My Evil Mother: A Short Story by Margaret Atwood
The Becoming by Nora Roberts
The Awakening by Nora Roberts
In November 2020, I participated in a book blog tour for a book called Tsarina. I am happy to present to you the follow up, The Tsarina's Daughter. You can find my original review here. I hope you enjoy the excerpts.
Ellen Alpsten's stunning novel, The Tsarina's Daughter, is the dramatic story of Elizabeth, daughter of Catherine I and Peter the Great, who ruled Russia during an extraordinary life marked by love, danger, passion and scandal.
As friends turn to foe in the dangerous atmosphere of the Court, the princess must fear for her freedom and her life. Fate deals her blow after blow, and even loving her becomes a crime that warrants cruel torture and capital punishment: Elizabeth matures from suffering victim to strong and savvy survivor. But only her true love and their burning passion finally help her become who she is. When the Imperial Crown is left to an infant Tsarevich, Elizabeth finds herself in mortal danger and must confront a terrible dilemma - seize the reins of power and harm an innocent child, or find herself following in the footsteps of her murdered brother.
Hidden behind a gorgeous, wildly decadent façade, the Russian Imperial Court is a viper’s den of intrigue and ambition. Only a woman possessed of boundless courage and cunning can prove herself worthy to sit on the throne of Peter the Great.
PrologueIN THE WINTER PALACE, ST. NICHOLAS’S DAY
DECEMBER 6, 1741
Ivan is innocent—my little cousin is a baby, and as pure as only a one-year-old can be. But tonight, at my order, the infant Tsarwill be declared guilty as charged.I fight the urge to pick him up and kiss him; it would only make things worse. Beyond his nursery door there is a low buzzing sound, like that of angry bees ready to swarm the Winter Palace. Soldiers’ boots scrape and shuffle. Spurs clink like stubby vodka glasses, and bayonets are being fixed to muskets. These are the sounds of things to come. The thought spikes my heart with dread.There is no other choice. It is Ivan or me. Only one of us can rule Russia; the other one is condemned to a living death. Reigning Russia is a right that has to be earned as much as inherited: he and my cousin, the Regent, doom the country to an eternity under the foreign yoke. Under their rule the realm will be lost, the invisible holy bond between Tsar and people irretrievably severed.I, Elizabeth, am the only surviving child of Peter the Great’s fifteen sons and daughters. Tonight, if I hesitate too long, I might become the last of the siblings to die.
Curse the Romanovs! In vain I try to bar from my thoughts the prophecy that has blighted my life. Puddles form on the parquet floor as slush drips from my boots; their worn thigh-high leather is soaked from my dash across St. Petersburg. Despite my being an Imperial Princess—the Tsarevna Elizabeth Petrovna Romanova—no footman had hooked a bearskin across my lap to protect me against the icy wind and driving snow while I sat snug in a sled; I had no muff to raise to my face in that special graceful gesture of the St. Petersburg ladies, the damy. My dash toward my date with destiny had been clandestine: snowfall veiled the flickering lights of the lanterns and shrouded the city. Mortal fear drove me on, hurrying over bridges, dodging patrolled barriers—the shlagbaumy—and furtively crossing the empty prospects, where my hasty passage left a momentary trace of warmth in the frosty air.
This was a night of momentous decision-making that I would have to live with forever. An anointed and crowned Tsar may not be killed, even once he is deposed, as it sets a dangerous precedent. Yet he may not live either—at least not in the minds of the Russian people or according to the diplomatic dispatches sent all over Europe.
What then is to become of the boy?I feel for Ivan’s limp little hand. I simply cannot resist—never could—nuzzling his chubby, rosy fingers, which are still too small to bear the Imperial seal. We call this game a butterfly’s kiss; it makes him giggle and squeal, and me dissolve with tenderness. I drink in his scent, the talcum powder blended in Grasse for his sole use— vanilla and bergamot, the Tsar’s perfume—carefully recording it to last me a lifetime. The men outside fall quiet. They are waiting for the decision that will both save and damn me. The thought sears my soul.In Ivan’s nursery the lined French damask drapes are drawn. Thick, pot-bellied clouds hide the December new moon and stars, giving this hour a dense and dreadful darkness. During the day the seagulls’ cries freeze on their beaks; the chill of night grates skin raw. Any light is as scarce and dear as everything else in St. Petersburg. The candle-sellers’ shops, which smell of beeswax, flax, and sulfur, do brisk business with both Yuletide and Epiphany approaching. On the opposite quay the shutters on the flat façades of the city’s palaces and houses are closed, the windows behind them dark. They are swathed in the same brooding silence as the Winter Palace. I am in my father’s house, but this does not mean that I am safe. Far from it—it means quite the opposite. The Winter Palace’s myriad corridors, hundreds of rooms, and dozens of staircases can be as welcoming as a lover’s embrace or as dangerous as a snake pit.It is Ivan or me: fate has mercilessly driven us toward this moment. The courtiers shun me: no one would bet a kopeck on my future. Will I be sent to a remote convent, even though I do not have an ounce of nun’s flesh about me, as the Spanish envoy, the Duke of Liria, so memorably recorded? I had once been forced to see such an unfortunate woman in her cell; as intended, the sight instilled a terror that would last me a lifetime. Her shorn head was covered in chilblains, and her eyes shone with madness. A hunchbacked dwarf, whose tongue had been torn out, was her sole companion, both shuffling about in rotten straw like pigs in their sties. Or perhaps there is a sled waiting for me, destination Siberia? I know about this voyage of no return; I have heard the cries, seen the dread, and smelled the fear of the banished culprits, be they simple peasants or even the Tsar’s best friend. By the first anniversary of their sentence, all had succumbed to the harsh conditions of the East. Maybe a dark cell in the Trubetzkoi Bastion, the place nobody ever leaves in one piece, will swallow me; or things will be simpler, and I am fated to end up facedown in the Neva, drifting between the thick floes of ice, my body crushed and shredded by their sheer force.
The soldiers’ impatience is palpable. Just one more breath! Ivan’s wet nurse is asleep, slumped on her stool, resting amid his toys: the scattered pieces of a Matryoshka doll, wooden boats, a mechanical silver bear that opens its jaws and raises its paws when wound up, and a globe inlaid with Indian ivory and Belgian émail. One of the nurse’s pale breasts is still bare from the last feeding; she was chosen for her ample alabaster bosom in Moscow’s raucous German Quarter. Ivan is well cared for: Romanov men are of weaker stock than Romanov women, even if no one ever dares to say so. I celebrated his first year as a time of wonder, offering my little cousin a cross studded with rubies and emeralds for his christening, a gift fit for a Tsar, and put myself in debt to raise an ebony colt in my stables as his Yuletide present.
Steps approach. My time with Ivan, and life as we know it, is over. I wish this were not necessary. The knock on the nursery door is a token rasp of knuckles; so light, it belies its true purpose. It is time to act. Russia will tolerate no further excuses. The soldiers’ nerves are as taut as the spring in a bear trap. I have promised them the world: on a night like this, destinies are forged, fortunes made and lost.Ivan’s breathing is growing heavier. The regiment outside his door weighs on his dreams. As I touch his sides, his warmth sends a jolt through my fingers, hitting a Gold in my heart. Oh, to hold him one more time and feel his delightful weight in my arms. I pull my hands back, folding them, though the time for prayers has passed. No pilgrimage can ever absolve me from this sin, even if I slide across the whole of Russia on my knees. Ivan’s lashes flutter, his chin wobbles, he smacks his pink and shiny lips. I cannot bear to see him cry, despite the saying of Russian serfs: “Another man’s tears are only water.”
The lightest load will be your greatest burden. The last prophecy is coming to pass. Spare me, I inwardly plead—but I know this is my path, and I will have to walk it to the end, over the pieces of my broken heart. Ivan slides back into slumber; long, dark lashes cast shadows on his round cheeks, and his tiny fists open, showing pink, unlined palms. The sight stabs me. Not even the most adept fortune-teller could imagine what the future has in store for Ivan. It is a thought that I refrain from following to its conclusion.Beyond the door utter silence reigns. Is this the calm before the storm my father taught me to fear when we sailed the slate- colored waters of the Bay of Finland? His fleet had been rolling at anchor in the far distance, masts rising like a marine forest. “This is forever Russia,” he had proudly announced. “No Romanov must ever surrender what has been gained by spilling Russian blood.” In order to strengthen Russia, Father had spared no one. My elder half-brother Alexey, his son and heir, had paid the ultimate price for doubting Russia’s path to progress.
“Elizabeth Petrovna Romanova?” I hear the captain of the Imperial Preobrazhensky Regiment addressing me. His son is my godchild, but can I trust him completely for all that? I feel as if I am drowning and shield Ivan’s cradle with my body. In the gilt-framed mirrors I see my face floating ghostly pale above the dark green uniform jacket; my ash-blond curly hair has slid down from beneath a fur cap. On a simple leather thong around my neck hangs the diamond-studded icon of St. Nicholas that is priceless to me. They will have to prise it from my dead body to take it from me.
I am almost thirty-two years old. Tonight I shall not betray my blood.
“I am ready,” I say, my voice trembling, bracing myself, as the door bursts open and the soldiers swarm in.
Everything comes at a price.
It was winter, and Ded Moroz—Father Frost—had touched my soul. Augustus stroked the hair gently from my forehead as I cried on his shoulder, both of us numb with grief and terrified by Tolstoy’s and Feofan’s incarceration. “I will keep you safe. We will be formally engaged as soon as the mourning period ends. Come,” said my fiancé, leading me to the bed. We lay together between the starched linen and the heavy furs. Feeling his strength next to me was the best consolation I could imagine. He whispered endearments to me as well as promises of eternal love.The moment for me to leave for Holstein and marry Augustus there drew closer. To arrange to receive my dowry, my inheritance from Mother, and all the smaller sums and gifts that had been promised to me on marriage, I asked for an audience with Menshikov. The young Tsar was once more in Oranienbaum, supposedly because the Baltic air was good for his lungs.
Menshikov made me wait for long weeks. The hour finally came early on a late spring morning, just days away from my formal engagement to Augustus. Mother’s death had delayed the cere- mony, but it would still coincide with the public announcement of Petrushka’s engagement to Maria Menshikova. A fresh wind chased away the last of the winter chill, helping along the first buds on the fruit trees planted on the quays; on the Neva the last ice broke, the glare of it flashing among the steely waves. I still wore white, mourning my mother, when Menshikov invited me into my father’s former study.“Come in, Lizenka,” he said, withholding my proper title, his familiarity a calculated slight. Yet I should not play into his hands by reacting angrily. Worse than his insults was the sight of him sitting at my father’s desk, legs stretched out and feet comfortably crossed. His fingers twirled the great Tsar’s quill—what for? He could not even read or write! The man he was today had obliterated any memory of the loyal, low-born friend he had pretended to be, who had been raised literally from the Russian dust.
“What a delight to see you.” Menshikov shifted one buttock half-heartedly but stayed seated in my presence on a chair my father had made. The great Tsar had lathed the night hours away to chase his demons or hatch new ideas.
“I see you are busy,” I said, trying not to let discomfiture color my tone. “But where is the rest of the State Council? I thought this was a formal meeting.”
“Too many cooks spoil the broth.” He crossed his arms behind his head and leaned back in the chair, balancing it on two legs like a schoolboy. “How can I help?”
“I come for my mother’s bequest to me. My dowry, as well as recompense for relinquishing my right to the throne to Petrush- ka’s possible heirs. It can all be sent to a Hamburg bank. Mother’s plate, silver, and jewels I shall take with me in person. I trust no one here,” I added, smiling sweetly, looking him straight in the eye. “Bequest? What bequest?” Menshikov shuffled some papers on the desk, as if to find the answer there. He frowned and shook his head. “I am at a loss, Lizenka. Nothing is owed to you, and the Tsar has generously given all your late mother’s belongings to his beloved fiancée, my daughter Maria.” He gave a short, wolfish grin. “I was promised one million roubles in recompense for relin- quishing to Petrushka and his heirs my right to the throne—” I started, unable to contain my anger.
“The wisdom of your decision will be remembered. Tsar Peter is delighted.”
“I imagine. My mother’s will . . .”“. . . of which I am the careful executor, remember.”“Careful indeed,” I interrupted him, my voice brittle, remembering my mother’s lying-in-state: had Menshikov himself plucked the rings off her fingers, carelessly breaking a bone or two in the process? Had he untangled the tiara from her tresses, or had he simply torn it off, and clumps of hair with it? I hated him so much then that my voice failed me. I had to clench my fists so as not to claw him. “What shall I live on?” I asked, fighting back tears. “Augustus is a minor prince of the House of Holstein.”“You made your bed, you must lie in it. Surely young Augustus has a stipend or possibly wages as a sailor in the Holstein Navy?”
“Not that I know of.” A sailor’s wages would not pay for a single ribbon on one of my dresses. From the impoverished existences of my cousins Ekaterina Ivanovna and Anna Ivanovna, I knew what kind of life I was facing. Augustus and I were to reside in a far-flung, freezing corner of an inhospitable castle in Gottorf, more suffered than welcome there, running our meager household and touchy retinue on a shoestring. Each log on the fire would be counted, and only rind should enrich the pea soup, never proper bacon. During big family dinners, once or twice a year, we would be served last with the scraps from the platters, the servants already hovering, im- patient to get away. At Easter my painted egg would be cracked; for Yuletide an unwanted gift from the past year’s celebration would be offered. My children stood to inherit nothing. For as long as Karl reigned as Duke in Holstein, we would walk two, if not three, steps behind him and my sister. How had life turned the tables so swiftly on me? Well, I could do it, I decided: I could live with the fall in status because I loved Augustus.
Menshikov watched me, alert. “There is no room for further negotiation. All your mother’s belongings are already with Maria,” he said. “Including her furs. My daughter, the future Tsarina, does love a good sable coat. Petrushka will offer her your mother’s crown. My grandchildren will rule over All the Russias. Better give in, Lizenka. We are a family now. One large, loving family.”
Give in? Never! He was basted in self-regard. I fought back the tears for good. I was not a little girl but a Tsarevna of All the Russias, claiming her rightful inheritance. Any show of weakness would be fatal. “You owe everything you are to my father. My mother, the Tsarina, left her daughters a fortune.”
Menshikov slithered out from behind the desk toward me, teeth bared, all vice and venom. “Believe me, I am intent on repaying all debts. Without me, Petrushka would not become Tsar. There is always someone else, Lizenka—someone such as you.”
Me?His eyes pinned me to the spot. “As you so helpfully recently pointed out, you have not yet renounced the throne. You would make a spirited Tsarina, wouldn’t you? Possibly the regiments would support you, for some . . . consideration?” It took all my self- control not to slap him for that insult. “Whoever is favored by the Russian regiments, is favored by fate. But there can only be one ruler, my dear girl.”My dear girl. I saw every broken blood vessel in his cheeks and could smell his perfume of sandalwood and jasmine, too sweet for a man, as well as his sour breath—his steady chewing of cumin was in vain; his teeth had reached the point of no return. The threat was clear: if I did not leave for Holstein, he would stalk and slay me here. Better not to test his ingenuity in dreaming up a justification for it. Menshikov smiled as if reading my thoughts. He laid one hand casually on the nape of my neck. I froze at his touch, our gazes locking. For an incredible moment it seemed he might actually force a kiss on me. I stared at him, and he hovered, undecided, not moving any closer. Finally, he said: “So in memory of all the generosity your father showed me, I am letting you live. More so, I am letting you leave. How long would you survive a damp, freez- ing nunnery, lovely Lizenka? There is not a shred of sanctity about you. I know what Augustus and you did in Peterhof.”
I blushed deeply.
“But what might His Majesty think of that, who loves you as an aunt and wishes to respect you as a Tsarevna of his house?”
I freed myself from Menshikov’s grip, my eyes blazing. “I am engaged to marry Augustus,” I said, gathering my last shreds of dig- nity.
“Yes, he is only your husband-to-be,” Menshikov chuckled. “That which made your father virile, makes you a harlot. Such behavior in a woman warrants a heavy punishment.”
“What do you mean?”“Death,” he mouthed, as ruthless as a gun dog. “The choice is yours. Cease your demands, and your carriage to Germany is ready to depart at any time you choose. Persist in them, and you will be shamed and punished severely. Now is there anything else? I have a country to rule. But I am not ungrateful.” Once more he sifted through the papers that were waiting to be sealed and signed. “I might or might not forget the words you spoke to me today.”Anger and pride won over fear. If I had to leave the only country I should ever love, I refused to do so like a stray dog, my tail between my legs. With a single movement, I swiped the desk clear of all the papers. They billowed and flew up in the air be- fore scattering all over the beautiful rugs and parquet, like doves spreading their wings. Now it was I who leaned in, placing my knuckles on the Tsar’s desk. Menshikov shrank back, taken by surprise. Time flowed slowly, like fresh sap bleeding from a tree. It was true, the choice was mine.
Menshikov startled when I spat: “Rule the country? You might as well pee against the wind, callous coward that you are. A man like you cannot even begin to rule Russia. You are dust!”
The last vestiges of civility between us had disappeared. Menshikov’s eyes became hard and unforgiving, that nasty smile lurking at the corners of his mouth. I should not be fooled by it ever again, but would hide my feelings. Otherwise the hunter in him would feast on them, devouring his prey’s most tender part with relish: the heart.
“And you? No wonder France rejected you! What a joke it was to the Bourbons: the illegitimately born daughter of a serf, a washer- maid, wanting to reign in Versailles! And France knew only half the story. I plucked your mother from a heap of prisoners of war because she was as irresistible as a beautiful animal. She had me to thank for everything—and she did, believe me, many times over. You have forgotten where you come from, Lizenka.”
Menshikov was not wrong.
He did not know how grateful I was for the reminder.
(Photo Credit to Andreas Stringberg)
