Hey guys, I'm super sorry about disappearing there for about two weeks. School has gotten pretty crazy in almost no time at all. This one is more of a filler chapter. Initially I had planned on adding more, but I couldn't get it right and I wanted to at least get something out to you guys. I really appreciate your patience! Enjoy!


Dmitry stood atop the snow mountain, shielding his eyes against the bright winter sun. Below him, Anastasia and Alexei were busy making snow angels, though with little success since the snow had turned icy and hard. The Big Pair was somewhere inside the house with their mother, and Maria was lounging on the swings across the yard. On the surface, it seemed to be a very peaceful scene. But if someone were to look closer, they would see a very different picture.

Even from atop the hill, Dmitry could hear Anastasia and Alexei muttering to each other. He mentally applauded their attempt to at least be subtle about it, though they could use a few more pointers. Maria's face was mostly hidden, but he still knew there was a troubled expression on it as she threw glances every few minutes to her parents' bedroom window. Dmitry had a feeling that's where Olga and Tatiana were sitting with Alexandra.

He knew (though the former empress didn't know he knew) that they were busy sewing the rest of their jewels into coats again. They had already concealed the bulk of their "medicines", but now had decided it was time for them to hide most of their jewelry too. They all kept a few pieces on, so as not to arouse suspicion, but the rest was hastily being sewn into the linings of their coats and skirts.

Nicholas was in the new Commandant's office, and had been for hours so far. None of them had a clue why. Anastasia had even tiptoed past the door a few times, and reported that she couldn't hear anything they were saying with any clarity.

Yakovlev seemed decent enough, for a Bolshevik. At the very least, he was as polite to the family as Pankratov and Kobylinsky had been. He had even effectively shocked them all into silence when he exchanged a few words with Monsieur Gillard in French.

The same could not be said for the new guards. Most of the old ones had been sent away that morning, the official excuse being that good officers like them should be helping keep the cities safe and the country running smoothly. But it could not be a coincidence that all the ones sent away were the ones who were friendliest with the family. The new guards and the old ones who remained were suddenly under strict orders not to speak with any of the family or their servants unless it was for official reasons.

"You! Boy!" Dmitry startled as a guard began marching through the snow, hand resting on his gun. "Get down from there!"

Though he longed to answer back to the guard, Dmitry scrambled to obey. As much as he liked making the guards' lives a little bit harder, he liked the current arrangement of his face more. His nose still throbbed sometimes in extreme cold, and he wasn't looking to relive the incident.

"Is there a problem?" he asked when he was finally on the ground again and level with the guard who was still sneering at him.

"We've been told not to allow anyone on top of that pile of snow."

"But he wasn't doing anything," Alexei protested from where he sat in the snow. "He didn't even look at anyone on the outside."

"It's for all of your safety, Comrade Romanov," the guard said stiffly. "There has been unrest in the streets. You are not allowed up there for the same reason you're not allowed to sit on the roof anymore. Commandant Yakovlev will not be taking any chances with your safety." The guard turned and walked back to his post, his hand still on his gun.

"Unrest in the streets," Anastasia scoffed. "If there was unrest in the streets, we would have heard it."

Dmitry only glanced longingly at the summit of the snow mountain that had brought so much fun to their lives for a few weeks, now. Though Anastasia and Alexei hadn't gone sledding down it after that first day, he and the other girls had made a habit of sliding down it during most of the hour they were allowed outside. It seemed cruel to take away that source of joy, especially when they had all worked so hard on it.

Dmitry drifted over to the swings, and Maria nodded at him briefly before turning her gaze back to the window. She didn't acknowledge him in any other way as he sat down on the swing next to her. He wished she wouldn't be so obvious about staring at the window; he worried the guards might catch her and become suspicious.

"I just hope they're not interrupted," Maria said when he told her as much. "I get the feeling these guards wouldn't believe anything we told them, even if it was the truth." Dmitry nodded, risking a glance at the window as well. He had stumbled upon their secret because they were careless and left the door mostly unguarded, but their mother also hadn't been there to manage that. He thought, or hoped, that Alexandra wouldn't make that mistake.

Nicholas suddenly emerged from the house, the new Commandant following a few steps behind him. Dmitry watched them as they walked around the perimeter. Beside him, Maria inhaled sharply, and straightened just the tiniest bit. Even Anastasia and Alexei stopped whatever game they had made up to stare. Nicholas alone looked unperturbed at Yakovlev's presence.

"My three youngest children," Dmitry heard him say as they crossed the yard. "Alexei and Anastasia are the ones in the snow. Maria is on the swings."

"And the boy?" Both men turned to stare at him, and Dmitry suddenly felt much younger than his nineteen years under their scrutiny.

"Dmitry, my son's companion," Nicholas said warmly, offering him a smile. "He's a good, strong lad, an orphan who has been in our service for almost a decade. In another life, he could have been a proper son of mine."

Beneath his coat and scarf, Dmitry felt himself flush. Maria squeezed his fingers and offered him a bright grin. Nicholas and Yakovlev turned and started back toward the house, but Dmitry wasn't listening to a word they were saying anymore.

Of course, for a while now, he had felt as if he might as well be family, even before their arrest in St. Petersburg. Privately, he had come to think of himself as an extra almost-sibling to the imperial children, though he never told anyone that. Alexandra was the only mother figure he could remember. And Nicholas, to his credit, never tried to act like a parent to him and trod on his father's memory, but Dmitry had grown to wish he had the right to call him Papa.

That was not to say Dmitry renounced his true lineage, he still loved his father dearly and thought of him often, but he also loved this family that had opened their home and their hearts to him. He could not imagine everyone would be so kind, especially not other royal families.

For a moment he allowed himself to wonder what his life might have been like if he had been born the son of the Tsar. He would have grown up speaking a collection of languages, and would have gotten a formal education. Upon being hired as Alexei's companion, he was taught to read and write, as it would not do for a high-ranking servant such as him to be illiterate. But as an imperial child he would have learned so much more.

He would never had known what it was like to go to sleep hungry and cold. If he had been born healthy, without Alexei's disease, he would not have been a pampered little prince, but he would not have lived in squalor on the streets.

He tried to picture himself dressed as Alexei always was. There would have been plenty of official portraits of him in addition to the private family photos the girls always took. He would have been the third child, right in the middle with Maria, but he would have carried the title of Tsarevich, being older than Alexei. Tsarevich Dmitry Romanov, heir to the throne of all Russia. That thought made him wrinkle his nose. He didn't think he'd ever want the responsibility of governing any country, never mind the largest country in the world.

Dmitry shook himself out of that line of thought as the guards announced that their time outside was up. Maria hopped up from the swing she had been sitting on and all but ran back inside the house, leaving the rest of them shaking their heads. Dmitry trailed behind Anastasia and Alexei, tipping his head up in a last attempt to hold onto whatever fresh air he could. It was unlikely that they would be allowed back out later in the afternoon, another new rule. It was getting hard to keep track of them all.

He looked up as a sudden flurry of motion ahead of him caught his attention. Anastasia had apparently lifted her arm and thrown something, and Dmitry managed to look up in time as the wet snowball made contact with one of the guard's heads. With a shrill- almost giddy- shriek, Anastasia grabbed both his and Alexei's arms and ran back to the house with them, never looking back to see how angry the guard was.