Something strange stirred inside her: a sudden sensation that ran down her spine and sent a shiver through her body. Instinctively, she wrapped herself in her thick beige wool turtleneck.
She followed her colleague’s long hair swinging freely as she disappeared through the entrance door. The most important research project of her department was dissolving amidst technical problems. They needed a stroke of luck, almost an academic miracle, to begin the study of the Tuekta kurgan.
—I’m so glad to see you! —Lyudmila sighed as she turned around.
—What’s wrong? —Ksenia asked—. You look strange… It has nothing to do with me, does it?
—Pavel called me…
—Magomedov —Ksenia completed, pronouncing the name of the current director of the Institute of Archaeology and Social Sciences at Tomsk Federal University.
Ksenia reached into her coat pocket and touched the two envelopes she had kept there. She hesitated for a moment and almost took out the white one in front of her colleague, but restrained herself. As she set the laptop on the desk, she focused on not revealing the secret Sasha had entrusted to her.
And yet, as if by magic, it was precisely the white envelope that found its way into her hands.
She opened it.
Before her eyes unfolded a geographical map: the Tabyn Bogdo Ola Assemblage, a cirque of glaciers crowned by a range of white mountains brushing the skies, forming one of the most complex border regions in the world, where Russia, Mongolia, China, and Kazakhstan converged.
Across the relief, marked by contour lines, points with precise coordinates were distributed, articulating on both sides of the map until converging at a single red dot.
—Here! —Ksenia said firmly, pointing at the spot—. Something very important happened here… and I need to find out what it is.
—First, we have to untangle the knot we have in Tuekta.
—What happened in Tuekta? —Ksenia asked, her excitement still intact.
—We have a meeting with the administration next week to assess the excavation. There are doubts about its historical relevance, the originality of the context, the potential for new cultural interpretations, and above all, the amount of unpublished data justifying such a major financial investment by the university.
—Tell me Ekaterina has nothing to do with this —Ksenia said, referring to Pavel’s current partner and strong candidate for the next chair of Ancient History.
—I’m afraid she does —Lyudmila replied, her voice breaking despite herself.
Meanwhile, Ksenia opened Google Maps and located the georeferenced point sent by Sasha. She realized how disturbingly close it was to the Tuekta site, where remains believed to belong to a shamanic burial had been found.
—I knew it! —she exclaimed, tapping the point multiple times on the screen—. Our steppe clans traveled north in search of summer pastures.
A soft knock sounded at the door.
This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
—Yes?
—I’ve brought the academic evaluation —said Valentina, one of the assistants, cautiously peeking in.
The two women exchanged anxious and surprised glances. The same question arose without being spoken:
Who had requested this evaluation?
Lyudmila spoke without realizing it, as if the words were not her own:
—I was just waiting.
Too fast. Too clean to be a good sign.
As a tenured professor, Lyudmila opened the report and went straight to the conclusions. She read aloud:
The project presents serious methodological and scientific deficiencies. Documentation is incomplete and the lack of rigorous analysis limits the value of the findings. Without a comprehensive methodological review, international collaboration, and systematic publication of results, the project cannot be considered scientifically reliable.
Final Assessment: Deficient / Requires Complete Revision (D-C)
—They’ve crushed all our expectations —Ksenia murmured, discouraged—. What can we do now to continue?
Lyudmila looked at her with a mixture of tenderness and fatigue. Too young. Too innocent. Surrender was the first word that formed in her mind.
—Are we just going to leave it like this? —Ksenia insisted, seeking a reaction.
—I’ll talk to Pavel. Maybe I can change his mind —Lyudmila said, stretching her words as if gathering the strength to face his gaze.
—That’s it!
Ksenia could have said many more things, but she left in silence, the bitter taste of defeat lingering in her mouth, leaving Lyudmila alone in her office.
Pavel, director of the Institute of Archaeology and Social Sciences, was being questioned from multiple academic fronts for a management style considered impractical and excessively etymological, heavily influenced by the archaeologist Ekaterina Smirnova.
But far from that internal power struggle—in which Lyudmila no longer participated—Pavel had been the great love of her life. And that weighed too heavily to allow for a rational response.
They had been a perfect pair: researchers, academics, a solid future ahead of them…
Until that redhead crossed his path.
Until the day she stepped between them.
Ekaterina had a lively and outgoing character, rebellious and bold, with a burning, bright gaze that consumed everything in its path. Lyudmila sensed it before she even understood it. It was a fleeting, almost banal moment: a hallway, a folder pressed to her chest, the echo of footsteps. But in the crossing of their eyes—Pavel’s, surprised; Ekaterina’s, direct, unguarded—something broke loose like a storm contained for years. No words were spoken, only an invisible current that swept away calm, loyalty, everything that until then seemed immovable.
Lyudmila remembered the exact day Pavel finalized the breakup. She remembered the light spilling down the staircase, resting on the curls of Ekaterina’s reddish hair. It entered obliquely through the tall windows of the institute’s old wing, overlooking the inner courtyard, where birches endured even the harshest winters.
Pavel stood motionless in his office, frozen. That gesture—so distinctly his—always appeared when circumstances overwhelmed him.
—We need to talk —he finally said.
She knew, even before hearing the rest, that there was nothing left to save. There was no fear. Only a heavy calm, like the one that precedes a storm that has already chosen to fall elsewhere.
—Go on —Lyudmila said.
Pavel turned. He smiled with that mixture of guilt and excitement, the one that only people who believe they are finally being honest after so long can have.
—I’ve met someone.
Silence settled between them with surgical precision.
He did not say her name. It was unnecessary.
—I wasn’t looking for anything —Pavel added, as if that relieved something—. It just happened.
Lyudmila nodded slowly. She watched the light pause on his face, marking lines that hadn’t been there before. She thought, with a clarity that surprised her, that love also ages suddenly when it is no longer shared.
—Do you love her? —she asked.
Pavel took too long to answer.
—Yes.
That was all.
There were no reproaches. No shouting. No broken promises, because none were spoken aloud. Lyudmila gathered her notebook, carefully closed the cap of her fountain pen, and put on her coat.
At the door, she paused.
—Be careful what you do —she said without turning—. Not everything ancient survives being unearthed without consequences.
Pavel didn’t understand those words then.
She did.
Now, many years later, Lyudmila closed the academic report and rested her hands on the desk.
The past had not returned to ask for forgiveness.
It had returned to claim something that had never been settled.
Outside, the sky over Tomsk was beginning to darken.
Lyudmila did not move.
For the first time since that breakup, she understood that she was no longer willing to step aside.
Not this time.
She had been waiting far too long…
And at last, the moment had come.