Page 44 of My Wild Horse King

I shrug. “It’s a free country—America, right?”

Mirdza laughs. “You sound remarkably modern. Grigoriy still sounds like a Tolstoy novel sometimes.”

“Tolstoy?” I cringe. “He was ancient a hundred years ago.”

“Forget it,” Mirdza says. “You seem to have caught up quite well.”

“I watched a lot of television while I first woke up, when Leonid stuck me in a room, and then I watched more in that room at Kristiana’s house.”

“Ah, television. The great educator of our time.” Mirdza looks at her hands.

“Did you want something?” I should be nicer to her. She’s the first person who has actually tried to talk to me, but I can’t help it. I’m not good with chit chat when I know the person wants something. I’d rather know what it is.

Her face scrunches.

“You can just ask. I’m a pretty straightforward person.”

“I actually don’t want anything,” Mirdza says. “But you look so miserable over here that it got me thinking.” She sighs. “Maybe I should just butt out, but I’m the kind of person who worries when horses in a herd are being excluded.”

She’s different than Kristiana, and definitely different from her twin. Is it possible she really just wanted to check on me? If so, she should know who I am. I can’t really make friends with her when I wanted to betray her sister. “Sometimes there’s a reason the herd ostracizes one horse. I—I came here to try and break Adriana and Alexei up.”

She giggles.

Honest-to-goodnessgiggles, like a little girl. “Duh.”

I blink.

“I mean, we all knew that, but it’s fine. You didn’t have a hope of success.”

I start to laugh too. I can’t help it. She’s acting like I was a child in a superhero suit, bent on stopping crime.

“Those two are meant for each other,” Mirdza says. “Nothing on heaven or earth could have stopped them from being together.” She shrugs. “You might have annoyed Adriana. Her self-esteem isn’t what it should be, but none of the rest of us were worried.”

That makes me feel pretty lousy. I was the only one too stupid to see what she’s saying, but now that she says it, it’s painfully clear. “We don’t get to pick what our hearts want.”

“But we do get to choose what we do about it.” Mirdza’s voice is soft, and from anyone else, it would have sounded like a reproof, but not from her. It sounds like she’s been there, and she’s made the wrong choice before, too. “And for what it’s worth, you look happier now that you’ve given up. You should think about that.”

“What do you think it means?”

“You never had a mother,” Mirdza says. “Alexei mentioned that.”

“I’m not a charity case,” I say. “I made my own decisions.”

“But as someone who never had much of a mother herself,” Mirdza says, “I wonder. Is it possible that you wanted a family as much as you wanted Alexei himself?”

I blink.

“I’m certainly no expert, but I wonder whether you loved the idea more than the person.” She shrugs. “Maybe not. Just thinking out loud.”

“What if we choose wrong?” I ask. “What then?”

“I chose wrong.” She snorts. “I bet most women have.”

“You did?” I have trouble believing that.

“I think it might have been harder on you.”

“I don’t need pity.”

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