I walk barefoot on the ice. It's so cold that my feet are sliced open and bleeding. Red seeps into my footprints. But I don't feel it.
I'm much more concerned with the bullet wounds. Blood seeping from the neat, little holes, trickling through my bodice. Threads ripped from my clothes with my fingers. I gasp for breath, seeing stars. Lightheaded, losing consciousness fast.
I fall to my knees in the snow.
What a pity that I'll ruin such a nice dress.
My stomach, I retch from the poison they'd given me.
"друг, друг, my friend, my friend..." And, oh, how'd they clasped me tightly. Passed round the wine to get my tongue flowing loosely. I'd laughed, thinking I was invincible.
Nobody would mess with the vědma who'd charmed her way into the tsarina's heart, the emperor's bed. Nobody would...
I fall, face-first, into the snow.
"Alexei the one who started it all..." I whisper, seeing his face before I see that of my own children. "I'm sorry I wrote that prophecy. I'm sorry your family had such rotten luck written for them in the stars."
He laughs, begging me to come follow. No longer bedridden. Strong. Healthy blood flowing through his veins. Pumping as he runs and leaps like a fox in the snow.
But I'm so tired, Alexei.
I'm just going to lie down. Just for a bit. We'll play in the morning...
YOU ARE READING
Rasputina and the Witch's Tsar
FantasyThis is the Emperor. I think. Alexandr. Queen Victoria's grandson, the foreign British power. I feel his blood beat, thin, beneath his paper skin, in those blue veins. Something amiss. Something that's too weak in the Russian snow, the turned earth...
