Daughters of the Night Sky

A cherubic little boy missing his front teeth grinned up at her. “Have you brought us any sweets?”

“No, my darling boy. You have new teeth coming in. The sugar wouldn’t be good for them. How about some good bread and some soup?”

The children nodded enthusiastically, and she pulled the box from the back of the truck. A little girl took my hand as we entered the building that smelled strongly of gunpowder and coal. She had no idea who I was, but the uniform told her all she needed to know—I could be trusted. I was on her side.

Their teacher, a wizened old man who must have been deemed too old for service, smiled at the sight of Oksana and guided us into the school cafeteria.

“We’re glad to see you, my dear,” he said. “And you brought one of your comrades. How nice to meet you.”

“Excuse me. Captain Soloneva, meet Comrade Mishin. He looks after the children here at the school.”

“Pleased to meet you,” I said, offering the stooped man a smile and sticking out my right hand. He took it in a firm handshake, his chest puffing with pride, as though Oksana were presenting him to Stalin himself.

“Can the regiment spare all this?” he asked, his eyes widening at the box, which contained a large jug of soup and two loaves of black bread along with a handful of bandages and a few odd first-aid supplies. The food looked like just enough to give each child a few mouthfuls, though they all danced in anticipation of their warm meal. “I cannot accept your help if it will land you in trouble, my dear. I couldn’t live with myself.”

“The cook himself gave me permission to bring this to you and the children, Comrade. It’s my honor to do so.”

“You’re an angel, Major Tymoshenko,” he said, breaking the bread into portions for each child as Oksana dished up the soup into the bowls the children produced from the nearby kitchen. I looked around for an occupation and ensured each child had both clean spoons and napkins for their meal.

The children smiled up at me with dirt-streaked faces that all looked far too thin and far too wise for their years. The oldest child was not yet thirteen, the youngest still toddled, clutching the sides of benches as he learned how to navigate the expansive room. He climbed up into the lap of one of the older girls, gumming his bread in between dimpled smiles.

“The wee one looks a bit young for school,” I commented to Oksana, who had served Comrade Mishin a larger portion of soup and bread with an admonishment to eat it all so that he would be better able to keep an eye on the children. “Is he tagging along with an older sibling to stay out of his mother’s hair?”

“Not exactly,” Oksana said, pulling me a bit farther from the table. “He’s here with his sister, but their parents were killed in a raid a few months ago. They’re all orphans. They’d be fending for themselves if it weren’t for Mishin.”

“He’s a good man,” I said, watching the man who tried, and failed, to siphon off some of his soup into the children’s bowls without being observed.

“There aren’t enough of them,” Oksana replied. “And as soon as we move on, he’ll be back to scraping together enough food to keep them alive. Most of them won’t make it through the winter. Fewer, if Mishin won’t eat his portion and keep himself alive, though there’s no reasoning with him.”

I looked at the faces, alight with happiness at the prospect of bellies that weren’t exactly full, but not rumbling for the first time in several days.

The sun began to hang lower in the sky, and we’d be needed in the air in a few hours. We made our farewells and loaded the empty crate back in the truck.

“It’s kind of you to help them,” I said after a few minutes on the road. “Not many would think to do it.”

“I’ve tried to do what I can whenever we’re near a village. They’re all the same. The people need help, especially the orphans.” It occurred to me then that over the past two years, much of what I’d considered to be her silence might very well have been her absence as she’d quietly tended to those who couldn’t tend to themselves. Knowing that her aid was a small mercy that was likely only to delay the inevitable.

“You didn’t need to bring me with you,” I said. “Are you trying to show me your kind side, then? Trying to get back in my good graces?”

“No. Trying to show you why I did what I did.”

“How do the children have anything to do with nearly blowing our plane out of the sky?”

“The only thing that might save those children and millions of others just like them—Russian, German, Polish, French, Dutch, and otherwise—is to finish this damn war. And we have to win it, Katya. You weren’t in Kiev. You didn’t see what the Germans were capable of. I will do what I can to follow the safety protocols because I want you in my plane, but I have to do what I can to end this war, even if it isn’t always safe. I made a mistake. It was a foolish maneuver, and I’m sorry.”

“That I can understand,” I said after a brief pause. “I’ll fly with you.”

Oksana took my hand in hers and shook it. “I won’t abuse your trust again.”