by Joy Preble
“Not now,” he says abruptly. He starts the car and pulls out into traffic. “There’s no time. We’ll have to get it later. We need to get back to Alex and see what he’s figured out. I’m hoping it will line up with what you’ve just been telling me. So keep trying to remember all the details.”
“Okay,” I say as Ethan rockets the Mercedes down Lake Street.
But it’s hard to just sit here and say nothing. So I choose a distraction.
“Ethan,” I say as he veers left, passing a Suburban and two Range Rovers before cutting back to the right lane, “do you really have a tattoo of a lion on your shoulder?”
The silence in the car is—well, deafening.
“Yes,” he says finally, both hands firmly on the wheel. “We all do. The Brotherhood. It stands for our strength and unity. Or at least, it did.”
“Oh,” I say, keeping what I hope is a casual tone.
“Saw it in the dream, did you?” he asks after another moment or two.
“Uh-huh,” I tell him.
“Well,” he says, and keeps on driving.
To Papa—
I have saved the last of my truths for you. Truths so filled with anger and longing and bitterness that I fear they will rise up from the page and wrap around me, squeezing tighter and tighter until my last breath is gone.
Cruel irony, Papa, since where I am, that could not happen—even if I hoped for it. Prayed for it—if I still prayed, which I used to, like my mother, but now I do not.
Even with all that, Papa, I love you. You are my papa still. The father who knew how much I loved the smell of lilacs. With whom I spoke Russian, even though Mama preferred English. I know you wanted a son when I was born. Your Anastasia, your fourth daughter. The story goes that you had to take a walk outside to compose yourself after your disappointment that day. Maybe that explains how restless I always was. How much I wanted to be moving, running, laughing. As though the boy you hoped for lived a little inside me and made girlish pursuits dull.
If you were here with me now, Papa, I would tell you this: I forgive you for wanting me to be what I could not be. And I forgive you your weaknesses, as I hope you have forgiven me mine. As I love you, my papa, I believe in my heart that you loved me, loved Mama and our family. That you wanted the best for us and for Russia and its people. These things are true.
But here is another truth, Papa. One that is harder to forgive. A truth from your fourth daughter, who knew more than you thought she did and less than she needed to.
You did not love your first son. The one who came before all of us girls, before Alexei, and before you married Mama. You did not love Viktor. Or if you did, you tucked that love inside yourself so deep and far away that you could no longer find it. Like I am hidden here at the witch Baba Yaga’s, deep in her forest and ever on the move so that even if someone wanted to reach me, the search would be nearly impossible.
So I say again—you did not love him. But I did. Even more, I think, because he was forbidden. I do believe now that his being outcast was part of it. Because as much as daughters love their fathers, a part of them longs to rebel. To become women in their own right and not just someone’s daughter or someone’s grand duchess.
If the history books ever write of me, I wonder what they will say. How will they know of this small rebellion that became something I never wanted? And if they do, how will they see me? Like the American women I used to look at in the newspapers. The ones who bobbed their hair or the ones who chained themselves to the White House fence the year I turned sixteen so the American president, Woodrow Wilson, would know how serious they were about wanting the right to vote? If somehow my story is told, will people think I was strong like them?
Or will they only see me as another sad, young Russian woman, like that silly Anna Karenina created by Mr. Tolstoy—just another Russian woman who loved badly and paid the price, even if mine was not a romantic love, but a love for a brother, a love for someone she thought deserved more than what he had been given?
Do you like stories, Papa? Well, let me tell you one you have not heard. It is my story, the tale of the tsar’s youngest daughter, a wild, headstrong girl. A girl you named Anastasia. Your daughter with the light brown hair you said was so pretty and the blue eyes exactly like your own. Your youngest girl, who liked games and races and listening to her mother’s tales. It is the story of my life as it used to be. A wonderful life.
Until it was not.
Until things changed for us, and I went in search of the brother I knew I had. The one whose eyes were dark—not the clear blue of a summer’s day like yours, Papa—but whose veins held your blood nonetheless. My secret brother that no one spoke of. The one whose mother—a mother not the same as my own—had given the name Viktor. Champion.
Because I suppose that is what mothers want for their sons. To win. To prevail.
“Can you help us?” I asked him, because by then, there was no one else, no one who had not turned against you, Papa, even though I know you loved your people dearly.
Viktor thought for a very, very long time before he answered me. So long that I should have known enough to turn and leave. But the blood between us was strong. And so I stayed. And I waited.
“Your father doesn’t want my help,” he told me when he finally spoke again. “As I have told you before, he does not care for me very much.”
What I told him in return, Papa, was that you did not need to know.
“Are you sure you know what you are asking?” he said then. I remember watching as he pushed a lock of hair from where it had fallen over one of his strange, dark eyes.
“They say you know things,” I said.
“Who have you been listening to, little sister?” he asked me. “You’ve seen what happens to those who dabble in the magic. You were there when they pulled Father Grigory from that frozen river.”
“He was evil,” I said. “You are my brother.”
“Are you so sure,” my secret brother, Viktor, asked me then, “that I cannot be both?”
I reached out, clasped his hands in mine, and told him I was.
“Remember,” he said to me, even as his hands warmed my palms almost to burning, “nothing comes without a cost. Are you willing to pay whatever it takes?”
This is what he asked me, Papa. And I nodded my head and told him yes. Because I was a Romanov. My world was filled with things of value. Even in that horrid house in Ekaterinburg to which we’d been forced. Even there.
Only, Papa, this was not the payment that Viktor had in mind.
“I will do what you ask,” he told me. “I will save your family.”
“Our family,” I reminded him. “Our family.”
“Yes,” Viktor said. “Yes, Anastasia. Our family. As you say, sister.”
So he told me the rest of it. That if I let the witch Baba Yaga keep me for just a short while—witches and magic being real and not imaginary, like my mother had told me—the power of our Romanov blood mingled with the power of the oldest of magic would shift the tide of events. No matter what happened, the magic would protect us. No harm could come to our family if I was brave enough to let myself be taken.
Because I thought I loved him, I believed. And I agreed. “Yes,” I told Viktor. “I will do what you say.”
Much, much later, of course, Papa, when it was too late to change what I had done, I learned at least part of the truth. By then, this hut in which I sit writing to you had become the only home I had.
“I am here to keep my family safe,” I told the witch who had taken me when I was finally no longer too terrified to speak.
“You are a fool,” Baba Yaga said. “But so am I. Your family is dead, girl. You saw it with your own eyes, even as I reached down to take you. You are the only one he ever meant to save. You. The girl, Anastasia. The one whose name means ‘resurrection.’ You are the only one, little girl. Now and always. You are mine. So the magic compelled me. And so you chose. Your brother, it seems, had something else in
mind for both of us.”
“It cannot be as you say,” I screamed, because having found my voice again, screaming was what I wanted to do most. “It cannot be!” I stood in front of her, clutching the matroyshka doll my mother had given me. Baba Yaga’s black cat rubbed against my legs and gave an odd cry.
But even as I denied it, I knew it was the truth.
Do you like this story, Papa? Does it please you? Does it make you see what you refused to see?
I hope that it does. But the ending—well, that I do not know. That part of my tale has yet to be written. Blood began this story, and blood may end it still. Like me, my secret brother, Viktor, lives. How that is possible is not something I understand. But it is true nonetheless. He lives, and so do I, and you and Mama and my sisters and my dear, dear Alexei are dead. It is not the story I had hoped for. It is not the story I was promised.
Still, Papa, it is my story. And I am still the tsar’s daughter. Your daughter. I may yet finish this tale in a way that honors us all.
Please forgive me, Papa, for trusting the man who betrayed us. For believing what I never should have believed. And as I said as I began this last of my letters, I forgive you as well. It is not a forgiveness that has come easily. You betrayed your first son, and that betrayal came home to you. You insisted that Mama bear a fifth child so you could have your true son, and his illness sent Mama into Rasputin’s hands. You were as strong as you could be, but it was not strong enough, and it made me think that I needed to save you.
And, of course, when I did, it all went horribly wrong.
There is nothing left for you and me, my papa, but forgiveness, and so I offer it to you with all that I have left.
Keep me in your thoughts and prayers, dearest Papa. Keep me in your heart. If I see you soon, or if I do not, know always that I remain—
Your daughter in blood and heart,
Anastasia
Thursday, 7:15 am
Ethan
My cell phone is dead,” Anne says as we walk rapidly up the path that leads to Alex’s office. She’s retrieved it from her backpack and is flipping it around in her hand. The campus is quiet still, just the few early risers, their coffee to-go cups firmly affixed in their hands.
“Stop fiddling with it,” I tell her. “Just close it and hold it in your hand.”
“But why?” A scowl crosses her face, and those deep brown eyes flicker with frustration. “What difference could that possibly—”
“Shh.” I place my hand on her shoulder. “Just do as I say. Close your hand around the cell phone as tightly as you can.”
“Okay,” she says. Her tone tells me she’s simply placating me, but she does as I tell her.
“Now, concentrate,” I direct her, once the phone is enclosed in her palm. “Just like last night. Concentrate on what you want it to do.” I place my hand over hers. “I’m going to help you.”
I feel the power flow from both our hands, feel it mingle, grow stronger. “ Ya dolzhen. ” The words float softly into the air. “I must.” The beginning of a simple spell, one that tells the forces around me that I must change something, bend it to my will. One that makes Anne smile.
I take my hand away. “Now, open the phone.”
She flips it open, and her smile grows, lighting up her face. “Fully charged,” she says gleefully. “Fully charged and five bars. I can’t believe it.” She makes a sound I can only describe as a squeal. “This is so awesome. Did I really—did we really do that?”
“Seems that way,” I say mildly. “But don’t fiddle with it again,” I tell her as she starts to toy with the device once more.
“Why?” she says with a little laugh. “What could I do? Power it up so much that it explodes?”
“Actually, yes,” I say, and I grin as she quickly tucks the phone in her jeans pocket.
The worry comes flooding back then. I’ve pulled this girl from her family, placed her in the gravest of danger. I have no guarantees I can keep her safe, no guarantees that whatever power and knowledge I have can do more than recharge a cell-phone battery.
We round a bend in the path. I can see the outline of Olensky’s office building in the distance.
“What’s it like?” Anne glances over at me briefly, then returns her gaze to the path. “Being—the way you are?”
“As in—?”
“As in knowing all this stuff. The magic. As in being able to charge a cell phone with the squeeze of a hand. Or build a mystical protection around someone’s house. As in—well, not being able to die.”
“Ah,” I say. “That.”
“You say it like it’s nothing.”
“I say it like it’s something I’ve grown used to, something that’s part of me.”
“The magic, maybe. But what about the rest of it? The whole immortal thing? I mean, at least until I do what I’m supposed to and then you get to pick up where you left off.”
Even with all that’s happened, I’m surprised as the answer rushes out of me before I can censor it. “It’s lonely,” I tell her. “It’s long, and it’s lonely. When I was eighteen—who doesn’t think he’s going to live forever at eighteen? Who doesn’t want to? Until you actually do. And then—well, it’s the proverbial other story, the story where the guy who looks eighteen suddenly realizes that he can’t have friends. He can’t even fall in love. Because his friends and his lovers, they’ll grow old. And the guy himself can’t until he finishes what he started. It, uh—sort of closes certain doors.”
“Oh,” Anne says. Then she’s silent as we continue toward Olensky’s building.
I pull my cell phone from my pocket. “I’ll let him know we’re almost there,” I say.
“You could use my phone.” Anne grins. “Since it’s fully charged and everything.”
“Keep that in your pocket where it belongs,” I tell her as I press in Alex’s number.
I’m smiling at her as his phone begins to ring on the other end. It rings some more.
The smile dies on my lips.
The phone keeps on ringing and then clicks over to voice mail.
“What is it?” Anne asks.
“He’s not answering.” My throat tightens. I close the phone and blindly shove it back into my pocket.
The door to the front entrance is locked. I grip the handle and concentrate, feel the energy flash through me. The door opens. I take Anne’s hand and step inside. Our footsteps echo against the tile floor.
Something is wrong—very, very wrong.
“What is it?” Anne asks again.
“Just stay behind me,” I rasp. My mouth has gone dry.
In front of Alex’s door, I let go of Anne’s hand and motion for her to stay still. I listen. Nothing.
“Alex?” I call. I rap lightly on the door. “Alex. We’re back.” I turn the knob. The office door is unlocked. This can’t be happening. He’s asleep at his desk or has gone out for coffee, even though I told him not to. “Alex?” I say again into the silence. Still he doesn’t answer. Slowly, I push the door until it swings open.
“What’s that smell?” Anne whispers.
I sniff the air and smell something with the tang of copper.
Blood.
I reach the desk in two strides. My friend, Alex Olensky, is sprawled next to it. Blood seeps from a hole in his brown cardigan, which is still buttoned neatly around him.
I crumble to my knees next to him. “Alex,” I say. His eyes flutter open. There’s blood spattered in his silver hair.
“I thought it was you,” he gasps. His voice is barely a whisper. “When I opened the door, I—” He coughs. More blood. It oozes thickly down his chin.
Anne kneels down next to us. Her face is ashen. “We need to call an ambulance, Ethan! It’s okay, Professor. It’ll be okay. We’ll call someone and—”
Alex reaches over and places his hand on Anne’s arm. “No need, my dear.” He coughs up more blood. “No time.”
He looks over at me. His eyes are starting to haze ove
r.
“Hang on, Alex.” I touch his shoulder gently. “Who did this? Did you see him?”
Alex shakes his head. He reaches down slowly and pats his pants pocket. “I never even got the gun out. He had his own.” His lips curl in a bloodied smile. “Ironic, eh? Not how I thought this story would turn out.” He coughs again. There’s blood everywhere. “I imagined I’d be having tea with Anastasia.”
His voice strengthens. For a moment, his gaze is fully lucid. “He took my book, Ethan. So you wouldn’t find it. So I couldn’t show you. But the book doesn’t matter. Not exactly. Not in the way I thought. Anne already has the answer. That’s what Viktor couldn’t know. To get Anne to Baba Yaga’s forest, she just needs her…”
Alex stiffens. His eyes go blank. His hand clutches at the blood seeping from the wound in his chest. His mouth tries to form more words. And then he’s gone.
“Alex, no.” I hear myself sob.
But it’s too late. Alexander Olensky is dead—not by magic, not by some supernatural force I might have undone.
Anne covers her mouth with one hand, then uncovers it, bends over the small trash can next to the desk, and vomits.
I hold her bent body, feeling the grief pulse inside both of us, until she can stand up.
“It was Viktor,” she says as she leans against me. “Ethan, I can feel him. Like I could feel him in that dream last night. I can’t explain it, but I know he’s been here. He did this. Or maybe he sent someone to do it, but it’s still the same thing. Oh God, Ethan. Why would he—?”
“Not now,” I manage. “Later. You’ll tell me later. It doesn’t matter now.” I pull away from Anne, then bend down over my friend Alex. I gently close his eyelids.