by Joy Preble
"Even if she wants to free her," Ethan says. He turns to Anastasia, fires off some Russian, listens to her response.
"She agrees," he tells me. "The witch wants to give her up. She's the one who called the horsemen to help, set things in motion to let her free. But I don't think she can. She's got to protect a Romanov, whether she wants to or not."
"I will go back to her." Anastasia stands up straight. Her blue eyes--even bluer than Ethan's--are clear and strong as they look at me. The grand duchess, telling me what she wants to do.
"No!" Of all the things that are making me absolutely hysterical at the moment, this one seems somehow to be the worst of all. "No!" I say again. "Tell her, Ethan. Tell her in Russian so I'm sure she understands. She can't go back--not after all that's happened, all we've done. She just can't!"
I don't even wait for him to say what I've asked him to. I put my hands on Anastasia's shoulders. I have to keep myself from just clutching at her wildly. "You can't do that!" I scream at her. I'm not sure if she can understand me, but the words
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pour out of me anyway. "You're only seventeen! You didn't have a chance. You've been stuck there all this time. You've got to stay here. You've got to live. You've got to do the things you've always wanted to do. Please, Anastasia!"
"Let her do what she wants." Viktor's voice sounds tired and angry at the same time. 'You think she cares what you think?" He grabs my arm and yanks me away from Anastasia. A cut on his cheek is bleeding freely. He's mortal again, so his wounds will be around for a while. "You--you've destroyed everything! Look at all this! Look at her! You think she can survive in this world? You think you've really helped her? I told you--"
'You stupid son of a bitch!" Ethan's fist connects with Viktor's jaw so hard that Viktor staggers backward. Ethan grabs him by the collar with one hand, then punches him again with the other. The second punch sends Viktor sprawling to the wet ground.
"Stop it!" I yell. "This isn't solving anything! It isn't going to help us stop Baba Yaga."
"Nyet!" Anastasia shouts in Russian. No!
Maybe she really doesn't understand, I think. Maybe she doesn't realize how much Viktor has betrayed her.
"You can't protect him!" I scream at her. "Not after what he's done to you! To me too! Do you know why it's me? Because I exist through him. I'm his blood too. That's why it's me. He had a daughter, and I'm descended from her! I'm one of you too! Part Romanov. And I'm telling you, he's the bad guy!"
"Do you think I do not know?" Anastasia says. "Please. Let me do what I must! Let me end all of this."
So I back away, and Ethan does too, and we both let her do what she has to do.
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Ethan
YOU SAID THAT YOU WOULD HELP." ANASTASIA STANDS IN front of Viktor, still the grand duchess, even with the rain whipping sideways at us as we press against the building. She's speaking in Russian, so I translate quickly for Anne. "That you would keep us safe. But you didn't really do that, did you, Brother? You never planned on doing it."
"But I did," Viktor says to her. So many emotions are crossing his face--anger, denial, regret, perhaps even love. It's like he's seeing Anastasia for the first time, not just as a pawn to use to get what he wanted, but as a person. "I did. I wanted you to live." As he says it, it's like he's there again, and for a moment, I almost believe him.
Anne moves to stand next me. I listen, and watch, and translate for her as best as I can.
"Do not lie to me, Viktor," Anastasia says to him. "I will know." They both step from the protection of the bank's overhang out into the driving rain. In an instant, they're both soaked once more by the storm, the wind swirling around them.
"It is no lie," he says to her. "I wanted you to be safe. I wanted to help."
"But then, my brother, you wanted something else, didn't you?"
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"She really does know, doesn't she?" Anne says. "She knows what he's done--why he's done it."
I nod. It is between them now; between Viktor and the half sister he has betrayed--just as he betrayed me, and Anne.
"Look at you," Anastasia cries at him. "You look exactly the same. You have not changed. You have not aged. How is this possible? Am I the price you paid for that?"
"Anastasia." Viktor attempts again to say something, but she's already told him that she knows, so his words could only be lies.
"Your jacket, Viktor. It is leather, is it not? And a fine leather. I can see that. Your
shoes--look at your shoes. I know good quality, my brother. I am a grand duchess of the Romanovs. I know what it is to have the very best. And I know he denied you that. So what did you do, Viktor? Did you really use me to gain this jacket, to buy these expensive shoes? Tell me, Viktor!" She's shouting now, her voice echoing even over Baba Yaga's howls, even over the torrential storm. "Tell me the truth!"
Viktor stands silently. The rain is streaming over him, running down those fine clothes, soaking those fine shoes. And even through the storm, I can see he is doing something I never expected him to do. He's weeping.
"They killed them, one by one," Anastasia says. She clutches her arms around her as though she's in that room once more. "Mama. Papa. My sisters. Even Alexei. You told me it would be all right. But it wasn't! They were slaughtered! Their blood spattered over me as they died. I knew it was all wrong then. That I shouldn't have listened to you. But it was too late. They were dead--and I was not. You said I would save the Romanovs, but the only one you wanted to save was yourself!"
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Viktor's face has become a study in anguish. He seems to grow smaller: the powerful Brother Viktor, bowed by the truth.
"Then she"--Anastasia points to the sky, to Baba Yaga-- "she took me away. Because you made her. You compelled her. She didn't want to. Do you know that, my brother? Do you know that I was reaching for my mother's hand when Baba Yaga grabbed me?"
"I'm sorry" Viktor says to her. "Oh, God. I am so very sorry."
"You must let me go back," she says to him.
"To be trapped again? No. I cannot."
Anastasia's brown eyes burn into Viktor's face as she studies it. "He was right," she says finally. "You really are not worthy of being his son."
She reaches back and slaps him--hard--across the face. I can see the red imprint of her hand on his cheek. "To the world, I am already dead. Do not destroy any more lives because of me! Please. I am begging you. Let me go."
As though she has heard the girl speak, Baba Yaga swoops closer, reaches down with those hideous hands.
I'm not prepared for what happens next, even though I should have realized it was coming. People sometimes surprise you--perhaps surprise themselves. I can't say that it changes anything. It doesn't bring back the dead. But it's something, just the same.
"Witch!" Viktor pulls Anastasia aside and stands to face Baba Yaga. I can see the distorted reflection of his face in her iron teeth as she smiles at him. "You need a Romanov, do you not?"
For one terrifying moment, I think he means something else. I reach out for Anne. He's going to give her to the witch, trap her forever.
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But I'm wrong
"Take me, then!" he says to her. His voice is as terrible as Baba Yaga's smile. He reaches up to the jagged cut on his forehead, swipes his fingers over it, and holds them out to her-- stained red with his own blood.
"It's in me too!" he tells her. "Romanov blood." He shoves his hand into her face. "Smell it, Baba Yaga. Know it. I am one of them. So take me! Stop this thing! But do not take the girl. Take me instead."
For a moment, it's as if everything around us is holding its breath--the rain, the thunder, Baba Yaga herself.
And then she smiles. "Ah," she says. She runs one enormous finger over the blood on Viktor's hand--brings it to her lips, runs her tongue over it,
Viktor turns around to look at us. He opens his mouth, about to speak. But whatever he might have said, we never get to hear. Baba Yaga's hands wrap themselves arou
nd him. He doesn't even scream as she lifts him into the mortar.
She whirls away with him, up toward the black clouds. Her eyes are glowing in the dark sky, each pupil a smiling skull. Her iron teeth are shining.
"Peace be with you, Brother," I say. But I never know if he has heard me, because then they are gone.
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Anne
THE THUNDER STOPS, BUT THE RAIN CONTINUES TO FALL. If possible, it's raining harder. The street is filling with it.
"She is crying," Anastasia says. Well, actually she says it in Russian and Ethan translates it for me, but it's still what she says. "Auntie Yaga. She is weeping."
I don't ask why she's crying, if, in fact, that's what she's doing. The answer is pretty clear. She's crying for Anastasia. Like a mother, I realize in a rush, crying for a lost child--or at least for a poor, motherless girl who just wants some piece of what she has lost.
I'd thought of Baba Yaga only as a witch. It never occurred to me that she might be more than that.
I peer into the door of the bank. My mother is still lying where we've left her. I press my face against the glass until I see the movement of her chest. She's breathing. I need to go to her, but I can't--not yet.
"What do you want?" I ask Anastasia. I reach over and smooth my hand down her wildly tangled hair. Then I take her hands in mine. They're warm. Even out here in the damp, her hands are warm. Anastasia--my distant relation through circumstances I'd never have believed even a few days ago.
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I could be friends with her, I think, if things were different. She and I and Tess.
"What do you want to do?" I ask her again, because I think that if we can help her do it, then it will be all over. It's the one last thing Baba Yaga needs.
Anastasia hesitates. She pulls her hands from mine, but our gazes stay locked. When she answers me, it is in Russian. I'm not sure why, but I mink it is easier for her because she knows that her words will hurt me.
Ethan translates. "She wants to go home," he says. His voice is very tired and sad. "Back to Russia. Back to when it happened. Anne, she wants to die like she was supposed to. It's the only thing she really wants."
"Die? But she can't! I--Ethan, how can she want to--?"
I don't even finish protesting. I may be a lot dumber about some things than I ever knew I was, but I understand that sometimes, you just have to let go. There's an order to things, to life. Viktor had broken that order. Maybe he'd done it out of selfishness. Maybe he'd done it for vengeance. Or maybe a little part of him--the part that knew Anastasia loved him--did it to help her. But none of that mattered--not even Ethan's personal sacrifice for so many years, not anything that I had done.
It only mattered that it was broken, and we had to fix it if we could.
"Can we do it?" I ask him quietly. "Is there a way? Do we have any magic left? Maybe together or something?"
"I don't know for sure," he says. "I would think right now, you've got a lot more than I have, but we won't know until we try."
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I look at Anastasia. She's pulled the small, wooden doll from her pocket.
"She's pretty," I say to her.
"She is my matroyshka," she says to me slowly in English. "It means 'little mother.' My mama told me to hold on to her. No matter what. That if I did not let her go, she would keep me safe. And she has. She has kept all my secrets." Anastasia pulls the doll apart, shows me the other smaller dolls tucked inside. "Even as I was hidden away like this."
I watch as she clasps the pieces back in place, and I wonder how a doll can keep you safe, but I don't say anything. It's amazing enough that she's kept this doll with her all this time, with everything she's been through--things I don't even want to know. She's still kept this link to her home, to the person she used to be.
"May I see her?" I ask Anastasia. I hold out my hand, palm up. She hesitates, but only for a second. Then she places the doll in my hand.
I suppose I can always think that what I hear then is just my over-stimulated imagination. Or I can choose to believe that the doll really says something to me. I mean, it's not like those pretty, red-painted lips actually move or anything. Still, a little voice whispers in my head.
Hold me between you, the voice says. Both of you think about where she'd like to be. Imagine. And if you can hold that thought- -- together -- then you can send her home.
I don't really know what to believe. I'd thought of home when Baba Yaga had told me to choose, and that hadn't gone well at all.
But somehow, this feels different.
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Professor Olensky's dying words come back to me. The book doesn't matter, he'd said. Not exactly. He'd said that I already knew what I needed to, and maybe he'd only meant about using my blood to get to Anastasia. But maybe I knew something else too.
My mother had given me the answer when she'd handed me the lacquer box and told me the story--the one I'd read the rest of on my own. About Vasilisa the Brave and her magic doll. The doll like this one, that Tsarina Alexandra had given to her daughter Anastasia.
"Yes," Anastasia says. "I hear what you hear. And I think it is the way."
"It's the doll," I say to Ethan. "That's what will send her back."
"Are you sure?" he asks.
But we all know the only way to be sure is for us to try. So we do.
We stand together, Anastasia and I. Between us, we hold her matroysbka, my hand on one side, and hers on the other.
I take my other hand and place it over my heart like I've learned in ballet--the universal sign for love. Can I love someone I've never really known? I guess it doesn't matter. All that matters is that I can do this.
The air around us sparks with light.
I don't flinch when, like in my dreams, I see what's in her head. I know it's just part of the connection we have with each other. So when she sees that basement again, I don't push the image away.
But then--well, it's like it always is for me in my dreams, when things shift without my permission. I just can't help
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myself when all of a sudden I think of one last thing I'd read when I was researching Anastasia--about the wonderful Easter her family had spent together in 1911, when she was almost ten. It was the Easter her father had commissioned this really fantastic Faberge egg with all the children's pictures on it to give to the tsarina. They all looked so happy--and so unaware that a few years later, their lives would all end.
So there I am, trying to think about death--but all I can think about is life. And Anastasia--well, she looks over at me. Her hand's still on the doll. So is mine. And she smiles. It's a great smile--and it even reaches her pretty blue eyes, the ones I know Tess would want to fix up with a little mascara and some shadow and all that.
"No," she says to me softly. ''Not then."
Our fingertips touch across the doll. The image we're sharing shifts back to the basement. No matter how much I want her to live, it turns out that it's not my choice. I can only stand and watch as the shooting begins and Anastasia, the last grand duchess of the Romanovs, slowly fades and disappears.
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Ethan
ANNE STUMBLES AWAY FROM ME INTO THE RAIN, SOBBING . "Anne," I say. I follow her. We stand in the street, the rain soaking us. 'Anne, stop. Please, stop. Don't cry. It's over. You did it. It's going to be okay"
I wrap her in my arms. Her body shakes against mine.
"What difference did I make?" she weeps. "I was supposed to save her, Ethan. That's what you told me. And I couldn't. That poor, innocent girl--trapped for all these years, and now what? She's dead. And there's nothing i can do about it. I have all this crazy power, and for what?"
She pounds her hands against me over and over until I grab them and hold them tight. "You told me I could make a difference," she says, her voice ragged with pain, "that I could save her. But I didn't. Not really I just helped make a huge mess of things. I didn't save anyone."
I hold her tighter. "Don't you see?"
I tell her as the rain streams down our faces. "You did save someone." I slide my arms from her and then cup her face in my hands, look into those warm, brown eyes so filled with pain. "Look at me, Anne. I'm still here. You did save someone," I tell her again. "You saved me."
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I bend and press my forehead to hers, half-expecting her to pull away. But she doesn't. She reaches up, links her arms around my neck, and touches her lips to mine. And then I kiss her--really kiss her, like I've wanted to for a while. And as the last of the clouds disappear, and finally, the rain stops falling, she kisses me back.
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Chicago, A Few Weeks Later
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Anne
There's no headstone yet on Aleksander Olensky's grave--just the freshly turned earth and a few flowers I've placed there, the thin, white ribbon around them fluttering in the cool breeze.
It had been a small, graveside service. Turns out the professor really had no family left. Just Ethan. And me. And so many students who had loved him, but whose questions about his death will have to remain unanswered--because, honestly, what would we tell them?
So many secrets, I think as I stand here holding Ethan's hand. So many secrets.
"How's your mother doing today?" Tess asks. She'd wanted to come with us to the cemetery, as if seeing the grave would help make it all seem more real.
"She's good," I say. "Real good. She'll have to keep that cast on her arm for a few more weeks. And she's going to have to have some physical therapy. But she's getting stronger. And she's eating and starting to bitch at me." I smile. It's not quite the grin I'd like it to be, but as with my mom, it's taking a while to get back to what had been.