Wedding Night

The novella “Wedding Night” is dedicated to courage and selfless struggle of Belarusian underground fighters and partisans during the Great Patriotic War.… In the summer of 42, Valya saw Stepan for the first time since the war began. He was the very person from the city underground to whom she had gone on liaison. That’s how their love was renewed. Valya often demanded dangerous assignments for herself, just to get to the city. In the summer of 1943, partisans and underground workers prepared a joint operation—to bomb the railway station through which the fascists drove military echelons toward Kursk and Oryol. It was precisely Stepan who had to guide our bombers to the target with light signals. To coordinate actions with “the mainland,” a scout named Masha—a beauty—was flown into the partisan detachment. By order of the commander, Valya took Masha to Stepan, and from that moment Masha could not find peace. One day, unable to bear it any longer, Valya ran off to the city on her own and ended up at Stepan and Masha’s wedding…