The Last Days of the Romanov Dancers

by Kerri Turner

  The last word sounded like a challenge. Valentina raised her eyes to meet Maxim’s and they stared at each other for a moment.

  Eventually, she nodded. ‘Right.’ Her tone was soft, compliant.

  With a sharp tug on her arm, Maxim pulled her down the corridor. Neither of them said goodbye to Luka. He waited another moment after they’d disappeared from sight; he wanted to make sure he was alone before he dared to move again.

  Once sure of his solitude, he stepped into the flower-strewn dressing room. He kneeled and picked up a couple of soft pink petals, rubbing them between forefinger and thumb. He couldn’t tell what kind of flowers they were, but by the sheer number of petals he was sure it had been an expensive bouquet. He ran his fingers through the mess, searching for the card he knew must be there somewhere. The edge of his hand brushed against something thin and hard; he barely had to read it to know it was from Maxim. It contained the usual generic congratulations a ballerina of Mathilde’s status would expect.

  Luka stood up and ran his finger along the edge of the card, staring at the wreckage of the bouquet that had accompanied it. Such a small thing to get upset over, and such a violent reaction.

  Valentina chewed the inside of her cheek as she followed Maxim away from Mathilde’s dressing room. Her shoulders hurt from where he’d dug his fingers into them, but she paid it no mind. She’d learned that Maxim’s temper rose quickly, blowing in like a snowstorm no one saw coming, but it also disappeared just as quickly, leaving little trace that it had ever been there in the first place. It was an uncomfortable but fleeting price to pay for the kind of influence and roles she could never have got by relying on her talent alone. Besides, it had been her fault really. She should have told him about Mathilde’s patriotic wish not to receive flowers. Of course, there had been the announcements in the newspapers. But Maxim wrote for the newspapers; he couldn’t be expected to read them too.

  ‘Where’s your cape?’ Maxim said abruptly, stopping.

  ‘My cape?’ She’d been wearing a sable fur cape earlier, but it wasn’t around her shoulders now. ‘I must have left it in my dressing room before … before we went to Mathilde’s room. I’m sorry. I’ll fetch it. It won’t take me a moment.’

  ‘No.’ He stilled her with one hand. ‘I’ll go. You wait here.’

  He kissed her on the cheek; his lips were cool even though his skin was still flushed. Valentina could tell he was already coming off his temper. By the time they got to the party he would be back to his usual self, probably suffering remorse for the way he’d spoken to her.

  She leaned against a wall as she waited for Maxim to return, absent-mindedly practising some petits battements. Her movements were restricted by her heeled boots, but she didn’t really notice. She was too busy remembering Luka’s expression. He was too young to understand what life was like for a man of Maxim’s status; how quickly it could all crumble if he made even one wrong move. She hoped Luka would have the decency to keep what he’d witnessed to himself. If he didn’t and Maxim found out, the shame of it would be almost too much for him to bear. And much of the blame would land on Valentina.

  Luka was placing the card on Mathilde’s dressing table when a voice made him start. ‘That doesn’t belong to you.’

  He turned to see Maxim Sergeivich leaning in the doorway, a woman’s fur cape draped over one arm. His face was shadowed by the doorframe and Luka was glad he couldn’t see his expression.

  ‘I know, I was just returning—’

  ‘What is it you think you saw tonight?’

  Luka faltered. They both knew what he had seen. Did Maxim want him to detail it, or was he looking for a way to forestall damage to his reputation? Luka chose his next words carefully.

  ‘I suppose I saw something that isn’t my business.’

  ‘Close, but incorrect.’

  Maxim took a step into the dressing room. Luka had expected his face to be contorted into fury, as it had been during his confrontation with Valentina; but it was cool and detached, that superior glint Luka disliked so much lighting his eyes. The impulse to step back gripped him, but he resisted.

  ‘You saw nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’ Luka couldn’t keep the disdain from his voice.

  Maxim’s lips twisted into a wolfish smile. ‘You are still so new to this world. It would be a shame for one so promising to find himself released from his contract.’

  The earth began to fall away beneath Luka’s feet. His breathing quickened, and his fingers reached for the bench behind him to steady himself. Maxim didn’t really have the power to do that. Did he?

  ‘You know Valya wouldn’t be with me if I didn’t have the power to influence the ballet,’ Maxim said. He ran two fingers over his moustache, his gaze fixed on Luka. It seemed he wanted an answer.

  Luka swallowed, willing his throat not to stick, his voice not to shake. Fear and loathing were battling inside him, but he didn’t want this man to know he had rattled him.

  ‘I saw nothing.’

  Maxim laughed. Of course he knew he’d rattled Luka. The predatory edge dropped from his smile; he had what he wanted now. He reached forward, making Luka flinch, but all he did was slide the card off Mathilde’s dressing table and pocket it. He turned away, the heels of his shoes loud in the empty space, then paused in the doorway.

  ‘Oh, and Malysh? There’s no need for Valya to ever know about our little tête-à-tête. Not unless you want to encounter an unfortunate accident which will damage your precious dancer’s feet beyond repair.’

  Luka’s jaw tightened so much he thought his teeth might break. He was burning with rage towards this man: for his threat to undo all of Luka’s dreams on a whim, and for the cowering fear he’d incited. He managed to choke out a sound that Maxim took as an affirmative.

  ‘Good boy.’

  Luka had to stop himself from hurling one of Mathilde’s unwanted bouquets at the man’s retreating back.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Winter 1915

  Xenia sat smiling between Luka and his father in the troika, her legs tucked under the seal fur coverlet Luka had given her to keep warm, hands hidden in an ermine muff. The buildings around them, normally stained black from the factory chimneys, had taken on a new beauty under the crisp snow. People were everywhere. Most were on foot, and Luka watched them through the cloudy mist of his own breath, reminded of Christmases past. His family had never been able to afford transport, instead trudging over the icy roads, the noise of the crowds around them amplifying their own silence. Luka wished Pyotr were here to experience this. From his comfortable spot in the troika, he was able for the first time to truly enjoy the spectacle of Petrograd’s midnight streets blanketed in snow, yet alive and swarming with crowds. The view reminded him of the Kingdom of the Shades in La Bayadère, where the entire female corps came onto a blue-lit stage in frothy tutus and slowly performed a series of repeated lilting steps—posé arabesque, fondu—over and over again until the stage was covered with a snow-white swaying crowd.

  The sleigh jostled Luka closer to Xenia, and the warmth of her skin seemed to filter through her heavy coat to his own. As he watched the steam rising from the flanks of the three side-by-side horses before them and breathed in their earthy, hard-working smell, Luka felt that perhaps the world wasn’t such a bad place after all. Their prayers would be heard, and the men would come back from the war victorious, his brother among them. Pyotr would find a way to make him laugh at Maxim’s threats and they’d fade into nothing more than a distant, unpleasant memory. Food would become plentiful, and Russia would be at peace. On a night like this, it could almost be believed. It was, after all, a night for miracles.

  Initially, Luka had regretted asking his father if Xenia, whose own family was ill and therefore off-bounds to someone in the Imperial Russian Ballet, could spend the Christmas celebrations with them. But his father had warmed to Xenia after she spoke about her own father being at the front—oblivious to the fact that he was in the artillery depa
rtment and not likely to see a day of fighting. He hadn’t snapped when Xenia had taken over setting the table with the white tablecloth, hay, candle and pagach. Perhaps he’d been glad of her presence to fill the gap left by Pyotr. They had made the blessings and thanksgiving with quiet solemnity, and when the time came to break their fast, his father had refrained from declaring that it was greedy and wasteful to serve all twelve of the traditional dishes in this time of shortage. Luka had paid triple the usual price for the food, but as they’d dined on slow-cooked beans, mushroom soup, fresh dates, figs, nuts and kutya, washed down with wine so dark it stained their lips, he’d thought it a worthy way of giving thanks for all this year had brought him.

  The troika lurched to a stop near the red-brick façade of the Temperance Church of the Resurrection of Christ, and Luka stepped down, his ankles disappearing into the snow. He could smell the ice in the Obvodny Canal behind. He reached up to help Xenia, but she was already being handed down on the other side by his father. Luka was surprised the old man remembered chivalry. He’d always been gentle towards his wife, but Luka had thought it a result of her influence. Her kindness had been infectious even to the most hardened of souls.

  The church’s wide interior was bare of ornamentation, and the overhead concrete arches supporting the central cupola lent an appropriate gravity to the occasion. The pews were only filled to halfway up the nave, and Luka realised the worshippers were mostly women, children and old men. Xenia’s hand slipped into his to give it a reassuring squeeze, and he wondered if she had noticed too.

  They slid into one of the pews, the hard wooden seat cold beneath their legs even through their clothing. Luka was making sure Xenia was comfortable and didn’t see the woman standing before him at first. It was Xenia’s odd expression, a widening of her eyes as the corners of her mouth tightened, that made him look around.

  The woman was dressed in a worn sheepskin shuba, and Luka knew instinctively she was a factory worker. She had that perpetually underfed hollowness to her face and a lack of hope in her eyes that made her fit in with this crowd in a way Luka no longer did. He offered her a smile, wondering if perhaps she had seen him dance and wanted to say hello. It would be the first time anyone had ever recognised him and it coming from the area he’d grown up in would be some kind of validation. But the smile died as he saw what she held in her hands, and his stomach flipped like he might vomit. It was a white feather, so like the one he’d handed to Valentina at Mathilde’s country house. But this was not a symbol of a dream waiting to be fulfilled.

  The woman silently held the feather out. Trembling, Luka lifted one hand. Xenia put her hand on his arm, trying to stop him, but he didn’t hesitate. With face burning and insides emptier than they’d ever been despite the earlier feast, he took the feather. The woman took her seat, and Luka lowered the feather into his lap. His eyes prickled, but he would not let any tears fall.

  ‘You shouldn’t have accepted it,’ his father growled.

  ‘Why not? It’s true, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s not her position to say so.’

  The fact his father hadn’t disagreed with the woman didn’t escape Luka. The service began and he kept his head bowed; not giving thanks, but looking at the symbol of cowardice that had been bestowed on him.

  As soon as they left the church, Xenia snatched the feather out of Luka’s hand and thrust it into the snow, where it got lost among the sea of white. But she couldn’t rid him of his shame, which was a greasy layer coating his insides. The ride back home had lost all its magic. The feather was burned on his palms, and he kept checking them for welts. No one spoke until they were almost home, when his father broke the thick silence.

  ‘Have you received a letter from your brother recently?’

  Luka sensed the concern underneath the casual tone. He tried to think back to the last time he’d got word from Pyotr. ‘Not for a number of weeks. Why?’

  His father scratched at his beard; his eyes were scrunched, but was that fear Luka saw lurking within them? ‘I haven’t heard from him since then either.’

  The troika came to a stop. Luka was shivering, but he didn’t move from his seat. Neither did his father.

  ‘I’m sure it’s not easy getting letters out,’ Xenia said in a quiet voice. ‘Or perhaps he’s even on his way home.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ His father dismounted.

  Ugly thoughts were trying to creep into Luka’s mind. He hadn’t questioned the long stretch since Pyotr’s last letter for he knew his brother wrote to their father more often. But to know that he hadn’t written to him either … it was impossible not to think of the horror stories from the front, the increasing number of deaths being reported every week. Enemy bullets competed with frostbite and starvation to steal a soldier’s life first. His chest was tight, and Luka distracted himself by paying the man he’d rented the troika from, then headed inside. His father was stomping snow off the valenki that had been a Christmas gift from Luka. Snatching up the bottle of vodka Xenia had given him, he nodded to their guest. ‘That’s me finished for the night.’ He clambered up the few rickety wooden steps to the platform on top of the stove, and pulled the curtain closed with a hacking cough.

  ‘Spokoynoy nochi,’ Xenia called after him.

  She stood next to the stove as Luka silently lit it. He would have liked to have left it burning while they were out so they’d have a warm room to come back to, but his father hadn’t had enough coal. Luka had offered to go out to buy some, but was told in a sharp voice that if any were readily available Vladimir would have bought it himself.

  ‘I look a wreck, don’t I?’ Xenia said softly. She put a hand to her hair, smoothing down the dark strands that had come up when she’d taken off her rabbit-fur turban.

  ‘Not at all.’ Luka took the hat from her and placed it on the table. He removed his own coat, lost in thoughts that were too bleak to share.

  ‘You seem withdrawn,’ Xenia said, surveying him with concern. ‘Is it your brother?’

  Luka nodded, and tugged off his gloves to warm his hands on the stove. Even this small action pierced him with guilt, knowing there would be no hot stoves for Pyotr and the other men at the front.

  He lowered his voice so his father wouldn’t hear, even though he’d begun a slight, rattling snore. ‘Xenia, do you look down on me for not going to fight in the war?’

  She sighed, and Luka hated the look of pity on her face. ‘Damn that feather and the silly woman who gave it to you. Don’t pay any attention to it.’

  ‘Why not? Even before she gave it to me, I’ve been struggling with myself. Why should I be exempt because of my talent for dance? Why don’t I volunteer anyway, like a good patriot?’

  ‘Luka, don’t you think that if they needed more men out there, they’d call for them? That not even the ballet could prevent you being conscripted then?’

  ‘I suppose so. But my father says—’

  ‘Your father has high notions about how this country should work. That doesn’t mean they’re right, or even possible.’ Xenia rubbed her hands together, chafing the cold out of them. ‘There’s nothing to say that you won’t be conscripted anyway. Perhaps you’ve been given this time as a gift.’

  ‘What for, though?’ He wanted to believe what she was saying, but it was difficult when he couldn’t think of one reason why he should be granted such a gift when others weren’t.

  ‘I didn’t say the gift was just for you …’

  Luka stared at her, trying to understand what she meant.

  A loud chorus of song interrupted the quiet moment, followed by an answering cough from his father.

  ‘Kolyadki,’ Xenia murmured, her dark lashes fluttering with amusement. She grabbed Luka’s hand and pulled him to the apartment’s single tiny window.

  Luka pushed it open to the freezing night air, hoping the creak of the hinges wouldn’t disturb his father. He was lucky to have a window—not many others in the building did. He and Xenia pressed themselves together so
they could both peer at the ground below. A group of women dressed in costumes to resemble manger animals stood there singing carols, as Xenia had guessed.

  As they watched, Luka was conscious of Xenia still holding his hand. Hers was delicate and warm in his, and when the time came to pull away so he could throw a few coins down to the singers, he was reluctant to do so. The coins collected and their thanks shouted up, the singers trailed away. Luka pulled the window shut once more, blocking out the frost. He could still hear the women’s voices travelling across the frozen night air.

  When he turned around it was to find Xenia watching him, her eyes unreadable. The intensity of her gaze made him flustered.

  ‘Will you be … That is, I don’t think you should go. Home. Tonight, I mean.’ Almost immediately he realised his words could be misunderstood and rushed to correct them. ‘I mean, it’s so cold out there. And it’s almost three o’clock. I don’t think it would be safe for you to go back to your apartment at this time of night. We’ve already seen how on edge people are, and in such fine clothes you won’t entirely blend in …’

  ‘Why Luka, are you worried about me?’ Xenia teased. She was standing so close to him now that her long skirt brushed against his trouser legs.

  ‘Of course I am. I …’ Luka didn’t know what to say next. He stared at her pink face, the heat from the stove finally beginning to seep through his clothes, and felt an urge to lean in closer. He struggled with himself; the food and wine, his father’s unusual lack of resentment, and his desire to push away the memory of the white feather were addling his mind. He shouldn’t do anything stupid.

  ‘If I don’t go home, where will I stay?’ she said softly.

  Luka wondered if she could possibly be thinking the same thing he was.

  ‘I sleep on the floor when I stay here.’ He gestured as if Xenia wasn’t able to see the floor for herself. ‘It’s not as warm as on top of the stove, of course, but it’s quite comfortable with a few blankets and pillows.’