Author's note: It's taken me a year to write this story, y'all. A year.

Thanks to every single person who reviewed, commented, kudosed, bookmarked, etc. You are life. More detailed thanks in the endnotes.

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Ten games to nine. Nineteen games. Nineteen endless, draining, relentless games, and twenty-three days, marching on into a wilderness haze of grey skies and moving pieces. Ten games to him. Nine games to her. Five to go, and she cannot afford to lose more than one. If they go twelve to twelve… no good. She goes home and everything is as it was. Borgov wins.

She won today; not that it seems to make much difference any more. The first win, the first two, were heady - and then…

One more day off tomorrow - and then five more, one after the other. Five more games, facing Borgov across that table.

She's come to hate his face; the brutal, slablike planes, the ruler-straight parting, the closed silence in front of her as her piece and then his clicks and slides on the board and the people seated around them (more of them every day) murmur and shuffle.

She went on the tour that Borgov suggested, after the first three games. A neat, dark little Muscovite with her hair tightly braided explained in precise English the history of St. Basil's Cathedral and the tomb of Lenin, casting adoring smiles at the two men in dark suits who had ushered her and Mendelsohn into the car and then followed them, inscrutable, as they went. And whenever she looked behind her, there was Mendelsohn, hands in pockets, giving her a sardonic smile.

She's in her room finally - Borgov was swept away down another corridor, to his own room, his own suite, where no doubt the best players in the Soviet Union await to tell him how best to beat her in two days' time. But she's alone - Mendelsohn having peeled off, the bolt shot solidly into its slot - and for the moment, these four flat planes of walls are hers.

She's ready when the phone chirps, and lifts it tiredly to her ear without wasting energy on words.

"Well?"

Beth lets her head flop back on the pillow. "Queen to king's knight three. I got him."

"Sloppy. Could have had before that. But it is well done, ditya."

Beth feels a welling of hopelessness. "What does it matter, Demyan? I took him today, and he took me yesterday. We'll do the same thing again on Monday. What does it matter? Even if I take him again. It's all the same…"

There is a silence on the other end of the line. Then: "Is not same. You will beat him."

"Maybe."

"Borgov is bastard. You are American bitch. In long term, bitch beats bastard. Known."

Beth breaks into a smile, still lying boneless on the plushy cover. "You'd know."

"So tell me more about game. Did he play the knight's pawn?"

"Yes, but not when we thought. Not until the end."

"Did you wait him out?"

"Yes. He didn't see it. The way we shifted the pawn centre… it worked."

"Good," Demyan says, his voice all hard edge. "Now we follow up, on Monday."

Beth closes her eyes; blessed darkness blooms behind them, rolling from the corners - but even then, the pieces aren't far behind, the black queen moving, white's bishop in fianchetto. "Demyan, I'm so tired…"

"So is he. Now is when you must take him."

"You don't understand. I just can't go on doing this, it's so hard…"

There is a flat and complete silence on the line.

Beth struggles half-up. "...Demyan?"

There are more long seconds of iron silence, then: "Are you done?"

"Am I… what?"

"Are you done bathing in your pity? I thought you had no room for so much of it in that suitcase of yours."

Beth digs her teeth into her lower lip; the tears are starting behind her sore eyelids already. "Please, Demyan…"

"You want me to tell you, it is so hard for you? So hard to play a game, at the top of the world, the world championship?" Demyan's words are as slow and precise as his moves on the board. " If that is what you want, I hand you back your check, the day you land. I don't play with that girl, ditya. Hear me?"

Beth turns her face into the mocking softness of her pillow. "Demyan, I…"

"I don't want a single cent of her money. You hear?"

Beth squeezes her eyes shut; finds the grain of anger. "I hear!"

Demyan emits more silence from the other end of the line.

"You really are a bastard, you know," she says, through clenched teeth.

"And you are bitch."

Beth half-smiles despite herself. "Right. So I win. You said so yourself."

"Funny."

Beth levers herself fully upright, blinking her eyes clear of their dampness. "So."

"So. I hear no more, yes? You are bitch, and you will take old tired bastard Borgov, and we will not stop until he is on the run."

Beth lets her gaze wander to the failing light outside the window; the Moscow night creeping in thick and foreign. "Old, huh? He's not as old as you."

"He is old enough, and he knows it. His day comes. You must not stop now."

Beth sucks in air, and feels for her animating grain of rage again; it's flickered out. "I wish you'd come with me."

Demyan's exhale rattles in her ear; he doesn't speak for a few long seconds. Then, so quiet she barely hears: "I wish I had been able, ditya. I do."

Beth has half-scrambled to her feet, breath-stopped. "You what?"

"What?"

"You said it," Beth says, grinning to her own reflection in the darkening glass. "You said it!"

"I said nothing," Demyan says hastily, but there's a smile in his voice. "You overstrain yourself, ditya. You hear things."

Beth rolls her eyes at her reflection in the darkened window, melting in a Moscow summer rain. "So what now? What do I do?"

"Tea."

"...Tea?"

"Drink some tea. I will call again tomorrow. We can beat him, child. We can." The receiver clicks; as usual, he simply puts it down when he's finished.

Beth puts the gilded receiver carefully back in its cradle and sits on the bed, facing it. Demyan has given her something, just enough, for now, but oh, it's dark inside, and every inch of her skin is cold…

Her hand hesitates, then reaches back out to the receiver. Warmth. Strength. Forward. She dials Shelbyville, through the tongue-tied Russian operator. Then the harsh buzzing that replaces a ring. On and on; again and again. It rings out.

Beth lets the receiver drop back into its cradle, and looks past it to the battered red cardboard box still unopened on the table she's using to work. It moulds to her fingers as she pulls it towards her; the leaves inside are fragrant and crumpled inside their thin paper bag. A few spoons of leaves into the china teacups on the table, then hot water from the samovar. Two minutes for it to stand and brew. She wraps her hands around the cup and breathes in.

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Mendelsohn pulls out the chair opposite hers, where she's poking half-heartedly at what the hotel restaurant calls a sandwich, and raises his habitual eyebrow at her. She pushes the jug of water at him; he fills his glass and pushes it back. She lifts her glass to her mouth; he follows suit. A ring from the water begins to soak into the embroidered tablecloth.

"God," she mutters, surprising herself. "I want a drink."

Mendelsohn leans back in his chair, stretching his long legs under the table, and quirks a brow at her again.

"Aren't you going to talk me out of it? Tell me why I can't?" Beth gives up on the sandwich and pushes it to the side, arching the constriction out of her back.

Mendelsohn slouches further. "Why? What good would that do? You want to order a vodka - " he nods at the hovering, white-jacketed waiter - "what could I possibly do to stop you?"

Beth looks at the edge of the table, fighting a flash of embarrassment.

"You want one?" Mendelsohn says drily. "I'll get him." He gestures to the waiter.

"No. Stop. Stop!" Beth says, around a rising panic. "Mendelsohn - what are you trying to do to me? Stop it!"

Mendelsohn holds up his hand, flatpalmed, to the waiter, with an apologetic expression; the kid turns sulkily in his tracks and returns to the back of the room.

"Why did you do that?" Beth says, around a growing tightness in her throat. It would have been so easy; so easy. So easy to be warm and forgetful for a little while.

Mendelsohn lifts his head up and regards her steadily through his pale lashes. "You didn't want me to be your shadow. Your keeper. And I'm not."

"But I could've - "

"You told me you wanted a drink." His eyes glitter behind the placid mask of his face. "Okay. So: what are you going to do about that?"

His question cuts into her brain like a needle. The colour is mounting to her cheeks again; she looks down at the rings on the tablecloth, the crumbs. "I suppose - find something else to do. Drink tea. Go for a walk. Or something."

"So."

"Fine. I get your point."

"Good." Mendelsohn drapes himself limply over the chair and pulls his hat forwards over his eyes.

Beth bites her lip; but the afternoon is stretching ahead so long, and so grey. "Would you… come with me? For the walk."

He sits up straight, with a jerk, and lifts the hat again; he looks genuinely surprised. "I said I'd call my wife this afternoon."

Beth feels her tongue seize up; the image of Irina Borgova, precisely-edged thundercloud, flashes across her mind. "Sorry, you don't - it's okay, I'll - it's fine - "

Mendelsohn holds his hand up flat again, and regards her thoughtfully across their waterglasses and abandoned plates. "Say," he says eventually. "How about - I go call her now, and I can meet you in the lobby in a half hour?"

Beth swallows back her spurt of gratitude. "That's - fine. Good. Thanks."

He nods, and reaches for half of her discarded sandwich; he swallows it in three bites.

"How long have you been married?" Beth says hesitantly, feeling her way.

"Nearly two years." Mendelsohn picks up the other half of the sandwich, shoots her a questioning look, and inserts it into his mouth after her nod. He swallows. "She's expecting in a month."

What he's saying seems, in so many ways, like dispatches from another universe. "It must be - hard," she says tentatively. "Being away right now."

He sprays crumbs across the table with a snort; brushes them off her sleeve rapidly with a glance of apology. "I didn't ask for this assignment, that's for sure. There was plenty to do back home."

Beth drops her gaze to the table, and begins to draw patterns on the tablecloth, running her finger through the condensed water on her glass. "And what do you… do? When you're back home?" The strokes are beginning to shape themselves into a board.

Mendelsohn finishes chewing and brushes the crumbs off his suit jacket. "I'm the most junior agent, for now. So I get all the shit jobs. Low level intel. Visa interviews. Security investigations. All the boring stuff that stops the U.S. Government facing foreign attacks." He notices the shape she's drawn on the cloth, and adds with irony, "Nothing that would focus your attention, I'm sure."

Beth swallows. "No, I'd - I'd like to hear more. Maybe you could tell me. When we're walking. About when you lived here."

Surprise permeates his long face again; then he nods, and drops his white napkin on the table as he pushes his chair back.

"Madame Harmon," the desk clerk calls, as they pass on the way to the elevator; Mendelsohn gives her a questioning look, but peels away as she diverts to the desk to take the thick cream envelope from the clerk's hand.

Inside, on a sheet of the hotel's heavy notepaper, is scrawled in the clerk's effortful English: Message for ELIZABETH HARMON Flying in for last TWO games can't wait stay strong white queen - TOWNS.

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Everything hangs on these last two, now. Everything. The room has been more and more crowded each day; no faces she recognises, but a dark buzz of Russian and, every day, more notebooks and cameras. Eleven-eleven; she took two to his one, but she must take two more. Today, at least, Townes should be part of the press pack; her heart, as she carefully applies her lipstick in the bathroom mirror, is lighter than it's been since she left Jolene's apartment.

The first familiar shape she sees in the hall isn't a neat dark head, though, but a nimbus cloud of wild gray over small spectacles. He nods to the Russian official he is talking to, then turns away and presents himself to her with a smile. He bows deeply over her hand.

"My dear Miss Harmon."

Beth breaks into a smile. "Luchenko?"

"I could not resist," he says, in his courtly old-fashioned English. "I knew I must be here when history was made in this game of ours." His cheeks crease as he smiles behind his glasses.

Beth feels her own smile wilt off her face. "Are you helping Borgov? You are, aren't you. Discussing every night how to beat me in the next game." The subject of discussion is sitting closeted in a corner, deep in low-voiced discussion with another suited man.

Luchenko only smiles the wider. "My dear, of course I am. He is my countryman; but more than that, I pity him."

Beth feels the corners of her own lips turn upwards. Luchenko lets her hand go, and bows deeply to her again. "I must go, but I am honoured to have played you before I go, young lady. I am honoured to have seen you play Borgov. If I do not see you at the end, as I suspect I shall not, please take home my warmest regards."

Beth spots Townes now, talking intently to another journalist and pushing the hair back out of his eyes. He catches her eye too, and moves towards her, his face breaking out into a grin, as Luchenko fades away.

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Beth has a pressing headache after the game, and doesn't bother opening her eyes when the telephone chirps; just fumbles it off the ornate stand and holds it to her ear.

"Took it. Twelve to eleven. You were wrong though."

Benny laughs uncertainly. "Uh. I was? Hi."

Beth fumbles the cool flannel off her forehead and sits up. "...Benny?"

"Yeah. It's me. I guess you were expecting someone else." Benny coughs; a rustle.

"Just my coach. So," Beth says, clearing her throat nervously, "how… how are you?"

Benny emits a rough chuckle. "I, uh. I got a couch."

All confusion, for a few seconds; then she rolls her eyes. "A couch, huh."

"Yeah. A guy in my building was getting rid of one, and, uh, well, I got a couch. So, you know, when you land…"

"Oh," says Beth dryly, "there's room at the inn, is there?"

"Yeah." Benny clears his own throat. "If, you know, you want to come by and tell me about it. But you stay on the couch, Harmon. I mean it."

Despite herself, Beth is smiling. "I got it."

Benny rustles vigorously. "They printed the first six games, in the, in the New York Times this weekend. That, uh, that knight-rook-pawn combination in game three?"

"Yes?"

"That was. That was really something. You got him good with that one."

Beth's headache is fading a little; she lifts the damp flannel to the nightstand and twines her fingers into the rich bedspread. "Thanks for calling, I guess… although I knew you would."

Benny snorts in mock outrage. "No you didn't."

"Yes, I did. You always do. You couldn't not be a part of this. I know you." Beth is smiling wider and wider, pressing the counterpane to her heart with her free hand.

"Yeah, well," Benny says gruffly. "Sounds like you're doing OK. So, just so you know… about the couch."

"I know." Beth is breathing freely, clutching her fingers into her palm tightly; little pangs of joy as her fingernails dig in. "Thank you, Benny. I know."

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She almost misses it. She could so easily have missed it.

It's here, finally; the last game; she's made it. She and he have had their limp, exhausted shake, and they're seated on the hard chairs while the maelstrom of the press swirls around them, notebooks and coats and cigarettes, and the arbiter is announcing the arrangements in a loud, slow mix of English and Russian. And Borgov leans forward, with his eyes fixed to the centre of the board, and takes a pawn into his hand.

"Leezabeth," he says, to the board, barely audible over the hum. "Miss Leezabeth."

She doesn't dare raise her own eyes above his hand still on the board. "Yes," she says, through barely opened lips.

"Miss Leezabeth. I am… I am sorry. That we could not."

All of Beth's breath is propelled out of her body in a rush; the weight of everything, of these hours, these years, of rooms full of hard beds and trailer walls and nights alone, alone, alone. "I…"

Borgov too is moving his lips as little as he can, as the adjudicator drones on. "I have been… It has been… I wish you to know that you have my respect."

Beth's tongue is suddenly unlocked. "Borgov," she says, reckless, headlong, "how have you… done this for so long? Why do you keep playing?"

Borgov startles, a little; raising her eyes the margin that she dares, she can see his mouth open, a little, then hesitate; he almost shrugs. "I…" he says, then checks himself helplessly. "I… Because I…"

But in that instant, she's understood; he has given her this last gift, in the way his hand moves so fluidly to the pieces all the while he can't say what he feels. What he is. What she is too.

Borgov closes his mouth hurriedly when the adjudicator finishes speaking and the room falls silent.

She's drawn black, this game. The last game. Borgov plays the Spanish Opening. She's ready with a Morphy Defence. Pawn to queen's rook three. She draws herself up, in her mind, and imagines her deep, steady bow to him. One long breath. Steps into the dance.

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Endnotes: If this fic has any recognisable chess or Russian in it, it's because of resources like agadmator's chess channel, Chess with Gabriel, move-by-move online breakdowns of great historical games, the Descriptive Notation page of Wikipedia, which I had open in a tab for weeks at a time, and Google Translate. I ask pardon and forgiveness for anywhere my chess or Russian fell short.

I had some wonderful discussion with commenters and reviewers. Thank you to everyone who commented, reviewed, or left kudos. Particular thanks to TiaRat and thescarredman, for expanding my understanding of my own characters, and to Terra_Banks for her tireless commitment to discussing, and constructively challenging, my character choices.

My metapost about the genesis and intent of this story, along with its greatest spoiler and some more random backstory nuggets, can be read at my journal: shiva-goddessof DOT livejournal DOT com. If I left out any plot points you want an update on, give me a shout via comment/PM.

Thank you for sticking with me to the end.