The Gathering Storm (23 page)

The empress and my mother entered the anteroom at that moment. “Katerina! We must hurry back to our box, dear, before the next act. Ooh, chanterelles?
Merci!
” Maman said, picking up an hors d’oeuvre. “These are divine!”

I risked a glance at the grand duke before following Maman out. He raised his glass to me but did not smile. I looked away in a hurry.

Slipping into my seat next to Maman, I settled in to watch the remainder of the mediocre ballet. Fortunately, the Montenegrins did not visit our box the rest of the evening. I did not know what Danilo had said to his sisters, if anything. They would be coming to call on me as soon as they found out; I was certain. I wanted to be the one to tell my parents, but I did not want to spoil their evening. I promised myself I would tell Maman and Papa first thing in the morning.

Ah, well, some other girl could be the prince’s fiancée. Let her become queen and have hospitals named after her. It was not for me.

I
dragged myself out of bed the next morning, dreading the day I knew I was going to have. Before anything else, I had to tell my parents about my broken engagement. Somehow I did not think Papa would be terribly disappointed. Maman might take to her bed, however. We would have to send for Dr. Kruglevski.

Anya’s friend Lyudmila had been hired to help out while Anya was recuperating from a late-winter cold. She was not as friendly as Anya, but I thought she was just shy, having traveled from Kiev and leaving her family to come here. I tried to put her at ease. “Do you know Anya’s brother?” I asked her. “He attends the medical school in Kiev.”

She cast her eyes down, her face a deep scarlet. Lyudmila must have known him rather well, but she said nothing.

She fixed my hair in a slightly different fashion, more Russian than European, but I liked the change. The curls framed my face, making my cheeks seem thinner. “This
looks beautiful, Lyudmila. You’ll have to show Anya how to do my hair like this.”

“Thank you, Duchess,” she said, finally smiling.

I gave myself one last glance in the mirror before going to face Maman.

She was in her boudoir, having tea and toast. “Katiya! You are up early this morning! I expected you to sleep until noon. Sit with me and have some tea.”

“Maman, I must tell you something and I do not want you to be upset.” I slumped into a peacock-blue velvet chair. “I broke off the engagement with Prince Danilo last night.”

She let her butter knife slip, and it hit the table with a loud clang. “Katiya! What on earth would you do that for?” She turned to her maid, who was putting several dresses away in the wardrobe. “Please send for my husband at once! Oh, Katiya, how could you?” She was going to be hysterical again.

I helped her to her bed, sighing. “Please understand, Maman. I am not consort material. The prince and I had a disagreement and I realized that he is not someone I would be happy with.”

“Happy? Being queen would not make you happy?”

“Would you have married Papa if he did not make you happy?”

“Well, that was different. I should have married him for his title, even if he hadn’t made me happy. We were extremely fortunate that our personalities were so … agreeable to each other.”

“Agreeable? Is that what you call it?” Papa said, catching
the tail end of our conversation. “You were hopelessly in love with me.”

“It was you who were hopelessly in love with me,” she said indignantly. “Anyway, it is not our marriage I’m concerned about. Katiya has broken off her engagement with the crown prince!”

Papa raised an eyebrow. “And?”

“And? And you must convince her to change her mind—if the prince will take her back.”

“Did the prince try to take advantage of you?” Papa’s face looked grim. “I’ll challenge him to a duel if he did.”

“Heavens, no, Papa! It was nothing like that.” I sat down on the bed beside Maman. “I told him I wanted to be a doctor and he said he forbade it. He said it would not be proper for a crown prince’s consort to have a career outside of the home. So I told him I could not be his consort.”

“Oh, Katiya! This foolish nonsense about medical school again?” Maman wailed. “Alexander, please talk some sense into your daughter!”

“My dear, are you sure you’d give up the chance to be queen? You would have the money to open a hundred hospitals and fund more medical research. A doctor can only do so much in his lifetime.”

When he put it that way, I felt almost selfish. But I shook my head. Not as the wife of a blood drinker. “I don’t want hospitals named after me. I want to be the one finding new cures and antidotes.”

He shook his head and smiled. “Then I suppose you would not make a very good queen. How did the prince take it?”

“Alexander!” Maman said. “You are not taking this seriously! Do not encourage this foolishness!”

“Shenia,” Papa said, using his pet name for Maman and taking her hand. “The world is changing. Our daughter does not belong to our old ways. She is going to be one of the brightest women of her age. The Russian Medical Council has filed a petition requesting that the minister of education reopen the women’s medical courses. Dr. Kruglevski was one of the doctors here in St. Petersburg who signed the petition.” Papa winked at me as he said this.

“However,” he continued, “if Katiya cannot attend medical school here in Russia, we can take her to Switzerland. Or Berlin. And if she never finds a husband that accepts her and loves her for who she is, then she can live at Betskoi House with us forever.”

I wanted to cry with happiness. “Thank you, Papa!” I flew into his arms as Maman pulled away from him.

“We are not finished discussing this!” Maman said. “Alexander, I must put my foot down!”

“Maman, please think about it,” I said.

“And what will all of St. Petersburg say? My daughter threw away a crown to dirty herself with the sick and the dying?” She sat straight up, her face pale. “What did the prince say?”

“The prince was not happy when I handed his ring back. I expect we shall have a visit from his sisters sometime soon.”

Maman wiped her eyes with her handkerchief. “The
Montenegrins will tell everyone that he broke off the engagement.”

“It will all blow over, my dear,” Papa said, squeezing her shoulder gently. “Have courage. Katiya, I think I shall name my medical institute after you. That way, you can be a doctor, and have your own hospital.”

I couldn’t help smiling; I loved my father so much. I thought he’d been unhappy when I had accepted the prince’s proposal. “That would be wonderful, Papa.”

Maman blew her nose loudly. “Well,” she said, getting out of bed as soon as my father left us. “The only thing to do is to leave immediately for France. Even though I hate to abandon St. Petersburg in the middle of the season, we must go and let the scandal die down. In a few months, no one will be talking about it anymore.”

“Maman, do you really think that many people care about what a silly little Oldenburg girl does? There won’t be much of a scandal.”

Maman looked astonished. “Katiya, you are the great-granddaughter of a tsar! Of course people will care! And you are rejecting a crown prince!” She told her maid to begin packing. “We must make plans to depart immediately.”

“What about my lessons at Smolny?”

“I will send word to the headmistress, and we will hire a tutor for you. I must go and speak to your father about our trip.”

I did not want a tutor. As much as I dreaded lessons with Madame Metcherskey, I liked my classmates (most of them) and I loved Madame Orbellani. I did not think a personal
scandal was a good enough excuse for not attending my classes.

I started to pack my bags, but there was one person I could still not abandon. Count Chermenensky. I did not know where he was hiding, but the grand duke George was right; I could not leave my messes behind for someone else to clean up. I wished I could find the count and take him with us to France. I needed to speak with Dr. Kruglevski.

Perhaps he would have some kind of tranquilizer we could inject Count Chermenensky with, subduing him for travel. I told my parents I was going to visit the patients at Oldenburg Hospital and tell the doctor goodbye, since we would be leaving soon. Papa let me take the family carriage but insisted that I bring Anya with me and have the doctor give her medicine for her cold.

Anya was reluctant to leave the house, but I made sure she was well bundled in furs and I let her keep the hot brick under her own feet. “Thank you, Duchess,” she said, snuggling into the warm fur. “I went to the healer in the Gypsy quarter, but I haven’t felt any better since her treatment.”

“What did she do to you?” I asked.

“She prayed and rolled an egg up and down my arms. She—” Anya’s fitful cough interrupted her story. It was several moments before she could talk again. “It seems to me the illness is in my chest, though. Why wouldn’t she have rolled the egg there?”

I frowned. “Because she knew nothing about proper medicine. Dr. Kruglevski will know what to do.”

Anya sat back, worn out by her coughing. “I just hope I’ll be well in time for Rudolf and Lyudmila’s wedding.”

No wonder Lyudmila had blushed when I’d asked if she knew Rudolf. I patted Anya on the shoulder. “I’m sure you’ll feel better in no time. And if not, perhaps they will wait with the wedding until you are.”

“Oh, no!” Anya said, distressed. “The date has already been set. If they don’t marry on that date, it would be bad luck for them to marry at all.”

I tried to soothe her, reassuring her that she would be healthy again soon. I shivered, wondering what my wedding date would have been. Thankful that I was no longer the crown prince’s fiancée, I did not worry about superstitious wedding omens. I had enough to worry about.

T
he nurses at Oldenburg Hospital were much happier to see me when I arrived with my maid in the carriage bearing the Oldenburg family crest. We were ushered into the doctor’s office and each given a cup of hot spiced tea. Dr. Kruglevski came in and listened to Anya’s chest and gave her a small vial of cough syrup.

The doctor looked happy to see me as well. “Duchess! What a pleasure! You are looking much better than when I saw you last. How are you feeling?”

“Actually, I wondered if you have any medicine that will help me sleep more deeply at night. I have been having horrible nightmares lately, and I’ve not slept well in over a month.” Not including the two days I was unconscious at the Vladimirichi Palace.

“Hmmm.” He scanned through his glass cabinet full of brown and green glass bottles. “Here is one I feel comfortable with you using. But only take one dropperful each
night before going to bed. And it would be better if you do not use this every single night, as you will become dependent upon it.”

“Thank you, Doctor,” I said, taking the green bottle he handed me, feeling only a little remorseful about deceiving him. If one teaspoon would knock me out, I wondered how much it would take to knock out an undead soldier.

As Anya and I were preparing to leave, the head nurse rushed in. “Doctor, you must come quickly! They have brought in Prince Demidov!”

Princess Aurora’s cousin. I set my things down and followed Dr. Kruglevski into the triage area, where they had laid the prince on a stretcher. There was blood everywhere. Anya began to swoon.

“I need a bottle of saline and some gauze, quickly!” Dr. Kruglevski barked out orders to his associates.

“What has happened to him?” I asked. The prince was still breathing, but it was very shallow. His face was snow-white.

“Katerina Alexandrovna, you should go home now,” Dr. Kruglevski said. “You should not have to see this.”

“I want to help,” I said. “Tell me what I can do.”

The doctor did not waste any more time arguing with me but handed me a large bundle of gauze and told me to place it over the young man’s neck. “Hold pressure on the wound,” he said grimly. “There is a major artery there that is bleeding out.”

The gauze bloomed a bright red and became saturated. I still put as much pressure on his neck as I could.