The Last Days of the Romanov Dancers

by Kerri Turner

  ‘That’s you sorted then. What about me?’ She moved closer. One of her legs was bent so her knee was resting between his.

  It was strange. Xenia was his friend, the only one he had at the ballet—he didn’t count Mathilde’s patronising companionship, and the men were one another’s competition, making friendship difficult—yet Luka wanted to run his hands over her neck, her shoulders, down to her waist. He wanted her to lie down on the blankets in front of the stove with him. He wanted it so much he ached, but still he didn’t say anything. For underneath this desire was a fierce terror that lust was clouding his mind. She could be disappointed in him for thinking of her like that; perhaps she might refuse to be his friend any longer. His body quivered with indecision and he was unable to make a sound.

  ‘It looks like there’s room for two,’ she said.

  When he didn’t say anything in response, she gazed at him steadily and undid the top button of her sailor-collar blouse.

  Luka ran his fingers over Xenia’s bare arm, enjoying the way her skin erupted into goosebumps at his touch. She was soft, like some expensive fabric that could only be bought in Paris. Leaning in close, he kissed her elbow and was rewarded with a soft laugh.

  ‘You’re supposed to be sleeping,’ she whispered.

  ‘I know. But I find it hard to sleep when you’re beside me like this.’

  ‘Hush, your father might hear now we no longer have our heads buried under the blankets.’

  Xenia rolled over to face him, and for a second her features were those of another dancer—one more used to the feel of fur and lace against her skin than his father’s rough blankets, her face discoloured with old bruises. Luka jerked back. He didn’t know where the vision had come from.

  It was true that the scene he’d witnessed between Valentina Yershova and her protector had played on his mind ever since, unsettling him. He’d made a forced promise to keep it secret, but had been unable to stop himself from scanning the soloist’s face for bruises whenever he caught a glimpse of her. He had never seen a mark on her; that ugly moment might have been an aberration. Still, Luka found himself pondering it in the most unlikely moments. Like now.

  Xenia, registering his shift away, tried to disguise her crestfallen look. ‘Is something the matter?’ she whispered.

  ‘No. Nothing at all.’ Luka bent his head to kiss her. But it was awkward, the imagined picture of Valentina disturbing the intimacy of just moments ago. He suddenly felt like his nose was in the way, or perhaps his lips were too dry.

  Whatever it was, Xenia must have noticed, but she didn’t say anything. She just lay in his arms, breathing rhythmically. Their heads were tucked underneath the yolka, its branches criss-crossing above them and the pine scent curling around their nostrils. Their feet almost touched the table at the other side of the small room. It was exactly how Luka and Pyotr used to lie in the days leading up to Christmas, each tucked against one side of their mother as she told them stories to a backdrop of their father’s snores. Vladimir always slept the sleep of the exhausted.

  ‘This isn’t exactly what you want, is it?’ Xenia whispered. She pushed her fingers through his damp hair, the gesture delicate, almost sorrowful.

  Luka caught at her hand to kiss her knuckles. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, it might have been what you wanted,’ her eyes crinkled at the corners in the dim light, ‘but only in that moment. It’s not what you really want.’

  Luka spoke against her skin, tasting the sweat that had dried now they were still again. ‘Of course it is.’

  The words sounded hollow, but he was telling the truth. He knew he could live a good life with Xenia. She understood him: how conflicted he was about his brother, the war and his own desire to dance—an internal force that felt like it came from some otherworldly place. She was his best friend; she could be his family too. This was what he wanted. He was almost sure of it.

  As if able to hear his thoughts, Xenia spoke again. ‘I know you think that right now, Luka. But I’m older than you, and perhaps that’s why I can see things with more clarity. And I know: this isn’t what you want.’

  ‘Oh, really?’ Thinking she was joking, he added lightly, ‘Tell me then, what do I want? Seeing you know so much better than I do.’

  Xenia changed position so she was lying on her front, her chin resting on her folded-up arms. She was no longer looking at him. ‘Passion.’

  ‘Didn’t we just share that?’

  ‘Not that kind. Tell me, Luka, have you ever had to question your love for the ballet? Or is it just there, burning so brightly you know it can’t be ignored?’

  He didn’t answer.

  ‘How could a woman ever compete with that, unless you felt the same passion for her?’

  ‘It’s not a competition,’ he said.

  ‘All of life is a competition, my Luka, and I’ve been playing at it long enough to know when I’ll be on the losing side.’

  Luka lay back. Through the scented boughs of the yolka he could make out the few ornaments his mother had made. They were cheap and hadn’t worn the passage of time well, but his father still placed them on the tree every year. He knew Xenia was right. He didn’t love her the way he loved dancing; nor the way his father had loved his mother.

  The sweet pleasure that had lingered in his body had almost faded as he said, ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘This wonderful night, this precious moment—’ Her voice caught and she looked down, her unfashionably long hair making a thick curtain that masked her face.

  Tonight was the first time Luka had seen her hair down; usually it was tied back for classes and rehearsals, or hidden underneath a wig for performances. Only moments ago he’d enjoyed its long silkiness, running his fingers through it and twining it between his fists. Gently, he pushed it back over her shoulder; it stayed there briefly before sliding back.

  With a sound like a laugh, Xenia shook her hair out of her face and looked at him again. ‘Tonight is just that, Luka. Just one night.’

  ‘You mean you don’t …?’

  ‘No, I don’t. If we leave it as just tonight, my heart remains protected. I can pretend that for one night I had everything I wanted, that everything was perfect.’

  They lay together in a silence marred only by his father’s staccato cough. Luka wondered how he could have believed, even for a moment, in the possibility of miracles.

  ‘I suppose this isn’t quite what you wanted either then,’ he murmured.

  ‘Not quite. But I got to experience every last bit of you. That’s enough for me.’

  Xenia moved closer again, her face resting on his neck. Their naked bodies were pressed together so tightly that her heart beat rapidly against his own.

  ‘I should leave, before your father wakes and finds me still here,’ she whispered.

  ‘Alright,’ Luka said, but he knew his day would be far emptier without her.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Winter 1916

  Valentina swallowed the bile that was swimming at the back of her throat and pressed the handkerchief she’d soaked in lavender to her nose and mouth. It didn’t block out the sweet, rancid smell, but went some way to covering it. A nurse had just finished lancing the raw wound where the remainder of the soldier’s leg had been, and the Grand Duchess Olga was now bathing it with warm water from a chipped china basin. The white apostolnik she wore left only her face exposed, and her dark tapered eyebrows were drawn together in concentration over her strikingly pale blue eyes. Her nursing uniform and apron were stained with substances Valentina didn’t want to identify. She wondered how this young woman who had grown up in palaces could stand the sights or stench of the hospital.

  ‘Perhaps you would like to hold his hand while I finish?’ the Grand Duchess Olga suggested. ‘It might help to ease his pain having something to squeeze.’

  Valentina’s eyes widened. The man’s curled fingers looked clean, but she was frightened of touching him all the same. Still, Maxim was by her side
—he’d assumed any invitation from the imperial family must include him—and he wouldn’t be pleased if she refused such a small request from the Grand Duchess. Reluctantly, she peeled off her glove and stretched trembling white fingers towards the soldier’s hand. His fingers were cold and didn’t curl around hers the way the Grand Duchess Olga had suggested they would. The soldier’s eyes opened and a brief flash of accusation told her he knew her concern was not for him, then they squeezed tight again as he twisted in breathless pain.

  Valentina turned her head away, but there was no better place to look. To her right the hospital’s matron was keeping a watchful eye over a man waking from the anaesthetic he’d been put under while surgeons tried to repair his shrapnel-torn face. On the other side were the rest of the twelve beds that made up Mathilde Kschessinska’s hospital for wounded soldiers. The building had originally been a house, and the patterned wallpaper made an odd backdrop to the iron beds with their white linens, and the distraught expressions of the men who inhabited them. Mirrors and other glass surfaces had been removed from the building, so the soldiers would not be disturbed by their own shattered, unrecognisable appearances.

  ‘I understand it can be confronting,’ the Grand Duchess said gently. ‘I asked you here to see if you might help me with another matter, though.’

  ‘Your Imperial Highness?’

  ‘I have been thinking that perhaps it would be nice to give a special ballet performance for the injured and recovering soldiers, to lift their spirits. You have been so kind to my sister Anastasia in the past, making her laugh, and Grigori Rasputin speaks highly of you.’ Valentina sensed Maxim’s smirk. ‘I knew you were just the person to ask. I’m sure I could persuade Mamma to open the Hermitage to the soldiers were you to agree.’

  Valentina’s heart skipped, and she breathed slowly through her nose to hide her excitement. The Hermitage was the Romanovs’ private theatre inside the Winter Palace, and dancers could only perform there by special invitation from the imperial family. It was an honour that all in the Imperial Russian Ballet aspired to.

  ‘Your Imperial Highness is most generous,’ Valentina said. ‘I would be honoured. Perhaps I could dance some of the favourite variations from the classics, and a few pas de deux. I know someone who would make a wonderful partner.’

  She carefully avoided looking at Maxim as she responded to the Grand Duchess; not because she was afraid of his expression, but because she didn’t want him to see hers. It was Luka Zhirkov she was thinking of as a partner. She knew Maxim didn’t like him, but his dancing held such promise. And, if she were honest with herself, she found him interesting. A man who didn’t seem to fully realise his talent, who occasionally spoke his mind and was a terrible liar—his weak excuses to leave Mathilde’s dacha that weekend had shown her that—was someone she rarely came across in her own circle. She pushed the latter thoughts away, though, telling herself her interest was only in how she could tie their names together in the eyes of the company, so that when his star began to rise, hers would be strengthened too. Just as Maxim did with Grigori Rasputin.

  As little as he liked Luka, even Maxim would have to recognise this as a shrewd move. It was the kind of thing he himself would do, and Valentina thought with satisfaction that it would show him what a powerful team they could be. A wife who understood how to get ahead was a wife worth having.

  Luka leaned against the gallery rail, watching the Imperial Ballet School’s senior class below. Like him, many of those students would spend their lives going over the same exercises, striving for a perfection that would never come. Only the lucky ones, though. Those who didn’t have the skill or the correct body would have to move on to something else, the ghost of that which they’d tried yet failed at evident in the grace of their posture and everyday movements.

  Behind him, heeled shoes tapped against the floor. Luka didn’t need to turn around to know it was Valentina—he could smell her musky perfume. As she came to stand beside him, her cool presence indicated that she’d only just entered the building. Spring was around the corner—the sound of the ice cracking in the River Neva heralded its arrival—but the air still held the last cold dregs of winter and people’s skin and clothes carried the crisp scent of snow.

  Luka wished Valentina would go away. He hadn’t forgotten Maxim Sergeivich’s threat; in fact, he’d been thinking a lot recently about how the great Vaslav Nijinsky had been expelled from the company and wondering if he too had been the victim of someone’s dislike. If Nijinsky wasn’t immune from being ordered to resign, no one was.

  ‘Bringing back memories?’ Valentina murmured. The necklace that hung to her waist clattered against the gallery rail and she put her pale hand up to still it.

  Luka didn’t answer at first, but the growing silence made him uncomfortable. It wasn’t easy, like the silences between him and Xenia; rather it felt as if it was saying too much.

  ‘Look at how the teacher can’t take his eyes off the two front and centre,’ he finally muttered.

  Valentina’s gaze went straight to them. ‘It’s understandable. They’re very good.’

  ‘They are. But now look at the young man second from the right in the third row.’ He waited while Valentina’s eyes found the boy; he wasn’t as easy to pick out as the other two had been, his movements not demanding the same attention. ‘He’s not hiding in the back row because he hopes no one will see his faults. He’s pushing forward; he wants to be seen so he can improve. But the teacher only has eyes for the front two, who are already skilled and don’t need the extra help. Has it always been that way?’

  He turned to look at Valentina. Her skin, always pale, had a washed-out sallow look to it, and dark circles like bruises were imprinted beneath her eyes. Perhaps the demands of both the ballet and pleasing a protector were taking their toll on her.

  ‘Of course,’ she said, and he heard the tiredness in her voice. ‘Perhaps you never noticed when you were at the school because you were the one front and centre.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Luka wasn’t sure he liked the thought.

  ‘Watching them reminds me of my audition day,’ Valentina said softly. Her dark hazel eyes were still trained on the young dancers but they’d taken on a distant quality, as if she wasn’t really seeing them. ‘Mamma bought me a new pair of socks for it. They were the first new thing I’d ever owned, and when I put them on I was sure they’d transformed me into a glamorous adult. But when I got to the school and saw the other girls in their fancy ruffles and lace-trimmed dresses, the socks embarrassed me. Funny, isn’t it? Nothing had changed, but all of a sudden my socks weren’t beautiful any more.’

  She paused, and seemed to realise that she was speaking about her personal life, a past usually kept tightly to her chest. An almost visible veil came over her as she turned to Luka. It reminded him of the first time he’d seen her in rehearsal—how quickly she’d changed from angry and confrontational to smiling appeasement. He felt the urge to stop the change, to expose the Valentina underneath, the person she’d allowed him to see for a second. But he didn’t know how, and a second later it was too late. The Valentina Yershova the public knew was back in place.

  ‘I’ve been looking for you,’ she said. ‘That friend of yours told me you might be here.’

  ‘Looking for me?’ he echoed in surprise.

  She nodded, diamond and turquoise earrings swinging. ‘I have a proposition for you. One that will no doubt assist in your career. I’ve been invited by the imperial family to put on a performance at the Hermitage for wounded soldiers. I would like you to partner me for a few pas de deux.’

  Luka’s mouth almost dropped open. An invitation from the Romanovs, a rare chance to dance at the Hermitage—Valentina had been understating it when she said it would assist his career. His mind flashed to Maxim and his threat. Luka would almost be guaranteed another contract renewal were he to dance at the Hermitage. Maxim wouldn’t dare to openly criticise a dancer who’d been shown public approval by the imperial f
amily.

  Warily, he said, ‘You could choose any man you wanted from the company to partner you.’

  Valentina shrugged. ‘Yes. I chose you.’

  Luka didn’t ask why. It didn’t matter. There was no chance he would turn down this opportunity and the security it offered him.

  They chose the Black Swan/Prince Siegfried pas de deux from Act III of Le Lac des Cygnes as the pinnacle of their Hermitage performance. It surprised Luka that Valentina didn’t choose a White Swan piece instead. True, this pas de deux was one of the most spectacular in the entire ballet repertoire, but he knew how she yearned to dance Odette. Valentina was adamant, though. She said audiences responded with wild applause to the brilliant, sharp movements and daring risks the dancers took; and the wounded soldiers deserved such a spectacle, not the aching tragedy of Odette. The Black Swan would make them forget their pain, their nightmarish memories, if only for a moment. It was a touching sentiment, and one Luka didn’t quite believe. He thought that perhaps she didn’t want to dance the role of Odette by her own choosing. She wanted the recognition of the company bestowing it on her. If that were the case, it was something Luka could understand.

  ‘Are you able to keep up?’ Valentina asked him during their first rehearsal.

  They were using one of the rooms at the Mariinsky, and she had somehow roped in a pianist—not the one who deliberately played too fast when she danced—to accompany them. Luka had only learned half of the pas de deux so far and Valentina’s comment could have been seen as an insult. But as she stood before him, hands on her hips, damp curls springing out from beneath the scarf tied around her head, he didn’t think she meant it as one. She wanted them both to be the best they could be. Nothing else was as important.

  ‘I’ll admit, it’s more difficult than anything else I’ve danced before,’ he said. ‘But I will perfect it. I won’t rest until I do.’

  A rare smile blossomed on Valentina’s face, and Luka thought he might even have heard a chuckle. He wanted to remind her that she’d once admonished him for laughing when they were practising, but decided against it. Who knew how long her good humour would last if he tested it.