They had gathered as a family to celebrate his eighth birthday.

Because his parents, both doctors, often traveled outside Russia to remote regions lacking medical care, it had been months since they had last met.

At times, being apart from them was unbearably lonely. But whenever they were together, they would shower him with kisses until his cheeks were sore, hold him in their arms all night long, rub their faces against his and burst into laughter.

The boy loved his parents more than anyone in the world. Even though he had perfectly adapted to the strict private school he attended, whenever he was cradled like a fragile fledgling in their arms, his loneliness melted away without a trace.

Yuri, remember this. Even when you can’t see it, there is always a path.

Whenever he asked what that meant, his parents only smiled faintly, never explaining it clearly. They would kiss his cheek as if to dodge the question and then dance as though drunk, even though they had only drunk orange juice.

When he stifled a yawn and opened Machiavelli’s book, they would snap at him, “Don’t read such thick books, read fairy tales instead,” and nip his small nose. So he assumed this too was just another one of their silly sayings.

And yet sometimes, they would send him a gaze filled with pity.

Our son... may he never become like Russia’s biting wind...

They always gave that solemn plea.

For some reason, no matter how far away they traveled for work, they never entrusted their young son to the Winter Castle. They would rather leave him in someone else’s hands, but never in his grandparents’ home.

Papa, I like the Winter Castle. There’s even a lake there with my name on it.

His father only stroked his hair silently. When you’re a little older. He would always dodge the question that way.

“......”

After the splendid banquet ended, the boy looked around the family gathered around the outdoor table.

The most striking figure, of course, was his grandfather Maxim. Well past sixty, yet with not a single white hair, his thick dark-brown hair was like eagle feathers. His high nose and broad, solid shoulders made him look every bit a soldier.

He touched his wife’s glass and then called for the servant to reheat her teacup.

Then he personally poured black tea into his son and daughter-in-law’s cups and asked, in his usual low and weighty voice:

“Ivan, I hear you’ve been very busy lately.”

“Yes, Father. A doctor is needed everywhere. And thankfully the foundation is running well.”

“So it seems.”

Maxim nodded curtly.

Just then, when the boy’s eyes drifted under the table, he caught sight of his parents’ hands clasped tightly, trembling. Their incomprehensible fear reached even him.

Strange...

Grandfather wasn’t a frightening man.

Whenever the family elders looked down on them for their black hair, it was Grandfather who never tolerated it.

Though he rarely showed emotion, he would cut them down with scathing words and drive them away, never to appear again. Maxim Solzhenitsyn was their reliable, towering shield.

And yet Ivan and Yani always went pale whenever there was a family gathering.

“...When I was in Africa last time, I bought an ornament made # Nоvеlight # of elephant ivory. They said carrying it would bring good fortune, so I poured almost a year’s operating funds into it... but it turned out to be just cheap porcelain! I got scammed badly, left a big hole in the budget...”

They filled the conversation with silly talk like this, cutting their own dignity. Even to the young boy’s eyes, his parents seemed foolish and ridiculous. He couldn’t understand why they would deliberately drag out such frivolous conversations.

Yes, until that day, it had always been so.

“Ghhk...!”

Clang—! His father dropped his teacup and collapsed under the chair. Cough, cough! Ivan suddenly clutched his throat and vomited a gush of bright red blood.

As he pulled the tablecloth down, the expensive tea set crashed to the ground—kyah!—a short scream rang out.

“...Papa?”

Yuri breathed in a gasp. His mother, raising her teacup to her lips, froze in place, while his grandmother turned ashen. Spitting blood in violent bursts, Ivan suddenly glared at his father.

The awkward gentleness was gone from his face; his bloodshot eyes twisted in grief and betrayal.

But as everyone else recoiled in horror, only Maxim Solzhenitsyn sat with his long legs crossed, sipping tea. Eyes blazing, Ivan slapped his wife’s teacup away and roared:

“Run, Yani! Take Yuri and run—!”

The red liquid splashed onto her skirt. The boy stared blankly at the unfolding scene, unable to believe it real.

What was happening to Papa...? That very morning he had woken to his parents tickling him, then skated freely on the lake. It had been such a peaceful time...

“I—Ivan...!”

His mother sprang to her feet, choking back tears. She had turned deathly pale, and yet it was as if she had long prepared for this moment. Her lips pressed tight, her face shone with defiance and grim resolve against her fear.

Without hesitation, Yani seized her son’s arm. As she pulled him to flee, it happened.

Bang—!

Her body pitched forward like a wooden log. It was then that Yuri first learned that when a hole is blown through a person’s head, the blood sprays like a mist.

Smoke curled from his grandfather’s cherished small silver pistol. Ivan bared his reddened teeth and howled like a beast.

He clawed across the floor on his elbows, stretching out his hand again and again, never reaching his wife. Then his movement ceased.

“――”

It felt like a nightmare. The unbelievable sight shattered something deep inside his chest.

His father drowned in blood until the front of his shirt was drenched, and died.

All because he had drunk a single cup of tea his father had poured him. Just that... only that...

It was the first time he realized that the proud mansion was nothing more than a gut to be devoured.

The gift-like breath from his parents suffocated him, his pride collapsed, affection crumbled, trust shattered into fragments. Later he would learn the truth—it had been a purge.

“Yuri, happy birthday.”

His grandfather rose from his seat, wiping his hands and mouth with a napkin.

“Ivan—!” His grandmother cried out her son’s name and fainted.

***

Every night, his grandmother screamed like a madwoman until she was sedated with an injection. Grandfather did not avoid her hatred. He simply endured it in silence and only tightened the security of the estate.

At the funeral, the Archbishop of the Orthodox Church came to pray. The black suit the boy wore fit him as snugly as his school uniform.

Relatives whispered behind his back—how could the child not cry even after his parents had died? But whenever he recalled that day, his legs froze before his tears could.

“He fell out of favor, that’s all. Ivan had always been peculiar. He enrolled in medical school on his own, without consulting the Prime Minister. The whole family was in uproar back then.”

“He was a frivolous man, wasn’t he?”

“He was swindled often. Always chasing investments and stocks, squandering his fortune. He didn’t even care for his only son, just flew overseas. And then he brought home a wife exactly like himself...”

“Then who inherits now?”

“Shh—! Quiet...!”

The Solzhenitsyn family lawyer delivered a box, saying it contained his parents’ keepsakes. The relatives showed brief interest, but scoffed and turned away.

Inside were a wedding photo and a stethoscope. That was all his parents had left him.

The stiff suit, the tie, the shoes—all of it strangled him. This Winter Castle, his two-faced grandfather—he could not bear any of it.

He only wanted to put on his bladed shoes and skate until sunset.

If the wind froze his cheeks until the skin cracked... yes, then perhaps he could breathe again.

The boy fled the mansion and ran to the lakeside.

Panting, panting, when he arrived, the lake was still blue and transparent. A vast, dancerless sheet of ice. He gripped the skate blades until they cut into his flesh without him even noticing.

“Hoo...”

Then, a shadow he did not welcome fell over him. A man in black leather gloves raised his brows as he looked at the boy.

An intruder—but an intruder no Russian could fail to recognize.

“You must be Maxim’s grandson.”

It was Maxim Solzhenitsyn’s longtime friend—and the ruler of the nation. His face was deeply wrinkled, but his eyes burned bright.

“It would have been better had you learned to hunt instead of skate. Those blades are wasted where they are.”

The boy knew well that this man had been close to his grandfather. There were countless photos in Grandfather’s study of them together from childhood. Still, when the boy narrowed his eyes warily, the man smiled.

“Child, don’t resent your grandfather too much.”

“......!”

His stomach churned, remembering the sight of his unmoving grandfather that day.

“Truth is, Maxim is pitiful as well. I gave your grandfather a very difficult assignment.”

But contrary to the word “pitiful,” he laughed cheerfully.

“A high seat is for those who make choices. Choices that are always the hardest and the most cruel. That’s why one must study much, and bear the troubles of others. Isn’t that why you’re paying such expensive tuition now—to climb to that seat?”

He flexed his tight gloves slowly as he spoke.

“Little Solzhenitsyn, shall I give you a problem as well?”

He tapped Yuri’s cheek lightly.

“Your grandmother funded the Chechen independence fighters. Your parents stole Russia’s wealth.”

“......!”

The boy’s fingertips went cold. Even at eight years old, he knew of the wars with Chechnya.

Last year, Chechen rebels had led terrorist attacks that brought down Moscow apartments and theaters, killing hundreds of Russian civilians.

Yet Chechnya persisted in demanding independence. In the end, the Russian government dispatched troops again, and the second war began in earnest.

“Treason, this is treason. Of all families, the family of the beloved Prime Minister...”

He furrowed his brows.

“So I gave Maxim the choice directly. Whose head would serve as the example? To execute the entire family would have been too cruel for my old friend.”

He gazed across the mirrorlike lake and asked:

“Child, whose head would you have taken?”