He looks toward Valentin and me, and his grin vanishes. “I didn’t think you liked chess, Yul.”
I scan the chessboard, trying to remember where this bishop piece belonged. “It passes the time.” Killing time. Passing these interminable hours, waiting for a chance to plan with Valentin, steal a moment to speak and kiss and exist with him without guards and Kruzenko and our classmates hovering over us …
“Sergei Antonovich!” Kruzenko’s shrill voice splits the air. “What on earth are you doing to our maps?” She rushes into the parlor and snatches the tube out of his hands. “Not studying them for the mission, I can see!”
“We still have time to prepare,” Sergei says.
Kruzenko shakes the maps out of the tube and unfurls them with a crack. “We depart the day after New Year’s. Misha and Masha, have you practiced your drills?”
“Yes,” Misha says, chiming with Masha’s “Of course.”
“Valentin? You have been keeping your mind limber?” Kruzenko tapes the maps over the now-completely crossed-out list of wildlings.
“As much as I can, without hurting anyone.” Valentin’s gaze falls to his hands, tucked into his lap.
Kruzenko smiles. “Good to hear it. Larissa will…” Kruzenko looks around us, tongue clucking, then shrugs. “Well, I’m certain that when she is feeling more like herself again, she will be up to the task. I will see to it. In the meantime, might I have a word with you, Yulia Andreevna?”
I jump up from the table. “Did you approve my request?”
Her back is to me, but her finger beckons me from over her shoulder. “We’ll discuss it in my office, please.”
My pulse thrums as I follow her through the mansion. If Valentin and I succeed in Berlin—no, I scold myself, must bury that away—then this may be the last time I see Mama and Zhenya for a while. Not forever, though. It can’t be. No matter where we run for help, we have to find a way to rescue them, too, eventually. I just want this last glimpse, this memory that I can tuck in the darkest corners of my mind for safekeeping.
Kruzenko closes the door behind us, keeping even the guards outside. Her face is too flat. Her gypsy music shield races around the room. Is it stronger than usual? I’d never noticed before the subtle shift in her shield when she’s working hard to suppress her thoughts. I dare to hope I’m getting stronger, shrewder in my skills.
“I have tried, Yulia,” she starts.
Everything collapses inside of me. Crumpling up, shriveling.
“I have begged and pleaded, but Comrade Rostov will not allow it. You must understand, your mother is very busy with her research…”
I’m numb, deadened to the rising tide of emotion inside me. “Surely she can take time away. And Zhenya, I know the doctors think he’s doing better, but I don’t want him to—” I strangle back a cry. “—forget me.”
“Perhaps when we return from Berlin, and she completes the next phase of research, then something can be arranged.” Kruzenko laces her fingers together. “I trust that will be sufficient.”
“Of course it’s not sufficient.” Tears burn in the corners of my eyes, ready to blaze a hot trail down my cheeks. I have to see them once more, I have to. I have to know what Mama is afraid of. Why she told me to run. I have to hug my brother one last time and hear him tell me, matter-of-factly, that I have no reason to be upset. “What is so damned important about her research? Why can’t she step away for just a few hours?”
Kruzenko rubs her temples, squishing her skin around like it is dough; she looks so much older now than just a few months ago. “Yulia … There is something I must explain to you about your family.”
A warning shot fires in the back of my mind. Bang-bang. There is something that I know, but it lies broken in my mind, flattened under layers and layers of thought. I probe at its edges, like I’m probing an aching tooth with my tongue.
“Rostov does not feel it is necessary for you to know these things in order to do your job, but I do not always agree. Sometimes we need reasons more than mere orders.” She swallows; the whites of her eyes gleam as she leans toward me. “Your parents … You know that your mother is a geneticist and your father was a developmental biologist for the State.”
“They were working with children with genetic disorders,” I say. “Trying to train them to be functional workers.”
“Yes, that came afterward. But before that, they worked on a secret research project for Stalin.” She sucks in a deep breath, hands quavering. “Our program, Yulia. They helped create it.”
I don’t answer. Jet fuel burns through my chest: shock and utter inevitability all at once.
“They isolated the genetic markers that carry enhanced mental powers, yes—at least, a few of them.”
Their old research. The cabbage soup from lunch creeps up my throat. The dream I had, one Valentin stirred up, of my parents arguing about returning to their old research. The room sways beneath me. Did they know I had this ability? They had to have known.