CHAPTER EIGHT
Alix
COVERED IN A FRESH DUSTING of snow, the rooftops of St. Petersburg glittered like rows of iced cakes. Alix stared out the window of the carriage, which was the most opulent one she’d ever set foot in: a golden coach drawn by matched white horses, with oversized gilded plumes on their harnesses.
She recalled what Grandmama had said, about the Romanovs being too ostentatious for their own good, and shivered in foreboding.
“Are you all right?” Ernie asked.
Alix hurried to smile. “I’m excited to see Ella. I miss her so much.”
For years the two sisters had been inseparable.
They had slept in the same room, their beds pushed close so that Alix could reach for Ella’s hand when her nightmares were at their darkest. The episodes that had started after Frittie’s death only got worse after their mother passed, which was when Ella, eight years her senior, became the maternal figure in Alix’s life.
It was Ella who brushed Alix’s hair at night, whispering stories of enchanted forests and star-crossed lovers.
When Alix got her first blood and wept in fear—she thought she was dying of the same disease that had killed Frittie—it was Ella who explained everything, and showed her how to fit a cloth belt beneath her petticoats.
Last fall, Ella had come back from St. Petersburg to oversee Alix’s coming-out party: pinning lilies of the valley to Alix’s white muslin gown, selecting the music for her first dance.
Ella had been both sister and mother to Alix, and when she’d married the Grand Duke Sergei and moved to Russia, it had left a gaping hole in Alix’s heart.
As their carriage pulled into the courtyard of the Anichov, the Romanovs’ official residence in St. Petersburg, Alix’s chest constricted.
Sunlight glinted blindingly off the hundreds of windows.
And on the front steps stood row upon row of guards and servants, all of them wearing the Romanovs’ crimson livery trimmed in gold braid.
All those eyes on her—weighing her, judging her, finding her wanting.
“Alicky?”
She tried to nod, though she could barely hear Ernie’s voice through the roar in her ears. “Alicky, are you having one of your episodes?”
Her episodes, her condition—Alix’s family had never known how to refer to her strange illness.
Alix herself didn’t really know what it was.
All she knew was that her body would, without warning, descend into a whirlpool of grim panic.
Her limbs would freeze up as dark spots exploded behind her eyes.
She should have known this might happen today.
The attacks usually struck when Alix was in a highly public setting or facing a weighty decision.
Her most recent episode had been that night at the opera, back in London, when she’d collapsed into such a trembling heap that Princess Hélène had been forced to go fetch Ernie.
How shameful, that someone outside her family circle had seen Alix in the grip of her affliction. Yet, oddly enough, Alix sensed that Hélène wouldn’t tell anyone.
“Alicky?” Ernie repeated, as the carriage drew up to the front steps. He reached out and shook her by the shoulders, yet Alix hardly noticed; her mind was hurtling back to that awful day, to the nursery with its woven blue rug—
A postilion leapt from the back of the carriage and walked around to open her door. Just step outside, Alix willed herself, but her body refused to obey her commands; she felt like she’d been turned to stone, like one of the carved figures on the enormous stone pillars.
And then she saw him.
Nicholas, the tsar’s oldest son, bounded down the stairs in a flagrant violation of protocol. He was taller and more broadly built than Eddy—why was she comparing him to Eddy?—yet despite the imposing bulk of him, all muscled shoulders and powerful thighs, he was light and graceful on his feet.
“Ernie! Alix!” Nicholas reached the bottom step and held out a hand. He spoke in French, the official language of the Romanov court, though she knew he could just as easily have chosen English. “Welcome to St. Petersburg.”
He wore a scarlet coat over dark trousers, with leather boots that stretched almost to his knees. His dark hair was cut short, emphasizing the bold lines of his jaw. His deep blue eyes met hers, seeming to thaw her from within.
Alix placed her gloved hand in Nicholas’s and stepped down from the carriage.
For a moment they stood there, gazes locked, like dancers frozen mid-waltz. There was something warm about Nicholas, something that made Alix feel like she’d been tossed in a storm and now she’d found safe harbor.
A soft tut from one of the equerries recalled her to her senses.
Alix withdrew her hand and sank into the most reverential curtsy she knew how to make, so low that her gown swept over the stones of the courtyard.
She wasn’t required to make this curtsy to anyone except the tsar himself, but something in Nicholas’s presence, the strength and solidity of him, made her do it on instinct.
Alix hadn’t seen the tsarevich since Ella’s wedding five years ago. Back then she’d been an awkward and uncertain thirteen-year-old, and while Nicholas had treated her with kindness, he hadn’t really noticed her.
“Thank you for having us,” she breathed, as servants began collecting their luggage from the back of the carriage.
“Of course. I’m sure you’re eager to see Ella,” Nicholas offered. “She’s upstairs with my mother; they were hoping you could join them for tea, if you’re not exhausted.”
Alix wished that protocol required him to take her hand again. “We would be honored.”
Asking questions about the journey, the tsarevich led her and Ernie through the hallways of the Anichov.
It was magnificent, every surface covered in gold leaf or lapis lazuli or snow-white marble.
Everywhere there were mirrors, lush Aubusson carpets, display cases of Fabergé eggs, whimsical Chinese tables.
And it was all so vast—it seemed to Alix that her father’s entire house would fit in the frescoed dining hall alone.
Buckingham Palace, which a few months ago had felt like the height of sophistication, suddenly seemed outdated and old-ladyish by comparison.
“My mother and Ella are in the blue salon.” Nicholas made eye contact with a footman, who threw open a set of double doors.
“His Royal Highness Prince Ernest Louis Charles Albert William of Hesse. Her Royal Highness Princess Alix Victoria Helena Louise Beatrice of Hesse,” the footman announced.
Alix always found it a bit silly, hearing herself referred to by that endless string of names. Clearly, the Russian imperial court was particular about etiquette.
She took a hesitant step through the doorway, and her years of training seemed to melt away, because there was her sister.
“Ella!” Alix sprinted forward and threw her arms around her. “Oh, how I’ve missed you!”
She was still Ella, Alix noted with relief. She smelled like Russia now, like warm furs and spicy perfume, and her gown and upswept hairstyle were painfully Russian—but underneath it all, she was still her sister.
Ella laughed softly. “Alicky, my darling,” she murmured, a note of reproof in her tone.
Alix spun about and curtsied to the tsarina.
Nicholas’s mother sat in a chair by the window, staring at her and Ernie as if they were a pair of ignorant country bumpkins.
“Forgive me, Your Imperial Majesty,” she said self-consciously.
“I was so excited to see my sister again. Thank you for having us.”
The Tsarina Maria—Minnie, her family had always called her—pursed her lips together in disapproval. Alix sensed that she should remain in the curtsy, though her thighs ached from holding herself in that position. Behind her, Ernie bowed and politely greeted the tsarina.
Finally Minnie flicked her hand, a gesture that Alix took to mean she could rise.
Nicholas cleared his throat. “Enjoy your tea.”
“You’re not staying?” Alix blurted out, then winced. Her second violation of protocol in two minutes. She wasn’t acting like herself.
Nicholas smiled, unbothered by her lapse in manners, and Alix’s stomach tugged at the sight. He glanced at Minnie. “I’d love to join, if you don’t mind, Mother?”
“Oh, very well.” The tsarina waved at a footman, who hurried to bring over another antique chair.
Alix took a seat, her heart fluttering strangely when the tsarevich sat next to her.
A steaming gold samovar of tea stood at the center of the table. The porcelain dishes held a mishmash of traditional English foods—scones, clotted cream, bread and butter—and others that must be Russian delicacies: crystal bowls of nuts, poppy-seed cakes, unfamiliar crescent-shaped cookies.
“I’m so glad you two are here,” Ella exclaimed, smiling at her siblings. “I can’t believe it’s been five years since you last came to Russia. To think that you haven’t visited since my wedding!”
Alix had longed to come sooner. She would have visited every year if her father had allowed it, but he and Grandmama had insisted she wait. Sergei won’t want his new wife’s sister underfoot. Wait until they’re no longer newlyweds, Alix’s father had told her.
In royal circles, a couple was usually considered newlyweds until the birth of their first child, but so far Ella hadn’t gotten pregnant. Alix wanted to bring it up with her sister, but she feared it was a sensitive subject, so she never mentioned it in her letters.
“Your wedding was so beautiful. I think of it all the time,” Alix replied.
To her surprise, the tsarina looked over. “You do?”
“I miss Ella; she feels so far away. And of course the wedding ceremony was breathtaking,” Alix hurried to add.
Her sister had seemed like a princess from a fairy tale, dressed in a white dress sewn with pearls, the Romanovs’ famous pink diamond tiara on her head.
“We had the most magical time on that trip,” Ella agreed. “Walking in the gardens, staying up half the night waiting for the sun to set over the water.”
“Russia is at its best in summer, isn’t it?” Nicholas chimed in.
Alix nodded. “I’ve never seen skies like that. It felt like they would keep glowing all night, like it would never turn dark at all.” Dimly, she noted that the rest of the table had detoured into another conversation, leaving her and Nicholas in a temporary bubble of intimacy.
There was that smile again, the one that lit up his whole face. “ ‘In the afternoon they came unto a land in which it seemed always afternoon,’ ” he quoted softly.
“You read Tennyson?” She hadn’t expected that.
“I find that reading poetry helps me practice my English. My father disapproves, though. He considers poetry a waste of time.”
“Does he feel that way about all the arts?” Alix wondered how someone too impatient for poetry could own so many spectacular paintings and sculptures.
“My mother collected most of the things in this palace,” Nicholas replied, guessing the direction of her thoughts. He lowered his voice. “She’s the one who helps me get books of English poetry, too. Aunt Alexandra slips them into the packages that Eddy and George send from England.”
Alix blinked. It was disorienting, hearing Nicholas talk about Eddy, but royalty was a very small circle. Especially at these elevated levels. And, after all, Eddy and George were Nicholas’s cousins: their mothers, Minnie and Alexandra, were sisters.
She wondered if Nicholas had heard anything about her and Eddy. What if he had some mistaken idea that she and Eddy were planning to marry? Could she find some tactful way to let him know it was nothing—that they’d each only written a single letter since her departure from England?
“We have nothing like Tennyson in Russian,” Nicholas was saying. “And the few poems we do have…they don’t capture that same sense of quiet peace.”
“Recite one for me.”
“A Russian poem?”
“Yes,” Alix pleaded, just wanting to hear his voice.
Nicholas spread his hands on the table before him and began to speak.
The Russian language sounded harsh at first, almost guttural, yet the longer his poem went on, the more Alix sensed something else to it.
A fluidity underneath all those rasping consonants.
A feeling of melancholy, perhaps even wistfulness.
“That was very moving,” she said, after he’d finished. “What is it?”
“An old folk song about a man who goes away to war. When he returns, his wife has run away to join the tree spirits. I heard it during my time in the army.” He shot a glance across the table, to where the tsarina and Ella were laughing at something Ernie had said.
“My mother says it’s demeaning for me to know peasant songs, but I believe there’s value to it.
As monarchs we should understand what motivates our people, the things they hope and fear. ”
“I agree.” Again Alix marveled at how different Nicholas was from Eddy. She broke off a small corner of bread and buttered it, trying to keep from staring. “When did you serve in the army?”
“I was in the Preobrazhensky Regiment for a few years. Under Sergei’s command,” Nicholas added, naming Ella’s husband.
“And you saw active combat?”
“I saw enough to make me dislike it.” He shook his head. “Forgive me, we should speak of happier things. How long will you be staying with us?”
“Six weeks.” Suddenly Alix wished it were longer.
“Well, I hope you find Russia as captivating in winter as you did in summer.”
Alix glanced out the window. It was snowing again, great flakes swirling behind the glass pane in a gentle dance. “It’s beautiful.”
“Yes, it is,” Nicholas agreed, though his eyes were on her.