Dmitrii's palace was a sturdy stone tower that had seen a few centuries to float by. It had a grace of its own, but it made me miss the sky bound woodwork of the monastery.
There was another disadvantage to the stonework: when Besson stepped inside, the draft that touched his neck was so cold, it must have lingered inside since February. The chattering of his teeth carried through the cavernous interior as well, despite the rugs. I'd been to cathedrals with lesser acoustic qualities.
The reception Prince Shuiskii received had the same stony quality.
Tsarina Maria slumped in her gilded chair, flanked by her equally grim-faced brothers, Mikhail and Grigorii. The size of the hall dwarfed the two men despite their bull-like builds. The rest of Maria's trusted retainers, decked in pearl-and-gold sewn robes, overshadowed her instead of imparting grandeur. Yet, the aura of despair coated their shoulders too, thicker and blacker than the furs on display.
Maria boasted a flaxen braid and translucent cheeks, alternating between scarlet and ashen in time with her breathing. Her eyes, on the opposite, lost much of their natural color—cerulean blue, unless I missed my guess—from crying. But once I subtracted the toll taken by grief...
Wow! I whistled.. Wow, that's a real tsarina for you!
Tsar Ivan favored swarthy women since his second wife, a Tatar woman.
If he had a type and made an exception for this girl, I get it.
Besson scrunched his face. They... they say Maria's appearance reminded him of his first and beloved one, Anastasia. Maybe the old apostate sought to find the peace Anastasia used to instill in his sinful soul.
Maria interrupted Besson's charitable thoughts. She pointed a shaking finger right at my unfortunate friend. Her eyes regained all the color, lost to tears, and blazed brighter than gems. "Villain! Murderer!"
Besson staggered behind his uncle's back to break contact with tsarina's maddened gaze.
Leave him be! My shout merely echoed through Besson's mind.
Uncle Vasilii's arm shot backward, unerringly found Besson's collar and shoved him toward the nearest bench.
"Sit and scribe," he growled under his breath.
Besson blinked, reorienting himself to find a bench in the farthest corner, shuffled to it, and set out his writing implements. That done, he slumped and kept his gaze on the paper, on his quill's pointy tip, on the swirl of ink in the inkwell... basically anything inanimate.
"Take a longer counsel before shouting accusations at my sister's son, Maria," Uncle Vasilii spoke in a quiet, scary tone. "Your wild outcry had already roused the rubble. Three youths of good behavior and of honest families lay dead."
Maria opened her mouth, but he overrode whatever retort she might have had, forcing everyone in the room to bend their ear and listen to the heavy fall of his words.
"The same grim fate had befallen eleven other men of various stations on your instigations. Dmitrii was sired from Rurik's mighty seed, but he was a child. Did it take fourteen men to subdue him?"
Uncle Vasilii eyed each of his would-be opponents, one after another. None dared to open his mouth. It was uncanny, as if he had more gravity than everyone else in the room combined.
"No argument? I'm glad we agreed," he said.
Maria shook from head to toe.
"Cowards," she hissed at her menfolk before straightening to face Uncle Vasilii. "It took many more men than fourteen."
"How many and how did they accomplish this attack?"
She rearranged the veil, draping her head under the coronet. "First, they sent the poison, but the Almighty Lord taught me to employ a knowledgeable physician. His amulet saved my son from that harm. But they came again. They came, and they finished the job. They did... they did..." Her control broke, releasing the sobs she was choking back.
"They!" Prince Vasilii exclaimed once the solemn silence re-established itself in the hall. "Do you refer to the fourteen boys and men killed on your orders?"
No matter how much Besson flexed his numb fingers, his letters were coming out crooked. It was this chilly in the Prince's hall, despite the burning candles and a smelly hide of a monstrous brown bear strewn under his feet. Nothing could warm this hollow place.
Mikhail and Grigorii, the Tsarina's brothers, bent in unison to whisper into her ears, but she pushed herself forward, fingers white on the chair's armrests. Those were oak wood, carved into a semblance of magic birds, so it made me think of her fingers as talons.
"Godunov," she screeched. "I mean the godless dog, the Tatar spawn, the apostate! Godunov and his cronies!"
After she decried the regent as a poisoner, Maria slumped back breathless.
Just as she lost her vivacity, her brothers sprung to life.
"The physician, that's who is to blame! He whispered into our sister's ear with Satan's voice," Grigorii said. He was my namesake, but I didn't like his squint, nor the scowl half-hidden by his bushy beard.
"Maddened by grief, out of pity for a mother who'd lost her child, we listened to his treasonous words!" Mikhail added.
The trusted noblemen bobbed their heads sagely. A chorus of muttered agreement rippled through the room, while Tsarina lay limply in her gilded chair, breathing heavier than I would after running three miles. I almost pitied her, for if they didn't rehearse it behind her back, I'd eat my socks after running those three miles.
Why doesn't your uncle just squish this sorry lot? He's Prince Shuiskii and stuff. It's a big deal, right?
Tsar Fedor wants to govern fairly after terrors unleashed by his father.
If I had a jaw, it would hang. Either Besson was romanticizing Fedor, or he was an exception in the uninterrupted line of despots, stretching as far back as I could see.
Meanwhile, Uncle Vasilii smiled so widely, I could count his teeth. "Do you speak of the physician who treated Prince Dmitrii's seizures?"
Maria jerked upright again, but Mikhail and Grigorii cried in unison before she could speak."Yes, Prince Vasilii Ivanovich, yes. That's him! The villain! The apostate!"
"The physician did no harm to my son!" Maria glared at her brothers. "Boriska Godunov sits in Moscow and weaves schemes against me! That's who killed Dmitrii."
Uncle Vasilii hooded his eyes, appearing to be deep in thought. "The Regent Boris Godunov is our beloved Tsar's most trusted advisor."
The brothers and the noblemen's faces showed such awe, you would have thought Uncle Vasilii had revealed a cure for cancer.
"Tsar Fedor loved his half-brother Dmitrii dearly. Loved him almost as much as he would have loved a son of his own body, if our Lord would have blessed his marriage to Irina Godunova with children. He would understand your grief and be merciful if you show remorse over your lawlessness."
Besson scribbled furiously, controlling the quiver in his hands. His thoughts ranged freely, reading between the lines. I combed through those secret messages in his head, because none of it went on the paper.
Tsar Fedor, uncle Vasilii hinted, was married to Irina Godunova, Boris Godunov's sister. While their marriage remained childless, Dmitrii was born of a morganatic marriage, not sanctified by the Holy Church. He was a bastard as far as Moscow was concerned.
That's why Dmitrii had never been crowned as Fedor's successor, but removed to Uglich with his mother, far away from the seat of power.
The ancient custom in Ivan's line was that a brother succeeded a brother before a son, particularly when a son was a minor, let alone a bastard. Godunov was a man in his prime, well-respected and the tsar's brother by marriage. He was the heir apparent, rather than Dmitrii.
Bereft of her precious son, Maria could only hope to use his death to gain allies against Godunov, the true power behind the throne... but for whose sake? Perhaps it was vengeance. If her son couldn't sit on the throne, neither should his killer...
Wow, that's a lot to read between the lines. Respect!
If thoughts could look sheepish, that's how Besson's thoughts would be. I guess I'm a Muscovite and a Shuiskii.
I didn't have time to boost his confidence further, because Uncle Vasilii stroked his beard and spoke again. Besson jumped to writing.
"I heard a curious tale last night," Uncle Vasilii said. "I heard Dmitrii was really fond of building snowmen in the winter. He gave them names of important men in Moscow. Regent Godunov, in particular, always got such an effigy."
The two brothers flanked Maria tighter.
"After it was done, Dmitrii attacked these snowmen with a musket and a saber." A dangerous twinkle danced in Uncle Vasilii's eyes.
"So what of it!" Mikhail cut the air with the rib of his palm. "Dmitrii had a snow fort built as well. The boys deployed my hunting dogs as cavalry. He was boisterous and playful, nothing more. Your nephew can confirm that for you."
Besson lowered his head even lower over the paper, slouching to let the shirt soak up sweat between his shoulder blades. When did the stone hall become so miserably hot?
Uncle Vasilii waved away the suggestion. "Dmitrii was a wonderful lad, so full of life and hearty of spirit! Apart from his epileptic seizures, of course. How often did he have those, Maria?"
"Only when some knaves upset him," Maria spat through her cherry-red lips. She glared daggers at Besson, so there would be no mistake who she called a knave.
"How often?" Uncle Vasilii insisted.
"Ask your nephew, my Prince," Grigorii rushed to say. "He is an honest lad of an excellent character. He would never lie."
"Do you vouch for him as a trusted witness, then?" Uncle Vasilii asked. "No suspicions at all?"
"No, no! How could we, the sinners, suspect the lad, when our Lord guided him to the sanctuary," Grigorii said. "Like a bodiless spirit, he had disappeared... aye."
Silence reigned in the hall long enough for Besson to catch up with his writing, even though he quivered inside with relief. Uncle Vasilii just got the Nagoy family to vouch for him!
"I will ask him," Uncle Vasilii promised at last. "Yet, to keep both accounts straight, give me your answer. How often did Dmitrii have seizures?"
Besson's uncle reminded me of the TV detectives who saved the most important, damning question for the last. He's like a dog with a bone, eh?
Alas, there is no way of knowing, Besson said to me. Dmitrii had the illness, but more often he faked a fit when things didn't go his way. The brat would drool out of the corner of his mouth, drop to the ground, beat the dust up with hands and feet. He even held his breath to go purple in his face.
I see. Somehow I impregnated this remark with gravity I didn't intend.
Besson's ink-stained hand sank into his hair, ruffled it shakily. Lord, forgive me for these uncharitable thoughts! Dmitrii was a mere child and cruelly murdered. Please, our Lord and Father in Heaven, please forgive me, though I am an unworthy sinner!
"Pray hold your anger, Prince Vasilii Ivanovice, after I speak..." Grigorii bowed low and tarried in this uncomfortable pose, waiting for Uncle Vasilii to interrupt. When he didn't, Grigorii straightened and held his arms wide to the sides, to show how stumped he was. "That's a matter for nannies, companions and ladies-in-waiting to occupy themselves with, not for the noblemen."
"So, the Prince's health was of no significant import to the men-folk of his household." Uncle Vasilii chewed his lips, ignoring Nagoys' brothers protestations. "Record that later. Now, we must be away, Nephew."
Despite his furrowed brows, Uncle Vasilii seemed to be in a good mood. He even smiled at Besson with one corner of his mouth, while the latter was packing up his scribing kit. Then he raised a hand to stay the ramblings in the hall one last time. "Farewell Tsarina and noble assembly. Fare thee well."
He marched out of the palace with his hand resting on Besson's shoulder. It was heavy, but Besson needed its guidance, because he stumbled as he walked. I couldn't blame him, because even my head reeled, and I wasn't stuck in the middle of it all as a principal witness slash suspect.