Romanov(11)

I enacted one last search. The doll was definitely gone. Zash was lying—it was excellent acting. But a Bolshevik would lie only if he wanted to keep the item himself. I returned to the entryway where the servants hustled back and forth, packing belongings for themselves and whatever else they figured we might need.

Dr. Botkin helped Alexei into his thick officer’s coat with its double-breasted gold buttons. It hung on him like a blanket. Alexei wore his tsarevich soldier uniform, standing tall with his papakha hat at a little jaunt on his head. He could not walk yet, only stand. Dark rings outlined his large eyes and painted his face like porthole windows in a white ship’s hull.

Alexei wouldn’t be able to stand for long, but at least he was showing his strength to the soldiers before we bid them all farewell. Papa would be proud.

My stomach lurched. We were mere minutes away from leaving and I’d yet to locate the doll. I would not lose this match!

I gathered an armful of towels and marched down to the soldiers’ quarters, passing Olga as she tucked a sewing kit into her valise. “Nastya, what are you doing? Get your coat on!”

“In a moment!” I left the entry and hurried down the hall. Only two Bolsheviks remained in their quarters, tightening their belts and moving soggy egg feet around in their slimy boots. “I brought towels,” I chirped.

One rolled his eyes and swept past me. The other snatched a towel and wiped his foot off before he pushed it into his boot, without so much as a thank-you. As he left he ground out a single word. “Shvibzik.”

It wasn’t said in the sweet nickname way my family said it. But it made me grin all the same. They knew I’d put the eggs in their boots. Served them right. If they couldn’t even detect raw eggs in their boots, how could they protect the Russian people?

I dumped the towels on the ground once the room was empty and hurried to Zash’s space. His belongings sat neatly on his cot—a folded bedroll beneath a smooth, buckled knapsack and a coat beside it.

This was more than an organized soldier. This was a soldier ready to leave. He was joining us on the train. I could search his belongings then. It took incredible willpower not to tear into his knapsack, but the best imps were the patient ones. Still, I patted it down and squeezed all the fat areas to see if there were any hard pieces in there. None of them felt round, but the doll was so small he could have snuck it into a sock.

Then I squeezed and met something firm. I glanced back toward the door, my senses on high alert. I couldn’t risk losing the doll.

I unlatched the straps holding the fat pack together. Then I placed one hand on the outside where I’d first felt the hard item and sent my free hand through the bag’s opening. I wove it carefully through the folded fabrics and past a small notebook. The doll was, indeed, wrapped in an extra set of socks. I pushed them aside with my nimble fingers until I finally felt smooth wood. I curled my fingers around the doll and pulled it out ever so carefully, pausing to listen toward the doorway.

Still no sounds.

Finally, I yanked my hand out with a relieved exhale. I’d done it. I’d retrieved the—

“No,” I breathed, turning the item over in my hand. Brown and silver paint, a fat sphere, and a pointed stopper.

It wasn’t the doll.

It was a bottle of . . . cologne? Perfume? I popped out the stopper and smelled. No scent, but the sphere weighed down my hand with its sloshing contents. I dipped a pinky in and met liquid. When I pulled it out, my breath caught.

Spell ink. Glistening, silvery-rainbow spell ink.

What was a Bolshevik doing with a bottle of spell ink in his pack? Spell mastery was illegal! If this had been an item found during the search, he would have turned it in to Yurovsky. Either he found it and kept it for himself, or he had brought it with him.

But Bolsheviks were hunting and murdering spell masters. This made no sense.

I gripped the traitorous bottle. It wasn’t the Matryoshka doll, but at least it was something I wanted. Something I needed so I could help Alexei. Yet I was an imp. Not a thief. And no matter how badly I wanted this spell ink, I could not allow myself to sink so low as to steal it.

I was a Romanov. And I would represent that name honorably until my dying day.

I shoved the stopper back in and plunged the bottle back into the pack, making sure it returned to roughly the same location. I buckled the flaps and angled the pack against the end of the bed as I’d found it.

I left the room, glad I hadn’t put an egg in Zash’s boot. It had been awkward peering at his sleeping face last night to make sure the boots belonged to him, but if he thought I was an ally—or even just a flirt—he might show my family kindness. And if he didn’t . . . I now had blackmail.

My shoes clipped up the hall. I knew who I’d need to search next. If Zash did not have the doll, that meant he must have turned it in to Yurovsky.

The entryway was a flutter of madness. People lugging suitcases, servants asking the Bolsheviks to help, Bolsheviks resisting, Yurovsky directing the chaos, and only half of the crowd listening to him. The front door hung open, letting in the cold. It was raining outside.

Yurovsky wore his coat, a shoulder satchel, and a firearm—enough attire to see us to the train station but not enough for him to travel along the spine of Russia with us. I located his quarters—a room to himself with hardly more than a water pitcher in it. His belongings lay folded but not packed.