"Is anybody out there?" Bartol vaguely heard someone calling out. "Get out, while you can!" He smelled smoke, which he realized was heavily coating the inside of his lungs. He coughed to clear them out and opened his eyes. The palace was burning around him. He rolled over and felt the gash on the side of his head. What just happened? He wondered to himself. He sat up slightly and realized he was still in children's bedroom. On the floor near his arm laid a lone slipper. It was brown leather, slightly worn out with a wool lining. He knew this belonged to Alexei, but at that moment couldn't remember where the prince had ran off to. The wound in his forehead indicated he might have a tough time remembering much of this night. He just knew he was lucky enough to be alive. The lonely servant boy gathered his strength to hop to his feet and run for it, but all of a sudden he felt an overwhelming premonition to go back for the prince's missing shoe. Besides, it was the only lead he had in finding Alexei. He ran back for it, scooped it up and held it close to his chest. "I'm not sure what happened on this night, but I will be reunited with you my prince" he quietly assured himself. He had a strong feeling to leave the palace grounds out the secret passage of the servants quarters. Since he woke up next to Alexei's shoe in front of the doorway-he decided it could be wise to investigate further. He took the dark hallway all the way to end where there was doorway leading to the gardens. He shoved the slipper in his jacket pockets and opened the door to see the snow had stopped and it would soon be dawn. He wondered how long he was knocked unconscious for.

When he stepped out he noticed two sets of tracks started from the doorway and lead down to the pond that flowed behind the palace. Strange he thought as he wandered over the bridge to see what else he could find. As he neared the other side of the bridge he noticed a third pair of tracks that came from the opposite direction, but they appeared to stop midway and vanish altogether. Bartol faced the palace and looked over the side of the bridge and realized the pair of people who left behind these tracks in the snow ran underneath. They must have tried to hide from whoever was on this bridge. Bartol peaked over the other side of the bridge and continued hypothesizing. The tracks on the other side of the bridge showed a third person definitely jumped down to chase after whoever was running across the icy water...then Bartol felt his heart drop to his stomach in fear. He saw a tiny hole in the pond and lots of evidence of struggling surrounding it. "No!" He cried. It couldn't be-was his beloved prince drowned in this very pond?

He dangerously jumped on the ice to investigate, he didn't care if he too fell through and drowned. At least he would be closer to Alexei. But as he hastily approached the hole, he had just barely noticed a small piece of black fabric poking through the shards of ice. He shimmied on his stomach very carefully to retrieve it and not cause the ice to break further. After he scurried back to the street from the pond he looked closer at what he held in his hand. It was a thin black sock, damp and crusted with chunks of ice. He immediately threw it to his face and took a deep breath. "Alexei!" This pained Bartol immensely and further confused him. If his sock was untouched and outside of the icy grave, then perhaps he didn't drown in the pond. His brain worked hard to try and make sense of the event, trying to put two and two together. The unknown assailant had probably attempted to kill the boy after seeing him flee, but when he saw them escaping under the bridge, he was then forced to attack him on the thin ice. Bartol remembered the slipper in his pocket and finally remembered the last time he saw Alexei. Bartol had been rushing him to safety when the young prince lost the shoe from his foot, but the servant persisted he carry on without it. The pain in his heart continued as he envisioned Alexei scared, his toes drenched in snow and ice as he almost drowned fighting for his life. If Bartol had thrown the slipper back to him, he wouldn't had been so handicapped in his escape. Bartol sat down on the cold street with his face in his hands and wondered if Alexei had managed to catch a train to freedom...

ONE YEAR LATER

Alexei had been staying at an orphanage after he had been found abandoned on the train platform. They lady who ran the place didn't have much information on how the boy ended up there-other than he was found with one shoe on and he had little memory of his past. She decided to call the boy Ali. Whenever someone had asked him where he came from, he shrugged. The only flashback of memories that played in his mind was: a grand party, a music box, and running through the snow with someone as if they were chased. He also woke up with a necklace hidden under his shirt. When he was in the orphanage trying to gain back some of his memory he would take it out and read the embellished script together in Paris. So, he decided he would hop a train by himself and search Paris for whoever else was waiting for him. A year had gone by since he woke up alone and he was desperate to put together all the missing pieces of his life.

So one day he kissed the other orphan kids goodbye and set off towards the city. As he trudged through the snow he got an eerie feeling that he had done this before. As he approached the city he got a strong sense that maybe he should watch his back. The boy noticed a woman walking back from the market- he stopped her. "Miss which direction is the train?" "Oh it another mile north from here..." she trailed off as she answered him back. Her eyebrows furrowed as if he was familiar to her. This was odd to the boy so he walked on "uh thank you." He turned around for a second and saw her still standing there peering back at him in confusion. He didn't garner this attention from everybody, but the closer he got to the train station, he caught a few whispered glances. Luckily, there were very few people traveling on that day. Ali bought a ticket with the few dollars in his pocket and boarded the train. "Traveling alone, child?" The conductor grabbed his ticket and peered down his face intently. The man who worked aboard the train had black eyes and a creepy black beard. "Yes, sir to Paris. Is that a problem?" "Not at all..." the conductor replied with a crooked smile. Ali had a strange feeling after that so he quickly found a private cart with the sliding doors and hid in the corner. The whistle to alert the station of the trains departure went off, so Ali threw his bag under the bench he slumped in and shut his eyes. Soon he would be in Paris, searching for the person who left him with the necklace around his neck. He drifted off into a light sleep, even though he had a lot of anxiety but the lull of the train in motion consoled him.

The deep sound of a man clearing his throat jerked Ali awake. He rubbed his eyes open and sat up on the bench. It was the conductor and he was reading a newspaper. "Got some shut eye, boy?" The man spoke, but did not revert his eyes from the paper that he read. The train rumbled on full speed ahead. Ali suddenly felt nervous to be trapped alone in this cart with the creepy conductor man, so he didn't respond. "You're probably tired from all the running and hiding you've been doing, huh?" That time, the man folded his paper shut and assessed the boy. Ali furrowed his brow in confusion, wondering where this was headed. "See, a year ago, you were suppose to be killed." Ali was hit with a flashback of screaming children, smoke, men crashing through windows... "I'm not sure you have the right person", the boy said. He slyly glanced at the sliding door to make sure it hadn't been locked for he planned an exit strategy. "You don't remember? Our leader died because of you and your despicable grandmother!" He leaned in closer and slammed the paper in his hands on the floor faced upwards. Ali looked down at the paper where there was a big ad that read:

Searching For Missing Prince: Last Seen Fleeing From Train Station. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of the last remaining Romanov, please meet with the Dowager Empress Marie at her estate in Paris within the fortnight. Included was a very realistic drawing of a young red headed boy, Ali thought the resemblance was a possibility but not concrete evidence. "Legend has it that our grand leader of revolutionists was last seen apprehending this runaway prince under the bridge"...he continued to lean in closer to Ali, exposing his gnarly teeth with a slow grin. "Until you kicked him into the water where he drowned-remember!?" He boomed and just then Ali had another flashback of a set of icy cold fingers, desperately gripped onto his young foot, struggling through the wind and snow. Ali, still seated in the bench slid towards the door. "You have the wrong boy!" He demanded but the scary conductor laughed. "Oh I don't think so! Now, let's take a look at your precious, royal toes and see if all this talk is true." With his right hand he immediately grabbed Ali's right ankle and yanked him close. Then with the other hand he swiftly ripped the leather shoe off to reveal the softest, palest foot he had ever seen. Ali yelped and squirmed, "get off of me!" The conductor closely examined around his ankle and noticed two little marks that could have indicated where his leader dug his sharp nails into the skin when he attacked the boy. "Oh, master you were here!" The man cried into the air. "I will worship the last thing your hands touched...and then I will finish the deed" he grumbled horrifically, sending fear to the boy. Then the worst came when the man caressed the boy's beautiful foot to his face and started to plant soft kisses on the tops of his toes. The thirteen year old boy began to whimper for he was disturbed by the perverted nature of this man. "Oh your highness, you have the nicest feet in all of Europe." Ali cringed at the sight of the bearded man plunging each toe past his lips and passionately tasting each one individually. "Too bad this will be your last moment.." when the boy heard that he really began to panic. "Let me go!" He twisted his bare foot around as much as he could, feeling the man's evil scratchy mouth on his porcelain smooth skin. Then he remembered he had a second foot and planted a firm kick right in the center of the man's face. This caused him to fall backwards and crash hard against the wall. Ali quickly stood up and ran for the door and slammed it shut behind him which then caused the conductor to smash face first into the glass. Ali glanced at the man who's face filled with rage as blood ran profusely out of his nostrils. Ali made a run for it-he had to get off the train or else this man would surely beat him to death.

Once again he fled being barefoot on one side, but he had no other choice. He jumped cart to cart passing luggage, passengers, cargo and made sure no one else was followed. He made it to the last cart which was filled with random boxes of cargo. There was no light except for the beams of moonlight that crept in from the cracks in the sliding doors. The back door of this caboose was not properly shut tight. A single metal rod held the door giant doors together in the center. Easily anyone could be pushed out the back. He heard someone running in behind him so Ali crouched behind some cargo and held his breath, attempting to stay hidden. It was the conductor. Half of his face was messy from the blood that came from his busted nose. "I will strangle the life out of you, boy! Where are you?" He evilly called out to the dark train cart. As he approached the back of the cart near the faulty doors, Ali crept around the opposite side of the cargo, in order to put him closer to the exit that lead back to the front of the train. He heard a noise from the metal doors and he took that chance to make another run for it. But, the conductor had purposely confused the boy and was actually perched on top a box of cargo - so when the boy ran the opposite way the man leapt from the box and landed on Ali. They struggled as the man attempted to grab the boy by the neck but Ali crawled ahead, kicking the man man onto his stomach. He flipped over as he felt the man grip both hands around his bare ankle and tugged hard. The man laughed "I got you now boy! You'll never escape from the Bolshevik!" Ali had another intense flashback of a similar bearded man snarling in his face as he held his foot close. But, before the conductor made another move, the big metal doors at the back of the cart flew open and immediately boxes of cargo flew out from the speed of the train. You could hear them smashing on the tracks under them. This startled the conductor. He took his hands off the boys foot and spun over to face the wind. Ali took this chance to give him another kick-which sent him sliding towards the open door. He screamed and desperately clawed his nails in the floor boards of the train but in an instant, the wind swallowed him up and he flew to his death off the train. Ali turned around to see a dirty boy his age reaching out his hand. Ali took it and vagrant child scurried them away from the hemorrhaging train cart. Ali didn't know who to trust anymore but he oddly felt safe accepting the help of another boy his age.