136. Your Wedding
That was precisely why she didn’t want to show it to her husband.
Though he probably already knew of its existence as a famous painting, seeing it in person would be different.
Lantskoĭ was famous for his realistic style.
Who in the world would want to see their mother’s miserable final moments?
There was one more reason why she planned to send 「Pavlovsk, The Final Day」 abroad for exhibition rather than keep it at Hersen Palace.
Tatiana’s portrait currently waited for the Grand Duchess’s decision at the Summer Palace.
Though the deposed Grand Duchess’s body had been carelessly buried in a cemetery near the monastery, it was finally moved to the Grand Ducal tomb when her son Nikolai became Grand Duke.
The Grand Ducal tomb was located at the Central Temple, not Hersen Palace.
Only through this faded portrait did Tatiana return to the palace she was driven from, more than 10 years after her death.
Katya, who became mistress of the Summer Palace after pushing out Oksana, had achieved revenge for her mother-in-law.
When palace staff brought the seized assets to the Summer Palace, Katya discovered Lantskoĭ’s paintings mixed among them.
「Pavlovsk, The Final Day」 immediately caught her eye when she entered the room.
When she first saw this painting she had only heard about, Katya’s heart ached.
She knew well the pain of losing a mother.
But she had her father and sister.
Though she became a deposed Grand Duchess, when Tatiana was alive, Nikolai held hope that his mother would one day clear her name and return to his side, to the palace.
He prayed to the gods every day.
Please let him wake up from this terrible nightmare and reunite with his mother, returning to their former life.
For Yuri to also realize his misunderstanding and return to being the loving father and wise ruler he once was.
He desperately prayed for a miracle.
It wasn’t just the young Nikolai.
There were quite a few nobles and citizens who wished for the deposed Grand Duchess’s restoration, which became a threat to Oksana’s faction.
Tatiana’s death meant they could never return to their happy past.
When he lost his mother, Nikolai’s world collapsed.
The death of his brother Ruslan, who had been completely on his side, followed soon after, and the child became alone.
How deeply must that young child have missed his mother after being forcibly separated from her when she was deposed?
But he must have held back from even saying he missed her out of fear of his father.
What must the mother have felt facing death while leaving behind the child who was her life?
As she turned away, unable to bear looking anymore, something crossed Katya’s mind.
A question she hadn’t considered before.
‘How could Lantskoĭ paint so realistically when the Pavlovsk Monastery was off-limits to men?’
The detailed depiction of the room’s structure, furniture placement and appearance stood out—details one couldn’t know without visiting personally.
Until then, all that was publicly known was that the Neda River had flooded, causing water damage to nearby Pavlovsk Monastery, and the deposed Grand Duchess Tatiana was the only casualty.
Was it just a dramatic imagination that she drowned in her narrow bedroom without being able to escape to the corridor?
Katya immediately examined the Grand Ducal records and found a document stating Tatiana’s body was found in the bedroom.
The details matched Lantskoĭ’s painting.
However, all Grand Ducal records were only accessible to the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess for security reasons, and only the Grand Duke’s closest confidants who directly reported the situation or wrote the documents at the time knew.
Looking at other documents, she discovered the Grand Ducal family had secretly brought in Lantskoĭ to interrogate him about how he knew the circumstances of that day.
Fearing for his life, Lantskoĭ consistently claimed he just had a vivid imagination, and he was eventually released after his family used all their connections to intervene.
Since he was also a boyar, the investigation went no further.
‘Maybe Lantskoĭ contacted someone who was at the monastery then and painted based on their testimony. No, that’s the only explanation that makes sense.’
At the time, Lantskoĭ had been desperate for success as a painter.
For him, obsessed with creating his life’s masterpiece, the controversial subject of the deposed Grand Duchess’s death must have been appealing.
What if he had also searched for people for thorough research?
Though she was deposed, Tatiana had been Grand Duchess.
Everyone who worked at the monastery was disciplined for failing to properly serve her.
Though called discipline, they were essentially driven out of the Grand Duchy of Hersen.
The site where Pavlovsk Monastery stood was abandoned without being renovated.
An entire religious order was dissolved in an instant.
Katya couldn’t understand the Grand Ducal family’s decision.
They discarded her like an old shoe at the monastery, but suddenly enforced excessive punishment on everyone in the name of proper treatment for a former Grand Duchess?
Yet they didn’t restore her honor posthumously either.
Something didn’t add up.
‘Like they’re trying to hide something.’
Katya cast out her line hoping to catch even one of the scattered monastery people.
This would be the first and last exhibition where people could see Tatiana’s portrait directly.
After the auction, whoever bought it would keep it as an heirloom, and unless one was close to the owner, they would never see it again.
Someone who missed the deposed Grand Duchess would surely come during the exhibition.
‘I must pray that happens.’
Thinking this, Katya said to Brunhilde’s reflection in the mirror:
“His Highness must not know.”
What I am planning.
After finishing her hair, the Grand Duchess asked Brunhilde about her next schedule.
“Do I go meet Pavel now?”
“He said he would visit after Your Highness has breakfast first.”
“What could be so urgent first thing in the morning? And asking to meet without His Highness knowing too.”
Last night, Pavel had secretly sent a letter through Brunhilde.
The letter briefly stated he had something urgent to discuss tomorrow.
Asked to keep it from Nikolai, Katya had no choice but to send a letter to the Winter Palace, lying that she would skip breakfast tomorrow because she was tired.
After receiving her authority as the Grand Duchess, she stayed at the Summer Palace.
Her devoted husband would visit the Summer Palace daily with various excuses like wanting to eat together or the weather being nice for a walk.
Thanks to this, nobles and palace staff said if you want to see the Grand Duke, go to the Summer Palace where the Grand Duchess is rather than the Winter Palace where he stays or the Autumn Palace where he works.
Anyway, reading his wife’s intention to meet in the afternoon instead, Nikolai sent back a disappointed reply.
It was an affectionate letter saying he understood for now but would miss her until tomorrow afternoon.
“Breakfast isn’t important right now. His Highness might change his mind and burst in at any moment. We need to get this over with quickly. Where is Pavel?”
“Actually, he’s been waiting in the reception room for Your Highness.”
“Then let’s go right now. I’m curious what he has to say.”
Just as Katya took a step to leave the room,
At that moment, someone knocked on the door from the corridor.
When permission to enter was given, the door opened from outside.
It was a servant who worked at the Summer Palace.
“What is it?”
“Your Highness, you have a visitor.”
“If it’s Pavel, I was just about to go meet him.”
“Well, it’s not Sir Pavel……”
“There’s another visitor? Who is it?”
“It’s His Highness Mikhail. When we told him you had an appointment, he was very insistent about not taking much time and just wanting breakfast……”
Katya pressed her fingers to her throbbing temples.
Just when she thought he had been quiet lately, what nonsense was he here to spout now?
Since he wished so earnestly, she figured she should meet him once.
And it wouldn’t be bad to properly warn him today to stop bothering her.
“Where is he?”
“He went straight into the dining room where Your Highness’s breakfast is set and is waiting there.”
The servant reported the troublesome brother-in-law’s location to the Grand Duchess with dismay.
Brunhilde couldn’t hide her shock.
“My goodness. What kind of behavior is this? I will inform His Highness!”
“No. It’s fine. Then I’d have to explain why I lied about not eating breakfast. I’ll stop by briefly before meeting Pavel.”
Katya thought her appetite was completely gone and she wouldn’t be able to swallow a single bite this morning.
The lie she told Nikolai had come back to bite her.
***
As soon as Katya entered the dining room, Mikhail, who was inside, jumped up to greet his sister-in-law.
“Oh, it’s been a while, Your Highness.”
Finding it awkward to call her sister-in-law, he addressed her as Your Highness with a gloomy face.
Why did he stubbornly insist all this time like a child throwing a tantrum for a toy when it would end up like this anyway?
Katya could not be his woman.
Would things have been different if she had met him before his brother?
No. Compared to his brother, he was an utterly lacking and insufficient person.
There was no way Katya would fall in love with him.
“I’ve become very busy lately after receiving the Grand Duchess’s authority early. So I’d appreciate if you could keep it brief.”
Her polite tone conveyed impolite words.
It was natural for her to treat him this way.
When he should have confessed sincere love from the start, he had only spouted nonsense.
But what use was regret now?
“Though late, I wanted to congratulate you on the confirmation of the royal wedding.”
It was the first time he conveyed his true feelings to Katya.
He didn’t expect those feelings would take the form of wedding congratulations.
His voice trembled as he spoke and tears welled up in his eyes.