Page 44 of One For my Enemy

For sweet discourses in our times to come.

JULIET:O God, I have an ill-divining soul,

Methinks I see thee now, thou art so low,

As one dead in the bottom of a tomb;

Either my eyesight fails, or thou look’st pale…”

Romeo and Juliet, (3.5.50–56)

“Ask for me tomorrow,

and you shall find me a grave man…”

Mercutio (3.1.94–95)

III. 1

(Succession.)

To believe in destiny, one must also believe in succession. If the world is ruled by predetermination, then it must also be ordered, measured, paced out from first to last:

If this, then this.

Roman Fedorov knew nothing of the stars at his birth, but if he’d been told they stood for loyalty, for duty, for immobility of faith, he would have easily believed it. For Roman, destiny was a vehicle for purpose. If this, then this. If he was born a Fedorov son, then he would know no other identity. If he was born the second son, then he would revere his brother Dimitri as the heir. If he saw his father and his brother wronged, then he would defend them, without regard for cost. He would take a threat made against his brothers as surely as if it were his own constitution in harm’s way.

It was for love of family, but it was more than that, too. It was because if Roman Fedorov didn’t believe in succession, then being second-born would surely drive him mad. How was it possible to feel such greatness in one’s bones and yet be kept from it by birth? To give in to such a feeling would be to relent inevitably to chaos.

So—if this, then this.

Roman was six years old the first time he had seen his father silenced, and by his seven-year-old brother, no less. Their brother Lev had just been born, their mother passing in the night shortly after, and Dimitri—golden Dima, with his princely smile and his quick wit and his sun-stroked hair—had been the only one brave enough to touch their father’s shoulder, resting one small hand on Koschei’s back.

“Go to bed, Dima,” Koschei had said, “and take that baby with you.”

That baby.Koschei had nearly spat it out, ruthless in his grief.

Dimitri, then, rather than answering, had turned from his father’s side, gathering the infant in his arms from the cradle that still sat beside their mother’s bed.

“This baby is named Lev,” Dimitri reminded his father, holding the child out fiercely as Roman had looked on, rigid with apprehension, and their father kept his hard gaze turned away. “He is called Lev, as Mama asked for him to be. Levka, like a lion. I’m this lion’s brother. I will protect him with my life, Papa, but I am not his mother, and I am not his father. If you will only be his father for me,” Dimitri pleaded, “then I will be his brother. If you will not fail him, Papa, then neither will I.”

He held out the baby then, and Koschei didn’t move. He didn’t blink. He merely stared at his own hands, and then Dimitri, astoundingly, shifted as if to drop the infant. The movement was so unpredictable and sharp that both Koschei and Roman stumbled forward, panicked, and the baby Lev began to cry in earnest, wailing with his little hands curled into fists.

“Dima!” Koschei roared in anger, snatching Lev from his eldest son’s hands and pressing him close to his own chest, protective at last over the fragility of his newest son. “You would have dropped him!”

“No,” Dimitri corrected, laughing his clever warrior’s laugh, “because you wouldn’t have let me, Papa. Nor would Roma,” he added, gesturing over his shoulder to where Roman had stumbled forward, nearly falling over himself in his effort to keep the baby aloft. “Because we are all brothers,” Dimitri explained, and Roman blinked, watching Koschei’s eyes widen with understanding.

“Because, Papa,” Dimitri finished, reaching out to let the crying Lev reach for his fingers, soothing him gently, “we are all your sons.”

It was the first time Roman had ever seen his father humbled. Koschei was a great man, a man whom others listened to, but never had Roman seen that sort of rapt attention given from his father unto others. Devotion, Roman had always thought, was reserved for lesser men. But Koschei had reached up then, pulling Dimitri’s golden head to his, and brushed his lips gently across the forehead of his eldest.

“I will give you everything, my son,” Koschei had whispered, the words buried in Dimitri’s golden curls, and in that one moment, Roman understood the entire world had shifted.

(If this, then this.)

For years Roman had replayed that moment in his head, wondering what exactly Dimitri had done to earn their father’s hard-fought respect. He wondered, too, whathewould have done, had Dimitri not been there to speak for both of them. Even in Roman’s most earnest of imaginations, though, he finally had to admit to himself the divergence of his nature from his brother’s; had to concede, grudgingly, that he would never have done as Dimitri had done. Roman would have followed his father’s instructions without question. He would have abided by his father’s wishes, as any dutiful son should do. He would have taken Lev and cared for the baby himself, or tried to, if only so that Koschei’s wishes would not have been so recklessly pushed aside. If it were Roman, he would have made certain a man like their father never had cause to doubt the loyalty of his sons.

But was that not admirable, too?

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