Which means—I shake my head—of all people, the one who didn’t betray me was Valentin. I’d been so worried about the dangers he posed that I didn’t see he’s my only ally.
Larissa raises one finger to her lips: Shh. I glance down at Masha on the extra cot, eyes still closed, humming boisterously to herself as she basks in victory. Larissa slowly raises her other hand, dangling a dead mouse by the tail. Easy, Shostakovich. Larissa moves slowly, deftly enough to keep the floorboards from squeaking, and tucks the mouse into Masha’s bed.
Masha’s ear-bursting screams after dinner, ringing throughout the house and rattling the windowpanes, almost make me grin. Larissa may not be my ally, but there’s clearly more to her motives than I’d first guessed.
*
“Check.” Ivan knocks Valentin’s pawn with a heavy click. “Again. Stick to your jazz music, Valya.”
Valentin fiddles with his black frames and studies the board for a long moment, then finally claims Ivan’s bishop with his knight.
“You’ve fallen into my trap!” Ivan slides his rook across the board, sending the knight flying. “Check and mate. You’re really terrible at this game.”
Valentin shrugs. “I never trust people who are good at chess.”
Sergei nudges Ivan. “Move over, it’s my turn.” Ivan lopes off to join Larissa on the couch, and Sergei plops down at the chess board. My chest tightens at the sight of him. He’d been carefully avoiding me since I’d returned yesterday. “Yulia, want to play?”
He flashes me that half-formed grin, hair glittering gold in the afternoon light, but where it might have made me smile before, now it leaves a taste in my mouth like ash. I narrow my eyes at Sergei and point to the textbook in my lap. Valentin’s gaze flicks from Sergei to me.
Sergei’s smile falters. “All right,” he says, “your loss. Let’s play, Valya.”
The book is An Introduction to the History of Genetics, my “welcome home” present from Major Kruzenko. She’d given it to me along with a list of the dates for Moscow State’s entrance exams this spring. “You’d better start studying now,” she’d said. As if like that, my escape had been erased and the conclusion foregone: I would continue my work with the KGB. I would be permitted to attend courses at Moscow State. And just like that, Kruzenko ties onto me a puppet string of her own. As if Rostov hadn’t attached enough.
“You should have forced Ivan to lose,” Misha says to Valentin, as he heads toward the doorway.
“Get in Ivan’s head and force him to make a bad move,” Masha adds. Her delicate legs are slung over her chair arm as she flips through a newspaper.
“I wouldn’t use my powers like that.” Valentin shakes down his rolled-up sleeves. His eyes catch Sergei’s, and my heart twists when he speaks again—“It would set a bad precedent.”
Sergei jumps up from the table, chess pieces scattering everywhere. “Do you have something to say, Valya?”
Valentin’s eyes dart toward mine, then away again. “No. It isn’t worth it.”
“Oh, let me guess,” Masha says, voice reeking with sarcasm. “He thinks you owe his little girlfriend an apology.”
My cheeks sting like they’ve been slapped. I’m frozen, uncertain whether I should deck Masha across the face with this heavy textbook or shout a refutation of what she’s just said, but neither seems like a good option just now. Fortunately, Valentin leaps in for me. “It’s nothing of the sort.” I’m relieved I don’t have to speak, but a sick, vile part of me, one I wish I could smother, feels disappointment at his words.
“I don’t owe anyone an apology,” Sergei says, words whistling through gritted teeth. “I was trying to help her. Save her from far worse. Better than end up like old whats-er-name, right, Valya?”
One of the spider-guards crawls out of the shadows. “Sergei Antonovich.” A look passes between them, then Sergei shrugs them off and storms from the room without so much as a glance toward me. Valentin watches me for a moment, head lowered like he’s embarrassed by the whole affair, then shuffles off. I expect to hear him banging around on the piano within minutes, but silence hangs thick as fog in the mansion.
I turn back to my textbook. A chapter on eugenics—the practice of selectively breeding a human population for desirable qualities and keeping those with undesirable qualities from procreating. Americans and Germans have long taken part in eugenics programs, the book claims. But it says nothing of the perks given to obedient little children like us, or to couples who meet in the Komsomol, the youth members’ group of the Communist Party. Lavish apartments on Kutuzovsky, healthier rations, prompt medical services—I wonder if it’s really so different.
The goal of most eugenics programs is to eliminate unfavorable mutations, but some programs embrace them as welcome additions, much like dog breeders shaping a new breed.
Or turning a fox into a pet or a weapon, I think.