Anastasia

It was a cold night, even inside the palace. For the past year, maybe even longer, we had been moving around from place to place. We were told this was for our protection, so it came as no surprise one night during early summer when we were awakened in the middle of the night and told to dress. We were being moved again.

We were at the Catherine Palace in St. Petersburg, our summer residence, and where we would be moved this time, no one knew except our captors. It was in the dead of night that the armed soldiers marched into our rooms, giving us all a rude awakening.

“Get up and get dressed, you’re being moved to a new location for your protection,” they barked at us, and then left, closing the door behind them.

Father got up and pulled on a shirt over his night clothes and I followed his example. When we were done getting dressed we walked outside and waited for my four sisters and mother to get dressed. When we were all awake and dressed we were ushered into a small basement. Father turned to the guard at the door.

“Sir, can you bring us two chairs for me and my wife to sit down?” he asked politely. We’d been treated badly and with more disrespect than a common prisoner in the last few months, but my father never failed to be polite to the men who held us as captives in our own home. He said we should never stoop to their level.

The guard motioned for our physician, Eugene Botkin, to get us a couple chairs. He disappeared through the door and returned a few minutes later with one in each arm. Mother collapsed in her chair and dramatically put a hand over her forehead, as if she were about to faint. Anastasia gasped and ran over to mother to see if she was alright. Father sat down and motioned for me to come and sit on his lap. Just as I sat down a well-dressed guard came in and spoke to us.

“You are told to wait here until the truck that is to deliver you to your new location arrives,” he said coldly before turning on his heel and walking off, his feet tapping against the cold cement beneath our feet.

“Father, I’m scared,” I stated. My father rubbed my back soothingly.

“Don’t be, Alexei. We have nothing to fear.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out an old metal watch on a chain.

“My father gave me this watch when I was young, saying it had an enchantment on it that would protect me from all harm, would you like to hold onto it for a while?” I took it from my father's hand and opened it. Inside the small seconds hand ticked by. When I felt the weight of the small clock in my hands a calm feeling washed over me.

“Thank you father,” I said with a smile as I slipped the watch into my pocket. I turned and saw Anastasia looking at me with envy in her eyes. She always felt that since I was the only boy in the family, and the heir to the throne, father favored me more than my sisters. She always felt jealous when she saw father giving me special attention, or when he spent more time with me.

Suddenly the door on the other side of the room burst open and about seven men with guns filed in. The well-dressed man from before walked in calmly as he stepped in front of us. He cleared his throat before addressing us.

“Nikolai Aleksandrovich, in view of the fact that your relatives are continuing their attack on Soviet Russia, the Ural Executive Committee has decided to execute you…” My eyes widened in fear and my bones felt frozen in place as I turned to look at father. His normally calm expression had turned into a mix of fear and rage.

“What?” The words had barely left his mouth when the man barked a command and the men raised their guns and fired at us. What happened next seemed to pass in a blur, and I couldn’t really tell what was happening. I remember hearing ear-splitting screams from my sisters and mother, and the room filling with gun smoke.

“The guns aren’t working! they just bounce right off them!” I heard one of the soldiers cry.

“God must be protecting them!” another cried. I knew why their bullets weren’t working. I looked down at my own shirt and clutched at it as cries rang out through the room. Before we were taken into captivity by these evil men who were rebelling against their rulers of Russia, mother had sown all our precious jewels into our clothes so the soldiers wouldn’t be able to take them from us. We had successfully hidden them from the soldiers, and now they were protecting us from their bullets.

Father pushed me off his lap and sprung to his feet. He ran up to one of the soldiers and tried to knock the gun from his hands but one of the men, but one quickly pointed his gun at the back of father’s head and fired a single shot. The smoke cleared just enough for me to see father collapse in a heap on the ground. I screamed and turned to run for the door, but I suddenly felt a burning pain right behind my ear. I tripped and fell to the ground. I screamed as I clawed at my ear and tried to get the pain to cease.

I’m not sure what happened next, but the room once again filled with smoke and I hear screams from my mother and sisters, followed by the sound of someone stabbing something. The last thing I can remember was a sharp, shooting pain in my side before blacking out.



When I woke up I felt pain all over my body. I tried to move my arm but it felt like it was frozen stiff. I groaned and opened my eyes. I suddenly shot up when I realized I was in a pit. The pain in my side flared up, making it feel like it was on fire as I fell back down. I stared up at the shallow hole I was in. I looked to my right and let out a cry when I saw my sister Anastasia laying there, facedown. Her strawberry blonde hair fanned out around her, concealing her face. I crawled over her and bit down on my lip to avoid crying out in pain. I gently moved her hair away from her face and turned her over on her back.

“Anastasia? Anya?” I called out softly, shaking her shoulder. My eyes filled with tears. “Anya! Wake up!”

I shook her shoulder and called her name, but she never responded. I rested my head against my sister’s shoulder and started to weep aloud. My whole family! Dead!

I cried out in anger at the men who did this to my family. After a few minutes I lifted my head and wiped my tears away, this was no time to cry; I must escape first. If these wicked men were ever to be brought to justice for their crimes I would have to survive. I brushed my sister’s hair away from her face and kissed her forehead before trying to stand up. The sharp pain in my side spread all throughout my body; I fell back down and clenched my teeth in pain. I grasped my side with my hair and looked down to see blood seeping from my open wound. I realized that I wouldn’t be able to survive this, the found was too big.

Ever since I was young I was told I suffered from haemophilia. I was told that if I got even the smallest cut, I would die from bleeding to death because my blood was not able to properly heal the wound. Several times when I got injured mother had to call on Rasputin to heal me, and each time I was saved from the brink of death, but Rasputin was not here, and I doubt that even he could save me from such a deadly wound as this. I knew from a young age that I may never live to adulthood because of it. Although my family liked to think positive, I preferred to look at things realistically. I remember a conversation I had with my older sister Olga when I was ten, it was when my family finally realized that I had accepted my fate.

I laid down on the grass and looked at the clouds in the sky with wonder. Thoughts swirled around my head as I watched the clouds float away in the sky, traveling their already charted paths by the wind. Suddenly a shadow covered me and I looked up to see my sister Olga standing above me. She sat down next to me and looked up at the sky for a moment before turning back to me.

“What are you doing, Alexei?” she asked simply.

“I like to sit here and think; to wonder,” I answered.

“What do you like to think about?”

“Oh, so many things," I responded, "I enjoy the sun and the beauty of summer as long as I can. Who knows whether one of these days I shall not be prevented from doing it?” Olga looked at me in surprise before finally nodding.

“You are quite wise, Alexei. Quite wise.”

My eyes filled with tears when I thought of Olga; of how I would never see her eyes shining again.

With a new determination I looked up at the shallow hole they’d thrown me in. No, I would survive! I had to; I had to do it for my family: for my father, my mother and my sisters.

I grabbed onto the end of the ditch and pulled myself up, letting out a cry from the pain. A moment later I lay on the brink of the pit, panting heavily and trying to keep my head from spinning from the pain. A few minutes later I stood up with great difficulty and started to walk down the long dirt road that most cars traveled. If I am to survive I must first get out of Russia, if I didn’t I would surely be found again and executed. Second, I must find help. Maybe I would be able to find a man like Rasputin who would be able to heal me.

I kept one hand clutched over my wound in my side as my head started to pound from the wound I’d received there. I would feel the fresh blood dripping down my face as I stumbled along. I just hoped I could get out of Russia, or I would soon share the same fate as my family.