ALEXEI
The Malakov mansion is as inevitable and deceptively aseptic as a luxury hospital. I see it even before getting out of the car: the iron gates, the surveillance cameras hidden in lion sculptures, the cobblestone path that seems to spit you directly onto the steps of the main hall.
The last renovation was a decade ago, yet to this day the smell of fresh cement refuses to die under the layer of lemon essence and cleaning products that permeates the halls.
Today, however, the house is different. The silence is obtuse, tense, inhabited by too many presences.
The main hall—with its white marble staircase, ridiculously large crystal chandelier, and French tapestry showing gods slaughtering humans—is crowded with relatives.
Malakovs of all shades and subgenres, arranged in small swarms that only gather to bite harder.
I recognize every one of them. I feel the weight of their stares.
Second uncles with hands clenched around glasses of vodka, wives chattering about art exhibitions in a hysterical tone, teenage cousins with the fever of newly discovered power.
They are here because something big is about to happen, and Malakovs can feel these things in the air.
The new thing is that, this time, I am the epicenter.
Angélica is always the first. She crosses the room in a deep blue silk dress hugging her slender body, with her makeup perfect, and her gaze escaping all symmetry.
“Alexei,” she whispers, and that’s how I know she’s desperate. She only greets me by name—and not a diminutive—when she fears we’re all going to die before dinner.
She stops in front of me, and her eyes examine my face, fixing on the bruises. Her hand hovers between us but hesitates midway. In the end, she touches her fingers to my jaw so gently I barely feel it. “Your face… did Ivan do this? It’s worse than I thought.”
I don’t pull back, but I don’t offer comfort either. “It was a difference of opinion,” I say.
She retracts her hand.
“Your father… he hasn’t left his office since he heard the news. He broke a glass.”
That, in my father’s language, is the equivalent of a declaration of war. “Is he alone?”
“He doesn’t want to see anyone,” she replies, adjusting a lock of hair that isn’t out of place. “He just said… for you all to wait.” The plea in her eyes is clear. “He spoke with Ivan this morning on the phone. He’s… distraught. Complained about your… protégé. About the fight.”
“Let him,” I say. “The truth carries more weight than a first impression.”
“To your father, the first impression is the truth,” she retorts. “Be careful. Please.”
Before I can answer, the sound of the front door opening again silences what was left of the whispers.
Ivan enters. His face is a map of swellings, his nose crooked. He stops at the door, his gaze sweeping the hall, daring anyone to comment on his appearance. He sees us with a toxic mix of hatred and sadness. He doesn’t say a word. He just walks past us, limping.
Angélica adjusts the pearl brooch on her dress in a nervous tic.
“He’s going to blame you for everything,” she whispers.
“Let him. It’s the other one I’m worried about.”
We share a moment of mutual and absolute understanding. We don’t need to say the name. Vasily.
“He called before he came,” she says. “Asking if ‘father had already decided on an heir’. Insensitive. Not even you are like that.”
I suppress the urge to laugh. There are no good examples of sensitivity in this family.
“Ambition makes him careless,” I comment, taking a glass of champagne from a passing waiter’s tray, more out of habit than desire.
“Careless?” Angélica lets out a short, humorless laugh. “He’s paranoid. He fired half of his personal security team last week.”
“Vasily never cared about the rules,” I say, taking a sip of the champagne. “He only pretends to.”
And then, speak of the devil, the door opens one last time.
Vasily enters, impeccable. A perfectly tailored suit. The smile is almost imperceptible, just a shadow of vanity at the corner of his lips, but he makes a point of scanning the hall before landing on me and Angélica.
“Alexei. Angélica,” he greets, his voice as smooth as silk, loud enough for everyone to hear. “It’s been a while since we all gathered.”
He stops in front of me. His gaze travels over my bruises. He quickly hides a flash of genuine satisfaction under his diplomat’s veneer.
“It seems the night was more physical than usual. I thought you’d left bar brawls for our cousin.”
Ivan, a few feet away, grinds his teeth. He wants to respond. Vasily ignores the reaction, as if Ivan were a decorative piece in the room and not a family member about to explode with rage.
“I suggest you save your jokes for the interrogation,” I say, ignoring the bait.
Vasily tilts his head theatrically. The smile doesn’t falter, but a sudden hardness appears in his eyes. Subtextually, we’ve been killing each other for weeks, maybe years.
“Of course,” he says. “I would never make father wait.”
Vasily looks up to the top of the staircase, just as the double doors of the office swing open.
Dimitri appears at the top of the steps. Impeccable in a black jacket, his face half in shadow, he scans the hall.
“Mr. Malakov is waiting for you,” Dimitri announces, not addressing anyone in particular. But the order is for the three of us. “Now.”
The fake laughter dissolves in the air. All the clusters of relatives atomize, opening a silent corridor through which only we, the heirs—and the wife—must pass first. I feel the weight of eyes behind me. They don’t want to miss a syllable of this audience.
I leave the champagne on a coffee table and go.
Angélica accompanies me, but unlike usual, she doesn’t try to soften the impact: she stares at the floor, moving heavily. Ivan, right behind, is tense, but the pain forces him to maintain his dignity. Vasily closes the group, his steps light, his posture relaxed, as if going to receive a medal.
At the top, Dimitri waits for us, motionless. He holds the door open, and the smell of mahogany, leather, and sickness hits me before the gaze.
We enter, one by one, and the environment swallows our names and reduces us to mere avatars of the family drama.
The walls covered with stuffed books, legal treatises, and war manuals only serve to intimidate those who do not belong to this blood.
The Persian rug absorbs our steps, and the solid oak desk, with grotesque carvings of eagles devouring lambs, takes up half the room.
The old man is there. My father was always a statue of flesh: impossible to bend, impossible to ignore.
Now, sunk into the leather chair, he is more bone than muscle.
The cashmere blanket on his legs betrays the body’s failure, yet his eyes, under arches of white eyebrows, still burn.
Beside him, an oxygen cylinder hisses that death is already circling the room.
The other relatives enter behind us, disciplined. They spread out on the sofas and armchairs, leaning against the walls, all looking toward the center, toward the power vacuum that no one dares to occupy. The old man doesn’t speak.
There are three chairs positioned in front of the desk.
The black leather creaks as we sit, forcing our bodies into an involuntary contact with fate.
Each of us—Ivan, me, and Vasily—occupies a carefully choreographed position in the power dance: Ivan, on the left, vibrating with anger and resentment, ready to go for anyone’s jugular; me, in the center, bearing the weight of the old man’s gaze like a shield; Vasily, on the right, with an unctuous silence and the air of who signed the verdict in advance.
Behind, Angélica remains standing, a pale witness.
In the background, relatives are positioned like birds of prey waiting for the first blood.
The old man observes us for a long time.
“Ivan,” he says. “You have dishonored this family’s name in a third-rate bar. Start talking. And pray that your reasons are better than your actions.”
Ivan stiffens even more. His face, which already looked like a topography of bruises and fury, closes up. “Uncle, I acted to protect this family’s honor. The honor my father taught us to defend.” He throws me a look of pure venom. “While my cousin, your heir, busies himself with his new pets.”
The old man doesn’t blink. Ivan feels encouraged.
“I received news that one of my best men was attacked. In public. By Alexei’s new toy.
” He spits the words. “A mutt he pulled from the gutter. A snitch. A dog that served the Volkovs in the past. And what was I supposed to do? Let it slide? Allow a renegade, a traitor, to spit on our name and get away with it? I went after him, yes. I went to collect the debt. And then, when I was just defending myself, defending our honor, Alexei shows up. And who does he defend? The mutt. He points a gun at his own cousin’s head…
to protect a rat who attacked one of my men in my territory! ”
He leans back in his chair. The shadows of aunts, cousins, goons, and wives all lean forward, fascinated by the verbal violence.
Vasily shifts in his chair, with a small smile that I can decode: an encouragement for Ivan to continue, to dig himself deeper, because the more mud Ivan throws, the easier it will be for Vasily to capitalize.
I feel the expectation of the bodies behind me, the hunger for the next speech. The old man glares at me.
I wait just long enough for everyone to feel the dread of not knowing which side I’ll jump to.
“It’s true.”
The Malakov universe stops. The silence is so absolute I can hear the noise of the oxygen cylinder next to the patriarch, hissing.
“What was that?” the old man roars, and the sound is the opposite of his physical frailty. He leans forward, intending to stand, but his body doesn’t obey.
“I said it’s true.”