That winter was a far from easy one. Russian winters were notoriously difficult, and though her father's hunting lodge had been designed to protect its inhabitants from the harsh weather, it had never been meant for extended stays.
The close quarters meant that when Raya got sick with some sort of bad cough and cold, they all got sick, but her father was affected most of all and Katarina spent most of her time caring for him and Raya while her brother tried to hunt for game.
Her whole life she had been treated as her father and brother thought a lady should be and they had tried to protect her from the harsher aspects of life, but when her father did not get better and Raya succumbed to her illness, she was the only one available to help her brother dig a makeshift grave in the frozen ground for the old woman who had been a surrogate mother to them both for so long.
After their old housekeeper's death, her brother had helped her with caring for their father and with preparing their meals, but she still had much of the brunt of the work since he spent so much time off hunting for food.
One evening when their father lay nearby in a restless, feverish sleep, they both sat in front of the fire. She was working on mending some tears in some of her brother's clothes and he sat watching her for a while before he finally spoke.
"I am so proud of you, Katarina."
She had looked up in surprise and tilting her head she replied, "Proud of me?"
He nodded. "Yes, and I owe you an apology." When she started to open her mouth to protest he had held up a hand to stop her. "Let me finish. I know that father and I have treated you like a girl who cannot handle anything more complex than a needle and embroidery hoop, but you are really a young woman who is stronger than either of us ever was. I am proud to call you my sister."
She had only blushed at his words, not knowing how to respond, but a response was not necessary as he continued, "Life for us will never be the same after this and things will get harder than they even are now, but if anyone comes out of this stronger and better it will be you, Katia." He smiled at the old pet name that their mother used to call her. "Katia. I remember when mother used to call you that. You were such a tiny pretty little thing and the name suited you then, but you are a young woman now. Katarina is lovely, but much too formal." He looked at her for a moment, remembering the name of an English woman he had once met on one of his business excursions. "Kate. Is it all right if I call you that? I think it suits you."
She nodded, confused by the sudden need to give her another pet name, but what she didn't realize was that her brother felt closer to her than he ever had and it was his way of bridging the gap that had formed between them over the years. What neither of them realized was that this new found bond between brother and sister wouldn't last long.
When their father did not get better and the weather began to get worse rather than better, her brother decided that he needed to make an excursion to find some sort of medicine as well as gather information about what was happening with the war.
When he left she had pressed Mikhail's coat on him, knowing that it was the warmest coat that they had brought with them, but he had refused. "No, Kate. It is yours and you need it. I will not be gone long." And, then he kissed her forehead and had gone.
She never saw him again.
He had warned her that his excursion would last two to three weeks, so she only began to worry when the fourth week of his absence came and went. By then, the rations that he had left for her and her father were almost completely gone, and her father was delirious with fever more often than not.
In the fifth week after her brother's departure her father died and she did her best to bury him, no easy feat considering that the ground was almost frozen solid and her father was a robust man. But, she had done her best and had dragged her father's body to a shallow grave, promising that she would give him a proper burial at a later date.
She did her best to hunt, and though she had had a brief lesson in how to shoot the rifle that her brother had left behind, she was not trained in how to find game, so for a couple of weeks she made do with the winter plants that she found or the animals she managed to capture in a makeshift trap she had come up with.
Two months after her brother left, she realized he was never coming back.
Gathering Mikhail's coat, the small satin pouch he had given her, and the jewelry that they had brought with them, she set off, knowing that if she stayed in the cabin it would mean certain death from starvation.