Chapter 10 #2
He cleared his throat, and Anastasia’s hand went to cover her mouth, stifling back a few giggles. She thought of all the priests who had promised they held an understanding of the gift she hardly knew herself.
“So,” Mikhail started again, “they really think you were cursed.”
“I’m not?”
“No. Not in the way you think.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Anastasia,” his voice took on a disciplinary tone that made her blush, “Can you please stop interrupting me?” Anastasia nodded and beckoned for him to continue.
“Anyway,” Mikhail flipped a few of the sheets, “A curse is typically inflicted on someone throughout their life. You have hereditary gifts. It doesn’t fit the definition of a curse.”
“They did say it was in my father’s bloodline.”
Mikhail nodded, “Yes, it’s Romanov. I dug around in your family’s library. From what I found, it looks like your mother was chosen to wed your father specifically based on the lack of magic in her bloodline to help dilute his.”
“That worked well,” Anastasia rolled her eyes, “She’s obsessed with it.”
Mikhail made a noncommittal noise, “She’s obsessed with control. Your family’s political popularity is waning, but people remain highly loyal to the Orthodox Church. If they can keep enough mystics and clerics performing miracles—”
“They stay in power simply due to the religious fervor,” Anastasia finished for him. Mikhail gave her a reprimanding look for cutting him off again. She flushed further.
A woman could die satisfied being on the other end of a look like that.
“Yes, that’s essentially it. As you already know, your mother seems to have a talent for finding charlatans rather than people with real talent. They forced those people into hiding when they suppress gifts like yours. People already gossip about your tutors.”
“They do?”
“Yes. You aren’t the secret your family thinks you are. People whisper, especially devout people, about the demon princes that mentor Anastasia. Why do you think they’re always killed?”
“I figured my mother was upset.”
Mikhail waved a hand dismissively, “Your mother doesn’t care. Your father does it to keep people at bay. It’s all a political show to make him look like a good Orthodox man, executing any tutor he discovers is using black magic.”
“That’s all of them.” Anastasia’s face paled as she realized how far her father was willing to go to have his cake and eat it, too.
It was a vicious cycle, hiring priests who practiced the dark arts only to have them executed publicly for their magic as a political move when they failed him.
She always knew she was a pawn, but the gravity of her situation weighed on her, freezing her blood in her veins.
“How do you know all this?”
Mikhail was unbothered, “Some I learned from my mother, but you’d be surprised how much monks gossip even when they’re hundreds of miles away. The books I found in the library bridged the gaps.”
“Do you think he would kill me, too?” Anastasia looked up at Mikhail. He unsuccessfully attempted to squash down the protective feeling that rose in his chest.
“Anastasia,” his hand going to cover hers, “I don’t know how we’re going to move forward. I don’t. I will promise you this: I will not let the tsar hurt you.”
“You wouldn’t mind seeing me dead!” Anastasia removed her hand from his grip, her brow furrowing. “Just because you won’t let the tsar hurt me, doesn’t mean you wouldn’t gladly give the job to someone else.”
Mikhail let out a grunt and picked up the spell sheets again, “I already told you. I’m not going to promise anything about us working together.”
“Well, that won’t work for me!” Anastasia jumped to her feet and scoffed, “I’m just supposed to trust you blindly, respect you, while you might be planning my demise. Do you think I’m stupid?”
“No,” Mikhail kept rifling through the papers as if he was dealing with someone throwing a tantrum that he had no patience to sort through. “I think you’re sheltered, and you have no idea how to use your magic. Honestly, the biggest threat to you right now is you.”
Anastasia sputtered, looking around the room in frustration before sinking back down in her seat. “I don’t like it.”
“You don’t have to,” he admitted smoothly. “I don’t like it, either. Is your tantrum over?” His voice was antagonistic as he looked up at her, chewing on his lip, shamelessly eyeing her flustered cheeks and heaving chest.
Anastasia settled in her chair, plastering a perfect smile on her face that Mikhail already knew to fear. “It is. You’ll have to forgive me. It sounds like I’m a little more pent up than the present company.” She arched an eyebrow, and it was Mikhail’s turn to freeze.
Fuck. Did she hear me?
“The walls are thin,” Anastasia smirked, “Do remember that next time.”
He swallowed thickly and recovered swiftly, “I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re a little more tightly wound. Judging by your magic, you have no idea how to release.” He cocked a brow, making his tone unmissable.
“You are an insufferable—”
“Stop,” Mikhail’s tone was firm as he cut her off, “Your magic.” Anastasia let out a long breath and glanced down at her sparking hands. The conversation pivoted before they ended up at each other’s throats once more.
“Go on.”
“It’s hereditary. My mother was an oracle, but that’s clearly not what you possess,” he said, analyzing the magic swirling around her hands. “It’s much more powerful than that. You’re an amplifier.”
“I’m a what?”
“Essentially, you can manipulate energy down to an atomic level. You can speed them up, slow them down, make energy and matter respond to you. It’s why you could explode gas lights that night. You made them react to your magic and amplified the flame until it burst.”
“What about Alexei and whatever that abomination was?”
“A khlyst priest,” he nodded, “I heard about that. You did the same thing with air instead of fire. You turned it into a weapon.”
Anastasia’s mind began to spin at the implications. This was true power, and it scared her. Her heart rate started to race at the thought of what would happen if her family discovered the full extent of what she could do.
“They’ll turn me into a weapon,” she said, her voice going quiet.
“You need to learn to control your magic so that doesn’t happen.” Mikhail sounded reproachful, as though she had willfully neglected her magic all these years. Anastasia’s blood boiled.
“Don’t blame me for this,” she snapped. “I’ve used my magic properly only twice in my life, and both times were enough to make me want to cut my hands off.”
“You need to lean into who you are, Anastasia.” Mikhail’s temper went hot when she mentioned being rid of her gift. “You’re right. If you don’t get a hold of this, they will make you a weapon. You must figure it out so you can fight them off.”
“Why are you acting like I haven’t tried?”
“Have you?” Mikhail pushed, wanting to see what happened.
“How could I? I’ve had nothing but priests sleeping a door away from me my entire life. They’ve all just been waiting for the opportunity to tell my parents that my magic has reappeared again.”
“It’s not reappearing. It never left you.”
“It’s unreliable!”
“You use it when you go out on Sundays,” he stared at her, his eyes challenging her. Anastasia’s rage emerged in a way that only seemed to happen when she was around Mikhail.
“I use the smallest amounts, and it is barely useful, at best. I’ve never been able to recreate the results of what happened that night,” she muttered. It was true.
She could make small things happen, and she was hardly ever without her faithful sparks, but she had never been able to make great pulses of power come flooding out of her body.
“It’s because you don’t want it,” Mikhail accused gently, clasping his hands in front of him. Anastasia turned to face him, gritting her teeth.
“How could I want to kill someone?” She screamed, her resolve cracking.
“You’re afraid.”
“How dare you!”
“You’re afraid of who you could be. You’re afraid of who you already know you are.”
“Can you blame me?” Anastasia shrieked, throwing her hands in the air and releasing the truth about her fears surrounding magic for the first time. They stared at one another. Anastasia flushed, and Mikhail was frustratingly stoic.
The silence stretched between them, escalating in its tension. Mikhail moved first, grabbing Anastasia’s face with his hands and pulling her into a vicious kiss. There was nothing tender or exploring about it, both meeting in a crushing embrace that was more fight than finesse.
Mikhail paused for a moment, shocked by his lack of control. Anastasia fisted his shirt and brought him back to her. In one smooth move, Mikhail rolled Anastasia over until she was under him.
She squirmed in response, and he bit at her lip, hard and almost punishing, as if he was trying to pull the fear from her.
Anastasia let out a noise that sounded foreign to her as she felt Mikhail’s large hand moving up her side. He cupped the side of her breast, and Anastasia tossed her head back, giving Mikhail access to her neck.
Her breath hitched as he moved down, placing kisses along her jaw and neck. She tugged on his shirt, desperate to get it off him as he moved back up to capture her mouth with his.
His hand moved again and gave her breast a firm squeeze, sending shockwaves through Anastasia, which sent Mikhail flying off her.
The moment was shattered, Anastasia’s magic exploding out of her in response and leaving her wanton and breathless on the chair. She stared wide-eyed at Mikhail, now kneeling at her feet.
They sat in silence, on a precipice once again. Mikhail broke out into laughter.
“That was one way to get you to use your magic. I was right.”
“Right about what?” Anastasia snapped, sitting up straighter and attempting to straighten her skirts.
“You have no idea how to release your magic,” his voice was dripping with innuendo that made Anastasia feel light-headed all over again.
“I have my magic, though,” she offered a lame rebuttal.
“You have uncontrolled magic that is released by extreme emotion,” Mikhail chuckled and stood, running his hand over the stubble on his jaw. He sat down quickly again, and Anastasia rolled her eyes at his feeble attempt to hide his hard-on.
“Hatred is still a very extreme emotion, Mikhail.”
Mikhail grinned, tossing a hand behind his head in a picture of male arrogance that made Anastasia want to hit him and beg him to climb on top of her again.
“Hate me all you’d like, your grace,” he licked his lips, “It seems I’ll get what I want either way.”
“And what is that, Mikhail?”
“I want your magic to burn this palace to the ground.”