‘I must tell her,’ thought Nikki. ‘Now before it is too late.’
She leaned toward Katia. Her hand outstretched, the fingers splayed like the ridges of a seashell, she made as if to hold back the tide of death that was all around her like a black sea coming to engulf and carry her away.
“Petersburg Troitza. The Mother House.” She said the words with the last of her living, her fingers dragging at the sleeve of Katia’s gown. “Go to Lady Anna. Go.”
Chapter Thirty-six
Lady Anna Romanov’s knees were red and painful from long hours kneeling on the stone floor before the icon corner of her chamber at Troitza Convent Mother House. Her back hurt, and her head ached. She could not concentrate on prayers that night because thoughts of Michael MacDonald crowded out the sanctity of the ancient words. Why had she not heard from him through Boulton, his solicitor, as he had promised? He was in Australia; Mr. Boulton had written that news long ago. But this could not explain his silence. The longer he delayed, the more desperate Katia’s situation became. Where was he? Why had he failed to keep his promise? What if he never came for his daughter?
‘What must I do, Lord? If I do not hear from Michael soon, I shall have to act alone. But what should I do? And how?’ As she paced the unadorned chamber that had been hers for almost twenty years, her lips moved in silent prayer.
Until now, her decision to leave the world had seemed entirely right; and she had always believed in the wisdom of her bargain with Natasha Filippovna. When she remembered Prince Ivan, the man who had been her husband, she knew that, right or wrong, she had had no choice but to give up Katia. Prince Ivan would have killed the baby girl, knowing her to be another man’s child. And slowly, by painful stages, she too would have died from her husband’s unspeakable cruelty as he punished her for having dared to seek warmth and affection, a few hours of joy, with another man. She rested her arms on the broad stone windowsill and stared into the night. The air was cold, but she didn’t feel it. She was remembering Prince Ivan; and beside his memory, the night seemed warm and gentle. A discreet knock sounded at the door.
“Enter.”
A portly nun bustled in, rubbing her ruby-chapped hands together and spluttering with nervous excitement. “There’s a young woman downstairs who insists upon seeing you. Lady Anna, she was most outspoken. She said…” the nun rolled her eyes in consternation…she is your daughter!”
“My daughter?” A flush of excitement brightened Lady Anna’s cheeks.
“I could not make her leave, Lady Anna. It is bitter out, and so late; and I could tell she had come a great distance. She has a little girl with her, and they are both half dead with exhaustion.” The nun looked uncertain. “Should I have sent her away?”
“No, of course not,” Lady Anna reassured her. “But we must be very careful. No one but you and I may know of this until I have spoken with Mother Superior. Put the girl in the corner room; and when you come out, make sure the panels are well hidden. Put the Chinese screen in front of the drapes as an extra measure of caution. She will be safe there.”
For some moments after the nun’s scurrying departure, Lady Anna stood without moving in the middle of the room. Part of her wanted to rush to Katia and embrace her as a mother should. Another part longed only to hide. Katia would remind her of too many painful things. Loves and hates she had tried to forget for twenty years. She wanted no part of Katiana Danova; and yet she was her daughter, and she loved her. She was afraid. But why? Ivan was long dead. He could no longer hurt her. Still, she was trembling with fear. Was this Ivan’s legacy from Hell? A terror that was limitless, that even time could not assuage?
Suddenly she shook herself. There was no time for fear whatever its cause. Katia had to be told the truth about herself; something had to be arranged about her future and that of the child she kept with her. Lady Anna wasn’t sure how she could accomplish anything without Michael’s promised help, but she knew she must. She admitted to herself that she was afraid of the world after so many safe years in Troitza, clothed in the sweet anonymity of the religious life. Sometimes she had been able to forget she was a princess; she was only Lady Anna, a pious lay sister. But Katia had paid dearly for the sins her mother had tried to forget; she must not be made to suffer more.
From the silence around her, she knew that the hour was late. Mother Superior would be sleeping. Nevertheless, Lady Anna did not hesitate. Quickly, a plan was forming in her mind; and Mother Superior must be the first to know of it. She took her cloak from a wooden hook beside the washstand; and throwing it over her shoulders, she left her chamber. The oaken door swung noisily shut behind her, and the echoing sound followed her down the corridor.
The next morning Lady Anna took Katia and Mary their breakfast in the corner room where they were hidden. During the night, word had come from the palace that the Patriarch had given his permission for Imperial Guards to search the convents of St. Petersburg for Katiana Danova. Lady Anna knew now that her daughter was wanted for the murder of Oleg Romanov. In the black and bitter night hours, all trace of doubt and fear had left the Romanov princess. She knew what must be done to save her daughter, and she was willing to do it.
Katia recognized her mother immediately. The look of loathing on her face cut Lady Anna cruelly, but she bore the girl no malice for her honest feelings. She put the tray on a small table near the iron stove.
“You recognize me.” The eyes were alike in their exotic shape though Lady Anna’s were brown and Katia’s blue. The high cheekbones, the spirited flaring nostrils were the same as well.
“I am only surprised that Prince Oleg did not see the likeness himself,” Katia responded icily. Despite the robust fire in the stove, she was cold through and through as though a part of her were trapped in death with Oleg Romanov. “What do you want?” For a moment, Katia had forgotten that it was she who had come to Troitza Mother House searching for her own mother. “Aunt Nikki is dead.”
Lady Anna’s eyes filled with tears. “I am so sorry.”
Katia laughed bitterly. “Oh, yes, I’m sure you are! While you have been safe, hiding from the world behind these stone walls.”
“My child…”
“I am not your child! I am no one’s daughter!”
“If only you knew how wrong you are.” Lady Anna reached for Katia, but the girl moved away. “You have the right to despise me. I do not blame you. Only, please,” she pulled out a chair for Katia and urged her to sit, “please, hear my story. Afterwards…”
Katia watched as Lady Anna poured tea from the samovar. She might just as well listen and know the full story of who she was. She had no where else to go. ‘But I will never forgive her,’ she determined. ‘Never!’
Lady Anna pulled a chair beside Katia’s and began her story. “I became Prince Ivan’s wife when I was scarcely fifteen. A year later, I gave him what he wanted. A son. Prince Oleg.” She looked sad. “You think of Oleg as a monster, and I cannot blame you. During the years in Troitza I have heard things. I know the hate he bears me. But I remember him before he was infected by his father’s poison. When he was six and seven, he was blonde and handsome as a child god. But he spent so much time with his father that he soon began to change. By the time you were ready to be born, I hardly knew my son. He had become mean and bullying. Ivan pampered his every whim; he was as spoiled as a French puppy fed on chocolates.” She noticed Katia’s cold expression. “Never mind,” she sighed. “I do not expect or ask that you forgive him. I am not sure what Oleg did to you, but I know enough to be ashamed I ever gave birth to him.”
Neither Katia nor Mary tasted the food on the tray. The little girl lay in a curl beneath the down comforter on the bed with only her huge haunted eyes peering out. Katia’s pallor, the stern expression rigidly fixed on her beautiful face, the unchanging arctic blue eyes, were aspects of her daughter that punished Lady Anna with guilty love and shame. “Katia, you must eat.”
“Why did you marry such a brute?” asked Katia coldly,
ignoring her mother’s solicitude.
“I had no choice in the matter. What woman does? I became a Romanov princess because before that I was an Orlov princess, and such a match was not only suitable but profitable as well for all concerned. Ivan was twenty years my senior, and one of the richest men in Russia. Believe me, Katia, I never wanted to be his bride. His wealth and prominence meant nothing to me. From the first time we were introduced, I saw the evil in him. I tried to tell my own mother this. I told her that his touch was like a spider crawling on my skin. But she only laughed and spoke to me of the way it is between men and women. She called my aversion virtue and innocence and said I would get used to him. But she didn’t know Ivan.” She tried to take Katia’s hands. “Don’t blame me for running away from him, my child. You would have done the same. I see in your eyes that you too would be willing to risk much for what you truly believe and strongly feel.”
Katia acknowledged the truth of her mother’s words. It was disturbing to have her resentment of Lady Anna tempered by this bond of similarity between them. She wanted to keep on hating her mother, but that was difficult when Lady Anna spoke so sweetly and sincerely. ’Of course, it’s only her side of the story,’ Katia cautioned herself. But it was easy to believe that Oleg’s father had been a brute. Without thinking, Katia sipped a little tea from the cup her mother set before her. The scalding drink warmed her pleasantly. She looked at her mother, wanting to hear more, wanting to believe.
“Prince Ivan was a gambler. He played for high stakes all over the world, and he used to take me with him on his arm like an ornament.” Lady Anna reddened. “I haven’t seen myself in almost twenty years for, as you know, Troitza forbids the vanity of mirrors. But I remember how I used to look. I was almost as beautiful as you. You have Michael’s mouth and coloring, but the eyes,” she whispered, “the eyes are mine.”
“Who was Michael?” Katia asked, closing her eyes and turning away. “My father?”
Lady Anna nodded. “His name is Michael MacDonald.” Her face was half in shadow when she looked down at her hands. As she spoke, Katia did not need to see her expression to know the pleasure she experienced from just the mention of her long-ago lover’s name. “He wasn’t a prince or anyone special. He bore no title. He was a younger son without a fortune. A laughing handsome man with only his love to offer me.
“MacDonald? He was an Englishman then?”
“A Scotsman. His father was a Highland Duke and lived all his life abroad. He left Michael with the management of his estates. The other sons—and he was one of ten children—had no interest in the land. But Michael was skilled at managing the castle and grounds in the Highlands.”
“He sounds more like a servant than a Duke’s son.” There was a note of wonder in Katia’s voice.
Lady Anna laughed. She looked up, and Katia saw that she was radiant as if her love were fresh as yesterday. “You’re right, of course. And I mistook him for a servant the first time we met. He went along with the deception just to tease me. He pretended to be my most dutiful servant until we were interrupted by Ivan inviting him to join the hunting party. Michael declined. He said he had work to do, and after that Ivan was always very cool to him. As the weeks went by, we could not help being together a great deal. Apart from my maids and Nikki and the housekeeping staff, I was the only woman in the castle. I was still young; I needed someone to talk and laugh with so it was only natural that Michael and I were drawn together. I couldn’t help loving him, Katia. He was everything that Ivan was not: young, happy, warm. And he was interested in me. I wasn’t just a thing, an object of beauty, as I was to Ivan. I was a live human being with ideas and wishes and thoughts. Can’t you see, Katia, how I had to love such a man? Wouldn’t you?”
“And so I have, Lady Anna. But that is a matter of no concern.” Katia’s eyes filled with tears that made her angry with herself. “Go on,” she said, making her voice cold. “I want to know more.”
Lady Anna’s expression was quizzical. She was going to ask a question, but thought better of her impulse. She had not spoken of Michael for twenty years, and now it gave her the greatest pleasure just to pronounce the syllables of his name. “Ivan and I were guests of Michael’s father for six weeks. Imagine the great stone castle built on cliffs above the sea. I was lonely in my deepest heart for someone to love me, and Michael was a golden knight come to chase away the chill of those empty granite rooms. By the time I left, I knew that I was carrying you inside me.”
“I might have been Prince Ivan’s child.”
“No. After Oleg was born, Ivan had other women. Sometimes they even traveled with us. There was no doubt that you were Michael’s child, and for that reason I desperately wanted you to live, to thrive.”
Katia’s anger flashed anew, and she laughed bitterly. “How can you speak such a lie? You who sent me to Troitza, who made me a prisoner of ignorance? You abandoned me!” Lady Anna tried to speak, but Katia would not let her. “Don’t bother to explain. I know all I need to know.” She tried to leave the table, but Lady Anna’s hand on her arm stopped her.
“The hatred in your voice, Katia. Can it be true? Are you so hard against me?” Lady Anna ached with pain for her child. She saw now that whatever he had done, Oleg had almost broken her spirit. “I had no choice but to vanish, to appear dead. I had to give you up to Natasha Filippovna. If you had been born in the palace, Ivan would have killed you without hesitation. And then he would have turned his sadistic cruelty on me and killed me too.”
Katia stared at Lady Anna. Her mother. In spite of herself she thought, ‘She did the right thing, the only thing.’ It was a hard admission to make; but when it came, Katia’s instinct for fairness could not deny it. ‘Here I am, trusting again,’ she thought with just a touch of bitter humor. Then she recalled Alexei’s advice, and once again her eyes filled with tears. Suddenly, she wanted to rush into her mother’s arms and sob her story out against her warm breast. She had been alone forever, and she was so tired of being cautious and unendingly fearful.
“I suppose you did what you had to do. As I have done.”
“What have you done, Katia?” The girl appeared so desolate when she spoke that Lady Anna could not control her impulse to reach out and embrace her. “My child, what is the matter? Is there more that I should know?” Katia collapsed against her shoulder; and, as they clung together, she whispered the sordid details of Oleg’s murder.
“The Czar will want to find you,” said Lady Anna presently. “He has already ordered the convents opened. The order says you are wanted for murder. His men will search Troitza from top to bottom.”
Katia tossed her head back and wiped her eyes. “I am not afraid to pay for my crimes. But Mary must not be touched. I don’t want her hurt any more.”
“There is no question of that, Katia. When I left Prince Ivan, Mother Superior hid me from him in this very room. You were born here. I muffled the sound of your crying with my hands lest the guardsmen hear you. I protected you then and I will do it again. You need not fear the Czar or his men.” She handed Katia a lace bordered handkerchief. “Dry your eyes and tell me if there is more that I should know. You mentioned once having loved.”
“I meant nothing.” Her voice broke, stifling a sob. “Come, come, my dearest child. Already I know you well enough to say when you are not being truthful with me. Whom do you love, Katia?”
Katia did not want to tell the story of her love for Alexei. She wanted to forget the shame of the Hummingbird incident and the hope that had gone before it. But the purge of her emotions could not be complete without this final telling, and Lady Anna listened gravely until she had tearfully recounted everything. “Alexei hates me now. He believes I am a wanton, a harlot.”
“Then he is blind,” murmured Lady Anna, holding Katia to her, rocking as easily and naturally as if she had been practicing the gentle art of mothering all her life. “I only wish that Michael could see you and know you. He promised…”
Katia felt a to
uch of her anger returning, but it was tempered by pity now. “And you believed him?” She sighed hopelessly. “We women are made to be fools!”
“No, Katia, you must not speak so harshly. Not of him, nor of yourself. Michael promised that when you were eighteen he would come for you. He promised many things and never failed. I believe he will not fail you now.”
“Where is he then, my honorable father?”
Lady Anna sighed for she had no answer that could stem her daughter’s bitterness. She believed in Michael MacDonald, but she realized she had no right to demand the same trust from his daughter who had known only rejection and abandonment. “I don’t know where he is. But I know he has not forgotten you. There has been a delay, that is all. We will hear. I am confident.”
“He’s probably dead.”
“No. His soliciters would have informed me. We had an agreement.”
“Ah, what does it matter? He’ll never come.” Katia pulled away from her mother and went to stand near the window. Her obvious determination to be strong-willed and stoical touched Lady Anna more deeply than she could have expressed. She felt a terrible responsibility to right the many wrongs done to Katia. The weight of it was crushing to her spirits, and she felt sadder than ever before in her life.
Katia was saying, “I only know I cannot stay here. Hide me from the Czar’s men if they come searching for me or for the child. But when it is safe, we must leave St. Petersburg. I cannot stay here.”
The news did not surprise Lady Anna for she had not expected to have her daughter with her for long. The memories of this time would be her wealth, a small fortune she would cherish until she died. Her child and Michael’s had grown into a beautiful woman despite everything. Trials and pain had made her strong and yet forgiving; Lady Anna swelled with pride to have such a child. “How will you care for yourself?”
“I don’t know. But I must be free. It is all I have ever wanted. I thought freedom would come when I left Troitza. Instead I was handed into the arms of Prince Oleg, and from then on I was his prisoner. But now he is gone, and I am truly free at last. I have my liberty though nothing else.”
The Frost And The Flame Page 33