The Crown's Fate by Evelyn Skye

Author:Evelyn Skye
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-03-14T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

I’m actually glad I don’t know who my real parents were, Vika thought as she rematerialized inside the Winter Palace halls. A tsar and a monster had given birth to an enchanter. What horrors might have combined to create an enchantress? Vika bit her lip and tried to shake the thought away. Sergei, she reminded herself. He might not have been her biological father, but he was all she’d needed. She clung to his memory and regained her focus.

Then Vika strode toward Yuliana’s apartment. The halls along the way were decorated with holiday garlands made of hand-blown glass—too expensive for anyone other than the imperial family—but Vika didn’t have time to stop to admire their delicate beauty. She whisked right past them.

“I have something important to tell the grand princess,” Vika said to the guards as soon as she turned the last corner to arrive at Yuliana’s doors.

The bearded, older one on the right lurched toward her. “How did you get in here? These are the imperial family’s private residences.”

Vika evaded his attempt to grab her. “The tsesarevich let me in,” she lied.

The guard froze. “Uh . . .”

Was he thinking that she’d just emerged from Pasha’s bed? But if so, what did it matter? Let them imagine what they would. This was important.

“I need to see the grand princess,” Vika said.

The other guard, also bearded but much younger, said, “It’s half past six, mademoiselle. The grand princess will have our heads if we wake her for some trifle.”

Vika glared at him. She had half a mind to magically toss these guards in the air and cast open Yuliana’s doors herself. But in a moment of extraordinary restraint (which she made note of to congratulate herself for later), Vika kept her magic and her temper tamped down and said, “This is not a trifle. And I guarantee the grand princess will have your heads if you do not wake her for it.”

The young guard looked to the older one. Perhaps it was the early hour, or perhaps it was the ferocity of Vika’s glare, but they nodded to each other.

The older guard knocked and slipped inside. She heard him apologize for the intrusion and announce her name to an attendant. A few seconds later, he reemerged and said, “The grand princess will see you now.”

He held open the door, and Vika strode inside. She paused for a moment, though, wondering if she’d come to the right place. The room was far from the tidy sanctuary she’d imagined Yuliana’s antechamber would be. Instead, piles of letters were strewn all over the floor, the mess evident even in dim candlelight.

Yuliana came in through another door that connected to her bedroom. She wore an elegant silk robe wrapped around her nightgown, and even in the early morning, every ringlet was in its place. Now that was more what Vika expected. In fact, it was likely that Yuliana hadn’t been asleep at all, but wide awake and hard at work on something.

There was

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