Read Last Citadel - [World War II 03] for Free Online Page B

past minefields and mark them, too. They’d identify lanes of retreat should the Germans push them back from this second defense line to the third and final belt in front of Novoselovka, the last stand before Oboyan and Kursk. The generals would let German spotter planes photograph them here, let them report to their own command how the Russians have occupied this fork on the Oboyan road. Then tomorrow night, after the T-34s had gone, engineers would build
maskirovka
tanks here out of barrels, hay, and poles.
     
    Hitler’s waiting. He should have come at us months ago, when we were still reeling from the Khar’kov loss. Now, with the spring and summer, we’ve packed so many men and guns around Kursk we’re tripping over each other.
     
    The Red Army generals definitely know where Hitler’s going to attack, even if they’re not sure when.
     
    But Hitler knows something we don’t. He’s let the weeks go by without concern that the Red Army has dug in. The bastard’s got something up his rotten little sleeve.
     
    This is going to be a tank battle, that’s certain.
     
    That’s it, of course. Hitler’s not worried about our million and a half men, our three thousand tanks, or our uncountable anti-tank mines and guns. He figures he’s got a weapon to turn the battle his way, no matter how ready we get. He’s waiting for his new tanks. The Tigers. His super-tanks.
     
    Dimitri had never faced a Tiger. The hulking things had only made fleeting appearances during the debacle at Khar’kov. But every report, every rumor, told that wherever the Tiger appeared, it dominated. T-34s by the dozens were left in wreckage by a handful of Mark VI Tigers.
     
    Around him, for miles in every direction, more and more moonlit tanks pulled into position. The T-34 was quick, even nimble, with Dimitri at the reins. It had excellent armor, a strong main gun. He recalled Andrei’s hand sweeping over this small southern portion of the battlefield inside the Kursk bulge, studded with Russian tanks. Can Hitler bring enough super-tanks here to kill all of us?
     
    In the sky, between Dimitri and the moon, a shadow skittered, like a crone on a broomstick. Then came the faint clatter of engines. The sound headed south, toward the German lines. In a minute it was gone, and the night belonged again to the dark, idling tanks spread across the fields and hIIIs.
     
    Valentin appeared beside him. The boy, too, had his eyes raised to where the black flash had cut across the moon.
     
    ‘Night Witches,’ murmured Valentin.
     
    ‘Yes,’ Dimitri answered. ‘I saw them.’
     
    He scanned the sky farther to the south, away from the moon’s aura, and caught what he was looking for. One star blinked in and out, then another winked in line, and he wondered if this was Katya.
     
    * * * *
     

CHAPTER 3
     
     
    June 28
    2320 hours
    one thousand meters above Syrtsev
    ten miles north of the front line
    Voronezh Front
     
    The flying was effortless. Katya pulled her hands from the stick, her feet from the rudder pedals, and the U-2 flew itself, straight and deliberate, heavy with four 200-pound bombs strapped under the low wing. The night let her pass unescorted except for what she brought with her, the
pop-pop-pop
of her little engine, the flap of wind in the percale of her wings, and the siffle of air slipping through the wire struts that held her bi-plane together.
     
    Below, the earth slid by, the color of cobwebs and ghosts, soaked in the full moon. Plumes of dust rose from the vast grasslands, the thin stalks were smashed flat in straight lines, the unmistakable sign of tank columns. These are our tanks, she thought. Hundreds of them, on night maneuvers.
     
    Katya put her hands and feet back on the controls. She shoved the stick hard to the left. Even laden with bombs, the plane snapped into a quick barrel roll. Blood rushed behind her eyes, bulging them, but she kept her stare on the dim horizon. When the world had twirled once, she