Chapter 13 #2
Anastasia and Mikhail made their way through the abandoned hallways. When they finally laid eyes on the door to Anastasia’s rooms, Mikhail released a satisfied sigh.
Despite the calm facade he’d tried to manufacture around Anastasia, he had been worried they’d get discovered.
There was no one waiting outside her chambers and no wait staff running around in a panic, so he assumed they had escaped detection.
Mikhail stepped in front of Anastasia politely, holding the door open for her.
She smiled demurely as she passed him, turning to go into her rooms, but froze on the spot. The color drained from her face, and she sucked in a sharp gasp. Mikhail’s brow furrowed, and he flung the door open wider to see what frightened her.
In the middle of Anastasia’s sitting rooms sat the tsar and tsarina, accompanied as always by the same three dvoryanstvo standing behind him.
All of them stared expectantly as if Mikhail and Anastasia were late to a prearranged meeting.
They sat there, unmoving, with blank expressions.
Their stoicism was far more frightening than their anger; this was unpredictable.
Mikhail gently put his hand on Anastasia’s back, moving her forward and shutting the door behind him. He tried to position himself in front of her, an overwhelming desire to protect her from this family taking over him. Her family.
“Hello, Anastasia,” the tsar’s voice was calm and bored, as if he had walked into a business meeting. The tsarina couldn’t look directly at Anastasia, picking at the gold threads on her dress.
Mikhail eyed her with disgust. She was wearing a pair of diamond earrings so heavy that the wire looped over her ears to support them.
Whatever this fucking setup is, I hope the tsarina chose jewelry she doesn’t mind losing.
“Your imperial majesty,” Anastasia’s voice rang out clear and strong. She was afraid, but she hid it well. She used the formal address for the tsar, betraying the lack of familial intimacy between them. Mikhail was overcome with the impulse to throw her over his shoulder and run far, far away.
“You have been missing for a day, Anastasia.” The tsar finished every sentence with her name, as if he sought to punish her with it, to remind her she was one of them.
“Please do let us know where you’ve been.
The streets are full of rioters these days.
It's a dangerous time. You can imagine how distraught we were when we discovered you were gone.” His voice was foreboding and full of thinly veiled threats.
“I was with the tutor.” Anastasia’s voice was detached. She spoke of him casually, as if he were just a member of staff. The latest in a long line of tutors, the next one to be executed when he inevitably failed.
Mikhail had faith in Anastasia, but cold remembrance dripped down his spine. They were playing a dangerous game.
“The tutor, yes…,” the tsar’s voice was cold, calculating. “Do you understand how improper that is?”
Anastasia fought back the impulse to roll her eyes at her father. He had forced her to share her chambers with hand-selected maids and tutors for years. “I’m always alone with my tutors,” she made the double entendre clear.
“You are alone with your tutors in private,” the tsar snapped, his control slipping ever so slightly. “Not where other people can see you.”
“So, it doesn’t matter what they might have done to me, as long as it didn’t spin the rumor mill?” Anastasia’s voice rose. Mikhail couldn’t help but be proud of her. Standing up to an abusive father was one thing; it was another entirely when your father was the tsar to all of Russia.
“We have enough to worry about without having to worry about you,” the tsar barked, his facade cracking. He took a deep breath, rearranging one of the brooches on the grandiose sash that he insisted on always wearing.
“Perhaps,” one of the dvoryanstvo spoke up from behind him, his large mustache moving almost independently of his mouth, “We would feel better if we knew how your magic was progressing.”
“It’s magic now?” Anastasia laughed darkly, staring daggers at the overinflated old man. “Because I distinctly remember you sitting in this room when I was thirteen while everyone talked about what a curse I was.”
“Anastasia,” the tsarina glanced up, finally looking interested enough to take part in the conversation, “That’s inappropriate.”
“Inappropriate?” Anastasia scoffed. “That’s rich coming from you.” Anastasia always shrank in front of her parents, but something in her shifted.
The opportunity to use her magic, to help people, to right some of the inequities that she was raised in… It had rocked her sense of purpose to the core. What that meant, she couldn’t be sure. She did know she wouldn’t spend another minute listening to her parents conspire.
“I don’t care if you’re fucking the priest,” the tsar’s voice was like crude oil, “Anastasia, you must use your gifts for the family. You have no idea what we are up against.”
“For the family?” Anastasia threw her hands up in the air. “You have no idea what that word even means. You don’t even know what I can do—”
“You do know?” Another one of the dvoryanstvo perked up, catching the implication in her voice, his hand clutching over his heart in anticipation.
“Tell us everything, Anastasia,” the tsar said, going still. “Tell us now. This is not a request from your father, it is a command from your tsar.”
A deadly silence settled over the room. Mikhail’s hands pulled into fists, ready to fight anyone in the room, including the tsar himself, if it meant pulling Anastasia out of there.
“No.” Anastasia’s voice matched his in contempt, drawing a line in the sand. It was the first time she had ever stood up to her father. She was directly refusing an order from the tsar.
“Do not ask me again,” she continued, her voice full of ire, “Or I will show you what I can do. Is that understood?”
Mikhail couldn’t help but turn and look at her in awe. This woman had completely risen from the ashes of an imprisoned life.
Her family attempted to crush her under the wheel of their dynasty and political games, yet here she was, giving them orders. He didn’t know what she could control, but the threat was enough.
The tsar waved once, and the dvoryanstvo got up and filed out of the room, quickly and quietly. One look between the tsar and tsarina followed, leaving with a passing glance at Anastasia that looked more bored than anything.
“Anastasia… Rasputin,” the tsar looked at them both, an unholy fire in his eyes. The tsar’s facade was beginning to crack, and there was an eruption brewing.
“You will come to see the magnitude of what you have refused to do here today. With god as my witness, daughter,” he said the word like it was a curse.
“You will extend your servitude to me as your father and as your tsar, or I will have your magic bound, and you will be married off. Am I clear?”
Mikhail’s blood pressure skyrocketed, ready to clear the gap between him and the tsar, to send him falling to the floor. It was Anastasia’s hand on his back that made him stand down, as she took a step towards her father.
“Best of luck finding someone more powerful than me to accomplish that,” she said primly. “You are dismissed from my chambers.”
Mikhail’s jaw dropped as he watched Tsar Nicholas II stare down his daughter and relent. He adjusted another brooch, dropped his hands to his side, and walked towards the door. Before he shut it behind him, he turned to look at his daughter.
“This is war, doch.”