Olga opened her eyes, staring up at the white ceiling. The room was cold enough that, in the half-light of the graying dawn, she could see her breath clouding above her; in the darkness, she could hear the gentle rustling of her sisters in their beds. Outside, she heard the sound of boots on pavement, the far-off clatter of a horse’s hooves on cobbled streets.
She tried closing her eyes, but sleep was beyond her now. Instead, she let her sight adjust to the gloom, searching the ceiling for the crack that stretched from the door frame nearly to the window. At the Alexander Palace, her bedroom walls had been covered with dragonflies: as a girl, she fancied she could see them dance in the half-dreaming moments between sleep and waking, looping and swirling across the ceiling with a magic only a child could conjure.
Here, no such magic existed; no such hope that fanciful creatures might take wing and fly away.
She rolled onto her side, curling her blankets close to her chin to stave off the morning chill a while longer. She’d learned long ago not to trust in magic, nor hope—not when so many of her patients arrived from the front cold, long dead after a painful journey. No fancy, no flight. No faith that waving a wand might reverse their fortunes, that they might recover thanks to the tireless efforts of a hopeful grand duchess. It was no wonder, to Olga, she’d grown increasingly disheartened after Mitya returned to the front line.
But where Olga wilted, Tatiana had bloomed: as the war went on, she grew ever more tireless, her refugee committee taking up more hours of her day as the enemy encroached farther onto Russian soil. Even the sight of wounded men seemed to affect her differently than Olga, energizing rather than depleting her, giving her added incentive to increase the number of hours she spent at the hospital.
That practice seemed to be serving her well now. With Alexei still recovering from his most recent attack, Tatiana had become, once more, a Sister of Mercy: she spent as much time in Alexei’s sickroom as Mamma herself, propping up Alexei in bed to take sips of broth as the swelling gradually receded in his leg; sending Anastasia to the kitchens for fresh water. She’d even rebuked Matveev over the state of Alexei’s diet, demanding that the kitchens supplement his meals with iron-rich foods.
Tatiana turned in her sheets, her breath shifting from the slow, steady lull of sleep to the hitched irregularity of wakefulness. Olga glanced out the cracks of the window at the brightening sky. The house would be stirring soon.
“Tatiana,” she whispered. “How did you do it? During the war? How did you manage with the pain and grief of it all?”
Tatiana sat upright, the long rope of her braided hair hanging dark against her rounded shoulders. She rubbed a hand over her sleep-worn face and shifted the heavy blankets aside.
“Do you remember playing in the tide pools at Livadia? Before Papa had the swimming pool made...do you remember the day Anastasia got swept up by a wave?”
Olga could feel that long-ago day lingering on her skin: lying on the pebbled beach, staring up at the rounded cliffs, the light so bright it washed all the green pale. “Papa went in after her,” she replied. “He didn’t even take off his jacket. He dove in and didn’t come up again until she was back on the shore.”
In the gray half-light, Tatiana nodded. “She was too small to swim against the current. The wave just...knocked her off her feet. I remember waiting for them—it felt like hours.”
Olga glanced at the small mound that was Anastasia, lying in her bed: once dawn broke through the window, they would see the mess she’d made of her army cot, the scarves and coats and small rugs she’d piled, one over the other atop the covers; the photographs she’d pinned to the wall, including the one she’d taken of herself in a mirror, kneeling against the back of a lemonwood chair, using it to hold her box Brownie steady.
Tatiana got to her feet, the springs groaning as she searched for her house robe. “That’s what it feels like, I fancy,” she muttered, as if to herself.
She turned back to Olga, sliding her arms through the sleeves of her robe. “You must harden your heart,” she continued. “You must take all of the feelings you wish you could feel—grief, rage, love, despair—and push them deep into the core of yourself. Harden your heart. There’s nothing else to do. No other way to stop yourself from falling into the tide.”
Harden your heart. The advice sounded simple enough, but Olga found it impossible. How could she harden her heart at the sight of Alexei? He’d been in bed for weeks, and though he’d lost the ghastly yellow pallor that had crept up his face, his leg was still swollen—the blood not yet reabsorbed into his bloodstream. He winced, his narrow shoulders hunched as he shifted up in the pillows.
Still. Progress was progress, and with Dr. Botkin’s assurance that Alexei was out of immediate danger, even Mamma deigned to leave Alexei’s bedside after luncheon to join the rest of the family in the sitting room.
“It’s Father Grigori’s doing,” she said, nodding with conviction as she worked at undoing a seam in one of Anastasia’s corsets. “Still watching over us from on high; still caring for our boy.”
Across the room, Papa emerged from his study, a book tucked under his arm. As he crossed to a chair beneath the window, Olga could make out the title: The Brothers Karamazov.
“Father Grigori...still a friend to this family,” Mamma murmured, turning the corset over to see how much fabric the undone seam afforded her. Out of the corner of her eye, Olga saw a flash of something sparkling and turned to look—but it was only Mamma’s ring, catching in the light. “One of our only friends, it seems...”
Maria passed out cups of tea and Olga sipped hers, wishing for a spoonful of sugar to take away the bitterness. Mamma’s idle chatter disturbed her: their only friend, a dead man? She thought of Dr. Botkin, tireless in his efforts to allay Alexei’s suffering; the servants who’d remained at Freedom House without pay, shuttling in and out of his sickroom with pillows and fresh water. Were their contributions so worthless in Mamma’s eyes?
She was pulled from her thoughts by the sound of movement down the hall. Moments later, Matveev entered, with two armed guards at his side. He was followed by a man in a freshly pressed greatcoat—with his combed-back hair and neatly trimmed beard, he looked more handsome, more genteel, than the guards who flanked him.
“Good afternoon, Colonel,” said Matveev, clasping his hands behind his back. “I won’t mince words. I must inform you that recent unrest in Tobolsk means we can no longer guarantee your safety.”
“I beg your pardon?” Papa closed the book, keeping his place in the pages with his finger.
“Commissar Yakovlev has recently arrived from Moscow with orders to remove your family to a more secure location.” Matveev indicated the man standing beside him with a nod of his head and Yakovlev stepped forward, his lips pressed together in a thin smile. “I trust I can count on your cooperation in this matter.”
“Absolutely not.” Mamma’s voice was sharp; she set aside the corset, staring at the men as though they’d suggested something obscene. “Our son is gravely ill; he can’t possibly be moved.”
Papa stood. “I’m afraid she’s right, gentlemen.” He circled to the back of the sofa, resting his hand on Mamma’s shoulder. “As you’re well aware, Matveev, our son suffers from an illness of the blood; any movement could prove fatal. You’re welcome to have your own doctors examine him to confirm it.”
Yakovlev’s pleasant expression hardened, almost imperceptibly. “Is that so?” He turned on his heel and stalked out of the room; Matveev and Papa followed.
“They can’t possibly be serious,” Mamma muttered, plunging her needle into the fabric with renewed vigor, but Olga looked at Tatiana, seeing her own dread reflected back in her sister’s eyes. Unrest in Tobolsk...that could mean any number of things. Bread riots, like in Petrograd? Infighting amongst Lenin’s troops?
Or perhaps the arrival of loyalists, ready to launch a rescue?
The men returned to the sitting room, and Mamma craned her neck to look at them, imperious. “Well? You’ve seen it for yourselves. Our son is ill. Any question of leaving this house must be put off until he’s well again.”
Yakovlev’s fingers twitched, and though she couldn’t see anything concealed beneath the bulk of his greatcoat, Olga fancied he was used to carrying a sidearm: a pistol, perhaps—something small and discreet. Easily reached, under the right circumstances.
“I agree that the boy is too ill to be moved, but it doesn’t follow that I can’t carry out my orders,” he said. “I’m tasked with removing Colonel Romanov from Tobolsk; the rest of you may follow once your son is well enough to travel.”
Mamma paled; across the room, Maria let out a small gasp.
“I’m afraid that is quite impossible,” Papa replied. He circled back to Mamma and sat down, collecting her beneath his arm as though he could shield her from the news. “I received assurances from your predecessors, gentlemen, that my family would remain intact. I hope I can count on you to honor those assurances.”
Yakovlev was silent for a moment; beside him, Matveev watched, almost sulking. Whoever Yakovlev was, he clearly outranked Matveev—he had to, in order to bring such disastrous news. From Moscow, then, Olga thought, panic rising in her throat as she eyed the high shine of Yakolvev’s boots. Did he plan to take Papa back to the seat of Lenin’s government?
“I am not my predecessor,” Yakovlev said, finally, “and my orders are clear. I’m afraid my hands are tied.”
“Where are you planning to take him?” Mamma asked.
“I cannot say,” Yakovlev replied. “But rest assured, I will personally vouch for the colonel’s safety.”
Olga knew, with dizzying certainty, that if Papa was taken away, they would never see him again—that he would disappear within the depths of Lenin’s duplicity, his bitter malice, his anger—
Mamma grasped for the cross she wore, shining about her neck. “You ask me to trust the word of a revolutionary?” she said. “You ask my children to put their father’s life in the hands of a man they’ve never met?”
Yakovlev let the insult in Mamma’s words stand unchallenged. “I’m afraid I must insist,” he said. “Colonel, you will be leaving Tobolsk tonight. If you refuse, I am authorized to use force.”
At the other end of the room, Maria and Anastasia began to weep. Yakovlev glanced at them, coloring.
“I must tell you, Colonel, I have no desire to make this difficult,” he continued. “If you do not wish to travel alone, you may take one of your daughters with you; the rest may follow along once the boy is well enough to travel. In either case, you will be leaving at dawn. Make your preparations accordingly.”
Olga slipped into the sitting room, her heart pounding as she listened for a shout behind her: a guard, perhaps, or one of her sisters, someone suspicious that Olga was going where she wasn’t meant to. The room, however, was silent. Mamma and Papa were in their bedroom, packing up their suitcases. The decision had been an agonizing one to make, but inevitable, given Yakovlev’s refusal to budge: Papa was leaving at dawn, with Mamma, Maria and Dr. Botkin to support him. Olga, Tatiana and Anastasia would remain behind with Alexei, waiting until he was well enough to travel.
She crossed the sitting room to Papa’s study and tried the door handle, sending up a prayer of thanks when she found it open. He would be coming to clear his personal effects soon, no doubt, but for the moment the room was tranquil, sun-drenched from the corner windows. As was the case at Alexander Palace, the miscellany on Papa’s green-topped desk was meticulously arranged, pens and picture frames lined in perfect rows; envelopes and sheets of paper piled in neat mounds. In the corner, a grandfather clock kept time, its steady ticking a relentless reminder of the urgency of Olga’s task.
Be patient, Papa had told her. She had been patient. She’d bitten her tongue at indignities from the guards, had choked down her frustration at walking the same 120 paces in the courtyard. But now they’d run out of time, and if there was some way Olga could communicate with their would-be rescuers—to let them know that they needed to set whatever dominoes they’d placed into motion—she needed to find it.
She knelt before the desk, running her hands over it with trembling fingers. There was something here: she could feel it, something that could help them, guide them. She opened the desk drawer and emptied its contents—pens and inkwells; a pot of glue and a half-filled photo album. Photographs, neatly bundled and secured with rubber bands: the Shtandart; winter at Alexander Palace. Alexei, laughing in a rowboat; Olga herself, as a baby, a child, a young woman—
Of course, she thought as she turned over the photo album in her hands, he needs an excuse for the time he spends in here. She set aside the album and knocked on the drawer, hoping to hear the hollow ring of a false bottom, but the wood was solid.
She pulled the drawer out completely, shaking her head at her own stupidity. The drawer would have been searched for a secret compartment by the guards before they brought it into the house. She ran her hands along the drawer’s cavity—perhaps he’d secured some message on the underside of the wood?—then turned her attention to the photographs, pulling them free from their rubber bands and scattering them along the tabletop, flipping them in hopes of finding some cypher written on the backs.
The album. Papa had glued each of the photographs neatly down, his tidy, slanting script detailing each photograph’s contents: Tennis in Finland 1912; Tsar’s Guard on Polar Star 1908. Alexei and Maria rollerskating, Livadia 1910.
She could hear footsteps in the next room over but ignored them. She was close, so close, to finding some hint: a letter from Sablin, Papa’s trustworthy aide-de-camp, perhaps, or a note from their extended Romanov relations—something, anything, out of place. She prised a photograph from its page with her thumbnail, but there was nothing hidden beneath it: no note, no code. Nothing to indicate the album was anything more than it appeared.
The door handle rattled, and she flew upright.
“Olga?” said Papa. “Who let you in here?”
“The door was unlocked.” Olga planted her hands on the desk as she stared down at the photographs, her earlier panic replaced by a sudden, dreadful calm. “What is all this, Papa? These...these photographs...”
Papa crossed to the bookcase. “I’m not sure I take your meaning,” he said. “They’re albums. I’ve been chronicling our lives for posterity... My dear, I really ought to let the servants in here to begin packing.”
Olga circled the desk, taking Papa by the hands; she pulled him to the window, afraid a guard might be eavesdropping at the door. “Of course they’re just albums, but your plans, Papa,” she whispered. “Whatever provisions you’ve been working on, we’ve run out of time. You need to get a message to your supporters, let them know you’re being moved. They might be able to intercept your train, get you and Mamma to safety, but only if we can alert them...”
Papa looked down, politely quizzical, and Olga loosened her grip. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, my dear,” he said. “My books...my photographs, I’d like to take them with me. What do you mean, provisions?”
She could have cried out. “Papa, the wolves are at the door. If they take you to Moscow, all will be lost. Don’t you see that? We’ll never have another opportunity once you’re in the capital. We need to escape, now.”
She trailed off at Papa’s look of strained pity. Behind him, the grandfather clock thudded in time with Olga’s heartbeat.
“My dear, I’m afraid you’ve read too many fanciful novels,” he said quietly.
She was silent a moment longer. “You mean to tell me you’ve made no plans? No means of escape?”
“There were no plans to make,” Papa replied. “I’m sorry to disillusion you.”
“No...no plans?” Olga’s knees trembled; she gripped the edge of the window, the glass cool against her back as she leaned against it for support. “Papa, there’s unrest in Tobolsk—that means there are loyalists in the city, surely! Soldiers, good Russians, good Christians, ready to help their tsar...” All these long months of waiting; Papa’s visits to the soldiers—Olga, sitting dumbly with her knitting, trusting in the imagined bravery of others. “Do you mean to tell me you’ve done nothing to save our family?”
Papa circled to the bookcase and began pulling out volumes, stacking them one on top of the other atop the scattered photographs on his desk. “Of course, I tried. You think I wouldn’t have done anything—everything—necessary to ensure your safety? Your sisters’ safety?” He shook his head. “But in the end, all of the intrigues I was made privy to were unfeasible.”
“There was more than one?” Olga looked up, picturing armed guards storming Freedom House; Sablin and Mitya and Dmitri Malama, directing cobbled-together regiments in the town gardens.
“Oh, yes,” Papa replied, “but they all involved splitting the family up: taking your mother and me in a first rescue attempt, with the rest of you following. Seven was too large a number to take at once...” He shook his head again, light glinting off the faded braid of his cap. “It was too risky. How could I leave my daughters behind? And poor Alexei...how could he be expected to scale down a building?”
“Too risky?” Olga stood, trembling. “Papa, we’re being split up regardless! If you’d done what was needed, we’d be through this by now! We might have been rescued by now if it weren’t for your cowardice!” She knew she was wounding Papa, but she didn’t care—she didn’t care, either, that Papa’s reasons for refusing to leave were entirely justified. The gravity of their situation made her blind to anything other than her utter desperation. “They’re going to take you to Moscow and try you for war crimes, Papa! Do you not see that? Do you not see the danger you’re in?”
“Of course, I see it!” Papa shot back, dropping his armful of books. She’d hit on the core of him. Papa was red-faced, pacing the room with a restlessness that she’d never seen before—not even in their long frustrating year of imprisonment. “Why do you think I stayed, Olga? To protect you—to protect your sisters! I will sacrifice my own freedom if it means ensuring your safety!”
“You could have protected us by letting us go,” she said finally, tears streaming freely down her cheeks. No rescue; no salvation. “If we’d been allowed to meet people, rather than spend our days with you and Mamma in that—in that summer palace! We might have had friends willing to fight for our cause—” Olga’s heart was beating wildly. She knew she ought to stop, but she was voicing things she’d never expected to say, the depth of her anger cutting, like a wound, to bone. “Aunt Olga knew it,” she said bitterly. “She knew we were being suffocated by you. By Mamma. We might have married, Tatiana and I, if we’d been given the opportunity. We might have been safe, we might have been able to save you, in turn—”
“Don’t.” Papa was ashen; he stared at Olga and she knew she’d gone too far. “Don’t you dare judge me for keeping our family together.”
She stepped back suddenly, ashamed but unrepentant. “You’re the tsar of Russia,” she said. “Despite what they say, you’re still the tsar. You could have saved us all, if only you’d been brave enough to do so.”
Papa let out a heavy breath. “I stopped being tsar long ago,” he said, his voice cracking with effort. “My only duty that remains—the only duty I ever truly cared about—is that of a father. I could not abandon my children. I simply could not.”
Olga stooped; she picked up the books and handed them back to Papa, tears falling on the leather covers. “The choice is no longer yours to make, Papa,” she replied. “Through your own inaction, you’ve seen to that.”