Peg wrapped her arms around Caroline and the two stood crying as one, black and white together. How had I been reduced to scolding poor Peg, grieving herself for Henry? A hot word had been almost unknown in our house.
I wrapped my arms around them both and felt their sobs in great heaving breaths against me.
How would we get through it all without him?
CHAPTER
15
Varinka
1916
I approached the estate gates and a chill went clean through me, as it always did, to see those sharp, black spikes atop there. Such a scary-looking fence for such a pretty house. Eager to get to work, I hurried by the guardhouse and Ulad and Aleks waved to me.
“You get prettier every day, Miss Varinka,” the younger, Ulad, said.
“I seem to remember it’s someone’s name day,” Aleks said.
“I’ll bring you both some cake,” I said, barely looking at him, and hurried by.
It was growing dark by the time I made it to the estate and climbed the back steps to the rear entrance. I knocked, listened for Raisa, no longer able to see through the pebbled glass, for old Bogdan had boarded up the glass of the doors.
A key scraped in the lock and the door swung wide to reveal Raisa.
“Come in quickly,” she said, moving aside.
I stepped into the back hallway and breathed in the scent of vanilla cake.
“So, it’s your special day?” Raisa asked as she closed the door behind me and locked it. “There’s a surprise for you.”
From the kitchen came the usual clank of cast iron against the porcelain sink, Cook shouting orders, the scent of fatty goose. Maybe I could live there one day and share the oak table downstairs in the servants’ dining room. Sofya was close to offering it, I could tell.
“But go upstairs to work now,” Raisa said.
I climbed the back stairs to the nursery, my fingers caressing the orange in my pocket. Mamka would love such a treasure. We would open it together.
I stepped into the nursery, once a rather plain room furnished only with a fancy bassinet and a white slatted crib. Sofya made it much more comfortable once Afon left. She’d moved a cot and some of her clothes into the room. I lifted one pillow and held it to my nose. She didn’t allow the maids to launder her bed linens because they still smelled of him. Of palaces and hair pomade and love.
In the corner, a trunk stood open, hung with racks of small clothes. This was new. I had overheard Raisa say the family was leaving soon for Paris, but why had Sofya not told me? I clutched the crib rail, light-headed. Would I never see Max again?
I moved to the fireplace, tossed a birch log onto the grate, and put a match to it. Once the log caught, I wiped every bit of soot from my hands on a white towel.
I stepped to Max’s crib, picked him up and he clung to me. “Face hibou, Inka!” he said, and I made one of my silliest wide-eyed owl faces. He shook with laughter.
What a good boy. I slipped him my special remedies, designed to induce love in a person, just small tastes when no one was about. They seemed to have done their job. What was the harm in this?
With his blond curls, I could pass for his mother, couldn’t I? I brushed Max’s soft cheek with my lips and he smiled up at me. Taras and I would never have a baby, so what was the harm in pretending Max was mine? Sofya had everything and all I wanted was him.
If only Mamka could see his little smile.
All at once a heavy gray smoke billowed out from the fireplace. I stepped toward it, waving it away with my hand.
How had I not seen it smoking so?
I opened the nursery window, grabbed the white towel, and swung it back and forth over my head to dispel the smoke.
Suddenly I heard shouting below us and the sound of footsteps on the back hallway floor.
My gut lurched. What had I done? The signal.
I froze in place.
Taras.
CHAPTER
16
Sofya
1916
Luba and I clutched each other, there in the dining room. Why could I not move? The bandits shouted orders to the servants and the sound of gunshots came from the direction of the back entryway. Who are these intruders? Would they attack my family? My son.
“Max—I must go—”
Luba whispered in my ear, “Quiet.”
Father ran to Agnessa and stood between her and the door.