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It isn't at all what Gleb would have expected from a New Year's celebration, even down to the date, but then, the past week and a half has made the fact of that itself easily predictable. Nearly everything about Darrow seems to be as far from the Russia he left behind as it's possible to get, and this is no exception. At least it's not quite as unpleasant or as unusual as it could be, as other things have been. Practically the entire city has turned out for this, it seems, bundled up more so than dressed up, waiting in line for food from street vendors. He's heard talk of other New Year's Eves spent up the mountain at the ski lodge, and between the two options, this one is infinitely preferable.

For all the people here, though, there's really only one whose presence he cares about. Despite seeing her, at her insistence, on the Christmas they celebrate here, he barely has the first idea what to do around Anya, no more than he did when he first caught sight of her here outside her building, having thought that he would never see her again. What he does know is that she's as beautiful as he's ever seen her, so much that it nearly hurts to look at her. She's not dressed for the ballet or a press conference this time, and mercifully so, but she's still a world away from the street sweeper he first noticed, what feels like so much longer ago now than it must actually have been. He never could have guessed then where they would wind up, either in this place or before it.

Of course, it makes sense that she would seem to fit in here, far better than he does or could imagine to himself. Wearing the suit that he'd worn in Paris, the nicest thing he owns and likely to stay that way, for how far from comfortable he is in it, he straightens his jacket before he makes his way over to her, mostly for something to do with his hands. "Anya," he says. "You look — well."

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None of the answers that she has received have been as satisfying as she'd have liked. It is to be expected that any city that has this many people who call it home would have its own history and traditions, legends that spring up around certain things. However the native citizens that she has asked about it seem to dismiss her questions or offer explanations that only produce more questions. Those that have not been born here, transplants like herself and Gleb, seem to be just as bewildered.

Perhaps one day Anya will have greater insight. Today, however, is for observing another odd set of traditions.

"I think it might be," she agrees with a thoughtful nod, moving forward with the line. "Come midnight, we will be 90 years out of step with what we knew. A little unsettling is perhaps the least of our problems."

As strange as it is to think about it in terms of numbers like that, to put an actual figure on it, it's also something that's inescapable. Even the apartment that was waiting for him when he got here is full of things that he doesn't understand or know how to use; a brief scan of the crowd and the surrounding buildings only drives her point home. Someone in line ahead of them is busily tapping away at their little cordless, pocket-sized phone, as are many others, and in spite of the weather, most of the clothes that people are wearing still seem utterly illogical, a world away from anyone wore back home or even in Paris. At the time, Gleb had thought all of that unusual, uncomfortably so. He'd needed only to blend in and stood out in spite of that, his shoes giving him away to the doorman, his suit not half as formal as what others at the ballet wore. Comparatively speaking, though, all of that may as well have been normal. No matter how much he'd disliked it, at least he'd had a better idea of how to navigate it.

"You haven't seemed to be having much of a problem with it," he notes, head tipping slightly to the side. Perhaps it's not entirely fair when he hasn't seen all that much of her since he arrived, but at least as far as he can tell, she seems to have some grasp on how to get by in this future into which they've been thrust. He's seen her now, though, as several different people: the lost Grand Duchess in Paris, the street sweeper in Leningrad, the girl behind a closing gate ten years and another lifetime ago. Had those pieces not come together, had they all been taken in isolation, he wouldn't have questioned any of them. It's no wonder, then, that she seems to be doing well enough for herself here and then some. "I still don't understand most of it, and I wouldn't even if it weren't for the effigy. Ninety years — I don't know how anyone could catch up on that much time."

During her brief time here, Anya has wondered if any of the people really look at anything anymore. Do they wonder at the tall buildings? Appreciate the sky and the bright moon over the cold night? Or are their worlds somehow smaller than hers was before, back behind the Russian borders. So much attention is dedicated to such small devices. While she has her own and has used it once or twice, she still cannot fathom being so dedicated to it. It's doesn't seem worth it.

A small laugh escapes her at his comment. "I'm used to adapting, to playing a part," she comments with a light shrug before looking up at him. "This is just another make believe."

It both is and isn't. This is her world, their world, willing or not. Somehow pretending that it isn't permanent, that it is just another step makes it easier. "I don't think anyone fully can catch up on that much time. But we can try. We have to try. It's a brave new world and it has such people in it."

The evening he arrived here, what seems like impossibly long ago and even more recently than is actually the case, he parroted her own words about people pretending to be someone they aren't back to her. At the time, that day in his office, he'd been intent on taking them at face value, believing that there was nothing more to it than that, ignoring any reasons he might have had to wonder if maybe the pretense was the other way around. For all he knows now, remembering her confusion a few days ago, her insistence that she couldn't have been Anastasia, she'd been doing the same herself.

Any questions Gleb might have about any of that, though, he's kept to himself, and he means to continue doing so. He may have told her who she really is and what almost happened because of it, but how to ask about how any of that is possible at all, he has no idea. For that matter, he isn't sure he would want to know. Her identity, he has no doubt about, but it's still so difficult to reconcile the girl he saw all those years ago as the gate closed, who lived across the road from him, whose family he was taught from an early age to hate, with the woman standing before him now.

He almost killed her. He loves her. It's difficult to reconcile that, too.

"It does at that," he says, by way of agreeing with at least the second part of what she's said. Brave and new might not be quite how he would choose to describe this place, but he can't exactly say she's wrong, either. It's something, strange and uncomfortable and remarkable all at once. "Perhaps this is a start, as far as trying is concerned."

Pretending to be someone that she's not is an easy enough thing. It's less dangerous here than it was when she said as much to him in his office back in Russia. Perhaps it had been an innocent enough fantasy, despite the fact that all that she'd been pretending, had come to believe and then disavowed, is actually the truth. That she is a little lost princess, that her father and mother once ruled Russia. She can picture the floorboards of that house in Yekaterinburg, can smell the rough soap, the breeze in the walled in garden that was never enough. Over the past few nights, ever since Gleb arrived and told her that all she'd wanted to believe and didn't want at once was true, she's thought of the close of the gates. The young man her eyes with the serious expression. How she'd hoarded the images of those outside, made up stories of their lives and what she'd say to them when given the chance.

None of that matches what she actually said to him. But she hadn't known who she was then. He had just been a man in a uniform offering her aid. Another cold wind blows sending a shiver down her spine as it tugs at the fabric of her coat and silvery dress. It was such a pretty thing she hadn't been able to resist it. It's not the most practical garment for the weather.

"I think it is," she says with an assertive nod of her head. There is only one person ahead of them now, perfect timing with midnight being five minutes away. "What are you going to drink?"

If only because the line necessitates that they stand somewhat close beside each other, Gleb can't help but notice the way a chill runs through her, glancing over in mild concern. "Always shivering," he says, a little too quietly wry to really sound like a joke. It's hard to make light of what time they've spent together before, brief as those meetings may have been, if only because of how everything ended back there. It doesn't matter that she doesn't remember it, apparently didn't live it. He does and did, and he can't just disregard that, couldn't even if he hadn't told her about it. Some things are just more than a person should carry on their conscience.

That is not, however, why he instinctively slips off his suit jacket to rest it on her shoulders. The coat she's wearing is a beautiful thing, which he can't help but feel a little strangely about, but regardless, it doesn't exactly seem intended for weather like this. He can spare his if it means she'll be a little warmer.

The person in front of them steps aside, and both in response to her question and to the man behind the counter, he says, "Vodka soda," shrugging a moment later as he turns towards Anya as if to fend off any remark about it. It's predictable, probably, but he isn't going to stand around with a flute of champagne as so many of the people here seem to be doing tonight. It doesn't matter that he's in a different place and time; it wouldn't feel right. Fishing some money out of his pocket, he asks, "Are you getting anything?"

Catching his words, Anya's child tilts upwards so that she can look at his face. The image of the serious man he was — still is — passionately speaking one minute, holding out her broom to her the next flashes through her mind. It had been a cold day then for all the talk of spring and new dawns. Not entirely different from the weather that they are currently experiencing here in Darrow. Her coat was made for a Parisian spring, a far cry from her practical wool coat. Much of what she'd worn in Paris would be deemed impractical, just as what she's wearing now is a bit light. Parties don't ask for practically. They're excuse to slip into finery and into foolishness. It isn't a place one would want to live in permanently. For now, it does just fine. Her reasons for shivering that day had been just as much out of a relived fear than the cold.

She opens her mouth to object as he drapes his suit coat on her shoulders. He's only in a waistcoat and shirt now and the air is still cold. "You'll freeze," she remarks, a wry sort of smile on her face even as she reaches up to pull the jacket closed around her shoulders. "Thank you, though, for the coat."

Waiting as he orders, she shakes her head when he asks. "No. I think that I've had plenty." She's not used to drinking. The champagne has gone a little to her head. "Three is more than enough. You can be a bit caught up by midnight."

"It's fine," Gleb says with a quick shake of his head and a small smile, admittedly a little grateful when she keeps the jacket. It's cold, yes, but he can manage. A drink will almost certainly warm him up some, and besides, after he hadn't particularly thought through not just offering it to her but setting it on her shoulders, it seems like it might be an odd thing to have to put back on. There's enough strangeness between him and Anya as it is without him doing anything foolish to add to it. This could easily have fit that description, but instead, it doesn't seem to.

The downside, of course, is that he likes seeing her in his coat far more than he should, but he can set that aside for now. She'll be warmer; that's all that matters. Anything else is just an unintended side effect of sorts, and ought to be ignored without too much trouble. After all, that's the last thing she needs from him. It doesn't matter that she didn't see the way he all but fell apart after aiming a gun at her and attempting to follow through. He's still shown enough of his hand as it is, or so it seems to him, feelings that he should never have developed in the first place and has no interest or need to burden her with now.

Paying the man at the counter, he takes his drink, stepping aside and waiting for Anya to join him so they don't hold up the line. It's far more than he would ever have imagined he would pay for such a simple drink, but then, it isn't as if he's needed the money this place allotted him for much else since he got here. "I guess I'd better drink this quickly," he says, half-joking in earnest this time. "I don't have very long to try to do that catching up."

Stepping out of the line Anya tosses a small wave and a happy new year to those working the booth. Falling into step with Gleb, she adjusts the coat on her shoulders re-securing it as she walks. The wool smells like he must smell, an earthy combination of scents that surprises her with the strange intimacy of it. Wearing someone else's clothes, freely given, is an affection gesture. This isn't like wearing the washed and mended hand-me-downs from her sisters. This is something else, something more adult in its fondness.

They do have a shared past, overlapping at very different points in their lives. Ten years between the closing of the gates and that day on Nevsky Prospekt. A decade before he saw her in Paris, a time that she doesn't remember, doesn't know how to process that he couldn't follow orders. That he resigned himself to die to let her live. One day she'll ask him why, find out more about that meeting. An odd sort of wonder runs through her as they walk closer to the effigy, meandering through the crowd. They are one hundred years from when they were teenagers in Ekaterinburg. What a strange life they have lived.

His stilted joke makes her smile. Once he told her that he had a sense of humor and while she didn't feel it then, she believes it now. "Yes you should. We can toast the new year later," she says before impulsively reaching out from the folds of his coat to grab his hand, gently tugging him along a little closer towards where the crowd thins. "Come on, let's find a good spot to view it. My former coworkers were telling me that it is quite spectacular at midnight."

"Isn't everything here?" Gleb counters, though his voice doesn't carry the disdain that it might have under any other circumstances. As it is, being here with Anya, her hand suddenly around his as she leads him out of the way of the crowd, it's hard to mind any of this as much as he thought he would. Just days ago, before he blinked and found that the world had changed around him, he thought it would be enough for him to know she was alive and safe somewhere, or at least close to it. He would have held onto that on his way back to Russia, up until the very end that he knows would have been coming, which would have been worth it for that knowledge. This is already so much more than that, and than he was ever supposed to have gotten. She owes him nothing, her friendship included, but she seems to be offering it in spite of all the reasons she'd have had not to do so. He knows better than to take that for granted.

At least it's a little less packed over here, too, though there's no missing the crowd around them cheering in anticipation of midnight, each second drawing them closer to a year that he was never supposed to have lived to see. If he was going to begin it with anyone, though, here or otherwise, he'd have wanted it to be her. It's a strange thing, having the awareness of how much he was prepared to give up for her without ever really needing to do so. While he may never shake the moment when he realized that he couldn't follow his orders and the mess of complicated emotions that comes with that, he'll never question whether or not he made the right decision. Every time he looks at her, he knows he did. What that says about him, he can't entirely figure out, but that, too, is worth bearing.

"Well," he starts once they've found a place for themselves, but he doesn't finish whatever he might have said. He tips his head back instead, taking a long swallow of his drink — for courage, he thinks, though what he'd need courage for, he can't quite determine. Maybe just to be here at all. For warmth, too, though the sight of her in his coat leaves him warm enough. "They're counting down, I think."

The lack of weighty disdain in his voice does not pass her by. Anya suspects that perhaps Gleb has caught some of the holiday spirit. New Year's Eve is significantly less commercialized than Christmas is here and while it's more of a celebration it is less of an affront to Bolshevik sensibilities. Being a good member of the party had never been anything that she had been accused of. Keeping her head down, working to gather money and looking for a means of getting out of Russia had been her singular goal.

She'd succeeded in that. Now Russia is an entire world away. An entire lifetime, gone with a fury of anger.

"Yes it is," she agrees with a faint nod of her head as she comes to a stop. The lights and the cheering warms her in a way that is different from the coat. Perhaps the champagne really has gone entirely to her head, but the giddiness of the crowd is contagious. Another nod as she realizes that the countdown has started.

"Ten....nine...eight..."

She counts down along with them, pulling her gaze away from the effigy to look up at Gleb. Her hand is still clasped in his. As confusing as it may be, all the news that he has so recently shared with her, a history she still needs to unpack, she is glad that she isn't alone. That she is looking at the future with someone who remembers the past.

"Seven..."

The soft smile she offers him in genuine, her head tilted up to meet his eyes.

She hasn't let go of his hand. More than anything else, Gleb is aware of that when they stop, waiting for the moment she'll do so only for it never to come. They're all such simple things, really, his coat over her shoulders, her fingers around his, but they're striking even so, and not just because the very sight of her is still enough to make his chest constrict. That day in his office, when they'd first met properly, one of just a few brief times their paths crossed, she'd been reluctant to take his hand when he offered it to her, and he couldn't have blamed her for that even then. He knows how daunting the uniform and the office and all of that could seem; had she been anyone else, he likely would have made the most of that, delivering a far more brusque warning than he gave her, as he'd started to before he realized who she was. Now, he thinks she probably has less of a reason to want anything to do with him than she had then. Had she decided that she wanted nothing more to do with him after the evening he arrived here, when he told her what happened in Paris, he wouldn't have blamed her for that in the slightest.

Instead, here she is, clasping his hand and smiling up at him as the crowd counts down, making it hard not to wonder about things he told himself he wouldn't so much as consider. It isn't fair to, not after what he's done to her, what he almost did. It just also isn't entirely possible not to. Before, watching her at the ballet in Paris, already trying to convince himself to follow his orders — in retrospect, what probably ought to have been a sign that he wouldn't be able to — he'd tried thinking that there's no place for love in a revolution, certainly not enough to give up the cause over. There is no cause here now, though, that revolution a century behind them, and he knows with an odd sort of surety that he loves her. He's already chosen his side, anyway, by choosing her, putting her life before his own and everything he's fought for.

Maybe he ought to stop pretending that he'll ever be able to shake the way he feels for her.

"Happy new year, Anya," he says quietly, his own smile soft in turn, even as the cheers of the crowd around them grow louder and the countdown reaches zero. In the distance, he thinks he can smell smoke; the effigy must have gone up in flames, but despite what he's heard about the view, he can't bring himself to look away from her. She's impossibly beautiful, and standing this close, there's no shutting off the thoughts that filter through his head about how easy it would be to lower his head and kiss her. In a moment of rare boldness, he just about starts to do so, the slight movement more of a question than anything else and easily enough ignored but the look on his face, still conflicted but not about how he actually feels, likely speaking for itself.

Letting go of his hand had not occurred to her. It's an innocent enough gesture. Holding someone's hand is an excellent way to not lose them in a crowd. Even though they've stopped, there isn't time to think things through beyond that with the countdown having begun. She will let go after midnight once the moment has passed. For now it is nice to simply be reminded that someone is there, someone as equally if not more baffled by this entire city. Someone who knows and remembers both the Russias she left behind.

Watching him, Anya thinks she knows what he is about to do. A kiss at midnight is a tradition, a way to welcome love into the new year. He is likely going to kiss her cheek, another innocent yet awkward gesture. Or maybe he want to kiss her on the mouth, something she is less certain of. It wouldn't be how she imagined her first kiss at all. Despite the thoughts in her head, she finds herself leaning up towards him just a little.

None of this matters. The countdown ends and there is a bright flash of light as the effigy bursts into flames. This is immediately followed by another bright flash, this one of pain running through her. It feels like every bone in her body is breaking all at once. It is worse than any pain she has ever experience or every imagined.

Anya screams.

It doesn't help.

Somewhere in the pain she's released Gleb's hand, reaching to wrap her hands to her body, to make it stop. None of it does any good as her teeth elongate, fur sprouting, her body reforming into that of a wolf. Her dress, her shoes, her coat and his, are all ruined. Something wild grabs a-hold of her, a fierce primitive thing. The wolf that once was Anya lashes out, eager to escape, to howl at the full moon over head.

Any small reason that is left in her head doesn't question the feel of her paws lashing out, claws digging into and scratching into flesh, a fierce snap of teeth as she licks at human flesh. The warmth of something on her paws and fur. A howl escapes her and then just as quickly, she has jumped away, running off into the night and wild crowd.

It seems, for an instant, like maybe it's not just him, like any step he'd have taken, if he wound up taking it, might be returned. That instant passes too quickly, though, and Gleb never gets a chance to find out if he'd even have worked up the will to go through with it. The effigy lights, the crowd cheers with excitement — and Anya, so close in front of him, her hand still in his, starts to scream in apparent pain, though what's wrong, he doesn't know. He inhales sharply, sets his hands on her shoulders, eyes wide and frantic with fear, saying her name without thinking in some sort of bid to get through to her, though she doesn't seem to hear him. That isn't much of a surprise, between the crowd and the sickening sound of snapping bones. She's changing, somehow, but he doesn't know what's happening or why, only that he seems to be powerless to do anything about it and that whatever this is shouldn't be possible.

Any lack of logic, though, isn't enough for him to keep a distance, as if there's still some chance that this could be stopped somehow, that she might come back to herself. The only thing that sends him, finally, staggering back is when the wolf in front of him — because it's an animal now, and not Anya at all, all happening too quickly for him to even try to process — lunges up at him, claws digging through his shirt and into his chest. He's the one who cries out, then, hands lifting to press to the wounds left behind, already red and wet with his own blood.

Oh, he thinks, pain radiating through his chest, his breath shaky. On an instinct, he leans over, wincing as he does, to grab the tattered shreds of Anya's coat, watching the wolf disappear into the crowd as he does. The fabric barely visibly stains as he presses it to the gashes. Already, though, his mind is elsewhere. Anya had been hurt, screaming, and now she's gone. That seems far more important than anything that's happened to him, and means that he has to find her. Logic and injuries be damned, there isn't a chance he'll be alright until he knows that she is, too.

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