"Night is not something to endure until dawn. It is an element like wind or fire. Darkness is its own kingdom; it moves to its own laws, and many living things dwell in it."
- Patricia A. McKillip
Kate had dreaded her walk with Fyodor not because she didn't want to spend time with him... but because she didn't want to be alone with him. She knew that in this moment of awkwardness after their fight, she was vulnerable to whatever trickery Fyodor might play. She didn't trust him fully after that stunt, how could she?
She wore a simple dress, hoping it would get cold quickly and Fyodor would return her to the house sooner than anticipated. She knew it was wrong for her to think that way, but she did so despite her reluctance. She sighed deeply as she watched her reflection stare back at her in the mirror. She would have to play nice for today since she couldn't even go anywhere else if she wanted to.
She wanted to know more details about Fyodor's arrangement involving her. What exactly did it mean? She was supposed to be staying with him, but did this confine her only to the walls of his home? Was she permitted to move freely by her own decision? And should she choose to breach this contract, what would be the consequence? She had all these questions and no answers; she hoped to get some out of him today.
When the knock sounded upon her door, she knew it was time to finally face him. She walked over and opened the door, looking up at the face of Ivan. He was a pleasant surprise.
"Ivan, what are you doing here?" She asked, her brows furrowing together slightly.
"Master has sent me to fetch you from your room. He is downstairs, waiting for you." Ivan moved out of the doorway, allowing her the opportunity to walk in front of him should she choose to. She looked at him expectantly, cueing him to walk ahead of her.
As she followed behind him, she bit her tongue to prevent herself from asking Ivan questions. However, as they drew nearer to the bottom of the staircase, she couldn't hold back any longer.
"Ivan?" She stopped as she called for his attention.
"Yes?" He turned and also stopped when he noticed her stationary position.
"Does Fyodor tell you about his work?" She asked, trying to both get information and lead into her other questions.
"Only when it benefits him for me to know." He responded, nodding his head slightly.
"When he added me into the contract, were you aware of this?" She asked, knowing she would cover up her true intentions of spying on them very well.
"I was not, he decided the negotiations and then kept them to himself. I, of course, didn't ask questions of master." Ivan answered.
"If you had known, you wouldn't have told me; I'm very aware of your allegiances. However, what would you have thought of it? What would you have thought of your master throwing me into the deal like that? Don't hold back, I know you know everything that goes on in this house." She stared down at him from a higher step.
"Master knows what is best for us, even if we don't see it at first. He wouldn't use us without purpose. If we are still being used then that means we are still valuable. It's beautiful, isn't it?" Ivan smiled in admiration as he spoke of Fyodor. Kate couldn't ignore the way that Ivan's eyes seemed to sparkle and his entire complexion seemed to glow as he spoke of his master.
"I believe Fyodor is still waiting for us." Was all she could respond with as she couldn't answer the question for herself.
Value is given to things by their usefulness. Money has a high value because of how useful it is to the world. Smartphones have value because they are useful. Kate had realised that this was true for people too; Employees will be seen as good and valuable employees by how useful they are to the business and the employer. Everything has to be useful or else it has no meaning.
Kate had been forced to prove herself to be valuable for her entire life, she couldn't lose her meaning. She had to be good at everything she did or else her value as a Chopin (the youngest of the siblings in fact) would also decrease. Her public image would go down and she would bring bad publicity and shame to her family name. She constantly had the pressure to be useful.
Ivan's logic wasn't flawed to her, in fact, it made so much sense that it scared her quite a bit. If she wasn't the first person to realise that, it meant she had even more pressure on her to be perfect and prove herself. Kate was constantly trying to prove she still had value, that was her purpose for living. Should she lose this purpose, she would lose all will to live. Perhaps, that was how Fyodor would get her, he would make her useful to him and give her life a new sense of value.
When they finally reached the sitting room where Fyodor was, he was anxiously pacing back and forth. He stopped once Ivan entered, followed by Kate. My God, how beautiful she always looked. If there was one thing she always made him jealous of (of which there were many things) it was her beauty. She always outshone him with just her beauty alone. She was perfectly dressed for every occasion that he could possibly throw at her.
"Kate, you look..." He breathed out, unable to find a word that could possibly compare to her beauty.
"Fyodor." She nodded her head with a tight-lipped smile in her attempt to greet him. Fyodor's face instantly fell at this sight.
When he first met this extraordinary woman, he wanted nothing more than to get this reaction from her; disgust, hatred, contempt-- all towards him. Now that he had this reaction, he wished he had never seen it at all. She had begun to change, yes, but this kind of change wasn't for Fyodor's benefit. How could he ever find it in his heart to use her when he had become so attached to her?
"Kate, I... I'm very grateful for the opportunity you've given to me to prove myself. I hope I might be able to regain your trust someday soon." He spoke in complete sincerity for the very first time that Kate had ever seen from him. It caught her off guard quite a bit.
"I..." Kate struggled to find words.
What could she say? She didn't want to let him know that she truly wanted him to regain her trust, that would be too easy for him to let him off the hook like that. She also didn't want to lie and be overly mean. She felt a bit stuck but thankfully, Ivan spoke up.
"Shall I expect you two home for lunch?" He asked, looking between them for an answer.
Kate took notice of this action, reading deeper into it. On any normal occasion, Ivan would have simply asked Fyodor and not even bothered to look in Kate's direction for an answer. This meant that Ivan was growing to trust Kate, and respect her even.
Fyodor also took notice of this action. To him though, this meant that those around him had noticed that Kate was more important to Fyodor than anyone else leading up to this moment. Fyodor was the one who was supposed to be the sole master of Ivan, so the action that Ivan would consider Kate's answer meant he had begun to see her as the lady of the house-- Fyodor's lady. Fyodor was quite unsure how he felt about this, he didn't want Kate to mean more to him than someone to use up until she no longer had a purpose for him.
Fyodor was a man who had been abandoned as a boy by all those whom he ever loved. The very word scared him. Love. It was a cruel word to him, something only temporary. He didn't want to admit his love for those around him because then they would leave him too; he wouldn't be able to handle it... not again. Fyodor too was broken, although he would never admit it openly.
"I don't think so, but we'll have to see, won't we?" He smiled at Kate.
"Yes, we'll have to see." She nodded her head, wishing she wasn't agreeing with him.
Ivan simply nodded his head and opened the door for the pair. Fyodor stepped out first and held his hand out for her. Kate took a deep breath before stepping out of the house and grasping onto his hand and bandaged fingers. The pair began walking into the city square where everything was located.
While they held hands, Kate couldn't help but take notice of the way his bandaged fingertips felt on her hands. They were a bit rough and scratchy from the material of the tape around the bandages. Not to mention his hands were cold, they often were. Her fingers brushed his bandages out of curiosity. He took notice and looked down at her.
"You want to ask me about them?" He asked, raising a knowing brow.
"I'm sorry?" She asked, looking at him with wide eyes.
"My bandages, you wish to ask why I have them, do you not?" He clarified, making her red with his question.
"It's alright, questions such as those are rude." She shook her head slightly, looking away.
"Rude? It's not rude to satisfy your curiosity." He scoffed, shaking his head.
"Very well, why are your cold, slender vampire fingers always bandaged?" She asked, stopping to pull her hand away and look at him. He only stared at her, mouth agape.
"That's not what I meant when I said you could ask..." He looked away with a disturbed expression.
"I only used adjectives while asking. Now, what's rude is not answering a question given to you by someone of a higher class." She raised her chin towards the air, once again showing her more hostile and stuck-up side. She only truly used this when she was tired and upset, he had known that by now.
"I bite the tips of my fingers when I'm stressed or nervous... And since I'm sickly, my skin breaks easily." He answered, almost rolling his eyes. She looked at him with regret.
She had truly been so mean to him when he stood before her so vulnerable and actually trying? How cruel of her. Kate had never been one to be unkind to those who surrounded herself, especially since she knew nothing of their origins. She treated everyone as equally as she could, and yet here she was failing to uphold that honour.
Truthfully, Kate felt guilty for her upbringing. She had a nice home, lots of money, and endless amounts of privilege. What was there to complain about? She couldn't say that she felt suffocated when she lived on such a large estate, there was always somewhere for her to go. She couldn't say that she felt immense pressure because she wasn't the first in her family to try and get into college, she didn't have that type of pressure. All of her struggles were the ones that were silent to everyone else but it certainly didn't feel like struggling, it felt like she was complaining, and Kate was taught not to complain.
Because of this train of thought, she knew that others went through struggles silently as well. That was where she began her promise to herself that she wouldn't be unkind to those around her. She just couldn't when she had all of that experience. Be kind to everyone you meet because you never know what people are going through. That was the kind of person Kate tried to be and here with Fyodor, she had failed tremendously. She never once asked why he did the things he did or what had happened in his past. Perhaps this was time for her to start anew with him. After all, what more did she truly have to lose?
She had feared conversing with him in this way because she was a spy. She didn't want to seem suspicious or as though she were prying for information. She had heard many stories of colleagues getting caught that way. She was supposed to be the best so she couldn't possibly get caught in such an obvious and generic way-- she wasn't supposed to get caught at all. She was the one person trusted with the monstrous task of spying on Fyodor Dostoevsky AND The Guild. Her plate was full and her eyes were big but her appetite was nearly nonexistent at this point.
She had endured this darkness hovering over her for far too long, she would push past the storm clouds by asking him the unexpected questions.
"Can you tell me about you? I want to know everything." Her voice had a different edge to it, Fyodor noticed it right away. She sounded much less timid, repressed, and instead sounded sure of herself. He didn't know what brought on this change or why she even cared to know about his past, but at this point, he didn't care-- his Kate was back.
"Where should I start?" A smile found its way onto his lips.