“I used to find things,” he says. “Cufflinks, a hair comb, an old iron wedding ring. A silver spoon. A carving of a bear. All these little treasures that would be nothing to anyone but a five-year-old, but I used to keep them safe in a box I found and I never told anyone.”
“Do you still have them?” I ask.
“I do,” he says. “It’s so strange, sometimes, to walk around this place like it is now and think about what it looked like the first time I saw it. That’s what it looked like when I met my father. We were in that ballroom where the masquerade was, and it was morning, so the sun was coming in through those big windows.”
His hand moves against my back, stroking me absentmindedly. I fight to keep my eyes from filling with tears, because for a moment, this feels normal.
“Actually, most of the windows were broken and there was a breeze,” he says. “My father was up on the dais, and he was wearing his military uniform, surrounded by other men in military uniforms. I entered with my mother, through those big doors, and I remember her saying, ‘Kostya, go say hello to your father,’ and I wasn’t quite sure which one he was.”
I can’t even imagine that.
“How old were you?” I ask.
“Six,” Kostya says. “I’m not sure he ever quite forgave me.”
“Of course he did,” I say.
“I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead,” Kostya says. “It’s bad luck.”
“I won’t tell,” I say.
“I owe everything to him,” Kostya says. “I’m here and not herding cows in the mountains because of what he did. He used to tell me all the time, ‘blood isn’t enough,’ that just having a lineage didn’t mean shit unless you could back it up. And he could back it up.”
He pauses and swallows, his fingers still moving against my back.
“I don’t know if I can back it up, Hazel,” he whispers. “I’m afraid everything he fought for is slipping through my fingers, and if I don’t stop it, we’ll have five more years of civil war. He brought Sveloria from a backwater to a first world country, and I don’t know if I can keep it that way.”
I have no idea what to say. Anything I can think of sounds like a kindergarten teacher’s encouragement, so we’re quiet for a long time.
“I don’t think I ever loved my father,” Kostya finally says, his voice low and quiet. “He’d lecture me about continuing the bloodline and having children, and I’d think, I’d rather not be a father than be a father like you.”
He’s silent a moment.
“I didn’t want him to die like this, Hazel,” Kostya finally says.
“I know,” I say, and kiss the top of his head.
We’re quiet again.
“Can I sleep here?” he asks, his fingers on my back. “I don’t dream when I sleep with you.”
I push both of us up, and he looks at me like he’s still waiting for an answer. His eyes are even more bloodshot now. I stand and hold out one hand again, and he takes it.
“Come on,” I say.
In the bedroom I move the laptop off the bed and Kostya just looks around tiredly, like he doesn’t understand what a bed is any more. I walk to him and start undoing the buttons on his shirt, and as I do he takes both my hands in his and leans his forehead down to touch mine.
For long moment he just rubs his thumbs over my knuckles, like he’s trying to think of how to say something.
“I’m sorry,” he says, his voice close to a whisper.
“Kostya, don’t be,” I say.
He laces his fingers through mine, his palms against the backs of my hands.
“Zloyushka, I don’t know what I’m doing,” he says. “I don’t know how to be the king, and I don’t know how to keep my country from disintegrating, and I thought if I could ignore you I’d stop thinking about you all the time and I’d get better at what I’m supposed to be doing, but I couldn’t. And I didn’t.”
This time I can’t stop my eyes from filling with tears.
“I wanted to protect you, and I couldn’t,” he says. “Not even from the Tobov Post.”
“Kostya, you have bigger things to worry about than me,” I say. “I’m fine. The Post can go fuck itself.”
He half-smiles and squeezes my hands in his. A very, very distant bell tolls three times.
“I’m glad you slept with your married professor,” he says.
“I’m not,” I say.
“You wouldn’t have come here otherwise,” he says.
I sigh and let my eyes close, our foreheads still together.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe.”
“You’re the American and I’m finding the silver lining,” he says. “Something must have gone wrong.”
He wobbles a little on his feet, and I tug at his shirt.
“Come on,” I say, softly. “Go to bed.”
I get the last button undone, push it over his shoulders, and ignore the heat pooling inside me. Once his shirt is off, he slides one hand down my back, along my still-open robe, and then pulls me toward him, swaying on his feet as he does.
He kisses me and I kiss him back briefly, my hand on his neck, and then pull away. I stroke his stubble with one thumb.
“Come on, zloyushka,” he says, sounding half-drunk.
“No,” I say firmly. “You’re falling asleep on your feet.”
“I’ll make it fast,” he murmurs.
“Not sexy,” I murmur back.
Kostya sighs, his fingers circling on my back.
“You’re right,” he finally says. “You’re naked and I’m so tired I’m barely hard.”
“Your dirty talk is also pretty lacking,” I tease, shrugging my robe the rest of the way off, and climb into bed.
He gets in after me, and his eyes are shut before his head’s on the pillow.
“Let me get six hours of sleep, and then we’ll fuck slow and hard until you come so hard your hair curls,” he says.
My insides twist around themselves. Kostya barely opens one eye and looks at me.
“Was that better?” he says, his voice slurring.
“You’re filthy for a king,” I say.
He smiles, sleepily.
“I’m just honest,” he says, and rolls over until his face is in my neck. “Sometimes in important meetings the only thing I can think about is what it feels like when you come with me inside you.”
“Kostya, go the fuck to sleep,” I whisper, wrapping my arms around him.
He sighs, but he doesn’t say anything else. I stay awake for a few more minutes and listen to him breathe, then fall asleep myself.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Kostya
When I wake up, there’s a moment when I forget everything that’s happened. Hazel’s curled into me, her back against my chest, my arms around her, and my father’s murder, the insurgency, the fighting, everything seems like a long bad dream.
Then I wake up a little more and remember that it wasn’t, that it did happen and I’m probably late for something.