Božidar: Redemption

By Mark Irwin

'Bozidar: Redemption' is a historical fiction that cuts across three turbulent generations of Yugoslavia (1944-93) and follows the trials and tribulations of the Bejic family. It also contains mystical elements and at times reads like a gripping thriller that keeps the reader on the edge of their seat with its action-driven tale of the eternal fight between good and evil.

The story begins in 1944 with Europe ablaze in war and the indiscriminate brutality that comes with it. It is in the midst of this terror that Bozidar Bejic's bizarre birth and the ethereal consequences mark him as an infant destined to grow into a worldly mystic. His mother, Alya Bejic, raped as a young woman and left for dead, birthed him in a collapsed bomb shelter. The two of them survived for 40 days by consuming the body and soul of the Holy Sisters, who died in the same collapse.

Found after 20 days, Alya, considered insane, is taken to a camp, and the Holy order of Benedictine Sisters takes in the baby. As Bozidar grows, the Holy Sisters become aware of his intellectual prowess and spiritual transcendence.

 

Decades pass, and Bozidar's supernatural gifts and willingness to stand against oppressive communist governments create many enemies for him. Yet, he follows his conscience in caring for and protecting the Holy Sisters, and others, putting him high on Tito's wanted list. Slowly, his name and his other-worldly acts on behalf of the oppressed bring the word, Legend, to his name.

 

As the '90s approached, the breakup of Yugoslavia brought on a horrific civil war as Serbia invaded Bosnia with a genocidal agenda towards Muslims specifically and non-Serbs in general. Thus, the Bejic family is a target, in constant threat of imprisonment and extermination.

In 1993, Arianna Bejic, the gifted eldest Bejic daughter, trained as a surgeon and now practicing in Canada, resolves to act. She and her indigenous companion, Bobby Rafferty, leave Canada to locate and save her family. Bobby Rafferty is along because the troubled Arianna saved his life and his indigenous spirit now commits him to help her.

Bobby is a tortured soul, living with the brutalities of his past history, lost and desperate, until Arianna steps into his life, her morality, sense of purpose and personal troubles awakens the lost soul in Bobby and begins the journey into his own mortality and the depth of spirit hiding behind his rough exterior.

Arianna's strength of purpose had a powerful hold on Bobby. Arianna and Bobby are very different people, but somehow their individual differences slowly merge over time and experiences. They become as close as lovers can while still remaining celibate; theirs is an ethereal marriage – with room to grow.

Once in Bosnia, their journey confronts powerfully evil, unforeseen realities. These headwinds create deep character journeys for Arianna, Bobby, and the host of other characters in their struggle to survive. Those characters, all makes and models of diversity (religious, ethnic and social) welded together with one common agenda, stand against the evil, genocidal wave that seeks to consume them.

During this time, Bozidar, long since a phantom presence, brings himself and his powers overtly into the fray to protect the Bejics, the Holy Sisters, and all else he finds in need. The brutal onslaught of murder, rape, and genocide rage as Bozidar walks in judgment among the souls of the best and worst of humankind. And he's joined by the likes of Bobby, Adhem and Dubravko - men who connect with him on a deeper level and who have the potential to be the light in that darkness.
Tribulations at every turn, but yes, equally triumphant moments as the characters make metamorphous journeys from who they are to what they become.

There is nothing gratuitous about any of it - it happened, and this is their story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Alsirat
• Release date: May 27, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223306580

Mark Irwin

Born in Toronto, and raised in the farm country of southwestern Ontario, Mark graduated from the University of Western Ontario and spent two years travelling and absorbing the cultural riches and diversity of Europe, Africa and the middle east. Upon returning to Canada, he pursued a career in education, having held tenure at four different Canadian colleges.  He is married and lives with his wife and two children in a small town in Ontario, Canada. He has been a writer since high school, publishing poetry, short stories, three fiction novels, and a three-act play. He is presently working on a new novel, ‘BOZIDAR’ to be published soon in both English and Bosnian and Croatian.

Book preview

The Only Thing Necessary for the Triumph of Evil Is for Good People to Do Nothing

Edmund Burke

***

Prologue

The Birth of the Legend

Sanski Most, Bosnia, Yugoslavia

Early Spring 1944

Days passed in the collapsed bomb shelter with the deceased Sisters, and Alya, ripe with child and losing her sense of self, knew it was the Mother Superior’s voice, no doubt, but from an unknown source inside her head, maybe, but there. And not the first time she’d heard it. Her hallucination had grown with her hunger and dark privation, and so had the voices.

Every time she closed her eyes, the voices were there; the stiff, torn-clothed Spirits of the nuns spoke to her. Once, when she opened her eyes hoping to escape the voices, she was sure she could see the Mother Superior's mouth moving silently. Conscious or not, the message wouldn't leave her.

Consume our Spirit, feed yourself. Do it for the child. Give it who we are, what we are. Nourish him with our souls.

Different voices, seemingly vying to be selected, an honour to serve.

Within Alya, the child, nourished by this ethereal and most holy of Spiritual feasts, suckled the life of God into itself.

God's mysterious purpose or the mythology of mere mortals.

Regardless, the embodied Spirits of these nuns guaranteed the child's future to be strange, as strange and unexplained as this prologue.

The nameless child was to become the human embodiment of the Legend that would be the life and times of Bozidar Bejic.

To be believed or not, but most definitely not a predictable birth.

*

1. Fifty Years and Six Thousand Miles Away

Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria, British Columbia Canada

Spring 1993

Doctor Arianna Bejić, now a 29-year-old surgical intern at Royal Jubilee Hospital, awoke at 6 am. It was her nature to be ahead and look forward. The alarm went off thirty minutes later at 6:30, as it always did, and just as surely, Arianna awakened early.

She had two days off but was still on call and needed her pager. Waiting for a crisis wasn't the best way to spend your day, but it was a partial respite after ten days at the hospital. She would enjoy it, she thought, and stepped barefoot onto the warm rug of her bedroom, headed for the kitchen, and got the coffee going while she attended to her toilette.

Splashing water on her face, she took the obligatory but brief minutes to view the mirror. Not a classic American beauty and not particularly tall, Arianna carried a little extra weight, but a weight that suited her and was part of her balanced being. She had a dark, smooth-skinned complexion with distinct facial features that spoke more of natural ethnic sculpting than cosmetic surgery; a look bred from generations of Balkan people born and raised on the hard Pannonian Steppes of eastern Europe. Regardless, the look was dramatic and attractive.

On that morning, the mirror spoke volumes to her fatigue. She wasn't one to spend much time in front of her image. She shrugged, splashed more water on her face, tied her hair back, and returned to the efficiency kitchen in downtown Victoria.

Coffee in hand, she made her way to the balcony and sat herself down in the early morning sun as she viewed the vista from the twelfth floor. In front of her sat a clear view of the harbour. The condo had been expensive, but the scenery made something she looked forward to every morning and every evening.

She remembered the tiny basement she'd lived in when she first got accepted for a surgical internship at the hospital. She remembered all the small, cramped accommodations she had endured in the almost ten years since she'd first come on a medical scholarship to the University of British Columbia.

A Bosnian Muslim, a Bosniak, her Balkan homeland seemed so far away at the moment, but the realities there were never far from her mind these days. She didn't want to think about it, but as the situation back home deteriorated daily, her thoughts increasingly on her family. Her parents and two siblings, still there in what was becoming a more dangerous place for them, and the rest of the Muslims were still in Bosnia.

Things were going south fast. Once solid and united, Yugoslavia had broken into separate countries that, one by one, declared independence. As usual with new regimes, there was an almost universal desire to be bigger and better. Serbia, with leadership that shouldn't have had power, grew increasingly deluded with the dream of a Greater Serbia.

Arianna had made annual visits home and, on several occasions, had talked about bringing her family to Canada and a new life. At one point, she'd even started the immigration process for them. On the last couple of visits, she'd noticed a dark mood in the air, a certain uneasiness amongst the population. Bosnia/Herzegovina had been recognized internationally and was on its way to creating an independent state, half of which was Muslim. Of course, the Serbs living in Bosnia were displeased at the prospect of sharing power with the Muslims, and it also didn't fit the scheme of a greater, purer Serbian empire.

On her last visit in 1992, she had already heard about the Serbian troops in border clashes and some Muslim homes being vandalized and burnt by the local Serbian population. She had asked her family again to come to Canada, but Ibrahim, her father, had generations invested in their little farm. He was a Bosniak and proud of it. He was firm in his belief that the neighbours he'd known—Croatian, Muslim Bosniak, or Serb Bosnian—had gotten along, so it would always be that way; he believed in the decency of people. Besides, the trouble was in the south, and the Serbs would never get this far north. Or so Ibrahim thought.

What was evident to Arianna on that last brief visit was the trouble in the south of Bosnia—Sarajevo and Srebrenica, in particular—where the Serbs were indiscreetly pushing what started to appear to be outright war. At the request of the Bosnian Serbs, the Serb army surrounded Sarajevo and intended to conquer it, cleanse it, and start the journey to a greater Serbian destiny.

She'd reached the Benedictine Sisters but hadn't yet heard back from them, adding the Benedictines to her worry list. To make the worry worse, she hadn't spoken to her parents or siblings for several weeks, nor had she been able to contact them. There was a no-service message on their phone, through regular weekly calls back home had been the norm for years now.

Arianna tried to relax as she sat and sipped her coffee, but the nag wouldn't leave her.

*

Ten kilometres away, in an urban environment home to some of the less well-to-do residents of Victoria, Stink, a low-life drug hound, pulled the key from the door of his low-rent hovel. He had just given up Bobby Rafferty, an old associate, to the cops.

Stink felt terrible—well, just a little, and not for long. He was more concerned with whatever consequences might befall him. Rafferty wasn't a man who forgave quickly; he was also the only guy who'd ever really given a damn about Stink and did anything for him.

Then there was Stink's nightmare, Detective Bernie Panchetta, Ponch to his friends—not to assume he had any. He was a downwardly mobile narc with two bad marriages and a personal plan that excluded morality, integrity, and honour. He reeked of corruption, so decent cops stayed away, leaving only undesirables like Stink for company.

Stink sniffed a baggy of dope past his nose, a tradition for him, like looking in his toilet after a satisfying movement. He dropped the baggy and his jacket on a coffin that took up a lot of space in the living room and headed to the kitchen to fetch his paraphernalia.

Moments later, Ponch let himself into the damp, filthy basement apartment and dropped onto the frayed couch. His clothes needed laundering, his hair needed cutting, and his pockmarked face showed a multi-day growth.

It ain't enough, Ponch. Stink's voice trailed in from the kitchen.

Ponch ignored the comment. What the fuck is that coffin still doin' here? Wasn't that for your grandmother?

Told ya, man. Stink came in from the kitchen with a razor blade. He looked at the bag of dope on top of the coffin and missed the symbolism. I decided to have her cremated. Why waste it? Welfare sure won't pay for anythin' like that for me. He looked smug. "That's why I gave 'em my measurements."

You're a fuckin' scumbag, Stink.

Ya can't say that. Ya didn't know my gramma. Stink reached for the bag of dope amongst the scattered rubbish. She woulda told me ta keep the fuckin' thing. Besides, I needed a coffin table. The sad joke got no response from Ponch. It's an extra bed if I get company, too. Not bad for sleepin'. I done it a coupla times.

Let's talk about our friend, Rafferty.

Whatever.

When's he gonna make another run? Ponch growled. It better be soon, asshole. I'm tired of feeding you evidence locker coke.

Stink looked up at Ponch. I want some of the money and my charges dropped.

Okay. Ponch would decide based on how the bust went. Where's it happening?

Near the cabin, in Sooke. Stink looked back down at the lines, snorted one. I know where he comes ashore, where he lives, and where he picks up on the American side.

I don't give a shit about the American side. I want Rafferty here, and I want him soon. You dig? Ponch extended a finger gun in Stink's direction as he stood. The rancid basement had finally gotten to his usually impermeable nose. "All ya gotta do now is get me details. And you're gonna be there."

No way, man. Stink shook his head. He sees me, and I'm dead. No way.

Ponch headed to the door, getting miserable and thinking of facing the precinct empty-handed again. If you hear from him, I wanna know.

It's tomorrow, Ponch.

Ponch stopped in his tracks. Stink enjoyed the hammer moment and kept his attitude casual.

Tomorrow night, he said. Sooke. You be ready with SWAT or whatever the fuck you use. He turned back to his coke, all smiles. Details to come.

Ponch took a step towards Stink, irritated with the cocaine smirk across his face. He wanted to smack him hard, but he didn't. He wouldn't, not until he had Rafferty in his grip. You be in touch real soon.

Don't slam the door on your way out—

The slamming door cut off Stink's words.

Asshole! Stink shouted, then pulled himself upright on the couch. He cleared a space on the coffin's shiny blacktop and dumped the baggy's remaining contents. He watched, enchanted, as the puff of powder rose off the shiny black surface.

He snorted another line and went to work separating his booty into 'uncut for me' and 'cut for sale' divisions.

*

2. Forty Days in the Tomb

Sanski Most, Bosnia

Early Spring 1944

Twenty days had passed since Alya Bejić first awoke in the crushed shelter, a World War I remnant that always looked more like a crypt than a bomb shelter. Was it God's plan, destiny for Alya and the Holy Sisters, and a necessary precursor to the inevitable and surreal future of Božidar? Ironic that the nuns' residence sat undamaged while the 'crypt' crumbled into itself.

Alya was a beautiful young Bosnian Muslim, a Bosniak, seventeen when the Chetnik bandits had raided that particular village. They chanced to find her there on a trip from her parent's farm. Nestled amidst a beautiful valley, the village was the place one sees on postcards from Yugoslavia. But not where one wanted to live during a war between Germans, Russians, Chetniks, and the Ustache. Impossible to know who fought with whom, who was a friend—and for how long that might be true.

Vukašin Ilić, the Chetnik leader, claimed Alya; he brutally raped and beat her before leaving her dead near a pile of bodies.

No surprise; it is what soulless animals do.

When they returned to the desecrated village, those who'd fled found only Alya and a few old women still alive. The survivors banded together, living communally in makeshift barracks, eating whatever they could dig from the earth and the small caches of food they'd buried in anticipation of just such a calamity.

Three months passed before Alya realized the animal, Ilić, had impregnated her; the blessing of pregnancy became, in her own words, a curse from God.

Horrified old women planned a homemade abortion. The night before the event, her stalwart biological mother spirited her away. She walked Alya through that night and part of the following day across the low reaches of the Dinaric Mountain chain to the Sibenik Monastery, an ancient Benedictine nunnery at the base of Mount Grmeč. It was a place familiar through word of mouth as a holy sanctuary and safe respite. All this in the worst of the early winter weather. They arrived exhausted, clinging desperately to one another, fighting death.

The Sisters took them in without question. Only Alya and the unborn child survived the trek; her mother had given up her coat early in the journey, and the following pneumonia took her life within a week. Her mother's sacrifice weighed heavily on Alya's heart, yet her will to survive only grew stronger because of it.

Months passed, and the entire monastery awaited the birth, a rare event there and thus one filled with holy reverence. The nuns changed her Muslim name, Alya, to Croatian Catholic Sonia, fearing her Muslim heritage might bring unwanted consequences. They lived on constant alert for her until the night the Russians came with their planes and indiscriminate attitudes.

That night, the nuns took themselves and their charge to the bomb shelter some quarter-mile behind the ancient monastery. The antique shelter itself sat half above ground, a giant tortoiseshell. They heard the bombs and felt the ground shake. They shivered in fear as concrete dust drifted onto them. They prayed, reciting the rosary as Mother Superior held the terrified Sonia, her unborn absorbing her terror.

But it didn't matter, not the praying, not the holding, nothing. The shelter took a direct hit, shuddered ominously, and flattened onto itself, killing everyone inside—everyone but Sonia and the unborn child.

When the Soviet troops claimed victory in the region in the name of Mother Russia, forty days had passed since the burial. Their souls had long since departed. Sonia had birthed her baby and kept them both alive as she nourished herself on the holy nuns, now no more than semi-frozen corpses. She'd given birth and swaddled herself and the child in the clothes she stripped from the Sisters' bodies. Perhaps the birth had given her the energy to fight for survival, the delivery and the Voices.

They never left her alone. Predominantly the voice of the Mother Superior, cajoling her, speaking softly, then sternly, encouraging her to consume whatever was needed to keep Sonia and her baby alive. You must. This child has a purpose, a reason to survive. You did not come to our care by chance. It was God's will, and it still is. At times, Sonia felt Mother Superior lived inside her mind, body, and soul.

The infant, oddly, never cried throughout the ordeal—not even at birth, not a whimper. Not until the moment the Russians were within earshot. And those hardened and war-weary troops heard and, ever more peculiar, responded, digging through the concrete debris with whatever makeshift tools they could grab.

A sudden shaft of light broke over the infant and the seemingly delirious Sonia. She pulled herself protectively over the child as smoky dust settled on them. And as the light appeared, the infant's cries stopped as quickly as they'd begun.

Then the soldiers heard Sonia's broken, whispery rasp of a voice, rambling about in her delirious wilderness. She was unaware of the soldiers' presence, still speaking to the nuns, having conversations with the dead, partially consumed bodies of those about her. The light rushed in, and the stench wafted up, making even these men, much used to the Stink of war dead, gag. Decomposing bodies, maggots, feces, urine, and the nauseating stench of death shrouded them.

They all backed away as one man pulled a grenade from his belt. A sergeant grabbed his arm as he raised it, pin out.

Something deep inside Bashmakov roused him. I want the baby out. Alive. The grizzled sergeant said it as he pushed the soldier aside, took a breath, and made his way through the opening.

Thinking the sergeant a demon, Sonia screamed desperately as he wrenched the infant from her grasp. Sonia crawled frantically after him, and reassurances from the rescuers did little to quell her. A soldier hit her heavily across the face, and she fell unconscious.

They saved them, mother and child. They swaddled the baby from the cold with the cleanest of the filth they carried with them. Now not only the sergeant but all of them huddled around the infant. These men, so brutal and brutalized, death and cruelty their daily reality—strange they should suddenly turn soft, the extreme of the infant's helpless innocence contrasting their brutal, kill-or-be-killed reality. But they were gentle, arguing to hold the child; perhaps it reminded them of their children, their mothers.

Ordered back to base camp, Sergeant Bashmakov took the infant from their collective grasp and warned them to tell no one. Sonia roused herself, seemingly cognitive to the plan, and again ranted nonsensically as she raced after them. A soldier raised his rifle, thinking to shoot her like he would any peasant for any stupid reason.

Bashmakov again stepped in, striking Sonia across the face with his revolver and knocking her to the ground. They bound her, jammed some rags in her mouth, and threw her in the back of the transport.

Bashmakov motioned to a soldier, who stepped back and dropped a grenade into the crypt. The remaining structure imploded onto itself.

Buried where they died, and that's all the grave we can give them, said Bashmakov.

They kept Sonia bound and gagged until they rolled her off the back of the truck in front of a crude detention center. The Soviets unbound her and crammed her alongside all manner of wartime refuse. No one mentioned the infant, not one of them.

Word spread quickly about cannibalism at the monastery, and both the Soviet guards and the various cage inhabitants turned vindictive. They taunted and beat her. She screamed incessantly as she fought back, stinking, snarling, and drooling rabid white phlegm. It soon became apparent that bothering her only asked for more trouble in return—an odd but effective disincentive.

The real mystery in all this sat with the unknown explanation for the commitment of Sergeant Bashmakov and his men to rescue and protect a deranged seventeen-year-old mother and her silent infant.

Perhaps God knows.

*

3. The Culture of Genocide

1993 – The Bejić Farm

Hambarine, Bosnia

Saleema Bejić's voice broke the dark farmhouse silence: Wake up.

Adhem Bejić, a strong, good-looking seventeen-year-old, was used to rising early, but not this early. He resisted his mother's voice. Why?

Get up! She ripped the handwoven comforter from him as he pulled his legs over the side of the bed. Dress. Now.

Why? Adhem repeated with irritation.

You must leave.

His mother disappeared from the room. Now Ibrahim stood at the door, a proud and moral Muslim father, bearded and devout. Adhem always thought he made too much of their faith. Still, he saw his father and hurried; religious disagreement didn't interfere with respect.

What, Father? Adhem asked as he followed his father down the stairs. What's happening?

The Serbs. Serb checkpoints are up everywhere. There was a shooting last night at a checkpoint in Hambarine. This morning, the paramilitary militia and the VRS took over the village. Bandits.

In the kitchen, Saleema, ever constant, had warm burek and hot Turkish coffee waiting. She motioned for her son to eat and continued packing food and clothing. The Prijedor radio station played a patriotic Serbian background. At the same time, a much-used recording on radical Islam repeatedly preceded the call for Serbian nationalists to support, The Army of the Republic of Serbia, the VRS, who'd taken control of the police and the paramilitary apparatus.

Nadia, Adhem's 15-year-old sister, sobbed quietly in a corner.

Stop crying, Nadia. Ibrahim looked at her sternly but then walked over, put his arms around her, and held her close. He felt her shaking. It's okay, my little sweet. It will be okay.

Father, she whispered, I've heard stories about them—the bandits, the camps, and what they do to girls there.

She sobbed and shook more as Ibrahim held her at arm's length. Look at me, Nadia. She didn't. Look at me, he commanded and lifted her head. "You must be brave now. Nothing will happen, and Adhem will take you and your mother to the Benedictine Sisters.

But they are Croats and Catholics.

Ibrahim knelt, took Nadia's delicate little hands in his, and spoke softly. Listen, my little dove. They are good Christians, and they love God. I know Mother Superior, an extraordinary woman. It is where Božidar was kept safe for all those years. They told us where to find your khala, Alya. He kissed her on the forehead.

Will my cousin be there? Božidar? Nadia had never met him, but she'd sat with so many stories of him and hoped they were true. If they were, he would care for them.

Of course, he watches over us, always.

Nadia caught her mother's eye and got a reassuring stare. It is time to be a strong young Muslim woman, Nadia, Saleema said. Make your father proud.

Nadia put on a brave face as she put her arms on her father's shoulder and kissed his cheek. Okay, Father. I am okay. She squeezed his hand before turning to help her mother.

Ibrahim motioned for Adhem to follow him outside. His face showed the concern of a Muslim who knew only too well the stories from Srebrenica and Sarajevo. "You are taking your mother and your sister to the monastery. You must be a man now, Adhem. Nothing must happen to them—on your life, nothing must happen to them."

Adhem nodded. What about you?

I am here. We have the farm, the animals, spring planting.

Adhem believed none of it. They will take you, Father, and put you in Omarska. He, too, knew the stories going around Prijedor. I am coming back.

No. The tone brooked no discussion. I give you the treasures of my life to guard. Ibrahim turned and pulled an old shotgun and a box of shells from the woodshed. He handed them to Adhem. You get them to the monastery. Watch over them. I will be here when you return.

We must fight them. I would rather die than let the Serbs take our life.

Ibrahim watched his son's anger flash. You have the most important task. His words became stern, and he put a hand on Adhem's shoulder. Use your head, not your heart. You understand?

I understand.

Their eyes met. Adhem said nothing, choking back his tears as they hugged.

Ibrahim helped load them up and walked his family to the forest's edge. Follow the stream into the foothills, then follow the ridge all the way, he said. It is a two-day trek. Stay hidden. The paramilitary bandits will be everywhere. He looked to Adhem. Keep them safe, my son.

His family disappeared into the tree line. Ibrahim wished to keep them close, but he knew the women would not be safe on the farm. Only a matter of time before the Serbs came to demand whatever they chose. He'd once had a good relationship with Duško Tadić, the former police chief. It unnerved him that this man now ran the paramilitary gangs, riding high on the new wave of repression that seemed to engulf all of Bosnia. Regardless, Ibrahim felt secure that his history with Duško would accommodate his safety from the deviants.

*

4. Božidar Bejić Finds a Home

Russian Field Hospital, Northern Bosnia

Early Spring 1944

Sergeant Bashmakov secretly spirited the infant to a contact at