Rasputina and the Witch's Tsar

Chapter Forty-Three

I knock on the door at midnight, wearing a black coat with thread loose at the sleeves. An eggshell-colored evening dress whose arms feel tight and the hemline scratchy with lace. Black stockings beneath. It's out of fashion now. I'm out of fashion, it seems. More of a cheap trick than any fearsome magician.

The night is cold, and I cough into my sleeve as I wait to be let in. A faceless servant ushers me through the polished halls of the Moika Palace, walking towards a door. Dust motes twinkle in the light like emaciated fireflies. Felix Yusupov's pale face enters the unflattering light. A smile peels back his eyes as he takes me in.

"What?" I stare back into his gaze, refusing to allow him to see me in weakness. "Am I a sight for sore eyes, Prince Yusupov?"

"Please, call me Felix. My wife is on a first-name basis with you, isn't she?" His grin never wavers. Perhaps I am not the only one unused to entertaining in human company. "I hear you have passion for drink, my friend, unlike what most ladies have."

"I am not like most people." I respond, still not backing down from his gaze.

He holds his hand out with a flourish, "please. I know cellars can get drafty, but I've fitted the wine cellar with a table and fine chairs, carved with solid Russian trees and hands. And the wine..." A twinkle in his eye as he says this.

I do not back down from the challenge. "You think I fear a little cold?" I lean in close, my own lips peeled back in a snarl. "Not even death can kill me."

His grin, finally, falters. I take that as a victory. "You misspeak. Perhaps the cold's gotten further than you think."

"I know what I say."

He follows me into the cellar. I sling my black coat over the back of a chair, and an embarrassed servant rushes it out of the room. The table is squat, the chairs upholstered and embroidered with splashes of color. A serving cloth covered in tassels and plates heaped high with cakes and fruit. Candles hang from the wall, wax dripping as they frame the face of a man in a portrait, watching me.

I take a seat and the prince follows.

He points to the cakes. "Go on, my friend. Eat."

I scoff at the empty glasses. "Irina said there would be wine."

He laughs. "Irina says a lot of things, she's just a silly—." His joke dies in his throat as I glower at him. "Please. I've eaten plenty. Try some."

I look at the tray, the honey and powdered sugar glistening. My stomach rumbles. Nothing but liquids for the majority of the day. Food looks so unappetizing when your children should have less.

Prince Yusupov leans close. "I apologize for everything that was done to you, Maria." He exhales sharply. "Irina told me everything you had suffered. I knew nothing."

"You're right, you know nothing of what exile is like. Ridicule. Getting spit on and stabbed—."

"You are skeletal." He says, gazing into my eyes. "A mere ghost of what you were. Do not go so easily, Ms. Rasputina." He pushes the plate at me. "Eat. You need your strength to fight them."

"Fight who?"

He leans back, pointing at himself. The servant in the corner. "Every royal, pompous male who denies you your right. Your fire. Your spark to lead." He claps and a servant takes a bottle of rich Madeira wine, filling glass after glass. "You are better than all of them, Maria. Or maybe..." and here he pauses, "Irina was wrong to see that fight in you."

I take a tea cake, a tiny thing, barely longer than my thumb, and bite into it like it's the flesh of my enemies. Tearing into it like I, too, am nothing more than a hellhound meant to exact justice. He grins, tipping his own glass gently against his lips. "There." I wipe at my mouth, tearing into the feast. "Don't think I eat like a royal bastard. Dainty. I traveled the world. I crossed sands and oceans because I thought I was chosen." I drink deeply of the wine, wanting the world to spin into oblivion. "Chosen for what?"

"For greatness?" The pale prince offers.

I drink two more glasses, supplementing the sweet bitterness with scalding tea, and throw my plate down. "To be remembered." I confess.

Still watching me with that curious gaze, the prince seems frightened, almost shocked. His eyes bore into mine, running across the length of my body. "How could it not... It should have worked..."

I look down at the crumbs on my skirts, rubbing them away. "What is wrong, my prince? Are my words too venomous for you today?"

Poison. He's trying to see if the poison's working.

"You will regret this, you witch. You demon!" He sprints up the stairs, his servant sealing the door behind him. Locking me down here to face my fate.

I collapse into the chair, wondering what other horrors the prince has planned for me. I stare up at the cross. In the Holy Book, the son of a deity went almost happily to his gruesome death. Am I, the one called witch across all of Russia, to do the same?