CHAPTER ONE | " RUB SALT IN THE WOUND "

A SLUSH OF RIDGED ICE TWINKLED UNDERNEATH THE MORNING SUN RAYS. 

The golden beams — that were peeking through the obscured windows — stroked Belava's hair and outlined her body. She held out a hand to reach toward the reflecting light as she felt the subtle warmth touching her cheeks, inhaling deeply the chill of the ice rink that pinched her nose.

Belava Mikhailova was a flying swan among the crows.

One foot was forward to the inside edge of the rink with a bended knee and the other was backward, achieving her favorite Ina Bauer. Her arms were spread out, showcasing her wingspan. Feeling, the pearl feathers ruffled by the breeze of the moment, she glided with grace. She closed her eyes as her back bent as she was carried and lured by Tchaikovskyij playing in the background.

She was a lost bird searching for a home. The only petal in the stormy seven seas. She was a piece of dust sent adrift.

Her fingers curled up delicately, proceeding to let her touch the harp made of air. Her fingertips brushed the invisible strings that resonated a melody in her head, a siren's aria that followed her heartbeat.

One foot after the other completely eased. The way she touched the twines, copied her moves.

Belava followed a step sequence with subtle jumps as if she was attempting to cross a river, ignoring the slippery stones. Like a pond skater, she felt the water's flow by touching its waves. She outsmarted the stream, trying her best to not get swept away by the ripples, she follow them as a pattern. She turned in both directions, bedazzled by the golden spotlight, lifting one of her feet swiftly to trace the ice.

She grasped the air soon as the world started spinning with her. Faster. Her arms were moving like a blooming flower. A hand rose to the ceiling, just like a thread of a puppet that was pulled. The other one grabbed the free blade and pulled it above the level of her head. Her back was a bowstring, arching upward until she let go, scratching the ice with easy strokes.

A half-silent cheer resounded the rink that was before concealed in the tranquility of the ice show. As usual, Ionna, Belava's mother, came to see her training and was thrilled.

A blow of a movement collided with her face leaving out red residues on her cheeks and the cinnamon brown coat that kept her secure. Fuzzy ushanka warmed her ears and dried the wet streaks of her blonde hair. She held a handkerchief, elbows leaning against the rink's railing. The fabric was pale as snow fluttered, Ionna's hands were ready to clap, nonetheless, they suddenly stopped, froze in motion. Feeling the locked eyes on her shoulder, she had to be careful with her reactions.

They weren't alone.

The sound of grinding ice and suppressed hurrahs was complemented by murmurs of disapproval. Two figures watched Belava's performance on the opposite side of the icerink.

"So?" Commander Mikhailov questioned with a swallow as his voice got raspier than usual due to the cold. Alexander was always attending his daughter's training, not just to accompany his wife but he secretly adored the craft when it comes to becoming better at something a person devoted his whole life to.

He took a glimpse at a lady that was standing on his left; she knew more about figure skating than he did.

The woman — probably in her fifties — adjusted rectangular glasses that were sliding on the tip of her nose, "Average spin. The flexibility of her back is on point though. I'm surprised, she always seems so stiff."

Commander Mikhailov nodded, although the lady's note seemed unimpressed as the corners of her lips didn't move at all, he was satisfied with the answer. His youngest was getting in shape.

The woman; Madame Volkova wasn't a figure skating coach, in fact, she was too far from that. Of course, with that friendly face, and the creasing wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, she could be easily mistaken for a professional. She retired from skating years ago but that didn't give her the impact to proceed to help others with the training.

They were living the dreams she couldn't pursue and she hated that.

Madame Volkova was rather an observer than a teacher. She was a widowmaker, the jury. She was in charge of observing the errors and pointing out the flaws that needed to be fixed before successfully graduating from the Red Room.

If a student failed graduation, they were instantly killed off as the leadership wasted precious time with them. Nonetheless, if a family member proudly worked for the USSR, the recruits had protection.

The Red Room was divided into two classes. One of them used kidnapped children, those who were taken in Kazakhstan or other Soviet countries that were known for not having a police system and the other class used girls that were assigned willingly to depict their love for the state, giving their bodies away.

Belava was assigned to serve in the Red Room when she was only six years old, and now that she was almost sixteen, she had to graduate yet she didn't.

She was constantly retaking the final test at her father's demand. Her results got even worse after a few months of trying.

Madame Volkova was following and observing every step Belava made, to track down the repeating mistakes. She watched the blonde girl successfully land, "Excellent split jump."

Alexander nodded again, more enthusiastic this time while rubbing his dry hands, arid like a desert. His forehead was sweaty as he was getting nervous about the widowmaker's verdict.

Madame's light blue eyes rolled as sudden applause resounded.

Ionna couldn't refrain from showing her forbidden happiness. She locked eyes back on Belava, remembering her body easing every time a single sound disrupted her during the graduation test. This was different.

Belava seemed captured by the music, switching gracefully her feet, creating a flawless choreography from scratch.

Tchaikovsky's Serenade for strings escalated with fast-moving and briskly sounding tones of violins. Belava's delicate moves helped her to encircle the ice quickly as if she was a floating snowflake.

Widowmaker hummed with frowned eyebrows, examining her moves even more carefully, squinting her eyes.

Alexander was caught off-guard, deeply glancing at the woman he always wanted to marry. Ionna was a gem among women. A jewel that was overseen by many. She was born as Belova and wasn't treated by society well, in fact, nobody took her family seriously. They were a ruin, a disgrace to the state. When he appeared in her life, she knew that it was the only way to finally be valid.

She was meant to love him, there was no other way.

He didn't look at her too fondly as he always was bad at showing affection. Still, he was concerned about the fact that Ionna was so sure about going outside, although the local doctor prescribed her to stay in bed and take medicine. Now she was there happily clapping with her pale hands, almost reddish at the fingertips until a sore cough unexpectedly left her lips.

Startling sounds were Belava's curse. A nemesis that couldn't be avoided, specifically when it was the middle of testing. A loud exhale forced her hands to quiver and miss a shot. Interestingly enough a mother's cough didn't do anything.

"Interesting."

Alexander was startled by Madame's sudden expression, "I beg your pardon?"

"The way she is focused. The sounds; she completely ignores them." Widowmaker pointed out. Her eyes were now darted, ready to catch any other detail that wasn't completely reverberating the memory of Belava's failed graduation tests.

The girl dancing on the ice appeared to be locked away from the world around her. She was a rising star in her own performance. She was a solo instrument aware of her choices. No one could stop her from the power of art.

Madame Volkova squinted, absolutely speechless, stepping forward, closer to the stair railing. She was in awe, but not impressed in a way others would expect. She was curious as the girl repeated the same moves over and over more confidently than before until she randomly looked at the widowmaker and chills started to run down her spine. Her steps were all of a sudden hesitant and uncertain.

Ionna's cough echoed throughout the area one more time.

"Please excuse my wife, she isn't in her best condition," Commander instantly muttered as he noticed Volkova's subtle head shake of irritation. He could feel the pensive stare, the tension between her and his daughter.

Belava pirouetted into the exhilarating rhythm, unbothered.

"If she's not well, she shouldn't be here," Volkova insisted as another hacking cough made her hackles rise. She groaned in annoyance as she played with her concentration. Madame's shoulders quivered as sickening as she was hearing those dry and frequent sounds. However, the ice skater used them to her advantage, moving with much grace, and disregarding them.

Alexander was about to reassure her yet her utterance caught him by surprise.

"Commander, I'm afraid your daughter is avoiding the trial on purpose," she declared on the spur of the moment of the ice being scraped with metal. Alexander's eyes narrowed with a stare fixed on Belava's outstretched arms. She copied the swan's wingspread perfectly. Gentle wind stroked her body as if it was bristling her feathers.

The ruffling endured like a whisper.

"Please elaborate," he dwelled, trying his best to see it himself. If she was right, that meant Belava was capable to pass graduation from the very beginning.

What was she up to? He didn't understand.

"I haven't seen a single mistake," the widowmaker expounded on command, "yes; some of the jumps could be better, but here she's unstoppable as much as she is in the field. She's not ready to move on... As if she was waiting for something -"

"- or someone" Alexander finished her thought out loud. Frowning, he headed downstairs, hand waving, gesticulating for the music to be cued.

Belava's eyes ticked between her mother's sickness and her father's vein forming on his forehead. A dreadful raspy cough stirred up the chaos of the grading music. The colliding sounds made her deranged, and dizzy. Nerves tensed. Her throat quivered as she took a deep breath before she tried to hit the double axle, quickly as possible to silence mother's earsplitting spits.

This was the time.

Belava bounced off the ice, successfully spinning till she staggered over the icy flakes. Thud. She hit the ground, falling on her back and arms, playing with her threshold of pain as the sound of instruments dropped and squealed to foreshadow a coming tragedy. Ionna almost choked. She stuttered on her convulsive coughs.

Wheezing in shock, she witnessed the amount of ichor that was stuck in her lungs being transferred to an originally snow-white handkerchief that was now tinted crimson red, drowning the apathy in blood.

She used a cloth to wipe the open wound on Viktor's hip, "Just tell me if it hurts, oh, wait-"

"Suchka." He uttered widely grinning over her joke.

Belava was gentle and precise when it came to cleansing her brother's wounds. There was no need to rush. She had to make sure that everything is properly cleansed and disinfected. It was difficult to persuade him to let her take care of him, yet she somehow managed to talk him out of it.

A small wound needed a steady hand, and Belava was the ideal candidate. She took the needle with the suture she clenched between her lips and began stitching. It went right through his skin. Belava's nose was slightly wrinkled as some of the fluids carried on spreading. By cleansing the injury, she imagined the anguish he would've suffered if he felt any type of physical pain.

Even she had a bit of trouble sanitizing her own spites from combat. How could he be so sure that there was no infection in his?

Belava was constantly checking on Viktor, observing his reactions. Her vision was perplexed, fixed right at him when the needle went deeper, tightening the gash.

"Does it hurt even a little?" She wondered. She couldn't imagine being in his shoes. Having the capability to tell the pain was something that defined livingness. Belava's thoughts were in a never-ending circle till they became regrets. She couldn't even look at the fresh scars on his back when she treated the recent stab wound. Although they were healed, she understood that the story behind them was much more heartbreaking.

"You tell me," Viktor mumbled with eyes that sparkled with concern.

"Well, I got used to it," Belava responded roughly with a shrug, fastening quickly the suture to express her suppressed anger. Of course, it hurt. Every day of her wretched life she lived in hope that one day someone with a good heart will save her; like in those fairy tales, her mama read her. Sadly, it did not happen.

She was bound to rot, ruining the flawlessness she once achieved in order to save her life, whether it cost the blood being shed.

"Then that makes two of us," fair-haired exhaled heavily as he held his breath for a moment, "look, now that I am here, I can help you out. Dad has no idea that I am here -"

"That's why you're hiding here; in his own apartment, huh? You haven't changed a bit," Belava looked around, at the walls from which the plaster was crumbling off, inhaling the moisture. It seems like no one cared about the flat anymore as it was imprisoned in oblivion; in memory, making her understand that he never cared about this place, to begin with.

It had been a long time since she had been in this apartment for the first time.

Belava remembered herself sitting by the dining table, eating mama's famous solyanka (a sour soup) with a rusty spoon, waiting for her dad when he came back from work. He always slammed the door, which made her realize that life could've been better without him.

She shook her head after reminiscing and packed the first aid kit. Clasp. The tin box harshly closed as she stood up, heading back to the kitchen.

"Either way, you can't fool me, Viktor, I've done that before. Alone. You'd be surprised but every time I've tried to run away, it ended with a disaster," Belava stirred up his helpfulness with a bit of her chaos. He shouldn't have given her hope in the first place, everything could be different.

Viktor was pondering, silently nodding to her thoughts that were said out loud. She was right. Anything that was profoundly connected to their father was a tragedy and that made them walking catastrophes.

"Have you ever tried to embrace it?" He asked, following her to the kitchen from where he did hear distinct rumbling, quickly putting on his sweater.

"What do you mean? Like the one time, I accidentally injured one of my rivals on the ice because he wanted me to hurry up? Yeah, that was an embracement cause she hasn't skated since. Good for me, I guess," Belava muttered sarcastically, rummaging through those old cabinets to find something to drink. So far she found piles of dust and canned beans. She groaned in misery.

"No. Definitely not that," he blurted out almost instantly as she gasped for air, "I know it might sound impossible but have you ever tried to look for peace in it?"

"And end up like you? No thanks," Belava cackled, whereupon her eyes lit up as she pulled a bottle of gin from a small pantry next to the fridge which no one had used for many years, "I think I just hit a gold mine."

"I wouldn't drink that," Viktor pointed out, concerned as she started to pour the liquid into two of the mugs she found on the shelf, "God knows how long it's been there."

"Then we have to embrace it, isn't that what you wanted?" she winked at him, pushing the dotted, taller mug closer to him while screwing the bottle lid. Viktor looked at the rippling surface of the mug she rubbed in her hands.

The spiciness flooded her mouth and turned it into nothingness, she sighed with relief and fulfilled pleasure until the aftertaste hit her. Belava's face was now crooked, with a tongue running over the insides of her mouth, "Fu! That's disgusting."

Viktor came to check the label which was barely visible as some of the words were scratched off. He chuckled, "This is the one I was using this one to disinfect back in the day."

Tears welled up in Belava's eyes, trying to cough away the burning carry-over trapped inside her throat, "Of course you did."

Bela's lips scrunched to fight the bitter taste, unintentionally catching herself scanning every bit of his face. His smile faded away with a head that hung down, not knowing what to do. She was right; he hadn't changed a bit. Casual conversations seemed more difficult to him than usual., finding it hard to match anyone else's energy.

Viktor has always been sheepish, seeking an allowance to speak because he was used to following orders. Poor thing.

Eventually, Belava discerned how his face was slightly emaciated as his cheekbones were sharper than usual. Belava remembered his face so bright and warm-hearted. The only thing that remained was the caring look in his blue eyes which appeared teary at certain angles.

Beautiful yet sorrowful.

She missed him a lot as even words couldn't describe how much she missed him. Belava waited for him every day. Every second of her life, she'd longed for his brother to come back. Now that Viktor was finally here, she desired to feel reassured and comforted yet the quelling anger she kept from the past couldn't let her feel that way.

He had the privilege of freedom when she was locked in a cage.

She had every right to be angry. Right?

"I thought you were done with KGB," Belava's thoughts were emitted out loud after she cleared out her throat.

"I am."

"Then why were you up there?" She proceeded in interrogation as expected. That was one of the other things she couldn't get out of her head.

Viktor appeared spaced out, stunned by a sudden question. He should've prepared a response, but now he looked like a total liar, "I was following orders."

"What orders?"

He hummed, restfully pondering. He probably shouldn't have trusted her so much but he did. Belava took care of him, if she wanted to betray him she would have already done it. Viktor took a deep breath, "I was hired to assassinate the Serpent."

Bela's eyebrows rose in surprise, "You?"

"You're telling me that you were hired to kill the Forefather?" She almost burst out laughing until he pressed the index finger against his lips to indicate her to be quiet.

It was a known fact that Viktor Alexandrovich Mikhailov was Forefather's favorite student; he was his protégé. In truth, they were closer than many had thought. The Serpent was a big role model and a father figure to Viktor.

How strange. The Forefather was the only person he felt safe with but he destroyed him most of all. He ruined everyone, not only Viktor. Even if he wanted to (which he really wanted), he wasn't able to do it. That's how much power he had over him.

Viktor knew that if he killed him, he would save the world from further suffering.

"Why didn't you do it?"

"I've thought about the collateral damage; it would be like pouring gasoline on a fire. I couldn't risk it."

"Risk what?" Belava wondered.

"To lose you and my family."