by E. P. Clark
“And…so you say he is gone, Boleslav?” she added, to fill in the silence, but urgency suddenly overcame her. “Gone from this city?” she asked, her voice cracking again, to her shame.
“Tsarina…” Boleslav Vlasiyevich came and, to her surprise, knelt down before her and kissed her hand before she could stop him. “By all accounts, he is dead. And, Tsarina?” He smiled up at her. “He suffered greatly.”
Slava knew she should say something, thank Boleslav Vlasiyevich for his service, express joy that this man whose face she only remembered in nightmarish snatches had suffered and died in order to give her peace of mind, but instead she found herself sitting on the floor, crying as she had that night so long ago when she had slipped out of the kremlin and run bareheaded through the frosty streets. Boleslav patted her back until she was done.
“Are you sure you don’t want my sister back?” she asked when she had stopped. “Or someone with a little more steel in her backbone? Someone who…wouldn’t cry over trifles all the time? As you told me yourself, I am made of such fine, soft stuff. Perhaps this is all wrong…perhaps I should go back to the sanctuary…” She tried to make herself shut up, but she couldn’t, and babbled on for several more breaths, until Boleslav took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped her face.
“Your maids are coming, if I guess rightly, Tsarina,” he said. He got up and helped her to her feet. “And Tsarina?”
“What?” She tried to arrange her hair and her clothing to make it seem as if she had not just been crying her heart out and—it had to be admitted—practically lying on the floor in the dark in the arms of her own Captain of the Guard, but it was a hopeless task. The best she could hope for was that her appearance would be no more disheveled than usual, and Masha and Manya would put it down to her general carelessness about such matters.
“Two things. One, your secret—your mother’s secret, that is—is safe with me, but only on one condition.”
“What?”
“Don’t feel too sorry for him, Tsarina. You were hardly the first he…treated as he did. All the maids and guards walked in fear of him. He volunteered for the duty, knowing the trick your mother was planning to play on you, and he…” Boleslav Vlasiyevich’s cheek twitched, “bragged to me of your tears when I questioned him.”
“Oh. How…how terrible.”
“For him, Tsarina, yes. So don’t feel too sorry for him.”
“I’ll…I’ll try not to, I guess. But…will you forgive me for forgiving him?”
“Forgive him? Why would you do such a thing?”
“I don’t know. No, I do. I always thought…I always thought I could never forgive him, or my mother, but now…now I am the one with the power, I am the strong one, and so…so I can forgive him, and her too. I…I can feel the strength, for the first time in my life, I can feel the strength to forgive.”
“Neither of them deserve it,” said Boleslav Vlasiyevich bluntly.
“If they deserved it, it wouldn’t be forgiveness. The question is whether or not they need it.”
“I doubt they need it either.”
“But I do. I need to forgive them so that I don’t spend the rest of my life wringing my hands over wrongs done to me and by me. But what was the second thing?”
“Oh.” He gave her a considering look, and wiped off a few more tears. “To the best of my knowledge, Tsarina, your sister never made a ruling Empress kneel at her feet and beg forgiveness when she was still a slip of a girl. Your sister never raised a magical army and threatened to sack Krasnograd with it.”
“I also called on Severnolesnoye and the steppe princesses to join me,” said Slava through her sniffles. “Who knows what kind of an army we might have at our gates next month.”
“I suppose I’d better be prepared, then,” said Boleslav Vlasiyevich, crooking one corner of his mouth. “Do you think they’ll actually send an army?”
“I wouldn’t put it past them; that’s why I sent my messages to them,” said Slava. “The Severnolesniye have always been rebellious, and the steppe princesses have let me know that they would only be too happy to see someone of their blood sit the Wooden Throne. I am just afraid that—that the realm be will divided over this. But I could never have lived with myself if I had just sat back and let my sister harm Vladislava.”
“You see, Tsarina?” said Boleslav Vlasiyevich. “Your sister never…your sister never did anything that frightened her, simply because she knew that she could never live with herself if it were not done. I always knew who the true Empress in the family was, and so did many others. It was never your sister.”
“Thank you,” said Slava, and started to sniffle again.
“Keep the handkerchief, Tsarina,” he said, folding it into her hand, just as she had with Princess Malogornaya’s daughter, so many months ago.
“Thank you,” she said again.
“Think nothing of it, Tsarina,” he said. He turned to go, and then stopped. “And in case you had any doubts, Tsarina, I will never waver when it comes to you.”
“Why?” she demanded, and then could have kicked herself for asking such a question and for encouraging him when she shouldn’t, as she so often seemed to do, but it was too late. He turned back to her, no longer showing any signs of intending to leave, and gave her another considering look in the semi-darkness.
“I told you, Tsarina. I wanted to serve a great Empress, someone I could take pride in. A child of ten could see that that Empress would be you.”
“And what if I fail?”
“You won’t, Tsarina.”
“I am weak and foolish, Boleslav Vlasiyevich. Just now I was sobbing on the floor over a cruel trick played on me some fifteen years ago, one I barely remember. I doubt that is the behavior of a great Empress.”
“You are wrong, Tsarina.”
“And my own Captain of the Guard contradicts me at every turn! This is hardly the beginning of a brilliant reign!”
He laughed. “I never contradicted your sister, Tsarina, for even someone as hotheaded as me could see it would do no good. But you are another matter entirely.”
“So you wanted me in her place because you think I am more malleable than she was?” She tried to say it lightly, like a joke, but the accusation was plain enough, too.
“No, Tsarina. I think you are wiser. Worthier. And most of all, kinder. You are kind to everyone, even those of us who don’t deserve it. And that is why I will never waver. Not about you, and not about…the child you are said to bear. The father is not here, is he?”
“No,” she confessed in a small voice. “And I don’t know if he ever will be.”
“Well. I am sorry, Tsarina. But your daughter, if she has the good fortune to be born, will never want for any care, any service, any protection a father could offer.”
“I…I am glad to hear it, Boleslav Vlasiyevich.” Her attempt to put an imperial tone back into her voice was stymied by another mortifying bout of sniffling that his words had brought on. “I’m sorry that I have troubled you with my foolish weakness,” she said, and instead of stopping there like she should have, she carried on stupidly, “I didn’t think it would affect me so, but it did! I’m sorry that you had to see that. You…I presumed too much upon your kindness, but I couldn’t stop myself! I’m sorry.”
“Any other Empress would have already had me put to death for what I did today, Tsarina,” he said. “Once again, you…once again you have shown me more kindness than I deserve. You could never presume too much upon my own kindness, paltry as it is. But, Tsarina?”
“Yes?”
“I wouldn’t go around saying ‘I’m sorry” to too many others, if I were you. People like a good strong Empress, whether they’ll admit it or not. But if you’re ever in need of a secret shoulder to cry on—well,” he suddenly smiled, “you know where I live.”
This made Slava laugh through her sniffling. “That would be quite a sight!” she said. “The Empress coming into the barracks to sob on a guard’s shoulde
r!” She grinned, feeling her sniffling retreat for good. “I fear it would do nothing for my hard-won dignity, however.”
He grinned back. “Well, I could always come to you, Tsarina, if you prefer,” he said.
Slava blushed, scandalizing herself and thanking the gods that the light from the single candle was not enough to show her face. She thought she knew well enough what he was offering, but a member of her own guard! And her carrying another man’s child! It would be, it would be…well, quite in line with what many of her foremothers had done, but that was neither here nor there. And…a small part of her had to admit that there might be healing in that, in finding solace in someone who wore a guard’s uniform, in someone who could help her come full circle and—not undo, not erase, but heal over the dreadful hurt that had been inflicted upon her, by her own kinswomen, when she was barely more than a child. And maybe there would be healing in it for him, too.
“I thank you for your loyalty, Boleslav Vlasiyevich,” she said. She meant to say it formally and distantly, but she could hear the laughter bubbling out with it, and so, by the look in his eyes, which now she could read very well, could he. Slava could sense that, whether she wished it or not, the intimacy that Boleslav Vlasiyevich had always seemed to believe was between did, in fact, exist. For what seemed like the first time in her life, and perhaps was, she was certain, as certain as she could be, that the sympathy that she sensed for him was reciprocated, and that he saw her as clearly as she saw him, maybe more so, he saw her as herself, strangely enough, and not just what he wanted her to be. He saw her as a kindred soul just as (and how strange, how unexpected, how inexplicable this was, given how different they were) she did him. The only question was what she was going to do about it. The memory of him kneeling before her popped back into her head, bringing with it another blush, one that started in her stomach and and made her scalp prickle so that she was sure her hair must be standing on end. Luckily, at that moment Masha and Manya came bustling in, or the gods alone knew what she might have done.
“I will leave you to your evening, Tsarina,” he said. Something about the set of his mouth made her sure that he was recalling the same memory, and it was having the same effect on him. “Call for me if you need for anything, day or night.”
Slava blushed again horribly, but even though Masha and Manya were lighting candles all over the place and filling the room with unwelcome light, neither of them seemed to notice. “Thank you,” she said weakly, and told herself she would be glad to see him go. But just as his hand was reaching for the door, her voice said, entirely (she could have sworn) of its own accord, “I have one condition too, Boleslav Vlasiyevich!”
He stopped and waited by the door, looking at her with raised brows. Masha and Manya also stopped, but then, catching Slava’s eye, retreated into the bedroom.
“The dungeons,” said Slava. “You will not go down there again, do you understand me, Boleslav Vlasiyevich? There will be no ‘brutal work’ under my reign, by you or anyone else. Especially not by you. Is that clear, Boleslav Vlasiyevich?”
He caught his breath, and something—perhaps joy? Or was it regret?—flashed across his face. “Perfectly, Tsarina. I will make it so.”
“Anyone serving under me, anyone whom I can trust, must have clean hands. Do I make myself clear, Boleslav Vlasiyevich?”
“You do, Tsarina.”
“Once you have proven to me that your hands are no longer sullied by…by what you have done in my kinswomen’s service, well…then I will decide how you may best serve me. Do you understand?”
Even from across the room, Slava could see how he smiled at her words. She didn’t know whether to slap herself in the face for foolishness or smile at her triumph, but when he bowed stiffly and left the room with his eyes still fixed on her face, she knew she had won something. At the cost of, well…she told herself not to dwell on it. She would decide what to do about Boleslav Vlasiyevich once he had proven that he could have clean hands, just as she had told him.
And, she thought to herself, with him there will never be any need to put my foot down. I could let him go a thousand times, and he would always come back of his own free will. A gift I can never earn or repay. If…if the future between us unfolds as I sense it will, I will have to spend the rest of my life being grateful to him for his free offering of more than I ever could or would ask from him. I will have to spend the rest of my life trying to deserve that, and not failing him. As usual, the thought of needing to help someone else gave her strength, more strength than any attempt to stand up for herself or put her foot down ever could.
After a moment Masha and Manya came bustling back in, laden with food, which was a very welcome sight. They broke out in fluttering apologies about their absence, but Slava, having recovered herself entirely thanks to their relentless desire to serve her, which meant that she must relentlessly try to be the person they thought they were serving, stopped them by saying she was pleased to see they had been down in the kitchens, as she was starving, which prompted them to stop apologizing and start unburdening themselves of their trays.
Just as the food—much more than Slava could have ever possibly eaten by herself—was being set out on the tables in the front room, Olga and Vladislava came in.
“Are we…” said Olga uncertainly.
“No, sit down, sit down,” Slava told them. “You’re not bothering me at all.”
“Was that…?” asked Olga, raising her brows and pointing towards the door to the corridor with her chin.”
“We just saw Boleslav Vlasiyevich in the corridor!” Vladislava informed Slava excitedly. “He had the funniest look on his face! Did you chastise him, Tsarinovna?”
“Tsarina!” Olga corrected her sharply.
“Oh yes, Tsarina. Did you chastise him? Will you punish him?”
“No, why?” asked Slava, trying to convince herself that a child’s avid desire for cruelty was not shining in Vladislava’s eyes at the thought.
“For serving your sister!”
“Serving her was his duty,” said Slava. “I wouldn’t punish someone for doing their duty.”
“And I think he’s already served our Tsarina well enough, and is likely to continue to do so,” said Olga, raising her brows again. “If I were you, Tsarina, I’d keep a man like that around. He could be useful for…all sorts of things.”
“What did he do?” demanded Vladislava.
“He saved us when we were…down there,” Olga told her, stroking her hair, much to Vladislava’s annoyance.
“He didn’t help us at all! Slava was the one who saved us! All he did was fall down!”
“He never hurt us when we were,” Olga swallowed and looked Slava in the eye, making sure that she knew what it had been like, “in the dungeons. He made sure we were gently treated, to the best of his ability, and he never hurt us, even though…even though that’s his job, isn’t it, Tsarina?”
“It was his job,” Slava told her. “Now it is no one’s. Let him think of the defense of the kremlin and my family, and nothing more.”
“Well, that’s good,” said Olga. “After…after being down there, I can’t argue with you, even if others might think you’ve gone soft. Ah, Tsarina, I didn’t mean any offense, of course.”
“None taken,” Slava assured her. “And I am glad to hear what you told me.”
“But Slava saved us!” insisted Vladislava again. “Not Boleslav Vlasiyevich! He just got out of the way by falling down!”
“Well, sometimes that’s the best you can do,” Olga said, her natural cheerfulness reasserting itself as the dungeons were pushed into the back corners of her memory. “Anything else would have caused a bloodbath, like as not, so I’m glad to see he had the wit to take the opportunity when it presented itself. I tell you, Tsarina, if it were me, I’d rather have a man who’s willing to fall down in the face of danger than, say, run away from it.”
“You may be right,” Slava told her. “I will think on your words.”
“I know I’m right, Tsarina.” Olga grinned at her. “And who knew you’d be owing your reign to some man’s wavering, eh? Now there’s a thought to worry over, and no mistake!”
“A piece of irony, indeed,” Slava agreed. “Or perhaps it was all the will of the gods.” The fact that her reign rested on what some might call masculine treachery and inconstancy was an irony not lost on her, and one that was, as Olga had pointed out, rather worrisome. Or perhaps not. Perhaps this was what all those aunts and grannies had meant when they had patted her arm and told her, with many a salacious look and leering grin, that she needed to take in a “bit of a man.” Perhaps she just needed to act a bit more like a man from time to time, or at least accept the misdeeds of the men she had encountered throughout her life, because without them, without all their thoughtlessness and cruelty, she might not have gained the rule of Zem’. Not that she particularly wanted it, but perhaps without all the wrongs that had been done her, she would never have been given this opportunity to do right. Perhaps there was a reason for all of it, or, most likely of all, she realized, this was her opportunity to turn all that foolishness and futility into something that was neither foolish nor futile. She could transmute the dross of pain and petty human problems into something more, if she could find the courage to do so.
“The gods make strange choices, then,” said Olga. “But handsome ones, eh, Tsarina?”
“Oh, indeed.” Slava made herself smile at that. She found she no longer wanted to talk about men, and particularly about Boleslav Vlasiyevich, grateful as she was to have Olga’s unexpected support of him. He seemed like unfinished business, to be put away for a time and brought back out when there was breathing room to contemplate the unexpected—problem? No. Gift? Perhaps—that he had given her. Perhaps next year she and Olga could discuss this again, since Olga, strangely enough, seemed like the most trustworthy confidante for something like this. But then again, Olga had always liked him, for reasons Slava found mysterious. Perhaps her heart, so much blunter and yet so much shrewder than Slava’s fearful and circuitous one, had seen something in him that Slava was yet blind to. It was a thought best filed away for later times, Slava told herself again, and, in order to change the subject, she asked, “Where are the others?”
