The Secret Language of Stones

Chapter 33

The Dowager knew where the phone was, in a small room off the library. It was really no bigger than a closet, save that it had a window. She called her sister, and Alexandra said she would arrange to have a local constable come to pick us up and cautioned us to be careful until help arrived. Even though I was certain everyone else had departed and we were the only ones still there, we locked the room from the inside and remained, both of us cowering behind the curtains that pooled on the floor.

The next hour passed slowly. We had been in shock, but the longer we waited, the more the reality of what had almost happened to us sunk in. Both of us jumped at the castle’s every creak. Were trees brushing against the window, or had Grigori come back to check on us? Was that a gull crying, or was someone calling out in Russian? What if the people Grigori had mentioned came before nightfall? What if they arrived before the police?

Finally we heard a car’s tires grating gravel. The Dowager took my hands, closed her eyes, and bowed her head, whispering a litany of words under her breath. Even though I couldn’t understand her, I knew she was praying that help had arrived. Friends, not foes.

And it had. We were taken to a safe house where we were well taken care of for the next twenty-four hours while the royal household prepared the ship to take her back to Yalta and arranged my passage to France.

And then it was time to go.

The Dowager touched my cheek and gave me a wise and sad smile. Around her neck, under her dress, the Dowager wore the emerald egg necklace. But on top of the black satin bodice, the talisman I’d made for her hung on a silken cord. She reached for it and held it tightly in her fist.

“You know, it was your magic that saved me and gave me hope when all hope had been lost. I will keep your magic orb with me always, but not to use as a gateway to whatever doom my family may or may not be experiencing.” She shook her head. “No, I will hold on to this for the promise it offers of a future, one in which they, like me, have been rescued. And that someday, in this life or the next, I will be reunited with them.”

Then she took off one of her gold rings we hadn’t needed to melt, and handed it to me.

“Will you take this as a token of my thanks?” she asked.

“I would be honored.”

She kissed me on each cheek and then let me go.

I was immensely relieved to see her off without our trying to learn the fate of her grandchildren from the talisman. The entire enterprise went against the very purpose of my ability. My job was to bring solace, not stir up turmoil. My hearing the children’s voices would have caused her nothing but pain and sorrow. She wouldn’t have been a mourner asking for closure but rather a woman who still had hope having it dashed. And in not asking me to discover her grandchildren’s fate, she had in turn given me a great gift. I never had to see her face dissolve in agonizing grief, a sight I never would have been able to unsee, never have been able to forgive myself for causing.

If I’d been traveling alone, I would have been nervous on the crossing back to France, worried that Grigori had found out I’d survived, but the Dowager had arranged with King George to have one of his guards escort me safely home. The return trip proved as smooth a journey as the voyage over had been rough. Little had I known then that Grigori had been the Bolshevik spy I was searching for on the way over.

Now I dreaded what faced me back in Paris. I was going to need to tell Monsieur Orloff and Anna about Grigori. I’d witnessed their sorrow and watched them mourn when Timur died. But he’d died with honor. I feared this in its way would be worse.

They listened to my story without emotion, but when I finished, Monsieur broke down. He sat at their dining room table and put his head in his hands and wept like a child. Anna put her arms around her husband and began to whisper in his ear. I stood to leave them, he to his grief and disappointment and she to the job of comforting.

I’d reached the door when Monsieur called out.

“Opaline, don’t go.”

I turned.

“You should stay with us. Mourn with us. You are part of our family. You’ve suffered too. This has been tragic for you as well.”

“But I’ve let you down. Because of me, Grigori is gone. You may never see him again.”

“Because of you?”

“If I hadn’t discovered what was going on in the castle, hadn’t realized what their plan was, he and I would have returned home. I’d have done what you asked-made the Dowager’s talisman and given her your gift-and Grigori’s trespass would have gone undetected. And I let Timur down. Because of me he died without hope.”

Monsieur rose and came to me. He put a hand on each of my shoulders and looked into my eyes. I’d never stood so close to him. Never noticed his eyes were the exact same brown diamonds as Grigori’s.

“Because of you, one of my sons died believing he was well loved. Even if you think you should have given him more hope than you gave him, he didn’t. He loved you, little one, and he believed you were going to be here when he came home.”

“How do you know-”

“He wrote to me,” Monsieur interrupted.

I looked at Anna, wondering why she’d let all this time pass without telling me. But she looked as surprised as I was.

“Pavel, why have you said nothing before now?” she asked.

“I didn’t know before now how Opaline felt. That she thought she could have done more.” He turned back to me. “He wrote to me and said how happy he was and how much he loved you and he believed you loved him back. And having read his words,” Monsieur said, “how could I ever be anything but thankful to you? My child was not alone in his last thoughts because of you, darling girl. For that, I will always be grateful. So grateful I must make sure you understand you are in no way responsible for Grigori’s escape. He was his mother’s son. I never really faced that fact, never wanted to see it or admit it. But he was. I’ve always feared one day he would return to her and to the new Russia.” He shook his head slowly, with regret. “No, you aren’t responsible for me losing my son. But you are responsible for saving my sovereign, for protecting the Dowager.”

He kissed my forehead, and I felt one of his tears moisten my skin. “You are a gem, Opaline. And I am forever in your debt.”

I went down to my bedroom. Depleted. Exhausted. It was going to take days for me to process what had happened in England. Perhaps years to understand it. But it would have to wait. Now that I had delivered my news, there was only one thing left on my mind. And I did not know how I was going to face it or cope with it. Jean Luc was gone. He’d left when we were in the castle and he hadn’t returned. The talisman around my neck was nothing but a cold crystal bauble, as empty of magick as my soul was of hope.

I needed to return the books Madame Alouette had lent me. But first I had to finish reading the rest of his columns. I spent the next few days going over and over his words, his phrases, his insights. Grieving for him in a way I’d never grieved for anyone.

Finally, on Thursday evening, I took the walk he wrote about in his final column, the one he’d written just before meeting his death.

He’d invited his Ma chère to take a boat ride on the Seine. There were no tourist boats anymore. Not during war. But I found a tugboat and paid the captain handsomely to let me stand on the bow as he took his final trip of the day. So while twilight settled over the city, as the magical l’heure bleu descended, as the boat journeyed on the gently flowing river, I read Jean Luc’s last words and shed the last tears for him I would allow myself.

Ma chère,

As the boat takes you down the Seine, look at the people going about their lives on the banks of the river. Life goes on whether we want it to or not. Sometimes here, I think of Paris and am amazed people are still baking bread-even if it’s brown bread-and going to the museum, and walking in the beautiful gardens and washing their clothes and punishing their children. Amazed anything but this hell exists.

Does something truly exist if we are not there to witness it?

Just because I cannot see those people going about their business doesn’t mean they aren’t doing it. Just because they don’t know of my existence in this rat-infested watery trench doesn’t mean I’m not here.

I love the Seine. The river is the heart of the city. And you are the heart of my heart. The water is our lifeblood, mixing, mingling. The bridges are our hands meeting. One side connected to the other. We can’t be together in the flesh, but you can look through my eyes and see what I saw and feel what I felt. You can know that even here, so far from you, I hold your heart in me. Like the precious gift it is. And I will hold it within me always.