They met on a secluded section of the western shore of Lake ülemiste, just a few miles south of Tallinn city center. The main airport was on the eastern side, and every few minutes another plane roared overhead. The two men spoke in Estonian.

“When will he arrive?” Aleks asked.

“Eleven. They say he is quite punctual.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Not much,” Paulu said. “I told him you have a daughter, a daughter who is pregnant with the child of a Lithuanian. I told him you were in the market to sell the baby.”

“And you are certain he is the man who made the deal to sell my Anna and Marya?”

Paulu nodded. “Through his minions, he made the deal. He has been in the black market for children for many years.”

“Why haven’t I found him before?”

“He is expensive and secretive. There are many people afraid of him, too. I had to meet with three other men first. I had to pay them all.”

This angered Aleks, but he pushed the feeling back. Now was not the time for anger. “He will come alone?”

Paulu smiled. “Yes. He is this arrogant.”

Ten minutes later, bright headlights split the darkness. A vehicle topped the hill; a candy red American SUV with chrome wheels. The sound system blasted Russian rap.

Another gaudy vory, Aleks thought.

“That is him,” Paulu said.

Aleks reached into his pocket, pulled out a rubber-banded roll of euros. He handed it to Paulu, who pocketed the roll without looking at it.

“Where do you want me?” Paulu asked.

Aleks nodded to the hill to the west. “Give this five minutes. Then go.”

The smaller man hugged Aleks once – a man he had never met before this night, a man to whom he was bound in ways even deeper than blood – then slipped onto his motorcycle. Moments later he was gone. Aleks knew he would watch from the nearby hill much longer than five minutes. This was the vennaskond way.

When Paulu’s bike was out of sight, the SUV cut its lights. The man soon emerged. The Finn was big, nearly as tall as Aleks, but soft in the middle. He wore a tan duster, cowboy boots. He had thinning ice white hair to his shoulders, a yeasty, wattled neck. He wore red wraparounds at night. He would be slow.

His name was Mikko Vänskä.

VÄNSKÄ SMELLED OF American cologne and French cigarettes.

“You are Mr Tamm?” he asked. Tamm was Estonian for oak. They both knew it was not a real name.

Aleks nodded. They shook hands cordially, lightly. The distaste between them was thicker than the smell of spent airplane fuel in the air.

“I understand you have something to sell,” Vänskä said.

Something, Aleks thought. This was how this man thought of the children, of Anna and Marya, as if they were objects, some sort of commodity. He wanted to kill him right there and then.

Vänskä reached inside his coat, extracted a pack of Gitanes, put one between his lips. He then took out a gold lighter, lit the cigarette, drew on it deeply. All quite dramatic and unimpressive. All leading up to a discussion of money.

“There are many expenses on my end,” Vänskä began, as expected.

Aleks just nodded, remained silent.

“I have traveled a good distance to be here, and there are a number of people – highly placed people – who must be paid.” At this, Mikko Vänskä removed his sunglasses. His face was bone-pale, with dark smudges beneath his eyes. He was a drug addict. Aleks surmised meth.

“What is your profession?” Vänskä asked.

“I am a farrier,” Aleks replied. While it was true that he shod his own horses, there was something in the tone of his reply that told Vänskä it was not exactly the truth. The man ran his hand through his greasy white hair. He looked out over the lake, then back.

“You do not have a child to sell at all, do you?”

Aleks just stared at the man. It was answer enough.

Vänskä nodded. He smiled, crushed out his cigarette with the toe of his boot. He used the movement to slide back the hem of his coat. The move was not lost on Aleks.

“Do you know who I am?” Vänskä asked.

“I do.”

The man shifted his weight. Aleks relaxed his massive shoulder muscles, poised to strike. “And yet you waste my time. You do not do this with Mikko Vänskä. Tallinn is my city. You will learn this.”

Aleks knew it was pointless trying to finesse men like Vänskä. They looked at him as if he were some sort of rube, a provincial from south-eastern Estonia. “Let us just say it is a tragic character flaw.”

Mikko laughed, a raspy sound that echoed among the trees. “I am going to leave now,” he said. “But not until you pay me for my time. And my time is very expensive.”

“I think not.”

Vänskä looked up. It was clear he did not hear this sentiment often. Before he could make a move or a reply, Aleks had the man off his feet, face down on the muddy earth, the air punched from his lungs. An instant later Aleks had the man’s weapon removed from the holster at the small of his back. It was an expensive SIG P210. He continued to pat him down, found nothing else. He lifted the dazed Vänskä back up to his feet.

“The question now is, my Finnish friend,” Aleks began, his face just a few inches from Vänskä’s, “do you know who I am?”

A tic in the man’s lower lip betrayed his fear. He remained silent as he caught his breath.

“I am Koschei,” Aleks said.

The man smirked, then realized that Aleks was serious, and probably insane. This made him twice as dangerous.

“This is a myth,” Vänskä said. “Koschei the Deathless. A tale for children and old women.”

Aleks lifted the SIG, chambered a round. He handed it back to Vänskä. Vänskä took it in a snap, leveled it at Aleks, his hands shaking. “Fuck you, vittu! You do not come to Tallinn and talk this way to me. You do not lay your fucking hands on me.”

Aleks shrugged, took a backward step. “Then you have no choice but to shoot me. I understand.”

“What?”

Aleks slapped Vänskä across the face. Hard. So hard the man stumbled back a few steps. His lower lip began to bleed. Hands trembling violently now, Vänskä cocked the weapon.

Again Aleks slapped the man; this time a rotted tooth flew from Vänskä’s mouth. Vänskä put the gun to Aleks’s forehead and pulled the trigger.

Instead of a loud report, there was only the small, impotent echo of metal on metal. The weapon had jammed.

For a moment, Tallinn fell silent. No traffic, no airplanes. Just the sound of the water lapping onto the shore of Lake Ülemiste.

With lightning speed, Aleks lashed out with his left hand, striking the man just beneath the solar plexus. Vänskä dropped the weapon, clutched his heaving stomach. A gush of yellow vomit flew from his mouth. Aleks picked up the SIG and threw it into the lake.

When Vänskä caught his breath, Aleks slipped the Barhydt out of its sheath, opened it to its fearsome length. Vänskä’s eyes bulged at the sight. Aleks touched a finger to the perfect steel. It seemed to disappear in the blackness of the night.

“You should know this about me, Mikko Vänskä. I am a man who asks a question just one time. I will ask you a question. You will tell me the truth. Then we will part company.”

Vänskä tried to stand tall. His shaking knees prevented this. He remained silent.

“Four years ago, just before Easter, you brokered the illegal adoption of two newborn Estonian girls,” Aleks said. “The girls were stolen from their mother’s bed in Ida-Viru County. All this I know to be true. Who was your contact on the other end?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Aleks brought the knife up with a movement so fast it seemed a mere distortion of air. At first, Vänskä did not know what happened. A second later, it was all too clear. The man in front of him had slit open his left eye. Vänskä fell to his knees, blood gushing between his fingers, his shrieks echoing across the ancient hills. Aleks knelt, covered the man’s mouth. The snarl of another jet soon covered the screams.