The Crown’s Game (23 page)

T
he tsarina had been unwell for quite some time. This Pasha knew, as he had heard his mother muffling coughs into handkerchiefs at supper, seen her retire earlier and earlier from state functions, and watched her once-regal presence wilt into a near nonexistent one. Yuliana had commented on the tsarina’s wan complexion as well, and Pasha himself had caught her once when she
fainted during a stroll in the gardens.

Now Pasha strode into the small chamber his mother used for conducting business—the same room through which he’d sneaked the night of the ball—having been summoned by the tsarina in the middle of his meeting with the Spanish ambassador.

“You wished to see me, Mother?” Pasha asked as he strode up to the tsarina’s desk. He took her gloved hand and kissed
it.

“Yes, darling.” There was no one else in the room but some of her attendants, and she waved them out. “I
apologize for interrupting your meeting. This may be the only moment I have free before I leave.”

“No apology necessary. The Spanish ambassador is a pompous bore, and Father had me meet with him only to keep the Spaniards out of his own hair. But did you say you’re leaving? Where to?
Are you sure you’re fit to travel?” Pasha dragged a chair from the opposite side of the desk and set it next to his mother’s. When he sat down, he took her hands and clasped them in his lap.

“The doctor has deemed it advisable to move me to warmer weather, now that October is ending and the chill has arrived. Your father and I shall depart for the South in two days’ time.”

“Forty-eight hours’
notice? Why the rush?”

She frowned. “Your father has urgent business to which he must attend in the Crimea.”

“Trouble with the Ottoman Empire.”

“Yes, the situation is worsening.” The wrinkles on her forehead pinched, making her look even more worn down. “He wants to see it for himself. You’ll take care of the city and your sister while we’re gone, will you not?”

“Yuliana does not need taking
care of.”

The tsarina laughed then, and her wrinkles unpinched. But her laughter was punctuated with hacking coughs.

Pasha winced.

She waved off his concern with her handkerchief. “I shall see you soon, all right?”

“All right.” Pasha kissed his mother’s hand again. For what could he say? She was his mother, but she was also the tsarina, and other than the tsar, the tsarina had the final word.

“Now if you will help me up, I need to check on how the staff is handling my luggage.”

He stood and pulled her up. She needed a second to steady herself, and then he led her out of the room, into the hall. She clung to him for support the entire way to her rooms.

Pasha rowed toward the island with long, even strokes. It was not hard to know where to go; the island was lit with twinkling lanterns,
luminescent against the black sky. He had been back to the island only once—the tsar had been trying his hardest to keep Pasha occupied—but unlike the first time, Pasha’s second visit had been crowded, since the new dock allowed the rest of Saint Petersburg access.

And everyone had known he was the tsesarevich, for his Guard had accompanied him. It was impossible to enjoy the Dream Benches when
he knew everyone would watch him, and besides that, Gavriil had refused to allow the tsesarevich to “fall under the influence of hallucinatory drugs.” Pasha shook his head. As if the benches could be explained so simply! But the people of Saint Petersburg had convinced themselves that the colorful mists surrounding each bench were hallucinogens, and then they’d shown a surprising willingness to
throw themselves into the experience anyway.
That in itself,
thought Pasha,
could be construed as magic.
He laughed aloud at the memory of the crowds of ordinarily staid Petersburgers, packing themselves ten people to a bench.

But at least now, in the middle of the night, Pasha would have the island to himself.

Or so he thought. When he rowed up to the dock, there
was something else tied to
the pier. It was not a boat, per se. But rather, a leaf. A yellow birch leaf with its edges turned up, enlarged to the size of a small boat.

“Vika,” he whispered.

He leaped out of his own skiff and secured it to the pier. Of course, it could be the other enchanter who was here, but Pasha had a feeling it was Vika. It was a birch leaf at the dock, and Vika came from an island covered in birches.
It had to be her.

He ran toward the main path, leaving his dignity at the dock, the gravel crunching under his boots as he approached the promenade. The lanterns appeared to dance with the leaves in the breeze, the moonlight somehow not detracting from their brilliance, but adding to it. Pasha emerged from the trees to the center of the island, and it was there that he stopped short, on the walkway
lined with benches.

Vika sat on the bench for Ovchinin Island.

Pasha slowed as he walked toward her so that he would not startle her with his presence. But she didn’t look up, even though his boots seemed to pound on the path no matter how lightly he tried to tread, and he knew she must be immersed in a dream.

He hovered. He could sit next to her, and perhaps join her. He didn’t know if each
person had their own separate dream, or if you shared the same vision on the same bench. Of course, if he sat down, it might surprise her, and he had been attempting to avoid that all along.

“It’s a tad eerie of you to stand there and watch me sleep,” Vika said, her eyes still closed.

Pasha jumped. Ironic that
he
had been the one trying not to startle
her
.

She opened her eyes and smiled.

Pasha recovered himself and bowed. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Vika.”

“And you as well, Pasha.”

He straightened. “How did you know I was here?”

“I have a knack for sensing anomalies in my magic.”

“Ah. So I am an anomaly. And the benches are yours, not the other enchanter’s.”

She laughed. “Oh, goodness, no to both. You’re an anomaly only to the extent that you are
not
my magic, and thus,
I can feel when you—or anyone—is there, if I so choose. And the benches are not mine. The island, yes. But the benches . . . I couldn’t create something so magnificent.”

“I would venture to say the island itself is quite magnificent.”

“Thank you.” Vika stood and straightened her skirt. “I’m rather pleased with it myself.”

“Is that your leaf at the dock?” Pasha pointed in the direction from
which he’d come.

“Yes, I’ve been experimenting with different modes of transportation. Do you like it?”

“Very much.”

“I could make one for you.”

“I think Gavriil would die of fright.”

Vika tilted her head. “Gavriil?”

“The captain of my Guard. He doesn’t like it when I try new things. A boat made of a leaf, I think, may push him to the limits of his tolerance.”

“You may assure him it is
entirely safe.”

“I have no doubt. Perhaps I ought to send him out on the leaf first, to prove its sturdiness.”

Vika laughed, and Pasha did, too. She sparkled like the lanterns under the moonlight.

“Have you tried the benches?” she asked.

“No. Gavriil wouldn’t let me when so many people were around during the day. Have you been through all the dreams?”

“Yes, and some more than once. They are
all astounding.”

Pasha glanced over his shoulder at the benches he had passed on his way to Vika. “Which is your favorite? Besides the obvious?” He dipped his head toward the Ovchinin Island bench on which she sat.

“The steppe,” she said without pause.

“Interesting. I have a friend who is originally from the steppe. You met him, actually, at the ball. Nikolai. He was the harlequin.”

Vika paused,
and for a moment she seemed as frozen as her dress had been that night. But then she was herself again. “Right. The harlequin. I think I remember him. Remarkable dancer.”

“Indeed. He is always popular with the girls at balls.” Pasha watched her closely for her reaction.

“Is he?” Vika’s expression remained even and bland. It was as if she were neither impressed nor unimpressed, as if Nikolai
wasn’t memorable to her at all. Pasha exhaled.

“But enough about Nikolai. Could we sit on the bench with the steppe dream? Would you show me around?”

Vika furrowed her brow. “Actually . . . if you don’t mind, I was rather fancying a walk. I’ve been sitting here for a while. Or if you’d rather have some time alone with the benches—”

“No. A walk sounds perfect.” Pasha offered her his arm, and
she linked hers through his.

They strolled down the rest of the promenade, past the last bench, the one that contained the dream of the steppe, and turned left onto another path.

“Why did you come to the island in the middle of the night?” Vika asked. “To experience it without Gavriil watching? And how
did
you escape his watch? I would think a tsesarevich would be closely guarded.”

“They try,
but I know secret passageways in and out of the palace of which they are unaware. In general, they don’t report my absences, for at best they would appear to be fools, and at worst they would be disgraced and lose their positions. So in exchange for them ‘forgetting’ on many occasions to inform my father when they lose track of me, I return unscathed each time.”

“A risky bargain, but I suppose
I understand. You haven’t answered my other question, though. Why are you here?”

“I may ask the same of you.”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Nor could I.”

They walked on for a while without speaking. Vika looked up at the lanterns, while Pasha took pleasure in the weight of her arm against his. There were many layers of cloth that separated them, but he swore his skin tingled at her touch anyway. His
pulse definitely thrummed faster. It was a welcome distraction from worrying about his mother.

When they turned onto another path—this one, Pasha recalled, led to a grove of maple trees—Vika said, “You have a great deal on your mind.”

Pasha started. It was the second time she had surprised him in half an hour. “Are you also a mind reader?”

“No. I hate to tell you, but your face gives everything
away. There’s so much tension in your jaw, and you have a groove chiseled into your forehead. Not to mention your hair. Do you always pull it when you worry?”

Pasha shook his head. “You are remarkable.”

“Merely observant.”

He sighed as they stepped into the maple grove. “It’s just that my mother is very ill,” Pasha said. “It has been one thing after another, and the doctors are at their wits’
end. Their last hope is to send her to the South in hopes the warmer weather will do her good. I love her dearly, so I, too, hope it is the cure, but the truth is, I doubt it. Her problems began long before autumn arrived.”

Pasha released Vika’s arm and began to pace along the path. He thought of his mother’s life; it had not been easy to live in the Winter Palace with his father. The tsar had
had many well-known affairs. Other children, borne by other women. The tsarina could have left and taken Yuliana with her, but Pasha would have had to remain behind as official heir to the throne. As such, his mother had stayed and abided a mountain of insult and indignity for the love of her son.

“I wish there were some miracle that could heal her.”

“Are you asking me to use magic on her?”
Vika asked.

Pasha stopped his pacing. Hope caught in his throat. “Can you?”

Vika exhaled slowly and rubbed a spot just under the collar of her coat. She took several more breaths before she replied. “I can heal cuts and broken bones, but what ails
your mother sounds much deeper. I think I’d do her more harm than good.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry. Magic is not always the answer. It’s old and very complicated,
and comes tied with many strings. Even this”—she tapped the knot of the maple tree, which began to pour amber liquid into a bucket below—“one of Ludmila’s innocent ideas, has consequences greater than syrup.”

“What do you mean?”

Vika pointed up at the branches of the maple. The green leaves that swayed in the wind began to blur, then vanish. They were replaced by dead limbs.

“What . . . how
did you do that?”

“The leaves are a mirage. These trees have actually been drained completely of life.”

“In order to create one thing, you had to sacrifice another.”

“Yes. Sometimes, magic is deadly.” She frowned.

Pasha eyed her. “Are you telling me you’re dangerous?”

Vika’s frown vanished, and she laughed, almost too wildly given what they’d just been talking about. “Quite so. But I’m no
danger to you.”

The moon shifted then, and its light slivered through the bare maple branches and landed in pale stripes on Vika’s face. It highlighted her delicate cheekbones. It emphasized her otherness. Pasha couldn’t resist stepping closer to her. He reached out to touch her face.

“Please don’t,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry, I just—”

She didn’t move away as his fingers hovered next to her
cheek, aching to brush against her skin. But she said, “I mean, you don’t want this.”

“What if I do?” He wanted to kiss her. And not just her lips, although he wanted that, badly. He also wanted to kiss her neck, to peel away her coat and touch his mouth to her pale shoulders. He wanted to feel the softness and warmth of her skin. Pasha leaned closer.

This time, Vika backed away. “Trust me,
you don’t. I’m too complicated. I am bound by too much not in my control.”

Pasha sighed. He, too, was bound. By his father. By duty. By the people of an entire empire. He wondered what trappings hindered Vika.

“There’s no such thing as simplicity,” he said.

She took off her glove and ran a finger through the trickle of maple syrup, frowning at the crystallized lumps in it. “I’m beginning to
fully comprehend that.”

“I like you,” he said. “More than like you.”

She shook her head slightly, but more to herself than to him. “I don’t want to like you.”

“But you
do
?” Pasha went to run his hand through his hair, but caught himself before he gave his nerves away.