by Kay Kenyon
Nikolai said, “What does it feel like to be shot?”
“Kolya!” whispered Annakova.
Kim asked, “May I answer, Your Majesty?”
Annakova paused, then nodded.
“At first, like a bee sting. When I fell, I hit my head on a rock. Now that really hurt.”
Nikolai, who had been very serious up to now, let a tiny smile stab at his cheeks.
“And then later,” Kim went on, “the wound did start to ache. Like your arm finally realizes what happened. But it isn’t so bad.”
“Thank you,” Nikolai said. “That was very interesting.”
Annakova flicked a glance at the officer, who moved forward, gesturing for Nikolai to precede him from the room.
“My gun, Your Majesty?” Nikolai said.
Annakova nodded to the officer, who retrieved the revolver from the table. He and the boy left, the puppy at their heels.
Kim curtsied and started to follow.
“Stay, Miss Copeland,” Annakova said. She gestured to a chair next to the divan on which she sat.
Kim hesitated, wondering if she would now be faulted for being in the wrong place at the wrong time and getting the tsarevich in trouble.
When Kim had seated her herself, Annakova said fondly, “He is young. He still thinks these guns are . . . That they have . . . romance, is word?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
It had grown fully dark outside. A small fire crackled in the fireplace.
“We have talk,” the tsarina said. “You and I.”
Oh, let’s not, Kim fervently thought.
“I am curious to see that American comes to us. You come so far. Why?”
Kim had to dispose of her standard I-like-Hitler speech. She was talking to a Russian. What did the Russians believe? No, what did an expatriate Russian believe, and one moreover who wanted the vacant throne? It was too much to grasp. She cast about, conscious that she was taking too much time.
Finally she said, “I want to give myself to something larger than just me.”
Annakova was attentive, encouraging her to go on.
A sudden thread occurred to her. “I see how the world goes. The masses become inflamed and pull things down. Then it is chaos.” As Annakova was very well aware, in 1917 they had thrown Tsar Nicholas down a well in the woods.
“This word, ka-ous?”
“Excuse me, Your Majesty. Things in disarray. A mess.”
“Ah. Anarchy, you mean. But your country, your United States, which side they are on? They think Stalin stands against Hitler? So they approve Reds?”
“They do not love the Bolsheviks.”
“But you join with Germany. Is crime against your country? I am curious.” She seemed to intuit that Kim was uncomfortable. “Is difficult question. You do not have to answer.”
An elderly servant entered the room, her gray hair braided into a little bun. Annakova waved her away with noble contempt. A queen, Kim mused, knew many hand gestures.
“I forgot what you asked me, Your Majesty.”
“Loyalty to country. A difficult decision, coming here?”
“I believe my country is not under correct leadership. And, also, we are not at war with Germany.”
“This is interesting. My country, too, not under good leaders. I love my country with my life’s blood. Is why I seek good allies.”
The fire collapsed, breaking open coals that had been soft red, now flashing golden.
Annakova seemed momentarily lost in thought. “I give everything for country. What I give to my Progeny . . . it takes from me. It takes my days, my years. But all for Russia.” She looked at Kim. “You see?”
“Yes, ma’am. Love of country is worth every sacrifice.”
Annakova nodded, gazing at the fire. “I do not trust Hitler.”
Realizing what she had said, the tsarina reacted with a startled twitch. Then she turned a blameful look on Kim.
“Oh, Your Majesty, forgive me. I cannot help these things.” A spill. A horrid one, by Annakova’s reaction.
The woman settled, staring hard at Kim, taking her measure. “I did not mean that.”
“Perhaps, in fact, there is no one a ruler can trust.”
Annakova raised her chin. “Yes, yes, that is right. More than you can understand.” The fire burned low. “I am impressed by you, Miss Copeland.” She paused. “I bring you under my wing. It can be now.”
Kim blinked, not following.
Then, as Annakova gestured to the empty place on the divan, next to her, Kim began to realize what the tsarina had in mind.
But it couldn’t happen. She did not have the powder. It was in the barracks.
“Sit by me,” Annakova said. A knife carving the words on Kim’s skin. “Come.”
“I . . .” Kim cast about for some way out of this. “I am not . . . prepared, ma’am.”
“And so? Is not necessary. Come.”
Is not necessary? The chance, her only chance. Slipping by, second by second.
A small frown from the tsarina.
Kim swallowed. Then she rose and took her place by Annakova, feeling like she was dragging the world behind her. All their planning. All gone, gone.
“Do not be afraid. First times, they make anxious. But no need.” The catalyst turned to her and cupped Kim’s face with her hands. Then she pressed her palms gently into Kim’s cheeks. Her skin where the powder should have been.
The Russian woman’s perfume enveloped her. It was flowery sweet, nauseating.
“You are patriot,” Annakova whispered.
The tsarina’s hand lay against her cheek. With her other hand she grasped one of Kim’s. Skin to skin, they could not have been closer together unless they had stripped. Annakova’s power was by now flowing into her, the woman’s voice preternaturally loud: “You will have great honors in our mission. I am sure for you.”
Time passed. Kim was trapped like a mouse in a cat’s paws, terrified at first, but then gradually giving herself up to something not entirely unpleasant. Heat entered her body from Annakova’s hands. She felt herself lifted in a wave of excitement, a golden surge of confidence. She rode it with an exultation, a joy that shook off all thought, all nuance. Beyond sexual, it was the taste of something more important, more primal.
Power.
She was becoming a grander being, larger than before. She heard the wind caressing the porch outside, the thunder of the logs collapsing in the fire, the tsarina’s heartbeat and her own.
Annakova’s whisper came to her. “Never forget me.”
“Never,” Kim said, ashamed, joyful.
Annakova sat back, still holding Kim’s hand. “Your eyes . . . ,” Annakova said. “They are extraordinary.”
“My eyes?”
Annakova looked at her wonderingly. “Yes. Eyes. I see a thing there.” She nodded slowly. “You have gone far, my dear girl, so very far.”
It was true. Untethered, Kim felt herself floating away from her old self, her old world.
Tears formed in the tsarina’s eyes. “I think you have become so pure. Nora Copeland. You have already gone there.”
“Gone where?”
“To the end.”
A 10? She stared in terror at the tsarina. “It will kill me,” Kim whispered.
“No.” Annakova looked at her, very pleased. “Maybe only 9.8. It will be well. We shall be proud of you.”
The old servant came in again. Annakova looked up, frowning. The spell was broken. She took her hands away from Kim, saying something in Russian, calling the woman Polina.
The ceremony was over. She was a 9 or a 10, Annakova said, or guessed. What difference, numbers? Her Talent burned in her, raging to work itself on others.
“You may go, Miss Copeland,” Annakova said, watching her carefully, smiling indulgently as though to a child savoring a sweet.
Kim staggered to her feet.
“I see you on Christmas,” Annakova said. “We are all together then.”
Kim nodded.
Forgetting to curtsey, she moved to the front door. The corporal was waiting to accompany her back to the barracks. She felt a sneer curling at her lip and managed to control it. Striking off across the plaza, her escort finally gave up and let her go.
He had probably seen the like before.
You didn’t get in the way of the newly purified.
40
THE AERIE
LATER THAT DAY. Erika stood a few paces away from Kim, who sat on the stump near the pond. The only light a small fixture on the equipment shed, its pool of illumination adding nothing to the blackness of the early alpine night.
After trying to ignore her, Kim slowly turned to fix her with a gaze. “Go away, Erika.”
“I do not like you to be alone.”
If she ignored the woman long enough, perhaps she would leave. Kim felt power flush her skin. She didn’t fear Erika or anything that she might do. Perhaps she did not fear anything. Annakova’s words: You have already gone there. To the end.
“I am supposed to watch you,” Erika said.
Ah. A nice little spill, but Adler had already told her that. She had the feeling that as soon as they were alone in the dormitory, Erika would be helplessly shedding secrets. Was her new spill rating as high as Annakova had said? 9.8? Or 10?
“You could do me a favor. Please tell cook that I will need some meat for dinner. Her Majesty will want me to have a steak.”
Erika’s face, incredulous. But then she figured out what had happened. It took her a moment to figure out who was in charge. “I will talk to cook.”
“Yes, do.” It wasn’t Erika’s fault that Kim had botched her mission, but she felt exceedingly snappish.
She thought of flicking her hand at the woman to dismiss her. Copying Annakova. She almost giggled.
Oh God, this was not good.
Of course it was not good. Her penetration of the Aerie, a failed operation. Now that she had undergone a private purification, Annakova would not need to include her in the Christmas Day ceremony. She must think of an alternate plan. She would be in Annakova’s presence at the Festival Hall Christmas party, but what was she to do there, stab her with a dinner knife?
She was not an assassin. Last summer she had killed a man who had a string of child murders to atone for. But he had begged her to do it. His suffering. She still didn’t know why she had pulled the trigger. Things that for most people were morally clear, for one in the intelligence service, it was . . . more complicated.
Erika had trudged off.
Stars poked through in the gaps between clouds. She did so love that it was dark. This was the shortest, darkest day of the year. The solstice. The Nachkommenschaft—of which she was now indisputably one—should have a celebration tonight. Something properly pagan. She imagined torches in the woods. People wearing antlers. Sex on a slab of rock.
It was said that Himmler favored pagan myths, so by rights today should have been the uplift celebration for the Nachkommenschaft. But reportedly Hitler found occult things ridiculous. They would use Christmas Day instead.
She had been thinking all along that the Nachkommen underwent their transformations out of fanatic loyalty to the Nazi cause. Most of them were SS, so surely that was part of it. But now she knew they also loved catalysis. As a Progeny, you were not in the world so much as creating the world. Events waited for your action, your manipulation. If they went awry, you exerted stronger measures. If these failed, you went back to Annakova and became stronger. Eventually you burned out, but by that time you were so far gone you didn’t know what you had lost. Your mind. Your humanity.
A wave of nausea rolled through her. She leaned over and threw up.
When the spasm passed, she took a fistful of snow and cleaned her face, swallowing the melt. Her face now wet, she thought the water might freeze on her. She rubbed at her skin with her mitts, making it worse.
Someone handed her a handkerchief.
Evgeny. He stood before her, very pale, a long cape wrapped close around him, looking startlingly like a vampire. Gratefully, she rubbed the handkerchief against her face. It was a lovely piece of cloth, edged in lace. “Thank you,” she said at last, handing it back to him.
“You are welcome.”
She stood up, gesturing for him to take the only dry seat, the stump. He nodded at her, looking gratified. He sat, putting his hands on his knees, looking at the frozen pond.
“You saw my future.”
“Da. You almost die.” He smiled up at her. “But today, a reprieve!”
He looked happy to say so, and she appreciated it. “News travels fast.”
“Is true. Everyone hear how the young tsarevich shoots you.” He gazed at the ice, which glowed blue-gray where the wind had polished the surface.
“I also see a thing,” he began.
Oh. Another vision. He was the only one she was really afraid of at the Aerie.
“You and I. Our destiny. Is together. Like skaters, holding hands and going round and round. And if one falls, so does second one.” He looked up at her, smiling a little, as though to say, And so it goes . . .
“Evgeny Feodorovich. When you see these things, does it often turn out as you thought?” He did not answer. “And if it doesn’t turn out, how do you ever know which visions are true?”
Evgeny closed his eyes, breathing deeply. Peaceful. She did not want to intrude on that. Such moments were hard to find in this place.
With that, she suddenly remembered: her meeting with Adler. She had forgotten it. She turned away, heading for the barracks.
Evgeny’s voice came to her. “All are true. All.”
She turned back. “But the bullet, was it just a reprieve for today? I will still die by the hand of a uniformed man with a gun?” It was a bad idea to pursue this, but she was in a reckless mood.
“I do not know. Maybe another girl named Nora dies instead. She is told by another Evgeny that a soldier is shooting you. I think the things I see, they are always true.”
“Thank you for telling me. I think it’s best to know.”
He looked at her, finally, his face plainly visible in the moonlight, contorted in pain. “It is nightmare to know.”
They looked at each other for a few crystalline, cold moments.
“Goodnight, Evgeny Feodorovich.”
She traipsed back through the snow toward the path. As she went, she thought she heard him say, Goodnight, Kim.
That was wrong. She did not really hear her true name. Did she? But she could not think about it; she must hurry to meet Captain Adler, if he would even be waiting for her in the washing shed. Striding up to the barracks, she found the room empty. Hilde and Erika were at dinner. She quickly pulled the sheets off her bed and made her way down the path. The door to the washhouse was unlocked.
To her relief, Adler was waiting for her in the back by the hanging laundry. No fans ran, so they whispered.
“I was wounded today by a stray bullet from the tsarevich’s gun.”
He was smoking a cigarette and exhaled through the side of his mouth. “I heard this. And that Irina Annakova asked to see you.”
“We had a nice chat. So nice that she decided to augment me on the spot.”
He stared. “Augment? You were prepared for this?”
“No. It was unexpected. I didn’t have the materials.”
“Well.” He drew on the cigarette, watching her. “It was not a good plan.”
Convenient for him, that it had all come undone. “Maybe I’ll come up with a better plan.”
A smirk. “I am, do you say, all ears?”
He really shouldn’t goad her. She might do something rash. Rash seemed so appealing. “Did you find the Aerie’s back door?”
“There is no back door.”
“You said you would find it!”
His cigarette was down to a stub. He took his last puff, holding it as it smoldered. “I have tried, but it is closely guarded. Go home, Nora.”
&nb
sp; She laughed. “And miss Christmas with the Nachkommenschaft?”
He narrowed his eyes. Had she pushed him too far? He had been willing to destroy operation Monarch, but at the same time he was SS. He was not a garden-variety soldier, but a member of Hitler’s elite corp.
“What exactly did your British handlers tell you to do?”
They told me to quit, the same as you did. “I’m to disrupt the operation to the extent possible.”
“And put us all at risk.” He ground out the cigarette under his heel, then picked up the butt and put it in his pocket. “You are out of control.”
“If I can think of something, you’ll be the first to know.”
His face had developed a sheen of sweat. No doubt he was terrified of any new plan that, in her fragile state of mind, she might come up with. Perhaps he was thinking of Hitler’s penchant for hanging traitorous officers with a wire noose.
“I will have you assigned to maid duty for the next week. Before you execute a plan, you will inform me. You will bring folded laundry to the senior officers’ quarters and make the beds. There will be more than one maid, and I cannot be certain of your cabin assignments. Go to mine by mistake. Tie a string around one of the bed legs if I’m not there. I’ll find you.” He gestured to the linen shelves in back. “You had better get back to the barracks.”
She was tired of him. She turned to go, but he took her arm. “You look half mad. Calm yourself, or you’ll make a mistake.” His hand tightened on her arm. “You understand?”
“Yes.” She yanked her arm away and left him.
Outside the washhouse, she trudged through the snow, making a diagonal down the slope toward the Festival Hall. She looked up toward the pond, but Evgeny had disappeared.
It felt like she had not eaten for days.
Pray God Erika had talked to the cook.
THAT EVENING. “Please be at ease,” Irina said to the gun crew in rudimentary German. “I am not here, ja?”
The officer in charge clicked his heels and gave a stiff nod. There were two of them manning a mortar mounted to command the road and the near slopes of the forested valley. Pulling her fur cloak more tightly around herself, she moved to the far end of the emplacement, looking out.
