Rider on a white horse.

The spirit of the Slavic girl.

Germany smoked a cigarette, imposingly spreading on soft grass.  Embers gave weak heat and a little light in this impenetrable darkness.  Impassable Belarusian forests were not distinguished by hospitality.  Gilbert warmed the remains of their humble dinner and grumbled on cold nights and high humidity.

What to do - Polesie is a serious thing.  From this one word, Ludwig felt a little uneasy.  Rumors spread among German soldiers that a very large detachment of Belarusian partisans was stationed in the forest, in the middle of which stands a clearing, where they are now actually resting.  It still went where, and only among these same partisans, who haunted Krautz’s troops, was there one mysterious person, the mere mention of which threw the German into a shaking.

It was rumored that it was the spirit of a beautiful, fair-haired young Slavic woman with a rifle in her hands, riding a snow-white horse.  The girl always abruptly and unexpectedly left the forest and mercilessly killed all the enemies of her land that she saw.

Ludwig knew that all this was absolutely true.  Except the spirit.  It was an ordinary Belarusian, or rather, Belarus itself - Natalya Arlovskaya, which did not make her any less dangerous.  Krautz knew firsthand that the formidable Slav did not spare anyone.  Neither bullets nor knives took her.  And Ludwig would rather want to meet with a whole company of the most evil partisans of Belarus than with this girl alone.

Despite all these unrest, the German was still able to maintain imperious relaxation and absolute calm.  Of course, all the spreaders of these rumors did not survive even until dawn, but still ... The cigarette burned his fingers, and Krautz threw a small cigarette butt into the thick grass.

Ludwig looked up at the dark blue velvet sky above him, strewn with a scattering of Golden stars as cold and beautiful and infinitely distant as Natalia. The German frowned — not liking that he had been thinking too much of the girl lately. He had shamefully missed her.

Arlovskaya should have belonged to him - because he had occupied the whole country, but the proud Slav did not want to obey him.  Cutting all the soldiers of the night guard, she escaped from a place from which it was impossible to escape.  And that drove Krautz even more.  He had to find her.  And suddenly grave silence came - the crickets fell silent, the birds fell silent, even the wind stopped rustling with the leaves of tall trees.

All nature was silent, giving way to something terrible.  Krautz instantly tensed.  All his imposingness vanished.  What is it?  A luminous dot flickered between the thick trunks.  Lamp?  And suddenly the sharp silence was broken by the sharp sound of a loud shot.  The soldier standing next to Ludwig, as a sheaf fell to the ground, not even having time to cry out.

The German did not see anything, but felt a stream of hot blood flow on the ground.  Just not her, please.  If this is she ... They didn’t give thought to Krautz - a beautiful snow-white horse jumped out of the forest, and his horsewoman was no less beautiful

With a rifle at the ready in her thin, but amazingly strong hands, with blond hair fluttering in the wind, with the menacing gaze of her deep dark blue eyes, she was thousands of times more beautiful than the most beautiful Berlin ladies and inspired awe in people.  Ludwig involuntarily admired the proud posture of Natalia.

Suddenly another shot rang out, and another soldier fell into the thick grass, staring into the dark night sky with his glazed glance.  There were relatively few Germans — thirty people.  Sorry, twenty-eight. 

Gilbert whispered to his brother:

— Es ist das Mädel, ja gut? * — and immediately got a bullet exactly in the knee.  Natalya, in addition to her eagle's vision, had an equally delicate ear.

Baldschmidt cried out heartbreakingly, and the soldiers turned deathly pale.  Ludwig felt that if not for him, there would have been no one here for a long time.  And suddenly ... A shot.  Still.  And further.

The soldiers fell one by one, like an unsuccessful house of cards.  Krautz did not even have time to shout, when he was alone with a revolver in his hand in the middle of an impassable forest in the company of a heap of dead bodies, a pool of blood, unconscious from the pain of his brother and a beautiful fair-haired girl sitting proudly on a white horse.

A clear full moon peeked out from behind a small running cloud, illuminating the warrior with a soft silver light.  The girl slowly and powerfully brought the horse closer to the German and stopped about five meters from him.

— So we met. I promised, – Natalya smiled with hatred.

— Go away. – Ludwig muttered.

Arlovskaya only smiled:

— Or what?  You still can’t do anything.

It was true. Every last word. The girl grinned and jerked the reins sharply, turning her horse like the wind toward the forest. Ludwig raised his hand with the revolver, but without firing, slowly lowered it. She captivated him. Her beauty, her courage. He will definitely find her and take her. But then. In the meantime…

In the meantime, Ludwig Krautz, with a slight grin on his face, watched his icy-blue eyes with the graceful silhouette of a formidable Slav, proudly sitting on a snow-white horse, racing towards the equally harsh Belarusian forest.

* — Good girl, right?