Teatime

Dimitri winced when he noticed Irina setting out the good china for tea. "Tell me you're doing that because you feel bad for our mentally unstable guest."

Looking up as she set a gleaming brass fork on top of a linen placemat, Irina shook her head. "Afraid not – three guesses who telephoned and announced they'd be joining us."

Groaning, he lifted his hand to his face. "Such bad timing."

"It won't be so bad," Irina sighed, breathing on a spoon then rubbing it with her less-than-clean handkerchief to shine it – an action the former kitchen boy that still lived in Dimitri's marrow found utterly repulsive. "We've done it before."

"And yet, without fail, part of me dies just a little every time," he simpered.

"Oh, don't be so dramatic, Dimitri."

"Oh, right, a group of high-ranking Bolshevik officers who have the authority to shut us down and throw us in prison if we displease them in any way will be here for tea. And, to top that off, we've got a madwoman upstairs we fished out of the Neva this morning." He forced a sardonic shrug. "Why on earth should it bother me?"

"Well, I'm glad you brought up our little half-drowned waterlily upstairs," Irina said next, smoothing her skirt and stepping away from the table. "She'll need to be moved."

"We can't put her back in the Ladies' dormitory," Dimitri said flatly. "She's too unstable."

"I realize that," Irina conceded, "but the room we've put her in has always been reserved for the Bolshevik officers. If they don't get it, they'll be furious."

"Then where are we going to put her?"

The madwoman's resemblance to Anastasia made him uncomfortable – all the more so the way she'd acted like she knew him before looking at his right hand and randomly exploding into a fit of weeping that could have drowned out a parade – but he last thing he wanted to was kick her out before he discovered who she actually was.

He hadn't even had a chance to check the registry for her name yet.

"I was thinking...and don't have a conniption fit, it really doesn't flatter you...your room."

"My room?" he repeated, dumbfounded.

"Yes, it's not like you'll use it during the officers' visit."

"Why wouldn't I be using my own room?"

"Dimitri, you know they expect us to be sharing one." Irina frowned, plainly put-out by his lack of cooperation. "You're going to move into my room with me until they've gone."

"And we're back to the dying just a little," he told her.

"So, can Miss Unknown use your bedroom or not?"

"Fine," he gave in, throwing up his hands in surrender. "By the way, why are you calling her Miss Unknown? What name did she register?"

"Erm, Anya something or other," Irina said, popping a fresh chew in her mouth and chomping down. "Starts with a P, or maybe it was a V." Her forehead crinkled and her upper lip curled with the effort of using her brain to recall something that didn't involve tobacco, room decor, or make-up. "It's in the registry – check it if you want to know."

Thinking Irina couldn't have stated the obvious any more plainly if she'd been offered a set of semaphore flags as visual aid, Dimitri left the dining room and went to rickety desk to leaf through the register.

Anya Vagonov.

Vagonov... Where had he heard that name before?

A memory exploded in his mind, a blur of colors and white light.

He was hunched over with a broken, bloodied nose.

Commissar's voice: I think it best if Comrade Vagonov escorts them in your place.

Gleb.

Comrade Gleb Vagonov.

Closing the registry, Dimitri reached up to rub his temples. What he had hoped would allow him to glean at least some small answer had only left him all the more confused.

Anya felt a hand on her arm, shaking her, and rolled onto her back without opening her eyes, the bed creaking loudly under her. "What do you want, Dimitri?"

"How did you know it was me?"

Her shoulders lifted in a weary shrug as she slowly opened her eyes, gazing up at him blankly.

"Where's Irina?" She could not bring herself to say 'your wife'.

"Getting clean linens for the bed."

She grabbed a fistful of sheets in one hand and clenched her fist around it. "These are fine."

"They're not for you."

"Oh?"

"We have a superior Bolshevik officer coming to tea," he told her. "He requested this room."

"I can't imagine why," she murmured.

"You don't like it?" He arched a brow.

"I just thought Count Ipolitov had much grander rooms in this wing than this," she remarked, as if in a daze. "I remember velvet curtains sewn with silver thread, the last time I was here. There was gold on the ceilings. The main ballroom alone..." Her voice trailed off. "I tried to smuggle my brownie camera in, to take pictures of the play and the dancers – Mama took it away, of course."

"How did you know Count Ipolitov? Were you an aristocrat?"

Tears filled her eyes, blurring his face, protecting her from his unmoved expression though not from his disinterested tone. "Who do you think I am, Dimitri?"

"I don't know," he replied dismissively.

"I think it's best if you do most of the talking," Irina was saying, while Dimitri only half-listened, still thinking about Anya.

For some reason, he hadn't told her that the new room he'd given her was his own. He wasn't entirely sure why. Maybe he didn't want a crazy lady knowing where he slept most nights.

Or maybe he was becoming afraid of her in a way that was altogether unrelated to how mentally unhinged she obviously was.

Every time this Anya looked at him, he felt like his insides were being wrung; it was hard to breathe, let alone think straight. Taking his eyes off her was as difficult as if they were glued in her direction. And yet he was all too aware of how ridiculous he was being; how she couldn't possibly be the person he saw looking out through those beautiful blue eyes – Romanov eyes, he'd have called them, if he didn't know better.

Her knowing his name without being introduced to him was a little creepy, but he believed there had to be an explanation. She'd guessed, or heard someone else say it.

Dimitri had been fooled once before, and it nearly destroyed him; he didn't think he could bear it if he let himself be tricked again.

"As you know," Irina still prattled on, like she expected him to care, "I'm not really much of an actress."

No kidding. He rolled his eyes and lit a cigarette, only to stub it out a moment later when the Bolshie party arrived at the desk, their grim, no-nonsense faces melting into smiles more befitting French gargoyles when they saw Irina.

These men were convinced that pretty Irina Alexandrovna was the living embodiment of everything pure and good about the New Russia. A dutiful woman with a steady, respectable job, an open hand, and – as far as they were currently informed – a loyalist husband.

"Show time," Dimitri muttered under his breath.

Anya hadn't intended to come down for tea. Especially knowing there would be Bolsheviks there. She stayed clear of that sort as much as she could – an effort that proved increasingly difficult in the new order of things.

But, after a while, she couldn't stand being in that room alone anymore. Even crying no longer held any release for her – she was completely drained of tears.

She could find no sharp objects – nor any objects, really – in the drawers. The pitcher on the nightstand didn't even have any water inside.

The only things of interest she could find in the entire room were a collection of icons stashed away in a cabinet. She found the music box Grandmama had given her when she was eight hidden behind a large four-wicked candle and removed it.

After all, it wasn't Dimitri's to keep. Besides, if he'd cared about the music box – about its connection to her – he wouldn't have left it in a random storage cabinet.

She thought perhaps, despite the fact that she had little appetite, she might slip downstairs and at least have a drink of water.

Though her corset was gone, discarded, Irina had washed and returned the rest of her clothing – a worn skirt, plain blouse, and a woolen coat.

After stowing her reclaimed music box in the coat's pocket, Anya put the blouse and skirt on, trying to ignore how naked she felt without any proper underthings.

In the dining room, she was greeted with a sight that tore her heart out.

Dimitri sat at the head of a long table spread with a hearty teatime fare – black bread, fresh fish, a couple kinds of fruit and creamy milk, and hot water from a spotlessly shined samovar – Irina (looking very striking in a pale blue dress trimmed with white lace at the collar and cuffs) at his right side. They were holding hands above the table and smiling at something the Bolshevik officer seated closest to them was saying.

"I'll never forget," Dimitri began, after the Bolshevik officer had finished speaking, "the day I met the most beautiful woman in all of Russia."

One of the more elderly guests went "Aww..."

Anya desperately wished Irina would choke on a fish bone, uncharitable as that thought was. At the very least, she wanted to see the woman Dimitri had just declared the most beautiful in all Russia spit up her tea.

"What was that nickname you always liked calling me when we first met?" Irina chimed in.

Dimitri's brow crinkled, the fingers on his free hand curled around a quarter-filled wineglass. "I'm sure I can't wait to hear."

"Reenie," she said, her voice rising jubilantly as if she'd had some sort of delightful epiphany. "That was it."

"If you say so, darling," he managed, not-so-smoothly trying to steer the conversation back to what it had been a moment earlier. "Anyhow, I was in a bad way – I'd lost my last ruble to a con someone I'd believed to be a friend pulled on me – and then...Reenie..." He nodded in Irina's direction. "Irina... She saved me."

Taking a gulp of wine, Irina cut in again. "I couldn't believe anyone would want to con such a handsome face. I mean, with looks like that, he should have been doing the scamming – am I right?"

"Irina, stop." He squeezed her hand – a little too hard, Anya thought, growing more baffled and hurt with each passing second.

"Is it true," the officer four seats down from the closest Bolshevik asked, "that you went to Moscow to ask her father's blessing and refused to spend the night under the same roof as your bride until you'd gotten it?"

Dimitri smirked. "Now where did you hear that, comrade?"

Irina giggled madly, as if at some private joke between herself and her husband.

Anya wanted to vomit. She'd seated herself, so as not to draw attention, at the lowest seat at the table – by a stroke of poor luck right across from a frantically waving Clara Mikhailovna – and been presented with her own teacup and wine glass, as well as offered a plate of fish and bread; but she couldn't bring herself to touch a crumb of it.

This man who was proudly flaunting his lovely wife in front of the Bolsheviks had once pledged himself to her in Tolobsk and, in return, she had given herself to him. She had gone to his bed and been one with him. He was so in love with her back then he'd called her dusha.

Later, reappearing in her life as Alexander Tchaïkovsky, he had promised to find her again if she left the House of Special Purpose.

He never had.

And now he seemed to want to impress the very people that killed her family and tore them apart forever.

Anya's mind understood that it had been a long time, that she should be glad he'd found someone else to fill his lonely days and stave off the empty suffering, but her heart was indignant.

He wasn't supposed to love Irina (she wasn't even sure he did, whatever he told the Bolsheviks); he was supposed to love her – Anastasia Nicholaevna Romanova – his childhood sweetheart turned lover.

After all, she had never found someone else. She never wanted to – still didn't. Seeing him now, even wanting to strangle him for saving her life only so he could go and break her heart into a thousand useless pieces, she knew beyond doubt there was nobody else. She had never stopped being in love with him. Nine years didn't weigh much of anything in the balance of her feelings.

Worse than his being with someone else was his total nonrecognition.

He acted as if she were a crazy stranger, a wandering lunatic.

All she wanted now was his recognition and one last loving embrace. It really didn't seem like too much to ask for, in the grand scheme of things. Given all she'd lost and suffered through.

Indeed, it felt like that much was rightfully hers.

Dimitri longed for the evening to be over. What started out as a slightly more extravagant tea than usual had spread into a boisterous gathering in the lobby by the fireplace, lasting agonizing hour after agonizing hour. The last time he'd wanted to bash his own head in with a rock this badly, just for the sweet relief of unconsciousness, had involved Irina's best friend Daria (an extremely unpleasant woman who called him 'Dimmy' and had a bizarre compulsion to make quacking noises and flap her arms whenever someone uttered the word tomato) and an act she performed using a sock puppet.

Spending time with the Bolsheviks, pretending to be enamored of Irina Alexandrovna, was a close second on the torture scale. The only thing that didn't make it worse was that at least none of the Bolsheviks tried to convince him a sock with buttons sewn on for eyes was capable of human emotion. Or make him apologize to the aforementioned sock for allegedly hurting its feelings.

For men whose ideals supposedly centered on simplicity and lack of personal property, they sure insisted on being entertained and getting the best of everything whenever they came to The Sunbeam.

Making him even more cranky was the fact that Irina kept pinching him every time his eyes strayed to that Anya Vagonov woman.

He did try not to look at her when she arrived and sat herself down at the far end of the table. He doubted she even noticed his occasional glances. The Bolsheviks certainly hadn't.

Irina, on the other hand, had noticed unfailingly each time his eyes strayed in that direction, and starting pinching him back to attention accordingly.

Dimitri risked one sharp kick in her direction under the table to try and make her quit, but ended up bumping the heel of a Bolshevik's boot by mistake and had to give it up.

His right thigh under the table was beginning to feel rather sore (Irina had sharp fingernails, which dug in as she pinched him) and he was a little disappointed – and surprised – when Anya didn't go back to her (well, his) room after tea, staying with the rest of the guests to watch the Bolshevik officers lounge around, smoking and talking about nothing of any importance.

One of the officers began a revolutionary song (somebody had dragged in a piano, from Dimitri had no idea where, as he didn't own one, to accompany him). It was one of the songs Dimitri hated most – about the dead tsar's cold body rotting and his damned soul drinking booze in hell. Still, he and Irina had no choice but to join in. The last man who'd been close to their group when this happened and hadn't sung along was suspected of being a White sympathizer for over a year. And they had only stopped investigating the poor fellow once he was able to bring medical proof that he was, in fact, a mute to the nearest government office.

At least Irina was having fun. She loved singing, no matter what the song was about. Dimitri grudgingly had to admit she was rather good at it, too. The nasal voice which made her speaking so unbearably grating was strangely melodious whenever she sang.

During the song, Dimitri noticed Anya growing more and more visibly upset. Her jaw was clenched, unshed tears filling her eyes, and she had her arms wrapped around herself in a protective hug.

A cigarette she had bummed off one of the other guests was now untouched, smoldering in the closest ashtray.

He had the overwhelming urge to rush over and apologize to her, perhaps try and explain, before he remembered she wasn't Anastasia and he didn't owe her anything.

He didn't have to justify himself to this woman.

After the song, and a round of cheering, the Bolsheviks decided it would be a good time for a photograph of everyone.

Dimitri, Irina, and a selection of the nicer-looking (as in less poor and recently bathed) guests were hustled towards the piano, where the head officer tried to position them just right so that they'd all fit in the frame.

"Dimitri and Irina by the bench, yes," the man was saying, pointing, "and that man and woman there behind them...that would look about right..."

Rather too loudly, Irina whispered, "Why are we doing this again?"

She might have been addressing the question to Dimitri, but it was the officer positioning everyone who answered. "A few upstarts have been complaining that the new order has produced nothing but misery – a picture of a merry, loyal party such as yourselves will counter that and reassure the public."

Before the camera could be produced and the photograph taken, however, Anya started screaming at the top of her lungs.

"No!" she shouted, leaping up from the thinly upholstered chair she'd been sitting in, shaking like a leaf; "they'll kill us...they've got guns pointed at us...they're going to kill us all!"

Every eye in the room fell on the raving woman, convulsing and weeping.

"The little dog in my arms was growling," she sobbed, crumpling to the floor and burying her face in her hands. "Oh, Pooka..."

Irina came forward and touched the officer's arm. "I'm sorry, our guest has been unwell – she took ill after a dunk in the river this morning."

Dimitri went over and crouched in front of the madwoman. "No one is pointing guns at you."

Her breathing regulated itself, her mind appearing to return to the present.

"I should have died when they shot me," she whimpered, her chest heaving as she peered at him through her fingers. "This keeps happening – I keep seeing it everywhere."

"I think we'd better get the poor thing back to her bed," Irina declared, trying her best to defuse the situation. "She'll feel better after a nice lie-down in her quiet room."

"I want," the officer said slowly, "that woman's name."

"Certainly, certainly," Irina patronized him, "but first you want a freshly opened bottle of vodka, to help forget this little hiccup, yeah?"

"Your wife is absolutely charming, Dimitri," the officer told him, melting under Irina's warm gaze and open, generous hand. "I hope you realize how lucky you are."

"Oh, I have no idea what I did to deserve her in my life," he managed, forcing a tight smile.

"I don't know," snapped Irina, buttoning up the high collar of her nightdress as Dimitri turned down the bed, "why you always insist I sleep dressed like a nun when you share a room with me."

"A respectable nightdress is hardly a habit," Dimitri sighed, smoothing the covers then wandering back over to the nightstand to splash water on his face.

"It's a habit I'd like to avoid getting into," she retorted.

He stopped, turning to look over at her in utter shock, his face still dripping. "My God, Irina, I think that's the first joke you've ever made in my presence."

"Would you have liked me better if I'd been funny?"

He shrugged, reaching for a towel to dry his face. "Perhaps."

Irina sat on the bed cross-legged and pulled the covers over her lap. "Wish I'd known that when we first met."

"Oh, don't act like you like me, Irina," he snorted. "You've said it yourself – you're not much of an actress."

"Well, you're not the thespian you think you are, either." She leaned back and picked an imaginary piece of lint off her pillow. "I saw the way you looked at our unknown waterlily downstairs."

"She just reminds me of somebody I used to know," he said, trying to play it cool. "That's all."

"Somebody you used to love, you mean," Irina corrected him. "I can tell the difference, you know."

"That's really none of your business." He pulled off his boots and slipped into his side of the bed, turning his back to her.

They were silent for a few minutes, until Dimitri suddenly started laughing hysterically, shaking the mattress.

"What's so funny?" she yawned.

"Reenie? What the hell was that?"

"Well," she defended herself, "Dasha calls us Reenie and Dimmy sometimes."

"Dasha talks to a sock," he pointed out. "And it answers her."

"Well, my best friend's an idiot, whatever." She yawned again. "Goodnight, Dimmy."

"Night, Reenie."

He was still laughing when she fell asleep. Or so Irina thought. She never heard the moment his laughter turned to tears and muffled sobs, never noticed the difference as he began to cry himself to sleep.

Meanwhile, Anya couldn't sleep. Not after what happened downstairs. When she'd flipped out, she'd noticed a small change in Dimitri's expression. He no longer looked at her like she was a stranger, or a loon.

At least not entirely.

There had been the smallest twinge of doubt in his eyes. More than that, of fear. Like he'd seen a ghost fly out of her mouth.

She wondered what she would do now.

She wanted to leave this ghastly place – this former palace – and never come back, but not before he recognized her.

If she wasn't going to kill herself after all, wasn't going to join her dead family, maybe he could help her get out of the country, help her find her way to her living grandmother in Paris.

If nine years hadn't stopped – or even slowed – the outbursts, the freakish episodes where she relived that night in Yekaterinburg again and again, then probably nothing would.

This was the first time she'd had one of her meltdowns in front of government officers.

If it happened in their presence again, and they began to suspect who she really was, she didn't even want to think about what they'd do to her. She knew firsthand how merciless they were.

So that settled it; she had to stay until he believed she was Anastasia Romanov and agreed to help her.

Then she would try to never think of him – of his betrayal – ever again.