks before now.

“I see that. Get out your grenades,” she snarled into her mouthpiece, her hands steady on the stick.

My own hands shook as I pulled a pin from the grenade and lobbed it over in the direction of the German aircraft. They maneuvered much faster than we did, and I could barely see the flash of metal as they made another pass, whooshing by and riddling Daisy with bullets. The grenade fell uselessly to the earth below with a pathetic pop as it exploded.

I wanted to run. My legs burned for it. My hands ached to grip the stick. But Taisiya was the one selected to fly—it was my duty to fight. I freed a few more grenades from my ammunition pouch and aimed my revolver. I might as well have been throwing rocks for the good my bullets and grenades were doing against the far more advanced airplane, but it gave me an occupation other than shaking in fear.

Taisiya changed course and took the plane to a lower elevation, where she slowed down to below the fighter’s stall speed. She weaved away from the German plane with the grace of a dancer, and we were headed east again in moments. I looked up at our top wing and down at the other. There were more holes than I could count, but we were still—miraculously—airborne.

A second plane came from the south, the metallic whirr of its dual propellers bearing down on us, charging like an enraged dog. Taisiya slowed the plane to a crawl, hoping the pilot would be forced to pull up. It looked as though the German craft was going to slam right into the side of us, so Taisiya dove lower still, knowing there was no way the heavier aircraft could hope to match the maneuver without risking a death spiral. They opened up their machine guns, and it became apparent they didn’t have to catch us. They simply had to get close enough before we dove out of range. The engine smoked ominously—the plane shuddered, making screeching, metallic hisses as it labored to stay aloft, and Taisiya hadn’t corrected for her dive. The Germans would be thrilled to have two bodies to trade in for their Iron Crosses.

“Pull up!” I called to Taisiya. I didn’t bother with grenades this time. I gripped the metal bar on either side of me, fighting the urge to grab the stick and scream for Taisiya to turn over the controls.