She moved then as if drawn by invisible hands to Stefan's large bed. The balconies fronted all the bedrooms in this wing and this room was very similar to the one she'd stayed in last time, but Stefan's bed was different, larger, darker, more masculine, a mahogany-and-tulipwood marquetry cut on massive lines. Climbing up onto it, she sat in the middle of the forest green expanse of silk coverlet, looking like a flower blossom in her peach silk gown, her skirt in poufs about her, her glance surveying the immensity of the room.
And that's when she saw it.
A note directly in her line of vision, an envelope with her name on it propped against the mantel. Her heart stood still.
Sliding off the bed, she approached it cautiously, dread and longing both prominent in her mind. Stefan had written it. Short hours ago he'd held that exact envelope in his hand, his words the closest she could come to having him near. She wanted to snatch the letter down and devour the words and feel for a transient moment as though he were here. But apprehension held her hostage against that impulse and she stood beneath the ornate and polished mantel, reluctant to know what her husband might have written her before riding off to war.
She lifted it down finally because her longing was greater than her fear. But the weight of that fear crumbled her to the floor, where she sat before the small fire the footman had set before he left and read Stefan's letter. She cried as his words unfolded across and down the page; she cried for their beauty and tenderness, for his sweetness and devotion. He was more articulate in many ways than she in expressing the imagery of love.
"When the war is over," he'd written, "we'll join the eagles in the mountains and show them our new baby… I can scent the wind and freedom even now."
There was hope in his words and a love so intense she hardly noticed the menace of the closing phrase he had written so reluctantly.
She reread his scrawling script over and over, his strength evident in the rhythm and form of his letters, his spirit alive in his words. In the silence of his room, surrounded by objects familiar to his world, his cologne lingering in the air, photos from childhood displayed on the walls and bureau tops, she could almost hear him speak of his love for her. She could almost hear his deep rich voice echo within the confines of his bedchamber, his love surrounding her, and she prayed to all the benevolent gods to protect him and bring him safely home.
She slept that night in his bed with his note clutched in her hand, as a young child might cling to a cherished toy or a young woman ardently in love to her lover. She dreamed of mountain landscapes and moss-covered mountain pools, of starlit ceilings and a rain-damp bridegroom on a honeymoon night.
It wasn't till morning that she found the second note. She was dressed already and wandering about Stefan's room, thinking as she walked: he sat here and stood here and brushed his long dark hair before this mirror and wore these slippers in his leisure and wrote at this desk-
The small white envelope was addressed with the single word "Baby."
It lay pristine and chaste on the red-embossed leather of the desktop.
He'd left no instructions concerning its unsealing, although addressed as it was to their baby, the implication was perhaps to wait until its birth. And she intended to, she decided a moment later, as if that punctiliousness would annihilate the panic beginning to creep into her mind. There was no need to write to their child now; he'd be home certainly-at some point-in the months before its birth.
She moved back a step as though she were standing on the brink of an abyss.
She found herself a moment later seated on a chair on the far side of the room, clutching the chair arms with undue force, her eyes trained on the stark white envelope. Why had he written?
She poured herself a glass of water from the carafe on the nearby table and moistened her dry mouth, forcing herself to look away from the object of her terror. Catherine the Great's tall cypresses stood majestically against the blue morning sky, marching down the hill in solemn procession, immune to the years and her puny fears. She wished she could deal as tenaciously with her emotional turmoil and persevere like Catherine's trees.
In the end she rose, walked over to the desk and opened the envelope as perhaps Stefan had intended.
No! she silently screamed as she read. No! No! No! She felt herself trembling when she'd finished, her heart beating in her chest as though she'd run ten miles. Stefan had written this note to his child because he wasn't coming back!
"Masha!" she screamed into the sun-dappled silence of the room, struck with fright, unable to move. "Masha!" she cried. A bird sang its morning song somewhere beyond the window as though it were unaware shadows were beginning to cover the earth. "Masha," she whimpered, helpless against her pain, a great darkness overtaking her, and she crumpled to the floor.
Lisaveta woke in Stefan's bed, Militza holding her hand, the room filled with hushed and reverent servants. She remembered instantly, and her eyes filled with fear.
"You mustn't worry," Militza said, wishing she could soothe that trepidation. "Stefan wouldn't want you to worry."
"I'm frightened, Masha," Lisaveta breathed, her voice so faint it was barely audible.
"He didn't mean to frighten you, Lise. He only wanted to talk to his child before he left." Militza stroked Lisaveta's hand as one would a distrait child.
"He'll be back?" It was a heartrending plea.
"Of course he will," Aunt Militza firmly declared. "Stefan's invincible." But her own confidence was shaken by Stefan's note. His tone was almost prescient, alarming in a man who'd always felt indomitable. "Would you like to see the vineyards or Stefan's special Barb horses? We could take a small picnic with us and make a day of it." She could have been coaxing a small child.
"When do they plan on attacking?" Lisaveta's voice was strained, her mind immune to the distractions Militza offered.
Militza debated a moment the style of her answer and then decided on the truth. "Tomorrow," she said.
Stefan rode into his cavalry corps headquarters at midnight to find his entire staff had been on the ready since word of Hussein Pasha's march had been received. When he walked into the large tent, a cheer went up and he smiled. "We're slightly pressed for time, I hear," he said, stripping off his gloves, his grin remarkably cheerful. "But we're conveniently ahead of Hussein." A collective sigh of relief went round his officers. Prince Bariatinsky was back in time.
A magnum of Cliquot materialized, and while it was being poured, Stefan accepted all the numerous congratulations on his sudden and novel state of matrimony. He took the teasing good-naturedly.
"So you're finally leg-shackled," one of his brigade commanders said, his smile wide. "You're the last one we thought would succumb."
Stefan's brows rose, his eyelids dropped marginally and he observed his grinning officers for a moment with a narrow-eyed smile. "I recommend it," he said.
"In a bit of a hurry, Stash?" Loris Ignatiev sportively inquired, friends with Stefan long enough to press for details.
"I didn't want to give the Countess any opportunity to change her mind." Stefan's reply was mild, amused and unmistakably untrue.
"Was that all?" Loris apparently wasn't going to be satisfied with evasion.
The telegraph line must have been completed, Stefan drolly thought. "You may congratulate me," he pleasantly said. "I'm about to become a father."