Read The Third Section Online

Authors: Jasper Kent

The Third Section

About the Book

It was dark now. The moon outside was a thin crescent, shining its light through the doorway and through several holes in the ceiling, cutting through the cave in glowing, ethereal columns. The skin of the dead Russian, lying in one such ray of moonlight, looked as grey as the rocks beside him. Next to the body stood the figure of a man …

1855
. After forty years of peace in Europe, war rages. In the Crimea, the city of Sevastopol is under siege. To the north, Saint Petersburg is blockaded. But in Moscow there is one who sits and waits – for the death of a tsar, and for the curse upon his blood to be passed to a new generation.

As their country grows weaker, a man and a woman – unaware of the hidden ties that bind them – must come to terms with their shared legacy.

In Moscow, Tamara Valentinovna Komarova – an agent of the tsar – uncovers a brutal murder. It seems this is not the first death of its kind, but the most recent in a sequence of similar killings committed by one who has stalked the city since 1812.

And in the ruins of Sevastopol, Dmitry Alekseevich Danilov confronts not only the guns of the British and French but also another, unnatural enemy – those creatures his father had thought buried beneath the earth, thirty years before …

Contents
 

Cover

About the Book

Title Page

Dedication

Author’s Note

Characters of the Danilov Quintet

Selected Romanov Family

The Crimean War

His Imperial Majesty’s Own Chancellery

 

1854

Prologue

 

1855

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

 

1856

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Chapter XXIV

Chapter XXV

Chapter XXVI

 

1864

Epilogue

 

About the Author

Also by Jasper Kent

Copyright

THE THIRD
SECTION
 
Jasper Kent
 

 
For my parents
AUTHOR’S NOTES
 
Measurements

A verst is a Russian unit of distance, slightly greater than a kilometre.

Dates

During the nineteenth century, Russians based their dates on the old Julian Calendar, which in the 1850s was twelve days behind the Gregorian Calendar used in Western Europe. All dates in the text are given in the Russian form and so, for example, the coronation of Alexander II is placed on 26 August 1856, where Western history books have it on 7 September.

Characters

A list of characters in the Danilov Quintet appears
here
.

 

Thanks to Stéphane Marsan and Hilary Casey for assistance with French and German.

CHARACTERS OF THE DANILOV QUINTET
 

Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov 

 

Russian soldier and spy who defeated the Oprichniki in 1812 and saved Tsar Aleksandr I from Zmyeevich in 1825 by helping to fake his death. Sent into exile after the Decembrist Uprising 

 

Dmitry Alekseevich Danilov 

 

Only son of Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov 

 

Marfa Mihailovna Danilova 

 

Wife of Aleksei and mother of Dmitry 

 

Domnikiia Semyonovna Beketova 

 

Aleksei’s mistress, who accompanied him into exile in Siberia in 1826 

 

Iuda 

The only human among the twelve 

also known as
Vasiliy Denisovich Makarov
and
Richard  Llywelyn Cain 

Oprichniki who came to Russia in 1812. Under the name of Cain he experimented on vampires. Became a vampire himself in 1825 

 

Zmyeevich 

 

The arch vampire who brought the Oprichniki to Russia in 1812 and who seeks revenge for the trickery played upon him by Tsar Pyotr the Great in 1712 

 

Vadim Fyodorovich Savin 

 

Aleksei’s commander, who died during the campaign of 1812 

 

Maksim Sergeivich Lukin 

 

Comrade of Aleksei, who died during the campaign of 1812 

 

Dmitry Fetyukovich Petrenko 

 

Comrade of Aleksei, who died during the campaign of 1812 

 

The Oprichniki 

 

The nickname for a band of vampires defeated by Aleksei in 1812. Individually they took the names of the twelve apostles 

 

Yelena Vadimovna Lavrova 

 

Daughter of Vadim Fyodorovich 

 

Valentin Valentinovich Lavrov 

 

Husband of Yelena Vadimovna 

 

Rodion Valentinovich Lavrov 

 

Son of Yelena and Valentin 

 

Dr Dmitry Tarasov 

 

Physician to Tsar Aleksandr I, who conspired with Aleksei to fake the tsar’s death 

 

Prince Pyetr Mihailovich 

 

Adjutant general to Tsar Aleksandr I,
Volkonsky
who conspired with Aleksei to fake the tsar’s death 

 

Raisa Styepanovna Tokoryeva 

 

Vampire who helped Iuda to escape Chufut Kalye in 1825 

 

Margarita Kirillovna 

 

A prostitute colleague of Domnikiia who was murdered by Iuda in 1812 

 

Natalia Borisovna Papanova 

 

Daughter of a cobbler; sheltered Aleksei and Dmitry Fetyukovich during the French occupation of Moscow in 1812 

 

 
THE CRIMEAN WAR
 

In 1853 Russia went to war with the Ottoman Empire for the eleventh time in three hundred years. The difference on this occasion was that Great Britain and France allied with the Turks, leading to a European war on a scale not seen since the time of Napoleon. There were major engagements around the Danube, in the Baltic and the White Sea, in the Caucasus and even in the Pacific, but the most significant theatre of conflict was the Black Sea, where the Allies attempted to destroy the Russian fleet harboured in Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula. Hence in the West at least, the conflict became known as the Crimean War.

The immediate cause of the war was the argument over who should have control of the Christian holy sites within the Muslim Ottoman Empire; the Catholic Church, championed by France, or the Orthodox Church, by Russia. More generally, antagonism between the two sides was due to fears of Russian expansion into the British Empire. Russia had the potential of reaching British India over land, while Britain’s access was by sea, over the circuitous route around the Cape of Good Hope. Turkish influence in the east acted as a buffer against Russian ambitions, but the anticipated collapse of the Ottoman Empire – nicknamed by Tsar Nicholas I as the ‘Sick Man of Europe’ – would mean that Russia could gain much of the Turkish territory and take a step closer to the subcontinent.

While the French had little interest in this dispute, the French Emperor, Napoleon III, was, like the British, concerned over Russian naval access to the Mediterranean, through the Black Sea. Moreover, Napoleon III saw that making a stand against
Russia
might consolidate his recently acquired position (he became emperor in the coup d’état of 1851) as well as offering a chance to take revenge for his uncle Napoleon Bonaparte’s defeat by Russia in 1812 and Tsar Nicholas’ failure to properly recognize Napoleon III’s claim to be emperor.

To test Turkey’s determination during negotiations over the holy sites, Nicholas I ordered the Russian occupation of Moldavia and Wallachia – autonomous principalities within the Ottoman Empire and historically the lands over which the two nations had often clashed. The Conference of Vienna led to a proposed compromise which gave Russia limited authority over the holy sites. This was enough for Russia, which began to withdraw from the principalities, but not for Turkey, which declared war on Russia. The remaining players began to take sides.

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