The Tsarina's Legacy

by Jennifer Laam

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  To Melissa and Lou Ann.

  Thanks for getting me started.

  Prologue

  ALEXANDER NEVSKY

  MONASTERY 1774

  A cluttered mind seeks solace in ritual and routine. Grisha reminded himself of this simple truth as he crossed himself and dropped to his knees. How easy it had been to fall away from the world, as though sinking into a bedroll made of the finest down. The monastic order may have resided a short distance from the palace, but it was the difference between heaven and a fatally flawed earth. In this peaceful place, Grisha’s melancholy kept a safe distance. The entrancing smoky sweetness of incense mingled with the aroma of birch-wood fires blazing in hearths. All was stillness and bliss.

  The flickering tips of tapers and tiny oil lanterns illuminated the face on the icon before him. In the vast heaven of holy images, Grisha sought comfort in the steady gaze of St. Catherine, an eternal beauty in her flowing scarlet robes. He felt the divine presence as a reassuring hand on his shoulder, steadying him while whispering seductively in his ear. Lingering on her visage, he began to wonder how St. Catherine might have looked in life, how her shape might have tempted him. Flushed, he lowered his face to avoid stern looks from the monks gathered for prayers.

  As matters stood, the holy brothers barely tolerated Grisha’s presence and were particularly vexed when visitors from court disturbed the simple order of this place, their false voices ringing out sharply amid the holy quiet. The women whispered in his ear, giggled while they fiddled with makeshift head coverings, and fussed over his scruffy beard. The monks tried to avoid these preening intruders. They shuffled their feet at a faster pace as they passed his cell, while messages were slipped into the loose folds of Grisha’s cassock with delicate, persistent hands.

  Grisha accepted the notes reluctantly, reading them by candlelight before the last service of the night. Always the same motif. The empress was distraught and needed him back at court. She was lost without him. Grisha burned the paper in a candle’s dancing flame, taking strange joy in the pinpricks of pain as the fire brushed against his skin. The ashes left smudges on his fingers, like those Catholics bore on their foreheads at the commencement of Lent. The women, though charming in their own rights, could not compete with the path he’d chosen. What fool would return to the empty life of court when he’d found sublimity here?

  As he lowered his head to prostrate himself before St. Catherine, Grisha’s stomach began to rumble. He had grown accustomed to the epicurean delights of the empress’s court, whereas the meals of the monastic order were meager even by the stingiest standards. Of course, there were subtle delights for the senses here as well, a blurry haze of hallowed scents, chiming bells, glistening colors, and gold leaf affixed to wood.

  Footsteps fell softly behind him. Grisha twisted to see who approached. One of the older monks, Vladimir, his robe in disarray, headed in his direction. Vladimir ducked to avoid a low eave that threatened to topple the black kamilavka from his head.

  The monks began a low chant. Still on his knees, Grisha scooted to a side shelf and withdrew one of the new prayer books that still smelled of fresh leather and vellum. No doubt Vladimir merely felt out of sorts over some nonsense or other. Perhaps a stray sister from the nearby convent had flirted with a kitchen boy, or possibly Vladimir simply required assistance in dealing with a cat with a lame paw.

  “Grigory Alexandrovich, you have another visitor. She appears of a high rank.”

  Grisha had received a guest only yesterday and wasn’t yet in the mood for another, no matter her rank. He shook his head, beard tickling his neck. “After my prayers.”

  “You should make an allowance for this guest,” Vladimir insisted, adjusting his lopsided headwear. “The prayers … our Holy Father will understand.”

  “You know this visitor then?”

  “She says her name is Countess Bruce.” Vladimir spoke with the weight of newfound self-importance. “Her carriage bears the imperial insignia.”

  Grisha smiled. The Countess Bruce was one of Catherine’s closest friends. It seemed the empress had grown more desperate. “I shall be pleased to see her,” he told Vladimir, “once my prayers are complete. She may observe if she wishes.” He opened the prayer book and joined the other voices in the singsong liturgy, bobbing his head forward and back in a manner once demonstrated to him by a Talmudic scholar. Vladimir shuffled out of the chamber.

  Grisha tried to absorb the power of the moment, to focus on the rise and fall of voices, the rhythm and flow, and so transcend his flawed earthly self. But his mind wandered. He pondered what urgent matter had driven Countess Bruce to the monastery. Likely he would be regaled with tales of collapsed soufflés at the imperial dessert table and the madness of the latest pretentious twits out to win the empress’s heart.

  Let them try. He had fought to win the enigmatic Catherine’s love for years, since the moment he first saw her astride a stallion, wearing the dark green uniform of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, ready to seize her husband’s throne on an endless white night. She was regal, radiating power, created to rule. Her gaze had sent lightning searing through his chest. He had been born to worship her. It was his destiny.

  But her love? That prize eluded him still.

  Grisha sensed a quiet intake of breath as another lowly corporeal presence entered the holy space. Never mind. He had come to the monastery to commune with the celestial. The countess could wait. Yet even as the brothers reached the end of their chant, the visitor remained silent. Grisha found this odd. Countess Bruce had never been a patient soul. He expected her to clear her throat dramatically and tap the dainty heel of her shoe to steal his attention.

  Grisha glanced behind him. His visitor had a sable cloak drawn close around her shoulders, her face obscured underneath a velvet hood. Tiny hands in leather gloves clutched a prayer book.

  The old wound tore open, piercing his heart. How often had he grasped those dainty hands and begged for a moment of her precious time? How often had he kissed them, declaring his love, heart thumping as Empress Catherine laughed softly in his face?

  “I thought I might join you,” Catherine said quietly, opening the prayer book. “Forgive the deception, but I did not care to call undue attention to my presence.”

  “May I stand?”

  She nodded and he rose to his feet unsteadily. Taking her arm, Grisha guided her from the chapel to the privacy of a narrow corridor and a shadowy alcove. He drew the thin silken drapes shut.

  “Is it wise to cut short your prayers?” Catherine moved closer to him, lowering her hood so that he might see her face in the dim light, her playful features and coy blue eyes. “I should think you of all souls require every last one.”

  “My heart could not freely return to prayer now, Your Majesty.”

  “I am surprised to hear it. I think you hide behind God in this place, use God to punish me. You take refuge here, but it
is a mere gambit to make me jealous.”

  Grisha tried not to stare at the empress. He would lose himself if he did. Then he remembered his own face, the scarring in his left eye forever limiting his vision. He had come to peace with the defect, but not around Catherine. For the empress, he needed to be perfect.

  Attempting to position himself so she might not notice his disfigurement, he turned his attention heavenward. Through the dusty pane of a high window, he spotted the snowy tips of a birch tree quivering in the wind. This was life. Outside in nature. Inside with God. How much time had he wasted already in chilly palace rooms and overheated barracks?

  “I only followed my heart,” he told Catherine.

  She set the prayer book aside and placed a hand firmly on his arm. “Look at me.”

  Catherine was his sovereign. He had no choice but to do as she commanded.

  “Since you abandoned my court, I am threatened from every side. Even Paul…”

  She bowed, hiding her face once more in the shadows. Not that it mattered. Grisha had seen the contempt in her expression often enough when she spoke of her feckless son. Paul worried more over his fussy military parades than the qualities of an enlightened empire: culture, art, expansion, tolerance. Catherine, despite a mother’s natural inclination to make excuses for her child, was all too aware of his shortcomings.

  “Now that he is of age, some would see him rule in my place.”

  Grisha felt his first defenses slipping. After she had spent ten years on the throne, could Catherine’s position be endangered? “Never.”

  “Paul accused me of trying to kill him. My own son! He claimed I ordered glass shattered in his favorite pudding. What nonsense. And yet there are those who listen and whisper.”

  “Some whisper, but none believe.”

  “Paul must not take the throne … not yet,” she amended quickly. “He is not ready.”

  “Anyone can see that,” Grisha said.

  She stroked the length of his beard. He felt like a pet, like one of her greyhounds, and yet he couldn’t help but give in to the comfort of her touch. “You look a fright, my dove,” she teased. “Like a sailor trapped too long on an island after a tempest.”

  He caught the scent of her perfume, floral with a dark hint of musk. “What do you want of me, matushka?” he finally asked.

  Catherine lowered her voice to a whisper, forcing him to incline his head nearer her body. Her fingers shifted, now lightly resting on his neck. “God would not have gifted you with ambition and a taste for politics unless He intended you to use those talents.”

  “I am but a humble soul in need of saving. I have found my place here.”

  “That isn’t fair. How can a mere mortal compete with God?”

  “You were never a mere mortal,” Grisha told her. “You never will be.”

  “I could command you to return, but I ask it instead. As a gesture of your affection.”

  “My affection was rejected again and again. How many times did I tell you I loved you? And yet you kept me at a distance.”

  She removed her hand and looked up at him once more, her bright eyes moistened with tears. He suspected she’d manufactured the tears to toy with his emotions, and yet his heart ached nonetheless.

  “I’m sorry you were hurt,” she told him. “If you return, everything will change. You will have whatever you desire.”

  Everything about Catherine left him helpless and besotted, from the curve of her waist to her intoxicating ambition. Surrounded once again by sensual pleasure, he would change. He would forget the peace he knew here and be at war with himself once more. “I fear for my soul, for what I will become if I return to court.”

  “You are meant to be a man of this world,” she said, eyes flashing. “You are meant to lead armies and build new cities, a new Russia.”

  “You are surrounded by capable men,” he said.

  “Who speak only flattery and act only in fear. I have no use for such men. Russia is at a crossroads, on the threshold of greatness. I need someone who will stand up to me and challenge my decisions if they are misguided.”

  “I am called to a spiritual life. I shall remain here.”

  “Your motherland needs you. What will become of you if you remain in this place?”

  As Catherine spoke, the divine hand slowly lifted from his shoulder. He knew too well what would become of him here. The peace he found so soothing would come to dull his senses until he wasted away. Perhaps God had sent Catherine, not to test his faith, but to show him the right path. A young man with an appetite for life should be of this world—was meant to be of this world.

  Even so, he would not let her victory come too easily, not after all he had suffered at her hands. “I have found God here.”

  “God is on my side, Grigory Alexandrovich. He has drawn me here so that you might see your destiny.” Catherine tilted his chin gently and forced him to look her in the eyes. “You belong to me.”

  That evening, Grisha shaved his beard. A thread of guilt wormed its way through his chest as he watched the long strands fall to the floor, but he was no longer willing to turn his back on the life Catherine offered.

  The imperial carriage returned him to the Winter Palace, jingle bells ringing on the harnesses of eight white stallions as the runners cut through the snow lining the ice-encrusted river. Grisha occupied the apartment below the empress, ascending a spiral staircase to visit her at night. Life meant little without her. It was God’s plan.

  One

  THE WINTER PALACE

  MARCH 1791

  The sharp smell assaulted his senses immediately. Fortunately, Grisha Potemkin had been warned in advance. He tucked his scroll tighter underneath his arm and withdrew a lavender-scented handkerchief from his pocket. The tight breeches and heavy fabric of his European waistcoat felt thick and burdensome against his bloated stomach. Serving in the south, in his own military encampments, he had grown accustomed to silk robes and loose trousers.

  He settled next to a stout cadet in an ill-fitting uniform. The young man gave him a sideways glance and edged slowly away, mopping his broad forehead with a mottled handkerchief. No matter. The opinions of Catherine’s courtiers scarcely fazed him anymore. Seventeen years had passed since he left the monastery and returned to this world. He’d long since ceased to care what anyone thought.

  Except Catherine. Always Catherine.

  Grisha surveyed the crowded salon with his one good eye. Many of the men fidgeted and inched closer to the walls. A few appeared near to forty, while most looked straight out of the Cadet Corps. Catherine had always surrounded herself with youth. Even the chefs in the kitchen were rosy and slim, their youthful metabolisms impervious to decadent preparations. Amid the fresh faces, Grisha spotted a few men even older than him, bodies stiff in formal uniforms, rusting medals and frayed sashes adorning their fragile chests.

  An elderly brigadier, face sun lined and flecked with brown spots, hobbled to a silver samovar and struggled to fill a delicate china cup with hot water.

  “Not too strong this time.” Catherine’s newest favorite, Platon Alexandrovich Zubov, called. He reclined lazily on a richly upholstered chaise longue, long limbs sprawled, nibbling on a wedge of brie. “And don’t forget my pot of raspberry jam. Mishka adores it. Let’s try to keep him happy. We don’t want another accident.”

  Zubov waved at his pet monkey, its clever face surrounded by a cream-colored ruff of fur. The creature’s urine clouded the plush rug, one of many gifts Grisha had presented to Catherine at the close of the first war with the Turks. The rug was woodland green and woven with interlacing curlicues and darkly blossoming roses, a pattern modeled after a concubine’s boudoir in Topkapi Palace. He remembered Catherine’s breath, warm and gentle in his ear, when she thanked him. It is as I said. You were meant to be a man of this world.

  The brigadier passed, attempting to balance Zubov’s tea and jam in each hand. Tucking his scroll in place under his arm, Grisha extended his hand to
take the pot of jam. The old man signaled his gratitude with a weary smile.

  Zubov’s monkey assessed the room, smacking his lips, small eyes glittering. Grisha flexed his hand and tried not to shudder. He had seen that look before, in the eyes of one of his officers while choosing a man to execute, to break the will of the other prisoners.

  At last, the monkey chirped and bounded over to a courtier cringing near the back exit. The creature plucked the freshly powdered silver wig from the man’s head and twirled it in his hand, as though preparing for some exotic ball game. He hoisted the wig up in the air, where it caught on the chain of a crystal chandelier.

  Sputters of nervous laughter erupted from the corners of the room. Zubov choked on his cheese and coughed, handsome features distorted as he worked the food down his throat and laughed. He took a long swallow of wine. “Priceless! Priceless!”

  The men in the room managed a few more chortles. Even the courtier who’d lost his wig tried to smile at his ruined hairpiece. Silver powder scattered on the dark green carpet below.

  The monkey scampered up Zubov’s arm and hopped onto his shoulder. Zubov ran his hand through the creature’s luxuriant fur. Grisha escorted the old man to Zubov’s side table, where he placed the pot of jam next to the tea.

  “Prince Potemkin!” Zubov cried, catching Grisha’s eye. “When did you sneak in?”

  The cadet who had been standing next to Grisha suddenly straightened his back. Grisha realized the young man hadn’t recognized him at first.

  “Your Most Serene Highness,” Zubov intoned. “Field Marshal! Grand Admiral of the Black Sea! Have I learned your titles correctly? It seems the empress enjoys frequently adding to their number.” He fluttered his large hands at Grisha’s medallions and ribbons. “My brain simply cannot keep pace.”

  “Prince of Tauride,” the cadet told Zubov helpfully, using the ancient name for the Crimea.

  Zubov glared at the cadet but kept his voice merry, still reclining as though he hadn’t a care in this world. “We’ve been expecting you, Prince. What kept you?” He cocked an eyebrow imperiously. “Fucking one of your officers’ wives again?”