Vika might have stopped Nikolai’s rampaging statue before it shouted its message through all of Saint Petersburg, but she hadn’t stopped it soon enough. A good part of the city had seen a bronze tsar come to life and an enchantress command lightning to liquefy it.
Vika hurried down Nevsky Prospect, turning onto a side street as soon as she could.
Nikolai isn’t our only problem now, she thought, her pulse racing. For the existence of magic, so long kept a tidy secret, had been unveiled.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Ilya had been on guard duty tonight, and when Pasha snuck out of the palace, Ilya had followed. He’d crouched against the side of a building at the edge of Peter’s Square and watched the entire confrontation unfold, far enough away that he could not make out what had been said, but certainly near enough to see. He had managed to keep himself from crying out in surprise—and revealing himself—by clamping his hand over his mouth when he first saw Nikolai’s shadow, and again when Peter the Great’s statue came to life.
But as soon as Nikolai departed the square, Ilya coughed, each sputter like its own cloud in the night air.
“The girl appeared out of nothing. Then disappeared, like she did to the tsesarevich,” he said to himself. “And that was Grand Prince Karimov.”
Ilya gave up crouching and sat in the snow banked against the building. The grand prince could command magic. And come back from the dead.
Or he had never been dead.
Ilya leaned back against the building as he tried to make sense of what he’d seen. It was unbelievable, and yet it was real.
He stared at the empty Thunder Stone and the square where the tsesarevich and the two enchanters had just stood. Then he shook his head as it slowly sank in.
“This changes everything.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
By morning, the churches of Saint Petersburg overflowed with those afraid of the devil’s arrival, and the streets filled with men concealing knives in every sleeve and pocket, whispering of capturing the witch and burning her alive. Vika was safely ensconced at home on Ovchinin Island, but she didn’t need to be in Saint Petersburg to know the city was on the brink of panicked hysteria. She’d seen it and heard it stirring already as she tamed Peter the Great’s statue. And fear always flourished in the dark of night.
With the sun rising behind her, Vika stood at the edge of the island’s forests, looking across the frozen bay at Saint Petersburg in the distance. She was supposed to report to the Winter Palace to meet with Pasha and Yuliana. And yet the string that tethered her to Nikolai pulled insistently.
Where are you, Nikolai? She closed her eyes and tried to feel his magic. But there was nothing, not even a hint of his silken warmth. Vika sighed as she opened her eyes. He must have a barrier shield around him.
She shouldn’t be wanting him anyway. Sergei had raised her better than to turn her back on the tsardom so easily. Father had been Russian through and through, all balalaika music and borscht and rustic saunas full of birch branches and leaves. The same love for Russia infused Vika’s soul, and she knew in her blood that what the country needed was not a vengeful shadow as tsar, but a boy who had grown up in the imperial family, learning the history of the people and the art of ruling the empire. Vika might have loved Nikolai and loathed Pasha, but that didn’t mean Nikolai was right for the throne. Not at all.
I suppose I must go, she thought. Even though I don’t want to.
Duty called.
So Vika evanesced into the former tsar’s study in the Winter Palace.
Her head spun as she rematerialized; stars actually flickered at the edges of her vision. She seemed to arrive more quickly than it ordinarily took to cover the distance from Ovchinin Island to the city, as if the magic she commanded was more potent this morning, like drinking five or six cups of tea instead of one. How bizarre, especially considering that Nikolai was now sharing in Bolshebnoie Duplo’s power. It took a moment for Vika to shake the stars from her head.
The young guard at the door—Ilya, she thought his name was—gawked at the space Vika occupied, where there hadn’t been a girl a few seconds before. But there was no point in hiding her comings and goings. With the secret of magic out, everyone knew what she was.
When her vision cleared, she took in the study. A painting of Saint Petersburg hung behind the desk, and a portrait of Catherine the Great graced the wall to Vika’s right. The entire room was decorated in royal blue and gold, from the crown molding to the trim around the floor-to-ceiling windows to the Persian rug upon the floor.
Yuliana sat at the late tsar’s desk, naturally, and Pasha paced in front of the windows. He’d clearly been doing so since before Vika arrived; he’d worn a groove into the carpet with his boots. But why did Vika even care? She might have intended to defend his right to the crown, but it didn’t mean he shouldn’t suffer. Pasha had brought this stress—arguably, this entire turn of events—upon himself.
Yuliana cast a withering look at Vika. “You couldn’t have put down the statue more discreetly?”
Vika scowled right back at her. “Next time you try your hand at taming a bronze tsar-come-to-life. We’ll see how discreetly you manage it. Besides, you’re not the one the entire city wants to roast on a stake, so I think I’m the one with a right to complain if anyone can.”
Pasha groaned. “Enough. Bickering won’t solve anything. Some believe the statue was one of the four horsemen portending the apocalypse. People have already begun to flee the city. And the black market in Sennaya Square is overrun by those who can’t afford to leave, seeking wards against evil spirits.”
“Oh,” Vika said, but only partially in response to what Pasha had just said.
“Oh, what?” Yuliana asked.
“I just understood something. Belief begets more magic.” Vika recalled the stories Father used to tell her about when Russia and other countries believed more openly in magic. “That’s why it was easier for me to evanesce. Before today, only a handful of us knew about magic. But after Nikolai’s statue, tens of thousands of people suddenly believe—or fear—magic, and that, in turn, stokes Bolshebnoie Duplo’s ability to generate more.” She held up her hand, which sparked visibly at the fingertips. She jittered as she tried to stand still on the carpet. Vika had never been one who could be easily contained, but this surge in the power gave new definition to the word “irrepressible.”
Yuliana scrunched her nose. “However, it also means that not only are you more powerful, but Nikolai will be as well.”
The sparks at Vika’s fingers snuffed out, the momentary thrill of all that power suffocated by Yuliana’s insight. There would likely be enough magic now that there would be no more hitches, real or dreamed. But it also meant bigger and more dangerous enchantments.
Vika crossed the study and sank into one of the pair of blue-and-gold chairs in the center of the room, angled to face the tsar’s desk.