The entire room smelled like stale liquor and sweat; it only took Mikhail a few seconds to take stock of the empty vodka bottles that were littering the floor like tiles. It was yet another disgusting example of wealth in the most forlorn of places.
He spied several oil paintings as large as a man stacked up against the walls and a discarded marble bust in one corner as if the Tsarina had decided that one wasn’t up to par. Statues were lining the other side of the room, the marble itself valuable enough to feed an entire village.
The men were yelling and laughing at one another at a volume that could only be explained by intoxication, and it took Mikhail a few seconds to realize there were women in the room.
Two servant women, both of whom he knew by sight, were perched on the lap of a priest and another lord. He could see their disgusted expressions every time the men leaned over the baccarat table and inevitably touched them with their sweaty hands.
He was about to intervene and pull the servant women out of the room when the other priest’s booming voice cut through his thoughts.
“Who is this now?” He laughed heartily, his reddened cheeks betraying the constitution of a very unhealthy man, who was very,verydrunk. The priest who had summoned Mikhail took his seat at the table and laughed.
“Someone strong enough to move some of those paintings for us. I’ll send the second one to Ksenia as a present.”
Mikhail saw red. These were men of the cloth who wreaked havoc on Russia — drinking, bingeing, gambling, and pulling him into their den to haul paintings as presents for their mistresses.
“Now listen —,” Mikhail started, getting ready to grab the servant girls and leave before he was interrupted by the third priest, who had remained silent up until this point.
“Heisstrong,” the priest chortled, his voice sounding like oil and his face greasy to match. “Are you sure we can’t find a better use for him?”
The priest’s hand dropped below the table suggestively, and Mikhail felt his blood run cold at the insinuation. The men in the room all burst into laughter as if this was a very ordinary suggestion.
Without thinking, Mikhail grabbed the wrists of both girls and, gently as possible, pushed them towards the door. The men yelled in protest as the women fled up the stairs quickly, Mikhail blocking the door.
“You insolent little —,” one of the lords sputtered, pieces of pork stuck in his beard.
“Those were the Tsarina’s maids,” Mikhail lied on the spot, “and she is particularly picky about her cabinet. I have a hard time believing she’d accept you,” he nodded at the scene set out before him, “…pulling them from their duties.”
Mikhail watched as the drunken men immediately began nodding, accepting the lies before sitting back down and resuming their game as if nothing had happened.
Mikhail turned to leave, bile rising in his chest when the original priest stopped him.
“I’d still like that painting brought upstairs,” he snapped his fingers. “Take it to the carriage house and have it dispatched to my home.”
Mikhail’s hands curled into fists with the sudden desire to dip a match into their bottles of vodka and shut the door, burning their den of traitorous wealth — but stopped himself as he saw his mother’s face in his mind, remembering his promise. They would all burn. Not today.
“Of course, sir.”
3
Anastasia sat over the desk, struggling as everything in the room seemed to exist only to suffocate her. The luxurious apartments that the Tsarina kept in the Winter Palace were some of the most opulent, overly done to the point of contrition.
The tutor who was sitting next to her — Anastasia never bothered to remember their names — was holding a long switch in his hand, eyeing her with contempt as if he only lived for the moments he got to use it.
Her feet dug into the soft carpet and her back pushed into the plush chaise that she was in. She was overcome with the innate cruelty of her mother and the latest tutor's presence.
Her mother had insisted that all her tutors meet with Anastasia in the Tsarina's chambers so that she could take apersonalinterest in her daughter's education.
Anastasia had thrown a fit when it happened, knowing that it was another attempt of her mother's to keep her from spending more time with Asya. The Tsarina was envious of the gossip surrounding Asya’s kitchen magic, as she had never been able to replicate anything close in her experiments.
The Tsarina was sitting in a corner, barely paying attention to the needlepoint in her hands, as she kept an eye on her daughter.
The tutors that Anastasia was subject to had a high turnover as of late, as they were fired and hired as often as the clerics were. They all had a different belief system regarding what they thought the young Grand Duchess should be educated in, and the Tsarina's opinion changed like the tides.
Anastasia's heels dug in, and she grimaced, letting out a controlled breath as she began writing down the repetitive lines the tutor had placed in front of her.
She was on the fifth attempt of completing an entire page of Latin, over and over, which she assumed was some sort of prayer. It was easy enough, but the ink was different than what she was used to. It seemed to be made of pure iron, smelling of metal, and all but burning through the paper itself.
Anastasia fought back tears as she copied the script next to her and felt a burning sensation ripple through her fingertips with every letter she managed to scratch out on the paper.
