Wintermourne (1/6)
Boast
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On the evening of November 22, 1910, at Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, Tsar Nicholas II and his Tsarina, Alexandra hosted a dinner for the wealthy elite of the city. Merchants, scientists, spiritual figures, and other people of influence attended, though beyond the Tsar and his wife, none of the nobility attended.
The Malachite Room shimmered like a jewel sealed in glass. Columns of veined green stone loomed between gilded mirrors, their polished surfaces catching firelight and flickering candle flame in strange, spectral ways. Gold leaf clung to every edge—cornices, chairs, the delicate scrollwork above the doors—so that the room seemed not merely furnished but gilded shut.
Above, a crystal chandelier swayed faintly with the draft from unseen corridors, scattering fractured light across the guests’ faces. Their skin looked pale against the emerald backdrop, their voices strangely soft, as if even conversation here had to be lacquered. The room had once belonged to an Empress; now it played host to uncertain men and a mystic in a fraying cassock. Outside, snow scratched against the palace windows. Inside, the walls listened.
The salon glowed with the soft flicker of chandeliers, their crystal prisms scattering light across damask tablecloths. It was a modest affair by Romanov standards, yet the air was thick with unspoken tensions. The recent death of Count Tolstoy, whose body lay unblessed by the Church, had set tongues wagging. Whispers of his excommunication mingled with debates over the soul of Russia itself—Orthodox tradition versus the mystic fervor that crept into the court like damp rot.
Viktor Petrovich, a merchant with a penchant for vodka and grand gestures, sat among the guests. His cheeks flushed as he raised his glass, emboldened by the night's third pour. His merchant’s finery, a velvet coat strained at the seams, betraying his eagerness to shine among the elite. He’d spent years clawing his way into St. Petersburg’s inner circles, his warehouses brimming but his name still common. Tonight, with the Tsar’s weary eyes upon him, he saw a chance to trade wealth for honor, perhaps even a noble title to silence the sneers of old aristocracy.
Across the table, Nicholas picked at his sturgeon, his face drawn, while Alexandra's gaze darted toward Grigori Rasputin, who lounged to the Tsar's left—a place no peasant should occupy. His dark eyes gleamed, unblinking, as he swirled a glass of Madeira, untouched.
The room had been murmuring about Tolstoy’s funeral—or lack thereof—although some ignored the dispute. On one hand, A young nobleman from Novgorod, Mikhail Volkov, sat quietly in a corner, his eyes on a book rather than the Tsar’s table. But a young officer, emboldened by wine, declared, “The Church was right to deny him. A heretic’s soul needs no prayers.” A lady in pearls countered, “Yet the people mourn him as a saint. Who decides God’s will?”
Rasputin’s voice cut through the room. Soft bit firm. “There are older truths,” he said. “The gods once walked these forests, long before your saints were etched in stone. Some of us remember. God speaks through the humble, not the proud. Tolstoy stirred hearts, yes—but pride barred him from grace.”
The weight of it settled over the room like falling ash. Conversation stilled. Even Alexandra nodded, her fingers tightening around her napkin.
It was then that Viktor Petrovich, perhaps too eager to shift the mood—or simply to be noticed—rose unsteadily from his seat.
As the debate over Tolstoy’s soul grew heated, Viktor seized his moment, rising unsteadily. “I concur, Master Rasputin!” he declared, voice booming with rehearsed bravado. “God is seen in the humble, such as my daughter, Nadya, though I am not humble about her. She is the finest spinstress the world has ever known. She can spin flax into linen so fine it carries the very essence of the celestial.”
The room stilled. A few scientists chuckled, thinking it a jest, but Nicholas’s head tilted, his eyes narrowing. The Tsar had been quiet all evening, burdened by reports of his son Alexei’s latest hemorrhage—a secret known only to the inner circle. Rasputin’s “miracles” had staunched the boy’s bleeding before, but the court’s faith in the mystic was fraying, especially after the Tolstoy affair cast a spotlight on unorthodox beliefs.
“What do you mean by this?” Nicholas asked, his voice low but sharp, like a blade drawn slowly.
Viktor blinked, steadying himself on the table’s edge. This was the moment he had been waiting for. To be seen by the Tsar. “Sovereign,” he said, “her linen is so fine, it preserves the health of the wearer. It brings longevity. Even illness flees from it.”
A silence fell, heavier than before. The Tolstoy debate had already stirred unease about miracles and divine favor; now, Petrovich's claim sounded like a challenge to Rasputin’s own mystique. Alexandra’s lips parted, her gaze flicking to Rasputin, who smiled faintly, as if amused.
Nicholas leaned forward, his fingers drumming once on the table. “You speak boldly, Petrovich. We have heard much of miracles lately—some true, some not.” His eyes lingered on Rasputin, then returned to Viktor. “If your daughter’s skill is as you say, she shall prove it. Bring her to court. She will be given flax from the royal stores and a room of her own. If her garments are as wondrous as you claim, they shall clothe my children.”
Viktor paled, the weight of his words crashing down. He mumbled assent and sank into his chair, avoiding his wife's furious stare across the table.
Rasputin’s smile widened, his eyes sliding to Viktor like a wolf scenting weakness. “A bold promise,” he murmured, just loud enough for the Tsarina to hear. “Let us see if the girl’s thread can weave miracles… or merely tales.”
Nadya arrived at the Winter Palace in a carriage too grand for her comfort, wearing a cloak borrowed from her aunt and boots stiff from polish. The guards did not smile as they opened the gate, and the maid assigned to escort her did not speak unless spoken to. Nadya tried to thank her, but the woman only nodded and glanced away, as if words were not meant for her kind.
The palace loomed above her like a cathedral of ice. Marble gleamed beneath her feet; gold filigree crawled across the walls; even the candlelight seemed rehearsed. Portraits of dead emperors stared down from shadowed corners, eyes painted with ambition and sorrow. Nadya’s hands tightened around a small linen bag, patched and faded, holding her wooden spindle—worn smooth by years of spinning flax in her family’s cramped attic, where she’d woven linen fine enough to earn her father’s rare praise—and a few keepsakes from home. That skill, honed through long nights to help pay his debts, had been her pride; now, it was her family’s doom.
She passed through archways that dwarfed her, past servants who looked through her, and nobles who didn’t bother to look at all. The maid led her down a long hallway hung with tapestries older than her family name, until they stopped at a tall wooden door with a brass handle carved like a swan’s neck.
“This is yours,” the maid said. “You are to begin at once.”
The room was colder than she expected—large, but bare. A single window framed the grey winter sky beyond.
The maid took Nadya’s bag, placing it in a corner near the hearth, and gestured to the spinning wheel in the room’s center. Nadya hesitated, her fingers brushing the bag’s rough weave, then turned to the wheel, its shadow looming over her.
Nadya had never been fortunate enough to use a spinning wheel before, but she knew it would be a significant upgrade over her little spindle. It would just take a while to get her feet used to the treadle.
On a table beside it lay three bundles of Russian flax, pale and fibrous, coiled like the guts of some sleeping animal.
There was no chair. She would have to fetch her own.
On the far wall, a small fire struggled in the hearth, throwing more shadow than heat. Above it, mounted in silence, hung a mirror framed in black birch, warped ever so slightly, as if its glass remembered things no longer visible—faces long since faded, secrets sealed behind polished silver.
She shivered. There was no sound—no footfall, no voices, just the faint breath of the palace settling into itself.
And yet, she felt watched.
Not by the Tsar. Not by the guards.
By something else. Older. Patient.
Her fingers trembled as she touched the flax.
Outside the window, snow began to fall.
Inside, the door creaked open without a knock. A man stepped inside, quiet as a shadow. He was dark-haired, bearded, with eyes that did not blink. Something about them made her skin crawl—too deep, too still, like looking into the eyes of a buried thing.
“Why, Miss Nadya,” he said, his voice softer than she expected, almost tender. “You have quite a task before you. To spin flax into celestial thread—and from that, to weave linen fine enough to cure the Tsarevich.”
She looked down at the floor. “Who are you, sir?”
“I am Grigori,” he said. “Grigori Rasputin. I advise the Tsar.”
“I don’t know if I can do it,” she whispered, ashamed to admit it.
“Dear Nadya,” he said with a sorrowful shake of the head, stepping closer. “We both know you cannot. And when the Tsar realizes he has been deceived—and that his son remains in danger—you and your father, your mother, and your brother… will all be executed.”
“That’s not true,” she said, though she felt the truth of it in her bones.
He gave her a sad smile.
She broke. Her knees buckled beneath her as sobs tore from her throat—born not only of fear, but of fury. Her father’s drunken boast had ruined them all.
“Whatever shall I do?” she asked through tears.
“I can help you,” Rasputin said gently.
“How?”
“I possess a relic,” he said. “A spinning wheel from the elder world. It can do what the Tsar asks of you. We both understand it’s not in the material or the maker—but in the magic that shapes it. My wheel can spin celestial thread.”
“Truly?”
“Yes. But there is a price.”
She laid a trembling hand on her chest. “What price?”
“Not your virtue, child,” he said. “That is for another. No—I ask only for your firstborn child.”
She flinched. “My child? But… I have no suitor. And I’m to be kept here, spinning flax. It seems unlikely I shall ever—”
“Then it is a safe bargain,” Rasputin said. “You may never bear a child. And if so, I’ll have lost. But should you someday bring a child into the world… you will surrender the first to me. I desire children, and I cannot make them on my own.”
Nadya stared at him, breathless. The fire cracked softly behind her.
“I cannot do that,” she said, barely above a whisper. “I cannot make that promise.”
Rasputin’s smile deepened, slow and strange. “We shall see,” he murmured, “in time.”
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Stephen B. Anthony is the author of Transmigrant, an epic science fiction thriller, available on both Amazon and Audible. The first seven chapters are available on this website for free.