Page 10 of The Crown's Fate
Renata looked mostly the same: a gray dress with a white apron, and intricately woven braids swaying against the nape of her neck. But there was no spark left in her eyes. Even near the end of the Game, Renata had been a candle flame of bravery. She’d leaned against the bars of the cell in which she was trapped and wished Vika well.
No trace of that courage remained. Nor was Renata’s telltale kindness present. She merely looked at Vika blankly. “How can I assist you, Baroness Andreyeva?”
It was the same way Vika acted toward Pasha. Detached. Reluctantly dutiful. Using her official title, not her name.
“I need to talk to you. Can you spare a few minutes?”
“I don’t think I have a choice.” She looked at the snow at her feet.
Vika gritted her teeth. She knew what it was like not to be permitted choices. She would not impose the same on Renata. “You always have a choice, at least with me. But thank you. Come this way, please.”
She led Renata off busy Nevsky Prospect onto a quiet side street. Vika looked up at the snow drifting from the sky. She issued a silent command, and the snowflakes began to flurry in a protective cylinder around them. “There,” she said. “Now no one will be able to hear or interrupt us.” Any passersby would simply see a heavier burst of snowfall.
Renata forced a smile despite not wanting to be there, the learned reaction of a servant, born and bred to be polite. “That’s a pretty bracelet you’re wearing.”
Vika glanced down at where the sleeve of her coat had shifted when she’d conjured the flurry. “Oh. Um, thank you. It’s from His Imperial Highness.”
“The tsesarevich?” Renata’s eyes widened.
“It’s supposed to mean I belong to him. To the extent I can ever belong to anyone.” Vika snorted, which actually showed a great deal of restraint, considering that every time she looked at the bracelet, she wanted to punch the tsesarevich and the grand princess in their haughty faces.
But Renata didn’t laugh, either because she was too well mannered or because she was too entranced by the gold and the rubies.
“Anyway,” Vika said, shaking the sleeve of her coat down to cover the bracelet, “I wanted to say I’m sorry. I should have come to you as soon as the Game was done. Iwas distraught and confused, and ... It’s no excuse. But I’m here now, because I wanted to tell you—”
“You don’t need to.” Renata stared again at the icy street beneath her scuffed boots. “I know ... I know it’s not your fault how the Game ended. Nikolai had said from the start that you were more powerful than he. And someone had to die. But I had still hoped he would win, that somehow, he’d find a way to defeat you and survive. It was naive of me. I’m sorry, because I know that means I was hoping you would die.”
Vika swallowed a dry patch in her throat.
But she forced away the hurt of Renata’s comment, because if Vika had been in Renata’s place, Vika would have hoped the same thing. She shifted her focus and snapped her fingers at the street.
A sofa and a table, both made of snow, sprouted from the cobblestones, like mushrooms do from the forest floor. “Please have a seat,” she said as she took the bundle of bread and the box from Renata’s arms and led her to one of the chairs. “Don’t worry, the sofa is warm.”
Renata gaped.
“Magic, remember?”
“Oh.” Renata nodded slowly and sank into the seat. The snow was fresh, soft powder, and its cushions were airier than goose down. Renata let out a little sound, something between confusion and pleasant surprise.
Once she was settled, Vika sat down, too. “I came to you because I need your help.”
Renata looked up at her and blinked.
“You see, Nikolai didn’t exactly die at the end of the Game—”
“What?”
Vika had to pause. It was harder retelling this than she’d anticipated. “He didn’t defeat me, but he defeated the Game, in a way.”
Renata paled. “Nikolai is alive?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
“I—I don’t understand.”
Vika frowned. “Honestly, neither do I.” She took Renata’s hand and began to tell her everything she knew, from how the final duel had concluded to the shadow boy who’d appeared. Renata trembled the entire time.
The snow flurried a bit more fiercely around them.
