Emin said I was brave. Time will tell if he was right. As far as I'm concerned, bravery is the prerogative of men. Women who risk their lives are either mad or stupid. I'm most definitely mad.
Madness seized me the moment I realised what had happened to you. It was like a switch flipping inside my head — I heard and felt the click, sharp as the cracking of bones when you stretch after being still too long. The truth is, I had always been on the edge, barely holding myself together. I only pretended to be strong and composed for the sake of my family. But they were far away in the Scythe Empire, you were gone, and my only support was Emin — a man who might well be even more insane than I am.
You have no idea what your death did to me.
We were only seconds away. We had everything under control and were coming for you. I admit, we were delayed by the guests on that floor. We had to neutralise them to stop them raising the alarm. Emin had just stepped into the room when the explosion hurled us against the wall. The blast knocked me unconscious. When I came to, he told me a bomb had detonated and he couldn't find you in the rubble. Then we heard screams. We found the bodyguards. One of them told us what had happened.
Moments later came the heavy thud of rotor blades. Emin realised a helicopter had come to lift Ivo from the roof. He raced to reach it in time, but he was too late. Ivo had already been evacuated.
They found two bodies. One was a bodyguard. The other was in the bedroom — or rather, what little remained of it. The roof had collapsed. No one could have survived. The body was so badly disfigured it was unrecognisable. Only Emin and I knew who it was. We couldn't claim you. Doing so would have exposed us.
I'm so sorry we couldn't bury you properly, my love. Now you lie here, under a foreign cross with no name, in cold enemy soil. My poor Volodenka… You didn't even leave me one last kiss or embrace to hold on to. Nothing to convince me that you ever truly wanted me. Nothing to warm me on the endless nights. Only the memory of your soft voice, which will echo forever in the silence you left behind.
It's driving me insane, Volodja. When will it stop? They take, and they kill. They kill, and they take. But I swear to you — you will be the last man Ivo Arsonist ever kills. I will make sure of that.
I think you would strongly disapprove of what I'm doing now. Even more than when I insisted on coming with you and Emin. Don't believe what they say about me.
I had to.
They made me do it.