H.R.H. (6 page)

“I should have sent you with one of ours,” he teased her. He knew Christianna would never have worn it.

The guests began to arrive then, and it was a serious, extremely circumspect evening. Christianna worked hard at dinner, speaking to the dignitaries on either side of her, one in German, and the other in Spanish. And she was relieved to dance with her father at the end of the evening.

“It's not as exciting as London, I'm afraid,” he said apologetically, and she smiled. It had been a painfully dull evening for her, but she had expected it to be. It came as no surprise, but she attended many events like it to please her father. He knew that, and was touched by the effort she made. She was so diligent about her official duties and obligations, no matter how tiresome they were. She never complained. She knew there was no point, she had to do them anyway, and accepted it with grace.

“I had enough fun in London with Victoria to last me for a while,” she said generously. She was actually exhausted after all the late nights she'd had. She had no idea how Victoria did that as a constant way of life. She was a seasoned partyer in London, and had been doing it for years. Unlike Christianna, she had never gone to college. She always said there was no point, she knew she'd never use anything she learned there. She attended art classes instead, and was actually a fairly decent artist. She especially loved to paint dogs dressed up as people. A shop in Knightsbridge was selling her paintings for a fortune.

The guests at the palace in Vaduz went home long before midnight, and she followed her father slowly up the stairs afterward. They had just reached the door to her apartment when one of the prince's aides came looking for him. He looked as though it was urgent, and Prince Hans Josef turned to him with a frown, waiting to hear what it was.

“Your Highness, we just got a report of a terrorist attack in Russia. It appears to be a very serious hostage situation, similar to the one in Beslan several years ago. It appears to be almost an exact duplicate, in fact. I thought you might like to watch it on CNN. Several of the hostages have already been killed, all children.” The prince hurried into Christianna's living room, and turned on the television set. All three of them sat down to watch in silence. What they saw was horrendous— children who had been shot and were bleeding, others being carried out of the building, dead. Nearly a thousand children had been taken hostage, and over two hundred adults. The terrorists had taken over a school, and wanted political prisoners released in exchange for the children. The army had surrounded the place, and there seemed to be chaos everywhere, with crying parents outside, waiting for news of their children. The prince watched the broadcast unhappily, and Christianna stared in horror. It was a grisly scene. They sat watching for two hours, and then the prince got up to go to bed. His assistant had long since left.

“What a terrible thing,” her father said sympathetically. “All those poor parents waiting for their children. I can't imagine a worse nightmare,” he said, as he hugged her.

“Neither can I,” Christianna said quietly, still wearing the white chiffon gown and silver sandals. She had cried several times as she watched, and her father had been moved to tears as well. “I feel so useless sitting here, all dressed up and unable to help them,” she said, as though she felt guilty, and he hugged her again.

“There's nothing anyone can do, until they get the children out of there. It'll be a bloodbath if the army forces their way in.” The thought of that was even more upsetting, and Christianna dabbed at her eyes again. The terrorists had killed dozens of children. There were already a total of a hundred fatalities by the time they turned off the TV. “This is the worst situation I've seen since Beslan.” They kissed each other goodnight, and Christianna went to undress and put on her nightgown. A little while later, already in bed, she felt compelled to turn on the television again. By then the situation had gotten worse, and more children had been killed. Parents were frantic, the press was everywhere, and soldiers were milling in groups, waiting to be told what to do. It was mesmerizing watching it, and horrifying. It was easy to guess that many more lives would be lost as the night progressed.

In the end, she lay awake all night and watched it, and by morning she had dark circles under her eyes, from the many times she'd cried, and lack of sleep. She finally got up, took a bath and dressed, and found her father having breakfast in his office. She was wearing a heavy sweater and jeans when she walked in. She had made a number of phone calls, before she went to look for him. And when she found him, he looked every bit as distressed as she did. By then the death toll had doubled, almost all of them children. As half the world did, her father had the TV on, and had been watching when she came in. His food was virtually untouched. Who could eat?

“Where are you going at this hour, all dressed?” he asked, looking distracted. Liechtenstein had no official role to play here, but watching the tragedy unfold was leaving everyone feeling frantic and upset. This was no made-for-television movie. This was all too real.

“I want to go there, Papa,” Christianna said quietly, with eyes that bored deep into his.

“We have no official involvement or position on this situation,” he explained to her. “We're a neutral country, we have no reason to work with Russia on solving this, and we don't have an antiterrorist team.”

“I don't mean in an official capacity. I want to go as me,” she said clearly.

“You? How else would you go except in an official capacity, and we don't have any there.”

“I just want to go as one human being helping others. They don't have to know who I am.”

He thought about it for a long moment, pondering the situation. It was a noble thought, but he didn't think it was a good idea. It was too dangerous for her. Who knew what the terrorists would do next, particularly if they found that a young, beautiful princess was afoot? He didn't want her there.

“I understand how you feel, Christianna. I'd like to help them, too. It's an absolutely terrible situation. But officially, we don't belong there, and on a private level, it would be too dangerous for you.” He looked grim as he said it.

“I'm going, Papa,” Christianna said quietly. This time, she didn't ask him, she was telling him. He could not only hear it in her words, but sense it in her voice. “I want to be there to do whatever I can, even if only to hand out blankets, pour coffee, or help dig graves. The Red Cross is there, I can volunteer to work for them.” She meant it. He knew it. He suddenly suspected it would be hard to stop her, but he knew he had to try, as gently as he could.

“I don't want you to go.” It was all he could say. He could easily see how distraught she was. “The area is too dangerous, Cricky.”

“I have to go, Papa. I can't sit here any longer, feeling useless, watching it all on TV. I'll take someone with me if you want.” It was obvious from the look in her eyes and what she was saying to him that she felt she had no other choice.

“And if I say no?” He couldn't tie her up and have her carried to her room. She was a grown woman, but he was adamant that she not go.

“I'm going, Papa,” she said again. “You can't stop me. It's the right thing to do.” It was. But not for her. He would have liked to go too, but he was long past the impetuous compassion of youth, and too old to take the risk.

“It is the right thing, Cricky,” he said gently. “But not for you. It's too dangerous. If they find out who you are, they could take you hostage, too. I don't think terrorists respect neutral countries any more than they do anyone else. Please don't argue with me about this.” She shook her head then, obviously disappointed by his reaction. But he felt obliged to protect her from herself. “You have a responsibility to our people here,” he said sternly. He tried everything he could. “You could be killed, or get hurt. Besides which, you have no technical or medical skills to offer. Sometimes untrained civilians, however well-intentioned, only make situations like that worse. Christianna, I know you mean well, but I don't want you to do this.” His eyes burned into hers.

“How can you say that?” she said angrily, with tears swimming in her eyes. “Look at those people, Papa. Their children are dead and dying. Probably many more will die today as well. I have to go there. There must be something useful I can do. I'm not going to sit here, just watching it on TV. That's not who you taught me to be.” She was pulling at his heart, harder than she knew. She always did.

“I didn't teach you to risk your life foolishly, for God's sake,” he said, angry in his turn. He was not going to allow her to bully him into it, no matter how hard she tried. The answer was still no. The problem was that she was not asking him, she was telling him. In Christianna's mind, there was no other choice.

“You taught me about ‘Honor, Courage, Welfare,’ Papa. You taught me to care for and be responsible for others. You taught me to reach out to those in need, and do all I could to help them. What happened to honor, courage, and welfare,
your
family code? You told me that our lives are dedicated to duty and responsibility for all those who need us, no matter how much courage it takes, to stand for what I believe. Look at those people, Papa. They need us. I'm going to do what I can for them. That's what you taught me ever since I was a little girl. You can't change that now because you don't want me there.”

“It's not the same when there are terrorists involved. They don't play by any rules.” He looked at her miserably, his eyes begging her not to go. And then she reduced him to tears, by turning her face up to his and kissing his cheek. “I love you, Papa. I'll be all right. I promise. I'll call you when I can.” He saw then that two of her bodyguards were standing in the doorway, wearing rough clothes. She had organized them to travel with her, even before she came to see him. She had meant every word she had said. And he knew then that unless he physically restrained her, she was going with or without his permission. For a moment he bowed his head, and then raised it again to look at her.

“Be very careful,” he said gruffly, and then he looked at the guards with daggers in his eyes. He was every inch the reigning prince, and even if Christianna defied him, the two men knew there would be hell to pay if anything happened to her. “Don't let her out of your sight for a minute. Do you understand that? Both of you.”

“Yes, we do, Your Highness,” they said rapidly. It was rare to see him angry, but he looked it now. In fact, he was not angry but worried. More than that, he was terrified for her. He couldn't have tolerated losing this child he loved so much. Thinking that made him realize how the people must have felt losing their children as the terrorists were murdering them one by one, in order to get their friends released from prison. It was an exchange of terrorists for children, a horrifying exchange, and an impossible situation for all involved. And as he thought of it again, he knew she was right. He didn't like it for her, but he admired her courage and her desire to go. She was doing just exactly what he had taught her: to lay down her life if need be in service to others. Indirectly, her wanting to go there was entirely his fault.

After Christianna went back to her bedroom to get her backpack, her father walked her and her two bodyguards to the car.

“Go with God,” he said as he hugged her, with tears in his eyes.

“I love you, Papa,” she said calmly. “Don't worry about me. I'll be fine.”

She got in the car then, with the two men. All three of them were wearing boots and warm jackets. She had called for a reservation on the flight several hours before. She was planning to find the Red Cross, and volunteer once she got there. She had seen on CNN that they were on the scene, doing whatever they could.

The prince stood watching until the car went through the gates. She hung out the window and waved to him with a victorious smile. She blew him a kiss and mouthed the words
I love you
, and then they turned the corner and were gone. He walked back into the palace with his head bowed. He was sick over her going, but he knew there had been absolutely nothing he could do to stop her. She would have gone in any case. All he could do now was pray for her safety and safe return. More than she knew, he admired her with all his heart. She was a remarkable young woman, and as he walked into his office, he felt a thousand years old.

Chapter 4

C
hristianna and her two bodyguards drove to Zurich and flew from there to Vienna, where they boarded a flight to Tbilisi in Georgia, which was a five-and-a-half-hour flight.

They landed in Tbilisi at seven o'clock that night, and half an hour later, they took an ancient, wornlooking small plane to Vladikavkaz in the southern Russian territory of North Ossetia. The plane was crowded, the interior looked threadbare and poorly maintained, and the turbo-prop plane shuddered noticeably on takeoff. It had been a long day on the first plane, and all three of them looked tired when they got off the final flight just before nine o'clock that night.

The bodyguards she had brought with her were her two youngest ones. Both had been trained in the Swiss Army, and one of them had served before that as an Israeli commando. She had chosen the right men to accompany her.

She had no idea what she would find when she reached Digora, where they were going, some thirty miles from Vladikavkaz, where they had landed. Christianna had made no definite arrangements beyond the flight. She was going to look for the Red Cross as soon as they arrived at the scene of the hostage situation in Digora, and offer them whatever assistance they needed. She assumed they would be allowed at the scene, and hoped she was right. She was not afraid of what would happen, and had made no efforts to secure a place to stay or a hotel room. She wanted to work at the scene, around the clock, if necessary. She was prepared for long hours on her feet, and no sleep, while she helped either the frantic parents or the wounded children. She had taken first-aid training in school, but other than that she had no specific skills, other than youth, a good heart, and a willing pair of hands. And in spite of her father's frantic warnings, she wasn't worried about whatever potential dangers she might encounter. She had been willing to take the risk, and she was sure that for those outside the school the terrorists had taken over, the risk was slight. In either case, she wanted to be there. And she knew her bodyguards would protect her, so she felt safe.

Her first run-in with an unexpected stumbling block happened as she came through immigration at the airport. One of her bodyguards handed the customs officer all three of their passports. Her agreement with them had been that under no circumstances were they to reveal her royal identity once they got to Russia. She hadn't anticipated it being a problem before that, and was startled when the customs official stared at her passport at length, and then at her. The photograph was a good likeness, so it was obviously not that.

“It's you?” he asked, looking slightly belligerent. He was speaking to her in German, as he had heard her speak to one of her bodyguards in German and the other in French. She nodded assent, forgetting the difference between their passports and hers. “Name?” And then she knew what it was.

“Christianna,” she said quietly. There was only a single name on her passport, her first name, as was the case with all royals. Queen Elizabeth of England, Princess Michael of Kent, who was Marie Christine. All passports issued to royals in every country showed only their first name, but not their title or surname. The Russian customs official looked angry and confused.

“No name?” She hesitated and then handed him a brief letter issued by the government of Liechtenstein explaining the circumstances of her passport, and her full identity as a Serene Highness of the principality. She had needed the letter while she was studying in California and had had similar problems going through

U.S. Immigration. The official letter was written in English, German, and French, and she kept it in her travel pouch with her passport. She only presented it if asked. He read it carefully, glanced up at her twice, then at the bodyguards, and back at her. “Where are you going, Miss Princess?” She tried not to smile. He was obviously not familiar with titles, having grown up in a Communist state, but looked moderately impressed. She told him their destination, and he nodded again, stamped their passports, and waved them through. Hers was a neutral country, like Switzerland, which often opened doors for her that another passport would not have been able to do. And her title usually helped. He questioned them no further, and they went to a car rental office and stood on line for half an hour with everyone else.

All three of them were starving by then, and Christianna handed the two men a small package of biscuits, and two bottles of water she had carried with her in her backpack, and opened a third for herself. It seemed like an eternity to get their turn. And when they finally did, all that was available was a ten-year-old Yugo, at an astronomic rate. Christianna agreed to take it, since there was nothing else, and handed her credit card across the counter, which once again had no last name. The woman asked if she had cash. Christianna had brought some with her, but didn't want to give it up so early in the trip, and the woman finally agreed to accept the credit card, after offering them a better deal if they paid cash, which Christianna declined.

She signed the agreements, took the car keys, and asked for a map. Ten minutes later she and the two bodyguards, Samuel and Max, went out to the parking lot to find the car. It was tiny and looked battered. The two men barely fit into the car, as Christianna slipped easily into the backseat with her backpack, grateful that she was small. Samuel started the car, as Max opened the map. From what the woman at the car rental had said, they had a thirty-mile drive ahead, and would probably arrive at eleven o'clock that night. Samuel was driving, and once in the parking lot, they had taken their weapons out of the bag they'd checked, and put them on. Max loaded them for both of them, as they drove out of the parking lot, and Christianna watched. She had no qualms about guns, and had been around them all her life. Her bodyguards were useless to her without them. She had even been taught to fire weapons herself, and was an unusually good shot, better than her brother, who found weapons offensive, although he liked the social aspects of duck and grouse hunting and went often.

They were starving by the time they left the airport, and stopped for dinner halfway through the trip in a small restaurant by the roadside. Samuel spoke a few words of Russian, but mostly they pointed at what others were eating, and sat down to a simple, rugged meal. The other diners were mostly truck drivers, traveling at night, and the pretty young blonde and two powerful healthy-looking men were instantly noticeable among them. They would have been even more so if any of them had even imagined that she was a princess. But all she looked like was a pretty young girl, in jeans, the heavy workboots she'd had in Berkeley, a thick sweater, and a parka. She had her blond hair pulled back. The men were similarly dressed and had a military look about them. Others would have guessed easily that they were security of some kind, but no one questioned them here. After eating, they paid and drove on. They noticed a number of Daewoo minivans on the road that were used as shared taxis and were called “Marshrutkas,” Christianna learned later. They were a favorite form of transportation.

Unable to read the signs and confused by the map, they took several wrong turns and arrived at their destination at nearly midnight. They were quickly stopped by a roadblock manned by Russian soldiers in riot gear. They were wearing helmets, face masks, and carrying machine guns, as they questioned why Christianna and her guards were there. Christianna spoke up from the backseat and said in German that they were looking for the Red Cross representatives in order to work with them. The sentry hesitated, told them in halting German to wait, and consulted his superiors, who were conferring at a short distance. One of them talked to him, and then approached the car himself.

“You're Red Cross workers?” he asked, frowning at them, and looking at them intently with suspicion. He wasn't sure what they were, but they didn't look like terrorists to him. He had a sixth sense for that, which told him that the threesome in the Yugo were there for the reason they said.

“We're volunteers,” Christianna said distinctly, and he hesitated, continuing to look them over. Nothing he saw set off red flags for him.

“From where?” The last thing he wanted was tourists wandering into the mess they already had on their hands. Like the first man they had talked to, he looked tired. It was the second day of the siege, and a dozen more children had been killed that afternoon, and dumped in the schoolyard, which had demoralized everyone. Two others trying to escape had been shot. The entire situation was a copycat event of the similarly awful hostage crisis that had happened several years before in Beslan, in the same region of North Ossetia. This was nearly an exact duplicate, on a slightly smaller scale. But the death toll was rising daily, and it wasn't over yet.

“We're from Liechtenstein,” she said clearly. “I am. The two men are Swiss. We're all neutrals,” she reminded him, and he nodded again. She had no idea if it would make any difference or not, but she thought it couldn't hurt to remind him.

“Passports?” The guard in the driver's seat handed them to him, and he had the same reaction as the customs official to Christianna's. “Yours has no surname,” he told her, sounding annoyed, as though it were a mistake she had made in the passport office when she got it. But this time she didn't want to hand him the letter, she didn't want people in the area knowing that she was there, or making a fuss about it.

“I know. My country does that sometimes. For women,” she added, but he remained unconvinced, and began to look suspicious. He had to be, given what was going on. Reluctantly, she handed him the letter. He perused it carefully, stared at her, then at the two men, back at her, and then looked at her in astonished admiration. “A royal princess?” He seemed utterly amazed. “Here? To work with the Red Cross?”

“I hope we will. That's what we came to do,” she explained. The officer then shook hands with her driver, told them where to find the Red Cross enclave, handed them a pass, and waved them through. It was a most unusual occurrence, to give them access to a hostage scene, and Christianna had the feeling that if she hadn't been a princess, they wouldn't have let them in. The officer respected her, and the two men who had accompanied her to Russia. He even gave them the name of the person in charge. And before they drove on, Christianna asked him quietly not to explain to anyone who she was. She said it would mean a great deal to her if he didn't. He nodded, still looking impressed as they drove off. She hoped he'd be discreet. Having people know who she was would spoil everything for her, or certainly make it difficult. Anonymity in these circumstances was far easier for her. And if the press caught wind of her presence, they would pursue her everywhere, and she might even have to leave. That was the last thing she wanted. She wanted to be useful, not cause a journalistic feeding frenzy, fed by her.

As they approached the school, there were police cordons, military barricades, riot police, commando squads, and soldiers with machine guns everywhere. But having made it through the initial barricade, they were no longer checked as closely. Their passports, when asked for, were only glanced at and no longer thoroughly inspected. They looked at the makeshift passes, and nodded. Most of the civilians they saw were crying, either parents or relatives of children or teachers still inside. It was so exactly reminiscent of the earlier hostage situation in Beslan that it was hard to believe an almost identical event had occurred, in the same state. And finally, after searching thoroughly, and drifting past a fleet of ambulances, they found four large Red Cross trucks, with an army of workers around them, wearing the familiar red and white armbands to identify them in the crowd. Several of them were holding children. They were serving coffee, tending to frantic-looking parents, and standing quietly in the crowd.

As soon as she saw them, Christianna got out of the car, and Samuel, the bodyguard with the commando training, followed her closely, while Max went to park the car in a field that had been designated for families and press. The car had been tight for them to ride in, but at least it had gotten them there. Christianna asked for the name that the officer at the barricade had given them, and was directed to a cluster of chairs standing near one of the trucks. There was a woman with white hair sitting there, speaking to a group of women in Russian. She was reassuring them as best one could. There was very little one could see of what was happening inside, only the constant shifting and moving of soldiers, standing ready and alert. And all of the Russian women were crying. Christianna didn't want to interrupt and stood off to one side, waiting until the older woman finished talking to them. She knew it might be hours before the woman was free to check them out. Christianna stood patiently by until the woman in charge of the Red Cross team noticed her, glanced up, and met her eyes with a questioning look.

“Are you waiting for me?” the woman asked in Russian, sounding surprised.

“I am,” Christianna answered in German, hoping they would find a common language. Usually, in cases like that, it was English or French, and she was fluent in both. “I can wait.” She wasn't going anywhere and didn't want to interrupt. The senior Red Cross member excused herself, patted one woman's arm consolingly, and stepped aside to where Christianna stood.

“Yes?” It was obvious that Christianna was neither a local nor a parent. She looked too clean, not disheveled enough, her clothes were still neat, and she didn't have the worn-out look that everyone else had all around them. The strain of watching the scene unfold had taken a toll on them all. Even the soldiers had cried as they brought back the bodies of the children who had been shot.

“I would like to volunteer,” Christianna said quietly, looking calm, quiet, self-possessed, and competent in the way she addressed the older woman, who had no idea who she was.

“Do you have Red Cross identification?” the woman asked. They had settled on French. The woman in charge looked like she had been through the wars, and she had. She had helped to wrap the bodies of dead children, held sobbing parents in her arms for two days, tended wounds until the paramedics could get to them. She had done everything possible since arriving there within two hours of the attack, even served coffee to exhausted, crying soldiers.