September 9, 1915

The white nurse's wimple is suffocating and binds too tightly across my forehead; the veil has an irritating way of flickering into my face at even the thought, much less actual presence, of a breeze. I'm sure the face inside it is horribly flushed, and I can feel the perspiration beginning to soak the hidden tendrils around my forehead and cheeks. Would that I could be rid of this terrible thing now; I am impatient with all discomfort and the twenty men assigned to me, though at the same time my body is trembling with a joy--no, the expectation of a joy, that both animates and paralyzes me with its proximity. Mama will be leaving in three hours and I will be expected to follow...and it is absolutely imperative that I have enough time after my duties...

Moving down the long rows, my heavy clogs slapping the floors upon which princesses far fairer than myself once danced the mazurka in dainty slippers, checking bandages and bedpans, accepting the inevitable blessings and obsequiousness...my lips and hands move gently, even efficiently, but every word I say is drowned out by the heavy thumping of my heart. So long as the gratefully placid morphine smiles continue to greet me, I suppose I am doing my work properly. Perhaps the distraction is better, in a way, for even the infected bayonet wound in Private Polokov's left thigh cannot slow me down. I smile at him more gently than I am wont to; not that I am usually brusque with the men by any means, but there is a a strange fluidity, an easy grace, in the way that I dress the purulent gash that so often makes me hesitate and stammer in my reassurances. It is not my imagination, for after all has been washed and rebound, the Private leans back and regards me with a little smile, a bit of pity on his square brown face.

"Your Highness, if I may so, you are much more like an angel today than I can usually see. Tell me, to whom are you bringing heavenly greetings?"

At this, I stop a little, the thumping somewhat muffled now by embarrassment--not at the soldier's fawning address, but at the knowing teasing that it implies. "I...my...it is a lovely day. It's still warm in here, with all of the bodies, but outside the cool breezes are beginning to blow. I suppose it makes me a little wistful, but...happy. Autumn is my favorite season."

Polokov nods, still smiling with one side of his broad mouth a little twitched up in what could be amusement, or perhaps compassion. "Of course, Your Highness. God bless you."

"And Christ be with you." I back away, still smiling, but as I turn to move to the next row, I can feel my entire face turn the color of peasants' borscht. It is obvious, then? Oh, how it must be. And how embarrassing, how piteous, how charmingly laughable it must be for all of them. Another outburst from Olga, and this time there'll be no poking fun at her temper, which isn't half as amusing...but this..love. How much easier to scorn and deride....

For of course, it is a hopeless thing. There is simply no question about it. And it is not a simple thing either, for that matter....I say love in one way and another, in the way it is understood generally, and then what it means between....

"Your Highness." A quiet voice speaks behind my left shoulder; its subdued breath just rustling my veil.

If possible, my face burns brighter, but I whirl behind instantly to see a figure standing straight in a flawlessly pressed, though faded brown officer's uniform; well-shined boots making a distorted mirror for my slightly agape expression.

"Mitya...so soon? But I thought--" I fumble for a moment with my apron, accidentally dropping a roll of bandages as I do so. I scramble to retrieve it as it rolls, uncoiling all the meanwhile, beneath a nearby bed. "Dear Lord, I am so clumsy...." Stooping, I stretch out my flailing hands, only to accidentally grab something warm and slightly callused instead of the thick cloth. I stare stupidly for a moment at my fingers clutching the Lieutenant's, but he seems nonplussed. I withdraw my hands tremblingly, and he rewinds the bandage, handing the tight white roll to me with a wry smile.

"I'm sorry to have taken you aback. May we--I know you have your duties but--"

"If you are leaving--" The exclamation leaves my lips with undue violence, but I do not know how to complete it...if...then....no, there is nothing, nothing. There is no way to complete the thought; there is no reaction to this news that would not utterly disgrace me. I attempt composure. "If you are leaving, then I am sure it will be alright if I took a moment to see you off."

We walk swiftly through the rows now, and a slight twinge of guilt somewhat pinches me even through my disillusioned selfcenteredness. I ought to be at my duties, but truly, I cannot be more than a minute...I cannot be seen making a fool of myself where no emotions, nothing save a passive, utterly patriotic, warmth, belong--

After a momentary blur, we are in the gardens, where there are usually far too many hobbling convalescents and guiding nurses to give anything but the faintest illusion of privacy, but it is approaching mealtime and all are withdrawing indoors. "A stroke of luck," I mutter disconsolately as we stride over a cracked marble bench nestled among the hedges; a familiar location for the two of us. He waits for me to settle on one end of the seat, then a little stiffly takes the other.

"Was I that troublesome?" Mitya's words are light and leaping, but his look is somber. For these past weeks I have known him, I have seen this expression often, however teasingly witty his words often were. His very appearance is something of a wry contradiction--fair of eyes and hair, though his face is sun burnt to a degree of semi-permanence; body slim, still boyish but tensed with a strength seen in few men of greater years.

"Hardly."I am too upset to play with words now, too bluntly disappointed to do anything but show it. "The doctor yesterday--said it would be another two weeks yet before he'd like to see you heading back--"

"Yes. I know. That is what he said." Mitya shifts further towards his end of the bench and takes unprecedented interest in the ground at his feet; as if he is quite seriously afraid that it will open to swallow him at any moment. "I told him last night that I would be leaving the next morning with his approval or not. Against his will, he gave me clearance. It is the nature of duty, sometimes, to act in defiance of the will of others."

"As you have so often told me." I bite my lip angrily, feeling the tears and sweat beginning to stream uncontrollably down my cheeks. Angrily, I reach up to tear off the cumbersome nurse's headress. My hair pulls out limply, damp as it is, but at least now it is free--damn anyone who sees, for I cannot make myself care about propriety right now.

"My offer still stands --and I swear, if you do not agree to help me, then I shall seek out the opportunity on my own. I cannot bear--I will not have your future destroyed by such a filthy heretic--a usurper--I will kill Rasputin if you only speak the word."

I shake my head in a mixture of mournfulness and anger at the thought of it, though this hardly the first time Mitya has made such a proposition to me. "I have told you before--I do not doubt--I sometimes wonder if it is not the power of his demons that keep my brother alive, so that they may have the opportunity to torture him longer. But the responsible parties notwithstanding--it is undeniable that he has a hold over Alexei's life. And I could not risk...I love him. And my mother--"

Mitya cuts me off, eyes flashing with righteous offense, "Olya...you cannot see what that man...that beast is...and continue to make excuses for him. A demon at worst, a charlatan at best, and it is in God's hands, not his, that the Tsarevich's fate lies. You know this."

Could I give the word, truly? Is my judgment an equal weight to the crime of Grigori's constant interferences in maneuvers, in politics, both of which have already cost thousands of lives?--And then, there is the perfidious second life he lives so brazenly beneath the gaze of my self-blinded mother--the imperious assurance in which he moves through our apartments, the very air around him trembling with the fearful, paralyzing energy that follows him like a menacing, invisible familiar...how assuredly he regards us all--held in his thrall, bound to him by those lovely large eyes held in the Father's hypnotic gaze; those bloodlessly frail limbs borne up time and again by his strong peasant's arms....

"I cannot. By God's grace, he may be the hostage of a demon, but I love my brother. And you do not--you could not. Did you not hear what happened the last time one tried to assassinate him? That woman in Siberia--his very entrails spilled upon the ground as she screamed "I have killed the AntiChrist", and yet--"

Dmitri flinches not a little as he bluntly cuts through my fearful recounting. "You are educated--not only that, but bright. Either I accept that you are correct, and it is hopeless--that all efforts towards righteous justice are useless--or I do my duty to God and the people of this land. And to--" He stands abruptly, turning so that I cannot see his face. We are both very still for a moment that seems too short to speak courageously and too eternal for continued evasion of what must and absolutely cannot be said. "I...you know what I feel of your station, of everything you are made to be, aside from a brave girl--"

"There is nothing brave about me, else I would agree to your offer. Else I would--oh--" Looking away from his turned head to wipe my tears (not that he will see me in either case), I see a still far-off, but unmistakably purposeful, nurse striding in our direction."Tanya." If only I feared being caught amidst mere flirtation...

"Dmitri Ivanovich." Clutching my sodden, wrinkled wimple, I stand up and he turns to look at me with distant eyes. "I--you remember how we met. Do you think--do you think ever again, I will meet someone like you? I had no choice but to know you--to let you name me as you would any other." Dropping the soiled cloth with a finality that leaves it in a wadded pile at my feet, I reach up to yank the thin silver chain hidden beneath my high-necked robes. The clasp breaks, letting the small icon it held slip off easily into my waiting palm. I thrust it at Dmitri pleadingly, asking for him to understand, now without naming, without giving any recognition to what burns so agonizingly in my breast. "I...signed it for you. Trite and predictable, I know."

"I love you, Olga Romanova." I hear Mitya's voice uncomrehendingly, at first thinking that he is merely thanking me for the icon as I expected him to. But as he pockets it dispassionately; eyes feverish and strange, I realize his words as if he has just repeated them. Instantly, stupidly, I turn to check my sister's progress, ensuring that my reply will be riskless, will cost me nothing. When I turn back, a fraction of a second later, it is already too late and Mitya has vanished.

A/N: Something I found lying about forgotten and mostly completed. Should be amusing to the many readers that still inexplicably stop by :P.