"You are acting like a child, Ivan."
"That is not fair, Elizabeth. I have done nothing."
"Precisely. Dear Sophie has been here for months and you haven't said a single word to her yet. She'll be the Tsarina one day, once she marries Peter and he assumes the throne. You ought to at least introduce yourself."
Russia picked at the ends of his scarf and grumbled under his breath, too quiet for his empress to hear. He wasn't looking forward to the day Peter was the Tsar, not at all. That stupid boy probably needed help putting on his own boots. There was always the slim chance that he would grow up and be a fine ruler one day, but in the mean time Russia was still crossing his fingers that a sudden plague or freak accident would take that wretched little boy out.
That was part of the reason he didn't like the little Prussian bride-to-be; Peter seemed to be very fond of her. Russia had a hard time imagining that anything Peter liked was good. After all, most of what Peter liked was Prussian. That proved Peter had bad taste.
Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg. Maybe Elizabeth and most of the court had been charmed by her, but Russia didn't see her appeal. Granted, he had only ever watched her from across the room, a tiny little figure mingling among adults with a grace and ease that seemed out of place on one so young...and from such an unextraordinary family too.
She wasn't even that pretty. Russia had seen the portrait of her that was sent to Elizabeth, and even the artist wasn't enough of a liar to try to hide Sophie's pointed chin and long nose (though Russia was willing admit that he was in no position to criticize anyone's nose when his own was so unattractively large.)
"You don't have a good reason to dislike her," Elizabeth said, in the sharp voice that said she'd be losing her temper soon. Her tone brought Russia's eyes up from the frayed ends of his scarf. "It was either a Prussian princess or a Saxon, and I've said it a hundred times: I won't have a Saxon!" Her voice softened slightly after that outburst. "I've spoken to Count Lestocq about this, and he agrees that it would be to your...our advantage to improve relations with Prussia."
"I know," Russia agreed sourly. "But I still don't like it."
"You have plenty of time to get used to it," Elizabeth said with a air of finality. "And you should get used to your future Tsarina too. Go speak to her when she's well again. You may find that you like her once you get to know one another better."
"Not likely. May I leave now? I will go talk to the girl, if that is what you wish."
"Not now. She's still very sick. The poor thing hasn't been well in weeks."
"All the more reason to keep my visit very short, da? I will behave myself."
"If you're going to insist on this...she seemed well enough for a short visit yesterday. Just see to it that you don't disturb her."
"I won't," Russia promised, bowing politely to his empress before leaving her chamber. Sophie's sick room was a good distance away from Elizabeth's, but Russia knew the palace well enough to navigate it in his sleep, and the walk was a short one. He hesitated outside her door, hearing voices chatting from within in German.
"-were told to put your books away, Princess," a man's voice said, patient but long suffering.
"I just wanted to study a little today. I'm feeling much better now!" A girl's voice, Sophie.
"You wouldn't have fallen ill in the first place if you hadn't been staying up all night to study. You don't need to be in such a hurry to learn Russian."
"But I want to learn, as fast as I can. I want to be Russian."
Well. This was news to Russia. He had assumed the girl's illness was the result of her lack of resistance to the cold weather. She had been bundled in furs and shivering when she first arrived in Moscow. He thought she was just too delicate for his winter. But no, she had made herself sick by working too hard to learn a language...to learn his language.
He cracked open the door as Sophie said, "Dobraye ootro. Minya zavoot Sophie. How do I sound, doctor?"
"You have an accent," Russia said from the door, making girl and doctor whip around in surprise.
Sophie looked even less lovely than before. Her dark hair clung damply to her forehead, and she was pale under the flush of fever. Her mouth worked as she tried to come up with the correct words and finally said, "Dobraye ootro. Um...kak vas zavoot?"
"We can speak in German, if you like," Russia allowed, switching into the language but not answering her question. "Is hard enough to learn a new language when you are healthy, da?"
Sophie sighed in frustration and dropped her eyes to the open book in her lap, where she had been practicing writing the Cyrillic alphabet on a blank page. "I'm sorry. I had hoped to learn how to speak Russian faster, but-" The words broke off into a coughing fit and the doctor shooed Russia out of his way as he hurried to the girl's side, helping her to sit up until the fit had passed. There was a thin trickle of blood down her chin by the time she caught her breath.
"Excuse me," she said faintly as the doctor dabbed the blood away and retrieved her book, which had fallen to the floor. "Have we met before? I-I feel that we have, but I can't recall your name..."
"We have not met yet. That is why I came to visit. It seems it slipped my mind to introduce myself," Russia lied easily. "Ivan Braginski. I am an...adviser to the empress. It's a pleasure to meet you, Princess."
"A p-pleasure to meet you too," Sophie croaked, choking on another cough.
"We need to bleed you now, Princess," the doctor said firmly, digging into his bag and producing a surgical knife, bowl and bandages. "That should help with the inflammation in your lungs."
Sophie's long nose wrinkled, and her fingers tightened slightly over the bedsheets.
"Are you afraid? Do you not like blood?" Russia asked bluntly, noticing her sudden anxiety.
"I'm not afraid of blood," Sophie said, watching the doctor prepare the knife warily. "But I don't like the weakness that comes afterward."
"Ah, I hate that too! Bad enough to be sick, and then they make you even dizzier, da?"
"Maybe you would like to hold her hand through it, sir?" the doctor asked. "Since you both seem to have such distaste for the procedure."
"That's not necessary," Sophie insisted, composing her expression. The only thing that gave away her nervousness was the slight furrow of her eyebrows. "I'm sure he has other business to attend to-"
"I am not so busy that I can't spare a few more minutes," Russia interrupted, taking a seat by her bed. The corners of Sophie's mouth quirked up and her eyes warmed into the smile. Russia decided that her chin wasn't really so pointed, and the size of her nose wasn't all that noticeable from this angle.
Her tiny hand was engulfed in his own, little fingers curling against his palm as the doctor punctured the artery. She hadn't been lying when she said that she wasn't afraid of blood; she calmly watched the spurting stream as it flowed out of her arm and into the bowl.
"Can...can you take out my German blood?" she mumbled thickly to the doctor when the bowl was almost full. "I want you to drain all the German blood in me, so only my Russian blood is left."
Something flip-flopped in Russia's stomach, but it was too late to ask Sophie to elaborate; she was already sagging against the pillows, slipping out of consciousness. Why did she say such things? Why did she want so desperately to be Russian?
"She says the oddest things sometimes, doesn't she?" the doctor said with a quiet chuckle as he tightly bandaged the little wound on the unconscious girl's arm. "She seems to really love this country."
"Why?" Russia asked quietly, half to the doctor and half to Sophie. "She has only been here a few months. How can she love someone-...something she barely knows?"
"Maybe it was love at first sight?" the doctor said, laughing to himself as he left the room. It was only a joke to that man, but Russia stayed seated by Sophie's bed, watching her face as though it could give him an answer. Some time passed before he let go of her hand.
Historical Notes:
Catherine the Great (whose original name was Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg) came to Russia in 1744 to marry Empress Elizabeth's nephew Peter, who would take the throne as Peter III after Elizabeth's death. Elizabeth decided on Sophie because some of her advisers convinced her that it would be good to strengthen ties with Prussia and France through that marriage. There were many in the court who strongly opposed this, and wanted Peter to marry the Saxon princess, Princess Mariana, in order to unite Russia, Saxony, Austria, England and Holland against Prussia and France. Fredrick II of Prussia wanted to avoid that, so he encouraged Sophie's mother to agree to let her daughter become one of the marriage candidates. Count Lestocq, a Frenchman who helped bring Elizabeth to power, also supported Sophie as Peter's future wife. Both Elizabeth and Peter liked Sophie initially, but unfortunately for her, that was not to last.
Sophie was surprisingly sharp even at her young age (she was only 14 when she arrived in Russia) and was very devoted to learning Russian, converting to the Orthodox religion and basically 'Russifying' herself as soon as possible. She started staying up late to practice the language, and ended up with pneumonia as a result. The court really softened up to her a lot after they heard that she had gotten sick from her late night Russian study sessions. She was bled a ridiculous number of times over the course of her illness, which her mother freaked out about because her own brother had died from being bled too much (according to her, anyway.) Allegedly, she asked a doctor to remove all her German blood so the only blood in her would be Russian blood.
The title is a reference to a quote by Catherine the Great, in which she said, "I cannot live one day without love."