Email: absinthe_girl@optusnet.com.au
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~Prologue~
Russia, New Years Eve, 1873
From the darkness, from the cold, came a carriage. Horses, their coats stained dark with sweat, were driven at a reckless pace across the hard packed snow. Flanking the carriage was a barricade of Cossack guards in full dress uniforms mounted on gallant steeds, the heavy, fur-lined cloaks swirled in the darkness as the mad pace continued. Sheets of snow fell across the land and the wind, full of the rage of winter, blew, twisting and turning the soft white so that it became something fierce and to be feared, and still the party continued their breakneck speed.
The horses labored under the whip and jeers of the driver, their hooves threw up great clumps of ice as they moved ever forward through the flurry, and the darkness slowly gave way to a soft luminosity. The snowstorm lightened, the small flakes turning to bright crystals as the brilliance grew until it became a blinding light. A palace lit up the night, its massive form looming out of the darkness as bonfires burned to illuminate its existence in the presence of the storm. The horses were hauled to a halt and the Cossack regiment fortified the carriage, closing their ranks as the horses steamed. The Captain shouted commands as the liveried servants that had accompanied the carriage hurried about, ensuring that their passengers would be able alight safely. With a final directive, the Cossack regiment parted and the carriage door was opened.
From the shadows stepped a man wrapped up in the finest eveningwear of the time. He glanced up briefly at the massive citadel of stone before turning his attention to the snow that still twirled and danced in the light, like a million diamonds falling from the sky, and he smiled, holding out his gloved hand to the other occupant of the carriage. Leather met leather as his offered hand was taken and the servants and Cossacks bowed their heads in respect as the Dowager descended from the carriage, bundled in fur. Barely did the two acknowledge any of the people who surrounded them as they made their way through the snowstorm with careless elegance to the grand entrance of the palace. The heavy doors closed behind them, protecting them from the brutality of the storm.
But the palace wasn’t a sanctuary for all. Amongst the turbulence there was one who was bearing the full brunt of Mother Nature.
Upstairs, in one of the many luscious rooms, there was a woman whose dark hair was saturated with sweat and her fine, delicate features were flushed red from her long and fevered labor. Days had past since the first spasm of her labor, but that small discomfort had grown as the hours past until nearly two days later she was left in agony, screaming and writhing on the massive bed as her body tried to expel the child she had carried for so long. As the pains had grown so had her resentment. She screamed and cursed the devil she’d married, the man who had forced this demeaning and agonizing situation on her, the man who had demanded a child and brought her back to a country she hated and despised.
Hours dragged on and although she was not alone in her struggles, for the Tsar’s own physician had come from St Petersburg and the family’s most trusted female serfs who were well versed in the nature of midwifery attended her. But despite their combined knowledge, there was little they could do. Murmured voices reassured the tortured woman, urged her to push, to fight her exhaustion and bring the child into the world. She writhed in agony and gasped for breath and when she no longer had the strength to curse her husband, she whimpered for it to end, for the pain to stop and for there to be peace.
The night wore on until the darkest hour was drawing to a close. In the large opulent hallways of the isolated palace various timepieces began to chime in the close of one day and the start of another. But they heralded not just the end of a day, but the death of a year and, in that moment where neither really exists, not one day nor the next, there was a final agonized scream that rent the air of the palace. The bells finished tolling and the soft cry of a child was heard.
Moments later the heavy panelled doors of the room opened and an elderly woman crossed the threshold. In her arms she held the small, whimpering child, swathed in a down filled wrap. Its newborn status was evident in the few pieces of membrane and mucus that clung to its tiny body, but those were soon to be removed. Indeed the large warmed room that the woman took the child to had been prepared for exactly that, amongst other things.
The lights were turned down low, the flames barely alive behind the richly ornate shades that hid them, softened them to cast strange shadows over the room that was handsomely decorated with soft, luxuriant velvets and silks, and highly elaborate gilding. Laying the child down, the serf quickly went about her work, pouring warm water into a bowl of gold and using the finest of sea sponges to wipe away the afterbirth from the tiny body, barely raising more than a whimper from the child. Murmuring softly, the serf abandoned the sponge and held out her hand. From the shadows the Cossack Captain stepped forward and handed her a small silver bowl and watched as she spat in it. Still murmuring, she mixed her saliva with the ashes the bowl contained and turned back to the child. The murmuring continued, soft and regulated, as the peculiar mixture was used to mark the baby, the dark fluid forming curious symbols that seemingly meant nothing. The decorative swirls were completed and the old woman stepped back, staring at the child who rested against the downy wrap. Turning her back to the infant and the Cossack, she crossed over to the heavy velvet drapes and drew them aside, her fingers clumsily working the latch that held the ornate slatted wooden shutters closed. Finally the latch gave way and she pulled them away, exposing the glass of the freezing windows. Taking a deep breath, she stepped forward and forced open a window.
A cold blast of air exploded into the room, bringing with it snowflakes that had been caught in its rage. The wind howled about the room with enough force to make the Captain stumble backwards, and the child, left so exposed and still damp from its sponge bath, screamed. Tiny arms and legs curled up, trying to instinctively find the warmth that it had been use to, only to be left exposed to the freezing cold air. The little body was wracked with spasms as the cold continued its assault and the child continued to scream, to cry out with no understanding, until it began to turn blue about the mouth. Only then did the woman close the window, pulling the heavy drapes across and returning once more to her charge. Using water that was now cold, she once more sponged down the baby and then dried it off, quickly swaddling and then dressing the child in an elaborately sewn silk gown. The original down wrap was pushed aside as the woman bundled the infant up in a rich, mink-lined, silk blanket. Carefully, the serf lifted the prized child in her arms and continued on her way.
Left in the shadows of the softly lit room, the Cossack lowered his head and crossed himself, murmuring for forgiveness.
Outside the storm continued to rage and somewhere in the white fury wolves were howling.
“Perhaps they try to drown out the wind,” the man spoke in Russian as he stared out at the snowstorm, his hands clasped behind his back. He was a striking man, tall and handsome in his elegant evening wear, while his golden brown hair was carefully sculpted into the latest style.
“Don’t be foolish,” snapped the Dowager as she sat as if in state upon a broad seated wing chair, dressed in her black silk gown that was encrusted with diamonds. Her fingers drummed impatiently against the arm of the chair, the soft light of the room catching on the many rings that she wore. “Why tonight of all nights? Do you not think that she could have had the decency to wait until after the Winter Ball?”
“Babushka…” the man smiled slightly. “You know that children rarely wait, they are quite impatient.”
As if summoned by those words alone the heavy double doors were opened by liveried footmen, and the small child, wrapped in its furs and silk, was ushered into the drawing room.
“At last, at last,” cheered the old woman, rising to her feet as the gentleman stepped toward the serf and his child. “Well? Has she produced an heir?”
The old serf carefully handed over her charge, letting the child’s father take its weight in his arms. Silently, she shook her head in the negative, before bowing slightly. “A girl child.”
“A girl?” the Dowager's curt reply was practically spat out, looking on with disdain as her grandson cradled his child and she sunk back down into the chair. “A girl is of no use,” she stated, easily and carelessly dismissing her entire gender. “I am disappointed, I had thought that she would have produced an heir for us…but a girl…”
“How can you say such things, Babushka?” he demanded, his face alight with the joy of merely holding his child in his arms.
“Surely you are not suggesting that you are pleased to have a daughter?”
“Why shouldn’t I be?” he asked, smiling down at the precious little bundle he held in arms, marvelling at the tiny features, cherub cheeks and a pouty little mouth.
“A girl, Nikki,” stated the Dowager, dismissing her great-grandchild with a piqued flick of her wrist and she turned away in disgust from the sight of father and daughter, looking beyond them to the storm that raged outside. “A night like this, it is unlikely that the child will survive…”
“How dare you!” hissed her beloved Nikki, appalled at his grandmother’s callous comments and anger lit up his brilliant blue eyes. “How dare you doom my child, my daughter.”
“Nikki…” she began in her most appeasing tone.
“No,” he cut her off, turning is attention back to the daughter he held cradled in his arms, and he slowly meandered over to the window, the storm still howled beyond the glass. “No, you won’t say another word, Babushka. She will live through the night, I’ll see to that, and the next night and the night after that…she was born in a storm, after all.”
He turned about and faced the other occupants of the room, smiling over his daughter and his eyes fixed on the old serf who had brought her down.
“What do you say, Koshka? Will she live through the night?”
“Yes…she will live…forever…” the old serf’s words were broken and rickety, but enough to satisfy the father and disappoint the great-grandmother.
“This is ridiculous, Nikki, you act as if the child has bewitched you.”
“Perhaps she has, my little winter fairy, my little queen…my Tatiana…” he smiled once more at the tiny baby and turned back to the storm. “What do you think, Tatiana? A beautiful bewitching name for a beautiful bewitching girl.”
“What utter nonsense,” huffed the Dowager. “I believe you drank too much before we left the ball.”
“Tatiana…” he murmured to his daughter, marvelling as she yawned. “And you shall rule the world if you want to…”
Behind him the Dowager huffed at her grandson’s fit of fancy, while the serf looked on in silence.
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