“Who,” she breathed, her voice barely a whisper, her grip tightening on my arm as she steadied me, “who are you?”
I swayed, a profound dizziness washing over me. The smell of ozone was still thick, but now it was mixed with something else: the sterile scent of old dust and Anja’s own subtle, crisp aroma, like snowmelt on pine needles. Her touch was cold, but surprisingly steady, keeping me upright. My head lolled. My voice, when I finally managed to summon it, sounded like dry leaves skittering across pavement.
“Bogdan Chekhovsky,” I rasped, stating the obvious, because what else was there? “And I’m about to pass out.”
Her eyes, the color of winter ice, narrowed. Suspicion warred with the undeniable, fleeting relief that had etched itself onto her features just moments ago. She didn’t release me, though. Instead, she adjusted her grip, pulling my arm over her shoulder. My body, a collection of useless limbs, offered no resistance as she half-dragged, half-carried me further into the sanctuary, towards a low cot tucked against a wall.
The orphans, who had been huddled together, watching the drama unfold with wide, anxious eyes, now stirred. A small boy, no older than five, with a soot smudge on his cheek, pointed at me. “Mama Frost, is the ghost gone?”
Anja shot him a look that promised a stern lecture later, but her focus remained on me. She practically dropped me onto the cot, though with a surprising gentleness that belied her usually formidable demeanor. I collapsed onto the rough wool, every muscle screaming. I closed my eyes, willing the world to stop spinning.
“A ghost, is it?” she murmured, standing over me. “That’s what you want them to think?”
“It worked, didn’t it?” I mumbled, too exhausted to be anything but blunt. “They ran. Your little flock is safe.”
She was silent for a long moment. I felt her presence, a cold pressure in the air above me. Then, a shift. The tension in her stance eased, just a fraction. “Why?” she asked, her voice softer now, devoid of its usual frosty edge. “Why would you do that? You risked… everything.”
I cracked open one eye. “Risked what, exactly? My illustrious career as the academy’s foremost expert on napping?”
She didn’t laugh. Instead, a sigh escaped her lips, a sound heavy with a weariness that matched my own. She sat on the edge of the cot, not too close, but closer than she had ever allowed herself to be. Her gaze swept over the sleeping forms of the children, then toward Elian, who watched us from a distance, his frail body shivering despite the warmth of the sanctuary.
“Elian,” she began, her voice barely audible, a fragile thread woven into the quiet hum of the mini-Core that powered this place. “He caused it. The meltdown of the central Core.”
I blinked, my exhaustion momentarily forgotten. My past self had already deduced this, but hearing her say it, the raw admission laid bare, was different. It stripped away the last vestiges of the ‘Witch of the Frostwood’ facade.
“Elian has always been… delicate,” she continued, her fingers absently tracing a worn patch on the cot’s fabric. “His affinity for runic manipulation is extraordinary, a true prodigy, but his physical constitution is weak. The stress of the Advanced Flux Calculations for the main reactor was too much. He was experimenting with a new output matrix, trying to impress Pavel Orlov, hoping to secure a place in his research faction. A miscalculation, a momentary surge… and the Core began to destabilize.”
Her eyes met mine, brimming with a desperate truth. “I was there. I saw it. He panicked. And I… I took the blame. Pavel was quick to capitalize on the chaos. He made sure everyone believed I was responsible. He even offered to ‘help’ Elian recover, making him swear to secrecy.”
Her mouth pressed into a flat line. “If his involvement had been revealed, his future would have been destroyed. Pavel would have seen to it. He’d be exiled, his talent wasted, his life forfeit. I couldn’t let that happen. He’s all I have left.”
A small, carved wooden bird, the one Matron Elzbieta had given me, peeked out from her pocket. The scale of her sacrifice settled over me. She had accepted public scorn, exile, and the threat of a sealed Core, all to protect her brother from a manipulator like Orlov.
“And you,” she said, turning her full attention back to me, her voice regaining a touch of its earlier frost. “You, a Chekhovsky. Why help me? Your forebear was a… complicated man. He hated inefficiency, despised anything that threatened the Empire’s stability.”
I let out a short, humorless laugh. “Complicated is an understatement. I’m currently stuck in this body precisely *because* of him. My past self, the original Bogdan, apparently decided that instead of enjoying his eternal, well-deserved slumber, he’d rather orchestrate my reincarnation into a sickly body, just so I could clean up whatever mess he left behind.”
I rubbed my temples, the headache still throbbing. “He left me a list of directives. ‘Save the Witch’ was at the top. Everything I’m doing, every ounce of effort I’m expending… it’s all because that infuriating, posthumous busybody decided his afterlife wouldn’t be complete without me to deal with his unfinished business. I just want to go back to sleep, Anja. A quiet, uninterrupted, millennia-long nap. But he won’t let me.”
The confession tumbled out, a strange mix of exasperation and genuine frustration. I hadn’t meant to say so much, but the weariness, the absurdity of my situation, and perhaps the shared vulnerability of the moment, had stripped away my usual reserve. Anja listened, her expression shifting from suspicion to bewildered understanding.
“He… he planned this?” she asked, her voice hushed. “Across generations?”
“Eras. Decades. Who knows?” I gestured vaguely. “All I know is, the moment I thought I was free, he dragged me back, saddled me with his ‘legacy,’ and now I’m stuck trying to prove your innocence to prevent a civil war, all so I can finally get some peace and quiet. The man never met a simple solution he didn’t despise.”
A fragile silence settled between us, heavy and still. Her brother’s secret, my absurd predicament. Two lives entangled by the echoes of the past, by the machinations of others. For a moment, the chasm between the 'Witch of the Frostwood' and the terminally lazy descendant of a legendary figure seemed to shrink. A shared, ironic understanding flickered between us, a nascent bond forged in the crucible of shared exasperation and unwilling alliance.
Later, with my strength partially restored thanks to some medicinal broth Anja had grudgingly provided, I made my way back to the old strategist's study. The Core Attunement Exam loomed, a physical impossibility for my current state, and I needed a miracle, or at least another one of my predecessor’s convoluted solutions.
The study was exactly as I’d left it: notes scattered, schematics pinned to the walls. I rummaged through a stack of old journals, hoping for a clue, an obscure runic sequence, anything. My fingers brushed against a small, ornate silver locket tucked beneath a pile of blueprints for a long-decommissioned stellar cartography array. It wasn't the sort of keepsake the old strategist would usually keep.
As I picked it up, a faint blue light emanated from its surface. A voice, familiar yet chillingly detached, filled the room. The air shimmered, coalescing into an ethereal projection of my namesake, the Grand Strategist Bogdan, standing before me, looking exactly as he did in the few portraits I’d seen. His eyes, sharp and knowing, settled on me.
“Ah, my dear descendant,” the phantom Bogdan began, a dry, almost regretful tone in his voice. “Took you long enough. It seems even my most efficient plans require a few… nudges, for the truly indolent.”
I scowled. “You think this is indolence? I’m practically a one-man emergency response unit for your centuries-old mistakes!”
The ghost chuckled, a sound like dry rustling. “Indeed. And now, the true purpose of this little interlude. Anja Volkov. Her grandmother, Lady Katerina, was… a friend. A formidable woman, whose intellect I greatly respected. I failed her. Failed to protect her kin from the ravenous political vultures of the Imperial Court. They orchestrated her downfall, just as they now attempt to destroy her granddaughter.”
The apparition’s gaze grew distant, tinged with a faint, sorrowful shadow. “This entire grand, tedious orchestration, this resurrection of yours, is my penance. My final, convoluted apology. A debt unpaid, festering through the ages. I swore to Katerina I would safeguard her lineage, and I meant it. You, my reluctant heir, are simply the means to that end.”
He paused, his form flickering slightly. “Now, to business. The Core Attunement Exam. Your current physical state makes it a death sentence. However, it also presents an opportunity. House Orlov has a secret. A very important one. The proof you need to expose Pavel, to clear Anja’s name, it’s not in my notes. It’s in their hidden vault, deep beneath their manor. Win the exam to secure entry.”
I stared in disbelief. The Orlov vault? Entry rights? My forebear had just given me a new, far more immediate problem. How was I supposed to win a magically demanding exam when I could barely conjure a spark? And why did winning grant entry to a private noble vault? This was an entirely new level of ridiculousness, even for him.
The phantom's lips twisted into a faint, self-satisfied smile, then he began to fade, his voice echoing one last, infuriating directive. “The key, my dear, is not strength, but… precision. And perhaps, a touch of theatricality. Remember: sometimes, the path of least resistance requires the most elaborate setup.”
The blue light winked out, leaving me alone in the dim study, the silver locket now cold in my hand. Win the exam to earn entry. My head swam. My ancestor wasn't just trying to save Anja; he was using me to settle an ancient score, manipulating me with a promise of peace that seemed to recede further with every one of his revelations. And now, the Orlov vault. This was no longer just about Anja’s innocence. This was about a centuries-old conspiracy, and I was squarely in the middle of it, armed with nothing but a crippled body and the grudging guidance of a very dead, very annoying genius. And I had two days to figure out how to pull off a miracle.