by Ally Carter
“It’s not your fault,” I say, because it’s what people always say to me, even though it’s never true and it never helps. I say it again and again. “It’s not your fault.”
A glass breaks.
The prince and I pull apart as if we’ve been caught, and when I look up I see Alexei. He must have stepped on one of the fallen glasses, but nothing is as sharp as his gaze before he turns and walks away.
“Alexei!” I yell. I start to stand, to run after him, but then I remember the boy whose life I’m basically destroying.
“Go,” Thomas tells me. “Go to him.”
So I do.
It’s hard chasing after Alexei. Sometimes it feels like his legs are twice as long as mine, so I pick up the full skirt of my fancy dress and run as fast as my delicate shoes will let me.
Out the doors and through the gates, he doesn’t look back. And I keep running. My heels try to catch between the cobblestones, but I don’t care. I can’t stop running.
I do not dare stop running.
Some might think I look like Cinderella, fleeing from the ball, but I can’t shake the memory of another night and another party. I know in my gut that, once again, something bad is about to catch up with me.
So I run faster.
“Alexei!” I yell, but he doesn’t slow down. His long legs stride over the cobblestones, and I have to hold my dress higher. The stones are damp and the hill is steep, but I’m not afraid of falling.
“Alexei, stop!” I yell when I finally reach him. I grab his hand and pull him to a stop, and he spins on me.
“Go back to your prince, Gracie.”
“He’s not my prince!” I snap. “I never wanted him to be my prince.”
Alexei gives a huff. “I thought this was your birthright. I thought you were born to be a princess.”
I slip closer, grab the lapels of his tuxedo with both hands. “I lied. I do that.”
“Yeah. You do.”
For a second we just stand together. No doubt all of Adria—all of the world—is huddled around their TVs and computers right now, listening to the news from the palace. The king is dead. The succession is happening. The nation will be in mourning. I should be in mourning. The hope I had two hours ago is dead, gone. And it will never be alive again. Now there is only moonlight and gaslight and the look in Alexei’s blue eyes.
“So the prince seems … nice,” he tells me.
“He is nice,” I say.
“You don’t sound happy about it,” he says.
I look up at him. “Nice guys are overrated.”
And then Alexei’s arms are around me, and he’s pulling me close, holding me tight. But my hands are still between us—there is still so much between us—and I push against his chest, holding myself apart.
“I have to marry him,” I blurt out. I can’t look in his eyes, so I stay focused on his perfect white tie. I want to straighten it even though it isn’t crooked. I want a legitimate excuse to touch him. I want to find a reason to make this last.
But there isn’t one.
“I thought that I could stop it. The king knew. That’s what I was trying to tell you guys. He was going to stop it. So they killed him. No. I’m not sure the Society knew in time, but Ann did. Ann knew. So she killed him. She’ll kill anyone. She will. She’d kill you.”
Suddenly, I force myself to look at him. I need to see those blue eyes just one more time as fear grips me.
“She would kill you,” I say, and I know that it’s true.
But the look that Alexei gives me isn’t one that I’m expecting. “She’s welcome to try.” He smiles and pulls me closer. My hands slide to his shoulders. I’m pressed tight against his chest.
“I have to marry him,” I repeat before Alexei and I can get any closer. In a lot of ways. “This was a warning as much as anything. If they can kill the king … I have to marry him.”
Alexei pulls me tighter. “You’re not married yet.”
And then his lips are on mine and my fingers are in his hair and everything fades away, the streets and the darkness and the prince who is a few blocks and an entire world away.
Nothing matters except this and here and now. Nothing matters except us.
But there never can be an us, I know now. Not ever again.
And so instead of sinking into Alexei, I make myself pull away. Someday soon I know I’ll regret it, regret not making the most of these brief moments while they lasted. But what’s going to haunt me more in the future—memories or regrets? I honestly do not know.
“Gracie …” Alexei starts. He pushes a piece of hair out of my face.
“There’s something I have to tell you.”
“No. No more talking,” he says, then kisses me again, so hard that I almost forget my fears and my guilt and the dread that has been simmering inside of me for ages.
But, eventually, the kiss ends and I ask, “Is your mom really lucid?” for reasons I don’t know.
“Gracie, don’t.”
“Don’t what?” I ask.
“Don’t get your hopes up.”
And that makes me break away. It’s like I’m being held by a stranger.
“Do you honestly think I’m capable of that? Well, I’m not.” My voice is dry and joyless. “Don’t worry. I will never get my hopes up ever again.”
“Shh, Grace.” Alexei tries to hold me again, but this is a completely different kind of embrace. He knows I’m on the verge of running—not toward but away.
“She killed the king,” I say, because it’s the only fact that matters. “She killed the king.”
“I know,” Alexei says and smooths my hair. Then his arms are gone and his hand takes mine. “Come on.”
He doesn’t take me to Iran. Not to Russia or the US or any of the embassies on the row. Instead, Alexei leads me to a narrow, winding street just like a hundred others in Valancia. In fact, I probably couldn’t find it again if I tried, but I’m not thinking about the future. And I’m not thinking about the past. I’m just trying to memorize every second of this moment because I know it may very well be our last.
When Alexei walks up the steps to a narrow town house, somehow I’m surprised when he reaches into his pocket for a key and unlocks the door.
When he smiles at me, I raise my eyebrows.
“Dominic,” he explains, because of course Dominic has a safe house. He probably has a dozen.
The apartment is old but neat. Clean and tidy but without frills. A lovely woman comes rushing toward the sound of the opening door, saying, “You’re back! I’m so glad. I was …” Karina trails off at the sight of me. Her entire countenance changes when she says, “I know you.”
Carefully, I glance at Alexei, who nudges me closer to his mother. “Yeah. I—”
“Caroline,” she says, and my spirits fall. But then she brightens. “You look just like Caroline, so that means you must be … Grace?”
I must have been holding my breath because I can feel myself exhale.
“Yes,” I say, relief rushing over me. “Yes, I’m Grace.”
And then I see—really see—Alexei’s mother for the first time. Her hair is short and clean and curls into a natural wave just like her son’s. Her eyes are brighter, less tired. But, most of all, she seems present in a way she never has before.
I don’t know what they were giving her at that facility, but I can imagine. I know better than anyone that the medicine can be far worse than the disease. I know how it feels to be here but not here, in the now but locked in the past.
She isn’t shaking. Her eyes don’t dart around the room as if there might be an attack at any moment. But there’s still an edge to her—the never-ceasing pulse of someone who knows just how bad things can turn and just how quickly.
I know because I carry it myself.
“‘Hush, little princess …’” Karina starts to sing, and panic rises within me. I can’t let her slip away—not now. Not after she has come so far.
“No. Stay with me, Ka
rina,” I say, reaching for her. “Stay here.”
“Your mother wanted me to sing that for her, the last time I saw her.”
I look at Alexei. It’s like we’ve both felt a piece of the puzzle start to fall into place.
“When did you see her?” Alexei asks. “When did you see Caroline?”
Karina brightens at the name. “Caroline? Oh, I’d love to see Caroline. Is she here?”
And my heart falls again. Alexei’s hand rests at the small of my back as if to comfort me and remind me that there are no miracles.
“No,” I say, and Karina’s face falls. “She’s not here.”
“That’s too bad,” Karina says. “I haven’t seen her in … well, I think it must have been months.”
“Yes.” I force a smile. “I think it’s been a while.”
“We’re very dear friends, your mother and I. Did you know?”
I swallow and force out the word. “Yes.”
“We were thick as thieves when we were girls. Me. Your mother.” Karina turns. Her entire body stiffens, and when she speaks again it’s like the words are laced with acid. “And her.”
I know who she means, but still I have to ask, “Ann?”
Karina spins on me. “Don’t say her name!”
She’s rocking now, a back and forth so subtle it might be missed by someone who doesn’t know, someone who hasn’t been there. But I see it, and I know it’s like a ticking clock. Karina is going somewhere deep inside her mind and we might be running out of time.
“What happened, Karina?” I ask softly.
She walks to the window. Light from the street falls through the parted curtain and slants across her face. But she’s not looking outside, I know. Alexei’s mother is looking back.
“Do you know about the little princess?”
She doesn’t turn as I say, “I know Amelia lived.”
“Oh, yes,” Karina says, brightening slightly. “She lived and she grew up. Did you know that? And she had a baby and then her baby had babies. They were in the Society—they had to be. So we—my friends and I—we wanted to find them.”
The longer Karina speaks the younger she seems. It’s easy to imagine her as a little girl, gathering with her two best friends, deciding to search for treasure.
“And then …” Karina steps closer, out of the light. “We found them. Oh, how I wish we hadn’t.”
Alexei’s hand is warm on my back. “How did you find them?” he asks.
“There were whispers,” Karina says, her voice low.
“What kind of whispers?” I ask.
“The families who took the babies home kept records, you know. They made notes and plans for the day when Amelia would need to claim her throne. But it never happened. Maybe because peace came and no one dared to disturb it. But I think …” She steps a little closer. Her face actually glows. “I think Amelia was happy. No momma wants to change that. So the records were hidden or lost, but we found them. At first we thought that her descendant was … her. But we were wrong, weren’t we? It isn’t her.”
She practically spits the final word.
A part of me wants to spit, too.
“No,” I say. “It isn’t her.”
“It’s Caroline. She is the heir. She told me when she came to see me.” Karina smiles. She giggles like a little girl.
“What did she tell you?” I ask, but Karina is turning back to the window, singing softly.
“‘Hush, little princess …’”
“Karina!” I snap, because I need to keep her here; I don’t dare let her slip away.
“She wanted to know about the song,” Karina says.
“What about it?”
“She didn’t know all the verses. Most people don’t. But my grandmother knew about Amelia. She believed Amelia should have been put on the throne—many in the Society did, you know? Many do to this very day. And so Grandmother used to tell me stories about the princess and sing the song. She made me learn it when I was just a little girl. I so wanted Alexei to be a girl so I could teach him. Isn’t it a pity?”
It’s like she doesn’t know her son is in the room. And maybe she doesn’t.
She brightens again, looking at me. “Has Caroline taught you the song?”
“Why don’t you remind me?” I say. “Please, could you sing it now?”
She does and I listen very carefully.
Hush, little princess, dead and gone.
No one’s gonna know you’re coming home.
Hush, little princess, wait and see.
No one’s gonna know that you are me.
Hush, little princess, it’s too late.
The truth is locked behind the gates.
Hush, little princess, pretty babe.
The sunlight shines where the truth is laid!
“That’s it?” I ask when Karina’s finished. “That’s all she wanted? To learn the song?”
“She said she had to go to Adria. She needed proof,” Karina says. “Nothing was ever going to happen without proof.”
I don’t dare look at Alexei. I don’t dare to let myself believe. But the fact remains that my mother was looking for something. She came here. She found it. And if I could find it, too …
Maybe I could get someone else killed, I realize, and I feel sick.
Alexei doesn’t see it, though. He just asks, “What kind of proof?”
“The bodies, of course!” Karina sounds like she’s just been invited to a birthday party. “She said she’d found the bodies … or she thought she knew where the bodies would be. She was going to have to come back to Adria to be certain.”
And now I find myself hurtling back in time—to Paris and the bridge and the desperate look in Ann’s eyes.
“The tomb,” I say, turning to Alexei. “In Paris, Ann asked about a tomb.”
“What tomb?” Alexei asks.
“The king and queen and little princes. Their bodies were lost in the war. If Mom needed proof she was Amelia’s heir—”
“Then your mom needed DNA,” Alexei fills in.
“So if she really found the proof—”
“Then she found the tomb. And for whatever reason, she went to the palace and told Ann about it.”
Alexei’s voice is as hard as my heart. “And Ann tried to have her killed.”
Karina starts to shake. Her voice is too high. “I told her not to go. I warned her. I said that she wasn’t our friend anymore. I said that she had changed. And she was the one who sent me to that place. She did it. She—”
“It’s okay, Karina,” Alexei says, reaching for his mother. “It’s okay.”
“Caroline said she’d get me out. Caroline said that she was going to come to Adria and get her proof and then she was going to get me out!”
Alexei’s mother is shaking. Tears fall from her eyes. Her voice breaks. “Did she send you to get me out?”
“Yes,” I say. “She did.”
And in a way it’s even true.
We’ve held Karina for too long and I can see her slipping, descending into whatever peaceful place she’s built inside her mind. When she starts to sing again, “‘Hush, little princess …’” I know it’s not for me.
She walks to a chair and curls up like a kitten, singing herself to sleep.
Alexei covers her with a blanket and then takes my hand, leads me outside.
We’re halfway to the palace before he speaks again, leaning low to look into my eyes.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Don’t go back there.” It’s like he’s been fighting with himself for ages, trying to keep from fighting with me, too, but it has to be done and we both know it.
“I have to,” I say.
“You’re Grace Olivia Blakely. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”
“This isn’t optional,” I tell him, but I’m really arguing with myself.
“Yes.” Alexei shakes me slightly—like he’s trying to shake some sense into me.
“It is. Go to the US embassy. Come with me to Russia. Come with me to Moscow. We’ll get on a plane. We’ll borrow Noah’s mother’s van and drive all night. I don’t care. Just get lost, Grace. Run away. Disappear and I’ll go with you.”
“I can’t.”
When Alexei presses his palm into my cheek, I can feel it like a brand.
“She killed the king, Gracie,” he says, voice low. I don’t bother to mention that there’s blood on my hands, too.
I look into his eyes. “She won’t kill me.”
“How do you know?” he challenges, and I pull away.
“Because I’m playing her game. And she’s winning.”
I’m not surprised that I don’t sleep. When I close my eyes, I see the king fall. I hear the crowd gasp. I can feel Ann’s gaze upon me, and I know she saw it coming. She’s seen everything coming for ages, and it’s far too late for me to catch up.
So I throw off my covers and ease into the dark, still halls. Walking, pacing. It feels like I’m stuck inside the castle from “Sleeping Beauty,” dormant but alive and waiting for the right moment to wake up.
I shouldn’t be surprised when I find myself in the big sitting room where Ann invited me to tea right before the Night of a Thousand Amelias—right before Jamie almost died.
These are the windows where the bodies of the royal family hung two hundred years ago. The Society would have cut them down from here. They would have taken them through this room, out into the palace, and then … where?
Where did my mother find them? There are hundreds of miles of catacombs beneath the city—maybe thousands. The Society has a secret underground headquarters and their own private island. There are caves in the hills and lakes and a sea so big and so blue that it feels like this is the end of the world.
The Society wanted to keep the bodies safe, and they did it, I have to think. They just did it a little too well.
“Karina Volkov is crazy.”
I’m not surprised to hear Ann’s voice. I’m not even afraid to turn and see her by the doors. I didn’t lie to Alexei. She has me right where she wants me. I’m not a threat to her, and she knows it, so for the moment I really don’t have anything to fear.
“Don’t look so shocked, Grace,” Ann says, sidling closer. “There’s nothing that goes on within the palace that I don’t know. And, besides, I told you this was my favorite room. Did you really think I wouldn’t know you had stopped by?”
